BilmBlog500

So I did some work today, at least one project wring St. Martin's about an author was taken care of, but it's hard to concentrate, especially because I'm getting over a big that's making me a little more tired than usual, which isn't good for doing work reading.  So I've read a few weeks of comics.  You can find a collection of links to my blog posts on the DC "0" issues in September here: http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-new-52-weeks-later.html http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-new-52-weeks-later-pt-4.html http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-new-52-weeks-later-pt-3.html http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2012/09/batwing-was-pleasant-surprise-in-dcs.html Disappointments:  Issue #1 of Team 7 did not live up to the theoretical promise of the 0 issue, and since the Teen Titans looks to be crossing over with Team 7 and is very of and off, I may stop with Teen Titans.  The dark side of crossovers, they are as or more li...

I'm not a big fan of pontificating too much about things with too much uncertainty, and believe it or not there are a lot of uncertainties about Random House's acquisition of Penguin that make it a mistake for people to get too far ahead of themselves. The first major uncertainty is government regulation.  In both the US and UK, the merger will give the combined company large market share in the publishing industry.  Will there be any divestitures required?  My guess is we're not looking at a lot, because 25% market share with four other decent-sized competitors is hardly a dominant market position.  But will the government look more closely at any particular categories?  As an example in sf/fantasy, the merged company would control Ace, Roc, Del Rey, and distribute DAW.  Which would be quite a dominant market share.  Our Bookscan account doesn't offer market share data, but it's out there, if anyone who reads this post has any light to shed on their p...

Back in 2011 I did a blog post about some controversy I didn't entirely understand regarding Harlequin's broad efforts to add in or update e-book royalties on some older contracts.  One of the things I discussed was Harlequin's ability to play around some with e-book royalties by self-dealing with various of their international subsidiaries.  And now, lo and behold, Publishers Weekly reports on a lawsuit about just that... This comes not long after Google and publishers announced a settlement of a lawsuit on pretty much the exact terms I'd suggested might be nice. My stopped clock has now been right its two times in a day, but maybe it will be right again anyway!

The World Science Fiction Comvention is always exhilarating and exhausting for me. Bouchercon is a little different. Named for the mystery fiction critic Anthony Boucher, it is the World Fantasy of the mystery genre in that it is a heavy networking convention, a busy bar scene for the professionals, but without the membership cap, and more fans, and people who actually go to panels.  It isn't near as exhilarating for me as a WorldCon, but I also have fewer clients, so there's a little less scheduling pressure.  And while there's a strong bar scene at night, there aren't the room parties and hospitality suites that are such an important part of the scene, social and business and fannish all in one, at the major sf conventions, so it doesn't require as much after hours time. So I had clients to see and award ceremonies to attend, I was also able to use the weekend to see some of Cleveland and really, most importantly, to recharge the batteries a bit after an exhaustin...

My client Jeff Gelb is a longtime fan of all sorts of pop culture things, and was kind enough to put some thoughts to paper on the 50th anniversary of the first James Bond film Dr. No: Dr. No was released 50 years ago! Hard to believe! So  I was thinking about the tremendous effect  I an Fleming's creation has had on so many areas of popular culture (and my life) these past 50 years. I devoured all the Bond paperbacks in high school, and then read at least 100 Bond wanna-be spy novels (many of which I still own!). Spy novels are still immensely popular, from the works of Robert Ludlum to Daniel Silva (I'm a big Silva fan). Even Jack Reacher  arguably  could be called a distant cousin to James Bond. Comic books ran rampant with spies for awhile, including Nick Fury and SHIELD, now popular in the Avengers movie and coming soon to your TV set. Meanwhile, TV shows in the '60s gave us The Man from UNCLE, I Spy, Wild West, The Avengers, and so many others, continuing ...

Some time back I did a blog post about the controversial and eventually overturned settlement between Google, the Authors Guild, the major publishers and others about the Google project to scan zillions of books and make them available. Read that post here.  http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2009/04/google-settlement.html This week, the major publishers settled their case with Google, you can read the Google press release about that settlement here. http://googlepress.blogspot.com/2012/10/publishers-and-google-reach-agreement.html Just to say, I called this one. The main part of the settlement here is that the publishers get Google's file for their use. Which is exactly what I said was missing from the larger agreement. If they had done that same thing three years ago for the broad settlement, our ebook program would have long ago had a lot more books, our clients would have been making a lot more money all along the way.  Instead, the Authors Guikd is still spending how...

I didn't watch the debate because I was watching Indians, but if I understand this part of it correctly... Mitt Romney said he doesn't have plans for a $5 Trillion tax cut because he intends to find that amount of money elsewhere in the budget so it doesn't raise the deficit, and this cannot be considered a tax cut. He intends to have the government take five trillion dollars from some people to give five trillion dollars to other people Isn't that redistribution?? Yes, Redistribution R E D I S T R I B U T I O N Now, from a Republicsn standpoint maybe not because money people don't pay in taxes is always your money that you get to keep so how can it be redistribution to just let you keep your five trillion dollars. But, if you are one of the people who will lose a tax loophole and pay more of your money in taxes than you are now, won't that look like the government took Five Trillion to redistribute it elsewhere? If you benefit from a government program whether ...

Besides all the New 52 books, what else has been in my funny book pile in recent weeks... Phantom Lady and Doll Man, a 4-issue mini-series by Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti and artists Cat Staggs and Tom Derenick.  If I'd gotten around to reading the first issue, I wouldn't have read the second.  It looks really nice, but it didn't cohere.  It seems to be bits and pieces of a story instead of a story, a Zan and Jayna of a comic book. I always buy some Bongo.  Bart Simpson #75 was an OK issue of this title. American Vampire has a great story arc going on, The Blacklist.  I think this is the third arc I'm into since I started reading this DC/Vertigo title, and this might be the best of the three. There's some great artwork by Rafael Albuquerque, Scott Snyder is doing some excellent work.  I don't know why I didn't cotton to this series when it started, but I'm totally into it now. I had two issues of The New Deadwardians.  This is an excellent Vertigo m...

Wherein we come to the end of our exploration of the new DC Universe after its first 13 months of existence... I thought Birds of Prey started off strong and then went off track pretty quickly.  The 0 issue by Duane Swierczynski, Romano Molenaar and Vicente Cifuentes will probably be my last.  It didn't interest me, hard to say why, but it didn't.  Nor did Superman #0 by Scott Lobdell and Kenneth Rocafort. Here, at least I know why.  The art wasn't my style.  And more to the point, I know there that I have zero interest in having another retelling of the Krypton side of Superman's origin.  Been there, done that, got it it one in the opening 20 minutes of Superman: The Movie in 1977.  And for all the reboots of Superman since from John Byrne's in the mid-1980s and onward, it is what it is.  While I'm not likely to  continue with the book with this art team, it's possible there are other story-lines, perhaps with other art teams, that I'll deci...

So it's That Time of the Year, that biennial season when you can turn to CSPAN at off-hours or streaming on their website with oodles and oodles of political debates. And it's that time when I am perennially reminded how good the Republican Party is.  Not on ideas or policies, there are very few of those that I agree with, but their messaging is always so much better and so much more consistent.  You watch a handful of debates, you'll see the Republicans trotting out their well-tested talking points.  And you'll see the Democrats -- well, you never know what you'll see the Democrats doing.  Do Democratic strategists watch debates?  Can't they figure out after the first few what the Republican message is and start to get some counterpoints out by the time debate season is into its third or fourth weeks?  Will Democrats ever realize that you can get only so far trying to distance yourself from your party or your President, that one of the great Republican suc...