Amazing Stories really doesn't fit, in so far as AM was never a major magazine, and her death is due more to mishandling by her last publisher and the subsequent animosity of the people who purchased that publisher.

In short, Wizards of the Coast (who still own the trademark) had no idea what to do with Amazing Stories, and Hasbro (who bought Wizards a few years back) didn't think a game publisher had any business publishing a magazine. A case of "If we were supposed to use it as an antitank gun we'd call it an antitank gun." The major magazine stuff comes more from the television show than the magazine itself. And that came about because Gary Gygax was a long time fan of the zine, and bought the rights to it when the previous publisher was going under. Steven Spielberg was also a fan, and the two got together to produce the anthology series. Since I worked with Gary on a few projects, this gives me a Spielberg Number of two. Same as my Al Gore and Stephen Hawking Numbers of two.

Now you know the rest of the story.

(Ask me about my John Lennon Number of two.)

Thanks so much for picking this up! I'm flattered! I'll post a sequel on Monday.

Isn't Harper's still publishing?

Yes, Harpers is still publishing, a mistake on my part (I confused it with Harper's Weekly, which is long gone). I'm still trying to figure out how to fix that w/in the limits of YouTube.

In any case, I've posted the sequel to this one, The Freelance National Anthem, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjlvYOmXLc8 .

Thanks!
Bill Dyszel

Ich bemerke jetzt in diesem Moment, dass ich diese Seite wesentlich öfter besuchen müsste ;-) - da kommt der Leser wirklich auf krasse Ideen