Star Wars: Rogue One – The Facade Cracks

Star Wars: Rogue One – The Facade Cracks

Image courtesy of Douglas Cootey [Insert standard disclaimer about it being poor form to say "I told you so", but...] Regular readers may remember how I warned Hollywood that moviegoers can only stomach so much cynical propaganda disguised as entertainment before a backlash sets in. The main impetus for that…
November 15, 2016

On Science Fiction and the Business of a Revolution

The following post has been assembled from my comments in a recent discussion on Google+. Superversive vs. Subversive is symptomatic. Indie vs. Big Five is definitive. The social aspect of the battle for SFF's soul has been pretty well covered by others. I'll address the business angle, which is the…
October 4, 20167 Comments
The Dragon Awards: CHORFs Double Down

The Dragon Awards: CHORFs Double Down

Predictably, the self-styled masters of SF fandom have learned nothing from the last time they gave my fans a reason to mobilize. Here, a butthurt CHORF attempts to DISQUALIFY! Souldancer's Dragon Award win by citing Amazon review numbers as evidence that the winner of a populist award isn't popular. Tip…
September 6, 201617 Comments
There Will Be No SFF Reconciliation

There Will Be No SFF Reconciliation

Only replacement of the intellectually, morally--and often physically--sick post-Campbellian fans, editors, and publishers who came to dominate the field in the 1970s. The SFF "Field" Baen author Brad R. Torgersen relates his experiences with the SJW monoculture in SFF: The mandarins of SF/F expend a lot of energy wrapping themselves…
August 29, 20168 Comments
io9 Reports on the Dragon Awards. Misses the Point

io9 Reports on the Dragon Awards. Misses the Point

Gawker Media-owned science fiction blog io9 weighed in on Dragon Con's announcement of the finalists for their inaugural Dragon Awards. As anyone who's been following the controversy over the Hugo Awards will have come to expect, io9 completely missed the point. You don't really need to look any further than the…
August 15, 201624 Comments
Breitbart Reports on My Shadowban

Breitbart Reports on My Shadowban

Breitbart's Allum Bokhari reports on Twitter's ongoing shadowban of my account: There have been widespread reports that Brian Niemeier, a Hugo Award-nominated sci-fi author, has been “shadowbanned” on Twitter, with his tweets no longer appearing in peoples’ notifications or feeds. According to Niemeier, his followers are reporting that “they aren’t…
August 3, 20163 Comments
Unpersoned by Twitter’s Deep Shadowban

Unpersoned by Twitter’s Deep Shadowban

Having written before about Twitter's nasty penchant for censoring and outright banning users who deviate from the company's rigid left wing ideology, I fully expected the Twitter thought police to come for me. Milo Yiannopoulos warned as much. I just didn't expect them this soon. Late Friday afternoon: friends on…
August 1, 201624 Comments
Over the Target

Over the Target

Denizens of Reddit's deepest bowels have taken umbrage at my observation that Hollywood is now a propaganda machine. You heard it here first ladies: your existence in popular media is propaganda. Even though TFA became one of the highest grossing movies of all time and was pretty much universally well-liked,…
July 26, 2016
When Is a Movie Not a Movie?

When Is a Movie Not a Movie?

When it's a cynical propagandistic cash grab. Actually, we can scratch the last part now that Ghostbusters 2016 has failed to beat the opening weekend domestic box office take of Ghostbusters II. Here are the numbers Ghostbusters II: $29,472,894 (June 16, 1989) Ghostbusters: $46,000,000 (July 17, 2016) At first glance I seem to have…
July 18, 201620 Comments