Walking Dead, Fear the Walking Dead, Orphan Black, Mr. Robot, Z Nation, Humans, Even Rick and Morty - an Epic, Seven-in-One Piece of Fan Fiction

This is going to be the best "very special episode of" ever.

Who doesn't love a good crossover? You know, like Ray Romano showing up on King of Queens. The doctors from St. Regis having a drink at Cheers. Granny from the Beverly Hillbillies appearing on Mister Ed.

I guess that was on my mind lately. I was wondering - as many have - if there was any way to connect the cast of The Walking Dead with the spinoff show Fear the Walking Dead (I recap both shows for the WSJ, as you can see here and here, so I tend to think about them quite a bit.) The former is set in Georgia, and the latter in Los Angeles, and in case you don't know, the trains aren't running. So having these two groups of apocalypse survivors meet is pretty unlikely, but not impossible. Maybe it would have something to do with the cast of Z Nation? After all, they're in the same zombie boat, and trying to get from the east coast to California.

Then it occurred to me that there are a bunch of shows I watch that could conceivably be crossed over. Besides the three zombie shows, I also like Mr. Robot, Orphan Black, and Humans. Could there be a way to write one story that combines characters from all those shows? Just for fun, as a sort of as a writer's exercise, I tried to dream up a way to do it.

It all tumbled together quickly. Within an hour had the outline of one story that connects every show I follow on a regular basis. Essentially, it's this: A hacker society knocks out power across the country, which releases deadly rats from a genetics lab that spread a zombie plague. The only way to stop it is for the scientists at the lab to get back the one man who is immune, but he's clear across the country.

You can see where it's going if you watch the shows. What's more, it works out in a way that is actually pretty organic. It connects several completely separate shows (well, sort of completely separate) and doesn't violate the internal logic of any of them, I think, taking only minor liberties.

I even figured out a way to get a Rick and Morty cameo in there.

The Walking Dead Premiere at Madison Square Garden

I was lucky enough to get a press pass to attend Friday night's "Walking Dead" extravaganza at Madison Square Garden. You can read my piece on it for the Journal here. But, I took a bunch of photos, most of which we couldn't use for the post, so I thought I'd share those here.

I will say, personally, it was a blast. It was very unusual to watch a TV show in a theater setting, with a huge high-def screen and pounding sound system. With more than 10,000 other fans cheering and screaming, it was unlike almost anything else I've ever experienced.

They really did a great job of creating the right atmosphere. They had people shambling around dressed up like zombies:

And they even trucked in the Governor's aquarium:

Home Movies Will Never Be the Same

Back in the spring, when I went to South by Southwest, I met up with Sean Ramsey, a Toronto production guy who had ditched his production company to start a new company building 360-degree cameras. He called it the bublcam, and that day he gave me a little demo of it.

This month, the company sent me one to test out for myself, which I've been doing. Here are some of the photos I've taken. It's not quite as easy as shooting with your cellphone, but your cellphone can't do this.

I was in Washington on the 10th for a conference, and took a little time to walk around the Mall.

The Washington Monument:

Lafayette Square:
The Lincoln Memorial:

Bitcoin at OnCue

I should've put this on here a while ago. It's the talk I did with Mike and the Economist's Matthew Bishop in June at the OnCue2015 conference in Boston. This panel was held in the Memorial Church at Harvard.

It was shot with a VSN Mobil 360-degree camera. I just placed the camera on our table, and let it run. The way the software works, it cuts the video in half for viewing in these kinds of environments, but if you watched this with virtual-reality goggles, you'd get the full 360-experience. It's kind of wild.

My 1914 Penny

UPDATE: So, my 1914 penny is not a 1914 penny, and it's not worth much more than a penny, either.

Took it to an appraiser in midtown, who took one look at it with a magnifying glass, said it was a 1917 penny, and mumbled something about its worth.

"It's what?" I said.

"A penny, a penny," he said real fast, not wanting to waste one second on it. "It's a penny and it's worth a penny."

Here's the original post:

This morning I was pulling some change out of my pocket, to dump into a little coin jar we have in the house. I'd just come back from grocery shopping. As my hand was going toward the jar, I just happened to notice that the penny on top - back side facing up - had wheat leaves on it. That automatically means it's an older coin. They stopped the wheat leaves design in 1956.

It first, I couldn't even make out the year, so faded were the numerals. I had to actually take a picture of the coin, and magnify the picture. As you can see, it's seems to be "1914."

I did a quick Google search, and found a pretty good piece about 1914 pennies. The bottom line is I don't think my penny is worth all that much more than a penny.

There were three series that year, from mints in Denver, Philadelphia, and San Francisco. The Denver pennies have a D under the year, and are the rarest. They have the most value. The San Francisco pennies have an S under the year, and are also valuable. The Philly pennies don't have a marking, and are the least valuable.

It's possible that my penny has an extremely worn D or S on it, but I can't see it at all. Which would make it a Philly penny, and worth about 60 cents. I also found a coin appraiser just a few blocks from my office, so I'll bring it over there just out of interest.

Still, it is absolutely wild to me that this penny is 101 years old, and that it's been in circulation all that time and is still in circulation.

We've Gone to Bandcamp

We've gone to bandcamp. Really.

Bandcamp is an online site, for musicians mainly, a sort of sales platform and social network rolled into one. Artists can sell their music, set the prices, talk to fans, follow other artists, and so on. The website is good, and the mobile app is even better. They have a nice product for musicians, and have managed to sell a good number of albums over the years.

They've recently expanded into audiobooks, and the publisher of our audiobook, Gildan, suggested that we put the book on there for sale. I met the team running the site when we were out in San Francisco (they were literally a few blocks north of 20Mission, on the top floor of the US Bank building in Mission District, I think it was the 13th or 14th, in this big open office space with giant plate-glass windows and a phenomenal view of the city. I can't believe I didn't take a single picture.)

Not sure that I actually had much choice in the matter, but I was impressed by the site, and what they were building, and agreed that we should put the book up there. So we did. The player above provides an excerpt from the audiobook, narrated by Sean Pratt, and will take you to our page on Bandcamp.

Give it a shot!

The New York Times Review

Can't believe I didn't post this earlier, but the New York Times reviewed The Age of Cryptocurrency in its March 22 edition, in a piece written by Columbia University's Emanuel Derman, who called it a "thorough, timely and colorful book."

It's going to sound kind of silly, but to be blunt this is something I've dreamed about for decades. To have your book reviewed in the Times? There just isn't anything that tops that. I'll be honest with you, I get a just a little bit emotional even thinking about it.

This whole past year has been like a storm with this book. It's been a mad dash, and massive undertaking, like trying to run a two-hour marathon, and we never really had time, well, I never did at least, to sit back and just reflect on what it all means. Seeing the book on a bookshelf for the first time was one big moment, like a musician I'd imagine hearing their song on the radio for the first time. It's hard to explain exactly the feeling.

The other big moment is picking up the Sunday Times, and seeing your book reviewed there.