Sean Williams

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• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  That's a good thought about comics. It's taken me several years to compile this list just from novels and short stories, the medium I know best. When I make the leap to expand the list, I'll know where to come....
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  Mitchell was an amazingly inventive writer who never sought fame, hence his near-complete erasure from history until Sam Moskowitz tracked him down in the 60s. The collection The Crystal Man contains a great introduction detailing his life and his many...
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  Thanks, all, for the suggested names. I hope one of them catches on - either in fiction or in real life!...
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  I like your classification system. In my PhD I left the matter somewhat vague because I was concerned with exploring the ramifications of the technology more or less regardless of how the mechanism actually worked - provided there was a...
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  There are a few stories out there that treat the matter transmitter as more than just a means of moving people around. (Some of the links I've provided link to my thesis which name a few.) You'll find a list...
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  Ditto in Australia. I wanted to jaunt so hard when I was a kid I'm lucky I didn't pop a vein....
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  The devices in the Cuckoo Sage appear under "Doomship" in the list as "tachyon transporters"....
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  This is likely true, which gives SF writers a lot of scope. Can you think of an example from the genre where a fictional brand name has leaked into popular culture? I can't, but then it's early here and my...
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  Langford's The Space Eater was a joyous discovery while I was doing my research. I'm glad someone remembers it. Truly, a horrific means of getting from A to B....
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  It's after midnight here in Adelaide, South Australia (just a short teleport away), so I'm hitting the sack. I look forward to checking in on the conversation tomorrow. Thanks, all....
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  I think you're probably right, in terms of getting a better word than "teleport", but if it hasn't caught on after 70+ years, will it ever? Maybe it just needs the right book....
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  To my knowledge that story has not been written. Go for it, and I will cite it!...
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  "Abattoir Gate" - eww Amazing what people can get used to. Many of us seem quite happy at the moment whizzing around with tanks of flammable liquid just inches away from our children. :-)...
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  Perhaps "presimilarisation" or "transimilarisation"?...
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  Ouch. There are some stories where different parts of organic material are reproduced differently or not at all. Gernsback wrote a yarn in 1909 featuring the way onions lose their flavour when they're transmitted. Professor Challenger lost his beard in...
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  Hey, I like Q-jump. If we ever perfect the technology, we might have a branding trend where everything is "Q-ed, like everything is i-ed today (iPhone etc) and e-ed recently....
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  I agree! It doesn't make sense at all. This is something that always bothered me, hence my ongoing picking at the idea until it bleeds....
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  Quite right, but Lan Wright got there first in 1951. I've tried to list these in first appearance (probably should've said that)....
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  Dirk - I personally love "apport" but (iirc) Fort when he coined the word was giving an unexplained phenomenon a name rather than describing a technology. He also wasn't writing fiction. I hope not, anyway. His writings are far too...
• Commented on Nom de Teleport
  I agree, Hugh: "Beam me up" is pretty much understood everywhere. When people dream of imaginary technologies, it's hard to guess in advance are the ones that will be difficult to achieve. Certainly, in the days before quantum physics etc,...
• Posted Nom de Teleport to Charlie's Diary
  This is not a post about Breaking Bad's brilliant Star Trek pie-eating contest scene, although the title would work. Rather, it's about a pet theory of mine, which is that one of the reasons the matter transmitter is overlooked as...