In 2002 the rights to Aboriginal Science Fiction were acquired by Absolute Magnitude.

In an interview Charles Ryan explained his choice of name as follows: At that time there was Analog, and Asimov's, and Amazing, which had all been around for a while.

We looked at those names and realized that newer authors -- the people we wanted to focus on -- would use one of two methods to choose who they'd submit to.

Then we thought of "Aboriginal", and came up with this whole story about an alien anthropologist who'd been sent to Earth to study the indigenous population -- the Aboriginals -- and got so intrigued by science fiction that he started to beam it back as part of his reports to his home world.

Sure, it was a cornball gimmick -- but it worked!In 1988 Absolute Entertainment, Inc. released an 80-page anthology called Aboriginal Science Fiction 1988 Annual Anthology which contained twelve stories from earlier issues of the magazine.