Can you really not discern the moral, legal and ethical differences lending someone a book to read and manufacturing a verbatim copy of that book for that person (the correct analogy for what goes on in "file sharing").
Are you saying that Grisham is just as insightful as Isaac Asimov?
No. The OP suggests that geeks hang on SF authors in a way that other people don't dote upon popular authors.
The respondent says : "Great SF authors are more insightful hack popular authors."
Well, thats a good answer w.r.t. the specific example of Grisham (as he is a hack).
But: there are very many great popular authors and i) they are at least as insightful as Asimov et al ii) while they are treated as great creative artists, they are not (often) treated as Gurus in the same way that SF authors are.
So, insight is not the answer. (if it were, the insightful popular authors would be treated as gurus too).
Similarly, you'd have to say that Philip K. Dick isn't a scifi writer, as he only introduces technological innovations either as scenery or to explore philosophical concepts via imagined technology.
Dick's an interesting one. Some of his novels are clearly sci-fi : "Do Androids Dream..." (are robots capable of feeling, what does it mean to be human in a world of sentient machines, how do mood-altering machines and TV-based religious cults affect us). "Valis" / "Radio Free Albemuth" are religious allegories with God disguised as an alien. Dr Bloodmoney is straight SF (albeit with a hilarious space-war-on-LSD sequence). "The Man In The High Castle" is basically straight alternate history. "The Zap Gun" and "Vulcan's Hammer" are straight pulp SF.
Then there are the various drug based ones -- "Flow My Tears The Policeman Said" and "The Three Stigmata Of Palmer Eldritch" for example -- are SF social criticism (even if the latter is somewhat incomprehensible).
As to Star Wars -- the spaceships *are* what the story is about. The damn thing ends with a big battle between spaceships to blow up another spaceship. There's little characterisation to write home about, but watching the spaceships fight is fun.
common centers of complacent white collar republicrats who fear for the safety of their cozy existence... African and Asian gated communities did not foretell THAT in 1992.
Yes they did. That's *precisely* why white South Africans, middle class Egyptians and the Asian residues of Empire retreated into their private domains.
Science fiction, and fantasy, postulate a world that functions differently than ours, be it by a little, or a lot, and explore how that world works.
Thats a massively over-broad definition. Enormous amounts of fiction can be so described. By that definition, "Animal Farm" is SF/F because pigs can't really speak English. Maybe Dante's "Divine Comedy" is SF/F because angels and demons and ghosts exist in it.
How about this definition: Science fiction is a form of fiction which deals principally with the impact of actual or imagined science (and/or technology) upon society or individuals.
Not that impressive. There were gated communities Africa in Asia in the 1970s, and middle class gated communities were already opening across the southern states by 1990.
it is set in a (then) future world which has been drastically altered from the one in which the author lived.
Yes, its set in a future world, but not one that is all that far removed from the paranoia in the information department of the BBC, during WWII. Orwell himself said this was the primary influence.
Sure, its hyperbole, but Orwell had personal experience of both Soviet Russia and Franco's Spain, so the ideas and working of totalitarian states was well known to him.
1984 is about the future to the same extent that Animal Farm is about agriculture or Moby Dick is about whaling.
Bullshit. Theres no science at all in 1984, and thats pretty much the only book he wrote that could even conceivably be thought of as SF. Road to Wigan Pier, Homage To Catalonia: SF? surely you jest.
Coupland has no insights whatsoever.
Well, you pays your money, you takes your choice. Personally, I find Stephenson dull -- too obsessed with the minutiae of technology to include such things as good characterisation and a plot that resolves satisfyingly. (I know its a cliche, but boy, do the endings to Cryptonomicon and the Diamond Age such, or what?) Beautifully observed from a geek perspective, and full of facts, but badly written. Coupland can dwell on minutiae too, but I prefer social minutiae to tech ones. And like it or not, Coupland was sufficiently socially insightful for one of his novel titles to attach itself to an entire demographic.
or at least since John Lennon returned his MBE with the message
Your Majesty, I am returning this MBE in protest against Britain's involvement in this Nigeria-Biafra thing, against our support of America in Vietnam and against "Cold Turkey" slipping down the charts. With love, John Lennon of Bag.
So do I, and believe me, I get a lot more spam to the unmunged address you see at the top of this post. Which is handy, 'cos it all just goes in the bit bucket. My usenet@ address, I do occaisionally get genuine emails on.
Making a new Star Wars film is a lot like making love to a beautiful woman. You've got to start positively, with a chase, and some mild fisticuffs, a little diplomacy...... then as your climax nears, you can just let little drips of information come out, about what is going to come...
LSongs has precisely 2 letters in common iTunes. Have Apple now trademarked 'n' and 's', or is this supposed to infringe their existing patent on 'bAd pUnctuation' and 'rAndom cApitalisation'?
Not to mention the fact that this thing has only a four second memory. Thats like having your privacy intruded upon by the guy from Memento's somewhat non-retentive goldfish.
I'll bite back : cut and paste from my server logs comcast-spam 4445 4441 y
Meaning I've received 4445 unique spams from *.client.comcast.net (4 in the last hour) from the time when I gave up trying to get any sense from abuse@comcast.net (about 3 months ago)
Re:Thousands per year
on
Paid To Spam
·
· Score: 5, Funny
Imagine all the toys that could be bought with it.
Forget that, Imagine how much I'll be able to extend my penis...
Slashdot Mirror
Thank you AC... I stand corrected. (And by an AC, too. Oh, the shame.) :)
Re : Right To Read
Can you really not discern the moral, legal and ethical differences lending someone a book to read and manufacturing a verbatim copy of that book for that person (the correct analogy for what goes on in "file sharing").
Which is not, as far as I can ascertain, what has happened here.
As you point out, the answer to the questionis : non-SF writers *do* get treated like gurus.
The respondent says : "Great SF authors are more insightful hack popular authors."
Well, thats a good answer w.r.t. the specific example of Grisham (as he is a hack).
But: there are very many great popular authors and
i) they are at least as insightful as Asimov et al
ii) while they are treated as great creative artists, they are not (often) treated as Gurus in the same way that SF authors are.
So, insight is not the answer. (if it were, the insightful popular authors would be treated as gurus too).
Then there are the various drug based ones -- "Flow My Tears The Policeman Said" and "The Three Stigmata Of Palmer Eldritch" for example -- are SF social criticism (even if the latter is somewhat incomprehensible).
As to Star Wars -- the spaceships *are* what the story is about. The damn thing ends with a big battle between spaceships to blow up another spaceship. There's little characterisation to write home about, but watching the spaceships fight is fun.
How about this definition:
Science fiction is a form of fiction which deals principally with the impact of actual or imagined science (and/or technology) upon society or individuals.
Sure, its hyperbole, but Orwell had personal experience of both Soviet Russia and Franco's Spain, so the ideas and working of totalitarian states was well known to him.
1984 is about the future to the same extent that Animal Farm is about agriculture or Moby Dick is about whaling.
You've missed my point. You based your argument about the veneration of SF guts on the fact that good SF is more insightful than bad popular fiction.
I merely pointed out that good popular fiction is more insightful than bad SF, which undermines the rest of your argument.
[0] Twain, Dickens, Coupland, Orwell, whoever.
Yes, you're right.
But, I guess, they'd be honour bound to supply any infantry man who got the Linux kit with the source code, if they asked.
Maybe their kernel patches have a "don't ask, don't tell" policy.
(Seriously, I imagine they one of the standard hardened kernels, and attach lots of their own non-GPL apps / kernel modules to that)
So do I, and believe me, I get a lot more spam to the unmunged address you see at the top of this post. Which is handy, 'cos it all just goes in the bit bucket. My usenet@ address, I do occaisionally get genuine emails on.
Penguins can't fly, you insensitive clod.
Making a new Star Wars film is a lot like making love to a beautiful woman. You've got to start positively, with a chase, and some mild fisticuffs, a little diplomacy... ... then as your climax nears, you can just let little drips of information come out, about what is going to come...
LSongs has precisely 2 letters in common iTunes. Have Apple now trademarked 'n' and 's', or is this supposed to infringe their existing patent on 'bAd pUnctuation' and 'rAndom cApitalisation'?
Not to mention the fact that this thing has only a four second memory. Thats like having your privacy intruded upon by the guy from Memento's somewhat non-retentive goldfish.
I'll bite back : cut and paste from my server logs
comcast-spam 4445 4441 y
Meaning I've received 4445 unique spams from *.client.comcast.net (4 in the last hour) from the time when I gave up trying to get any sense from abuse@comcast.net (about 3 months ago)
Actually, I was being sarcastic.