Camestros Felapton

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The Phantom Nominations

There was a comment from The Phantom to this post which said:

tinyphantom That looked like a lot of work. Don’t you ever think about anything else? We paid $40 and nominated stuff we liked. That’s the extent of most Puppy’s participation. Getting a sweep of the noms was a surprise.
Having all those noms No Awarded was not a surprise. Because that’s what we know to expect from y’all. See a witch, burn a witch. Anything not talking from the Daily Talking Points is a witch.
That our collective choices were counter to your taste is the entire reason and purpose of Sad Puppies. We are tired of your taste being dominant. Time to try something else.
That the very idea somebody might differ from the Party Line continues to be such an outrage, even four years on, this is simply delicious.
 Which is a variation on the its-not-a-slate style arguments i.e. Sad Puppies 3 was just people joining and voting for what they liked and it was all big surprise to them that they tended to vote for the same things.
For this to be true there are two aspects that need to be considered.
The first has been discussed before in several ways. That is for the slate-like results to have occurred without the SP3 slate being a slate (despite all the overt reasons that it was a slate), the pool of possible choices that puppy–voters drew from would have to have been small. This sounds implausible, but it does have some merit. We can see from the Sad Puppy 4 suggestions that while there are many books people might nominate there are only a few books that many people will nominate that have the ineffable Puppyish quality.
If we assume a very small pool of potential Puppy nominations then it would be possible to get slate like nominations without a slate. This requires everybody to ignore that there was actually a published list of nominations actually called a slate with an associated campaign that followed two previous slates but let’s just see where this takes us.
The second aspect has been touched on less. If we Sad Puppies as just a group of people who nominated things, who just so happened to have very similar taste and so ended up voting for very similar things then…WHERE ARE THE NON-SLATE PUPPY NOMINEES? Many/most categories had a fullish set of nominees in the SP3 slate and when it didn’t the spaces were taken up by Rabid Puppy nominees. However, there are a few places were there was space even in the combined Sad and Rabid slates. In those spaces, if The Phantom is correct, the people-who-just-happen-to-vote-the-same would still have just voted for similar stuff.
Is there any evidence of this? I started at Semiprozine because there is one obvious candidate that is sufficiently Puppy aligned that it was odd that SP3 didn’t push it.

Jason Rennie’s Sci-Phi Journal was not on either the Sad or Rabid slates for Semiprozine even though his Sci-Phi podcast (http://sciphishow.com/sci-phi-show-got-nominated-for-a-hugo/) was on the slates.

Looking at the Hugo 2015 nominations numbers about 179 people voted for Sci-Phi Show in Best Fancast, whereas in Semiprozine Sci-Phi Journal only just scrapes into the list of also-rans with 29 votes. These two categories are about equal in terms of how many people nominate for them, so the difference in raw numbers is basically comparable.

Moving on to the Best Graphic Story category. This was notable for being a bit of an embarrassment for the whole Puppy campaign. Brad could only muster up one nomination for his slate and it was the woeful Zombie Nation. So this left the field open for all of the Puppies who-just-so-happen to all vote for similar things to really show us how they vote independently of a slate.

Hmmm. Arguably Schlock Mercenary got some Puppy love but it’s base is broader than just the pups. So that’s maybe one (6.5% of the vote). Girl Genius got it’s regular set of votes (3.7%) but that is a Hugo regular. Order of the Stick has a much wider fanbase than the pups but maybe it’s D&D themes appealed (3.6%)?  Simply put, you can’t spot the Puppy impact in this category EXCEPT for the single slated work.

And this is true in general. There are two associations that show The Phantom’s story to be implausible in general (although it maybe true at a specific individual level). The Puppy voting block is highly VISIBLE for the works that were on the SLATES. The Puppy voting block is barely visible for works that were not on the slate but which were Puppy-like. Slate = impact, non-slate = no impact.

camestrosfelapton

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29 responses to “The Phantom Nominations”

  1. I hate to offer such a prosaic explanation, but Sci-Phi Journal will have been ineligible in 2015 under the 4 issues role. On the other hand, the puppies have been demonstrably terrible at working out eligibility (Weir, Tuesday’s with Moloch) and 29 of them made that mistake, so maybe that doesn’t matter.

    I think your method here is sound though. It’s an interesting question as to what sort of distribution non-slate puppy picks should show.

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    • Double posts are uncouth, but I was looking at Novella where there were two free slots for SP voters. The only credible puppy-adjacent stories I can see on the longlist are the Rothfuss and the Sanderson (on the slim grounds that both are successful epic fantasy writers) but you can make a strong case that each were likely to have picked up their votes from non-SP. That particularly goes for Sanderson who has previous noms.

      Short story ought to have attracted decent independent puppy participation based on what categories got traction for SP4. You could make the long list with 33 votes, but there’s nothing in there that says puppy to me. Surely there were candidates from baen.com, Intergalactic Medicine Show, Galaxy‘s Edge, etc.

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      • Maybe with all that charity work, giving livestock to furriners, Rothfuss is just too SJW? But you’d think Brad would have been in the tank for Sanderson and slated him. Or the SP would have voted for him all on their own, him being popular and successful.

        The fact that no Puppy influence was seen outside slates proves that they don’t all think alike when they’re allowed to choose on their own (Just like all the rest of the voters!). If that was true, their silent “majority” wouldn’t need slates to get nominations. They’d have all risen up independently and converged on a set of stories. At least as far as getting one of their non-slated choices on the ballot, somewhere.

        You’d think something would have stood out that filled their “Nutty Nuggets, no SJW” requirements. They didn’t all find something in Galaxy’s Edge edited by their heroic martyr Mike Resnick? Why, even some of the SJWs of File 770 are nominating a story from there this year!

        Must admit SP4 is doing better this year — Paulk’s not just bowing down to Teddy and rubber-stamping his choices. Good for her, I say; Teddy’s used the “Puppy” concept to promote himself, ripping them off, and it’s great to see her trying to put some space between them.

        (I mean that without sarcasm, Kate, honestly; Teddy’s a vile toad and you’re better than him.)

        Liked by 1 person

  2. I did not say it wasn’t a slate. It was. It’ll be one this year as well. Kate’s making it up right now.

    I liked and had read most of what was on the slate. It’s a slate made out of what I liked this year. I agreed with the choices.

    If Kate puts Ancillary 3 on the nom list this year I won’t nominate it. I can’t read the Ancillary series, the story line is repugnant. Slavery etc. is not something I’m willing to read about.

    The surprise last year was how well our noms did. The no-surprise was the chicken-shit no awarding afterward.

    Duh.

    However the results of us showing up to vote have been three years of screaming from people I’m happy were offended. I hope for much more and better screaming this year. Mike Glyer will spend another 12 months boosting his otherwise moribund blog numbers with Sad Puppies coverage.

    We don’t have to win a single Hugo to beat the SJWs, all we have to do is show up and make ’em go crazy. Nobody likes a crazy SJW.

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    • So, Phantom, what did you do with the free slots that Brad left? Did you ignore them, fill them with RP picks, or choose some things of your own?

      You say you liked and agreed with the SP slate. What do you think your vote would have been if the SP3 slate had never been published? The same, or did you have some personal favourites that would have gone on instead?

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        • Well, I’d agree that your precise nominations are your own business, but you could address the issue in a general way without revealing those. The first is multiple choice – “none”, “RP”, or “other” – and the last question is a simple yes or no – was the SP slate what you would have voted for in the absence of that slate?

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      • Mark,

        From his post, I don’t think the Phantom thinks it important. It seems not to be so much about liking this or that but of “making people scream” and “beating the SJWs”. Seems to me he is being duped by authors using outrage to niche market books.

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  3. “We are tired of your taste being dominant. Time to try something else.”

    Observations and questions:

    1. This is a fan based award. Why are your tired of the Fans taste being reflected in their awards?
    2. Puppies still got dominated. That’s because not many people have puppy taste and/or are willing to march nose to puppy leader in voting. The Fans judgement is demonstrated by a record number of “no awards”. Shouldn’t you respect the fans judgement?
    3. There is an award that should satisfy puppy taste, the Prometheus award. It isn’t very prestigious but it is a puppy type award. I think Sarah won it. Why not participate in a award that reflects puppy taste.
    4. On broader based awards, the pups don’t do well either. Compare the 2014 puppy nominations to the Goodread Choice Awards. In that award, Hugo Fan favorites tend to outperform puppy favorites. Why don’t you freep that award?
    5. The puppy leaders are second tier authors. Could it be the so called puppy movement is just niche marketing to sell books to conservative culture warriers?
    6. This year the pups seem to be changing their strategy. In the past their was not much market support for the works that they championed. This year there seems to be an effort to slate things with market support – a sort of me too strategy. That’s fine, but what is the purpose of that?

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    • 1. “This is a fan based award. Why are your tired of the Fans taste being reflected in their awards?”

      I am a fan. Hugos do not reflect my taste. Never have. So last year I nominated and voted for stuff I liked.

      2. “Shouldn’t you respect the fans judgement?”

      I am a fan. I voted. Behold the results. Blanket slate voting of No Award, and nobody has shut up about it since. I call that a huge win for busting up the status quo.

      3. “Why not participate in a award that reflects puppy taste.”

      I am a fan. I get to vote. Fuck off.

      4. Why don’t you freep that award?

      Please see #3

      5. The puppy leaders are second tier authors. Could it be the so called puppy movement is just niche marketing to sell books to conservative culture warriers?

      Could it be that the existence of a different opinion to your own is so threatening that you feel the need to attack it by any and all means?

      6. This year the pups seem to be changing their strategy.

      Yes, this year we aim to vote again. Such a change from last year, isn’t it?

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      • Last year pups freeped the award and the Hugo Fans said it was crap. This was the vote of the Fans. Why is it you don’t respect the vote of the Fans. Are they wrong Fans, reading wrong books, having wrong fun, and making wrong votes?

        As to your question, no. I am happy to see what other people think. There is an award the reflects Puppy taste. It is called the Promethius award. It doesn’t offend even though it isn’t my taste. I don’t think it offends anyone here. Sarah won the award as I recall. Sarah could never win a Hugo and that’s fine but she can win that one. Nothing wrong with that.

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  4. Given the ink spilled here and elsewhere about the Evile Slates!!!1!, your defense of the No Award slate is hysterical.

    No doubt this year there will be a Double Assterisk issued.

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  5. What defense and what slate?

    The vote simply reflects the judgement of the Fans. Do you think that are wrong Fans making wrong votes?

    A no award slate would mean that no award was placed on the ballot during the nomination process. Such a thing is nonsensical. “No Award” has been and is always an option for Fans in exercising their judgement.

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    • I see, so Sad Puppies was a slate and therefore evil incarnate, but 3,000 people blanket-voting No Award at the behest of Steve Davidson (among many, many others) is just “the judgement of the fans.”

      And the fact that more people voted last year than have in ages, if ever, has no bearing on anything. Nor do the efforts of some to give out free voting memberships to people “who couldn’t afford it.”

      Please see my comment of March 15th above, at #3.

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      • Not even close to the same thing. On one hand a minority freeped the nomination as part of a culture war when they could have voted for anything they liked. And they put crap on the ballot. On the other hand fans brought their judgement to the ballot that was before them. One group followed the puppy leader – pack leader I suppose. The other group voted what they liked during the nomination.

        After the ballot is determined, Fans have to vote what is set before them. If a lot puppy freeped tufff is crap, they have will vote it below no award. If they nominate something really good like they did with Gaurdians, they didn’t.

        Really Phantom, you are not in it for the SFF; you are not a Fan. You are in it to answer the call of your puppy leaders. You are simply a tea-puppy. As you say, you were happy “people were offended”, not to “win a single Hugo to beat the SJWs”, and “show up and make ’em go crazy”.

        Except puppys didn’t show up. Not only did they get dominated in the vote they were no-shows in the business meeting were to measures were passed to counter puppy slating. Puppies don’t show up because puppies are not Worldcon Fans. They are culture warriors concerned about SJW at the bequest of second tier authors trying to stir up some interest. Not much room left for SFF fandom is there?

        After EPH, pups will continue to yelp but they won’t continue to pay the membership fee. They will eventually go away and real Fans will go back to arguing over SFF. And…. Larry Correia still won’t win a Hugo – but will sell a lot of books to wingnuts.

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      • “Would you like to re-post it with fewer direct insults.”

        No, not really. When replying to “Really Phantom, you are not in it for the SFF; you are not a Fan. You are in it to answer the call of your puppy leaders. You are simply a tea-puppy.” there’s not much left beyond personal insults. Mine were rather restrained, generally I go harder.

        You don’t like heat, maybe you should stop stoking the flames, eh? Just a thought.

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  6. One of the few things in your phantom post I agreed with was when you reiterated that you are a fan. At least for the purposes of the Hugo award, a fan is effectively “anyone who cares enough to pay for a membership”, and if you did that then you are in, no gatekeepers required. The question is whether the puppy tactics broke the principle of “one fan one vote”. I’d still be interested to hear whether you feel the SP picks you voted were your natural picks, and how you handled the blank spots.

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    • “The question is whether the puppy tactics broke the principle of “one fan one vote”. ”

      I’m one fan. I voted my one vote. Nobody paid, coerced or fooled me into voting, I chose and voted myself. As did all others of which I am aware, possible exceptions being those who had their memberships purchased for them. That was a thing last year, as I recall.

      Some guy posted a list on the interwebz. I liked the list, as I had read much of it already. I voted for some of the stuff on it, other stuff I did not, I put in what I wanted. The end.

      Now, almost a year later, I’m still getting crap for DARING to be a fan and vote what I liked.

      What am I nominating this year? Not a hell of a lot, I’ve been writing, not reading. I expect I’ll go over Kate’s list, see what is worthy, and nominate it if it is. God knows there’s been sweet f- all to read in the aisles of the bookstore this year, that’s certain.

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      • OK, so you didn’t follow Brad’s slate to the letter, that’s good to hear. You’ve not quite addressed what I was driving at though: if the slate hadn’t existed, would you still have voted the way you did? If not, then you’re describing how you participated in a process that artificially centred a group of voters on the works on Brad’s list, so that even if like you they didn’t agree with them all, the overall effect was to concentrate that groups’ votes. That’s why I say “one fan one vote” has been broken; non-slate voters were much more diffuse in their choices, while a tactical concentration around the SP slate had the effect of magnifying the power of your vote.

        (On your other point, I’m aware of MRKs membership donation drive which I believe received funding from both sides of the aisle, the recipients of which were demonstrably also from both sides of the aisle. None of them were told what to vote for, and as a practical matter it would be impossible to enforce)

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      • Without Sad Puppies I’d have been unaware there was any point in participating at all. Hugo suckage would have remained Just One Of Those Things. Plus I will remind you, yet again, no rules of any kind were broken. There is no rule against slates. There is no legitimate moral objection against slates. Slate voting is a thing that happens at WorldCon, the Puppies were not the first and will not be the last.

        What we did was successfully challenge the well-established -political- agenda of the Hugos in-group, and for that crime and that one alone we continue to be excoriated. That’s what Correia did the first two years just by daring to show up, and that’s why File770 , Making Light, CF et-al continue their hate campaigns.

        Just check out the comments on this page. It’s political. None of you give two shits about SF, you’re bashing perceived anti-Progressive elements. Slates and “quality” are the excuse, not the source of the rage.

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        • “There is no legitimate moral objection against slates.”

          I think there is an obvious one. A slate can result in the nominations being dominated by works that will be unpopular when it comes to the voting. That is a technical flaw in the system and exploiting it makes the system go all skew-whiff. If a person KNOWS this and uses a slate to exploit that then it undermines the award process for everybody. I think don’t-do-stuff-that-will-make-everybody-unhappy-including-yourself is a reasonable ethical principle,

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      • “None of you give two shits about SF”

        You know, having _just_ agreed that anyone who wants to participate is a fan, no gatekeeping necessary, for you to then throw the same BS back is really disappointing. Also, obviously wrong: why would I be bothering to read lots of SF and pay to vote if I didn’t care?

        “Just check out the comments on this page. It’s political.”

        No. Unless you believe talking about puppies to be inherently political, the only conversations that have strayed into politics have been the ones you’re involved in.

        Anyway, you’ve neatly dodged around the question I’ve been asking several times, so I’m just going to assume that you concede that had you been nominating in a non-slate year, you’d have chosen differently. That’s really the point: whether or not the slate was followed exactly, it provided enough of a focal point to persuade people to nominate something different from normal, magnifying their nominating power.

        There’s what I am coming to recognise as a pervasive tactic in this kerfuffle, a slightly more sophisticated version of “I know you are but what am I” or perhaps a matter of seeing your own reflection, where the puppies consistently see their own tactics motivations in their so-called opponents. The puppies organised as a group, so they insist their “opponents” are an organised group. The puppies used politics as a motivator, so they insist their “opponents” are political. The puppies concocted a slate, so they claimed their “opponents” did it first. Some puppies are motivated by careers and money, and those ones claim their “opponents” are. And so on.

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  7. As a followup, I tend to agree with GRRM. I am not a Fan either and that doesn’t mean anything bad. However, I attempted to narrow it even more by using the term Worldcon Fan and Hugo Fan and using the capital “F”. When I address puppies I mean they are not Worldcon Fans………

    I do think each organization has its own Demographic and point of view which I celebrate. Particularly the ones that actually travel and participate and where many have done so over a number of years.

    What puppies have told me repeatedly is they joined Worldcon because [insert reason of the day]. I make a distinction in that regard. Mostly, the reason resolves to Hugo Fans are Wrong Fans, reading Wrong Books, for Wrong reasons and casting Wrong votes. If there was a substantial number of puppies reflecting the puppy philosophy and taste, they might be able to do something about their assertions. But there isn’t. It is a small and vocal group. So they will fade away.

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  8. The Phantom said:

    “What am I nominating this year? Not a hell of a lot, I’ve been writing, not reading. I expect I’ll go over Kate’s list, see what is worthy, and nominate it if it is. ”

    I rest my case.

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