(1) INDY 5 IS GO. Consequence of Sound has the story.
Walt Disney Company chairman and CEO Bob Iger, has confirmed that a fifth Indiana Jones movie is indeed happening.
During a recent interview with Bloomberg, Iger spent much of his time talking about the franchise possibilities that are opening up with the massive success of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. When he got to comparing Disney’s acquisition of Lucasfilm to that of Pixar and Marvel, however, he noted that taking on Lucasfilm’s intellectual properties also meant “Indiana Jones, by the way, which will be coming.”
(2) ABOUT FACE. Kameron Hurley posted a funny gallery of GIFS to illustrate the “Faces I Make When Reading Reviews”.
A lot of people think authors take reviews personally, and I suppose there are many who do. Those are the folks who should really steer clear of reader reactions to books, or rather, what some readers believe the books say about the author, which is always far more amusing.
There are great reviews with insightful criticism of my work, and glowing reviews about how it changed people’s lives.
But, this being the internet and people trying to poke an author for a meltdown, I’m often asked about my reaction when reading negative reviews of my work. What folks don’t get is that I find most negative reactions endlessly amusing. Not the real criticism that points out real flaws, no, but the reactions that say far more about the reader than the writer.
(3) MIND MELD. SF Signal’s latest Mind Meld, curated by James Aquilone, posts the question “What are your favorite new genre (SF/F/H) TV shows of 2015?” – with replies by Alex Shvartsman, Sarah Pinsker, Matthew Johnson, Robert Davis, Carlie St. George, Erin M. Hartshorn, Andrew Liptak, Rob H. Bedford, and Sally Ember, Ed.D.
(4) CHOOSE FEAR. Here’s how David Brin’s Mars mission would start.
Go to Phobos before landing on Mars itself? I have pushed this idea for twenty years and now some at NASA agree. Not only is the larger moon far easier to reach and might serve as an ideal research platform, it also has two advantages never mentioned in this article. It can serve as a logistics hub where supplies might be pre-positioned and tended without complex orbital management. It also might (some figure) be carbonaceous chondritic material, containing volatiles like water. If these could be mined and stored and prepared, subsequent Mars landing missions would find all the water and rocket fuel they need, lowering both cost and risk by an order of magnitude.
(5) ZICREE ON FAN-MADE TREK FILMS. Marc Scott Zicree on Facebook.
Science fiction has a long and honorable tradition of fan fiction — in fact, many of the top professional writers started out writing fan fiction — and these fan films are the logical extension of that tradition. More than that, speaking as a professional who’s written extensively for all the major studios and networks, the reason I chose to do “World Enough and Time” was that I felt Michael Reaves and I, along with our creative team, could bring as high a level of professional quality to that project as anything we had ever done for the studios and networks. I wanted to work with George Takei, the powers that be were never going to choose to do the ultimate Sulu story we wanted to tell, and it was something we could share with the whole world.
CBS/Paramount views Star Trek as a money machine, and that drives their decision on what or what not to make. This is perfectly justifiable. But it’s not what led Gene Roddenberry to create Star Trek, nor is it why Renegades or Axanar are being made. I think often taking a step back, gaining perspective and saying, “How can we create a win/win situation here?” is a good idea. It’s what led George Lucas to not only allow Star Wars fan films, but to hold an annual contest recognizing the best ones.
(6) GERROLD ON SUIT STRATEGY. David Gerrold on Facebook:
…But this lawsuit also suggests that CBS and Paramount might be missing the more important point. The fan productions are about the hunger for new Star Trek. They’re not competition as much as they are signs that the franchise is alive and well. Keeping the fans engaged is the best thing that CBS and Paramount can do to keep the franchise alive.
I understand the corporate desire to protect their rights to the franchise, but that cat got out of the bag a long time ago. If they weren’t going to shut down Star Trek New Voyages and Star Trek Continues and Star Trek Renegades and Star Trek Farragut for “copyright infringement” — and those productions use Kirk, Spock, et al, and the original enterprise — then they’re going to have a much harder case with Axanar which barely touches the same specific content of the original series.
I suspect that the lawsuit isn’t about copyright infringement as much as it’s designed to intimidate Axanar’s producers. I’ll be interested to see how this proceeds….
(7) CAVEAT TWITTER. Business Insider reports “Mark Hamill is protecting fans from fake signed ‘Star Wars’ merchandise on Twitter”.
He apologized to fans who have spent money on fraudulent items and urged them to look at real copies to learn how to confirm his signature on their own. When asked why he wasn’t tired of responding to people, he said, “Because I owe it to all true fans to protect them from being victimized by dishonest dealers.”
(8) FORCE A FEW DOLLARS MORE. Steven Harper Piziks opines about writers who are “Riding the Coat Tails of the Force”.
These and other similar articles mean absolutely nothing, of course. They’re written by people who have no real cred. For example, Lili Loofbourow, who wrote the desperate-sounding “emotional blind spots” article above, is a freelance reporter. She’s not a professor of media studies, or an experienced film reviewer, or a film maker. She has a computer and a contact at Salon.com and ticket stub for THE FORCE AWAKENS. Same goes for all the others. They’re just riding along on TFA’s coat tails, trying to make a few dollars for themselves.
Well, at least I got a blog entry out of it.
(9) PICACIO PLUGS COMPETITION. Today John Picacio commented on George R.R. Martin’s pro artist Hugo recommendations and added six more names (with links to their work).
Thanks so much for the shoutout, George. It’s an honor to be be considered in any year, including this one. That said, winning any major award comes with responsibility along with hardware and glory. It’s always great to win, but as a past winner, I want the Pro Artist Hugo list to reflect the extraordinary range and evolution of the field. So while I’m not recusing myself, I would like to take this opportunity to shine light on some of sf/f’s art stars that have had an outstanding year and deserve Hugo consideration in this category:…
(10) HITCHHIKER’S HOMECOMING. Think how much more effective Lazlar Lyricon 3’s “about” statement would be if it hadn’t stopped with just four reasons for holding this convention? I hope the concom will treat themselves to one or two fifths as part of their launch celebration.
Dateline: The Old Kings Head Pub, London, 21 November 2015. Today, ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha (the Official Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Appreciation Society) Annual General Meeting authorised a committee to run Lazlar Lyricon 3. This is the third (coincidentally) in a series of conventions celebrating The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and Douglas Adams, the first having occurred in the 1980s.
Lazlar Lyricon 3 will take place on 9-11 June 2017 at the Quality Hotel in Stoke-on-Trent.
Committee members Stefan Lancaster, Emma J. King, David Haddock and Alan Sullivan, amongst others, were on hand to discuss plans, answer questions and receive the imprimatur of the AGM. They were also given ‘seed money’ of £500 towards the costs, which was greeted with much cheering!
The first two Lazlar Lyricons were part of a series of conventions in the 1980s, 90s and early 00s colloquially called ‘Fun Cons’, which also included the Incons, Dangercons, and several one-off conventions such as Year of the Wombat and Aliens Stole my Handbag. The aspiration is to ensure everyone has a great time (and not panic!), with fun, loosely Hitchhikers-inspired programme items such as crab stomping and towel-based martial arts. The announcement that the first and foremost in appointments will be a ‘beer liaison’ was greeted with more cheering!
(11) SPEAKING OF LAUNCHING. Gail Z. Martin on “Making the Most of Your Launch Day” at Magical Words.
Book launches are on my mind since Vendetta, the second book in the Deadly Curiosities urban fantasy series, just launched yesterday. So I thought it might be fun to pull the curtain back on what can go into a book launch, and let you pick and choose the elements you feel best suit your own circumstances.
Social media is is your biggest bullhorn to the world. Long before your book comes out, you should be creating a presence on Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, Wattpad, a blog, and a web site. These are the places you can gather your tribe–the people who have read and liked your work, your friends and others who wish you well and are happy to help spread the word. Make sure you let your friends and followers know in advance when the book is coming out, and how they can help.
(12) ON RECONCILIATION. Joe Vasicek’s “Response to Steve Davidson on Reconciling with the Puppies” is a commentary on Steve Davidson’s Amazing Stories post “Reconciling with Puppies – ‘…to dram, the impossible dream, to reach the unreachable star…”.
Mr. Davidson’s post is interesting, and worth reading. We obviously don’t see eye to eye on a number of things, but it would be rather petty to go through our disagreements line by line. Instead, the part that I want to respond to is his call to action at the end:
Want to reconcile? Here’s what puppies must do.
1: Stop scamming the system. If you want to recommend works that you think are worthy of the award, go ahead and do so. But drop the political agenda (you’re dragons are imaginary) and eliminate the hateful, snarky commentary
If you’re looking for “hateful, snarky commentary,” I’m sure that you’ll be able to find it. On the fringes of both sides, there are a lot of people with blogs and strong opinions. I’d count myself as one of them—while I align with the Sad Puppies, I’m not a leader or organizer by any stretch, just another guy with opinions and a blog. Don’t be so quick to look for ammunition, because there’s a lot of it lying around.
Kate Paulk, one of the Sad Puppy organizers, has pointed out that Sad Puppies 4 is open to nomination suggestions from anyone, which appears to be what you’re calling for. And honestly, I think a lot of us don’t want to see conservative writers edge out everyone else so much as to see them go head to head with more liberal writers on a more equal playing field. It’s not about slaying imaginary dragons so much as breaking down walls.
So on this first point, Mr. Davidson and I tend to be in agreement. This seems like a reasonable step for reconciliation, and it’s one that the Sad Puppies 4 already appear to be taking.
(13) YOUR RANCOR MAY VARY. Brad Torgersen’s “Sad Puppies and the future”, prompted by Martin’s “reconciliation” post, says many familiar things.
Many people have already seen George R. R. Martin’s optimistic (and well-intended) commentary at his LiveJournal. However, just as with George’s hood ornament Alfie awards (also well-intended) there is more than one way for a thing to be perceived. My perception — and I am not alone in this — of George’s desire for an end to the rancor, is that George still seems to think that a) the rancor was flowing almost entirely one-way, from the Puppies’ side to the Trufan side, and also b) none of the Puppies are themselves fans. Not Fans (caps f) and certainly not Trufans. No. Puppies are still an outsider bunch, who carry an outsider’s stigma.
There is also a bit too much parentalism in George’s tone: dear kids, I hope you’ve learned your lesson, now wipe those dirty looks off your faces and come give your mother a hug!
(14) DO YOU FEEL SAFER? And in the comments, national security consultant Arlan Andrews, Sr. gives MidAmeriCon II members something to look forward to:
I for one will never forgive anyone who appeared in that pre-Awards “90-minute-hate-the-Puppies” TV show, nor anyone who called me a neoNazi. Though some were, I had thought, nice acquaintances if not actual long-time friends, their behavior before, during and after the Hugos simply meant that I shut them out of any future consideration of any kind, meaning no purchasing of their products, no voting for their works, no attendance at any function at which they are honored or prominent, no reviews of anything they are involved with, and no defense of any criticism of them. As a very minor player in fandom/prodom, despite 60+ years of fanlife and 35+ years of prolife, those people will seldom notice nor long remember what I do here, but if thousands of others do likewise, the effects may be meaningful. All of the SP3 experience this year has been enlightening, and a tiny reflection of the national schism between those who cherish Freedom and those banding together to enforce Collectivism. I thank Brad and Larry and the Jovians for graciousness in the face of fire. And next Worldcon, I will definitely attend. (Does Missouri have Concealed Carry?)
(15) HOOKY HEADLINE. “9 things ‘Starship Troopers’ totally nailed about today’s technology” is a pretty bold claim about a movie that showed space infantry fighting in shoulder-to-shoulder formations like at the Battle of Waterloo.
(16) CHRISTMAS CONFLATION. When I read the headline of io9’s post “Chewbacca Comic Finally Answers A Question Star Wars Fans Have Pondered For Years” I mentally filled the blank with, “Does Chewie sleep with his whiskers outside or in?”
(17) REEL CONSPIRACY. At Star Wars Minute, “How Kylo Ren Got Darth Vader’s Helmet.” A fan theory based on some events in Disney/Lucasfilm comics and novels.
(18) TONIGHT ON JEOPARDY! A Bradbury-themed question.
Literary Characters for $200
Answer: Beatty is the captain of the fireman in this Bradbury Novel
Question: What is Fahrenheit 451
(19) IF YOU WERE A DINOSAUR…BUT WAIT, I AM. “Retaliation for getting coal in my stocking!” says YouTube poster Ralph the Rex.
[Thanks to Will R., John King Tarpinian and Brian Z. for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Will R.]
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Oh my poor non-USians – you ain’t seen nothing yet.
You may have thought you had seen the most in the way of resentment, grievance, and mindless fear of the Other, the Ayrab, the immi-grint, and those Queers last summer. You may have thought you had reason to think it was as bad as it could get. But there’s a cycle to American cultural life, and MACII comes at that point in the cycle, every four years since around 1964, that people like JCW and Correia and the rest start to talk darkly about the End of America and the need for citizens to take things Into Their Own Hands if the other side should win an open election. (Sound familiar to anyone?). The last six months before the Presidential vote is Prom for resentful white folks with guns. It’s going to get more intense before it gets better.
So I have good news and bad news. The bad news is that some of these same poor impulse control puppy authors whose non sff posts are all “I really love guns” are going to be muttering about the necessity of revolutionary violence, right as you may be getting ready to go to MACII. This is distasteful, I know, even if you live here, and have had to make your peace with the social right of any failure to own a gun they can make a last angry statement with.
But now the good news: how many people you know who LARP, or participate in some other kind of scene, have actually killed someone? I’m pretty sure it’s the exception, not the rule, right? If not completely unknown? Because while it’s terrifying, all this talk about the armed citizen is a LARP without the decency to call itself one. they are LARPing would-be revolutionaries, and that AR is just the sourcebook. An dangerous and concerning sourcebook, but about as likely to be used (non-accidentally) for violence as one.
They spin their fantasies of the good guy with the gun and the patriot and like the LARPer Le Sexxe the 8th gen Toreador,(I) or the big dominat of the local dungeon scene, they are mild mannered accountants in their everyday life. They’d faint at the sight of blood, and they view the police as infallible gods. They’re as likely to start shooting as that one guy is to drinks someone’s blood.
The justified fear that one of them might pick the day your near them not to be is just the price of living in America these days. Heck, in an open carry state like Missouri, he can walk around with the weapon out,* and if you call the police, you’ll be told they can’t do anything until he starts shooting. Fun times here.
This is why we no longer have the things here in 7721.
(I) I may know if what I speak…
*White skin permitting.
This is a classic argument abusive and controlling people use to attempt to manipulate and demoralize their victims.
Just about every convention I have ben to has a “no weapons” policy, usually meaning no realistic-looking toy weapons and nothing out and about that hasn’t been disabled, tied up, or otherwise made obviously and blatantly unusable.
I would hope next year’s World Con has a similar policy, yes?
In which case, all that talk about concealed carry is little more than self-aggrandizing macho posturing and petty attempts to intimidate reasonable people away from that all-important businss meeting vote.
I’m pretty sure that in 2016 a small group of hateful far right types will nominate a series of essays implying that the man they most hate in fandom is a child molester, and when it’s No Awarded for being terrible, they will then claim that this is proof that hugo voters are pro child molestation.
So there’s that to look forward to.
I know we really ought to be above giving them nicknames and stuff, but I have to get The Hateful Kate out of my system. Sorry.
Okay. How about I amend that to, Joe Picacio has acted with class here.
I presume the point here is to get the essays into the voter packet? I’m not an expert, but I don’t think the Hugo Awards committee are under any obligation to include a work in the packet
Ray: I’m not an expert, but I don’t think the Hugo Awards committee are under any obligation to include a work in the packet.
I doubt very much that the Hugo Admins would be willing to exercise editorial control over what goes in the packet; if it’s nominated and the author & publisher submit it to be included, they will include it. (I point out some of the garbage which was nominated this year, which was included in the packet.)
Alas, I think they should include it if nominated. The committee becomes hugely more vulnerable if it doesn’t maintain a strict by the book neutral position. Unless a work was actually the subject of a libel suit, and I don’t think Scalzi would want to give it the oxygen of publicity, then refusing to distribute a legally nominated work would expose then to so much ‘Aha! Told you so!’ as to become intolerable.
The funny thing about this comment is that the Hugo Awards have managed to become and remain prestigious without any help from the Pups. In fact, the only thing that threatens to damage the prestige of the Hugo Awards is the Pups wedging inferior works by their buddies onto the ballot. As I have said before, if the Pups were to take over the Hugos and get them to work they way they want, then they would lose almost all prestige value and most science fiction and fantasy fans would look primarily to alternative awards such as the Nebula, Locus, or BSFA as indicators of quality.
This is, of course, the reason that the Pups don’t start a competing award and outdo the Hugos: Even they know everyone would treat their award as a meaningless joke. No one cares about the Jovians, not one would care about any hypothetical “Real Science Fiction award Given by Real Fans” either.
DO YOU FEEL SAFER?
Nope. I really dislike that comment at the end by Arlan.
What I would rather hear the self-identified puppies talk about is how they are going to have a great welcoming party at the convention; how they plan on doing fun fannish activity – and enjoy WorldCon for the convention and not solely focus on the awards which are a small part of the convention.
How many Filer’s are planning to go next year ?
I am considering it if time and expenses allow. It would be great to have a meetup like I heard about this summer.
The Puppies failed utterly in their strategy to prove nepotism, favoritism and cheating on the part of the awards committee, for the obvious reason that it was not there.
Now they seem to be committing the classic bullies’ error of thinking that impartiality means weakness.
@Aaron:
I don’t think the Jovian Awards were a joke. I think they were a nice gesture.
I don’t think the Jovian Awards were a joke.
But do you care about them? Should they be given out again, would the award make you want to read the works so honored?
@Ray:
Both are actions that are within the letter of the rules, but some people decry one or other as being outside the spirit of the rules. You don’t need to take sides in that argument to see that one will inevitably lead to the other. The nomination phase comes first, so the Puppies get to make the first move – do they want to try to rerun last year or not?
How many Filer’s are planning to go next year?
I’m planning on going, assuming that certain obstacles don’t arise in the next several months.
(13) YOUR RANCOR MAY VARY
It’s telling that the furthest Brad goes in distancing himself from Beale is to say that (quote) “Many Sad Puppies find Vox Day and the Rabids to be revolting.” Many. Not “We Sad Puppies”. Not “I, and most other Sad Puppies”.
Apart from that, it’s mostly (paraphrasing) “the CHORFs should do as I say, so they don’t provoke Beale”.
And the comment field is full of ignorance. Like one guy who pulls up a conspiracy theory about how Martin knew how many Alfies he needed to give out. And one who complains about “that black baboon in the Whitehouse”.
So after Tasha’s piece I clicked through to Torgersen’s piece and – man that was a lot of words. Skipping down to his list of demands, we have:
I’m tempted to quote the famous response, “Here’s my offer…” from Godfather II, except I really hate that beat because its payoff is the Coreleones’ torture-murder of an innocent woman and I think we’re supposed to find that clever, which galls me. So instead, I will just say:
Piss off. It’s not just that Brad is a moral coward – he is a moral coward – it’s that he’s an ineffectual one. He took his shot and he lost. Even if you can talk yourself into believing that his conscious decision to be “the skunk at the picnic” was praiseworthy rather than contemptible, he got creamed. And he’s not even in charge any more. He’s a loser on the loser pile and his demands are of corresponding urgency.
(13) Once again it seems that there is a need to point out that one cannot both nominate several works by Castalia House (and there were several works published by Castalia House on the Sad Puppy ballot) and also claim that you are not aligned with Beale. Sorry, when you put works by his pet publishing house on your slate, you’re claiming him as one of your own, no matter how much you claim it just isn’t so.
Johan P: It’s telling that the furthest Brad goes in distancing himself from Beale is to say that (quote) “Many Sad Puppies find Vox Day and the Rabids to be revolting.” Many. Not “We Sad Puppies”. Not “I, and most other Sad Puppies”.
There are two reasons for that. Firstly, BT is quite happy to have VD and his minions assisting in targeting the Hugos (of course, he’s too stupid to realize that he’s just a puppet whose strings are being pulled by VD).
Secondly, the only reason Puppies want to associate with him is because he’s a useful tool (in both senses of that word). If he ever dared to renounce VD, the backlash on him would leave him a pariah in the wilderness, with no one having any interest in having anything to do with him — either because his usefulness had ended, or because of all of his lying, name-calling, and other infantile behavior.
Ask me again in ten years’ time.
The first years of the Hugo Award were pretty shaky, as I recall.
Whether this winds up being a nice one-time gesture or the beginning of something built up and worthy of longterm respect depends on what the people doing it do in the future.
Simon Bissen: Well, it’s about time! *achoo*
Here in the year 5567, I am FIFTH!
To whoever was worried about coming to the U.S. because of concealed weapons: calm down. Worry about the drunk drivers instead–most states don’t take drunk driving seriously.
Jim, may I suggest “I propose to move immediately upon your works”?
Peace Is My Middle Name: Ask me again in ten years’ time. The first years of the Hugo Award were pretty shaky, as I recall. Whether this winds up being a nice one-time gesture or the beginning of something built up and worthy of longterm respect depends on what the people doing it do in the future.
Except that the Hugo Awards program actually started out being, you know, an awards program — where nominations were taken from members, collated onto a ballot, and voted upon by members.
All the Jovian awards are is a grudge piggyback on the Hugos: the site openly admits this to be the case:
No, indeed. What they “signed up for” was an attempt to force the Worldcon voters to give rockets to the subpar works that they had gamed onto the ballot — and when the Worldcon voters refused to roll over and do that, they handed out trophies to the people whose works had been deemed not worthy of Hugos.
Do you honestly believe that an “awards program” based merely on giving trophies to the Hugo also-rans is a viable awards program?
I don’t see a reconciliation happening, to be honest. The Puppies (Sad and Rabid, not that there is much distinction, given that the Sad founder brought the Rabid founder into the business and gave him proof of concept) were founded and continued for the purpose of handing out Hugo nominations like party favors to friends and mentors of the organizers.
Of course most Hugo nominators and voters despise them. Individual Puppies could quit rigging the Hugos just any time and live it (mostly) down in a decade or so of good behavior–at which point they really aren’t Puppies anymore.
The Puppy group(s) would have to change beyond recognition to do the same thing, and first that doesn’t seem likely–the changes at the moment are the Puppy group(s?) ratcheting back the unfair advantage to see how much unfair advantage they can get away with rather than any fundamental change–and second if it does happen, the group has become something fundamentally different from what it was before, and I’d argue the “reconciliation” would be with a group that isn’t “Puppy” in the sense we use it now.
@Jim Henley:
There are so many false premises in those demands.
I am reminded of something one of my theologian friends said about Martin Luther, although I don’t know if it’s true. My friend joked that Luther was perfectly fine with sitting down with the Pope and having reasonable talks about religion — provided that the Pope first made “a very public admission” that he was the Antichrist.
What does “a very public admission” mean, anyway? And who does Torgersen think he means by “the establishment”?
It’s melodramatic and grandiose, sure. But it doesn’t mean anything.
@Shambles
Eric and I will both be there. We should probably look into getting some “Rocket Stack Rank” ribbons made.
Gotta few minutes to go, but happy new year to all filers, and here’s hoping for a less… strident year ahead!
@Paul
Based on our discussion of literary elitism a couple of scrolls back, I have become convinced that if they really, truly think that, and if that is really, truly their motivation with all this Puppy business, that the only possible way forward for them is to start their own award.
That’s what fandom — or, in GRRM’s parlance, Fandom — did, back in the 50s when science fiction was still supposed to be exclusively the province of 12-year-old boys. Fandom said, “no, these works are good, they’re important, they’re worth taking seriously, and to demonstrate that, we’ll give awards to some of the best ones.” And thus the Hugos were born. Today, they have the prestige they do, in part, because Fandom was ultimately correct — SF was worth taking seriously as a literary genre.
So if the Pups think the same Fandom that started the Hugos has drifted into their own kind of elitism, which is causing them to shut out worthy SF works the way the literary establishment once shut out SF entirely, they have to do what Fandom once did — start an award that takes their own kind of stuff (whatever that is) seriously, awards some of the best of it…
And then wait fifty years for the history of nominating and awarding terrific stuff to build up to the point where their award has the same prestige as the Hugos.
I suspect this is the real sticking point with the Pups, and why they keep trying to hijack the Hugos instead. They’re trying to steal prestige they haven’t earned, but have nevertheless convinced themselves they deserve. We can say “start your own award then” and they might, briefly, say “okay, we will!” But then they think about how much work it is to administer, and how long it takes to build up a reputation, and how difficult it is to define in any objective sense what they actually mean by Nutty Nuggets.
Still, if they’e committed to this, the Jovians would be a good place to start — it’s a catchy name, and once you’ve got that, well, you’re halfway there. But the award would really have to be defined as something more general than “puppy-slated works that didn’t get a Hugo.”
@ TheYoungPretender on December 31, 2015 at 5:44 am
I think you’re right that the gun-swagger crowd is mostly engaged in a particularly dangerous form of LARPing. Harmless, right up until it isn’t. I put up with it, but I respect it about as much as I respect people who drive like maniacs in order to get a few cars ahead and perhaps, unless they cause an accident, shave a minute or two off their drive time.
I’m going to Mid-Americon. Puppies with guns will not make me feel any safer, but they won’t make me feel much more endangered either.
How many Filer’s are planning to go next year?
I will be there and working on staff, as usual. Program Ops again (a job that can mostly be done sitting down, which is a bonus in a convention center).
BT fails at the first demand
1) A very public admission by the establishment that the NO AWARD bombing of the 2015 Hugos was a gross error.
Actually, in two ways – there is no establishment, and No Awarding crap is why No Award is set up. Force more subpar crap on to the ballot this time (like the inevitable attempt to nominate the 5 part smear of John Scalzi, JCW’s latest novel plus assorted other dross) and I’ll vote the same way. Not sure about everyone else, as the bulk of Hugo voters are individuals.
Also, someone said Beale is mostly a joke at this point – leave out the mostly and I’d agree with you.
Shambles:
Me for one.
The actor who played the Kurgan is also the voice of Mister Krabbs on SpongeBob SquarePants.
I offer this as mental anodyne for the next bout of eye-rolling.
In happier thoughts–on the last day of the third fifth year, I want to thank you all. This weird little community may have come together as a response to shenanigans, but it’s become a lot more and it’s a regular part of my morning routine, so thank you.
@bookworm1398
Ultimately, Brin is talking about a manned mission. The trouble with landing on Mars is, mostly, having to take off again, since that adds about 4.1 km/s to your delta-v.
The problem disappears if you can refuel on Mars, but that’s a big if. If you cannot, then every 2.5 km/s of delta-v doubles your required launch mass, owing to the exponential in the rocket equation, assuming rocket exhaust velocity of 3.6 km/s. (SpaceX’s proposed Raptor engine.)
So suppose that you needed to launch 3 Falcon 9 FT rockets to assemble a mission to Phobos. You’d need 9.5 to mount a landing on Mars, all else being equal.
There are so many false premises in those demands.
I have to say I’m entirely unsurprised by BT’s “demands”. There’s not much to him other than stompy feet and whining, and his list of demands amounts to more of the same. To be honest, there’s not much more to any of the Pups other than stompy feet and whining.
Redwombat:
He was also the voice of Lex Luthor and, let’s face it, who doesn’t want to be Lex Luthor?
Which filers are getting New Years first? The Australian contingent? It’s 16:20 here in GMT, so I’m just about to start prepping some colourful cocktails for later.
(Umm, GMT in 8622AD. You wouldn’t believe the fireworks we’re about to get)
I like that one a lot. Now I need to decide whether I really care how long a headline is….
Maybe if I break it at the semicolon and put “continued next headline”?
More importantly, he was Rawhide in The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension.
Torgersen is kind of elitist himself, isn’t he? Or just stuck in hierarchical thinking. Saying that the establishment should go out and say that the voters did wrong. Isn’t that like wanting to elect a new people?
That seems like an important point to me, too.
Novella review: “Johnny Rev” by Rachel Pollack (F&SF, July/August 2015). Urban fantasy. This is Pollack’s third Jack Shade story; she tells a bit about the series here. Not having read the others, I found it rather hard to comprehend the very complex setting from the references dropped. Nonetheless, the setting hangs together nicely, solidly grounded in New York City, multiethnic and, in the case of Jack himself, incorporating familiar American mythic elements like poker and the private detective in a way that doesn’t feel clicheed. That is down to the writing style, smooth and controlled, fluidly moving through dreamlands and magic transformations like the Travelers, one of whom Jack is. The plot concerns the creation of Duplicates of oneself, and the competition necessitated by two versions wanting to live the same life. Of course it is both metaphorical and not that Jack is going to have to “face up to himself” — all satisfactorily handled. I do take points off, though, for the fact that the conflict is launched by the murder of Jack’s wife who plays no other role in the story, and that the two other women mentioned most often in the story are both sexually involved with Jack and are never shown doing anything that doesn’t relate to him. Rating: Three dreamy stars.
Mart:
If You Like To Pixel, I Tell You I’m Your Scroll
That’s a good one.
When I was doing puppy roundups I was getting so many good title suggestions I found a way to run two a day. Now that I’m in this for the long haul, I’m being economical with them. Just don’t doubt yours will show up in due time.
Well, it’s 0040 Jan 1 2016, as well as December 31, 9490, so Yay?
I think first would have been Soon Lee though – isn’t she from NZ?
@MaxL: Ooh, I like “I propose to move immediately upon your works!” Except in this case his works have already been reduced utterly. 🙂
@Peace Is My Middle Name: Tee hee!
I ended up reading some of the Torgersen thread and enjoyed the work of many familiar names here: Mark, Snowcrash, “Camel Person” – good show! Even our semi-resident contrarian Vivienne came in for a Brad-lashing.
In practical terms, I think demands by anyone for their perceived opponents in the Puppening to express any remorse about past behavior is misplaced. The viable possibility of “healing” is:
1. People stop slating.
2. Other people give works the former slate-mongers like a fair shot. No more no less than a fair shot, but maybe checking themselves for ideological bias as they go.
The problem is that only the first of these constitutes somewhat observable behavior. (There are a lot of edge cases around what might or might not constitute a slate, but we know that SP3 and RP1 were slates.) If Pups stop slating but authors Pups like continue to not win awards, it’s not possible to directly observe that as happening because Worldcon members “fairly” didn’t like them or “unfairly” ruled them out of contention because politics. Nor is there some magic number of Nutty-Nuggety/right-wing-message-fic award winners that we could know, ex ante, would convince CHORF-punchers that they were getting their “fair share” of awards.
So, you know, I think things just might continue to be a bit messy for awhile.
(6) I commented on David Gerrold’s FB page that this attitude–“I understand the corporate desire to protect their rights to the franchise, but that cat got out of the bag a long time ago”–is exactly why Paramount had to sue. If it has gotten to the point where fans believe that any Trek production, including a seven-figure budgeted movie billing itself as “not a fan film, but an independent Star Trek film” that uses SAG actors, Director’s Guild directors, and hires a WGA writer as its creative consultant, automatically has the authority to proceed without interference from the IP holders because “it’s not making a profit”…
(Which, about that. Apparently the staff is drawing salaries from that pool of over $1 million crowdfunded money, and the actors are getting paid, and the people doing the effects are getting paid, and they’re selling merch that’s going back into the production budget. At some point, you have to acknowledge that even if at the end of the day, the profit and loss sheets show a zero balance, people made money off this film. Using Hollywood accounting to hide your profits does not make you a fan production, or ‘Coming to America’ would have been the most expensive labor of love in human history.)
…the point is, if someone as well informed about IP rights as Gerrold really believees that Paramount doesn’t have the right to shut down blatant, money-making infringement of their IP rights, then Paramount has to sue, if only because the alternative is losing trademarks. Something is badly out of whack in the Trek fan community if Axanar is seen as a “fan film”.
The first years of the Hugo Award were pretty shaky, as I recall.
I think they found their feet quite quickly. In their first year, the Hugos honored The Demolished Man for Best Novel, which is now a well-regarded classic of the genre. The award skipped 1954, and in 1955 the voters picked They’d Rather Be Right as the Best Novel, which was a very poor pick. On the other hand, in 1955 the novella and short fiction Hugos went to The Darfstellar and Allamagoosa, both of which were excellent choices.
In 1956, the fiction Hugos went to Double Star, Exploration Team, and The Star, all of which are good selections. In 1957, the awards were oddly recast as essentially publisher awards, but in 1958, the voters selected The Big Time and Or All the Seas with Oysters, both of which are quite good.
Right from the start the Hugo selections for fiction works were by and large good choices. There were a few years where they weren’t given (1954), or where the awards were changed oddly (1957), but on the whole, the early years of the Hugos established a pretty good track record of giving the awards to good works.
@Jim Henley
The viable possibility of “healing” is:
1. People stop slating.
2. Other people give works the former slate-mongers like a fair shot. No more no less than a fair shot, but maybe checking themselves for ideological bias as they go.
I was pretty much just on #1, but I think #2 is a good point.
Happy New year!
May the new year be a good one.
[2016 is six hours old; so far, so good. ]