Salt Lake Comic Con Defendants Take the Stand

A federal jury has been hearing witness testimony this week in San Diego Comic-Con Inc.’s suit against Salt Lake Comic Con, accused of trademark infringement for using the term “comic con” in its name.

SLCC’s Dan Farr told Facebook followers on Wednesday:

I have been pretty silent about the lawsuit that Bryan [Brandenburg] and myself are involved in but today we ended witness testimonies. I wanted to express the gratitude I feel for all of the love and support we have felt because of all of the thoughts and prayers sent our way. We have received so many messages from people expressing positive thoughts that I can say that it honestly has given me strength and courage that I may not have had otherwise. I sincerely thank everyone for this support. I was very proud of Bryan’s testimony today and feel that he did a great job of telling our story and supporting our position in this. Tomorrow we will hear closing arguments from both sides and then the Jury will deliberate and potentially have an answer for us by the end of the day. Regardless of the outcome, I am so grateful for all of the love and support from everyone and the hard work that has gone into this by everyone involved.

The Deseret News covered Bryan Brandenburg’s appearance — “Salt Lake Comic Con organizer testifies he saw no trademark barrier to ‘comic con’ name”.

Although a Court of Appeals lifted the judge’s gag order on public statements, with the jury out of the room, an SDCC lawyer read one of Brandenburg’s social media posts to the judge —

The post announced that Brandenburg would take the witness stand to show that “comic con is owned by the people, by all the fans that experience the joy and celebration of comic con in cities all over the world.”

[Judge] Battaglia prohibited such arguments in the trial based on objections raised beforehand by San Diego. He warned that if Brandenburg intended to make any such statements during his testimony, “tell him to bring his toothbrush with him.”

The same applied to any of Salt Lake’s other witnesses, Battaglia indicated.

“I will put them in jail if they violate this order. They are not to escalate this case into a war involving the world,” Battaglia said.

When the jury returned, lawyers led Brandenburg through questioning:

As he and his new business partner considered starting a comic and pop culture convention in Utah in early 2013, Bryan Brandenburg fired up his computer.

He reviewed websites of other events, news stories about their conventions and online industry forums discussing them all.

What he found, he testified in court Wednesday, was inconsistency.

Varied spellings, differences in website designs and functionality, and distinct logos and themes all led Brandenburg to believe the events spread all across the country were all independent of each other, and many identified themselves as “comic cons.”

“It led me to believe we could call our company Salt Lake Comic Con,” Brandenburg testified.

…On cross examination Wednesday, Callie Bjurstrom, an attorney for San Diego, questioned Brandenburg on whether he reached out to anyone at San Diego Comic-Con to confirm whether they took issue with the name when Salt Lake chose it.

Brandenburg confirmed he did not.

She also presented two emails from Brandenburg, sent in the early days of Salt Lake Comic Con, discussing the businesses’ plan to “hijack” the popularity of comic con. One of the emails went on to clarify, “Comic con is just the abbreviation for comic convention.”

“Mr Brandenburg, that’s what you have done here, isn’t it? You have taken something that isn’t yours and you are using it for your own purposes, isn’t it?” Bjurstrom pressed.

“No, it is not,” Brandenburg replied.

Bjurstrom also alleged that Brandenburg didn’t do the research he talked about until after receiving the cease and desist order from San Diego Comic-Con. Brandenburg replied that was “absolutely not true.”

Trial began last week – highlights of the opening statement made by SDCC’s lawyer were reported by Courthouse News, including “She claimed the Utah organizers identified their convention as a comic con was a way to ‘steal the Comic-Con brand.’”

The defense rested Wednesday. Attorneys will make their closing arguments on Thursday, then the case will go to the jury.

[Thanks to Dave Doering for the story.]

With Gag Order Stopped, Salt Lake Comic Con’s Brandenburg Has Plenty To Say

Salt Lake Comic Con co-founder Bryan Brandenburg told the Associated Press “they’re going to try crowdfunding to help pay legal bills topping $1 million.” He is free to speak about the case again since the Ninth Circuit rejected a district court’s gag order in the San Diego Comic-Con’s trademark infringement suit against SLCC.

Brandenburg also wrote to supporters:

Here’s our thoughts. We’re considering a crowdfunding plan that allows fans and supporters to support the funding with rewards being tickets for Salt Lake Comic Con and other allied events and 100% of the proceeds will go to the legal fund, crowd funding fees and a documentary about the case. Support of the case will also get you a free copy of “Con Wars”.

That way, if you’re supportive of our cause, you can send a signal to the opposition AND get a ticket to one of our events or one of the events of our allies in the comic con community. What do you think? (Please keep it civil).

The Associated Press story said they did not immediately receive a comment from the San Diego Comic-Con.

Nor did Reuters commentator Alison Frankel, who approved the decision in a column titled “Common sense (and the Constitution!) win in Comic Con gag order appeal”:

On Thursday, a three-judge panel at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals dissolved a pair of lower court orders that barred producers of Utah’s Comic Con events from commenting on – or even posting public documents from – their infringement litigation with a San Diego group that claims ownership of the Comic-Con trademark. The appeals court held the orders to be an unjustified, unconstitutional prior restraint on the Utah group’s free speech rights.

That was the only sensible outcome. The trial judge in the Comic Con case, U.S. District Judge Anthony Battaglia of San Diego, issued the orders because he was convinced the Utah group’s website, Facebook and Twitter posts – which included commentary as well as links to articles about the case and documents from the litigation – would irretrievably taint the jury pool in San Diego. The 9th Circuit said Judge Battaglia’s reasoning simply didn’t hold up given the size of the jury pool and the availability of common procedures like voir dire to weed out biased jurors.

Allowing the restraints to remain, the 9th Circuit said, would justify gag orders “in almost any situation where an article is written or a statement is made in a public forum.” In other words, if the 9th Circuit hadn’t struck down the Comic Con restraints, parties’ First Amendment rights would be vulnerable in every case of public interest in the circuit. Thanks to Judges Kim Wardlaw, Ronald Gould and Paul Watford, that dire prospect is foreclosed….

The Deseret News of Utah also ran an article based on the AP story, “Appeals court: Gag order on Salt Lake Comic Con violated First Amendment”.

The district court “clearly erred” in restricting the free speech rights of Salt Lake Comic Con co-founders Dan Farr and Bryan Brandenburg, quoting a 1976 U.S. Supreme Court decision that emphasized “the loss of First Amendment freedoms, for even minimal periods of time, unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury,” according to the ruling.

[Thanks to Dave Doering for the story.]

Ninth Circuit Lifts Gag Order in SDCC v SLCC Suit

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals this week refused to sustain the district court’s gag order on the litigants in the San Diego Comic-Con’s suit against Salt Lake Comic Con and its organizers, Dan Farr and Bryan Brandenburg. The suit about alleged infringement of SDCC’s trademark on the words “comic con” has been in progress since 2014.

Judge Anthony Battaglia granted the gag order in July at the request of SDCC’s attorneys, swayed by their argument that publicity is tainting the jury pool. Salt Lake Comic Con’s Bryan Brandenburg has worked hard to gain public support for his side in the suit brought by San Diego Comic-Con.

The Ninth Circuit judges overruled the order, saying:

The orders at issue are unconstitutional prior restraints on speech. They prohibit speech that poses neither a clear and present danger nor a serious and imminent threat to SDCC’s (San Diego Comic-Con) interest in a fair trial…

For those interested in greater detail, here are several excerpts from the decision which begins —

This petition for a writ of mandamus arises in the context of a hotly contested trademark action initiated by San Diego Comic Convention (“SDCC”) against the producers of the Salt Lake Comic Con—Dan Farr Productions, Daniel Farr, and Bryan Brandenburg (“Petitioners”)—over the use of the mark “comiccon” or “comic con.” The case has drawn nationwide attention and discussion on traditional and social media alike, in part because “comic cons” have been held in hundreds of venues across the United States. Because defendants actively participated in the public discussions over the internet, on various websites and through social media platforms, including Twitter feeds and Facebook postings, SDCC successfully moved for a sweeping set of “suppression orders” prohibiting Petitioners from expressing their views on the pending litigation and from republishing public documents over social media platforms. Instead, the court ordered Petitioners to prominently post on their social media outlets its order prohibiting comments about the litigation on social media, dubbing this posting a “disclaimer.” Petitioners assert that the court-ordered prior restraints on their speech violate the First Amendment. We agree, and order that the district court vacate the “suppression” and “disclaimer” orders.

Several times in the Ninth Circuit’s decision, they practically teased the district court judge about his inept analysis, and tendency to draw conclusions despite a lack of evidence to support them.

There is no evidence of the extent to which the jury pool was exposed to such coverage, which apparently did not even reach the district court judge. [The district court noted at one hearing about the extensive nature of the postings, “Because for some reason, I must live under a rock. I didn’t see any [of] this stuff.”] There is also no evidence that any of the Facebook users who expressed support for Petitioners in response to Brandenburg’s postings about this case are part of the jury pool, and in any event the record reflects that the total number of such users is insignificant.

The district court’s analysis also disregarded two critical factors for evaluating the likely effect of pretrial publicity on the jury pool: whether the subject matter of the case is lurid or highly inflammatory, and whether the community from which the jury will be drawn is small and rural, or large, populous, metropolitan, and heterogeneous….

…In addition to improperly analyzing each alternative, we note that the district court’s logic disqualified alternatives categorically and would justify imposition of prior restraints in almost any situation where an article is written or a statement is made in a public forum.

Although the Ninth Circuit refused to uphold the gag order because it violated the parties’ Consitutional rights, the panel could not resist pointing out how the order was ineffectively drafted to accomplish its purpose.

The orders are simultaneously unmoored from the interest they purport to protect—the integrity of the San Diego-area jury pool. For example, nothing prohibits Petitioners from contacting and collaborating with San Diego-area media to create newspaper articles, magazine features, or television coverage of the case, and Petitioners would not even have to include the “disclaimer,” which is explicitly limited to Petitioners’ online activities. Nothing prevents Petitioners from mailing all San Diego-area residents annotated copies of the publicly available filings. And nothing prevents Petitioners from holding press conferences in San Diego at which they discuss the case (while avoiding the specific prohibitions in the first protective order).

The parties are expected to fight to the finish. In other rulings handed down by Judge Battaglia in September, he refused to grant summary judgment on the trademark infringement issue because some factual issues can only be resolved by a trial.

[Thanks to David Doering for the story.]

Judge Issues Gag Order in Comic Con Suit

Salt Lake Comic Con’s Bryan Brandenburg has worked hard to gain public support for his side in the trademark infringement suit brought by San Diego Comic-Con. He’s been so successful at generating favorable publicity that SDCC’s lawyers asked Judge Anthony Battaglia to impose a gag order on the litigants, which he granted July 18.

San Diego Comic-Con’s request for a protective order played up Brandenburg’s own press coverage claims as a basis for requesting the order:

Since the inception of this dispute, Defendants have brazenly engaged in a strategic public campaign to disparage SDCC and “win this case in the court of public opinion.” Defendants’ public campaign has included statements made in numerous press releases, news articles, on websites and on social media including Facebook and Twitter. Indeed, Defendants boast they have secured more than 200,000 media articles reporting on the case that are “favorable” to Defendants.

Additionally, many of the statements made publicly by Defendants are misleading, prejudicial, inflammatory, or false. These include numerous claims that SDCC lied and/or committed fraud on the government in order to obtain its trademarks.

(Brandenburg’s fraud allegations are covered here.)

The complaint continues:

Defendant Bryan Brandenburg consistently disparages SDCC and/or its board members on social media by suggesting SDCC lies and engages in other unethical behavior.  Brandenburg’s comments are designed to harm SDCC and incite others on social media to engage in disparaging discussions about SDCC. Moreover, Brandenburg’s comments about SDCC almost always relate to this litigation and the suggestion that the dispute is frivolous.  Defendants repeatedly litigate their case by using media outlets to mischaracterize the parties’ positions and taint the public’s perception regarding the issues in dispute in this case.  Defendants’ media campaign is increasing in intensity as this case nears trial.  Defendants’ goal is to win this case by using media outlets to tarnish the reputation of SDCC and taint the jury pool.  As Defendant Bryan Brandenburg stated in one of Defendants’ many press releases, “I am asking for support from the community and all the powers of the Universe to bring victory to us in this case.”

Judge Anthony Battalgia, though motions for summary judgment in the case are still pending, seems to have been swayed by the argument that publicity is tainting the jury pool. The Hollywood Reporter, in “Comic-Con: This Year’s Convention Comes With a Judge’s Gag Order” explains the order, which denies part of the relief requested by SDCC while granting the most important items:

…Battaglia rejects a move to stop Farr and Brandenburg, and those associated with them, from making any false or misleading statement about San Diego Comic-Con or the merits of the dispute. That would be an unconstitutional prior restraint, the judge concludes.

However, accepting evidence that “the venire is being influenced through social media dialogue,” the judge is preventing both sides from making statements accusing, suggesting or implying that San Diego Comic-Con lied or committed fraud. Additionally, the parties aren’t allowed to discuss the alleged genericness of the term “comic con,” how the mark may or may not be descriptive, and whether San Diego Comic-Con abandoned its trademark rights.

The parties are being allowed to post court papers, but only in full and without further comment. The judge is also warning that violation of the order will warrant strong sanctions.

There’s a livelier article at Techdirt, “San Diego Comic Con Gets Gag Order On Salt Lake Comic Con”, where the writers are still pissed that SDCC subpoenaed them in 2015 about their coverage of the suit:

You can read the demand for a protective order here or below, and if I had to summarize it, it’s basically: “it’s no fair that Salt Lake Comic Con is getting good press coverage and we’re being mocked, so the court should silence them.” I read through the document and I kept expecting more… and… that’s really it. They literally complain that they’re losing in “the court of public opinion” and argue that it’s somehow unfair that one side is talking about this case publicly and they should be barred from any further conversation. And, it gives some more context to the paranoid view that was clear in the subpoena we received: SDCC and/or its lawyers are so focused on the negative press coverage that they seem to assume that something more nefarious is going on… beyond the basic likelihood that lots of people think this lawsuit is over-aggressive bullying by SDCC.

And about the gag order itself, Techdirt’s Mike Masnick says:

I have trouble seeing how the first two are unconstitutional prior restraint, but the rest are allowed to be gagged — especially something as mundane as discussing whether comic con is generic or descriptive. But, really, since the court apparently doesn’t want anyone discussing that kind of thing, perhaps go ahead and have a discussion in the comments about that very question. And, in case SDCC’s high priced lawyers are looking at this yet again, I’ll remind you once again that we have no relationship of any kind with the organizers of the Salt Lake City event. We just don’t like big bullies silencing people or filing questionable lawsuits.

Bryan Brandenburg’s only public statement since the order has been to make the announcement ordered by the court. He told Facebook followers:

United States District Judge Anthony J. Battaglia of the United Stated District Court for the Southern District of California has ordered that no editorial comments, opinions, or conclusions about San Diego Comic Convention v. Dan Farr Productions, LLC, et al., No. 14-cv-1865 AJB (JMA) (S.D. Cal.), be made on social media, and that no highlights or summaries of the status of the proceedings or the evidence presented be made on social media.

Naturally, fans like Chris Hamatake were quick to observe:

But there’s no restriction on fans commenting or expressing opinions, right? As I’m not part of the litigation process, I don’t see that anything posted by fans could affect the legal process either way…

Brandenburg laconically agreed, “No,” and his Facebook commenters immediately resumed their vocal support for SLCC.

[Via Petréa Mitchell.]

Pixel Scroll 3/1/17 Old Man Pixel, He Just Keeps Scrollin’ Along

(1) HELSINKI NEWS. Worldcon 75 is holding an Academic Poster competition and would very much like participation from as many university students and researchers as possible.

We are hosting a science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine (STEMM) poster competition for undergraduate students, graduate students and post-doctoral researchers. The competition is also open to posters that explore the connections between STEMM subjects and SF/fantasy/horror. There will be a €100 prize for the poster that best communicates research to the general public.

Presenters will be able to share their research with an audience that is very interested in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine, but where many audience members will not have been formally educated in STEMM subjects. In addition, presenters will be invited to give five minute mini-talks on Saturday 12th August 2017 explaining their research. Taken together, the posters and mini-talks represent an exciting opportunity for the presenters to practice research communication, and for audience to learn about cutting-edge research.

If you are interested in displaying a poster then fill in our web form below or follow this direct link to the form.

The deadline for applications is 1st May 2017 and we will inform you of our decision by mid-June.

(2) DREAM FULFILLED. Phil Kaveny, who I know from the Mythopoeic Society, announced the script for his play “The Munitions Factory” is available from Amazon Kindle.  He calls it “My project of a lifetime.”

The Munitions Factory is a play about love, money, revolution, and the military industrial complex. Set in Imperial Germany in 1917 during the worst winter in German history, The Munitions Factory is really about our world in the 21st century. It is a hard driving play that will jar you out of your complacency, and it is also a compelling love story about characters who walk the razor’s edge between desperate love and repulsion that is common in wartime.

(3) DOWN TO THE WIRE. In comments Jonathan Edelstein pointed out that “a team headed by the heroic Jake Kerr is putting together a 2017 Campbell-eligible anthology.”

The submission form is here for any Campbell-eligible authors (first pro publication in 2015 or 2016) who want to submit a sample of last year’s work.

(4) ODDS FAVOR THE HOUSE. The Conservative-Libertarian Fiction Alliance opened voting today for the CLFA Book of the Year Awards.

CLFA an online group of readers, authors and other creative individuals who want to see more freedom-friendly storytelling in the marketplace. We provide our members with networking opportunities as well as a safe, friendly and open environment for both political and creative discussions. We are currently at over 1300 members strong, with new participants joining us on a daily basis….

CLFA Book of the Year Awards, now in their third year, seek to recognize the best in freedom-friendly fiction. To qualify for entry in the CLFA 2017 Book of the Year contest, the work has to be over 50k words and first published in any form in 2016. Our members voted to arrive at the Top 10 list, which is now open to the public for the final vote.

Voting is open until midnight on March 31, 2017. Winners to be announced in April 2017. Voting happens here.

The finalists are:

  • Iron Chamber of Memory by John C. Wright
  • Discovery by Karina Fabian
  • Set to Kill by Declan Finn
  • By the Hands of Men, Book Three: The Wrath of a Righteous Man by Roy M. Griffis
  • Murphy’s Law of Vampires by Declan Finn
  • Chasing Freedom by Marina Fontaine
  • Domino by Kia Heavey
  • Monster Hunter Memoirs: Grunge by John Ringo
  • Souldancer by Brian Niemeier
  • Brings the Lightning by Peter Grant

At the moment Peter Grant’s novel from Castalia House is leaving the field behind. He’s got 50 votes to 25 votes for John C. Wright’s novel (also from Castalia House). Last year’s Dragon Award-winning Souldancer by Brian Niemeier has one vote so far.

(5) INJUSTICE. Australia writer Tom Taylor, of Injustice Gods Among Us and Injustice 2 comics, told his Facebook readers he won’t be at Emerald City Comic Con this week and or other U.S. events.

Sadly, I won’t be attending Emerald City Comicon in Seattle this week.

I have also turned down all other US signing and convention invitations so far this year.

I know I’m far from the only person concerned about traveling to the States at this time, but I wanted to explain my decision.

I want to start by saying this decision was incredibly difficult. I was really looking forward to this trip. I have traveled to the US regularly since 2009. This year, I have four different books with three different publishers, and a TV series to promote. Beyond this, I have fans and colleagues I was looking forward to meeting. I also have many good friends in the States, and I was looking forward to catching up with all of them. Truth be told, I’m missing them.

But America, through no fault of most of its citizens, doesn’t feel like a safe or welcoming travel destination at this moment.

There have been reports of interrogation, phone data downloads, requests for social media accounts, returns and five-year travel bans and everyone from children to the elderly being detained. All of this has many people I’ve spoken to reconsidering or cancelling their US travel plans.

I’ve had friends and people I work with suggest I leave my phone at home, or delete my twitter account for a month before I come.

I refuse those terms.

My twitter account isn’t complimentary towards the current administration, but it’s far from inflammatory and shouldn’t need to be scrutinized to gain entry to a country where free-speech is so highly valued.

Traveling fifteen hours on a plane is bad enough. Travelling towards uncertainty, half-worried about being caught in limbo by overzealous border security, with my wife and children wondering why I haven’t called, is nightmare fuel…..

(Via Comicsbeat.)

(6) PENRIC SEQUEL. Lois McMaster Bujold’s latest novella Mira’s Last Dance (Penric & Desdemona Book 4) is out.

(7) VOTE FOR PAUL WEIMER. Ten days ‘til Down Under Fan Fund voting closes. The deadline is midnight, March 10 (PST). Our Paul Weimer is the only candidate for the trip to the Australian National Convention, but the contribution of $5 or more accompanying your vote will help keep the fund going during and after Paul’s trip. Click here to get started.

CANDIDATE PLATFORM

Paul Weimer

I’m a podcaster for the Skiffy and Fanty podcast, the SFF audio podcast, a noted SF/F book reviewer and a regular panelist at local cons. I am also an amateur photographer. I have only been to one international con, the Worldcon in London in 2014, and would love to broaden my international fandom connections. If I have the honor of being selected, I aim to build the links I already have with Australian fandom (in things like being a prior participant in The Australian SF Snapshot) into face to face interviews, meetings, and more with fans and genre folk at Continuum and elsewhere in Australia. Have camera and recorder and ready to travel!

Nominators: North America: Mike Glyer, Arref Mak, and Jen Zink. Australasia: Gillian Polack and Alexandra Pierce.

(8) GLOWING REVIEWS. Jason continues to burn the midnight oil and has melted down another month of online science fiction and fantasy offerings into a shiny list of favorite stories in “Summation of Online Fiction: February 2017” at Featured Futures.

Thirteen February pro-rate webzines (the same as last month’s list except that a new bimonthly issue of Compelling replaced the defunct Fantastic) produced forty-three stories of 196,912 words. I most appreciated six (amounting to 14% of the whole)…

(9) SMALL WORLD, BIG NEWS. ChiZine Publications has cut an illustrated book deal with George A. Romero, creator of The Night of the Living Dead. They have acquired The Little World of Humongo Bongo, an illustrated book, originally published in French.

The Little World of Humongo Bongo is the tale of fire-breathing giant Humongo Bongo, who lives on the tiny planet of Tongo. Gentle and curious, his world is thrown upside down when he encounters a race of tiny people named the Minus, who initially worship him as a God but then turn on him when they succumb to fear, greed and the lust for power….

The Little World of Humongo Bongo will be published in Fall/Winter 2017, in association with Dave Alexander’s Untold Horror, a multi-media brand dedicated to exploring the greatest horror stories never told.

(10) TODAY IN HISTORY

  • March 1, 1692 — The Salem Witch Trials began in Massachusetts with the conviction of West Indian slave, Tituba, for witchcraft.

(11) CALLING ALL SMOFS. Kevin Standlee shared the news that as of yesterday there was still no bid for the 2019 Westercon, to be selected this July in Tempe.

Any site in Western North America (or Hawaii) is eligible. (Nobody filed by the end of December 2016, so the exclusion zone is suspended.) The filing deadline for the ballot is April 15, 2017. If no bid files by then, site selection won’t have any bids on the ballot, and I probably will have to ask Tempe for a larger room and longer time slot for the Westercon Business Meeting.

So here’s your chance to host a Westercon!

The bidding requirements are in the Westercon Bylaws, Article 3. The bylaws are on the Westercon web site at http://www.westercon.org/organization/business/

It’s approximately the same as Worldcon, with minor differences. The outline is the same: file bidding papers, and if the voters at the administering Westercon select you, you get the bid. If nobody wins, the Business Meeting decides.

(12) SLCC UPDATE. Here’s Bryan Brandenburg of the Salt Lake Comic Con appearing before the Utah Legislature (to the right of the flag). In his address, Bryan emphasized that their intent is to fill the void and not replace the other commercial events.

(13) ROBOMALLCOP. Francis Hamit is sufficiently impressed with the company that he bought some stock. “I thought this might be of interest. Securitas is the largest provider of contract human security officers in the world. Knightscope is a new company with a unique robotic system that does not replace human officers but does greatly extend their range.” And they have some good news.

Knightscope, developer of advanced physical security technologies focused on significantly enhancing US security operations, and Securitas AB (SECU-B.ST), the world’s second largest private security company, announced today that the parties are extending their channel partner agreement through February 2020. The agreement gives Securitas Security Services USA, Inc., a subsidiary of Securitas, rights to offer Knightscope’s technologies to its significant existing customer base, while Knightscope continues to develop new technologies and provide operational support.

Hamit adds:

Any resemblance to the Daleks is strictly coincidental. I am sure.

(14) UNDERSTANDING FUTURISM. New from McFarland, Science Fiction and Futurism: Their Terms and Ideas by Ace G. Pilkington.

Science and science fiction have become inseparable—with common stories, interconnected thought experiments, and shared language. This reference book lays out that relationship and its all-but-magical terms and ideas. Those who think seriously about the future are changing the world, reshaping how we speak and how we think.

This book fully covers the terms that collected, clarified and crystallized the futurists’ ideas, sometimes showing them off, sometimes slowing them down, and sometimes propelling them to fame and making them the common currency of our culture.

The many entries in this encyclopedic work offer a guided tour of the vast territories occupied by science fiction and futurism.

Beware, it will help multiply the number of books on your TBR pile. In his Foreword, David Brin says, “Provocative and enticing? Filled with ‘huh!’ moments and leads to great stories? That describes this volume.”

(15) RING THAT BELLE. John Ostrander talks about The Other in “The Face in the Mirror” at ComicMix.

The most recent issue of Entertainment Weekly featured an article about and interview with Emma Watson, playing Belle in the upcoming live-action Disney version of Beauty and the Beast. She may be best known for playing Hermione in the Harry Potter films. In addition to being very talented, Ms. Watson is also very smart and very articulate. As the article notes, she has also been a leader in feminist causes.

In the article, she’s asked why it is hard for some male fans to enjoy a female hero. (Witness the fanboy furor at the all-female remake of Ghostbusters and the female leads in the last two Star Wars films.) She replied: “It’s something they [some male fans] are not used to and they don’t like that. I think if you’ve been used to watching characters that look like, sound like, think like you and then you see someone [unexpected] up on the screen, you go ‘Well, that’s a girl; she doesn’t look like me. I want it to look like me so that I can project myself onto the character.’. . .for some reason there’s some kind of barrier there where [men] are like: ‘I don’t want to relate to a girl.’”

That sounds right to me. We’ve seen that attitude prevalent not only in movie fans but comic fans as well. There’s a wish fulfillment, a fantasy fulfillment, in comics and comics-related TV and movies, in fantasy as well and we want to be able to easily project ourselves into that. For some male fans, a woman doesn’t cut it. The bias also can extend to seeing someone of a different race as the hero. I think it’s certainly true about sexual identity as well. To appeal to a certain demographic, the hero, the lead, cannot be female, or black, or gay. And heaven forbid they should be all three; tiny minds might explode….

Are you Arab? Do you wear a turban? Are you black? Are you gay? Are you female? Then you are not like me, you are “Other.” And that is inherently dangerous. We cannot be equal. It comes down to “zero-sum thinking” which says that there is only so many rights, so much love, so much power to be had. If I have more of any of these than you, I must lose some for you to gain.

Some of the people feel they don’t have much. I remember a line from Giradoux’s one-act play The Apollo of Bellac: “I need so much and I have so little and I must protect myself.” Sharing is not gaining; sharing is losing what little you may have.

Except it’s not. If for you to keep your power intact, you must deny someone else the power to which they have a right, it’s not really your power. It’s theirs and it’s been stolen.

Pop culture has its part to play. Putting women, blacks, gays, Latinos, and others in the central role helps normalize the notion of equality. Mary Tyler Moore did it; Bill Cosby (gawd help me) did it, Rogue One does it. However, pop culture can – and has – also re-enforced negative stereotypes. So – how do we engage it for more positive results?

Denny O’Neil, many years ago, when he was editing a special project I was working on told me, “You can say anything you want but first you have to tell a story.” That’s your ticket in. “Tell me a story” appeals to the very roots of who we are as human beings. It’s how we explain and codify our world. If you want to open a closed mind, go through the heart. Don’t lecture; engage. Show, don’t tell. Showing women, blacks, LGBTQ, Latinos, Asians, and so on as heroes, as something positive, normalizes the notion. If I can be made to identify with them then The Other is no longer strange; they are me and, thus, not other.

(16) BRADBURY ASSOCIATIONAL ITEM. I’d tell you to start shaking the change out of your piggy bank except that will only work if you filled it with gold sovereigns. Still available on eBay, Ray Bradbury-owned oil painting by Raymond Bayless. Price: $15,000.

Ray Bradbury personally owned Raymond Bayless painting, titled, “War of the Worlds, H.G. Wells”. Art depicts the famous naval battle from the story between a martian “Tripod” weapon and English ironclad, the HMS Thunder Child. Cityscape along the horizon is on fire, and the ship also goes up in flames with a cloud of black smoke, the martian chemical weapon, rising from it. Painting features a color palette of predominantly light blues and greys, accented in orange, black and white. Signed, “Raymond Bayless 91,” at lower left. A sticker on verso is also signed by the artist. Oil on Masonite painting is framed to an overall size of 18.75″ x 24.75″. Near fine. With a COA from the Bradbury Estate.

[Thanks to David Doering, Cat Eldridge, Francis Hamit, JJ, Jonathan Edelstein, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day John From GR.]