jangobongo writes "SciFiWire.com reports that fans of Star Trek Enterprise have succeeded in placing a full-page ad in the LA Times. The ad will urge someone to pick up the show for a fifth season. According to the official fan site, a Star Trek Enterprise fan working for the LA Times has arranged a special deal for a discounted ad. Donations collected to date have covered the cost of the ad which will be located in the "A" section of the paper on Feb. 21."

Chairboy writes "The Sci-Fi Channel has just announced the renewal of Battlestar Galactica for a second season. The creator of the show has announced that the second season will delve into the religious issues surrounding the Cylons in addition to opening up their society more. The latest episode had 3.2 million viewers, almost twice as many as watched the latest episode of Star Trek Enterprise." I said it before, and I'll say it again- this is the best Sci Fi program currently airing, so I'm happy to see more.

An anonymous reader writes "What started of as a suggestion to pay for season 5 of Enterprise has actully snowballed into a project that no one has ever attempted before, that of getting fans to pay for the production costs of a tv series. It has brought on board a raft of people including lawyers. I wonder if the quoted $50 to $80 million is reachable." I gotta say that Enterprise has been better this season, but I feel like it's still only mediocre. Battlestar Galactica might be the best SciFi airing right now. And I woulda chipped in for more Firefly in a heartbeat.

InklingBooks writes "In the late 1990s, when Hollywood paid an all-too-willing Congress to extend copyright terms to 90 years, an existing problem grew much worse. Many out-of-print books, including some SciFi classics, became orphans. Though still "protected" by copyright, there was no one around who could give legal permission to publish them. Their author were dead, and it was expensive and often impossible to find out who (if anyone) now owned their literary estates. Fortunately, the Copyright Office is now taking comments on how the law might be changed. See Orphan Works."

Snaller writes "Tonight the Scifi channel begins airing the new reimaged Battlestar Galactica series. Having run to rave reviews in the UK, the new series is darker and grittier than the original, and showrunner Ron Moore aims for a more adult narrative with comments on issues such as terrorism, security, freedom, religion and what it means to be human in a series which is essentially one long story arc. The entire cast from the 2003 mini series is back and the first episode, called '33', picks up almost where the mini series left off: The humans are still on the run, but each time they come out of hyperspace, the Cylon armada catches up 33 minutes later ... every 33 minutes. When we join the crew this has been going on for five days."

blkmagic writes "Sci Fi Wire is reporting that Disney will remake Tron. The original article was in Variety, but requires a pay subscription, unless you want to sign up for a 14-day free trial. The article didn't mention what stage they're at, but sounds like they're changing the story a bit (surprise). I loved the original when I was younger (and still watch it again once in a while), so I don't know how I feel about this one!"

Several readers have written in with unhappy opinions on the Legend of Earthsea miniseries just aired on the Sci-Fi channel. Ursula Le Guin has also chimed in, with a short but highly critical blurb on her website, and now this dissection on Slate.com.

scifi451 writes "Both Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis have been renewed for another season, 9th and 2nd respectively. All of the key cast members are coming back for Atlantis, where as SG-1 stars are in negotiations, with Amanda Tapping expecting a baby in March right as filming begins. Also Richard Dean Anderson might look for an even further reduced role in the show. More news can be found here: Gateworld & Scifi-Wire"

BayBlade writes "It seems a lost Ed Wood film, Necromania was recovered recently, and can now be ordered on DVD. Reuters goes into more depth."

jagilbertvt writes "I know a lot of Slashdot readers are Farscape fans, so here's some more fantastic news... Farscape returns Sunday October 17th at 9pm ET with the first of two episodes of Farscape: Peacekeeper Wars. WatchFarscape.com has more coverage of Farscape's return. A trailer is available at Apple's Movie Trailer site."

Our latest Slashdot interview victim... err... guest... is Neal Stephenson, author of (among others) Snow Crash, CRYPTONOMICON, the much-discussed essay, In the Beginning was the Command Line, and more recently a series of books he calls The Baroque Cycle. (Last month Slashdot reviewed the series' third volume, The System of the World.) Now you can ask Neal whatever you want. As usual, we'll send him 10 -12 of the highest-moderated questions and post his answers verbatim when we get them back.

wes33 writes "An amazing technological achievement deploying high-temperature superconductors is reported in Space Daily. American Superconductor Corporation (nice scifi-ish name) has built a 5MW electric ship motor using high-temp. superconductor technology. The Queen Elizabeth's 44 MW engines weigh 400 tons each (and she has two); a single comparable HST motor (36.5 MW) will weigh 75 tons!"

blamanj writes "One of the great sci-fi short stories, Ray Bradbury's A Sound of Thunder is scheduled to be released on film next month. Links to the trailers (QT, Real, WMP) can be found here. The original story prefigured chaos theory in its 'small changes, large effects' premise. Indeed, when I first heard the term 'butterfly theory,' I assumed it was based on Bradbury's story. Unlike the original, however, the film won't be touching on dystopian politics, but appears to have been turned into a 'Jurassic Park'-style creature feature. Sigh. Oh, well, we can hope that the new Fahrenheit 451 will be treated with a bit more respect."

EvilBuu writes "The Sci-Fi Channel has begun airing ads announcing a full Battlestar Galactica series following the surprisingly (to some) good new mini series starring Edward James Olmos. Looks like it will be a straight forward continuation of the mini, with the same cast and more Cylon goodness!" According to this press release, Richard Hatch will guest star, and the show will air starting in January 2005.

BadDream writes "I read an old slashdot article about Stargate Atlantis comming this summer. Well its summer, and guess what starts this friday." You can also enter to win a walk-on role on SG1, but I call first dibs, no cuts.

pdawerks writes "According to Sci-Fi Wire, Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski told fans on a B5 Usenet group that he and Dark Skies creator Bryce Zabel have put together an idea for a new Star Trek series, which he said would revive the ailing franchise. 'I got together [with Zabel] and wrote a treatment earlier this year that specified how to save [Star Trek] and develop a series that would restore the series in a big way,' Straczynski wrote. 'I actually think it could be a hell of a show. Whether that ever goes anywhere with Paramount, who knows?'"

seattlenerd writes "The 2003 Nebula Awards were awarded late Saturday night in Seattle (for the first time ever) by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. Winners: The Speed of Dark by Elizabeth Moon, Coraline by Neil Gaiman, "The Empire of Ice Cream" by Jeffrey Ford, "What I Didn't See" by Karen Joy Fowler (the previous two both published on the SCI FICTION site), and the script for Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. Noteworthy were comments made by GrandMaster honoree Robert Silverberg and Harlan Ellison, who introduced Silverberg, along with guest speaker Rick Rashid of Microsoft Research. To say nothing of Cory Doctorow's acceptance speech he didn't get to make, but has made available for "alternate historians."" I was at Penguicon this weekend, along with Neil Gaiman - congrats to him on the win, and to all the others.

Snaller writes "The Sci Fi Channel has listed its programming for the upcomming year, it includes the Farscape miniseries already mentioned by Slashdot, it also includes a miniseries based the legendary scifi story by Larry Niven: Ringworld. In the far future 4 travelers crash on a ring around a sun in a distant system. Shall be interesting to see how they depict the Puppeteers."

Albinus writes "The Sci Fi Channel has decided to continue the Farscape series in the form of a miniseries, according to a short article on SciFi.com. Apparently, 'The four-hour miniseries picks up where the cliffhanger series finale left off and will reunite John Crichton (Ben Browder), Aeryn Sun (Claudia Black) and the rest of the Moya crew.' Hopefully this will generate a renewed interest in the show and bring it back permanently." We reported on earlier rumors to this effect late last year.

Gumpy writes "The Sci-Fi Channel has started producing a TV miniseries based on the first two books of Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea series. The Earthsea miniseries is supposed to start on the Sci Fi Channel in December 2004."