StillPaisleyCat

joined 2 years ago
[–] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 7 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

You’re tripping yourself up on the difference between British English and American English. Canadian English is tolerant of both forms.

Oxford, where he wrote his thesis, would require ‘an’ before ‘historic’. When Governor of Bank of England, he would have had to have been careful to use British English.

If you’re a Canadian using American spelling and grammar checkers to define your language, you might wish to reconsider that. MS Word does have Canadian and UK English options.

[–] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 4 points 1 month ago (2 children)

The production values are sufficiently high that it makes me think it might actually be from an episode to come.

Good to know.

Perhaps the major changes in the market might lead to some of the foundries rethinking their willingness to do smaller runs.

There are so many Canadian small producers that have stopped producing as manufacturing moved south for economies of scale..

[–] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 4 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

What I would like to see here is Canadian sourced yarn.

Canadian spun yarn from Canadian sourced fibres do exist but are harder to find.

There are also many small Canadian dyers but unfortunately many are buying imported merino yarn that is not ethically sourced.

There are lots of great yarn stores across Canada selling lovely imported yarns as this one is. Especially when this stores’ promoted partners, such as Pacific Yarns, are based in the USA.

I’m sincerely not sure what promoting them does for buying Canadian. I don’t see a focus on promoting Canadian yarn on their main page and the brands listed aren’t specifically Canadian.

Spinrite used to be a Canadian yarn maker but it’s more complicated now, and many of their yarns are available at big box stores.

Perhaps because there’s a big dose of misogyny intertwined with the critique of American Exceptionalism.

Think about how the song would play with genders reversed.

I think you’ll find that many store cards are really Visa or Mastercard.

Many Canadian store cards used to be owned by the stores. Some of the department store ones were very profitable.

However, many firms ‘rationalized’ by getting out of what was seen as a financial services business line to focus on their core retail. Weston’s with PC Financial is an exception - but for many consumers there are other reasons not to go with Loblaws/PC branded financial products.

[–] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 7 points 2 months ago (2 children)

There are, or at least were, Canadian cast iron makers.

Unfortunately, they seem to rely on Facebook.

See: https://castironcanada.com/

Also, it’s not clear which of these businesses are actually still operating. For example, Bristol Iron Works in Huntsville ON has a danger flagged website and a FB page that hasn’t been updated in years.

Also, you don’t want to be looking to log into dodgy wifi when travelling with a burner phone to another country.

Physical guides are more secure and don’t require downloading to a burner device.

I believe one or two of the new senators have joined Mastodon as well but haven’t seen much from them yet.

Mastodon is very techy. It’s getting good traction there.

[–] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Just be sure to wash and block before connecting the blocks.

[–] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 1 points 3 months ago (3 children)

I love making samples, so working up 8 x 8” / 20 x 20 cm samples of a lot of different stitches is fun for me.

There’s an old Bernat pattern that I have for an Afghan made of squares of very many different classic crochet stitches. It’s a great practice and skill building project.

If you choose a good palette of solid colour yarn, it works out nicely. If that kind of throw isn’t the kind of thing you like in your home, they’re always a gift or charity option.

 

Bleeding Cool previews behind the scenes commentary from Hageman Brothers from prerelease of DVD-BlueRay bonus content.

CBS Entertainment is keeping the profile up on Prodigy merchandising. A bright spot amidst Paramount’s erasure of Prodigy in Star Trek Day content.

 

/ Film is continuing to report and opine on key points in the oral history book "The Fifty-Year Mission: The Next 25 Years: From The Next Generation to J. J. Abrams," edited by Mark A. Altman and Edward Gross.

For those of us who haven’t (yet) invested in the book, these extracts and reflections can prompt some interesting discussion.

In this case, it sounds like Nimoy’s hesitation led to a much less action-oriented integration of Spock’s presence. An interesting thought experiment.

Also, it sounds like tapping nostalgia and interlinking shows has been a constant pressure from senior executives at the IP holder. It’s well known that Roddenberry resisted close callbacks to TOS, and was determined for TNG to stand on its own in its own era. Even five seasons into TNG, Paramount senior executives though still weren’t convinced it didn’t need a TOS-connection boost.

Considering the amount of callback mining and IP nostalgia mining in the current era shows, it seems as though Kurtzman’s got a hard road to convince Paramount to give new characters and eras a chance to stand on their own.

 

This was included in the Star Trek Day content, but released separately a couple of days ago.

It’s nice to see Discovery getting a lot of love in this. It also really shows how great so many of Discovery’s vfx heavy scenes have been.

 

Leaving aside bias towards the American market and critics, this latest criticism of Rotten Tomatoes influence comes from this September 6th piece from Vulture. The report provides new evidence of PR firms paying critics and persuading them to keep negative reviews off of Rotten Tomatoes tracking.

The Bunker 15 employee replied that of course journalists are free to write whatever they like but that “super nice ones (and there are more critics like this than I expected)” often agreed not to publish bad reviews on their usual websites but to instead quarantine them on “a smaller blog that RT never sees. I think it’s a very cool thing to do.” If done right, the trick would help ensure that Rotten Tomatoes logged positive reviews but not negative ones.

Collider has its own overview and retrospective on previous examples of corruption in reviewing, headlined “Rotten Tomatoes has always been mouldy at its core.’ It notes the inherent vulnerability of RT as it is owned by NBC Universal and Warner Brothers. Collider summarizes the recent criticism and analysis of RT as follows.

THE BIG PICTURE

Rotten Tomatoes' binary system oversimplifies complex works of art and diminishes the role of nuanced film critics.

The recent controversy surrounding Rotten Tomatoes reveals the site's susceptibility to manipulation by PR companies.

The dominance of Rotten Tomatoes in film discourse has led to a diminished appreciation for the human element and individuality in film criticism.

 

Because it’s the weekend and Star Trek’s new Moopsy is possibly the most frighteningly inspired adaptation/extrapolation of Pokémons to hit the screen.

 

It appears that this is a promotional feature in Smithsonian Magazine for a a new book Reality Ahead of Schedule: how science fiction inspires science fact.

This seems a good fit for Daystrom Institute, but happy to relocate if it’s a better fit for another community.

 

Earlier this week Disney announced (whinged) that it expected a $ 300 million revenue loss attributable to the strike.

Today, The Hollywood Reporter says sources are reporting cost-cutting at Warner Brothers Television Group.

the studio has suspended a number of overall deals for its top creatives including J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot (Duster), Greg Berlanti (Superman & Lois), Chuck Lorre (Bob Hearts Abishola), Bill Lawrence (Shrinking), John Wells (Maid), Mindy Kaling (Sex Lives of College Girls). Sources say Lorre’s multiyear pact with his decades-long studio was quietly suspended in May, a week into the strike, with Wells’ deal a month later.

Deadline has a similar report but interprets the news as more likely ‘suspend and extend’ arrangements.

One has to wonder why the major content producers are continuing side with Netflix, Amazon and Apple which are primarily streamers.

 

I was initially delighted to see BBC amplifying the celebration of TAS’ 50th anniversary. Then I read this piece.

Half a day later I’m still annoyed at the number of easily verifiable errors and that with the BBC’s trusted source credibility, the power that this piece can have to create uncertainty on settled issues.

First there are 22 episodes of TAS not the 20 claimed in the article.

Second, it’s established that Gene Roddenberry’s rejection of TAS as canon was overstated or at least inconsistent (and that Richard Arnold’s own view was a factor in magnifying this question in early TNG production). The BBC article overstates this as fact.

Third, it ignores the fact that Paramount as the rights holder has decided to treat TAS as canon. The article concludes with a statement that this continues as an open question. While it might have been fair to say that for a number of fans, this remains a question, it’s not accurate to portray this as an official position even just implicitly.

Anyone else irritated by this?

 

As previously advertised.

 

The rebranded Star Trek magazine Explorer, published by Titan, is including original fiction.

For those who are fans of @DavidMack@davidmack@wandering.shop, this month’s issue may be one to add to your purchases if you’re not planning to already.

 

Labour Day statement from guild/union leadership as cited in article …

Keyser called out these contentions on Monday, emphasizing that, “These things must be resolved. And not with contract language that has a one-to-one ratio of promises to loopholes. Truly resolved.”

“Of course, that’s not the AMPTP way. And it’s a hard thing to give up on something that has served them so well for 40 years,” he continued. “They are in the process of wrestling amongst themselves, ramping up their public relations, and coming to terms with the fact that – with writers on strike – and actors on strike behind them – this negotiation is different. And they are going to have to do more – offer more – than they usually do. Much of our frustration with how long this is taking stems from that – from their internal bargaining. But they will get there.”

 

In honour of Star Trek day, this month Simon & Schuster is offering 23 ebooks at discount prices.

Books from every era are represented. (A special shout out from me for the Diane Duane one.)

As usual, look for the discounts in the US, Canada and UK through the major ebook platforms.

Enjoy!

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