Amazon, Macmillan, e-readers

If you haven't heard, Amazon and Macmillan have gone to war, with the unfortunate result, for readers and writers caught in the middle, that you can't buy Macmillan's books on Amazon.com, and writers can't sell Macmillan's books on Amazon.com. Macmillan is the large parent company that owns the huge presses of St. Martin's Press, Henry Holt and Co., Tor (science fiction), Forge (mostly mystery but other stuff as well), my beloved Scientific American and several other publishers. They are Big Guys. Amazon.com is the world's largest online bookseller, selling multiple other items as well.

( My mixed reader/writer response )

The Mummy

Do you know how you can tell that The Mummy, with Brendan Fraser, is a terrible movie?

We were fifteen minutes into it before we realized that we were actually watching its sequel, The Mummy Returns.

(Which is also a terrible movie, but we took it out and watched The Mummy instead on the basis that at least The Mummy does not have an overly cute kid, whatever its other multiple defects.)

It is, I admit, entirely possible that we might have noticed this sooner had we not had various complaints about the armour, the set direction, the portrayal of Egyptian religion, and the horrific CGI. Or perhaps not.