welch wrote:
Another point I'd like to make, and note: ONLY DO THIS IF YOU HAVE A LEGITIMATE TOPIC. (I *completely* get off the bus if you're talking about trolling a conference.) If you see a conference calling for speakers, AND you think you have a decent topic to talk about and might do a good job, submit. There's no better way to be able to alleviate the influence the dipshits have than creating your own. Again, don't do this just to be a tit. But if you have something topic appropriate to talk about, submit a session. If you're accepted, give a talk on your topic, do a good Q&A, and if you feel like it, submit again.
Demonstrate the difference between idiots like benson et al and good speakers by being one.
And it's the year for starting that. We've done our due diligence trying to accommodate the Potemkin Skeptics, trying to figure out what it is they want and how we can make their boo-boos better. This year is going to be, I think, total push-back.
I would like to see more topics in skepticism, but considering that a lot of the FTB/SCK loons would give talks on how to blog and use social media, for fuck's sake, so the bar isn't all that high. Hell, if Rebecca Watson can give keynote speeches on how people were mean to her on the internet, then I doubt there is a bar. Yes, I do realize that anyone who isn't one of the approved incestuous cool kids will be helf to a higher standard in keeping with P.Z. Meyers-level rampant hypocrisy, but might as well start poking away.
Remember that analysis done a while back comparing Atheism Plus to The SlymePit that noted posters here tend to have disproportionate influence? Time to start cashing that shit in. We have a number of "famous on the internet" YouTubers here. In fact, I would recommend people link to The SlymePit on their video lowbars because, unlike the oh-so-important and talent-less SWJs, if anyone wants to interact with their favorite YouTuber, this is the place to do it. One of the remarkable things is the disparity between the high profile of people like Woolly Bumblebee and Thunderfoot and their lack of self-importance.
Oh, on my own front I have one that is now moving forward. I seem to have gone over the tipping point of using new software from "This sucks, I don't know how to do X like in the old program" to "Oh, this is actually better than the old program".
I was talking with Ikonographer on Skype and we noticed that Thunderf00t seems to have paid attention to some of the work other people have been doing and incorporated that into his video, notably the P.Z. Meyers "pick a card and fuck me" clip and the whole Melody Hensley incident. Which is great if true, as he presented a nice, concise, punch-in-the-face version. We seem to work on an open license with each other. That is, we've got no Amy Roth's whining about appropriation. There's no ownership here. We should be building on each others work. I mean, if someone found any of the stuff I've done useful, run with it, let's build on what each other are doing.
Most important, in the long term, is when we can transition from being the opposition to a bunch of idiots to just doing an end run around them, show that they aren't the faces of the atheist and skeptical movement, rather they are a perversion of it. To do that, as Welch says, we have to offer something other than opposition.