Groff Conklin disappointment

John Pelan wrote in message . ..
On 2 Sep 2004 00:19:37 -0700, (Bill
Palmer) wrote:

John Pelan wrote in message . ..
On 1 Sep 2004 01:11:25 -0700, (Bill
Palmer) wrote nothing of any importantance (as is usual),

Ah, Palmjob, I see that you've made the acquaintance of Crass Barfer!
This is a big day for you, Barky's a publisher, you know. He also
claims to be a writer, and like yourself has never sold anything nor
is likely to.


I have referred in an earlier posting to
certain patterns of lazy, self-deluded thinking
that the Pelans of the net fall into. Here is
another one: they talk out both sides of their
mouth regarding the importance of book sales.

If they learn that a net writer who has tweaked
their beak has not print-published anything, that,
for Pelan and his ilk, becomes a handy excuse to
try and denigrate the writer or even to deny
that the writer being attacked is a writer at
all.

Yet, when you remind them that Dennis Rodman
and the Long Island Lolita are "paid and
published professional writers," then they
usually take another tack and start blathering
about money and book sales not being everything.

If you judge these "being-paid-and-printed-is-
what-makes-the-writer" types by their own
comments, then one's conclusion would have to
be that Dennis Rodman is a far greater writer
than E. A. Poe, and Nora Roberts is a far
greater writer than the Bronte sisters combined.
(After all, Rodman has sold more books and earned
more for "writing" than Poe ever did in his
lifetime, and Nora Roberts has sold FAR more
books and earned FAR more money than the Bronte
sisters togehther did, even adding all their
earnings together and calculating the difference
in the buying power of money between the Bronte's
time and now.)

Of course, when confronted by that key aspect
of reality, people like Pelan always start
shuffling, back-peddling, weaving, bobbing
and waffling. Sort of like "book sales and
earnings tell us EVERYTHING about a writer's
worth" and "no, book sales and earnings tell
us nothing at all about writers' merits."

Why? Because it hurts their pride to admit
that Hulk Hogan, Dennis Rodman, and "da Tooz"
are -- when judged by these newsgroup huffers
and puffers own blather about books sales--
far more authenic as writers.

In my own view, neither money nor being printed
makes a writer authentic. The only thing which
does that is readers.

Proof of being published means next to nothing.

If you can give proof of having readers, then
you are at the same time giving proof of being
a writer.


Mr. Palmer
Room 314 in the upstairs office

Palmjob, you're out of your depths, and dragging in spurious
autobiographies not actually written by their subject means nothing.

Let's try another tack, will readers pay to read what you've written?
On the Internet, where things are free, I suspect that even a
talentless got like Chris Barker can get a few people to read his
drivel. Certainly you may have had any number of people peruse your
rantings for a chuckle while they're bored at work, but will they pay
money to read your work? I suspect not.

Here's your challenge, Palmjob; Post the "best" of your work at a
website and set up a PayPal account for donations. Let's see if you
have enough to buy a couple of library discards at the end of a month.

Let us know how it goes, will you?


Cheers,

John


Your life's always about slapping your willy on the counter to show
how big you think it is, isn't it?

Go seduce that fanboy of your dreams; exorcise those demons; leave us
alone.

CB
http://hauntedriver.co.uk

John Pelan wrote in message . ..
On 2 Sep 2004 00:19:37 -0700, (Bill
Palmer) wrote:

John Pelan wrote in message . ..
On 1 Sep 2004 01:11:25 -0700, (Bill
Palmer) wrote nothing of any importantance (as is usual),

Ah, Palmjob, I see that you've made the acquaintance of Crass Barfer!
This is a big day for you, Barky's a publisher, you know. He also
claims to be a writer, and like yourself has never sold anything nor
is likely to.


I have referred in an earlier posting to
certain patterns of lazy, self-deluded thinking
that the Pelans of the net fall into. Here is
another one: they talk out both sides of their
mouth regarding the importance of book sales.

If they learn that a net writer who has tweaked
their beak has not print-published anything, that,
for Pelan and his ilk, becomes a handy excuse to
try and denigrate the writer or even to deny
that the writer being attacked is a writer at
all.

Yet, when you remind them that Dennis Rodman
and the Long Island Lolita are "paid and
published professional writers," then they
usually take another tack and start blathering
about money and book sales not being everything.

If you judge these "being-paid-and-printed-is-
what-makes-the-writer" types by their own
comments, then one's conclusion would have to
be that Dennis Rodman is a far greater writer
than E. A. Poe, and Nora Roberts is a far
greater writer than the Bronte sisters combined.
(After all, Rodman has sold more books and earned
more for "writing" than Poe ever did in his
lifetime, and Nora Roberts has sold FAR more
books and earned FAR more money than the Bronte
sisters togehther did, even adding all their
earnings together and calculating the difference
in the buying power of money between the Bronte's
time and now.)

Of course, when confronted by that key aspect
of reality, people like Pelan always start
shuffling, back-peddling, weaving, bobbing
and waffling. Sort of like "book sales and
earnings tell us EVERYTHING about a writer's
worth" and "no, book sales and earnings tell
us nothing at all about writers' merits."

Why? Because it hurts their pride to admit
that Hulk Hogan, Dennis Rodman, and "da Tooz"
are -- when judged by these newsgroup huffers
and puffers own blather about books sales--
far more authenic as writers.

In my own view, neither money nor being printed
makes a writer authentic. The only thing which
does that is readers.

Proof of being published means next to nothing.

If you can give proof of having readers, then
you are at the same time giving proof of being
a writer.


Mr. Palmer
Room 314 in the upstairs office

Palmjob, you're out of your depths, and dragging in spurious
autobiographies not actually written by their subject means nothing.

You are already weaving and waffling, Pelan. You
have posted many times indicating, in so many
contemptuous phrases, your belief that "real" writers
have to be published and paid to be authenticated.
Well, I brought up a few examples of "writers" who
are published in far more volumes than you, and are
paid far more than you. Hoisting you up painfully
by your very own petard for the amusement of our
readers, I am afraid that I must apply your own
standards and conclude that Distinguished Authors
Rodman and "Tooz" are far greater literary figures
than Mr. John Pelan! (You see, John, you prove
very predictable, from your posting links to
hoary flames by notorious spankards to the
way you responded here.)

Let's try another tack, will readers pay to read what you've written?
On the Internet, where things are free, I suspect that even a
talentless got like Chris Barker can get a few people to read his
drivel. Certainly you may have had any number of people peruse your
rantings for a chuckle while they're bored at work, but will they pay
money to read your work? I suspect not.

Here's your challenge, Palmjob; Post the "best" of your work at a
website and set up a PayPal account for donations. Let's see if you
have enough to buy a couple of library discards at the end of a month.

If I used your less-than-brilliant strategy
(outlined above) they probably would not.
After all, they can and do enjoy the best of
my stand alones free in the Google Nova.
Why should they pay money for what they can
get free? My readers and fans aren't stupid.
At some time in the future, I may decide to
offer for sale a new work of mine at a website,
but it will be that -- something new that has
not been posted and Google-archived.

(I know John was being snotty, but I have found
that a straight answer is usually best -- whatever
the intention of the person asking the question.)


Mr. Palmer
Room 314 in the upstairs office

Let us know how it goes, will you?


Cheers,

John

"Bill Palmer" wrote in message
om...
Well, something is very peculiar about John
Pelan, because his actual Google archive
shows a good deal of trolling poppycock,
and little if any of the food for thought
you suggest. In fact, when I ran his name
though Google groups, the first page which
popped up showed a good deal of puerile
silliness. I hard time discerning any real
substance in his entire Google archive.
I don't know, maybe Pelan should look into it.
Perhaps someone somehow hacked in and deleted
most or all of his intelligent postings --
charitably assuming there were any to begin
with.

Further, Pelan has been tallking rather big,
but the odd thing is, his actual GEM count --
considering he has been hanging around Usenet
for a few years -- could only be described as
anemic. People just don't seem to find his
comments very interesting, and by and large,
outside this one group, they don't respond
to him, unless he simply starts insulting them
to get a littly shabby attention. Sad.

Maybe there are two John Pelans, because
his statements don't fit very well with his
actual Google history, if one can dignify such
a feeble collection of stale trolling tidbits
and general juvenile silliness with such a
grand word as "history," that is...

No, there is something about John Pelan
which just does not add up. It doesn't
add up in Google, and it doesn't add up
in any of the customary ways of trying
to evaluate someone as a thinker and/or
a writer. There is something seriously
lacking about that fellow.

I do not know much about Google or usenet. I don't know what GEM stands for
and I am not interested enough about the history of net culture to go and
investigate your role in it. I don't know how Google archives posts, nor
why over half of my own posts do not appear there when I search for myself.
But I do know that in alt.books.ghost-fiction and rec.arts.horror.written,
as well as various Yahoo groups, I have encountered a large number of posts
by John Pelan that I have learned a considerable amount from, as well as
finding amusement and other value. Posts other than the nasty ones, mind
you. I don't know or care why there is acrimony between you and him or
anyone else. I have no taste for abusive posts of any sort, really, and I'm
not defending anyone's language or attacks. But the point that Pelan
contributes nothing is simply not accurate. I am not impressed by reports
from Google archives, not in comparison to my own experience of the last
five years. Neither does the fact that you may have created a lot of value
logically support the claim that he has not.

- Todd T.

"Todd T" wrote in message ...
"Bill Palmer" wrote in message
om...


I do not know much about Google or usenet. I don't know what GEM stands for
and I am not interested enough about the history of net culture to go and
investigate your role in it. I don't know how Google archives posts, nor
why over half of my own posts do not appear there when I search for myself.
But I do know that in alt.books.ghost-fiction and rec.arts.horror.written,
as well as various Yahoo groups, I have encountered a large number of posts
by John Pelan that I have learned a considerable amount from, as well as
finding amusement and other value. Posts other than the nasty ones, mind
you. I don't know or care why there is acrimony between you and him or
anyone else. I have no taste for abusive posts of any sort, really, and I'm
not defending anyone's language or attacks. But the point that Pelan
contributes nothing is simply not accurate. I am not impressed by reports
from Google archives, not in comparison to my own experience of the last
five years. Neither does the fact that you may have created a lot of value
logically support the claim that he has not.

You sound reasonable enough. Even so, all you have
to do is look over the interchanges between Pelan
and myself to see that he started trolling me out
of a clear blue sky before I had taken any notice
of him whatsoever. As a result, his calling me a
troll is transparently ironic, to say the least.

Pelan seems to (or at least pretends to) mistake
someone's enjoyment of thoughtful follow-up
responses for trolling. There is nothing at all
wrong about working hard to entertain and/or inform
newsgroup readers and then enjoying what they have
to say in return. That is what I sometimes
call swimming in the thoughtstream. It is not
being a troll.

(I know. I am the author of "To Catch a Troll,"
perhaps the best-known Usenet article about
trolling. Pelan should read it. It will make
him ashamed of the trite stunts he has been
pulling trying to troll me, acting as though
I were born yesterday and could not see through
his shallow attention-begging ploys.)

When "troll" is used in a pejorative way, it
connotes insincerity. It conjures up images
of a person who will say anything to get
attention, and who, in fact, is so attention-
starved and misguided as a writer that he
would rather be called a bunch of dirty names
than ignored.

That's not me, but it does somewhat describe
the manner in which Pelan accosted me with his
silly accusations and mean-spirited flames,
simply because I had expressed myself very
sincerely about an admittedly rather
unorthodox experiment involving removing
an ink impression from page edges.


Mr. Palmer
Room 314 in the upstairs office

- Todd T.