{"id":26307,"date":"2010-07-28T08:11:01","date_gmt":"2010-07-28T08:11:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/comic-con-3-w00tstock-bad-astronomy\/"},"modified":"2010-07-28T08:11:01","modified_gmt":"2010-07-28T08:11:01","slug":"comic-con-3-w00tstock-bad-astronomy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/astronomy\/comic-con-3-w00tstock-bad-astronomy.php","title":{"rendered":"Comic Con 3: W00tstock! | Bad Astronomy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As I write this, last night I was at W00tstock, an incredible evening of geekery that was one of the most fun and wonderful things with which I have ever participated.<\/p><p><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/badastronomy\/4820974313\/sizes\/l\/in\/set-72157624565396150\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-o-matic\/cache\/ceb23_4820974313_e7547462ee_m.jpg\" style=\"padding-left:10px; padding-right: 10px;\"><\/a>Run by Adam Savage&trade;, Wil Wheaton, and singer\/songwriters Paul and Storm, it features lots of geeks singing and talking about the stuff they love. A friend of mine called it a talent show for nerds. That&rsquo;s about right.<\/p><p>I was invited by the gents above to give a ten minute presentation while I&rsquo;m at Comic Con, and I didn&rsquo;t hesitate to accept! I mean, c&rsquo;mon. Adam? Wil? <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nerdist.com\/\">Chris Hardwick<\/a>? Veronica Belmont, the <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.rifftrax.com\/\">Rifftrax<\/a> guys, <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.mariancall.com\">Marian Call<\/a>? How could I turn that down? <\/p><p>When they asked me I didn&rsquo;t hesitate to say yes, but then one minute later realized this meant I had to come up with a talk, and not just <em>any<\/em> talk: it had to be funny, geeky, and only 10 minutes long. Yikes!<br><span><\/span><br><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/badastronomy\/4820975325\/in\/set-72157624565396150\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-o-matic\/cache\/ceb23_4820975325_9b0578b820_m.jpg\" style=\"padding-left:10px; padding-right: 10px;\"><\/a>I knew it had to be astronomy-related, and after a few more minutes of pondering and back-and-forthing with Mrs. BA, the topic seemed obvious: astronomical pareidolia, objects in the sky that look like other things. The obvious choices are things like the Eskimo Nebula, and all the heart-shaped craters and nebulae I post every Valentine&rsquo;s Day. <\/p><p>But it had to be funny. And not just funny, but <em>nerd<\/em> funny. That became obvious too, once I realized what I could do. Without going into too much detail, let me just say that I borrowed a couple of pictures from my friend Amanda Bauer&rsquo;s <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/amandabauer.blogspot.com\/2010\/03\/dirty-space-news.html\">Astropixie website<\/a>. I&rsquo;d seen most of her imagery before, so I felt safe enough using them, and gave her full credit, of course. I ran with the premise, and perhaps went a little \"bluer\" than most people would expect from an upstanding citizen like me. But it was a <em>lot<\/em> of fun to do. I haven&rsquo;t seen any video of my talk on YouTube yet, but if anyone finds any, please let me know!<\/p><p>I also showed the new trailer to my TV show, <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/blogs.discovermagazine.com\/badastronomy\/2010\/07\/23\/my-sooper-sekrit-project-revealed\/\">\"Phil Plait&rsquo;s Bad Universe\"<\/a>, which got a very healthy and warm reception. In fact, I was overwhelmed with the response; a whole lot of folks came up to me and told me how happy they were and how they couldn&rsquo;t wait to see the show! That makes me very happy and adds thermal energy to the cockles of my cardiac muscle. I realized later that I was nervous after my presentation; a common event for performers. But I was surprised to realize that I was more nervous about showing the trailer than I was about the talk itself! Interesting. I&rsquo;m sure a psych student could write a thesis about me. If you do, be prepared for the inevitable B- you&rsquo;ll get.<\/p><p>Anyway, the acts were incredible. I haven&rsquo;t laughed so hard for so long in ages. But for me, the real magic was <em>behind<\/em> the stage. Paul said it was like a parallel world running along at the same time; I got to hang with so many cool kids! <\/p><p><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/badastronomy\/4821568778\/in\/set-72157624565396150\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-o-matic\/cache\/e84f1_4821568778_a4e3dba557.jpg\" style=\"padding-left:10px; padding-right: 10px;\"><\/a><\/p><p>That picture is fairly typical of the behind the w00tstock scene: Adam Savage telling (a probably dirty) story to Nerdist podcaster Chris Hardwick, fellow Mythbuster Grant Imahara, and magician Jamy Ian Swiss. <\/p><p>Here&rsquo;s online goddess <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.veronicabelmont.com\/\">Veronica Belmont<\/a> and my friend, the siren <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.mariancall.com\">Marian Call<\/a>:<\/p><p><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/badastronomy\/4820929689\/in\/set-72157624565396150\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-o-matic\/cache\/e84f1_4820929689_c1272152dd.jpg\" style=\"padding-left:10px; padding-right: 10px;\"><\/a><\/p><p>You can see more of my pictures from the event and Comic Con at large <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/badastronomy\/sets\/72157624565396150\/with\/4820975325\/\">on my Flickr page<\/a>.<\/p><p>Aaron Douglas (Chief from BSG) was there, Jamie Hyneman made a cameo, and so many others. I can&rsquo;t tell you in words how awesome and amazing the evening was. Smart people! A <em>thousand<\/em> of them! Laughing, sharing their joy, being unabashed geeks reveling in their nerdery! It was warm, it was welcoming, and wonderful. <\/p><p>In other words, it was w00tstock. <\/p><p>Thank you thank you thank you to Wil, Adam, Paul, Storm, and everyone else who was there and made this dorky astronomer <del>feel like<\/del> <em>know that<\/em> he belongs. And if you ever, ever have a chance to attend one, do not hesitate. If you&rsquo;re a geek &mdash; and you are, it&rsquo;s time to admit it &mdash; then this will be one of the best evenings you&rsquo;ll have.<\/p><p><\/p><p><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~a\/T1zWdxMTYfGcVbqdbYU4MrUQpZE\/0\/da\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-o-matic\/cache\/e84f1_di\" border=\"0\" style=\"padding-left:10px; padding-right: 10px;\"><\/a><br><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~a\/T1zWdxMTYfGcVbqdbYU4MrUQpZE\/1\/da\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-o-matic\/cache\/e84f1_di\" border=\"0\" style=\"padding-left:10px; padding-right: 10px;\"><\/a><\/p><p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-o-matic\/cache\/e84f1_4OtwoAyuxzM\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\" style=\"padding-left:10px; padding-right: 10px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-o-matic\/cache\/e84f1_LXtZBirkJDE\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\" style=\"padding-left:10px; padding-right: 10px;\"><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As I write this, last night I was at W00tstock, an incredible evening of geekery that was one of the most fun and wonderful things with which I have ever participated.Run by Adam Savage&trade;, Wil Wheaton, and singer\/songwriters Paul and &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/astronomy\/comic-con-3-w00tstock-bad-astronomy.php\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"limit_modified_date":"","last_modified_date":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-astronomy"],"modified_by":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26307"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26307"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26307\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.euvolution.com\/futurist-transhuman-news-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}