Conventions (in fandom, shortened as "cons"), are held in cities around the world, catering to a local, regional, national, or international membership. General-interest conventions cover all aspects of science fiction, while others focus on a particular interest like media fandom, filking, etc. Most are organized by volunteers in non-profit groups, though most media-oriented events are organized by commercial promoters. The convention's activities are called the "program", which may include panel discussions, readings, autograph sessions, costume masquerades, and other events. Activities that occur throughout the convention are not part of the program; these commonly include a dealer's room, art show, and hospitality lounge (or "con suites").
Conventions may host award ceremonies. Worldcons present the Hugo Awards each year. SF societies are a year-round base of activities for science fiction fans. They may be associated with an ongoing science fiction convention, or have regular club meetings, or both. Most groups meet in libraries, schools and universities, community centers, pubs or restaurants, or the homes of individual members. Long-established groups like the New England Science Fiction Association and the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society have clubhouses for meetings and storage of convention supplies and research materials.
The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) was founded by Damon Knight in 1965 as a non-profit organization to serve the community of professional science fiction authors, 24 years after his essay "Unite or Fie!" had led to the organization of the National Fantasy Fan Federation. Fandom has helped support related groups as they started to form, including media fandom, the Society for Creative Anachronism, gaming, filking, and furry fandom.
The first science fiction fanzine, "The Comet", was published in 1930. Fanzine printing methods have changed over the decades, from the mimeograph and the ditto machine, to modern photocopying. The number of copies was usually not enough to use commercial printing. Modern fanzines are printed on computer printers or at local copy shops, or they may only be sent as email. The best known fanzine (or "'zine") today is "Ansible". David Langford is the editor and it has won several Hugo awards. Artists working for fanzines have risen to prominence in the field, including Brad W. Foster, Teddy Harvia, and Joe Mayhew; the Hugos include a category for Best Fan Artists. The earliest organized fandom online was the SF Lovers community, originally a mailing list in the late 1970s with a text archive file that was updated regularly. In the 1980s, Usenet groups greatly expanded the circle of fans online. In the 1990s, the development of the World-Wide Web made the online fan community much, much larger. Fans created thousands and then millions of web sites devoted to science fiction and related genres for all media. Most of these websites are small, ephemeral, or about very specific topics. Though sites like SF Site and Read and Find Out give readers a broad range of references and reviews about science fiction.
Fan fiction is non-commercial fiction created by people who love an SF story or world. Fans write stories that take place in the setting of an established book, movie, or television series. Some people call it "fanfic". In some cases, the copyright owners of the books, movies, or television series have instructed their lawyers to issue "cease and desist" letters to fans.
Blaise Pascal
Blaise Pascal (19 June 1623 – 19 August 1662) was a French mathematician, physicist, inventor, philosopher, writer and Catholic theologian.. He was born in Clermont-Ferrand, France. His mother died when he was three years old. His father's name was Étienne. He had two sisters, Jaqueline and Gilberte. Pascal was completely educated by his father.His father was a tax collector. Pascal was considered a child prodigy. Though best known for his works in mathematics, including the creation of Pascal's Triangle, which is named after him, and developments in the field of probability, Pascal was also a scientist. He wrote in support of the scientific method and also contributed to physics. Later he wrote two books about Christianity. Also, the Pascal unit was named after him.
Pascal died in Paris, France at 39. He had several illnesses; it is not known which of them caused his death.
Pascal invented a form of counting machine which helped inventors create the calculator in the 20th century.
Pascal's Triangle
Pascal's Triangle is a mathematical triangular array. It is named after French mathematician Blaise Pascal, but it was used in China 3 centuries before his time.
Pascal's triangle can be made as follows. On the first row, write only the number 1. Then, to get the numbers of following rows, add the number that can be seen above and to the left (if any) and the number above and to the right (if any) to find the new value. For example, the numbers 1 and 3 in the fourth row are added to make 4 in the fifth row.
The triangle has many uses in probability. It can also be used in binomial expansions. For example,
Notice the coefficients are the third row of Pascal's triangle: 1, 2, 1.
In general, when a binomial is raised to a positive integer power we have:
where the coefficients "a" in this expansion are precisely the numbers on row "n" + 1 of Pascal's triangle; in other words,
Formally speaking, the way of making the Pascal's Triangle uses Pascal's rule, which states that
for non-negative integers "n" and "k" where "n" ≥ "k" and with the initial condition
Pascal's triangle generalizes readily into higher dimensions. The three-dimensional version is called Pascal's pyramid or "Pascal's tetrahedron". A higher-dimensional analogue is generically called a "Pascal's simplex". See also pyramid, tetrahedron, and simplex.
The first and last number in each row is always 1.
The second number in each row is the row number. In a binomial expansion, this second number is equal to the power. (This makes the 'first' row, 1, actually the zero row).
The rows always read the same forward and backward.
The sum of the numbers in each row is double the sum of the numbers in the row before. The sum of each row is 2.
Antidisestablishmentarianism
Antidisestablishmentarianism is a political position. It means "to keep an established church". An official state church is called the "established" church, so a disestablishmentarian is a person who wants to stop the state church. These people say a state church hurts the freedom of religion. These people say the state should be secular, meaning religion and the country are separate. This idea is called disestablishmentarianism. So antidisestablishmentarianism wants to keep the state church.
It is famous because it is one of the longest words in the English language.
The word comes from England in the 1800s. In England, Ireland and Wales, there was an official state church called the Anglican Church. Ireland disestablished in 1871, and Wales disestablished in 1920. England still has the Anglican Church as the state church.
In 2014 Nick Clegg, who was the Leader of the Liberal Democrats at the time, said that he thought the Church of England should no longer be the established church. David Cameron, who was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, said the establishment helps the church and state.
Antidisestablishmentarianism is one of the longest words in the English language. It has 28 letters and 12 syllables. It is considered to be the longest word, if you do not count technical terms. For example, "pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis" is a technical term for a lung disease made by people who wanted it to be the longest word.