OMNI Magazine Remembered 131
An anonymous reader noted that Slate is doing a bit of a retrospective on OMNI. If you're anything like me, reading it was a treat. At home I suffered through Popular Mechanics, but OMNI was what I wished I had. There's many interesting things in the article, like the fact that OMNI is the place where William Gibson first coined the term "Cyberspace."
Hot Alien Chicks (Score:3, Informative)
The Alien Chicks with the glossy lips were hot!
But yeah, loved that magazine and especially the short stories. Not very reliable science stuff but overall a very optimistic and stylish mag that back then was a nice counterpoint to Heavy Metal which was less rooted in reality.
But both had Hot Alien Chicks! :)
It was OK (Score:4, Informative)
It was more on an entertainment magazine than a science magazine really. I always prefered to get my Sci Fi straight up via publications like Analog, but I found Omni to be entertaining often enough in my youth. It really was more Sci Fi than a true science mag though.
Great mag (Score:3, Informative)
Oh man I used to love this mag, I had long forgotten about it. I subscribed for several years. I was in college from '78-'81 and that is that main period I remember reading. I read an article about the development of video games and how flight simulator technology was being applied. When I left college I went in the air force and became a flight simulator technician. I chose that job from the list based on reading about it in Omni.
Definitely the best decision I ever made. I found I had a knack for technology and working on/with computers. At my high school there were no computers, most people had never seen one. I never saw a computer in college except maybe in the administration building when they took my money. If I had not read that article and chosen a technology field in the AF I would probably be a burnt out school teacher.
Great aside from the mixing of science and fringe (Score:3, Informative)
Mondo 2000 (Score:3, Informative)
Anyone remember Mondo 2000? I bought & read issues of that, but looking back, it was just pure performance art garbage. I swear that magazine tried to worship anyone related to The WELL in every issue. Oooh! Circuit bending! Ooh! My life on a webcam! Boy did that get old.
buttered cat array (Yes, I found it) (Score:4, Informative)
I cut and pasted the top of the page here, go to the link to read it in all its glory.
http://www.deepscience.com/justsilly/fun006.html [deepscience.com]
Results of a contest for "theories" sponsored by Omni magazine.
Back -- Next
GRAND PRIZE WINNER:
When a cat is dropped, it always lands on its feet. And when toast is dropped, it always lands with the buttered side facing down. I propose to strap buttered toast to the back of a cat; the two will hover, spinning inches above the ground. With a giant buttered cat array, a high-speed monorail could easily link New York with Chicago. [see below for further info on buttered cats - Ed.]
RUNNERS-UP:
#1 If an infinite number of rednecks riding in an infinite number of pickup trucks fire an infinite number of shotgun rounds at an infinite number of highway signs, they will eventually produce all the world's great literary works in Braille.
#2 Why Yawning Is Contagious: You yawn to equalize the pressure on your eardrums. This pressure change outside your eardrums unbalances other people's ear pressures, so they must yawn to even it out.
#3 Communist China is technologically underdeveloped because they have no alphabet and therefore cannot use acronyms to communicate ideas at a faster rate.
#4 The earth may spin faster on its axis due to deforestation. Just as a figure skater's rate of spin increases when the arms are brought in close to the body, the cutting of tall trees may cause our planet to spin dangerously fast.
HONORABLE MENTION:
The quantity of consonants in the English language is constant. If omitted in one place, they turn up in another. When a Bostonian "pahks" his "cah," the lost r's migrate southwest, causing a Texan to "warsh" his car and invest in "erl wells."
Re:I would really like to find copies of the (Score:3, Informative)
Terry Bisson's They're Made of Meat [eastoftheweb.com]
One of my all-time favorites for what it makes you think of the end, somewhat like some of Asimov's stories that were only two or three pages.