Secrets For Success?

Jason Stoddard, who is fast becoming one of my favorite science fiction people, has a tidy little call for action up on his blog. Succumbing to sweet temptation, he resorts to the old Top Ten list (and if David Letterman ever manages to get a cut of that action, he’ll dwarf Gates’ net worth in no time flat) to outline the things he thinks science fiction as a community can do to improve its standing, and the first five seem pretty easy.

So easy, in fact, that I think a lot of organizations are already jumping on #9 on his list, creating social networks. Baen has had mad success with Baen’s Bar, Tor is fixing to launch their own thing soon, SFWA now has a limited presence on LiveJournal and several magazines and book publishers use MySpace for bringing together readers and flogging new material.

The irony that’s long been tossed around is that there are so many science fiction and fantasy authors, “visionaries” to potentially abuse a term, that seem to be seriously intimidated by current trends in marketing, distribution, and technology. The practical result, I think, is that SFWA’s web presence looks as though it was cutting edge in 1995 (an upgrade from the previous incarnation which looked run-of-the-mill for 1994), a website designed by committee and bargain-basement prices because no one can agree on how important that presence is.

Whether or not it’s SFWA’s job to provide an appropriately cutting-edge face for science fiction and promote the work of its members is a separate question, and yet one that should probably be settled one of these days. I suspect that picture might come clearer following the coming elections.

Anyway, as usual Jason makes a lot of sense. The only potential question I have for his agenda is where the leadership is supposed to come from. SFWA seems a natural, and thus we again have a call to answer the question above, but has been sorely lacking and may never be up to the task. Even if they get their house in order, SFWA is going to spend a long time looking inward and checking to make sure they are doing best by the authors under the group’s current mandate. Expanding that to any kind of outreach type mission will be problematic at best.

So where is that leadership going to come from?

I don’t know, but it seems increasingly likely that it will end up being a loose association of interested parties who are going to take on some of these challenges from outside of the SFWA (and perhaps traditional publishing?) framework. I think John Scalzi and Cory Doctorow have already started down that road, in some fashion, and I think a lot of folks are eager to follow. Whether this informal evangelism of SF produces any converts is another open question, but one that can only be answered over time.

Crossposted with klech.net

Grammar Revolution

I’m going to take a big chance here and use up my Scalzi-invocation quota for the month (really, you should limit yourself to two, otherwise you just look like a tool–and I’m flirting with tooldom by referencing him two days in a row), and plant a flag, countering his demands for grammar orthodoxy.

Hear me, all those who really dig the non-standard usage of “alright”!

Now is our hour! Now is the time to say that we like newfangled compound words, that we’re into being noncommittally good, and that things are generally groovy!

We’re alright!

Also, the Collegial Association of Serial Commas has thrown its punctuation-heavy support behind us. Not for any grammatical reason, mind, but just to annoy John.

Crossposted with klech.net