The PPC Posting Board - Latest posts

I've read the first two, so I have a certain morbid curiousity about whether he can make this one even worse. But then again, that would involve parting with money for the thing - and 20 ish dollars is too much to pay for something that will probably end its life as a coaster!

I do have one friend - an intelligent person in virtually all other respects - who actually likes CP, so maybe I'll borrow it from her.

Elcalion

...because I'm probably going to stay as far away from it as possible. Did he really put the Doctor in there? Or rip off of Doctor Who in any way?

But couldn't find the stomach to continue. Even the slightest mention of this book sends me into an apoplectic rage (well, at least a very long rant).

I can't think of any exact sites off the top of my head, but there are sites you can use that will enable you to disguise your email as coming from somewhere else.

Friend of mine tells me that if you've got decent spam protection it'll filter those from popular places out, but it's obviously not the case here.

Quite frankly, it's obvious they're reading the board, which makes soliciting advice out in the open difficult, obviously.

... using "abuse@neopets.com". I hope he's not a Neopets team member. Can someone with a Neopets account report this to them for me?

As I do to read SMeyer's Sparkly Vampire series. A friend of mine read Eragon, and when it was mentioned at dinner and I said the parts I had read and what I had heard made it sound like an obvious Star Wars-meets-LotR rip-off, he nodded his head and agreed rather emphatically.

And to think he can churn out this dreck and I still can't work out where to go with my two epic novels I'm working on - one an expansive noir novel and the other The Adventures of Heist the Porcupine.

The section of the act that you should be pursuing in the US, if you charge over there, is section 223 of title 47 in the Communications Decency Act (amended). In particular, you're looking to charge the bastard/bitch under this subparagraph -

"(a) Prohibited general purposes

Whoever-- (1) in interstate or foreign communications--

(C) makes a telephone call or utilizes a telecommunications device, whether or not conversation or communication ensues, without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any person at the called number or who receives the communications;"

(NB: subsection (h)(1)(C) of this act states(C) "in the case of subparagraph (C) of subsection (a)(1), [telecommunications device] includes any device or software that can be used to originate telecommunications or other types of communications that are transmitted, in whole or in part, by the Internet (as such term is defined in section 1104 of the Internet Tax Freedom Act (47 U.S.C. 151 note)).")

In the UK, you're looking at the Malicious Communications Act 1988 (amended 2001), which states the following -

"(1) Any person who sends to another person
(a) a letter, electronic communication or article of any description which conveys
(i) a message which is indecent or grossly offensive
(ii) a threat or
(iii) information which is false and known or believed to be false by the sender or
(b) any article or electronic communication which is, in whole or part, of an indecent or grossly offensive nature,
is guilty of an offence if his purpose, or one of his purposes, in sending it is that it should, so far as falling within paragraph (a) or (b) above, cause distress or anxiety to the recipient or to any other person to whom he intends that it or its contents or nature should be communicated."

(The relevant section is section 1, subsection a, paragraph ii.)

So there you go. If you need any other legal advice from a first year Law student who's not been admitted to the bar in his country yet and thus is in no way an expert on foreign legislation, don't hesitate to ask (on the plus side, it's free advice, heh).

And that was enough. After I finished, I literally threw it at my wall in disgust. And the movie wasn't any better. I agree with the comment someone made; that it's simply Star Wars retold via Lord of the Rings, with a bit of Dragonriders of Pern thrown in.

The reason publishers publish it is because it does appeal to the masses, unfortunately. Since a lot of us are widely-read, and have the ability to critically analyze a book by looking at it, that's why you'll hardly find a good word about it around here. It's a generic fantasy novel with elements of others, thus making it easy to read, and even easier to create your mental images of what's happening in there. In a lot of cases, people won't even realise that the plot is essentially Star Wars, since it has dragons and it's in a fantasy setting, as opposed to the Sci-Fi genre of Star Wars.
What really irks me is that all these people are praising him because of the age he was when he released the books. 'Oh he's so talented, and so young!'. Too bad they're mistaking talent for determination.

Ok, that's the end of Artic's rant, brought to you by the letters W,T and F.

Ugh. Don't get me started on Brisingr. I'm over 200 pages in, and absolutely NOTHING of importance has happened yet. I'm starting to think that it might just be another brick of filler material until Eragon finally kills off Galbwhatever in Book 4.

Mild spoilers below in the event anyone cares...

Paolini seems to have picked up on a few teenage trends, as there's a cutting scene and a furry. Well, okay, the cutting scene is a "test of strength" over who gets to lead the rebels, but it reminded me WAY TOO MUCH of the emo!Sue cutting her wrists in badfic... And the furry is an Elf guy who decided to take on the form of a wolf, or something to that effect. Apparently he gives off a scent that makes all the women in the vicinity want to mate with him. >.
And yeah, emo!Eragon. Good Lord. One minute he's angsting over how many people he's killed, then he mercilessly kills a soldier who's begging to be spared, then he angsts over that, then he kills some more people... Ugh. I'm rather pacifistic, so I'm in pain at those parts... >.
[/rant]

Good to be back on the Board, though. I need to remember to show up here more often... XD

... we can just catch them one at a time, so no big deal.

I've never been on 4chan anyway except very briefly to read the Creepypasta and Holders Series, which I found elsewhere as well, so no problem there.

Dad tells me that since we didn't send said comments to him directly and we clearly meant it as blowing-off-steam rather than an attempt to be threatening, we're safe.

Paolini really did rip off other fandoms. >.
I read Eragon, but I couldn't get through Eldest. It was too...boring. I'd rather read fanfic any day!
And I heard that in Brisingr, if that's the proper spelling (can't have minis popping up!), Eragon goes all emo because he got some wierd Gary Stuish mass-murder power. Go figure. *eyeroll*

I'll never understand this.

4chan isn't that bad, as long as you avoid certain sections of it. Sure arguments can get heated and people get insulted, but it's no worse than some other areas of the internet.

Of course I mostly stick around /m/ and /y/. I'm a bit wary of stepping into /a/. That's supposedly where the worst of the crazies hang out.

But I'm going to be sending a parcel to the UK at some point soonish, so I'll let you know how much it costs me... I can also help with postage payment :)

*lets go of Ansela*

That is, if I have the money to send it to you. How much would a small parcel from England to New Zealand cost, d'you think?

I only saw the movie, and that was after hearing all the criticism around here, and I spent the entire time MSTing it. The books - won't touch 'em, and relieved to say so.

*whacks Morbid Curiosity yet again* DOWN, boy!

That would be awesome. Thanks!

If you still haven't read it by the time I've finished with it (which will likely be very early in the New Year), I'll see if I can mail it to you. 'Kay?

Cos I haven't read any of them, but now that I've heard so much about how awful they are, I'm actually dying to, just to see 'How Bad Can It Be?'

Problem is, the local library's copies are all out all the time, and I'm damned if I'm *buying* the things.

... that'll teach me to hypothesise wildly.

These people do this sort of thing because they think the internet is full of idiots and that there is entertainment to be had by jerking the idiots around. I don't know if that is true in your case, but chances are the spammer(s) didn't need much of an excuse to be asshats to begin with. I don't think you're likely to get in trouble for making a joke, but that's because it's so ridiculously hard to prove emotional distress and stuff like that. That's why it's hard to pin down people who perpetrate this kind of harassment. Their argument is, "It's text on a screen. Stop taking the internet so seriously."

My advice is to keep doing what you're doing to stop the harassment, but whatever you do, don't give them the satisfaction of seeing you freak out.

And maybe leave 4chan forever. I mean, why make it easier for people like them to mark you as a target by hanging around?

Again, this all may or may not hold true for your situation. Ultimately, you'll have to use your own judgment. It just comes from stuff I've picked up by reading.

~Neshomeh

... but from what I've heard, it's really bad. Someone was comparing it to "The Eye of Argon" and had excerpts from both. My first thought when I read one of them was "Wait, I don't remember reading this part in 'The Eye of'--oh, Glaurung, no!"

Also, someone needs to tell CP that "humping" may mean what he thinks it does, but it has some ... other meanings, too.

but as I know that it's been bought for one of my Christmas presents (shouldn't know, but came home earlier than was expected and saw it as I was helping unload the car), I'll get to read it then.

If anyone hears an apoplectic scream from the direction of England on Christmas Day, that'll be me cracking open the book.

Kit and Minty were discussing whether they could get away with putting him in Jackverse Hell. They decided against it, they didn't intend to cause him actual physical harm even within the fictional context, and it was meant solely in a fictional context as a letting-off-steam joke. Would I still get in trouble for that if this did end up in court or something, even if his reaction of death threats is clearly overblown?