[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by zerospinboson

I find this somewhat amusing. Just how much diversity do you think is "accepted" even by today's major publishing houses?

The point is, right now we have major publishing houses with different focuses (I buy a good deal from Weiser), and many minor publishing houses that publish content that major houses wouldn't touch (New Falcon, Freya's Bower, New Page, Loompanics). Remove their content controls and put them all in the hands of a single organization--one with a history of censorship and repression of "dangerous" ideas--and the diversity we now have gets stifled.

While i'm impressed by the fact that both Neal Stephenson and the guy who wrote the DaVinci Code are printed, I find the emphasis you all put on "scary government" a bit silly.

I'm not so much worried about "scary government," but the ridiculous ideas that (1) ALL governments on the planet will agree on what artistic content should be subsidized and (2) any one government will subsidize all the artists who are currently making a living selling their content to publishers.

I understand that the premise includes the idea that the gov't would subsidize artists who aren't currently published, and we would all be enriched thereby. I don't disagree with that notion--but I don't blithely accept that we'd be better off with the gov't choosing whose works to promote.

all you'd have to do is prove you're being read in order to be eligible for funding?

Such a sweet idea. How widely-read do you have to prove you are to be eligible? I predict a rash of spambot "readers" to drive up popularity numbers... and the authors who get the subsidies are the most technologically advanced ones, not the most skilled writers.