Unabashed

I was only there on Sunday, from 11AM to around 5PM, and I had a blast. I didn’t get to see any shows or presentations or author readings or contests or, well, anything at all, really. I walked around with my wife, Suzy, hopping between the four hotels and immersing myself in the event that the Con really is. There are a few photos I took at the end of this post.

In order to miss traffic (we were staying with family in Conyers), we drove to Indian Springs and hopped MARTA into Peachtree Station, which put us at ground zero for the event. We immediately began seeing people in costumes. Highlights follow:

• Met Cherie Priest, and got her autograph. Positively the high point of the Con. You may remember I interviewed her here a while back, and I can tell you now that I’ve met her that I’ve not met very many nicer people. She didn’t bring any books with her, so I couldn’t buy one, but she did sign my Dragon*Con program, and she chit-chatted with Suzy and I for a little while, and she even remembered my name :-) 
• (I was a little disappointed that Cherie wasn’t wearing her steampunk regalia, but still…I was just glad to have met her)
• Met John Scalzi, who was nice as well but you could kinda tell he was ready to hit the road for home, and I can’t say I blame him. He signed my copy of “You’re Not Fooling Anyone…”
• Bought a book of H.P. Lovecraft stories, because it’s been too long since I read any of them.
• Saw Lou Ferrigno, who was a lot taller than I thought he would be, for some reason. I mean, I knew he was BIG, but I didn’t know how big he really was, y’know? I stood right beside the Incredible Hulk.
• Among the other actors we saw: the captain from Firefly (who is also Captain Hammer now in Dr. Horrible’s Sing-a-long Blog), Spike from Buffy (my wife swooned. She SWOONED!), and the little Asian dude from Big Trouble in Little China (who, I pointed out to my wife, was more famous–to me at least–for his classic performance in Seinfeld. Remember? “Seinfeld four!” Anyway…)
• I was surprised to see so many steampunk costumes. It seemed like steampunk was the second most popular genre there (next to Star Wars, of course). …Maybe I should point out that I’m thinking of putting together a little ensemble myself…nah, I’ll just keep that under my hat for the time being…er
• Evidently it’s a lot easier to come by a chain mail or steel mesh bikini top than I’d ever dreamed. I must have seen a dozen. I must say I think it’s a good look :-)
• Yes, of course I held Princess Leia’s slave chain. She made me. I had no choice. (See pic below)

Overall, I’d rate my experience an A+, and Suzy and I are seriously considering going for the whole event next year. These were my kinds of people, I think. It was my first event of this type, and I really didn’t know what to expect, but once I was there I just walked around in a daze, trying to absorb the reality of something so amazing. All those wonderful costumes, on people that–excuse me if I’m wrong here–are basically, generally, anti-social. But, wow, how they let down their guard when in costume. I’ve seen costumed people in tourist-trap towns (New Orleans), “living statues” and the like, who are quick to come to life if you dare consider taking their picture without boning up a dollar first. So I really didn’t know what to expect. My wife saw two girls she wanted me to take a picture of, so I turned on the camera and they stopped, posed, and smiled while I grabbed a shot. Then they continued on their way. I didn’t know if I was going to have to pull out a dollar or what, but no, of course I didn’t. And on it went, through the whole afternoon: “Mind if I take a picture?” And then they’d pose, and you’d know it’s a practiced pose, but they’re all so gracious and…well. You get the picture. I love these people. They’re my kinds of people. I would make friends with people like these. I am people like these. For everyone at Dragon*Con, thanks, you were great, and I enjoyed seeing every one of you.

Me and the princess:

Here was one of the best costumes of the day, a steampunk girl with copper-tube wings:

Can anyone tell me who this is supposed to be? This hat was so large she had to be led by the fairy ladybug girl and had to stop and bend over to get through doorways. She had a big sword in her hand, and the rest of the costume was basically a towel and a brown bra. I was a very well made hat, big, but well made. It actually looked like metal. I just don’t know what she’s supposed to be.

I think these two were really pirates. And not in a good, happy, or fun way. The bad way.

This Guy (I know you know who he is) came complete with sound effects:

That’s enough for now. I took a few others, but this is a good sampling. If I’d been there the whole weekend I think I could have taken a million pictures.

written by Matt Mitchell \\ tags: Atlanta, con, convention, dragon, dragoncon, pirate, Pirates, steampunk

I had the glorious idea this year to buy myself and my wife Archos media players for Xmas. My wife specifically wanted something she could listen to music and look at photos with, as well as read ebooks. I researched a little and bought her the 404 and myself the 605 w/wifi.

Of course, now there’s a problem. Much of the content I own that is, that I have purchased and now own usage rights to is DRM locked, meaning it can’t be used on more than one media contraption or it’s in a format that’s not going to work on the new player. So all my CDs I’ve got to re-import just so I can use them. But it gets worse, and there’s one particular format of DRM that’s got me mad as a hornet.

Ebooks. There are a few ebook outlets on the web. But suppose I want to buy Halting State by Charlie Stross, which I do, or did. I found it in a couple of places, and it’s usually around $24. My first reaction to that figure was Huh? I’ve got a problem right off the bat, because this isn’t a hardback copy of a novel; this is something that costs basically nothing to produce. I feel like it’s a ripoff right out of the gate. So why would I want to pay hardback prices for something like that? Well, unfortunately for Mr. Stross, I won’t. I’ll probably now pick up his book at the library.

So, fine: New books cost too much in ebook format, but there are millions of books out there, so I figured I’d just do a little research and find something cheaper, and I did; the titles are inconsequential. I found two ebooks for less than ten dollars apiece, and I bought them in Adobe format, which I presumed was .pdf, a format my Archos will handle out of the box. Wrong. This is a new ebook format that Adobe has created which restricts printing, copying text and search functions. And what’s worse? It won’t install on my Archos. But even if it did, this Adobe format won’t allow an ebook to be read from two different readers, to which I again said, “Huh?” This tells me that the publisher not only doesn’t want me to let my friends read a book I’ve purchased, they don’t want my wife to read it, either, unless I loan her my reader, which is senseless and the exact reason we bought two of these things in the first place.

So, my bright, shiny new paperweight is sitting on my desk upstairs, waiting for me to give it some content to make it worth owning. The masterminds of DRM have done their best to ensure that I can’t put anything on it without making an additional, considerable investment each time. There are ways, around it, of course; I can purchase some ripping software (illegal in the US) so I can put my DVD’s that I’ve purchased on it; I can re-d-load my CD’s also that I’ve purchased, and I can read free ebooks on the web via David Wellington’s website and a few others. My wife can’t: she didn’t want wifi (finds it complicated) so one of the caveats to my purchasing this for her was that I would handle her content. So, other than a site like Project Gutenburg, where I can download free .pdf versions of Homer and Aesop, I’m finding content is hard to come by, even for someone who’s willing to pay (a reasonable price).

Another thing that makes this so difficult to swallow is that I could care less about printing the ebooks I might buy. I do want to put it on two different readers, and I’m not about to purchase two copies so my wife and I can both read it. And I’m not going to apologize for letting my wife read the books I buy. I’m not even going to apologize for letting my friends read my books, because you know what? When I loaned my neighbor my issue of Master and Commander, the first of the Aubrey/Maturin series by Patrick O’brian, he read it and then went and bought all 23 books for himself. If not for my loan, he never would have read the first O’brian novel, never would have known how great the series was, and never would have contributed his wads of cash to their purchase. Sure, sometimes I loan someone a book and they don’t purchase it or any more, but those aren’t the buyers you want to cultivate anyway, are they? They are the one-time readers who buy one or two books in their lives and find that they prefer movies. If I try to get them interested in books by loaning them one, am I doing anything but helping the industry, even if it never takes? I understand that the real reason DRM exists is to stop mass piracy. To keep the bastards who take an electronic copy of something and print it off to sell cut-rate versions to the masses. But in the process of fighting them, your damaging your relationship with us. Your bread and butter.

I don’t own a pirated copy of anything; primarily because I can afford to buy things I want for myself. What’s amazing to me is that I am convinced that the bigwigs that control our content believe that we are all pirates. That we are all trying to stick it to them, that we would all stroll the streets for printed-off versions of Harry Potter instead of buying an official copy. Why else would you cripple your own hardware and inhibit your users from being able to attain it without jumping through hoops? The only real reason I can come up with is that they really believe we are all out to get them.

But basically the DRM folks have made a model of anti-piracy content that keeps willing non-pirate buyers away from their content. Of course, I envision a group of cigar-chomping big wigs sitting around a table greedily clutching wads of greenbacks, screaming at passersby: “Thieves! Pirates! Stop stealing my money!”

written by Matt Mitchell \\ tags: ebook, ebooks, format, pirate, pirating