Proud of your fandom?  Well, shout it out loud!  No Hiatus is looking for writers for the Friday Fandom 411.

The Fandom 411 is a short overview of fandom including plot points, characters, what people are writing/vidding about and why it draws you in.  Tikatu sang the praises of Thunderbirds, Kiyosan explained the ins and outs of Naruto, and Marphlets took us through the Stargate for a look at SG-1.

Now it’s your turn.  We’re looking for every kind of fandom from big to small, new or old — if it compels you to write, vid or draw, we want to hear about it.  Just leave the fandom name in the comments below, no need to write any more than that (unless you want to) and I’ll PM you with the details.

With all this talk about the strike, and what we can do to get through, I thought I’d share what some of what the striking writers are doing to cope. 

On Tuesday, a group of Horror writers descended on the WB to perform an exorcism.  Dressed as priests and killers, and clutching Chucky dolls the horror writers bore signs reading "We Eat Scabs" and "Out, Demons, Out!" and sprayed the gates of the studio with holy water.  Scott Kosar (scribe of the recent remakes of Amityville Horror and Texas Chainsaw Massacre) "intoned" for the group, saying that he doesn’t believe the studios are "evil," but that they "have been invaded by evil spirits, whose goal is the destruction of this union."  He then read from a modified Catholic exorcism, splashing holy water and asking God to "repel the greed that bewitches these studios."

Another writer who’s found a creative and positive way to deal with her frustration is Nia Vardalos (writer/star of My Big Fat Greek Wedding), who organized a toy drive outside Raleigh Studios this past Monday, which yielded dozens of boxes in the first ten minutes.

In New York, the casts of SNL and 30 Rock have been doing live shows and donating the money to their support staff who have been hurt by the strike.

I love when the creative community uses their brains and imaginations to help themselves.  What stories have I missed?  How else is the creative community helping itself during this time?   If you have a story or have heard one, please share.

Smallville creator, Al Gough, has been a very vocal supporter of the writers’ strike, passionately urging fans to join in the Pencils2MediaMoguls campaign.  Today, he decided to kick it up a notch by offering a prize to one lucky pencil-sender.   He’s offering Smallville’s resident kingpin - Lex Luthor!  Well, kind of.

What the winner will receive is a phone call from Lex’s real-life counterpart, Michael Rosenbaum.   

Here’s a snippet of Gough’s letter which you can read in full at KryptonSite. 

We thought, why not offer a challenge to some of these other shows who have devoted fanbases (that’s right Battlestar and Buffy I’m talking to you!) and see whose fans can really deliver the goods (in this case, pencils). So here is the skinny: For every box of environmentally friendly pencils you buy at Unitedhollywood.com, your name will be entered into an e-raffle. We will then pick a winner at random and they will receive at phone call from Michael Rosenbaum thanking them for their support of both the cause and the show. That is right, Lex Luthor will call you directly! Make sure you list SMALLVILLE as the show you are supporting when you click on the icon. So, Craig, please spread the word far and wide…..and thank you all for your continued support and good wishes. We are all in this together.

Best, Al Gough

I love a producer who understands the power of fandom!   

So it’s not a cure for cancer, but let’s face it, writer’s block or any kind of creative block is totally maddening!  And when you write for a living, like I do, it can be worse than maddening — it can be income threatening!  So what’s a creative person to do when the muse has bricked itself up behind a wall and refuses to come out?  Simple.  Hire Holiday Jack.

To the untrained eye, Jack appears to be nothing more than a Styrofoam ball on a stick, but to those of us who have seen the light, Jack is a miracle worker.  Jack is a bobbling, multicolored bit of whimsy that you can get free with your lunch at any Jack-in-the-Box restaurant.  He’s part of a long line of Holiday Jacks that are made for your car antenna but invariably end up on the end of one of my pens each Christmas.  Not so this year.  This year’s Holiday Jack comes with a suction cup that allows you to anchor him to your desk for properly bobbling.  

Now, you’re probably wondering what all of this has to do with writer’s block and the creative muse.  Smack the cut-tag and I’ll tell you.

Read more »

It’s been over three weeks since the Writers Strike began, and contract talks are ongoing.  We all hope for a resolution soon, but in the meantime, FanLib presents 10 Ways to Survive the Writers Strike (for real fans only). 

After heeding our advice, we want yours.  Share how you’re going to survive at the forums, and you’ll be entered to win one of five Writers Strike Survival Kits, filled with over $600 in goodies. 

Then, tell a friend or two about Strike.FanLib.com.  If one of them wins, maybe they’ll share a piece of chocolate with you.

I know everyone liked the character naming resources, so in that same vein, here’s dialect info!  Ever write a story and have a character who’s from a certain walk of life or time or place, and you want verisimilitude? Well here are a few sites that’ll be sure to have you writing dialog like a native.

Welcome to the Fair - A great big glossary of Carny terms; perfect for Like Water for Elephants fanfic.

Shakespeare Insult Kit - Select words from each of the three columns to create perfectly Shakespearian insults.

The Dialectizer - Type in a few words, or give it the url to a whole page, and the Dialectizer will swap it into anything from Redneck to Jive Talk to Elmer Fudd.  But it won’t do Elmer Jive - "Be weal, weal quiet; I’m hunting wabbits, turkey."

I’m sure there are other cool dialect glossaries out there, or sites that re-write your words for you in other voices.  Any favorites I missed?

Do you have an eye for great graphics?  If so, you could win a trip for two to Los Angeles to attend the premiere party for Fox’s new series, The Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Fox is running a contest to pick the best fan-made poster and we know we’ve got FanLibbers who can take the prize.  Here are the details:

The Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles Poster Contest challenges fans to use their creativity and design an innovative poster. Fans should visit www.fox.com/terminator where they can find pre-selected artwork such as graphics, photos, fonts and title cards to create their submission. The application of the artwork will be critical in determining the winner. Contestants must submit their design through the FOX website before Midnight, December 14, 2007, to be considered for the grand prize.

Five finalists will be chosen based upon originality, creativity and use of provided images. During the second round, the top five posters will be featured on fox.com/terminator where the public will have an opportunity to vote online for their favorite from December 18-21. The poster that receives the most votes will be declared the winner and will be revealed at the premiere party for the show January 9 in

Interested fans should visit www.fox.com/terminator for contest rules, deadlines and to download the necessary elements to create their poster entry.

Just a reminder, this is a contest run by Fox, not FanLib but we’d love to vote on your submissions so let us know if you enter!   Good luck. 

"JK Rowling’s reaction is that she is very flattered by the fact there is such great interest in her Harry Potter series and that people take the time to write their own stories," says a spokesperson for the author’s agent.  The statement was released in regard to a flurry of rumors that Rowling would sue fan fic author George Lippert, who posted his extensive follow-up story online.

Releases from Rowling’s camp say that there will be no lawsuits against Lippert or any other fan writer as long as the stories weren’t sold and that it was clear that she was not involved in the works.  She also requested that the stories not be pornographic or racist since the originals were written for children.

Read the full story.

What would become of your life if you received an e-mail that contained all the secrets of the US Government?

It would turn your life as you know it upside down. That is exactly what happened on one of the standout new series of the fall, NBC’s Chuck.

Chuck Bartowski (Zachary Levi) is an adorkable computer geek who works for the Nerd Herd at Buy More. One night Chuck receives an e-mail from his former college roommate, Bryce who turns out to be not only the guy who stole Chuck’s girlfriend and got him kicked out of Stanford, but also a rogue CIA agent. Contained in the e-mail are all the secrets of the United States Government and its intelligence agencies which Bryce copied from a massive super computer, the Intersect, before destroying it. The secrets are all encoded in millions of images, which are now solely stored in Chuck’s photographic memory and are triggered by random, day-to-day events.

Read more »

For those of us in the United States, Thanksgiving is a time to reflect upon the past year and discuss the things for which we are grateful.  Here at FanLib, we’re thankful for our partners, supporters, and our "wow-they’re-so-creative" members.  What are you thankful for?

Enjoy your day off, as well as these Thanksgiving stories and images.

Kaze joins the No Hiatus bloggers as our resident anime blogger.   

As usual, we American anime fans are behind the times. While the popular series Death Note just recently started airing here in the states on Adult Swim, the Japanese movie industry is set to release a new live-action Death Note Movie.

The third movie in the Death Note universe, “L Change The World” will be something of a prequel in the timeline. The movie will focus on the character “L”, the nemesis of Yagami Light from the regular series. The movie opens February 9, 2008 in Japan.  A novelization of the movie will be released on December 25. The story will be written by an unnamed writer under the pen name “M.”

While we might not have the name of the writer for the Death Note novel, we do have the names of a few of the writers here on FanLib who write for the fandom.

Read more »

I held off on posting this, because of the strike, but now that there might be some movement in the next few weeks…

It was reported, before the strike began, that Joss Whedon is developing a new show for Eliza Dushku, Dollhouse.  The project is set up at Fox, who’ve already ordered seven episodes for next fall (ostensibly).  Here’s how Whedon (creator of fan faves Buffy, Angel, and Firefly) describes the project:

The idea is those with the money or connections can access this secret highly illegal facility where they can basically fulfill their greatest fantasies. Most people assume that means sex—and on an occasion it does, because that is a lot of people’s fantasies—but it’s basically scenarios. They can basically reenact scenarios of romance, adventure or anything perfectly, because they become the person that you want them to be—they become that person. They don’t act like that person, they are not a robot pretending, they become that person, and then they forget all about it. The problem is the character of Echo, Eliza Dushku’s character, stops forgetting. She doesn’t completely remember, but she does realize she is a person, and that she might have been a person before she did this, and she doesn’t know what that is.

Sounds like fun (also a little Westerfeldian) and very ficable.  Until then, here’s some Whedon fan-creations to tide you over:

Mournful means:

— sad
— misshapen
— canine
— endearing

If you get the answer right, Free Rice will donate 10 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Program.  Get 5 vocab words right and 50 grains will be on their way.  Now imagine if everyone here on FanLib played and got just 10 vocab words correct.  That’s 120,000 grains of rice and I imagine that would feed a few people.

Pretty cool, huh?  You can become a better writer by enriching your vocabulary and feed the world, all at the same time.  Now that’s a deal.  

Give it a try then come back here and tell us how many grains of rice you donated today! 

I stopped by The Official Battlestar Galactica Convention in Burbank, California yesterday and saw Katee Sackhoff (aka “Kara ‘Starbuck’ Thrace”).  It was an unscripted affair, so she said that she’d start by discussing the state of affairs in the industry: “Does anyone know how to get rid of streaks from a spray tan?”  (I kid you not.) 

In all seriousness, she did go on to talk about the Writers Strike.  Katee feels confident that BSG will continue.  Her thought was that with four-and-a-half seasons completed, it only makes financial sense to complete the series.  She is hopeful that they’ll begin shooting again in January.  (Bionic Woman, on the other hand, is a question mark.)

She covered elements of the Starbuck character.  Nothing too juicy here, since she mentioned having to sign a nondisclosure agreement prior to the show.  One fan asked about Kara’s feelings for Lee “Apollo” Adama vs. Sam Anders.  She said that she felt that Apollo and Starbuck are soulmates; with Sam, Kara sees part of herself in him.  And she got everyone murmuring when she mentioned that the show’s producers told her that Starbuck is not a Cylon.  What do you think?

In the meantime, here’s a Kara story for you:

Good morning all!  It’s Thanksgiving week here in the US so many people are preparing to head out on road trips home.  We hope everyone has a great time and be careful out there, we want you all back safe and sound.

In honor of Thanksgiving, we have a carousel full of holiday stories and searching for these was quite amusing.  I expected to find them on Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars or One Tree Hill, instead I found them on Thunderbirds and Hellboy.  That’s fan writers for you!

We’re winding down on our first FanLib Biggest Fan Rewards give-away.  The Fanlibbers are really climbing the prize ladder and we’re thrilled to see the response.  Have a story, video or piece of art on your hard-drive that we haven’t seen yet.  Put it up today and collect your points!

That’s it for now.  Keep watching the front page for more great writing contests from FanLib and don’t forget to enter the fan-made contests, too! 

Have a safe and happy week.