[Kirok]

Wouldn't it be nice if it were Christmas all year long?

Christmas is a Christian festival that has become popular all over the world and in just about every culture. It has transcended its beginnings as a church holiday and is accepted as a part of Western culture. It is gazetted as a public holiday and government has legislated retail trading laws that regulate the hours that shops can stay open. It is in effect now a state holiday, at least it is in Australia where I live!

Whilst the religious aspects of the holiday are still observed in Christian communities, not everyone celebrates it as they do. The Christmas message holds two aspects however that can be respected by every person on the globe whether they be Christian, Humanist, Buddhist or Moslem:

Peace on Earth
and
Goodwill to all men

For the third year in a row, The House of L'Stok is sponsoring The Twelve Trek Days of Christmas. Twelve presents, which (in theory) will be given out on the website over the traditional twelve days between Christmas and Twelfth Night.

It is my hope that by showing how fan production groups can give away presents for free not just over Christmas but all through the year, it might encourage us all to remember the spirit of brotherhood that pervades the Christmas season, all year round.

Seasons Greetings to old friends, new friends and friends I have never met!

Kirok of L'Stok

[Terilynn]

Huzzah! I'm so excited!

This post has been edited by Terilynn: 27 December 2009 - 08:57 PM

[Kirok]

Klingons are often depicted as being mindlessly aggressive barbarians without culture, art or sport. Nothing could be further from the truth and to prove it, this year, I have put together a simple to make portable game board and playing pieces for Klin Zha, Klingon chess! This game, steeped in the spirit of combat and valour is uniquely Klingon: you don't just capture pieces, you kill them! Play boldly and with honor and along the way learn something of the final reflection, the great game of life.

[Bill]

I am a big fan of playing chess. I have a number unique sets I have acquired over the years.
I really like the concept of "killing off the opponents pieces"

As always I look forward to how 2009's Twelve days unfolds!

[barbreader]

Bill, on 28 December 2009 - 06:50 AM, said:

As always I look forward to how 2009's Twelve days unfolds!

Likewise.

[Kirok]

Thanks for the support, Terilynn, Bill and Barbreader - I appreciate it. Klin Zha is from me (who knows, next year a 3D chess set?), but the internet is littered with freely downloadable material that fans can try. This year's 12 Days might not be as high profile as previous years but I think I've got something interesting up my sleeve for the Enterprise fans to finish off with.

Cheers

K

[Terilynn]

Excellent!!! The Enterprise fans need a little love! Looking forward to all of this once more K. So great!

[Kirok]

Terilynn, on 28 December 2009 - 09:11 AM, said:

Excellent!!! The Enterprise fans need a little love! Looking forward to all of this once more K. So great!

Thanks, T! I'm flat out like a lizard drinking at the moment - I'll catch up later.

K

[Terilynn]

I will tweet the link to the Blogger site K...That last update was utterly amazing! Jam packed with TONS of information! that's 12 days of fun right there!

[Bill]

Whilst Kirok is off "Lizard Drinking" ,I'll do my minor part and LINK TO DAY TWO Lots of great stuff there!

[Kirok]

Thanks for the links guys! Christmastide is always exciting in the House of L'Stok - trying to post about the Twelve Days whilst I'm writing it is like trying to work on a motorbike engine whilst you are riding it!



It has been pointed out that the embedded viewer on the release page has no download link although you can print it. If you go to the file on Issuu HERE...
<http://issuu.com/kir...klin_zha-1.2.1c>
...there is a download button, fourth from the left on the top menu bar.

Cheers

K

[Kirok]

Day 2: Citizen Journalism

Fan production is about roleplaying! Some fans fantasise that they are film-makers or actors, artists or writers. Others want to be involved but have different talents, such as sound editing, managing a website or carpentry which are all very useful to a production group. Citizen journalism is halfway between. It is creative yet practical by reporting on what the fan productions are doing or commenting on it on forums, websites, Blogs, fanzines and podcasts.

This was the news and the way it was reported by the fans, for the fans, in 2009.

[Kirok]

Day 3: Three Wise Men


With the down-turn in the economy, this year I could only afford two wise men, Doug Zeitlin and Jim Caswell, the prime movers behind TWERPs (Time Well Electronic Productions) who, for the third year in a row have contributed a specially dedicated podcast for the Twelve Trek Days of Christmas. This year they have taken the bit between the teeth and tackled one of the thorniest questions in Star Trek fandom: Why, in a programme that prides itself on its intellectual content, is there so little said about religion and politics?

Read more on the website and download this year's Trekcast from the TWERPs website, http://www.twerponline.net/twerpcast

[Kirok]

Day 4: Audio Dramas



In the five years that fans have been making Star Trek audio dramas we have built up a sizable body of work with over 170 episodes. Recently there have been attempts to create directories of them so its only fair that I open the archives of The House of L'Stok to the public to give you the details as they were recorded by my loyal minions.

Today's present is a listing of every Star Trek audio drama known to me as the posting date. Are they good? That's for you to decide!

Coming tomorrow? Five Fan Films!

[barbreader]

I'm guessing you intended the Audio Drama to be Day 4...

[Kirok]

barbreader, on 01 January 2010 - 12:03 AM, said:

I'm guessing you intended the Audio Drama to be Day 4...

OOPS! Thanks for that. Edited that in the original post - K

[barbreader]

Your forth day gift is an amazing and wonderful one. I've linked to it from my webpage/blog which includes a list of audio dramas, and added the audio dramas you had that I didn't have to that page as well. Not, however, in the detail you offer. I'll probably add links to that page from each and every audio drama on that page, too. Wow, what a lot of work!

[Bill]

Amazing list Kirok, thanks as always for all your hard work!

[Kirok]

Bill, on 01 January 2010 - 07:23 AM, said:

Amazing list Kirok, thanks as always for all your hard work!

Thanks to both of you. I was only half joking about "opening my records" - To keep track of what I write about I have been keeping records in an Excel spreadsheet which I imported into Access to turn into a report. Unfortunately my latest updates didn't come through so I had to add them by hand last night straight into Blogger! I can honestly say I did a year's work last night! I worked straight through from 2009 to 2010!

It doesn't have the same breadth of material as your ST Reviewed , Barb, but I have been going into detail by recording the producer, director, writer and I have a separate sheet (or table in Access) for performers so in theory I could do an IMDB for fan productions online.

I say in theory because it would be a full time job to keep it up to date and I'm only doing annual updates. I have an audio darama planned for Jan - April and then I'll be free to try my hand at something I've been wanting to try since I saw E: TCW - an Enterprise Machinima!

Back to the five fan films ... you'll never guess which they are!!!

K

[barbreader]

Kirok, on 01 January 2010 - 07:42 AM, said:

Thanks to both of you. I was only half joking about "opening my records" - To keep track of what I write about I have been keeping records in an Excel spreadsheet which I imported into Access to turn into a report. Unfortunately my latest updates didn't come through so I had to add them by hand last night straight into Blogger! I can honestly say I did a year's work last night! I worked straight through from 2009 to 2010!

It doesn't have the same breadth of material as your ST Reviewed , Barb, but I have been going into detail by recording the producer, director, writer and I have a separate sheet (or table in Access) for performers so in theory I could do an IMDB for fan productions online.

I say in theory because it would be a full time job to keep it up to date and I'm only doing annual updates. I have an audio darama planned for Jan - April and then I'll be free to try my hand at something I've been wanting to try since I saw E: TCW - an Enterprise Machinima!

Back to the five fan films ... you'll never guess which they are!!!

K

Two unrelated thoughts:

1) Machinima... yech! I wish I could find a good excuse to exclude those from fan films and trade them for audio! I confess I am watching the rest of the game runout on Star Trek: A Final Unity. It's somewhat boring, but interesting enough that I want to know what happens.
2) I'm interested in your take on Incident on Beta 9, a Klingon-centric Fan Film in the Multiverse Crisis series. Fan Film Fridays will review it in the next month or two. Randy Hall was delighted by it. I consider you more Klingon-centric (can't imagine why... ha ha) and I'd like to hear what you think. It was shot in 2002, before Enterprise tackled the subject of why Klingons look different in TOS than in TNG and other series.

Concerning your comments about listing... with the work you just did, I hope you have just a tiny taste of why I felt I had to limit what my website covered. I see a lot of Trek websites that do a lot for six months and then aren't touched for years. I'd like to keep mine to a level in which I could actually keep it up over the long term. As it is, I've added two groups this week working on new fan films, and a few new shorts and parodies. Not enough for a Headline, but still, work. On top of that, a friend sent me a novel he wrote to read. And I've exchange e-mails with a fan film group inside the PRC who can't see my website because it's censored.

I pass the Chinese embassy to the UN often. I have to admit I've been tempted to walk in there and just yell at them for censoring my Star Trek Fan Film website. Technically, though, it's Chinese soil and they could arrest me. Not an attractive idea. Still, I'm very frustrated about it.