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2007 Nebula Awards Preliminary Ballot Released

The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America have released the Preliminary Ballot for the 2007 Nebula Awards.

I've read Rollback by Robert J. Sawyer, Odyssey, by Jack McDevitt, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, by J.K. Rowling and I am currently reading Mainspring, by Jay Lake.

Spoilers for Rollback:


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In Rollback the idea that second message for the aliens could not be decoded because the key, Sarah Halifax’s answers to their original ethics quiz contained one value different from that announced is ludicrous. Firstly it would be impossible to the message sent out without the entire world knowing and secondly the use of this very slightly changed answer as a key would be instantly noticed.

On receiving the second message I imagine the conversation between Cody McGavin and his AI would go like this:

Cody: Decode the second message; use the answers to the first message as a key.
AI (a few seconds later): No matches
Cody: Assume a few answers got scrambled during transmission
AI (a minute later): Got it! Answer #20 by person #100 was C not D.
Cody: Great! By the way did the Leafs win tonight?

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