This is a great bit by Ira Glass on Art, and how you have to keep working at it if you’re going to be any good… even when you know that what you’re doing isn’t as good as you wish.
Posts Tagged ‘arts’
A Thought for Monday Morning: Keep Going
Posted in Writing, tagged arts, awesome, books, creativity, finishing, inspiration, Motivation, rejection, Thoughts, video, work, Writers, writing on March 18, 2013| 1 Comment »
Way to go Scalzi & Co
Posted in Writing, tagged arts, books, creativity, e book, genre fiction, john scalzi, literature, sff, work, Writers, writing on March 12, 2013| Leave a Comment »
This is still in progress but John Scalzi reports new updates have been made to the previously mentioned contracts through Random House’s Hydra and Alibi imprints:
… and Scalzi’s immediate followup:
Immediate Thoughts on the Random House eBook Imprint Contract Changes.
More on Bad Contracts… and One Very Good One
Posted in Writing, tagged arts, books, copyright, creativity, e book, genre fiction, john scalzi, literature, rights, sff, work, Writers, writing on March 7, 2013| Leave a Comment »
John Scalzi’s righteous assault on bad deals for authors continues, with a look at a contract from Alibi, a sibling imprint of the previously discussed Hydra. The downsides look very similar and the upsides are few and very far between:
So, don’t ask me how, but I have in my hands (from what I consider a reputable source) a contract from Alibi, which is the sibling imprint of Hydra, the Random House imprint that I thumped on roundly in the previous entry.
And if you need more evidence that signing over all rights for the term of the copyright is a terrible idea, check out this DBW piece on Wool author Hugh Howey’s latest contract. He cut a deal with Simon & Schuster for print rights only to the tune of a seven-figure advance. Yes, apparently Howey’s self-published e-books were bringing in $150k a month already, but no matter who you are, why sign your work over to anyone else for nothing? Heck, you’d be better off printing your book out and using it for party invitations. Or tinder. Or any other use you can think of that is controlled by you and not someone else.
Just saying.
“Random House’s Hydra Imprint Has Appallingly Bad Contract Terms”
Posted in Writing, tagged arts, books, creativity, e book, genre fiction, john scalzi, literature, sff, work, Writers, writing on March 6, 2013| 2 Comments »
A great discussion is going on right now over on Whatever, John Scalzi’s site, around publishing contracts. Specifically, Random House’s new science fiction imprint Hydra is (so far as has been determined) acting as a vanity press. No advance, signing over copyright forever, and the author pays for expenses. In sum, Hydra somehow manage to make the music industry’s often exploitative contract terms look more reasonable in comparison.
Read John’s excellent salvo here:
Note to SF/F Writers: Random House’s Hydra Imprint Has Appallingly Bad Contract Terms
Random House recently started Hydra, an electronic-only imprint for science fiction stories and short novels. But, as noted by Writer Beware here, the terms in a Hydra deal sheet shown to them are pretty damn awful…
I’d say this is a must-read for all new or un-agented (i.e. unprotected by someone with industry experience or a lick of financial sense) writers. John’s right, there’s no justification for terms as bad as these.
Space Milkshake
Posted in Likes, Reviews, tagged arts, awesome, comedy, entertainment, fun, funny, goofy, movies, Reviews, science fiction, SF, sff on March 2, 2013| 1 Comment »
Space Milkshake: A Movie Review, or, An Appreciation of Sci-Fi Comedy
Current trends in genre movies lean toward zombies, war, and the Apocalypse, but I’d like to take a moment to appreciate the benefits of humor in science fiction. Sure, our future planet may be filled with trash, our scientists mad, and our educational standards in decline, but at least we should be able to laugh about it. What is humor, if not a way to cope with (and thereby begin to address) our problems? I spend Saturday nights watching B movies of the science fiction and fantasy persuasion for just that reason. With that in mind, I settled in to watch Space Milkshake.
Starring Robin Dunne (Sanctuary), Billy Boyd (The Lord of the Rings), Kristin Kreuk (Smallville, Beauty and the Beast), Amanda Tapping (Stargate, Sanctuary), and George Takei (Star Trek) as the voice of Gary the duck, the film allows each of these actors to emphasize their comedic strengths.
The story is a classic crucible, sci-fi style. The setting is a future Earth where space debris is a serious problem, addressed by permanently-crewed orbital stations tasked with space lane maintenance. Geosynchronous trash trucks, if you will. While living on one such station, our cast of hapless sanitation workers find their lives disrupted by a rubber duck from space. Needless to say, there’s more to the little yellow duck than meets the eye.
George Takei does a wonderful turn as Gary; he is now my gold standard for voicing mutant rubber duckies. The rest of the acting team delivers as well. Kreuk’s job is one of the hardest, given that she doesn’t speak for a significant portion of the film. And while it’s a stretch to imagine bathtubs would be feasible on such a future space station, it does allow for a tension-filled scene with Amanda Tapping in a bubble bath with the aforementioned duck. What could be better?
This was my best B-movie Saturday night in a long time. Space Milkshake is a low-budget film with sets and special effects to match, but the movie is well put-together and the actors all appear to be having a terrific time. This is quality B-movie material, and I mean that in the best of ways. Think My Name is Bruce. The movie is also sprinkled with shout-outs to classic science fiction and fantasy like Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings, and is prime material for homegrown drinking games, should your proclivities lean in that direction.
Space Milkshake is pure comic entertainment. And no, I don’t understand the title,* but that didn’t detract from my enjoyment. If you have a soft spot for science fiction that embraces goofy fun, and enjoy well-scripted, conscientiously-acted movies, you should see this film.
Bottom line: if you like science fiction, have a goofy sense of humor, and are ready to be entertained, break out the popcorn and enjoy a deliciously funny Space Milkshake.
Director: Armen Evrensel
Writer: Armen Evrensel
Stars: Kristin Kreuk, Amanda Tapping, Billy Boyd, George Takei, Robin Dunne
Sci-Fi / Comedy
2012
* Note from the future: Funny how colloquial phrases may not immediately resonate. If the title had been “Space Mashup” it would have made sense to me from the outset.
Today in Spectacular Bookseller Practices: A Random Used-Book Vending Machine
Posted in Other, tagged art vending-machines, arts, awesome, creativity, yay on November 16, 2012| 1 Comment »
Now this is cool.
You may not know, gentle reader, that yours truly spent some time in Tucson, but they had nothing as out and out awesome as this back then. Ok, the Sonoran Desert is pretty spectacular, but we’re talking human crafted for the nonce.
This machine reminds me of a fair in Somerville, Massachusetts. It was the sort of festival where people in bright colors and face paint close down streets and act happily silly, with art! art! art! everywhere. Most of that art was framed or in plastic sleeves or in display cases. It was a beautiful day, full of cotton candy and bright sun and interesting people. But what I remember most was the truly clever Art-O-Matic* at the Somerville Red Line exit. For a dollar this repurposed soda machine would pop out a random cardboard tube containing art. In my case I got a three-inch tall roll of archival paper with an abstract hand-drawn sketch of feathers. Beautiful. I stood in the subway station with people streaming by and wondered how anyone could pass up an opportunity as effervescent as this.
That’s how art should be, I think. Not up on a distant pedestal, isolated behind velvet ropes. (Ok, obvious exceptions for the Mona Lisa, etc. because people can be jerks. But still.) Easy as buying a Coke.
* Oh look, it’s a thing! Different form factor and a slightly less appealing association (cigarettes and all) but same idea.
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