Ran

That's the pacing starfighter before the big race, about to drop the flag. You studio execs are tough, man. ETA: Revised poster to make sure we get R9-G8 in there.

Goes without saying: Bonus movie poster.

Notes taken. Chad's available for story pitches, Dave and Kathleen.

The 1033 Program is a big part of it. Started in 1990, it was made to transfer excess military surplus to law enforcement with a focus on the "War on Drugs", then was expanded to counter-terrorism. Add in the DHS having a separate procurement supply pipeline that leans toward tactical gear, and there's interagency transfers as well. Law enforcement in the US has gradually become increasingly paramilitary.

You all laugh, but Chad Geppty is helping me develop this.

The Great Waldo Pepper, but it's Star Wars. At least it hasn't been done a million times.

Agreed re: aggregate vs. per capita -- both are useful lenses, just depending on what you’re trying to show. Totals help visualize scale and historical trends, but I think per capita is more helpful for understanding local impact and political pressures which I think is most relevant to the case of countries like the UK that are struggling. The UK is on a poorer economic footing than the US, both because of economic conditions and how tight housing and services already are, so even if they have broadly similar per capita net migration, they can feel very different pressures or benefits. On the low-skill migration point, yes, in the US they are largely a big positive. The data is incontrovertible. But I do think the structure of the receiving country matters a lot, and that's where the UK case diverges from the US. The UK’s welfare system is more expansive and universal, with fewer barriers to access once someone is lawfully present, especially if they come on a family or humanitarian route. Combine that with lower labor productivity and persistent housing shortages, and it becomes harder to argue that low-wage migration is a net positive in the short term, especially if there's low churn or mobility. That’s not to say it’s a drag — just that the margin is narrower, and the public cost per capita may be higher than in a U.S. In fact, found an OBR report that suggested that a low-wage migrant is likely to be a net cost to the tune of 150k pounds by retirement age. (That said, that same report also says that overall the impact of new migrants in their simulations was about ~1% of GDP, so really the economic effect is relatively small over a short period.) I think immigration is best thought of as a long-term investment, but the UK has to solve its poor productivity and housing issues or it's never going to be realized as effectively as it could be. So I think it makes sense for, in the short term, for the UK to try and limit migration based on skills with selective openings in areas that have persistent labor shortfalls (health care, as cited), maybe become tighter on requirements for giving dependents visas, and basically try to get a higher-earning, higher-skilled mix than they have now while sustaining labor in the sectors that really need it. And then with whatever breathing room that gives in regards to housing and such, try to fix that ASAP and then figure out why productivity is so shit, while also trying to support the immigrants you have gotten to improve their skill base, improve mobility for the second generation, etc.

"New Romances" is such a strange thing to see as an advertising point for a Star Trek show. The shippers won, I guess.

Your population is not getting younger, your birth rates are low. If the UK had had 0 net migration over the last decade, your GDP issues would be even worse because your labor force would have fallen. I think the UK needs to figure out the economic and political changes that will help stem the fall in fertility and make it easier to absorb more immigrants.

I feel like net migration is less useful than net migration per capita or share of net migration in population growth or some such, because 1 million net migrations to the UK is a larger share of the population than 4 million net migrations to the US is to its population. It's not a massive difference, it's not 2x (it's more like 35% higher?), but still, that maybe provides a better sense. I think it's true that the UK has structural and economic problems that make it harder to absorb immigrants in large numbers than the US which is comparatively in a better place for it (especially in regards to the labor market). The housing crisis is worse in the UK, productivity is low and stagnant, and so on. The question then is whether very large influxes of immigrants -- this 1 million figure per year that's being batted about, which I'll assume is correct since no one seems to be challenging it -- will actually provide a net benefit or actually be net harmful towards righting the ship. Will it be easier to solve housing issues with smaller net migration for awhile? Can productivity problems be fixed before introducing a lot more labor? And so on. What's the optimal figure economically? But at the same time, you can't just cut immigration levels and call it a day. The UK really has to solve its productivity and housing problems. Another factor that I think bears considering... does a predominantly low-skill immigration produce greater drags in high welfare states, compared to other countries which spend less on welfare? It's just a notion, but it seems to me that no one should ever complain about high-skill immigrants, because they essentially "pay for themselves" almost immediately, while I can see the argument that countries that are high in taxation and high in welfare will find more cases of low-skill immigrants taking out more from the system than they contribute, especially if labor productivity is lower than you'd want. But low skill immigrants may become higher skill with time, and their children higher skill still, etc., and you still need laborers, so even there you have to see migration as a longer term investment rather than a short term fix.

War for Westeros seems to be going the Age of Empires/Battle for Middle-earth style game, which could be good. They have a previous game from several years ago that is in that wheel house that had decent reviews on Steam (75 or something lifetime). Chronicles: Medieval seems like a serious attempt to basically do the Mount and Blade-style sandbox but with a lot more polish. Tom Hardy narrated the cinematic trailer. Will be interesting to see how it comes out... and how moddable it'll be for those who want to, say, do an ASoIaF game...

They don't want to rehash Star Wars, so they rehash Mandalorian and Obi-Wan instead. This is not the idea that I expected out of something like this. Funny, though, I was recently thinking Mia Goth would be interesting to see in a Star Wars show.

Nice, Pawel Sasko reveals that a 2.3 update has been quietly cooking in secret, and is overseeing the update personally. June 26th release date.

I would be very surprised if this were the case. Not because I don't think he's dabbled in whatever opportunities corruption allows, but as Mudguard says, he's just painting a big target on the back of whoever inherits that ill-gotten wealth. He has a daughter, she apparently has revealed a luxury-heavy lifestyle, and estimates from a Congressional report estimate his wealth at $700 mllion, and some put it up to like $1 billion or a bit more. But $500 billion? No chance.

I also don't think there's any African political or business figure even remotely in the league of Musk/Bezos/etc.

Finished Dandadan's first season, only to discover the second season isn't out until July. Doh. I had to pause after that 7th episode for awhile, because the way the episode ended suggested it was back in zany shonen battle land, and that just seemed so cognitively dissonant given the story that episode told. With some time and distance, though, went back in, and yeah, zany is right, but it does have some amazing animation, character designs, and appealing characters. I gather from some critics that all the things it does is done better, individually, in other shows. And maybe that's true. But I like the genre-mixing of it, and most of its sense of humor, so I'll stick with it.

Right, and that was Tim Miller again. He's been floating around this for awhile. Do we know if Joe's commented on how he got involved in LD+R? I'm guessing Miller suggested he try his hand at it.

According to TV Line, they have "well-placed sources" who indicate the show is not being shopped around. So, that's it, I guess.

I mentioned that earlier. It was announced in 2023 with Tim Miller directing, and Rebecca Ferguson possibly starring as Monza. But that's being produced by Skydance, not Lightstorm, so as @polishgenius says, there's no connection except by the coincidence that Tim Miller and James Cameron have some past collaborations, and it's entirely possible in my mind that Tim Miller (who's a big SF/F reader in his personal life, and whose sense of humor and approach to violence, gore, foul language, and sex aligns with some of Joe's work) is the one who introduced Cameron to Joe's work The origin of Love, Death, and Robots (created by Miller and David Fincher) was a Heavy Metal reboot with a lot of talk of Cameron co-producing and directing a segment, and Miller directed Terminator: Dark Fate but apparently he felt inhibited by Cameron's control of that franchise so wasn't interested in working on that sort of project with him again... but I believe Fincher has remarked that he and Miller wanted Cameron to do an LD+R episode at some point, at least originally, but admitted the people who direct this (if they are big names) will need to be willing to give up the money they'd otherwise make spending their time on much more lucrative projects.

Because when someone takes over the inheritance through their mother, say, they end up taking her mother's family name, or at least that is very common in Westeros. At least, that's what George suggested. We have a clear example of this being proposed in ACoK, when Leobald Tallhart suggests: We also have a different example, in TWoIaF, of a LeffordLydden who took the name Lannister from his wife, the daughter of the late king, to establish the new lineage. One useful aspect of this habit of people not combining territories and people taking on the traditional family name associated with a house they have inherited from via the maternal line is that it can help explain why a house like the Starks can live many thousands of years: for all we know, at some point some third cousin twice removed named Benjen Ryswell ended up inheriting and just renamed himself Benjen Stark for the power of the family name and the continuity it gave.

I've always liked Enemy Mine as a film, and read the novella because of it, which if anything is even better, I think -- less comedic and sentimental, but very gripping. RIP

Eh, pre-production on Witcher IV began in 2022, ended in 2024, and the game is out no earlier than 2027, and I'd guess 2028 is likelier. A similar timeline for Cyberpunk 2 (officially in pre-production now after a lengthy concept period) would be ~2031 for the release date. I don't think it will take until 2035.

That's not necessarily what's being said in the press release. Cameron is not named as prospective director. He's talking about working with Joe on writing it, yes, which implies he's interested, but he's not committing to it. Lightstorm Entertainment made Alita: Battle Angel with Robert Rodriguez directing based on a script co-written by James Cameron. There, Cameron did explicitly claim he was going to direct it when they first acquired it, and part of its long delay was basically due to that. I suspect it's either a scenario where Cameron decides he wants a change of pace before wrapping up the Avatar series, and in that case it may move relatively quickly, or (more likely) he'll decide to kick the can down the road, and then maybe it'll be the case that he'll get someone else to direct it. This of course assumes it gets made. Not everything that is optioned gets made. But Cameron's direct interest and his intention of co-writing it gives it a tremendous leg up compared to most books that get optioned.

Here is the Paleyfest event:

I think Gilroy is talking pure production budget.