Quote:Well, I'll grant you that you've accomplished that much.
Anyway, before I get into the whole finding a job thing, I thought I'd pop in and say a few cranky, no-fun words.
Quote:"Total war" as a concept postdates Napoleon by almost 75 years. The first serious example of what we'd call total warfare was the American Civil War, and even then the concept didn't catch on for another fifty years until the meat grinder we call the First World War. Also, the last instance of total war - serious, actual everything-goes-to-the-war-effort total war - was the Second World War. There've been some interesting situations since then, but nothing that could be rightly called total war.
Not knowing how or why the whole Boskone thing started, nor how it ended, it's a bit difficult to attribute motives and what-not to the sides. At any rate, ever since Napoleon or thereabouts, Total War has been the name of the game. Granted, we haven't had a full-scale nuclear exchange on Earth yet, but that doesn't mean that it wouldn't happen.
Quote:Because as we all know, human beings are scum.
The only reason why this hasn't happend is editorial fiat. Which really isn't that good of a reason.
That is the thesis, right? That we're basically awful to everything and thus can't have nice things without destroying the world. It certainly seems to be the point you're driving at here.
Yes, it's editorial fiat. No, I'm not going to change it without a serious, honest to god majority of the writers wanting a change.
Quote:*sigh*
Well, no, not really. It's a great anime/light novel series. She's a great character. However, what really takes you out of this shared universe thing is the idea of a single god-like character out there laughing it up while handing out handwavium goodies.
For the record, I'm really sorry that I ever thought of bringing Haruhi Suzumiya into Fenspace. It was a spur of the moment thought back in the original plotbunny thread, I thought it was cute and decided to roll with it... and now it's become this huge monster that's devouring everything in its path.
Ah well, we're stuck with it for the moment. Moving on.
Quote:I don't know. Tell me the truth; do you feel like Singularity Sky and Iron Sunrise, or Accelerando and Glasshouse are undermined because godlike beings are the root causes of those stories? If not, why not?
It also goes against the, for lack of a better term, feel of the shared universe. What is the point of being semi-hard science fiction if it's the product of a god-like being? Doesn't that undermine everything?
Quote:Don't hold back, mate. Tell us how you really feel.
Look at how this world was set up, regurgitating the ideas and dreams of dead men like ideological necrophiliac cannibals.
Quote:I would think creating a functional society on a shifting foundation of pop culture would make for some entertaining new, even if it's low-gadgetry. But that's just me.
Where's the new, the outbreaks of future, in having your fictional avatar live in a world that people born in the ass-end of the last century would have found comfortable and explicable?
Okay, here's my end point. If you want hardcore, well-designed near term hard or semihard science fiction, go read Stross, or Doctrow, or MacLeod or Banks or Brin or Bear or Benford or Robert Charles Wilson or Warren Ellis. All those people are paid to write science fiction, and they do it very well. We - and by "we" I mean the Fenspace writers - are here to have a little fun in the sandbox, kick around some ideas and hopefully get a couple of good stories out of our efforts. We are not here to pretend to be revolutionary, we're taking an idea ("If the only people who want to colonize space are science fiction fans, what happens when they go and do it?") and running with it until we trip, fall & stab ourselves.
If that doesn't appeal, then you ought to stop reading Fenspace, because you're not going to enjoy our output.---
Mr. Fnord
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
http://www.jihad.net/
Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery
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