Digital Scrapbooking

***Please fill registration [form](https://forms.office.com/r/y5UgWSbP8P) before 10th Februray, 5:30 PM*** **.NET Aspire is Microsoft’s opinionated toolkit for building, composing, and running modern distributed applications with a strong focus on local development and observability.** In this session, we’ll explore how Aspire can be used as the backbone of a modern application by building and evolving a distributed system live. The talk will be almost entirely demo-driven, using the terminal and VS Code, with minimal slides and no traditional PowerPoint, focusing on how Aspire works in practice rather than theory. **What to expect** * 🎤 Demos about Aspire * 💬 Plenty of time for Q&A and open discussion * 🤝 Casual networking with developers of all levels * 🍕 Snacks & drinks provided (while they last!) ***Note: Please fill registration [form](https://forms.office.com/r/y5UgWSbP8P) before 10th Februray, 5:30 PM*** **Schedule** * 17:30 - 18:00 - pizza and networking * 18:00 - 19:00 - talk * 19:00 - 19:30 - wrap up **Sponsors** * [Microsoft](https://www.microsoft.com/) \- Venue * [Arinco](https://arinco.com.au/) \- Food and drinks ***Note: Please fill registration [form](https://forms.office.com/r/y5UgWSbP8P) before 10th Februray, 5:30 PM***

Let's Crop!

**Our February novel is: Julia by Sandra Newman** **This month is a classic, dystopian, fiction, literary fiction, women’s fiction, and science fiction novel. The book is 394 pages in print and 14 hours and 20 minutes on audiobook.** **An imaginative, feminist, and brilliantly relevant-to-today retelling of Orwell’s 1984, from the point of view of Winston Smith’s lover, Julia, by critically acclaimed novelist Sandra Newman.** Julia Worthing is a mechanic, working in the Fiction Department at the Ministry of Truth. It’s 1984, and Britain (now called Airstrip One) has long been absorbed into the larger trans-Atlantic nation of Oceania. Oceania has been at war for as long as anyone can remember, and is ruled by an ultra-totalitarian Party, whose leader is a quasi-mythical figure called Big Brother. In short, everything about this world is as it is in Orwell’s 1984. All her life, Julia has known only Oceania, and, until she meets Winston Smith, she has never imagined anything else. She is an ideal citizen: cheerfully cynical, always ready with a bribe, piously repeating every political slogan while believing in nothing. She routinely breaks the rules, but also collaborates with the regime when necessary. Everyone likes Julia. Then one day she finds herself walking toward Winston Smith in a corridor and impulsively slips him a note, setting in motion the devastating, unforgettable events of the classic story. Julia takes us on a surprising journey through Orwell’s now-iconic dystopia, with twists that reveal unexpected sides not only to Julia, but to other familiar figures in the 1984 universe. This unique perspective lays bare our own world in haunting and provocative ways, just as the original did almost seventy-five years ago.

**I’m planning future book club meetups and would love your input. Please choose your top three from the list below—your picks will help decide what we read next!** **Book Options** *The Hong Kong Widow* – Kristen Loesch *American Spy* – Lauren Wilkinson *God of the Woods* – Liz Moore *Listen for the Lie* – Amy Tintera *The Swallows* – Lisa Lutz *The Drowning Kind* – Jennifer McMahon *The Eights* – Joanna Miller *The Quiet Librarian* – Allen Eskens Thanks so much for sharing your pick! Please **reply in the comments** with your top three. I can’t wait to see which books rise to the top and to discuss them together at our next meetups.

NFT's are here to stay folks! This is a group for like minded people interested in understanding, leveraging, using, creating for, profiting from, trading too i suppose, NFT's.. everything around them, complexity, fear and exploits, best practices and more. **PLUS** This group will talk AI ART tools, techniques, artists, video, audio, prototypes and more in the AI assisted production space- ART specifically, but we can get into any aspect of some of the cooler things happening in AI in general.

Welcome, readers! Our February read is **_1984 by George Orwell._** In 1984, George Orwell imagines a world where the government watches everyone, rewrites reality, and punishes even private thoughts. Winston Smith dares to question this system, believing that truth and love might still exist. His rebellion draws him into a chilling struggle against a power that knows him better than he knows himself. The novel leaves readers asking whether freedom is possible when reality itself can be controlled. Looking forward to discussing with everyone! We will meet at Zaftig Brewing Co in their event room in the back. We are welcome to bring in our own food, but **drinks must be purchased at the bar.** Happy reading! 📖