HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: rita@eff.org (Rita Marie Rouvalis)
Subject: Re: Electronic publication
Originator: rita@eff.org
Organization: Electronic Frontier Foundation
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 13:59:50 GMT

In article <1992Aug31.101259.9684@usenet.ins.cwru.edu> bf455@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Bonita Kale) writes:
>
>
>I've got the info (temporarily mislaid--I'll find it after I wake up, no
>doubt) on ClariNet (sp?), a plan to publish reprint short stories and
>reimburse authors depending on how many subscribers ($5.00 a month) to the
>service download their stories. 
>
>Anyone got an opinion on whether this would put your story in the public
>domain? 

	Why would it do that?  Brad is simply acting as a publisher.
If he has bought one-time publishing rights to the stories, then the
rights immediately revert back to the writers.  If he has bought
exclusive rights to the stories (which I doubt), then he could choose
whether or not to put the stories into the public domain.

	Brad Templeton actually has very strong feelings about
copyright on the Net.  Why don't you ask him?





-- 
Rita Marie Rouvalis              rita@eff.org 
Electronic Frontier Foundation   | 
155 Second Street                | "Stop me before I post again."
Cambridge, MA 02141 617-864-0665 | 
Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: micah@milton.u.washington.edu (Micah Anderson)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Story submissions?
Summary: How to submit stories?
Keywords: Shortstories, magazines
Date: 27 Aug 92 09:11:32 GMT
Organization: University of Washington

Does anyone have any suggestions as to the process of submittal to
magazines? 

Thanks!
From: chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Sequels (was Re: Work in progress)
Date: 23 Aug 92 00:50:43 GMT
Organization: I is a writur

johnh@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu (John J Humpal) writes:
>>I would have thought that
>>editors would be far more excited to see a new idea explored, rather than
>>returning to the same old theme.

>	Would you really have thought that of editors?  I would assume
>that editors, and especially publishers, would be far more excited to see
>a previously successful idea repeated, rather than a new idea explored.

You have to be careful here. "What editors want to do" and "What editors
really do" are not always the same thing. Editlrs love nifty new ideas and
original material. 

So to readers, to some degree -- but (and it's a big but) the average reader
prefers to go and revisit an author they've read before and revist a land
they've already read about. That may not be what they say in surveys
(although the ones I've seen back it up. Something like 85% say the primary
reason they buy a book is because they've read the author before) but that's
what they say with the pocketbook. Given two books that are roughly
equivalent as far as author name, publicity push and whatever, and if one's
a sequel, it'll sell better. So editors tend to encourage related works
because that's what the readers tend to want.

-- 
Chuq "IMHO" Von Rospach, ESD Support & Training (DAL/AUX) =+= Member, SFWA
  chuq@apple.com | GEnie: MAC.BIGOT | ALink:CHUQ =+= Editor, OtherRealms
	A real SF writur with stories in ALTERNATE KENNEDYS and THE 
	  FURTHER ADVENTURES OF BATMAN, in better bookstores now!

          Painted emblems of a race, all accurst in days of yore,
       Each from his accustomed place steps into the world once more.
From: Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Language Lists (was Re: Work in Progress: Proposal
Date: 26 Aug 92 03:11:56 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

Now I know how Dr. Frankenstein felt...but this kind of discussion is just what
SF is all about.

Bear in mind that most of the world-creating a writer does will never really
figure in the finished text. It may give the world more solidity in the
writer's imagination, but if it doesn't move the story forward, out it goes.

In Chekhov's The Sea Gull, the hero (a writer) reads a rival's work and chokes
with envy on the rival's ability to evoke a scene with two or three tiny
details. That should be enough in SF or any other genre as well. Of course, in
SF or fantasy you can sometimes shovel all your notes into a set of appendices,
like Orwell or Tolkien. If you're really lucky, though, your editor won't let
you.
From: Alan_Barclay@mindlink.bc.ca (Alan Barclay)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Screenplays
Date: 29 Aug 92 07:42:47 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

John Allen writes:

"The majour problem I have seen with screenwriters is their lack of respect for
the form. Granted in film the writer is the bottom of the heap but that still
doesnot mean that there is some easy formula to it. Time and time again I have
seen three act structure screenplays filled with plot points and inciting
incidents but no moment to reality. It seems we are breeding a generation of
Happy Days writers.

<Interesting note on Shakespeare deleted>

"Recently the best example of great screenwriting is The Unforgiven. It is a
script devoid of sentimentality and cliche. It is interested in the moment to
truth as opposed to the manipulation of audience and the writer does not allow
himself the luxury to preach as I'm doing here.

"Manhattan and Chinatown are two other scripts which it pays well to study."

***

I'm not a screen writer, but I pay a lot of attention to film and really enjoy
an unusual script like Voyager or Naked Lunch.  I find it's the unusal scripts
that make me think about plot in my own writing.

My understanding is that film-making is dominated by companies
who are interested in least outlay for largest profit.  This makes them
unwilling to mess with formulas they know make money.  Likewise, a screenwriter
has to eat, so they will try to write stories the companies will buy.  Am
I right?

I believe this system educates the viewing public in what to expect from a
movie, i.e. a formula story.  Many more unusual stories suffer as a result.

As for "the moment of truth," I appreciate a film that asks hard questions,
but I also enjoy a well told action film (and Old Will's best stuff is both).
Of action films of the past few years, I think The Princess Bride, and
Die Hard (the first) are among the best written.

I believe that an author fixated on meaningfull dramatic problems can
get just as tedious as one who loves poetry too much.  What is called
"modern literature" often suffers from both these diseases.  The stories
which have survived to be called great are those whose drama, philosophy,
and humor are integral to a rousing good plot.  (Hamlet, Othello, Midsummer
Night's Dream, etc... )

Is there any hint that the popularity of Video rentals might encourage
more experimental film making?


Alan
From: Alan_Barclay@mindlink.bc.ca (Alan Barclay)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Balance of Technology and Story
Date: 29 Aug 92 07:50:55 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

D Y Yoshikami writes:

"I am interested in what the SF-er's think about balancing the
technology versus having a believable story that could be (in terms of
situation) similar if not the same as a story here on Earth.  In one
sense, I find it rather irritating, because if so, only the decoration
would distinguish SF from any other genre; on the other hand, if SF
does not appeal to anything that I am familiar with, it may lose my
interest."


My definition of Speculative Fiction ( a group which includes Science
Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror ) is "Fiction where one or more of the key
problems only exists because of a speculative element."

The various genres are defined by the nature of the speculative element.
Hard Science Fiction speculates on plausable extrapolations of the physical
universe.  Soft Science Fiction speculates on plausable extrapolations of
the social universe.  Fantasy speculates on implausable extrapolations of
both.

All of SF is a vehicle for exploring human response to challenge.  Science
fiction often tries to explore social/technological trends and suggest
approaches to change.  Fantasy concentrates on the symbolic representation
of conflict a la Joseph Campbell, and may also make social commentary.


What do I think about the balance of technology verses story in science
fiction?  I think there should only be enough technology mentioned
in the story to support the plot, the sense of reality, and the reader's
enjoyment.  If the reader gets bored, there's too much technology.  But
there isn't enough technology if the reader can say "you never told me
your ships had artificial gravity!" and be really pissed because
having artificial gravity made a difference in the story.

Different readers have different tastes, so a writer has to target an
audience.  Afficionados of Drake Drek love piles of futuristic war machines.
Lovers of Bradbury might tolerate a rocketship, or a mechanical house.

A good author to look at if you want to write hard SF is Larry Niven.
His Know Space stories (now being printed in new collections) are classics.
Most of them only deal with one piece of technology at a time.
_Neutron Star_ is an excellent example.




Alan


"Politics is the art of never quite coming to the point."
From: perez@mgr.hjf.org (Charles Perez)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: FUNSIES: Antonymous Collectives
Date: 2 Sep 92 17:39:40 GMT
Organization: HJF AIDS Research Project, Washington DC

In article <57680025@hpscit.sc.hp.com> fish@hpscit.sc.hp.com (John Fisher) writes:
>
>A block of writers???
>
>Ack!  I can't believe I did this!

That's not contradictory! Writers get writer's block all the time.

How about "a dyslexicalis of writers"? Or maybe "an illiterati of
writers"?


-- 
==========================================================================
That which is necessary is never evil. If an evil seems necessary, look
to your context; that's where its root lies.  - Charles Perez
==========================================================================
From: spare@gandalf.rutgers.edu (Joshua Spare)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: World Creation
Date: 2 Sep 92 13:53:51 GMT
Organization: Rutgers University

I started writing my novel a little while ago and it became almost impossible
to work without a map. I just loaded up a computer draw program and started
making lines anf orests, etc.  The world exploded out of my head and lent me to have 
some interesting ideas about what could happen in the different areas, based upon
 the name I gave them.

I find that once I make up the names for the different places in the world, an almost unstopable wave of ideas knocks me over.

My style is to make the rules of magic and other "natural" laws make sense.  If one character does this once then he better be able to do it again when it is needed, unless I told the reader the character couldn't do it in these circumstances.

For Example:

		I have a character who uses woodland magic and is very powerful in the
		woods but when she gets farther away from the forests here power wains.


-- 
Go, write it in a martial hand, be curst and brief.  It is no matter how
witty, so it be eloquent and full of invention.  Taunt him with the license
of ink.						Twelfth Night (III.ii.42-45)
From: Alan_Barclay@mindlink.bc.ca (Alan Barclay)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: First one to correct the typo wins
Date: 29 Aug 92 08:07:10 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

Selling to Amazing Regularly!  That's great.  I know shorts are supposed to be
the way up, but I've always wanted to write books and I'm sort of single-minded
on a project so I haven't produced a SS in six months.  I will look for you in
the library's Amazing collection.

Statistics from Pulphouse show that Amazing has an average response time THREE
times as long as the eight other major SF mags.  162 days!  Asimov's is 53.

Buy!

Alan
From: Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Work in Progress:Magic
Date: 4 Sep 92 04:36:44 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

Chuq asks for details about my source on Aztec magic etc.--the book is titled
Aztec Medicine, Health, and Nutrition, by Bernard R. Ortiz de Montellano. New
Brunswick NJ: Rutgers Univ. Press, 1990. ISBN 0-8135-1563-7 (paperback). Now I
need to get my hands on some kind of Nahuatl dictionary...any suggestions? I
don't think Berlitz has a pocket guide.
From: Crawford_Kilian@mindlink.bc.ca (Crawford Kilian)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Work in Progress:Magic
Date: 3 Sep 92 02:04:59 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

Tony Bible asks whether magic as a major plot element is unique to Del Rey...I
suspect not, though different publishers may indeed have different attitudes to
magic, sex, setting, and whether the hero has a perm. How did I know this about
Del Rey? When my editor there first suggested I consider a fantasy, he went out
of his way to mention it--suggesting that they'd seen too many novels in which
the magic was just decorative or otherwise inessential.

Meanwhile, I hit paydirt today with a book on Aztec food and medicine; it deals
with magic in great detail, including the tripartite soul that was an important
part of Aztec religion. I won't use it all, but it will give me a very
distinctive kind of magic for the bad guys. And this leads to a suggestion: if
you're writing fantasy, don't confine yourself to old geezers in pointed hats.
Go exploring in anthropology and see if some other culture has a magic you can
use. (Some day I'm gonna write a novel about Tibetan gods who follow their
people into exile and rouse the American gods...that would be fun!)
From: jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov (JOSEPH T CHEW)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Science vs. story in SF (Was: World Creation)
Date: 29 Aug 92 20:35:12 GMT
Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory - Berkeley, CA, USA
Reply-To: jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.254.198
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4   

In article <1992Aug29.105401.28284@usenet.ins.cwru.edu>, 
bf455@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Bonita Kale) writes...

>I've been re-reading my C.S.  Lewis, and came upon two statements I'm not
>going to look up again to get the right credit for:
>In one place, he says that a writer who merely transfers a Western or some
>other type of story to outer space is wasting the genre.

Something about "Ferdinand Feghoot, Space Marshal" comes to mind...
not that it stopped a feature-length movie, "Outland," from being
basically patterned after a hodgepodge of oat operas, most notably
"High Noon."  

>But in another, he mentions how he read James Fenimore Cooper as a boy, and
>how he enjoyed the books not just for the plot (Someone's in danger!) but
>for the "feel" of the kind of danger, the kind of place and people he was
>reading about. 

See also Mark Twain, "Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offences."  The debate
about research and verisimilitude is hardly new to science fiction.  :)

In another posting, Alan Barclay recommends Larry Niven's Known Space
Stories as examples of good "hard" SF.  You might start with a specific
story, "The Soft Weapon" in _N-Space_, as an outstanding example of 
his point about how to use technology -- writing a story such that the
central conflict exists only because of a speculative element.  In
this case, it's a modal weapon which our heroes have to use, but which
they may or may not figure out safely and in time... 

--Joe
"The pallid pimp of the dead-line/The enervate of the pen" -- Robert Service
Newsgroups: misc.writing
From: duck@pembvax1.pembroke.edu
Subject: Re: FUNSIES: Antonymous Collectives
Organization: Pembroke State University
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1992 12:17:09 GMT

In article <Btyy74.GMH@unx.sas.com>, saslpo@stevens.unx.sas.com (Len Olszewski) writes:
> In article <1992Sep2.173940.8103@nocusuhs.nnmc.navy.mil>, perez@mgr.hjf.org (Charles Perez) writes:
> |> In article <57680025@hpscit.sc.hp.com> fish@hpscit.sc.hp.com (John Fisher) writes:
> |> >
> |> >A block of writers???
> |> That's not contradictory! Writers get writer's block all the time.
> |>
> |> How about "a dyslexicalis of writers"? Or maybe "an illiterati of
> |> writers"?
> A volume of novelists
> A collection of short story writers
> An issue of journalists
> A file of "manual laborers" (technical writers - two puns here for one 
>                              low price!)

Sorry but couldn't help to add mine:
  Proofing proved proofs. (re: math publications).

-- 

- Craig Taylor   || Standard Disclaimer Applies (of course!)
duck@pembvax1.pembroke.edu (Pembroke State University)

I realize that the MX missile is none of our concern.  I realize that
the whole point of living in a democracy is that we pay professional
congresspersons to concern themselves with things like the MX missile
so we can be free to concern ourselves with getting hold of the
plumber.
  
But from time to time, I feel I must address major public issues such
as this, because in a free and open society, where the very future of
the world hinges on decisions made by our elected leaders, you never
win large cash journalism awards if you stick to the topics I usually
write about, such as nose-picking.
		-- Dave Barry, "At Last, the Ultimate Deterrent Against
		   Political Fallout"
Xref: sparky misc.writing:2671 rec.arts.sf.written:11473
From: chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: misc.writing,rec.arts.sf.written
Subject: Pulphouse magazines and SF Age info
Date: 26 Aug 92 02:30:49 GMT
Organization: I is a writur

Pulphouse magazine has just closed to submissions until September 1993
because their inventory is bulging. Effective tomorrow, all submissions
get returned unopened for a year or so because they have 18 months of
inventory hanging. The good side of this is that when they re-open
submissions, they'll be paying on contract instead of on delivery of
galleys.  This doesn't affect their other magazines. REPORT, TOMORROW
SF (Ajay's new magazine) and MYSTERY STREET (which is about to be
announced, but doesn't officially exist yet) are all reading.

I read the galleys of the first issue of Tomorrow SF last week when I was up
visiting Pulphouse, and it's an interesting magazine. If you're interested
in Analog-type fiction, TSF is something you ought to take a look at.

Also, Scott Edelman has told folks that the first issue of SF Age is at the
printers, and that it got about 23,000 paid subscriptions prior to mailing
the first issue, so the direct mailings were evidently quite effective, and
it looks like it's in pretty good shape to be a success. Folks I've talked
to who've seen the fiction are pretty impressed.
-- 
Chuq "IMHO" Von Rospach, ESD Support & Training (DAL/AUX) =+= Member, SFWA
  chuq@apple.com | GEnie: MAC.BIGOT | ALink:CHUQ =+= Editor, OtherRealms
	A real SF writur with stories in ALTERNATE KENNEDYS and THE 
	  FURTHER ADVENTURES OF BATMAN, in better bookstores now!

          Painted emblems of a race, all accurst in days of yore,
       Each from his accustomed place steps into the world once more.
From: chuq@gallant.apple.com (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Re: Self-Promotion
Date: 27 Aug 92 17:19:22 GMT
Organization: I is a writur

Alan_Barclay@mindlink.bc.ca (Alan Barclay) writes:

>Robert J. Sawyer from Toronto gave an excellent talk on self promo at
>ConText'91.  He went so far as to produce 200 mock up copies of his first book
>to send out to reviewers.

Rob's promotion was very effective. At least part of the effectiveness was
because he was very professional and knew whic targets to aim for, but
another reason it worked as well as it did is because what he did was so
unusual. If everyone did it, it'd lose effectiveness. But it's a good
example of investing for the future.

It happens that I was one of the few reviewers who was less than glowing for
FLEECE because of technical issues I didn't think he resolved cleanly, but
he was able to generate a lot of interest in the title, got enough folks
inside SFWA reading it that it made the Neb ballot and gave it and himself
an unusally high profile for a first novelist. This all encouraged his
publisher to do some pushing (and not inconsequentially got him a nice
multi-book contract and a fair amount of push for his second book, which is
doing even better).

It helps that he's a pretty good writer. FAR-SEER is getting lots of raves
from people I trust (it's still in my in-box, so I don't know for sure). But
beyond that, he's business smart and pretty personable, which help him
leverage the writing out into the market.

>Most review columns don't bother with first time
>books because they never get copies until the book is released.  By the time
>the review is published, the book is gone from the shelves.

I specifically went out of my way looking for first novels (still do for
OtherRealms, but that doesn't have the visibility of Amazing) just to try to
encourage them, but the timeliness aspect of reviews is a serious hassle
that has to be kept in mind.

>It might be a worthwhile investment for a starting author.

If done properly. I know of at least one other writer with the same
publishing house who did many of the same things with his book, but either
didn't do them as effectively or just didn't click and didn't really get
much out of it. So there are no guarantees.

-- 
Chuq "IMHO" Von Rospach, ESD Support & Training (DAL/AUX) =+= Member, SFWA
  chuq@apple.com | GEnie: MAC.BIGOT | ALink:CHUQ =+= Editor, OtherRealms
	A real SF writur with stories in ALTERNATE KENNEDYS and THE 
	  FURTHER ADVENTURES OF BATMAN, in better bookstores now!