The most recent 20 comments posted to Making Light by JoXn:

Show all comments by JoXn.

Posted on entry MSWord: I love it less each year ::: October 05, 2006, 02:17 PM:
You're going to have to convince Microsoft to rewrite the whole thing in FORTRAN.
Posted on entry Yesterday's man ::: August 09, 2006, 12:32 PM:
Would that he had fought as hard to keep his Vice-Presidential job.
Posted on entry Turn around, bright eyes ::: August 06, 2006, 11:24 AM:
Theresa's description makes a seriously good springboard for a Doctor Who plot.
Posted on entry Why Barack Obama can kiss my ass ::: August 06, 2006, 02:10 AM:
Of course, if Steven Brust and his interlocutors take the discussion of Trotskyistism and permanent revolution to e-mail, all the rest of us hangers-on lose the benefit of being able to read the discussion. So, take it to your blogs if you're going to take it off thread! That'd be a perfect place to lay out more detailed arguments, and you can leave a link here for us interested folk.
Posted on entry Laugh harder ::: August 03, 2006, 10:49 PM:
Keith, the best rigged election should be close. Otherwise people start asking questions, such as: how come all the polls had the election as "too close to call" but Bush won by 20%? That's much less convincing than a squeaker.
Posted on entry A monthly family budget ::: July 19, 2006, 05:09 PM:
She spends more on rent than I make in two months.
Posted on entry Annals of short-lived phenomena: Star Wars fanfic on Amazon ::: April 24, 2006, 04:28 PM:
Didn't Donald Kingsbury write and publish (to some critical acclaim) some Asimov fanfic with all the serial numbers filed off? In my opinion it was a much better development of the original Foundation universe than any of Asimov's (or Benford/Bear/Brin's) pre/sequel stuff, but nonetheless it seems as if under today's copyright regime it was just a hair to the "legal" side of the "copyright violation" line.

I don't know. It's clear that if a fictive work is of diminished coherence -- or even nonsensical -- when one hasn't read some source opus, then that work is at least artistically derivative. But should that be enough to make it legally derivative in terms of copyright law? If a global search-and-replace is enough of a legal fig leaf, why shouldn't fanfic writers just write "Garry Topper" stories. Others can then distribute a separate set of emacs and Microsoft Word macros which let readers remove the fig leaf. Or maybe fans would develop a taste for Garry/Snipe slash...
Posted on entry The Yankee Internationale ::: February 22, 2006, 10:23 AM:
My favorite version of The International (there's an MP3 available with appropriate googling) is on Hannes Wader singt Arbeiterlieder (which is all around a marvelous CD). I appreciate big showy arrangements of tunes like La Marsellaise, but I think that workers' songs are best sung by a lusty, tipsy group with a vigorous guitar accompaniment. And that's what Wader gives you.
Posted on entry The Yankee Internationale ::: February 22, 2006, 10:10 AM:
You can sing La Marseillaise to the tune of I've been working on the railroad, at least up until the chorus.

Comment statistics for JoXn on the Making Light blog

YearNumber of comments posted
20069

Total: 9 comments. View all these comments on a single page.