28.6.2009 by Traveler.

A short but important historic note: 95 years ago today, Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie were asassinated in Sarajevo…

What more is there to be said? Possibly the farthest reaching and most tragic murder of the 20th century. Some of the issues that came out of this event are still not resolved today…

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28.6.2009 by Traveler.

Ah, another fine edition of the esteemed Gatehouse Gazette. This issue’s topic is one which is very dear to me: Metropolis 

Metropolis, a masterpiece by Fritz Lang and the embodyment of every claustrophobic’s nightmare.By now, Metropolis the movie has cult status and rightly so.

The term Metropolis has become both a word used by the proponents of progress to talk about the world wide city, as well as a near-curse for people who seek respite from the constant buzz of citylife.    In the words of our editor-in-chief, Mr. Ottens, this issue’s content is: 

In response to the discovery of lost Metropolis footage, issue #7 is dedicated to this 1927 classic of silent film and the metropolis in general.Of course there is a review of the original Metropolis, by Mr Marcius Rauchfuß, as well as an article about the 2001 anime of the same name, by Mr Sigurjón Njálsson. For the latest about what is going on in that other fine city, the Old Smoke called Londontown, we introduce Brigadier Sir Arthur Weirdy-Beardy of The Steampunk Club, while Mr David Townsend is off to farther realms once again, traveling by the Indian Pacific from Perth to Sydney, Australia.We are also extremely glad to present an exclusive preview of Mr Toby Frost’s upcoming Space Captain Smith novel, Wrath of the Lemming Men!And it almost goes without saying that this issue features all the columns and features that you might have come to expect from us: Ms Hilde Heyvaert writes her “Steampunk Wardrobe” about ethnic steampunk; Mr Craig B. Daniel dedicates his “Liquor Cabinet” to a story about beer, and Mr Guy Dampier is back with a Quatermass review. More reviews come from Hilde (Unhallowed Necropolis), Mr Trubetskoy (The Court of the Air and Outcry) and Toby Frost (Gormenghast).   

So, without further ado, take off your gloves, get the grease out of your face (or take off your jacket and unbutton the collar of your shirt), click the image below and enjoy!

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27.6.2009 by Traveler.

So, after many years of Microsoft OS grief and some rather appaling experiences concerning Vista I have finally decided to switch. The money returning from Iceland was a big help. So, after almost 10 years I am finally once again working with a Mac! This time, it is my very own and not a company owned.Since I am a modest guy I went for the simple white model, which is performing most amiably. I measured the time it takes from pressing the button o being fully operational: 34 seconds!

 My less than a year old Vista notebook with the same RAM and processor speed sometimes needs about seven minutes! This was the right investment at just the right time and I guess I shall stick to MacBokks for the next few years to come. 

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25.6.2009 by Traveler.

You could also say that finally the gears and cogs (all not particularily well oiled) of the world wide financial sytem got going.
In this case: Germany and Iceland at last found some kind of deal, which meant that

finally startded transfering money back from its frozen accounts to the German customers. This morning I saw that the money I had invested had returned.

So, what to do with it now:

1.  Most of it will be reinvested, I have thought about putting some into the Tagesgeld Konto offered by the Berliner Sparkasse, but this is just a thought.
2. I think I will get myself a nice, new shiny MacBook

And one final thing to keep it norse and steampunk:

Here’s a most marvelous image done by Adam Bray. Please visit his website.

Steampunk Thor

(click for larger image)

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24.6.2009 by Traveler.

A dear friend of mine has pointed some remarkable historic factlet out to me:

In the 1920’s there were several attempts to reach the North Pole by Zeppelin! Sounds almost like the expedition done by LZ-X1 Württemberg (see the link menue to your left). Unfortunately, these real-life expeditions were not remotely as successful nor was their equipment as advanced as the one of my very own fictional Zeppelin.

In real life, they all failed. Read the whole story (in German) by clicking on the image below:

Also:
Let us remember Roald Amudsen, the famed explorer, who gave his life rescuing the members of one such an ill-fated expedition by airship.

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23.6.2009 by Traveler.

… the future as envisioned sometime in the 1930s that is…

A nice and in retrospect really quaint excerpt of a showreel. Propably 1935 give or take five years.

How people would dress in the year 2000 (looks rather 1930’s Buck Rogers style to me…)
Please sit back and enjoy:

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22.6.2009 by Traveler.

I just noticed that it’s been a while since I last posted some Zeppelin images from the ætherweb.

So here again are some images of my favourite steampunk way of travelling:

Actually, I should use this one in my Steampunk Expedition Project some time. It fits well into the storyline.
And another:

This is from 1936, the Graf Zeppelin, so it is quite Dieselpunk, actually:

And this completely different artist’s rendition of a Steampunk airship:

Hmmm… Actually reminds me of a flying centipede… What a perfectly weird idea… I just hope no mad scientist reads this blog.

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20.6.2009 by Traveler.

OK, so this is my second article in this blog for today and I stick to the space theme:

Virgin Galactic and the State of New Mexico are building the first commercial spaceport for space tourism!

Yes!

Finally! The 21st Century is here! We still do not have jet packs (which are a stupid idea of sorts anyway and rather impractical) but there is a space tourism industry that is finally picking up momentum! Private funding for things in space. Another source of financial back-up for adventuring along the final frontier. So if NASA doesn’t get the funding… Private companies jump in… OK… I’m dreaming again.

Read the report on CNN.

I will propably never have the money, but what an adventure for a traveler that would be!

Well, maybe one day it will no longer cost 200.000$… I can still dream.

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20.6.2009 by Traveler.

In my early to mid-teens I was interested, fascinated and a firm believer in UFOs, the Bermuda Triangle and related stuff. Scientific education, more in-depth knowledge of the workings of the universe and related matters dispelled my believe (and failed predictions of aliens revealing themselves to us). I still continue to follow news and events concerning these matters on an irregular basis. A fairly random search concerning UFOs led me to Worth1000.com, where I found these marvelous steampunky images:

Encounter with a Steampunk UFO

Steampunk things abducting ships in the Bermuda Triangle

All rights belong to the respective artists, this is basically free advertisement.
Now I shall see if I can find a steampunk Sasquatch somewhere on the ætherweb.

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16.6.2009 by Traveler.

Just one thing that came into my mind regarding the whole steampunk/dieselpunk/cyberpunk thing:

Some timeframes concerning the historical backgrounds of the corresponding punk settings:

Approximately 1870s - 1920s:

The Steampunk Aera

After all, it was the high time of Victorian and Edwardian Times, it was the lifetime of Verne and Wells and this is where we Steampunks draw our ideas and aesthetics from.

Approximately 1910s - 1950s:

The Dieselpunk Aera

(also: The Pulp Aera), yes there is an overlap.
The start of the pulp fiction area, the Golden Age of Science Fiction and also the time of both World Wars. Diesel and petrol replaced steam and technology moved on (what a blunt, unsophisticated summary).

Approximately late 1970s - ongoing:

The Cyberpunk Aera

with many things described in Neuromancer already existing in reality (the internet) or emerging.
I am not going into detail, we live in this area now, so why should I bother describe it? Just look around you!

Also: The original Punk movement also started in the 1970s.

So, we have a Punk-Gap of some 20 years, where there is no specific technology-related subculture.
My personal unverified ad-hoc theorie is the following:

The gap-space is the time of the space race. There was no need for a specific technology relatedsubculture in this time, because weird, arcane, cutting-edge technology was all the rage and everybody was really interested in the New Frontier of Outer Space.

Interestingly, cyber-culture has not penetrated all levels of society yet, as the space race focused the interest of every strata in society of the participating nations and power blocks. Well, within a generation at the latest, cyberculture will be everyday culture and Cyberpunk will be Mainstream Punk, what a weird thought in deed.

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