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At the World Fantasy Con in San Diego, volunteers spent yesterday assembling promotional giveaway packages for each of the 1200 registered members of the convention. Largely publishing professionals, each member will come away with a “gift bag” of books, courtesy of publishers eager to get influential eyeballs on their titles.

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This “bag” must be the size of a garbage bag and fifty times as strong. I am curious to know what exact form this package will take! Will registration staff also be handing out luggage carts to cart away the booty?

I mention it because if you’re attending World Fantasy this weekend, dig deep in your gift bag and keep an eye out for this:

This 52-page booklet features info about Machine of Death (which, if you’re reading this post, you probably already know about, but not everyone at the con will) as well as a preview of two stories from Volume 2.

I’ll be at the convention myself, and hope to meet you there! I won’t have a table, but I’ll be at the autograph session on Friday afternoon, and I’m also on a panel:

Sunday, 10AM: Intellectual Property Rights vs. the Free Web

Does information really want to be free? Do the people who say that still think so once they’ve been published? Generational differences in attitudes toward information and its effects.

Justin Ackroyd, David Chanoch, Jeff Conner, Ashley Grayson (M), David Malki !

I find it interesting that “generational differences” as a factor is called out right in the panel description. Are old folks by definition curmudgeons about Those Blasted Internets? Are young folks cool and hip and culture-savvy and with-the-flow, riding their skateboards with their backwards caps? WE SHALL SEE, on Sunday!

Able chronicler of generational differences Harley Schwadron

I also hope to spend some time asking folks their opinion of the giveaway bags. Is this a viable way for publishers to promote new titles, or just a thing that they feel they have to do because everybody else does? THE DEFINITIVE ANSWER: FORTHCOMING.

You will also be able to pick up a sampler booklet next weekend, November 5-6, at the Minneapolis Indie Expo! Matt will be representing MOD and signing books along with MOD frontispiece illustrator Katie Sekelsky. (Did you know that Katie also sells prints of her drawing?)

IN CONCLUSION: THESE THINGS ARE GOOD

I know everybody is super excited and champing at the bit for Volume 2 announcements. Well guess what! There are none in this post. (But it won’t be much longer!)

A FEW IMPORTANT TIDBITS while you wait:

Regarding the title cloud of Volume 2 submissions. Some folks have become worried because they can’t find their title. Regardless, in all likelihood, we did receive your story. Generating the cloud required wrangling data through four different programs, and some slippage through the cracks is regrettable but inevitable. (I have you covered, though! On the poster version I included a little blank for you to write in your title, if you found that it was accidentally omitted.)

So while I tried my very best, the cloud is unfortunately not one hundred percent comprehensive, and the blame for that falls on me. I apologize! But don’t worry — if your title’s missing, you’re in good company. Here’s another dude whose story title is not in the word cloud:

Who is that? Why it’s only ERIK ZIMMERMAN

FROM ANTARCTICA

Erik, a globetrotting firefighter, had also previously sent us a submission from Afghanistan, which was awesome, but this… this quite frankly fulfills our lifelong dream.

Erik’s story (appropriately titled “FULFILLING A LIFELONG DREAM”) was quite a late submission to MOD2, but we have unanimously voted to amend our submission guidelines to accept all late submissions if they come from Antarctica. Thanks so much, Erik!

Also, it turns out that one of the stories that was submitted earlier got double counted by mistake, so we’re still at 1,958 total submissions. IT ALL WORKS OUT.

NEXT ITEM. Reader C.S. Markle, organizer of the Perth, Australia branch of 24-Hour Comics Day this year, used MOD as his group’s theme! As you may know, 24-Hour Comics Day is when folks undertake the challenge of writing and drawing a complete 24-page comic in 24 hours. C.S. prepared MOD predictions for each participant to use as prompts for their comics!

We think this is a fantastic idea. One of the completed comics has posted online by its author already — you can read the entire thing here, and the author discusses the work in a Reddit thread here.

“FATED” by Kat Zhang

A note about fan art

Lots of folks have expressed interest in creating their own Machine of Death-themed projects of various types, and we couldn’t be more excited to hear it! We’ve been incredibly honored to see folks make films, stage plays, and generate art of all sorts.

Because we get the inquiry a lot, though, it’s probably best to clarify our stance on fan art for the record. Since (most of) the individual stories in the book — as well as the introduction — are covered by a Creative Commons license, you should absolutely feel free to create noncommercial MOD adaptations of your own so long as you follow the guidelines of the license, i.e. provide attribution and release the resulting work under the same or a similar license. You can also feel free to quote from the book’s introduction if you like.

Here is an easy way to do it above board! Just include the following disclaimer:

Inspired by the “Machine of Death” concept created by Ryan North. This independent adaptation was created under the MOD Fan Art License and is not officially affiliated with Machine of Death. For more information, visit machineofdeath.net.

If you choose to release your work under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license, we’ll be happy to feature your work on a Fan Art page here on the MOD site — just contact us! Hooray!

I should also clarify that this covers noncommercial adaptations only. School assignments, stuff for fun, blog posts etc. all qualify. If you’re interested in any commercial use of the MOD concept — basically anything that might make a profit — contact us so we can steer you in the right direction. Thanks!

“KILLED BY DANIEL,” by Julia Wainwright.
Read by Timothy Volpert. (22 min)

He got the results in April, and his first thought was that he had no idea what to do with them. For a while, he kept the little slip of paper hidden at the back of a desk drawer at work, still inside its official envelope. He didn’t want it in the house — Phil was bound to ferret it out. Phil wouldn’t even have to try, bless him; he was just one of those people who found things. 

He’d thrown away all the other stuff that had been in there, all the leaflets about counselling and help-lines and support groups and whatnot. Everything seemed to be full of leaflets these days. It was like the Sunday papers: you always had to give them a proper shaking over the coffee table before you read them, otherwise hundreds of shiny advertisements would be likely to slither out and attack you.
 
After three weeks, Robin took the slip of paper out of his desk drawer and burnt it in the wastepaper bin.

Download the MP3 • Subscribe on iTunes
Direct podcast feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/machineofpodcast

Julia Wainwright lives in Suffolk, England, where she writes stuff, makes things, and grows 0.1 percent of her own food. She’s just happy to be here. Julia can be reached at juliacw at ntlworld.com.

Timothy Volpert is a poet and musician from Topeka, Kansas. His latest collection of poetry is Their Memories, Your Orchard OR The Worried Courier and Other Stories.

In the book, “KILLED BY DANIEL” is illustrated by Marcus Parcus. This podcast episode was edited by Matt Schwartz.

Flickr photo by Robynne Blume

Break out your cameras! I’m pleased to announce the MOD Evidence Photo Contest!

The rules are simple:

1. Take a photo that tells the story of a single MOD prediction. The prediction slip can be present in the photo, or not. People can be present, or not. But between the photo itself and its title, the viewer should be able to grasp the whole story. (Ironic twists are, of course, OK.)

2. Upload your picture! Join the new MOD Flickr Group, upload your entry, and tag it “modevidence”.

3. Write something in the description — about you, about the photo, how you thought of the idea, where you took it, etc. I want this set to be fun for folks to browse and read!

4. REPEAT UNTIL CAMERA EXPLODES FROM OVERUSE

Photos will be JUDGED and PRIZES AWARDED. Scoring will be based on:

20% Idea/concept
30% Quality of photography
50% Overall creativity of execution (no pun intended)
+10% Extra credit for description

We will award at least one BEST IN SHOW award of $100 cash, and (depending on number of entries) we may award other prizes as well, if there are enough to break the field into categories. We will also show our favorites at the Super-Stupendous MOD Magic & Variety Show next month!

If you don’t have a Flickr account, you can still enter the contest by emailing us your entry; we’ll upload it for you. Send it to submit at machineofdeath dot net, with the subject line “Evidence Photo: [Some brief description].”

Put in an actual description, not the actual words “Some brief description”, even though it would be a hilarious joke.

More Rules

1. You may enter as many times as you like. Collaborative entries are OK too.

2. Remember that part of the judging will be on photo quality, so webcam and cellphone shots will likely suffer on that score. Take as nice a picture as you can!

3. The use of photomanipulation is OK. We may award both a “best manipulated” and a “best naturalistic” award, depending on the number of entries.

4. You agree that by submitting a photo, we’re allowed to repost it here on the MOD blog, or on TopatoCo. (You of course retain the copyright to it, unless you choose otherwise.)

5. The deadline to submit or upload photos will be the end of the day (midnight Pacific time) on Monday, November 7th. So you’ve got three weeks!

SIMULTANEOUS CONTEST ALERT

I am also holding a nearly identical photo contest over at Wondermark! You can also enter that one if you want to win another $100 cash prize.

The rules are all the same, except instead of an Evidence Photo, you must submit a Classy Wondermark Photo. This could be a photo with a piece of Wondermark merchandise, or a recreation of any single Wondermark panel. More details here.

The deadline and other guidelines are the same! This is what we call SYNERGY. Any questions? Leave a comment. Can’t wait to see your photos!

Can you believe it’s been almost a year already?

Nearly six months ago, we held the Machine of Death Half-Birthday Party and Talent Show in Hollywood. We were delighted by the packed house — folks came from all over town to watch comedy, sing songs, deliver monologues, play games, listen to Jesse Thorn read Jeffrey Wells’ story, and hear us announce that submissions were open for Volume 2.

It was a ton of fun! And person after person came up to me afterward, excited and feeling inspired and creative and ready to take that feeling with them into their own lives. That’s great! That, of course, was the entire point!

Now we’re going to do it again.

Not a talent show, not the same exact thing — something different, something amazing.

Please save the date for the…

Super-Stupendous Machine of Death Magic & Variety Show!

Once again, we’ll be at The Fake Gallery in Hollywood, starting at 8pm, and streamed live online. The show will feature many things, some of which are still under development…but I can announce that there will be:

• A spectacular Machine of Death performance by master magician Pop Haydn!

• A sit-down talk-em-up conversation with Ryan (via Skype) and David, hosted by the incomparable Kris Straub!

• Games and such!

• Our birthday gift to you: We’ll have a special Volume-2-related giveaway for all attendees that you will not want to miss!

• And once again, admission will be free!

It’s gonna be great. How great? I’ll leave you with this video of Pop Haydn, whom I had the pleasure of meeting earlier this year at a convention and who absolutely charmed me in every way. As soon as I met him, I thought “I gotta put on a magic show, just to have the pleasure of working with him.” So by gum, that’s what I’m doing — and I’m bringing my friends along too. (That’s you!)

NOTE: We previously announced an October 26 date for the show, but it’s now confirmed for November 17. We hope to see you there!