Appropos of Something. Definitely Something.

ETAs below. And now even more.

It appears that sf_drama is hitting the high points of the post alluded to here. (I usually don’t connect to these things directly).

I’m disappointed that Elizabeth Moon and this guy now have more in common than just the genre they work in.

Things I give odds on:

• 1:1 odds this shows up on unfunny_business.
• 3:1 odds this shows up on fandom_wank.
• 10:1 odds that Andrew Sullivan discovers this and the Daily Dish linkorama starts and embarrasses us all.
• 25:1 odds that Wiscon uninvites her. ((I don’t blame them if they don’t; it’s a big thing to uninvite a guest of honor. At the same time, it is Wiscon.))

I hate this, so very much. Unlike with this guy ((Screw you, Google blog search…. Never leave me. :’()), I take zero pleasure in any of this.

Oh well. We’re all human. And hell, I’m actually evil, so. ((More on that later, I guess, in the next entry in Dancing with Psychologists.))

I suppose, though, that even evil has standards.

Update: Okay, now I have lost all respect for her, utterly and entirely. Perhaps I should have started with that. See below ETAs.

ETA: BAH-LEETION has now occurred to all the comments on Moon’s post. Hmmm.

ETA2: So apparently Moon also edited her post at the end. What the hell, Elizabeth Moon?

ETA3: bloodparade has screencaps. And apparently Wiscon will become aware of this. Bahleetion: it does not make things better 24 hours into the wank.

This is now elevated from FUCKUP to TRAINWRECK.

Authors and Wank; or, Perfect Isn’t People, Part II

I already posted this as a comment on another thread elsewhere, but I’ll repost it here. With, er, grammar corrected. Sigh.

Everyone is human. Authors no less. If they were wanky all the time, that’d be a different thing, but this is just one issue on which they wanked, and truth to tell, most of us have our own issues on which we would wank; we just haven’t been featured on fandom_wank yet.

(For an example, look at bookshop; Aja has been featured on fandom_wank numerous times, but she definitely isn’t a wanker here.)

So yeah; on this issue, GRRM ((And others, it has to be said.)) hasn’t been thoughtful. Everywhere else, though, he’s a nice guy. That doesn’t excuse his mouthing off on something he’s not done research on, or his particularly weak response to being called on it, or his condescension.

I’m not calling for people to be absolutely forgiving; sometimes an author will wank on something we care very deeply about, and people have every right to stop wanting to read said author.

At the same time, it’s important to remember: authors are human. They are no better and no worse than the rest of humanity, even though they’re published. This wank (and previous ones) are especially illustrative of that.

One more thing I’d like to add:

Over the years, I’ve learned that people are people everywhere you go. People are good or bad or human on their own merits, not because they’ve gotten published, not because they went to college—and not because they haven’t gotten published or haven’t gone to college, either. This bites people on both sides of the coin; on the one hand, it becomes easy to put someone on a pedestal and be horribly disappointed later, and on the other hand, it is this very attitude of “I am better than the rabble” that enables so much author wank.

In the end, it’s just best to assume in general that they are no better than you.

For Various Reasons

… I am on low SAN today. Actually, I’ve been on wavering SAN all week.

Hm, I forgot what I was going to write briefly. Oh yes.

Thank you, John Scalzi, for briefly alleviating the madness via pointing out new Fandom Wank when I’d forgotten for the week.

ETA: Other good reading: Kate Nepveu’s Open Letter.

I’m blanking a bit now on everything except for tea and the idea of Obin slashfic. You see, the Obin are a sentient race without consciousness (self-awareness). They did get some adaptive tech to give them consciousness, but they can get emotionally overloaded easily. (I find it interesting that they have individual personalities when conscious, even though most of them have lived their lives without any.)

So. You know. I’m pretty sure that sex as a sentient but non-self-aware being is pretty different from having it for the first time with the consciousness switched on. Although I’m sure for many of them, the idea of sex might overload their consciousness tech a little bit, and the actual act might blow a fuse.

Unlike other sentient races, the Obin can also switch their consciousness off without resorting to alcohol. There are definitely possibilities.

Sadly, I do not write slashfic very well. So Hickory/Dickory will not be written by me. Woe.

On the other hand, I feel a lot better about the fiction I am working on. Perhaps I will work on it some more when my current SAN-draining adventure is abated, or SAN reaches negative levels and I’m insane.

New Post at Tor.com: My Favorite and Mostly Improper Items of Holmesiana: A Letter

Dear Fans of the new Sherlock Holmes movie:

Let me apologize on the behalf of older Sherlock Holmes fandom for the bits of it that have been generating get-off-my-lawn reboot wank, not five days after the release of the movie. The Sherlock Holmes fandom has thrived for over a hundred years and multiple generations, and every generation has its… special snowflakes.

But fortunately, every generation has also produced creative fandom work (though they may not see it that way), from the solidly analytical to the wondrously fanciful. I may not agree with all of them, or even remotely like some of them, but they all occupy a place in my heart, because there wouldn’t be a Sherlock Holmes fandom without constant re-interpretation of the works. Yes, even the fic pastiche where Moriarty is a vampire who falls madly in love with Holmes.¹

I present to you the more amusing pieces of Holmesiana I’ve gathered throughout the years. I’ve strived for a varied collection here that is at the very least sometimes accessible, even if it knocks out some of my absolute favorites. Too much of the fandom is out of print; I hope that changes one day, so that reading all the ’ship wank doesn’t cost 500£.

[Love and adaptation: that's how legends survive.]

A Last Sputter From the Helix SF Train Wreck

I wouldn’t even have remarked on the most recent slight flare-up—I didn’t even comment when Helix Magazine took its ball home shut down, what, a couple months back?—but the minor wank spawned of course spread to the SFF.net newsgroups.

So apparently Helix Magazine, of late racism, wank, and lols, has decided to pull all of its archives after all, claiming that they were scared of Janis Ian after she requested Helix remove a story of hers because

And she is, after all, a well-off popular entertainer, with legal and financial resources we could not hope to match; and none of us had the time nor the energy for a courtroom fight.

Yes, Janis Ian, who had to resort to the resources of the SFWA grievance committee, obviously had deep pockets of cash to drop on this.

And of course the right response is to pull down all the archives, even though this was not requested.

Deathless comment by Nick Mamatas: “I’d call even remarking on this beating a dead horse, except that in this case the dead horse has actually managed to get a bat in its teeth and with a posthumous twitch, smack itself!”

And because this is William Sanders, the baby train wreck doesn’t stop there.

Oh Sanders, never change.

Meanwhile, in the World of Social Networking: EntreCard. Twitter. Explode. And Turnips.

I haven’t yet decided whether I should enjoy this as schadenfreude or not. EntreCard hasn’t really ever pissed me off, but then again, I left some months ago ((July 18th. I wasn’t mad or upset at EntreCard. S∂ was switching focus, and I didn’t feel that an EC widget would be a great idea for a while. And as it turns out, I didn’t really need or want it anymore (and became much too busy).)) before the drama and excitement.

A Short Post: Schadenfreude Pie a la Twilight

Schadenfreude: n.

delight at the misfortune of others

Just to save in my album of Late Summer 2008.

Take:

1 successful teenage girl romance novel, nicely fluffed up with sparkles

2 somewhat less well-received sequels

30000 gallons of expectations of the next coming of J.K. Rowling

a google of rabid, ravenous, raving fans

1 very (DearAuthor) badly (PW) panned (LA Times) finale (Amazon review slapfest)
Updated Aug 9: there’s (EW) even (Washington Post) more (Guardian)

Yields:

numerous and humorous commentaries, parodies, mockings, musicals, and link fests

much pawning and returning

EPIC mockery

1 writing campaign to Little, Brown

The Best Breaking Dawn review of them all

Update Aug 9:
1 organized protest

1 unexpected Rotten Tomatoes thread that morphs into a Breaking Dawn thread

It was like Christmas in August.

Back to your regular bloggery tomorrow.

Summary of a Train Wreck: Helix Speculative Fiction Magazine's Sordid Bigotry and Blunders

Is it worth it to submit to some place or other in the mere hopes of publication?

As the worms turned up from Helix: A Speculative Fiction Quarterly‘s recent wankery show, sometimes it is decidedly not.

Come with me as we explore a trail of

• racism, bigotry, and rejection letters;
• the acts of nonprofessional spewage from an editor of a Hugo-nominated semi-prozine;
• what happens when your contract with your publisher is not well-examined;
• and how to deal with the blatant wankery.

Summary of a Train Wreck: Helix Speculative Fiction Magazine’s Sordid Bigotry and Blunders

Is it worth it to submit to some place or other in the mere hopes of publication?

As the worms turned up from Helix: A Speculative Fiction Quarterly‘s recent wankery show, sometimes it is decidedly not.

Come with me as we explore a trail of

• racism, bigotry, and rejection letters;
• the acts of nonprofessional spewage from an editor of a Hugo-nominated semi-prozine;
• what happens when your contract with your publisher is not well-examined;
• and how to deal with the blatant wankery.