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Post by Cei-U! on Nov 7, 2019 13:11:04 GMT -5
You would not believe the insane amount of detail my research is requiring to straighten out the baffling quagmire that is the comic book black market. That loud boom you hear later today will probably be my head exploding. Cei-U! I summon the shelter from the (data) storm! It never even occurred to me there was a black market for comic books. Color me intrigued. Is there a brief abstract of what you're finding? I'd love to read more when you're done. During World War II, pulp paper and the sulphur and chlorine used to make it, earmarked as vital to the war effort, were strictly rationed for civilian use. Publishers, including comic book publishers, were restricted to 90% of their prewar usage in 1943, 75% in 1944-45. The resulting scarcity meant that even the crappiest comics sold out their entire print run. These profits were too tempting for a number of publishers, printers, and art studios to resist, and they flooded the newsstands with illegal comics. The War Production Board frowned on such scofflaws and they were subject to stiff fines and confiscations. Will Murray wrote an excellent article for Comic Book Marketplace has been my primary source on the subject (though my own research has turned up several errors* on Will's part).
Cei-U! I summon the paper police!
* Edited to add: "Errors" isn't fair. I'm bringing my old data analysis skills to bear on the information (some of which had yet to be discovered at the time Will wrote) and coming to different cnnclusions.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 7, 2019 15:53:27 GMT -5
Why is it so difficult for so many people who should know better, especially people who write books, newspaper articles and various other forms of published material, to spell the name of Dr. Seuss (not "Suess"!) correctly?! Or Gandhi's name? (It's not "Ghandi.") Also Edgar Allan Poe? (it's not "Allen.") because proofreaders and copy editors have been deemed an unnecessary expense in today's publishing field as they trim production costs to maintain profitability in a shrinking market. By doing so, they have de-emphasized getting it right over getting it done on time and that has bled into all levels of writing. I imagine that it isn't that more people are getting it wrong initially than before, but now the safety net, i.e. the people who used to catch and correct such errors are no longer in play. -M
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Post by Prince Hal on Nov 7, 2019 16:05:07 GMT -5
Why is it so difficult for so many people who should know better, especially people who write books, newspaper articles and various other forms of published material, to spell the name of Dr. Seuss (not "Suess"!) correctly?! Or Gandhi's name? (It's not "Ghandi.") Also Edgar Allan Poe? (it's not "Allen.") because proofreaders and copy editors have been deemed an unnecessary expense in today's publishing field as they trim production costs to maintain profitability in a shrinking market. By doing so, they have de-emphasized getting it right over getting it done on time and that has bled into all levels of writing. I imagine that it isn't that more people are getting it wrong initially than before, but now the safety net, i.e. the people who used to catch and correct such errors are no longer in play. -M So true, and this became obvious when reporters began posting their stories directly to the compositor rather than sending it to an editor first, which goes back decades now. Weird hyphenation because of the lack of regard for margins, and frequent misspellings -- "exhuberant" is one that still sticks in my memory from those days -- became the rule. And of course, bad spelling and grammar become ingrained in those who are readers and who may not write quite so much themselves. And even good spellers and grammarians, besieged by incorrect spelling and grammar, begin to question whether their versions are correct! Thus we have "would of" instead of "would've;'' "resigned" instead of "re-signed" on the sports pages; and the complete abandonment of a distinction between "who" and "whom," even in the New York Times... and in headlines, to boot!
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Post by berkley on Nov 8, 2019 0:43:28 GMT -5
If it's the same film I'm thinking of, I actually saw Frankenstein 1970 at the theatre as a very young kid. I remember being a bit disappointed with the Creature, who looked like an average-size guy with a torn-up face. And was he wearing a space-suit for some reason?
Right at the beginning of the new decade there was a Canadian tv show that I loved called "Here Come the 70s": it was basically a sort of news or information program about not just science and technology, but also social changes, things like that - basically the strange new world that we were all soon to be living in. But when the show lasted a few years into the 70s, so that "the 70s" no longer sounded all that futuristic, they changed the title to "Here Comes the Future". When they dubbed the show in French, they must have realized the 70s were too close because they renamed it “Vers l’an 2000”! Great memories. I remember being very scared that people in the future would really shave their head, because shoulder-length hair was all the rage back then. Also, that’s the show that predicted that automation would develop so quickly that by the year 2000 one of the big problems in our society would be how to occupy our considerable leisure time. To say I now feel cheated is an understatement! They have the closing credits to Vers l'an 2000:
I don't remember these images as well but nice to see the band, Syrinx, performing the theme song!
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Post by The Captain on Nov 8, 2019 6:25:21 GMT -5
because proofreaders and copy editors have been deemed an unnecessary expense in today's publishing field as they trim production costs to maintain profitability in a shrinking market. By doing so, they have de-emphasized getting it right over getting it done on time and that has bled into all levels of writing. I imagine that it isn't that more people are getting it wrong initially than before, but now the safety net, i.e. the people who used to catch and correct such errors are no longer in play. -M So true, and this became obvious when reporters began posting their stories directly to the compositor rather than sending it to an editor first, which goes back decades now. Weird hyphenation because of the lack of regard for margins, and frequent misspellings -- "exhuberant" is one that still sticks in my memory from those days -- became the rule. And of course, bad spelling and grammar become ingrained in those who are readers and who may not write quite so much themselves. And even good spellers and grammarians, besieged by incorrect spelling and grammar, begin to question whether their versions are correct! Thus we have "would of" instead of "would've;'' "resigned" instead of "re-signed" on the sports pages; and the complete abandonment of a distinction between "who" and "whom," even in the New York Times... and in headlines, to boot! A big part of this starts in the schools. I know at least a couple of my older daughter's teachers don't correct spelling or grammar mistakes in papers because they're "more focused on the ideas being presented than the accuracy of spelling and grammar." There are some teachers who will accept shorthand texting words (Ur instead of Your, for example) because they feel that society and language is changing and that the kids are expressing themselves in an "authentic manner consistent with their life experiences". Must be nice. My dad was a professional journalist, and I got railed at if I produced a paper with misspelled words and grammatical errors. Those were just simply unacceptable.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 8, 2019 7:13:43 GMT -5
So true, and this became obvious when reporters began posting their stories directly to the compositor rather than sending it to an editor first, which goes back decades now. Weird hyphenation because of the lack of regard for margins, and frequent misspellings -- "exhuberant" is one that still sticks in my memory from those days -- became the rule. And of course, bad spelling and grammar become ingrained in those who are readers and who may not write quite so much themselves. And even good spellers and grammarians, besieged by incorrect spelling and grammar, begin to question whether their versions are correct! Thus we have "would of" instead of "would've;'' "resigned" instead of "re-signed" on the sports pages; and the complete abandonment of a distinction between "who" and "whom," even in the New York Times... and in headlines, to boot! A big part of this starts in the schools. I know at least a couple of my older daughter's teachers don't correct spelling or grammar mistakes in papers because they're "more focused on the ideas being presented than the accuracy of spelling and grammar." There are some teachers who will accept shorthand texting words (Ur instead of Your, for example) because they feel that society and language is changing and that the kids are expressing themselves in an "authentic manner consistent with their life experiences". Must be nice. My dad was a professional journalist, and I got railed at if I produced a paper with misspelled words and grammatical errors. Those were just simply unacceptable. My Mom is exactly like your Dad ... more ways than one. Her Mother was a School Teacher ... Get the Picture Here.
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Post by Cei-U! on Nov 8, 2019 9:24:38 GMT -5
Had an email from my publisher this morning informing me that my book has made back its cost and is now turning a profit. I still have to wait until it compensates for my advance, but he assures me it won't be long before I get my first royalties. How cool is that?
Cei-U! I summon the perfect eye-opener!
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Post by Prince Hal on Nov 8, 2019 15:44:44 GMT -5
Yes, some of this sloppiness can be laid at the feet of individual teachers, and I’m with you there, The Captain. However, it's more than just that. I see it as another indication of the shift, seismic, but not sudden, in education over the last couple of decades. Years ago, every teacher was expected to be an English teacher. Not that your chem teacher was going to teach you the ins and outs of what metonymy is, but in the sense that standards of grammar, spelling and writing were expected in every course in the curriculum. Nowadays, here’s what I often heard teachers outside the English department say about evaluating student papers: “I’m not an English teacher. That’s not my job.” Now we live in the days of cost-efficient instruction, data-driven learning, standardized testing and writing from building principals like this: “I will be leading training with supervising evaluators to continue to grow instructional leadership skills. General consensus is setting of clear goals and professional dialogue about teaching and learning lead to trying something new and stretching beyond the instructional comfort zone." (Actual quote from a few weeks ago, not my snarky attempt at satire.) There's clear, specific and concise for you. Teachers are seen by an overwhelming number of people in charge -- yeah, I'm looking at you, Betsy DeVos -- as being dispensers of information, injectors of knowledge that can be regurgitated at will in the same form in which it was injected onto Scantron sheets, SAT's, AP tests, state exams, and computer screens. They also regard teachers as being easily replaced by "long-distance learning," and "on-line learning," not to mention by instructors who have "real-world experience" and therefore need no specialized instruction to become teachers. They don't even have to demonstrate mastery of the content. This is a by-product of the "Anyone can teach" philosophy. Nowadays, teachers are forbidden to go outside the lines. Stay in your lane, teach to the test, stay on-task, keep up with the department guidelines, timelines and deadlines, and basically just do what the supervisor, the curriculum guide, the state frameworks and the textbook tell you. This is the culture of education in which young teachers especially have been inculcated. It is not designed to attract the kinds of people who want to think for themselves, I’m afraid. Teaching is not piece-work or assembly-line work. It is an art as well as a craft and it can’t be mastered by having it force-fed into students. However, that is the model followed on all levels today. Not by all teachers, thank the gods, but by too many. I do hope that you speak about your concerns to your daughters’ teachers and to the various supervisors. The flip side of all the educational bushwa is – If you can believe it, “customer satisfaction – and a sincere letter or phone call (if those are still used rather than “X-2” or “Aspen,” or whatever other soul-sucking computer program they use at your school for “reaching out”) can make a world of difference, especially if you know that other parents feel as you do. Would that your daughters could have at least one teacher like shaxper. He is an example of what all teachers should be: caring, challenging, hard-working, and in love with his subject. Sorry to go on like this, Cap, but you hit on something close to what’s left of my dark heart. PS: I hope like hell I spelled everything write.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 8, 2019 16:02:36 GMT -5
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Post by Prince Hal on Nov 8, 2019 16:07:34 GMT -5
Thank you, @mechagodzilla!
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Post by Rob Allen on Nov 8, 2019 16:08:48 GMT -5
Prince Hal, your heartfelt frustration with American public schooling is clear and well-earned. My father left the teaching profession in 1964 because the situation you describe was already underway. What you wrote above are the things I grew up hearing from my dad. It's sad that things have been this bad for this long in our schools.
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Post by Prince Hal on Nov 8, 2019 16:13:27 GMT -5
Prince Hal , your heartfelt frustration with American public schooling is clear and well-earned. My father left the teaching profession in 1964 because the situation you describe was already underway. What you wrote above are the things I grew up hearing from my dad. It's sad that things have been this bad for this long in our schools. Well, as a nation, we have rarely valued education as anything more than a means to status and/ or money. And we pay the price in innumerable ways, not the least of which is in our lack of knowledge of our own history and government and the shameful quality of our public discourse. Thanks, Rob.
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Post by The Captain on Nov 8, 2019 16:34:43 GMT -5
Prince Hal , I agree with you 100%. I have a degree in secondary social studies ed (never taught, as I went a different direction in my life), but I wouldn't make it in today's educational environment. My biggest complaint is the rise of the standardized test. My daughters waste an inordinate amount of time every year (although it was much worse in elementary school, to be fair) getting ready to take benchmark tests and PSAA tests and all kinds of other evaluations that allow the state to rank schools and divvy up money and whatnot. What a horrible environment for them to be in, a joyless drudgery of ingesting facts for the sole purpose of being able to regurgitate them at a later date to satisfy testing requirements so that the school district can earn a gold star, a pat on the head (or rear end, I'm not sure), and some extra dollars because the teachers are "doing their job". No, teachers doing their jobs would be the ones instilling in the next generation a love of learning and a sense of wonderment about the world around them, helping the students develop into well-rounded young adults so that they can take over the challenges the world will present them in the future. And don't even get me started on the lack of funding for "gifted" education either. Both of my girls are in our "gifted" program, having both tested in 2nd grade and found to have qualifying IQs and abilities (our school calls it "gifted and talented", and both have, in addition to well-above-average IQs, significant musical and artistic abilities), but the program suffers because there aren't enough resources dedicated to it. However, there's always funding available for the lowest-performing students, the troublemakers, and the special needs kids, which is great and all, but I question why we spend so much effort trying to pull up everyone, especially those with identified low ability, while throttling the speed at which the best and the brightest can go. They've canceled field trips and activities for the gifted kids due to lack of funding, but my older daughter spent a year in a class with a kid who had a dedicated aide because he "wanted to be a cat" and would curl up under his desk and meow during class, which was during the times when he wasn't crawling around on all fours disrupting everyone else. Some of the best teachers I ever had in school were the ones who didn't play by the rules and who weren't afraid to take chances or "color outside the lines", and it was because they had PASSION for teaching and molding young minds. When I student taught, my mentor teacher killed my enthusiasm on the first day when I asked about him helping me write lesson plans. He told me that he had two full file cabinets of lesson plans that he'd written years ago and that he just pulled them out when he needed to, and that I could do that too if I wanted. This was a man teaching social studies, for crying out loud, in fall 1994, when the Republicans, led by Newt Gingrich, gained 54 seats in the House of Representatives and 8 Senate seats, and he not once discussed that momentous event in class with his seniors. He cared more about coaching the football team (rinky-dink rural school, maybe won 2 games that year) than he did teaching, to the point that he would have his classes watch videos while he worked on game plans. Of course, another factor in the downgrade in teacher quality is that it doesn't pay crap in most places. If a person has even the slightest ability to achieve something, they're likely going private sector rather than take a job teaching. Long hours, putting up with students who don't care because they know the school will pass them just to keep them moving through the system (and to avoid having too many kids held back, even if they deserve to be), having the administration breathing down their necks because the test scores aren't increasing enough, having the administration not have their backs in disputes with parents, being called "parasites" or worse when they ask for a little more pay by the very people who expect and rely on the schools to provide full-day childcare for their kids, and minimal funding because the political party that loves to run on the "CUT TAXES" platform ensures that there isn't enough money to go around and so they are spending money on classroom resources out of their own pockets are just a few of the myriad reasons for people to avoid going into teaching. I feel where you are coming from, Prince Hal . Our nation diminishes the position of educator, demeans the people who choose that path, and devalues the skills, abilities, and passions those individuals possess in the name of rote memorization and standardized testing. But, hey, as long as the football team wins some games and the smart kids pull up the test results so that the administration isn't called into question, everything is good, right?
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Post by DE Sinclair on Nov 8, 2019 19:42:13 GMT -5
It is pretty amazing that all other facets of home office technology and computing have gotten light years better yet printers still totally suck. There's a prime example of intentional stagnation to inflate prices if ever I've seen one. If anyone made a quality easy to use printer that works well with inexpensive ink they could steamroll the competition and capture market share. I got tired of the inkjet printers where the replacement ink was nearly as (or more) expensive as a new printer, making the printers basically disposable. I finally broke down and bought a cheap Brother color laser printer for $200 from Amazon. I've had it for over a year, haven't had to replace the toner, I print whenever I want, and don't have to worry about the ink drying up or clogging the nozzles. I still keep the old all-in-one inkjet printer around to use the scanner part, so it's still useful too.
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Post by wickedmountain on Nov 9, 2019 0:10:46 GMT -5
Hi Everyone how is everybody? I hope you all are doing well. Me well with my dad passing away in October some days are worse than others. My mom lost her prescription meds yesterday we looked everywhere for them my conclusion was, She must of thrown them out by accident So we got that refilled today thankfully her doctor understood. As did her insurance company . Her memory has been very bad since my dad passed away it worries me but i know it's all a part of grieving , Although her memory was bad some before my dad died. My dads birthday is coming up soon on November 13th he would of been 79 years old. I Wish he could of made it through the holidays and his and my moms birthday her's was last month. We will be going out to eat for thanksgiving this year the first year ever that my mom didn't make dinner. but with her being 75 my dad said she needed to not do it anymore. makes her sad but it will be okay in the end.
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