Wednesday News: Scribd offers unlimited comics, Samsung TVs are listening, the Hugo Award & gender bias, and rare TV interview with E.L. James
Publishing Newsbias / Comics / E. L. James / fan-fiction / Fifty Shades / Film / gender / Hugo Award / privacy / Samsung / Scribd / smart tvs / subscription service / voice recognition5 Comments
Scribe Unlimited Comics – The latest development in the battle between subscription services is Scribd’s offering of more than 10,000 comic books. This one might finally push me over the edge and into signing up. Check out the launch page for more details, and per the press release, features include:
* Classic Comics – Classic runs of the Avengers, the X-Men, Daredevil, Archie, Judge Dredd, the Rocketeer and more
* Top Characters – Spider-Man, the Avengers, Betty and Veronica, Kevin Keller, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, My Little Pony, G.I. Joe, Bloodshot, Adventure Time
* Major Creators – Alan Moore, Frank Miller, Fiona Staples, Darwyn Cooke, Mark Waid, Ed Brubaker, Renee French, Jeffrey Brown, Joe Hill, and many more
* Acclaimed Graphic Novels – March, From Hell, Swallow Me Whole, Underwater Welder, Spiral-Bound, The Ticking, Too Cool to Be Forgotten
*Award Winners – League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, 30 Days of Night, Locke & Key, Alec, Will You Still Love Me if I Wet the Bed?
* Hit YA Titles – Ultimate Spider-Man, Runaways, Afterlife With Archie, Harbinger, Lumberjanes
* Manga – Partnership with Media Do brings titles from Cork and Harlequin Manga, including work by acclaimed artist Moyoco Anno
* Leading Publishers – Marvel, Arcana, Archie, Boom! Studios, Dynamite, IDW/Top Shelf, Kingstone, Space Goat, Top Cow, Valiant, Zenescope –Scribd
Samsung warns customers not to discuss personal information in front of smart TVs – When I got my new car and excitedly downloaded the app necessary to view my phone’s applications on the nav screen, I was horrified to read the terms of use, which included the provision that anyone might be listening to conversations in the car. The Samsung smart tv voice recognition feature has basically the same risk, and although the issue came to light with the Samsung televisions, it’s one of the downsides of “smart” voice recognition technology in many different environments. Privacy is so 20th century, right?
Samsung has now issued a new statement clarifying how the voice activation feature works. “If a consumer consents and uses the voice recognition feature, voice data is provided to a third party during a requested voice command search,” Samsung said in a statement. “At that time, the voice data is sent to a server, which searches for the requested content then returns the desired content to the TV.” –The Week
Biased Opinion – Gender and the Hugo Awards – Although it’s probably no surprise to you that the Hugo Awards are biased against women, seeing that assertion laid out, broken down, and closely analyzed is especially powerful, because despite all of the notable exceptions, institutional gender bias in literature is deeply entrenched. Which is especially interesting when you think about how many women work in publishing, and, by extension, in getting these books into the literary marketplace to begin with.
Some people point to the women who have been nominated or won as evidence that there is no bias – oftentimes citing early nominations given to works by Zenna Henderson, Pauline Ashwell, and Marion Zimmer Bradley. Such individuals will maintain that women have always written science fiction, and always been nominated. But if women have always written science fiction, the track record of the Hugos is terrible. In the first twenty years of the Hugo awards, female nominees were dramatically underrepresented in the fiction categories (Best Novel, Best Novella, Best Novelette, and Best Short Story). From 1953 through 1973, 124 nominations went to male authors who wrote or cowrote a piece of fiction. Of those 124, 30 of them won. In contrast, during that same time period, 46 nominations went to women who wrote or cowrote works of fiction, and 3 of those resulted in Hugo victories. If women have always been writing science fiction, the early years of the Hugo Award certainly didn’t do a very good job of honoring their contributions. –Dreaming About Other Worlds
Fifty Shades of E. L. James – If you hate Fifty Shades, this rare televised interview with E.L. James, conducted by Rowan Farrow, isn’t going to change your mind. In fact, it may just piss you off more. However, if you enjoyed the books, are looking forward to the film(s), or are just plain curious, check it out. Farrow addresses the “abuse” issue directly, and James responds directly. She talks about the fact that the story is intended as traditional Romance (beauty and the beast), admits freely that she wrote it as Twi-fic, and characterizes it as fantasy for women. Oh, and one fascinating detail: ticket sales for the movie in Mississippi are way beyond the national average, consistent with a pattern in more religiously conservative U.S. states. Very interesting.–MSNBC
What i want to know is, how long until we get the technology so that TV and movie characters can hear the helpful advice you yell at your tv?
The Hugo thing makes me especially sad, since Frankenstein is generally cited as the first SF novel.
Someone was reporting on Twitter that there were compatibility issues with the Scribd’s comic subscription and their device (Kindle Fire I think). So double check that your device of choice works with the subscription before buying in.
The comment on the popularity of 50 Shades in religiously conservative states actually makes sense to me, because I grew up religiously conservative, technically still qualify as one, but…
I guess the easiest way to show this is by example: I was told outright that I’d have to surrender my dreams (and, tbh, my own health) to hubby and kids after I got married. (Never mind that I’m an aromantic asexual—something that I didn’t even realize until recently because my mother in particular was so vehement that my squishes were, in fact, crushes and infatuation.)
It was normal for the women in the church to gripe about their husbands’ …and to look sheepish/embarrassed if overheard by their husbands, even muttering about how they were [going to get] in trouble.
I’m not speaking of all religious conservatives, but it isn’t unusual for guys to be encouraged to be draconian jerks. They call it being decisive and leaders. And guys who actually, like, listen to and respect the females around them get gossiped about, people saying they need to put their foot down…forgetting the entire “leaders serve the led” component in Scripture.
Since that kind of controlling behavior being what many of us are encouraged to see as caring, loving, what a man should be… Yeah, I can understand why 50 Shades is so popular in religiously conservative states.
@Lostshadows:
I sincerely could not stop laughing so your first comments! How many times have I wished for the same thing? Ever since I started watching telenovelas sitting on my grandma’s lap, and heard all the “helpful”advice she would yell..er..give the tv characters I’ve wished for that technology. Lol