Slashpine

So the UK has a new prime minister, David Cameron, after his Conservatives agreed on a coalition with the Liberal Democrats. The LibDem's young leader, Nick Clegg, is seen in a virtual "love-in" with Cameron, and has a new role in national leadership himself.

This didn't entirely make sense to me but fortunately fandom friends like yonmei are taking the time to explain.

It still feels a lot like seeing, say, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton working together on the Haiti crisis: aside from feeling good that an important matter is being addressed, there's a bit of nausea and wonderment that two such rivals, whose political philosophies would seem largely to be in opposition, can suddenly get along so well. It's a sinking feeling, as I see that mutual love of power and fame and comfortable backgrounds amongst the elite seem to be a stronger bond than any commitment to the marginalized ordinary folks like me.

ANYWAY. THE IMPORTANT QUESTION IS WHAT THIS NEW COALITION IS CALLED.

Yonmei mentioned ConDem. Which might be all the protection they offer to society and the less well-off. I was thinking that the fandom tradition of smush names is good too.

If the Cameron/Clegg government become Clameron, it rhymes with "yammer on". 'Nuff said.

Or should it be called Camelegg? That sounds like something with a hobble in its gait, and it could be that as well.

I'M WAITING FOR THE FANFIC...

I live in the warm dry West but oh, my heart went out to all my friends who lost their homegrown tomatoes in the East last year! Here's a news brief and some tips you might not know.

Tomato Growers Told to Take Steps Against Blight
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: May 12, 2010

CLAVERACK, N.Y. (AP) -- Plant pathologists are already recommending farmers and gardeners take steps to avoid another outbreak of late blight. The disease destroyed millions of dollars worth of tomatoes in the eastern U.S. last summer. ( Read more... )

Hmmm, money for writing things online that are eagerly read? I think I know some people with this talent!

*hem hem* This involves writing about environmental issues. You know, that major cause of injustice and generations of war that most of fandom ignores. Also, there's a Warnings challenge: the writing must all be "G" rated. ;-) But - money for mad writing skillz! On a blog! How cool is that?!?!?!

JOB ANNOUNCEMENT:

Water Words That Work, LLC is recruiting a group of bloggers to write about four topics for residents of the Washington, DC metro area. If you can answer "yes" to the following questions, then this opportunity may be for you:

Do you know (or want to learn) how to keep the snappy articles coming? Can you build a loyal audience of regular readers, and engage them on your blog, on Facebook, and via Twitter? And -- would you enjoy writing about one of the following topics -- with a pollution prevention/water conservation twist:

Public works -- water, gas, electrical, and transportation infrastructure:

http://metro-dc-utilities-blog.com

Dogs:

http://northern-virginia-dog-blog.com

Lawn and Garden Care:

http://metro-dc-lawn-garden-blog.com

Raising children (from a woman’s perspective):

http://metro-dc-mom-blog.com

Our bloggers will be independent contractors. You will set your own hours, work from the location of your choice, and use your own equipment. You will earn a fixed payment based on a minimum monthly volume, plus additional payments for traffic, subscriptions, and other performance benchmarks. Payment can exceed $1,000 per month.

Each of these blogs will be sponsored by county and city governments who are working together to engage their residents in a new and exciting ways. The project is a pilot -- each blogger will be contracted to write for 6 months. After that, the sponsors will evaluate the effort and determine whether to continue.

We seek self-starters who can:

• Find topics and produce articles that engage readers in these topics

• Get noticed -- and linked to -- by other bloggers in the space

• Extend the blog conversation into Facebook and Twitter

• Periodically repeat pollution prevention/water conservation messages that the sponsors want to get out

• Ensure the blog content and commentary reflect well on the sponsoring governments

We will look favorably on candidates who live in the DC metro area and who can demonstrate their passion for the topic in question -- but we will give priority to candidates with a demonstrated track record building thriving blogs.

How to apply

Send a resume, cover letter, and samples of relevant work experience to:

contract-blogger-opportunities@waterwordsthatwork.com

***

Eric Eckl

Water Words That Work, LLC

(703) 635.4380

http://waterwordsthatwork.com

"Make a Splash With Your Communications"

The New York Times headlines, 7:59 p.m. EST, 6 May 2010:

Polls Close in Tight Election in Britain

By ROBERT MACKEY 47 minutes ago

The election could end in stalemate with none of the leading contenders securing the seats needed for an absolute majority.



Anything but the Tories is a win for human rights.

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/06/live-blogging-election-night-in-britain/

*crosses fingers*

Fandom is political. Fandom is international. And politics are international: what happens in each country very much tends to follow the "trends." For all these reasons I urge you to read a UK fan's comments below on their upcoming elections. It happens here too. It happens everywhere.

Consider what privatizing society - taking away public goods so that only wealthy and powerful groups have access - has to do with "net neutrality." How secure is our fannish freedom to say and write and be who we want online? Only as secure as our voices are heard; our votes and opinions must be counted. Do you want Tory-style governments handing over big chunks of the internet to rich commercial customers only? (Think LJ. 6A. Youtube take-downs.) It's not just public parks and women's shelters such governments close down and destroy.

The scene: Britain. The crisis: freedom. Read on:

Of course, we have to hope.
[A signal-boost from Yonmei, c/p by permission; feel free to comment at her journal]

So I hope. That despite everything, we won't end up back in Tory Britain again.

Obviously, there's the pond of homophobia and transphobia lurking under the happy smiling of-course-we-like-LGBT-people face. But that we know: I don't think many LGBT people are likely to be fooled by the Tories.

Johann Hari points out that we can already see what Cameron's vision of "Big Society" looks like in real life: a Conservative council was elected in Hammersmith and Fulham, a model for Conservative government, says George Osborne, who wants to be Chancellor on Friday: they immediately sold off 12 homeless shelters, handing them to large property developers.

The horrified charity Crisis was offered premises by the BBC to house the abandoned in a shelter over the Christmas period at least. The council refused permission. They said the homeless were a "law and order issue", and a shelter would attract undesirables to the area. With this in mind, they changed the rules so that the homeless had to "prove" to a sceptical bureaucracy that they had nowhere else to go – and if they failed, they were turned away. ..... A young woman – let's called her Jane Phillips, because she wants to remain anonymous – turned up at the council's emergency housing office one night, sobbing and shaking. She was eight months pregnant. She explained she was being beaten up by her boyfriend and had finally fled because she was frightened for her unborn child. The council said they would "investigate" her situation to find "proof of homelessness" – but she told them she had nowhere to go while they carried it out. By law, they were required to provide her with emergency shelter. They refused. They suggested she try to find a flat on the private market.

Eight months pregnant, beaten, and terrified, she ended up sleeping in a park for four nights. That's what David Cameron regards as a model of good governance, and I know that I'm preaching to the converted: but that's what the Tories mean when they talk about "Big Society" and people "taking responsibility". They mean that people with a disability so severe they need 24/7 care should start paying the bills - £12.50 per hour. (You do the math. I'll cry.) [US $18.90/hour] And any disabled person assessed as having only 'lower moderate' needs would be totally cut off. Leave people who could have some quality of life with help, rotting abandoned in their homes, if that saves the rich some money.

When I was visiting London in the 1980s, at the height of Tory Britain, I just got used to the plain fact that you'd pass a teenager huddled under a blanket anywhere that was a good begging spot: kids almost my age, who had left home and found that Thatcher's pro-family policies meant they'd get no help at all from any of the agencies supposed to provide for those in need. Over 16, they were legally allowed to leave home: under 18, they weren't entitled to claim benefits of any description. There were so many of them, and I had so little money myself, I used to make formal awkward rules that I would give what I could spare to the first one I passed on any given day, and try not to feel too awful about the next one, and the next, and the next.

It's not just the children who are homeless: There's kids who have homes, but need youth clubs and parks:

Castle Youth Club. It was built in Dickens' time and bequeathed to the local council "to benefit the children of this area for perpetuity". The Conservatives shut it down two years ago to sell it off. The deal fell through, so now it sits empty while the local kids hang around on the streets outside.

Hurlingham Park was a big vibrant patch of green where kids from the local estates could play, and run on one of the few professional running tracks in the country, in a setting so classically beautiful it was used in the film Chariots of Fire. But then the Conservatives were elected. They handed the park over to a large international polo consortium that has ripped out the running track and shut the park down for a month every year – so rich people can watch polo for hundreds of pounds a day. ..... Nick Anderton, a 17-year-old from the local estate. He stares at it sadly and says: "The park is meant to be for everyone, isn't it? But we have to stop our football now so they can get it ready so these people can play polo, and we won't be able to use it for most of the summer ... My friend used to run on the track every day, he wants to be an athlete, but they got rid of it so he can't now ... It feels like we don't have the right to be here any more.

To benefit the children of this area for perpetuity.

Or until a Tory government comes along.


Send this to someone you know in Britain. Remember it for the next election, wherever you are! This signal-boost is of a post by Yonmei, c/p with her permission; feel free to comment at her journal.

ETA to fix html error mistakenly ascribing a ¶ of Yonmei's words to Hari. *facepalm*

Crossposted from http://pine.dreamwidth.org/6567.html. Comment here if settings allow, or there using your DW or OpenID. Please do not FW link. Play nice in comments. Don't run w/ scissors. Hug fandom hard!

gacked from ravenna_c_tan

You can tell which part of the country I am from! TBH, most of my visits to states east of the Mississippi have been conventional travel: that is, driving through or flying through or visiting for several days. Whether there as a tourist, working, going to a conference or convention, or visiting relatives, a day or two is such minimal exposure to a place, it barely counts.

Most of my travel from the Plains west, however, has been lengthy stays. Like, living there and working there, on the ground. Extremely on the ground: during 15 years as an archaeologist, I walked around locating and recording all the prehistoric sites in many wild areas and across thousands of acres. Learning the geology, history, plants and climate of an area and walking back and forth across every acre, hanging out in the bars and going to the laundromats and post office and grocery store, getting to know the people, the present and the past, is about as in-depth as it gets. Even so, there are big chunks of states like Alaska and Texas that I don't know.


visited 39 states (78%)
Create your own visited map of The United States

I really hope someday I have some reasons to spend time in New England. The southeast, too, though there the social issues really turn me off. But I'd love to see the SE for the land and the history. Also, to see a lot more slash pines. :D The southeast is their heartland.

My abroad travel is sadly rather minimal, with the exception of Mexico and Central America. Too bad, as I'd love to see more of the world. But alas, I've also done my share of causing climate change. *grimaces at planeflights to latin america and europe* So it's as well I'm not recklessly, fecklessly, contributing more. But, living abroad for a chunk of months? I could justify that! *dreams happily*

Saw the following this morning - probably pays for crap but it's an awesome cooperative-style company. Certainly right for one of the many underemployed, administratively skilled people of fandom:

Operations Assistant: The Operations Assistant is a seasonal, part-time position with the Trade Team to perform administrative duties such as order taking and bookkeeping assistance. The Operations Assistant reports into the Trade Team Operations Manager and is responsible for daily order taking from customers as well as other administrative duties defined by the Operations Manager. This is a part-time position of 20 hours per week that is seasonal (May through September/October). Some weekend hours will be necessary. RT is an Equal Opportunity Employer committed to creating a multi-cultural organization. Please visit http://www.redtomato.org/jobs.php for more information.


Laura Edwards-Orr
Marketing and Communications Manager
Red Tomato
1033 Turnpike St.
Canton, MA 02021
www.redtomato.org

So in reading my dwircle I gather that LJ pulled a quick-trick with the code in a way that rather substantially benefited them financially but was pulled quickly after fans got uber-miffed.

Someone linked to LJ user's Kyle_Cassidy's journal for more info on this. The name sounded so familiar I clicked over there to read. Oh! KC is our LJ user rep. I'm still groping for specific memories around that datum point - my LJ files have been have deleted and the rest are slowly trickling out of sight - so I read farther down the comments and see that yes, many are happy that KC is doing a great job (which he kindly thanks them for but demurs, saying he'll be convinced when they get a User Backup function going).

To someone who says UR THE BEST USER REP EVAH he replied:

i think i'm only the second one and, from all i've heard, the first one vanished immediately after being elected.

Oh rly? Hmmm. Izzat so? How'd that go down? I actually recall voting in the first LJ user rep election - or wait, make that both of them - but without remembering either time who that user rep ended up being. Although I also recall being pleased that the best-qualified candidate IMO, the one I voted for, ended up being elected each time. However, these are but tiny floating islands of knowledge in a sea of HUH WHAT HAPPENED?

Enlighten me O clued-in flist. What, in the varied and vocal opinions of fandom, has been the *concrete* outcome(s) of having an LJ user board and user-elected reps?

Crossposted from http://pine.dreamwidth.org/5148.html. Comment here if settings allow, or there using your DW or OpenID. Please do not FW link. Play nice in comments. Don't run w/ scissors. Hug fandom hard!

Gacked from r_grayjoy and others. When you see this meme, post a poem.

Ogden Nash
"In the Middle"

Whene'er I think of bygone days,
I think how evening follows morn.
So many we loved were not yet dead;
So many we love were not yet born

For Peter and Jasper, with much love. Vale.

So I've always been interested in society and medicine and disease. I mean, disease... how can it not be fascinating? My left science list is having a discussion lately on military metaphors in medical discourse - discourse in the broad sense of being not just the language but the ideology and the practice of medicine itself.

As an illustration one of that flist just posted a link to a book that is online for free (YAYY FOR FREE ONLINE BOOKS AND DOWNLOADS) from the U.S. National Academies of Science, "Ending the War Metaphor: The Changing Agenda for Unraveling the Host-Microbe Relationship" (2006).

Here is the opening of page 1. Is this not beautiful? A brilliant sign of hope for what science can be if it ever all becomes this reflexive. Not to mention humble.

ENDING THE WAR METAPHOR: THE CHANGING AGENDA FOR UNRAVELING THE HOST-MICROBE RELATIONSHIP

p.1

The History of Medicine

2000 B.C.—Here, eat this root.

1000 A.D.—That root is heathen. Here, say this prayer.

1850 A.D.—That prayer is superstition. Here, drink this potion.

1920 A.D.—That potion is snake oil. Here, swallow this pill.

1945 A.D.—That pill is ineffective. Here, take this penicillin.

1955 A.D.—Oops…bugs mutated. Here, take this tetracycline.

1960–1999—39 more “oops.” Here, take this more powerful antibiotic.

2000 A.D.—The bugs have won! Here, eat this root.

—Anonymous (World Health Organization, 2000)


Ahhh, my Snapefan self also loves the part about potions! :D There aren't many other HP fans on my radical science list-serve, alas. So I bring it here. My science studies love, let me show you it.

It's amazing to think that this book on medical metaphors, on the language of leading paradigms for understanding infectious disease, is from a conference organized by the (U.S.) Institute of Medicine and National Academy of Sciences. O the slipperiness of meaning; compared to this even bugs are predictable! But neither can be controlled by men in white coats, not with all the gleaming lab equipment in the world (and in the U.S., which spends the most in history to get some of the worst national health results, that's a lotta spending indeed).

I could segue into clever comparisons to fandom were it not well past my bedtime, and me with a persistent headache as well. And a new book to look at! So I leave the analogies to you and take, instead, the book...

Crossposted from http://pine.dreamwidth.org/5062.html. Comment here if settings allow, or there using your DW or OpenID. Please do not FW link. Play nice in comments. Don't run w/ scissors. Hug fandom hard!

So Belgium's Kevin van der Perren is skating to Robin Hood (the Michael Kamen score).

Earlier, it was Pirates of the Caribbean, with Spain's young Javier Fernandez doing an awesomely fun, lively interpretation. Worth watching especially for his swaggering drunken-sailor section, in the cutest pirate "boots."

Watching yet another slim young man with dark tousled hair and a sparkling personality take the ice, I wondered... when we'll see a Harry Potter interpretation in the Olympics or worlds. Quidditch, anyone?

An IJ friend is pondering a Snape figure-skating AU. OOOH. We should cheer her on to do this, y/y?

I could really go for a Plushenko!Lupin too.

Also, I need skater icons, I think! Or really, if I'm going to use DW, more icons of any kind.

Crossposted from http://pine.dreamwidth.org/4738.html. Comment here if settings allow, or there using your DW or OpenID. Please do not FW link. Play nice in comments. Don't run w/ scissors. Hug fandom hard!

I'd say I'm back online but really, I'm just posting to share my squee about the upcoming Olympic men's figure skating finals.

Plushenko.
Lysacek.
Takahashi.
Weir.
Lambiel.

OMG!

I love seeing more of the skaters *not* attempt quads but that's simply because it hurts so to see them fall. Most of them do, more than half the time. New York Times has a great interactive spread tabulating risks and rewards of a quad for the 14 men skaters in this Olympics who've tried a quad in major international competitions in the last four seasons (and not including the short programs from Tuesday night).

The record shows: "only about a third of them earned more points than if the skater had performed a well-executed triple lutz, one of the most difficult triple jumps, but one which most of the top men can do consistently."

In other words, even landing one doesn't necessarily help that much. Lysacek, for instance, only added "positive grade of execution" points 31% of the time for trying and/or landing one - and even then, it was only an additional +0.8 at most (and far less than that on average). So, he's smart not to plan one in the long program. Plushenko's efforts, however (with only the four competitions since his 2009 return tabulated) have hit 100%, and have netted him an additional +1.2 on average, with +1.8 as his high.

Daisuke Takahashi, ranked 3 after the SP (but virtually tied with Plushenko and Lysacek) has tried more quads than Lysacek, and he's landed half of them, and garnered up to +1.5 additional points for grade of execution as a result. So it makes sense he'd try one in the LP tonight.

Who am I rooting for? WAHHHH I WANT THEM ALLLLLLL!!!! THEY ARE ALL SO AWESOME. Truly, I love them all, for different reasons. Takahashi is beautiful, Lysacek is elegant, and Plushenko is OMG PLUSHY OMG. And Johnny Weir is SO CUTE. (Although frankly, I find him more a performer than a skater, especially Tuesday night.)

Can I just say that also, Lysacek reminds me somewhat of Snape? especially when he wears something like Tuesday night's dark, long-limbed Firebird costume, with the gorgeous feathers drawing attention to his large, strong hands. And Plushenko, IMHO, makes a perfectly marvelous Remus? :D :D :D *Snupin love* In person, of course, Lysacek is just a nice well-to-do American boy who loves sports (see interviews below). But Plushy, in his interview, could still be Lupin. I have so much love for Evgeny Plushenko as the bravura daredevil he truly is, I have to be rooting for him. But... also for all the others! I just hope (like Dick Button, lol) that they all do wonderfully, pull off their best performances ever. Which I will then enjoy!

The NBC Olympics website has the short program videos up, as well as
a long interview with Evan Lysacek (in two parts, the second linked from this one) and a shorter but still delightfully rich interview with Evgeny Plushenko.

The short programs for virtually every contestant is up there, though a bit hard to find: Plushenko, Lysacek, Takahashi, and all the rest. YUM YUM YUM.

Crossposted from http://pine.dreamwidth.org/4576.html. Comment here if settings allow, or there using your DW or OpenID. Please do not FW link. Play nice in comments. Don't run w/ scissors. Hug fandom hard!

I decided I'm tired of seeing great-looking jobs that aren't in my area or field or whatever, and just passing on by instead of sharing the info with my fellow fans! Especially because some of my flist are, like me, looking for a better job (or *a* job) or might be. So I created a free comm called fandom_jobs for us to share info when it comes our way, or ask about the kind of job we're looking for, or whine about the one we have. I'm also posting it to ecofans as it's an environment-related job.

Besides, wouldn't it be neat if all the best jobs were held by fans? :D *visualizes the Obama family at a con, in costume*

The job announcement below came my way via a posting to the "Environmental Communication Network" list-serve by Eric Eckl. Eric is a good guy, who has an env'l communications consulting business in the D.C. area. It's one of his clients doing the hiring, as he says, so he might well be able to give some additional info, but certainly the CPB/ACB groups mentioned would have good info online that would be the best place to see more about who they are, and what they might be looking for.

Deadline: Jan 29. Location: region of Washington, D.C., USA. Other aspects of note: it seems they may only want a cover letter, CV/resume, and two work samples (much less than a lot of job apps require!)

ETA: and from the online full announcement (link below behind cut), Good computer skills are essential, and knowledge of social media tools and e-mail blast software would be of additional value. O HAY I THINK FANS HAVE THIS SKILLSET PWNED.

Eric wrote: One of my clients is hiring a senior level position for conservation communicators! Please feel free to apply or forward.

The Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay seeks a qualified individual to plan, implement and coordinate all aspects of communication for the Chesapeake Bay Program (CBP). The CBP is the federal/state partnership responsible for leading the Chesapeake Bay restoration effort.

( Read more... )

Happy Birthday to Severus - and may there be many happy returns of the day for him and for all of us fans!

I've been hidden away in my dungeons under a very heavy workload and as a result, my Severus birthday gift will be one of the late posts. *Sigh* So nearly done for months, yet where's the time to complete it?!! *scowls sadly*

In fact, I have to steal time from RL to read even one per day of the birthday fic and artworks now showering us like confetti. OH WAIT ... this means I'll get to enjoy a new Snape birthday gift every day for over a month! SWEET. :D

Meanwhile, I'll try to rec all the ones I love. My first three recs salute one Art work; one Fic; and one very Special Site and its Marvelous Mod.

Site, Fest & Mod Rec: Severus Snape Big Bang Birthday Bash, by sylvanawood

The celebration is going on all over the place, but the Severus Snape Big Bang Birthday Bash, organized by the wonderful sylvanawood, is the biggest candle on the cake. It's a Birthday Site of Sites: go see!

The first delight is how she's organized the main page to be lovely and readable. Even more awesome, she's cross-referenced everything so that Snape fans can click to listings of every different ship, rating, genre or medium. WHERE TO START?!?! IZ ALL SO AWESOME! ♥

The SevB4 feast also features a wonderful diversity of flavors. There's art, there's fic, there's art-and-fic... Some of these are treats you've never tasted before. And are they ever yummy!

Here, have a nibble:

Art Rec: Party Dress, by spidermoth

spidermoth's Party Dress (Harry♥Snape; NWS) is a tour-de-force of finely crafted creativity. Her unique, hand-sewn HP dolls have been fantastic from the start, yet with each one she also finds new ways ( ..... )

There's loads of personality in this amazing doll. Kudos and kisses to Spidermoth! Kudos and big hugs to Sylvanawood as well, for recognizing the diversity of fan creativity and doing the extra work so that all genres can participate!

Fic Rec: Seeking Skin, by sinick and ac1d6urn

I started the Severus B4 at the top: with a winner. Seeking Skin (Snarry; R; 10,500 words) is the kind of story fans of Acid & Sinick might expect ( ..... )

The accent here is on humor; although Snape's (and Harry's) serious issues hover not far below, the overall result is: fun!

Hmmm, looks like I happened to rec two fics from the same pairing (or potential pairing) and fest. I'll sample some other Snapeish flavors tomorrow, then!

It's been a busy fall, so it's nice to take some time to read a holiday fic or two! There's clearly some excellent Snupin Santa fics as always. I've read a couple I enjoyed very much. Among them are some brilliant new gems, some whimsically different takes, and some that are simply satisfying little comfy fics, as every good pairing should have.

( four snupin recs )

and some Snarry Awesomeness.

There've been lots of recs as always plus the round-up listings with the "hot recs," so ... meh. Who needs any recs from dweeby old me? but this one I read tonight, and it's everything I ever loved in Snarry, and that is so, so good to find!

Remedial Potions. Summary: It turns out Harry probably shouldn't have spent his sixth year cheating, because now he needs Remedial Potions for real....

( rec and excerpt )
Yummy, yummy, yummy! In a season loaded with goodies, this is no recycled fruitcake. More like babas au rhum: pure, rich and wickedly strong.

What do you do after a flaming row? An intemperate remark (or 10)? When the bitter anger of a wank dies down, there is occasionally a fleeting wish that some of it could be unsaid, or at least that you could apologize and agree to move on. Or sometimes, there are things you didn't do - the "sins of omission" - and you wish you could say what you didn't say, and explain why, and apologize, and move on.

quinfirefrorefiddle on Dreamwidth came up with one interesting solution:

meaculpa

Because if we don't move on... we're stuck. Not changing, staying the same, is being stuck, too.

In the aftermath of every fail there are some who wonder, Is fandom getting wankier all the time? What happens when you follow the Geek Social Fallacies too assiduously (or your whole flist seems to) and can no longer be "friends" with anyone who didn't totally agree, jump in on the "right" side, join the drama, care deeply, get the point?

Eventually the only friends you dare have are those who (a) don't talk, (b) don't talk publicly, or (c) are newbies. The friends who don't talk - well, hello? They're gone. The ones who no longer talk online - why stay, then? We're gone. As for those newbies, they will soon go through the same trial-by-fail, resulting in most of *them* becoming polarized or silenced or silencing or walking away from fandom... do the math. It's a never-ending turmoil with smaller and smaller circles of trust, and larger and larger circles of former friends and lifelong enemies.

Woah. This is not my shiny fandom! This is not the online community we say we want! Instead, it's a steadily shrinking space of love and trust and diversity, of civil discourse. It's ever less of the squee, and teh shiny, not to mention my beloved meta. Yes, it's good that fandom becomes ever more aware of important issues - but not if it becomes ever less willing to just *talk*, and resolve them, and move on with an increase in both awareness *and* community. Because dude, regardless of how right the path is, if it goes into the big empty desert without that loaf of bread, jug of wine, and especially *thou* - the rest of the community - it's a lonely, empty place.

Sure, there's that whole "different drummer" shtick, taking "the less travelled path". But there's also the old "No woman is an island." It reminds us "for whom the bell tolls": it's for *us*. That death knell always, in some way, signals a loss from our community. Because hey, we are social animals, and if we can't take care of each other? We die a little inside. Sometimes social animals, cut off from healthy community, just die.

This web 2.0, this fandom, our shiny jewel in the online sea, this splintered isle - it's no good if we can't learn how to get along.

Sometimes, you want to say you're sorry for your actions or inactions, for words spoken or unspoken, information divulged or topics shied away from. This can be regardless of whether the others involved are interested in dialogue or forgiveness. Sometimes, *you* need to make an apology for your karma or serenity, your self-respect or sense of closure or whatever.

( Here's a way )

So I rimed me some Mother Goose filk on the PervySurveyFail (Ogi Pogi, puddin' and pie)

( behind the cut )

And jalendavi_lady promptly shot back a limerick form (with apologies for the dissonant last line):

There once was a man, name of Ogi,
Who along with a friend was a fogey.
Fandom thought they were pervy
Once they'd posted their survey
And told them quite loudly, "Nokey!"

(Yes, I know the last line is horrid.)

Now along comes quinfirefrorefiddle (quinfirefrorefiddle over at DW) with an awesome, full filk! YAYYY fandom, that hath such talent in it!

"Once there were two researchers..." Sung to the tune of Carole King's Tapestry

For those who are fuzzy on the music, a link to the video. Cue, roll, sing!



Sung to Carole King's "Tapestry":

There once were these two researchers who thought they had a clue
A never-changing vision of an everlasting crew
A web of all desire they wanted to weave and hold
Stereotypes to feel and see, spelled out right there in bold.

Once, amid the internet, and sites to make you sigh
With plot lines, authorship and wit, the fannish nerds did cry,
"I do not fit your labels, and you are not on my side,
Your ignorance is willful, which I will not abide."

They moved with some uncertainty, as if they didn't know,
Just what they'd gotten into, or whether they should go.
Once, they reached for kindness, hoping for sympathy
But their words came off empty.

Soon, amid the internet, the acafen arrived
Querying their methods, and how they had derived
Their predetermined hypotheses, which did not work too well
No one wept to see them suffer, they'd ignited their own hell.

As fandom watched so cynically, they quickly disappeared
Abandoning their "research" and their new-begun careers
In times of deep despair, at least, we know they won't come back
Their "survey" lost them all their cred, we won't trust them with jack.
We won't trust them with jack....

AHH Fandom! You are Made Of Win. Now, someone's got to do the Youtube version and CIRCULATE IT AROUND THE WORLD so that every search for "Ogi Ogas" comes up with this lyrical paean to SurveyFail. ::sporfle::

ETA: for more filk, fic, fan art, parody and all your meta needs: http://linkspam.dreamwidth.org/tag/surveyfail

Crossposted from http://pine.dreamwidth.org/2886.html. Comment here if settings allow, or there using your DW or OpenID. Please do not FW link. Play nice in comments. Don't run w/ scissors. Hug your fandom!

So ithiliana over on LJ was asking who impudently dubbed this the PervySurveyFail. *raises hand reluctantly*

Oh, but she liked it! Well... in that case. *is inspired* Also, IZ NOT TL;DR TODAY, JUST BAD RHYME!

Remember Mother Goose and "Georgie-Porgie, pudding and pie"?

I give you:

"Pervy Ogi"

PervySurvy, Ogi and Sai,
Polled the fans but told a lie.
When they asked about the fail,
Pervy Ogi started to bail.
When the fangirls came to play
PervySurvy ran away.

LIKE? WANT MOAR? WRITE SUM PLZ!!!

Crossposted from http://pine.dreamwidth.org/2649.html. Comment here if IP/flist settings allow, or there using your DW account or OpenID. Please do not FW link. Play nice in comments. Don't run w/ scissors. Hug fandom hard!

Ogi, thanks for more evidence of your social immaturity, your sexist bias, your utterly self-absorbed scientific twerpitude:

Apology

[Sep. 3rd, 2009|06:24 am]

We wish to apologize for any offense caused by our survey, which was certainly never our intention. We can clearly understand how strong feelings were evoked by the specific nature of our interactions. We deeply regret this. We appreciate tremendously the invaluable feedback we've received, and certainly hope to improve our work and grow as people as a result of this experience.

No Ogi, how about you apologize FOR BEING WRONG? For doing BAD SCIENCE and CRAPTASTICALLY AMATEUR, INSENSITIVE pop social research? For pretending to know something about fields you never took even an undergraduate class in? FOR LYING?

How about YOU apologize for YOUR FAULTS AND FLAWS AND FAILINGS instead of blaming fandom?

*takes deep breath and turns to analysis*

Sorry for the tirade. I really, really hope someone Ogi talks to points out to him that THIS IS NOT AN APOLOGY. Rhetorically, discursively, syntactically, this is a DENIAL OF RESPONSIBILITY for a situation HE CAUSED. Ogi should be apologizing for what HE did, not essentializing fandom further by telling *us* what *our* response is.

Also, I particularly vomit at how he (& poor Sai who is either an even bigger coward or a total tool of Ogi) hope to "grow as people." It's not just that they should grow as *men* and as *scientists* since in both those areas they are clearly at a very immature stage, it's that through this and other choices of words, they RESTATE AND COMPOUND their sexism and colonialism. Throughout this pathetic and completely unprofessional excuse for an apology, they emphasize their agency over fandom. They characterize fandom as a passive mass, an object, an only vaguely seen - and not worth seeing - group who they just spent many hours with, but failed to get to know in any way.

So instead, they deliver an apology that is a nonpology (or as I've also heard, a nopology). They post a text that is all about them, to a group they can't even bother to name, using discourse that frames fandom as composed of hyperemotional women who have no qualifications, no intelligence, no humanity, no rights. Their discourse establishes this binary us-versus-them schema in a way that reaffirms Ogi on a number of levels and devalues fandom in all. It does this in a number of ways; let me show you them!

ETA: now revised, with subheds and better summary. I'm workin on it!

( turn up the tunes, pop open their nopology in a new window with the handy link below and let's do some discourse analysis. Whee! )

That Fan Fiction Survey, or "2 EMSNS (Elite male single, nerdly scientists) seek fandom women to share links, lusts, fantasies re hot m/m sex" has continued to inspire amusement and fun posts, including a very nice OMG RPF BADFIC posted to the EMSNS LJ, which the lovely and brilliant Accioslash linked me to:
(ETA: Almost forgot the excerpt! DOH!)

Neuroscience-cest be here RAR:

Waves of extasy rolled across their bodies, Sai's free hand fondling Ogi's genitals even as he cramemd his meat into Ogi's rear. They rolled around on the bed, Sai's wizard robe tangling them up, cacooning them within their hot sweaty lust as Sai increased the tempo of their passion.

Ogi and sai quivered all over, together, as they both came at the exactly the same moment (±0.5 seconds), Sai's sticky white gender essentiality coating Ogi's insides.

Warnings/Kinks: Also contains Wuthering Heights ref, small penis, bad writing.

Go, read, comment. As Accio said, Gd, I ♥ fandom. I think it's rather lovely that so many fans who avoided the survey like the sensible women we are have come over to cuddle the fic. If Ogi/Sai are paying attention, they will realize that IN FANDOM, WE SURVEY YOU. Getting yourself into RPF is just the prologue...

OTOH, our arrogant male nerdly neuroscientists (I mean, srsly, posting your exam scores WITH DECIMAL POINTS on your webpage?) don't seem to have been paying attention at any point to anyone since they began their weird self-insertion into online fanfic reading fandom. Except maybe to the call of cold cash from Dutton for their proposed pop-science book on Women Go Wild, er, I mean, Rule 34: How NetPorn Explains Why Women Won't Date Us or really, what looks like it should be called How NetPorn Women Gave Us One-Handed Reading Material And So Can You.

Elf put together a nice meta links list over on dreamwidth:
http://linkspam.dreamwidth.org/5995.html

Yonmei linked me to her great blog entry today at Feminist SF - The Blog:
"Fandom to researchers: We are not your lab rats"
http://blogs.feministsf.net/?p=1259

As to how this whole thing started, here are several of the "Ground Zero" exchanges, for those of us who love the trackback/can't stop being researchy:

Dr. Science "Talking about who writes fanfic" July 27, 2009
http://mecurtin.livejournal.com/805503.html

Shaggirl "Rule 34, or: tentacle porn, what tentacle porn?" July 19, 2009
http://shaggirl.livejournal.com/185387.html
==> Special interest for the verbatim post of their letters to her and their interesting and constant revisions of the supposed research <==

Shaggirl "My response to the neuroscientists..." July 20, 2009
http://shaggirl.livejournal.com/185688.html
(in which she refers them to mecurtin, a whole bunch of informative metas *that they obviously did not read*, OTW, and several of the "canon" texts on fandom LOL, like _Textual Poachers_)

Shaggirl "A response from our friendly scientists..." July 22, 2009
http://shaggirl.livejournal.com/186106.html
(includes responses by Ogi Ogas in comments to other commenters)

Shaggirl's Response to the n/scientists has perhaps the most explicit statement from Ogas of his preconception that men and women (little 2gender problem there) are fundamentally different neurologically, that this can be studied without paying any attention to the social, cultural, or any other contexts, or even psychology... and the most loltastic reply to him, which he ignores:

From: [info]ogi_ogas
2009-07-28 09:27 am (local)

chicklet_girl:

Yes, we're interested in understanding some very ancient neural circuits that are different in men and women. We certainly don't have anything useful or interesting to contribute to cultural studies, literary studies, social sciences, or psychology, which we leave to individuals better informed than ourselves! :)

Ogi

From: (Anonymous)
2009-09-01 10:56 am (local)

Neural Circuits...

I don't see how you can really do that without actually studying a sample of individuals (both male and female) who write or read fanfic in a properly controlled setting.

Also, you will probably not be aware that there are also large numbers of asexuals who are involved in fandom.

Nate (who happens to be male)

To quote Accio: Gd, I ♥ fandom.