73 thoughts on “Pixel Scroll 1/23/19 I Should Be Writing But I’m Sitting Home Watching Pixels Scroll”

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2. (9) The thing the Hildebrandts did that I liked was a series of posters for schools, depicting fantasy versions of the lunchroom, study hall, and so on. Most of their other material didn’t sway me one way or the other: I didn’t dislike it, but it didn’t speak to me. Still and all, I always wished they’d have been chosen to illustrate an edition of Bored of the Rings (search doesn’t show one, nor does it reveal any of the school posters).

   Looking at a page of search results for them, I see they apparently dug Maxfield Parrish as much as I, and more power to them for their taste.

3. (4) RSR ARTIST RESOURCE.

   I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: it is really NOT cool to include ineligible works on that page. Nominators should not be basing their decisions on anything but 2018 work.

   And as far as I can tell, only 19 of the 102 artists listed on that page actually have the three eligible 2018 works required to be eligible for the category, which is why the rest of them don’t have galleries on the Best Professional Artist Hugo: Eligible Works from 2018 page.

   This is so extremely inappropriate, presenting ineligible works for nominators to consider when drawing up their ballots. This does Hugo nominators a real disservice.

4. (11) What? No edit window? Okay. Big fan of Dr. D., especially of the early days when he played existing recordings and not stuff people sent him. I recorded him off the air over KFML, and apparently got on the bandwagon pretty promptly. I recorded one show, listened to it for a week, and recorded the next week’s show over it. The one I recorded over it was his third syndicated program. I spent the intervening years wishing I still had the other program, which I finally re-acquired through the miracle of the Dementia web page. And we all wore onions on our belts, because it was the fashion then.

   ps: I don’t believe I’m the only one here who has to type in name, email, etc., every time… am I?

5. (11) I listened to Dr. Demento every week for a few years in college.great stuff.

   @Kip: I think everyone does.

6. Hey, Scroll Title credit! Yay!

   9) The city I live in Minnesota, Roseville, one of only two cities that touches both Minneapolis and St. Paul, was Richard Dean Anderson’s birthplace.

7. (9). No SF/F authors? How about Walter Miller (1/23/1923 – 1/9/1996), who wrote A Canticle for Leibowitz. My high school American Lit teacher assigned this, the only genre work I was ever quizzed on in English or in American Lit (my German teacher did have us read “Jabberwocky” in German).

8. @Kip Williams: the retyping was extensively discussed some time ago; IIRC it happened to pretty much everyone as a result of an interface (WordPress?) needing to comply with European privacy rules and not wanting to have to suss out where it or the writer was. OTOH, I don’t know whether it’s a browser property or something else, but if I type in the first letter I get a short menu of choices rather than having to type in the whole string. I suspect it’s Foxfire-related, as some of the choices are completely unrelated things I use this browser for, but it seems useful enough that other browsers should have it — maybe it’s not the default on yours?

9. Pleasant celebrity encounters: I’ll skip SF authors, because growing up in fandom means the list is simply too long, but I once met Dr. Timothy Leary, and we ended up discussing Dune for about half an hour. He was a big fan (as was I).

   Ok, not exactly a hero of mine, but it was a surprisingly pleasant experience.

   I also enjoyed meeting Chuck Yeager when I did some brief work on the motion control systems used for The Right Stuff, and he’s a little closer to being a hero of mine, but it was a much more brief encounter.

10. 18)
    I have to say that I’m very sick of this anti-anti Marie Kondo backlash. Of course, any racist comments about Ms. Kondo are completely inappropriate, as is calling her a monster. But that doesn’t mean that you cannot criticise Marie Kondo and the movement she represents. Is it unfair that the mnimalism and decluttering backlash focusses mainly on Marie Kondo? Probably. But then she is the most visible face of the minimalism and decluttering movement right now, so she gets the brunt of it. Besides, I’ve been hearing criticism of Marie Kondo for years before that Netflix show came out.

    That said, I hate the current minimalism fad and this whole decluttering movement, especially the anti-consumerist spin it’s being given. Because making you throw out things that are still useful (and some decluttering gurus want you to throw out anything you haven’t used in six months, which means a lot of seasonal items are caught up in this) means that you have to buy new ones next time you need them. It’s basically a way to get you to buy more stuff.

    If you feel the need to throw out things (and I feel that need on occasion, too) or if you like to live in minimalist homes, feel free to do so. Just let everybody else live the way they prefer.

11. Chip Hitchcock: I type in the first letter and it fills two of the three blanks. Another blog I go to calls for the same info but doesn’t even do that much for me. I’ve gotten pretty good at typing “kipwblog.blogspot.com” now, as I do it several times every day.

    I remember the discussion. I was sort of hoping things might have changed.

12. Ah, can’t edit, so I’ll just add it here:

    BTW, J.K. Rowling’s crime fiction pen name is Robert Galbraith. Cormoran Strike is the name of the protagonist. I only read the first book in the series, but it was pretty good.

13. I’ve always loved Dr. Demento and hearing him perform live at the Reno Worldcon was a treat. Plus he brought us Weird Al Yankovic.

    Cora: Do the Germans still have this tradition that a couple of times a year they put stuff they don’t want on the street for other people to take? What’s that called? I agree with you that people ought to use their stuff until it’s worn out.

14. (11) I listened to Dr. Demento every week for a few years in college.great stuff.

    @Kip: I think everyone does.

    I still do, thanks to drdemento.com. (He still produces a new show every week–the topic last Saturday was part 2 was his tribute to the old west.)

    I’ve been listening to him since 1978, and now have a collection of nearly 2600 shows (for many years, he also produced a second show, live on local radio in LA, and they’ve released recordings of many of those on drdemento.com in addition to the new weekly show).

    I’m surprised they did a story now about Covered in Punk–it’s been out for nearly a year.

    (We’re having lunch with him on Sunday, while he’s in Portland for his annual presentations at his alma mater, Reed College.)

15. @Martin Wooster
    You probably mean Sperrmüll, which means large size trash, i.e. trash too big to fit a conventional trashcan. It’s not put out on the street for others to take, though people certainly do and no one minds. In fact, it’s put out on the street for the garbage truck to collect.

    There used to be special Sperrmüll dates when you could put out your large size trash. Nowadays, you call the garbage collection company and request a Sperrmüll collection. I think it’s free once a year.

    Of course, if someone has Sperrmüll out, more trash will accumulate, brought by neighbours who just happen to have a non-working TV or an old coffee table standing around. Useful objects will also vanish, taken by folks who still have a use for it.

    If you don’t want to throw your old furniture, etc… on the Sperrmüll, there also are so called social department stores to whom you can donate your stuff (provided it’s still good) and who will then refurbish it and sell it at a very low price (basically just to cover the cost) to poor people. There are also recycling centres for electronic trash, bicycles and the like. This is actually the option I favour, though Sperrmüll is more convenient and some stuff simply isn’t reusable.

16. Around here (left coast US), we have a tradition of putting stuff you don’t want out on the street at any time, as long as you pull it back in within a couple of days if nobody else wants it.

    My town in particular is very supportive of this practice, because it has A. a large “starving student” population, and B. a large eco-warrior population. 🙂

17. (9) For Rutger Hauer, I would surely include Blind Fury (1989), given his character Nick’s rather supernatural abilities. A most entertaining film.

18. (4) Wow, I totally missed the requirement for three eligible works when a finalist accepts the nomination. Thanks for pointing that out, JJ.

    I’ll probably trim my list tomorrow, though I’m now really tempted to download ISFDB and run a custom query to generate the list of artists who did art for three or more books/magazines/stories in 2018 (especially since thumbnails come for free with most books in that database). Integrating ISFDB into RSR and calculating scores for all short fiction and novels from the past 30 years based on awards and year’s best anthologies is on my to-do list for later this year, but maybe I can set aside next week to try it with Pro Artists first. 🙂

19. Here in much of New England, it’s also normal practice to put unwanted but potentially usable things out before trash day, to be taken by whoever wants them.

    In the communities I’ve lived in, if they are items that can be collected by the regular trash collectors if not taken by scavengers, it’s acceptable to leave them. If not, then you need to call the designated company for taking large things away.

    I once put out a washing machine and called the haulers of large trash. Then I had to call them back and cancel because, despite clear signage that it needed repairs I couldn’t afford, someone decided it was worth their trouble to haul away. Maybe they wanted it for parts, maybe they felt able to do the repairs.

20. 9) There were so many cool movies that Rutger Hauer was part of. Wedlock, Flesh + Blood and the underrated Split Second. And then this weird apocalyptian movie called Blood of Heroes, like a mix of Mad Max and Rollerball. Good times.

21. Eric Wong: I’m now really tempted to download ISFDB and run a custom query to generate the list of artists who did art for three or more books/magazines/stories in 2018

    That’s not a bad idea. But be aware that you’ll have to weed out the re-printed and re-issued works with older publication years and covers, for example:
    http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?649366
    http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?2440811

22. Here in San Francisco, it’s ‘illegal’ to put things out on the sidewalk but that never stops anyone. If the city wanted to cut this back, it should be easier to dispose of larger items.
    I will say that where it used to be that you could find really cool stuff, since the internet, you really don’t find as much. Just like the Goodwill and Salvation Army used to be great for old stuff.
    Dratted HGTV and Ebay.

23. It used to be that there was a yearly council clear-up for bulky items that you would leave outside your house. In the interval of time between people putting stuff out and the council collecting it, people would take stuff they liked the look of. A few years back there were so many old-style CRT TVs that the people who use to grab stuff for scrap just wen by cutting off the power cables as the only thing worthwhile in TV was the copper in the power cord.

    The council changed it to a thing you had to book-in. You can book a bulky goods removal once a year. The last time we used it, we got rid of an old lounge chair, which I removed from the house by throwing it from an upstairs balcony (that’s a longer story and also a longer storey). Unfortunately, the council pick up was delayed and this horrible old thing sat outside the house for weeks in the pouring rain. Eventually it was picked up…on the same day (but just after) the Google Street View car had driven by…thus memorialising the chair forever.

24. I have fond memories of listening to Dr. Demento and hoping for something wacky like Fish Heads or My Name is Larry.

    I also live near one of Those Unofficial Corners in San Francisco and have acquired some nice endtables that way. Sometimes there are entire couches.

    As far as the filling in, I use a password manager, and it automatically fills in things for me. I’ve been filling in my name manually lately because it defaults me as Charon D. but I want to celebrate the full-name fad.

25. I had been collecting weird and strange music for a few years when I first came upon Dr. Demento. It was a really nice surprise to find so much good stuff at once. Dead Puppies is still my favourite.

26. @Camestros – beware, someone will try to identify you by means of that chair!

    Meanwhile, I’ll leave this here. A perfect accessory for your credential

    Now reading ‘Terra Nullius’ an interesting if imperfect take on colonisation

27. @Eric Wong: I’m of the opinion that you should keep your Pro Artists page as it is. The award is for a person and not a work. You’ve clearly marked what is 2018 work and what isn’t. And there have been times when I’ve used the direction an artist is going in their work to help me make a decision between two otherwise close calls. In fact, I very often go from a resource like yours (or JJ’s) to the artist’s website to see if the work I liked is a good representative of their usual style and taste.

    And I don’t agree that the requirement for the acceptance of nominations should always be used by the nominators in their decision making. The definition of professional publication is so broad that I feel that many artists may have published work that isn’t linked to their name publicly but which would be eligible for the acceptance of a nomination. I would hate to exclude an artist from my nominating ballot just because I’m not in a position to know an artist’s full range of work.

    I know there are lots of people who feel otherwise, but there already are resources such as JJ’s excellent page here on File 770 and the Spreadsheet of Doom which do restrict included artists to those with three 2018 published works. There’s no need for all the resources to be in lockstep with each other.

    I know someone will correct me if I’m wrong but haven’t finalists included artworks in their Hugo packets which appeared in semiprozines? I seem to recall John Picacio doing so one year. So I’m not sure the situation is quite so clear cut.

28. Lorien Gray: And I don’t agree that the requirement for the acceptance of nominations should always be used by the nominators in their decision making. The definition of professional publication is so broad that I feel that many artists may have published work that isn’t linked to their name publicly but which would be eligible for the acceptance of a nomination.

    I don’t think it’s that broad. The rule is
    3.3.12: Best Professional Artist. An illustrator whose work has appeared in a professional publication in the field of science fiction or fantasy during the previous calendar year.
    3.2.11: A Professional Publication is one which meets at least one of the following two criteria:
    (1) it provided at least a quarter the income of any one person or,
    (2) was owned or published by any entity which provided at least a quarter the income of any of its staff and/or owner.

    It’s not just “a professional publication”. It’s “a professional publication in the field of science fiction or fantasy”.

    My concern is that nominators will not realize that they’re using one of their precious nomination slots on someone who doesn’t have at least 3 eligible works and who would not be allowed onto the ballot, even assuming that enough people nominated that artist (which is what happened with 2 Pro Artists in 2017).

    And if anyone points me to eligible work I’ve missed, I’m happy to get them added to the gallery right away.

     
    Lorien Gray: I know someone will correct me if I’m wrong but haven’t finalists included artworks in their Hugo packets which appeared in semiprozines?

    They have when they’re finalist for Fan Artist. I’m not aware of any Semiprozine covers which have been included for Pro Artist portfolios in the packets for recent years. (Although about a third of the Pro Artist works in last year’s packet were first published in 2016 or 2018, when they were supposed to be from 2017, so if the Hugo people are not paying attention, ineligible work can get included.)

29. Lorien Gray, I’d like to add that I am not at all happy with the rules for the Professional Artist category as they currently stand, and I was really disappointed at San Jose when a number of WSFS members chose to punt it back to committee rather than passing the changes that had been proposed by the Hugo Category Committee.

30. (9) English composer Rutland Boughton: born 23 January 1878, died 1960.
    Founded the first Glastonbury Festival (ran from 1914 – 1926). He wrote a series of five operas based on Arthurian legend but his best known work is the opera The Immortal Hour. The latter work was very popular during the 1920’s and it’s depiction of faerie folk seems to me very likely to have influenced Tolkien’s portrayal of elves.

31. In 2017, our neighborhood started a community Facebook group. Since then, the practice is to put out unwanted items a day before trash day and post a description on the Facebook group letting people know they can take it if they want.

32. JJ: “My concern is that nominators will not realize that they’re using one of their precious nomination slots on someone who doesn’t have at least 3 eligible works and who would not be allowed onto the ballot…”

    I do understand that concern, and I appreciate your approach in putting together your page. It’s been a great resource for me. But I also appreciate Eric’s approach to his page. The works are clearly marked so that I know what is 2018 and what is not. I think both approaches are valid and I like having both resources available to me. Both of you have made very clear what standards for inclusion you’ve used, making it easy for users to choose one or the other, or both, if they want. I think having the two of you coming at the same issue from different points contributes something very valuable that I would not like to see lost.

    I’m interested in getting your opinion on something. If Macmillan decided to produce a calendar with the theme of ‘beauty and the beast,’ I believe any art purchased for that calendar would qualify as a professional publication in the field of fantasy for the purposes of the three 2018 works requirement. Art commissioned for Magic: The Gathering cards would also qualify in my opinion. That’s what I meant by saying the definition of professional publication is so broad that it would be easy to miss things. Am I way off base? I know magazine and books are the usual contenders, but do these other categories count as well?

33. Pro Artist is one of the categories that almost makes me think that the puppies had a point. Not their methods, but that the Hugos are a closed garden.
    There’s a ten year period with only 11 nominees, but I can’t remember exactly when. It really feels like people nominate whoever was on the ballot the last year.

34. Lorien Gray: I’m interested in getting your opinion on something. If Macmillan decided to produce a calendar with the theme of ‘beauty and the beast,’ I believe any art purchased for that calendar would qualify as a professional publication in the field of fantasy for the purposes of the three 2018 works requirement. Art commissioned for Magic: The Gathering cards would also qualify in my opinion. That’s what I meant by saying the definition of professional publication is so broad that it would be easy to miss things. Am I way off base? I know magazine and books are the usual contenders, but do these other categories count as well?

    I would say “absolutely”. Note John Jude Palencar’s gallery on the Best Artist post.

    Also, for absolutely no reason whatsoever, last year I made a point of creating a gallery for Bastien Lecouffe-Deharme on the 2018 Hugo Nominee Wiki, which contained numerous gaming images that I found when I got hold of Spectrum 24. 😉

    I’ve only just now been able to get hold of Spectrum 25, so I’m going to go through that. It takes a bit of work, though, because often their images have been previously published in a Hugo-eligible venue in a prior year, so it takes a considerable amount of Googling to check them.

35. Hampus Eckerman says There were so many cool movies that Rutger Hauer was part of. Wedlock, Flesh + Blood and the underrated Split Second. And then this weird apocalyptian movie called Blood of Heroes, like a mix of Mad Max and Rollerball. Good times.

    The list of genre films that he was involved in was very long. I figured y’all would bring up your favorite ones.

36. nickpheas: There’s a ten year period with only 11 nominees, but I can’t remember exactly when. It really feels like people nominate whoever was on the ballot the last year.

    I totally agree, and that’s why I’ve made such a huge effort at producing both Pro and Fan Artist galleries for Hugo nominators the last 3 years. There are so many great artists producing eligible work; it’s a matter of calling nominators’ attention to them to get them out of that same-old, same-old nominating rut.

    I was thrilled that 2 of last year’s 6 Professional Artist finalists, Lecouffe-Deharme and Jennings, were first-time finalists.

37. Oh, and Rutger Hauer was also in Lexx, which is one of my favorite shows (at least the first three series; Hauer was just in the first season).

38. @JJ – I agree that the wording of the rules for Best Professional Artist could use changing and I liked the changes proposed to the business meeting this year for that category. But I didn’t like the changes proposed for Best Fan Artist. Partly because I like the idea of being more inclusive of artists who produce art for the joy of it rather than placing so much emphasis on the donation of art to fanzines or conventions. If writing on a personal blog can qualify someone for Best Fan Writer than I think the same should apply to Fan Artist.

    I’ve also run into a problem with nominating professional artists for the fan category. The artists did not want to be nominated for a fan award as they thought it could hurt their chances of making professional sales, or lower what money they’re offered when they do make a sale. As long as the awards are titled ‘Professional’ and ‘Fan’ I think we are going to have these issues.

    Speaking of Best Fan Artist, does anyone know of more resources to help with nominations in the fan artist category?

39. Other artists doing fabulous work who have never been finalists yet, who I would love to see recognized:

    (Page 4)
    Stephen Youll
    Sam Weber
    Charles Vess
    Steve Stone
    Greg Ruth
    David Palumbo
    Cliff Nielsen

    (Page 3)
    Reiko Murakami
    Gene Mollica
    Jeffrey Alan Love
    Jaime Jones

    (Page 2)
    Vincent Chong
    Rovina Cai
    Ben Baldwin
    Tommy Arnold

    Jaime Jones and Tommy Arnold have both been putting out exceptional work the last few years. Arnold was kept off the 2017 ballot by another finalist who had a lot of bullet nominators (Arnold had more actual nominations, but fewer EPH points). Sam Weber, whose covers for The Divine Cities were stunning, was on the longlist for 2016.

40. Lorien Gray: I didn’t like the changes proposed for Best Fan Artist.

    I wasn’t fond of them, either. Reading the committee’s report, at least one of the members of the committee seems to be extremely dedicated to gatekeeping, and not just in that category, either. 😐

41. Camestros: the only thing worthwhile in [CRT] TV was the copper in the power cord

    There are people in USA desperate for large CRTs (in particular Sony Trinitrons, which are considered the pinnacle) – the professional Super Smash Brothers Melee circuit. Because plugging a GameCube into a digital flatscreen TV introduces lag that is noticeable when you make moves with single-frame (1/50 second) precision.

    What was that quote about the future being unevenly distributed? Arguably, the same is true about the past.

42. Dr D played so much great stuff in the early years of the show. I loved the older tunes particularly, and those are what ended up being lost when the show was taken over by people who heard Weird Al and figured they could do it too.

    So the show was inundated with tapes from DJs who replaced all the nouns in a well-known song with the names of fish, and it drove out the good stuff. They didn’t have Al’s genius for the exact right word, and they didn’t have his musicianship. Nobody ever came anywhere near him for the quality of his originals: “Dare To Be Stupid” and “Christmas at Ground Zero” are my two favorite recordings from him, and both videos are in my personal top ten for the music video medium.

    The same thing has happened in other media. When MAD comics came out, a number of publishers decided it was an easy way to make some money. If you’ve read The Sincerest Form of Plagiarism, you’ve seen that the results are uneven at best, and mediocre at worst, but that’s not exactly true. The results, at their worst, were just plain hideous.

    Friends of mine showed me off-brand humor comics way worse than anything in the collection. My favorite was an attempt at a Tennessee Williams parody whose artist was at least aware that he couldn’t draw a caricature of either star, so for the whole story, their faces were mostly covered by props, word balloons, backs of heads, etc.

    I wish there could have been two separate shows from Dr. Demento, with one continuing the original job of revealing the gems that are still in his legendary record collection. Thanks to this internet, though, I can keep finding new things, and most of it doesn’t add to the bulk of stuff we have to some day get rid of so our daughter won’t have to have it all plowed under.

43. I’m curious if anyone has challenged the intersection of the category description and the acceptance criteria. The category description for Professional Artist makes no mention about requiring 3 works published in the previous year (unlike Semiprozine, Fanzine, Editor, which does call out minimum requirements).

    But, the Acceptance criteria states that the acceptance of Professional Artist should cite at least three works. This makes it seem like three works are required, but I think the word “should” is important. “Should” is not “Must”. It is a suggestion, which is made even more so when taken in context with the acceptance criteria for Fanzine and Semiprozine which states “shall be required”. “Shall be required” is a mandatory requirement much stronger than the “should” of Professional Artist.

    My interpretation, without yet getting further insight, is that three works are not required for Professional Artist. With that said, I do think that any gallery or recommendation list should only include qualifying works from the previous year.

    3.3.12: Best Professional Artist. An illustrator whose work has appeared in a professional publication in the field of science fiction or fantasy during the previous calendar year.

    3.10.2 In the Best Professional Artist category, the acceptance should include citations of at least three (3) works first published in the eligible year.

    3.10.3 Each finalist in the categories of Best Fanzine and Best Semiprozine shall be required to provide information confirming that they meet the qualifications of their category.

44. Joe Sherry: My interpretation, without yet getting further insight, is that three works are not required for Professional Artist. With that said, I do think that any gallery or recommendation list should only include qualifying works from the previous year.

    In 2017, a Pro Artist was disqualified because they had no work published in an eligible professional venue from 2016 (though they did have work published).

    I don’t think it’s ever been tested. No finalist, at least in recent history, has been unable to produce at least 3 eligible works for the packet. (Even the ones last year whose packet included works from the wrong year still had plenty of eligible works from the right year, they just weren’t in the packet.)

    I think if the packet came out, and a finalist had been allowed onto the ballot with only one work, it would be very noticeable, and you would hear some substantial rumbling from Hugo voters about it. The category is supposed to recognize a body of work for the year. I would be very surprised if a Hugo Admin allowed someone with only one eligible work to be a finalist.

45. That’s what I’m wondering about. I fully agree about the category being for a body of work (from that year), and I’m thinking back to a conversation I had around 10 years ago with an art director / editor and a working artist regarding the Richard Powers cover of Eclipse Three (the Strahan anthology for Night Shade).

    Powers had died more than a decade prior to that, but the art selected for Eclipse Three had never been used. It was (and remains) of the finest and most striking pieces of art I’ve seen on a book cover.

    Anyway, the conversations had to do with whether the category was recognizing the best piece of art or the body of work of an artist working in the field that year. The answer, of course, is the body of work – but the Hugo ballot has been controversial because they ask voters to list a work.

    The reason I bring this up is because the one thing that didn’t come up during that conversation was whether or not Richard Powers was eligible for only having one work. These were smart, plugged in individuals who thought deeply about the field, art, and the Hugo Awards. One was involved in the drafting of the category. (The WSFS Constitution from 2008 did have the same suggestion for 3 works). They were working from the same assumption I was, that Powers was absolutely eligible with one work, but that one work produced more than a decade prior (but not published) was not representative of the output of a working artist or the field that year.

46. (9) I really wish someone would take a swing (okay, a good swing) at the Buck Rogers franchise one of these days. It may be that the rights situation is still toxic.

    (9bis) A non-genre Hauer film that I think rates mention, at least for its title, is Hobo With a Shotgun, whose villain is played by Lexx lead actor Brian Downey. Full circle!

    I use both Safari on iOS (which usually does a good job of autofilling forms) and Pale Moon on Windoze and macOS, and none of these combos enter my name for me, possibly because they expect a password field and there isn’t one. I’m used to it.

47. @Patrick Morris Miller — I remember seeing Hobo With a Shotgun, but I had completely missed the fact that the villain was played by Stanley Tweedle!

48. 12) I appreciate the intent, but this is still convoluted and discouraging for those who have little free time, which tends to be disproportionately the poor. I much prefer the approach of my own library, which was to eliminate all fines for children’s and teen books and charge for adult books only when more than 30 days past due.

49. @Joe Sherry
    When Eric first pointed this out to me, I interpreted “should” as “must” but the more I think about it, the more I’m wondering if it’s really just advice to the candidate. That is, perhaps all it means is “if you want to have any hope of winning, submit at least three samples of art from the year of eligibility.” I wonder if someone like Kevin Standlee or Nicholas Whyte could chime in here.

    This points up (again) the problem with awards that are for people and not for works. This would all be a lot easier if the awards were for best professional and best fan covers (where the difference between pro and fan is simply whether it was paid for or not and “cover” means it was the definitive picture for an issue of a prozine, semiprozine, or fanzine as currently defined). Yep, that would exclude lots of other art, but trying to include everything makes the problem of nominating intractable. The result is that most people don’t nominate at all in these categories, and those who do always nominate the same people over and over.

    Full disclosure: Eric is my husband and Rocket Stack Rank is our joint effort. However, the art portions of the site are entirely his work; all I do is beta test it for him.

50. (4) Thanks for your support, Lorien. I’ll play with ISFDB’s schema for a few days and see if I can get the best of both worlds, which is query ISFDB’s data to get more artists with 3+ works from 2018, AND add toggle buttons to show/hide the art from 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015 (the limit of RSR’s own database built from short fiction reviews). If that turns out to be too much work this year, it’ll be a high priority feature for next year.

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