Since 1993
About Star Bound
A subscriber-funded magazine about living somewhere other than here, begun in Alaska and put back together from what survived.
Star Bound Magazine was subscriber-funded. The idea started in 1993, and the plan was to collect ideas about living somewhere other than here. It was straightforward, and probably naive: sell enough subscriptions, and put the proceeds into a private space program.
It ran out of Alaska. The same site carried the magazine, my father's fiction, and the guided watercraft tours I was running in Prince William Sound. It picked up close to forty thousand visits before the host deleted the files with no backup.
The first business card carried a line I wrote for it and have kept since: Turning dreams of the night into the challenges of the day. That is still the job description.
This page is the start of putting it back together from what survived in the Internet Archive. The letter below is the one that opened it, and under that is the list of what we were setting out to cover.
What this magazine covers
Set out in 1998. Unchanged in intent.
Space colonization
- Theories and ideas on how to colonize space
- Should we colonize? Both the yes and the no sides of the question
- What are the benefits — power needs, unlimited resources
- What happens if we do not colonize
- What kind of habitats should we live in
- Psychological effects of living in space for extended periods
- How close are we to moving into space
Science
- Medical science, and how it benefits in space
- Geology, earth science, environmental science
- Engineering, physics, chemistry, biology
- Planetary engineering, and how it affects space policy and planning
Space
- Astronomy — how astronomers map out the sky
- Exploration: should we, and how should we
- Interstellar and interplanetary travel
- Effects of zero gravity
- How distances between planets and stars are measured
New technologies
- Computers, the internet, robotics
- Closed ecological life support systems
- Power generation and communications
- New rocket ship designs and launching systems
- Waveriders, Skylon, skyhooks
- Single stage to orbit — reusable launch vehicles
- How does that work?
- The mechanics of simple things everyone uses. How the display on a quartz watch works. How resistors work.
- Testing your science knowledge
- Commonly held scientific facts in layman's terms — orbital mechanics and their effect on objects in any given orbit.
- Transitions
- Old science fiction and early science that was only a dream and has since turned real. Leonardo da Vinci draws up the first helicopter; would he not be impressed with what we have now?
- Technology transfer
- Technologies developed for space and since taken up by the private sector. CAT scans, first developed by NASA for use in low earth orbit, have saved hundreds of millions of lives through early detection.
- Up and coming writers
- Short and serialized science fiction by unpublished or under-published authors.
- Theories
- For anyone with ideas or theories relevant to the broad purview of the magazine.
- International space forum
- Coverage of international space activities and the commercial launch market around the world.
- NASA news and accomplishments
- Following NASA's missions, and evaluating earlier discoveries for their relevance to what comes next.
If your work belongs somewhere on that list, it will have a home here. Submissions are not open yet — the magazine is being rebuilt first, and writers' guidelines will be published when it is ready to receive them.
About the cover
The original painting still hangs on my wall. The logo and all of the lettering are mine; the airbrushed background was painted by my friend Dave Haney in Idaho.
- Logo and lettering — John Lang
- Airbrushed background — Dave Haney
- First published — 1995