Fortune.com

Fortune.com:

When ADV thought a Scooby Doo-esque series called Ghost Stories would be a dud, it issued a version with an intentionally inaccurate translation of the script—redubbing the characters to be more American (the leader now has attitude, and the boring sidekick was made into a born-again Christian)—knowing that would stir powerful passions. Authenticity being the Way of the Otaku, fans obliged by erupting in a furor. Then they ran out to buy the DVDs to assess the damage. Some found they actually liked the show and turned Ghost Stories into a mini hit for ADV. That's just what Ledford's looking for. "Our company is built around base hits," he says.

This is why I hate ADV.

It's interesting that Fortune would run a piece on anime at all, but it's all about the different way that ADV and other importers conduct their business. They note that ADV takes their leads solely from fansubbers like ANBUdom or Anime Empire, since these internet quasi-pirates are the best judges of quality and fan responsiveness. Fortune notes that not suing fansubbers is THE business model for ADV, and a major part of fan relations. Fortune mentions Otakon's final attendence count (over 33,000) and how con presence is also part of the fan-relations business model.

Technorati tags: anime, business

QotD Things

Me: Is Sasuke getting owned?
Roomie: Yeah, with a capital 'P!'

Technorati Tags:quotes

Pro Things

Thank GOD! I finally updated my professional site. Been meaning to do it for 2-3 months now, but I have never had time to do it right. I've missed a lot of school and homework for these recent two breaks, but at least this time I'll have something to show for it.

Check out Archmagus.us for my pro site if you're interested. Since I severely lack for content, I went for the striking minimalist angle. I do wish I had some non-personal web sites for the portfolio, but I seem to be positively terrible at finding people to do web sites for. I guess that's part of the reason I don't want to be a freelancer at all - people just don't seem to want to hire me for that kind of work. I'll stick with jobs that have a steady paycheck.

Most of the remaining work for that site is browser testing (if something don't look right, please drop me a note) and backend tech. I want to get it compatable with Google Sitemaps and edit my robots.txt file to make sure it's 200% geek-friendly. I guess I should also make sure it's highly accessable for the blind, and collapsable for wireless devices. For the moment, though, it's liquid-layout (finally!), and that makes me happy.

Anyway, enough nerding out. I should get back to drawing or music or homework or something.

Technorati Tags:webdesign

Reflective Things

Reflective Things:

Upwards of 75 percent of homosexual men have been molested or had a prepubescent sexual experience early on in their childhood. Upwards of 90 to 95 percent of homosexual men have had or have a broken or nonexistence relationship with their father. Especially one during the early developmental years . and most likely were or are closer with their mother, even thought they may have had friends who are boys, most likely many have had more friends who were girls, they were much safer. Upwards of 85 to 90 percent of females have been molested by a male very close to them.

Where did Stephen get these statistics? God only knows cos Stephen never says. Perhaps concerned listeners should email him and ask. Oh but there's more:

( 19:35) Stephen: Homosexuality can stem from a death in the family, divorce, physical attributes such as being too tall, too short, heavy, etc... anything that makes you different from the rest of your same-sex peers.

Straightness hormones... Statistics without sources... Gayness caused by being too tall?

Some time, I would absolutely love to go to a "reparative therapist," or Stephen Bennett, or some other asshole and inquire as to why exactly I'm gay. Even through seperation and divorce, my dad and I have a relationship better than most kids'. I have thought of my mom as overbearing at times, but frankly, every tennage boy on the planet has had that particular thought. I have never been molested by anyone, ever. I was never indoctrinated into gaydom - I never really thought much about homosexuals until after I came out. My friends were about 80/20 guys, which is pretty normal for kids, methinks.

Mostly, I would just love to hear them explain it. Is it because I played video games instead of football? Because I was an outcast geek in elementary / middle school? Because my sister and I, like every other brother/sister pair on Earth, didn't get along super great? Because I liked Sailor Moon when I finally saw it subtitled? What's your explanation, Dousche McGoushe?

Speaking of good family relationships, I'm back in Maryland with my family for Thanksgiving. Hope you all have a great holiday!

Technorati tags: gay, Christian, XGW

Convention Things

Midwest FurFest
Originally uploaded by agius.

I went to Midwest FurFest this weekend. I had a blast, and met some really great folks. Say what you want about furries or the fandom in general, but I met more interesting people in 48 hours at a con than I do in 48 weeks otherwise.

At most conventions I go to, I spend most of my time hanging out with people. Chatting, in public areas, or back to someone's hotel room for some GameCube-related shenanigans. There are generally panels, tournaments (for DDR or Smash Bros.), dances, and many other things to do, but on the whole I skip most of them. I didn't go to any of the panel discussions, RPG's, the dance, or participate in the DDR tournament after qualifying for it. I didn't even take that many pictures - all but 3 of the good ones are on my Flickr set.

What I did do was meet some fantastic new people - too many to name here, honestly. You guys know who you are. I saw one of the new video game consoles, watched one of the funniest Picto-chats I have ever seen on a Nintendo DS, hung out with people I haven't seen for 8 months, and gave hugs to about 50 random strangers. I did play in the Smash Bros. Melee tournament, and did pretty well for not playing more than once a week on average. I came back without spending every dime I have. I dressed up, and even went fursuiting in my panda outfit for a while. I got professional photos of that done, but they didn't give me the web site of the company that did the photos, so I'm not sure how to get ahold of them.

I had a blast. I wish I could go to more of these things.

What's awesome is that after today, I leave to go home for Thanksgiving break. Two vacations back-to-back is hopefully going to provide the level of break I need from stressful projects.

Governer Things

Ehrlich bristles at Oreo skeptics - baltimoresun.com:

Ehrlich Jr. said yesterday that he is angry at "revisionism" from political opponents who question a much-repeated story about Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele being pelted with Oreos during a 2002 campaign debate in Baltimore.

Versions of the story have been repeated over the years by Ehrlich, Steele and their supporters in describing what they call a pattern of racial slights against the black Republican, and accounts of the event have spread widely.
...
The incident is said to have occurred when Steele walked to his seat before the debate started, not during the event on stage when it would have been captured on video. Newspaper articles and television news reports from that night didn't mention it, and representatives of the news departments at television stations WBAL, WJZ and WMAR and Maryland Public Television said they have no video of the incident.

Our governer is such a damn wanker. He ran on the promise of being a moderate, but he's helped to teach Marylanders and other blue-staters: there are no moderate republicans. Frankly, I don't like moderate democrats like the antigay Tim Kaine, but at least they're not pushing bullshit to win in a state that doesn't want an extremist.

I've been taking off from political blogging, but I think it might help to up my post count, so I'm going to pick it back up. Don't worry; this will still totally be a cat blog.

Technorati tags: MD, Maryland, oreo, race

Pencil, Paper, Dice

Pencil, Paper, Dice
Originally uploaded by agius.

So, as is not unusual enough, I have passed on blogging in favor of work and socializing. Yesterday I did something I do very rarely - I worked all day. I passed on all my social commitments (even dinner out), sat down, and worked 'till my eyes bled. Two in the morning, I could be considered (generously) halfway done. I would do it again today, but I have commitments for group meetings which will most certainly throw off my work groove.

I'm curious about what allows that kind of work ethic. It's an amazing state of zen-like patience whereby I can work for any amount of time without frustration, tedium, or other emotional interferences. I need to find some kind of mindhack that allows me to enter this kind of "working trance" whenever I need to. Maybe it's just a matter of practicing.

Crazy Christian Things

IU Antigays:

The Old Paths group began the day with a protest behind Woodburn Hall. Though the group has been to IU many times in the past few years, Monday's demonstration was larger than usual, complete with children playing instruments and singing songs beside the sign-wielding adults.

Hmmm... Of course I've heard of the Phelpsian types, but never had one hit as close to home as IU. I notice both this group of crazies and Phelp's small crowd are Baptists... is there something wrong with Baptism? I wonder if these are the same jerks who come around Purdue every spirng and have 10-year-olds waving around pictures of "aborted fetuses," which are actually live babies born with a lethal skin condition?

In any case, I found this bit hilarious:

The protestors left promptly at 3:15 p.m., boarding a bus covered in large photographs of aborted fetuses.

A man runs up to the brave protestors who are viciously prayer-battling a deviant coffee shop. He quickly finds the man in charge of the Baptist Battallion 3, 2nd Division.

Messianic Messenger: Sir! We have to move! Defeating this evil coffee shop is important, but I've heard Planned Parenthood is having a bakesale not 10 minutes from here!
Christ Commander: *gasp!* Quick, to the fetus-mobile!

The group quickly mobilizes and performs a strategic retreat. As they drive away, the Christ Commander waves his fist defiantly at the deviant coffee shop.

Christ Commander: You may have won this round, villains, but God will smite you next time!

Via Straight, Not Narrow

Technorati tags: politics, gay, baptists

NaNoWriMo Things

I was going to participate in National Novel Writing Month this year. I really was. I had a great plot idea that I've been beating around for 2 years or so now. I even went over and set up a Writeboard for it, thinking that a simplified, centralized, online storage method would be the best & easiest way to write. Plus, i get to try out a new 37signals widget, which is always fun.

Unfortunately, unless something changes, it's just not gonna happen this year. With the current setup of classes I have, my time for personal projects is extremely limited, and I just can't prioritize NaNoWriMo over, say, improving my sketching / drawing skills. Trying to prioritize activities that improve me personally is really difficult, because at some point I would like to be a damn good artist, musician, and novelist; alas, some point is not this year.

Hopefully I can pick up fiction / scifi writing again once I'm a bit more satisfied with my development in art & music. Until then, I think blogging is as much writing as I'm going to do.

Technorati Tags: NaNoWriMo

Panda Things

Panda
Originally uploaded by agius.

So, I got to wear my panda suit for Halowe'en this year. Quite a fun time, that was. I was really surprised this lady wanted me to hold her baby, though. Surprised, and a little nervous about my grip in that thing. But it all turned out okay, and the picture came out pretty cute-tastic.

Our room had Marolyn Manson music, strobe lights, and a fake dead hobo outside (who was actually my roommate - boy, did he scare some sorority girls!). We had candy, which included a lot of mints and some chocolate. We bought a fog machine, but we couldn't use it because it would set off the sprinklers in our dorm. We had a lot of fun this year.

I also won a $50 Adobe CS2: Revealed book in a costume contest, for dressing as a generic anime catboy. But then again, nobody there knew what a generic anime catboy was, so my costume seemed far more outlandish than it was.

Hope everybody else had a good time this year, and see you next Halowe'en!