An unexpected H2G2-tribute by the NASA

It was probably one of the best tribute to Hitchhiker for its 30th anniversary. While the LCROSS spacecraft crashed towards the moon on 9 October, its twitter feed quoted the words of the spermwhale that fell towards its death on the planet of Magrathea:

“And what's this thing coming toward me very fast? So big and flat and round,
4:34 AM Oct 9th from web

it needs a big wide sounding name like 'Ow', 'Ownge', 'Round', 'Ground'!”
4:34 AM Oct 9th from web

“That's it! Ground! Ha! I wonder if it'll be friends with me?”
4:34 AM Oct 9th from web

How cool is that? Thanks NASA! (and thanks to Jan for the info)

Here is LCROSS's twitter page
And here is LCROSS's website

"Last chance to see" event sold out!

Stephen Fry and Mark Carwardine have made this fabulous sequel to the Douglas Adams's book "Last chance to see". The book and DVD of the TV series are now avalaible in all the good shops.

Save the Rhino has organised a special event with Mark Carwardine and Stephen Fry and it will take place on Tuesday 27 October 2009 at 19:30 at the Royal Geographical Society, London. 

Congrats to those who bought the tickes because now the event is sold out! 

Join Rod Lord's mailing list

Rod Lord is the genius who did the wonderful graphics for the Hitchhiker BBC TV series. Those who were at the Hitchcon had the opportunity to talk to him and buy some prints. There was even an auction for an original piece of artwork (that i sadly lost).

On Rod Lord's website, you can get a lot of details on Rod's work on Hitchhiker, watch a video interview, order some prints and also add your details to a new mailing list to be kept informed of when items of original artwork are to be posted on eBay or new items or features added to the site.

http://www.rodlord.com/pages/hhgg.htm

Webchat with Eoin Colfer : the video online

The 9th october, a few days before the Hitchcon, Eoin Colfer answered to some questions asked by the fans (the first one is mine!). Here is the video of the webchat :

"And Another Thing" on Radio 4

Since monday 12th october, Stephen Mangan reads extracts from "And another Thing" in ten episodes on Radio 4 everyday at 22h45. You can listen to the episodes on the BBC iplayer during 7 days after broadcast.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00n4yrp

And remember that you can also listen to Eoin Colfin's interview on Front Row

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00mzyxp/Front_Row_08_10_2009/

The Hitchcon 09 & ZZ9 celebration party videos and pictures are here!

 

You can watch the pictures of this incredible event here : http://picasaweb.google.com/Grand.Ordre.de.la.Serviette/Hitchcon09#

The video of Hitchcon 09 is here :  http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xaslyj_hitchcon-09

And you can watch the video of ZZ9's party at Captain's Cabin on the saturday night :
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xas53p_the-hitchhikers-guide-to-the-galaxy_creation

 And now the pics of ZZ9's tour in Inslington and visit to Douglas Adams's grave.
http://picasaweb.google.com/Grand.Ordre.de.la.Serviette/ZZ9SuperSaturday#

Mostly Harmless issue 114 sent to ZZ9 members

"Mostly Harmless" is ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha's quarterly magazine (ZZ9 is the offical DNA and H2G2 fan club). Issue 114 has just been sent to ZZ9 members. If you're not a ZZ9 member, you can join here.

The current edition includes some interesting stuff :

- The first part of a long interview with Eoin Colfer who answers with a lot of details to John Coxon's questions. In this first part, Eoin talks about the characters ("I think I went for Restaurant and took that kind of stage development... so when I started the book, that's whre they are and they're very recognisable as characters from the original series, especially the first two books"), Douglas' unique style of writing, one-liners, humour, deadlines, sequels, Hitchhiker as a cult (It's like a mainstream religion rather than a cult. I think there are a few people who might have gotten away with this without the faithful worrying about it, and I'm not one of them").

- David Haddock and friends try to remember what they were doing 30 years ago when the book was published

- "And another book about the science of Douglas Adams..." by Alexander Pawalk who is busily writing a book called "Die Wissenchaft bei Douglas Adams" (The science of Douglas Adams) which will be published in january 2010

- "Hitchhiker's and philosophy. Part two : the ethics of entertainment" by Nicholas Joll

- Reviews of "The rough guide to the Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy", "Dont panic" (5th edition) and two reviews for the first half of "And another thing" (one very positive, and a "could have been better" one)

Let's remember that as a ZZ9 member, you have access to their merchandise, which include the world famous Beeblebear, a Don't panic towel, and other fun stuff.

Don't forget to bookmark ZZ9's website

New Hitchhiker Trivia iphone app

Perfect Storm Software has just released an iphone app called "Ask me again : Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy edition". At first you are delighted! But once you've bought it (for 0,79 euros - a 50% off introductory sale), and tried it, you'll be disgusted.

It's not even pretty, but the worst thing about this Hitchhiker trivia is that there are just 30 questions split in 3 difficulty levels : "Junior shouting officer", "Hitchhiker" and "hoopy frood". In the junior officer section, you even have to reply seriously to that question : "The answer to the great question of life, the universe and everything is...?". I won't tell you the answer because i don't want to spoil the fun.

This kind of trivia game should have 200 questions at least, and it shouldn't be too difficult to make trivia questions with Hitchhiker. The creators promise "live content updating" but they release their app with 30 questions so maybe they will release ten more questions per year - if you're lucky.

Perfect Storm Software, which describe itself on its website as "a company born from a common desire to achieve excellence" is very similar to the infamous Marketing Division of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation, and should be best described as "a bunch of mindless jerks that were the first ones up against the wall when the Revolution came."