Goonswarm Federation: The Last Bastion Of True Macho Chat

[Night]

Its not so much the payment but the process involved in becoming a successful and recognized author.

It requires a vast amount of time investment, harsh amounts of criticism, and draft after draft after draft (:ctrl c, ctrl v: x 1000 times)

I have to address this because it's not true at all. I spent time trying to get published once when I was younger and more foolish, and also I've asked people who have been published (Kevin J Anderson, for example, who dear god can't write but he's such a nice guy in person it's hard to criticize him).

Getting published is about getting the same rejection form letter five thousand times until someone is dumb enough to tell you yes.

There's little in the way of criticism involved. Pretty much none, in fact, unless you seek it out yourself (and there are authors both capable and shit who do not) and draft some friends into it. Drafting? A ridiculous notion. Many people can and will write by the seat of their pants and get published, it really has no bearing on your ability to get published at all since regardless you'll only ever send them the final version. Careful editing? They hire other people to edit your crap, at least until you develop name-recognition and they stop editing you at all except to fix your spelling.

Beyond a very basic level of ability, the publishing system doesn't recognize writing skill. It's not designed to. The system is designed to protect itself, which means it's risk-averse rather than interested in promoting quality work. (Shades of EVE.) The only true statement you've made is it requires time, time wasted on those five thousand rejection form letters I mentioned.

Want to kill your will to live? Think about how someone, somewhere, is writing Twilight Fanfic as we speak.

Want to restore it? Somewhere, someone's writing Twilight fanfic of better quality than the actual published story. (Admittedly this is a low bar, but it's equally true.)

Losing your will to live generally involves wandering into a less-populated fandom and confronting twenty cases of mindless slash between characters that hate each other...and realizing that's all there is written. At least with something like Twilight you can always hit the button for the next page and hold out some hope.

[Teh Ashen]

Which one, the part with Victor Davion?

(Much as I find Stackpole readable, I must admit that he's not actually as good as Allston is and hasn't been since he wrote the Warrior Trilogy back in BattleTech. Since then he's been...almost recycling, it feels like.)

I enjoyed Stackpole. I liked how he wrote out the plot and it kept my attention. Allston bagged all the characters and basically made another series. Of course I was in junior high at the time so my knowledge of well written literature was limited, to say the least. Didn't read Stackpole's other stuff though.

Edit: someone probably already posted this, but meh.
“Harry Potter is about confronting fears, finding inner strength and doing what is right in the face of adversity. Twilight is about how important it is to have a boyfriend." Stephen King

[Rer]

Perhaps I made some false comparisons to my industry of choice Night (the media at large) where despite always hoping for that one 'lucky break', and the fact that networking is a fucking enormous piece of the pie, whether your work is actually good or not is the clincher.

I could go on into a discussion of how the internet has allowed every Joe and his mother to create and post their own forms of media and the effect this plays on the industry at large, but unless you also want to we can just go back to chatting about books.

Considering some people here have read the EU, I must ask a question, should I read the Jedi Academy Trilogy first or I, Jedi? I've never really gotten a straight answer.

[Night]

I'd honestly suggest you read I, Jedi and skip Jedi Academy Trilogy.

Like I said above, Kevin J. Anderson is a really nice guy in person and apparently a competent fantasy author, but he was very much not a man who should have been tapped to write about Star Wars.

[Some Market Dude]

lololol

"authors"

[Sami]

Its not so much the payment but the process involved in becoming a successful and recognized author.

It requires a vast amount of time investment, harsh amounts of criticism, and draft after draft after draft (:ctrl c, ctrl v: x 1000 times).

You can write a fanfic in maybe a day or two and post in on the interwebz and maybe correct a few things after some criticism.

My point isn't the money, its the time and skill investment that makes the two incredibly different.

Right, except: a number of fanfic authors have spent vast amounts of time, harsh amounts of criticism, and just as many drafts to produce good fanfic. The time and skill investment has nothing to do with whether someone is professional. See: Dan Brown and Stephanie Meyer vs a number of fanfic writers who are *actually good writers*.

Point one.

And also, except: A number of fanfic authors are *also professional writers*. Usually as a hobby, but some people have written fanfic, honed their writing skills to the point where someone is willing to publish their work (or, in the case of one Xena: Warrior Princess fanfic writer, invite them to write an episode of the series itself), and thereby become published authors as well and *continued to write fanfic*.

Many fanfic authors are shit, I don't deny it. Some are cringe-inducingly terrible, in fact. But there's a fair few who are genuinely excellent writers. One of the best novels I have ever read was a Stargate: Atlantis fanfic. Not everyone writes with :getting published: as their sole objective.

[Sezja]

I'm not a fan of EUs either. Most of the time they feel like an attempt to milk a franchise beyond the limmits of decency; as usual, there may be hidden gems within the swamp, but it doesn't seem worth it. I feel that authors capable of writing decent derivative works should be doing their own thing, not dragging other people's work.

'Good EU' in my opinion is as follows:

Thrawn Trilogy
Jedi Academy stuff
I, Jedi
First 4 X-wing books, then the stuff with Wraith Squadron
NJO

There are two good books in the Legacy series, but it mostly goes to shit. I'm not reading the newest one out of spite, but the overall plotline sounds like garbage.

Basically the rule on Star Wars books is usually the less they have to do with main characters from the movies, the better they are.

Thrawn Trilogy should replace the Prequels

(Just saying)

"But, it was so artistically done"

First part of the X-Wing series was alright, before it switched Authors. I liked the "tales" as well. Cool to read short stories that didn't drag on and on. vOv

pretty much this.

Also for whoever mentioned Dresden Files, they are awesome, quick, light reads. Sometimes you just want something pulpy, fun, and cool to read when you don't feel like being punched in the dick with supergrimdarkness like in ASOIF.

As I've been losing eve recently my 'shit to read' queue has built up which is not necessarily a bad thing but I have a lot of stuff to work through

edit:

Considering some people here have read the EU, I must ask a question, should I read the Jedi Academy Trilogy first or I, Jedi? I've never really gotten a straight answer.

the Jedi Academy trilogy was written way before I, Jedi. You can read I, Jedi without the trilogy, but the part where they intersect you won't know as much about whats going on in the background. I personally feel the trilogy suffers from what I call Han/Luke/Leia syndrome in that a large % of the viewpoints go to them and thus its shit/not as good as other stuff.

[Vinata]

When i was in third grade (and the internet was new) I read fan fiction. I stopped after realizing at one point that I was reading a fanfic involving the cast of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, Xena: Warrior Princess, and Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon. Even at that young age I realized "This is not what a human being is supposed to be doing with his life."

[Sami]

When i was in third grade (and the internet was new) I read fan fiction. I stopped after realizing at one point that I was reading a fanfic involving the cast of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, Xena: Warrior Princess, and Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon. Even at that young age I realized "This is not what a human being is supposed to be doing with his life."

Dude.

What the fuck.

Although now I want to find a link to a fic I read... well, several times, technically, because I later gave a dramatic reading of the piece at a con, on account of its status as the Worst Fanfic Ever.

I'll spare you the horrors of the original text, but let's just say it included someone killing herself by biting off a piece of her thumbnail and pulling out an eyelash, the better to undergo some Klingon ritual (SUPPOSEDLY) - because she realised that Captain Picard (whom she had met positively HOURS earlier) ~~truly belonged~~ with Dr Crusher, and therefore her ~~passionate affair~~ with Picard must end. Cue Picard sobbing in Crusher's arms and finding ~~true love~~.

On the other hand, fanfic writers have produced things like Written by the Victors and Veterans of the Psychic War, so, you know, swings and roundabouts.

[Kesper North]

Apologies but I get irritated when people compare well written books and fanfic and say "they're basically the same thing".

Well, Peter Watts got paid for The Things, and he certainly used the "fanfic" word.

Overall, I think people need to quite worrying about whether something is "fanfic" or not, and just care about whether it's any good.

[Vinata]

Dude.

What the fuck.

So it was pretty bad, I remember it being pretty bad. However, try as I might, I couldn't find any of the ones I remember reading. I did, however, find something absolutely horrifying.

An MST3K fanfic of an adult version of the same dude doing the same premise.

I'm glad I never read the story as a kid, I'd be fucked up.

Also, what the hell? MST3K fan fiction?

[Traakile]

So it was pretty bad, I remember it being pretty bad. However, try as I might, I couldn't find any of the ones I remember reading. I did, however, find something absolutely horrifying.

An MST3K fanfic of an adult version of the same dude doing the same premise.

I'm glad I never read the story as a kid, I'd be fucked up.

Also, what the hell? MST3K fan fiction?

What the fuck, why am I reading that?
And why can't I understand it at all, am I retarded or does it honestly make no sense at all?
The fuck?
?

[Vinata]

The pre-fic portion with Mike makes no sense to me either.

e: jesus fuck what the hell is wrong with people

e2: I'm just going to call it now: Fan-fic is a horrible thing for horrible people.

e3:

[Traakile]

The whole thing can be summed up with

[tgr]

What the... who... how... I don't even

[Iratus]

You see.... that's why I believe Sturgeon's law doesn't apply to fanfic. 50% of it is shit, 0.5% is decent, and and 49.5% of it is some kind of anti-matter so far below shit that it stops being understandable.

I think that comes from the fact that most of the times, fanfic writers are people who are unhealthily invested in a fictional world, so the limmits if "canonical" writing are too small and can't fulfill their fantasies... so they write how Anakin Skywalker's migthy penis is the only way to save the universe, and it must do so entering the anus of someone who suspiciously fits the author's fantastic self, but Anakin's dick is so big that it can only do so with the help of a million slime ball given by Steve, the minecraft guy.

So yeah, chances are that if you write fanfic, you are likely deranged in a bad way, so most fanfic can only be treated as psych ward-level scientific evidence.

[Jambe]

I think I must be one of the few people on this board who don't like Star Wars. George Lucas is shit, and the first three movies are not as good as the hordes proclaim. The only reason they are in any sense watchable is because Marcia and other editors around him could pick through the vomit he spewed and find things with which to construct coherent narratives. Case in point: after he got rid of all those people and started trusting his own "vision" his films went from mediocre to full-on rancid "taste the smell in the back of your throat" diarrhea steaming on a sun-parched road.

Perhaps the EU is worthwhile? But fuck, if the watery children's-story-tier films were anything to go buy I will just stay away.

Jeeze, I remember reading Agent Orange's Cowboy Bebop fiction which was itself hosted on a fansite (bigbigtruck's, I think). lol

Just looked, that stuff is still up. And not bad at all, really. Now I'm gonna have to rewatch Bebop.

[captainktainer]

I don't care how much fanfiction you claim to have read; if you haven't had to read My Immortal, you don't know the true meaning of pain.

(I have a poor opinion of fanfiction in general, due to exposure; however, I'm going to read Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality to give it a seventh chance).

[Iratus]

I think I must be one of the few people on this board who don't like Star Wars. George Lucas is shit, and the first three movies are not as good as the hordes proclaim. The only reason they are in any sense watchable is because Marcia and other editors around him could pick through the vomit he spewed and find things with which to construct coherent narratives. Case in point: after he got rid of all those people and started trusting his own "vision" his films went from mediocre to full-on rancid "taste the smell in the back of your throat" diarrhea steaming on a sun-parched road.

Perhaps the EU is worthwhile? But fuck, if the watery children's-story-tier films were anything to go buy I will just stay away.

Jeeze, I remember reading Agent Orange's Cowboy Bebop fiction which was itself hosted on a fansite (bigbigtruck's, I think). lol

Just looked, that stuff is still up. And not bad at all, really. Now I'm gonna have to rewatch Bebop.

Starwars is far from the epithome of narrative works, true, but the original trilogy was an incredible movie for it's time, and most of us either watched it when we were little, or the oldfarts among us saw them at their prime, when they where released, and that means that a big chunck of it's fandom comes from nostalgia googles. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy those movies just like any other nerd does, but I know they are not that good.

[Atticus]

and the first three movies are not as good as the hordes proclaim.

Why don't you find a sharp knife and run into it!

[Grim]

If we are talking about star wars books one of my favorites is the han solo trilogy. Just harrison ford and chewie. No whiny princess or faggoty farmboy to weigh down a good storyline.

[Rowan Sjet]

Star Trek EU is better than Star Wars EU.

[Jambe]

I enjoy those movies just like any other nerd does

I'm a nerd and don't enjoy Star Wars. Laser swords and spaceships is fun, and Vader's design is iconic... but as a friend once put it, Star Wars is a kid's story. George Lucas is a manchild and his stories and production talent reflect that fact. I don't have anything against kid's stories or YA fiction or any of that, but I'm delusional enough to hold such material in high acclaim. ffs, Sesame Street > Star Wars, as far as I'm concerned. Henson was a boss. Ditto Fraggle Rock and all that stuff.

And yeah, Gene Roddenberry > George Lucas in just about every way imaginable. Even though some of the ST stuff is laden with weird moralizing woo, at least it's interesting.

It says much about Star Wars that I find the various parodies of it (the Family Guy ones and the Robot Chicken ones) far more entertaining and worthwhile than the films themselves.

What the hell is an aluminum falcon?

[Vinata]

Star Trek EU has all the gay

[Teh Ashen]

I'm a nerd and don't enjoy Star Wars. Laser swords and spaceships is fun, and Vader's design is iconic... but as a friend once put it, Star Wars is a kid's story. George Lucas is a manchild and his stories and production talent reflect that fact. I don't have anything against kid's stories or YA fiction or any of that, but I'm delusional enough to hold such material in high acclaim. ffs, Sesame Street > Star Wars, as far as I'm concerned. Henson was a boss. Ditto Fraggle Rock and all that stuff.

And yeah, Gene Roddenberry > George Lucas in just about every way imaginable. Even though some of the ST stuff is laden with weird moralizing woo, at least it's interesting.

It says much about Star Wars that I find the various parodies of it (the Family Guy ones and the Robot Chicken ones) far more entertaining and worthwhile than the films themselves.

What the hell is an aluminum falcon?

Explain this "Star Wars is a kids story" to me. What is your reasoning?

[Kazoki Zocore]

Man, I haven't read any sci fi in over 10 years but I read both Star Trek and Star Wars. Vendetta and The Romulan Prize were two Trek books I liked. I read most of the various Star Wars trilogies too but the first Thrawn trilogy was my favorite. As others have said above, wish they would have gone that way with the new movies. Instead, we got JarJar Binks. Misa so disappointed.

[Iratus]

Ok, time for my unpopular oppinion:

I hate Star Trek. I really do. From the costumes to the storytelling to the settings... I can't stand any of it.

Why? I'm not sure why, but it irks my nerves just to see the uniform design.

[John Smith]

Ok, time for my unpopular oppinion:

I hate Star Trek. I really do. From the costumes to the storytelling to the settings... I can't stand any of it.

Why? I'm not sure why, but it irks my nerves just to see the uniform design.

It is the soccer wife of sci fi.

[Malcanis]

Science fiction on video reached its apogee with Bladerunner.

[Kesper North]

Ok, time for my unpopular oppinion:

As unpopular as your typing is inaccurate!

I was a pretty big fan of the Star Trek EU books when I was a kid - between them and Heinlein juveniles, they made up a good chunk of my pleasure reading up until age twelve or so. Naturally they varied in quality wildly, but I think the average writing quality was a bit higher than the Star Wars EU.

[Iratus]

God dammit. Not a native engrish speaker, so I get to screw up now and then.

[Vinata]

Babylon 5 ruled. Its movies and spin-offs did not.

[Fix Lag]

Anyone else remember how CCP stopped writing Eve background stories a year ago because it was ? I do.

[MtA]

EvE has a story?

[Jambe]

Explain this "Star Wars is a kids story" to me. What is your reasoning?

It's just a general observation; the overall character of the trilogy is schlocky and juvenile. It's an epic, black & white good vs evil tale with the only shade of gray being a comical boob. The super-future religious mysticism bullshit is childish and there's the lovely damsel in distress and space-chivalry tropes. It's just mediocre, and the pacing and gags and general arc of the narrative screams "kid fiction" to me.

*shrug*

Also, it's not as if I have only good things to say about Trek; it's just that it's better than SW. There's weak out-of-place moralizing in many of the tales, the uniforms are crap, most of the aliens are uncannily humanoid (but what do you expect), they fucked up all the potential the Q had for interesting tales, the Borg were shabbily executed and mostly sucky, all the movies were mostly crap, and on and on. I think DS9 had the highest snr of any of the television series but I adore Patrick Stewart. Also Brent Spiner. I liked the episode where Data made a daughter.

I never looked into the Trek EU, but on recollection I did have some of Dark Horses's SW comics years ago. I don't remember much about them, though.

[Phineas Freak]

Anyone else remember how CCP stopped writing Eve background stories a year ago because it was ? I do.

i miss discussing why none of us ever reads them.

[Vinata]

Anyone else remember how CCP stopped writing Eve background stories a year ago because it was ? I do.

They ran out of Babylon 5 material to rip-off.

If someone is actually knowledgeable about the lore, I'd love to hear about the supposed 6th race that are even more advanced than the Jovians and who the Jovians are trying to protect us from.

Gallente = Membari
Caldari = Humans
Amarr = Centauri
Minmatar = Narn
Jovian = Vorlon
Mysterious Group I Can't Recall Anything About = Shadows

[Lysander]

ITT: People talk about terrible scifi authors.

Please do yourselves a favor and burn your star wars novels, kevin J. anderson, and peter watts (little wonder this dude is writing Halo novels now), and pick up some good scifi. You wont be disappointed by Iain M. Banks (Use of Weapons, Consider Phlebas, The Algebraist), or most of Alastair Reynolds stuff (Skip Century Rain). There's good scifi out there that isn't glorified video game/movie fanfic.

[xutech]

Iain Banks and Alastair Reynolds are great, I also like Charles Stross.

[tgr]

Anyone else remember how CCP stopped writing Eve background stories a year ago because it was ? I do.

Effort, or just "stop doing that, we have vampires to sexy up"?

[The quick and the dead]

It's just a general observation; the overall character of the trilogy is schlocky and juvenile. It's an epic, black & white good vs evil tale with the only shade of gray being a comical boob. The super-future religious mysticism bullshit is childish and there's the lovely damsel in distress and space-chivalry tropes. It's just mediocre, and the pacing and gags and general arc of the narrative screams "kid fiction" to me.

This is a bullshit analysis. Do you really think something has to be muddled in moral ambiguity to be "adult". Lord of the Rings is the same way. These stories though aren't about the sides they're about the struggle. George Lucas actually did a very good job with character development (at least in the originals) and that's why so many people identified with the story. Also how is 'future religious mysticism' childish? It's basically an implant of Japanese martial arts culture and Buddhist philosophies into a sci-fi setting and giving it some corporeal manifestation in the form of the force. I would really like to see how you justify that as 'childish'.

Either way you've established that you're way to smart and highbrowed for all these lowly non-morally challenging childish sci-fi flicks. Enjoy your sesame street though.

[Kesper North]

I really found the lack of moral ambivalence to the Force annoying and off-putting. You gotta be TOTALLY GOOD ALL THE TIME, or you become TOTALLY EVIL, and that's just not a valid philosophical position to take in my opinion.

[Kesper North]

(little wonder this dude is writing Halo novels now)

Not only do you seem mad, I think you've got the wrong guy. Are you thinking of Eric S. Nylund? I was really annoyed when he started writing Halo novels, because I enjoyed the stuff he was writing before that, and he stopped doing anything else.

[captainktainer]

ITT: People talk about terrible scifi authors.

Please do yourselves a favor and burn your star wars novels, kevin J. anderson, and peter watts (little wonder this dude is writing Halo novels now), and pick up some good scifi. You wont be disappointed by Iain M. Banks (Use of Weapons, Consider Phlebas, The Algebraist), or most of Alastair Reynolds stuff (Skip Century Rain). There's good scifi out there that isn't glorified video game/movie fanfic.

See, I adore Alastair Reynolds, to the point that I created an entire GURPS setting and ran a campaign based more-or-less loosely on his books, with some help from Dr. Reynolds himself. I have also come to love Iain M. Banks after receiving Consider Phlebas as a Christmas present. That doesn't in any way dampen my enthusiasm for the Star Wars books written before R.A. Salvatore introduced "Drow in Space" and dropped a fucking moon on Chewbacca. They serve different purposes; for all that Banks and Reynolds make me think and inspire the few tattered shreds of my creativity to awaken and show themselves, I don't get the same sense of rollicking adventure and shooting lasers in space that I experienced from, say, the Wraith Squadron series. Are Banks and Reynolds better? Yes. Does that eliminate the need for things like the Black Fleet Crisis (flawed though it was), the Halo novels, or the SCE series of Star Trek novels? Not for me.

Shit, now I need to get my tablet back and load it up with ebooks. I've missed reading.

On a final note, Eric Van Lustbader is a cunt. Probably a nice guy and all, but what he does to the idea of literature is a genocidal crime. Fuck that guy.

[Kesper North]

See, I adore Alastair Reynolds, to the point that I created an entire GURPS setting and ran a campaign based more-or-less loosely on his books, with some help from Dr. Reynolds himself.

*fangasm* SERIOUSLY? You have to share!

If you weren't so goddamned busy all the time I'd say we should get a game together.

[Kesper North]

Oh and while we're all discussing fanfic: Don't forget that Alistair Reynolds is currently writing a Doctor Who novel.

[captainktainer]

*fangasm* SERIOUSLY? You have to share!

If you weren't so goddamned busy all the time I'd say we should get a game together.

Very seriously. I can dig up the notes sometime, though due to an agreement I made with him I can't redistribute anything or let it run wild on the internet. I liked the Chasm City setting and the hard-SF nature, and adapted it into something else. There were very few if any crossovers with any actual Revelation Space canon, but other interesting things happened.

[Kesper North]

Very seriously. I can dig up the notes sometime, though due to an agreement I made with him I can't redistribute anything or let it run wild on the internet. I liked the Chasm City setting and the hard-SF nature, and adapted it into something else. There were very few if any crossovers with any actual Revelation Space canon, but other interesting things happened.

You've got me wanting to reread Chasm City and The Prefect again.

[Lysander]

Not only do you seem mad, I think you've got the wrong guy. Are you thinking of Eric S. Nylund? I was really annoyed when he started writing Halo novels, because I enjoyed the stuff he was writing before that, and he stopped doing anything else.

I apologize, its Crysis not Halo. http://www.amazon.com/Crysis-Legion-Peter-Watts/dp/0345526783

Not really mad, I just don't like Peter Watts. He ends 2 books with humanity getting extincted, which isn't all bad, but kind of lame when you just spam it as a generic ending. Starfish was okay, but Blightsight was pretty weak and basically just a rip-off of some ideas Karl Schreoder used in Permanence (also not great, but full of cool concepts).

Edit: Chasm City and the Prefect, my 2 favorite from Reynolds. Chasm City is one of my all time favorites, great novel, it ties together so well at the end.

[Kesper North]

I've read both books and I didn't feel that Watts was being derivative at all. (It's not surprising that there is some cross-pollination of ideas, since Schroeder and Watts are friends). I didn't think Blindsight was weak at all; it's still one of my favorite books.

I agree that his ongoing use of human extinction is a bit wearisome, but - fuck, it is the most likely outcome, and as a scientist you gotta call 'em like you see 'em.