Fueling the Muse

How to tell if the scientist you're talking to is a chemist or an astrophysicist: Ask them if carbon is a metal

This fan fiction is older than the push-through tabs on soda cans.

Your grandma wrote this on her Commodore 64.

I miss my Commodore 64

Oh my dear, sweet children. The Commodore 64 came out in 1982. This was produced on a typewriter and probably mimeographed. And while it may seem funny now, it took more courage to write and distribute this than you will ever  know.

Reblogged for that last comment.

respect your elders

Children, in the olden days fanfiction was written on a typewriter, copied and sent by snail mail. Getting one one of those letters from across the world was every bit as exciting as getting a notification that your favorite writer posted a new fic.

The precedent line is especially amusing when you bear in mind that “A Fragment Out of Time” is not only the first Star Trek slashfic to be published in a widely distributed magazine: it’s believed by some to be the first slashfic of any kind to be widely published.

In 1974 it was illegal to send pornography through the USPS. So distributing fic like this via mailed newsletter was literally dangerous. And they knew it.

I kicked like a child when I realized what song this was!