(1) QUINN FEATURES IN MAINSTREAM NEWS. Jameson Quinn is quoted several times in “Your ballot has matrix algebra lurking in the background” at the Concord Monitor.
Mathematically speaking, “one man, one vote” sounds about as exciting as “1 = 1.” Yet it turns out that something so simple can produce a Nobel Prize in economics, not to mention a slew of graduate school statistics homework.
“Our class spent three weeks just on Arrow’s Theorem, looking at it from different angles,” said Jameson Quinn, a Ph.D. candidate in statistics from Harvard who showed up in Concord last week to testify before the House Elections Committee in favor of a bill allowing something called approval voting.
Arrow’s Theorem, key to the aforementioned Nobel prize, is to social choice theory what E=MC2 is to physics. It is usually described as saying that all voting systems are imperfect, a synopsis which misses lots of nuance and isn’t all that helpful to laymen, because most of us don’t even known that other systems exist.
(2) EDELMAN’S NEW PODCAST. Scott Edelman has started an SF-related podcast, Eating the Fantastic.
Are you ready to have lunch with me and writer/musician Sarah Pinsker? Because the first episode of Eating the Fantastic is now live!
Scott Edelman and Sarah Pinsker
Food, friends, and clanking dishes in the background reproduce the atmosphere where so many great fan conversations take place. Edelman writes:
I’ve found that while the con which takes place within the walls of a hotel or convention center is always fun, the con away from the con—which takes place when I wander off-site with friends for a meal—can often be more fun. In fact, my love of tracking down good food while traveling the world attending conventions has apparently become so well known that Jamie Todd Rubin once dubbed me “science fiction’s Anthony Bourdain.”
…During each semi-regular episode (I’ve yet to determine a frequency), I’ll share a meal with someone whose opinions I think you’ll want to hear, and we’ll talk about science fiction, fantasy, horror, writing, comics, movies, fandom … whatever happens to come to mind. (There’ll also be food talk, of course.)
One thing to note—this will not be a pristine studio-recorded podcast, but one which will always occur in a restaurant setting, meaning that mixed in with our conversation will be the sounds of eating and drinking and reviewing of menus and slurping and background chatter … in other words … life.
(3) PKD AWARD. The five Philip K. Dick Award judges for distinguished science fiction published in paperback original format in the United States in the 2016 award year are Michael Armstrong, Brenda Clough, Meg Elison, Lee Konstantinou, and Ben Winters.
(4) CASSANDRA CLARE SUED. “Copyright Clash Over Demon-Fighting Stories” at Courthouse News Service has the scoop.
Sherrilyn Kenyon says she started the “Dark-Hunter” series in 1998. The story “follows an immortal cadre of warriors who fight to protect mankind from creatures and demons who prey on humans,” according to court records.
On Friday, Kenyon sued Cassandra Clare aka Judith Rumelt aka Judith Lewis, claiming her “Shadowhunter” series initially used Kenyon’s trademark “darkhunter.”
After Kenyon demanded that Clare remove the word “darkhunter” from her work, Clare used the term “shadowhunter” for her protagonists instead, according to the lawsuit. The word “hunter” was also removed from the book title.
Clare’s book, “The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones,” was published in 2007. Since then, Clare has expanded her use of the term “shadowhunter” despite assurances that she would not, according to Kenyon.
Clare’s 2007 book was made into a movie and released in 2013, the lawsuit states. In 2014, it was reportedly announced that “Mortal Instruments: City of Bones” would be adapted into a television series called “Shadowhunters: The Mortal Instruments.”
Kenyon says ABC Family picked up Clare’s TV pilot in March 2015. The first episode of the “Shadowhunters” TV show premiered on Jan. 12 of this year, according to IMDB.
The “Dark-Hunter” author also claims Clare has used symbols and merchandise that are confusingly similar to Kenyon’s.
“Comparing the Dark-Hunter series to Clare’s work or works, the literary components are fictional and, in many respects, the elements are virtually identical,” Kenyon’s Feb. 5 lawsuit states. “These substantially similar elements, coupled with defendant’s access to the Dark-Hunter series, which were widely disseminated, leave little doubt that numerous substantive original elements of the Dark-Hunter series have been copied by defendant.”
(5) AB INITIO. Sarah A. Hoyt begins a column for Mad Genius Club about the preceding news story, “There Is Nothing New Under The Sun”, with these words —
So, this morning (yes, I crashed early yesterday) I was sent this article NEWS: Sherrilyn Kenyon sues Cassandra Clare over infringement claims by Amanda S. Green. It’s amazing. And by that I mean, I was amazed anyone is giving this so called “plagearism” any credence.
Now, I haven’t read the complaint, so perhaps there is more to it, and the complaint is more substantial. …
We’ll stop here and wait til she reads the complaint…
(6) GRRM’S EDITOR RATIONALE. George R.R. Martin had some feedback for File 770 commenters about the Best Editor (Long Form) category, but he also queried some of the editors he recommended about “What They Edited” in 2015.
My observations about the Best Editor (Long Form) Hugo, which you can read in full several posts down, have drawn some comments here and on FILE 770 from fans who object to my suggestion that this category has become a de facto lifetime achievement award, at least since David G. Hartwell set an example by withdrawing from future consideration after his third win.
The objections seem to take the form of stating emphatically that Best Editor (Long Form) is NOT a lifetime achievement award, it’s not, it’s not, it’s just NOT.
And quite right they are. According to the rules, that is. According to the rules, the award is only supposed to be for the previous year’s editing.
Which is great in theory, and completely wrong in fact. Maybe those who are objecting vote on that basis, but if so, they are a very tiny minority….
(7) TODAY IN HISTORY
- February 10, 1957 – Roger Corman’s Not Of This Earth premiered.
(8) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY BOY
- Born February 10, 1906 – Lon Chaney, Jr.
(9) A PEEK AT PIXAR. “Pixar and Khan Academy Release Free Online Course for Aspiring Animators”, from Makezine [via Chaos Manor.]
Up there with being an astronaut, comic book artist, or the President, there’s one job that your average kid would probably love to snag: Working at Pixar. Animation and Pixar enthusiasts of all ages, take note! Pixar in A Box (or PIAB) is a collaboration between Khan Academy and Pixar Animation Studios that focuses on real-Pixar-world applications of concepts you might usually encounter in the classroom. The latest batch of Pixar in a Box, released today, gives Makers a rare peek under the hood so that you can get a whiff of the warm engine that keeps those Pixar pistons pumping. There’s no need to register for the course, nor a requirement to watch the lessons in order — just head to their site and start exploring!
(10) BRING HIM HOME. Here’s a review of an app game — “The Martian: Communicate with Astronaut Mark Watney in real time while helping him return to Earth”.
In The Martian, you’ll experience the plight of astronaut Mark Watney, only in this strategy game you’re his only hope for survival. You play one of a NASA communications specialist that is communicating with Mark in real time via text-based messages. You’re his only contact on Earth, and all that stands between him and a return to our world, or certain death.
(11) MAD TEA. Links to all kinds of interesting Alice In Wonderland-themed merchandise in this post at The Snug.
(12) BEST OF A YEAR LONG AGO. Black Gate’s John ONeill revisits “Thomas M. Disch on the Best Science Fiction of 1979”.
He has particular praise for Connie Willis’s first published story, “Daisy in the Sun,” originally published in issue #15 of Galileo (see right):
My own favorite among the also-rans is Connie Willis’s first published story, “Daisy in the Sun” (in the Wollheim/Saha annual). With lyric ellipses Willis describes a world in the grip of epidemic schizophrenia precipitated by news that the sun is going nova. The heroine is a sexually disturbed adolescent girl in a condition of fugal amnesia. All the way through I thought, “This won’t work,” but it did. What a great way to begin a career.
Of course, you could dismiss all this as sour grapes, as Disch’s own Hugo-nominee, the novel On Wings of Song, came in last in the voting that year.
(13) A CURIOUS ARTIFACT.
https://twitter.com/LoopdiLou/status/697262017569095681
(14) RULES OF THE ROAD. After reading a few thousand selected words in the Amazon Web Service’s Service Terms, the account holder arrives here —
57.10 Acceptable Use; Safety-Critical Systems. Your use of the Lumberyard Materials must comply with the AWS Acceptable Use Policy. The Lumberyard Materials are not intended for use with life-critical or safety-critical systems, such as use in operation of medical equipment, automated transportation systems, autonomous vehicles, aircraft or air traffic control, nuclear facilities, manned spacecraft, or military use in connection with live combat. However, this restriction will not apply in the event of the occurrence (certified by the United States Centers for Disease Control or successor body) of a widespread viral infection transmitted via bites or contact with bodily fluids that causes human corpses to reanimate and seek to consume living human flesh, blood, brain or nerve tissue and is likely to result in the fall of organized civilization.
[Thanks to John King Tarpinian, Will R., and Cat Eldridge for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day J-Grizz.]
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Jet-lag insomniath.
6) That’s it for me. A category where you are supposed to vote against the rules? I’ll No Award the lot.
10) So, by “in real time” do they actually mean there’s a 30-40 minute lag for each move?
GRRM is engaging in groundless speculation about how other people vote. Thousands of other people whose voting rationale he will never know.
David Hartwell withdrawing from consideration for BELF after crowning three times doesn’t mean it’s a lifetime achievement award, or that David thought it was. He thought people weren’t taking a good enough look at other nominees because they knew his name. If he thought it was,a lifetime achievement award, or if the voters thought it was, surely he would have needed only one, not three.
That whole fifth thing is so last year
Feet’!! ETA: Sixth, then.
*sigh*
(10) BRING HIM HOME
Well, at least they airbrushed the grass out of the app’s cover image. *clicker*
(13) A CURIOUS ARTIFACT.
It’s wonderful that Bear, Lynch, and company decided to recognize the people on the longlist, especially those that didn’t have the opportunity to get Alfies or be in the Hugo Longlist Anthology. They have my thanks for taking the initiative to show that appreciation.
Great, a pin that looks like an asterisk! The Puppies won’t have to spin their Wheel of Outrage this week to decide which subject to complain about again.
Posted a comment on GRRM’s blog, saying that Best Editor is obviously broken
(1) QUINN FEATURES IN MAINSTREAM NEWS
The Hugos, way way back when I was a kid, were my first introduction to the idea of voting systems other than first-past-the-post. Since then, I have fumed every election cycle about being forced to choose the “lesser of two evils”, when there were clearly better ways. I am happy and proud to say that the city I currently live in, and several nearby cities, have recently chosen a better method for local elections, but state- and country-wide ballots still force me into the same binary options.
And yeah, I’ve actually looked into Arrow’s Theorem, and it’s true that no system is perfect, but some are much better than others. First-past-the-post is one of the worst that doesn’t involve actual corruption, so pretty much any alternative will be an improvement. So kudos to Mr. Quinn for trying (probably in vain, I fear) to explain this to people who actually might be able to use the information!
(1) Yeah, I read the original article, and I must say I very much share Quinn’s frustration – the article simply did toss a bunch of terms around, but never set out to explore or explain anything about any of them.
Long form certainly is. Any award for a person when you don’t know what work was done and you generally haven’t the first idea who did the work at all. To my surprise the book I am currently reading does mention the editor on the acknowledgements page. How many do that? One in five? One in ten.
At least Anthologists tend to have their names on the cover.
(4) CASSANDRA CLARE SUED. – I’ll be honest. I’m completely unfamiliar with with both works in question, but it just sounds like two absolutely derivative works with unimaginative names going head to head.
(5) AB INITIO. – Heh. I like the mention of Potter, and regarding the whole Magical School thing. Way back when there were a bunch of people convinced, absolutely *convinced* that Rowling was ripping off Gaiman’s Tim Hunter (from Books of Magic). IIRC, Gaiman’s reactio was something along the lines of “lolwut?”
(6) GRRM’S EDITOR RATIONALE. – Enh. End of day, different people have different voting metrics. If GRRM thinks it’s a lifetime achievement award, go him. If I think I have no way of evaluating this and thus leave it blank/ No Award it, go me.
Also from that post, and apologies if this is silly, but how do you edit a colouring book?!
Just a minute ago on the other thread you said that the rules say that there is a right and a wrong way to do it.
Sound advice whenever someone opines on a legal case they are not intimately familiar with.
(4) CASSANDRA CLARE SUED
For those thinking that this is just a case of convergent ideas, Cassie Claire had a reputation for word for word plagiarism with little evidence of repentance. I suspect many of the links have rotted, but there is a summary here.
(13) A CURIOUS ARTIFACT.
Uhh, is that a Sasquan asterisk on that pin?
There’s a difference between originally producing them not thinking they’d cause offence, and continuing to use the symbol after offence has very publicly been taken.
@Mark
So long as there are puppies maintaining “We don’t know why this offends people, they’re silly, so la la la la la la” I can entirely see why people might want to carry on with the one thing that seems to offend them. But it doesn’t lend itself to a peaceful resolution.
Re 13) Hunh, if the Mail Gods are kind, I should be getting one of those, too, unless they only sent them to Jen (as above) and Shaun and not the rest of the S&F crew. I’ll happily take it.
Re 5), not so much a defense of Ms. Hoyt, but plenty of people opine on things that they don’t read. Doesn’t seem to stop most people. OTOH, I am not interested in an uninformed opinion from her.
It’s also possible to have some opinion on things like whether the editor seems to have good taste in selecting/commissioning work, whether the anthology concept was good and how well the results lived up to it, and whether any editorial matter added to the book. (All reasons why Harlan Ellison is usually considered a better editor than Roger Elwood, for instance.)
@nickpheas
I guess my take on it is that if the kerfluffle is to continue I’d rather be debating points like “no, nominating female authors is not affirmative action” rather than “no, that symbol was not meant to look like an arse.”
@Mark
Was not meaning to suggest it was a good thing to keep doing, just understandable.
Mark: Uhh, is that a Sasquan asterisk on that pin? There’s a difference between originally producing them not thinking they’d cause offence, and continuing to use the symbol after offence has very publicly been taken.
I’d agree with you that it was probably not the best choice.
On the other hand, with the exception of one guy in the Fan Writer category, I suspect that the rest of the Longlist members who receive it will regard it as an acknowledgment that last year was the Roger Maris Year Of The Hugos, and will appreciate receiving it — especially those who would have earned the right to use the moniker “Hugo Finalist” or “Campbell Nominee for Best New Writer” and will possibly now never get to do so.
@Nickpheas
Sorry, I was mostly using your comment as a jumping-off point. I agree with you that it is understandable. I also agree with you and JJ that it’s not the best idea, so my comment was mostly a weary groan in prose form.
Just got my backer’s copy of Michael Jantze’s The Norm graphic novel Knocked Out, Loaded. A delightful piece of work, exploring home, family, and how we grow into them.
Not genre, but well worth a read as an example of how to go from gag-a-day comics to depth.
Mark: I agree with you that it is understandable. I also agree with you and JJ that it’s not the best idea, so my comment was mostly a weary groan in prose form.
Though if it was me getting one, I’d have Elise Mattheson making it into a tiara for me. 😉
Malformed link in Doire’s post on Cassie Clare. I fix.
Not mentioned in that link is the rumored cease and desist she got from the Tolkien estate for selling things based on her Very Secret Diaries fanfic. All we know for certain is that she kept trying to open a CafePress store and it kept closing abruptly.
::ticky::
[One day, I’ll graduate to God Stalk. But today is not that day.]
When Pixels Last in the Scrollyard Bloomed.
@Mark
Not all claims of offense deserve to be taken seriously. If someone calls me “a fucking faggot who doesn’t deserve to be on this Earth” (as has happened in the past), then I think I have pretty good grounds to take offense, and it’s nice that (these days) I can find a good number of people to take my side. But if I’m at breakfast and someone asks “do you like Fruit Loops,” then it’s not reasonable for me to explode that I don’t like being called a fruit. If I double down and insist I’m still offended, no one should take my side, much less call for all people to stop eating (or at least talking about) Fruit Loops.
Otherwise, there is a certain type of person who will begin to manufacture things to be offended by, not because they’re really offended but because they want attention or, worse, they want to control other people. Or, worst of all, because they’re trying to make fun of people who have genuine grievances.
One Pixel Does Not a Scroll Make
A Pixel in the Hand is Worth Two in the Scroll
Short version of Cassandra Clare’s plagiarism history: when she was writing Potter fanfiction she would use frequent “quotes,” dialogue lifted from Buffy, Doctor Who, Black Adder,etc, which she freely and cheerfully admitted in the author’s notes on the stories. But after it was pointed out she also had essentially duplicated great long sequences of plot and dialogue from other sources without giving credit she was kicked off fanfiction.net, which started some wars here and there between Clare, her supporters and her detractors. Her Mortal Instruments series is, from what I understand, her Potter fanfiction with the borrowed bits filed off.
NOT OF THIS EARTH gets a rewatch from me frequently. It is direct and well acted, There’s a lot of suggestion, hints and shadows. I like the original over the big breasted remake.
Well, my pin has still not arrived. Can anyone give me the email adress which I should contact? Pretty please?
I emailed
[email protected]
and got a response that day
I could have sworn I did that one!
Hmm. Or maybe it was “puppies.”
@Greg
You make some very good points. For me, one of the questions would be whether the ostensibly offending item was a usual, long-standing thing that hasn’t previously caused offence, which should require strong justification to change, or something new with no particular significance. Admittedly the asterisks may be approaching “done twice is a tradition”, but they’re not exactly a core element of WorldCon.
Next is the tricky point of intent. For me, the asterisks were an attempt at gentle ribbing that missed their mark and caused offence. (Admittedly a great deal of the offence is ginned up and exaggerated). I think that if you pass an innocent remark about fruit loops you’re entitled to claim any offence is so unlikely that you shouldn’t have to worry about it, but if you decide to rib someone with a good-humored but slightly cutting remark and he takes it badly, the fact that you did include that cutting element means there was that chance you misjudged it and the offence is genuine. (But you can still conclude it isn’t – I’m just saying to weigh it in the balance)
Ultimately I’m not too invested in this (long screed above notwithstanding!) but I just think they’re something that missed the mark and aren’t important enough to defend or continue.
Click, brothers, click! Click like clocks!
Click on the pixels of the tickybox!
Lis Carey on February 11, 2016 at 12:36 am said:
I completely and utterly agree with this.
Come on, George. Are you saying the voters in the Hugos have not awarded Best Editor Longform the way you think they should, so you’re advocating we sidestep the actual written rules? Really?
I think there’s a quote, something along the lines of “The wicked flee when no man pursueth.”?
And people who know they have been *ssh*les see *ssh*les in everything. That is their conscience trying desperately to get their attention. We don’t have to make it easy for them to ignore it.
Also Greg Hullender wrote:
This. So much this.
And “I’ve been doing this all along and you never dared to complain before now” is precisely the metric used against women asking for hostile work environments to clean up their acts and members of minority religious beliefs asking the government to stop promoting one set of religious views over others. I…have my doubts that it is a good one.
4) CASSANDRA CLARE SUED
Fanfic without properly filing off the serial numbers possibly getting her in trouble again? Shocking. Please let this be the last time.
5) AB INITIO. Sarah A. Hoyt
Why bother with pesky facts when you can give your opinion on a summary. Research and reading a few paragraphs takes so much time and isn’t nearly as easy to make fun of. But she did include a link that’s a step in the right direction.
6) GRRM’S EDITOR RATIONALE
Hey GRRM reads file770. How cool is that?
I have a couple Long editors lined up to nominate but I keep vacillating over leaving it blank and voting NA because it’s impossible for me to do justice to the category and I want to see it gone. GRRM isn’t helping me believe it’s a good category. Nuking it is sounding better and better.
Emailed about my pin…
Cat
Long ago, a commenter at Sadly, No referred to this thing you’re describing as ‘martyrbation.’ Today’s martyrs lug their own cross and nail gun to places they think they’ll find disagreement to chide, and they’re always ready to plant their nose where they think your next gesture will bring your hand.
It reminds me also of people who see you about to turn into the street they’re driving on, and they speed up perceptibly just so they can feel aggrieved that you dared to enter their pavement.
AI tries to identify dog breeds: https://www.what-dog.net/?authtoken=299b20f0-9d87-41d6-b78b-da86ed612514#
A SFF anthology Kickstarter with our own Glenn Hauman & my personal friend Michael A. Burstein and a few others you’ve probably heard of Pangaea ll. You can pick up Pangaea, the first anthology, at the same time.
Description: A horde of top sci fi and fantasy authors return to a world in which mankind lives–and always has lived–on a single super-continent!
(4) Courtney Milan, a romance novel author and former professor of IP law at Seattle University, has been a great source of law-based info about the case on Twitter. The Guardian article quotes some of her tweets, but if you want to see her tweets in context, this is a good one to start with.
No offense to GRRM, but I think that the editor categories are a bit too “inside baseball” to keep going if we want to keep growing the Hugo voter and nominations pool. While editors for magazines and anthologies are easily found out, very little of what they do other than the selection of material is easily discerned. Long-form editors have it even harder, as it can be a pain to even find out what books they’ve edited.
I think that awards for Best Fiction Magazine, Best Anthology, and Best Publisher would make more sense in the future.
@Rail Thanks for fixing the link. I should know better than to try to comment using firefox (so I can use stylish) for android.
I got my pin after emailing and it worked the third time. Now to get those nominations in.
I don’t know if I was convinced, but I thought it was funny.
Er. I mean, I laughed with amusement “funny”, not I was squintingly suspicious “funny”.
(Sorry, not on a machine that enables edits)