Source for the term "Relaunch"?

[TJ Sinclair]

I know Marco Palmieri devised the DS9 Relaunch and the history of that. But there's a "debate" going on over at Memory Beta right now, with a certain party *convinced* it's a "fan-derived term" and shouldn't be used on the site. I'm trying to find an interview or a promo or something from that era where Marco or S.D. Perry or one of the other authors actually uses the term "DS9 Relaunch." Or "relaunch" in general. Something citeable that I can link to and say "here, the term came from Pocket" in some capacity. Can anyone help?

 

[Tosk]

My rudimentary search says that at the very least, Una McCormack and Heather Jarman have both used the term. Not that that proves anything of course.

https://tinyurl.com/vje7ew9

 

[Extrocomp]

The word "relaunch" was also mentioned in the acknowledgments of Mission Gamma: Book One.

But I don't see why it matters, since captainmike has already said you can add the Enterprise relaunch novels to the list.

 

[TJ Sinclair]

The word "relaunch" was also mentioned in the acknowledgments of Mission Gamma: Book One.

But I don't see why it matters, since captainmike has already said you can add the Enterprise relaunch novels to the list.

I don't care so much about the list, it's about his view that the term doesn't belong on Memory Beta.

 

[Christopher]

I know Marco Palmieri devised the DS9 Relaunch and the history of that. But there's a "debate" going on over at Memory Beta right now, with a certain party *convinced* it's a "fan-derived term" and shouldn't be used on the site. I'm trying to find an interview or a promo or something from that era where Marco or S.D. Perry or one of the other authors actually uses the term "DS9 Relaunch." Or "relaunch" in general. Something citeable that I can link to and say "here, the term came from Pocket" in some capacity. Can anyone help?

This is literally a yes-and-no answer, because I'm fairly confident that, yes, the term "relaunch" did originate with Pocket, not with fandom -- but no, Marco himself did not refer to the actual series of books by that name, preferring "post-finale" or "post-TV."

After all, a launch is not an ongoing process, just the beginning of one. "Relaunch" is a term used in marketing for rebranding a product or reorienting its image or otherwise giving it a fresh start in the marketplace. So the term "relaunch" as used by Pocket did not refer to the post-finale series itself, but specifically to the campaign surrounding its release, the process by which the DS9 publishing line was restarted with a new focus, a new logo, a big promotional push, and a big-event debut with multiple books coming out in quick succession. It was fandom that kept referring to the series itself as a "Relaunch" long after its actual relaunching was over, and I'm pretty sure I recall Marco saying that he didn't care for the usage.

 

[KRAD]

^ Yeah, the DS9 relaunch was, basically, Avatar and its attendant publicity. It was an event, not a series, but somehow the term kept being applied to the series as a whole.

 

[Stevil2001]

I found some old Q&As and stuff on the old Psi Phi site: https://web.archive.org/web/2001042...phi.org/cgi/upc-db/feature/new-ds9/plots.html

Marco refers to Avatar as "our relaunch story" (24 June 2000) and describes the books as "a complete relaunch of Pocket's DS9 publishing program" (23 June 2000). On other pages, he says things like, "the following May was determined to be the best month to relaunch" (18 Aug. 2000). At one point he does use the phrase "post-finale books" (21 Sept. 2000).

But some usage is more ambiguous, seemingly referring to the books as set, such as when Marco says, "there's little else in the [Millennium] trilogy that impacts the relaunch" (22 Jan. 2001), or Keith says, "sales on Millennium and The Lives of Dax were pretty good, which bodes well for the relaunch" (22 Feb. 2001). Margaret calls them "the relaunch books that Marco is doing" (3 Mar. 2000).

I'm sure the fact that Psi Phi called it "the relaunch" was influential, given it basically was Internet lit fandom in those days.

I initially used "relaunch" like everyone else, then adopted "post-finale novels" to be pedantically correct, then came back to "relaunch" because it's two syllables instead of six.

 

[TJ Sinclair]

Thank you, Stevil2001! That's what I'd been looking for. I remembered reading that interview with Marco way back when. And you're right, I'm sure it was Psi Phi's usage of the term that gave it such ubiquity over the years. Much appreciated!

 

[Therin of Andor]

Thank you, Stevil2001! That's what I'd been looking for. I remembered reading that interview with Marco way back when. And you're right, I'm sure it was Psi Phi's usage of the term that gave it such ubiquity over the years. Much appreciated!

Excellent!

I do recall Marco eventually suggesting that "post-series" better described the books/comics than "relaunch", and members striving to use the now-preferred term.

 

[Christopher]

But some usage is more ambiguous, seemingly referring to the books as set, such as when Marco says, "there's little else in the [Millennium] trilogy that impacts the relaunch" (22 Jan. 2001), or Keith says, "sales on Millennium and The Lives of Dax were pretty good, which bodes well for the relaunch" (22 Feb. 2001). Margaret calls them "the relaunch books that Marco is doing" (3 Mar. 2000).

But those are still from before the post-finale series premiered, and they're still consistent with using "relaunch" to refer to the act/event of restarting the series, or about Avatar as the duology that would relaunch the series. Although I can see how the regular use of the term would've gotten readers into the habit of using it for the whole series.

 

[Stevil2001]

But those are still from before the post-finale series premiered, and they're still consistent with using "relaunch" to refer to the act/event of restarting the series, or about Avatar as the duology that would relaunch the series. Although I can see how the regular use of the term would've gotten readers into the habit of using it for the whole series.

Yes, that's why I said it was ambiguous. Those are ones that can be taken in the intended way, but could also be taken as referring to the whole set of post-finale novels.