(no subject)

Good morning everyone, and welcome to Radio Free Monday!

Ways To Give:

Mel linked me to a post passing the hat for geekosaur, who is struggling to get a job and get out of a homelessness situation.

cassiephone linked to a fundraiser for a newly-established literary award, the "Translation Awards", which bring attention to SFF from other cultures that's been translated into English. Everyone who donates is eligible to win book prizes.

aris_tgd wanted to let folks know about Sins Invalid, a dance company that focuses on performance exploring disabled, queer, and otherwise marginalized sexuality. They're putting together a DVD, and raising funds for it at Kickstarter, where they still need a few thousand bucks in the next few weeks.

Help For Free:

yamx linked to a petition to the producers of House MD, regarding their recent handling of asexuals. I haven't watched House in a long time, so I'm not sure precisely what went down, but you can read a more detailed writeup of the issue at her journal.

Fans Helping Fans:

UPDATE! I posted last week about a friend who could use a hand, and you guys responded wonderfully. She asked me to tell you all she's really grateful, and that thanks to the Cafe her heat, electricity, and phone will stay on for another month.

Ascendio is a Harry Potter con taking place in Orlando this July, and they've extended their call for papers through the end of February. They're taking submissions not just for papers but also workshops and panels across a variety of subjects including publishing, YA lit, handcrafts, and fan culture. You can read more about the awesomeness of Ascendio here!

kalichan is writing a chapter for her dissertation on how fandom interacts with the producers of a given canon, and she's looking for fanfic written by people who later became writers on a show. Specifically in Buffy and Who, but she's interested in other canons as well.

OH NOES INTERNET:

Let's talk about internet censorship!

ACTA is, as far as I can tell (my research is basically what you guys send me, at this point) a global version of SOPA/PIPA. arsenicjade linked to an explanation and links roundup of it that covered my bases, at least; as internet citizens this is something you should be aware of. (Thank you to everyone who sent me links, but as they were identical I chose to link the source document.) hollyxu also linked to an alternate post aimed at UK residents here.

On the SOPA/PIPA front, imaginarycircus has a post up about March as "Media Blackout Month". I'm not sure I'd give odds on the success of the campaign, but I do believe in voting with your dollar, and this is a prime example of how you can do that.

Just For Fun:

I was quite pleased last week to see that I am not, in fact, by far the only person unamused by Shit Girls Say. azurelunatic and sumofparts both linked me to a Racialicious article about ownership and exploitation as regards the Shit Girls Say Spinoffs; I also found some more funny ones, such as Shit the Dowager Countess Says and Shit Nobody Says.

sprat and china_shop have a new panfandom flashwork community opening February 1st; you can read more about it here. It's hosted on both LJ and DW but without crossposting, so people can hang out on whichever platform they prefer. One of their goals is to encourage people to practice writing, and I'm all for that, so you should definitely check it out!

@MetEvaine on Twitter linked me to a wonderful exhibit of thousands of origami flowers.

nutmeg3 linked me to an amazing article about 20's Chicago Transit posters. HOT STUFF.

rusty76 linked to a journal which combines my love of origami with my fascination for masks!

jkivela linked me to The Avengers Shouldn't Text, which is kind of like the Askworld for Avengers fandom.

25 Things I Learned from Opening A Bookstore. Having worked in a bookstore, I personally know many of these to be true.

And this has been Radio Free Monday! Thank you for your time. You can always post items for my attention in comments here (or on any post) or email me at copperbadge at gmail dot com. If you're not sure how to proceed, here is a little more about what I do and how you can help. Remember, brevity is the soul of RFM.

(no subject)

It's all about love today in ( A Cheaper World. )

(no subject)

One of my coworkers, let's call him M, is in a tangle with HR. They sent him a bunch of paperwork about some upcoming leave, and then abandoned him with no help in filling it out. I had a look at his paperwork and said "Yep, I can't fill that out either" -- he just has some serious questions to ask HR because the questions in the paperwork are poorly phrased or not explained.

He's been calling HR and getting the runaround, I think in part because they don't know how to fill out their own paperwork. Eventually they stopped answering when he called (our name shows up the company phones). He managed to get hold of the HR admin, who told him the name of the person he needed to speak to, Employee L. She said she'd transfer him because she could see that said person was here. She transferred him...and the other person didn't pick up.

So I came back from lunch, heard him discussing this with Awkward Coworker, and decided to end his frustration.

Me: When was this?
Coworker M: About ten minutes ago.
Me: Give me L's extension.
Coworker M: Okay...
Me: *picks up phone and dials* Hi! Employee L? Glad I got hold of you. I'm calling on behalf of Coworker M. Please hold while I transfer you.
Coworker M: *picks up* hey, I had some questions...

At which point Awkward Coworker leaned on my cubicle wall and said, "I'm really glad you're on our side."

It's nice when my evil is properly appreciated.

(no subject)

Wow.

I know a lot of you have issues with Big Bang Theory, and much of the time I totally share them, but I just watched the hundredth episode from two weeks ago and sweet damn, that pushed my biggest, least-satisfiable competence narrative button like crazy.

Spoilers under the cut -- major ones, so if you haven't seen it yet you definitely want to wait.

( Spoilers. )

It's so hard to do this arc well, the arc where you go from insecure or shy or a minor character to an assertive badass, because it's so easy to go overboard; it's hard to write convincingly about growing up.

It's one of the stories I love best -- we got it with Ianto, I came so close to getting it with Lupin, and it's something I'm constantly writing about in my own work. Nameless is sort of about it, and tons of my fanfic is: Sweet Home, Man With Fedora, to some extent the Rulesverse. The only time I've really written it to my own satisfaction is in Dead Isle, with Jack's arc about coming out of his Mad Inventor shell, but it's been a theme I've worked hard to explore. So seeing a great example of it in a show I've been watching and alternately crowing at or cringing over for four years was like twenty-five minutes of pure joy.

Also, the penis jokes were funny.