Heinlein Reader’s Discussion Group
Saturday 1-26-2002 5:00 P.M. EST
The Evolution Of Presentation
Here Begins The Discussion Log
You have just entered room “Heinlein Readers Group chat.”
DennnEditor: Hello.
DennnEditor: You are early, too.
SAcademy: Okay. Was the topic posted? I missed it in that case.
SAcademy: Hi, Denis.
DennnEditor: Yes. But I have no idea what it means.
SAcademy: Wold you mind using boldface? I have trouble reading that light font.
DennnEditor: Is this better?
Paradis402: Hi Ginny, Hi DennE.. the topic is fluid I think.
SAcademy: A lot, thanks.
DennnEditor:
ddavitt has entered the room.
SAcademy: What fluid? Alcohol?
ddavitt: Hi everyone.
SAcademy: Hello, Jane.
ddavitt: Is that you twice Denis?
Paradis402: No it has to do with changes in reading books, evolution of eBooks, tapes and so on.
DennnEditor: *sigh*
ddavitt: oops, sorry Bill; thought it might have been a log alter ego as Dave Wright does.
SAcademy: We have a Denis P. and a B. Dennis. Confusing.
ddavitt: Isn’t it 🙂
DennnEditor: I just couldn’t get AOL to give me a screen name with “Bill” and “Dennis” in it.
SAcademy: Jane have you seen those smileys that move?
DennnEditor: Although I could have used my old “Libertarian Bill” screen name.
ddavitt: I know; I keep getting stopped by the fact that I signed onto things years ago and now have a new email. It keeps saying my name is taken; it is – by me.
DennnEditor: … but I’m not confortable with that.
ddavitt: Not yet Ginny; any luck with them?
Paradis402: Not confusing is it Bill? You have one more than I do. And probably nicer too.
DennnEditor: probably
SAcademy: Downloaded them, but can’t get them into a useful condition yet.
ddavitt: Shame.
ddavitt: Sound like fun
DennnEditor: animated smilies? LOL
ddavitt: brb; have to get food out of the oven.
SAcademy: It really is. Thought I’d surprise people with them
Paradis402: AOL says on their welcome page you can send somebody a thumping heart for Valentines. Give me a break!
SAcademy: You mean you won’t send me one?
DennnEditor: Which is one reason I am not using AOL. Besides the fact that my ISP lets me use high speed cable modem.
Paradis402: Of course! Both of them.
ddavitt: Hold out for roses Ginny; less gruesome.
Paradis402: She prefers orchids. 🙂
DennnEditor: reminds me of “The Telltale Heart” ….
Paradis402: Poe? Right.
DennnEditor: (is that the correct title? I last read it in grade school)
SAcademy: Actually green orchids
ddavitt: I got an orchid from David once valentine’s; a live one in a pot about 2 foot tall that his friend had grown form seed or whatever they grow from
Paradis402: Did you ever grow those? The green ones, Ginny.
DennnEditor: Anyone ever notice how the theme from “Jaws” is like a beating heart?
Paradis402: Yes.
SAcademy: Yes, I have a plant now. Got it for Christmas. Cymbidiumx
ddavitt: Flowered several times but we had to leave it behind Phallinopsis (sp?)
SAcademy: Scratch that x should be an s.
DennnEditor: People who hate plants send them to me. I kill them all.
Paradis402: Ginny is also our plant expert.
SAcademy: Phalaenopsis.
ddavitt: I have none now; as Ginny knows my cats and lauren kept eating ’em and turned out they were poisonous so I got rid of them
KultsiKN has entered the room.
DennnEditor: Hello!
KultsiKN: Hello, everybody!
ddavitt: That sounds right Ginny, thanks.
ddavitt: Hi Kultsi
Paradis402: Hi Kultsi!
SAcademy: Hi Kultsi. Greetings.
DennnEditor: I am going to have to set up a profile so eveyrone will know who I am …
DennnEditor:
ddavitt: Good news; Robert Crais will be a guest
ddavitt: Possibly the next chat
DennnEditor: Oh, good. The name is familiar, but I can’t recall what he has written
ddavitt: Any of you read him? I enjoyed his books a lot
SAcademy: Has Spider been scheduled yet?
Paradis402: Oh Jane. You and your hunks!
ddavitt: P.I stuff with a detective called Elvis Cole
ddavitt: He is cute:-)
DennnEditor:P. White write some more Sherlock Holmes stories?
ddavitt: Where did you finsih on Thursday after I left?
Paradis402: We were on Mars.
DennnEditor: In one, he had a poisonous snake crawling down a rope. That can’t do that apparently.
ddavitt: Lots of people have Ginny…don’t know about AP
SAcademy: I think under the name of H. H. Holmes.
ddavitt: Oh..but wasnt that a murderer’s name?
SAcademy: He had several pseudonyms going.
ddavitt: Rocket to the Morgue may have been under that name originally
DennnEditor: Nicholas Meyer wrote a couple … 7 percent solution and another one, I believe
ddavitt: It is a huge genre
ddavitt: I like the ones about Irene Adler
ddavitt: And of course, the laurie King ones
ddavitt: Beekeeper’s Apprentice and the sequels
DennnEditor: Phil Farmer wrote on that had Holmes and Watson meeting young Tarzan.
ddavitt: Conan Doyle would have been intrigued
Paradis402: That must have been a stretch for Tarzan!
DennnEditor: Of course, PJFarmer started whole sub-genre in which Tarzam, Holmes and other pulp heres are all related
ddavitt: And there are the Jane Austen myseteries; with her solving crimes.
SAcademy: Did anyone start a log?
ddavitt: I can save it all from where I came in
ddavitt: Dave Wright won’t be here
ddavitt: So he asked if we could send it to him
Paradis402: I have it in HTML format from the start.
DennnEditor: I don’t think anything all THAT important has been said.
ddavitt: Did it work OK on Thursday Denis?
SAcademy: I think Bill is relaxing he had an eye exam this morning, and can’t see probably.
ddavitt: No, and I can’t stay for the whole time so let’s start then
Paradis402: I sent it to him. But no reply yet. It worked the last time I sent it that way.
ddavitt: If he had those drops, no probably can’t
ddavitt: OK, we were looking at Heinlein books in the future and the past; different ways of presenting them and which work best
SAcademy: He expected to have those drops.
DennnEditor: Speaking of chatroom logs, I listened in on a World Church of the Creator chat room on Thursday. This is that racist group that is growing in popularity.
ddavitt: I grudgingly was persuaded that e-books are handy on space flights to save weight
Paradis402: How did all that go?
SAcademy: Ever attend a Holy Rollers meeting?
ddavitt: We had a Watchtower seller round today…
DennnEditor: Yes! My grandfather was a Holy Roller minister.
DennnEditor: I was a little kid and it scared the Hell out of me.
SAcademy: Really?
DennnEditor: He just did it to raise money. He also was a moonshiner
SAcademy: Great combination.
DennnEditor: He got out of both rackets and went to work elsewhere.
ddavitt: Water into wine…
SAcademy: Didn’t the moonshine pay well?
DennnEditor: He thought it was dishonest. The preaching, that is.
ddavitt: Obviously no conflict of interests
Paradis402: Did you want to see if that Church was another version of Scientology, Bill?
DennnEditor: Well, it paid well, but he faced competition from folks who do not tolerate competition, if you catch my drift.
DennnEditor: World Church of the Creator?
Paradis402: Yes.
DennnEditor: No, not scientologists. It is a white supremacist organization
Paradis402: Ooo>:o
DennnEditor: It is based in East Peoria, very close to where I live in Peoria.
SAcademy: Robert knew L. Ron Hubbard.
DennnEditor: My paper is stepping up coverage of them
ddavitt: Why? isn’t that giving them publicity?
SAcademy: He was always going to borrow an airplane and come to see us, but he never made it.
DennnEditor: They get publicity anyway.
Paradis402: They impounded it, Ginny.
DennnEditor: Believe me, it is a myth that media ignoring these people make them go away.
DennnEditor: It is wishful thinking.
ddavitt: Isn’t it hard to write about them objectively?
SAcademy: Well, I never met him. He was a really colorful character.
DennnEditor: “Objective,” in newspapering doesn’t mean “don’t have an opinion.”
ddavitt: We have a current story; local woman charged with assault for breaking up a same sex wedding and haranguing the congregation.
DennnEditor: It means sticking to known facts and giving all a change to comment.
DennnEditor: a chance to comment, I mean
ddavitt: Paper is doing a fair job of printing views from both side but obvious that they are against her.
DennnEditor: … and there are papers in which it would be obvious they are FOR her.
DennnEditor: It depends on publication and reporter.
DennnEditor: … a good editor would weed that out.
ddavitt: Canadians are pretty tolerant about people making up their own minds
ddavitt: Someone spoiling a wedding wouldn’t get much sympathy
DennnEditor: nope.
ddavitt: Anyway…
DennnEditor: remember that minister who picketed the funeral of that gay hate crime victim?
DennnEditor: Even Jerry Falwall had to distance himself
ddavitt: No, sounds awful thing to do tho
ddavitt: Even jerry huh?
DennnEditor:
DennnEditor: real books
Paradis402: I still buy only books. Falwell and Swaggart and Panshin in a boat.
ddavitt: This is a good chance to read it without it costing me anything
SAcademy: Well, Bill unearthed a letter from Robert to L. S. deCamp and it tells the real facts about Panshin and HID
DennnEditor: really? LOL
DennnEditor: What does it say?
ddavitt: Is that what Jim G meant when he told Panshin he was going to expose him?
SAcademy: I gave permission to put it online. Gidfford is going to do that.
ddavitt: Ah, must have been.
Paradis402: We will have to wait until Bill publishes that Biog.
KultsiKN: This is going to be fun.
ddavitt: Ginny, do you think Mr Heinlein would have used the new tech and let his books be published for palm Pilots and such?
SAcademy: It sure will be for our side.
ddavitt: You were both into computers from the start after all.
DennnEditor: I tried … I mean really tried … to read Panshin’s site. But it is all so ephemeral. He writes like a college English teacher trying to impress his doctoral committee. It sounds authorative, but it never gets to a point that can
SAcademy: Is that something you want?
DennnEditor: be proved or disproved
DennnEditor: authoratative
ddavitt: I don’t but I think as Sf writer maybe it would have been logical. Still printed as a book but also downloadable
DennnEditor: d’oh
SAcademy: There are now two books with one online publisher, and one with Stealth. That’s a print volume and a very tpretty one
ddavitt: Is it selling better from print or online?
Paradis402: I don’t want eBooks, soft books or a computer screen on the ceiling of my bedroom. And NO Panshin for me.
SAcademy: Haven’t had royalty reports yet.
ddavitt: I don’t want to be a Luddite..but I love books and the older the better
ddavitt: Though a new book is very nice too; being the first to read it is a special feeling
DennnEditor: Theoretically, publishiing online for a fee is a way to bypass book publishers, who act as middle men. More of sales go to the writer.
Paradis402: Really?
ddavitt: But wondering who else read one that’s over a hundred years old is fascinating
KultsiKN: I do a lot of reading on computer, but I don’t really like it.
SAcademy: Books will continue to be around, Jane.
DennnEditor: But I suspect that publishes play a more important role in promoting a book than most people realize
ddavitt: It should be cheaper I suppose as less overheads
ddavitt: And it does save paper
DennnEditor: I also love the smell and feel of books.
DennnEditor: Jane, paper is a renewable resource
ddavitt: Which, as I keep telling Eleanor, doesn’t grow on trees
DennnEditor: boo
SAcademy: Remember, Neil’s Pulpless books failed.
ddavitt: Only if people repalnt
ddavitt: replant
DennnEditor: I hate bad puns that I didn’t use first
ddavitt: Was he ahead of his time?
ddavitt: Need more people with the ability to download to portable readers
DennnEditor: If I didn’t have to go to bookstores, I would never leave the house
ddavitt: You just can’t read on a static computer all the time.
ddavitt: That’s why i couldn’t watch a DVD on a computer
DennnEditor: … and besides, I love sipping overpriced coffee and eating muffins at the B&N.
ddavitt: Want a comfy sofa, company, not squahed up against the screen
ddavitt: My spelling is wild tonight
ddavitt: I meant squashed
SAcademy: The scroll on this machine jams every so often.
ddavitt: I want to get locked in a book store…one with a coffee shop in it and those nice chairs
Paradis402: Kultsi, do you like eBooks?
SAcademy: Heinlein books anyway.
KultsiKN: Never tried, but as I said I read a _lot_ on PC.
SAcademy: AD.
KultsiKN: And don’t like it very much.
DennnEditor:
ddavitt: Someone said it’s harder to process the words on a screen?
DennnEditor: It depends on the contrast/layout/other distractions.
ddavitt: It just wouldn’t feel as if I owned it if it was a file on my computer instead of a volume on my shelves
KultsiKN: I think there is something to that. I utterly dislike the man pages on *nix systems.
ddavitt: Where is the aesthetic pleasure?
ddavitt: Suppose your computer crashed?
DennnEditor: Right. every book I buy and read is placed on a shelf for visitors to see. It shows how well-read I am.
DennnEditor: Correct Jane.
DennnEditor: I lost HUNDREDS of books in a flood.
ddavitt: The library is the first room as you come in. people stop and say, “oh, what a lot of books. Have you read them all?”
DennnEditor: most of my PJFarmer, ERBurroughs.
ddavitt: I am running out of polite replies
ddavitt: That is a tragedy
ddavitt: I dread that or a fire
SAcademy: We gave away aabout 10,000 books when we left Bonny Doon.
ddavitt: Let me know if you have a wants list and I’ll keep an eye out for you
DennnEditor: I could never give away books. I am always rereading them
ddavitt: Fiction or non fiction Ginny?
Paradis402: I’ve put 10 tons of my scientific stuff on Disk but I like my Heinlein to be real and in my hands.
SAcademy: Both Jane.
ddavitt: Non fiction is good online because it is searchable which would be handy
ddavitt: That must have hurt…
DennnEditor: No wants list. I just haunt Peoria’s six or seven used book stores.
ddavitt: Well, if you ever get down to one you can’t find let me know
DennnEditor: It gets worse … I lost all my *comic books* …
SAcademy: An encyclopedia of Magic, and my treasured book f Scandinavian design.
ddavitt: Try the charity shops; I get lots from there
ddavitt: Like in NOTB…
ddavitt: Just no room for hem Ginny?
ddavitt: them
SAcademy: I can’t read anymore so it shouldn’t matter.
DennnEditor: charity shops usually have only Old readers Digest condensed fiction.
ddavitt: You can still hold them
SAcademy: That’s right.
ddavitt: Heh…you have a poor class of thrift shops then
DennnEditor: Books also make great soundproofing when up an a bookshelf.
ddavitt: I got a first edition Elsie Oxenham once…
ddavitt: What a find.
SAcademy: Who is she?
DennnEditor: … of Peorians tend to snap up all the good books. (This must be true because I can rarely find Heinlein stuff … 😉
ddavitt: (very collectable childrens author)
ddavitt: Wrote in 1920’s 30’s
DennnEditor: “or Peorians tend … ”
DennnEditor: silly typos
ddavitt: Lots of camp fire books, school stories. Most famous were the Abbey Girls stories
SAcademy: What was it Peanuts said “silly jumpropes?
DennnEditor: I once found a dollar bill in a used book … it was being used as a bookmark, apparently.
DennnEditor: Probably Mrs. H.
ddavitt: Showed proper respect for the book
ddavitt: My bugbear is people writing in them
DennnEditor: It showed that it pays to read.
ddavitt: Once, they wrote (in ink) ‘This is the murderer!!” next to a name of a character.
DennnEditor: grrrr
Paradis402: 😀
SAcademy: You must have encountered some uninteresting marginal notes!
DennnEditor: … a case for justifiable homicide, IMHO
ddavitt: And the people who take it upon themselves to correct grammar ( invairiably wrong themselves) should be sent somewhere…special.
KultsiKN: Critics’ lounge?
ddavitt: That’ll do nicely:-)
SAcademy: Guess I’m exempt–I majored in chemistry.
ddavitt: You’re safe then
SAcademy: Thank you.
ddavitt: Well, I can’t think of more to say on the topic
DennnEditor: Used books are great when you want a complete collection and a book is out of print.
ddavitt: So I may go and eat
ddavitt: Yes; and now I can see all the ones online that I can’t afford to buy
ddavitt: But one day…
DennnEditor: I am still looking for a copy of “Rocketship Galileo (sp?)
ddavitt: I have got some that I never thought I would ever own
DennnEditor: copy
ddavitt: First ed?
Paradis402: OT, Jane do you want me to send you an e-copy of the log too?
DennnEditor: no, no. paperback would be fine.
DennnEditor: I found “Space Cadet” several months ago … which I had never read before.
ddavitt: No, I’ll read it on Dave’s page, no need to bother. Thanks anyway.
SAcademy: Have you tried eBaY?
DennnEditor: It was great! New Heinlein mamerial!
ddavitt: Oh well I’ll watch out for it
ddavitt: Or the Heinlein bookswap page; is that still going?
ddavitt: Don ran that
Paradis402: What is mammerial. Freudian?
SAcademy: You just want a reading copy?
ddavitt: But he hasn’t been around for months
DennnEditor: I think I have. I may give it a try. I still haven’t given up on finding it used, though.
DennnEditor: God, I am soooo cheap.
ddavitt: Is it on Amazon? Is it in print?
DennnEditor: Well, I want one what will look OK on my shelf. I’ll probably breat down and order a copy somewhere.
ddavitt: If so, they list used copies too
DennnEditor: break
ddavitt: And the prices
ddavitt: david is saying it’s time to eat so I will vanish; see you all soon.
DennnEditor: I find the idea of fighting Nazis on the Moon to be priceless.
ddavitt: Hope you can make it for the Crais chat
ddavitt: Night.
DennnEditor: I am going to leave too.
ddavitt has left the room.
SAcademy: Bye Jane
DennnEditor: I’ll stop back in later see if anyone else has come in.
DennnEditor: talk to you all at a later date.
SAcademy: Bye now.
Paradis402: What’s up, Kultsi?
DennnEditor has left the room.
SAcademy: Good that people leave when they say they will. I hate people who stand in the doorway talking.
Paradis402: I agree.
KultsiKN: Nothing special, really — trying to survive the winter 🙂
SAcademy: Snowy always tries to escape.
SAcademy: Is it a bad winter, Kultsi?
Paradis402: He is a snow Cat.
KultsiKN: Going up and down like a yo-yo, not very nice.
KultsiKN: One day rain, next day snow with wind.
SAcademy: A lot of snow?
SAcademy: Buffalo really got it this year!
KultsiKN: Very little here; more ice.
SAcademy: Several feet of snow!
KultsiKN: Our weather is mostly — moderate.
SAcademy: That might be good for skating, but I was a hothouse flower.
SAcademy: Liked indoor ice.
SAcademy: Funny, I would have thought it would be a continental climate. More like Buffalo.
SAcademy: Helsinki is pretty far north.
KultsiKN: More to the East it is.
KultsiKN: I mean like Moscow.
SAcademy: I see, the water nearby tempers the weather.
Paradis402: Like Vancouver?
SAcademy: Moscow must be horrid in winter!
SAcademy: The San Juan Islands.
KultsiKN: Is there a time when it isn’t?
SAcademy: No, you’re right about that. Ever go there?
KultsiKN: Just passing through once.
SAcademy: The San Juans are what they call a “banana belt”
Paradis402: Where are they, Ginny?
SAcademy: We nearly froze on May Day.
SAcademy: Straits of Juan de Fuca.
Paradis402: :'(
SAcademy: The Canadian and American islands between the mainland and Vancouver.
Paradis402: Thanks. I’m going brain dead or Alzie.
SAcademy: Alzheimers is no laughing mattteer.
Paradis402: So Spider switched oceans.
KultsiKN: Oh, that’s no biggie; once diagnosed you can go home and forget all about it…
SAcademy: Yes, he did. Nova Scotia is far worse in climate!
Paradis402: Yes/ I just need more RAM Kultsi. Maybe more Disk space.
SAcademy: What about the manic phases, Kultsi?
KultsiKN: Well, actually, they are not nice at all, the diseases, that is.
SAcademy: A friend of mine just found out his mother had it. She was manic for days.
KultsiKN: It’s a terrible strain on all close by, just to watch someone fading away.
SAcademy: Yes. I see it all the time here.
SAcademy: Fon’t let anyone ever tell you that a “retirement community” is a good place to live.
SAcademy: Don’t
SAcademy: It’s very depressing to see.
KultsiKN: I can imagine.
SAcademy: I wish I had thought of that before I came here.
SAcademy: It’s only my friends outside who keep my spirits up.
SAcademy: That and work.
Paradis402: Ginny, it’s everywhere. You have to focus on the beautiful like your little white lion.
SAcademy: He’s part of my young friends outside!
Paradis402: Indeed. He is.
SAcademy: Thank you Denis. I guess it’s time I quit for the day.
Paradis402: I guess no one else will show. Maybe we should close and send the log to David.
KultsiKN: Yeah, me too! Must wake up early.
Paradis402: Nice talking to you Kultsi.
SAcademy: What time is it there Kultsi?
KultsiKN: Nice talking to you, too!
KultsiKN: Quarter past one, AM.
SAcademy: Ouch. Get some sleep!
SAcademy: Bye all.
SAcademy has left the room.
Paradis402: Bye Ginny.
KultsiKN: I’ll do. Bye.
Paradis402: Bye Kultsi
KultsiKN: Bye, take care.
KultsiKN has left the room.
Final End Of Discussion Log
