A thousand miles an hour going nowhere fast Going through the details of your past
O
Talk about your damage and you’re wasting my time Wanna be the king and queen? Stand in line Henry Rollins
ld Hank Rollins may have written those lyrics for the song “Disconnect” back in 1994, but man, are they ever relevant today in the age of social networking and internet celebrity. I spend much of an average workday immersed in people trying to get attention for themselves and their projects and sometimes I really do feel
like everything’s moving a thousand miles an hour going nowhere fast. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. After all, the ’net has allowed a lot of great artists to find an audience. A few ex-
amples in the horror genre: author David Wellington won a publishing contract after being one of the first horror nov- elists to serialize his work online; the hilariously gory, animated Happy Tree Friends began as internet Flash cartoons; Jason Eisener made Hobo with a Shotgun because he won a grindhouse trailer contest on YouTube; Count Gore De Vol revived his horror host career by taking his show online; and there are countless horror bands I’ve discovered be- cause their music was accessible on the web. The proliferation of online horror content is overwhelming, and the competition fierce. A recent article on CNN titled
“Study: Tween TV today is all about fame” quoted a study in the web-based Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace, stating that it “found shows popular with children aged nine to eleven now hold ‘fame’ as their No.1 value. Fame ranked 15th in 1997. This raises red flags for researchers, who say the shift in values over the last ten years may have a negative effect on the future goals and accomplishments of American youth.” This height- ened sense of self-interest certainly isn’t limited to TV or to preteens. And when so many people are trying to stand out in the crowd, a lot of ’em will do anything to get an edge over the competition. I see it all the time. Often it’s an aspiring/amateur filmmaker who spends most of his budget securing a known actor to appear in his
film, when he should’ve worked harder on his concept or the technical aspects of the project. On a regular basis, I encounter filmmakers who aren’t half as good at writing dialogue as they are at dropping names of horror celebs they’re apparently in talks with for their next project. Name recognition helps sell your film, sure, but you know what else helps? Making a good film. Or, sometimes an aspiring artist tries to buy his way into notoriety. Recently, an indie filmmaker told me straight-
up that he doesn’t read the magazine but he knew about our CineMacabre movie nights and wanted to know how much would it cost for us to screen his (very amateur) film. I gritted my teeth and told him it didn’t work that way, but he didn’t seem to get it and tried again to get me to name a price, suggesting very strongly that because he was in- terested in advertising that I owed him something, including an article on his movie. Sigh... The worst of the corner-cutters, though, are the outright thieves. You’d be surprised at how much of our designers’
art has been swiped by people for logos, posters, T-shirts, you name it. It also happens on the editorial side once in a while; a few years ago I killed an article by a writer who copied a bunch of text from the website of a would-be Travelogue destination. Internet-based plagiarism is distressingly commonplace. For over a decade a friend of mine has put an astounding
amount of effort into running a niche horror film-themed website. He’s tracked down hundreds of hard-to-find films to review, posted related interviews, ensured that it’s all nicely designed and has done the research to back up his opinions. As a result, he’s been a guest at film festivals, contributed to books, appeared in DVD featurettes and written episodes of a documentary series. He’s earned the attention and respect through perseverance and hard work. Recently, he discovered that another horror fan was stealing content from his webpage – and those of others –
and passing it off as her own in reviews she had published on established horror sites. We’re not talking about general concepts or a sentence here and there, but entire paragraphs. She’s cultivated an online persona of “genre expert,” tied into her career as a model, actor, “journalist” and social media presence who appears at horror conventions and signs autographs. She wants to gain celebrity and respect without doing the work. My friend chose not to publicly humiliate her, but notified the sites hosting her plagiarized reviews and asked for them to be removed. They were. She got off lucky, yet still claims on her own blog that it’s her writing style and that “losers” online falsely accused
her, despite overwhelming, documented evidence of her blatant theft. The stupidity is mind-boggling. There’s nothing wrong with seeking fame as a genre celeb, but you’ve gotta earn that recognition honestly. A lot
of folks in the horror industry work their asses off to make a go of it, and that extends to those who enrich the genre from a fan culture perspective. It shouldn’t need to be said, but don’t fuck them over. To quote “Disconnected” again, “Too damn bad if at the end of the day, the only thoughts in your brain are the things that they say. What a waste.”
STAFF
publisher Rodrigo Gudiño
ManaGinG eDitor Monica S. Kuebler
art Director Gary Pullin
office ManaGer Jessa Sobczuk
MarketinG/aDvertisinG ManaGer
Jody Infurnari PH: 905-985-0430 FX: 905-985-4195 E:
jody@rue-morgue.com
financial controller Marco Pecota
CONTRIBUTORS
STUART F. ANDREWS A.S. BERMAN LYLE BLACKBURN JOHN W. BOWEN PHIL BROWN PEDRO CABEZUELO TOM CHEN PAUL CORUPE MARIO DEGIGLIO- BELLEMARE
JAY FOSGITT MICHELLE GALGANA THE GORE-MET BOB GRUEN
MARK R. HASAN LIISA LADOUCEUR LAST CHANCE LANCE MARIE-ÈVE LARIN MOANER T. LAWRENCE ANDREW LEE AARON VON LUPTON ANDY MAURO RON MCKENZIE W. BRICE MCVICAR JOSEPH O’BRIEN GEORGE PACHECO SEAN PLUMMER SCOTT SHOYER JUSTINE WARWICK
RUE MORGUE #115 would not have been possible with- out the valuable assistance of: Josh Bernstein, Lee Davey of
alicecooperechive.com, Briele Douglas, Sarah Field, Mary-Beth Hollyer, Toby Mamis, Al McMullan, and Steven.
Cover: dead island Design by Justin Erickson.
Rue Morgue Magazine is published monthly (with the exception of February) and accepts no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts, photos, art or other materials. Freelance submissions accompanied by S.A.S.E. will be seriously considered and, if necessary, returned.
We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Periodical Fund (CPF) for our publishing activities. RUE MORGUE Magazine #115 ISSN 1481 – 1103 Agreement No. 40033764 Entire contents copyright MARRS MEDIA INC. 2011. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. PRINTED IN CANADA.
eDitor-in-chief dave alexander
associate eDitor trevor tuminski
Graphic DesiGner Justin Erickson
copy eDitor claire horsnell
online eDitor april snellings
interns
mike beardsall denver wilson
RM6
dave@rue-morgue.com
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