1. The microwave died after some local electric power surge. Had to order a compact replacement from Walmart. Delivered next morning! Swapped out the old, put it in the new box and pushed it down the upstairs hall to the landing. On the way passed the last piece of my artwork still hanging on a wall in the hall. Dusty. Like me. I have well over a dozen framed and mouldering. ST99 screens print out beautifully on photo quality laser printer paper. (I’ve no objection to selling artwork for the right price if logistics can be kept under nightmare level. Coffee table book of my best graphics and photographs would be great too.)
Skip 1. Got me to thinking. Nothing we’ve talked about or planned for yet deals with the scale and cope of my art content. Revisited the question of what Kindle offers in the way of physical (print) publication in color or otherwise. Looked it up again. Here’s the not very helpful link: Kindle Book Publishing Types. Reference to comic books gave me a brainstorm about Shuteye Town and related material. For example, this is one of the three hardest links to find in ST99:
Why not publish actual comic books as a way of memorializing my graphic artwork? Comic books are only about 22 pages…
Skip 2. Got an idea how to do something that’s never worked with setups from the live version. A sequence of screens that demonstrates visually how ST99 does it work in idea development and satire. Whipped up this post for Malashock at the confidential site. Thought I’d Show You Something You Wouldn’t Have Found Otherwise…
Skip 3. Serendicity again. Looking through ROKU’s freebie content for something to sleep to picked a bland movie that woke me up getting loud at the end and rolled over immediately into this…
I think they’re describing our audience here, now jaded and looking for a different angle. The Punk writers are the perfect new angle. I’ve actually been groping somewhat blindly in exactly this direction (Browse the site list Below the Fold here), which also fits with and fills in some detail on the latest site premise I shared with you. Game concept, conspiracy narratives,, undead heroes (redefined) living largely at night, with the novel turn that I’m offering the ultimate rebellion, against the slacker, parasitic life of vampirism, toward renewed accomplishment and creativity. Much of the esthetics, however, are the same. We can learn from the lessons they learned and the missteps they made. Start a new youth movement in the Tik Tok children of the Dungeons & Dragons generation.
Skip 4. Got antsy about website design, which will obviously have an impact on what we do and how we do it. Remembered I’d gone far enough in the past with Godaddy.com that I had a username and password in my iPad settings. Tried to sign in, password didn’t work (standard these days), got a new one and fell for their one cent bait and switch, which aI negotiated down to somewhere between $14.98/yr plus maybe $10 more in marketing support for one year.
Then they wanted to start their AI web design process right away. Thought I’d play along, answer their questions (which were pretty good), and went as far as letting them do a working mock-up of main pages.
I didn’t give them the tooic headers. They inferred them. Here’s what they showed me:
I don’t know where this leaves us. Still waiting for answer to my big question: How to give you access to the Development features. They claim they’ll answer that within 48 hours. I didn’t give them your name or contact info.
So where are we?
Here’s my list of existing links related to the World of Darkness YouTube above.
Comics books are a great idea and one with perhaps perfect timing. I believe the world of self-initiated print runs is currently very possible and popular. I don't have a lot of experience with it myself, but one of the people I am closest with at Pomfret is the painting and drawing teacher, and I believe he has links to some resources. I'll ask! As for web development, yes, we can do incredible things with direct language. Part of me really wants to get you using Cursor yourself, generating exactly what you want and iterating quickly and precisely. That's the beauty of AI based code tools. But I know the web hosting sites all have tools as well, and if you got me access with either your login or one unique to me, I could do a lot with it. Specifically, rather than continuing development on the server, I'd make a local mirror that I can work with directly and integrate into the existing projects, pulling artwork and text and connecting it all. Is your iPad the only option? If so, a lot is still possible (especially with speech to text), but Apple has still made it different from using a full computer. I am now a complete Mac guy myself. I always saw them as toys, but when my PC laptop screen broke (now over 20 years ago) and they gave me a Mac loaner, I found that the whole system is built on a powerful Linux / UNIX command line. Macs can be for power users too, regardless of what the company makes or does apart from that. Anyway, I want to get these immensely powerful tools in your hands in some way. Your mental Universe has been projecting and instantiating into physical reality for years, and I hate to think that the bottleneck and stumbling block is something we can perhaps easily fix.
Replying to the ST99 TV thread at Malashock (I can't seem to post comments there): Yes. I remember, and as I re-read after all these years, I was surprised at how much I remembered. There I was, cooped up in the school's new observatory, working on one of the two most powerful computers on campus. Our shifts were long and went all night if the weather was clear, and babysitting the telescopes as they made the observations didn't take a lot of brainpower once it was routine. So I had the chance to go deeply into ST99 on that CD-ROM and discover as many corners as I could. I'll admit that I didn't see everything; some of the passwords eluded me and I had to wait until that guy on the forum (Zohan?) posted all of them. By then I didn't remember all the paths and connections to move through that world honestly, but it let me read files that were locked to me. It's been my dream over all these years to find a way to convert it, bring it all together in a non-Word based system, and make it fully playable. I know it's as important to you as The Boomer Bible, and while it doesn't loom as large in my own mind and life, it's still a vitally major piece of my college memories and experience. I think it's a key project and I want to add it / raise it on the list of priorities. I always assumed I would need years to convert and exhume it, but with the tools these days... I am hopeful.
Comics books are a great idea and one with perhaps perfect timing. I believe the world of self-initiated print runs is currently very possible and popular. I don't have a lot of experience with it myself, but one of the people I am closest with at Pomfret is the painting and drawing teacher, and I believe he has links to some resources. I'll ask!
ReplyDeleteAs for web development, yes, we can do incredible things with direct language. Part of me really wants to get you using Cursor yourself, generating exactly what you want and iterating quickly and precisely. That's the beauty of AI based code tools. But I know the web hosting sites all have tools as well, and if you got me access with either your login or one unique to me, I could do a lot with it. Specifically, rather than continuing development on the server, I'd make a local mirror that I can work with directly and integrate into the existing projects, pulling artwork and text and connecting it all.
Is your iPad the only option? If so, a lot is still possible (especially with speech to text), but Apple has still made it different from using a full computer. I am now a complete Mac guy myself. I always saw them as toys, but when my PC laptop screen broke (now over 20 years ago) and they gave me a Mac loaner, I found that the whole system is built on a powerful Linux / UNIX command line. Macs can be for power users too, regardless of what the company makes or does apart from that.
Anyway, I want to get these immensely powerful tools in your hands in some way. Your mental Universe has been projecting and instantiating into physical reality for years, and I hate to think that the bottleneck and stumbling block is something we can perhaps easily fix.
Replying to the ST99 TV thread at Malashock (I can't seem to post comments there):
ReplyDeleteYes. I remember, and as I re-read after all these years, I was surprised at how much I remembered. There I was, cooped up in the school's new observatory, working on one of the two most powerful computers on campus. Our shifts were long and went all night if the weather was clear, and babysitting the telescopes as they made the observations didn't take a lot of brainpower once it was routine. So I had the chance to go deeply into ST99 on that CD-ROM and discover as many corners as I could. I'll admit that I didn't see everything; some of the passwords eluded me and I had to wait until that guy on the forum (Zohan?) posted all of them. By then I didn't remember all the paths and connections to move through that world honestly, but it let me read files that were locked to me.
It's been my dream over all these years to find a way to convert it, bring it all together in a non-Word based system, and make it fully playable. I know it's as important to you as The Boomer Bible, and while it doesn't loom as large in my own mind and life, it's still a vitally major piece of my college memories and experience. I think it's a key project and I want to add it / raise it on the list of priorities. I always assumed I would need years to convert and exhume it, but with the tools these days... I am hopeful.