[MFAQ 1.4g] None of this is actually happening
Greg Pacek - CrazyOne
*** The alt.fan.douglas-adams MFAQ (Most Frequently Asked Questions) ***
Version 1.4g / Last changes 19 November 1998 / This posted 19 November 1998
(new info since previous post indicated with + in the contents)
Welcome to alt.fan.douglas-adams!
** The questions/contents (in some sort of order):
0. Special note about douglasadams.com
1. About this MFAQ / About this newsfroup (please read)
2. How do I find the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
or Bureaucracy computer games?
3. What is Starship Titanic and is it any good?
4. Is it true that Disney is doing a Hitchhiker's Guide movie?
5. What other current projects are Douglas Adams and The Digital
Village working on?
6. Where can I get CDs, tapes, books, etc.?
7. What happened to The Salmon of Doubt?
8. What do you get if you multiply six by nine?
+ 9. Does Douglas Adams read this group?
10. What is his email address / web address?
11. What kind of stuff is in the complete FAQ?
12. Where do I find HHGG/DNA _______ on the web?
13. Who is Douglas Adams anyway?
14. ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha info
0. Special note about douglasadams.com
Go check out douglasadams.com, the new TDV-produced web site about DNA and his
current doings! The address is (duh) http://www.douglasadams.com This very
MFAQ is currently featured there, at http://www.douglasadams.com/dna/mfaq.html
Now, I don't think it will replace the ol' newsfroup, but the forum area is
now up and running in what is apparently a temporary fashion. DNA is posting
there, even.
1. About this MFAQ / About this newsfroup (please read)
This is the Most Frequently Asked Questions (and answers, obviously) list, a
shorter version of the complete FAQ. It should address the questions that are
currently being asked most often. For more in-depth info on Douglas Adams and
his work, please visit the complete FAQ at:
http://www.atomiser.demon.co.uk/mh/faq/
The FAQ team is Greg Pacek, Owen Cameron and Stuart Bruce. This MFAQ was
developed and is maintained by Greg "CrazyOne" Pacek (self-explanatory address
in Reply-to header and .sig; I'm trying to see if it helps the spam) with the
help of a.f.d-a participants. Please send comments and suggestions to Greg.
Please note the comments in [these brackets]. This is where in my mind I
definitely need more information for the item to be complete.
This MFAQ will be posted weekly, and as soon as I get all the correct headers
in shape and have it checked (rules apply only to the headers, not the
content), it will be cross-posted monthly to news.answers and alt.answers so it
can be automatically archived in the usual places. (*.answers doesn't seem to
like postings more frequently than monthly.) The web home of the MFAQ is:
http://www.city-net.com/~crazyone/mfaq.html
A few notes about the alt.fan.douglas-adams newsfroup: This is an unmoderated
group, which means you may see "spam" from time to time. It is best not to
respond to spam, except maybe to send a mail to the spammer's service provider
if you can figure out who it is and you feel like it. This is also NOT a
binary group. That means if you have this great picture file, background
"wallpaper", etc. you should post an offer to email it to people or a pointer
to where they can download it rather than attaching the file to the post.
Binaries to the group will be met with a flurry of nasty notes from regulars.
So if you didn't know before, now you do. :-)
2. How do I find the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
or Bureaucracy computer games?
Well, the deal is that the rights to the HHGG game have reverted back from
Activision (successor to Infocom) to Douglas Adams. In fact, this is why the
game did not appear on the most recent Infocom collections. (It does appear on
"The Lost Treasures of Infocom" and "The Infocom Sci-Fi Collection", both of
which are now apparently out of print, or at least very difficult to find.) If
you do have an old version of the game, however, it is possible to take the
data files from it and use it on virtually any type of operating system.
Infocom designed the game (and other text adventures they did) to use the same
data file on any sort of computer and utilize an interpreter program that was
written for that platform. The practical upshot is that you can get a
shareware or freeware Infocom interpreter for nearly any platform you like.
This FTP site has been recommended as a source for several such interpreters:
ftp://ftp.gmd.de/if-archive/infocom/interpreters/
Info from folks at The Digital Village (that's the multimedia company that
Douglas is involved with) indicates they will be rereleasing the HHGG game "in
an exciting new form." A more recent message indicated they may well rerelease
the old game as shareware. Nothing has happened so far. An even more recent
online chat with DNA indicated they may do nothing with it. Please note that
unauthorized distribution of the game remains illegal, and TDV may well take
action against such distribution (including but not limited to closing of web
sites, lawsuits, concrete shoes, calling in the Vogons, etc.) There's a new
teaser note about TDV's potential plans for changing the availability of the
game at http://www.douglasadams.com/creations/infocom.html
*** Actually, here is THE HHGG GAME INFO YOU'VE BEEN WAITING FOR:
"We definitely plan to release the Infocom game as PC/Mac shareware (I've
already ported it to Java). The only thing we're waiting for is to sort out a
couple of legal issues over the code. As soon as that's sorted, it'll be
available from Douglas's new web site (http://www.douglasadams.com/)." This is
from Richard Harris of TDV. The HHGG game WILL be available again!
Bureaucracy is easier. It appeared on a couple of Infocom collections in the
past, and appears on Activision's newest collection of old Infocom stuff called
"Masterpieces of Infocom", just released on their "Essential Collection" budget
label. This collection is very inexpensive (around 10UKP/probably about US$10)
runs on PC or Mac and includes 30 or so other old Infocom text adventure games.
Look, it's simple. DO NOT post the games on your web site. DO NOT post the
address of any site (yours or otherwise) where the games supposedly have been
posted. DO NOT post requests for the games or offers to send them. And most
of all DO NOT post the games themselves to the group. (It's NOT a binaries
group.) Unauthorized distribution of the games REMAINS ILLEGAL. Wait until
they post the shareware for HHGG; buy the inexpensive collection for
Bureaucracy.
Word is (from that same DNA chat; I asked him the game question myself) there
will be an all-new Hitchhiker game to go along with the movie, though. It may
be a console game, which I assume means Nintendo, Sega, PlayStation, etc. The
newest info from douglasadams.com (http://www.douglasadams.com/news/) suggests
both computer and console versions will be available at the time of the movie's
release.
3. What is Starship Titanic and is it any good?
It's a multimedia project by The Digital Village, a new company that Douglas is
involved with. The IBM-PC compatible version of the game is available now.
There is also a novel, written by Terry Jones, that came out back in December
1997. There's even a web site at http://www.starshiptitanic.com with some fun
stuff. The Mac version is due by the end of the year. (They were originally
trying to do them at the same time, but it would have made the release even
later than it already was.) Some game discussion has taken place on the
comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.adventure newsgroup (as well as here.) Reviews of both
the novel and game are mixed.
4. Is it true that Disney is doing a Hitchhiker's Guide movie?
Pretty much, yes, but Douglas is very much involved. An agreement was reached
between Douglas Adams and Disney for production of a Hitchhiker's Guide to the
Galaxy movie to be released summer 2000. Roger Birnbaum (of Caravan Pictures,
now Spyglass Pictures, an independent company whose productions tend to be
released by a Disney company) will produce, Jay Roach will direct and Douglas
will write the screenplay and co-executive produce. Douglas is working on the
screenplay now; he says it's based on the first book with some new material
added. The recent story suggesting Jim Carrey will be in the movie has been
refuted by DNA himself, right here on the group. He has also even more
recently downplayed the Disney connection (as in it won't be a cartoon or
children's movie) as well as pointed out that Roger Birnbaum and Caravan have
been responsible for such notable pictures as Rain Man and Gorillas in the
Mist. Movie news can be obtained at http://www.douglasadams.com/news/
Latest info direct from DNA, from posting to the newsfroup on 13 September
1998:
<snip>
"Don't believe anything you read on the net. Except this. Well, including
this, I suppose.
"Here's where we are at.
"On Christmas Eve I agreed the deal with Disney to sell them the film rights,
to write the screenplay, and to be executive producer. Robbie Stamp, my
partner from The Digital Village, is also executive director.
"I have only just actually signed the deal. Everything in between has been
lawyer stuff. Really.
"The producer is Roger Birnbaum, of Caravan Pictures (now Spyglass Pictures).
There is no decision about which of Disney's various imprints (Touchstone,
Hollywood, etc) it will go out under. The director will be Jay Roach, who
directed Austin Powers, and is just finishing a new movie called Mystery,
Alaska.
"Now that the contract is signed, I am about to deliver a first draft of the
new screenplay. Other than me, nobody has seen it. No copy of it exists
outside my study.
"Jay is about to go into production of Austin Powers II.
"I will do rewrites to the screenplay after Jay, Roger and Disney have reacted
to it. Once everyone is happy that it's right, casting will start. If all
goes according to current intentions we should be filming next summer for
release in the following summer.
"That's it."
<snip>
5. What other current projects are Douglas Adams and The Digital
Village working on?
Well, the best way to get the best info is to go to http://www.tdv.com
yourself. TDV's current projects include the online Hitchhiker's Guide to the
Galaxy (which, incidentally, has a new placeholder homepage at
http://www.h2g2.com), Starship Titanic (mentioned above in its own question),
and douglasadams.com (http://www.douglasadams.com), which is a new site for
DNA's current goings-on.
Douglas himself is currently working on the HHGG movie script (see previous
question) and a novel or two that will be neither HHGG nor Dirk Gently. He is
involved in some of the TDV projects (such as the ones above) but not all of
them. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to suggest that one main purposes of
douglasadams.com would be to keep people up to date, though I'm sure it's not
the only one. DNA participated in an online chat on June 17, 1998. The
transcript is worth a read; see item 12.
6. Where can I get CDs, tapes, books, etc.?
The Radio Series is getting notoriously hard to get ahold of, and the TV Series
is approaching that point. Or maybe vice-versa. In the UK you can still get
these (as far as I know) from BBC mail-order. There was a BBC web site for US
orders, but (again as far as I know) no one was successful in getting anything
through them. Info from Australia suggests the ABC shops are a good source for
the radio series. Info from the US suggests Media Play for the tv series and
possibly even the making-of video. Some of the books are more difficult
(impossible) to get than others. My recent experience indicates that the
UK-based online bookstores (Internet Bookshop at www.bookshop.co.uk and
Bookpages at www.bookpages.co.uk, now part of Amazon.com) hold possibility of
getting UK editions of many of the books, audio books and possibly the radio
series. US-based online stores (Borders, Barnes and Noble, Amazon, etc.) offer
varying success at getting US editions. Smaller bookshops both on and off the
web can be great sources of hard-to-find stuff. This quote from a post by
Peter Seem seems (sorry) to indicate the BBC is flexible on where they ship:
"It's a part of the www.bbcshop.com thing, whatever branch of the BBC runs
that. You need to call the number they give (under "shop assistant", "general
?'s", "is this all the products") It's 0181 576 2000. I called that number,
and the person there had to bounce me over to the CD specific number. Then you
have to get it as the two separate phases. I just asked for catalog numbers
ZBBC1499, and ZBBC1500." Very cool, thanks Peter. [If anyone else has
specific *recent* (within the last 6 months or so) info for the radio series
and tv series, especially for the US, please let me know.]
Please note that like the game, the Radio Series and TV Series are under
copyright. Uploading or downloading audio or video files of them could get you
into trouble. Use a bit of common sense. Fair use should allow short audio
clips of under 30 seconds, though. (Standard disclaimer applies. I do not
have intimate knowledge of the law.)
7. What happened to The Salmon of Doubt?
Despite persistent publication dates (most recently sometime in 1999) in some
ordering systems and a bunch of fake reviews on Amazon.com, this book does not
yet exist and won't for some time (if at all.) Basically, Douglas started
writing a Dirk Gently book. Then Dirk didn't fit. Then later he gave up on
the idea for now. He has said that many of the ideas he came up with belonged
instead in a Hitchhiker book, so the eventual fate of Salmon may be as the
sixth part of the Trilogy. Douglas has several other projects between now and
then, though.
8. What do you get if you multiply six by nine?
Well, 54, of course. It can be argued that in base 13 you get 42. Those of us
who have followed this group for some time have seen the revelations of those
who have newly discovered this. (Some of us have even been there ourselves.)
It's an extremely tired discussion, though. The joke, when Douglas wrote it,
was simply that it was the wrong question for the answer (or the wrong answer
for the question, if you prefer.)
9. Does Douglas Adams read this group?
He hasn't for several years, at least not that we are aware of, at least not
regularly. In fact, it was significant hassling from people here on the group
that chased him away. He does post occasionally, generally when there is
something of particular import he would like everyone to know (see item 4).
And a couple of even more recent posts from him about the upcoming HHGG movie
seem to indicate that he is glancing at the group a bit more than usual, as
they are clearly replies to other posts here.
He is now posting regularly in the forums at douglasadams.com. Threads with
posts by DNA are even marked for easy finding of his posts.
10. What is his email address / web address?
He has a web site whose address has now been beat to death, where one of the
things he mentions is about his decidedly non-secret email address. He would
fans and others like us to please send email to ask...@tdv.com rather than his
other address. There's no guarantee of a personal answer or any acknowledgment
at all, but you never know.
11. What kind of stuff is in the complete FAQ?
Well, all kinds of good stuff, like differences between US and UK versions of
the books, more answers to less frequently asked questions, song lyrics,
biographical info about Douglas, an extensive bibliography, all sorts of silly
info about the making of things, DNA and Dr. Who, links to other cool stuff and
the Question to the Ultimate Answer. Well, maybe not the last one. Again, the
address is http://www.atomiser.demon.co.uk/mh/faq/
Two of the better things linked to the FAQ page are the Ultra-Complete Indices.
These were undertaken a few years back by Mathias Maul and are very useful
when you are looking for a certain quote. You can find The Ultra-Complete
Index to The Hitchhiker's "Trilogy" or The Ultra-Complete Index to Dirk Gently
on the FAQ website.
There's also a huge bibliography or "Multiple-media-ography" which has been
revised and expanded by Owen.
The complete FAQ has been updated again, on August 26, 1998. In the places
where these two documents overlap, info there should be in agreement with info
here. If we have any incorrect info, we are therefore at least definitively
inaccurate. Or maybe it's more like this: the FAQ is definitive; reality is
frequently inaccurate.
12. Where do I find HHGG/DNA _______ on the web?
Looking for sound clips, bad poetry, quotes, indices of certain passages from
the books and other such stuff? Check the FAQ site above, the pages at TDV
(see item 5), the ZZ9 website (see item 14) and the sites below first! You're
bound to find nearly anything you're looking for. (Well, at least when the
list gets longer.)
http://www.floor42.com/
(Kate Brown's very professional-looking site with general info, message boards,
a trivia quiz and more. Quite possibly the best looking DNA fan site I've
seen.)
http://www-personal.umd.umich.edu/~nhughes/dna/
(Nathan Hughes' Douglas Adams Worship Pages - the original source for lots of
cool stuff. He used to maintain the FAQ.)
http://www.thepassword.com/events/archives/transcripts/adams.html
(The official transcript of the June 17, 1998 online chat with Douglas Adams.
Look for yours truly as "CrazyOne42" asking a question about the HHGG game.)
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Hollow/1535/
(Lee Haslam has totally overdesigned this site, but it's one of the cooler
overdesigns I've seen. I like how all the info of the site appears on a
sort-of HHGG-like screen when you press the link.)
http://home.sol.no/~wiruz/HHGTTG/panic.html
(Slartibartfast, from the country with the award-winning coastline, has put
together a bit of useful info. Most of it can probably found somewhere else,
but it was the button at the bottom that says "Do not press this button" and
how that is set up that did it for me. Maybe I'm just easily amused.)
http://www.vogon.com/
(Vogon Heavy Industries is home to an apparently impressive HHGG implementation
(Java, I'm pretty sure), but I've never gotten it to work. Also, it appears to
have been neglected recently. Still, the design is good and concept is
certainly sound. Let me know if it does indeed work.)
A lot of these sites seem to belong to Web Rings and LinkExchange and this sort
of thing. Sorry, but I don't understand why they have to have this. My
opinion of the site goes down when I see these, although it does turn out that
a couple of the above sites do include such items.
[I've gone through my old saved messages that had web addresses in them and
picked out a few that I liked. I realize it's going to be subjective, but
there seems to be a lot of junk and a lot of repetition, and now there will be
the official site as well. Please post or email your web address, though, and
I'll take a look and may plug your site here.]
13. Who is Douglas Adams anyway?
You really don't know? ;-) Douglas Adams is a British author of humorous
science-fiction in various forms. By far his best-known work is The
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (in its various forms) and its sequels. For a
lot more info, please visit the complete FAQ mentioned above. And of course
check out douglasadams.com
14. ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha info
This isn't necessarily a very frequently asked question, but the info certainly
is relevant here. ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha (aka ZZ9) is the official Hitchhiker's
Guide To The Galaxy Appreciation Society. It was established in 1980 and have
released a quarterly magazine, Mostly Harmless, full of interviews, fiction,
news, art, discussion, and so on, ever since. They also produce a wide range
of merchandise related to Douglas Adams exclusively for members of ZZ9. They
come highly recommended by many people on the newsgroup. They also arrange and
coordinate meetings for fans of Hitchhiker's Guide, mainly based around the UK.
The society is based in the UK, but it recently became able to accept
memberships in US dollars. Current details, including contact addresses,
various files of interest, the Ultra-Complete Indices, and so forth, can be
found at their homepage:
http://www.arcfan.demon.co.uk/sf/clubs/zz9/
Thanks for reading!
That's all I have for now. If you have suggestions for more questions or new
info on these ones, please send it/them!
CrazyOne <---
--
craz...@SPAMXcity-net.com | "I say what it occurs to me to say
Greg Pacek | when I think I hear people say
Pittsburgh, PA, USA, Earth | things. More I cannot say."
Creative Craziness Worldwide - http://www.city-net.com/~crazyone