Internet Readalong

My laptop died in the middle of organizing Friday's link spam, which was exciting. It needs a new battery, which has been sent away for, and my internet presence will be a little sporadic in the meantime (...okay, so I still have my work computer, my home desktop system, and my ipod. But it's just not the same!).

This is abbreviated and not nearly everything I wanted to post but. I suspect it would have been kind of overwhelming and also overly cranky, so. Links!

* An update and comprehensive timeline on the Neil Gaiman thing by Deb over at American Indians in Children's Literature.

* And while we're talking about fail and references to Native Americans, did you know James Cameron is... I don't even know what to call him. Aside from an ignorant, appropriative douchebag. Who thinks that if the Lakota had only fought harder when they were 'asked to displace' they wouldn't have all these problems now. The Lakota.

And a couple more while we're on the theme:

* LINKAGE: The Feather In Your “Native” Cap on Threadbared: In the last few weeks, several writers have tackled the concatenation of concerns surrounding “native appropriations” in so-called hipster fashions.

* Feminist Intersection: On hipsters/hippies and Native culture on Racialiciious

* Feathers and Fashion: Native American is in Style on Sociological Images

* deepad posts an Open Letter to Charlie Tan (his response and her response to his response linked at the end): I do not understand how you can consider writers to be a proletariat worthy of defending against the elite excesses of their readers. Racefail was primarily about the impact of books on readers and how we saw the world, whether we aspired to write ourselves or not. Critiquing a book's faults because we find it hurtful, offensive, unresearched or otherwise lacking in craftsmanship is something we do in our free time, without payment, out of a sense of community with others who may have struggled against the same issues. To demand that such criticism place the needs of supporting authors above our own needs as readers devalues us.

* antumbral has a good summery of what, exactly, LJ is doing to your outbound links and why you should be upset about it.

* Relatedly, stepps has posted the amazingly comprehensive What to do with Dreamwidth: a list of tutorials and information

And finally, Roger Ebert vs Every Video Game Ever:

* Last year, Kellee Santiago gave a TedTalk at TEDxUSC about how of course video games are an art form (or capable of being an art form), can we please move this discussion forward?

* On April 16th, Roger Ebert posted Video games can never be art in response.

* Kellee Santiago replied with My Response To Roger Ebert, Video Game Skeptic

* Penny Arcade has an excellent summery of the whole thing here.

Okay, finally x2 via rm:

Deb Mensinger needs a new liver, because hers has been destroyed by a genetic form of porphyria. The hope is that Deb's brother will be able to be the live donor (livers are awesome that way). However, Deb's brother lives on the opposite coast and is uninsured, which means there are a lot of expenses involved in all of this that Deb's insurance won't pick up.

So a fandom auction is stepping in to help Deb, her wife (Laurie J. Marks, author of the Elemental Logic series, the Children of the Triad series, The Watcher's Mask, and Dancing Jack, and guest of honor at WisCon 31) and her brother. The auction will open for bidding on May 1, but right now we need people to offer things to bid on! Please visit debsliverlovers to offer items to bid on, and please help spread the word. Thank you!

Nothing to add, except that Laurie J. Marks' Elemental Logic series is fantastic and I suspect her other writing is too.

Stuff about things

And now, some random commentary on:

(Note: There Be Spoilers Here)

( How to Train Your Dragon )

( Castle )

( Doctor Who )

( Hayate x Blade v6 )

Ooh, three_weeks_for_dw starts today! This probably isn't worth including but I should plan ~something~...