• The Leitrim Observer reports that Star Trek XI's Simon Pegg will be awarded an honorary fellowship from the University of Gloucestershire for his "significant contribution to the arts." A native of Gloucestershire, Pegg said, ""I'm honoured to be receiving this fellowship, not least because it comes from an area very special to my heart. No matter where I go, Gloucester will always be my home and I can't wait to come back for this special visit"

• Pegg is not the only Star Trek actor to be honored with an award. As reported by Independent.ie, Star Trek: The Next Generation's Patrick Stewart received a Samuel Beckett Award at Trinity College in Dublin. "This is one of the nicest things I have ever been given," said Stewart. "Strangely and appropriately the next thing I am doing is a production of Samuel Beckett's 'Waiting for Godot' with Sir Ian McKellen. I saw it when I was seventeen and it has always been an ambition of mine to do a production of it since then."

  Waiting for Godot, reports Broadway.com, is the story of two homeless men waiting for someone or something named Godot. The two men, Vladimir (Stewart) and Estragon ( Ian McKellen) inhabit a drama spun from their own consciousness. The play will begin previews at the Theatre Royal Haymarket in April of 2009.

• Star Trek XI's Roberto Orci spoke recently about Star Trek XI and Fringe according to www.dwscifi.com. Orci was confident that pushing Star Trek XI to a summer release was a good thing. "We've only got fifty per cent of the effects shots in, so, in a way, that's a relief that we have more time," he said. "We also took the studio at their word that they were confident that the movie could open in the summer. If they had asked us to do all kinds of weird rewrites and re-shoots, we would have known that they were worried, but they believe in it." Orci also said that he saw no reason why they wouldn't all be back for the next Star Trek.

• TrekWeb reports that the latest installment in the Star Trek Federation One fan production series has been released today. Unity is part of a mini-series which focuses on the President of the United Federation of Planets. Producer Rob Caves explained that "We'll see the day-to-day operation of the Federation and the inner workings of its government for the first time."

• From KTAR.com comes the news of a construction project taken on by a Kino School student. Seventeen-year-old Thomas McNiece took over an entire classroom to build a full-scale model of the bridge of the USS Enterprise. Using computer graphics to produce a blueprint of the room, he wired the display for flashing lights and he created video footage to accompany a performance about a diplomatic mission gone awry. McNiece, a senior at the school, is considering a career in set design.

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