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Startrek.com Shutting Down
Curlsman writes to let us know that the fan site startrek.com, operated for 13 years by CBS, is being shut down and its staff laid off. Is this site worth a write-in campaign? From the (perhaps final) post: "Goodbye from the STARTREK.COM Team. Sadly, we must report that CBS Interactive organization is being restructured, and the production team that brings you the STARTREK.COM site has been eliminated. Effective immediately. We don't know the ultimate fate of this site, which has served millions of Star Trek fans for the last thirteen years. If you have comments, please send them to editor @ startrek.com — we hope someone at CBS will read them."
It would be great news if they then donated the domain to a fan based organization who could then preserve, maintain and preferably enhance the whole website and continue to move it forwards.
But I suspect it will be sold to the highest bidder, no doubt something to do with the new upcoming prequels.
Actually it says that the production team has been eliminated (which kinda sucks just during this holiday seasons), and the ultimate fate of the site is still unresolved.
...EVERYTHING I LOVE IS DYING!!! *geek brain explodes into a cloud of blood*
Kaaaaaaahn!!
damn you temporal agents...
until now.
They should have thought twice about having a 'Red Shirt Friday' in the office I guess...
Maybe they could give it to the poor actor who played Wesley, and he could write himself some dialogue that doesn't make him like a Slashdot poster child?
Could memory-alpha.org be part of the reason? I know I go there for all things Trek (huge nerd here...get over it). I can't remember ever going to ST.com for anything.
Slashdot: Where people pretend to be twice as smart as they really are by behaving like children.
Nah ... you're thinking of Charlton Heston ... Planet of the Apes ...
... he's dead, Jim ... now that's StarTrek, TOS
how about
The last editorial on the site is about the writer's strike. It would be logical to draw your own conclusions.
"Is this site worth a write-in campaign?"
Nope.
(Count the mods who break their legs in a rush to mod this as "flamebait" even though I'm answering the question asked.)
Don't Paramount have a movie coming out, by the very name "Star Trek", for Xmas next year? Seems like a dumb time to drop the site.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
I visited the link and there is no mention of the site shutting down! (is kdawson again posting misleading headlines?)
O.k., the production team have been pulled of the site - not a good sign!
There seems to be alot of advertising on the site - *if* the site is shut down - that would be nuts (assuming it is generating a profit)! There is also a new Star Trek film in the pipeline why would they shut the site down.
Unless they will use the domain to promote the new film - hopefully the content will still be available if people are interested in the film it makes sense to allow the 'old' content to be available.
"Live long and prosper?"
Ahhh.... Bob Saget!
It's dead, Jim.
I predict Paramount will re-use the domain for the upcoming prequel movie.
You are not entitled to your opinion. You are entitled to your informed opinion. -- Harlan Ellison
While reading the summay. Last fall/winter/ this spring i watched all 6 star trek series and 10 movies in chronological order by episode. Memory alpha was an indispensible resource for getting the order right, as well as reading background info and things on just about evey episode while i was watching, i cant remember ever going to the official site...
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
The website is a mess anyways, Memory Alpha is much better, its the star trek wiki, http://memory-alpha.org/
that's what you get when you deal with corporate America. .. they can suck a lemon .. .. they can also suck a lemon ..
..
the hell with the fans
the hell with employees
all they care about is their bottom line .
America : A government of the people , by the corporations
for the corporations !
I'm sure someone can rehost the stuff easily.
I don't know if I would use the phrase "poor actor" (in a sympathetic tone), as he seems to be doing fairly well for himself: http://www.wilwheaton.net/. He's got two books published and is still an active actor http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000696/. All things considered, I think he's better off than the Startrek.com people.
it could be worse, if memoryalpha was gone too.
It's unfortunate that the Star Trek site is being discontinued. Even if the site cannot be maintained any longer (despite a movie apparently being in production), the resources accumulated on the site are important, at least from a historic perspective. For a television and movie franchise to last around 40 years, and have the influence it has had on pop culture and scientific development (the standard "flip phone," for example, was created by a Motorola engineer who readily admits it was inspired by the "communicator" from the original Star Trek series), it deserves at least a Web site that archives important information about the show. I used to work for MSN (at Microsoft's Redmond-West campus, where MSN was operated out of) in the late 90s, when the site still existed in its early state startrek.msn.com. Even after moving beyond the days of "MSN Shows" this very site lived on and evolved to keep up with the series and discuss the latest episodes of DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise, as well as maintain a comprehensive history of the various series and movies. It never outlived a purpose as a site. I, personally, maintain several Web sites, including one that has sent over 240,000 letters to legislators in Illinois to encourage proper investment in public transportation infrastructure in the Chicago area. Considering that I personally spend about $200/year on the sites I am in charge of, it's shocking to me that StarTrek.com can't even be maintained as an informational resource by such a massive media conglomerate. Even if a salary needs to be paid to a developer to maintain the site, it's still peanuts. Even if there can't be the kind of investment to keep the content fresh, what exists now deserves to remain available to the public with whatever little maintenance it requires. Please, at the very least, maintain the Web site as it has existed as a resource to the fans, to the occasional watcher, and to the curious about the details of literally hundreds of installments of high-quality and socially important science fiction television and movies that have influenced generations of people to set higher standards for advancement, understanding, and peace. Star Trek, a fan of the show or not, must be acknowledged as having had a huge impact on pop culture and our technological and scientific direction. The least one can do is keep a Web site running on a server for what amounts to peanuts.
Seriously... This is something I always wondered about with blogs -- what happens when a major site like this (that I'm sure has been linked to by blogs and used as fodder for blog posts) shuts down? Can you imagine how many blogs will be inconvenienced when Youtube goes the way of the dinosaur as well? All it takes is some bean counter to kill half the internet.
.... or perhaps not.
Live Long and Prosper, "startrek.com"
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
Are you out of your Vulcan mind?
'sig' deleted due to the stupidity of it's 'nature'
Well this sucks.
Simply visit http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.startrek.com/ or is that too obvious? ;-))
Stuart http://stuarthalliday.com/
This is the most informative article about StarTrek on the internet
What will they do??? WHAT?????????
fuck karma, I like saying the truth better
...as if a million blogs suddenly cried out in terror, and were suddenly silenced. I fear something terrible has happened. OK, wrong movie, but the question in my mind is, just how will this affect the internet? I'm sure it'll survive the demise of one group of geeks. There're plenty more where they came from - get a grip!
Operation Guillotine is in effect.
Now I am not a natural sympathetic person. But that is for shit. How much do they really save versus how much bad will they reap. Sure memory alpha was pretty kick ass. I love the Starfleet Museum site. Hell I do not think I ever went to the CBS site
I'm just sayin'. Telling this story to the family is gonna suck like bringing tribbles to x-mas dinner
--Shaddup and support your local PBS station Plan for it
I feel a great disturbance in the Force. As if millions of nerds suddenly cried out in terror, and were suddenly silenced...
...It's dead Jim
Choose your allies carefully, it is highly unlikely you will be held accountable for the actions of your enemies
Memoryalpha and other fan sites will continue to exist. CBS will retain ownership of Startrek,com and use it as they see fit. Probably for new ST universe projects they have an investment in.
They really could have been more sensitive about their timing of firing the staff though, and I hope they reap all the negative karma they deserve.
I'll subscribe to Slashdot when I see a month without a dupe, a typo, or an article the "editors" didn't read.
Will the site be mirrored into an archive somewhere else?
Said someone sitting at a computer and posting on the internet.
none to soon for many of US. you can bet your .asp that they're not going away before doing A LOT more damage.
the creators will prevail. as it has always been.
corepirate nazi execrable costs outweigh benefits
(Score:-)mynuts won, the king is a fink)
by ourselves on everyday 24/7
as there are no benefits, just more&more death/debt & disruption.
we're intending for the nazis to give up/fail even further, in attempting to control the 'weather'.
http://video.google.com/videosearch?hl=en&q=video+cloud+spraying
fortunately there's an 'army' of light bringers, coming yOUR way
do not be afraid/dismayed, it is the way it was meant to be. consider all of yOUR other options.
the little ones/innocents must/will be protected.
after the big flash, ALL of yOUR imaginary 'borders' may blur a bit?
for each of the creators' innocents harmed in any way, there is a debt that must/will be repaid by you/us, as the perpetrators/minions of unprecedented evile, will not be available.
all is not lost/forgotten/forgiven.
no need to fret (unless you're associated/joined at the hype with, unprecedented evile), it's all just a part of the creators' wwwildly popular, newclear powered, planet/population rescue initiative/mandate.
or, is it (literally) ground hog (as in dead meat) day, again? many of US are obviously not interested in/aware of how we appear (which is whoreabull) from the other side of the 'lens', or even from across the oceans.
vote with (what's left in) yOUR wallet. help bring an end to unprecedented evile's manifestation through yOUR owned felonious corepirate nazi glowbull warmongering execrable.
some of US should consider ourselves very fortunate to be among those scheduled to survive after the big flash/implementation of the creators' wwwildly popular planet/population rescue initiative/mandate.
it's right in the manual, 'world without end', etc....
as we all ?know?, change is inevitable, & denying/ignoring gravity, logic, morality, etc..., is only possible, on a temporary basis.
concern about the course of events that will occur should the life0cidal execrable fail to be intervened upon is in order.
'do not be dismayed' (also from the manual). however, it's ok/recommended, to not attempt to live under/accept, fauxking nazi felon greed/fear/ego based pr ?firm? scriptdead mindphuking hypenosys.
consult with/trust in yOUR creators. providing more than enough of everything for everyone (without any distracting/spiritdead personal gain motives), whilst badtolling unprecedented evile, using an unlimited supply of newclear power, since/until forever. see you there?
This has to be the most insightful comment I've read on Slashdot. It's a pity to see the consequences of Marx's analysis of the capitalist society being carried away so naturally these days. The alienation of the workers from their work is extremely evident not only in the structure of today's society, but also in the minds of most of those partaking in the progress of society (or are they perhaps a consequence of this very society? It's hard to tell).
I really wish the best to these guys, they really seemed like they enjoyed their work. A rare treat these days.
resistance is futile
Quite frankly, Star Trek has never been particularly relevant. It may have a wide following amongst certain groups, but none of the series has ever been very good creatively, and none really stand the test of time.
The original series got a lot of press for having a diverse cast, but that diversity was diminished by the fact that the minorities in the main cast were all bit players. The main characters were still all white, and the writing was far from original or compelling. Flashing forward, the more recent series were either white male dominated homages to cliche, or relied on the crutch of time travel to the point of absurdity. It has often been said that Star Trek only had 5 or so plots along with a time travel modifier.
In the end, most incarnations of Star Trek were cliched products of their time that lacked truly compelling stories and failed to find a timeless relevance. There is little about Star trek that still resonates in this day. So the demise of a sepulchre to this irrelevance is not worth a fight.
Who the hell cares? I guess this falls into the "News for nerds" category. This is definitely not "Stuff that matters."
FOXTROT UNIFORM CHARLIE KILO
Timing seems a bit strange considering the movie is upcoming; you'd think they'd want to preserve the online fan community to hype the new picture. Especially considering that CBS and Paramount Pictures are one and the same (I think?)
Somewhere, there is a 35 yr old obese man who still lives in his mother's basement pulling out a bag of dice, because if you were there, man, he totally would've dealt 1d20 damage to you for your comment.
FOXTROT UNIFORM CHARLIE KILO
What would have been funny is if they all wore red shirts in the picture:
http://www.startrek.com/startrek/view/news/article/2316633.html
but that diversity was diminished by the fact that the minorities in the main cast were all bit players.
Yeah, like that Vulcan. I'd never let a Vulcan date my sister. Why can't he find another Vulcan to date?
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
http://www.startreknewvoyages.com/
and it includes D.C. Fontana and many of the original Startrek series crew.
The episodes are free, and some extend old story lines.
Over all, very enjoyable!
Running with Linux for over 20 years!
I shall archive you as you archived me... as you archived her...
Cached for all eternity in the midst of some massively-distributed RAID array....
Indexed forever...
Indexed forever...
I thought the gem to cheese ratio was pretty high for next generation... never saw many of the others.
Thank you CBS, for finally doing the right thing.If you think this post is a troll you are mistaking it for your mother.
. . how?
but beaten up too, and pretty badly. In fact, most of them died from their injuries... and then they were ground up into a fine pink powder...
Our wealth breeds emptiness
It appears to be part of a larger layoff/reorganization at CBS Interactive
Voyager. I'm not sure how but I'm sure it's Voyager's fault the site is closing down.
Some CBS exec happened to catch a re-run of the Voyager episode with Tuvix and said "That's it. Kill the site."
1 (short ton / firkin) = 89.1432354 slugs / keg
I feel a great disturbance in the force, as if a million geeks cried out at once.
Eh... Oops... I mean eh... Kirk shot first?
The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness.
You obviously don't get it, and that's fine. 90% of the population doesn't either. They also don't get things like working together for a better future instead of competing ourselves into oblivion. Or wonderment of the unknown possibilities of existence. Simple curiosity about their environment seems to have abandoned them as well. Star Trek is the only thing that keeps those of us who do get it optimistic, hopeful that the narrow-minded, short-sighted masses will eventually fade away and a better tomorrow will emerge.
none really stand the test of time Name another show from 40 years ago that people still talk about and watch. Derp.
never been particularly relevant failed to find a timeless relevance sepulchre to this irrelevance You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
The demise of the website is sad, but Trek will continue, despite people like you, as it always has.
Peace and long life.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - Evelyn Beatrice Hall, re Voltaire
Since the early days of the Web, the various companies behind Star Trek have failed at doing anything on the web that wasn't already done better by scores of fansites. (I keep having flashbacks to the peak of my Trekkieness, when the official Trek site was on freaking MSN of all things.) The fandom will be fine without that particular dot-com.
It's the handful of employees in that photo I really feel bad for.
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
Peace, and long life.
Kill it off now! Make it disappear for 5-10 years. THEN bring it back. The problem with the entire ST franchise is that it has been run into the ground. Kill it, let people forget about it for a few years, THEN bring it back. Hopefully by that time, Rick Berman (however you spell it) will have died off and some other writer can bring back this franchise.
...pitch all the trek fans with it. Man, then it would be a lot easier to be a nerd.
So, "Piece of the Action" didn't have a message. Like how foolish it is to base a whole society's rules and morality on one book of unknown, unproven origin. Right. Check.
So, "Balance of Terror" wasn't referring to nuke all-out warfare from the submariner's POV. Right. Check.
So, "Who Mourns for Adonais" doesn't indicate that one day, this planet will cast aside the notion of supernatural "gods." Right. Check.
That you fail to be receptive to the not-so-obvious stuff in pop culture tells me that you're only skin deep, and fail to look deeper, past the glossy, campy, Technicolor surface. Let me guess, you likely think Hendrix, the Beatles and Pink Floyd were just pop acts.
S'okkay, for every 1000 of you who aren't receptive to the undercurrent of fresh ideas buried deep in the arts, there is probably 1 to 10 who are receptive -- they are the ones who'll change the world.
Not you.
The "Civilized World" jumped the shark ca. 1973.
What is the point in keeping the site open, it isn't like they have a new Star Trek product to promote or something.
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
Should CBS decide to simply not renew the domain... the very first thing to fill it will be a domain-name squatter page jammed with ads and spyware.
Planet Zebeth - Metroid with a twist
VIACOM still owns the domain, and last I checked a little known subsidiary of theirs know as Parmount Studios is producing a new Star Trek film. So I doubt they are going to allow the domain to lapse so a fanboy effort can snag it.
They'll probably bring in a bunch of Madison Ave. suits to re-do the site and aim it at promoting the new film. If you squint you might find a link to some pages promoting the DVDs for the pre-existing series.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Grace Tejano pretty hot and worked on the Star Trek website? Why did I not know this!
http://www.startrek.com/startrek/view/news/article/2316633.html
Now it's over.
It is a good day to die.
I don't know how you managed to segue from a comment which was merely critical of our corporate culture in the US into your defense of George Bush along with a false accusation of antisemitism. You should be banned from the internet, or at least go to a special blog for Bush-loving morons.
Klingon bastard! You've killed my site.
The needs of the many DO NOT outweigh the needs of the few.
"Boldly going?"
More like "whimpered off"
My web domain.
Wikia's business is monetizing fancruft. They have the Star Wars/Trek/Gate/Craft wikis. They're the obvious buyer for this content.
Okay - what CBS did sucks, granted - but - the site at this point is still up and when you look at it from a business pov, it makes total sense. I'm sure the staff feels stabbed in the back - but go to the website and take a look at the announcement. StarTrek.com had 7 people working on a site for a franchise that has practically ZERO new content. Sure, the new movie is coming out, but that will have it's own branded site in conjunction with the distributing studio, etc...just like every other major motion picture. Look at the titles of the (former) staff: 1. "The Trek Life" cartoonist 2. Director, Production 3. Content Producer 4. Site Producer 5. Senior Content Producer 6. Production Coordinator 7. Content Producer I don't mean to dog-pile these folks in the midst of their crappy situation (and it is crappy) and I would also like to mention that I liked StarTrek.com - they did a good job. But seriously, 7 people to run that site? The only new content being added were contests and single page updates with one or two images of the HD-re-releases. So why 4 content producers, two of them senior or management level?? There has been not enough content to justify that kind of overhead. Title's like 'Producer' & 'Senior Producer' don't come cheap either. There is no way CBS will scrap StarTrek.com. All of the content that everyone is talking about is already built and posted (and useful). They can hire a couple of kids from the local ITT tech or college to take care of the marginal incremental updates StarTrek.com has been rolling out and start re-working the site for the 21st century: a cursory look at the tech on the site seems to be 1998 at best. Everything is HTML - probably all hand-written. This stuff needs to be in a database and will all be pulled dynamically on the new site. It won't take 7 people to run. Sure, in StarTrek's prime, with 3 shows running simultaneously, movies coming out...I could buy that you would need a full staff to run the thing (again, reference the hand-code HTML argument). But come on...The Trek Life - great as it is, from a management position, just isn't cutting it. ST.com suffered staff bloat. This was a business decision and honestly, probably a good one. I think in a year or so, we will have a better StarTrek.com for it. Because we DESERVE a great StarTrek.com
ReaLemon is yummy
Domain farmers on your marks...
I'm an information architect, not a doctor!
Skot Nelson music is my saviour / i was maimed by rock and roll
What's next? Shutting down ilovelucy.com?
Loose lips lose spit.
The Startrek.com website has been a bit of a joke for the last few years. With no new StarTrek shows or movies, there really hasn't been any fresh information on it. Instead they rehash old interviews and articles and shuffle stuff around. Looks more like the staff was just trying to do busy work to make it look like they were doing stuff to keep their jobs. CBS has finally caught on, they pretty much have killed the franchise... The new movie will probably be the last Trek movie anyone will see or hear of for a very long time if ever again.
enterprise, while I feel sorry for the actors, who tried, was not star trek. Voyages was BS, the last REAL Star Trek was Deep Space 9. CBS has decided they hate star trek fans. Look at that worthless piece of garbage they put out called star trek legacy. the devs and green-lighters on that project should be beamed into open space. They openly say, "we don't want to develop this for star trek fans, it's got to targeted to the lowest common denominator" = this is a completely retarded business decision that has effectively killed the franchise going on the last 10 years. Just imagine any other property being treated like this... "we're not going to make this football program for football fans..." yeah right, that'd really work. Well, this is the brain-dead attitude of the corporate retards who have done their best to ruin star trek. Frankly I'm sick of it and they can just go to hell, they're not getting one thin dime out of me, I'm rather going to do my best to help them loose the trademark and force the whole deal into the public domain. they've utterly failed and they've been leaching off this fan base for decades. it's over!
"Johnson, we'd like to thank you for all your work at startrek.com these past several years. Unfortunately, as you suspect, we're going to have to give you this..."
"Pink slip?"
"Red shirt."
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
But these are all trite, morality plays lacking any subtlety.
Morality plays show us a story with a defined message. Truer art is more ambiguous.
Take "The Godfather" as an example. Did Michael ever have a choice, is he a tragic figure, or did he choose to become who he was?
I don't know if that question could be asked. In the end "The Godfather" doesn't really make a judgment. Star Trek always seeks to interpret
meaning on behalf of the viewer. War is bad. Force euthanasia is bad. Religion is bad.
The villains in Star Trek are always clear. Who are the villains in "Romeo and Juliet"? The Montegues? The Capulets? Mercucio? Romeo and Juliet?
A story is told, but the moral is ours to discover.
This is just typical of television, it is not solely Star Trek's issue. Almost every program that has been on television fails to stand up as real art.
Star Trek is interesting in that it somehow has been held up by many as much greater than it is. No one would argue that "Family Ties" or "Cheers" was high art.
What of "MASH"? "MASH" was a program that had better talent, snd better writing, yet hasn't elicited the kind of loyalty that Star Trek has.
I am well receptive of the value of pop-culture, after all, today's pop-culture is tomorrow's high art. I merely object to mis-interpreting low art as high art.
Weird. Never even heard of it. Never would have thought of putting that addy in if I was looking for Star Trek info.
Meh.
I drank what? -- Socrates
12.17.2007
Keep the conversation going on StarTrek.com boards
CBS Interactive, which oversees StarTrek.com, is reorganizing the way it does business to align the division's workforce with its new vision that focuses on building communities online.
CBS Interactive remains absolutely committed to StarTrek.com and to growing the site along with its users by directly tapping into and utilizing the passionate fan base that has supported the site.
It has been your support and contributions to the lore of Star Trek that are what make StarTrek.com a vibrant place to be. To that end, we encourage you to keep the conversation alive and flowing using our message boards.
Jump into the conversation here!
OK, how's this: Jim Kirk isn't the knight in shining armor he's made out to be in pop culture's assessment. He's bent and broken rules. He's done things that'd likely get him courts-martialed. He isn't as shaded as some may like -- but he's not some flat 2-d "hero" like Zap Brannigan (the flattest, 2d-est character I could think of in the time I wrote this.)
;o)
But also, consider the target audience. They have trouble seeing just black and white, never you mind infinite shades of grey. Roddenberry had to aim low. Lower than he'd liked, but that's the deal when you're writing for a medium aimed at the Average Consumer.
Now, compare Trek (or let's say, MASH or even Mad Men) against what passes for TV, and I think you'll see that some shows are indeed High Art. When compared to the rest of the drek on the toob.
(FWIW, I think Mad Men's the smartest thing to hit da toob in long years. Okkay, lemme rephrase that: The smartest *live action* show to hit the toob in years. Thank the MCP for things such as Futurama and FG and Southpark and dare i say it, Animaniacs
The "Civilized World" jumped the shark ca. 1973.
It seems like the forums will remain...for me, the most interesting part of the site was the heated discussions on everything Trek related.
Makes me a tiny bit sad because the first URL I ever sneaked to from work was star trek.com. I didn't know anything else to type in. I remember keeping a URL notebook and every time I saw one, I'd write it down and go to that site...imagine trying to do something like that now....
My how my life has changed since then....
The again, maybe not...it's 5 pm EST and I'm sneaking a last peak at Slashdot before heading home.
How did CBS end up with 100% of StarTrek.com? Shouldn't Paramount have it, or if not Paramount then CW? (CW is only 50% CBS, right?)
I realize they're owned by the same conglomerate anyway, but it's hard to see why CBS would want to retain the responsibility when it could be pushed off to a more relevant company.
Name another show from 40 years ago that people still talk about and watch. Derp.
Doctor Who (Did I win something?)
Who is John Cabal?
Wow. You forgot your sarcasm tags.
That, or you've got your head deep up somewhere. I mean, come on. Maybe you should read Ellison's 'The Glass Teat' and come back to us about how 'relevant and moving' a television series can be.
Ellison wrote the script for the best Trek show in the series, btw, so should have extra credibility for a trekkie like you.
It's, uh, just a television show.
And while Shatner's SNL bit was doubtless focus group tested to make sure those 'in the cult' would view it as sarcastic, no: the rest of the world didn't see him as being sarcastic.
714 regular episodes * 45min
22 animated episodes * 25min
10 movies * ~120min
565 hours / 9 months (sept to may i believe) is roughly 2 hours a day, so i averaged about 3 episodes a day, not as bad as it sounds.
And for the record, i have a job and live with my fiancee.
As for my overall opinions of the franchise...
Enterprise, definitely watchable and definitely underrated. Never watched it when it aired, but the 3rd and 4th seasons were better than a lot of Voyager.
TOS, good, has stood the test of time pretty well, but not fantastic.
TNG, also good, but soooo overrated. I was a little young when it was on (1yo and 8yo), so i hadnt seen much of it, its all pretty good and there are some classic episodes, but its definitely overrated IMO.
DS9 was a rewatch for me, but it was as good as i remember it and is still my favorite series.
VOY, another rewatch, worse than i remember since i was still only in middle school when it was on. It got off to less of a rocky start than TNG or DS9, whos first 2 seasons were pretty bad, but voyager got worse as it went along. Overall i think i liked enterprise better than voyager.
And the movies dont require much comment, i think the accepted order of best to worst is 4, 2, 8, 6, 3, 10, 1, 9, 7, 5.
It was a fun experience, and i recommend it, its not as daunting as it seems, 2 eps a day and you can do it in a year. Part of the fun for me was watching them in chronological order, which helped break up TNG, DS9 and VOY, although i still had to watch 2 seasons of voyager straight through. Interesting to note, the finale of TNG and the premier of VOY are only separated chronologically by the first 7 episodes of the third season of DS9.
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
no life forms aboard
free brain-boosting widget: http://brain.com/
Well played clerk. Any response I could give to that would sound like the ravings of a psychotic nerd. You miss the entire point of what I said and just kick in with the same old putdowns your kind always fall back on. It's not about the show you moron. It's about the ideal behind it, Roddenberry's vision, which I think is as good or better a vision as any from more sophisticated fare.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - Evelyn Beatrice Hall, re Voltaire
Just about any Science Fiction writer who's ever been published more than a few times has presented better 'visions' than Roddenberry, or anybody else who has produced for Television. You can do better than Roddenberry. As long as you don't overly focus on Television, which isn't just 90% crap per Sturgeon's Law, but probably closer to the Ivory Soap ratio of 99 and 44/100% crap. Or maybe it's time to whip out some server reliability figures. How many 'nines' of television are complete crap? Six nines, perhaps?
Read some Ballard, or Pohl, or dozens and dozens of other writers from the period. A good approach is to go into used bookstores and buy only science fiction paperbacks with the original cover price being under two bucks. There was a lot of brilliant speculative fiction being written in the 60's and early 70's. That whole scene got wiped out by the Star Wars abomination, which, frankly, destroyed Science Fiction for a long time afterwards.
Roddenberry sucked! If you're a SF fan, you'll realize how much he sucked. Star Trek was better than anything on TeeVee those seasons, but there wasn't a heck of a lot of competition. I gave you a clue: read The Glass Teat if you haven't already.
Ellison is hardly the optimist foretelling the bright, shiny future of mankind. Don't get me wrong, I dig me some Ellison. Dystopian cynicism is a great way to spend a weekend. But as much of a cynic as I am, I need something to counterbalance that, something to make me feel that maybe things will get better. That's what Trek has always been for me. I get from Star Trek what the devout get from church; a higher standard to which to hold myself, a way to be, something to aspire to. Fucking HOPE, man. Q knows there's precious little else to be hopeful about in this godforsaken world. Shit man, it's about all that keeps me from walking down the street with an AR-15, popping every stupid, degenerate motherfucker I see, which is a fucking lot. Trek embodies what I want the world to be like, and it saddens me to know that it'll never fucking happen, but we all need our opiates.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - Evelyn Beatrice Hall, re Voltaire