Thanks to work things this weekend, no Star Trek for me, which I am not sobbing hysterically over but as we have delayed double deployment at the end of hte month, it's more exhaustion than anything that's keeping me from doing so.

However:

FF_A thread on the Star Trek Prime Directive reminded me of my favorite almost-great-but-not-quite Star Trek novel, Star Trek: Prime Directive by Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens (NOTHING LIKE THE TNG MOVIE EVEN LIKE A LITTLE). It has the distinction of being a very SJW take on the Prime Directive before SJW as concept or acronym was a thing on the internet (Social Justice Warrior) and takes great, great care to hit you over the head like a lot on why the Prime Directive is Awesome Like a Lot Seriously Why Don't You Get This Let Me Tell You Again, Really, but luckily, there's a lot of plot, so you can pretty easily skip the lecture portion of the show (it could be a 101 course, not kidding), and it does, in all fairness, make a vague half-hearted attempt at why the PM is bad using idealistic college students and single mother activists. Yeah.

Okay, leaving that off, it brings up two very interesting things that I'm pretty sure canon never bothered to throw out and turned out useful and obvious. One is a cultural scale model for pre-warp cultures, which assumed a crystal-growing type of development curve--all culture develop like this in this order, more or less, with the curve adjusted for population lifespan and I think worked differently on humanoid/non-humanoid/sentient slime-like species/incorporeal-who-the-hell-knows populations (keeping in mind Diane Duane to this day is the only one that had a sentient ensign rock and meetings involving Debians and non-humanoids, so detail is sketchy). It also emphasized, unfortunately, the powerful level of paternalism involved, which on one hand it is, no like--WE MUST PROTECT THOSE LESS ADVANCED--without leavening it with the much less skeevy Unintended Consequences model, which the story actually does for itself on reading, so maybe it's better that wasn't part of the lecture.

Reading for story, however, not lecture, you do get a very vivid and very precise explanation of what could happen if you're not truly hand to God--literally speaking--God and know where each single sparrow is and when it's falling. The use of the culture model that decides when a civilization is truly ready for pre-warp is shown as badly flawed but the best they have to work with, hence the requirement for warp technology. Humanity is still arrogant--and by humanity, read "all lifeforms in existence, probably mostly sentient but who the hell knows"--but the first rule to abide is Thou Shall Not Assume You Know Shit About Anything, Dumbass, even though you really think you do, and pretend at all times that you're likely going to be wrong until proven beyond all reasonable doubt otherwise and then take it to committee if possible because you gotta be sure. Which is, in a lot of ways, the basis of the prime directive; the mistakes you make when a civilization is at stake, not just their development, but their actual literal existence (see: nuclear winter, genocide) aren't the kind you can fix and even if you could, will they still be themselves after in their uniqueness, and what would you be saving, so to speak, if you destroyed all they were beforehand?

(Interesting point in the story is based on that; the Prime Directive uses the cultural model to bolster it's pre-warp-no theory, even though the cultural model is flawed because of the Prime Directive, because chicken, see egg. They know the model is flawed and because of that the Prime Directive is very much a best-guess at the safest possible save point--warp technology--because the model itself has to use that as the standard as well. It could be safe to establish relations earlier--it's likely, actually!--but they don't know because the cultural modeling is only perfectly accurate after they get to contact the culture. It's not a live model, it's observational up until that point. This could be fixed very probably if the Federation was willing to just give up a few pre-warp civilizations for cultural experimental purposes and try this at earlier and earlier points and learn from their failures (civilization one: contacted at pre-industrial era: blows self up: Fail! civilization two: contacted at medievalish era: thinks we're gods, genocide, ten people left on planet; REALLY FAIL! civilization three: not yet into the bronze thing, maybe we should....: BEARS ALERT RAPTORS RUN FUBAR BEARS FAIL BEARS LIONs BEARS!). They're not willing to risk that, however, any earlier than the first safe point, so you see how this is just academic hell.)

In the book itself, because it was Captain Kirk I was totally fine with the ending, but I would also argue that it was luck that it turned out well, and not just luck, but really one-time only cannot replicate this particular cultural development (story backs this up; this was very unique to this culture and what was happening to it) luckyity luck-luck by ten. I'd also argue that this is far less an exercise in anti-colonialism--though it is--and even less a bootstrap modeling of culture--though yeah, there is some of that--but a pretty sophisticated understanding of risk, when the risk is how on earth can anyone say no when you're the one carrying a nuke to a rock fight--you can't lose, there's just no way, the fact you brought it at all is the deciding factor, not that you wouldn't use it, so don't come at all.

...yes, I am re-reading everything Star Trek related so the sobbing doesn't go into effect. I hate work right now like you have no idea.

Note: I like the Bears alert model. The Raptors and Lions and Bears alert model however, is my variation, as raptors and lions are by nature funny and will also eat you in non-stuffed-animal form.)

Because reasons: io9 breakdown of trailer

Okay, Ami hit me with this in chat and if this happens? I will send JJ fruit baskets forever, okay. FOREVER.

( amireal's theory of in darkness from io9 speculation )

So weirdly enough, I've still never been to a Star Trek convention (or to LA, airports totally do not count), but that apparently will change.

KiScon 2011 has been announced by awarrington and rhaegal. I'm going to cut and paste their announcement from the Kirk/Spock Community and the KiScon Community directly.

KiScon 2011: Boldly Going Where No K/S Con Has Gone Before!

We are thrilled to announce that membership is open for KiScon 2011. On June 24-26 2011, we're taking you to the Kyoto Grand Hotel in Los Angeles to celebrate 45 years of the epic romance between Kirk and Spock, the pairing that invented slash fandom and remains the most enduring!

Over the years, fanfiction has taken Kirk and Spock through the Mirror Universe, Alternate Universes, and now we have the Reboot Universe. In 2011, we mark their 45th anniversary with a celebration of K/S in all its incarnations.

For KiScon 2011, we head to the heart of downtown Los Angeles, to spend a fun-packed weekend rediscovering the excitement and the passion that drew us all to this pairing, in the company of other fans.

We're proud to announce we will be joined by our two fabulous Guests of Honor Kathleen Resch and Seperis.

Membership costs only $99 until May 1st 2011, rising to $119 after that date, and includes all three days of programming (panels, vids, presentations and games) and the Babel Banquet on Saturday evening where costumes are encouraged! Space is limited, so join now to avoid disappointment.

Hotel rooms are available at a discounted rate of only $109 per room per night (exc. tax) for up to two sharing - so bring a friend! This rate is also available three days either side of the convention, so that you can add a vacation to your visit. Further information about the hotel, including online booking, is available on our website.

If you have any questions or suggestions, please drop us a line here on LiveJournal, or at: info [at] kiscon [dot] org. We can't wait to see you in LA next summer!


KiScon 2011 co-chairs
Amanda Warrington and Rhaegal
awarrington & rhaegal

KiScon 2011 Website

For the record, I was genuinely shocked to be asked by the concomm to come to this, and I think I irritated the hell out of awarrington with emails asking if she'd like, asked the wrong person. To be fair, I was sleep-deprived from going from the beach to svmadelyn's to VVC and also by Saturday I was not entirely sober, but she forgave me. And considering who Kathleen Resch is--seriously, go look at her bio and boggle at those credentials for a minute--beyond words humbled, but also hugely honored. Trek wasn't just my first fandom in fanfiction and fannishness--it's been a part of my life practically since birth, through TOS and TNG and Voyager, every Star Trek movie ever made, and a ridiculous number of Trek novels I still have, moldering on my bookshelf, even the really, really bad ones. And the really, really interesting ones that were published before Star Trek got all standardized (yes, the one with Kirk, Spock, and the Free Agent Mary Sue actually a threesome this was published really oh my God yes; also the one with the Kirk clone married off to The Romulan Commander after being cloned because this guy wanted him so much, God I love Trek).

Anyway.

You should come! It will be fun! Not that this should be a motivator or anything, but I'll have to do like, some panels and I have no idea what to do so I will totes take suggestions? Okay, sure, that's more for me than anyone else, but I'll totally credit whoever comes up with one. My ideas are all like "How about a panel on squeeing over Spock?" which isn't really a panel, I don't think. Though honestly, wouldn't that be fun. Also, svmadelyn promised--promised--to come so you know what happens on Sunday night, just in a new location. Admittedly, it will be weird without a mezzanine.

Star Trek! TOS and Reboot! Kirk/Spock! Fangirls! All of my favorite things!

There is the probability of being MIA for a couple more weeks while I finish 1.) my three help_haiti fic, one of which is mostly done but I keep picking at, 2.) War Games, which actually is done but I've gone beyond picking at it and am now engaged in cosmetic surgery on, 3.) work (I know! Why? Why do I have to work when I have one hundred and seventy five thousand accumulated words of fic to finish and post! Why?), and 4.) Child has a meeting with a behavioral psychologist and whatever this week. I feel this will be productive.

However, in lieu of content--seriously, I spent a week angsting over (This Is) Not a Statement because I had a bad feeling if I didn't finish it in one fell swoop it would enter WIP hell and I made a resolution after SGA that I'd never, ever post anything I wouldn't finish, and I can no longer call this a flirt fandom when I'm throwing out novellas--I have instead an ode to girlnamedpixley

So back in November, I asked girlnamedpixley to help me get a few pictures together for War Games since I ended up with a cast list a bit larger than I expected and some not entirely canon-compliant. If you want to see the horror I achieve when trying to do pics, go to my website under covers and wince. So you see why I went to an expert.

...there's like, a folder of art now. IDEK. It's like magic. Every time we talked, she had new stuff done that I'd gape over for a week while she swanned her way out. Then apparently, she thought that You'll Get There in the End was feeling neglected and sad that it did not have this much attention paid to it.

So. Below, the (very partial) fruits of girlnamedpixley's labor.

( cover: war games )

And because she was worried about the first fic.

( cover: you'll get there in the end )

She also created a PDF file for download, which I uploaded to my site after much fighting with Filezilla, and also fighting to remember my password--I forgot my password.

You'll Get There in the End (It Just Takes a While), PDF, 1.15 MB. She also is doing one for War Games when I send my final draft to her (she only looks at me now while I explain there is an important page one hundred seventy sentence that must be fixed! Because yeah, that sentence has issues. Or rather, I do.)

I like girlnamedpixley. I ask for like, a picture, and I get a gallery. It's like Christmas! But no one tries to give me tube socks or snuggies, so really, it's like Christmas with a pony. A pony with magical art skills.

ETA: edited for size, wow. Sorry!

So I had one of those days where I came home and fell asleep on the couch like some kind of vaguely regressive cliche of a fifties husband, but luckily, Child finds the lack of my attention useful for scoping out my room for more DVD sets to steal. In my defense, work sucked in ways that describing would cause flashbacks to, and also, there's a freeze warning, which, I want to explain for the non-Texan among you, freaks us out but in a good way, because it means we can stay home and not brave the icy roads.

(Reminder--I'm from Texas. I don't even put on shorts until it's over ninety-five. Four layers is not enough here. Weirdly, I don't have this reaction in Chicago, but that's possibly because if you have ever hung out with svmadelyn, she keeps you moving. I mean, I remember the theory that I was cold, but mostly, it's like a huge exercise event. I swear Chicago's the only place on earth I have to eat my own weight in food and still come back five pounds lighter than I was. It could totally be a personal training course.)

Of course that ended well--I'm up at midnight and left to my own devices until I can sleep again. Gah.

I feel--writey. I mean, as in, I keep falling asleep crafting elaborate stories to write, but I pretty much finish them before I fall asleep, so there's no reason to write them really. I write to find out how it ends. I ended up plotting out an Spock/Kirk/Uhura threesome where Kirk is weirdly reticent and Spock and Uhura end up having to chase him half the story before he gives up and accepts he's practically married to them and stops picking up intergalactic hookers that make Spock grind his teeth (logically) and Uhura has to fight not to toss out the airlock. ("...Jim, she's stealing equipment from engineering!" "She'll give it back!" "Your commitment issues are officially a mental illness. I just beamed her off the ship. Take off your pants right now. Also, we're moving in. Don't argue." "...okay.")

Plus, all of them are ridiculously long and exhausting--AU where Jim was left behind on earth and he and Gaila and some cadets steal a ship to escape before Nero destroys the planet! And accidentally become rebels against the Romulan Empire (and with Jim, that could actually happen. He wouldn't even try. These things just happen to him.)! And like, meet up with Spock Prime, who starts like a secret rebel colony for them and suddenly Jim wakes up in horror and realizes he's leader of the rebellion and tries not to notice the Romulan Prefect bears a creepy resemblance to Darth Vader (which of course he watched as a kid; Star Wars is forever). And also, there are like, ten rebel colonies and everyone cheers for him and a part of him wants to cry, but the other part is like, ten and thinks lightsabres would be so awesome here. And Gaila finds it hilarious and right before I fell asleep, she was using her pheremones to encourage Jim toward bondage between death-defying missions. Which--well. Yeah. The plot became odd there, yes.

(Later, they meet up with Spock and Uhura and Starfleet and Jim accidentally is taken prisoner and Gaila brings half the rebel fleet to stare down the Enterprise and Jim tries to explain to Spock how really, he has no idea how this became his life. And also, Gaila really likes blowing things up.)

...I seriously like this idea, but just the setup would take me weeks, and I am still waiting for betas to finish for War Games and I'm not sure I can face another 100K without crying. That was exhausting. But I don't know how it ends yet, actually; usually when I get this far, I can figure it out, but no. A universe where Jim Kirk is left to his own devices with a fleet of ships and millions and millions of refugees to take care of is a universe where he is not happy. He's brilliant and needed, and those things are things Jim needs to be, but I'm not sure how he comes out on the other side. Duty can do a lot, I think, and Jim beneath it all is bedrocked in that, but that doesn't really take the place of something he can keep for just himself, or that he would know he needs to, and who would tell the guy keeping them alive that he should?

I don't know how that ends and that's kind of what makes me want to write it. I'm tired of dystopias of grinding misery; there are many reasons I like sociopathic AUs. They seem better adjusted to reality in the end. I only want to write it if I can leave it better than I started it. HMm.

*curls up* Christmas decorating this weekend!

Randomly, because whining is not attractive, below are some cut scenes from War Games, sort of. Temporally, they're set during the first week after Jim and Spock return from Iowa and adjust to the realization they're mostly-married, but I couldn't work them into the narrative and felt superfluous except to my own entertainment. Also, lirpas are insane as weapons. Seriously.

( ficlet: adjustment )

Porn is just bizarre from a Vulcan's pov. I just want to state for this for the record, because I want really low expectations. Okay? Okay. I'm saying, I will really spellcheck this time, and like, check my its/it's, and I want credit for that when anyone gets to like, page thirty, kay? Thank you.

In other news, there is no other news. I mean, winterlive is a filthy, filthy tease with fic (seriously, my inbox is such a porny, porny place) and transtempts is trying to drive me nuts with what appears to be OT3 foreplay that lasts forever, and svmadelyn is sending me links to fic where people use the word orbs for eyes without irony. I'm sorry, no.

Also, apparently, my playlist for Star Trek is dance-pop and techno. I wnat to say I do not associate Kirk with Britney Spears (damn you, butterfly, with your brilliance; when I get stuck, that's the vid I watch to get unstuck when writing), but it's a lie. I am so not kidding. I dragged out The Pussycat Dolls and I don't know what this means, but I know it's not an improvement on my emo-by-way-of-metal-guitar phase.

[And talitha78 for freaking Lady Gaga. I--can't even deal with this. I just pretend I am not me. I am saying, my musical tastes are pretty much "Did a vidder use this song? I like it!" Is that even healthy?]

No.

It's been a while, so I feel it's about time to list off my most recent fic peeves. In no particular order in two fandoms.

( merlin, st:reboot, spoilers for reboot )

Okay, question for Uhura fans and the chain of command, please. This is jsut for my own curiosity for now, though I am using some of this for a fic.

( enterprise rank system )

And because this came up on my flist.

( POC and diversity in fanfic )

Finally, for anyone who is interested or who wasn't around circa 2006 when I did this, Trek Meet and Greet. I haven't updated comments since last year, nor is it terribly organized, but it has a pretty interesting cross-section of Trek writers on LJ, comms, etc. If it feels useful or there isn't a better reference out there, I'd be happy to start organizing and updating it again. There are some people I haven't added or removed either by request or because they really, really seemed to not want the connection.

Yes, this is what happens when I've been struggling with Vulcan porn. I can't even look at myself in the mirror right now. Kirk POV--next time, Kirk POV.

ETA: darkrosetiger asks for Tuvok recs here and now I'm kind of interested too. Bring your Tuvok recs!

You know, any review I do at this point is kind of the equivalent of guh, yes, this, guh. As one does when one falls on top of awesome and just grovels in it.

Thsi is written in one fell swoop. I know I missed a ton of stuff, but you know, I can totally meta on this for weeks.

Most of this is subject to change. In about a week, after I've read more, I'll probably have some caveats.

( prenotes: the kelvin )

( prenotes: timespace theory )

( star trek reboot: it's a wonderful life, if you think about it )

Have achieved Trek. Finally. Also, matinees are fucking expensive.

will make noise about later, except for this....

( really? )

Wow. That was good for me. I need that again.

...it's hailing.

Dear Texas Weather,

Child and I had plans today. Let me explain. My sister, her husband, her kids, her husband's mother, her husband's mother's partner, and various entities associated with them are coming over today and this being family, there was only one thing that could free me from six long hours of close quarters with that many people and it was Star Trek. Because apparently cultivating a reputation for being antisocial doesn't work nearly as well as staring into people's eyes and saying "Spock. Spock. Spock. Nerve pinch."

[Trufax. Sci-fi actually is my bullet-proof excuse to run away from anything at all. Let us all take a moment and thank God for the tiny, tiny used bookstore in the town closest to where I grew up.]

...it is hailing and raining and apparently there could be a tornado watch? Which you know, I am from Texas, unless the car achieves liftoff, I'm really not going to care, but Star Trek. I am supposed to be at a movie. I am not there because it is hailing. WTF WEATHER?

God I hate you.

Seperis

[Yes, it's only noon, but if I am visible when people show up, I cannot leave. It's kind of a Schroedinger's cat situation. I can be or not be here, but once I am proved here I cannot be not-here and at Trek. Yes, it took me several minutes to work out how to inject that into this entry.]

Now that that's out of the way, I am glad I didn't bravely hide the novel from myself when I got home but went ahead and read it through. Question--are novelizations considered soft canon still? Because let me say, I was really surprised that at least a couple of things in the novel haven't come up in any reviews I've read yet. Though only one was probably anything I'd notice, mostly because of samdonne the other day.

[This is not a great novel, but I treat movie novelizations as history books rather than entertainment. There are some really weird things done with pov.]

Child absconded with the novel last night when I was done, so doubtless we'll be canon-picking each other for the next ten years. *sighs* At least I will not--again--hear worried questions about Ianto's feelings. He was in a Primeval kick most recently--I have this horrible feeling that there's going to come a point in his pop culture development where all his anecdata will occur in a British accent--so it's nice to share a fandom with my son again.

...hail. I mean. I don't even know what to do with that.

[...my sister is here. This is not my life. This is someone else's life.]

I'm really tempted, for the sake of my sanity, to open a post for everyone who will see Star Trek (the Reboot) but hasn't yet, so we can all be bitterly jealous together and I'm not tempted to destroy small worlds and all my friends who have seen it.

In lieu of actually doing that, I had this great idea to to run over to alt.startrek.creative and ASCEML and see what everyone is saying. Because in the end, that's where I started in fandom, and I also started fandom in Trek, so lo, I wanted to return to my forefathers and also see if anyone posted fic there, and also because I wanted to see what the official acronym and pairing codes and code hierarchy were going to be.

Seriously, if you have never lived in a fandom where that was all decided by community to standard and you got to use single letter designators for each half of your pairing and everyone knew what it meant....well, my friend, you have not yet lived. I miss that. Holy God, do I miss that.

[For the record, I read Stephen's idea of ST:TOR and seriously feel that is the most awesome thing ever.]

Wait, I got off-topic.

I started with ASCEML and then went to ASC. Granted, I may have missed a page or so, but color me surprised that so far, the reactions are wildly divergent from what I expected.

I am going to toss this out there--

( I feel the need to preface this with my own deep pain from Atlantis )

Also, seriously, I feel bad for any new Trek people wading in there. Of the three or four posts on the movie, all of the conversation threads are really, really unpleasant, with minimal bright spots. Not a squeezone.

[Actually, if anyone found a squee zone over there, link plz? that was just depressing.]

ETA: I forgot to say, ASCEML does have some squee doing it's squee there. I am seriously hoping for old school positivity on the new Trek because some of those writers are amazing.