Truth, honesty. And the Internet way of life.
01/04/2004 . Source: Geoff Willmetts 

Sitting here under the Betelgeuse sun, sipping my favourite cocktail, a lovely mixture of hemlock and cyanide - it might sound poisonous to you but it has one hell of a kick for someone of my physiology with a distaste for alcohol, I can leisurely contemplate the human view on the computerised universe.

Sitting here under the Betelgeuse sun, sipping my favourite cocktail, a lovely mixture of hemlock and cyanide - it might sound poisonous to you but it has one hell of a kick for someone of my physiology with a distaste for alcohol, I can leisurely contemplate the human view on the computerised universe. [Please note, this drink isn’t allowed to be sold off-world, so don’t make your own versions as it can be fatal to terrestrial stomachs!!!]

What is truth?? Especially on the Internet. How do you know if anything is a done thing? This has all sorts of repercussions. I’ll cite a couple examples to see how many can wave their tentacles (those funny things you call hands) up to similar things?

How often do you type in an email link instead of copy and pasting and then wonder why the person who’s taking your e-calls while you’re away doesn’t get your messages? I mean, unless someone tells you differently, it just appears that people are respecting your holiday, not that they have to wait cos the alternative address doesn’t exist. It’s a variation on the Emperor’s new clothes. No one’s going to say anything because all too often it’s thought someone else will deal with the problem or say something. It might even be thought that there isn’t a need for a return message.

If someone vanishes off the Net, it tends to be thought that they’ve either run out of money, gone to a different server and haven’t bothered to tell people they previously knew their new email address. There is rarely a consideration that someone has died, unless details are published from someone who might have known them in the flesh. Even then, if you don’t pick up the bulletin, you’re not likely to know either. On the Net, you can be immortal or terminal and no one can really spot the difference as someone or something else will arrive to fill the gap.

Nothing is helped by the amount of spam we all receive but it does make me wonder if those who submit their websites to be distributed amongst the unwanted email messages get spam themselves and, more importantly, do they find it a bind themselves to receive it? Do they block their own spam or take their medicine knowing that to do so will encourage others to do so? Waiter, get me another drink.

The longer you use the Net, especially for shopping, the more you rely on places you use regularly. Of course, that comes from experience that your credit card details are safe on particular websites and no more different to the kinds of places you on any real time shopping trip. It’s in the interest of any shop to keep you happy, if they want to have your custom again. Prompt service with unbattered goods through the post tends to work well with me as I suppose with any of you. Getting a bargain as well, especially compared to terrestrial shops, is often a bonus. There’s one thing to add to a price for shop overheads, quite another to more than double such a price when there’s already a decent profit margin. The Net is firmly one extra place I check before buying something these days. [Is that an endorsement or just a way of living??]

A couple years ago, I editorialised about collecting has been made so easy on the Net that I’m less prompted to worry if I don’t chase too quickly for something ‘I must have’. Although this attitude hasn’t changed that much, I find there’s a bit more vigour over getting a decent price or discovering that something has had a limited release and there are only so many available to buy in the world. It’s beginning to make the hunt more interesting than adding another Predator’s skull to my trophy room.

Lately, I’ve noticed I will shop around for a particular product or item if I think I can get a better deal. No more different than in real time but with the Net, that can be world-wide. [Before you ask, there are daily deliveries to Betelgeuse care of Interstellar Delivery And Travel Inc. So what if I have a share in the company?!] Oddly enough, with the Net, the ability for it to appear impersonal and not knowing the people, inevitably means buying from one place is pretty much like another, providing credit card details can be locked from prying scans. Conversely, I’m sure website shops find their clientele has expanded and there’s probably less reliance on a few customers so it’s probably a win-win situation for either side providing you’re not afraid to look around. On an overall outlook though, you no longer see people but screens that supply you with things when you hand over money. Don’t you miss that impersonal touch of the check-out clerk who isn’t really interested in you talking about what you’re buying any more?

In many respects, the Internet is also the home of the Walter Mitty variant. Those of you too young to have heard of him, he was a character created by a human called James Thurber who escapes his hen-pecked existence (Mitty not Thurber so is alleged) by day-dreaming as he would like others to see him. With the Net, the ability to label or name yourself is seen by many as the means to be what you think you should be. This can even go to the point where photos might not be yourself. Humanoid seems appropriate for this planet and less likely to think you might have nightmares by my true appearance. [Although what I have aren’t really tentacles as they’d hardly be this mobile in a gaseous atmosphere.] For the Net, particular generations can appear to be Adonis or Venus to whoever encounters them. It’s often a rude awakening when in the flesh they really do have a lot of flesh but I digress.

As mentioned last month regarding groupings, it’s possible to find people with similar interests as well as the intellectual level within such groups. This tends to be less Walter Mitty and more by sussing out how your knowledge or how loud your mouth is compared to others. Occasionally, this bemused editor thinks, while scoffing down whatever is close to a plate, that with welcoming committees to new voices that it probably isn’t that far removed from an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, not that I’ve ever been to one. Saying that, I’d probably be the first visitor to an Non-Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. ‘This is Geoff. I don’t drink alcohol.’ ‘Hi, Geoff, we don’t drink either but we have this lovely non-alcoholic cocktail you might want to taste’ will come back the chorus. This is primarily why I don’t offer my favourite cocktail any more and why that particular group no longer exists. The thing is that without those welcome notices, you’d never be sure if you were heard or just a lonely voice on the Net.

Response time is another factor. Compared to terrestrial post, e-mail delivers in a matter of seconds across the world. Even near Betelgeuse, e-sending is a lot faster than waiting hours for the fastest FTL starship to slow down to reach orbit. The expectation that a response should be equally fast belies the fact that lengthy replies require some thought off-line than biting your foot off at the knee for saying something inappropriate or wrong. I might work on the Net but I don’t wait with the modem on. I continually get this image of people waiting by their computers late into the night waiting to receive any late messages just to prove that there are other insomniacs out there as well. Mind you, there is probably an Insomniacs Chat Group out there awfully confused by the fact that half of them do actually get some sleep across the other side of the planet when they are awake.

For the record, being off-line for me is the means to get work done. I’ve often commented that no one should, outside of deadline, need keep to my response times. From my perspective, it’s more a matter of ensuring that at least one of my backlog piles doesn’t mount up without some sort of control and my responses has a lot to do with working on this busy website.

I’m also digressing a lot as well. All the above is about truth on the Net. The converse can also be true. It’s also fair to say that we can all be taken in by the less scrupulous on the Net. Like with any real world situation, there are always people out there who think or like to take advantage of anyone’s good nature. Out in the wild, there are particular animals who specialise in such activity. Amongst its own species, you humans are just as likely to prey on each other if they can use it for their own advantage. Usually, a sense of morality stops most taking advantage...well, unless you really have a grudge against someone. Humans can be so fickle about such things! Fortunately, criminal activity remains only with a few. In, say, a town, the criminal element can amount to a couple dozen. Multiply that number by the factor who use the Net and the number can run into several thousands if not a million. The real problem is how can you govern this electronic world when you don’t really know who is really out there anyway? All the identification cards in the real world doesn’t really mean much inside the Net where everyone is treated as equal under the names they use.

The truth of the Internet and the denizens who use, if not inhabit it continually and blocking the telephone lines when they aren’t using it, is that it's a both a communications link and a village shop for those who use it sensibly. On any world, there’s a need to know that someone is out there hearing us and seeing to our needs. Whether we believe it or not is entirely up to the individual.

The truth might be out there but there has to be a certain amount of developing cynicism to not to let your guard totally down. Well, except to me that is but I’m a writer and we all know writers don't lie...except in stories...some of the time.

I was recently asked what the difference between astute observations and cynicism with what I write. For the former, it's spotting something that makes sense of what is going on. For the latter, it's complaining about what is going on in a loud enough voice for others to take notice and contribute to making a change in the world. An observer can point something out but leave it to other to make their own judgement about it. A consensus on the facts will have a better judgement call than forced by a single opinion.

If all of the above happened in a Science Fiction novel, I doubt if we’d believe it could happen. Why else has the popularity or believe in cyberspace fiction has take a downbeat with the reality that knows it probably won’t happen that way. Anyway, where’s my graffox. Gotta take him for a walk.

Be happy. Be safe. Enjoy the rest of the website.

Thank you and good night

Geoff Willmetts

editor: SFCrowsnest.com

PS For those keeping up with my health, all I’ve currently got currently is the odd sniffle cold. My Mum’s back in Musgrove Park Hospital, Taunton (hi folks) since 16 March. Schedule is fun but you also know the reasons for any delays in responding.

(Less Serious) Thought For The Month # 1: OK. Picture this. A ragtag fleet arrives Earth orbit saying that they are being pursued by a deadly robot menace out to destroy all of mankind and that we are their lost colony. Would you think of them as being sensible bringing them here not once but in two slightly similar realities?

PS If you’ve survived this far in the editorial, let me reiterate something from the website newsletter and the above editorial. As you can see from the main page, we have one of the biggest SF/fantasy/horror monthly reviews columns on the Net. Our success has increased the number of books that comes in and our policy is to read everything before giving a review. We roadtest books so you have some idea of what you’re letting yourself in for when all you’ve got to go by is the cover and promotional blurb. That means actually reading the product and telling others what you think.

If you like reading books in the genre, think and can show you can write a decent review and, most importantly, live in the British Isles (sorry, expense, time and distance travelled prohibits elsewhere), contact me below for my ‘Reviews Flyer’ - put this in the subject ebox and we’ll see if you’ve got what it takes. We can’t pay you but a review for the price of a book has to be a good incentive. We have one of the most popular SF review columns on the Net. Think you’re up to writing a review or do you think it's a hard thankless task??

PPS: For those keeping track, I’m still about 20 months (early May 2003) behind with going through the ebook samples. Thank you for your patience but let me know if you’ve sold elsewhere so I can reduce my pile or if you’ve changed address, especially e-mail address. I can’t give you my comments unless that’s up to date. Currently, I’m sorely tempted to do spot-checks to see if you’re still there when I reach your sample in the pile.

This isn’t much of a repeat, just to show you’re not forgotten. Those sending in samples, be prepared for a long wait and read the Guidelines elsewhere on this website. They are there to help you do some of the right things and reduce the number of times I’m repeating myself over silly grammatical errors. It makes editing a lot easier if any editor has less work correcting poor English which should have been sorted out in the first place. There’s an old editorial adage, if you can’t aim for perfection why should an editor nurse-maid you to that state? If you’re a writer, then you should understand the words and grammar of the job you’re supposed to be writing or are you considering it as mundane and boring as any other job to get right? Fall in love with making every sentence the best you’re ever written before letting anyone else read it