The Death of Print Media, part II: Scifi Short Fiction

Continuing the theme of my previous post...

Scifi used to be based primarily around short fiction. Just think of the short stories of Asimov, Clarke, Dick and Moorecock. And it's a genre that is dying in the print form. Why? Because it turns out that the people running things are utter luddites. Rather than rehash a complete history of why this is, I'm just going to throw some basic links your way:

1) The VP of the Scifi and Fantasy Writers of America called people who publish their fiction free online "webscabs" and "Pixel-stained Technopeasant Wretch"

2) Scifi magazines are losing members at an astonishing rate

3) They are completely unable to do even the most basic things to bring themselves into the 21st Century

But the thing that really gets me? Analog, Interzone and Asimov don't accept digital submissions. What the hell? You're the most famous Scifi magazines on the market. The big names. The ones you want to be published in. And you won't even take e-submissions. These are the people who are meant to be showing us the future.

Not to mention they pay around 7¢ a word.

This is why science fiction is always left in the shadow of its golden past. There was a time when great writers were pushing out amazing ideas through these magazines. When one could earn a bit of money by doing it. When people were actually challenging the world around them through print.

And those people haven't moved. But they've become older and scared of the internet. Of free media. Of technology.

Scifi helped put people on the moon. Why the hell aren't they pushing for Mars? Scifi used to inspire people into exploration and invention. It used to drive us to the miraculous. We've lost that.

But son of a bitch if we aren't fighting for it again.

Tor is revamping their website into a social network of sorts. Webzines and Podcasts are paying up and coming new authors. Murr Lafferty and Scott Sigler are both putting out absolutely fantastic fiction for free online. As is Cory Doctorow.

I just cannot believe that the golden bastions of the future, the writers who put us into space and into the universe, are so terrifyingly stuck in their ways.