The idea is great and the link somewhat entertaining. But the research on the link, as is demonstrated by some of the commentators, is lousy, and the blogposter just won't admit it. How can HAL9000 be inspired by 1990s-style CCTV cameras?

This doesn't matter too much for a fun piece of reading - except that it's not presented as speculation (until challenged). Playing fast and loose with the facts damages credibility.

Ironic, since she eviscerated Discover Magazine in a post a month or so ago for errors in their '20 Things You Didn't Know About Science Fiction" list.

Oh well, nothing like trufans (tm) to take the fun out of something.

I had read at the time of the film's release that the The "Star Wars" Imperial Walker's form was based on a Ice age mega mammal:

Indricotherium transsouralicum*
Height: 16ft (4.7m)
Lived: 30 million years ago - 25 million years ago
  Also known as Baluchitherium or Paraceratherium. Indricotheres were
  the largest mammals to ever walk the earth. Depending on the source, these
  overgrown rhinos were thought to weigh between 11 and 20 tons.

link:
http://www.kokogiak.com/megafauna/strange.asp

Is is just me, or is blogging about blogging total bullshit? I mean, the original, mediocre i09 blog post was made, isn't that enough?
Over at Gawker, they seem to be under quite a bit of pressure to churn out content at the expense of quality. Are Boing Boing bloggers under the same pressure?
Don't get me wrong Xeni, some of your stuff is great. Like that piece you did on the steamworks, it just blew me away. This is more of a general thing I'm noticing around the internets right now.

is blogging about blogging total bullshit

Isn't that the nature of an uberblog?

That blog post was beyond weak. With, say, 10 more (any?) minutes of research, Newitz could have discovered that much of the Imperial Walker design (particulary the legs and feet) was lifted from a (uncredited) 1968 Syd Mead painting. Quote from Syd Mead interview:

"And yes, my original 'snow walker' was done in 1968 for United States Steel. It was definitely 'copied' as an articulation model for the Imperial Snow Walker machines."

Also (puts geek hat on), Boba Fett's ship is an exact dupe of the streetlights found outside the old ILM buildings. Jeez, that's even on wikipedia!

You don't need a license to have a baby or a blog, and it shows.

Well, uberblog sounds like a lame excuse to just blog about what someone else has blogged about. I'm not saying that once something has been blogged about that it should never be broached again by another blogger. Just that they should at least try to put a different spin on it or cover some aspect of it that hasn't been touched upon yet. Or, in this case, that its even worth blogging about in the first place. I mean really, why point out such a lame posting in the first place. It looks like everyone else who checked it out has called bullshit right away.

No idea which came first, but the Army Transportation Museum at Fort Eustis, Virginia, has a freaking walker. It's a thing of beauty, standing somewhat neglectedly by the building with the exhibits inside. They also have hovercrafts (sans eels), a disk-like flying wing with bird nests in the air intakes, a jet pack film, and, scariest of all, a six-foot propellor with a platform on top of it that some volunteer was supposed to stand on, clutching handlebars.

The museum is worth a special trip. It's not far from Norfolk, between Newport News and Williamsburg, off of 64. (Naturally, the really good stuff doesn't seem to be on their web page.)

http://www.transchool.eustis.army.mil/Museum/Museum.html

You may already know that George Lucas was allegedly inspired to create the AT-ATs by these cargo lifters at the Port of Oakland

As pointed out above that's bogus. It's urban legend. Too bad as it's a good idea for an article, but now I have to believe the whole piece is a joke.