The Return of Testing Chat Thread

[The Spartan]

Red I only ever read part of one chapter but I will buy your book in hardcover when it finally gets published.

On this note, any idea when that's going to happen?

[Glass Fort MacLeod]

also, it's quite possible to enjoy something that is bad as a work of art. for example, i really enjoy john barnes' timeline wars series although it's a slightly more historically-aware and literate mary-sue story (main character is a bodyguard with most of a PhD in Art History who marries a swingin' sufi lady from a timeline where "fuckbuddies" has become a ritualized relationship, gets hit on by wilde and michelangelo, uses superguns and supergrenades, fights and kills his mirror-universe self onboard a crashing zeppelin, etc.).

I think what matters more isn't what you like but more how you like it. If you're incapable of accepting criticism or opposing viewpoints on the franchise/series/whatever, or accept changes to that franchise (because like it or not things change.) then I'd say there are problems. In my own personal Sci fi tastes I tend to focus more on wther I am willing/able to go beyond that comfort zone of 'what I like' and look at something that looks interesting but isn't really something I'm used to, or willing to at least look at the criticisms and consider whether my own thoughts/ideas could use revision on the basis of that. It's the stasis/lack of change that really bothers me in things.

i'm not even sure why- i am unable to read clancy or ringo. my eyes just glaze off the page.

Everyone is different, everyone has different tastes, likes, and such. One could look at 'suspension of disbelief' as being 'how much BS you're willing to put up with before saying "screw this".) and everyone's threshhold is going to differ. I can sort of tolerate Ringo (but not Watch on the Rhine) or most Baen stuff even whilst I am aware of the myriad flaws, and I can sort of tolerate Clancy too (again despite the flaws) but I would be willing to bet you would see alot of stuff in those books that just breaks your disbelief/BS tolerance and makes them unreadable.

[Bakustra]

I just mildly effort posted in reply to Junghalli in the TSBOI thread that started this tangent about this.

It's because Ringo and Clancy are hobbyists. Their works aren't fiction, per se, they're delivery vehicles for equipment manifests and Orders of Battle dressed up in hegemonic/patriotic cant. If you were to dissect the main sections of a Ringo book you could find and replace all the words and make it a alt-history on the Napoleonic wars without too much sweat. When you're not interesting in those laundry lists, however, it falls apart. It's got a niche market audience and when it gets into the hands of people who are interested in fiction it falls apart because there's nothing unique or at all interesting as fiction to add. It's just... words words words arranged in ways that are interesting for a certain obsessed group of people, just like the weird section of Youtube dedicated to various paternosters around the world. There's nothing bad about this obsession (well, maybe yes about the Milwank when it gets applied to real life) but it shouldn't be represented as anything more than a cultural curio.

Basically yes.

Also, I feel mildly ashamed that I ended my post over there with semi-obvious trollbait. I know that setting hooks like that is wrong but oh do I love it so.

There is never any reason to be ashamed of Socratic irony or its semi-modified forms.

[RedImperator]

OK so HI publication:

Short version is that I had an agent at a big boy agency and we were about two weeks from going into submission when my agent got laid off. I immediately sent out a bunch of agent queries, got a pile of rejection slips, got dispirited, and stopped working on it for a while (this all went down at the same time I was changing careers, when I wasn't exactly overburdened with free time or mental energy). I'm really not sure what I want to do at this point; a lot of me wants to just put the fucking thing on Lulu, collect whatever beer money it'll fetch, and get on with my life. But I get held up because I think it really does have commercial potential, not to mention it'd be a serious writing credit and a possible springboard to writing as a career (or at least writing plus convention appearances plus workshop appearances plus teaching creative writing part time at the local junior college as a career). So I have no idea when it'll be published. Probably a long time from now. Sorry guys.

OTOH, I may as well announce this now: a couple of you probably remember I was working off-and-on on a Voyager rewrite a few years ago. Well, I did a page one rewrite of it and I'm posting it on TEO as a weekly serial starting December 1.

[Bakustra]

[Straha]

The first part of that disheartens me. The second part of that cheers me up.

[RedImperator]

I'm going to make one last push at publication over the winter; if I don't get at least a nibble by next Memorial Day, I'm self-publishing at zero profit for me; the paper version will be printing and shipping costs, the ebook will be free.

[Straha]

Future of the industry.

[Bakustra]

Red this has gotten me so upset I've decided to inflict my attempt at a short-short story on you all.

Killer Toaster

Paper, paper, everywhere, nor anyplace to sit he thought as he regarded his apartment’s second-bedroom-converted-to-office. Drafts, treatments, correspondence, fanfiction to pad out his portfolio- all the shit a slob trying to get published or involved with the industry accumulates as he goes. He shuddered a bit, but remembered the panicked phone calls to his agent, the latest argument with his girlfriend, the accidentally-deleted story that had to be recreated from memory and a first draft.

It took the better part of the afternoon and a trip to pick up some cardboard boxes from a grocery, but now his office was organized if not tidy. He riffled through one of his earlier attempts, and smiled a bit. There came a knock at the door and he yelled, “It’s unlocked, hon”.

His girlfriend came in, set a box down on the counter, and said “Looks nice! See what I meant about willpower, Chuck?” Chuck smiled a little sheepishly.

“Yeah, you were right, Sue,” he said.

“I usually am. C’mon, I brought pizza.”

Well, hell, he thought, things are starting to look up a little. If only he could do something about his writer’s block, then he would be damn set.

They had pizza on the couch and watched the horror classics of the 1970s forwards, on the struggling cable channels- Frogs, Children of the Corn IV, Leprechaun VIII, etc.

“You know…” Sue said as she nuzzled his neck.

“Know what,” he moaned.

“Who writes this stuff? Do you think they ever mention it at parties?”

Chuck thought for a bit.

Sue pulled away and continued, “I mean, you did better than this in your freshman workshops, Chuck!” Onscreen, a man in painstakingly applied makeup stalked a teenager through what looked like a castle, giving an inarticulate speech about Jesus or something religious.

“Whaddayagonnado,” Chuck said. But inside, an idea seemed to be springing up. But then Sue pulled in a little closer and he put it off till tomorrow.

By morning the idea had percolated through his subconscious, and by the end of breakfast it had been fully digested by his conscious mind. Write a spoof of the genre. It probably wouldn’t sell, but he hadn’t had much luck writing straightforward pieces, genre or literary, so why not blow off steam a bit?

He settled down and set to work, taking only a quick break for lunch and for dinner. He read vintage King, Herbert, and Matheson, watched Mystery Science Theater’s horror episodes, and pulled out battered copies of Saki and M. R. James from his shelves for a spell after dinner. The next day he began writing.

It took form quickly and then started coming to life in his hands. He pulled out all the worst tricks- character suddenly loses peripheral vision as the menace comes after them, sex meaning death, completely ludicrous antagonists, a nonsensical explanation for the events of the film- he knew them well and he used them well. By lunchtime on the second day of writing, he had a rough script worked out. The plot revolved around killer household appliances, some of which reassembled themselves into psycho-killer form. There was only one title for it.

“Killer Toaster?” his agent asked.

“Just take a look at it,” Chuck said.

His agent gave him a bemused look and read through a couple pages, then cracked a grin.

“Loving the laundry room scene,” his agent said. “Tell you what,” he continued, “I’ll definitely have to look at it further, but if the whole thing is this good you might be able to sell it as a script somewhere.”

Two weeks later, his agent called Chuck as he was contemplating writing steampunk porn for ebooks.

“Chuck, I don’t know how to tell you this, but I sent your Toaster around and there’s something of a bidding war going on. Miramax just offered one-ten.”

Chuck found that his throat and lips wouldn’t cooperate.

“I’ll try to get them a bit higher, but it looks like you’ll have an in and some cash in your pocket regardless,” his agent said.

He called Sue first, and she actually whooped over the phone. He then made the rounds of family and friends, who all were congratulatory. The next week or so was a blur.

Then his agent called again.

“Chuck, I have some odd news for you. Toaster was bought for a million dollars-“

“What?” Chuck yelled. Questions boiled out.

His agent said, “It was bought by this company called Sukumogam. Never heard of them before but apparently they’re big in the electronics industry, make parts or whatever. Anyways, they bought it for a million, and paid Paramount a quarter-million in compensation, since they were the next-leading bidders, but they don’t make movies or have any partnerships with any studios as far as I can tell.”

“Why would an electronics company buy a script, though?” Chuck asked.

“You think I have any idea?” his agent replied. “But anyways, Chuck, I’m pretty sure that anything you do will get bought up after Toaster. That script was some kind of dynamite, apparently, and even if the next is nowhere near as good, they’ll still buy it cheap to get an in on Toaster’s kind of gold. Don’t give up.”

“Keep me posted,” Chuck said, and hung up.

He took that advice, and started working on treatments, but it still nagged at him. Finally, after about a week, Sue convinced him to call Sukumogam.

“What’s the worst thing that can happen?” she said.

He looked up the number online, and made his call.

“Sukumogam Industries, how may I direct your call?” came the voice of a professional-sounding woman. Chuck thought she had some kind of accent- the first word seemed a bit oddly pronounced- but was more amazed to hear a live receptionist rather than voicemail. He explained his situation and was sent from secretary to secretary, noting that they were about evenly men and women. Finally, he was connected to “Mr. Blackdeck, President and CEO.”

“Ah, you’re Mr. Maglin, the writer whose script we purchased, yes?” Blackdeck’s voice sounded precise to Chuck, but not the English accent “precise” usually referred to.

“Yes, I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions,” Chuck said.

“Wondering why, Mr. Maglin?” Blackdeck chuckled. “Tell you what, I’ll talk to you in person. You deserve that much, I think, and I’m sure you’d love to see the people who made you almost a millionaire.”

Sukumogam proved to have its HQ just a subway ride from Chuck’s apartment, Blackdeck proved to have some time available for that Thursday, and Chuck agreed to come in for 11:15. “We can do lunch afterward, perhaps,” Blackdeck had said.

This certainly seems all too pat, Chuck thought, but dismissed it as paranoia. Don’t let yourself think life is a movie, Chucky, he reminded his brain.

Thursday arrived rapidly, and Chuck entered the headquarters of Sukumogam Industries, Incorporated, noting the slogan “Making Our Way Around The World And Into Your Homes” over the reception desk.

There was nobody else in the lobby. Chuck was starting to feel a little uneasy for some reason, but figured that people took lunch early here. Or maybe they staggered lunches by floor. Yeah, something like that. He walked up to the receptionist. She looked up, and smiled.

“Mr. Maglin. We were told you would be coming. Please follow me.”

Chuck found himself looking at her closely. Not sexually, though she certainly wasn’t ugly, but the way she moved was off. She clicked and clacked her feet so carefully and quickly such as to make a drill sergeant weep. Her arms and fingers seemed to move from place to place without passing in between.

There was only one elevator, and he looked at her questioningly.

“This is the guest elevator. Our employees use different elevators to save on decoration expenses. Don’t let Mr. Blackdeck know I told you that,” she said, and directed him to step inside.

Once in she pushed the button for the 9th floor, but Chuck could swear that it had already been lit up when they entered. The elevator was lavish, with murals of technology on the wooden walls and brass buttons and fittings as well. They exited, and she told him to go straight ahead and open the first door on the left.

He passed several secretaries, all moving very precisely themselves and in near-perfect unison. It was more than a little creepy. He was reminded of a friend who worked at Disneyland in college and joked about the “Mousewashing”.

Finally, he reached the door, and opened it. Inside, there was a fairly dim room, set up as a perfectly ordinary office. Looking out one of the windows, his back to the door, was a figure who could only be Mr. Blackdeck. He looked even odder than the other employees. He was wearing an obvious toupee in a mullet and a suit as loose-fitting as you could get, but his body seemed to bulge oddly. There was an odd smell in the air that Chuck couldn’t quite place.

“I suppose you wonder why we bought it, Mr. Maglin,” Blackdeck said without turning around.

“Yeah, I did,” Chuck said.

“We bought it, I am afraid, for one purpose only: making sure that your movie never gets made.” Blackdeck seemed oddly regretful.

“Why?” Chuck asked, the cumulative odd feelings beginning to flash a warning inside his head.

Blackdeck turned, and Chuck looked, and looked again, and finally saw, and understood. A set of LEDs, mostly white, with a double ring of blue in the center surrounding a black one, on one side of the face. Below that, a welded plate with a couple bolts in it made up Blackdeck’s cheek. Oil dappled the surface. Below that, a set of fake rubber lips sat, with an array of little robotic arms latched on at dozens of points. They pulled the lips apart and up. Inside, a set of screens turned on and glowed white. Blackdeck smiled, and said, “Oh, we have our reasons. Little things.”

[Bakustra]

i figure posting this at people will serve as far worse punishment than bannings ever could be

[Zod]

tl;dr

[F.J. Prefect, Esq]

I'm going to make one last push at publication over the winter; if I don't get at least a nibble by next Memorial Day, I'm self-publishing at zero profit for me; the paper version will be printing and shipping costs, the ebook will be free.

Red if real publishing doesn't work out, maybe talk to me. I have this crazy idea re self-publishing and to be quite honest I would prefer not to see Homestead as a thing on Lulu, you dig?

[zhaktronz]

IF ITS PUBLISHED ITS A BOOK

[RedImperator]

I'm going to make one last push at publication over the winter; if I don't get at least a nibble by next Memorial Day, I'm self-publishing at zero profit for me; the paper version will be printing and shipping costs, the ebook will be free.

Red if real publishing doesn't work out, maybe talk to me. I have this crazy idea re self-publishing and to be quite honest I would prefer not to see Homestead as a thing on Lulu, you dig?

I'm all ears. Hopefully no Ukrainian teenagers will torrent it between now and then.

[Gands]

The smart money's on a Belorussian.

[F.J. Prefect, Esq]

I'm all ears. Hopefully no Ukrainian teenagers will torrent it between now and then.

My people will contact your people

By which I mean I will send you a PM after my exams are finished.

[adr]

this The Five show on fox news is so fucking stupid

two of these guys are complaining about how their second home on the jersey shore was damaged in the storm

oh woe

[adr]

and this one idiot was like "what if htis hit a socialist wonderland like cuba or venezuela"

the storm did hit cuba, genius

and haiti too, where it killed like 50 ppl, but not a word about them on the corporatemedia

[Gands]

I periodically see the Five, it's fucking awful.

I feel so sorry for token liberal guy.

[Darksi4190]

this The Five show on fox news is so fucking stupid

two of these guys are complaining about how their second home on the jersey shore was damaged in the storm

oh woe

Yeah, that's some world's smallest violin shit right there.

[adr]

i hate the word earn so much now. it is pure bourgeois propaganda

i'm reading something in the guardian newspaper right now and have to pause

take a gander at these two excerpts and tell me what is wrong with them:

Anyone earning over £1m a year can look forward to a £42,000 tax cut in the spring, while firms have been rewarded with a 2% cut in corporation tax to 24%.

Asda, Google, Apple, eBay, Ikea, Starbucks, Vodafone: all pay minimal tax on massive UK revenues, mostly by diverting profits earned in Britain to their parent companies, or lower tax jurisdictions via royalty and service payments or transfer pricing.

profits are not earned. profits come from exploitation

the word 'earned' implies it is something one ought to have, thereby reinforcing the structural inequality of our system by discouraging change


i've seen all kinds of people use this word including folks who should know better

and it just bugs me. we've gotta stop reinforcing this false morality if we are ever to achieve true economic justice

[xon]

god the humanist inheritance was so fucking good

even as a rough draft

This, so very much.

I'm going to make one last push at publication over the winter; if I don't get at least a nibble by next Memorial Day, I'm self-publishing at zero profit for me; the paper version will be printing and shipping costs, the ebook will be free.

Awesome, it would be great if you can post when something happens. I will then throw some money at you.

Amusingly, sb.com has an author who self-publishes via Amazon Kindle and some other publishers for stuff who has been posting draft's/almost publishable works while every now and again linking to his homepage with links to various stores. It looks like an interesting marketing strategy too.

[adr]

16:47:00) Destructionator: yeah for most things. F1-F4 on putty without screen aren't working but everything else does. all keys on xterm, screen, and rxvt. (And Windows but that's easy because Microsoft didn't use an idiotic mess of proprietary designs from the 70's)


down with the unix terminal system

christ it sucks

[adr]

are hurricanes god's way of redistributing wealth from insurance companies to contractors?

[The Spartan]

They're god's way of redistributing the wealth by chasing poor people out of prime real estate so the rich folk can move in and renovate it.