whatever happened to Litkicks

[YABYUM]

I was trying to saty out of this discussion, but I just can't. Litkicks was, in my opinion, a goldmine. I found that site while I was googling "beat generation". I clicked on the "I'm feeling lucky" button and there I was. I had just enrolled in community college, but I spent most of my time (when I should have been in a class) over at the library reading and writing on Litkicks. That place brought something out of me. It was the instant feedback, it was the playing tag with poetry, it was all the topics of mindless chatter, it was being able to realize that WE as a sub species truly exist all over the world and we do have ALOT to say. When Levi and the ladies started throwing live events, I was more happy then I'd been in a while. I met some some great fucking people in NY and Michigan. I met two girls I have fallen school boy in love with. When The Quest came around I was in a very strange place at the time. Both mentally and physically. I had so much fuckin fun with that competition. I read the poems that event brought out of me and I can't help but smile. I just, a few days ago, saw the and read the Action Peotry book. I can't explain how it made me feel to see my name and my poem in a published piece of literature. So, for all these reasons, and many more, I feel a deep loyalty to that website.

Now I'll tell you what bothers me. I had no chance to copy the hundreds of pieces of writing that I gave. I guess I should have saved them as I posted them, but I never owned a computer. Most of my writing was done throughout random travels inside internet cafes. No one had a chance to say goodbye. It's Levis site and if he wants to focus on Literature published by writers who are not in the Litkicks community, thats fuckin fine with me. I still read the site. I just wish they would have had at least given all of us who labored to make that site enjoyable to one a nother a bit of time to swap e mails or share new websites (like this one) where we could all still keep the real time love moving. I guess the last thing that bothers me is what has become of "action" poetry. It's not really action if I have to wait and see if my spontaneous ramble is posted.
Then, if it is posted, I have to keep waiting to see if someones reply is posted. Then I have to try and get back into the frame of mind I found when I typed the original piece and post back. Wich, for me, is impossible. I type at mind speed. I have only posted maybe 4 poems that I have written prior to sitting in the chair in front of the computer. This is why I loved Action Poetry. I had found a place that was playing the game I loved to play with others in my own notebooks. Except this was worldwide and everyone was good.

So I guess thats about it. It felt good to vent that out.

I do wish Levi, Caryn and Jamelah the best of luck. I will always be reading from thier site, if only from the shadows. Should they ever get Action Poetry back into ACTION, I'll be there with fucking beer in hand.

I have to go to work now.
ROCK OUT WITH YOUR COCK OUT, BE-OTCHES

[Doreen Peri]

I have similar wonderful memories, Yabyum!

It was a great time!

Unfortunately, they have decided not to allow my posts on their new format, without explanation, claiming their decision not to post my writing is "nothing personal." So, if I tried to post there now, I'd have to wait much longer than you are waiting to see any "action" since my posts will never appear.

Apparently, I'm not the only one (see firsty's recent post but there are others, I'm sure.)

I think it's a shame how people who contributed for years as community members and community builders have been treated.

I enjoyed our live events very much! I performed in NYC 2x as part of the Litkicks events, though they deny my 50th birthday party at the Back Fence was a Litkicks event, even though, at the time, they advertised it as a "spontaneous Litkicks event," documented it with photos online, similarly, and Levi introduced me on stage, announcing my birthday and welcoming everyone to the club for a "spontaneous Litkicks event." Why they don't acknowledge that event now, is beyond me.

We also enjoyed featuring the "Litkicks Action Poets" in our Cabaradio Show, an event which we were proud to have you perform in. All that was good.

Plus, Levi, Caryn, LR and I were interviewed and read some spoken word for the TV cameras for Perry Lindstrom's "The Poetic Eye" cable show in Arlington. Good times.

When the new format was established, someone turned my poem into a piece of prose and all the lines ran together. They refused to fix it for me and told me not to post there again.

The way some community members have been dismissed is totally baffling to me.

The name-calling and slander on firsty's fake profile page which was put up online for the world to view is, to me, abhorrent.

I'd like to say that if they opened up another true Action Poetry board where there really was action, I'd be there, too, martini in hand..... because I'd love to do that again.

But I can't say that.

I think the whole scene is a crying shame.

I'm embarrassed for them.

[stilltrucking]

The haiku, poetry and AP boards on litkicks are a national treasure. I still like the jota poem the sound of livi asher's boot steps coming down a gravel path. Brooklyn is cool with me, I would hate to think this was all about filthy lucre,




Yabyum
I hope you have a good day at work.

[Doreen Peri]

stillTruckin-

There's a software glitch in here somewhere. Sometimes people have to try to log in 2 or 3 times before the log-in works. I have no clue what the problem is. Sorry about that. If you can't get in the first time, try agan, ok? thanks!~

[stilltrucking]

Ok doreen
I rememberd the last time it happened clay had to tell me to chill.
cheers
j

[Atit]

hey, change is a good thing! i'm a little bit more politically angry, back in the day i use to be more pissede off with my parents, now i'm really pissed off about politics. i'm a little more cynical, and more opinionated...i think its a good thing.

still kinda sad about litkicks.

[mtmynd]

Needless to say, I was an ardent supporter of Litkicks for many moons. Got to know many folks and enjoyed many nights and days of reading the boards... just like you, and you, and you, too.

It was a memorable time for many as we all must agree judging by the current responses, times that will never repeat themselves.

I'll be upfront with you, (and myself), by first saying that I am not an avid follower of literary events nor do I have a bleeding passion to become a writer of fiction. My literary tastes are very limited when it comes to fiction - I stopped years ago with Richard Brautigan. Sure I've enjoyed some fiction now and then, but overall I could care less who's hot and who's not in literature. It just ain't my bag.

Which brings me to Litkicks... why would I have such an attraction to that site way-back-when? It was the immediacy, first off... the quickness of response, the quickness of the writers involved, the joy from that immediacy. I posted my fair share of poems and haiku along with my political and other rants, but yet I personally never considered them to be in anyway 'literary'. I'm sure many would agree with that, not only in my stuff but their own... we weren't there to learn literature, we were there to enjoy each others posts, others poems and viewpoints which was a part of the new cyber-literature, without intent.

Despite my negative opinions on how Levi so abruptly pulled the plug on everyone involved in his site, it is important to accept the fact that Levi (and ohters) do have a burning love for literature - the hottest writer of the moment, the latest books from their favorite authors, a bit of critiqueing on so-and-so's book, etc...

These things were pretty irrelevent to the old LK. Too many of us were absorbed in our own 'literary experiments' with very little input into the commercial literary scene. It seems clear to me that the 'old path' of LK was not what Levi had in mind when he began LK years back. It no longer spoke of the literature as a movement. It no longer called interest in books. It no longer became a record of literature in the classic sense.

I feel that Levi missed the original intent of 'his baby'... it became a community of like-minded folks, but most of the folks were not of Levi's like-mind. What would you do?

It is important for any of us to follow our own bliss and if that bliss is a half-mile away and running parrallel to where we are, there comes the time when we have to re-connect to our chosen path. That's what I've concluded Levi did with (his) Litkicks.

I am perfectly content to be here at S8. I feel no pressure to be anything other than what I am, even though I did the same at LK, but the 'literature thing'... that's not important here... and for me that is good. I enjoy immediacy of thought, I enjoy the egg-words hatched here, I enjoy what Dor' has wrought and not just wrote.

Litkicks this is not but Studio 8 is what this has become and hopefully will continue being. I will look forward to an ever-expanding group of regulars that have a common ground however that's defined, but careful with definitions - they can become barriers from other paths.

[enough]

[Lightning Rod]

It continues to be a mystery to me why litkicks changed course.
I have refrained from commenting on this subject, even though it has been a repeated topic here.
Certainly Levi has the right to do what he wants with his site.
I must say that i like Levi and I enjoy his company and he has a world class nose.
I don't feel like saying anything negative about Brooklyn and Co.
Litkicks was an enlightening experience for me too, but life goes on.

I've played at nightclubs and bars where for a few months or years it was magic.
There was a tight, loving community and a sympathetic management.
But communities change, just like people change and the world changes.

I was just talking today with a friend that I have had for forty years. We have both participated in many communities since we met. But we are still connected.

Life goes on. Places change more than people do.

I feel privileged to know you all, no matter where we are.

[stilltrucking]

mtmynd I agree with every thing you said.

here is my bottom line about it.

still kinda sad about litkicks.

But if brooklyn is happy the with the new format, then I am happy for him.

done

[firsty]

cec, i like your perspective on things. in fact, with yours and d's points there, i think those sum it up.

what one person does with their site is their own thing. i dont like people telling me what to do any more than anyone else. perhaps litkicks biggest problem is that they feel too many people are telling them what to do.

it definitely seems like theyre completely incapable of processing criticism without associating it with a sense that theyre being told what to do.

for me, it seems they have a disregard for others. thats really the big thing. as i told them and i might have mentioned here already, jamelah's little diatribe against pel and i doesnt really mean anything to me - its relevence, as far as i'm concerned, is that it betrays an inner hatred of some of the people who made the site what it is, and gave them the foundation for continuing in whatever fashion they wanted to continue.

it seemed to start with the book. honestly, i was glad to be a part of it. i was thrilled, in fact. it was great news. pel too. it's a publishing credit, and for new writers, it kicked ass. but the first sign for me that something wasnt right in their thinking was that no writer being published even knew which of their pieces was being selected. it was a big secret. yay surprises. but from a writer's perspective, surprises are pretty loaded events. i understand the point of it - to capture the immediacy of the site. but with not even a chance to edit a word, fix the spelling of something or vet the stuff before it hits the press - it sort of made the writers secondary and gave off an odor of arrogance or something - like them declaring "we own this writing, it's not owned by the writers simply by virtue of its being posted on our site."

then when it came out, i remember searching for weeks on the internet for news about it. nothing. it wasnt promoted, there hasnt been a single reading centered on it. it seems to have been the epitomy of a vanity press effort. except it wasnt a book written by the (self) publisher. it was written by many writers who, like us, were probably hoping for a little more press than seeing it on about.com. it wasnt mentioned on any blogs and events, which were vaguely referred to by the staff after my inquiries, never materialized.

with the new format, i completely agree with you, yabyum. no immediacy, and the fact that they review everything before it posts again takes the event out of the hands of the writers, who become contributers to someone else's event instead. i had a similar experience as doreen, where stupid little changes were made to my writing, with no explanation, no feedback, and an absolutely defensive and arrogant attitude when questioned.

while there may be individual reasons for each of these things, the sum of them makes it hard to avoid the conclusion that they really dont give a shit about the writers.

if they want their own site, they should make their own site and not have contributers. if they want contributers, they need to learn how to treat them. they also need to be able to accept criticism without acting like nothing matters.

litkicks is irrelevent. it's a blog now. posts are rarely responded to. there seem to be more staff members than there are regular posters. thats what they wanted, thats what they got. it sucks because they disregarded the feelings of others. they had every right to do what they did, but having that right doesnt absolve one of the responsibility to people as part of an interconnected community.

they took years of the boards, got a book out of it with their names on the cover, and then dumped the whole thing for something else. what thanks did we get for supporting them tooth and nail for years and for contributing all the writing? for fighting the trolls and defending the staff? we got booted for questioning the new format and what it did to OUR writing, and then we got ridiculed and insulted by the staff.

yay surprises.

[mtmynd]

I agree with you view also, firsty... wholeheartedly. it was that intitial close down that blew me away (and many others)... a seemingly cold stomp on many years of creative people's toes. I will never understand that immediacy.

But as time has passed and I peek into LK on occasion, Levi & Co seem perfectly content with the way things have turned out. There are some old troopers that continue to support the efforts and there's apparently many new voices participating... if they only knew the 'old LK'..!

It is very true Levi took the words and ran... maybe the poor fellow just has no social etiquette... maybe he felt he had to take the course he did to show that he was in charge... whatever the reason, he did it. Whether he is happy with the result I will never know but can only read between the lines (whenever I do pop over). But seriously, how can he be thrilled posting his words, his subjects (and his girlfriends), setting his own tone, editing any replies and really believe he has a good product? IMHO it has become LitBlog, as many have suggested... but aren't blogs gaining in popularity..? It no longer concerns me as to where LK is, but still puzzles me when I think of the wonderful community from where it came.

Thanks S8 for being around... and listening to it's people.

[Arcadia]

Litkicks was the first site in internet where I wrote. So it was something like a first love. Or maybe not. I never understood the site. The odd thing was that to not understand felt good.
Now, I´m more here than there or something like that.

[hester_prynne]

C'mon, that book was never meant to be promoted! It was more something that litkicks came up with to get litkickers to buy, for their own immediate profit. Very cunning business move actually, though not very "literary". Levi may be literary, but he is also a businessman.
I don't remember them ever mentioning much about promotions of it or anything, I mean, it just didn't seem to be a project like that, seemed more like a fast money kind of thing, for themselves. I mean they knew alot of litkickers would buy one for sure....I think that's all they wanted really.
And the way it looked, well the effort was half-hearted at most. A veritable yearbook, sold to the "class".
I'm sure Jamelah just hated the whole thing.....I mean, a book full of litkicks writers? How beneath her, right?
heh....
(yawn)
H

[e_dog]

i think it was wickedly uncool for Levi to close up the shop last year without warning folks about it first. as Yabyum said, people ended up not havin a chance to make network contacts, email addresses exchange, and because not all works were saved in archive form, stuff was apparently irretrievably lost. while, for example, on the whole the 'Mindless chatter' may have been just that, some of it was actually quite brilliant -- and the wholeconverrsational flow of it was great, the tree branching discussions, a great format that is unequaled by blogs and the silly pseudo-academic peer(less) reviewing format they now have.

although, if it weren't for brooklyn's private email recommendation, i wouldn't have found out 'bout this site. maybe studioeight should be prominently, perhaps permanently, linked to from the Litkicks site? (if its not already.)

[Atit]

what happened to that dude who did the art with wire...wireman? or something...he was pretty cool too.