theLogBook Guides need your help to grow and expand.
This site is one of the oldest resources on the web covering science fiction TV and movies, and for a shining moment in the late ’90s and early 2000s, it had an entire staff of writers contributing to it. For the past ten years, though? It’s mainly been one guy – that’s me, by the way, Earl Green, the founder of the site. I have two kids and two jobs (like so many of you do), and I only have so many hours in the day. And I need your help.
Where is show/movie [X]?
It hasn’t been done yet for reasons of – generally – time, taste, or availability:
- I don’t have the time to wade into a new thing that has been running for 4+ seasons…
- I don’t really care to watch the show even if it does fit in the genre(s)…
- I don’t have the show to watch because it’s not on DVD or under more suspect rocks than that.
What genres does theLogBook cover?
The early output of theLogBook generally covered what was to my taste, which was “space-based science fiction”. But my tastes have evolved, and so has the site! These days, I like to hew closer to the Forry-Ackerman-esque description of “the fantastic.” Spaceships, dragons and wizards, superheroes, “spy-fi”, paranormal, they’re all at home here. This site is about – as one of its podcasts says in the tagline – the fantastic and the futuristic. As the site has aged, grown and evolved, theLogBook has become bigger than one person or one person’s tastes. It was never intended to be the Official Site of Stuff Earl’s Watching. An example I fall back on a lot is this: Mission: Impossible would make the cut because it’s a forward-looking projection of spying and spy technology. Breaking Bad is set entirely in the present day, and does not have any speculative elements, and therefore does not make the cut.
What are some of the shows missing here?
There are lots of ’em. In fact, some of the biggest TV entries in the genre are AWOL from the guide.
Those are just the ones I’ve made those cute little screens for. Where are Masters Of Sci-Fi? He-Man? That obscure Filmation Flash Gordon cartoon that everyone always forgets? Quantum Leap? Forever Knight? Beauty And The Beast? Seven Days? Team Knight Rider? Buffy and Angel? Smallville? Supernatural? Game Of Thrones? Where’s the stuff I haven’t even thought of? What about movies? Where’s Alien, Blade Runner, Dark Star, The Terminator, and so on?
That’s where you come in. theLogBook is bigger than one person.
But some of these shows have partial guides on the site.
That’s true. Partial guides exist for shows like Lost, Heroes, Stargate Atlantis, the more recent remake of V, and a few early entries have been written for guides to shows like The Adventures Of Superman, Knight Rider, Metal Hurlant Chronicles, Westworld, and Highlander, driving a stake into the ground and announcing that we’d really like to cover them here. Some of these guides were started by staff writers whose daily lives have carried them away from theLogBook, some of them were started by me before I realized I was getting in over my head on yet another 5+ season show. I’m open to these incomplete guides being taken up and completed by others. theLogBook is bigger than one person.
But I thought you were writing everything because you were making books out of this stuff now.
Not necessarily. I have books in the pipeline covering Star Trek and Doctor Who and their spinoffs, as well as 1970s American sci-fi/superhero shows and UK genre shows. I have no plans to try to write all-encompassing genre guides to the 1960s, 1980s or 1990s – or, indeed, more recent decades. Those are yours for the taking – and I haven’t ruled out multi-author publishing projects in the future that don’t necessarily revolve around me writing everything. theLogBook is bigger than one person.
Wait, what? What’s this about possible multi-author publishing projects?
If you corner an entire franchise/time period/genre with your own material here. I’d be happy to help you get it ready for publication through CreateSpace, which is how I’ve published the WARP! and VWORP! books. I’d be happy to help with cover design, proofreading, layout, that sort of thing, stamp theLogBook.com logo on it…and it goes out under your name, and you get the proceeds. I don’t take a cut, it’s your work. I can walk you through that process if you want to do that – it’s not a requirement. And if things ever evolve to where the site has comprehensive coverage of a specific time period/genre/franchise and multiple authors are involved (whether or not I am one of them), the same applies. I think it’d be great to have lots of books from theLogBook.com out there. And I don’t have to be the person who writes all of them single-handedly. theLogBook is bigger than one person.
What do I need to contribute?
Three things:
- Access to the material you wish to cover.
- Willingness to gracefully handle direction and editing.
- Time and willingness to complete a guide.
What this boils down to is, for example, if you want to cover Sliders, you have to have access to the show, on DVD or a streaming service or what have you. (Please note that I can’t cover anyone’s iTunes or Amazon Instant Video or HBO Go bills; I am assuming that if you’re taking up a guide, it’s something you want to watch to begin with. That’s really where the best material comes from anyway.)
There is a house style; I’ll coach you on that, and it’s pretty simple – one of the hallmarks of it is, simply, don’t give away the ending. I’ll do very light editing to tighten things up and conform them to the aforementioned house style, and post them to the site’s database.
And finally…don’t start a project when your eyes are bigger than your stomach. It’s one thing to say “I’m gonna write the X-Files guide!”, but it’s a really bad thing if you’re burned out by season 5 and want to quit after that. Don’t take on more than you have the time or patience to handle. A lot of the shows missing – and some of the more obscure gems I’d love to see covered here – are one-season wonders requiring a limited investment of time. Only take on what you realistically think you can handle. theLogBook is bigger than one person…and take it from someone who knows, it can quickly become bigger than you can handle if you take on too much.
Writing for theLogBook is strictly on a volunteer basis; the site is struggling to return to a state where it’s covering its own bills on an annual basis. Possible publishing projects give you a chance to recoup some of your investment of time and outlay for resources, and that is why I’m willing to help you with such potential projects. It’s the least I can do to thank you.
Where do I start?
Talk to me.