By John Hertz: The only current annual fanziners’ convention I know of is
Corflu. Another called Ditto having run two decades, not always
annually, fell asleep. An attempt at another called Toner lasted, if
memory serves, two years.
Corflu is mimeograph correction fluid, once
indispensable. The Mimeograph was a 19th Century invention for
making inexpensive copies by forcing ink through stencils held on a rotating
drum. In the United States, “Mimeograph” was a registered trademark of
A.B. Dick Co., but was allowed to become generic.
Gestetner-brand machines appeared
a few years later. With Roneo-brand machines you could change drums to
change the color of ink. Rex Rotary was another
brand. I’m not sure how widely mimeograph or mimeo was
used as a generic term outside the U.S.
Many thought this the Grade A
technology for fanzine publication until cheap photocopying
arrived. Corflu was essential so as to cure misteaks.
Spirit duplication, which always sounded to me like something out of a fantasy
story, was a 1920s tech. Writing on a master sheet pressed the
master against a second, inked sheet; the master, duly inked on its back side,
and attached to a drum, was rolled over a wick holding an alcohol-based solvent
that transferred ink onto paper.
The Ditto brand was best known;
another was Heyer. You could
correct errors with skillful use of a razor blade, or an X-Acto knife, and
rewriting (or even retyping).
Each of these had various
advantages, disadvantages, and know-how. Generally mimeo could
reproduce more copies, spirit duplication was cheaper.
Toner is the powdery ink used in
laser printers and many photocopiers.
As Paul Skelton recently quoted
from Marshall McLuhan in Raucous
Caucus 7, when technology becomes obsolete it reshapes into an art
form. Actually McLuhan also said obsolescence isn’t an ending, it’s a
beginning. Speaking for myself I’m big on Right tool for
right task.
Corflu XXXVII was March 13-15,
2020, at College Station, Texas, U.S.A. (some cons get names; this one was
“Corflu Heatwave”). Corflu XXXVIII is scheduled for March 26-28,
2021, at Bristol, England, U.K. (“Corflu Concorde”). Seldom able to
attend in person, I’ve been a faithful Supporting Member, and happily recommend
membership in either kind.
If you’re electronic you can
start here;
or you can always write to me, 236 S. Coronado St., No. 409, Los Angeles, CA
90057, U.S.A.
…Now, that’s almost certainly the Ghost. Not a Force Ghost, THE Ghost. What’s the Ghost?
It’s the customized VCX-100 light freighter flown by Captain Hera Syndulla, which was kind of the Millennium Falcon of Star Wars Rebels. Later, it appeared in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and, thanks to the epilogue of Rebels, we knew it survived until the timeline of the sequel trilogy. Now, it seems the Ghost, and probably even Hera herself, are standing with the Falcon in what we can only assume is the Resistance’s final stand against the First Order.
And they saw even more ships in
that brief scene that you’ll probably need to look up in the Wookieepedia.
I have some good news for those of you who haven’t been paying close attention to comic books: Batman comics are finally readable!
That’s a major change from the puerile adventures which editor Jack Schiff has been presenting in the pages of Batman and Detective Comics. For all too many years, Schiff and his team of seemingly subpar creators have delivered a never-ending stream of absurdly juvenile tales of the Caped Crusader and his steadfast sidekick. He gave us ridiculous and dumb tales in which Batman gallivanted in outer space, Robin was romantically pursued by the pre-teen Bat-Girl, and the absurdly awful Bat-Mite showed up at random times to add chaos to Batman’s life. Even adventures which featured classic Batman villains (such as last fall’s Batman #159, “the Great Clayface-Joker Feud,”) fell far short of even the most basic standards of quality. Great they were not.
Have there been any particular books or writers who influenced you, whether in or outside the genre? [I’m a Jane Austen fan and live in Bath, which has featured in many dramatizations of her work]
As I mentioned previously, one of the inspirations for Daughter of Mystery was wanting to write a Georgette Heyer novel with lesbians. But the other major inspiration–if maddening frustration can be a form of inspiration–was Ellen Kushner’s novel The Privilege of the Sword. That book came so close to being the perfect novel of my heart…and then turned out to be a different novel. A perfectly wonderful novel, but not the book I desperately wanted. So that was another influence, not so much in writing style, but in the “feel” of the story–a story about brave and clever girls who love and rescue each other.
Jane Austen is something of an underlayer, if only in providing examples of the world of women in early 19th century Europe. One of the historical realities that modern readers aren’t always aware of is how strictly gender-segregated 19th century life was. Women–especially unmarried women–spent most of their lives socializing with other women and living with them in intimate proximity. It makes setting up same-sex relationships much easier! It’s been very important to me to center the series on women and their connections and community with each other. Too many historical stories allow women only as isolated characters, always interacting with men. In reality, if a woman had a problem or a puzzle or a project, the first people she’d turn to would be other women. I wanted the series to reflect that.
(5) MORE ON DALLAS TORNADO. Fanartist Brad Foster and his
wife Cindy also escaped injury, however, they were
almost right in the tornado’s path and their home suffered roof damage,
while in the yard trees and fences took a hit.
Narrating her memoir was more difficult than revisiting her words in the editing process. “There’s something to the art of reading it out loud, and it being an oral telling as opposed to written, that brings [those experiences] even more to the forefront. Reading it out loud in the booth, it was just even more intense. I was reliving it that much more.” The memoir details how she became a writer, showing “the idea that those things we think will break us can actually be the things that make us. All of these experiences that we have are useful, even the terrible ones. It’s just a matter of how you choose to use them. Because they are going to be there regardless. Do you want to just let them fester there, or do you want to make something out of them?”
Science Fiction is famous for the bewildering variety of worlds it imagines. This is particularly true for its political systems. A newcomer to SF might well be astounded by the diverse range of governmental arrangements on display. Let me provide some examples…
And even better, we know who they’ll be playing, per Deadline: “Pace plays Brother Day, the current Emperor of the Galaxy. Harris plays Hari Seldon, a mathematical genius who predicts the demise of the Empire.”
…Avengers and Age of Ultron director Joss Whedon singled out [James] Gunn’s work when responding to Scorsese earlier this month. He tweeted, “I first think of @JamesGunn, how his heart & guts are packed into GOTG. I revere Marty, & I do see his point, but… Well there’s a reason why ‘I’m always angry’” (the latter quote being a Hulk reference).
Speaking to Sky News, the two-time Palme d’Or-winning Brit described Marvel’s output as “boring” and cynically produced.
“They’re made as commodities like hamburgers, and it’s not about communicating, and it’s not about sharing our imagination,” he said. “It’s about making a commodity which will make a profit for a big corporation – they’re a cynical exercise. They’re a market exercise, and it has nothing to do with the art of cinema. William Blake said, ‘When money is discussed, art is impossible.'”
(10) TODAY IN HISTORY.
October 22, 1936 — According to the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, today is the day, “Fandom gathering at Milton A. Rothman’s home in Philadelphia, 1936, declares itself to be the first sf Convention. Some fans accept this; others consider the following year’s Leeds UK event a more significant landmark since it was organized in advance as a convention and used public meeting facilities.”
October 22, 2006 — Torchwood, a companion to Doctor Who, premiered on BBC Three. Starring John Barrowman and Eve Myles, it ran for forty one episodes over five years. And Big Finish Productions has produced some thirty audio-stories so far.
October 22, 2016 — On this day in the U.K. and Canada, Class, a spin-off series of Doctor Who, premiered. Starring Greg Austin, Fady Elsayed and Sophie Hopkins, the series would last just a single season of eight episodes due to really poor ratings though Big Finish Audio continued the series as an audiowork.
(11) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge.]
Born October 22, 1919 — Doris Lessing. The five novels collectively known as Canopus in Argos: Archives certainly established her genre creds. I personally would add her Cat Tales, three volumes of stories and nonfiction (Particularly Cats, Rufus the Survivor and The Old Age of El Magnifico) to your reading list. (Died 2013.)
Born October 22, 1922 — Lee Jacobs. LA fan in the last years of his life. I’m mentioning him here because he’s credited with the word filk which was his entirely unintentional creation. He typoed folk in a contribution to the Spectator Amateur Press Society in the 1950s: “The Influence of Science Fiction on Modern American Filk Music.” Yes I know that its first documented intentional use was by Karen Anderson in Die Zeitschrift für vollständigen Unsinn (The Journal for Utter Nonsense) #774 (June 1953), for a song written by her husband Poul. (Died 1968.)
Born October 22, 1938 — Christopher Lloyd, 81. He has starred as Commander Kruge in The Search for Spock, Emmett “Doc” Brown in the Back to the Future trilogy, Judge Doom in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and Uncle Fester in The Addams Family and the Addams Family Values. (Huh. I didn’t spot him in those.) Let’s not forget that he was in The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension as John Bigbooté, and he played Dr. Cletus Poffenberger in a recurring role on Tremors.
Born October 22, 1938 — Derek Jacobi, 81. He played a rather nicely nasty Master in “Utopia”, a Tenth Doctor story. He’s currently Metatron on Good Omens. And he was Magisterial Emissary in The Golden Compass.
Born October 22, 1939 — Suzy McKee Charnas, 80. I’d say The Holdfast Chronicles are her best work to date. Certainly they’re the most honored, winning Gaylactic Spectrum, James Tiptree Jr. and Lambda Literary Awards. Any of you read her Sorcery Hall series?
Born October 22, 1943 — Jim Baen. Editor of Galaxy and If. Considered to be the first profitable Ebooks publisher. Founder of Baen Books. (Died 2006.)
Born October 22, 1952 — Jeff Goldblum, 67. The Wiki page gushes over him for being in Jurassic Park and Independence Day (as well as their sequels, The Lost World: Jurassic Park and Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom) and Independence Day: Resurgence, but neglects my favorite film with him in it, The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension, not to mention the Invasion of the Body Snatchers remake he was in.
Born October 22, 1954 — Graham Joyce. Selecting his best novel is a futile exercise as everything is fantastically good but I’ll single out Some Kind of Fairy Tale and The Tooth Fairy as the ones I found the most interesting reads. (Died 2014.)
Born October 22, 1956 — Gretchen Roper, 63. Long-time member of fandom, filker and con-runner. She co-founded Dodeka Records with her husband, Bill Roper. She received with her husband the Pegasus Award for Best Original Humorous Song, “My Husband The Filker”, and was inducted into the Filk Hall of Fame in 2008. She runs The Secret Empire, a business selling filk and other things at cons.
(12) COMICS SECTION.
XKCD has a Narnia joke. (And remember, these cartoons have a second joke in a rollover– rest your cursor on the pictures and you see more text.)
Tom Gauld tries to help out New Scientist’s AI readers.
6. Engage. It can be a scary thing to approach folks at conventions. There isn’t really any way around it, but practice does make it easier. Start, if you like, by asking questions at panels that permit it. You can then use that to speak to any of the panelists afterwards, asking for clarification or even pointers. Also, try the dealer’s room if the convention has one. It’s a great place to practice conversational skills, and most of the vendors are quite happy to chat. I know I am.
Edgar Pangborn has been writing science fiction under his own name for thirteen years at this point and was apparently writing under other names before that. However, none of his stories have been translated into German and the availability of English language science fiction magazines is spotty at best. Therefore, I had never encountered Pangborn’s work before, when I came across his latest novel Davy in my local import bookstore.
…We’ve known for a while now that Jefferson Pierce (Cress Williams) is getting a new suit this season, but now we finally know how he receives it. In this exclusive clip from tonight’s episode, Agent Odell (Bill Duke) gives the imprisoned superhero a gift: a watch. Jefferson is initially skeptical because it looks like a normal timepiece and he’s probably suspicious of anything the shady ASA spook gives him. But Odell continues to gently push Jefferson until he actually tests it out and discovers the watch’s real purpose: It’s basically a morpher that contains Black Lightning’s sleek new super-suit.
“This is the reason we have you have here, why we’re testing you, why we’re putting you through so much pain and struggle,” says Odell as the suit begins to cover a Jefferson’s body. “It’s so we can create tech that will help all metas to live better. The Markovians are planning on killing or capturing all of the metas in Freeland. I cannot stop them without your help.”
Traces of ancient “glue” on a stone tool from 50,000 years ago points to complex thinking by Neanderthals, experts say.
The glue was made from birch tar in a process that required forward planning and involved several different steps.
It adds to mounting evidence that we have underestimated the capabilities of our evolutionary cousins.
Only a handful of Neanderthal tools bear signs of adhesive, but experts say the process could have been widespread.
The tool, found in the Netherlands, has spent the last 50,000 years under the North Sea. This may have helped preserve the tar adhesive.
Co-author Marcel Niekus, from the Stichting STONE/Foundation for Stone Age Research in Groningen, said the simple stone flake was probably used either for cutting plant fibres or for scraping animal skins.
While birch tar may have been used by Neanderthals to attach stone tools to wooden handles in some cases, this particular tool probably had a grip made only of tar. Dr Niekus said there was no imprint from a wood or bone shaft in the tar.
It would have enabled the user to apply more pressure to the stone flake without cutting their hands – turning the edge into a precision cutting tool.
(18) GALILEO PROBE GETS A MOVIE. The “‘Saving
Galileo’ Documentary Screens This Weekend” at Caltech’s Beckman Auditorium in Pasadena, CA on Saturday,
Oct. 26, at 7 p.m. PDT. Free admission; first come, first served.
…Produced by JPL Fellow and national Emmy Award-winner Blaine Baggett, the hour-long film tells the story of how the mission stayed alive despite a multitude of technical challenges, including a years-long launch delay and the devastating failure of its main antenna to open properly in space. It is also the story of a team of scientists and engineers transformed through adversity into what many came to regard as a tight-knit family.
“Saving Galileo” picks up from Baggett’s previous documentary “To the Rescue,” which focuses on the mission’s tortuous path to the launch pad. Together the films capture how, despite its many challenges and limitations, Galileo proved a resounding success, leading to profound scientific insights that continue to draw NASA and JPL back to Jupiter for new adventures.
If there’s one thing you do want to catch from a trip to your doctor, it’s her optimism.
A new study, published Monday in the journal Nature Human Behavior, finds that patients can pick up on subtle facial cues from doctors that reveal the doctor’s belief in how effective a treatment will be. And that can have a real impact on the patient’s treatment outcome.
Scientists have known since at least the 1930s that a doctor’s expectations and personal characteristics can significantly influence a patient’s symptom relief. Within research contexts, avoiding these placebo effects is one reason for double blind studies — to keep experimenters from accidentally biasing their results by telegraphing to test subjects what they expect the results of a study to be.
The new study both demonstrates that the placebo effect is transmitted from doctor to patient, and shows how it might work.
(20) OWN LE GUIN DOCUMENTARY. The latest Kickstarter
backer update for the documentary Worlds of Ursula Le Guin contains
information on how to view a digital copy and buy a DVD:
We know many of you haven’t yet had a chance to watch the film – we’re trying to bring it to you as quickly as we can. Online streaming, DVD, and broadcast opportunities vary by country, and continue to evolve, but here’s our latest update:
In the United States and English-speaking Canada, the film is now available to rent and buy via iTunes. For residents whose reward package didn’t include a DVD, you can also pre-order the DVD through our US distributor Grasshopper Films.
In the United Kingdom and Ireland, the film will be available to stream on BBC iPlayer after our broadcast date, expected to be announced soon. DVDs will be available in September 2021.
If you live in Israel, streaming and DVDs will be available in March 2020.
For everyone else, you can pre-order the DVD internationally through Grasshopper Films. We’re also planning a worldwide Video-on-Demand (VOD) release in December for participating countries (excluding those listed above, and some others).
Note that our DVD release date has shifted – we now expect to have DVDs ready to send out by mid-November. All DVDs will include closed captions in English for the hearing impaired, subtitles in several languages, and special extras we rescued from the cutting room floor. DVDs won’t be region-specific, so viewers around the world should be able to watch them.
(21) VIDEO OF THE DAY. in “Bicycle” on Vimeo, Cool 3D World shows what happens when
five green men decide to ride a bicycle.
[Thanks to JJ, John King Tarpinian, Chip Hitchcock, Cat Eldridge, Rob
Thornton, Mike Kennedy, Martin Morse Wooster, and Andrew Porter for some of
these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day
Brian Z.]
Many notable fanzine artists have banded together to present exhibits of their finest work at The Zine Artists, where they hope others soon will join them.
Here are high-resolution scans of great cover art unimpaired by cheap paper repro, faneds’ peculiar choices of colored paper, or massive blots of zine title typography. Pristine! At last, no barriers between the artist and the audience.
Already available are dozens and dozens of examples of the funny and beautiful work by —
The first thing you will notice is how terribly incomplete the list of artists is. “Where are Jeanne Gomoll,” you may ask, or “Jack Wiedenbeck, Randy Bathurst, or David Vereschagin?” The answer is that it will take time to track these artists down and contact them.
Taral has also penned a detailed history of the evolution of fanzine art – including his lament about the current state of affairs:
Then, of course, came the digital age, which changed everything. No longer was it necessary to print anything at all to publish a fanzine. Fan editors could manipulate words and images directly on the screen, and distribute them in whatever file format was convenient. It was no longer necessary to limit illustrations in any way. Colour became almost mandatory. Photographs were a breeze. Any image that was already digitized was fair game to import into your document. You could search the entire globe, through the Internet, for the exact image you wanted. In effect, fanartists became redundant.
The golden age of fanzine art represented here never really seems to have been accompanied by a golden age of appreciation for the artists. In every era there have been justifiable complaints that the artists did not receive enough egoboo to “sustain life as we know it.” So take advantage of this chance to leave an appreciative comment in The Zine Artists chat section!
There are numerous designs, multiple styles of shirts, a hoodie, jacket and a cap. (The shirts go up to 5X. Good thinking there.)
Shirt options include the Brad Foster-designed memorial T-shirt with “In Loving Memory-Bobbie DuFault-Chair In Memoriam” printed on left sleeve. (Sasquan co-chair DuFault passed away in September 2013, soon after winning the bid.)
There is also a Sasquatch Foot t-shirt designed by Ray VanTilburg.
Curt Phillips won the 2014 Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund race with a first-round majority. Here is a report from the fund administrators with the ballot count.
THE RESULTS
100 votes were cast in North America and 39 votes in Europe. These raised a total of $1,187.68 in North America and £266 in Europe.
The results of the first-place voting can be seen in the table below. The vote of one fan from the Rest of the World has been folded into the results from North America to preserve the anonymity of the vote.
N. America Europe Total
Brad & Cindy Foster 31 14 45
Curt Phillips 54 21 75
Randy Smith 15 2 17
No Preference 0 2 2
Total 100 39 139
The 20% rule meant that each qualifying candidate required at least 20 votes in North America and 7 votes in Europe (‘no preference’ was not included when calculating these numbers).
The list of voters follows the jump.
Update 04/29/2014: Added three names to voter list at request of administrators. Update 05/02/2014: Added another name at their request. Continue reading →
Brad and Cindy Foster, Curt Phillips and Randy Smith are your official Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund candidates in the 2014 race to pick a delegate to Loncon 3. Here are their platforms and nominators —
Brad and Cindy Foster
Why Brad and Cindy? Because they are one mind in two bodies. (They wish they had two minds, but that’s asking too much.) Because between them they have covered almost all the fannish bases. And, because this is probably the only way they will ever get to see London. He draws pictures – lots of them, and has lived the life fannish through zines and locs. (A paper-person.) She has been social (a people-person) through conventions and conversations. He’ll have to look you up in his files to remember which zine you pub, but she’ll remember your name, face, and family history.
Nominators: Mike Glyer (US), Andy Hooper (US), Steven Silver (US), David Langford (UK), Yvonne Rowse (UK).
Curt Phillips
I am a fan. I guess I always have been; I think I always will be. I’ve collected more science fiction than I’ll ever have time to read, but I keep on collecting more. I’ve written for and published fanzines; I’m the OE of FAPA. Have done many other fannish things in my time, both usual and unusual. But I’ve never traveled outside America. I’d very much to meet some of the wonderful fans in the UK and from across Europe as your TAFF delegate, and then come home to write about my adventures for you. Please support TAFF! Vote!
Nominators: Randy Byers (US), Ulrika O’Brien (US), John Purcell (US), Claire Brialey (UK), Pat Charnock (UK).
Randy Smith
Fandom is a conversation that began in the letter columns of the 1920s pulps and now extends around the world. As active participants in that conversation, we can look for new ways to expand, strengthen, and create new and divergent paths of exchange. We truly never know where it will take us. The TAFF delegate to LonCon 3 will be able to contribute in some small and unforeseen ways to that creative conversation. I would be honored if that person were me. I also promise a speedy appearance of my trip report.
Nominators: Christopher J. Garcia (US), Mark Olson (US), Kevin Standlee (US), Colin Harris (UK), Patrick McMurray (UK).
Randy Smith has entered the 2014 TAFF race. On his Facebook page he posted “I am informed by the TAFF administrators that my name will appear on the ballot for 2014. Many thanks to my nominators: Christoper J Garcia, Kevin Standlee, Mark Olson, Colin Harris, and Pat McMurray!”
This makes a three-way race, Curt Phillips and Brad and Cindy Foster having announced a few weeks ago. The nominating deadline is December 31, leaving open the possibility one or two more fans may decide to vie for the trip to the 2014 Worldcon in London.
By Brad W. Foster: This one might be kind of out of the blue, but thought I’d drop you a line and see if I could tap into the vast world-wide communications system that is the File 770 zine-and-blog to get the word out that I am now also trying my hand at the whole bloggy thing! My Corner of the Weird is happening over at http://my-corner-of-the-weird-by-brad-foster.blogspot.com/.
It started out some months ago when a small press publisher set it up, and asked me to drop in a cartoon now and then. Recently they handed the full reins of it over to me, and I thought it might be fun to try and do more with it. So recent posts have been not just cartoons, but some lesser-seen art pieces, old and new. Also hoping to put in notes for projects-in-works, photos from both fandom and the art festival circuit, and other such goodies. You know, the whole bloggy experience.
However, the MAIN reason I want to get the word out is totally evil. (Okay, partly evil.) I’ve got a small non-monetary side-bet going with another cartoony buddy on who can get more little faces in those boxes on our blogs. So I’m trying to spread the word about mine. I’m not proud, I’ll even accept people clicking in as followers who have no intention to ever look at it again. I’m such a cheat!
I do promise folks that I will work to add content on a fairly regular basis, so it won’t be static. But mainly, help me fake this other artist into believing I actually do have “followers”! And for anyone who has followers of their own blogs, you need to convince them to follow mine as well. Again, I don’t expect anyone to waste their time coming back that often to see my pointless posts, BUT this has nothing to do with content, I’m going for sheer numbers no matter how I must cheat to get them!
(We haven’t actually decided how long this will last, or what will constitute a “win”, but maybe if I can get a bunch of new folks at once, we’ll be able to wrap it up.)
Anyway Mike, any help you can give in spreading the word of my nefarious plan would be appreciated. He’s not hooked into the sf community, so I don’t think this will get back to him. (Cackle, cackle, rubbing together of hands.)