widdershins

Eastern Standard Tribe

Boing Boing contributor, EFF outreach director, and San Francisco-based science fiction writer Cory Doctorow's second novel, Eastern Standard Tribe, is out, for sale as a paper book as well as available for free download in various formats under a Creative Commons license. The book's blog also contains a massive comment thread debate about file sharing, this free download marketing strategy, and the history of intellectual property law. Early on in the debate, Cory observes that, historically, new technologies have repeatedly infringed on then-understood copyright law, and that it is our concept of copyright that has always changed to accomodate the technology and its widespread use, rather than vice versa:

First of all, to call file-sharers looters is, IMO, a non-starter. There are 70 million Americans engaged in file-sharing today, violating a copyright law that hasn't kept pace with technology (which is the norm -- people had to pirate sheet music to make piano rolls, phonographs to make radio broadcasts, braodcasts to make cable TV, and cable TV to make VHS recording -- each an activity that was eventually legalized by changing copyright instead of outlawing a popular new technology). No author is going to turn those downloaders into customers by calling them thieves. By contrast, the author who figures out how to capitalize on that activity will find himself sitting pretty: some Vaudeville artists sued Marconi for inventing the infringing radio, they ended up flipping burgers; other performers embraced radio and ended up rich and famous.

I couldn't agree more.

I greatly enjoyed Cory's first novel, Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, and am looking forward to reading his new one.

Lord of the Rings

In honor of Return of the King, which opened this week, I'm recommending two fun LotR parodies: Once More, With Hobbits, a musical (lyrics only so far) to the tunes of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer musical episode Once More, With Feeling; also, the very naughty, hilarious Secret Diaries. [via MetaFilter]

And speaking of RotK, which clocks in at a zaftig 3.5 hours, it was no Matrix Revolutions-style third episode disappointment. It's great fun, and the battle of the Pelennor Fields is particularly moving. Even so, I liked the first two movies more. I suspect the eventual "extended edition" DVD with a few key scenes reinserted will play much better (especially the Saruman bits). I was, however, mildly disappointed that my favorite moment in the trilogy ("I am the Mouth of Sauron") was left out of the film version, although I suspect that was a victim of the screenplay adaptation, not the cutting room, so I am not holding my breath on its DVD restoration....

Baen Free Library

The Baen Free Library contains free electronic versions of books from science fiction publisher Baen Books. Read the introduction by Eric Flint for an interesting discussion of copyright, "piracy", and free online materials. Of course, the free books made available by Baen only fuel additional sales of the hardcopy books.

Heinlein quiz

Thanks to Grumpy Times, I noticed the quiz to tell you which Heinlein book you should have been in.

You belong in The Cat Who Walks Through Walls. You
are creative and cunning. Your works often
feel empty to you, though others love them.
You suspect that the universe and everyone in
it are just characters in someone else's story.

Which Heinlein Book Should You Have Been A Character In?
brought to you by Quizilla

Lovecraft online

I was surprised and pleased to find out most of the works of H.P. Lovecraft are available for free online reading, thanks to this post on Kuro5hin.

2003 Hugo Awards

The 2003 Hugo Awards were presented tonight at Torcon 3, this year's World Science Fiction Convention. Spider Robinson was an amusing and punny toastmaster for the festivities. The award recipients were:

• Best Novel: Hominids, Robert J. Sawyer


• Best Novella: Coraline, Neil Gaiman


• Best Novellette: Slow Life, Michael Swanwick


• Best Short Story: Falling Onto Mars, Geoffrey A. Landis


• Best Related Book: Better to Have Loved: The Life of Judith Merrill, Judith Merrill and Emily Pohl-Weary


• Best Professional Artist: Bob Eggleton


• Best Short Form Dramatic Presentation: "Conversations With Dead People", Buffy the Vampire Slayer


• Best Long Form Dramatic Presentation: The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers


• Best Professional Editor: Gardner Dozois


• Best Semiprozine: Locus


• Best Fanzine: Mimosa


• Best Fan Writer: Dave Langford


• Best Fan Artist: Sue Mason


• John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer: Wen Spencer

Congratulations to all!

Discworld novels

Cory Doctorow points out at boing boing this cool chart showing the interrelationships between Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels. This is a nice adjunct to the more traditional approach of reading the Discworld novels in order of publication.

SpecFic Recos

When I'm looking for information on the web, I'm often very pleased indeed when I find honest-to-god opinions, articulated clearly and directly. I can disagree with them, mull them over, compare them against my own and others', and overall the general discourse moves forward. Great Science Fiction and Fantasy is chock-full of bold opinions about specfic essentials, classics, great authors, and favorites. Great introductory material to some seminal works.

2003 Hugo Award Nominations

See the list of nominees for 2003 Hugos to be awarded at Torcon labor day weekend.

Voting is open until end of July for Torcon 3 members. The online list includes links to web versions of almost all the short fiction.

V. and I are working through the remaining best novel nominees we haven't read yet. It's been fun to have a reading project to do together. We are looking forward to comparing notes before we send in our votes.