It was the hippie thing to do, if you didn't want to be identified as a hippie. Instead of overthrowing society, you pushed boundaries. As you say, at the time everyone was doing it. And looking back, most of the result was different, all right (like green shit is "different") but otherwise lacking merit.
Actually, it reminded me a lot of James Joyce. Whether that was bleeding-edge genius or word-salad circle-jerking, I leave as an exercise for the reader.
People want to buy shit. Company wants to sell it to them. Company hires author/artist/etc to create it. Work for hire, paid once, over and done with. That how it is with most business ventures.
Only reason it isn't that way with media is because the media companies want to ensure that they always make money even if their hirelings don't. By a system of royalties rather than one-time hires, they ensure that creators take on all the risk of poor sales, while the company absorbs none of the risks or losses.
This pretty much ensures that the companies get rich while a lot of the actual creators get fucked.
Wouldn't happen if it was all work for hire, same as any other job, and the company's subsequent profits (or losses) were not your concern. Of course, some creators are their own worst enemies here, by wanting a piece of the pie forever, and usually you don't get paid up front AND from later profits. So they had to choose one -- and we know how well THAT worked out.
Um... normally when you write something set in an "owned" universe (as ST is owned by Paramount) you give up all rights to it anyway. (This is why Paramount technically owns *all* ST fanfic, regardless of what copyrights the ST fanfic-author may claim. There was a court case settling that some decades ago.)
What makes Harlan special??
Other than having about the worst case of short-man's complex I've seen, I mean...
Or rather, thanks to those tools, we learned how to cope, rather than to avoid dealing with life. We learned to tell stupid from sensible, and how to avoid pitfalls. Now all the pits are roped off and there is no selection against stupid.
As to another 3 generations... urban California is already a goner (remember, this is the state where people are so easily led by emotions, and have become so poor at thinking through consequences, that last fall they voted to effectively ban eggs). I expect it's not much better in a lot of other "civilized" areas.
It amounts to the same thing. Nannyism restricts rather than educating, thereby actively prevents learning responsiblity and sense. Same problem, we just expressed it from different angles.
By amazing coincidence, the first two generations that had Real Life filtered for them, during the rise of the nanny government and its associated fear of the bogeyman being promulgated at home.
Before that, we pretty much had to view life as it came, not as we wanted it to be.
Focus groups are, in my observation, made up of unemployed people who are willing to waste an afternoon or two for 50 bucks. Draw your own conclusions.
I hadn't thought of that... but you're right, "Syfy" sounds like a porn channel. My fiction/media interest is almost exclusively SF/F, and has been for over 30 years; even so I would never have guessed "SyFy" to be anything related to SciFi of any sort.
[thinking] I see the problem. The network execs are suffering from late-state syphillis, and wanted to warn us what it can do to our brains.
Speaking as a middle-aged SF freak, which is frankly where most of that market IS... when I see SciFi, at least I know what I'm getting. When I see SyFy, I wonder WTF is that??
If the goal is to pull in more mainstream audiences, you use a mainstream term everyone already knows, like, uh, SciFi. I'm sure everyone else in the target market will respond to "SyFy" exactly as I would, had I seen it without the/. heads-up -- no interest at all, simply because it's a meaningless glyph.
I've been following the issue for a while... seems like initially they bring in money, then as conditions change they begin to be a financial liability. There is tons of info on the problem, and how camera enforcement negatively impacts our right to due process, at http://www.thenewspaper.com/
Also, cities cheating yellow light timing shorter to ensure more violators is a big issue (and illegal in most states, but some places do it anyway) -- and radically increases injury accidents. (So let's not hear any bullshit about how it's for "public safety". It's a revenue grab, and nothing else.)
Conversely, increasing yellow light duration by as little as ONE SECOND pretty much does away with both accidents and red-light violations. At which point there's no money to be made with a redlight camera, but people are better off.
The other thing that bothers me about these redlight cameras is that the providers are foreign -- and they collect about half the revenue. That's money being leeched out of the country at no benefit to our citizens, yet fines must double to maintain the same level of revenue as before. How is this not extortion?!
Techware belongs to Lee Green. It runs on Wildcat, currently version 6 -- lots of internet-features, yet it can look and act the same as a dialup BBS (and it still does dialup, if you wish). Wildcat was always my favourite BBS software, especially for the pleasant QWKmail handling. WC's default look is okay, but most sysops customize it to something similar to Techware, with straightforward menus. Wildcat is VERY fast even on old hardware, and exceedingly secure (I don't know of ANY confirmed cases of a "break-in" on a Wildcat system, and I've been BBSing since 1993).
ILink messaging network is open to any BBS that can handle the packets correctly, and you'll get plenty of help setting that up if you need it. Sign onto Techware and send a message to Barry Martin in DOS-Tips, Chitchat, Hardware, or wherever else you see him for more info.
If there were no more BBSs, I'd have to set one up myself:) but so long as Techware is around, I'll enjoy that instead:)
Heh... when last I visited a museum, I was amazed by the lifelike realism of paintings of all sorts from ca. 1600. Some are not readily distinguishable from a photograph. In fact, some are visually akin to the "3-D photography" used as film backdrops, with just a strong an illusion of being 3D.
Yes, but that's exactly the sort of person who is NOT affected by any ridiculous laws in the first place, so why do they care?? they live in a world where they are rulers and we are subjects.
"As soon as it became profitable to lock people up that was the end of it. Then the profit makers looked for reasons to lock people up. Sure some people do NEED to be locked up, but most don't."
Exactly my point. My understanding is that one of the biggest lobbying forces toward "tough on crime" legislation is the privatized prison system....
Sounds like he just signed up to serve in the Army!
Which used to be a common punishment for chronic miscreants -- join the army or go to jail. Guess which one is more likely to teach at least SOME self-discipline and life skills??
Slashdot Mirror
It was the hippie thing to do, if you didn't want to be identified as a hippie. Instead of overthrowing society, you pushed boundaries. As you say, at the time everyone was doing it. And looking back, most of the result was different, all right (like green shit is "different") but otherwise lacking merit.
Actually, it reminded me a lot of James Joyce. Whether that was bleeding-edge genius or word-salad circle-jerking, I leave as an exercise for the reader.
Are you thinking of "Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenix" ?? That was written by Larry Niven, not Harlan Ellison.
Larry Niven could have lived off the family inheritance for 300 years...
So you've never heard of work-for-hire??
People want to buy shit. Company wants to sell it to them. Company hires author/artist/etc to create it. Work for hire, paid once, over and done with. That how it is with most business ventures.
Only reason it isn't that way with media is because the media companies want to ensure that they always make money even if their hirelings don't. By a system of royalties rather than one-time hires, they ensure that creators take on all the risk of poor sales, while the company absorbs none of the risks or losses.
This pretty much ensures that the companies get rich while a lot of the actual creators get fucked.
Wouldn't happen if it was all work for hire, same as any other job, and the company's subsequent profits (or losses) were not your concern. Of course, some creators are their own worst enemies here, by wanting a piece of the pie forever, and usually you don't get paid up front AND from later profits. So they had to choose one -- and we know how well THAT worked out.
Um... normally when you write something set in an "owned" universe (as ST is owned by Paramount) you give up all rights to it anyway. (This is why Paramount technically owns *all* ST fanfic, regardless of what copyrights the ST fanfic-author may claim. There was a court case settling that some decades ago.)
What makes Harlan special??
Other than having about the worst case of short-man's complex I've seen, I mean...
Or rather, thanks to those tools, we learned how to cope, rather than to avoid dealing with life. We learned to tell stupid from sensible, and how to avoid pitfalls. Now all the pits are roped off and there is no selection against stupid.
As to another 3 generations... urban California is already a goner (remember, this is the state where people are so easily led by emotions, and have become so poor at thinking through consequences, that last fall they voted to effectively ban eggs). I expect it's not much better in a lot of other "civilized" areas.
Welcome, and see ya 'round the QWK echoes :)
It amounts to the same thing. Nannyism restricts rather than educating, thereby actively prevents learning responsiblity and sense. Same problem, we just expressed it from different angles.
By amazing coincidence, the first two generations that had Real Life filtered for them, during the rise of the nanny government and its associated fear of the bogeyman being promulgated at home.
Before that, we pretty much had to view life as it came, not as we wanted it to be.
(And yes, I'm old enough to remember that.)
Thanks to our Polish speakers, we know that in English we should refer to it as "The Zits Channel" ...
Certainly would improve performance, eh??
And a little set dressing, say, random bones from the nearest morgue, would be helpful too...
Focus groups are, in my observation, made up of unemployed people who are willing to waste an afternoon or two for 50 bucks. Draw your own conclusions.
Maybe it's the only pet they can afford....
I hadn't thought of that... but you're right, "Syfy" sounds like a porn channel. My fiction/media interest is almost exclusively SF/F, and has been for over 30 years; even so I would never have guessed "SyFy" to be anything related to SciFi of any sort.
[thinking] I see the problem. The network execs are suffering from late-state syphillis, and wanted to warn us what it can do to our brains.
Speaking as a middle-aged SF freak, which is frankly where most of that market IS... when I see SciFi, at least I know what I'm getting. When I see SyFy, I wonder WTF is that??
If the goal is to pull in more mainstream audiences, you use a mainstream term everyone already knows, like, uh, SciFi. I'm sure everyone else in the target market will respond to "SyFy" exactly as I would, had I seen it without the /. heads-up -- no interest at all, simply because it's a meaningless glyph.
I've been following the issue for a while... seems like initially they bring in money, then as conditions change they begin to be a financial liability. There is tons of info on the problem, and how camera enforcement negatively impacts our right to due process, at http://www.thenewspaper.com/
Also, cities cheating yellow light timing shorter to ensure more violators is a big issue (and illegal in most states, but some places do it anyway) -- and radically increases injury accidents. (So let's not hear any bullshit about how it's for "public safety". It's a revenue grab, and nothing else.)
Conversely, increasing yellow light duration by as little as ONE SECOND pretty much does away with both accidents and red-light violations. At which point there's no money to be made with a redlight camera, but people are better off.
The other thing that bothers me about these redlight cameras is that the providers are foreign -- and they collect about half the revenue. That's money being leeched out of the country at no benefit to our citizens, yet fines must double to maintain the same level of revenue as before. How is this not extortion?!
Techware belongs to Lee Green. It runs on Wildcat, currently version 6 -- lots of internet-features, yet it can look and act the same as a dialup BBS (and it still does dialup, if you wish). Wildcat was always my favourite BBS software, especially for the pleasant QWKmail handling. WC's default look is okay, but most sysops customize it to something similar to Techware, with straightforward menus. Wildcat is VERY fast even on old hardware, and exceedingly secure (I don't know of ANY confirmed cases of a "break-in" on a Wildcat system, and I've been BBSing since 1993).
ILink messaging network is open to any BBS that can handle the packets correctly, and you'll get plenty of help setting that up if you need it. Sign onto Techware and send a message to Barry Martin in DOS-Tips, Chitchat, Hardware, or wherever else you see him for more info.
If there were no more BBSs, I'd have to set one up myself :) but so long as Techware is around, I'll enjoy that instead :)
Makes you wonder what else Senior Coder had hidden in the project, don't it??
Heh... when last I visited a museum, I was amazed by the lifelike realism of paintings of all sorts from ca. 1600. Some are not readily distinguishable from a photograph. In fact, some are visually akin to the "3-D photography" used as film backdrops, with just a strong an illusion of being 3D.
Yes, but that's exactly the sort of person who is NOT affected by any ridiculous laws in the first place, so why do they care?? they live in a world where they are rulers and we are subjects.
An AC replied,
"As soon as it became profitable to lock people up that was the end of it. Then the profit makers looked for reasons to lock people up. Sure some people do NEED to be locked up, but most don't."
Exactly my point. My understanding is that one of the biggest lobbying forces toward "tough on crime" legislation is the privatized prison system....
Sounds like he just signed up to serve in the Army!
Which used to be a common punishment for chronic miscreants -- join the army or go to jail. Guess which one is more likely to teach at least SOME self-discipline and life skills??
Isn't "blurring out the actual buildings" exactly what the theoretical goal of these terrorists IS??
Hmm. Makes you think about this Assemblyman fellah...
Because thanks to California taxes, I can no longer afford to move back to Montana. :/