If you do the rounds on the GateWorld forums and the comment section of Joe M’s blog, you will probably have come across a poster by the name of Major Davis, one of the most vocal Stargate fans I’ve ever come across (but in a good way!)

I had the pleasure of meeting “the Major” in Chicago earlier this year for a brief few minutes and he’s been a regular attendee of our Hiatus Project chats so when he came to me a few days ago and asked for some help with a project, I was more than happy to say yes.

Major Davis is one of the people involved with the SGU Awareness Campaign, taking the lead from other similar campaigns (Dollhouse, Terminator: TSCC & Caprica) the idea is to fight for the show before it gets cancelled in an effort to ensure that a Save Our Show Campaign (where fans try to get studios and networks to reverse a cancelation decision) is never needed.

The Campaign is really still in its infancy, but they have decided to kick things off with a bang and attempt to get SGU to trend on twitter this Tuesday night.

We at ColonelEz.Net have agreed to lend our support to this and myself and a few of the team will be around on Twitter Tuesday night (8pm to 10pm EST / 1am – 3am GMT) for the hour before the show and when the show airs in the Eastern time zone Tweeting the following hashtags (#SGU & #giveSGUseason3) and we’d love it if you guys could do the same (and drag along some friends)

To get a trending topic you need to try to send unique tweets (better than Retweets) with those hashtags in them, try not to go crazy spamming individuals or driving your own followers crazy – but try to tweet about your love for the show, why you don’t want to see it cancelled, who you like, what you want to see in future episodes/seasons – anything positive about the show is great as long as its got those hashtags.

The more unique tweets that we fans can generate and the more fans we can have doing it, the better (the SGU Awareness team tell us that on average for that time of day – 1000 users and 2000 tweets give the topic(s) a fair chance of trending – but the more the better!

What can you do to support this, well it’s pretty simple:

-          If you have twitter follow @SGUAwareness and tell all your SGU loving fans to do the same.

-          Starting at 8pm EST and going through until 10pm Tweet the crap out of those tags

-          If you cant be online inside of those two hours to tweet it, use TweetDeck to schedule tweets in advance (not a TweetDeck user, there are multiple sites online that schedule tweets from your account for free)

-          Spread the word about this at any fan forum you frequent, get the message out to Facebook groups, forums, your own friends – the more individual tweeters the better

We’ll be having Major Davis on our podcast this week to talk about the Awareness Campaign and the efforts to get the show to trend, so let’s do what we can to make that happen for them & for the show because without SGU, we wouldn’t be here podcasting at you on a weekly basis.

Hope to see you all on Twitter tomorrow night

Cheers,
Terry (Colonel_Ez)

Well hello there!

It’s been a while since we put anything new out, we went straight from podcasting and reviewing into the micro hiatus and that has come and gone so I thought I should do something just to let you know we are all still here.

I’m going to throw some other things in here but this is mostly a blog about our upcoming trip to Chicago, the reasons are twofold – I assume that some of you will enjoy reading it being one and the other being that I have run out of people to vent my excitement about the trip to so it’s you guys turn to get it, but we’ll get to that later.

The micro hiatus went extremely well, largely due to our new tech guy – @Stephenmott… I really should start referring to him as Smotty if only for the Scotty references, because I’ve discovered while working with him that he’s a lot like Scotty (Star Trek Reference).

I don’t mean he’s Scottish, or that he’s a starship engineer (that I know of…) but he has a habit of doing the impossible and making it look easy, but anyway I digress – without “Smotty” our most recent Hiatus run wouldn’t have been so successful, he spent the weeks before and most of the weeks during refining our chat room and adding all sorts of new features, as some regular attendees will know it was our plan to move the Hiatus Project to a new chat room system for the season two hiatus, but because of the hard work Smotty has done – and will continue to do, we have decided to stay here.

But I think that’s enough praise for now for our man in the engine room, the hiatus went great as I said, we got through this run without any trouble makers and once again we had regular visits from Herb Sommerfeld and Mark Savela (SGU Extra and SGU VFX wizard respectively)

I’m big on learning from everything we do and trying to make improvements, I think this time around our only issue was that some people were still unfamiliar with the chats purpose, a few weeks we had people attend that didn’t understand that if they hadn’t seen the episodes being discussed then they would probably end up getting spoilers, im not sure if there is anything we can do to avoid that particular problem for people but – we’ll be making sure that for the season 2 hiatus project we ramp up a word of mouth campaign again to get the word out about exactly what we’re doing.

Now, onto Chicago – I’m unfortunately 5% less excited than I was a few weeks ago, because Brian (@Nunchux) is no longer able to attend, we were looking into the possibility or recording a podcast episode from Chicago (or maybe doing one live) but the novelty of that is lost now that he cant attend – lets face it, what’s different about recording a show with one of us in Chicago and one of us in Colorado than recording a show with one of us in Wales and one of us in Colorado, apart from a few less hours time difference – but, it’s still going to be a great few days with Sherry, Karrie, Bruce and Curtis (@ShowPatrol).

As I said earlier, I’ve been boring my friends and family to tears with talk of this trip, im unfortunately a somewhat obsessive planner when it comes to any sort of trip, once im there – im fine to go with the flow, but the travel elements… I get a bit crazy and you can’t keep crazy to yourself, you have to release it along the way – otherwise shit goes insane…

I love to travel and I love to meet new people, in this case it seems a bit funny to call these guys new people because they have been my constant companions for over 12 months, but I’ve never stood in the same room with them – so its going to be new – I mean does Sherry actually make that buzzing noise herself, or is it really just a product of her microphone? Is Karrie really going to beat me as many times as she has said she is going to, has she saved them up?

I’m also excited because its my second convention, my first was a little unsure as podcast listeners will remember I’ve mentioned this – its different being a geek now than it used to be, its more… cool… whether a product of when I was growing up or where (or both) my love of Sci Fi has always been a covert love, sure I took to the internet and geeked hard like most of you but with actual people, in the same place – bizarre… but I had a great time at my first con earlier this year (despite getting sick on day two and looking like death by the end)

But anyway, this is a touch more ramble than I wanted (I did toy with the idea of podcasting this but, without a co-pilot I just sound like a weird guy talking to myself) but speaking of podcasts, we’re going to squeeze out a few summer sessions before SGU returns at the end of September, I have a feeling one of them is going to be a random-cast simply because myself and Brian have such a discussion going on at the moment that I feel it needs to be out there for others to enjoy (or mock, or facepalm at) you see… when he found out he couldn’t attend Chicago I felt bad and im a nice guy so I thought, what can I do to cheer him up – that thing I could do became reading twilight, which im in the process of doing at the moment – during my reading we’ve talked a few times and our discussion about twilight and Lord Of The Rings has continued but never been resolved – so I expect one of our summer sessions to be a book war (I’m reminded of that family guy episode… “That’s right folks, it’s gonna be a Meg episode… there’s the clicker… nobody would blame you…”)

I’m going to stop myself now before I ramble further, except for saying how great it was to see you all (new and old faces) at the hiatus project chats and to ask any of you who are attending the Chicago Stargate Convention (or live in the Chicago area) to let us know, I’d love to meet some of you guys if there is the chance and im sure the others would too.

Cheers!
Terry
(The Colonel)

(more…)

Lifting up Rocks in the Stargate Fandom

By Terry Humphreys

If you are reading this you probably know what its going to be about, you probably also know as I do that its largely fruitless to write it and expect it to affect change, but sometimes you just have to get something out there and go on record to stand up for something.

I’ve never understood hate for a TV show, sure – I’m very critical about my TV viewing, I’ll often discard a show after two episodes or not watch it at all because I dislike an actors performance, or the premise of the show – it’s just the way that I… and I’m sure all of you treat your TV viewing.

For example, it should be no surprise to many that when SGU was first announced and the premise was detailed, I was not a fan – I felt as many others did that the shows change in direction and younger cast would take the franchise in the wrong direction.

But, as time went on and more information about the show came out I found I was more and more interested, add to that the cast and crew being very engaged with fans about shooting on the show got me more and more interested, until I couldn’t be more excited for the show and now 17 episodes into its first season – it is my favourite show airing at the moment – I have never been happier to be proven wrong for an early, uninformed judgement.

Although, part of me understands those that don’t like it, those that aren’t fans and those that choose not to watch, the circumstances surrounding SGU’s launch are well known and the events of those few days will always be a reason for some to dislike the show.

What I don’t understand is those people who have taken their hatred of the show, its inception and its cast and crew so far as to not only create a place to spread their hatred, but to extend so far as to attack friends and family of the shows cast.

Sherry Harris is a mother, we all have them – they are great people who’ve spent countless years being proud of your achievements – whether you learnt to walk, kicked your first football, passed a test, got a degree, or became a star of a popular TV show – it usually doesn’t matter to a mother how much you have achieved, they are proud of you.

Now I’m lucky enough to be able to count Sherry as a friend, one of the people (a group of people I could count on one hand) that I call a close friend that I’ve never met, we joke about her being our E-mom around here, shouldn’t be a surprise to anybody that we love her around here.

So I cannot fathom these people who have made her a target simply because she is proud of her son and defends him in public, I can understand not liking the show, I can understand not liking the characters but you lose me at not liking the people that play them and you completely piss me off by hating on their family.

As with others who have spoken up against this, I know that taking this stand opens me and our site up for the same type of attacks that others who support SGU are subject to, however I don’t care, this has been allowed to go on unaddressed for far too long and I personally feel that every site that claims to be a supporter of the show should make use of their site to register their feelings over these events.

A site was set up by a group of people who didn’t like SGU, a place where they feel free to bash a person because they have a son that stars in a show they don’t like, following the same logic, here on the site that we have set up, we will feel equally free to admonish these people.

You represent the worst elements of a fandom, some pretty sucky aspects of humanity and I personally feel sorry for you – because your efforts are largely wasted, in targeting individuals in your hatred you polarize their supporters, like the flocks of people who have contacted Brian J Smith & Sherry on twitter offering their support, or like Michael Hinman of AirlockAlpha who has written his own editorial on the subject.

To close, I hope that the attention you have gotten over the last day will serve to shine a light into the dark little forum where you live and draw some much needed attention to how completely pathetic you all are.

Welcome & The Downfalls Of Operating Online

By Terry Humphreys

Hi there and welcome to the Editorials section.

I decided a few weeks ago that I wanted to throw a section up on the site where I could talk about things related to the fandoms we follow, the site we run and the projects we manage – not a review, but not exactly a blog – something in between.

I’ll try to talk about this section and its purpose by citing some examples for why I wanted to set it up.

See, when we made the site, the big thing I wanted was organisation, everything to have its place – on the old blogspot I threw everything into one feed, my reviews, my random thoughts, my updates on the hiatus project – all there in one messy lump.

So, we built this site with a place for everything and where everything has its place, alas – I noticed soon after launch that something was missing, that odds and ends section, that “you know what really grinds my gears” section of the site.

Let’s be honest, most of us who come onto the internet have opinions and we tend to share them, which is good – part of what I love about the community we have formed on twitter and beyond is the opportunity to discuss things with other people and to not always agree on every point.

But what I didn’t want was for us to share our opinions in the wrong places, I mean – there would be nothing quite as unprofessional as any one of us including our personal feelings about another news site or individual in one of our interviews or reviews.

You may ask why I went there for an example, well – bear with me and I’ll do my best to get to it.

I talk a lot about the great things about doing what I do with the hiatus project, website and podcast – I love it and the sense of community it builds, that I can do things for my friends to enjoy; that I can make new friends off the back of working on these things I love doing.

I try not to talk about the negative, long hours of work after your work day is meant to be finished being one, but that’s just a niggle – the real bad stuff that comes with putting yourself out there and getting some success online is, some people don’t like you for it.

Since we started to grow out of the hiatus project we’ve had… let me call them a constant companion, that companion has developed into quite the thorn in our side, the annoying little thing that won’t go away – the perpetually stubbed toe, the nasty blue mind altering tic on the back of your neck.

It seems that just by doing what we are doing, we offend them, it doesn’t seem possible for a week to go by without some issue involving them coming up in a public forum, its annoying, irritating and its just not cricket.

We’ve been content to leave most of this unaddressed, it serves nobody well if we are having an e-pissing contest with another site instead of working on new stuff for you guys to enjoy however, it doesn’t seem as though this problem is going to go away so, in the spirit of everything having its place, I felt it was time for our site to have a section where, on occasion – should it be needed, I could fire a sarcastic shot across the bow, a cheeky little – “hey… you over there… yeah you! So… yeah, we did notice and yeah… we do think it’s childish…. but ya know what, we can do it too and you never know, we might be better at it than you”

But that’s not all the editorials section is, in fact – I very much hope after this post those it refers to (yeah, that’s right – you! No, not that guy behind you… you!) Will have gotten the message and the problem will go away.

The editorials section is quite simply, for this – whenever myself or one of the other writing staff have something on their minds that relates to the work we do in some way and want to share it, its not an interview, its not news, its not a review – its social commentary (and occasional warning shots!) and its in the right place.

Hope you enjoyed and please, feel free to comment here about what I’ve written or about other things you’d like us to write about

Too Blunt?

Cheers,
Terry Humphreys (Colonel_Ez)