{"id":484,"date":"2008-07-24T23:11:45","date_gmt":"2008-07-24T23:11:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.revolutionsf.com\/revblogs\/zombielapdance\/2008\/07\/24\/disappointed-in-the-chronicle\/"},"modified":"2012-08-17T05:24:19","modified_gmt":"2012-08-17T05:24:19","slug":"disappointed-in-the-chronicle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.revolutionsf.com\/revblogs\/zombielapdance\/2008\/07\/24\/disappointed-in-the-chronicle\/","title":{"rendered":"Disappointed in the Chronicle"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The local Austin weekly, <span style=\"font-style: italic\">The Austin Chronicle<\/span>, just put out a &quot;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.austinchronicle.com\/gyrobase\/\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"postlink\">Science Fiction<\/a>&quot; issue.<\/p>\n<p>Now, I&#8217;m not such a spring chicken that I take the publishing institution of so-called &quot;alternative&quot; weeklies seriously. After all, I have published in two of them, including <span style=\"font-style: italic\">The Austin Chronicle<\/span>. They are not journalism, and they are not fertilizers of bohemian creativity. They are ad revenue wrapped around restaurant reviews and movie listings (which are also ads).<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps this is some sort of re-hash issue, like a sitcom clip show, because they didn&#8217;t seem to do any actual research into the Austin Sci-fi scene. There&#8217;s only the usual suspects, an interview with the Alamo programmers, brief mention of Graham Reynolds (which seems obligatory in every issue), and a couple of inane essays about &quot;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.austinchronicle.com\/gyrobase\/Issue\/story?oid=oid%3A648439\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"postlink\">why zombies don&#8217;t eat each other<\/a>&quot; and somesuch.<\/p>\n<p>There was also the obligatory article on local theater&#8217;s take on classic sci-fi radio: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.austinchronicle.com\/gyrobase\/Issue\/story?oid=oid%3A648552\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"postlink\"><span style=\"font-style: italic\">Intergalactic Nemesis<\/span><\/a>, written by our favorite buddy, <a href=\"http:\/\/jess-ka.livejournal.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"postlink\">Jessica Reisman<\/a>, who has published right <a href=\"http:\/\/www.revolutionsf.com\/article.php?id=3470\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"postlink\">here in revSF<\/a>, as well as a novel and other less important accomplishments. Reisman was only quoted twice, and the second time the writer inserted explanatory brackets four times. I&#8217;m guessing that Reisman used the term &quot;FTL&quot; and the powers that be over at the Chronicle thought that was too nerdy.<\/p>\n<p>Now, I love Reisman&#8217;s work, and I enjoyed <span style=\"font-style: italic\">Intergalactic Nemesis<\/span> the first two times I heard it, but as the most celebrated product of the Austin local theater scene it&#8217;s pretty pathetic. Beating this ninety-minute production into the ground with repeated performances and constant promotion completely misses the point of vintage radio drama, which is: YOU CAN MAKE NEW EPISODES VERY QUICKLY!!<\/p>\n<p>They would come out with a new Buck Rogers episode five times a week, but Salvage Vanguard Theater has been trotting out <span style=\"font-style: italic\">Intergalactic Nemesis<\/span> for TWELVE YEARS now?!?<\/p>\n<p>Even now, <a href=\"http:\/\/decoderring.libsyn.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"postlink\">Decoder Ring Theater<\/a> in Canada is producing comparable product that is every bit as funny as <span style=\"font-style: italic\">Nemesis<\/span> on a weekly basis, which puts the hullabaloo in perspective.<\/p>\n<p>So basically I&#8217;m crabby about all the fuss and no sequel in the works. Could you get right on that, Jessica? Thanks.<\/p>\n<p>But what really chaps my mighty thews about this <span style=\"font-style: italic\">Chronicle<\/span> issue is the complete lack of local scene reporting in what is ostensibly a local paper. We&#8217;ll forget for a moment that they didn&#8217;t mention <a href=\"http:\/\/www.spacesquid.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"postlink\">Space Squid<\/a> or the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.spacesquid.com\/free_writing_contests.htm\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"postlink\">win a Wii contest<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s because I keep forgetting to send the local media comp copies.<\/p>\n<p>But where are the local writers? We must have, what, ten sci-fi novelists in town? Including first-time novelist <a href=\"http:\/\/www.patricesarath.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"postlink\">Patrice Sarath<\/a>, who deserves some breathless reporting from the local papers. <\/p>\n<p>Then there&#8217;s the local Armadillocon which is coming up soon.<\/p>\n<p>And this very website, a veritable powerhouse of geek culture, which is 50% based in Austin.<\/p>\n<p>And the influential writers groups!<\/p>\n<p>Ah, hell. <\/p>\n<p>I wasn&#8217;t expecting much from the <span style=\"font-style: italic\">Chronicle <\/span>anyways.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The local Austin weekly, The Austin Chronicle, just put out a &quot;Science Fiction&quot; issue. Now, I&#8217;m not such a spring chicken that I take the publishing institution of so-called &quot;alternative&quot; weeklies seriously. After all, I have published in two of &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.revolutionsf.com\/revblogs\/zombielapdance\/2008\/07\/24\/disappointed-in-the-chronicle\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v15.2.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Disappointed in the Chronicle - Zombie Lapdance<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.revolutionsf.com\/revblogs\/zombielapdance\/2008\/07\/24\/disappointed-in-the-chronicle\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Disappointed in the Chronicle - Zombie Lapdance\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The local Austin weekly, The Austin Chronicle, just put out a &quot;Science Fiction&quot; issue. 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