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You are viewing the most recent 20 entries October 19th, 200911:16 pm: Dollhouse fans are promoting the show better than FOX
WhyIwatch.com, as far as I can tell, is a professional-quality fan site for Joss Whedon's Dollhouse. Witness this video, promoting this Friday's episode. To be frank, I've enjoyed the season so far, but I haven't been wowed yet. I'm hoping for Whedon and Co. to bring their A game. This might be the episode that really gets the story into high gear, exploring the back story of Sierra, the one Doll who isn't a volunteer (so far as we know.) Tags: dollhouse, fandom, tv
07:34 pm: "The Pretty Horsebreaker" now on sale
Circlet Press' steampunk erotica anthology, Like a Corset Undone, is now on sale, which includes my short story "The Pretty Horsebreaker." It's set in the same world as my earlier "The Innocent's Progress", though most of the characters are based on real people of the Victorian era. The protagonist, for example, is based on Catherine "Skittles" Walters, a famous courtesan, equestrienne and celebrity. It's not on the Kindle yet, but you can get it in a variety of formats at Fictionwise, All Romance eBooks, Smashwords and Scribd. Not quite sure how to promote an ebook. You can't hand it to people, or autograph it. Current Mood:  pleased , writing
August 19th, 200910:44 am: Thoughts on Post-Scarcity Economy
List of things people will want in a post-scarcity world, with effectively limitless goods and energy, and probably some kind of functional immortality (e.g. mind backups) - Transportation: Some things will still require people to meet face to face, and there were still be places that are more interesting than other places, so people will want to go there. Also, some things will still need to be moved around.
- Gambling: This is a very deep rooted need in humans, and gambling without the actual possibility of significant loss or gain just isn't the same
- Custom-made things for a specific event or application. The coolness of this item drops rapidly after the event is over and the technical or artistic innovations of the item are copied or reverse-engineered by others.
- Participation in in collaborative projects. One person can write and compose an opera, and even design and make the sets and costumes, but that person will probably need other people to perform it. This can be in the sense of work (cast and crew of an opera) or play (game worlds in which player interaction is part of the experience)
- Security: Bodyguards, safe deposit boxes, etc. This implies that there are objects people want to destroy or steal, and other people want to preserve or keep.
- Violence: sabotage, assassinations, air strikes, theft, hijacking. Intimidation or actual destruction.
- Status Items: things that are artificially rare, such as limited edition items or performance awards (e.g. sports trophies), actually rare (e.g. Faberge eggs) or abstractions like titles/ranks. These will probably matter only to certain subcultures. Status items can confer tangible benefits.
- Status locations: Only so many people can practically visit Mecca or Disneyland. Again, only valuable to certain subcultures. Can be a real or virtual location (e.g. game world)
An additional angle to all of this is if some authority, with the force to back it up, has declared certain things forbidden. That creates an artificial scarcity and opens up smuggling, hidden production, concealment and other services. Roger Caillois' theory of games said that people have four drives that they try to fulfill, separate from the needs of food, shelter, etc. - Agon, or competition. People will challenge each other to see who is the best at whatever. That means games (and not everybody can participate in them), and awards.
- Alea, or randomness. Gambling, in other words. Probably closely tied to agon.
- Mimesis, or imitation. Playing roles. Performing in operas, hacking through MMORPG dungeons,etc.
- Illinx, destruction of perception, or mind-altering experience. Think of roller coasters.
Games, broadly defined, are usually delimited in time and space and participation. Space delimitation means that you have to go somewhere to participate, and perhaps to watch (not necessarily a physical location). Time delimitation means you have to prepare and anticipate, and the alea factor thrives on this. Certain locations or items will create illinx, because the "destruction of perception" is valued precisely because it is not everywhere or all of the time. So the industries of post-scarcity: Rennaissance fairs, games, gambling and mind-altering drugs? So, games might become incredibly important. Players gain status just through qualifying to participate, and spectators get vicarious agon, mimesis - Teaching. In-person, or at least personalized, teaching, would still be valuable.
Current Music: 181.fm The Buzz on streaming audio August 7th, 200909:35 pm: We have met the enemy...
One more thing about my Gen-Y memories of GI Joe: In the animated series continuity, COBRA was actually a front organization for "Cobra-La", a city in the mountains inhabited by the original, reptilian sentient rulers of Earth. They took a powder during the last ice age and when they woke up, found those pesky mammals had ruined everything. They had cool bio-tech weapons and equipment. Presumably this was created to add some juice to the toy line. When fascists get tired, there's always monsters. But it also meant that the bad guys were servants of non-human beings. In the Marvel comics largely written by Larry Hama, COBRA initially appears to be some kind of foreign power, but an early issue introduces Springfield, a small, all-American town in an unspecified state that is completely run by COBRA. Later stories reveal that COBRA began in Springfield as an Amway-like pyramid scheme, started by a failed used car dealer. In other words, COBRA is a purely home-grown American form of capitalism-fascism (despite the fact that its upper leadership seems to be composed of Eurotrash). What does being "a real American hero" mean when your enemy comes from the flyover states? In a weird way, those stories presaged the internal war of America in the 90s (e.g. Waco, Oklahoma City, etc), once the great external enemy, the Soviet Union, had crumbled. The Springfield of GI Joe also finds a parallel in the other Springfield of The Simpsons. Given Sprinfieldians propensity for following cults, fads, dubious experts and so on, is it that big a stretch to imagine them wearing navy blue uniforms with coal scuttle helmets and swearing allegiance to a guy with a mirrored face and a severe lisp (is it Mr. Burns underneath that)? Maybe what's stopping them is the equally American values of laziness and fickleness. Still, Hama's stories did impress upon me one very important thing: evil is as likely to come from within as from without, if not more so. Tags: nostalgia
August 5th, 200911:49 pm: Sickly sweet nostalgia, obsolete villains and COBRA middle management
I was probably at the right age for the early 80s blitz of marketing for the GI Joe franchise. I actually collected the Marvel comics, stopping around issue 60 or so, and had them pretty well memorized. I never owned one of the toys though. Thus, the current marketing blitz for the GI Joe film is giving me a feeling of sickly sweet nostalgia. Presumably, Hollywood is now full of guys that age who like that feeling of nostalgia, hence the film, which gives every indication of being a giant steaming pile. This is the opening sequence of the 1987 GI Joe animated movie, a set piece battle around Liberty Island between the Joes and COBRA. Apparently, it requires hundreds of paratroopers and dozens of bizarre aircraft and a flying aircraft carrier to deliver one bomb, the size of an attache case, to the base of the Statue of Liberty. If you have a suitcase-sized bomb that can take out a major landmark, you don't need an army of uniformed soldiers and tanks. This massive strategic blunder underlines not only why COBRA never won (in the animated series), but why this view of villainy has become obsolete. We're told that COBRA is "a ruthless terrorist organization determined to rule the world," but stylisticaly, it's fascist, with military uniforms, flame-lit night time rallies, a hierarchical organization, striking insignia and other visuals, etc. Ideologically, it's capitalist, profiting from arms sales overseas and using that money to gain power. Operationally, it is a modern state-backed army with no territory to defend. It is an invading army that comes from nowhere. Today, in 2009, it is actually easier to believe in alien robots who come to Earth and take the shape of cars from failing auto-makers, than to believe in terrorists who have underwater bases and ninjas and uniforms. GI Joe actually looks like a bad joke now after however many years of the War on Terror. In our heads, we're still fighting the "good war" against Nazis, who made themselves clearly identifiable. But now we're dealing with non-state actors, whose weapons of choice are cheap and plentiful: AK-47s, RPGs, IEDs, cell phones, cars and trucks. No distinctive uniforms, no bases in exotic locations. Hard to make a toy line based on that. Sidebar: How exactly do these evil organizations work? You've got the inner circle at the top, with the leader, usually a basket case; the second-in-command, who's scheming to take over; and the evil babe, who does most of the actual work but has hit the glass ceiling in the evil organization. Then at the bottom, you've got the endless, faceless, nameless, witless minions. And in between, you have this middle management tier of lieutenants who have names and bizarre schticks: the alligator guy, the eagle guy, the mind control guy, etc. My question is, where do these lieutenants come from? Are they outside hires, drawn from some other organization where this was standard attire? Or are they promoted from the faceless minions, presumably the 0.01 per cent who survive fighting the heroes? Do they have to audition to make the cut to schtick lieutenant status? I picture some faceless minion yearning to become a lieutenant, putting together his costume with a hot glue gun and working on his audition. "I am the Chef! I will put fear into the the heroes with my pastry knife!" "No, sorry, try next year. Get back into your faceless minion uniform, #45890345." "Yes, sir. CO-BRA!" Tags: nostalgia
July 15th, 200912:55 am: "Intake", a Dollhouse fanfiction
Title: Intake, a Dollhouse Fanfiction Rating: PG-13 for some sexual content Characters: Adelle, November Disclaimer: Dollhouse owned by Joss Whedon and FOX Word Count: 920 words Notes: Spoilers for "Man on the Street" Summary: Adelle DeWitt dealt in second chances, not get-out-of-jail-free cards. ( Read more... )Tags: dollhouse, fanfiction
July 9th, 200903:27 pm: Queen of Revels
A good friend, JW, whipped up this illustration for the novel proposal I 'm shopping around. (Thanks!) An editor said she wanted to hear about it on Tuesday, and I emailed her both an elevator pitch and a 1000-word treatment. No word back from her. Now I suppose I have to write the damned thing... Tags: qor, writing
June 19th, 200907:08 pm: Why didn't somebody stop me?
David Cronenberg says that when he was making Rabid back in 1977, he had a moment when he thought, "I'm making a movie about a porn star with a blood-sucking cock-thing coming out of her armpit. Why didn't somebody stop me?" That's about how I felt today once I put the signed contract with Circlet Press in the mail. I'm now committed to writing another 30,000 words of steampunk erotica by December 1st. That works out to an average of 200 words per day, which sounds much more manageable. I also felt a little when I listened to Mur Lafferty's "I should be writing" podcast and she reiterated, "You are allowed to suck." I have at least 3 stories in mind, and possibly some shorter vignettes. One should be an interesting take on the Jekyll and Hyde story. It's a pretty good deal, too. The advance is only US$75, but as its an ebook, 35% of revenue going to me. Compare that to the 8 per cent I get if it ever goes to print. Tags: erotica, writing
June 17th, 200911:08 pm: Getting back in the groove, hopefully
I submitted my first paying article in months, a review of Douglas Rushkoff's Life Inc. It was 70% over length and 2 days past my self-imposed deadline. My journalism output has dropped sharply over the past year or so, both in gross revenue and in total number of pieces printed. Part of that has to do with forgetting the first rule of freelancing: pester. I'm not competitive, yet freelancing involves fighting for the editor's scarce attention. I've sent several queries to a certain editor, and never followed them up, so I assumed that they were ignored. I'll also admit to taking this a little too personally, as an individual snub, instead of being the nature of the business. Of course, I have to try to get back into the freelancing game just when the money is drying up and everything is restructuring. Current Music: "Scrubs" on TV , writing
June 12th, 200906:30 pm: Why I hate shopping for clothes
I'm one of those guys who never got into the habit of shopping for clothes. This is a different from the utilitarian practice of buying clothes, as replacements for worn out clothes or for a particular requirement. Shopping for clothes assumes one is constantly on the lookout for new clothes, new ways of presenting the self. One reason for this, in my case, is a lack of money, but another reason is that I don't feel confident busying clothing that is not relatively nondescript, department-store fare. The reason is encounters like this: I was wandering around Davie Street and on impulse I walked into a men's wear store. Before I had a chance to even look around and get comfortable with the situation, one of the two clerks, the male, started into me. He quickly passed me over to his female colleague. Standing way too close to me and speaking way too fast, she said, "Looking at you I can tell, you've got broad shoulders [true], you've got a 34 waist [also true], but you dress old [what?]. My partner and I are older than you but we dress younger." At this point, I'm was biting down the urge to back out the door and leave. I don't appreciate pressure sales techniques, even when shopping for things I definitely want and feel some confidence in buying, and this was not one of those cases. Ms. Sales Clerk continued without a break, "I have clients in their fifties, their women won't date them because they look bad, until I was able to help them." In what world is telling a prospective client he dresses too old a good idea? This was shock and awe, aimed at making the customer pliant and susceptible. You know, like stunning cattle before slaughter. Enabling insecurity might encourage some people to send, but not me. I want some reassurance and encouragement, particularly if I'm out of my comfort zone. At last, I managed to say, "I think I had better run along now," and beat a hasty retreat to the safety of the street outside, checking my wallet on the way.
June 1st, 200908:24 pm: Second draft of "The Pretty Horsebreaker" done
The second draft of "The Pretty Horsebreaker" is on its way to Circlet Press. Mainly I strengthened the subtext. In an odd moment of synchronicity, I read this today in Susanah Breslin's Reverse Cowgirl blog, referring to the new film "The Girlfriend Experience". It goes remarkably well with what I was trying to do with Miss Ccri, the protagonist of my story. She's loosely based on the Victorian courtesan, Catherine "Skittles" Walters. Miss Ccri is famous, but also something of an enigma, distant from others, by the necessities of her profession and her social circle, and even somewhat alienated from her self.
She got called out for being cold or distant or impossible to read by various critics, but I agreed and didn't agree. One: Of course she is; that's how many sex workers are. Two: Simultaneously, of course she's not; she's only that on the surface. I don't know if it was me projecting based on my own experiences with sex workers, but I thought she did that, inadvertently or intentionally: revealed the sort of walking contradiction of sex work: that you are often totally there and very hidden. What appears to be invisible on the inside--if you look closer, is intensely complex beneath the surface. So, she worked for me.
Actually, "enigma" isn't the right word. You consider something enigmatic when it does something you don't expect, but have no theory to explain. If something doesn't apparently do anything unexpected, then it is not enigmatic. So, people can be highly visible to other people who think they know who the first person is, but the first person actually has vast areas of their life that are unknown to anyone else.
Tags: fiction, writing
May 31st, 200901:16 pm: An Angel has no Memory, Part 4/4, a Dollhouse fanfiction
Title: An Angel has no Memory, Part 4/4 Author: </a></b></a> ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) mightyfastpig Characters/Pairings: Ivy/Sophie Alvarez femslash Rating: M for sexual content Spoilers: Up to 1.12 "Omega", but occurs before 1.06 "Man on the Street" Disclaimer: Dollhouse belongs to Joss Whedon and FOX Word Count: 2335 Summary: She needed the idea of the machine that could break her open and free her from herself. ( Read more... )Current Music: Lush on SomaFM - keep Internet radio alive , fanfiction
May 28th, 200904:11 pm: Long term investment vs. paying off debts
I've accumulated enough money in my RSP that I can do a couple of things: pay off nearly all of one of my credit cards or invest in a GIC and wait for it to mature. This is the classic question: pay off debts or invest? The bank advisor considered the amount in question to be a neglible debt, but that's easy for him to say. Incidentally, I'm getting very cheesed off with my current bank. This is the second time they've made misleading statements to me about their services. First, they made me think I was getting a free life insurance policy, and neglected to mention I would also be paying for other insurance policies. Second, they made me think I would get 6% interest on a 5-year GIC, when that was only for the last year, and actually it would be more like 2.7% for the entire term. This is increasingly making me think that switching to a credit union is a good move. Frankly, I think there is way too much easy credit floating around today. I never had credit cards until I was in my 30s, and I'm glad I stopped at two. Considering I can't even use them for buying stuff online or making rental deposits, those interest payments are nothing but a chore. Now that I've actually typed this out, paying off debt seems like the better option. I know some people would say that I need to take my credit rating off life support and the best way to do that is regular sufficient payments, but I want the damned thing gone with the decisiveness of surgery, not the slow drip of chemotherapy. If someone has a reason why investment is better than debt reduction, I'd like to hear it Current Mood:  irritated May 27th, 200909:27 am: An Angel has no Memory, Part 2/4, a Dollhouse fanfiction
Title: An Angel has no Memory, Part 2/4 Author: </a></b></a> mightyfastpig Characters/Pairings: Ivy/Sophie Alvarez femslash Rating: M for sexual content, some language Spoilers: Up to 1.12 "Omega", but occurs before 1.06 "Man on the Street" Disclaimer: Dollhouse belongs to Joss Whedon and FOX Word Count: 1507 Summary: If Topher Brink was your boss, what would you do to relieve stress? ( Read more... )Tags: dollhouse, fanfiction
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