The Sanity Project

The long arm of Chinese censorship

This entry was posted in Writing on by

A company that uses a Hong Kong print shop exposes itself to Chinese censorship, no matter where the books will be distributed. Penguin Random House found that out when it had The Penguin New Zealand Anthology printed in Hong Kong. The printing company, not named in the article, told the publisher it couldn’t print the book because it had the words “first Republic of China” and “Taiwanese flag.” The publisher said it used the Hong Kong printer because of special format requirements that no one in Australia or New Zealand could meet.Flag of Taiwan

By Chinese law, Taiwan does not exist as an independent nation, and saying otherwise is forbidden.

The book was printed with the offending words redacted. Any company that cares about a free press should not use a printer that has to bow to China’s government.

Harvard groups’ endorsement of murder

This entry was posted in Personal and tagged Harvard on by

As a former employee of the Harvard University Libraries, I have to say something about the groups there who excused the mass murder of innocent Jewish civilians. The Reuters article says:

A coalition of 34 Harvard students organizations said they “hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence” following decades of occupation, adding that “the apartheid regime is the only one to blame.”

Saying that the Israeli government is 100% to blame implies that the people who committed the slaughter are blameless. That’s an endorsement of murder.

I’m disgusted though not surprised. We’re talking about a university that booted a dean for being a defense attorney in a criminal case. Harvard should not suppress the groups making these statements — it’s already bad enough that FIRE has given it an “abysmal” rating for free speech — but it should distance itself from them in the most emphatic terms. It has failed to do this.

The craft of children’s books

This entry was posted in Techniques Writing as business and tagged books publishing writing on by

I just learned that my friend Debbie Ohi, a writer and illustrator of children’s books, has a Substack. Even though I never plan to write a children’s book, I was fascinated by her article on understanding picture book format and construction. I’d never realized there were such strict page requirements. If you’re thinking of getting into this field or know someone who is, you should find her articles very interesting.

Words derived from authors

This entry was posted in Commentary and tagged language usage on by

This post is inspired by an online discussion of how the word “Orwellian” should be used. One person argued it should refer only to authoritarian dictatorships. I disagreed. That got me thinking of other words based on authors’ names, such as “Kafkaesque,” “Machiavellian,” and “Dickensian.” How broadly or narrowly should we use those words? Is there any basis for agreement?

The subject here is words that are reminiscent of something in the author’s work. Adjectives that denote the author’s ideas directly, such as “Jeffersonian,” “Marxist,” and “Freudian” are easier to deal with; they should refer to something the author has said, or they’re being used incorrectly. But words that indicate reminiscences are trickier. Any writer worth becoming an adjective writes about more than one thing and approaches them from more than one angle.
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The slow Worldcon train wreck

This entry was posted in News and tagged China fandom on by

We’re down to the month of the Chengdu Worldcon, and things aren’t shaping up well. At this point, it’s pointless for me to urge people not to go. Either you’ve made firm plans or you aren’t going. All I can do is advise you to be careful if you are going.

The much-hyped, still under construction convention center isn’t big enough to accommodate the biggest events. At least for Chinese attendees, admission to the opening, closing, and Hugo ceremonies will be by lottery. Hugo nominees and GoHs will be allowed in, as will people from far away if they’ve jumped through the right hoops.
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A look into the cancel culture mind 1

This entry was posted in Commentary and tagged ethics Internet on by

We’ve all run into the vicious nastiness which pervades the Internet. If you make public posts, there’s a good chance you’ve been its target, if only from occasional potshots. Sometimes it’s seriously painful. Anyone who’s had a loved one die of COVID needs to think carefully before mentioning the fact publicly.

An Atlantic article by Kaitlin Tiffany, “How Telling People to Die Became Normal”, looks at the kind of people who try to increase other people’s pain. Referring to a Facebook group dedicated to this kind of malice, she writes:
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Tomorrow’s Songs Today, second edition

This entry was posted in My writing and tagged fandom history Tomorrow's Songs Today on by

Cover, Tomorrow's Songs TodayThe second edition of Tomorrow’s Songs Today, my history of filk music, is now available as a free download. A new chapter covers events since 2015, and the appendices have been updated to list conventions and awards up to the present. The existing chapters have been lightly revised. Many links that broke over the past eight years are fixed.

Hachette v. Internet Archive

This entry was posted in Commentary Publishing and tagged books copyright law libraries preservation on by

The legal battle over the Internet Archive’s Open Library has drawn passionate responses from people involved in the creation, publication, and distribution of books. As I’m writing this, the court of the Southern District of New York has ruled that putting unauthorized digitized versions of copyrighted books on the open Internet is a violation of copyright, and the Internet Archive is appealing the decision.

Publishers Hachette, Penguin Random House, Wiley, and HarperCollins argued that distributing books through the Open Library violated their copyrights. The Internet Archive has declared its appeal is “a necessary fight if we want library collections to survive in the digital age.” SFWA has stated that the Open Library “is not library lending, but direct infringement of authors’ copyrights.” The debate pits the rights of authors and publishers against the aims of preservation.
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Will the real Chengdu con chair please stand up?

This entry was posted in News and tagged China fandom science fiction on by

A recent announcement from the Chengdu Worldcon adds to the abnormal level of hype over the slogan and the mascot’s name for the con. But I’ve already written about that. Something else is very weird.

Yao Haijun, the full-time chairman of the 2023 Chengdu Worldcon and president of the Chengdu Science Fiction Association…

Liang Xiaolan, the full-time chairman of the 2023 Chengdu Worldcon and the vice president of the Chengdu Science Fiction Association…

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