Saturday, December 18, 2010

Misleading Statements at Google’s Chrome OS Event

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Why *your* feedback is important

People love feedback. They revel in it. It’s part of everyday life for most people – whether it be their choice of fashion, their views or their creations.

Even if you disagree, your feedback is important to them. Without checks, they’ll just continue doing whatever it is you don’t like. And it’s possible that they might not have thought about it from the angle you have, or not know about it.

Heck, they might still keep on doing it, but at least they know that there’s someone out there who doesn’t appreciate it.

Commenting can help people know they’re actually being noticed, rather than just submitting stuff to an empty void. Some people, without feedback, might even wonder if they’re hallucinating about it being submitted, or that it came out as gibberish but their minds are pretending it’s not.

I know that every time someone comments on or reviews my work or replies to my own comment or review, my inner self is screaming with joy because someone noticed, someone cared enough to do so, even if their comment is tearing apart everything I hold dear. Feedback is that important to me.

And chances are, even if you may not admit it, even if you may not think it, it’s that important to you too.

So please, tell me if I smell, if my singing’s bad, if my artwork sucks, my writing’s boring, my software’s buggy, or my views are flawed. Heck, tell me if they’re merely mediocre, or if you absolutely loved or agreed with my works. I’d love to hear from you.

Monday, November 08, 2010

And now for something completely different

I’ve been thinking about doing some reviews for stuffs for a while. So this is me, announcing my intent to review stuffs.

Yes.

Well, I may not actually review much, if anything, depending on how lazy I am much I procrastinate much time I have, but I at least intend to do something.

Hmm.

Well anyway, this  is me signing off for now. Fair thee well!

Transformation, audience appeal and “fetish comics”

Today I’m going to talk about something that’s been on my mind lately. Bear with me, because this might be long, and it might be a little rambly.

Every now and then, I hear the term “fetish comic” thrown around, usually against comics which engage in male-to-female (or vice-versa) transformations. The first time was while reading Your Webcomic Is Bad and You Should Feel Bad by John Solomon (now removed from the interwebs), on a review of The Wotch. Recently, I’ve also heard it used to describe El Goonish Shive – the implication being that people get off on that kind of stuff, or that the author themself does.

Before I start, yes I am going to defend these two comics against the label of “fetish comics”, and it’s not because “I secretly associate with those kinds of people” or something. It’s because I enjoy reading those comics, and I don’t like seeing something I enjoy being attacked. It’s a perfectly reasonable human emotion, so there.

(And no, I don’t enjoy them in that way. Get your head out of the gutter.)

First, let’s define the term fetish comic. I think we can all agree that a fetish comic is one where the primary purpose is obviously to cater to someone’s fetishes.

So, what might make a fetish comic a fetish comic?

The comic attracts perverts: Well, to be honest, that’s a ridiculous measure. I’m sure VG Cats (which is awesoem, BTW)attracts people into anthropomorphic cats as well – despite it being nothing more than anthro cats playing video games. The fact is, everything attracts some kind of fetish-ers – one would only need to search for Rule 34 stuff to see what I mean.

Even if (and that’s a big if) the fan base is primarily made up of fetish people, that doesn’t make the comic inherently a fetish comic. Unless there is clearly fetish-appealing material in the comic does it make it one. (And TF or TG elements are not merely sufficient – more on that later.)

The comic’s author is a pervert: It is my belief that you can’t judge what a person is attracted to from the elements in a webcomic unless the elements are framed in the manner of which he is attracted to them. That is, unless the TG scenes in either comic are framed in a sexual manner, then there is no basis for believing that the author is sexually attracted to TG situations.

But, whatever, say the author is attracted to the content in that way. If the content is devoid of such sexual framing, it doesn’t matter if they are or not, it’s not a fetish comic. Otherwise, it’s an ad hominem (attacking the content based on the merits of the person), and thus has no basis for criticising the comic.

The comic has transformation/transgender themes: Woah, there, hold your horses! Transformation themes are merely a medium or plot device for telling a story. It’s no more inherently feterish then having two cats talk about video games. There has even been transgender themes on shows aimed at kids, tweens and teens – two examples that come to mind are The Zack Files and Johnny Test.

It’s rather annoying when people have pre-conceived notions about a particular subject, and even more annoying is when they let that colour their judgement on content like webcomics. Please, don’t let that person be you.

Conclusion

I hope that I have presented my case, that comics are only fetish comics not only if they appeal to a certain fetish, but are explicitly framed in the context of being a fetish comic, well enough. If not, feel free to sound off in the comments.

I realise that I probably won’t convince anyone who already has their mind set against such things. I’m not writing this for them, though. I’m writing this partially to vent, and maybe to convince some people to rethink the way they approach things. If I’ve convinced even one to approach their values from a different angle, I will have considered this a success.

Thank you for your time, and good night!

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Website: <Ctrl><Alt><Bkspc> About page, banner and other stuffs updated

I’ve just updated quite a few things on <Ctrl><Alt><Bkspc>’s little slice of my website. Here’s what’s new:about

  • Updated About page: the About page now has much better images and somewhat better descriptions.
  • New banners: The comic now has header banners, not unlike a whole lot of other stuff on my website.
  • Changed navigational links for the latest comic: Hopefully this will prevent any navlnkaccidental clicks to sketch-land. ^^
  • Fixed a bug with the sidebar for the “Truth” archive page.

You can visit the <Ctrl><Alt><Bkspc> website at http://markk-b.sitesled.com/stuff/cab/.

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Website: Updated Links page

Did I hear that you desired MOAR LINKS? What, no? Oh well, I’ve now updated the Links page with four moar links.

(I’ve also fixed that annoying layout bug that left gaps all over the place, and I’ve even updated some of the images so they ish look moar betterer.)

Anyway, you can check out my links page at http://www.markk-b.sitesled.com/links/ http://www.markkb.com/links/. The new links are:

Check ‘em out, won’t you?

Updated 14/07/2013 to fix broken links.

Animation: Their Princess Is In Another Castle

O hai. I has an animation over at YouTube. It's rough, but I hope it gets the idea across.

[Edit: I should probably point out that the video has nothing to do with Mario beyond the title, which is more of an analogy than anything else.]

(The address at the end reads http://markk-b.sitesled.com/stuff/fanfic/ http://www.markkb.com/stuff/fanfic/, for those who find it too small to read.)

Basically, this is a draft for a trailer for a fanfic I’m rewriting right now. Those who have read my fanfics over at FF.Net will know what scene this video portrays. Otherwise, I hope I can surprise you guys!

Updated 14/07/2013 to fix broken links.

Saturday, September 18, 2010

Website: Updated sidebar style

sidebarJust a heads-up – I’ve updated the sidebar for a lot of the pages on my website. Here’s what’s new:

  • Sections: the sidebar now provides sections of links relevant to the section, subsection or overall category.
  • Icons: the Software sidebar now has icons for each of the programs listed.

I’ve also updated the Software Updater and Flash Card pages with more infos, and updated the Frequently Asked Questions page, since it was getting a bit stale.

There’s still a bit more stuff I’m planning to do with the site over the coming few weeks, so stay tuned.

--MarkKB

Updated 14/07/2013 to fix broken links.

Friday, June 25, 2010

Project Nelson 1.0 Build 020 has been released!

Monday, February 22, 2010

Why We Must Return To The Moon: In Defence of Constellation – Part 1

President of the United States, Barack Obama, has filed his planned federal budget for the United States in 2011. In it, he has boosted NASA’s budget; however, in doing so he has made no allotment for the Constellation mission.

This was met with both joy and disappointment – on the one hand, more money is always good, but on the other, some feel that Obama is essentially throwing away their chance to forge a name in space. And, to state my bias early on, I’m inclined to agree with them.

In this article, I’ll be examining Constellation, the controversy around it, and why I believe Obama’s decision is the wrong one for spaceflight in the United States.

What is Constellation?

Constellation is NASA’s plan for human-based space exploration for the near future. It consists of two kinds of rocket boosters – the Ares I, for human missions, and the Ares V, for cargo and heavy lifting – and three craft – Orion, for crew, Altair, for lunar landing and transport, and the Earth Departure Stage, which acts as both part of the rocket and as the lunar module.

Right now, Constellation’s primary focus is landing a man on the moon again, but future missions include landing on an asteroid and landing on Mars.

Why the moon? Haven’t we already been there?

Yes, but it is important we go again, if only for three reasons:

  • Sharpening the blade. If we are to go to other planets, then the Moon is our best shot at practicing and perfecting our techniques and technology. If things go wrong on the way to the Moon, it’s a lot easier than if they go wrong on the way to Mars or Jupiter.
  • Inspiration and innovation. Only five times did people look up at the Moon while people walked and talked upon its surface; those five times inspired many people to become astronauts and astronomers and physicists and engineers and computer technicians and programmers, in the hope that they too could be a part of it. Those five times prompted a spark of innovation, so that we can do things in space that one could not normally do; many of these technologies greatly benefited people back on Earth.
    We need to go to the Moon, not just because of what we’ll do once we get there, but what it will do for all of us.
  • Inertia. In my opinion, it was a mistake to cancel the Apollo programme. We should have never stopped going there, simply for the fact that now that we stopped, it’s harder than ever before to go back. And now that we’re on our way again, we must seize the moment, least we loose it forever.

What do you mean, harder?

That’s right, I said it’s harder to go to the moon than ever before. But why?

It’s harder to go to the Moon than when Apollo 11 or Gemini or Explorer launched from Cape Canaveral. It’s harder than Jules Verne wrote his inspiring book, From the Earth to the Moon. It’s harder than when Kepler looked to the skies and found that the planets moved in ellipses; harder than when Galileo first spied mountains on the moon. It’s harder than when Copernicus and Aristotle wrote of the heavens; it’s harder than man told tales of vengeful gods and great heroes and strung their images in the heavens, or first looked up at the shimmering orb and decided, I want to be there.

Again, why is it harder? Because we’ve already been.

Because we can always argue, what’s the point? We’ve seen it, we have the data and the photographs. Big whoop-de-doo. We can always send robots there anyway. It’s not like we have to go.

We don’t have to climb Mt. Everest or K2. We don’t have to travel in rickety bulbs of metal and glass to the bottom of the ocean to explore sunken wrecks and unknown, alien species. We don’t have to travel to Africa, or America, or the Amazon; people have already been there, and besides, we can just send robots. I mean, it’s easier, right? And certainly a lot cheaper.

It’s always cheaper and easier to sit back and do nothing. It’s always easier to not have to worry about keeping humans alive; but such research helps us in other areas as well.

But that’s not the point.

It’s the human element. It’s saying, “we’ve overcome all these obstacles, and look at us now.” It’s holding the flag, and planting it in the soil of Plymouth, or the snow of Mt. Everest, or the dust of the Moon; even if you’re not the first, it doesn’t make the moment any less real. It’s about achieving things harder, faster, better; achieving things hardly anyone has achieved before.

We choose to go to the moon in this decade, and do the other things, not because they are easy but because they are hard.

Because that goal will serve to organise and measure the best of our energies and skills.

Because that challenge is one that we’re willing to accept,

one we are unwilling to postpone,

and one which we intend to win,

and the others too.

--President John F. Kennedy, 1962

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Comic Strip 1.0 Build 09