I’m originally from Southern California. Los Angeles, as a matter of fact. Things were a bit different then. Unbeknownst to us, we were actually fairly bad off. Not the best of incomes, not the best of situations, but it didn’t matter to us. My parents busted their asses to provide everything they could, and expose us carefully to the media around us, letting us approach it as they figured we could comfortably on our own.

My brothers and I got a kick out of Duke Nukem when we first got our hands on the demo. We were already enthralled with First Person Shooters at that time, and we had a real fun time out of it. The one-liners of sheer humor and ridiculousness made us laugh heartily, the appreciation of the females resonated well with us, as hey, we’re guys and we had a comfortable relationship with the women around us and our mother. It was edgey, colorful, and fun.

But since then, things have sort of got twisted for us. Outside of the little world my parents gave us to prevent us from ending up in street gangs, jail or worse, there was a nasty world outside of it. War and death was common, famine was beginning to encroach on my friends and family while the capital leaders sought to keep more of it to themselves. And our gaming media began to take on more and more of this.

I think the last FPS I really enjoyed playing that didn’t have to do with things we dealt with in life was… Well, it’s difficult to say, but I loved playing in premises that had nothing to do with Earth, things far-off and unreal. The Quake series before 4, the Doom series, Half-Life, and Portal… all terrific games whose premise never had anything we could primitively draw similarities to unless we did a lot of mind-altering substances. I became disheartened in everything else. Call of Duty, Counter-Strike, Day of Defeat, Halo… these games all had primitive similarities we could draw to our lives. War, dwindling resources, suffering were the names of these games. Some, to remind us of what we’ve come from, and others to remind us of what we’re going to end up at.

We had our time, over the past 10 years or so, to figure ourselves out and band together to buck the system that tried to encroach us. We theoretically had the tools to do so, even a massive distribution engine to utilize and disperse our message. The time to fight is now, but so is the time to remember what we’re fighting for, and what we love to do best. It’s time we do everything we can to do what we did as kids: Enjoy ourselves, despite a world trying to come down around our ears.

I draw similarities to some things I see in the music media. For example? I was disgusted at Korn’s track “Oildale“, and Disturbed’s track “Another Way to Die“. Look guys, I’m well aware of what the fuck is happening in the world. Our TV and peers shove it down our fucking throats all the time. And yet, while we are powerless to do anything about it as we don’t have the capital to, and we’re getting our very right to assembly and speech taken away, you’re sitting here fucking shoving it down our throats too. I have an idea, guys: Take the money you used to write and produce those songs and videos, and buy out our politicians to make them stop doing the things destroying our world. I bet the $200k it took to make that one song could go a long way buying out 20 politicians so they vote to provide government funding to clean alternatives. Or better yet, I bet that same money could’ve been used to buy 5 US researchers’ time or equipment to do the same thing. Quit fucking reminding me about how bad it is and do something about it.

Duke Nukem provides us with a crazy escape. Something unreal and fun. I’ve found that when I’m not listening to music to orchestrate slaughters on a supermassive level to, I am consuming media providing inspiration to be creative, whimsical and fun. For example, something that really resonated with me was My Darkest Days’ track “Porn Star Dancing“. It’s about just having fun, and loving the women that give us the chance to escape the grind. Even as a fairly hardcore metalhead, I have taken quite a fancy to Lady Gaga’s media concepts and music. It’s truly inspiring, creative, and gets me a chance to get away from the grind.

There is no better time than now to bring the Duke back into our lives. It’s a sorely needed reprieve. And I’m hoping it’s going to be all that we’ve wanted it to be, and more. And I hope it inspires people to hang loose and have fun, get away from the grind, even for a little bit.

And love those great tits.

Truthfully, I have a problem with the terrestrial radio broadcasting industry, that is alleviated in the Internet medium: The barrier of entry is ridiculously high to get to a somewhat narrow audience. Don’t get me wrong, that audience is also much more likely to buy your advertiser’s products and all. But I mean, come the fuck on, how the hell do kids our age get into the business and really start to produce content in a shorter period of time than the generation before us? It isn’t terrestrial radio, I’m afraid.

The other problem I have with terrestrial radio is the absolute berth of rules from the FCC and RIAA they have to follow. One of the things that pisses me off all the time is the 7-second delay they’re forced to employ to prevent cussing on the radio. Why? Why can’t little kids hear on the radio what they already hear from their parents? The left-wing child protectionist agenda and the religious right protection agendas by external entities angers me in this respect, because it is ridiculous, and we don’t belong wasting our government dollar on [en]forcing the will the parents should already be doing.

Why should we spend money to do for other kids what my dad stayed home to do for us? I don’t want my dollar to be someone else’s nanny. If you want to be parents, you god damned better be able to pony up for your own restriction devices. Like, I don’t know, having a parent staying home and actually take care of the kids. And no, don’t give me your sob stories. I seriously have absolutely no fucks to give, and the fucks I gave are on loan.

Another thing that upsets me greatly is the fact that DJs who make their money and name on being hyper-competitive in their local markets are being artificially restricted by the Publishing Companies under the RIAA. It angers me to hear on the radio, “OH FUCK YEAH I HEARD THIS AWESOME PIECE LAST WEEK But we couldn’t play it because we didn’t have the right to for another week and a half by that point because the record company wouldn’t allow us to air a finished piece of work to help them hype their material¹.”

What is wrong with this picture? Terrestrial radio does one thing magnificently: It offers a spectacular method for new artists to get exposure so that the RIAA fat-cats get their blood money, recant the old, and still make money as an advertiser service. And now the AFL-CIO is backing various measures to take that away, by forcing radio stations to pay the performers. And by the performers, I’m almost certain this would mean the RIAA, since if they paid performers directly, it would make the RIAA shit bricks, causing a second war.

Radio stations, from what I recall, already pay considerable fees to be on the air, to pay their workers, and get licensing rights to play the music on the air. And a lot of the terrestrial stations also have to deal with the anal and retarded marketing monkeys from their respective corporations. This smells to me of a further money grab attempt by not the artists but of the RIAA, much like the one of Metallica v. Napster, when it came out that really Metallica were nothing more than the puppets of their PUBLISHING COMPANY.

If you disagree with this – or any of the other dumb shit bills that YOUR representatives are voting on and getting passed through the house, may I suggest perhaps contacting your local representatives on these actions and giving them exactly your piece of mine – Good or Bad – about it?

As for me? The Internet is becoming an endangered space to produce what we want to have the connected world at large take a peek at. While these fights are going on in Terrestrial Radio, it had already started to encroach on our rights long ago, starting with the horrid monolithic oppressor bills of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and The Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act (UCITA) of Maryland and Virginia passed a decade or more ago. We still strive to barely hold on to our freedom as yet another piece of world-wide legislation in the form of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) encroaches to further restrict our ability to speak in languages other than our natural ones while giving the RIAA, MPAA and BSA authority to militarize their operations at the same time. And yet, we still manage to have our freedom.

And it’s here that we still can enjoy some freedom to create content as we see fit. It’s here that the barrier to entry is lower for us to really innovate or gunk up with more of the same shit to our target audience while keeping our advertisers paying us happy. Sure, there’s so many more eyes and the stream of data that we create is considerably larger, but the potential is there. What took previous generations 10 or 15 years to do, we can now get the same numbers in 5.

I love to create content. But I’ll never go into terrestrial radio. It’s not my scene. I could make it there, I could dominate the market… for a while. Until people who have no right to the money my crew and I made want their cut. And then how do we continue to produce good content if we can’t make ends meet doing it?

Then I just say, toss it, I’ll blag anyways. Lately I’ve been blissfully unaware of politics, so I’ve nothing to think of on that point. I could rant on about games, but who wants to hear that? So I return to the previous conundrum of what will I blither about?

Shit, I got nothing, so I’ll talk about games anyways.

One thing I pride myself on is not forgetting where games and I came from (in relations to games) My family was quite poor, so when it came to games, my dad got what he could. And damned if I didn’t get my(his) dollars worth out of them. It seem to me these days that games are getting shorter. Or is it that I’ve gotten better? Y’know when you start a brand new game, and as you progress and eventually beat the game, you start a new one. But as you play through it a second time, it seems like it wasn’t all that difficult to begin with. For me it seems like a lot of games these days give me a similar feeling, like I’ve played it before, merely going through the motions. And some will feel too short just as your beginning to have fun, or your having a blast and that’s it. But what gets me is when publishers are trying to wring every cent they can from a “franchise”. One of my personal favorite examples is Quake. God, I love Quake 1-3. But Quake 4,Quake Wars, they can go and ream themselves. Why the Strogg? Publishers have a nasty habit these days of stealing the ball, running for the end zone, then flinging themselves (and the property) into the sidelines. They could have pulled a Final Fantasy and made it into whatever they want. Hell, if they are going to go off on any storyline, the Slip Gates would have been the easiest. Yeah, the death of Shub-Niggurath might have been a stumbling point, but hell, how many times can you kill the Makron before you start getting all Metroid on its ass.

And agreed, not having Ramero on the team was a kick in the pants, but enough with the freakin’ strogg! At least in the case of Doom, it was so widely different from its predecessors that I couldn’t find much fault in it. If they do make a new doom (gods forbid) they should wait sufficiently long that technology has taken a whole new bound as to make the previous ones in the series look like a perverts satanic scrawls.

Wow, talk about off topic. Uhh…where was I? Y’know what, I forgot, I guess I’ll continue this later.

KTHXBYE

To segue, you, the reader, also must consider: What was once a oft-admitted practice is now not only mainstream, but coming close to being the societal norm. Yeah, thanks fucking Microsoft Windows for being such a lousy piece of shit operating system that every user getting their hands on it must pick up knowledge that they shouldn’t have to, to operate their equipment. What ever happened to grab it and it just works? But I digress.

A concept occurred to me, and I’m like OMFG you know what would be funny? And then I came up with this, based on some lines from the Bible:

Pwns 25:8 Boobs and Awesome are the Dana: therefore she will lead pwners in the way.
Pwns 25:9 The geek will she guide to dominate, and the geek she will teach her way.

Pwns 25:12 What man is he that feareth the Dana? She shall teach he in the way that she shall choose.
Pwns 25:13 His frags will swell at lot, and his arm shall consecrate the map.

ShariVegas 5:5 Blessed are the geek: for they shall inherit the earth.

I got a kick out of it, at least.

So what will I drivel on about here? Technology? Wow, THAT’S interesting. Politics? Gimme a break, I’m not a bloody news anchor (you want witty political satire? Go watch T.V.). The world at large? Sorry, don’t give two shits whats going on outside (by and large).

The biggest reason I don’t do anything like that is because I’ve the Vocabulary skill of a retarded pit bull fresh out of collage. I might pull off some drooling and snarling, but that pretty much sums it up.

So where does that leave me? Buggered if I know, but I think I’ll take a stab at all of the above. Then I’ll wallow is my own misery (mainly consisting of my own excrement and the blood of virgin plague rats), probably try to play it off as a half attempt at wit and proceed to wash down the gurry I spew with the aforementioned “misery”.

The more I think of it, the more it makes me want to brush up on my dictionary reading. Then I remember this wonderful thing called video games an’ I just say Frag it.

Now don’t get me wrong (or do, I don’t give two shits of a leper chicken), I’ve read plenty of books. Ranging from fantasy to non-fiction, much like my video games and music. There will be sterling example of them, the overflowing ewer of fecal matter, and my personal off limit pieces (with their exception that prove my own rules)

I’ve already mentioned games, so I’ll go off on music. Generally I’ll listen to most everything, and easily discern (relatively) the true gems in the never-ending seas of Crapulon V. But my overall rule is the almost strict avoidance of  “Country”. I’ll admit there are good bands/singer/whateveryoucall’em, but I’ve been informed that the ones I do prefer are not (strictly speaking) “Country”. Thus my exception that proves my rule. And no, if anyone asks, I couldn’t name them to save my life. I have enough issues remembering my own without storing the names of others without something important possibly being moved out of the way.

Next being books. I’ll read most anything, so long as the writing holds up long enough for me to turn the bloody page. The one genre that I avoid like its last month mulched diapers left in the august sun, is “Mysteries”. Most of them have the compelling writing of a drunken two year old after a month on mescaline. Now, to date, I’ve yet to encounter a “mystery” novel I was able to pallet. And no, I’m not taking suggestion.

There are a few books/games/music I just out and out refuse to read/play/listen to. Anything J.R.R. Tolken I will not read, have no intention to read, and will die never knowing what the hell a “Frodo” is. I’m sure this might get some rabid fanboy into a psychotic frenzy frightening enough to make Paris Hiltons chihuahua pee itself. I’ve no intention to play anything of the Ninja Gaiden series. People say how “hardcore” it is and blisteringly difficult. Y’know what else is difficult to do with resulting blisters? Fapping with a waffle maker plugged into 220 while simultaneously nailing your hand to your forehead while singing the Canadian national anthem. And no, internet goers, that is not a dare. And no, I am not going to reconsider (the game, not the fapping). Anything JayZ makes me want to puke, so I’m not going to elaborate on that (I’ve used up all my funny, and JayZ is an easy target anywho).

Movies are the one thing I’ve watched so little of to have a preference, really. Is it funny (to me)? Cool. Is it interesting (to me)? Cool. Is it not any of the above? Change it. I didn’t get a PS3 to watch movies, I got it to play games.

Beh, I just watched 666 words pass by, so that might be my cue to wrap this up. I need to recharge my Rantometer.

KTHXBYE

Certifications used to mean something. They used to mean that you had the drive, passion and hutzpah to accomplish your goals and your financial risk was a near doppelganger to your ability and the level of trust that could be put in you to create the most diverse and clever solutions.

I am disappointed — nay, distraught — in the result of digital media content creation as a service. There are people whose only gift is mediocrity, only doing as much to get through and pass the class, while those with true innovation and artistic passion are seen as no better than those who can stamp simple geometric shapes into a canvas.

And yet, it’s these people, the passionless dredge who muddy the waters for their peers. And in doing so, create the dirt that encases the diamonds, instead of stepping aside and letting the diamonds battle it out for superiority and kinship.

And while I write this, I really do wonder: We were in sort of a crisis of sorts here in the United States, of watching talent we spent money on get shipped back overseas because of immigration laws, limits, and processing incapacity to compete against ourselves. But really, how many of those will actually compete against us, instead of seek kinship working for our companies with their parasitic tentacles in far reaches? And how many are merely fæx immolare?

Whatever. Doesn’t matter. I’m glad to surround myself with the best, brightest, and often times exotic of mind and ability. And with all this competition in the market for certifications and the incoming demand of the people for cheaper certifications, hopefully we’ll be able to obtain these holy writs that make mere handwavey suggestions at the true powerful capability that lies within the minds I have the honor of wallowing in.

Why, some might ask? Because sites like that make otherwise insignificant ass-mites feel self important. So obviously talking about myself would be quite contradictory to me saying this, no? Yes.. yes it would be, but damned if I don’t get to feel like I’m heard once in a bleeding while! I otherwise am quite self-effacing, nay, am quite self-deprecating.

The only reason I bring that up at all is because of games like FF13. People will say (and quite often) “The game gets better 20 hours in” (add appropriate nerd/douche sounding voice)

THAT IS NOT STRONG POINT! That is a bloody flaw in game design! That is at the very least not something to be proud of…I really don’t know what to say about that. I love RPGs, RTSs, FPSs, MMORPGS (the free ones, at least) racing games, fighting games, shooters of almost all kinds. Hell,  I like JRPGs to a lesser extent.

There is only one kind of game I will not play, and that is sports games. I feel lazy enough in the first place. Then you add on a game you pay $50 for, when you coulda bought a ball and have done the same goddamn thing! Some would argue that “its the statistics”, GO DO SOME MATH YOU STUPID BASTARD. Some will say “its the rostering”… Do you really have so much time and so little brains as to fill this empty void (both in mind and time) for the sole purpose of making a TEAM?!  And even others will say “its to play with the pros”…. Uh-huh, right. More self-important bullshit.

Y’know why I will play games like shooters, fantasy games, and so one? Because either A: its physically impossible (let me see some force lightning, bitches!), or B: its illegal (I’m sorry officer, I had no idea that peoples heads actually EXPLODE).

I will say this though. My only exception to this rule of mine is WII Sports and so on. Its a sports game that doesn’t make you feel lazy (just stupid, flailing about an’ wotnot) Another example is a little game called Jet Set Radio/ Future. Mainly because I’ve yet to see someone rail grind UP a telephone pole.

guhh….. rants running a little long, need to collect thoughts.

kthxbye

P.S. Oh, if I seem scatterbrained, that’s because I AM.

So, I liek video games and wotnot. I spend a good part of my income on video games and paraphernalia.

When it comes to the computer industry and IT, I avoid it like that plague.

So far have I removed myself from it, that I work at a bloody hardware store.

And at the end of the day I fap for an hour and play gamez ’till my brain rots outta place.

And unlike ShariVegas, I’ve little claim to fame. Prolly ‘cuz of the aforementioned avoidance of the computer industry besides games.

Speaking of games, I’mma pound my head into FF13 a little more before I call it quits on the series on the whole (again)

kthxbye

Yeah, who would’ve known that hey, Wordpress actually has a limited amount of what’s actually bundled-in functionality, the rest is up to the end-user on how it’s treated: Blog, overgrown CMS, whathaveyou.

After doing some fighting, the blog is finally acting as I want it to. It should give me a base to allow for other people to contribute on their own pages.

Edit: And even more, I’ve been able to toss in a twitter widget on any page I want. Woot. Follow @KC7YRH :)