SoylentNews

Actually, there is no chapter nineteen, at least in this iteration. The book now starts with a third person narrative between the CEO and an underling about Captain Knolls' report, which the underling is delivering. Most of it is Knolls' report.

At any rate, what was originally chapter one is now chapter two. Chapter one is now a conversation between the company CEO and an underling, who brings Captain Knolls' report with him.

I'm following (and copying and pasting from) the manuscript, but every chapter has changed and expanded. What I'm posting today is a couple months old and has been added to.

Oh, did I mention? This is the new chapter one.

Meeting
                "Did you bring Knolls' report?"
                "Yes sir, here it is."
                "Did you read it?"
                "Yes, sir, I did. It's interesting. Knolls could be a writer if his grammar wasn't so atrocious, it was actually a good read. These reports are usually pretty dry."
                "Well, he's just a ship's captain. It's not like he's been to college or anything. How detailed is the report?"
                "Heh, too detailed in places. I didn't really need to hear about his bowel movements."
                "How much did he leave out?"
                "Nothing important. At least I think nothing important."
                "It says he saved her life?"
                "Yes, sir. He apparently kept a cool head, kept his wits about him and did everything right. It looks like he saved Kelly's ship and cargo as well."
                "Yes, I read the investigation report. Sabotage to Kelly's ship during the Mars overhaul so they could get his ship and ores. One of the workers was arrested, he'd been paid a huge sum of cash to do it. It wasn't hard to catch him, they just looked at spending patterns to find who was living beyond their means. He confessed, we need to figure out how to prevent that from happening again."
                "yes sir, we're on it already. If Mark Johnson can't solve it, it's insoluble.
                "It had better not be. What were damages to cargo?"
                "One specimen was severely injured but recovered before reaching the port on Mars.
                "Other damages?"
                "One of the ship's two fusion reactors was ruined, as well as three of its ion drives. The other was damaged but easily repaired. One battery incinerated. Minimal damage considering the dangerous cargo it was carrying and the problems Knolls encountered. May I ask, sir, why you allowed her on board with such a dangerous cargo?"
                "No, Bob, you may not, but I will say she's going to do whatever the hell she wants no matter what I think. I'm just glad it turned out the way it did."
                "Sorry, sir. Anyway, I hope you read that report. It answers a lot of questions the investigators didn't."
                "I will, thanks. Afternoon open? Want to shoot nine holes?"
                "Of course. But please, read the report first."
                "Don't worry, I've been looking forward to it, especially considering... get the hell out of here, Bob. Let me read this thing. I'll see you on the golf course."

Chapter 20 is finished and 21 nearly so. And yes, the incinerated battery and more is coming.

I realize this is a bit of a longshot, and I don't want to run a QA on the site for this, but does anyone have a lead on a lawyer in New Hampshire to help me through incorporation? I'm also looking for a CPA, but those are relatively easiler to locate.

I've looked at various services such as Harbor Compliance, but they don't seem to be legal help, just document filing services ...

"Nobots" showed up at Amazon.com today. B&N is the cheapest I've seen at $23 and change. Their shipping is free for orders over $25, while Amazon only offers free shipping for orders over $35. Unless you've been chomping at the bit for years, I suggest waiting until "The Paxil Diaries" shows up at B&N before buying a copy.

I'm disappointed that Amazon has no cover art shown, too.

I'm referring to the fans who bought copies of Nobots. It's finally listed at Barnes & Noble here, and somehow it's cheaper there by three or four dollars. Again, my apologies. If you're thinking of getting a copy of The Paxil Diaries you may want to wait a couple of months until it's at Barnes as well.

Barnes is far superior to Amazon. Why? The bitches at Amazon still haven't listed it. However, Google's spiders haven't found it at B&N yet, either; I found it through B&N's search facility.

I was amused that B&N suggested that you nag me to make a nook version out of it, when you can read it or download it (actually, both books) free on my web site on your nook. I'm making e-pub versions, but haven't quite figured out all the nuances of the conversion software. It will be free as well.

Wooo, that nearly killed me to finish it. It's going living at 20:00 UTC (4PM EST), which is the start of our peak hours. We'll be revising it based on community feedback and if other important points come up as time goes on.

Of course, words means only as much as the actions taken behind them, but I think we've been relatively consistent in meeting the goals I outlined. Here's a small sneak preview for those who read my journal til the whole thing goes live

Statement of Purpose

Our aim is to stand in stalwart opposition to these trends. We will be the best site for independent, not-for-profit journalism on the internet, where ideas and free discussion can take place without external needs overshadowing the community.

The Paxil Diaries is finally available. I hesitated releasing it, because it's still not perfect. There is at least one grammar error ("whom" should be "who") and at least two formatting errors. But to tell the truth, I'm really tired of working on this thing and it seems no matter how many times I proofread, fixing one mistake seems to cause another.

You can read it, download it for free, or buy a hardcover copy here. I hope you enjoy it, some of you have been waiting ten years for it.

This is a generic journal entry posted entirely so that you can tell me I'm awesome, call me a dick, or impart useful information since SN lacks a messaging feature and I'm not giving out my email address.

I've been working harder since I retired than I did working. Maybe it's because it's something I want. I've spent the last week proofreading. I found that typos and other errors are far easier for me to find in a printed book than on a screen.

I finished yesterday, updated and uploaded the file and ordered a new copy. Still having writer's block with Mars, Ho! (which is only 20% done) I checked Amazon and Barnes to see if they had Nobots available. Not yet.

Fifteen years ago when I had the Springfield Fragfest I had a terrible plagiarism problem. Folks weren't just infringing my copyright, they were posting my own work under their name. Not a week would go by that I didn't have to issue a DMCA takedown notice to someone, usually a university (a different one each time) where a student was plagiarizing my work. So I googled for pages using Nobots in an infringing way.

I publish under the noncommercial GPL license. All I demand is that it's non-commercial and I get credit.

I ran across this German site. I was taken aback at first... DMCA doesn't apply to Germans. Then I realized they were displaying mcgrewbooks.com in a frame!

I don't see how it could harm me and do see how it might actually sell a book or two so I'm not going to hassle them.

I wish I'd learned German rather than Spanish.

In this week's poll on Pipedot I ask you to rank popular websites using the Borda Count voting method. In other words, how much do you trust these sites to maintain your data and your online privacy.

Instructions:

Rank any number of options in your order of preference.

Notes:

• The highest preference is "1" and will reward the highest number of points
• The largest number you can enter is the count of the options (In this case "8") and will award 1 point
• Don't duplicate numbers
• You can leave some options blank; no points will be given to these choices

This marks the 3rd voting method supported. Approval Voting was added last month.

So ... I've recently gotten back into minecraft, and figured that perhaps there are other MC players here at SN, so I wanted to know if there was enough interest to setup a MC server in general. I'd probably use CraftBukkit, and I'm open to running mods if others are interesting. Leave a message below if you'd be interested.

Mods I'd like to run:
  * Traincraft
  * Railcraft
  * Mystcraft (useful for getting new ores without having to reset maps; age creation would be restricted to admins though; mystcraft is a server hog).

Leave your thoughts below.