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May. 7th, 2006 01:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cleolindaCurrently obsessed with New Order. I haven't listened to actual radio stations in years, so "Crystal" and "Jetstream," if they were even played over here, completely passed me by. So now I'm obsessed with finding the perfect remix. That, and I have finally identified a song I heard on the speakers at Bath and Body Works as Hooverphonic's "The World Is Mine," but--unless it just sounded different over the speakers--I can't quite seem to find the right version of it. The one I heard seemed a little dancier, so... I don't know. (Ooo! I think I just found it!)
I had half an entry about movie merchandise written, but it just wasn't coming together. Suffice it to say that the phrase "Barbie Loves Kraken" was involved. But that's okay, because I've been writing an average of five pages a day for nearly two weeks now, which is why you're not hearing from me much.
Rilly, rilly good POTC2 trailer caps. Like, "I can count Davy Jones' fillings" good. More screencaps: Casino Royale. Superman Returns. Tristan and Isolde (What? I really wanted to see this! PRETTY DRESSES!).
(Speaking of Isolde, what's this I heard about Sophia Myles being on Doctor Who? Something about Marie Antoinette and dating David Tennant?)
Lost links: Here's what happened if you called the number in the Hanso commercial. More on the Lost Experience. More clues. Were the Others were communicating with Henry? "Lost" Book Clues In Fans. WAAALT! (Hang on, guys, I screwed up the links. I'm trying to go back and fish them up.) (There we go.)
Yes, I have heard about the original Star Wars DVD release. (ACK. That ought to be all the links fixed.)
Meg Cabot addresses the Viswanathan plagiarism. Kind of, because she's too classy to actually mention the girl by name. Remember, she originally weighed in on the whole thing--and then it came out that Viswanathan had ripped her off, too.
(Can I just say that I have seen so much plagiarism that does not make sense to me at all? I mean, if you know exactly what you're doing and you know it's wrong and you do it anyway, I can at least understand that. You're cheating, and you know it, because whatever attention you get from "your" writing makes it worth it to you. What I don't understand are people who take someone else's work [cough], doctor it up a little, and then seem to get genuinely upset when someone calls them on it. This is generally what happens to me. I mean, people who take the entire parody, unaltered, and post it as theirs or [innocent look] "never said they wrote it!" but didn't say who did, I understand what they're doing. They want the attention, and they'll get more attention by reposting the entire thing than just posting a link to it, and they'll get even more attention if they coyly allow people to think they wrote it. I can understand the motive there, and usually if you call them on it, they'll sheepishly take it down. What I don't understand is how someone could take, let's say, the Phantom parody I did, change 50% of the lines while keeping the essential format--that is, the scenes as I wrote and described them [example: I have been known to do a scene in one or two lines, combine scenes, or skip scenes. This is left unchanged, is what I'm saying], my scene titles, and, oh, HALF MY LINES, and this person will not consider it plagiarism. A message board mod actually got involved between someone tipping me off and my actually getting there, so I didn't have to do anything. And you know, it's the internet. I've come to realize that there's not much to really do about it anyway, which is why I stopped hunting this kind of thing down a long time ago, but... once someone points it out, it's hard to just sit there and not do anything about it. Anyway. Why would you think that you could take someone's work, change it a little, and that would make it yours? But people apparently do. And there are moments when I think that Kaavya Viswanathan might really havewritten compiled Opal Mehta herself, rather than a hapless typewriter-for-hire at her book packager, and that she therefore did all that plagiarizing herself because she thought it was okay. I mean, you steal from so many sources, that makes it yours, right? Except that, while all of us, as artists, steal to a certain extent, most of us don't take other people's actual WORDS. In fact, I don't even really know how to tell you what kind of "stealing" is okay, except that I know it when I see it. Maybe a lot of it has to do with stealing in a way that the reader recognizes what you're doing--that you're doing it for effect, and that the reader recognizing your sources is the whole point of the game. The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is okay. How Opal Mehta Ripped Off Three Different Chick Lit Writers and Salman Rushdie (I KNOW!) is not.)
The strange story behind the LJ outage last week. "So, returning to my original point: saying that Six Apart’s services were taken down as the result of a 'sophisticated distributed denial of service attack' is an incredibly gracious statement that only addresses about 10% of the whole story. The other 90% of that story is that Blue Security, a company with already-shady practices, decided to solve its problems by dumping them onto Six Apart’s doorstep, something I’m pretty damn sure isn’t part of the TypePad service agreement. I know that ultimately, the denial-of-service attack came from the spammers themselves, but it was specifically redirected to the Six Apart network by Blue Security, and I hope that they get taken to the cleaners for this one."
ETA: Cruise's "Mission" underwhelms at box office. THAT'S RIGHT, TOOTHY!
I had half an entry about movie merchandise written, but it just wasn't coming together. Suffice it to say that the phrase "Barbie Loves Kraken" was involved. But that's okay, because I've been writing an average of five pages a day for nearly two weeks now, which is why you're not hearing from me much.
Rilly, rilly good POTC2 trailer caps. Like, "I can count Davy Jones' fillings" good. More screencaps: Casino Royale. Superman Returns. Tristan and Isolde (What? I really wanted to see this! PRETTY DRESSES!).
(Speaking of Isolde, what's this I heard about Sophia Myles being on Doctor Who? Something about Marie Antoinette and dating David Tennant?)
Lost links: Here's what happened if you called the number in the Hanso commercial. More on the Lost Experience. More clues. Were the Others were communicating with Henry? "Lost" Book Clues In Fans. WAAALT! (Hang on, guys, I screwed up the links. I'm trying to go back and fish them up.) (There we go.)
Yes, I have heard about the original Star Wars DVD release. (ACK. That ought to be all the links fixed.)
Meg Cabot addresses the Viswanathan plagiarism. Kind of, because she's too classy to actually mention the girl by name. Remember, she originally weighed in on the whole thing--and then it came out that Viswanathan had ripped her off, too.
(Can I just say that I have seen so much plagiarism that does not make sense to me at all? I mean, if you know exactly what you're doing and you know it's wrong and you do it anyway, I can at least understand that. You're cheating, and you know it, because whatever attention you get from "your" writing makes it worth it to you. What I don't understand are people who take someone else's work [cough], doctor it up a little, and then seem to get genuinely upset when someone calls them on it. This is generally what happens to me. I mean, people who take the entire parody, unaltered, and post it as theirs or [innocent look] "never said they wrote it!" but didn't say who did, I understand what they're doing. They want the attention, and they'll get more attention by reposting the entire thing than just posting a link to it, and they'll get even more attention if they coyly allow people to think they wrote it. I can understand the motive there, and usually if you call them on it, they'll sheepishly take it down. What I don't understand is how someone could take, let's say, the Phantom parody I did, change 50% of the lines while keeping the essential format--that is, the scenes as I wrote and described them [example: I have been known to do a scene in one or two lines, combine scenes, or skip scenes. This is left unchanged, is what I'm saying], my scene titles, and, oh, HALF MY LINES, and this person will not consider it plagiarism. A message board mod actually got involved between someone tipping me off and my actually getting there, so I didn't have to do anything. And you know, it's the internet. I've come to realize that there's not much to really do about it anyway, which is why I stopped hunting this kind of thing down a long time ago, but... once someone points it out, it's hard to just sit there and not do anything about it. Anyway. Why would you think that you could take someone's work, change it a little, and that would make it yours? But people apparently do. And there are moments when I think that Kaavya Viswanathan might really have
The strange story behind the LJ outage last week. "So, returning to my original point: saying that Six Apart’s services were taken down as the result of a 'sophisticated distributed denial of service attack' is an incredibly gracious statement that only addresses about 10% of the whole story. The other 90% of that story is that Blue Security, a company with already-shady practices, decided to solve its problems by dumping them onto Six Apart’s doorstep, something I’m pretty damn sure isn’t part of the TypePad service agreement. I know that ultimately, the denial-of-service attack came from the spammers themselves, but it was specifically redirected to the Six Apart network by Blue Security, and I hope that they get taken to the cleaners for this one."
ETA: Cruise's "Mission" underwhelms at box office. THAT'S RIGHT, TOOTHY!
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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Date: 2006-05-07 06:39 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2006-05-07 06:42 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2006-05-07 06:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-07 06:47 pm (UTC)I blame George Bush :)
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Date: 2006-05-07 06:58 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2006-05-07 06:48 pm (UTC)Eh, sorry. I just really wanted to like it, so I'm a bit bitter.
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Date: 2006-05-07 11:32 pm (UTC)Although, Rufus Sewell was quite excellent/tasty, if I do say so myself.
I felt really bad for his character...
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Date: 2006-05-07 06:48 pm (UTC)Not Marie Antoinette, Madame du Pompadour. That episode screened in the UK last night. And she is dating David Tennant! Aww.
Do you watch Doctor Who? Cos it's fantastic.
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Date: 2006-05-07 07:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-07 07:00 pm (UTC)Of course, I wonder what the Cruise camp looks like right now. It'd be funny if his publicist (does he have a new one yet?) suggests it'll do great word of mouth, or better yet "It's not about the money!" (The answer all three Charlie's Angels gave when the second movie floundered.)
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Date: 2006-05-07 07:11 pm (UTC)Although, yes--since MI2, the way people do sequels has changed drastically. Now they're much closer together, and generally part of a continuing story--even Spider-Man carries the Harry Osborne and Mary Jane storylines from movie to movie. It's not like the '80s, when you'd have a big hit and then come back ten years later to do a creaky and pointless sequel. And at first, when sequels were becoming more frequent it seemed kind of obnoxious, but since then I think it's kind of turned into a renaissance of serialized storytelling. They're not one-more-trip-to-the-well crapfests; after a movie launches successfully, you see people putting thought into what they'd want to do for the sequel and what they'd want to save for the sequel after that. I like that, because the overall quality is raised.
But the MIs are such stand-alones that... really, do I care what happens to Ethan Hunt? He's married now? To a new character I've never met before? Why do I care?
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Date: 2006-05-07 07:14 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2006-05-07 07:32 pm (UTC)Also, torrent Doctor Who. It's annoying as hell with the SciFi commercials, and once you get into it, you'll want to watch all the episodes right away.
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Date: 2006-05-07 08:03 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2006-05-07 08:04 pm (UTC)I was actually at the movie theatre yesterday, intending to see a movie, but the only one that was playing when I could go that I normally would have seen was MI3 so I.... left.
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Date: 2006-05-07 08:23 pm (UTC)I know where you're coming from, because it was the same reason that I vowed not to see M:I3, too. But, thanks to the influence of some friends, I ended up going anyway, and...it was actually really good. He's a freak and a half and totally batshit, but so far it hasn't affected his acting abilities. I'm a firm believer that you shouldn't let a performer's personal life, however effed up it may be, affect what you think of their performances. *steps off soapbox*
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Date: 2006-05-07 08:21 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2006-05-07 08:30 pm (UTC)Also, can any American/Canadian Doctor Who fans tell me whats up with that show? I mean, last year I watched the first season (which I really liked, by the way). I heard it was coming back, but could never find it. So is it just playing in the UK now or... what?
I don't know who came up with the idea of counting "WAAAAAAAAALT!"s, but they are brilliant.
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Date: 2006-05-07 10:57 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2006-05-07 08:59 pm (UTC)http://www.jitterbug.com/origins/index.html
It's a whole site exploring the underlying influences that shaped the original (ie, good) Star Wars films. It doesn't simply list sources, but gives some really rather intelligent thought on how to borrow and allude to and be influenced by other ideas and other works, without copying. Even without the philosophy, the history is pretty snazzy. (Everyone knows about Joseph Campbell, but did you know about Tolkien? or Frank Herbert?)
Hope you enjoy!
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Date: 2006-05-07 09:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-07 09:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-07 11:12 pm (UTC)I liked Tristan & Isolde too. Plus parts of it were shot in and around where I live (not that I knew this while it was happening). And it's always interesting to see films where the British are afraid of Irish invasions. No wonder they tried to subdue us so thoroughly centuries later! *g*
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Date: 2006-05-07 09:49 pm (UTC)http://lily-handmaiden.livejournal.com/21951.html
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Date: 2006-05-08 12:48 am (UTC)*headslap* That's who that was? I just watched that episode this morning, and couldn't figure out where I'd seen her before. Although in my defense I was distracted by all the pretty costumes and by Mme Du Pompadour's breasts. Wish I could fill out an eighteenth century dress like that!
And add me to the list of people who think that everyone should be watching Doctor Who. The one that just aired on SciFi (I think anyway) was The Empty Child which is the first appearance of incredibly awesome Captain Jack. It was also one of the first episodes I saw last year, and I didn't find it at all hard to follow along (I had seen the pilot, though).
And I was just watching the PotC teaser that's on the Casanova DVD, and at one point a giant tentacle smashes through the wall, which I hadn't noticed the last time I saw the teaser.
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Date: 2006-05-08 02:26 am (UTC)I loved the Classic Doctor Who and the latest season w/David Tennant is so far looking good. I had a harder time adjusting to Eccleston's take on the role, but Tennant seems to be fitting in rather nicely.
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Date: 2006-05-08 03:15 am (UTC)I can't wait to see more. That's the only problem with having seen all of the current season already - the next stuff can't come out soon enough!
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Date: 2006-05-08 05:06 am (UTC)My random anecdote: This kid at my high school won a short story competition with something that was blatantly plagiarized from a Buffy episode ("Restless"). He cleverly didn't use the Scooby names but hello, he stole the Cheese Man! I guess none of the judges watch Buffy... I only got to read his story because my teacher was "showing off" his Grade 10s to the older students. I didn't turn him in for some reason... I guess I felt bad because my teacher had such high hopes for him. Maybe I ruined his creative moral compass thing.
I think of this kid's face whenever I hear about plagiarism, hahaha.
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Date: 2006-05-08 07:08 am (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2006-05-08 09:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-08 11:36 am (UTC)I just don't get this sort of thing, especially in fandom. Do people really think they'd get away with it? That people won't mind them ripping off their words wholesale? That admitting it upfront makesit okay? What? The mind, she boggles, I tell you.
Also, re: Toothy, coincidentally enough, my co-workers are RIGHT NOW having a voncersation about how they're not going to go see MI3 because of him. It's not just us!
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Date: 2006-05-08 02:37 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2006-05-08 03:07 pm (UTC)Anywhoo, I recommend it.
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Date: 2006-05-08 08:55 pm (UTC)Original theatrical versions of Star Wars, Empire Strikes Back and Return Of The Jedi on DVD?
That's cool. I can now safely triple-shrinkwrap my big black box of Star Wars laserdiscs
to preserve it for all eternity and for future archeologists to find and puzzle over.
Now, how about the original theatrical version of Blade Runner on DVD?
Yes, the one with the narration and without the damned bloody unicorn.
Apparently, it's not available.
I like that version better.
Not planning to see Implausible Mess-ion Trois. Never really interested.
Also, not planning to see DaVinci Code. Not interested either.
I'll probably rent both of these when they come out though.
Tried to go see Silent Hill, but theater seats were too narrow.
This was an old theater where the seats were retrofitted with cup-holder-equipped
armrest covers. These covers are quite wide and reduce the width of the top-access
of the seat. Blargh. I don't have this problem in theaters built in the '70s and onwards.
Looking forward to Over The Hedge, X-III, Superman Returns, and Cars.