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Below are the 25 most recent journal entries.

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  2012.02.22  01.30
forgottenfutures.co.uk problem

There is currently a problem with this site - some direct links to files won't work. I think that this may be a domain registration foulup, or something wrong with the way that forgottenfutures.co.uk is hosted - I won't have time to do much about it before the weekend. In the meantime you can access all files by going to the front page of forgottenfutures.co.uk and using the links in that page.

UPDATE - NOW FIXED

 
 


 
  2012.02.19  14.15
Reminder - dead web site and email addresses

Just another reminder that

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/forgottenfutures/

is a "dead" web page - I can't update it, and a lot of the information on it, including all contact details, is out of date, but for some reason the hosting company won't take it down. In particular, email addresses at Cix, Demon, and Ntlworld.com are all now out of date.

PLEASE update your links if you are still getting this page as my web site!

Everything that was at my old site is now at

http://www.forgottenfutures.co.uk

 
 


 
  2012.02.04  16.51
Sir Howard Vincent's Police Code (1912)

I've put the complete text of Sir Howard Vincent's Police Code on my web site. It's the 15th (1912) edition of a compact guide to law, conduct, etc. for London policeman, by the man who founded Scotland Yard's CID (Criminal Investigation Department). It was used as a reference by all of the UK's police forces, and adapted to many Commonwealth forces. It should be useful to anyone researching or writing about the UK police or gaming in this period, and much of it undoubtedly applies to British police forces from the Victorian era well into the 1920s-30s. To make it easier to use I've adapted the index which now has several THOUSAND links to entries, and put several hundred links into the text.

http://www.forgottenfutures.co.uk/policecode/code0.htm

I've had a lot of help correcting this, but undoubtedly some OCR and formatting errors etc. remain, if you spot anything that looks wrong please let me know.

 
 


 
  2012.01.04  22.16
An interesting early interplanetary voyage.

Someone recently brought an 1847 pamphlet to my attention:

ORRIN LINDSAY'S
PLAN OF
AERIAL NAVIGATION,
WITH A NARRATIVE OF HIS EXPLORATIONS IN THE
HIGHER REGIONS OF THE ATMOSPHERE,
AND HIS WONDERFUL
VOYAGE ROUND THE MOON!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Edited by J. L. RIDDELL, M.D.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Which is basically a "serious scientific paper" about experiments with something that sounds a lot like Cavorite, which pre-dates Wells by 54 years.

I've put it on line here.

http://www.forgottenfutures.co.uk/lindsay/moon.htm

 
 


 
  2011.12.21  00.12
Season's Greetings

My online card is... err... on line here:

Version for double-sided printing, fold in two

Version for single-sided printing, fold in four

Illustration only

You will probably want to open these in separate tabs or windows.

 
 


 
  2011.11.01  23.37
Dragonmeet Games

These are the games I'm planning to run at Dragonmeet 2011 on November 26th


Forgotten Futures XII - Empire of Earth
Playtest of a new setting
Frog Day Afternoon
2240 AD - With the 450th anniversary of Bastille Day approaching, and the Anglo-Saxon Empire still recovering from its war with Sirius, the government fears that French terrorists will take advantage of perceived weaknesses to make another attempt to revive the "glories" of their long-dead nation. Your mission, should you choose to accept...
4-6 players, 3 hours(ish)


Fanfic The Role Playing Game
Diana Warrior Princess rules, Playtest
Jellystone!
The season's premiere of an exciting new action-adventure series: when poachers kill Jellystone Park's mascot and several park rangers, an elite team must be found to replace them. But there may be bigger problems than poachers...
4-6 players, 3 hours(ish)

Hope I'll see some of you there

 
 


 
  2011.10.14  23.22
Science Fiction Encyclopaedia on Line in Beta Text

The third (web) edition of the Encyclopaedia of Science Fiction (Clute etc.), possibly the most authoritative general-purpose source on SF, went on line in beta text earlier this week. Currently roughly 3.2 out of 4.2 million words are accessible, the rest is being uploaded as it's completed. For example, I'm referenced in a few entries, most notably one about Forgotten Futures, but there isn't an article called "Marcus Rowland" yet, and there are still a lot of articles that haven't yet been updated from the second edition, acting as place-holders for their eventual replacements.

http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/

Estimated completion date is the end of next year, but enough is already on line to be VERY useful, and the gaming content has been expanded immensely.

At the moment what they mainly need is bug reports; not so much omissions, which are only to be expected at this stage, but things like links that go to the wrong entry, weird behaviour, etc. But before sending anything in. PLEASE read the information on the news page etc. so that you know what the current issues are.

 
 


 
  2011.10.06  22.14
Maps of London

Pointed out by Ben Goldacre in his non-medical blog (the other is his Bad Science site which I thoroughly recommend), a very large collection of maps of London of various eras:

http://mapco.net/london.htm

And a similar collection of maps for Scotland

http://maps.nls.uk/index.html

 
 


 
  2011.08.09  20.08
More Victorian SF

I've added another Victorian story to my web site. Within an Ace of the End of the World By Robert Barr is another exciting story of the end of the world, this time a man-made disaster. This story will be added to the next release of the FF CD-ROM.

This one is heavily illustrated, and is best viewed in a separate browser window.

 
 


 
  2011.07.24  22.14
Farewell NTLworld

Over the next few weeks I will be changing my personal ISP; this means, amongst other things, that my current NTLworld email address will no longer work.

The address I will be using for most things can be found on this page (Open in a separate window)

http://forgottenfutures.co.uk/resume.htm

Please note that to deter spambots the mailto link is obfuscated and can only be read if you have javascript enabled.

This will eventually mean that the online collection of pages from the Army and Navy Stores Catalogue currently hosted on a Virgin site (see previous entries) will be closed - I'll try to find a home for it on my main site, but this probably means I won't be able to add many more pages.

 
 


 
  2011.06.19  23.33
Consternation Adventures

These are the adventures I should be running at Consternation, the RPG etc. convention at New Hall Cambridge on August 19th-21st.

Fanfic The Role Playing Game (Diana Warrior Princess rules, Playtest)
They Saved Milton Keynes

When disaster threatens, the Hacker government calls in a top team of experts to save Britain (and just possibly the world). After all, how hard can it be?
Please note - this is the same adventure I ran at Dragonmeet, with some rules modifications, and I've discussed it on Livejournal (and written the fanfic!) - please don't sign up if you know the plot!

Forgotten Futures XII - Empire of Earth (Playtest of a new setting)
Manifest Destiny

2150 AD - As the Anglo-Saxon Empire expands into space, a group of patriotic Americans decides that it's time to restore the full glory of the Stars and Stripes on another world. As the "Wagon train to the stars" assembles, will the Empire be supportive - or try to ensure that their brave new world never gets off the ground?

Forgotten Futures XII - Empire of Earth (Playtest of a new setting)
Frog Day Afternoon

2240 AD - With the 450th anniversary of Bastille Day approaching, and the Anglo-Saxon Empire still recovering from its war with Sirius, the government fears that French terrorists will take advantage of perceived weaknesses to make another attempt to revive the "glories" of their long-dead nation. Your mission, should you choose to accept...

 
 


 
  2011.05.08  07.49
Empire of Earth

This is a talk I gave at the UK national SF convention this Easter

I recommend opening it in a new window or tab since some of the illustrations are fairly big.

Empire of Earth
Victorian and Edwardian Military SF


 
 


 
  2011.04.19  08.41
Old web site

A reminder - If you're seeing this at homepage.ntlworld.com/forgottenfutures/ that site is already badly out of date. I can no longer make changes and it's going to be stuck as it is until Virgin delete it, but for some reason they haven't done so yet. This news is up to date, everything else there is old. For the latest updates see forgottenfutures.com and forgottenfutures.co.uk

 
 


 
  2011.04.01  01.54
Postal prices

Just to clarify - postal rates go up on Monday, I'll be making the price changes mentioned in previous posts on Sunday night.

To simplify things a little, I haven't set different rates for the Charity CD-ROM for different areas; however, I have raised the minimum postal price to £3 and set a broader range of suggested donations. All proceeds after postage and Paypal fees will be donated to Cancer Research UK.

 
 


 
  2011.03.15  00.26
Postal prices revisited

Royal Mail prices will be rising on April 4th. For several years the extra price I've charged for customers overseas (£1.00) has been well below the actual cost of postage. Unfortunately this is now reaching a point where I must either raise prices or reduce the contribution I give to charity.

As of April I'll be applying the following charges for postal customers.

Forgotten Futures first registration or FF CD-ROM (two mailings)
UK - no change
Europe - £1.50 (up £0.50)
USA, Canada, Australia, Japan, etc. - £2.00 (up £1.00)

FF Charity CD-ROM or FF registration renewal (one mailing)
UK - no change
Europe - £1.00 (no change)
USA - £1.50 (up 50p)

Please note that none of these charges apply to downloads, which are cheaper for everyone!

 
 


 
  2011.02.24  17.59
Another Charity Games Bundle

Drivethru RPG are selling another charity games bundle in aid of Doctors Without Borders and the New Zealand earthquake.

I'm not in this one since I don't currently have any products that haven't been included in previous charity bundles, but it's a worthy cause and they're offering $320 worth of games PDFs for a $20 purchase. Last time they raised $178,900.00 - The total for this one is already nearly $11,000! it'd be nice if this time they raised even more, so buy it before the offer ends on February 28th.

https://www.drivethrustuff.com

Later: Apologies - this is for the Red Cross, not Doctors Without Borders.

 
 


 
  2011.01.10  21.51
Final charity update - Doctors Without Borders

I've now sorted out my accounts on the Flatland RPG; after taking off the percentage that goes to e23 and Drivethru RPG I've ended up with just over £50, which I've rounded up to £55. There will be gift aid on that, which ought to take the final total to £68.75.

Ignoring gift aid, this takes the total amount raised for Doctors Without Borders from this project to date to £215; this is less than I'd hoped, but not as bad as I'd feared.

 
 


 
  2011.01.06  21.33
Charity Update and US Postal Problems

Over the last couple of days I've been sorting out Forgotten Futures payments etc. for the last few months, and working out how much to give to charity. I'm pleased to say that with the help of several purchasers who added extra money for charity I was able to give £110 to Cancer Research UK today. There's an additional gift aid tax refund that goes to the charity on top of that, taking the total to £137.50, and the total amount I've raised for charity from Forgotten Futures registrations, sales at cons, and other odds and ends to £2000.70 (ignoring Gift Aid) as of 7/11/01. It's actually considerably more if you factor in gift aid, stuff I gave to convention auctions, etc.

I should sort out the donation I'll be giving to Doctors Without Borders for Flatland RPG purchases over the weekend - probably about another £40 - £50, which was less than I'd hoped, but I won't know until I crunch the numbers.

Meanwhile, I've just been reminded that due to heightened security measures all mail to the USA has been flown by cargo plane since the end of November, which is leading to lengthy delays - I normally assume a week to ten days for US customers, at least 2-3 weeks is now more likely. I would really urge customers to go for a download if at all possible, it's cheaper (for you and for me) and a lot faster. It's likely that I will have to raise prices for overseas postal customers in April, the extra I charge lags far behind the prices I'm paying, so please think twice before you order.

Any customer who still hasn't received disks sent before Christmas should contact me for download details - given the current situation I'm not able to send replacement disks, since they will just be stuck in the queue.

 
 


 
  2011.01.03  22.46
Tooth and Claw now available as e-text.

Jo Walton's novel Tooth and Claw, the source for Forgotten Futures X, is now available as an etext from various sources, most notably Macmillan, at $2.99

An absolute bargain!

 
 


 
  2010.12.28  22.06
Untitled mail

Apologies if you just received an untitled email from me via Drivethru RPG, advertising Forgotten Futures XI - due to a problem generally known as being an idiot I fouled up my first attempt to send it, and somehow deleted the title the second time. This is NOT going to be a frequent occurrence - I don't plan to send any more advertising mail until I launch another new product.

 
 


 
  2010.12.28  10.21
Postal Price Rises - April 2011

Postal prices are going to rise again in April, and it's likely that I will finally be forced to raise prices for overseas customers. Prices for UK customers should not change.

Please note that any price changes will apply to postal sales only - download prices will remain unchanged.

If you're planning to register or re-register, please think about switching to downloads; it's faster, cheaper, and better for the environment.

 
 


 
  2010.12.26  13.46
Army and Navy Stores Catalogue

I've obtained a copy of the 1939-40 Army and Navy Stores catalogue, a comprehensive listing of consumer goods available in the UK at the time, and will be scanning selected pages from it and putting them on line as time and web space permit. For now this material is archived at this site:

http://www.forgottenfutures1.webspace.virginmedia.com/army_navy/

 
 


 
  2010.12.20  10.50
FF XI On Line

Forgotten Futures XI is now on line

http://www.forgottenfutures.com/game/ff11/index.htm

 
 


 
  2010.12.20  00.58
Site updates

I'm updating my sites in preparation for the upload of Forgotten Futures XI tomorrow. You may notice dead links tonight but I should have FF XI on line by ten or so tomorrow morning.

A reminder - I can no longer make changes to my old NTLworld web page - it's going to be stuck as it is until Virgin delete it. For the latest updates see forgottenfutures.com and forgottenfutures.co.uk

 
 


 
  2010.12.12  21.33
Domain move!

Rather than mess around with the Virgin site I mentioned in a previous post, I've changed forgottenfutures.co.uk to point to a secondary domain on the web hosting server that currently handles forgottenfutures.com

This should now be working properly, apart from some minor tweaks, but if you run into problems the old page is still working - I can't access it to mess it up!

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/forgottenfutures

Sorry for any inconvenience.

 
 


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