^You mean by CBS, these days.
What Trek Reference Books Need To Be Compiled?
- Thread starter MatthiasRussell
- Start date
After dealing with ST.com, it seems that CBS is not very interested in using the Internet in a way that engages fans.
I have no idea why not.
An active "resource" website with updated maps and so forth would be very cool
After dealing with ST.com, it seems that CBS is not very interested in using the Internet in a way that engages fans.
I have no idea why not.
How does that make profit, unless you have to pay to sign up?
Then you'd have people poaching the images/info and redistributing them.
Star Trek®, in all its various forms, and related marks are trademarks of CBS Studios Inc. All other trademarks and copyrights are the property of their respective holders.
Therefore, somebody's gonna want to get paid.
Therefore, somebody's gonna want to get paid.
Make your own personal, private reference guides. Draw from whatever sources you want to augment the canon information, engage in whatever speculation you desire, and as long as you're internally consistant you'll have a perfectly serviceable guide for personal use. 
You don't have to pay for it either, though it does take a lot of time and work...
You don't have to pay for it either, though it does take a lot of time and work...
If it's on one of the official sites, then year I'm pretty sure the writer is getting paid. I think the big thing here is the difference between fan material and official stuff. The fan stuff is usually something that someone puts up for fun during their free time, where I'm pretty sure the official stuff is usually part of somebody's regular job.
Make your own personal, private reference guides. Draw from whatever sources you want to augment the canon information, engage in whatever speculation you desire, and as long as you're internally consistant you'll have a perfectly serviceable guide for personal use.
I'd be more interested in a pop culture/historical/political analysis of Star Trek in context with the time in which it was made, at least for TOS. However, seeing as there's absolutely nothing like that on the horizon from the brilliant intellects among Trek fandom, I guess it falls all the way down to me to get things started!
Which is exactly what Memory Alpha and Memory Beta are already, so what's the difference if it's on the official Star Trek website or not?
I know there's no real chance of it, but I'd still love to see the Okudas put together an updated Star Trek Chronology. It'd be interesting to see how they've changed their assumptions and conclusions over the years.
What would happen to the farmers who need to sell their food to earn a living if others came along and gave away the same food for free? What would happen to engineers or doctors or professionals in any field if they were forced to compete with people who did the same work without asking any pay for it? It would drive them out of business.
For some reason, people tend to think of creative professions as if they were the same as amateur creative efforts, but they aren't. These are professions like any other, and their fruits have value, just like the products of any other profession. People who create things of value are entitled to be compensated for that value. Devalue the work of professional writers or artists by exploiting the free labor of hobbyists and the professionals won't be able to compete, to go on making a living.
Not to mention that the hobbyists need to make a living too. Presumably they have other jobs that take up their time, so they wouldn't be able to produce artwork on a reliable, consistent schedule. Anyone trying to put together a professional resource of the sort you're talking about would need reliable contributors -- would need to be able to guarantee that they would turn in their work on time, and would need a means to penalize them if they failed to do so. And that means getting them under contract and paying them for their time. Because you can't just ask them to skip their real jobs in order to get the artwork done on schedule. They need to eat too. If you ask someone to invest a specific amount of their time and effort, and maybe miss out on opportunities to earn an income by other means, then you owe it to them to pay them for that time and effort. If you don't, there's no way to guarantee that they'll stick with the work.
Bottom line, the difference between amateur work and professional work is far more fundamental than you realize. You just can't treat them like they're the same thing.
^Amen, Chris.
Like it or not, "It's the Free Market...and you're a part of it."
Hmm...and me!
Like it or not, "It's the Free Market...and you're a part of it."
Make your own personal, private reference guides. Draw from whatever sources you want to augment the canon information, engage in whatever speculation you desire, and as long as you're internally consistant you'll have a perfectly serviceable guide for personal use.
I'd be more interested in a pop culture/historical/political analysis of Star Trek in context with the time in which it was made, at least for TOS. However, seeing as there's absolutely nothing like that on the horizon from the brilliant intellects among Trek fandom, I guess it falls all the way down to me to get things started!
Hmm...and me!
Make your own personal, private reference guides. Draw from whatever sources you want to augment the canon information, engage in whatever speculation you desire, and as long as you're internally consistant you'll have a perfectly serviceable guide for personal use.
I'd be more interested in a pop culture/historical/political analysis of Star Trek in context with the time in which it was made, at least for TOS. However, seeing as there's absolutely nothing like that on the horizon from the brilliant intellects among Trek fandom, I guess it falls all the way down to me to get things started!
I'm sure it's been done for Media Studies PhD dissertations or published academic articles a lot. Check out a Google Scholar search results for ''Star Trek'' and ''political''. Just to warn you a lot of the studies will probably be heavily pedantic postmodern deconstructions of Star Trek arguing that it's gendered or racist or culturally imperialist or ethnocentric* or other terms of abuse from Critical Media Studies, a descendent of Marxist study.
*Star Trek actually is ethnocentric, but that's kinda beside the point since it was designed for broadcast to the American population at large...
LOL quite so. I love reading postmodern or Critical theory, just don't like it when people try to apply it to fiction or political policy.
Post-structuralism. Multiculturalism (the political philosophy/ideology of which that is far different from real policy in Canada or formerly in the UK etc). Post-colonialism. Awesome. Glad some academics were able to publish instead of perishing...
Yevetha
Commodore
Christopher posted:
"
For some reason, people tend to think of creative professions as if they were the same as amateur creative efforts, but they aren't.'
This would be an encyclopedia kind of thing, there could be people out there who are proffesional journalists or university profs who can deliver the necessary quality of writing.
SW allows amateurs to make contributions to canon and it worked for them.
" Devalue the work of professional writers or artists by exploiting the free labor of hobbyists and the professionals won't be able to compete, to go on making a living."
I did not suggest that they should write novels too,, just some online starchart or something like that.
You are right hovewer an Atlas sized thing would take a lot of time.
"
For some reason, people tend to think of creative professions as if they were the same as amateur creative efforts, but they aren't.'
This would be an encyclopedia kind of thing, there could be people out there who are proffesional journalists or university profs who can deliver the necessary quality of writing.
SW allows amateurs to make contributions to canon and it worked for them.
" Devalue the work of professional writers or artists by exploiting the free labor of hobbyists and the professionals won't be able to compete, to go on making a living."
I did not suggest that they should write novels too,, just some online starchart or something like that.
You are right hovewer an Atlas sized thing would take a lot of time.
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