At the end of the movie, she ends up right back where she started; in that stuffy little Precious Moments kingdom, surrounded by little bags of water she can kill anytime she hears a strange noise.

First, what sort of mechanism do you have for something that apes consciousness and something that *is* conscious?

When my wife tried to cancel her cell phone service, she was told that was impossible until she'd talked with someone from the "Loyalty Department". When my wife mentioned that sounded rather "1984", the representative replied, "I'm sorry, but I haven't seen that movie".

> not hell bent on destroying us?

We politely go to the next article without posting a comment that makes as look like a jerk.

I think designing a "visual package" for a book is increasingly important for blogging and digital books: Banners, color and font matches for headlines, thumbnail icons, etc.

Good point. I'm not convinced that reviews make a lot of difference for genre books, but I'm pretty certain that in terms of effect for dollar spent on promotion, making digital ARCs available along with a good list of reviewers is very high up on the list.Certainly has to be more cost effective than the 50-1 ratio…

I will admit that the mild sense of melancholy that pervades much of these videos for exactly that reason is part of what I find so attractive about them.

I have a friend who married...

For the big name books, the marketing budget might make a difference in how many books are stocked, but for the mid-list, the marketing budget is essentially zero, the trade mags are a joke, etc.

Unfortunately, I'm fairly certain this delightful comic only continues to exist by not having caught the attention of DC. If they ever find out about it, they'll have to shut it down instantly. (If you don't rigorously enforce trademark, then you lose it.)

If you are published by a mainstream publisher who can get your books into most bookstores, I think my numbers support my assertion that self-promotion including on-line is generally a waste of time unless you're already famous. There's a reason why most self-published books by non-well-known authors sell in three…

I have to say, most marketing spending by publishers (outside of the cover, which is *essential*, is pretty close to a waste of resources (except perhaps for buying shelf space, if necessary). If you have any pull, get the publisher to put the money into the cover instead.

At a guess, I think that actlxpl is is probably of that group that thinks that in the next 10-20 years only about 10-20% of the American population will have jobs that support a middle-class or higher standard of living, while the rest of us will move towards the global mean (any jobs paying higher will be exported or…

<i>The kicker is that urban politicians want food stamps more than they want no farm subsidies.</i>

I remember seeing a very primitive version of this video a few years ago and thinking how being able to map the orbits of stars in the centre of our galaxy felt like science fiction.

Indeed, I was beginning to wonder if everyone was going to completely miss the point.

First a peacock, now St. George not named after that St. George.

Look like a Peacock? No, it looks like a *Dragon*.After all, it's looking directly out onto St. George (Street).

Can one really even compare a science fiction convention to the comic-con behemoths that are now more popular? The two seem to be hardly the same species.