I’ve started a new side project — a YouTube channel called “Crimes Against Art.” It started as (a) a way to organize some of the research material I’ve found over the years, and (b) a way to learn how YouTube works. I’ve been reading and posting about art-related crime for…
Building 30th Street Station
NOTE: This post originally appeared on Novel Travelist on 26 Oct 2013. Sadly, Novel Travelist is going away. I’m reposting here so the information will live on after that site disappears. In my international thriller Doha 12, assassins follow Our Heroes Jake Eldar and Miriam Schaffer to Philadelphia’s 30th Street…
Building the Future
NOTE: This post originally appeared on Novel Travelist on 27 Jan 2014. Sadly, Novel Travelist is going away. I’m reposting here so the information will live on after that site disappears. With Google, Flickr, YouTube and all the rest, you can get a pretty good idea of what other places…
More Reasons to be Paranoid: Mobile Cell-Phone Intercepts
One of our favorite autocracies (Russia) brings us a new tech product that bypasses pesky FISA courts and warrants: AIBIS, a device that mimics a GSM cell tower and can intercept up to eight simultaneous connections within a 500m range. It can soak up voice, SMS, mobile internet and call-setup…
How Do You Find New Books?
I just finished writing a business plan for Wombat Group Media – all thirty pages of it. It’s essentially an outline for how I’d go about self-publishing Doha 12 and perhaps other books I write. I haven’t finally decided yet whether to make that leap, but that I spent several…
They’re Watching (Part 2b)
Last time, I reviewed some (but certainly not all) of the surveillance tools available today to law enforcement and intelligence agencies. This time, I’ll talk about a few of the new wrinkles that have appeared in the 2032 of South. These aren’t sci-fi whizbangs; they already exist, just aren’t deployed…
They’re Watching (Part 2a)
In Part 1, I reviewed the legal state-of-play enabling the surveillance state in South’s 2032 (disturbingly similar to today’s conditions). In this installment and the next, I’ll talk about some of the tools law-enforcement and intelligence agencies have available to monitor people’s activity and communications. Part 3 will talk about…
They’re Watching (Part 1)
Most of the point-of-view characters in South are either under surveillance or doing the surveillance. How does surveillance in 2032 differ from what we have now in 2012? The sad and scary answer: not much. Most of the legal and technological plumbing is already in place and already being used….
Money Money Money
I needed a topic this time around that wouldn’t turn into a major research paper. I’m on a roll in Act 3 of South and would like to get on with it. How will people pay for things in 2032? The foundations of retail transactions in 2032 are with us…
Future Beauty
Okay, back to the “what do people in 2032 look like?” thread. Part 1 talked about how economics may have an impact on our shapes; today I’ll look at fashion. In this case, “fashion” doesn’t mean clothes (that’s another post down the line); it means what people do to their…