The SF-LOVERS email mailing list (aka the SFL Archives) ran from September 1979 to November 2000, and was dedicated to discussing everything Fantasy and Science Fiction related across print, radio, TV, movies, and pop-culture.
https://archive.org/details/SFLoversDigestArchive
The Rules of this readthrough attempt are:
-Highlight the many weird, bizarre, horrifying and retroactively interesting things in the SFL Archives.
-Try to be objective as possible when mentioning things, but some things creep through anyhow (example: You may catch on that I utterly loathe filksongs when browsing my SFL Archive readthrough summaries).
-Give framing context for the many weird, bizarre, and retroactively interesting things of interest that make zero sense to people who grew up in the 1990's or later.
-Stay on topic and only mention things that come up in posts in the SFL Archives readthrough.
-Minimize internet-searching all the weird and bizarre things that get mentioned in the SFL Archives. If I gave in and started internet-searching everything, I would be somewhere in SFL Archives Vol 03 right now instead of <as of 09-17-2020> a third deep into SFL Archives Volume 11. So I take plenty of bookmarks for things I plan on looking up later, whenever the SFL Archives readthrough is finished.
Backstory of why this blog was created
I started posted the many weird, bizarre, and retroactive "oh that explains this thing" SciFi/Fantasy tropes I was finding reading the SF-LOVERS mailing list (aka SFL Archives) to the Book-Barn subforum of the SomethingAwful forums. https://forums.somethingawful.com/ back in June 2020.
Posting about the SFL Archives weirdness got positive feedback, so I continued posting mini-updates as I progressed through Volume 01 of the SFL Archives, then SFL Volume 02, then SFL Volume 03, etc.
The long-term and short-term viability of the SomethingAwful forums is in severe doubt, so this blog has been created to re-host & consolidate all previously posted SFL Archives read-through summaries and host everything new moving forward as I start SFL Volume 11 (1986).
Blindspots of my SFL Readthrough attempt:
There is a lot of re-occurring topics of discussion that will rarely be mentioned in my SFL Archives readthrough summaries, like movie/tv-series/book reviews, childrens stories, flame-wars, etc. Any Science Fiction or Fantasy pop-culture historians will have to dig into the SFL Archives themselves to find the following re-occurring topics of discussion
-Filksongs. I really hate filksongs, only the most annoying instances of filksong discussion will be mentioned in this readthrough
-Outdated science/physics chat and religious discussion/religion debates in the SFL Archives will almost never be mentioned
-Hugo/Nebula award nominations + award winners discussion will never almost come up. Drama about the Hugo/Nebula award process or voting scandals will be covered.
-SciFi & Fantasy conventions and after-action reports of SciFi & Fantasy conventions will rarely get mentioned unless something major drama/big weirdness happened at them.
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