(1) INDY 5 IS GO. Consequence of Sound has the story.
Walt Disney Company chairman and CEO Bob Iger, has confirmed that a fifth Indiana Jones movie is indeed happening.
During a recent interview with Bloomberg, Iger spent much of his time talking about the franchise possibilities that are opening up with the massive success of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. When he got to comparing Disney’s acquisition of Lucasfilm to that of Pixar and Marvel, however, he noted that taking on Lucasfilm’s intellectual properties also meant “Indiana Jones, by the way, which will be coming.”
(2) ABOUT FACE. Kameron Hurley posted a funny gallery of GIFS to illustrate the “Faces I Make When Reading Reviews”.
A lot of people think authors take reviews personally, and I suppose there are many who do. Those are the folks who should really steer clear of reader reactions to books, or rather, what some readers believe the books say about the author, which is always far more amusing.
There are great reviews with insightful criticism of my work, and glowing reviews about how it changed people’s lives.
But, this being the internet and people trying to poke an author for a meltdown, I’m often asked about my reaction when reading negative reviews of my work. What folks don’t get is that I find most negative reactions endlessly amusing. Not the real criticism that points out real flaws, no, but the reactions that say far more about the reader than the writer.
(3) MIND MELD. SF Signal’s latest Mind Meld, curated by James Aquilone, posts the question “What are your favorite new genre (SF/F/H) TV shows of 2015?” – with replies by Alex Shvartsman, Sarah Pinsker, Matthew Johnson, Robert Davis, Carlie St. George, Erin M. Hartshorn, Andrew Liptak, Rob H. Bedford, and Sally Ember, Ed.D.
(4) CHOOSE FEAR. Here’s how David Brin’s Mars mission would start.
Go to Phobos before landing on Mars itself? I have pushed this idea for twenty years and now some at NASA agree. Not only is the larger moon far easier to reach and might serve as an ideal research platform, it also has two advantages never mentioned in this article. It can serve as a logistics hub where supplies might be pre-positioned and tended without complex orbital management. It also might (some figure) be carbonaceous chondritic material, containing volatiles like water. If these could be mined and stored and prepared, subsequent Mars landing missions would find all the water and rocket fuel they need, lowering both cost and risk by an order of magnitude.
(5) ZICREE ON FAN-MADE TREK FILMS. Marc Scott Zicree on Facebook.
Science fiction has a long and honorable tradition of fan fiction — in fact, many of the top professional writers started out writing fan fiction — and these fan films are the logical extension of that tradition. More than that, speaking as a professional who’s written extensively for all the major studios and networks, the reason I chose to do “World Enough and Time” was that I felt Michael Reaves and I, along with our creative team, could bring as high a level of professional quality to that project as anything we had ever done for the studios and networks. I wanted to work with George Takei, the powers that be were never going to choose to do the ultimate Sulu story we wanted to tell, and it was something we could share with the whole world.
CBS/Paramount views Star Trek as a money machine, and that drives their decision on what or what not to make. This is perfectly justifiable. But it’s not what led Gene Roddenberry to create Star Trek, nor is it why Renegades or Axanar are being made. I think often taking a step back, gaining perspective and saying, “How can we create a win/win situation here?” is a good idea. It’s what led George Lucas to not only allow Star Wars fan films, but to hold an annual contest recognizing the best ones.
(6) GERROLD ON SUIT STRATEGY. David Gerrold on Facebook:
…But this lawsuit also suggests that CBS and Paramount might be missing the more important point. The fan productions are about the hunger for new Star Trek. They’re not competition as much as they are signs that the franchise is alive and well. Keeping the fans engaged is the best thing that CBS and Paramount can do to keep the franchise alive.
I understand the corporate desire to protect their rights to the franchise, but that cat got out of the bag a long time ago. If they weren’t going to shut down Star Trek New Voyages and Star Trek Continues and Star Trek Renegades and Star Trek Farragut for “copyright infringement” — and those productions use Kirk, Spock, et al, and the original enterprise — then they’re going to have a much harder case with Axanar which barely touches the same specific content of the original series.
I suspect that the lawsuit isn’t about copyright infringement as much as it’s designed to intimidate Axanar’s producers. I’ll be interested to see how this proceeds….
(7) CAVEAT TWITTER. Business Insider reports “Mark Hamill is protecting fans from fake signed ‘Star Wars’ merchandise on Twitter”.
He apologized to fans who have spent money on fraudulent items and urged them to look at real copies to learn how to confirm his signature on their own. When asked why he wasn’t tired of responding to people, he said, “Because I owe it to all true fans to protect them from being victimized by dishonest dealers.”
(8) FORCE A FEW DOLLARS MORE. Steven Harper Piziks opines about writers who are “Riding the Coat Tails of the Force”.
These and other similar articles mean absolutely nothing, of course. They’re written by people who have no real cred. For example, Lili Loofbourow, who wrote the desperate-sounding “emotional blind spots” article above, is a freelance reporter. She’s not a professor of media studies, or an experienced film reviewer, or a film maker. She has a computer and a contact at Salon.com and ticket stub for THE FORCE AWAKENS. Same goes for all the others. They’re just riding along on TFA’s coat tails, trying to make a few dollars for themselves.
Well, at least I got a blog entry out of it.
(9) PICACIO PLUGS COMPETITION. Today John Picacio commented on George R.R. Martin’s pro artist Hugo recommendations and added six more names (with links to their work).
Thanks so much for the shoutout, George. It’s an honor to be be considered in any year, including this one. That said, winning any major award comes with responsibility along with hardware and glory. It’s always great to win, but as a past winner, I want the Pro Artist Hugo list to reflect the extraordinary range and evolution of the field. So while I’m not recusing myself, I would like to take this opportunity to shine light on some of sf/f’s art stars that have had an outstanding year and deserve Hugo consideration in this category:…
(10) HITCHHIKER’S HOMECOMING. Think how much more effective Lazlar Lyricon 3’s “about” statement would be if it hadn’t stopped with just four reasons for holding this convention? I hope the concom will treat themselves to one or two fifths as part of their launch celebration.
Dateline: The Old Kings Head Pub, London, 21 November 2015. Today, ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha (the Official Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Appreciation Society) Annual General Meeting authorised a committee to run Lazlar Lyricon 3. This is the third (coincidentally) in a series of conventions celebrating The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and Douglas Adams, the first having occurred in the 1980s.
Lazlar Lyricon 3 will take place on 9-11 June 2017 at the Quality Hotel in Stoke-on-Trent.
Committee members Stefan Lancaster, Emma J. King, David Haddock and Alan Sullivan, amongst others, were on hand to discuss plans, answer questions and receive the imprimatur of the AGM. They were also given ‘seed money’ of £500 towards the costs, which was greeted with much cheering!
The first two Lazlar Lyricons were part of a series of conventions in the 1980s, 90s and early 00s colloquially called ‘Fun Cons’, which also included the Incons, Dangercons, and several one-off conventions such as Year of the Wombat and Aliens Stole my Handbag. The aspiration is to ensure everyone has a great time (and not panic!), with fun, loosely Hitchhikers-inspired programme items such as crab stomping and towel-based martial arts. The announcement that the first and foremost in appointments will be a ‘beer liaison’ was greeted with more cheering!
(11) SPEAKING OF LAUNCHING. Gail Z. Martin on “Making the Most of Your Launch Day” at Magical Words.
Book launches are on my mind since Vendetta, the second book in the Deadly Curiosities urban fantasy series, just launched yesterday. So I thought it might be fun to pull the curtain back on what can go into a book launch, and let you pick and choose the elements you feel best suit your own circumstances.
Social media is is your biggest bullhorn to the world. Long before your book comes out, you should be creating a presence on Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, Wattpad, a blog, and a web site. These are the places you can gather your tribe–the people who have read and liked your work, your friends and others who wish you well and are happy to help spread the word. Make sure you let your friends and followers know in advance when the book is coming out, and how they can help.
(12) ON RECONCILIATION. Joe Vasicek’s “Response to Steve Davidson on Reconciling with the Puppies” is a commentary on Steve Davidson’s Amazing Stories post “Reconciling with Puppies – ‘…to dram, the impossible dream, to reach the unreachable star…”.
Mr. Davidson’s post is interesting, and worth reading. We obviously don’t see eye to eye on a number of things, but it would be rather petty to go through our disagreements line by line. Instead, the part that I want to respond to is his call to action at the end:
Want to reconcile? Here’s what puppies must do.
1: Stop scamming the system. If you want to recommend works that you think are worthy of the award, go ahead and do so. But drop the political agenda (you’re dragons are imaginary) and eliminate the hateful, snarky commentary
If you’re looking for “hateful, snarky commentary,” I’m sure that you’ll be able to find it. On the fringes of both sides, there are a lot of people with blogs and strong opinions. I’d count myself as one of them—while I align with the Sad Puppies, I’m not a leader or organizer by any stretch, just another guy with opinions and a blog. Don’t be so quick to look for ammunition, because there’s a lot of it lying around.
Kate Paulk, one of the Sad Puppy organizers, has pointed out that Sad Puppies 4 is open to nomination suggestions from anyone, which appears to be what you’re calling for. And honestly, I think a lot of us don’t want to see conservative writers edge out everyone else so much as to see them go head to head with more liberal writers on a more equal playing field. It’s not about slaying imaginary dragons so much as breaking down walls.
So on this first point, Mr. Davidson and I tend to be in agreement. This seems like a reasonable step for reconciliation, and it’s one that the Sad Puppies 4 already appear to be taking.
(13) YOUR RANCOR MAY VARY. Brad Torgersen’s “Sad Puppies and the future”, prompted by Martin’s “reconciliation” post, says many familiar things.
Many people have already seen George R. R. Martin’s optimistic (and well-intended) commentary at his LiveJournal. However, just as with George’s hood ornament Alfie awards (also well-intended) there is more than one way for a thing to be perceived. My perception — and I am not alone in this — of George’s desire for an end to the rancor, is that George still seems to think that a) the rancor was flowing almost entirely one-way, from the Puppies’ side to the Trufan side, and also b) none of the Puppies are themselves fans. Not Fans (caps f) and certainly not Trufans. No. Puppies are still an outsider bunch, who carry an outsider’s stigma.
There is also a bit too much parentalism in George’s tone: dear kids, I hope you’ve learned your lesson, now wipe those dirty looks off your faces and come give your mother a hug!
(14) DO YOU FEEL SAFER? And in the comments, national security consultant Arlan Andrews, Sr. gives MidAmeriCon II members something to look forward to:
I for one will never forgive anyone who appeared in that pre-Awards “90-minute-hate-the-Puppies” TV show, nor anyone who called me a neoNazi. Though some were, I had thought, nice acquaintances if not actual long-time friends, their behavior before, during and after the Hugos simply meant that I shut them out of any future consideration of any kind, meaning no purchasing of their products, no voting for their works, no attendance at any function at which they are honored or prominent, no reviews of anything they are involved with, and no defense of any criticism of them. As a very minor player in fandom/prodom, despite 60+ years of fanlife and 35+ years of prolife, those people will seldom notice nor long remember what I do here, but if thousands of others do likewise, the effects may be meaningful. All of the SP3 experience this year has been enlightening, and a tiny reflection of the national schism between those who cherish Freedom and those banding together to enforce Collectivism. I thank Brad and Larry and the Jovians for graciousness in the face of fire. And next Worldcon, I will definitely attend. (Does Missouri have Concealed Carry?)
(15) HOOKY HEADLINE. “9 things ‘Starship Troopers’ totally nailed about today’s technology” is a pretty bold claim about a movie that showed space infantry fighting in shoulder-to-shoulder formations like at the Battle of Waterloo.
(16) CHRISTMAS CONFLATION. When I read the headline of io9’s post “Chewbacca Comic Finally Answers A Question Star Wars Fans Have Pondered For Years” I mentally filled the blank with, “Does Chewie sleep with his whiskers outside or in?”
(17) REEL CONSPIRACY. At Star Wars Minute, “How Kylo Ren Got Darth Vader’s Helmet.” A fan theory based on some events in Disney/Lucasfilm comics and novels.
(18) TONIGHT ON JEOPARDY! A Bradbury-themed question.
Literary Characters for $200
Answer: Beatty is the captain of the fireman in this Bradbury Novel
Question: What is Fahrenheit 451
(19) IF YOU WERE A DINOSAUR…BUT WAIT, I AM. “Retaliation for getting coal in my stocking!” says YouTube poster Ralph the Rex.
[Thanks to Will R., John King Tarpinian and Brian Z. for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Will R.]
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FORCE A FEW DOLLARS MORE – Wait, really? Pieces of criticism are just authors expressing their opinion? Tell me more.
Second fifth!
4. and 17. Actually, if you look closely at that helmet, it’s signed by somebody named ‘Mork Hamerton’
Also, third fifth?
Ticky
twofour-fifths!Need I say more?
Since you didn’t, I claim fifth! HAH!
I think a Hugo for best book *cover* (rather than just art) could work and would widen the field to include more graphic design type work.
@Camestros
IIRC, that’s how one of the Ditmars’ categories is set up.
I forgot the number 5 rule: Never ask a rhetorical question in fandom…
I think they do that even more broadly – the short film of Shaun Tan’s Lost Thing won that category one year I think.
By the way, as a consolation prize for having fifth stolen from me , I have won the File770 Time Machine. It very briefly told me the that the date was January 0.
We all know I am THE FIfth until at least the end of next year.
@Jim
Please. As we know, there is never just one fifth. Always two there are.
Onto the scroll!
(3) MIND MELD.
Im so happy to see love for Limitless, Into the Badlands, and Killjoys here, in addition to the usual suspects. They’re all realllllly fun shows.
(12) ON RECONCILIATION.
Reads first paragraph. Wow. Just when I thought CLU couldn’t get any sillier.
(13) YOUR RANCOR MAY VARY.
This is really a deja vu moment for me. Last year at about this time, I was having similar discussions with a whole host of Gamergaters in various places, and it was the same sense of reality being mutable, and the narrative trumping all. For some Pups, I don’t see that changing. Too much has been invested in their victimhood and in their identity that they are somehow both the victimised minority as well as the silent majority.
(14) DO YOU FEEL SAFER?
No. All the best to those attending MACII.
(15) HOOKY HEADLINE.
The current line of Marvel Star Wars comics are really, *REALLY* good. They’re all worth a read, but if you have to choose, get the Darth Vader ones. If the Vader Down storyline wasn’t crossing over into 2016, it would definitely be on my Hugo shortlist
It’s 6186, and I can’t think about the Puppies with my much nicer real dogs around.
Would it really be easier to land on Phobos than Mars? It would be easier to take off of course, but a Mars supply shuttle doesn’t need to take off, just land. Or drop supplies from orbit.
Well, it may not have been the primary reason. But making a buck was absolutely one of the top three reasons. Nobody makes a commercial network television series for strictly reasons of art.
(13) YOUR RANCOR MAY VARY. Brad Torgersen’s “Sad Puppies and the future”, prompted by Martin’s “reconciliation” post, says many familiar things.
Poor Brad.
CBS/Paramount views Star Trek as a money machine, and that drives their decision on what or what not to make.
Paramount has been watching what fans do for many years. (I wonder if the ‘Axanar’ people ever heard it called ‘Paranoid’.)
It’s the year 70, and ST is still a long way into the future. We’re still using chariots.
bookworm1398: Yes, it takes relatively little energy to land on the surface of Phobos. Landing on Mars takes substantially more, at least if you want your vehicle to be intact.
On (5) and (6): Yes, there are a lot of Star Trek fan films already, and I’ve seen quite a lot of them. A few are quite good, but even the best look very much like fan productions, and my impression is that most have had fairly small budgets with a lot of fans volunteering time. (I’ll note that Star Trek Renegades had a fairly substantial budget, but looks *very* much like a fan made show. Also, there are other fan films that impressed me a lot more.)
Prelude to Axanar is quite well done, not a typical fan work, and I was looking forward to the full show. But my impression from reading about Axanar is that they went too far on the commercialization and weren’t careful about talking about it. They have a studio with full time staff. They even are selling their own custom Star Trek model kits (Federation and Klingon). I don’t think it is an issue just because of copyright infringement, but also because it looks too much like a business.
13. I can’t believe that the puppies are still going on about those asterisks.
14. Looks like Andrews has gone full puppy by now rather than just a bystander caught up in the whole thing, as I initially assumed. Makes me feel a lot less bad about no awarding his (nowhere near Hugo calibre) novella.
And what is it with these folks wanting to take guns to conventions? Personally, I see it as a threat and intimidation attempt towards anybody who disagrees with them, since all the violent rhetoric has come from the puppy side. I do hope MidAmeriCon finds a way to keep all guns that are not toys off their premises. And I’m glad that guns won’t be a problem in Helsinkii at all.
Meanwhile, here in the year 2036, the puppy wars have finally become nothing but an interesting part of fannish history.
Arlan Andrews neatly summing up why I’m less than enthusiastic about potentially having to go to the US for work next year. I don’t really want to be anywhere near unstable people with easy access to firearms.
Re Vasicek: I don’t think you can rightly say it was the fringes of both sides when the Pups had Brad, Ted and JCW spewing bile all over the place. I can’t, off the top of my head, think of a prominent non-Pup that was quite as insulting and hateful as any of those three.
This.
Why do I think his idea of Freedom is “let’s organize slates where our team votes in lockstep to take over the ballot” and Collectivism is “vote for what you’ve read and liked as individuals”?
I don’t know what came over me but I read (12), (13), & (14). My brain feels like mush. I’m not sure but I think our arguments during recess in 5th grade might have contained as much logic when it was stupid – like who started a fight.
BT Most of the CHORFs and the crybullies will hate Larry Correia and myself forever.
This may be ego shattering but in 10 years I suspect you’ll be forgotten just like so many fans forgot about the Scientologist trying to rig their book.
I suspect that in order for a genuine mending to take place, between your average Sad Puppy, and the SF/F establishment, there would need to be several things.
1) A very public admission by the establishment that the NO AWARD bombing of the 2015 Hugos was a gross error.
Not bombing was done. No Award was created to deal with situations where nominators took advantage of the loophole you blew through with 3 years of slating. All you need to do is stop creating curated ranked list and suggesting people nominate from the list
2) A very public admission by the establishment that the CHORFholes were also a gross error.
What establishment? Who is a CHORF? Specifically what was done wrong? If you are referring to point #1 see above answer.
3) A very public apology from the establishment, for the deliberate conflation of the Sads, with the Rabids.
There is NO establishment. You refused to declare you weren’t affiliated with them so I believe the ball for this is still in your court.
4) A cessation of the endless game of shibboleths and street cred checks, on the part of Trufans, as conducted against everybody else (looks hard at Steve Davidson.)
There is no game. What you’ve been consistently told is vote as individuals instead of a bloc for what each individual think is the best and stop calling everyone you disagree with names. If you behaved like Worldcon members and Hugo voters you’d be treated as such.
It’s such a simple concept. Hugos are voted on by Worldcon members who vote as individuals for the books, stories, people each individual thinks is personally the best of the previous year. They may recommend others read/look at stuff they liked & list stuff they wrote which is eligible for X category because it’s hard to keep track of the thousands of works written, edited, art done each year. But they don’t make ranked lists & say vote for this because then it’s no longer an individual’s best.
ON RECONCILIATION:
Vasicek: I’m not entirely convinced that the Hugo Awards will continue to hold the same influential place in fandom in the next few years. Even with last year’s massive turnout, there were less than 6,000 ballots cast.
And yet, the Worldcon members have managed to build the Hugo Awards into the most prestigious speculative fiction award over six decades with far fewer numbers than that. So clearly, there’s more to doing an awards program well than just sheer number of participants.
Vasicek: With those low numbers, it wouldn’t take much for a rival convention to organize their own awards and eclipse the Hugos in short order — especially if a large contingent of fandom becomes disaffected.
Well, there ya go, Joe, you and the Puppies should get right on that.
As I said in a previous thread, I really, really wish GRRM would just stop with the “Puppy rapprochement”.
The way he’s framing his arguments is just making things worse. 😐
bookworm1398 on December 30, 2015 at 8:57 pm said:
The big difference is obviously atmosphere. Mars landings can make use of chutes/airbags/etc. Phobos would require powered descents all the way down. What’s probably got people interested is that the actual landing requires so little delta-v:
https://i.imgur.com/AAGJvD1.png
So the question becomes how much of that 1440 m/s Mars intercept can be burned in aerobraking? Could any of the 1280 down to Phobos be burned off at Mars?
Disclaimer: All I know about interplanetary travel I learned from Kerbal Space Program.
If I read this correctly, going from Phobos to Mars requires about 11 m/s before you can start using the atmosphere to slow you down.
Does anyone else think that it’s hilarious that Vasicek compares the Sad Puppies to a species which wants “to make the galaxy safe by enslaving all intelligent life, either by encasing their home worlds in impenetrable slave shields, or by enlisting them as Heirarchy battle thralls to conquer and enslave other species” — and thinks that he’s saying something positive about the Puppies with that?
@JJ yes
Force a Few Dollars More: Gah! I wish people would stop saying that it is illegitimate for people to have negative opinions on The Force Awakens.
I had someone on my twitter feed say that it people aren’t allowed to critically examine TFA, because The film is for “the fans”, not the critics(and critics have been soooo harsh, with its 96% on Rotton Tomatos).
Normally “this film is for the fans” is the sign of a stinker looking for excuses for bad reviews, but the touchiness of some people is baffling given how happy they should be that they got a half-way decent film instead of another Lucas stinker.
Tintinaus: I had someone on my twitter feed say that people aren’t allowed to critically examine TFA, because The film is for “the fans”, not the critics
Oh, FFS. I really hate this sort of “reverse elitism”. Anyone who wishes to post a critique should be able to do so without being told their opinion is invalid (though, of course, it does help if one’s opinion is articulate and well-reasoned).
This is the same school of “thought” that insists that TV and film actors are not allowed to voice their opinion about politics — while political opinions are perfectly acceptable coming from any uneducated moron who parrots, sheeplike, the opinions of whichever hatemonger has managed to capture their loyalty.
The only way to stop a bad guy with a voting slip is a good guy with a voting slip and a gun and the implicit threat of shooting the guy who doesn’t have a gun because they’re unamerican and stuff.
But seriously, anyone who makes a veiled threat about bringing a gun into a public space should be banned from having a gun in the first place, like taking a toy away from a child who’s proven they can’t be trusted with it.
My favourite instance of this was people complaining about various rock and alternative bands making anti-George W Bush songs in the early 2000s, while ignoring all the overtly political songs they had done in the past. Ministry got it in the neck from metal fans, who must have missed NWO being about Bush Sr…
CHORFholes
Great brand name for a new line of scrumptious donut holes.
Re reconciliation with the puppies.
Why?
At the end of the day we are talking about half a dozen resentful, loudmouth writers and a few hundred deeply unpleasant wingnuts with an internet connection.
I’m not a big fan of finding common ground with hateful people.
Let them stew in their bile.
another one not seeing the need for a ‘reconciliation process’
Puppies didn’t like the way No Award swept the categories last year.
Everybody else disliked the way the Puppies ran political slates to get works on to the ballot in the first place.
Both are actions that are within the letter of the rules, but some people decry one or other as being outside the spirit of the rules. You don’t need to take sides in that argument to see that one will inevitably lead to the other. The nomination phase comes first, so the Puppies get to make the first move – do they want to try to rerun last year or not?
If they do run a slate again, they might get works on the ballot but none of those works are likely to win. If they don’t run a slate, they take their chances with the rest of us.
It may be that, absent a slate, few ‘Puppy-approved’ works make the ballot. This doesn’t mean there is a conspiracy to be uncovered or a cabal to be overthrown. Just that there is not a huge overlap between Puppy tastes and the tastes of Hugo voters. Which is not a damning indictment of the Hugo Awards, or proof that they need to be reorganised completely (or burned to the ground) – just further evidence that tastes differ. If that means the Hugo awards are not a useful guide to interesting SF for some SF readers, this is not the end of the world. There are other awards, and new awards can always be created.
Based on yesterday’s post:
If You Like To Pixel, I Tell You I’m Your Scroll
And chiming in with Ray
The awards are a marker and a sign of esteem, not the be all and end all.
Re Vasicek. I find it amusing that he used Star Control II imagery in that post. Still one of my favorite videogames of all time. I don’t think his analogy about the Sad Puppies is accurate–but the Rabid Puppies do seem committed to the Delenda Est approach. And as far as reaching out to the Sads…well,. that seems to suggest that to save the Hugos, we have to acquiesce to Brad and Friends getting Hugo awards for subpar work. No, thank you.
All of these alternate dates and what’s happening reminds me of the song “In the year 2525…”. Of course here in 8476, that song is mostly nostalgia for the past.
Re Phobos: The interesting aspect is, if it is a source of water, it’s a source of reaction mass for the landing. You can get to Mars with more payload in less time, then refuel and land.
In 9838 we have finally found a cure for the common cold.
I left this comment on Joe Vasicek’s at around noon yesterday; it hasn’t appeared yet, although maybe it will at some point.
Joe wrote:
Dismissing hateful Sad Puppy rhetoric as coming from the “fringes” is ludicrous.
Here’s an example of hateful, snarky commentary from a Sad Pup: “I MOCK YOU! I MOCK YOUR ASININE INCESTUOUS CLUSTERFUCKED LITTLE CULTURE OF DOCTRINAIRE PROGRESSOSEXUAL MEDIOCRITY MASKED AS SUPERIORITY! You are all dolts. You are moral and physical cowards. You are without ethics, without scruples, and if you weren’t so patently pathetic, I’d say you might be dangerous. Fuck you. Fuck you all. The forces of the progressive pink and poofy Xerxes were met at the Hugo Hot Gates, and repelled by a few brave dudes and dudettes with the stones to stand up to your bullshit.”
That’s Brad Torgersen, who ran last year’s Sad Puppy campaign.
Here’s another example: “So, let’s call them for what they are. Nasty, petty, bullying socialists who would fit in just as well with the Nazis as they would with their equally murderous Communist cousins.”
That’s Kate Paulk, who is running this year’s Sad Puppy campaign.
Torgersen and Paulk aren’t “fringe.” They’re the leadership. And I could quote many more examples of prominent, widely respected Sad Puppies making such statements. (Let alone Rabid Puppies.)
When Brad and Kate and other Puppy leaders say things like I’ve quoted, they’re setting an example of acceptable behavior for all Sad Puppies. Because they are the thought leaders, not the fringe, how they talk matters. I don’t see how reconciliation is possible if the leaders of the Sad Puppies use demonizing, hateful rhetoric to discuss the other side.
It’s a sad fact that no matter what happens, there will be people on both sides using hateful rhetoric. So anyone saying “as long as any [Sad Puppy] [anti-slater] uses hateful rhetoric there can be no reconciliation” is effectively saying “there can never be reconciliation.”
So I don’t ask for hateful rhetoric to be 100% eliminated, because that would be demanding the impossible. But I ask that the leadership of the Sad Puppies, as well as the folks (like yourself) who are positioning themselves as reasonable voices open to reconciliation, to stop using hateful rhetoric. Including name-calling your opposition as “SJWs” and “CHORFs” and “puppy-kickers” and so on.
Joe, do you think that’s a reasonable request?
Since you guys clearly don’t have enough to read, here’s a top-20 of the best ongoing comics – Southern Bastards isn’t SF/F or horror, but it’s the kind of grungy crime southern gothic fans of Lansdale’s Hap and Leonard should dig.
http://www.blastr.com/2015-12-30/top-20-ongoing-sci-fi-fantasy-and-horror-comics-2015
It’s woefully incomplete, obvs, omitting not one but two great titles by Filepal Kurt Busiek – Astro City and The Autumnlands – but honestly that’s more indicative of the sheer quantity of great US comics coming out at the moment. BPRD, Lazarus, Kaptara, Clean Room, Pretty Deadly, Survivor’s Club, Chew to name but a few, and though there’s a proliferation of Avengers titles, Marvel’s generally had consistently good creators working on them. The Guardians space-y stuff is mostly so-so, readable but bland – in fariness that’s partly because they can’t seem to measure up to the glory days of Abnett and Lanning blowing the roof off the Marvel Cosmos. I get annoyed now that the alien races and civilsations and empires are all reduced back to being mere foils for humanity once more. But that’s a rant for another day!
Oh, and:
I’m not a pixel scroller I’m a pixel scroller’s son; I’m only scrolling pixels till the pixel scroller comes.
the other problem with talk of ‘reconciliation’ is not the past, but the future. In any peace talks (and let’s ignore the problem of who exactly is supposed to be talking in this case) you’re trying to arrive at an agreement of what will happen from then on that everyone will find acceptable. This is where the border will be drawn, this is what the new law will be, this is the new contract that all parties have signed up for.
What is it that Brad Torgersen would find acceptable? Books that Brad likes winning Hugos, and books that he doesn’t like not winning. How is that supposed to accomplished? By letting him organise a primary so only books he likes get on the ballot, and everyone has to vote for one of them? By changing the electorate to one that he approves of? By giving him a veto?
They tried the first, but realised they couldn’t get past No Award – so should the No Award option be removed? The second one keeps being suggested, but without any reason why anyone else should agree.
And that’s the key problem really. Why should anyone else care whether or not Brad likes the Hugo winners? He can celebrate them or ignore them, it’s completely up to him. Why does he think his approval is so important everyone else has to change to try to win it? If he thinks he speaks for a silent majority… well, he can think what he likes, I don’t mind. Worldcon and the Hugos will survive without his endorsement.
A clear reference to Captain Haddock.
http://omg.wthax.org/haddock.jpg
I wish Torgersen would stop calling Beale “the Kurgan”. The Kurgan was cool. Beale is mostly a laughing stock.
And that’s the key problem really. Why should anyone else care whether or not Brad likes the Hugo winners?
Judging from Joe’s latest comment, its the shibboleth that fandom is becoming elitist and the Sads represent the future.
“The Hugo Awards need the Sad Puppies more than the Sad Puppies need the Hugo Awards.”
Hampus Eckeman: I wish Torgersen would stop calling Beale “the Kurgan”. The Kurgan was cool. Beale is mostly a laughing stock.
It’s all about the Puppies trying to make themselves look impressive and important and powerful, instead of what they really are — childish and whiny and entitled and pathetic.
It’s why they keep trying to push the lameass narrative that the Hugos were “nuked’ or “destroyed” or “burnt down” — because that makes them feel really important and powerful, and they think that if they can make other people believe it too, they’ll gain respect and esteem.
In reality, all that happened this year was a correction, just as occurs in the stock market when things get out of whack. No Award wasn’t invented as a response to Puppies — it’s always been there as a method for Worldcon fans to say, “No, I don’t think these works are good enough to be on the ballot”. Lots of voters use No Award every year for entries they don’t feel belong on the ballot.
The Puppies have to keep pushing the claim that Worldcon fans “bloc-voted” No Award because of politics — because they don’t dare admit that what really happened was that Worldcon fans said, yes, you can rig the nomination ballot, but you can’t 1) force us to give awards to works which range from mediocre to utterly execrable, or 2) force us to put the stamp of approval on your bad-faith rigging of the nominations.
I wasn’t impressed by the grade school bully when he threw his weight around and tried to force me to do what he wanted, and Worldcon fans weren’t impressed when the Puppies tried to do the same this year. Trying more of it next year isn’t going to get them anything other than making themselves look even more childish and whiny and pathetic.
(2) ABOUT FACE
Kameron Hurley is very funny. Humor is a good response to such stubborn obtuseness.
Her comment about how much more some book reviews reveal about the reader than the author reminded me of a review I read, many years ago in the British magazine “The Economist” of a biography of the Bedonkohe Apache known as Geronimo.
As I recall it the review essentially said something like “While this is a generally excellent illumination of the life of Geronimo, well researched and engrossing, it falls short in its failure to discuss his economic impact on the United States … “
I’m comfortable with the idea of putting that proposition to the test.
(9) PICACIO PLUGS COMPETITION
John Picacio is a class act.
Peace Is My Middle Name: John Picacio is a class act.
He can be, sometimes. He can also not be, sometimes.