Jackson Allen's Blog, page 25

Books: Power-Ups for People Playing Life on Hard Mode

I ran across a news story that reminds me how books are power-ups for people playing life on hard mode. Bookriot shared some heartbreaking stories behind the controversial kids’ book ‘It’s Perfectly Normal,’ by Robie Harris. I have no personal opinion about the book – it’s probably not something I would give to a child – but you can’t help but cry when you hear about how the book has impacted young people.

“The most illustrative story she shared, though, was about a 10-year-girl in Delaware who picked up her book when at the library with her mother. Her mother let her check the book out, and when they came home, she showed her mom the chapter on sexual abuse and said, ‘This is me.’ She was being abused by her father, and it was the first time she’d spoken about it.

The father was convicted, and the judge said, ‘There were heroes in this case. One was the child, and the other was the book.’ Harris wrote in to add that the mother was also a hero in this story, for listening to her daughter, and that the librarian who ordered the book and kept it on open shelves also made this possible.”

Please don’t misinterpret what I’m saying: I’m not defending the book, I’m defending the book’s right to exist in a world where people are playing life on hard mode. We need to solve the problem at the right level – let’s live a world where no child is abused, neglected, or harmed. Is that asking for too much? If we can’t have that, if that’s too unrealistic for … reasons … then let’s give those little people playing life on hard mode some power-ups to get through the game.

For that little girl, the book was a power-up for her as she played life on hard mode. You want to argue that she shouldn’t have read the book? Cool. I’m arguing SHE SHOULD NEVER HAVE NEEDED THE BOOK. Yet she was. Her father failed her in every way possible. No one knew what she was going through. The book ‘It’s Perfectly Normal’ became her power-up as a ‘people playing life on hard mode.’

It’s not rocket science – If a book bothers you that much, stop arguing that the book exists, and start arguing for a world where that book doesn’t need to exist. If the idea of ‘power-up’ books bothers you, maybe make a world where people aren’t playing life on hard mode.

But they are. We live in a dysfunctional dystopian system that places more energy in looking healthy than in being healthy. More and more people are playing life on hard mode. Books have always been used as power-ups for people in that position. It’s disgusting, for example, that Winnie the Pooh is out there teaching kids to survive school shootings. But what if this book ends up saving lives? I’d much prefer to live in a world where school shootings don’t exist – but that seems to be asking for too much.

So an important takeaway for me is that I need to embrace a core value about my storytelling that I didn’t really understand before. My stories are power-ups for people playing life on hard mode. I mean, they always were, but the right words didn’t arrive until this week. I’m thinking and reflecting a lot on that.

Perks of Being a Nonfluencer – No ‘Influencer Marketing’

So how do you succeed at writing while using no influencer marketing – what are the perks of being a nonfluencer? I ask because all my ‘how do I sell my books when I finish them’ research seems to lead straight back to ‘influencer marketing’ in some way and that’s something I’m absolutely committed to avoiding.

Wait, what? Why would you not want to market yourself?? Yeah, there’s the rub – marketing my work without marketing myself – a person with my personal circumstances (disorders) is ill-suited for a world where people go to any length for attention. As this video illustrates, the fake reality of being an influencer means being prepared to play the game if you plan to survive.



Historically, influencer marketing stems back to the Roman empire, where gladiators – fighting for their lives in an arena – could rise to celebrity status. No surprise there that people saw the opportunity for social mobility and fiscal security and were willing to risk everything for it. We’re seeing that happen today in real-time: influencers shooting steroids, stupidly unsafe stunts, and dumb Devious Licks.

If you’ve got two brain cells to rub together and you’re being honest with yourself, you know the truth. It’s desperately dystopian to watch people risk their social capital, their health, and even their lives for attention they can translate into money. The real Hunger Games are ‘play the game, or go hungry.’ That’s not what I want for myself, and I can’t imagine that you do, either.

All of this is why I’m committed to being a ‘nonfluencer.’ I want you to enjoy my work, I don’t want to influence your life. No clothing lines, no tequila brands – just me, telling stories that you enjoy reading, hearing, or watching. The perks of being a Nonfluencer is that I still get to be myself. My communication to the world should be ‘life is worth living, the world is worth experiencing, and you are worth knowing.’ There’s a quiet power and joy that comes from promoting kindness and well-being, from turning limitations into something positive, and working to understand the struggle of others.

The good news is, it seems to be working. I’m getting a small but loyal following of people who appreciate who I am, what I’m doing, and what I’m saying. Like small seeds planted in rocky soil, it takes time for the blooms to appear. But they are appearing – people are responding to the books and Reddit posts and Mastodon toots with good intentions – it’s not taking large chunks of my emotional time or energy like influencer marketing would.

And I still get to be myself. That’s important to me. Living simply, so that others may simply live, practicing the tenets of human decency and being the change I wish to see in the world. Sooner or later, people are going to get tired of being screamed at, and all those influencers will need to find another way to connect with others. When that happens, I hope I can invite them to sit in the quiet, safe place we’re creating for ourselves here.

Write on!

Sci-Friday #185 – Space Ghost: Mad Genius

For this Sci-Friday, let’s discuss the mad genius of Space Ghost Coast to Coast – a strange, throwaway cartoon show that became a late-90s cultural icon. Long before Zach Galifianakis’ Between Two Ferns, SG:C2C was a fourth-wall breaking, metacognitive, hysterical tribute to every bad TV talk show, ever. One example below – where Space Ghost’s grandfather (voiced by Macho Man Randy Savage) attempts to interview Raven Simone. It makes absolutely no sense, but you can’t stop watching – take a look:



You can watch the entire episode here for free, based on your cable provider. What’s the deal with Space Ghost, anyway?

According to Wikipedia – Space Ghost Coast to Coast was created by Mike Lazzo after he was asked to develop a cartoon to appeal to adults.[1] The series’ original title stemmed from early 1993 when Andy Merrill and Jay Edwards were brainstorming names for a marathon of the 1960s Space Ghost for Cartoon Network, trying to find things that rhyme with “Ghost”. Because of budget limitations, Ned Hastings recycled clips from the original series and reorganized them on an Avid non-linear editor for a “talk show” style program. The characters’ crudely animated lips, awkward movements that resembled “paper dolls glued to Popsicle sticks”, and continuity errors became part of the joke.

For whatever reason, SG:C2C’s poor production values didn’t seem to matter. Pop icons from the cast of Gilligan’s Island to Jon Stewart lined up to be a part of the joke. Here’s Conan O’Brien’s raw footage from the time he appeared on Space Ghost. Take a look:

Every episode drips with whimsical insanity, in-jokes, fourth-wall breaks and Zorak being blown to smithereens. I don’t know why I love it, but I’ve always found SG:C2C to be oddly compelling, a triumph of creativity and science fiction.

I hope you enjoyed this moment of scifi weirdness! Please feel welcomed to dive down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Have a great weekend!

 

Mesh – New Painting – ‘The Station’

Happy Monday – here’s a new painting I’ve been working on for a few weeks – it’s ‘The Station’ from my novel ‘Mesh,’ a massive VR space somewhere between a Victorian library and a train station designed by MC Escher. The Station exists as a doorway between different virtual universes. Worked about 13 hours on this, hope you enjoy it.

The process involves multiple composites painted into a larger canvas in Photoshop to show a group of people on a Victorian iron bridge traveling across the vast, cavernous space of The Station. The Station is an evocative space – mysterious, a labyrinth of curiosities to be explored, protected, and defended. It comes from the same places in my head that are facinated by other strange cyberpunk/scifi concepts (Backrooms, arcologies, Freeside, etc).

This is probably not what you were expecting to see this morning and that’s okay. This painting is, as Jung put it, a ‘confession in stone’ – something for me to get out of my head so I can get back to other stuff I’m working on. The Station is a vast, abstract, digital space – a reflection of the connections of technology and ideas that make up the Internet, and ultimately the next phase of the Internet formed by throwaway tech and discarded people. Hope you enjoy looking at it as much as I enjoyed painting it.

 

Your Art Matters – Even If It Sucks

Pausing my re-drafting of Mike Sierra Echo to remind you (and myself): your art matters – even if it sucks. It’s been a tough couple of weeks, re-writing entire scenes, re-configuring and re-architecting the novel. I have a better sense now of what the emotional beats of the story are and I’m making sure the novel contains the ingredients it needs to connect with readers.

That said, part of me is like: ‘does this matter? Will people love the story? What if my writing sucks?’ Those negative intrusive thoughts are always there, eroding my confidence if I don’t actively do something to manage it. That’s why this little post on Reddit felt like a shot in the arm – your art matters, even if it sucks. Here’s a thoughtful breakdown of that powerful idea, courtesy TheBirminghamBear:

It is not possible to properly estimate the value of an individual. Which is why every individual must be afforded the opportunity to express themselves, in whatever form that expression takes. Because it is there, in the confluence of all of us reading, writing, painting, and theorizing, that true progress is made.

You can say that’s a sentimental notion, but it isn’t. The corporate conception of human worth isn’t realistic or pragmatic, it’s childish, simplistic, reductive and stupid. It is a view which appeals to the stupid and which makes the individual all the stupider for embracing.

The realistic perspective on the reality of humanity is that every human mind is unique, and that the value of its expression can not be properly understood or evaluated by anyone. If Van Gogh’s value could not have been properly understood by his contemporaries, how can anyone out there dare say they have the capacity to judge the true value of anyone?

Humanity is billions of unique nodes interlinked, communicating, building. No single person is smart enough to truly understand the emergent properties of that network. Just as the creators of an artificial intelligence don’t fully understand what their creation does, or why. No single person has the capacity to properly attribute all the essential influences and inputs that lead to a tangible output. The capitalist needs to pretend they can, because profit is dependent on ownership, and ownership is based on the delusion that you can justly compensate someone for their output.

Everything around us is only possible because of the size of the network of our species. We have gotten where we are despite the divsionary forces like capitalism that exploit and detract from our ultimate potential. Long, long before we printed paper money, we built tools, we conquered the animal kingdom, we created languages out of nothingness and abstracted and codified the concrete properties of our material reality on stone tablets and paper, because it is who we are and what we do.

The delusion that profit is behind innovation is one that humanity is far the worse off for sustaining. It isn’t within an individual that the spark of innovation resides, but in the connections between us. And the more each mind and voice among us is given the opportunity to contribute to that web of connection, the richer we all become, even when we have not the capacity to understand the true value of someone’s contribution to us until many years or decades after their time has come and gone.

Thoughts and Conclusions

Let me speak for a moment on why this is so important. Some might read this post and go ‘wait, you’re saying your novel sucks?’ No, of course not – I’m doing everything I reasonably (and unreasonably) can to make sure it doesn’t suck! Thing is, it’s always in the back of my head – the little voice going it’s not enough – your work sucks – nothing you do is worth anything. Every day, every written line, every Mastodon toot, every blog post – that’s me pushing back on the little voice.

Anthony Bourdain, great guy that he was, understood this struggle. He said: “I understand there’s a guy inside me who wants to lay in bed, smoke weed all day, and watch cartoons and old movies. My whole life is a series of stratagems to avoid, and outwit, that guy.” In fact, there’s a guy who talked about some lessons learned about productivity and self-actualization from Bourdain that you might appreciate.

Whole Lotta ‘Not Giving Up’ To Do

So I’m getting back to work on a Sunday morning. My art might suck, but it matters. This is me saying ‘I’m not giving up, I matter.’ One of these days I’ll figure out why this is all happening and we’ll share some important lessons learned. In the meantime, I’m reminded of the last lines in Bukowski’s Post Office: ‘In the morning it was morning and I was still alive. Maybe I’ll write a novel, I thought. And then I did.’

Gotta go folks – I have a whole lotta ‘no giving up’ to do.

Write on!

 

Sci-Friday #184 – Nobody Knows What Cyberpunk Is

Happy Friday, ya’ll – did you know that nobody knows what cyberpunk is? I didn’t, but it’s clear that these early 90s folks are as clueless as we are – check out this hilarious slice of 90s life for this Sci-Friday:

It’s funny that cyberpunk would be a non sequiter in the 90s – according to Wikipedia, Comics exploring cyberpunk themes began appearing as early as Judge Dredd, first published in 1977.  By the end of that decade, Lawrence Person would define cyberpunk ethos as follows:

“Classic cyberpunk characters were marginalized, alienated loners who lived on the edge of society in generally dystopic futures where daily life was impacted by rapid technological change, an ubiquitous datasphere of computerized information, and invasive modification of the human body.”

We’re living in a cyberpunk dystopia right now, according to that definition. I would invite you to explore more, although cyberpunk frequently includes ‘pulp detective’-style themes with violence and sex – definitely not stuff for kids. That’s why I prefer ‘solarpunk,’ where we’ve gotten beyond the societal collapse, dystopia and decay for something happier and hopeful. We’ll see which way the future rolls out.

I hope you enjoyed this moment of scifi sociology! Please feel welcomed to dive down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Have a great weekend!

Dystopian Warren Buffet – Three Laws of Artificial Intelligence

I read some Warren Buffet comments on artificial intelligence – ignoring how AI contributes to our modern boring dystopia – and started thinking about three laws that could prevent that. Here’s the news report and the quote – then I’ll offer some brief comments:

”When something can do all kinds of things, I get a little bit worried. Because I know we won’t be able to un-invent it and, you know, we did invent, for very, very good reason, the atom bomb in World War II”, the 92-year-old investor said at the meeting which was also attended by Charlie Munger, vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway.

“It was enormously important that we did so. But is it good for the next two hundred years of the world that the ability to do so has been unleashed?” he continued. He further said he believes AI will change “everything in the world, except how men think and behave.”

I agree with some of Buffet’s comments – AI will change everything except how men think and behave. Now for some brief comments on the ‘missing stair’ in his perspective and that’s what I think you and I should think about.

No one argues that Buffett isn’t smart or successful at making money. However, success in one domain doesn’t guarantee accomplishment in another. Articles like these create an  appeal to authority – a logical fallacy – by communicating ‘Warren Buffett is smart about money – you should listen to what he says about AI!’ without actually saying it. Warren Buffett is not an AI researcher, or an ethicist.

Further, no one argues that AI being used as a labor-saving device to fill in gaps of work or service is a bad thing. However, the explosion of AI as a tool for craven capitalism to eliminate the value of human creativity, of human authenticity, is nothing short of monstrous. As of this writing, ChatGPT has only been around for about six months, already we’re seeing significant impact to our economy and our society as greedy corporations look to make more by paying their people less. Need some examples? Look at the WGA strike, these robot servers, and Wendy’s new AI drive-through order system.

That’s not news, right? I’m not telling you anything you haven’t already heard from smarter people on bigger platforms. One thing that is consistently missing from the conversation – hence the ‘missing stair’ analogy – is clear and consistent messaging: Here’s why we’re doing this, here’s the problem we’re trying to solve, here’s how this benefits you, here’s how we’ll make sure this doesn’t become a problem.

Another thing that’s missing is self-awareness: If Buffett is accurate that ‘AI will change everything except how men think and behave’ then we have to ask the question: What realities of how men think and behave need to be acknowledged, discussed, and considered? Is Buffett qualified to speak to these issues?-He displays some self-awareness – good for him – but more is needed to address the craven capitalist exploitation of this new disruptive technology.

A conclusion occurred to me as I considered the facts and reflected on my own limitations – or perhaps a happy solution. If Asimov’s three laws of robotics from 1942 can balance the ethics and morals of technology, why haven’t we developed the three laws of AI in 2023? There’s nothing that prevents us from adopting three simple principles and explaining how they were considered when introducing a new AI tool:

An AI may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to physical, financial, emotional, or mental harmAn AI can be used to build tools to benefit humans, except where such tools would conflict with the First LawAn AI can protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law

I could wax exposition on how these laws could be applied, but I don’t love to hear myself talk as much as others do. The main takeaway here is that we – the humans not part of the ‘Warren Buffett club’ – need to respond to AI as both the existential threat and incredible opportunity it really is. Just as we learned to harness fire, electricity, and atomic energy – artificial intelligence is something capable of providing profound progress to the human race – but only to the degree to which we hold ourselves accountable.

I need to get back to working on Mike.Sierra.Echo – hope what I’m saying makes sense to you – happy Thursday and …

Write on!

 

Sci-Friday #183 – SciFi’s Guerrilla War on Toxic Masculinity

I caught this on /r/videos and it reminded me to talk about Scifi’s guerrilla war on toxic masculinity. Science fiction has always championed treating others as we want to be treated, and this video clip from Star Trek is no exception – take a look:

Everything Riker says rings true almost thirty years later – Deanna is her own person, as are all woman, and anyone who doesn’t understand that is in for a bumpy ride. Just ask Steven Crowder. In a tragically dysfunctional Jungian way, science fiction has been both ahead of time and behind the times when it comes to toxic masculinity. For myself, I’ve always felt that sunlight is the best disinfectant, and that’s why I’ve curated some Toxic Scifi Fan resources to you or someone you love with a complex problem.

I hope you enjoyed this moment of scifi sociology! Please feel welcomed to dive down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Have a great weekend!

 

Happy May the 4th – Star Wars Day 2023

Woo – May the Fourth is here – happy Mt4th, AKA Star Wars Day 2023, to all who celebrate! Here’s a fun music video someone put together and it remains one of my favorite Star Wars fan creations of the past few years. Take a listen!

What’s the history of May the Fourth? Interestingly, it came from The London Evening News. According to StarWars.com – It was on May 4, 1979, that the first known instance of “May the 4th Be With You” being used to mark the earlier date took place. Britain’s new prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, happened to assume office that day, and another clever newspaper writer for The London Evening News declared in a full-page ad: “May the Fourth Be With You, Maggie. Congratulations!”

It wasn’t just the British. “Randy Thom, who today is the director of sound design at Skywalker Sound and has been with the company for over 40 years, worked as a location sound recordist on Revenge of the Jedi (its title, of course, was later changed, and at the time of production it was known under the codename Blue Harvest) …   May 4, 1982, happened to be a working day, and Thom recalled thinking of the pun on his own when contemplating the date. He shared it with others on the set, and would continue to write an annual message to the company declaring “May the 4th Be With You” for years to come.”

Yeah, I know Star Wars doesn’t love me – I’ve come to terms with that. Nonetheless, I still enjoy well-produced pieces of scifi fantasy and this is no exception. @Rhinotv123 does a good job re-mixing your music and boosting it, more power to them.

Great Writing Advice for First-Time Authors

Found some great writing advice for first-time authors and am passing it along for your use. When you first navigate the space of writing, communicating thoughts via words, you need some kind of roadmap for navigating the minefield of ‘how do I write *well*?’

writer-dude from Reddit has ya covered, fam. Take a look at his great writing advice for first-time authors, and see what it can do to inform your craft today!

New writers tend to work primarily on plot-development first and foremost—which is okay, but often at the expense of character-development and scene-setting, both elements (of a complete story) no less important than the plot.

If you’re in draft mode, ain’t nothing wrong with defining your plot first. After all, you want to know where you’re going and how to get there. But once a writer’s sure of that destination, it’s all about plumping up character personalities and motivations, and also about visually grounding readers in each new scene in the where (a wind blown, daisy-drenched meadow?), when (early morning? Late Spring? 2007?) and even why you’re including specific characters in any particular scene. (What motivates them, and you, to be there?)

Personally, I think proper scene-setting is equally as important to readers as plot momentum, and character-development very often more so. Readers don’t read novels to find out what happens, they read to find out what happens to who. So creating unique, dramatic and interesting characters (both heroes and villains) is very important. I mean there are only so many plots in the literary world, and most of them have been written a thousand times over. But your characters have infinite possibilities for expression, and their (sometimes eclectic) uniqueness is what sells books (imho).

Typically (and this is a generic observation… exceptions always exist) for every 100 pages of ‘plot momentum,’ one can easily write 100 pages of character development as well, much of which concerns the outcome of your plot, but can also add back-stories or side-stories or include secondary characters who fail at their tasks (or intentionally thwart your MCs…who then have to try again). And a writer can easily add 50-100 pages of scene-setting, exploring/explaining realms, adding visual excitement to scenes and giving characters (and readers) a chance to occasionally ‘stop and smell the roses.’ Heck, some writers (and George R.R. Martin comes to mind) can write a dozen pages simply visualizing a feast, setting the table and choreographing a scene before the action even begins.

So if you find your characters moving mechanically through the book, mindlessly following the plot—realize that there’s room for all sorts of embellishment, side-stories and unexpected twists and options for adding additional drama. How many times have you seen a character fail to start a car, when time is of the essence? Those few moments of frustration aren’t directly plot-related, they’re intentional interludes meant to add tension and drama. You’re upping the emotional ante and giving readers additional reasons to turn the page.

Should you decide to throw in a few extra (clueless, nefarious?) characters to foil your MC’s efforts, you can add dozens or hundreds of pages to a manuscript that don’t directly influence/effect the plot, but that add to the overall thrill ride, not to mention that you’re creating characters far more exciting (clever or scary, unlucky or frivolous or devious…or whatever) for readers to discover.

So there you  have it – some great writing advice for first-time authors. Play around with plot, scene, character development – explore the space in your head where the story lives – and see what happens when you bring it to life. I’m pushing forward on this updated/edited draft of Mike.Sierra.Echo and I’m following this advice. I hope it helps you, too!

Write on!