The Wind’s Hind Quarters 6/30

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aka Quit Zoomin’ Those Paws Through The Air

Starring in today’s roundup: Charlie Jane Anders, Jon F. Zeigler, Arianne, Melina D, Paul Kincaid, Martin Wisse, Justin Howe, Lou Antonelli, Doctor Strangelove, Terry Weyna, Spacefaring Kitten, Laura “Tegan” Gjovaag, Grac and embrodski. (Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editors of the day Richard Brandt and Daniel Dern.)

Charlie Jane Anders on io9

“Eight Books You Need To Know About To Understand The Hugo Awards Snafu” – June 30

about books

But all the discussions about the Puppies, pro and con, tend to bog down in generalizations. So let’s get specific. Here are eight books that can help illuminate this mess. Because this is about books, or it’s about nothing at all.

[Anders takes a highly interesting approach, contrasting what reviewers and Sad/Rabid Puppies advocates have to say about these eight sf works:]

  • The Forever War by Joe Haldeman
  • Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton
  • Monster Hunter Legion by Larry Correia
  • Blackout by Mira Grant
  • Redshirts by John Scalzi
  • Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie
  • The Book of Feasts and Seasons by John C. Wright
  • Seveneves by Neil Stephenson

 

 

Jon F. Zeigler on Sharrukin’s Palace

“The Hugo Dispute: An Assessment” – June 30

[Thorough article. This is just an excerpt of two of the topics:]

Over at Amazing Stories, Steve Davidson recently blogged about possible fan responses to this mess. Some of his suggestions strike me as either impractical or actively harmful, but I think he’s on the right track with at least one item:

“First, the crafting of a formal statement that articulates the position that Fandom and Fans (which includes authors, artists, editors, podcasters, bloggers, fan writers, fan artists and everyone) do not game awards (or other fannish institutions) for personal, political or financial gain. Further, that individuals who may be eligible for awards state formally that they do not grant permission for third parties to include them or their works in voting campaigns or slates or organized voting blocs and that if their names or works are found on such, it is without their express permission.”

As a purely voluntary principle for creators in this space, I think that’s well worth considering. So here’s my line in the sand, to be repeated if and when it becomes fully relevant.

I won’t participate in organizing a slate for any industry award. If and when I publish something that’s eligible, I will not give my permission for that work to be included on any slate. If someone includes my work on a slate without my permission, and that work reaches the ballot, I will withdraw it from consideration. If that means the award becomes irrelevant to my success as an author, so be it.

I can succeed without having to chase fan politics. I can do that by pursuing the work I love: writing and selling stories. If that isn’t enough, I don’t intend to waste my time stewing over might-have-beens.

Now, as it happens, the argument above assumes that the rules of the awards process aren’t going to change. If they do change to make slate voting more costly or difficult, that mitigates the problem. There are multiple ways to get that result, some of which admittedly constitute a cure worse than the disease.

Fortunately, there’s a proposed rule change that will be considered at the WSFS business meeting this year, and that seems very promising. That’s the so-called E Pluribus Hugo proposal, a modification of the procedure for counting nomination votes.

I’ve spent some time looking at the EPH proposal. In fact, while I don’t claim to be an expert, the comparative study of election systems is familiar to me (my professional background is in mathematics and computer science). Thus far I’m quite impressed.

 

Melina D on Subversive Reader

“Hugos 2015 – Where to now?” – July 1

So what do I do next?

I was talking to my sister about the Hugos the other night. My sister is not in the community (though she does read and watch speculative media), but she’s worked in politics, so she understands a lot about the political process and it was relatively easy to explain how the slate dominated the awards this year. She helped me clarify some of my thoughts and then asked the question:

“So what are you going to do about it?”

Funnily enough, I’d been turning this question over in my head for a few days. What was I going to do to make my voice heard? How was I going to stand up and say ‘I want the best writing – the absolute best – to be nominated for and win Hugos Awards.’ I want writing which makes me feel something, writing which makes me stay up late reading, writing which makes me want to tell everyone about what I just read.

I have two main powers as a supporting member – I can nominate and I can vote. There is a third power though – I can write about it. I can write about the stories and books I read and why I love them or why they don’t quite work for me and why other people should go to read them. I can write about the nominees and why I would vote for one or the other. The power of the internet means that I can put my voice out there.

I can also read more. This Hugo ‘season’ has allowed me to find a lot of new places to find short fiction and I’ve already started reading some from the first half of the year. I’m reading more blogs and online magazines and looking at their book reviews and announcements. I’ve made sure that I’m putting more time into reading – even if it’s just a short story before bed.

There’s a few places I can go to find 2015 stories and media, but I’d also like to open it here. What new fiction or nonfiction are you consuming? What have you really enjoyed? What would you like to share with others? Leave a comment, tell me about it. I might go on to read and review it, I might not, but it gives me new places to explore and new things to try. I might find a new author I absolutely love, or find myself reading a new type of story I’d never even thought about before.

With more reading, I’m going to feel more confident nominating. And by sharing my reading, I hope I can encourage others to read and nominate their favourite stories of the year. Maybe it won’t be enough to negate the slate, but at least I’m doing something positive.

 

Paul Kincaid on BestScienceFictionBooks.com

“A Reply to Kevin Standlee on the Hugos”  – June 30

[Excerpt is first of four points.]

1: No, I do not want a “Strong Leader”, and that is not what I said. What I want is a more responsive organisation. Every award that I know of has a mechanism in place that would allow for a change in the rules between one award presentation and the next. Some of these amount to a strong leader, most do not. None of them takes at least two years to put in place any rule change.

Situations change, and in our modern digital age they change very rapidly indeed. It surely makes sense that awards should be able to respond just as rapidly. As it is, whatever might be proposed at the next WSFS meeting cannot take effect until after it is ratified at the following WSFS meeting in 2016, which means it will be the 2017 awards before there is any actual change. If the Sad and Rabid Puppies behaved within the rules this year, as indeed they did, then they have free rein to do exactly the same next year. That does not strike me as an award process that is fit for purpose.

Here’s is a proposal to make the award more responsive without a “Strong Leader”, (it may not be the only possibility or the best, but it is at least a notion that could be considered): I have seen a number of proposals online for possible changes to the Hugo rules. Why not provide a venue online where these proposals can be thoroughly debated by all interested parties, so that when the next WSFS meeting comes along all that is needed is for the proposal to be ratified or not by the meeting, and lo, the rule change is made, there and then, within the year? As it is, whatever debate has gone on previously, the proposal can only formally be made at the next WSFS meeting, by those who can attend the Worldcon (an expensive commitment, especially if it is on a different continent), and will then only be ratified by those attending the next WSFS meeting at the next Worldcon (yet another expense). By moving the debate online and making the WSFS meeting a ratification body, I think you would actually make the Hugos more democratic, not less.

So no, Kevin, I do not want a strong leader.

 

Martin Wisse on Wis[s]e Words

“If you want to change the Hugos, understand their history” – June 30

Okay, I don’t want to begrudge anybody their Hugo rant — ghu knows I’ve written enough and in fact I’d agree with quite a bit of this criticism:…

The Hugos are the way they are, with all their strengths and weaknesses because they’re the result of a decades long specific democratic process and the 2015 categories and rules are the fossilised remains of this process. You cannot understand the Hugos properly unless you not only know that the Best Semi-prozine category was created to shield all other fanzines from the Locus juggernaut, but also that the same sort of thing happened with the Best podcast category, the long struggle to get comics recognised properly and why there are two editorial categories and what went before that.

And not only that, you need to know the process and rules under which these changes are made, like the proposers of E Pluribus Hugo frex do seem to. You need to understand how the business meetings work as well as why and how it was established, even without Kevin Standlee to prompt you. You need to be a bit of a process nerd to be honest. (You also need to realise that much of this was designed by Americans, who seem to have a national weakness for over complicated voting systems with huge barriers to entry…)

This bone deep understanding and awareness of what is and isn’t possible given the history and current structure of WSFS and the Hugos is likely why people like Kevin Standlee might be a bit dismissive of such criticsm as well as looking overly lawyerly. That’s the risk of being an insider, you have a much better grasp on the mechanism of the system and less of an idea of what it looks like from the outside

But what you should also realise is that knowning this history and being familiar with the whole process more than likely also gives you an overwhelming sense of how fragile the whole structure is, how easy it is for a well intended proposal or rules change to damage or destroy WSFS. I see a deep fear and wariness behind that “slow and prone to complexify process, a desire to err on the side of caution, knowning how close it has come to all going kablooey.

 

Justin Howe on 10 Bad Habits

“Caring is Meaningless” – June 30

This is a thing I wrote in response to some SFF fandom bullshit going on. If you’re reading this and don’t know what the Sad/Rabid Puppies are, well, I envy you. Stay unaware. Don’t google it. Google prehistoric squirrels or Steven Universe conspiracy theories instead. It’ll be time better spent. For the rest of us poor bastards who have eaten of the Fruit of Bullshit from the Tree of Train Wreck, this post is for us.

When someone says, “Well, at least I care!” all they’re saying is, “Well, at least I have an opinion!” I’ve read this from one of the Sad Pup ringleaders, and couldn’t help but read the bit about “caring” as the foot-stomp of the petulant, self-righteous child. Caring is meaningless. Caring can be split so many ways and made to mean anything. You can carry it down into all kinds of Godwin Law absurdity. Mussolini cared about train schedules. Custer cared about the Sioux. You can’t say they didn’t. They certainly cared enough to have opinions about them. To state so sternly that you’re justified in your actions, because “you cared” is simply a sleight of hand attempt to raise feelings up to the level of values, because you’re not wise or self-aware enough to process your feelings without making noises.

 

Lou Antonelli on This Way To Texas

“Puppies in the heartland” – June 30

The Puppy Kickers cite well-known authors who are known conservatives – Mike Resnick and Larry Niven are two – but they came up through the ranks years ago. People like Larry Corriea and Brad Torgersen have entered the field in the past ten years, and have seen and felt first-hand the snubs and insults of the snobs. Both were nominated for the Campbell Award for Best new writer in their first year of eligibility. They didn’t win. Now, that award allows you two years of eligibility, and over the years many writers have has two shots at winning – but neither Larry nor Brad were even nominated in their second years of eligibility.

The Puppy Kickers would assert it’s because as people got to know them better, they realized they sucked as authors. I suspect it’s more likely they were shunted aside because they do not conceal their Mormon faith.

In 2012, when Mitt Romney was the Republican nominee for president, most of the leading lights in the s-f  literary world combined their hatred for people of faith with their hatred for Republicans by attacking Romney in the most vile language. Quite frankly, I personally believe there are some things you should never say to or about people, regardless of the subject. In light of the attacks on Romney, is it any wonder all the Mormon s-f writers went off the reservation? It’s almost a human rights issue – “you can’t say that about one of my coreligionists.

I doubt most of the Puppy Kickers have any Christian friends, and certainly no Mormons. But here in Middle America there are plenty of Christians, Mormons, and even – as Jay Lake used to say – “low church atheists” – people who don’t believe in the supernatural, but, like Jay, didn’t mind if you needed a faith.

I remember when Jay said the source of so much ill feeling were the “high church atheists” – people who didn’t believe in God, and wanted to stamp out your religion, too. Jay was a smart man and a nice guy.

As I have made the convention circuit, I have been heartened by the many people who have been kind and supportive of my work, and either supportive or tolerant of the Sad Puppies effort. It reminds me that most people are thoughtful and considerate human beings, and the internet is a tool that is – like the machinery left behind by the Krel as depicted in the s-f classic movie “Forbidden Planet” – letting the darkest and worst innermost aspects of human nature loose upon the land.

 

Doctor Strangelove on Strangelove for Science Fiction

“Attention seeking troll puppies” – June 30

The various Puppy leaders, it turns out, have little to say, and their arguments implode into insignificance. They don’t think a literary award, the Hugos, should go to literary fiction. They don’t think science fiction should contain messages, or be socially progressive. Their voting slates, of course, contain attempts at literary fiction and message fiction. If we set aside their arguments, all we are left with is noise. Their attention-seeking trolling of the Hugo nomination process in essence says “look at me, look at me!” That is sad, indeed.

 

Terry Weyna on Fantasy Literature

“Magazine Monday: Hugo-Nominated Short Stories 2014”

[Reviews all five nominees.]

The short stories nominated for the Hugo Award this year are a disappointing lot. I read a great many stories in 2014 that were far better than at least four of these tales.

 

Spacefaring Kitten on Spacefaring, Extradimensional Happy Kittens

“Jeffro ‘GURPS-disadvantaged people ruin SFF’ Johnson” – June 30

Reading Jeffro Johnson was an interesting and even SFFnal experience. I mean, one of the most enjoyable aspects of science fiction and fantasy is that it has the capacity to offer alien experiences and viewpoints.

Most likely I disagree with Jeffro Johnson on a wide range of topics, but unlike the three Mad Genius Club bloggers who are competing with him for the Best Fan Writer Hugo, Johnson makes a better job at explaining his views. He is also mainly interested in science fiction and fantasy instead of waging a culture war against “social justice warriors” which is more than a welcome change after wading through the polemics of Dave Freer, Cedar Sanderson and Amanda S. Green…..

 

Laura “Tegan” Gjovaag on Bloggity-Blog-Blog-Blog

“Hugo Reading – Fan Writer” – June 30

[Reviews all five nominees.]

Johnson is the clear winner here, since he seems to be the only one that really fits what I think of as the category. I might put Mixon on the ballot as well, but that is a difficult choice. Both of them are going below “No Award” I think. The other three do not deserve awards for the writing in their packets. In fact, they really shouldn’t have been nominated at all. My guess is that all three must have been on the slates, since I do not believe they could have been nominated by the merits of the writings they provided.

If I sound a little bitter, it’s because I’m feeling bitter… How can people who clearly hate fandoms not their own be nominated for a Hugo Award? My concept of fandom is a big umbrella under which all of us can hang out and do our own thing in a non-judgmental setting. To read screeds against other fans is depressing. To see those screeds nominated for awards? Gah. Seriously, did any of the people voting on the slates actually read these works and say, “Yes, this is the best writing about fandom I saw in 2014.” and, if so, why? How? How can writing that rips someone apart be the best? Why all the hate?

 

Grac on Grac’s Never-Ending TBR Pile of Doom

“The Three-Body Problem – Liu Cixin” – June 30

… I gave this book 3 because of the clunky/heavy part midway through, which almost made me give up. I can see why some people loved it, but I wasn’t one of them – it may well still end up winning this year’s Hugo but I don’t think it’s better than my vote (The Goblin Emperor, in case anyone is interested!). I prefer my science fiction a bit more people-oriented, to be perfectly honest, and the characterisation of many folks in this novel left something to be desired, even as the background of the Cultural Revolution and modern-day China added to its interest.

 

embrodski on Death Is Bad

“Amazing Man” – June 22

I dashed off a little short story, inspired by the Sad Puppies Hugo Fiasco. I had fun writing it, I hope someone finds it enjoyable to read. :)…

….“So all of this…” Paula gestured around herself to indicate the Presidential Palace, the Liberty Legions, and presumably the entire Liberated States of America. “All of this was because you felt snubbed by a group of people you don’t even like?”

Amazing ripped the glasses from his face and crushed them in his fist. His responding roar was super-human, shattering all the glass in the Palace and leaving Paula with mild, but permanent, hearing loss.

“It’s about ethics in journalism!”

Emilio won a Pulitzer that year, as well as a Peabody, an Oscar, a Grammy, a Dobby, and a Tony Award; all purely on merit and not for any other reason at all. Amazing Man won the Nobel Peace Prize. That last one raised a few eyebrows, but it was pointed out that the Peace Prize had previously been awarded to people with a much higher body count than Amazing Man had managed, and wouldn’t it be better to keep it that way? It was hard to argue with that logic.

Miss Perry was released, because Amazing Man was above petty things like personal revenge. She is now happily employed as a Field Hand in the Angola Liberty Farm.

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591 thoughts on “The Wind’s Hind Quarters 6/30”

  1. @Msb I like to make iced tea by using a teabag of regular black tea with one of a fruity herbal tea.

  2. My peas are much more pedestrian: in ranch dressing with sunflower seeds. There is a salad bar in metro Pittsburgh I try to visit a couple of times a year.

    “All we are saying, is give peas a chance…”

  3. For lemon/beer combinations I’m always fond of a radler: a German beer brewed with lemon juice with lowish alcohol content, developed (AFAIR) for cyclists in the Black Forest in the late C19.

    Huh? That’s new. A Radler is beer mixed with clear lemonade, not brewed with lemon-juice. Adding something like lemon juice would be against the Reinheitsgebot aka the German beer law. You can also do Alsterwasser btw which is beer mixed with orange lemonade.

    True is probably the story that it was created for cyclist as Radler is a colloquial expression for cyclists.

    Personally, though, I prefer wine mixed with sparkling water.

  5. @Simon

    For lemon/beer combinations I’m always fond of a radler: a German beer brewed with lemon juice with lowish alcohol content, developed (AFAIR) for cyclists in the Black Forest in the late C19.

    Whenever I’ve had radler in Germany it has been whatever the local beer is or pilsner and added lemonade just like a shandy.

    I would be very surprised if it was brewed with lemon juice as that would be against the reinheitsgebot which would have been active in the early 20th century when the drink became popular.

  6. Lin McAllister

    Summary of Antonelli’s essay: Let’s move the goalposts over there for a while. It confirms the impression I got from the excerpts from his Hugo-nominated related work: he’s a legend in his own mind.

    I took it as an instruction guide on how to build a strawman. He groups people who are against slate voting and assigns them a name as though they’re one group and gives them a list of attributes and opinions that he’s made up. Most of it was an attempt to falsely equate people who are against slate voting as being against all religions and to reinforce the idea that being against Sad Puppies makes you a literary snob. He’s just being a Nutty Nugget.

  7. I can only drink cold-brewed tea (and coffee) because the heat-released oils and acid ruin my stomach. But since I started making it that way, I’ve just gotten so much fonder of that lighter, more delicate and more complex taste. I love a little white or green tea in a jar of cold water, it’s delicious. I don’t even have to sweeten it.

  8. 1. It is hard to find foods from the BIV portion of the spectrum unless you like stuff aimed at children.

    2. I think Mashup is the correct terminology for anything that combines elements from two or more sources to produce something new. Like If You Were a Kaiju, My Love

    3. We get shandy from shandygaff, which was more often beer and ginger beer.

    4. I’m amazed the number of different editions of some of the older RPGs. (Wikipedia lists editions by year.) I’m now tempted to find an RPG that only had one edition so I can claim it as the one pure RPG.

  9. I think tofu unfairly gets a bad rap because of attempts to use it as a meat substitute, where it just doesn’t work (and is often pretty nasty)

    I tried making a stir fry with tofu and it turned out OK. The cat I was babysitting, one of the most spoiled kitties on the planet, demanded a taste. I think he thought it was either beef or chicken. I put some tofu on a saucer for him. I think the expression he had on picking it up was ‘complete betrayal’. Although I note he still ate it.

  10. tonieee, we’ve occasionally hit 45C. That’s seriously hot, even for this area. (Unfortunately it’s not the low-humidity season.)

  11. A good hot weather meal: cubes of tofu with cooked and chilled buckwheat noodles (soba), thinly sliced cucumbers, chopped green onions, cooked and chilled green beans, and whatever other vegs take your fancy. Make peanut sauce (you can do it in a blender, no cooking required) and dribble peanut sauce over everything.

    Cold meal, healthy meal, easy to cook, easy to prepare in advance.

  12. @Jack

    There are over 5000 RPGs with many, maybe most, of them having just one edition.

  13. @Gabriel I’ve never heard of cold brewing tea before – how long do you leave the tea in?

  14. Ray on July 1, 2015 at 2:51 pm said:
    @Anna
    But is the spoiler event the cause or is it another thing that is made possible by the return of magic?

    Good point. We don’t really know, do we? Not until A Dream Of Spring, I presume. For sure, there is a famous catastrophe that might have been a previous effort to effect Spoiler Event, at Summerhall.

  15. matt y:He’s just being a Nutty Nugget.

    I’ve read it three times now and it does sort of read like he is angry because people were nice to him on his travels. Maybe he takes as a given that the “puppy kickers” are not nice so every nice person he meets makes him think that only a tiny but vocal group are puppy-kickers. The other option (that his original premise is wrong) didn’t occur.
    He may not be understanding how the Krell machine works…

  16. > “I’m now tempted to find an RPG that only had one edition so I can claim it as the one pure RPG.”

    The Adventures of Indiana Jones Role-Playing Game not only had only one edition, but TSR eventually set fire to every copy of it they could lay their hands on.

    I am not making this up.

  17. Meredith, the best tofu dish I ever ate was a sweet-and-sour not-chicken. I wish I had the recipe to give you, but it’s worth trying to look up, in my opinion: I honestly couldn’t tell I wasn’t eating really good sweet-and-sour chicken. Since I usually find tofu basically “inoffensive, but not worth the effort,” that’s high praise from me.

  19. tonieee: Not Gabriel here, but I’ve made cold-brewing tea, and the answer to how long to steep it is usually something on the order of “according to taste.” You might try googling “sun tea,” for more specific information; at least, I know people who call it that.

  21. I am currently in my pre-colonoscopy liquid diet. Y’all are cruel.

    I actually don’t care for standard BBQ sauces that much, If only because the best BBQ I ever had was I San Louis Obispo, during the Farmer’s Market, with Santa Maria dry rub seasoning on beef ribs. It’s also good on tri-tip.

    Of course right now I’m in San Jose, where the only really good BBQ place closed down. There’s supposedly another really good one, but it’s closed during football games- which are the only times I’ve been by.

    Then again, we have excellent Korean and Vietnamese barbecue all around my neighborhood. And the best tacos and tamales from mobile stands.

    As for guac with peas? My assumption is that New Yorkers just don’t know better when it comes to Mexican food. I remember the line from the Runways comic, where our Californian heroes are transplanted to New York. With disgusted horror: “He put PICKLES. In a BURRITO!”

    But oh well, I’m sure we on the West Coast get musilage, or whatever New Yorkers eat equally wrong.

  22. @Mary my taste is pretty strong so I guess that means a long time :-). Thanks for the “sun tea” tip – googling (or duckduckgoing) now.

  23. My dad just started cold-brewing tea; AFAIR,he mixed loose leaf tea with cool water and refrigerated it for 24 hours. I would test my own, as tea strength and flavor depends on the water.

    Pimm’s! I’ve got some! Thanks for the reminder! (Oddly, my Kindle spellchecker wants so badly to change Pimm’s to Pink ‘s…)

  24. MK41 : You seriously think Scalzi would do anything but laugh if Beale put him on the 2016 slate?

    I think if he won while on a RP slate, Scalzi would get up at the ceremony wearing a dress, thank VD gushingly in as homoerotic an innuendo as he could manage, and then donate something to a charity VD hated.

    The guy’s a mensch.

  25. @ tonieee

    Usually between 5 and 9 hours, depending on the strength of the leaves/teabag and how strong I want it to taste.

    @ Mary Francis

    Sun tea is not cold brewing. Sun tea uses the sun’s heat to long-brew it over time. Cold brewing literally involves putting the grounds/teabag/tea leaves in cold water and setting it in the fridge.

  27. Ray

    I really don’t understand why an author should not say on his/her website that these are the works eligible for XYZ; no-one has ever put together a reasoned argument, supported by evidence, as an explanation of why authors should not do this. If you’ve got one I’d love to read it.

    Equally, I don’t understand why an author explaining the ‘Big Idea’ of his/her book is in any way a bad thing; surely it offers, at the very least, both authors and readers the chance to see whether this is likely to be a good fit. No one has ever started a book with ‘It is a truth universally recognised that all readers want exactly the same things in all the books they read’.

    I do regard this sort of knee jerk reaction to an argument which isn’t, in fact, an argument at all because no one has ever bothered to advance it, supported by evidence. Sticking a fig leaf on it does not make it respectable; it draws attention to the fig leaf…

  28. My recent reads:

    Twilight Robbery by Frances Hardinge (which I believe is called Fly Trap in the U.S.?) The sequel to Fly By Night. Fantastic. Witty, complex YA with not a word misplaced. Honestly, I haven’t yet read anything by Hardinge that I didn’t like. A lot of ideas in this one, including a good look at how the prejudices of others can form people’s own expectations for themselves.

    The Darkest Part of the Forest by Holly Black. A return to writing about fairies in a modern setting for Black. Extremely good. Coming of age story with a focus on the difficulty of truth (to oneself and others.) Not quite at the level of her classic Tithe/Valiant/Ironside trilogy, but better than her Curse Workers books (and bear in mind I very much liked the Curse Workers books, especially White Cat.)

  29. If cricket can have the Ashes, then gaming shall have the Diana Jones Award. Copies of the Adventures of Indiana Jones RPG remaining when the license expired were burned and the ashes placed in a perspex pyramid.

    The Adventures of Indiana Jones also gave us the story of TSR trying to trademark Nazi, but they were just using the list given to them by the legal department at Lucasfilm.

  30. @Stevie
    I am sure that authors explaining their ‘Big Idea’ would be an entirely sensible thing, if it was not something they were encouraged to do by the accursed Scalzi, may the fleas of thousand camels infest his armpits.

  31. @Stevie:

    I really don’t understand why an author should not say on his/her website that these are the works eligible for XYZ; no-one has ever put together a reasoned argument, supported by evidence, as an explanation of why authors should not do this.

    That may not be an ideal approach to understanding the taboo against self-promotion. A community’s traditions aren’t necessarily things that can be proven.

    I’ve found that if I want to understand why a community functions the way it does, loudly and rudely demanding that they prove to my satisfaction that their ways are ideal gets poor results, but approaching with humility and listening a lot seems to work.

  32. Once this year’s Hugos are done, we’ll definitely want to give some attention to questions like “What happens if the Puppies deliberately nominate people they strongly disagree with?” Because “ha ha, now you have to refuse your nomination or you’re a slate monger” is something I can very easily imagine the ringleaders doing, and we already know they don’t feel any obligation to let everyone know that they’re sticking them on their slate.

    Let me make it clear early: I do not plan to withdraw “If You Were A Puppy, My Sweet” should it be slated by anybody. I will assume that any pro-slate people who nominate it are trying to game things and deserve to have it beat anything else on their slate.

  33. @Stevie

    I think that there used to be a gentleman’s agreement not to promote your works for the Hugos in the same way as there used to be one about not gaming the Hugos. One is much less harmful than the other, but I can sort of see why some older fans might not like the change anyway.

    I like eligibility posts because my memory is made of swiss cheese, especially during hot weather, and I need all the externally sourced memory I can get. 🙂

  34. @Gabriel & @Ginger I’m going to try child brewing some tea overnight tonight. From what I’ve read on the internet it had an advantage over hot brewing in that it doesn’t go cloudy which is a problem I often suffer with when making iced tea.

    @Mary sun tea relies on having the sun which you often can’t rely on round here plus there’s loads of stuff about it getting bacteria in it. But maybe I’ll give it a go one day.

  36. @anna feruglio dal dan:

    Let’s discuss cocktails instead. With lots of ice.

    One drink I learned about in the south of France (where they know from heat) and popularized among my friends is the Mauresque (Pastis, Orgeat Sirup, and Water).

  37. Stevie – back in 2014 Adam Roberts wrote a post about why he wouldn’t list his eligible work and why he was unhappy with others doing so. I’m not completely convinced, but he does point out two flaws that he thinks award-self-pimpage introduce to the process.

  38. Laertes

    Well, my tenure in fandom goes back quite a while; I have been posting on matters SF/F under my own name, Stevie Gamble, since the glory days of Rec.Arts.SF. Written.

    Indeed there are a fair number of my posts still surviving, should anyone wish to google my name there they will find them.

    I appreciate that you probably thought that you were trying to be helpful to someone you believed to be a newbie, but it helps if you pause to consider the possibilty that the person you believe is in need of instruction in the One True Way, may in fact have been around for quite a while, before you launch into Fandom 101.

    That way you improve your chances of saying something sensible..

  39. @tonieee

    I would be more worried about bacteria in child brewed tea, but then botn of mine are fairly sticky today.

    We alway kept the tea in a sealed jar and preadded some sugar for our sun tea and never had any trouble.

    Lately my tea addiciton has been good rooibos. Yum!

  40. TYG: Oh lawsy, Allen and Sons. Still the best pulled pork and hush puppies I’ve ever had, and like all great barbecue joints, a place that looks like you shouldn’t be eating there. Anyplace that spells it “Dinning Room” will be either really good or really bad.

  41. @GabrielF

    If you like a good white tea, I’d recommend Teavana’s sweet asian pear white. I’m an avid earl grey fan (thanks, in large part, to Captain Picard), but I go gaga for that white tea.

  42. I don’t think it was so much a gentleman’s agreement, as that until the advent of personal blogs, it was difficult to promote one’s own work. But as has been pointed out before, self-promotion is now an integral and important part of the author’s job. It’s probably unfair to both the author and the publisher to expect authors to keep quiet when there’s an opportunity to self-promote.

    Of course that means that authors who have strong social media presence and a big fan following will have an advantage. But I don’t consider that to be fundamentally different from the advantage that name recognition has always given popular authors.

  43. @ Elisa

    I would be more worried about bacteria in child brewed tea, but then botn of mine are fairly sticky today.

    Haha, my nickname for my nephew is “Sticky.” Only people without kids ask me why.

  44. I think

    1. there is a difference between “Buy my book” and “Vote for me for an award.”

    2. Many people have gone beyond simply listing eligible works once on their website. Twitter in January often involves frantic activity around securing votes for the Hugos, for example.

  45. @IDK:

    Peas are the everyfood. They go with anything. You have not lived until you try the Peas-and-Rocky-Road ice cream combination.

    LOLWUT?!?
    #recoilsinhorror

  46. Once I was pretty confused when I was going out to eat with a friend and she announced that she wanted a “half a bison.” I said “what?” She said “I want a half a bison.”

    I chewed this over for a minute and said “Won’t that be hard to find? Would half a cow do?”

    It turns out there is a beer called “half a bison.” Well, not quite; it’s some german name I think, but I didn’t catch how to spell it, and it *sounds* very much like “half a bison.”

    This was in late fall, though; I’m not sure it is a hot weather kind of beer.

  48. @Gabriel F.

    Yep – only people that have no contact with children would have a problem figuring that out. I swear that some nights my daughter somehow manages to get sticky between her nighttime bath and being put into bed. I have no idea how.

  49. There was a mini beer festival going on at my favourite pub at the same time as the Summer Fair and they had a really delicious one called Salem Porter, from a local brewery called Bateman’s. Top notch.

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