just because you have written a book does not make you an author

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

You could be right that Michael Kozlowski is moonshot.

There are several arguments made in this thread that "author" does not mean anything with regard to status. These arguments (including some by myself) are used in this article, some almost verbatim. The article tries to point out that if "too many people" / self-publishers are using the term "author", the value of the word will diminish.

I call bullshit. It's the other way around. Everybody can use the word "author" *because* it has no intrinsic value.

edit: see the last paragraph of the article. It is an almost exact copy of one of my own posts here. The words "Some people will say..." actually link to said post, where I point out that drawing a line in the sand to define authors is useless; it can't be done because everybody has different opinions on what exactly an author is.

The poster of that article uses that post out of context to cement his opinion that the the word "author" has lost or is losing it's status, while I made that post trying to point out that the word "author" has no status to begin with.

Didn't that guy already get banned from MobileRead twice?!?!

[Katsunami]

Don't know. If you're running an ereader blog and get yourself banned twice from one of the largest ereading communities on the net, then only one thing can be said: you're doing it wrong.

[eschwartz]

Knew I saw this somewhere:

Originally Posted by Nate the great

This is your first and last warning. We expect civil behavior here at MobileRead.

You have given ample reason in your past posts to deserve a ban. The only reason i have not yet done so is that we have a rule that you are supposed to receive a warning first. (That, and I thought we might get past this and you would be civil. My mistake.)

Guess what i just learned? You are a sockpuppet for Goodereader.com. Bye-bye now.

If anyone wants proof, please see the attached image. This member visited from the same IP address as that blog.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Didn't that guy already get banned from MobileRead twice?!?!

Well, I'm finding at least one ban for selling pirated books. Not a good recommendation.

[jgaiser]

Let's see where this goes. I've just PM moonshot asking them to return to this thread and answer a couple of questions. I'll be surprised if they do so.

[Prestidigitweeze]

I once spent an afternoon trying to explain Blanchot, Roland Barthes' "Death of the Author" and Foucault's "What Is an Author?" to a well-known science fiction writer. This was the SF writer's reaction:

"If Foucault were still around, I'd ask him to sign some papers with me forgoing responsibility for the physical effects of our experiment. Then we'd wrestle. Eventually, I'd pin his arms and bend him over a table, so that when I asked whether there was an author behind him, I'd get a straight answer."

[moonshot]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

Let's see where this goes. I've just PM moonshot asking them to return to this thread and answer a couple of questions. I'll be surprised if they do so.

I have not left the thread.

But I have posted a fair share of comments and at least a couple of others seen to have similar points of view so I have been reading theirs.

Anyway fire away with any questions; I am happy to reply.........

[doubleshuffle]

Just getting some great entertainment out of the discussion at goodereader. The way Kozlowski is going on about professional standards has me in stitches. He's gotta be kidding since goodereader so obviously operates on the principle that in order to publish (certainly not author?!) e-reader tests on the interwebs you don't need any friggin' standards at all.

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by Catlady

I said there are exceptions.

Where in that post or prior ones? I seem to have missed it.

Helen

[Prestidigitweeze]

Kozlowski's responses are quite different from moonshot's stylistically, which suggests either that they really are two different people or that Kozlowski enjoys writing in character.

Also: Moonshot's comments convey a tone of seemingly unconscious bewilderment which Kozlowski's do not. Kozlowski seems to be of the parry-and-thrust school of interaction that suggests lost hours playing D&D.

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

Kozlowski seems to be of the parry-and-thrust school of interaction that suggests lost hours playing D&D.

What kind of a sneer is that? A hobby is a hobby is a hobby.

Kozlowski/Moonshot or no, that was unnecessary. And yes, I feel spoken to.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

What kind of a sneer is that? A hobby is a hobby is a hobby.

Kozlowski/Moonshot or no, that was unnecessary. And yes, I feel spoken to.

Thank you... Being snotty about other peoples hobbies is pretty elitest.

[Freeshadow]

@ Katsunami:
Haven't you said, you came to RPG via Baldurs Gate?
No right to be offended then, you are "only" a computer gameruntil you receive the baptising pen & paper playing experience Come over to the round table and roll the sacred dice we have pizza & cookies too.

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by Freeshadow

@ Katsunami:
Haven't you said, you came to RPG via Baldurs Gate?

Yes.

No right to be offended then, you are "only" a computer gameruntil you receive the baptising pen & paper playing experience Come over to the round table and roll the sacred dice we have pizza & cookies too.

I have played (A)D&D, both computer games and tabletop between 1998 and 2005, but since I started full time work (i.e., not a studet anymore), I don't really have the time anymore Even if I had, the group I played with has dispersed all over the country, and the Dungeon Master is dead. (Literally...)

And, to be honest, my RPG'ing is now limited to replaying an old RPG such as Baldur's Gate once in a while, and reading Forgotten Realms fantasy.

By the way, since we're talking about books and authors, and now got D&D RPG's mixed into it, the only thing I can say is that Planescape: Torment was one of the best fantasy books I ever played. (Yes, you read that right.)

That story was beyond amazing, and then some.

[Prestidigitweeze]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

What kind of a sneer is that? A hobby is a hobby is a hobby. Kozlowski/Moonshot or no, that was unnecessary. And yes, I feel spoken to.

Originally Posted by jgaiser

Thank you... Being snotty about other peoples hobbies is pretty elitest.

1. Having a hobby is no reason to lack a sense of humor about said hobby.

2. Who would know about lost hours playing an RPG but someone who shared that experience?

3. You confuse a point about someone's style of playing with a condemnation against their having played at all. The idea is that Kozlowski seems to argue with a view not only to winning but to triumphing by putting an opponent in their place. It's a style that I remember most vividly from my first and final Mensa meeting.

4. Charges of "sneering," "snottiness" and "elitism" are not limited to the intellectual snob. In this case, your haste to condemn a gamer for supposedly disparaging other gamers reveals you to be capable of sneering, and of actually hurling the kinds of epithets which you imagine were implied toward you.

The irony is that my mention of D&D was meant to be a nonjudgmental way of indicating that Kozlowski is a more concrete writer than moonshot. I don't happen to think that moonshot and Kozlowski are the same person.

Nor do I think that either person (or persona, to allude to another famous RPG series) should be made into a scapegoat. Nearly everyone feels that moonshot's conclusions are incorrect, but discussing them has been amusing.

Besides, a group consensus doesn't always translate into collective mercy.