Film-makers Mark Steensland and Andy Massagli in conjuction with philipkdick.com are pleased to announce that First Run Features will bring this PKD documentary to audiences starting with a spring 2001 theatrical release. The video and DVD will be available through the distributor's web site.

Fans are encouraged to sign up on the Gospel According to PKD Mailing List for a special offer when the video and DVD are available.

• Read the Press Release
• Visit the Gospel According to PKD web page on philipkdick.com.
• First Run Features Web Site

The following report appeared in this week's Entertainment Weekly magazine:

"Dimension has optioned sci-fi writer Philip K. Dick's 'The Short Happy Life of the Brown Oxford' about a scientist who invents a machine that brings inanimate objects to life, as a possible starring vehicle for Roberto Benigni."

• Have any details about this? Send the scoop to jason@philipkdick.com .
• Find out more about The Short Happy Life from David Hyde's PKDweb.

A must-see for PKD fans! FLOW MY TEARS, THE POLICEMAN SAID, based on the award-winning novel by Philip K. Dick. Presented by the University of Pittsburgh Repertory Theatre through November 12, 2000 (in Pittsburgh, PA). Visit www.pitt.edu/~play for full details or call 412-624-PLAY (7529).

Jason Taverner is the definition of a successful television star, followed and adored by millions of devoted fans. But after a freak accident, he awakens one morning in a world where he doesn�t exist. Void of required identification materials and no longer recognized by millions (or even one), this "unidentified walking object" struggles to survive the relentless pursuit of a Machiavellian police officer, who is determined to eliminate him. Dick�s visionary novel predicted the "identity theft" of today�s headlines.

Tickets: $9 and $12, with group and senior discounts available. See you at the theatre!

More Phildickian technology at work . . .

Think of an object and watch it appear before your eyes. All it takes is a click of a mouse, a flick of a switch and you can have almost anything, made to order. Researchers are on the point of creating a magic box that can bring the stuff of your imagination into the hard-edged material world. The technical name for this box of tricks is a 3D printer. Where an ordinary printer lays down a single 2D layer of ink on a sheet of paper, the new devices can deposit a bewildering variety of materials. They add the extra dimension simply by printing layer after layer until you have a real, 3D object.

• Read the full story from New Scientist .

Scientists have discovered that a single-celled organism can negotiate the shortest way through a maze. It means that some of the lowliest creatures in the plant and animal kingdoms, such as slime and amoeba, may not be as primitive as once thought.

Pieces of slime mould, an amoeba-like organism, were enticed through a 30-square-centimetre (five-square-inch) maze by the prospect of food at the end of the puzzle. The researchers believe the slime is exhibiting some form of primitive intelligence.

• Read the full story from BBC News.

This is to inform you about the international conference about Philip K. Dick to be held in Italy, at the University of Macerata, October 5-7. The program of the event can be read at:

http://web.tiscalinet.it/ausonia/progdick.html

For any info request, please send a message to vol.sco@tiscalinet.it or to Dr. Valerio M. De Angelis at vmdeangelis@tiscalinet.it.

Great news for Italian PKD fans! This news item was recently sent to the philipkdick.com.

"Fanucci Editore has recently acquired the Italian rights for the entire oeuvre of PKD, and has launched a 'Dick Collection' of very high quality, edited by Prof. Carlo Pagetti, with new and accurate translations, plus introductions and afterwords on each volume. The first two are 'Do the Androids?' and 'The Game-Players of Titan', in November 'Mary and the Giant' will be published for the first time in Italy. I am sending you the first two covers, if you want to add them to your collection. I hope you will appreciate a publishing and cultural effort that has no comparison in the whole world, and that in our opinion enlarges the status of PKD as a fundamental writer of our age."

• Visit the Fanucci Editore web site.
• E-mail the publisher at info@fanucci.it

"philipkdick.com is dedicated to keeping the deceased author's memory alive, and it does so with an extensive site that is as quirky as its namesake. It has all the things one expects from an author fan site: a book list with reviews, an active discussion board, archived author interviews, artwork, radio clips in RealAudio format and a fanzine."

• Read the full review on Scifi.com.

Reminds me of the "noser" pods in A Maze Of Death? (those crappy little spaceships that only carried enough fuel for a one way trip) . . .

"If you have an itch to fly into space and half a million dollars to spare, you may soon be able to nip down to the store and buy a spaceship in kit form. Once assembled, the craft, called the Kitten, will take you and two friends 200 kilometres up at a top speed of Mach 4. It's not quite Earth orbit, but who's counting?"

• Read the full story from New Scientist.

This is a theme that Philip K. Dick explored extensively in his fiction. His books The Penultimate Truth, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep and the short story Second Variety are about "second generation" robot technology. Phil called his "androids".
From the Discovery.com web site:

Two extraordinary new studies brought robots closer to life this week. The first study, published in the journal Nature, outlines a method where a robot can design other machines with little human input. While the design process occurred only in a virtual environment, experts believe it is an important step toward the day when artificial life systems are able to exist autonomously in the real world.

Taking a different path towards somewhat similar goals, another team of researchers has, for the first time, created a group of robots that work together like an ant colony in gathering "food."

The food-gathering effort was a resounding success, except when the researchers increased the number of robots. After a certain point, like an over-populated insect colony, the bots wound up banging into each other, minimizing collection efforts. Still, Keller said, "Robot (teams) could be used in dangerous areas, for example those with field mines or those that are radioactive. It is difficult to say how soon this could be put into practice."

(ed note: I think that this Keller guy has read a little TOO MUCH PKD!)

• Read the full story on Discovery.com