While I try to figure out what to write about, here are two press releases which will probably be of interest.

First of all, 2600 Magazine has has announced that pre-registration for The Next HOPE has opened. Held every two years at the Hotel Pennsylvania in Manhattan, the Hackers On Planet Earth conference draws hackers, crackers, cypherpunks, makers feds, and as many other sorts of people as you care to mention to present, attend presentations, get in trouble, and bounce ideas off of one another. The cost to attend HOPE is $75us in advance (paid through Yahoo's online store …

I'm back in Maryland on week two of (possibly two, possibly three) of my field assignment. I'm in another hotel in the same general vicinity as before and approaching dead tired after a long weekend of hot weather, running around, and pulling all nighters of one sort or another. I was running rather late today because I had a number of errands to run, which I took care of before starting the laundry, but now it's academic because it all worked out. Thankfully, the headache and aftermath of heatstroke last night went away while I slept, so I woke up …

Lionsgate Home Video has announced that it'll be releasing a DVD boxed set of the Sci-Fi Channel's original show, The Dresden Files (based on the novels of the same name by Jim Butcher). Season one is slated for release on 7 August 2007 and has some very interesting features planned, including the movie-length version of Storm Front (which was originally supposed to be the pilot), audio commentaries for at least two episodes (Robert Wolfe says that he recorded commentaries with Paul Blackthorne for Things That Go Bump and Rules of Engagement), and the usual collection of deleted scenes.

The …

Check out SignedPage.com.

This website sells first editions of books signed by the authors for fans who can't make it to book signings or whose cities will not be visited by authors on their book-signing and publicity tours.

Notables on the site at this time are Jim Butcher, author of the Dresden Files, who will be offering signed copies of his latest book, White Knight, and Jacqueline Carey, whose latest novel, Kushiel's Justice, will be released on 20 June 2007.

The man himself gives his opinion on the show/novels nerd rage.

And now, your weekly fan's writeup of The Dresden Files. Those who aren't fans, don't want spoilers, or plain just don't care can skip this entry.

Last night's episode was called Hair of the Dog... ..and it used a lot of plot elements of the novel Fool Moon. The episode starts off with Harry being called in to investigate a number of murders in which the canine teeth and parts of the scalps of a number of people were forcibly removed after death. The M.E. (one Waldo Butters - his t-shirt reads "I ♥ polka) reports nothing unusual about the bodies …