Talk:Harlan Ellison/Archive 5

More on one of the sources: California Sorcery is a collection of fiction from "The Group" (California writers including Ray Bradbury, Harlan Ellison, and Robert Bloch who were responsible for the bulk of The Twilight Zone scripts). The book has an overview of the development of the group, with biographical details on each member provided there and, in brief, before that member's story.

The Last Dangerous Visions

• Can we please quit cutting this part out? It's getting annoying. -james_anatidae, 2004-05-09, 02:22 EST
  • That's it, I'm requesting page protection. I don't really care about the book, its these useless deletions that are bugging me. -james_anatidae, 2004-06-11, 03:02 EST

Since this part is based on hearsay and rumor, it's pretty obvious why it keeps getting cut from a factual article.

Seems pretty factually-based to me. Which bits, exactly, do you think are unfounded or improperly qualified in the article? I'll need a lot more convincing before I'll let that paragraph stay deleted on this basis. Bryan 07:54, 15 Jun 2004 (UTC)

That the only citation for the allegations about Last Dangerous Vision is from a book by Christopher Priest (not the fine British author, by the way), a book with no real credibility.

Charles Platt "incident"

• On the issue of the Charles Platt "incident", the paragraph comes across as unsubstaniated rumor mongering. A secret non-aggression "pact" that H.E. supposedly violated many times? Sounds libelous without further evidence. If we must keep this paragraph, I'd prefer to indicate it as an apocryphal story about this author, of which there are many. I'd even support a separate section devoted to these types of stories, as long as it is clear that the validity of many of them are in dispute (or at least that the details may have gotten grossly distorted over the years). If citations are available, they should be referenced. In any case, the paragraph does seem out of place to me (as opposed to the LDV paragraph, which, while apparently controversial, at least seems to be written in a factual manner) - chad.netzer

• The idea of "secret non-aggression "pact"" is nonsense and should definitely be removed as inaccurate. It's a garbled version of a true part of the story, that they had a truce agreement at one time, which isn't a secret. There's a description about it from Charles Platt in the following message:

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/rec.arts.sf.written/msg/e1b8b77a080e614a

--Seth Finkelstein 00:30, 20 Dec 2004 (UTC)

• I took out the part describing it as "apocryphal" because it lacks court documentation. Why? There's no *reason* there would be court documentation. Abritration agreements, if it even rose to that level of seriousness, are by definition extrajudicial. I wouldn't object to someone describing it as apocryphal if their response is better-reasoned.

Direct contact with Ellison / stubbing the article

Harlan Ellison contacted us to complain about several errors in this article. Danny is in communication (or will be) with him to get more details and research this a bit more. In the meantime, we should take it slow and easy with the article.

It is likely that the anon who copied text from Harlan Ellison's website was authorized to do so by Ellison. That text is problematic for us, in that it's written in a press release style, but of course the information there will be helpful to us in improving the article.

One problem is that Ellison has had trouble with a persistent detractor posting stuff on the web that isn't true (as I understand it), so we have to take even more care than we normally do in making sure that everything we say in the article is properly researched.

I'm sure we'll get it right soon, and in the meantime, I hope this note is helpful in clarifying what is going on.  :-)

Jimbo Wales 23:25, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)

It's been a couple of months now, is there a progress report? I popped by here in search of information about his lawsuit vs. AOL, and I find that that's among the deleted material even though it's quite well known and publically documented. Bryan 02:36, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Yes, what's going on? Much of the removed material was informative and hardly objectionable even from HE self. --Malyctenar 11:58, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I'd also love to hear what's going on. GeneralPatton 13:20, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I've put the question directly to Jimbo's user talk page now, in case he no longer has this article watchlisted. Lacking any further information I think restoring the old contents is the best course of action, I'll do that in a few days if nothing more comes up. Bryan 16:49, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)

And now it's been almost a month since I posted the question on Jimbo's talk page with no reply. I'm going to just restore all the deleted material now, if Harlan Ellison still has problems with it he can either edit it himself or point them out here for us to deal with publically. This article's been in complete stasis long enough. Bryan 16:42, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Last Dangerous Visions question

While digging for references on whether Ellison had first publication rights on the stories in Last Dangerous Visions, I came across a page ([1]) which states that authors who want to publish the stories they'd put in that book can pull their stories from LDV and do so. It says "In fact, at least one author has pulled a story, attempted to submit it elsewhere, and then RETURNED the story to TLDV when the results were not satisfactory." Does anyone know if that's true, and if so which author/story it was? Also, the article could use a better reference confirming that Ellison does indeed have first publication rights than the one I dug up, which merely indicates that Ellison believes he does (or believes he can get away with claiming that he does). Bryan 01:02, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Oh, I should also mention this link in relation to the ones I added to the article: [2]. The relevant bit: "Harlan Ellison phoned about various Ansible pieces, saying in particular that his huge wrath at the inclusion of that Last Dangerous Visions story in NESFA's Cordwainer Smith collection had a lot to do with HE himself having partly rewritten Smith's imperfect draft for TLDV ... only to learn for the first time of the story's pre-emption (courtesy of the Scott Meredith agency) when he saw the NESFA volume." This doesn't affect the matter of who owns what rights, I just figured I should point it out for future reference. Bryan 01:13, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Birthplace

An anonymous user changed the location of Harlan's birth to Cleveland. This is consistent with information provided at Ellison Webderland. Much of his early life was spent in Painesville, however, as noted in his writings. --WCFrancis 15:31, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

Article protection

Danny reverted the article and then protected it with the following summary:

19:14, 5 Jun 2005 Danny protected Harlan Ellison (for reasoning contact me privately)

Without adding a protected article tag or making any comment here on talk. This action strikes me as having pretty dubious standing, so I'm unprotecting the article. Bryan 06:19, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The inline link to "The Book on the Edge of Forever" appears to be dead.

Foolscap exchange between Harlan and Gabe

I still think this is such a non-event that it really does not have a place in this article. I really don't think it is either very encyclopaedic, very noteworthy, and I doubt anyone is going to be interested in this in ten years. Am I totally off in my judgement? I'm just asking, because I keep shortening the write up, and I don't want to annoy people if they truly can make a case for this having a prominent place in the controversy section. --Codemonkey 22:05, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Obviously it hardly constitutes an important incident, but if you remove it, people will keep adding it back in. Best to wait a couple of years and remove it then. --221.249.13.34 05:05, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

I agree stongly with Codemonkey that this rumor-mongering is totally out of place if Wikimedia is serious about being a real encyclopedia. It is highly POV (It was worse before the mention of Ellison's comments) reporting of a minor incident. I happen to believe Harlan's version. Giving weight to a rant posted on the internet by someone who either could not make the effort to even spell "Harlan" right in his posting or thought it would be a cute insult to spell it incorrectly is as inappropriate here as the personal attacks in that rant would be. Keeping it here weakens Wikipedia. If it were to result in an edit war, then page protection would be in order.WCFrancis 09:51, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

I can't say I believe either of them 100%, but by whichever account you go by, it's still a pretty minor incident, if that. And I don't think we will have to wait years for the editing to die down. While the PA reader community is wonderful and capable of many great deeds, I seriously doubt their collective long term memory is big enough to last beyond 1 or 2 months with regards to a event such as this one. --Codemonkey 16:14, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Recentism. Couple of years? With luck, we can delete it in a month's time or so. –Hajor 15:28, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

• How about a couple of days? Just removed it. WCFrancis 03:11, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Sounds like fan protection, especially since Harlan's version of events is simply that he didn’t like them rather than he didn’t actually verbally assault them. I think it would be safe to say that on page views alone Penny Arcade is wider read (and thus more famous) than Ellison, IMHO it was this that caused the altercation. Since any changes on the PA page would be protected as feircly though I think it's best to leave the page alone, I'm sure Ellison is just overjoyed that someone is watching his back on wikipedia. (unsigned from IP address 62.49.6.235 10:23, 19 October 2005 )

Entry came back yesterday. Entered by unregistered user from IP 172.190.196.39 (AOL IP) who did not take part in this discussion here. I removed it again; I still consider it non-notable misunderstanding blown way out of proportion with no place in a serious encyclopedia. WCFrancis 03:39, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Controversy

"All the same, Ellison has also garnered a controversial reputation, being fiercely protective of his work and of any copyright infringement." User:E Pluribus Anthony

How does protection of your work from theft garner a controversial reputation? Harlan is not the only writer to vigorously pursue every legal means of protection of his work. The implication that this is "controversial" is questionable at best.

Ellison has always been outspoken and has always had a low tolerance for fools, jerks and idiots. He can be strikingly caustic due to his mastery of the english language. Curmudgeon he may be but he has every right to protect every bit of his intellectual property.

I am not sure what word to substitute for "Controversy" in the later heading, but review of the material does not actually describe controversy as much as it does contentiousness, with the possible exception of his embracing of causes that were controversial at the time with total commitment. WCFrancis 17:26, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

I just noticed this: I disagree. Given the considerable body of information in the article and elsewhere (e.g., online and in other media) about HE's reputation, a spade is a spade. Someone who asserts their proprietary rights may or may not be controversial: there are (presumably) a plethora of individuals (particularly 'celebrities' and, more to the point, authors and commentators like HE) who assert their rights without being known for doing so. There's nothing inherently wrong with either, nor in being perceived a curmudgeon (and I've been so called!), but it needs to be said. Not including this upfront obfuscates the subject matter of concern; anything else may be semantics and possibly POV.

As well, perhaps the latter section can be entitled Reputation or similar, but the section heading is currently summative. E Pluribus Anthony 04:31, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

I changed "fiercely litigious when he feels his rights or his work is threatened" to simply "fiercely litigious". Litigation implies a right has been threatened and so this is unnecessary. Whether that litigiousness was frivolous or meritorious is something that can be hashed out subsequently, but flabby writing aids no one. In that same vein I removed "justified or not" from comments about his reputation since, again, a reputation is presumed to not be the last word. I also changed an introductory sentence which claimed Ellison is "fiercely protective ... of copyright infringements" to something less counter-intuitive.(Unknown user)

And I changed the "fiercely litigious" line for another reason: it implies that Ellison fires off lawsuits over lesser or trivial issues. The text I entered ("Ellison is fiercely protective of his work, and has sought legal action against potential copyright infringements") is both accurate and without insinuation about litigiousness, fierce or otherwise. I also clipped two sentences from the "Last Dangerous Visions" section, as they were clearly written as an argument against Ellison rather than a presentation of fact. Signed, Brian Siano

And I have reverted Siano's changes. Litigious does not imply that one's suits are frivolous, it implies that they are numerous, as Ellison's undoubtedly are. Siano's argument amounts to this: true information that may lead one to a bad impression should be excised. Such is not the nature of encyclopedias or other non-propaganda sources.

In addition, I reinstated the details about Priest's book, including the rebuttal. The article as written did not fully balance the views of proponents and critics. Noting that Priest criticized his practices without showing *why* he did so renders the comment meaningless.

I removed the details about Priest's book because they were written in a manner intended to malign Ellison. Here is the text, with the questionable comments marked with a + sign: "Priest documented a half-dozen instances in which Ellison promised TLDV would appear within a year of the statement, but +of course those promises were unfulfilled+. (Why 'of course?') _Ellison has a record of fulfilling obligations in other instances, including to writers whose stories he solicited, and has expressed outrage at other editors who have displayed poor practices. This high demand on the ethics of others, however, has not resulted in Ellison returning TLDV stories to their authors or their estates._" (This is reaching for an effect, to insinuate that Elliuson is a hypocrite.) If you're going to write an encyclopedia entry, fine. Write one. But don't throw in this shoddy moralizing and editorial commentary, pretend it's merely "facts," and accuse others of censorship when they correct you.

Brian, I think you make some good points. But removing those sentences entirely is overkill. I have reinstates the Priest stuff BUT I have taken out the insuating parts--the "of course" and the "this high demand sentence". If you have an opinion on the litigious thing, I'd like to hear it.

litigious:

Adjective 1. Of, relating to, or characterized by litigation. 2. Tending to engage in lawsuits.

Ellison's Response

Ellison's response is not appropriate for an encylopedia. It reads like vandalism and the fact the subject himself wrote it is irrelevant. I'm not going to take it down just yet because I would like to hear competing arguments for its retention.

To who ever deleted the Ellison response to Wikipedia: Who are you to delete a response that the author wishes to have distributed? It says so in the text. How does it read like vandalism?

Response: because it's more of a rant than a biographical entry. This is not a place for people to give resumes or make personal correspondence. Is there *any* precedent for allowing an encylopedic subject to comment on his entry *within* the bio? Of course not. A fair compromise would, I think, be a link--but we have to vigilant to keept his from devolving into a screaming match, which is exactly what Ellison's rant was.

It's said above that it's irrelevant whether Ellison wrote it. I disagree. I think it's highly relevant. Because we all tend to view ourselves in less-than-objective light, a person's entry about themselves should be presumptively suspect. Structurally, it simply doesn't make sense--in the course of a very short biography, half the space will be devoted to what he thinks of one internet site??? If Ellison can point to factual inaccuracies, he should feel free to correct them, but his opinions on Wikipedia are not relevant here anymore than a more prominent's author's opinions on Encylopedia Britannica would be relevant there.

Hmm, I wonder why people don't feel obliged to sign their comments here? Makes it really hard to follow the argument, folks! PDD 00:42, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Text of Ellison's Comments

HARLAN ELLISON

- Tuesday, December 6 2005 13:11:44

WIKIPEDIA PUSTULANT

Let me urge you to go to the link Mark O. has posted re Wikipedia, just previous to this. My fervent 2 cents (and with all this much-vaunted hossanah'ing of PCs, and how they'll make us a better species, how come the fuckin' things don't have a "cents" sign as did the cheesiest typewriter Back In The Day?), my two cents is entered YET AGAIN FOR THE ELEVENTH TIME, that the site, the idea, the concept, the execution, the content of the Wikipedia site is simply unadorned crap.

Let me stress thst. CRAP. Not just useless for reference if you give even the smallest shit about truth or accuracy or fairness or being courant, but DANGEROUS and HURTFUL CRAP that balms the egos of those whose idle hours compelled them to create this cesspool in the first place, in blind denial of the idiocy of the opening concept.

It is a stupid idea, deifying the urban myths and illogical personal twitches of anonymous know-nothings. It is the raising to the level of notice, the blathering and meanness of those who formerly had an adequate and appropriate soapbox on the corner, but who now have the aid and abettment of worldwide broadcasting. It is the enabling of half-witted and jejeune autodidacts who truly believe every paranoid conspiracy opinion they foam up in their brain-basin is worthy of dissemination, and is as "valuable" as real facts and Britannica-researched real information.

The Siegenthaler situation exactly parallels mine own, EVEN AFTER I played their silly little game and spoke to the several creators of the site personally, and then spent an hour or so revising and submitting an accurate (evenhanded, non-ax-honing) revision...which lasted for about an hour till the anonymous brigands formerly of Enemies of Ellison realized their long-posted scurrilous CRAP had been deleted...and they just punched in the previous CRAP all over again. And the Wizards of Wikipedia giggled, shrugged their shoulders and said, "Well, see, that's the idea of Wikipedia. Nothing is permanent."

NOTHING IS PERMANENT???!!!!!!???????

gEEZus bleedin' whatever, this flies in the face of every basic instinct of the human race. The Great Wall of China, the Tower of Babel, the Great Library of Alexandria, the World Trade Towers, the Pyramids, the Eiffel Tower, all of Shakespeare's and Faulkner's and Shirley Jackson's writings, the begetting of children ... TO LAST, TO BE PERMANENT (even in the face of the futility of "eternal" permanence)(to defy death and the eroding sands of time, to leave a mark, to have BEEN HERE), to create that which does not slip and slide and fall away beneath our feet. To be permanent, as best it can be so.

IMpermanence = chaos.

Don't talk to me, those of you who must need to be slammed in the forehead with a maul before you'll GET IT that Wikipedia is a time-wasting, totality of CRAP...don't talk to me, don't keep bleating like naifs, that we should somehow waste MORE of our lives writing a variorum text that would be put up on that site.

It is a WASTE OF TIME.

Those who are obsessed with disseminating "Chinese Whispers," who enjoy "Playing Telephone," who batten on creating gossip and rumor and the kind of paralogical CRAP that is as real as the "little fuck" anecdote allegedly about me, that Phil Klass cobbled up from a creaky old vaudeville-cum-Joe Miller Jokebook shtick, decades ago...that still lives on...

Those pus-bags will revel in using CRAP SITES like Wikipedia, and the even more egregious ancillary-sites that reproduce the CRAP without checking, thus spreading obscurantism and illiteracy further and further...

Those schmucks will not go away. But YOU PEOPLE have some very laudable degree of common sense. So stop blathering about "we should do this" and "we should do that" and lamenting what a nasty business this is. Because short of finding each and every one of these people (and who the hell knows how many that might be, on a million different topics) and putting a Glock to their head, and festooning the wall behind them with strawberry gliomas, even RUMINATING about buying into this set-up is no more than annoying and aggravating.

So unless you can hack your way in, to destroy Wikipedia from the tap root up, give it a pass, I beg you...give it a rest!

In sympathy with John Siegenthaler's father,

Yr. pal, Harlan

Posted by WCFrancis 03:55, 9 December 2005 (UTC).

Um, Harlan, if you're still reading this... you can get a cent sign (¢) by holding down the "Alt" key on your keyboard and, while holding it down, typing 0162 on the numeric keypad. Firebug 04:50, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

I like much of HE's work; however, the above reads like a juvenile rant. If the above was written by him, it is badly written/styled and may give aspiring writers (and definitely Wikipedians) pause. And what's with the 'screaming'? In [cyber]space, no one can hear you scream. E Pluribus Anthony 05:36, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

It would be more "Ellisonian" to say that I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream. *Dan T.* 13:44, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Agreed! That title reminds me of The Matrix, when Smith removes Neo's mouth on the spot, but he still 'screams' ... :) E Pluribus Anthony 14:22, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Read the story. They have this place called a library. If you really can't get away from the keyboard you can buy a book from Amazon.com. I don't recall what collection it's in, but do a little research. WCFrancis 00:51, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Case in point – your first sentence on its own would've been just fine. And your sarcasm and emphasis is necessary ... because? There are things called manners and respect. If you cannot comment rationally or civilly, don't. End communication. E Pluribus Anthony 04:01, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Allow me to apologize for the sarcasm, which was out of line. I also failed to research it before opening my mouth keyboard. The story is available on the Sci-Fi.com site, with permission, I'm sure. The link is available at the end of the article I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream. I immediately thought of the story when I saw the scene you mentioned and thought that it might be deliberate homage. I do recommend the story highly. I am embarassed by my sarcasm and my failure to check facts. WCFrancis 04:13, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Anyway, the story in question is online... apparently with Ellison's permission (he's vigorous in protecting his copyrights, so he'd certainly object if it wasn't!) *Dan T.* 04:10, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Apology accepted. :) And thank you both for the constructivism! Now I must get away from this pesky keyboard ... ;) E Pluribus Anthony 04:17, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Without reading the rant, it seems highly unlikely that this is Harlan given the signature, "Yr. pal, Harlan". He would not abbreviate in such a way, even facetiously. JHG 11:27, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Read the board. HE uses that a lot. And I don't think Rick would allow sockpuppets. WCFrancis 00:51, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Fleisher Suit

Why is there no mention of the suit against Ellison/Groth by Fleisher?

I've got the Comics Journal issue that was published right after that suit ended, with lots of info (though filtered through that publication's strong biases). Maybe I'll get it out over the weekend and take a stab at giving an account here. *Dan T.* 15:19, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Just *whose* site is a wasteland full of crap?

Given Ellison's opinion of Wikipedia expressed in the above rant, it was interesting to stumble upon this (aptly-titled) page in his own site:

What the Hell?

It's apparently "fed" by some sort of guestbook script where anybody can post stuff, unmoderated, and he doesn't seem to have made the slightest effort to clean out the voluminous heap of spam that has come in through that route. At present, it's got so much malformatted crud that the bottom part of the page is showing up in raw HTML code without rendering, probably due to some oddball code that's been inserted somewhere along the way. *Dan T.* 22:20, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

HE doesn't do his site - a volunteer does it. When I looked at it, it was still full of spam but no raw code like you described. WCFrancis 00:45, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Maybe it's browser-dependent; the raw code still shows up for me (in the Mozilla suite). *Dan T.* 00:54, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm using Safari right now. So it probably is.

I checked with Firefox 1.5 for OS-X and it is indeed showing what you describe. Safari just stopped at the point that began. WCFrancis 03:56, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Oh, and it quite clearly says "Anyway, add your guess as to what Harlan is doing here and it will be posted here on this page." (Emphasis added.) It does not claim to be factual or informative. Or an encyclopedia. WCFrancis 00:58, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Then I suppose the "guesses" of what Harlan is doing here include "texas holdem" and "viagra"... didn't know he was into that sort of thing... :-) But if the page was a wiki, then his friends and fans could help out by weeding out the junk. *Dan T.* 03:57, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

If it was a wiki instead of just a script I would have cleaned it up. As it is, all I could do was email the webmaster. WCFrancis 04:15, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

What Volumes?

For whoever noted that there was a three-volume edition of Dangerous Visions and a two-volume edition of Again, Dangerous Visions (or whoever can answer me this)--What do you mean by this, and if so, where could I get it? Please reply on my talk page, at WAS. Thanks, WAS 23:42, 11 December 2005 (UTC).