B5 page at SciFi.com
Jms at B5
truly, is now up at:
http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
jms
(jms...@aol.com)
B5 Official Fan Club at:
http://www.thestation.com
(all message content (c) 2000 by
synthetic worlds, ltd., permission
to reprint specifically denied to
SFX Magazine)
Tammy Smith
Are you going to do regular columns there like you did with the B5
Magazine?
Tammy
Ted Dennison
> For those interested, a page with info about the show, and a small essay by yrs
> truly, is now up at:
>
> http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
A very touching essay it is too.
A few years ago I had a chance to go listen to you speak at a convention in
Orlando. I had a very low-grade headache at the time (probably due to caffeine
withdrawl, I later learned). But I sure wasn't going to let that stop me. When you
started to speak, I realized I had planted myself next to a badly humming speaker,
and would have to strain mightly to hear you over it. I wasn't going to let that
stop me either.
At the end of your talk an hour later, that damn speaker (and my own
hard-headedness) had caused the headache to blow up into the worst (and only)
migrane I'd ever experienced. It felt like my head was being crushed.
Non-perscription painkillers didn't even make a dent in it. 24 hours later it had
gotten so bad that I went to the hospital.
I wasn't mad at you for this, or even myself (as I perhaps should have been). But I
was very angry at the convention organizers for setting up the sound system in such
a shabby way. They should have known that the particular guest in question would
have fans so ravenous as to injure themselves trying to hear him over a horrible
sound system.
I bring this up now because when I visited that link above, I had a very similar
experience. I'm using Netscape on Windows2K. The text of your essay there is almost
completely unreadable on my system. It is both fuzzy and incredibly tiny. But being
the hard-headed fan that I am, I just dropped my screen resolution to 640x480 and
squinted real hard. I managed to read through it that way, but I still had to guess
at a lot of the words from general shape and context.
Doing a little more playing around, I discovered that the font is much more legible
on my disused copy of InternetExplorer (still *way* too small, though). Clearly
this was created by some IE user who never even bothered to see how it looks on
other browsers. But instead of only injuring a few dunderheads in one little talk
to about 100 people, I could see this technical gaffe causing Netscape-using fans
all over the world to injure themselves trying to make out what you are saying.
Anyway, I ask that you speak to the web designers at SCIFI.com about this, before
anyone else gets hurt. In the meantime, other readers here should be warned to
*not* try and follow this link with Netscape (or perhaps any others at SCIFI.com,
if this one is representative).
This dunderhead is going to go take an asprin now...
--
T.E.D.
Home - mailto:denn...@telepath.com Work - mailto:denn...@ssd.fsi.com
WWW - http://www.telepath.com/dennison/Ted/TED.html ICQ - 10545591
Mark Maher
<39C3D4F3...@telepath.com>...
You are not alone and it is not just a with Netscape Problem.
It's a piss-poor design and I intend to let scifi.com know about
it most strenuously.
__!_!__
Gizmo
Patty Winter
Jms at B5 <jms...@aol.com> wrote:
>For those interested, a page with info about the show, and a small essay by yrs
>truly, is now up at:
>
>http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
Ooooh, I love the idea of having you do a commentary on some episodes!
But in addition to making it available on SciFi.com, how about also
feeding it on SFC's alternate audio (SAP) channel?
Patty
c/Maj Joe Biles
It's what I did. Ah, what a nice non-headache I have.
On 16 Sep 2000 13:46:18 -0700, "Mark Maher"
<marka...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>Ted Dennison wrote in message
><39C3D4F3...@telepath.com>...
>>Jms at B5 wrote:
>>
>>> For those interested, a page with info about the show, and a
>small essay by yrs
>>> truly, is now up at:
>>>
>>> http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
>>
Jms at B5
>Are you going to do regular columns there like you did with the B5
>Magazine?
No, though I will be doing a weekly column for psycomic.com when it relaunches
the week of th 28th. It's owned by USA Network, which owns SFC, so it's kinda
in the same family....
Jms at B5
>before
>anyone else gets hurt.
Already done. They should have it modified by the first part of next week.
Maagic
Jms at B5 wrote:
>
> >I've been over there. I like the changes, & your essay is great, too.
> >Are you going to do regular columns there like you did with the B5
> >Magazine?
>
> No, though I will be doing a weekly column for psycomic.com when it relaunches
> the week of th 28th. It's owned by USA Network, which owns SFC, so it's kinda
> in the same family....
>
> jms
>
> (jms...@aol.com)
> B5 Official Fan Club at:
> http://www.thestation.com
> (all message content (c) 2000 by
> synthetic worlds, ltd., permission
> to reprint specifically denied to
> SFX Magazine)
--
-Maagic
aka Bryan Foster
Webmaster of the Rick and Bubba Experience
http://www.rickandbubba.net
Maagic
it to Notepad and read it that way. Great article... A must-read!
> Anyway, I ask that you speak to the web designers at SCIFI.com about this, before
> anyone else gets hurt. In the meantime, other readers here should be warned to
> *not* try and follow this link with Netscape (or perhaps any others at SCIFI.com,
> if this one is representative).
>
> This dunderhead is going to go take an asprin now...
>
> --
> T.E.D.
>
> Home - mailto:denn...@telepath.com Work - mailto:denn...@ssd.fsi.com
> WWW - http://www.telepath.com/dennison/Ted/TED.html ICQ - 10545591
--
Maagic
Patty Winter wrote:
>
> In article <20000915233237...@ng-bg1.aol.com>,
> Jms at B5 <jms...@aol.com> wrote:
> >For those interested, a page with info about the show, and a small essay by yrs
> >truly, is now up at:
> >
> >http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
>
> Ooooh, I love the idea of having you do a commentary on some episodes!
> But in addition to making it available on SciFi.com, how about also
> feeding it on SFC's alternate audio (SAP) channel?
>
> Patty
--
Rob Perkins
news:39c425bf...@news.wf.net...
> Why don't you people just highlight the text? :-)
> It's what I did. Ah, what a nice non-headache I have.
In the arena of user interfaces and human factors, little offends me more
than having to work around an easily correctable bad design. I shouldn't
have to *do* anything because some novice in a web content shop didn't test
his HTML. Said novice must fix it, plain and simple.
Rob
Jim Kress
people ask about 3D models for B5 spaceships, space stations, buildings,
planets, etc. that they could use to render their own images.
Have the owners of the B5 materials ever considered selling some of these
models?
Jim
>"Jms at B5" <jms...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20000915233237...@ng-bg1.aol.com...
> For those interested, a page with info about the show, and a small essay
by yrs
> truly, is now up at:
>
> http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
>
Shaz
"Mark Maher" <marka...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:q_Qw5.16949$6f1.8...@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
> small essay by yrs
> >> truly, is now up at:
> >>
> >> http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
> >Anyway, I ask that you speak to the web designers at SCIFI.com
> about this, before
> >anyone else gets hurt. In the meantime, other readers here
> should be warned to
> >*not* try and follow this link with Netscape (or perhaps any
> others at SCIFI.com,
> >if this one is representative).
> >
> >This dunderhead is going to go take an asprin now...
> >
> >
>
> You are not alone and it is not just a with Netscape Problem.
> It's a piss-poor design and I intend to let scifi.com know about
> it most strenuously.
>
> __!_!__
> Gizmo
Agreed. My solution was to go to 'view source' copy the text from there,
paste it into a text editor, remove all font tags, span references et al,
and viola, the damned thing is legible and my eyes will survive. Whichever
twit did the coding forced the font size, instead of letting us determine
how we wanted it to look on our own machines. I HATE it when people do that.
It's usually done by someone who lets their HTML editor do the work for
them, instead of hand editing.
Shaz
Timothy A. McDaniel
Ted Dennison <denn...@telepath.com> wrote:
>In the meantime, other readers here should be warned to *not* try and
>follow this link with Netscape (or perhaps any others at SCIFI.com,
>if this one is representative).
Edit-Preferences is *your friend*. You can set all sorts of things.
You don't have to put up with their choices. You *shouldn't* put up
with their choices. On my Linux box at home, I use
Variable Width Font: Times (Adove) size 14
Fixed Width Font: Courier (Adobe) size 14
<> Use my default fonts, overriding document-specified fonts.
At work, Windows NT, it's 11 and 10 respectively. Do whatever you
like to make it readable.
I also select my own Colors, because black-on-white hurts my eyes:
<Always use my colors, overriding document
Netscape doesn't always obey your choices, but 90% of the time it
works.
You can also get the Opera browser, or the Mozilla betas, or even use
Lynx if you don't mind plain text.
--
tm...@us.ibm.com is Tim McDaniel at work: International Business
Machines Corp., Austin, TX, USA. Phone number: +1 512 838-2408.
For personal mail, please use tm...@jump.net
Aubrey W. Adkins
processor and it becomes quite readable. I have found many web pages goofed up like
this, and the wordprocessor thingy works every time. sometimes the text isn't aligned
quite as it should be, but it is readily readable.
Ted Dennison wrote:
> Jms at B5 wrote:
>
> > For those interested, a page with info about the show, and a small essay by yrs
> > truly, is now up at:
> >
> > http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
>
> Anyway, I ask that you speak to the web designers at SCIFI.com about this, before
> anyone else gets hurt. In the meantime, other readers here should be warned to
> *not* try and follow this link with Netscape (or perhaps any others at SCIFI.com,
> if this one is representative).
>
> This dunderhead is going to go take an asprin now...
>
in_vale...@hotmail.com
jms...@aol.com (Jms at B5) wrote:
> >I've been over there. I like the changes, & your essay is great,
> >too. Are you going to do regular columns there like you did with
> >the B5 Magazine?
My 2 cents: good site, but I'd like to see added a "recommended
reading" page of the genre novels that inspired B5, and maybe a list of
the books that were suggested to Bruce Boxleitner to get him in the SF
mindset. Varley's STEEL BEACH was amazing!
> No, though I will be doing a weekly column for psycomic.com when it
> relaunches the week of th 28th. It's owned by USA Network, which
> owns SFC, so it's kinda in the same family....
Looking forward to it. Hope the sites do cross-links.
I hope psycomics.com will also start doing previews of upcoming
comics. Not just text blurbs, and maybe a cover. But 3 or so interior
pages, even if just pencils, hopefully at least at the lettered stage
though. Top Cow's solicitation ads in Previews catalog, and the
Wizardworld.com article, did this well. Seeing a bit of what one's
going to get makes taking a chance on ordering it *much* easier.
I assume the column going to be about comics? It'd be interesting to
hear what you've to say about the industry, the sate it's in, and how
to improve it.
scott tilson.
--------------------
Recommended: BATMAN: LEGENDS OF THE DARK KNIGHT #132-136 by Archie
Goodwin & Marshall Rogers.
http://www.dccomics.com/directcurrents/comics/June7/ldk132.htm
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
John Pennington
> It's a piss-poor design and I intend to let scifi.com know about
> it most strenuously.
>
> __!_!__
> Gizmo
I just read it, it was easily a large enough font to read. Did they fix
it already? You may need to adjust your font size in Netscape under:
Edit:Preferences:Font
JP
Pål Are Nordal
>
> Have the owners of the B5 materials ever considered selling some of these
> models?
WB is perfectly happy to licence them out to you. Of course, the price
probably is a _bit_ too high for most people.
--
Donate free food with a simple click: http://www.thehungersite.com/
Pål Are Nordal
a_b...@bigfoot.com
Jms at B5
>hear what you've to say about the industry, the sate it's in, and how
>to improve it.
It's pretty much whatever I want to write about: SF books, movies, comics,
horror, you name it.
Judy Williams
impossible to read.
J. Potts
>had a very similar experience. I'm using Netscape on Windows2K.
>The text of your essay there is almost completely unreadable on my
>system. It is both fuzzy and incredibly tiny. But being the
>hard-headed fan that I am, I just dropped my screen resolution to
>640x480 and squinted real hard. I managed to read through it that
>way, but I still had to guess at a lot of the words from general
>shape and context.
>
>Doing a little more playing around, I discovered that the font
>is much more legible on my disused copy of InternetExplorer (still
>*way* too small, though). Clearly this was created by some IE user
>who never even bothered to see how it looks on other browsers. But
>instead of only injuring a few dunderheads in one little talk to
>about 100 people, I could see this technical gaffe causing
>Netscape-using fans all over the world to injure themselves trying
>to make out what you are saying.
>You are not alone and it is not just a with Netscape Problem.
> It's a piss-poor design and I intend to let scifi.com know about
> it most strenuously.
In article <39C48B59...@micro.ti.com>,
John Pennington <jp...@micro.ti.com> wrote:
>I just read it, it was easily a large enough font to read. Did they fix
>it already? You may need to adjust your font size in Netscape under:
>Edit:Preferences:Font
That won't work for that page since the font is not one controlled by
the browser. I normally have my Netscape browser set to 12 point for
variable width fonts and 10 point for fixed width. This works fine in
most instances. Also, the site has some bad java scripting. If you
follow the link to the episode guide and try to view the description
of The Gathering, in Netscape you get a new window spawned with no
scroll bars and no way to view the entire text. In IE, you get an
error and no new window (and consequently no description).
The site definitely needs work.
--
JRP
"How many slime-trailing, sleepless, slimy, slobbering things do you know
that will *run and hide* from your Eveready?"
--Maureen Birnbaum, Barbarian Swordsperson
Bryan Campbell
>Date: 16 Sep 2000 20:10:51 -0700
>>Anyway, I ask that you speak to the web designers at SCIFI.com about this
>Already done. They should have it modified by the first part of next week
>jms
Hi Joe,
The way many Web pages are designed to suit MS IE has a distinctly Vorlon
flavor to it as a move to impose order from above. Taking a look around it
feels like the Vorlon have landed. [grin] Anyway this 'rule' in Web design
makes it difficult for folks using other browsers like Opera www.opera.com
because it has superior usability features! Since Web design has come up
Joe I'd appreciate it if you'd mention to Bookface www.bookface.com that
none of its story pages appear in Opera. Its driving me nuts that I can't
keyboard in, I'm dying to read your work, naturally, especially the Crusade
scripts! Thanks much.
In case anyone wants to read about the use of Opera's keyboard approach
please see
www.zdnet.com/eweek/stories/general/0,11011,2618369,00.html
Regards,
Bryan Campbell
--> "Just because we call it the Web does not mean it is supposed to tangle
people up!"
J. Potts
Timothy A. McDaniel <tm...@jump.net> wrote:
>Edit-Preferences is *your friend*. You can set all sorts of things.
>You don't have to put up with their choices. You *shouldn't* put up
>with their choices. On my Linux box at home, I use
> Variable Width Font: Times (Adove) size 14
> Fixed Width Font: Courier (Adobe) size 14
> <> Use my default fonts, overriding document-specified fonts.
>At work, Windows NT, it's 11 and 10 respectively. Do whatever you
>like to make it readable.
>
>I also select my own Colors, because black-on-white hurts my eyes:
> <Always use my colors, overriding document
>
>Netscape doesn't always obey your choices, but 90% of the time it
>works.
>
>You can also get the Opera browser, or the Mozilla betas, or even use
>Lynx if you don't mind plain text.
The problem is that all attempts to alter the appearance of the page,
specifying your own fonts and over riding the page fonts have proved
fruitless for this site. Even in IE, the change is minimal set to
"Largest" on the font menu.
Here is the font specification for JMS's message (via a ccs style
specification on that page):
color: #6699FF; font-weight: normal; font-size: 9px; line-height: 12px;
font-family: verdana, Arial, Geneva, sans-serif
That dark blue text on black back background is hard enough to read but
at 9px (that's *pixels, not points) that makes it micro-mini text. Had
they specified the font in points, it would likely have been a lot easier
to read.
Kay Shapero
>> essay by yrs
>> truly, is now up at:
>>
>> http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
TD> A very touching essay it is too.
TD> at a lot of the words from general shape and context.
TD> Doing a little more playing around, I discovered that the font is
TD> much more legible on my disused copy of InternetExplorer (still *way*
TD> too small, though). Clearly this was created by some IE user who
TD> never even bothered to see how it looks on other browsers.
I used IE, and agree on the type size, also the color contrast was such that
I had to "select" the whole thing to be able to read it.
Which I did because it was short.
If it had been long I would have downloaded it and read it in a text editor
at any size and contrast I cared to use. The nice thing about a HTML
document is that it is just a text document, just with a lotta stuff in angle
brackets.
A suggestion for all web designers - I don't care how spiffy it looks if I
can't read it because it's (a) horrible contrast or fontsize or (b) loads
slower than Great A'tuin's thoughts. Whenever you make a change to your
site, check it out from a public library terminal to see what you're doing to
your reading public. (Yes, I have one. I'll bet it looks drab to the
eye-candy enthusiasts, but it's there to give people information as rapidly
as possible and by all the comments I've gotten it does.
http://home.earthlink.net/~kayshapero/index.htm)
Pat Kight
>
> For those interested, a page with info about the show, and a small essay by yrs
You know, I'd be just thrilled to read this essay, but even with
bifocals my middle-aged eyes can't make out the blue-on-blue, 9-px font
settings they've chosen for their body text. This on a 17-inch monitor
at reasonably high resolution; I dread to think how tiny it would appear
on my even higher-resolution digital flatscreen monitor at home.
*sigh*
--Pat Kight
kig...@peak.org
Pat Kight
... Or had they followed the recommendations for HTML4.0 and used
relative font sizes instead of absolute pixel heights, those of us whose
eyes aren't up to the tiny type could, indeed, have set our own size
preferences.
--Pat Kight
getting pretty tired of Web designers who sacrifice content for look and
feel
kig...@peak.org
J. Potts
[yes, I'm following up to my own message, so sue me]
In article <8q590k$2...@ssbunews.ih.lucent.com>,
J. Potts <nav...@lucent.com> wrote:
>Also, the site has some bad java scripting. If you
>follow the link to the episode guide and try to view the description
>of The Gathering, in Netscape you get a new window spawned with no
>scroll bars and no way to view the entire text. In IE, you get an
>error and no new window (and consequently no description).
Actually, after I sent that post, I did discover that there was a
window that was spawned by the link. It was hiding beind several other
windows at the time and I only discovered it when I started closing out
the other windows. But it still gives the error message.
Pål Are Nordal
>
> Also, the site has some bad java scripting. If you
> follow the link to the episode guide and try to view the description
> of The Gathering, in Netscape you get a new window spawned with no
> scroll bars and no way to view the entire text.
If you press and hold down your mouse button in the middle of the
window, and drag it down towards the bottom, the text should scroll as
you mark the last of the visible text.
Gharlane of Eddore
Jms at B5 wrote:
>
> For those interested, a page with info about the show, and a small
> essay by yrs truly, is now up at:
>
> http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
>
In <39C6A1B5...@ucs.orst.edu> Pat Kight,
kig...@peak.org writes:
>
> You know, I'd be just thrilled to read this essay, but even with
> bifocals my middle-aged eyes can't make out the blue-on-blue, 9-px
> font settings they've chosen for their body text. This on a 17-inch
> monitor at reasonably high resolution; I dread to think how tiny it
> would appear on my even higher-resolution digital flatscreen monitor
> at home.
>
> *sigh*
>
Those are about nine-pixel characters; the font selection and color
determination were obviously done by a near-sighted pongid that lives
with its face less than five inches from a 29" high-resolution display.
If it's any help, we've discovered at this site that if you project
the display onto a twelve-foot by nine-foot screen, using a display
generator that provides inter-line averaging and a selectable contrast
enhancement algorithm, the result is very nearly legible.
As for the essay itself...
Note that Joe uses the phrase "...writers whose pencil boxes I am
not fit to carry..." without specifically acknowledging to the crafter
thereof; and that he lists Joe Stefano, who's on record as saying
"I HATE SCIENCE FICTION," as such a worthy, in a discussion of media
SF, to which he has hardly contributed appreciably.
On the other hand, the sentiments expressed are certainly laudable,
and a delight to read.
J. Potts
> That dark blue text on black back background is hard enough to read but
> at 9px (that's *pixels, not points) that makes it micro-mini text. Had
> they specified the font in points, it would likely have been a lot easier
> to read.
In article <39C6A2C3...@ucs.orst.edu>,
Pat Kight <kig...@peak.org> wrote:
>... Or had they followed the recommendations for HTML4.0 and used
>relative font sizes instead of absolute pixel heights, those of us whose
>eyes aren't up to the tiny type could, indeed, have set our own size
>preferences.
>getting pretty tired of Web designers who sacrifice content for look and
>feel
I agree. I once had a "discusion" with a co-worker about some web pages
I was taking over because I wasn't including a "<B>" around *all* the text.
She complained it made the text too hard to read without it. I told her
to change her preferences. I don't think she was really clear on the
concept.
J. Potts
> Also, the site has some bad java scripting. If you
> follow the link to the episode guide and try to view the description
> of The Gathering, in Netscape you get a new window spawned with no
> scroll bars and no way to view the entire text.
In article <39C6CF0E...@bigfoot.com>,
=?iso-8859-1?Q?P=E5l?= Are Nordal <a_b...@bigfoot.com> wrote:
>If you press and hold down your mouse button in the middle of the
>window, and drag it down towards the bottom, the text should scroll as
>you mark the last of the visible text.
That only works in IE. I tried it in Netscape (4.6) and it didn't.
frank_m...@mindspring.com
>"J. Potts" wrote:
>> Also, the site has some bad java scripting.
Tried to access the site with Netscape/2 v2.02. After displaying most of
the main page, it suddenly transferred me to a page set up for the sole
purpose of telling me I was using an out of date browser.
When I clicked on the tiny box saying "proceed at your own risk", rather
than send me back to the home page it transferred me to a page with the
text "/index.html".
Nothing like a nice, standard HTML implementation...
--
The good thing about standards is that there are so many to
choose from. -- Andrew S. Tanenbaum
--
Frank McKenney, McKenney Associates
Richmond, Virginia / (804) 320-4887
E-mail: frank_m...@mindspring.com
Mena Ryan
>
> In <8q6n2l$36b$1...@flood.xnet.com>, nav...@xnet.com (J. Potts) writes:
> >"J. Potts" wrote:
> >> Also, the site has some bad java scripting.
> --snip--
>
> Tried to access the site with Netscape/2 v2.02. After displaying most of
> the main page, it suddenly transferred me to a page set up for the sole
> purpose of telling me I was using an out of date browser.
>
> When I clicked on the tiny box saying "proceed at your own risk", rather
> than send me back to the home page it transferred me to a page with the
> text "/index.html".
>
> Nothing like a nice, standard HTML implementation...
What about that crappy Flash thing with the cookies? I never got that
message nor did I need to ever turn on the cookies until I upgraded the
Flash player. So far it has crashed my browser a couple times and I
can't get in without setting the cookies. Unfortunately this isn't an
isolated thing. Sometimes it seems that web pages have gotten worse and
worse over the last 5 or 6 years instead of better. One of my favorite
things are links that require you to have javascript enabled.
Hellloooo.... What ever happened to just clicking on links that run
through HTML? <sigh>
Mena Ryan
> > at 9px (that's *pixels, not points) that makes it micro-mini text. Had
> > they specified the font in points, it would likely have been a lot easier
> > to read.
>
> relative font sizes instead of absolute pixel heights, those of us whose
> eyes aren't up to the tiny type could, indeed, have set our own size
> preferences.
>
> getting pretty tired of Web designers who sacrifice content for look and
> feel
So you are saying that they need to be referred to
http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com? ;)
Martin A. Hohner
I have to admit, I have been very disappointed overall with that site. It has
some very cool content, some interesting graphic design on some sections, and
is very ambitious when it comes to the sheer size of the site and the nifty
interactive menu bar at the top. But it loads slower than molasses in January
(Okay, I got a slow modem, but other pages are rarely that bad) and an awful
lot of the pages have script errors. I have been trying to get one of their
"colony" homepages, and every time I try to upload something, it crashes on me.
To sum up, A+ for ambition, B+ for effort, C- for execution.
Martin "The Mess" Hohner <*> Simn...@aol.com
United States of Earth? Schoonmaker for President!
Expansionist Party of the United States Website:
**** http://hometown.aol.com/XPUS/index.html ****
Everett Ogden
>For those interested, a page with info about the show, and a small essay by yrs
>truly, is now up at:
>
>http://www.scifi.com/babylon5/welcome.html
In that article you wrote:
To this day, if I'm channel flipping and I come across
"The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" or "The
City on the Edge of Forever" or "Controlled Experiment,"
I put the remote control down on the couch and I watch.
Because they have become a part of me.
"Monsters" is my favorite Twilight Zone episode, and of course I
recognize "City" from Star Trek. I presume "Controlled Experiment" is
from Outer Limits, but I don't recognize it by the title. Can you
tell enough of the plot for me to know if I've seen it?
An aside on the power of good advertising: I don't remember the
sponsors of most shows, but the early Twilight Zone's were Kleenex and
Sanka. I credit their soft-sell ads for making the pitch without
breaking the spell of the show. I can't say that Kleenex's dancing
pixie made me want to blow my nose, but even though I was too young to
drink coffee, the dreamy image of a couple relaxing with their Sanka
in front of a fire made me feel a cup of it would taste pretty good
right then.
Everett Ogden <ogd...@global2000.net>