neonvincent

Crossposted to fandom_lounge and my personal journal on Journalfen.

My readers and I don't have to wonder. Here is Westworld intro with Game of Thrones theme.



And here is Game of Thrones intro with Westworld theme.



It helps that the themes are by the same composer and they're both HBO shows.

Texas A&M: Science Fiction Collection adds Filk as Deeper than Swords Exhibit Closes
January 08, 2014

Fans of Game of Thrones have until February 7, 2014, to visit the George R. R. Martin Deeper than Swords exhibit at Cushing Memorial Library and Archives before it closes. The exhibit showcases objects, editions and manuscripts from the best-selling author’s prolific writing career. The collection forms the capstone of Texas A&M University Libraries’ internationally recognized Science Fiction and Fantasy Research Collection.

As the exhibit closes, the Libraries will broaden its dimensions by adding “filk” related materials to its science fiction collection. Filk is best described as a musical culture, genre and community among science fiction and fantasy fans, which is a manifestation of fan labor to create a wide-range of musical styles and topics.

Science fiction conventions, as well as designated filk conventions, have various filk programming that includes concerts and late night filk circles, where music is performed and shared, as well as panels about music and fandom. Most filk conventions put out songbooks with songs submitted by members of the community to share with attending members.

The Cushing Library filk collection will showcase examples of these songbooks, as well as audio, video, digital recordings and fanzines and fanvids—which demonstrate the interest and affection for particular aspects of both literary and broadcast science fiction and fantasy media. The collection seeks to preserve the popular legacy of science fiction and fantasy by documenting and acquiring various fanworks.

Originally posted at fandom_lounge on JournalFen.

Second of two posts originally at fandom_lounge on JournalFen.

Michigan State University even made a video and a press release about it.

Justin Grosjean, media arts and technology major, and twin brother John produced the video Skyrim: 2012 that went viral receiving almost 2 million views since its release.

Michigan State University: Student video goes viral
Published: Feb. 15, 2012

The lives of twins Justin and John Grosjean changed when they released a video - "Skyrim: 2012" to their channel on YouTube.

Justin, a media arts and technology senior at Michigan State University, and his brother John, a student at Oakland University, have always loved the games produced by the company Bethesda Softworks. They began making videos about six months ago and it was only natural that they wanted to make a video out of one of the games they love - Skyrim.

( But they didn't expect it to be such a big hit. )

Here's the video itself.



Condensed version without video embeds here.

I posted the following to fandom_lounge on JournalFen.  The response there is also DO NOT WANT!

Fast Company publishes an article titled The Return of LiveJournal. This should be good news. It isn't.

According to LiveJournal general manager Anjelika Petrochenko, LiveJournal's planning a major 2012 push based around attracting new users to community sites. Petrochenko told Fast Company that the blogging service was planning between 10-50 new community sites by the end of 2012. These new community sites will offer organizers and admins highly detailed metrics and statistics on user activity that appear to be more detailed than Facebook. Petrochenko also stressed that LiveJournal accounts do not have to be tied to a real name/identity and offered greater anonymity than other social networks. However, LiveJournal has been involved in numerous censorship controversies in the past.

Oh No They Didn't will be the first community site to participate in LiveJournal's initiative. The company designed custom widgets to highlight frequent commenters, instituted new metric tracking and analysis systems, and created a new, community-driven interface seemingly designed to deemphasize blog content. The next LiveJournal-hosted site to get a makeover will be the popular AnythingDisney fan site. LiveJournal is staking their continued American growth on the community model; Oh No They Didn't's Brenden Delzer was hired as an on-staff community editor by LiveJournal several months ago.

The formatting of Oh No They Didn't--which includes advertising and a commenting-heavy interface--is close to what LiveJournal has planned for other communities.
...
LiveJournal recently unveiled a complete redesign that overhauled the service's comments system, emphasized social networking, and set the stage for the upcoming communities blitz. Reaction from longtime users has been overwhelmingly negative--LiveJournal patrons slammed the redesign on the service's official blog.

LiveJournal's leadership has made it clear that their future American business strategy lies in generating new traffic rather than catering to the service's current small-but-loyal membership. The challenge for Petrochenko and other executives at LiveJournal will be redefining the brand's identity in a crowded media marketplace.

The entire article was posted over at ontd_political here. The response has been 150+  ~190 comments (and counting) of DO NOT WANT!

Athhilezar? Watch Your Fantasy World Language

“The days of aliens spouting gibberish with no grammatical structure are over,” said Paul R. Frommer, professor emeritus of clinical management communication at the University of Southern California who created Na’vi, the language spoken by the giant blue inhabitants of Pandora in “Avatar.” Disney recently hired Mr. Frommer to develop a Martian language called Barsoomian for “John Carter,” a science-fiction movie to arrive in March.

The shift is slowly transforming the obscure hobby of language construction into a viable, albeit rare, career and engaging followers of fantasies like “Lord of the Rings,” “Game of Thrones” and “Avatar” on a more fanatical level.

At “Game of Thrones” viewing parties in San Francisco, fans rewatched Dothraki scenes to study the language in a workshop-like setting. Last October, a group of Na’vi speakers from half a dozen countries convened in Sonoma County, Calif., for a gathering known as “Teach the Teachers.” Mr. Frommer gave attendants tips on grammar and vocabulary and fielded any questions they had about the language. The rural, wooded setting felt “almost like being on Pandora,” he said. At a question-and-answer session in July that he participated in, at least a dozen attendants rattled off their questions in fluent Na’vi.

“There’s been a sea change in Hollywood. They realize there’s a fan base out there that wants constructed languages,” said Matt Pearson, a linguistics professor at Reed College in Portland, Ore. He created Thhtmaa (pronounced tukhh-t’-mah), the language of termite-like aliens in the short-lived NBC series “Dark Skies"

In case you're wondering, Klingon is mentioned on the second page of the article.

Above crossposted to fandom_lounge on JournalFen.

io9 has Doctor Who characters as if they were drawn by Charles Schulz. Also at Kuriositas and Flickr.

Originally posted to fandom_lounge on JournalFen.

Yahoo! News: German TV news host confuses Star Trek logo for Navy SEAL emblem
by Liz Goodwin

The ins and outs of other cultures can seem fairly mysterious to outsiders, admittedly. But we can't really get over the image of a German TV newscaster solemnly presenting a logo fashioned by Star Trek enthusiasts while explaining the Navy SEALs to his fellow countrymen.The German site Bildblog appears to have been the first to capture the error with this screenshot, at right.

Channel N24's host Mick Locher explained during the segment that the Navy SEAL Six team raided Osama bin Laden's compound in Pakistan and killed him—as the emblem made by Star Trek fans flashed on the screen behind him.

"And they also have the 'Team Six' that carried out the mission. They don't have the skull in their emblem for nothing," Locher said, according to a translation from the fan site TrekMovie.

Locher's team must have searched for "Navy SEAL Six" on the Internet and stumbled upon the symbol made by a Star Trek fan group called "Maquis Forces International." The Maquis, a rebel group, fought against Cardassia--the bad guys--in Federation colonies in some Star Trek storylines. The skull in the badge represents a Klingon, and it also includes three Klingon bat'leth swords. The group makes lots of imagined Navy SEAL logos for the "24th century," TrekMovie says.

The actual emblem for Navy SEAL Team Six is below. The military has never publicly admitted that the elite group even exists. The portion of the 2,500 Navy SEALs who are chosen to be in the elite force are not allowed to talk about their position, according to the Washington Post.
 

Images of the fake and real SEALS logos at the link.  For once, read the comments. The highest rated ones are actually quite funny.

Also, the icon I'm using has never been more appropriate.

Above crossposted to ontd_political on LJ, where it is awaiting moderation. A shorter version posted to fandom_lounge on JournalFen here.

Following up on my previous posts in my LiveJournal and fandom_lounge on JournalFen on university teams playing Quidditch, a case of life imitating art.



Right now, the video above has more views than either of the videos UCLA posted about their men's basketball team in the NCAA Tournament within the same 24 hour period.

UCLA Quidditch

Inspired by the famous "Harry Potter" book and film series, Quidditch is the newest sport to sweep the UCLA campus and the rest of the world. UCLA is actively involved in the International Quidditch Association's Western Regional Division. Learn about this unique sport and its players who made Quidditch a bona fide club sport team at UCLA. "Fantasy becoming a reality does not happen nearly as often as it should."

The video above shows that Eastern Michigan University isn't the only one of my four alma maters that plays organized Quidditch. UCLA does as well. The University of Michigan also has a team Even California State University, Northridge, which has the least school spirit of any of my four alma maters, has a Facebook page for people trying to organize a team.

So, three of my four alma maters have Quidditch teams and the fourth is trying. How about yours?

A less graphics-intense version posted at fandom_lounge on JournalFen.