quote:"Take this SotF that this thread is ostensibly about. Say that Cartman and I are discussing the performance of the Miranda-class starships in the Dominion War. You pipe up and ask about what the Bullshit-class starships would have been doing in the war, because after all they're about the same age and capability, so why shouldn't they have been doing something? I stare at you blankly (so to speak) because I've never seen SotF and very likely never will.
How is this in any way different than if I mention the USS Dipshit that was featured in DS9 episode number 84, and you never saw episode 84? Go out and buy the DVD, I'll say. If you want to see any of the ships in SotSF go to Gilso's Starship Schematic site. They're all there, and identified as coming from those books. And you don't even have to buy the DVD.
Its all available to anyone that wants to see it. And that cares to expand their horizons beyond what Paramount feeds them.
posted
So we should assume everyone should know about my USS Dominator NX-999990 Heavy Galactic Deterrence Attack Multi-Vector Dreadnought (Uprated) Mk XII-z?
Seriously, if we'd accept all material to be 'real', discussions would become incredibly useless, since there is zero frame of reference. Sure, some fandom sounds likely and some fan ships are very cool indeed, but they are all still *not* canon.
And anyway, canon doesn't mean good, and vice versa. Canon is just a convenient common frame of reference. I think.
posted
The important thing is to always give sources. Not everyone can memorise every bit of every episode. Not everyone has read every novel. Not everyone has the money to waste on the TNG Tech Manual. Give a source for everything you say. Then it doesn't matter at all whether the sources are "canon" or not.
-------------------- "My theories appal you, my heresies outrage you, I never answer letters and you don't like my tie." - The Doctor
Registered: Mar 1999
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There's canon, and then there's not. Mad props to Aridas for taking part in the creation of that book, but unless Paramount blesses you in some way you aren't canon and never will be.
But in the realm of that which isn't canon, there's stuff that a lot of Trek fans are likely to have seen at some point. Included in this list are the Okuda tech manuals, the Johnson guides, and the older Franz Joseph manual for some. Canon or not, these certainly will affect one's thinking about the show and the tech, and thus form some of that "common frame of reference" thing.
Most of us recognize that there are therefore multiple frames of reference, with the spectrum loosely catalogued into three segments:
1. The Paramount Canon (a.k.a. the TV/Film Canon)
2. The "Common Fan's" Canon (This includes some Okuda stuff, possibly the animated series, maybe some backstage info, perhaps the magazines, and maybe a little Franz Joseph and Shane Johnson. In short, this is the first tier plus bit from the most popular and readily available non-canon.)
3. The Fandom Canon (includes TAS, Okuda, Joseph, Johnson, "Jackill", FASA, and others innumerable, with the headaches this must cause Tylenolled away. Fan creations and even novels and comics may serve as inspiration, but aren't generally thought to be genuine Trek.)
I'd say that around here, most people fall at least into the second category, with many in the third. I fall into the second when it comes to my own personal tastes, but for my website's purposes (and for parts of the non-canon which I feel to suck) I'm rigidly attached to the first.
(Similarly, you'll sometimes see guys who like the third in general, but seek refuge in the second where disagreement appears.)
Again, Aridas, my compliments to your work and efforts. However, your work is third-tier and always will be. Paramount/Roddenberry/Berman/Okuda may be a bunch of bastards for not giving you first- or second-tier status, and the fans may suck for not buying your stuff enough to get it to that second level, but that's just how it is. Bemoaning Paramount's logical choice on what to consider canon isn't going to change that, and I'm sorry.
And yes, quality counts. But what people will consider to be quality Trek will vary widely. There are some people who view Voyager as their favorite, for crying out loud. Thus, you can't expect to have a quality-based standard. And, if you'll forgive me for saying so, I just don't find there to be much quality in most of the stories and tech from FASA and similar materials, including Jackill-style guides. Oh, the art is nice, but most of the write-ups are and always have been foreign to me, and not reminiscent of Trek at all. (That, incidentally, is one of the strengths of Masao's Starfleet Museum, since even his forays into manufactured historical figures and events usually have an air of proper Trek about them.)
And so what do we do? Argue tooth and nails about my Trek versus your Trek? No, of course not. We acknowledge that there is One Trek, the one canon, and then we can branch off from there if we so desire.
That's what Flare is all about, and why we all have such a good time. Some of us obviously don't desire to branch off into your Trek, and that's just how it is. So don't ruin our good time by bitching about it.
-------------------- . . . ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.
quote:Originally posted by Jason Abbadon: Probably the only DS9 episode I skip over is "Paradise". That was more boring than anything else.
"Muse" bothers me only because the Nebula has no captain, Al Gore is the commanding officer and has almost no lines and the bridge is the size of a shoebox: they could have at least redressed the Enterprise set.
"The Muse" (4th season) was the one with Lwaxana Troi pregnant and ended up marrying Odo to get way from her jackass boyfriend. I believe you are confused with "Second Sight" (2nd season) and Seyetik, the Prometheus, the alien babe and the ignition of a dead star.
For crap shows I nominate "Hard Time", the O'Brien goes to prison in his mind for 20years show, and its "Ex Post Facto" aftertaste, but then again I probably haven't seen in since it first aired.
Addition Eh, okay, so I'm watching "Paradise" now - one big flaw I found in it as far as major inconsistancies, and one of the many flaws in the contradicton of canon. It would seem one error was how Sisko says that his dad "was a cook" - unless he became one again between season 2 and 4. The second thing how he made mention of "his brothers" which eventually changed to him having just a sister in Portland, or so it would seem.
[ February 01, 2004, 02:50 PM: Message edited by: Futurama Guy ]
-------------------- Hey, it only took 13 years for me to figure out my password...
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quote:Paramount/Roddenberry/Berman/Okuda may be a bunch of bastards for not giving you first- or second-tier status, and the fans may suck for not buying your stuff enough to get it to that second level, but that's just how it is. Bemoaning Paramount's logical choice on what to consider canon isn't going to change that, and I'm sorry.
I commend you on your well thought out and expressed post, but ultimately am uncertain as to what you are commenting upon. Not anything I've written, to be sure. I have never bemoaned Paramount's choice on what to consider canon", and anyone that has taken the time to read what I've written here would know that. If someone from Paramount came up and offered "canon" status to what I have done I would reject it, not out of some hissy fit, but out of principle that it is irrelevant to anything other than internal continuity concerns. And that is what I wrote above.
quote:Some of us obviously don't desire to branch off into your Trek, and that's just how it is. So don't ruin our good time by bitching about it.
Well... It would be too damn bad if someone waltzed in here with an opposing point of view now, wouldn't it? And dare to "ruin your good time". Pfffft.
I'm not about limiting anyone's opportunities for a good time -- again as anyone that has read my posts will know. I'm about freeing minds from straightjackets needlessly imposed. I don't post on this forum. I limit my posts to the battleground that is the Trek BBS. That is because I have noticed an inordinate amount of narrow minded-ness on this canon business here. Sure, I read what is written. And certainly some that post here have managed to see the absurd limits that abiding by someone else's restrictions on what they can do can do to your own creativity.
But the subject came up, and after reading the inevitable slam at the book for being non-canon I thought I'd put my two credits worth in. It isn't geared to sell any books (because as I also noted the one being discussed is out of print). It isn't geared to be moving the material from "third tier" to second tier", or whatever the hell it was you wrote. Some of the "Ships of the Star Fleet" material was included in various Paramount produced and approved materials -- so what? Its author was picked by Rick Sternbach and hired by Pocket on the basis of SotSF to draw the 1701-D plans -- so what? These are things you don't know and don't care about, because they aren't in your limited range of what is important to pay attention to. They concern matters that aren't cannnnon.
Like I said, I'm all about informed, free choice. Consider this little "bitching" and "ruining your good time" as no more than an guidepost for those that haven't yet been afflicted by canon-blindness.
quote:In the interest of trying to help out before I slide back into the relative obscurity of lurking, the second volume of "Ships of the Star Fleet" is available in bookstores all over the world. And can be ordered online from Amazon. Now you can go get a copy so we can discuss it. The first volume has been out of print for several years, having sold upwards of thirty thousand copies over several print runs. It is reviewed here but you won't find it available anywhere. Not on any used book site. Not on eBay. Once people get it they just don't let go of it (I can afford to be boastful because it is Guenther's baby -- I just contributed to it). So in that case you have a point. If folks can't get it, then it can't really be a part of the discussion.
Time for a reprint.
Here here. I have the first edition print and will not part with it. There is very little canon for TMP era and this volume and the second (of which I own a first edition too) fills a big gap is what is going on with ship procurment during this time.
I build a scale model of Reliant from this book along with "fan produced" (OMG there's that nasty un-canon word again) blueprints long before AMT ever thought about tooling up for this model.
Aridas, you should be commended for your work on "The Ships of the Fleet Volume One 2290-2291" It is a very thorough and detailed addition to TMP era.
I guess because there is so little "canon" about this era, there was just a big time void during this period in the Trek universe and nothing at all happened...except of course Enterprise was re-fitted.
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Is that the mag with the schematics of the Belnap and the updated K'Tinga in it? Blue text on gloss white stock?
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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No, it is a large volume 9"x12" printed on heavy glossy stock with a black cover, black text, and black line drawings.
The Belknap class Strike Cuiser is included in this volume, but does not include the K'Tinga.
There is extensive information on the Belknap including system's fold-outs near the end of the volume and is a chapter in itself.
Registered: Jan 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Futurama Guy: For crap shows I nominate "Hard Time",
You are not allowed to ever have an opinion again.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Cartman: "Really, though there is no stand out awful DS9 episode."
*cough*
Fascination
YES - that's a bad one. I'll say that before "Muse" - funny how they are both Lwaxana eps - I liked her TNG eps. And her season 1 appearence was very good (on DS9).
quote: Let He Who Is Without Sin Ferengi Love Songs Profit and Lace The Emperor's New Cloak
*cough*
Hallucinogenics if I ever saw them.
Well clearly you don't like the Ferengi episodes - cause these are all good episodes in their own right. The Ferengi episodes are great - you have to look beyond the ears. There is a great deal of pathos in them as well as a nice bit of comedy.
-------------------- "Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica." - Jim Halpert. (The Office)
quote:Originally posted by Futurama Guy: Addition Eh, okay, so I'm watching "Paradise" now - one big flaw I found in it as far as major inconsistancies, and one of the many flaws in the contradicton of canon. It would seem one error was how Sisko says that his dad "was a cook" - unless he became one again between season 2 and 4. The second thing how he made mention of "his brothers" which eventually changed to him having just a sister in Portland, or so it would seem.
Paradise wasn't my fave when I first saw it - but you watch it again and it is a SOLID character piece. Amazing stuff there. That woman is an absolute NUT BAG too - she robbed those people of 12 or so years of their life.
And give Sisko a break, he was in a box in the sun for hours.
What is to say he doesn't have any Brothers - yes we hear of Judith his sister but we never see her. Live we never saw O'Briens brothers or ANY of Jadzia's family (which severely sucked).
Oh and as for his father BEING a cook - it looks like in later seasons Joseph Sisko OWNED the Restraunt - and employed other chefs.
-------------------- "Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica." - Jim Halpert. (The Office)
posted
Man, I'm loving this debate. First off, everyone needs to go out and find a copy of the William Goldman essay on the three grades of thinking. It's so topical to this thread it almost scares me. To boil it down, grade three is dogma, prejudice, feeling one's way through life without stopping to think about anything one has been told. Grade two is destructive, where one starts to find the inconsistencies and contradictions and begins tearing down the prejudices -- but doesn't replace them with anything. Grade one is where one analyzes everything, deconstructs the stuff that doesn't make sense, and then creates something new to fill the gap that fits with what one has observed oneself.
I'll leave everyone to ponder what level they're on. *heh*
The problem of Paramount's canon is how it's been influenced over the years, and the ironic/stupid way some of the fandom stuff is more canon (by their definition, if they bothered to look around and think once in a while) than what they go by.
Let's look at the period from 1970 to 1987 (roughly). The evolution and eventual dissolution of GR's and FJ's working relationship is well-documented elsewhere, so I hope I needn't go into that. Suffice it to say that most fandom shipwrights of the late '70s used FJ's Technical Manual and Constitution-class deck plans as the basis for their own works. Elements even made it into the first three motion pictures, most dramatically in TMP, with no less than four specific starships from FJ's Manual referenced by name and registry number in dialogue, and three classes from that same book appearing on display screens.
About this time, though, GR was starting his campaign to invalidate FJ's works. One early but important effect was when a Chicago-based gaming company called FASA was researching source material to include in books for their Star Trek role-playing game. Many people lump FASA's stuff in with fandom, but they are quite different. FASA held the RPG liscense from 1982 to 1989, and were considered (by Paramount) as official as the novels.
But FASA had been told -- either by GR or a liscensing clerk with instructions from GR -- that FJ's works, and the fandom stuff based on it, was unofficial and therefore not to be used for their game. So, when they sought to create a listing of Constitution-class ships, the only one they could find that wasn't taken from FJ was from an article Greg Jein wrote for a fanzine called T-Negative. This list became the starting point for FASA ship list. Mike Okuda, in turn, used the FASA list for the current official take on the Constitution registries, and for the same reason.
FASA is also the source of the refit design still being Constitution-class, which Mike also parroted. But this is where things start getting really twisted around. The Enterprise-class designation used by all the fandom designers was a result of behind-the-scenes info from TMP that led also to part of the set dressing in TWOK (the infamous [on this board, at least] simulator sign). But as that was the term used by all the same fandom designers who followed FJ's lead, FASA and Mike seem to have thought they couldn't use it. Never mind that the fandom designers got the designation from Andy Probert and the set dressing of Star Trek II... You see how it goes around?
Many of the fandom designers are more careful to match aired material than the official sources. Yes, they get some things wrong, and some of the designers out there are complete morons, but the same applies to the official-type people at Paramount. I can't stand the work of Doug Drexler or John Eaves, because they don't have anyone over them to channel their work through a general "what has gone before" overview of what should or should not be in or on a starship. Even Alex Jaeger, while producing interesting designs, didn't know enough about Treknology to make them appropriate designs. But then, I'm one of the minority that thinks twinned warp cores (Akira class) would be problematic.
All that said (*whew!*), 'canon' is a null term except as applied to a conversation about what Paramount will be using as source material for anything they do in the future. I still agree with the 'non-canon' advisory one should give when one posts a response that incorporates something outside that scope -- so no one else (hopefully) flames them for babbling about something that wasn't in an actual episode or whatever. As Steve said, 'non-canon' contributions to a thread should be fine so long as the poster cites the source material.
I only ask those who are still in grade three thinking to start questioning your dogmas, and everyone who nitpicks to move from grade two to one -- instead of just tearing down, build something new to take its place.
For me, what started out as a simple cataloguing exercise has evolved over the years into a complete reworking/unkinking of the canon/fandom mess I laid out above. I've loved the detective work involved in digging up as much as I can find about what everyone's intentions and ideas were, from Matt Jeffries on up, following the logical paths both forward and back, identifying the contradictions, and coming up with as many potential solutions as I can.
I posted some of my early observations, conclusions, and ideas here a couple years back, and got it with both barrels from the dogmatics. *heh* At this point, the biggest gap in my research is Mr. Guenther. I'd love to be able to contact him (or someone who's worked with him -- *nudge*), find out how much b-t-s info he knew about, and get his story of why he did things the way he did.
God, I love this stuff...
--Jonah
P.S. The 8�"x11" glossy white booklet was the "Starship Design" book -- an 'in-universe' follow-on to SotSF that presents itself as a Starfleet-published engineering publication. The New Klingon Destroyer in there is the K'teremny.
P.P.S. Hey, aridas -- maybe you can answer this... On page 1019 of the above mentioned magazine, it says that no ships of the Federation class were built after Star Union (NCC-2112). Um... What about the Entente (NCC-2120), heard to be sending out a signal to the Epsilon IX station in TMP?
-------------------- "That's what I like about these high school girls, I keep getting older, they stay the same age."
--David "Woody" Wooderson, Dazed and Confused
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I really don't have a problem with people using non-canon stuff for the basis of fanfic/fan sites/whatever. I don't think it should be bought in to 'serious' discussions about the actual show unless it has some kind of special relevance or value to the discussion. I do not think that the fact that a book is considered non-canon is a 'slam'. I liked SotSF. I have both volumes (the second purchased second hand, BTW). I did a bit of stuff for Timo's Hitchhiker's Guide, which uses a lot of stuff from SotSF. I just wouldn't assume everyone would have heard of it or that it has much relevance to the Trek we see on screen. I really don't think that canonicity is something we should be getting this worked up about. Especially after we've gone over it so many times.
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quote:Originally posted by aridas: I commend you on your well thought out and expressed post
No, you don't.
You feel that any parties who disagree with your anti-canonical viewpoint don't know anything about the non-canon, and are narrow-minded, blind, limited, unfree, failing to expand their horizons, crazy, stilted, paralyzed, incapable of getting out of the canon mindset, bound in a straitjacket, being fed by the Paramount money machine, and otherwise failing to live up to your 'principled' viewpoint wherein 'quality' (judged by you and those who agree with you and no one else, no doubt) should determine validity. Your pal in this thread seems to argue for the notion that those who accept the canon are unthinking dogmatists. Oh, and how dare they "slam" the book you're peddling for being non-canon!
I could, of course, have responded with equal levels of pompous jackassedness, shitting all over your silly viewpoint with equally disdainful commentary regarding any adherents of it. After all, the compartmentalization and intellectual hoop-jumping required for such a thing cannot be good for one's mind.
But I, at least, was trying to be kind.
The fact remains that you're willing to accept any craptastic fanfic (including your own) into your own personal Trek-wank. You also feel that the fact that one got published (sans license), and the artist graduated to the non-canon big leagues, somehow makes it better. Whooptee-frickin'-doo. You still don't realize that it doesn't mean spit in the Trek universe, unless and until it gets aired. That's the objective standard.
Peregrinus speaks of destruction, and he's more correct at that point than he knows. You see, those who hold to the fandom of the past are ignoring the canon of the present. You claim to have a good idea of Trek based on TOS, TAS, and some of Roddenberry's other work . . . well, where is it? The guys who worked with Roddenberry don't seem to agree with you . . . they went right on making canon Trek which shat all over your stuff. That doesn't make them wrong and you right, or vice versa . . . but it does mean that their work is more valid than your own.
Thus, instead of just cutting the crap and trying to make something that acknowledges the newer Trek, you and yours seek to destroy the very concept of Star Trek for others. "Abandon all common frames of reference, ye who enter here." And what are you creating in its place? Nothing except for your questionable "quality" standard, for which you are the judge.
Well, hell's bells, so much for objective standards of evidence. Everybody's got their own little preferred tidbits of data that help to make up their personal view of Trek . . . that doesn't mean that we all have to agree. But at least there is an objective standard to work from, giving everyone the opportunity to start from the same place.
And hey, perhaps one of Star Trek's strengths is that it can be 'tardified in so many directions simultaneously, from slash-fic to crappy fanfic-esque perimeter action ships. But that doesn't mean anyone has to read it, and it doesn't mean that others are blind or narrow-minded for refusing to accept it.
To know what Star Trek is, one only has to look at the movies and episodes. That's how it is, and no amount of whining, insults, or defenses of a subjectivist viewpoint will change that.
-------------------- . . . ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.
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