media coverage of the DNC

Jeff Jarvis quotes Ken Layne:

This is going to be the world's longest week. Until the Republican convention, anyway.

( on the coverage of the DNC )

the DNC speeches -- mostly Kerry's

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Kerry/Bush et al

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On WMD and intelligence failures

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linkage on a variety of other topics

My convention coverage:

I didn't watch the convention last night. I went to sleep.

Aren't you jealous?

-Jeff Jarvis, July 28, 2004

Last weekend and then the beginning of the week, I kept wanting to stab people for their stupidity. I decided to blame the DNC being in the air or something since the ridiculous convention serves no other purpose. The ickiness seemed to die away by the middle of the week, though. I spent Wednesday and today catching up on lots of stuff my dad has sent me over the past couple weeks.

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fandom

Inspired by fan_the_vote, stakebait has a poll up about doing a voter registration drive: making fanfic/art for people who register to vote.

double_helix posts about LJ’s influence on fannish discussion (I love her description: "It stops being The Internet Talking To You About Buffy, and starts being 79 Strangers Talking About Buffy, Stargate, That One Fandom You Hate, And Their Bosses.") and jacito follows up with why/how she blogs.

docvergil explains how the Aeneid is fanfiction.

themonkeycabal explains why, for her, original fic is harder to write than fanfic:

To me, writing fan fic is like playing a video game, whereas writing original fic is like programming the video game.

In fan fic my world is already created, my characters defined; the words, the politics, the settings, the tools, it's all already there for me to use, or abuse, as I see fit. In developing an original story, none of that is there until I create it, until I define it. The slate, she is completely blank. Quite frankly, I find original fic a terrifying process in some ways, liberating in others. At this very moment, however, it's mostly terrifying.

violetsmiles posts: "It Ain't Easy Being A Hero ~ Moral Absolutism & The H Word"
Money quote: "Many of the characters that fall do so not because they are inherently bad or evil, but because the line between acceptable and unacceptable means becomes blurred."
She also points out that we are often easier on characters who behave worse than the hero because we don’t expect as much from them as we do from the hero.

phineasjones’ Friday textslash challenge was: " ... and then they had sex." This made me wanna write fic again, but i was blanking, so i’m asking for requests of a sort. Give me a pairing and 1-3 other things: setting/object/phrase. I mostly only do Whedonverse, but feel free to suggest anyone from any universe you think i’m familiar with.