• Overlord Miller’s plans to attend GenCon were ultimately foiled, possibly by rampaging mega-nanobots.
• Overlord Miller recently finished reading Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies).
• Overlord Miller’s beard currently resembles a Recognizer from TRON.
• Overlord Miller also read The Book of Lies by Brad Meltzer.
• Overlord Miller is researching the history of Medina County.
• Overlord Johnson accidentally learned about William Stinchcomb, founder of the Cleveland Metroparks.
• Who even knew Billy Squier had a castle? Oh, Squire’s Castle. Well, that’s different.
• Overlord Miller has been re-watching The X-Files. That Charles Nelson Reilly episode? It’s called “José Chung’s From Outer Space” and it is made of win and bleeping dead aliens.”
• Nuketown’s Monster Week.
• Overlord Johnson recently listened to A Clash of Kings by George R. R. Martin.
• Overlord Johnson is reading Boneshaker by Cherie Priest.
• …and On a Pale Horse (Book 1 of the Incarnations of Immortality) by Piers Anthony.
• Overlord Miller recently listened to The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. [Link goes to YouTube trailer.]
• Overlord Johnson stumbled across an unaired trailer for Power Pack.
• Overlord Johnson recently watched the first (and thus far only) season of Gravity, an original series from Starz.
• Both overlords have seen Inception, which is not a documentary about how babby is formed.
• Overlord Johnson really enjoyed Between the Folds, a documentary about origami and paper-folding.
• Not to mention Helvetica, a documentary about a font.

Discussion: Kids’ Movies That Appeal to Adults vs. Movies for Little Boys Who Never Grew Up

• Show notes coming soon. Honest!

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• No one, not even SyFy, has made a creature feature spotlighting a havoc-wreaking shetland-bonobo hybrid, but the Overlords may be willing to option them for the screen.
• Overlord Miller reveals the shocking true origin of St. Patrick’s Day.
• Technically, it’s DOCTOR Mega John Cmar.
• “ant fungus exploding head” can be simplified to Cordyceps.
• Cat sharks and chipmunk spiders. You’re welcome.
  
  
• Did we miss any Monster Classifications?
  • Mythical Monsters (hydra, minotaur)
  • Natural Monsters (Jaws, Lake Placid)
  • Science (Man-Made) Monsters (Godzilla, Sharktopus, Them!)
  • Extraterrestrial Monsters (The Thing, Critters, Predator)
• Perhaps we shall do a monster contest. Nominate your favorite monster in the comments.

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Discussion: Iron Man 2 and Sherlock Holmes

• Iron Man is Overlord Johnson’s OMG Best Superhero Movie EVAR, so the sequel had a lot to live up to.
• Holy analogy, Iron Man! Iron Man 2 : Iron Man :: The Dark Knight : Batman Begins
• Hey, Black Widow: Vere is your aksent, comrade?
• Overlord Miller would have preferred Nick Fury: Agent of M.E.N.A.C.E.
• Justin Hammer was a good California millionaire.
• Overlord Miller felt that Whiplash was a little shoe-horned into the story.
• Overlord Johnson thought Whiplash was pretty cool, but his demise was weak.
• Gwyneth Paltrow, Jon Favreau and new-Rhodey (Don Cheadle) had a lot more to do this time around.
• Howard Stark is Walt Disney.
• Overlord Miller seems to think that Robert Downey Jr. will be relegated to a cameo in the upcoming Avengers movie; Overlord Johnson disagrees.
• War Machine was pretty darn cool.
• The new Iron Man armor was pretty cool, too. Let’s avoid the West Coast Avengers version (AKA Silver Centurion), though, okay?
  
• How about that Iron Baby?
• We take a slight tangent to discuss:
  • Chris Hemsworth as Thor.
  • Chris Evans as Captain America.
  • Jake Wyler is another Chris Evans role (Not Another Teen Movie).
  • Do not do this with Captain America’s shield. Ever again.
    
  • Overlord Miller is looking forward to the Green Lantern movie, but we have some concerns about how the power of the ring will be realized on-screen.
• And finally we get to Sherlock Holmes, which Overlord Johnson felt was a bit reminiscent of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
• Overlord Miller was relieved, as it could have been much, much worse.
• Holmes’ fighting strategy brought to mind Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns.
• Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams) appears in the very first of Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories, “A Scandal in Bohemia.”
• Was the movie too “steampunk-y”? What have we got against steampunk, anyway?
• Madam Overlord Johnson felt the plot lacked any sort of mystery.
• Who will portray Moriarty in the sequel? Perhaps one of Overlord Miller’s man-crushes.
  • And now we’re on a Doctor Who tangent. That’s the royal “we”, where Overlord Miller is the royalty and Overlord Johnson is a bloody peasant.
  • Are we really talking about a porn parody of the old Batman television series? Apparently so, but we say “cultural touchstone,” so it’s okay. There’s a fully-clothed trailer for Batman XXX: A Porn Parody on YouTube, of all places.
  • Finally, Overlord Johnson isn’t quite ready to declare steampunk a complete failure as a genre of fiction just yet; he very much enjoyed Gail Carriger’s Soulless, a review of which can be found on this very site.

Lairkeeping

• The podcast will be on hiatus for the next six weeks or so, but we’ll be updating the blog between now and then.
• Our theme music is “Skullcrusher Mountain” by Jonathan Coulton.
• Visit us on the web at trip-dubs dot thesecretlair dot com.
• Try StatusNet for those short updates. This service is invite-only, so send us a note if you’d like to join.
• Got something to say that 140 characters just won’t cover? Say it on our community site.
• Coming up on The Secret Library, The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell. Really. Any day now.
• The Secret Lair blog is powered by WordPress.

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Chief Medical Officer’s Report

It is entirely possible (probable, even), that the Bad Doctor has been ill-informed as to the purpose and, indeed, the very nature of our speculum farm in New Zealand.

Are we entering one or more of our shetland-bonobo hybrids in The Chagrin Valley Hunter Jumper Classic Horse Show? Well, it depends upon how well they jump, or perhaps hunt.

Finally, our Minister of Crackpot Schemes and Unfortunate Synergies may have—perhaps inadvertently—created a form of…oh, let’s call it Genetic Art.

Discussion: What is Art?

Well, that’s a fine question, isn’t it? Probably something transcendent and revelatory. Or not.

• Once again, we’re chatting about “Video games can never be art,” an article written by movie critic Roger Ebert. Because there’s no horse dead enough that we’re not willing to give it another whack.
• Chris thinks that The Void might well be art. It moved him.
• Amazing Fantasy #17? Geek reference fail. Spider-Man was introduced in Amazing Fantasy #15, Johnson.
• Myst, Riven and A Mind Forever Voyaging may well have been art. Probably not Batman: Arkham Asylum, though; it’s not boring enough.
• Some elements of Homeworld, Assassin’s Creed and The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom may be art (or even Art), but when all elements (visuals, audio, gameplay, etc.) are combined, the games fall short.
• How about those graphic novels? Watchmen, Planetary and Transmetropolitan are all cited as examples.
• Fan-fiction? Are we stirring that pot, too?
• crit·i·jism (Pronunciation: \ˈkri-tə-ˌji-zəm\) noun. 1. The reeking ejaculate spewed by critics.
• The Tangent Train chugs right along and we wind up talking about the maturity of geeks, Star Wars (there’s a shocker) and horror films (Overlord Miller doesn’t like the gore) until someone finally puts the show out of its misery.

Lairkeeping

• Our theme music is “Skullcrusher Mountain” by Jonathan Coulton.
• Visit us on the web at trip-dubs dot thesecretlair dot com.
• Try StatusNet for those short updates. This service is invite-only, so send us a note if you’d like to join.
• Got something to say that 140 characters just won’t cover? Say it on our community site.
• Coming up on The Secret Library, The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell. Really. Any day now.
• The Secret Lair blog is powered by WordPress.

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All right, now the first thing I need you to do is close your eyes. Just close them nice and tight. The next thing I want you to do is visualize a vast, empty space that stretches out to infinity in all directions. Fill that space with the purest white, completely lacking in color or shadow. Now imagine a single, perfectly round dot, contrasted against the backdrop of your pristine—wait a minute. Are your eyes open? They are, aren’t they? Dammit, how is this going to work if you can’t follow simple instructions? You know what? Forget it. We’re done here.

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I’ve owned a number of Windows PCs since the late 1980s, but this year I came full circle; I’m typing these show notes on Dr. Heckle and Mr. Jive, my dual-booting MacBook. Lest anyone think the poor, old Apple //GS was abandoned, let me assure you that it lives to this day, housing the Lair’s artificial intelligence, BECKI.

On this episode of the podcast, we hearken back to days gone by, reminiscing about computers in an age before dial-up Internet access, when the BBS was king and life moved at right around 30 characters per second. We also preview Project: Truth, a brand new board game from Evil Overlord Games.

Chatter

• What’s a MUSH?
• Okay, so what’s Inform?
• And…Python?
• Overlord Miller has a new podcast! From Python Import Podcast. Get your snake on.
• Overlord Johnson is reading The Magicians by Lev Grossman.
• Overlord Miller hasn’t quite started reading The Kingdom of Ohio by Matthew Flaming.

BBS: The Documentary

• A film by Jason Scott.
• Jason has another documentary coming soon, Get Lamp.
• Jason’s website is Textfiles.com.
• And then there was FidoNet.
• Later, there was The Cleveland FreeNet.
• Back in the days of wine and sexy, Overlord Miller was co-sysop of a BBS called The Pleasure Dome.
• What’s ANSI, anyway?
• NOTACON 7 takes place in Cleveland, Ohio from April 15th-18th, 2010.
• Download BBS: The Documentary at The Internet Archive, or purchase the 4-disc DVD set.

Musical Interlude: George R. R. Martin is Not Your Bitch by John Anealio.

Preview: Project: Truth from Evil Overlord Games

• Project: Truth is a conspiracy board game from Evil Overlord Games.
• The game was created by Scott Hammermill and Tim Darrows-White (Dry Dock).
• Players attempt to uncover a global conspiracy before The DOOMSDAY Clock runs out.
• The game is basically cooperative, but one player may become The Mole at any point.
• Project: Truth retails for $34.95, but is on currently on sale for 33% off. (Sale ends April 06, 2010.)
• At least one expansion is planned, which will span most of the first half of the 20th Century.

Lairkeeping

• Our theme music is “Skullcrusher Mountain” by Jonathan Coulton.
• Visit us on the web at trip-dubs dot thesecretlair dot com.
• Try StatusNet for those short updates. This service is invite-only, so send us a note if you’d like to join.
• Got something to say that 140 characters just won’t cover? Say it on our community site.
• Coming up on The Secret Library, The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell.
• The Secret Lair blog is powered by WordPress.

Feel free to Flattr this post at flattr.com, if you like it.

St Urho’s Day is a celebration of a fictional fellow who drove all of the grasshoppers out of Finland. From Wikipedia:

The legend of St. Urho was the invention of a Finnish-American named Richard Mattson, who worked at Ketola’s Department Store in Virginia, Minnesota in spring of 1956. Mattson later recounted that he invented St. Urho when he was questioned by coworker Gene McCavic about the Finns’ lack of a saint like the Irish St. Patrick, whose feat of casting the snakes out of Ireland is remembered on St. Patrick’s Day. In fact, the patron saint of Finland is Henry (Bishop of Finland).

Promo: The Command Line podcast.

Discussion: The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross

• The Atrocity Archives is the first book in Charles Stross’ Laundry series; it contains two stories: “The Atrocity Archive” and “The Concrete Jungle”. The second novel in the series is The Jennifer Morgue. The third novel, The Fuller Memorandum, will be released later this year.
• Overlord Johnson really enjoyed Glasshouse and Saturn’s Children, but felt that The Atrocity Archives was essentially a pulp novel that explains too much.
• Overlord Miller recently reviewed Halting State and is currently reading Iron Sunrise. He classifies The Atrocity Archives as “hacker pulp”.
• Our friend Gus has a review of the audio edition of The Atrocity Archives on his blog.
• The Atrocity Archives may not be the best introduction to Stross; the Overlords recommended checking out some of his non-Laundry novels first.

Promo: Kronos by Jeremy Robinson.

Lairkeeping

• Our blog, you’re reading it.
• 140 characters? Try our StatusNet.
• More than 140 characters? Try our community site.
• Our next selection for The Secret Library is The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell.
• On our next episode: A special preview of Project Truth from Evil Overlord Games.

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Discussion: Free Content vs. Paying the Creator

• Our discussion was prompted by a blog post from novelist J.C. Hutchins, author of 7th Son: Descent and Personal Effects: Dark Art.
• Podiobooks.com is home to a wide array of free podcast novels, including the entire 7th Son series.
• Dave Slusher at Evil Genius Chronicles: “Publishing 2010: The Beginning of the End or The End of the Beginning?“.
• How is price related to elasticity of demand? Cory Doctorow discusses this in an interview on Beyond the Book.
• Another author who has used podcasting as a springboard to more traditional publishing is Scott Sigler, author of Ancestor, Infected and Contagious, among others.
• Matthew Wayne Selznick asked (on Facebook), “When was the last time you paid for something creative (music, book, movie, art, etc.) even though it was also available to you for free?” The responses were interesting and sometimes eye-opening.
• Does the podcast novel walk a fine line between marketing tool and gimmick?
• How far is podcasting behind blogging on the adoption curve?
• Is there a sense of entitlement to free works among fans of podcast novelists?
• Mike Masnick at TechDirt says you have to (1) connect with fans and (2) create a reason to buy.
• Selznick: Even providers of free content like Jared Axelrod don’t expect to see direct financial return from that same content.
• What is neo-patronage? Matt explains.
• Thomas provides an example of an artist utilizing neo-patronage: cartoonist/animator Nina Paley.
• Matthew points to Another Sky Press, a publisher that lets customers decide how much they want to pay for a book.
• Matthew also mentions Amanda Palmer.
• Chris mentions Magnatune, which allows customers to set their own prices for music.
• Some artists have used The Ransom Model (or crowd-funding) to support their efforts.
  • Jill Sobule’s 2009 album, California Years, was entirely funded by her fans.
• Did the audience J.C. Hutchins created when he released the 7th Son podcasts let him down when it came time to pony up for the print edition?
• Mur Lafferty offers a variety of content for free: novels, short stories, dramatized fiction and advice for “wannabe writers”.
• John Scalzi is another author who successfully used free content to launch a successful (science-fiction) writing career.
• What does a creator owe their audience?
  • Neil Gaiman: Entitlement Issues; or, George R. R. Martin is not your bitch.
  • Matt isn’t currently working on the sequel to Brave Men Run, and he tells us why. While you’re waiting, you may want to check out Hazy Days and Cloudy Nights.
• Selznick: A better, more ubiquitous form of micro-payments would help make neo-patronage more viable.
  • Could Peter Sunde’s Flattr (currently in beta) be that system?
• The community that has sprung up around podcast novelists is very insular, and incredibly passionate, but have we been drinking too much of our own Kool-Aid? We try to put some perspective to the whole business.
  • Emer Sugrue: Websight: Podiobooks.com.
• Harlan Ellison: Pay the Writer (contains NSFW language).

Lairkeeping

• Our theme music is “Skullcrusher Mountain” by Jonathan Coulton.
• Visit us on the web at trip-dubs dot thesecretlair dot com.
• Try StatusNet for those short updates. This service is invite-only, so send us a note if you’d like to join.
• Got something to say that 140 characters just won’t cover? Say it on our community site.
• Coming up on The Secret Library, The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross.
• Did you know that The Secret Lair is powered by WordPress? Well, you should; it’ll be on the quiz.

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In this episode of the podcast, we discuss the lover’s spat between Amazon.com, the largest bookseller in the universe, and Macmillan, one of the six largest publishers in that very same universe. We also discuss some myths surrounding Valentine’s Day, which looms like a shadow over—I mean, is the second or third most wonderful time of the year.

Amazon vs Macmillan

Apple introduced the iPad which—among other things—is going to be an eBook reader. Why does this cause a fight between Amazon and Macmillan? It’s all about the pricing model.

• John Scalzi breaks it down for us.
• Charles Stross shares an outsider’s perspective.
• Tobias Buckell offers his take on the whole mess.
• John Scalzi presents a deeply slanted play on why publishing won’t die.
• Cat Valente doesn’t want the publishing industry to go away, either.

Promo: Harvey by Phil Rossi

Staff Reports

Chief Medical Officer Cmar files his latest progress report, in which he once again questions our judgment. This seems to be a common theme in The Bad Doctor’s reports. Meanwhile, Minister of Crackpot Schemes and Unfortunate Synergies Jay Lynn seems to be…surrounded.

In our new segment, Ask the Overlords, Don asks about the possibility of purchasing a gently-used space shuttle for a mere $28.8 million.

Promo: I Should Be Writing, now featuring All Write!, a webcomic drawn by Natalie Metzger, our very own Secretary of Artistic Propaganda.

Valentine’s Day

Saints and cards and massacres, oh my!

• The name of that Family Ties spin-off was The Art of Being Nick. Only the pilot was ever aired, and only once.
• That St. Valentine was an amorous fellow. And there were three of him. Does that make him polyamorous?
• What’s a little Lupercalia between friends?
• Lupa: wolf.
• Loofah: not a wolf.
• How do Chicagoans celebrate St. Valentine’s Day? Keep your chocolates and your greetings cards. Don’t bother sending flowers. Instead, say it with bullets.

Lairkeeping

• Visit the blog. Oh, wait, you’re already here.
• Try StatusNet for those short updates.
• Got something to say that 140 characters just won’t cover? Say it on our new community site.
• Coming up on The Secret Library, The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross.

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• Chris Miller, “The End” (from 2006)
• Tee Morris, “The End” (from 2007)

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