Avid Fan

Ok so this is about visual media here on this forum, but a lot of books become movies. There are also many differences between the versions. I have a hard enough time trying to find out book news even. I can't find out anywhere about the new Thomas Harris books. I know a lot of people read the star wars, star trek, and movie novelezations so it probably would be popular.

Scott27

Book discussions go in Other. But good luck finding any literate people in that forum.

Josh H

Never happen, Geoff won't add anymore off topic (i.e. not dvd or movie related) forums. I tried to get a sports forum a while back and got shot down for that reason. Plus a book forum wouldn't generate enough posts to justify it's existence. It's been quite a while since I've seen a book thread in Other. About all you do is post your book threads in other and watch them get overtaken by banal threads.

[Edited by joshhinkle on 04-19-01 at 10:08 PM]

Avid Fan

well where then could I find a site with good book news then?

Scott27

Search at Yahoo. I'm not a search engine.

Avid Fan

I was purely asking for advice not a rebutal to my opening statement. GEEESSHH! You ask nicely and get yelled at!

Scott27

I wasn't yelling. I was merely stating a fact. I'm NOT a search engine.

Just FYI, in the time you asked that here without getting any advice, you probably could've found at least 10 good book sites on Yahoo.

Soup Nazi

What's a book?

Alyoshka

I often think about posting Book of the Day xx-xx-xxxx much like the cd thread. However, I doubt there are many others who read on a daily basis. That's not an attack, but just a general societal thing. The only thing that would be put in there would be school books and a few random books. Maybe I'll do a What book are you going to read this week type of thread.

I think people need to be encouraged to read more, in general.

BoatDrinks

I think JustinS was posting Book threads for awhile in the "Other." If I recall they got quite a number of responses. I liked the threads.

Books iz good stuf!

edit: But I do agree an entire forum for books wouldn't work.

[Edited by BoatDrinks on 04-20-01 at 08:17 AM]

Avid Fan

Just FYI, your comments to me are not helpful and abrasive. I would appreciate it if you would hold back your comments to me if they do not answer my question.

Master J

I totally agree Avid Fan. I am not sure what scott27's problem is or why he felt your harmless comment was directed towards him, but his responses are the exact thing Geoff said would get users suspended or banned. If you can't add anything constructive or on topic, why add anything at all.

Back to the topic, I don't think a book only forum would get much traffic on a site such as this. Reading seems to be on a steady decline in our country, and I am not sure if there is anything we can do about it. Personally I dont read as much as I should, but a good book provides one of the best diversions one can find.

Scott27

Just what part of my comment was a personal attack?

jfoobar

Oh please. His response was both constructive (use a search engine) and on topic, insofar as he was answering a question from the original poster.

Master J, the nature of the threads you start here and comments you make here and elsewhere lead me to believe that you take real joy from trying to get other members in trouble. Why is that?

Startide

Scott's posting was not out of the blue. Avid Fan had made a direct request to Scott for a response to a short question and scott answered with a short USABLE response with approximately the same length. Generally, if you want or expect a longer answer, you spend more time in crafting the question, or show in the question that you have done some research.

This is not an attack. It is a general "wish" of mine that people who expect long and well-thought out responses (i.e. a significant investment of time from someone) also spend a little time on the question.

In the past, dvdTalk has had some comical requests. Like "Where is my CD?" or "Give me the lowest-priced laptop deal" and I almost got in trouble with my factual response to that question.

To get back on topic: As far as book postings go, they are buried by the huge number of banal threads, or even by people "padding" their post count. Heck, you can even see the padding in THIS thread.

How to make the Other forum serve our bookish needs more? Well, there are some approaches for both POSTERS and READERS of book threads:

(1) Search for the word BOOK in the subject line. The search engine defaults to searching the entire message, so you need to set the search to subject line only. Try this, it is very useful for those people considerate enuf to use the subject line.

(2) Bookmark some book threads and resurrect some of the older ones worth doing so for their archived content.

(3) Ignore threads with bad subject lines like "Read this" or "Help me". Tough love is needed to convince people to post better.

(4) Put the word BOOK in the subject title somewhere with brackets around the word BOOK.

(5) It's up to you to get rid of padders that pollute book threads. It's hard enuf to be literate in the Other Forum, and it's kind of an insult to have padders come into a book thread and pollute it. For example, while funny only in itself, someone could come into your book thread and post "May your bookworms breed faster than you can eat them!" but it wouldn't do much for the thread other than increasing the poster's post count. Send in a complaint to wherever they are supposed to go. Chances are the padder is doing this elsewhere and the complaints will pile up.

as ever,
Startide (whose name is based upon David Brin's book)

Scott27

Avid Fan, here's a thread about books on page 1 of Other. That's a start, right?

Is that helpful enough for you?

GeoffK

I would LOVE to do a Book Talk Forum....

I am an avid reader and always looking for suggestions on good books and authors.

Man if I thought enough people would use it. I'd set one up.

Avid Fan

I figured a lot of the forum people read, but there just wasn't a venue for them. Maybe we can have a new thread or poll to see if people really want it.

Bushdog

Neither one of these approaches has any merit in telling us hw much interest there is. There would be a lot of selection bias. If either, I'd sleect a thread where interested people would post. Still, it is one thing to say "Yeah, I'd love it," and it is another thing to actually use such a forum.

Maybe a 1 month test of a new forum and if it fails just fold it back into other?

Holly E. Ordway

You could even have it be a movie-related book forum -- discussing books that have some relation to movies, whether they have been made into movies, inspired movies, ought to be made into movies, or have some bearing on movies (ie. nonfiction that relates to the subject of a movie).

There have been a couple of potentially interesting book-related threads in the Talk forum (and I've participated in a couple), but IIRC they were kind of general (of the "what book are you reading now" variety), and I think that more specific threads are more likely to spark interesting discussions.

I'm an avid reader -- I'd love to talk more about books related to movies

Off the top of my head, I can think of a *ton* of interesting threads having to do with books and movies.

How good a job did a director/scriptwriter do in converting a book into a movie? (some examples include Cider House Rules, a gazillion Stephen King movies, The Right Stuff, Dangerous Liasons, Wings of the Dove, Conan the Barbarian, I, Claudius, etc. etc. etc.) With people discussing it who have *read* the book, there's a lot of potential for neat discussions about what could have been included, changes that the author made, etc.

What about novelizations of movies? Do they capture the spirit of the movie? Do they add anything to the experience? (The Abyss, Star Trek movie novelizations, etc.)

For movies made of "classic" novels, there a whole mess of topics that could come out of that. Some directors really try to go for the period feel, while others "modernize". (Sense and Sensibility, Portrait of a Lady, etc.)

If you include plays, egads, think of the different things that could come out of comparing different versions of Shakespeare's plays. There are multiple versions of Hamlet, Othello, Henry V, Romeo and Juliet, etc.

What about discussing books that inspired movies, even if they're not directly used? For instance, I just watched the Cleopatra DVD and thought that it basically fused the plots of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar and Antony and Cleopatra.

Honestly, I'm not going to go searching the Other forum for threads on books. I've looked in there a couple of times -- man, it's a free-for-all! I like structured forums on a single topic. A "Books and Movies" forum would go down well with me.

Josh H

It's your forum, you put all this effort into it. If you'd LOVE to have one, why don't you give it a shot. Test it on a one week basis and see. I doubt it will get much traffic, but who knows. There are a lot more video game threads now that it has its own area, maybe books would be the same way. There are a lot of people that would probably post there, that don't bother reading Other because of all the crap threads, porn and clutter.

Avid Fan

I have started a book forum petition in this same forum. Voice your support and suggestions here please and in all other book threads to get your wish:

http://www.dvdtalk.com/forum/showthr...hreadid=102507

Master J

Well it seemed the request was in general, not just to scott, which was obvious in avid fan's post considering it never said "Scott, give me a book forum".

Sorry for trying to foster a better community around here. How would you like it if any question you asked here was replyed to with "do a search on yahoo"?

Maybe you did not think Avid Fan could have been looking for recommendations for a forum, that other members here may be members of but that what I got from his post.

It is the attitude of people like you that is hurting DVDtalk. Instead of giving help people give smart answers. Maybe you do not see this, but it clear as day to me and alot of the other members.

J

Master J

Hmm, what members have I got in trouble? Do YOU have a guilty conscience? I am not even going to comment any further on baseless assertions.

I try to foster a better attitude around here which is severly lacking. I guess you were not around here in the earlier days, but there used to be a sense of community, which has all but disappeared. Maybe it is a lost cause, here at this point (judging from your post).

J