^But will it really lessen those old novels in your eyes if the new movies contradict them? I still read and enjoy The Final Reflection, Final Frontier, Federation and other contradicted Trek novels. The sad truth is, tie-in novels are only read by about 2% of a show's TV/movie audience. Did he really? This site tells a rather different tale of early Star Wars fandom where it was George Lucas being difficult, particuarly with regard to any 'zines featuring adult content: http://fanlore.org/wiki/Star_Wars_Fanzines
Things and people change with time... And I can direct you to sites to prove or disprove Any point... And interview a particular person of interest/power on a bad day... Well, it Could trash your opinion of that person and/or relevance to the material! Ultimately you have to use your own judgment in the end--and that's by taking in the big picture...not just a quote or an interview or some third person hearsay presented here and there...
I'd call a request for all SW 'zines to be sent to Lucasfilm for cataloguing and vetting to be a lot more than heresay or the opinion of someone caught on a bad day. More details on Lucas' open letter to Star Wars fans pubishers can be found here: http://fanlore.org/wiki/Open_Letter_to_Star_Wars_Zine_Publishers Star Trek allowed fanzine writers free reign to write about anything they wanted, so long as they didn't turn a profit.
This is CANNON: A Quinn Martin Production Starring William Conrad as Frank Cannon Canon is also a maker of fine cameras and lenses. STAR TREK cannon?: Harry
So someone isn't "really a fan" if they just enjoy the series in its original medium? Who are you to determine who is "really a fan" of anything? Well, if the result is anything like Abrams' Star Trek movie, I'll be happy to suffer. My son and I loved it.
There are many different Levels of Fandom, of course... If someone with no real grasp of science fiction watches an episode or two of Star Trek for the first time, likes it, s/he can claim to be Fan... HOWEVER, I would Not want such a...Fan...in the director's chair helming the next Star Trek movie... There are far, Far better choices than that... And the apologists are out there, using that last, desperate, lame excuse to prop-up bad Star Trek: IDIC... Except that IDIC can only go So Far... If we took the script to A New Hope and a couple others in That universe...and changed some names... Luke Skywalker to Jim Kirk, R2 to Spock, Threepio to McCoy, Leia to Uhura, Solo to Sulu, Kenobi to Spock Prime, Chewbacca to Chekov, Darth Maul to Nero... The Death Star to a "Romulan mining ship"...Hoth to Delta Vega... The Wampa ice creature to that...thing...on Delta Vega... JarJar Binks to Scotty's silent pal... The Cantina scene to brat-Kirk's bar hangout... Luke's landspeeder to brat-Kirk's stolen antique car... OK, let me pour myself a drink now...
It's actually an old-time tradition employed by members of DASA... I was told to Really be liked by the in-crowd here, to type like that...
You know, I'm willing to bet that Nicholas Meyer was not well-versed in Trek novels when he worked on movies #'s 2, 4, and 6. Ditto Harve Bennet and Robert Wise. You don't have to be a Fan with a capital F to make good Trek. And Lord knows you don't have to read all the books . . . not even mine!
One good reason I like to stick with a basic canon is what happens when other version start tampering with it. It loses value. Like Star Wars, they've gone all over the place. In the the movie, the Emperor was killed. That was the defining moment, the tyranny was finally over. But no, later in the comics, he was brought back as a clone. Luke Skywalker stood as the one who would never turn to the Dark Side. Later, after the movie, in another story he falls to the dark side and serves the resurrected emperor. Luke was supposed to be the last hope--no--in another story Darth Vader trained another potential Dark Sider years before he first encountered Luke. Sometimes extended stories and universes tends to mess with a classic good story line. Trek would be a weird mess if we allowed everything in the book world and elsewhere into it.
Yes, it could conceivably drive a fan trying to chronicle the many different novels and manuals and RPGs and... certifiably...INSANE... It could... Yes...it...could...
To paraphrase Spock, canon is a little tweeting bird, chirping in a meadow. Canon is a wreath of pretty flowers that smell bad.
That was by intentional omission. Since the handle is Melakon, it seemed best to put him at the end of the cycle. Also, I left out Dr. Sevrin in case someone was already (or would be) using him. I tried to find a good closeup of Skip from Don Knotts' The Ghost and Mr. Chicken, but no luck.
We're all lucky to have you here to confirm how we rate as true fans... Seriously, the 'expanded universe' of Star Wars has grown into complete rubbish. I truly hope Abrams ignores most/all of it and saves Star Wars in the way that he transformed Trek fandom - for the better!