PLA: The Book

[Tenorclefninja]

Did the same thing. Pretty sweet read rbcp.
I was excited since I just bought the 2600 book and I saw the post and thought there was a published PLA book. One day there should be, even if it is just a log of crazy shit that the members of the site pulled off. Probably an anonymous log is best :-)

[rbcp]

Every 18 months or so I need to post in here and make false promises, mostly to myself, that the book will be finished up any day now.  So here it goes...

The book is more or less done.  I reverted back to doing the version where it's just separate chapters of PLA material.  No storyline to follow, no plot.  I'm not even going to try using a real publisher anymore.  I'm going to use one of the many online services that takes your money and creates a print-on-demand book that can be ordered from stores, libraries, Amazon and even read on Kindle and the iPad.  The best part about not using any real publishing channels is that this can all be written for people who like PLA instead of for the general public.  I can throw in obscure PLA shit in there and not care that a bunch of people won't get it.

And this will be the reason for the delay this time.  While there's enough book here to just be finished with it, I'm going to hold off and add some more stuff into it.  Maybe the BNF and Richard Cardo fiasco if I can manage to make that not completely boring, maybe some of our April Fools pranks, maybe forum/phone mobs.  I don't know, but I'll comb the websites and find some good stuff to put in.  I'm thinking I can have it ready sometime this summer.  At the very latest, before this year is over.  That's the goal.

RTF is writing a foreward for it and Spessa is proofreading it all and calling me stupid a lot.  I'm putting inspirational quotes from PLA people, taken from this thread, at the top of each chapter and could use some more of those if anyone wants to post them into that thread or this one.  

Currently the book includes the Dino story, a chapter on call forwarding, another on credit card fraud, the Fred Meyer thing, a PLA bio, red boxing, revenge, eBay, the McDonald's sign prank, Celina beige boxing, the 7-Eleven stuff, and some other things.  It's not just copied text from the web site - most of it is stories based on the web pages and PLA issues.  

You guys should tell me what else you want to see in the book.  What's your favorite part of the web site that you'd like to see somehow converted into a chapter?  I need advice!  There's so much shit on phonelosers.org and the other sites that I'm sure I've forgotten some of it.  Any ideas that I can steal and not give you credit for would be really helpful.  Thanks!

[Nod]

YAY! RBCP is getting our hopes up again! Make sure that you put plenty of plugs for the site and the radio show into the book.

[rbcp]

YAY! RBCP is getting our hopes up again! Make sure that you put plenty of plugs for the site and the radio show into the book.

I will.  I'm going to turn /book/ into a companion site for the book since there are pictures, videos and other things to go with most of the stories.

[trevelyn]

Is the Love and Rockets dumpster diver scene in it?!?

[rbcp]

Is the Love and Rockets dumpster diver scene in it?!?

It's not, but I was thinking about throwing that in somewhere.  Maybe.

[UnknownCaller]

I will totally buy a copy of this for everyone I know

[notxmania]

Just put a whole lot of http://www.notla.com/travels/ in it and rename it Catch Me if You Can 2: Brad Carter.

Entice enterprising readers with promises of high-adventure and political subversion of corporations/government (depending on advertising region) and then bore them with complicated phreaking that doesn't work anymore.

[Nod]

I'd read that. Even though I already have.

[jx]

Write it already so we can buy it. KTHX

[rbcp]

Write it already so we can buy it. KTHX

This year, I promise!  I won't forget about it for a couple of years this time.  It really is all done now.  I just want to take some time, cleaning it up and maybe adding a few more things to it.

[trevelyn]

hurry!

[rbcp]

I updated http://www.phonelosers.org/book/ a couple days ago with the official chapter list.  The descriptions aren't all complete and some are missing, but I'll finish that up soon.  All the chapters listed there are completely done.  You could say the book is finished, but I'm still working on a few things to add to it.  Like the BNF/Richard Cardo thing, though I'm still unsure if it's possible to even make that interesting enough to include. 

I plan to turn the /book/ page into a companion for the book, where each chapter will have links to video, sound, pictures and links to original sources for the content. 

Rob T. Firefly is writing a foreward to the book, which I'm sure will be as awesome as everything else he does.  Spessa is my official copy editor.

Now that you see what will officially be in the book, what other PLA stuff do you want in there?

[MIB]

How about a chapter in there about Tannest. I believe she was the one who got uppity about postings to a message board about the Jon Benet Ramsey case. Maybe tie it in with the Richard Cardo saga.

A chapter about Curtis Lee Jones and how that story came about.

About Fred Meyers, is there any recordings of the PA system prank?

MIB

[trevelyn]

The god damned dumpster diving scene with love and rockets, for fucks sake. damn you phone loser slackers.