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NOTE: This is a modified version of the transcript. Segments of the "pre-chat" and "after-chat" have been included...
She was such a great guest; the chat room session went off by itself. She came in early to get a feel for the chat room, but for multiple reasons, the chat just launched. I was actually starting to wonder if there would be any questions left to ask because such good conversation was already going on. I didn't want to interfere because I did not want to mess with success so I let it be. And even after the official chat ended it kept going. So I want to include parts of the "pre-chat" and "after-chat" for your enjoyment. And again, we want to thank Jacqueline Lichtenberg for coming. We all enjoyed the chat a lot.
________________________________________________________________________
{Part of the "Pre-Chat"}
Sun Aug 29 14:36:49 2004:jl~ [0/] AAS-Login:
master_q: I'm looking forward to the chat. I think there will be a good turn-out (at least, I hope). And we'll also put the transcript up after the chat ASAP. By the way, do you watch Enterprise?
jl~: Yes, I watch Enterprise.
jl~: I may be the only one who actually likes it -- yes, it's flawed, but there's good stuff there.
master_q: What do you think about the possibility of Kirk coming back?
jl~: Not a Shatner-Kirk that's for sure.
master_q: Well, there has been a lot of news out there. Bill himself has said that they contacted him about it. So I don't know...it may happen.
master_q: I can’t say 100% if he will or won’t come back, but there has been a lot of news out there. The Bring Back Kirk campaign has also been pushing hard.
jl~: Admiral Kirk flying a desk maybe -- he just doesn't have the physique
master_q: Heheheh Maybe, but I know the Bring Back Kirk campaign would argue otherwise.
jl~: I think there's more dramatic potential with DS9 though.
jl~: I think it's interesting there are people left picking up classic Trek in reruns.
jl~: I would like to see the Kirk character again, but I can't see the current Shatner playing him except as an Admiral or maybe Ambassador.
jl~: Do you watch Stargate?
master_q: No...... I don't watch much TV. I'm a internet // talk-radio person :lol
jl~: The guy who played McGiver on that TV show (McGiver) has the lead role and exec producer slot on sg-l -- and this season - the 8th season
jl~: They gave him a promotion to General and put him behind a desk.
jl~: So now a lot of the action takes place in front of his desk so he can run around and shoot people -- but he also gets to issue more orders and make bigger decisions.
master_q : That's neat. I've seen maybe two or three McGiver episodes years ago.
jl~: Yes, it is neat because it shows action sf doing the "gunslinger grows old and hangs up guns" stories.
jl~: But this guy (General O'Neal) is really much like Kirk -- he's got the same "reverence" for stuffed-shirt "authority".
jl~: In fact he said something like "I don't know if I can be The Man -- I've spent my whole career sticking it to The Man. How can I be The Man?"
Prometheus_Nova:
jl~: I thought that was a great line. Self-awareness comes to action-drama!!!
master_q: Hi Prometheus_Nova
Prometheus_Nova: O'neill is the greatest sci-fi smartbutt ever
Prometheus_Nova: heya Q
jl~: Oh, I agree with you there -- definitely great casting. So far SG-Atlantis doesn't have a character that appealing.
Prometheus_Nova: Sheppard is the best on there, but he's not O'neill nor should he be
Prometheus_Nova : Atlantis needs to develop it's own identity
jl~: Sheppard has great potential -- like with all the Treks, they're using an ensemble cast and it'll take 2 years just to get to know them.
jl~: Personally I like Teal'c
jl~: But then I'm an Odo fan and a Spock fan etc -- the alien is the one who always captures my attention.
jl~: At any rate, I can understand the Bring Back Kirk movement simply because of the Jack O'Neal popularity.
jl~: In my review column, I demonstrate how the world of novels is really a dialogue among authors with each novel being one sentence in a conversation at a cocktail party -- with little groups standing around chatting on different subjects and listening to each
Prometheus_Nova: that makes sense
Prometheus_Nova: good comparison
jl~: As it happens I just started watching Stargate and I'm trying to catch up on 8 years of it. Like Babylon-5, it is a story-arc and I've been seeing them in almost random order.
master_q: Do you know Bjo Trimble?
Prometheus_Nova: s7 is the best to me
Prometheus_Nova:
jl~: At the time it first aired, ST was the first real sf on TV -- other shows were fantasy, horror, or some other sub-genre. ST was the actual, real thing we'd been reading for decades and loved.
jl~: Yes, Bjo has been a friend for a long time.
Prometheus_Nova : I started with trek, tng specifically
jl~: There's a long story there -- too.
Prometheus_Nova: but i got hooked on sg-1 when it started
Prometheus_Nova:
master_q: Okay.....let's save it when the actual chat starts.
Alterego: Someone with an email address with bjotrimble as part of her email address joined a couple weeks back but hasn't said anything yet...
master_q: We've got about 56 minutes.
jl~: When ST first came on, I was on my way out of the country -- and I was living abroad when the first save Trek campaign came together.
jl~: Bjo was the spearhead of that.
jl~: I grew up in the San Francisco Bay area and knew Bjo because at the time she lived in Oakland and worked the art shows at cons.
master_q: I e-mailed Bjo Trimble about a month ago, but I haven’t got a second reply back yet.
jl~: I had never met her -- I wasn't allowed by my parents to go to cons!! But I knew about her from paper fanzines.
master_q: That's probably why, Alterego.
jl~: She's not much on email to be sure, and I haven't heard from her lately. Anyway, when I got the mail out to Save Trek -- I wrote TO gene roddenberry!!! I hadn't even seen the show. But I demanded they keep it on until
Alterego: Well that was probably her, would you like me to search for her SN?
:jl~: I could get back to see it because and only because Bjo liked it.
jl~: Well, they took my advise for a change, and look where we are now!!!
master_q: Sure, Alterego.
Alterego: K...
master_q: I'll be right back.....
jl~: I suppose you folks all know each other but I'd like to learn something about you. Why don't you introduce yourselves?
Kor37: I am Kor........military governor of this chat room.......lol
Kor37: Actually, I'm from Baltimore, Maryland
jl~: Do you ever go to the Darkover Grand Council just outside Baltimore in Towson?
Kor37: Never have. What is that?
jl~: A convention dedicated to the Darkover novels by Marion Zimmer Bradley
jl~: How about Shore Leave?
Kor37: oh ok
Kor37: Been to shore leave many, many times
jl~: Hi Mrs. Picard!
Mrs.Picard: Hello
jl~: Well Kor, if you've been to Shore Leave there's a good chance we've met.
Kor37: Quite possible, although I haven't gone to a con in some years
jl~: Up until 3 years ago, I went to most of them -- now I live in Arizona and it's harder to get east.
Kor37: I love Arizona
Kor37: I took a 2 week tour of the Southwest a few years ago
Kor37: ended up in Tombstone
jl~: Arizona has all kinds of terrain and climates -- you know that's another reason I just don't get it when someone beams down to a planet and finds themselves in a desert and proclaims this is a "desert world".
Kor37: lol....good point
jl~ Just a few miles from Phoenix, you have mountains with enough snow to ski.
Kor37: I remember. I drove all the way through Arizona from north to south
darthhappy: well any one smart enough to do that might also be able to scan a bigger area than the southwest LOL
jl~: But I do love it here in what they call The Valley of The Sun -- except for July and August and this August hasn't been half bad. On the other hand, we're in the middle of a draught that hasn't been seen in 500 years.
Kor37: I understand you founded the Welcommitte. I remember that group well.
jl~: True, that's the only explanation I can think of -- that orbital observation showed the whole planet was the same as one spot. However, if you know anything about how the earth works, it just doesn't seem plausible that a planet with a breathable atmosphere would be the same all over
Kor37: answering fan questions using "gasp!".....paper and typewriter
jl~: Yes, ST Welcommittee was my idea.
jl~: Yes, gasp! Indeed, gasp
Kor37: I still have some of the letters
jl~: I can't imagine how we did it -- but we did.
Kor37: guess I'm showing my age
jl~: When I joined fandom, people were using purple ink and gel to make copies. Mimeography was for the rich fans!
Kor37: lol
jl~: And any mimeo a fan might use would be hand-cranked.
Kor37: stone knives and bear skins indeed
jl~: The point being that nothing will stop a fan from communicating with other fans. Not even Microsoft products that crash all the time.
Kor37: lol
Mrs.Picard: lol !! how true
jl~: One day we'll look back at this era and wonder how we all managed to do it.
jl~: But you know something interesting? With the internet has come a whole new era in television -- they are paying attention to chat rooms and Lists and other kinds of communications (blogs being the hottest thing right now)
Kor37: Yes. I understand Berman pays attention to chat rooms
jl~: Fan input was particularly influential in Babylon 5 too.
Kor37: When did you first join fandom?
jl~: And this marks a great change from the time when Bjo's first save Trek campaign hit fandom.
jl~: At that time there were no ST fanzines!!!
Prometheus_Nova: Berman pays attention to chat rooms?
Alterego: No luck MQ
Kor37: I remember that. I wrote a letter to Paramount back then
Prometheus_Nova: and he still made enterprise the way it is ?
Kor37: Oh stop Nova. Enterprise is good
master_q: That's okay, Alterego.
darthhappy: well voyager....(fill in the blank)
jl~: It was organized sf fandom (which I was very active in) that saved ST -- without that admittedly problematic 3rd season it would not have been rerun and would never have gained the necessary following for all the rest of this to happen.
jl~: We'd be living in a very different world had it not been for Bjo Trimble -- those of you joining us recently, we were talking about Bjo earlier.
Kor37: I've watched Trek since the first episode of TOS but I didn't actively join fandom till I went to my first con in 1972
Kor37 [0/] Msg:Hi Lizzy
jl~: Enterprise is a show I do like, but I'm not blind to its flaws. It is no way "good" -- but it has lots of good stuff in it if you can tolerate the rest.
Deanna_Troi_Fan_Lizzy: hello everyone
Mrs.Picard :hi lizzy
Deanna_Troi_Fan_Lizzy: hi mrs.picard
Kor37: hiya j1701
j1701: hi everyone
Mrs.Picard: hi j1701
Prometheus_Nova: so Ent is tolerable
Prometheus_Nova: But do you think Ent affecting history like it does is good or bad?
jl~: These people who create these shows -- like the Buffyverse for example -- Whedon is seriously connected through family, schooling, and just socially with all these other show creators.
Kor37: Picard changed history more than Enterprise ever did
Prometheus_Nova: not really Kor
jl~: The decision makers who decide that Enterprise must be this way or that way -- they all know each other the way sf writers all know each other.
Prometheus_Nova: Ent is introducing stuff way too early
Prometheus_Nova: and tech way too early as well
jl~: Ent has indeed put the cart before the horse -- and is violating the established timeline -- that annoys me more than some of the other quirks.
Kor37: Perhaps that is because Picard left that entire Borg tech lying around
jl~: There are two ways to look at the problems with Enterprise -- either as problems in bad writing or problems within the ST universe.
Prometheus_Nova: yea Kor the borg thing i comprehend how it happened, but i mean the other stuff is ridiculous
jl~: Hal Clement -- the famous sf writer -- used to call it "The Game" when you would find flaws in a story and "fix" the flaws within the universe parameters of the story using your scientific imagination.
Prometheus_Nova: Yea but in Ent's attempt to "fix" flaws it's developed tons more
Kor37: I guess it is hard to reconcile Archer's crew using phase pistols and years later, Captain Pike is using lasers
Prometheus_Nova: Kind of like if you killed your great-great-great grandfather because he killed lots of people, but then you were a scientist who developed a way to cure world hunger and time travel
Prometheus_Nova: you might have stopped him but none of the good things your lineage did from then on exist
Kor37: temporal paradoxes give me headaches
Prometheus_Nova: lol
jl~: Yes, exactly -- when you play The Game, you have to do things like postulate time travel events that changed things, sliding you sideways into a parallel universe.
jl~: But as a writer, I look at the motives behind those choices to do create those errors to begin with.
Prometheus_Nova: Ent should have left well enough along though
Kor37: I shudder to think of what Berman is going to do with this next movie
jl~: The mistake was in making the next show into a previous show - doing a prequel.
Kor37: He is going to do it again with the next movie
Mrs.Picard: that movie will be set even *before* Enterprise
Mrs.Picard: at least he said so
Kor37: I thought it was after Enterprise but before Kirk?
Prometheus_Nova: what the heck is he going to do before enterprise?
Prometheus_Nova: ww3?
Kor37: Isn't it going to deal with the Romulan wars?
Mrs.Picard: perhaps? who knows *shudders*
jl~: The problem is that to the 2004 audience, the stuff (material, visual, technical) that st:tos had looks massively primitive. You can't "sell" a show today that looks that primitive, and to make Enterprise work as a show you had to update everything, and that blew continuity.
spacetigger: Hello
Prometheus_Nova: yep jl my thoughts exactly
jl~:
Hi all those who joined us while I was typing away.Kor37: Well, some of the stuff in TOS is old even today like toggle switches and such
Prometheus_Nova: toggle switches...lol
Prometheus_Nova: got to love those little things
jl~: Absolutely -- but what you have to realize is that at the time we first saw st:tos -- that was great stuff! It was so far above anything else on Tv that called itself sf that you just had to stare.
Kor37: I remember going to Radio Shack and buying a ton of them so I could make a replica of Kirk's chair
jl~: We watched every episode again and again and again -- and that was hard before the invention of the VCR you know.
Kor37: I've tried to tell these kids how we kept fandom going all of those years with just 79 episodes of TOS
Kor37: They don't know how lucky they have it today
jl~: The thing is that to set Enterprise before TOS was a big mistake simply because it can't be done commercially.
Prometheus_Nova: we're lucky ...but you also gave us enterprise
Kor37: hmmmm
jl~: Note that I don't think GR would have allowed Enterprise to be set as a prequel
Kor37: I'm sorry, but I think last seasons Enterprise episodes were great for the most part
master_q: What kind of series do you think they should have done then?
jl~: I don't know exactly all the details of how that decision was made -- but it was a disaster and if I were a writer on the show today, I frankly don't know what else I could do to fix it.
Prometheus_Nova: go back and redo everything lol
Kor37: I've always fancied a Captain Pike series
jl~: Oh, they should have gone on to do a sequel of course -- continue the saga.
Prometheus_Nova: but then that messes up the series to date so
master_q: However, it would have to be something different. I don't think another Voyager-like show would work....
jl~: The thing that was wrong with Voyager was again basically a writing flaw -- they committed the classic beginner's mistake of creating a "Hung Hero" -- a situation in which the driving force behind the plot (Janeway in this case) was incapable of doing anything about the basic plot-problem (being lost in space).
Prometheus_Nova: something about going back to the Delta quadrant to deal with the borg would have been good
jl~: They could only trek their way home, knowing it was hopeless and hoping for a miracle -- which they got.
Prometheus_Nova: just don't make it too voyager-ish
jl~: But again the series ended by them being rescued, not really by them solving their problem themselves. So it was unsatisfying.
Mrs.Picard: I agree
jl~: the real pity is that this flawed series concept was the one where they let a woman be Captain -- and the flaw is blamed on her being a woman not on the very shaky writing behind the concept.
Mrs.Picard: I like the idea of a woman in charge, of course, but I don't like how they did it with Janeway *thinks*
jl~: Is there anyone here interested in writing as a craft? Interested in the craft-decisions discussion of what went in behind the various Treks?
jl~: I guess we should drop that line of discussion then.
Prometheus_Nova: I'm curious how the writers decide on one set plot for a season
Prometheus_Nova: like they did with ent's s3
jl~: But that was part of what drew me to the original Trek -- that the writing was better than you ever saw on any other sf type show on TV.
Kor37: Seasons 1 & 2 certainly
jl~: Oh, how writers decide the overall direction for a season -- the envelope or story-arc for the season?
jl~: Well, someone earlier noted that Stargate SG1 was "off topic" in this room -- but here we are again. How they decide is by watching the competition.
jl~: They don't necessarily watch the shows the competition is putting on-- but they watch the ratings.
jl~: and when the ratings of another show soar over theirs, they go watch the show to see what they're doing -- and try to do the same or better.
jl~: So first came Dallas in prime time, doing a soap opera style story-arc.
Prometheus_Nova: so ent might try to take some sg-1 things this season ?
jl~: then came Babylon 5 doing a story arc in sf.
jl~: So from the beginning, gr's premise for Trek included that it had to be an anthology show, to be seen in any order.
jl~: As I mentioned earlier, I'm just now picking up 8 seasons of SG1 -- and seeing them in random order. That makes it very confusion and hard to get "into".
jl~: GR wanted to make his show accessible by creating a show that was a typical anthology show, like Bonanza.
jl~: remember Trek was originally sold as "Wagon train to the stars." -- And that's why you can't discuss Star Trek without discussing every other kind of TV show.
master_q: Well, the chat has taken off on its own. I won't mess with success. But I do want to ask you some general questions when we reach 1:00pm-MST // 4:00pm-EST.
darthhappy: well without story arcs...there wouldn't be a B5 as we know it
jl~: So they now decide story-arcs for a season the same way it's done on daytime soaps. More and more shows are using a stable of writers.
Kor37: That's a lot different from TOS where scripts came from everywhere
jl~: In particular take the Whedonverses -- Buffy/Angel for example. Like Gene Roddenberry, and Strazynskki (whose name I can't spell -- B5) Whedon masterminds the story-arc and takes a few shows pitched by his stable of writers. But very very few scripts come
jl~: from outside that stable of writers.
jl~: They create these shows -- Enterprise for example -- the same way they write sitcoms and ordinary comedy shows -- in a meeting where they pitch ideas and assign scripts.
Prometheus_Nova: Enterprise: "Friends" in space
jl~: Yes, Kor you got it. The anthology show with a generalized Bible can hire writers or take scripts over the transom. A story-arc show can't do that.
Kor37: Berman said that there would be less story arcs this season
jl~: We still have five minutes before the moderator takes over -- is there something else that interests you?
jl~: I sense a lot of sheer desperation behind the casting around for something to make Enterprise work. Frankly I'm glad (and this is the only Trek I can say that about) I'm not a writer on that show.
Kor37: Berman has hired some new writers, hasn't he?
jl~: I do not know what to do with Enterprise except maybe loose it in a vortex somewhere.
darthhappy: think as far as ent goes i would have more friction with the Romulans
jl~: I think I'd take it into an alternate dimension or maybe ahead in time -- that might work -- take Enterprise up ahead in time and let them try to adjust to a really advanced galaxy.
Indy: Do you think the addition of the Reeves-Stevenses will help?
MTZ: hi all
Kor37: Have they been hired on Enterprise?
Indy: I believe they have
jl~: Like I said, I don't think anything can "help" Enterprise because it's major flaw is that it's set before Star Trek tos
Kor37: Wow. I do enjoy their novels
Prometheus_Nova: after s1 of ent they should have just focused on creating a new future series
jl~: The real question is will they allow the creative changes the new writers will want to make. As writers, I'm sure they're aware of the fundamental error that has to be fixed.
jl~: Yes, Nova I agree with that -- the problem can't be fixed back in time.
jl~: The other commercial solution would be to withdraw the original series -- pull it all off the market and pretend it never existed.
Indy: I hope they don't do that
MTZ: ayi!
Prometheus_Nova: they could have just use the "reset button loophole" again and had none of s1 happen and things go back to the normal timeline starting from the first ep again as the finale
jl~: Marion Zimmer Bradley tried that with the foundation first novel in the Darkover Series, Sword of Aldones. She rewrote it in a totally new version, Sharra's Exile and went on pretending Sword of Aldones never happened.
Prometheus_Nova: then move on to a new series
jl~: Yes, Nova -- that's what it would take. Major drastic surgery.
master_q: Well, it is 4:00pmUS/ET.
jl~: Uh-oh, play time over.
jl~: Yes, Master -- to work.
Indy: lol
master_q: hehehe
________________________________________________________________________
master_q: Thanks so much for being here, Ms. Lichtenberg.
What is your "Star Trek Lives!" book about?jl~: Star Trek Lives! was originally conceived as a newspaper article.
jl~: When I found myself (already a professional sf author) writing and gleefully letting fanzines publish for free my ST fanfic, I knew I had a news story here.
jl~: Before Trek, sf fanzines on paper did not publish fiction. Only articles and letters but never real fiction.
jl~: Star Trek fans changed not only the world, but fandom too. And the existence of fanfic was news.
jl~: I knew that because I grew up in a news family.
jl~: So I decided I'd write a little newspaper article for our local paper.
jl~: So I needed to know the basics -- who what when where and how many -- that's the formula for a news article.
jl~: So I started a chain letter asking people who published fanzines to tell me all the fanzines they were reading and how many subscribers they had.
jl~: It got bigger and bigger and this chatroom won't let me put all-caps but bigger.
jl~: So eventually, I put out a questionnair to all the names and addresses of readers, writers, editors, and publishers of fanzines -- trying to find out why they like Star Trek.
Prometheus_Nova: thats mq's fault
jl~: In the midst of this the first ST con happened in nyc.
jl~: So I took my idea to Gene Roddenberry and he said sure make it a book, and when you sell it call me and I'll do an intro.
jl~: That took a few years, and how we sold that book to Bantam (it ended up with a 2 publisher auction) is a long story -- but once sold, I called him and he did the introduction.
jl~: More on that story can be found -- just a sec here
jl~: I can't get paste to work.
jl~: http://www.simegen.c...Connection.html
jl~: there -- that's where you can find the story of how Fred Pohl -- who had bought my first sf story sale -- bought stl! for Bantam.
master_q: How did that expand into such projects as the "Star Trek Welcommittee"? Could you tell us a little bit about it?
jl~: Welcommittee is a name coined by the N3F (National Fantasy Fan Federation) --
jl~: It means welcome committee in fanspeak (circa the 1940's/50's)
jl~: The N3F still exists -- and it was my own first introduction to fandom.
jl~: I had written a letter to one of the magazines world OF IF --
jl~: And that was my first published words on paper.
jl~: They published my letter!!! I was in 7th grade at the time.
Indy: wow
jl~: They published my letter lambasting them for terrible illustrations that had nothing to do with the story.
MTZ: lol
jl~: And dozens of people wrote me from all over the place and sponsored me to join the N3F and opened a whole world to me.
jl~: I've been an active fan ever since.
jl~: Well, then when I had a contract for Star Trek Lives -- I knew what kind of mail it would generate and I was already over my head in mail.
jl~: So I asked GR about founding the Welcommittee to answer the STL mail and he said sure, go ahead so I did.
jl~: At the next ST con, I dragged a couple friends together, and one of them introduced me to Shirley Maiewski.
jl~: She constructed the Welcommittee as you knew it -- under my direction but mostly it's her work.
jl~: she passed on recently -- and we now have a website dedicated to tributes to her.
jl~: If anyone wants to provide a tribute about what ST Welcommittee did for you -- you can send it to us.
jl~: Email simegen@simegen.com and I'll connect you to whoever is running that page.
master_q: You said you're a friend of Bjo Trimble [earlier in the "pre-chat"], correct? (For those that don't know, she started the letter campaign to save Star Trek.)
jl~: Yes, and we were discussing Bjo's handiwork in fandom earlier. It's vast and complex.
jl~: Bjo became famous in sf fandom long before Trek for running art shows.
jl~: She's really good at it.
jl~: I knew her reputation before the first letter campaign -- and wrote in to save Trek without ever having seen Trek.
jl~: Bjo is a grand lady and a wonderful person. A mutual friend, Joan Winston -- who is also a co-author on Star Trek Lives -- and author of some other Trek novels -- and one of the original ST committee people -- introduce me to Bjo and we visited her house in Los Angeles.
jl~: And I've been on panels and hung out with her at cons and so on.
jl~: As I said earlier, if Bjo hadn't known how to organize sf fandom to save ST we wouldn't have the 3rd season.
jl~: I wonder how many of you realize that there's an unwritten rule in TV land -- you have to have such and so many episodes before you can be in reruns or get syndicated reruns or exports.
Indy: yes
Alterego: Uh-huh.
spacetigger: ST barely made it..
jl~: Star Trek would not have had the requisite number without that very problematic 3rd season of Tos -- so Bjo is actually responsible for all the rest of the good stuff that came after -- there would be no films and no animated and no revival without her work
jl~: Also it marks a landmark in television -- where fans of a show cried out and were heard and responded to in the positive.
master_q: And you were involved in that campaign, correct?
jl~: No, actually I was not involved at that time. I was pregnant and not really able to do anything but watch the shows.
master_q: Oh, okay.
jl~: But after Trek was cancelled, that's when I got mobilized.
jl~: I was so incredibly outraged -- they had cancelled the world!!!! That was simply not acceptable.
jl~: So I wrote a short -- incredibly short -- piece for Spockanalia (the first ST paper fanzine) called Mr. Spock On Logic.
jl~: After that came Ruth Berman's T-Negative and it was just sitting there so skinny and small -- and I just had to write story for it, so I did, and it became Kraith.
jl~: My Kraith series became quite famous -- it's even featured with Jean's Night of the Twin Moons fanzine in the New York Times Book Review.
jl~: The stories were scattered over every single zine being published at that time.
jl~: And then other people began sending me Kraith stories (it's alternate universe TOS -- finishing the saga that had been truncated by cancellation)
jl~: There was so much Kraith around and it got so hard to get all the pieces that at a ST con some fans were sitting behind me (didn't know who I was) discussing that sad state of affairs and I turned around and said hello.
jl~: That was the genesis of Kraith Collected -- the first ST fan stories to be "collected" -- today all that material is posted online for free reading. http://www.simegen.com/fandom/startrek/kraith/
master_q: How would describe the huge fandom of Star Trek?
jl~: Oh, that's a very good question.
jl~: As I was saying earlier, you can't discuss Trek in a vacuum.
jl~: I was invited to teach some fanfic writers of the Whedonverses at a convention in Las Vegas a few weeks ago.
jl~: I was not at all amazed to discover that those fanfic writers are -- demographically and by personality, education, age, etc etc (all the factors covered in my Trek questionnaire that STL is based on) -- identical to the early Trek fans.
jl~: It is not amazing -- it is however very gratifying to find that I had indeed found something newsworthy all those years ago. This group of people is really the group that will eventually change the world.
jl~: Today you can post and read fanfic online for free (price of access anyway) and you can meet these people.
jl~: They are the leaders of tomorrow.
jl~: Oh, one more thing.
jl~: The fanfic writers of the Whedonverses - they write in many other universes. And they know Trek! It's not separate things - it's all one thing.
master_q: How do you compare (or can you) the fandom of Star Trek to those of those other franchises?
jl~: They really are the same type of people -- it's just the particular interest they are caught up in that's different. The differences though are between what we call "mundanes" and people who DO get caught up in fictional universes to the extent of wanting
jl~: to write fiction in them -- original fiction.
jl~: that's the key -- original.
jl~: The fans of all the sf TV shows are as a whole, more creative -- more imaginative -- living more in the imagination than others we call "mundanes" -- people who live in the "real" world.
jl~: There's a bumper sticker that says it all
jl~: Reality is just a crutch for people who can't understand Science Fiction
Indy: hehe
jl~: BTW I am definitely a fiawol person not a fijagdh person
jl~: I think that bias -- that there are realms more real than "Reality" -- realms of the mind that matter more than the 6 O'clock news -- is ultimately what makes the fans of the world rise to command positions.
jl~: Imagination is what signifies the ability to think in the abstract and that thinking ability (hypothesizing) is what distinguishes people from animals (and the people don't always have to be human)
master_q: You were featured in "Trekkies 2," which will be released on DVD this Tuesday. What was your role in it?
jl~: The Trekkies2 crew went around the world to Trek conventions interviewing fans of the show. They wrote to me asking if I'd come and do an interview -- but I wasn't scheduled to be at any of the cons they were at when they would be there.
jl~: So we negotiated and as it happened I was scheduled to be in LA on other business when they would be passing through on their way somewhere else.
jl~: So they mobilized their unit into a truck and came to my hotel (not a convention in progress, just me there) to do the interview.
jl~: We sat out on the patio with people gawking from inside the glass -- and did the interview -- over an hour.
jl~: I saw in a chair and they used one stationary camera, and the producer asked questions and the sound guy did what sound guys do, and the camera man was pleased.
jl~: And I talked and talked and talked -- I answered questions they way I'm answering them here -- only I had show-and-tell to point to.
jl~: Now the whole film will be about an hour and it has hundreds of people in it. The DVD will contain much more material compiled from their interviews.
jl~: I have no way of knowing at this point what I said that they'll excerpt. I kept asking them if they had enough or if they were getting what they wanted and they kept inventing new questions and being very pleased with the answers.
jl~: Joan Winston is also one of those listed on their website -- http://www.trekkies2.com (typed form memory) -- so she's going to be quoted too.
jl~: They have a few people listed at the top and a longer list underneath -- I suspect the ones in larger print (where my name is) probably got two sound bytes.
jl~: So I have ordered myself a copy and I am hoping they will be showing it at WorldCon. Odd timing it comes out the day before WorldCon starts.
jl~: But one of the things I did try to show them was the relationship between star Trek Lives! and my Sime~Gen novels.
jl~: It's kind of long and complicated.
jl~: www.simegen.com/reviews/rereadablebooks/trekcon.html
jl~: You can find more on the Star Trek Connection behind everything Sime~Gen at that URL
jl~: Here is the scoop in brief.
jl~: I used the same research I had done for star Trek Lives! based on fan reader responses to my Kraith Series to construct the first novel in the Sime~Gen Universe.
jl~: SI sold that first Sime~Gen novel in the expensive hardcover edition to 60 Star Trek fans who were fans of Spock -- and never had one returned.
jl~: The core of that novel, House of Zeor, is what I called in Star Trek Lives! The Spock Effect.
jl~: I sold it to 60 Spock fans on a money back guarantee and never had one returned.
jl~: In other words, it works.
jl~: Today, many more than 50 fans are writing Sime~Gen fanfic, posting it to the web, and having a ball. They role-play online, and do all kinds of things.
jl~: So Sime~Gen does indeed capture whatever quality it was that ST had that made people want to write ST fanfic.
jl~: I'm very pleased with the way that has turned out. I was as far as I know, the first writer to allow people, to encourage and train people, to write in my universe.
jl~: Jean Lorrah -- as I mentioned above -- came to me that way.
master_q [0/] AAS-Login:
master_q: I'm very sorry about that ----- my computer discontented from the Internet
jl~: She started out writing Sime~Gen fanfic (which we have posted for free reading) and now is my professional collaborator.
jl~: I hope you'll have the whole log somehow.
master_q: We do
jl~: www.simegen.com/sgfandom/rimonslibrary
jl~: That's where you can find Sime~Gen fanfic to check it out for yourself.
jl~: OK, is there another question?
jl~: Or put Sime~Gen into Google and see what you get.
master_q: Let's move on the next part of the chat. We'll have everyone take turns asking you a couple of questions. Does that sound good?
jl~: Sure.
master_q: Everyone will have the chance to take turns in asking our special guest some questions. I will send you a private chat message letting you know when it is your turn. **Please wait your turn**
master_q: And please disable any pop-up blockers you may have.
Alterego: jl, you spoke of the importance of imagination to distinguish people from the animals- so why can't imagination fix ENT? ... You got me thinking … As a fix for ENT: Everything so far could be said to have happened in the Mirror universe. That arc ends by revealing that fact and setting up the MU to represent things there as shown in Mirror Mirror. We then see our good old timeline again (for the first time) complete with no continuity errors and move on.
jl~: Oh, before I forget -- my homepage is www.simegen.com/jl/
jl~: and you can find free chapters of my currently in print (and some forthcoming) novels posted online too.
jl~: http://www.simegen.com/jl/kren/
jl~: http://www.simegen.com/writers/luren/
jl~: Both those URLs are for series of novels -- both series are set in a galactic civilization with lots of aliens you get to know up close and personal.
jl~: Alterego -- yes indeed if only they would think like that, they could indeed fix it. But notice that thinking like that would mean doing violence to the ego of the persons’ who came up with the prequel idea to begin with.
jl~: The reasons television is such a mess when it comes to fiction structure is that it's "art by committee" -- and the decisions (as someone asked before) the decisions about what story-arc to pursue are more political than artistic.
jl~: Gene Roddenberry and Joss Whedon and so on -- these successful people are successful not because they're great writers but because they're great politicians.
jl~: So selling your (admittedly brilliant) idea to them would be an exercise in sidestepping an ego-based fight.
jl~: Your idea would repudiate the original concept -- tacitly admitting the error inside it.
jl~: How much would the career of that person then be worth -- remembering that the people who pay for these shows don't watch them and don't like them! They only look at the numbers coming in -- money, ratings, etc.
jl~: So, yes, I like your idea -- but I wouldn't know how to sell it. However, it would let Enterprise skip up-when far enough to gain a look we could stand to see and go on with a story-line that makes sense.
Alterego: Thank you.
Kor37: How would you compare the conventions of today to those original ones?
jl~: I think there's more commercial exploitation at today's cons.
jl~: Look at the dealers around Shore Leave for example.
Kor37: agreed
jl~: Mostly they're selling "junk" -- commercial souvenir items.
jl~: When that con started, there were tables and tables and tables full of fanzines. (on paper)
Kor37: I remember them well
jl~: Today, you see more and more junk -- and an array of T-shirts that have nothing to do with TV shows.
Kor37: and the guest stars were much more accessible
jl~: In other words, to make the rent the con has to pander to commercial interests.
jl~: Likewise the original Shore Leave had as a policy no actor-guests.
jl~: That meant you didn't draw the trekkies, but just the trekkers. I liked that ambience better -- but the con couldn't survive financially without the bigger draw.
Kor37: Has Shore Leave sold out becoming "licensed" by Paramount?
jl~: The stars could be more accessible because there were no trekkies around to speak of.
jl~: Well, no, I'd say it's better to have a con and allow some commercialism than to have no con at all. And that's what costs do to you if you're trying to run a con.
jl~: Which brings us to another fandom trends topic.
jl~: Cons are getting smaller. The internet has sucked the desperate urgency out of fans.
jl~: what urgency you jaded folk ask?
jl~: Way back in the beginning, most fans lived isolated among people who never read sf books -- the most heard comment at the end of a con was that the people couldn't wait for the next con when they'd have another chance at "intelligent conversation".
jl~: That's the main characteristic that distinguishes fans -- a high verbal skill level and something to say - thoughts that need expressing, that can be honed and fertilized by bouncing them off other intelligent and imaginative minds.
MTZ: Research. You did lots. Today writers, and producers seem to skip it. Any idea why?
jl~: Costs -- and the belief (supported by the profits made by rival shows) that it doesn't matter because the fans don't matter.
jl~: It's basically contempt for the fan mind!
jl~: Fans are too few in number (by percentage of total viewership or readership) to matter to the bottom line.
jl~: That's the perception anyway -- I was beginning to think they'd out-grown that but I've heard the new generation of people in the business spouting the same nonsense.
jl~: I believe online fandom will eventually teach them otherwise.
MTZ: sigh, just give 'em wordwooze
jl~: Look at how the internet is changing Presidential campaigning.
jl~: 4 years ago the internet was a phenomenon but not an influence. Today it's seen as an influence -- especially at raising money.
jl~: Don't forget the one way to solve a mystery that always works -- "follow the money"
jl~: It's expensive to do the research, and even more expensive to follow the advice the research recommends.
jl~: It's all about money.
jl~: I think we're going to see fanfic grow up into the highest quality fiction available anywhere.
jl~: The e-book is one of the most important developments, too.
jl~: It's not happening yet -- it's a long long way. But it's coming.
Jeanway: Obviously you are having Great success with your writing. How long did it take you to gain acceptance and also how do you deal with the Critics?? Thank you for coming.
jl~: Critics are great -- you learn more from a good critic than ever you can from a fan.
jl~: I don't think I've ever "gained acceptance" -- though I had an experience a few weeks ago at Westercon that may make me rethink that.
jl~: I was leaving a panel discussion room when a man came in the doors while everyone was going out -- like a salmon racing upstream.
jl~: He introduced himself to me as the Sales Rep for one of the distributors -- he was My Sales Representative.
jl~: That is the first time I ever met one of those kind of folks.
jl~: We stood (Jean Lorrah and I) in the hall and talked to him (pumped actually) for about an hour or more.
jl~: I learned a lot about the business of selling books to bookstores.
jl~: But the most stunning thing I learned -- I asked how much trouble he was having getting stores to take my novels (Those of My Blood and Dreamspy -- the Luren novels) and he said none at all.
jl~: He said my books were easy to place because of my reputation.
MTZ: yay!
Jeanway: So your TOO prolific??
jl~: Well, it's true that a lot of Sime~Gen fans are librarians, bookstore owners (though that's a dying breed) and bookstore managers.
Jeanway: Great minds
jl~: And I think that's the reputation he's talking about --
jl~: Apparently people do talk about me.
jl~: But how that has happened -- well, as you've all no doubt noticed I have a big mouth. I just keep talking.
Jeanway: Me too
jl~: And I come up with some ideas that others have to talk about. Sime~Gen is one -- it's now being reprinted in omnibus format from Meisha Merlin (real prestige there)
jl~: House of Zeor, that first Sime~Gen novel I've been talking about as written from the research for Star Trek Lives! is in the omnibus Sime~Gen: The Unity Trilogy.
Jeanway: Are any of your books on tape yet??
jl~: The other research I've done that is bearing fruit is into the depths of Star Trek fanfic.
jl~: I scoured the world and read and read every Trek zine I could get my hands on and analyzed and analyzed for years.
jl~: And I came up (after Star Trek Lives! which analyzes Star Trek itself for why people like the show) I came up with a theory about what it is that fans do when they transform a show into fanfic.
jl~: I decided that what we're looking at here in fanfic is the genesis of a new Genre -- a hidden genre.
Jeanway: Thank you
jl~: I looked for the distinguishing characteristics of that genre in fanfic -- found the formula, and went to pro-fic and found hidden inside a lot of books in a lot of genres -- that same hidden genre.
jl~: Fanfic revolutionized pro-fic -- and if you dig a little very often behind a pro byline you find a closet fanfic writer.
Jeanway: Some people confuse this with Simming, have you noticed that?
jl~: Anyway, I named that hidden genre Intimate Adventure.
jl~: I was quoted about it in Publisher's Weekly and that made it official.
jl~: I've written my review column based on it for well over 10 years (the current column is 10 years long, but I've been reviewing longer)
jl~: www.simegen.com/jl/intimateadventure.html
jl~: That will give you both a feminist version of the defining article and an sf version.
jl~: If you're interested in the relationship between profic and fanfic -- read that article.
jl~: Now, I see a couple comments, let me read.
Jeanway: Could we use that term in here "Intimate Adventure"????
drwho42: What is your opinion upon the direction of today's science-fiction literature is heading, compared with that from earlier decades?
jl~: No, I don't have any books on tape except from the Library of Congress division for the Blind and Handicapped and they may have pulled those years ago.
jl~: However, there is an online organization that is recording for free streaming MP3 distribution some of my vampire short stories.
jl~: Yes, the Intimate Adventure term is public domain now -- I gave it away in Publisher's Weekly.
jl~: I don't know what Simming is.
jl~: A Doctor! I've been a woven for decades --
drwho42:
jl~: Direction of narrative sf -- welllllll --
drwho42: Grand
jl~: It isn't so much the direction of the content of sf -- it's more a problem in publishing in general.
jl~: It's still melting down -- what I call the Fiction Delivery System.
jl~: Remember when Hilary Clinton was running hearings to change the way the HealthCare Delivery System worked?
jl~: Well, at that point I stood up and yelled that fiction is just as much a necessity of life as health care and it's delivery system was even more broken.
jl~: I see online fanfic as helping to fix the broken fiction delivery system.
jl~: But ultimately it's all the bottom line -- money $$$$$ -- that's all.
jl~: As we noted above fiction deliver on tv is hampered by how much it costs to do a show.
jl~: That brings hesitation -- art by committee -- people who don't read passing judgment on what story line the arc will follow this season.
jl~: If you aren't reading novels, how can you know what to put on TV?
jl~: But just like secretaries deciding what medical procedure you can or can't have -- we have non-readers deciding what books you may or may not choose from.
jl~: Our fiction delivery system is broken.
jl~: And in the face of that - what writers want to write isn't getting out to you to where you can choose to buy it.
jl~: The entire system from the editor on to the Sales Rep I was telling you about (I think there are at least 8 stages between those two) the entire process of taking fiction from my mind to your mind is just plain not working.
jl~: So if you go onto Amazon for something to read, and poke around (Amazon is another wonderful piece that may fix this broken system) -- you won't get to choose from the best books written just for you.
jl~: And that's all because of the expense -- and because publishing has changed as a business.
jl~: I teach the business of writing to new writers and fanfic writers -- and they don't believe me.
jl~: Is there another question?
Deanna_Troi_Fan_Lizzy: Does Marina Sirtis live in LA, California?
jl~: I don't know where she is at the moment -- very possibly she's moved.
jl~: One thing I forgot to mention when we were talking about Shore Leave -- which is where I saw her last.
Deanna_Troi_Fan_Lizzy: Do you know where she lives now?
jl~: No, I don't know where she lives now, but that usually doesn't matter with someone as hard working as she is. She's probably on the road.
Deanna_Troi_Fan_Lizzy: Shore Leave is in LA, right?
jl~: Shore Leave is the ST con by fans for fans (well it used to be) in Maryland.
Deanna_Troi_Fan_Lizzy: I never have been to a convention
jl~: Kraith won me the Surak Award at a Shore Leave one time -- the first Memory Alpha award.
Indy: Cool
Kor37: Congrats
Indy: congrats
jl~: I think of all the honors I've been given that one stands head and shoulders above the rest because it was for fanfic.
drwho42: Congratulations :thumbs
master_q: That's great!
Indy: It's always nice to have your work recognized.
