OK here is a ‘classic’ blog post I originally published on-line about 4 years ago. For people new to my rantings it is not meant to be taken entirely seriously. It is exaggerated for effect. Though I do find it much harder to write like this now as I am a much calmer person. :-)
Dispelling the Geek Chic myth*
If you pick up a magazine (are you from the past?), browse a blog or read a news website and your are liable to come across a boat load of lies about geeks and nerds. Apparently we geeks are cool, hip and trendy and women really go for nerdy guys. That is true. I’ve had to change my mobile number several times and had to take out restraining orders because Jewel Staite and Tricia Helfer won’t leave me alone… No. Wait. I might have that the wrong way around. Anyway, women go for geeky guys these days right? Poppycock! 100% grade-A cock from a poppy.
Women have no more interest in us bespectacled, computer loving (only when it is really cold) Trekkies than they ever did before. You see what women currently go for is metro-sexual Male models dressed up like a geek. You know 6ft tall Greek gods with bodies chiseled from granite, a full head of mussed up hair and ridiculous glasses without real lenses in them. Or perhaps just Doctor Who. Either way that describes very few actual geeks. It is just the other side of the lie that men really prefer women with curves. Actually it is not so much a lie as half truth. We just mean curves likes Kelly Brooke not Dawn French, who has way too many curves, in all the wrong places and frequently going in the wrong direction.
What women mean by geek (no that’s a Dalek):
It doesn’t help that films keep doing the geek/nerd/dork/loser get the stunning chick angle either. The more gullible of my brethren are beginning to believe it. Look guys it never happens, ever. American Pie, Knocked Up, Fanboys, Superbad, Wargames, Weird Science, Hackers, Spider-man and Kevin Smith movies (especially Kevin Smith movies) are all fucking lying to you. The only way you get girls like in those films is if you have Bill Gates’ bank balance or use Rohypnol. Both of which involve breaking the law. :-)
Just a quick definition as there is often some confusion between what is a geek and what is a nerd. To be honest they are pretty much the same thing these days and can be used interchangeably. Though perhaps Geeks tend to end up as Computer Scientists and Nerds as Theoretical Physicists. Both have the same dubious social skills, optional personal hygiene and tendency to become obsessed with things of a technical/scientific nature. Also geeks bite the heads off chickens.
So where did the idea that nerds are cool come from? Firstly, Bill Gates. You see Billyboy has a lot of clout and a lot of cash. With power and money comes influence on what is considered cool. Sadly geeks are not cool by any stretch of the imagination. The popular idea of the cool geek is filled by cool people who get dressed up like nerds. Incidentally if you need to spot a real geek ask them which is best Star Trek or Star Wars. If the answer is only two words they aren’t a geek or a nerd. Secondly geek culture is fast becoming mainstream. People go to see Superhero and Science Fiction films now that would never have done so prior to 1999. People watch the likes of Lost and Battlestar Galactica and enjoy them. Our shit is now popular.
It is just that only the real geeks actually take the time formulate theories about the temporal displacement in Lost and rant about the stupidity of angels in Battlestar Galactica. The mainstream has co-opted our culture but it doesn’t obsess over it like we do. Thirdly it is cool to say you dig geeks. Women like to say it for the same reason men lie about not finding skinny 18 year old girls totally hot. Because they think it makes them seem deep. Actions however speak louder than words so women, being equally as shallow as men, still go sleep with Cro-Magnon man.
What about geek girls I here you feminists cry! Actually I don’t because any feminist reading this deeply chauvinistic rant had a myocardial infarction towards the end of the 2nd paragraph. Well they look almost exactly like geek guys but with internal genitals. That is why there are so few of us. Like Dwarves (the fantasy kind not midgets) identifying the females is just so difficult. Either that or we end up raising the kids of normals after marrying a psychologically damaged woman who already has crotch fruit from her failed marriage to some mouth-breather with a below median IQ and a passion for football (that sentence ran on a bit). Like a cuckoo in reverse.
Horribly bitter I may be (I never did get over High School) but it doesn’t stop my rant from being bang on the money. If geeks really were cool and what all women wanted then Firefly would be in its 9th season, Richard Dawkins would be Prime Minister, I’d be dating Summer Glau and we would all have flying cars. None of these things are true so by my willfully faulty logic I declare Geek Chic to be a damned dirty lie. So there!
* Not to be confused with the ‘Greek Sheep myth’ which is a completely different thing altogether.
Wow! What a weekend. Inva2ion has to be the best time I have had in ages. Where to begin? I guess the beginning would be a good start. Names may be changed or omitted, not so much to protect the guilty but to protect me. :-)
So Friday! After a pretty long series of train and tube journeys (that at one point involved me missing my connection because public transport in the UK couldn’t rise to the level of competent even if the whole of existence depended on it doing so) I arrived at The Renaissance Hotel, near Heathrow airport. I checked in and went to hang around waiting for my contacts Leanne @leanneeef and Tony @TonytheCylon. While I was waiting I picked up my gold pass and went a stood in the queue to get some prints to be signed and to buy some photo session tickets. The three of us then ordered a pizza, scammed the hotel out of parking pass and sat outside and fought over the pizza with the ants.
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So far nobody seems to have argument against 48fps movies beyond that it is different therefore bad. Sure they tart it up by using words like ‘art’ and ‘cinematic’ and compare it with Soap Operas because they don’t like those either. No doubt certain people thought the same about colour film/tv too. Actually there are people who still do. When it comes down to it they simply don’t like 48fps because it is not what they are used to.
Now some of you may not be familiar with my reviews so consider this a warning. There are going to whacking, great, spoilers all the way through it. If you haven’t seen the film GO AWAY! Also there will be bad language, gibbering nonsense and quite possibly a little nitpicking. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Oh and in case you didn’t pay attention to the previous paragraph. Thanos turns up in the after credits sequence. Loki and the Chitari are just puppets of Marvel’s resident Death worshipping badass. Also Wash Agent Coulson dies.
This is straight up the best comic book movie so far. The massive bar lift by Iron Man and The Dark Knight got bumped up again. Warner Bros must be crapping their knickers. The damn thing is practically flawless in execution. I suspect I sat through it all with my mouth half open like a gormless idiot. If you take advantage of that obvious set-up then frankly I’ll lose a little respect for you.
The cast is spot on. We already new that for most characters but I so wish Ruffalo was cast in the other Hulk films. He manages to do nerdy scientist without Bana’s creepyness and tortured soul without being as emo as Norton. I’d like to have seen more of Renner as Hawkeye as what I did see I liked. As much as I like look at Johansson’s fine ass and great rack in a tight costume I’d rather see a Hawkeye spin-off than a Black Widow one.
So Joss Whedon eh? All those who said he couldn’t carry a big movie after Serenity and while he was good with dialogue but he could never manage a really epic movie? Well I offer you a big, fat fuck-a-doodle-do with a cherry on top because:
Seriously you just can’t fault him on anything with the Avengers. I guess we could blame him for it not being even awesomer. All the Whedon staples are there too including the compulsory death of a beloved character. He even manages to add some character development in the middle of a film about superheroes, gods and aliens. The guy is an evil genius.
Criticising this film is the height of nitpicking but seeing as I am comic book nerd I kinda have to. The film almost false starts as it slows a little too much after the opening sequence. The Chitari coming over all battle-droid when their mothership blows up doesn’t make a lick of sense. Would have been better to have a scene showing the National Guard, SHIELD and Police rounding up or taking out the stragglers. Captain America’s “there is only one god” line rankled a little. Like I said nitpicking.
My favourite parts are made up mostly of the banter between the characters and the Hulk. The film genuinely funny but without being comedic. Much of this comes down to Robert Downey Jr having sublime delivery of his lines. Not to say he gets all the best moments though. Hulk getting a cheeky cheap shot on Thor and smacking seven colours of shit out of Loki being amongst the best bits. Actually each character gets to do their part without the film becoming bitty.
Action wise Iron Man jump starting the shield Helicarrier and his new armour are fantastic. As is the Iron Man vs Thor fight mid way though the film. Hulk’s initial fight with the big flying eel thing is a stand out too, even if short. Incidentally are those things Acanti? They could be I suppose but that is more a Brood/X-Men thing.
I’ll be interested to see what they do with Thanos in the sequel as they pretty much covered the invading aliens lead by a god-like being plot. I guess the natural progression from saving Earth is saving the Universe. It could mean we get to see Captain Marvel in the next film.
I loved it and I am going to see it again on Saturday. Probably in 3D this time. I think it might be worth the migraine. Did anyone else think they’d missed the Stan Lee cameo? It was a little late on.
I wrote this yesterday but thought it overly ranty, even by my standards. So I decided to sleep on it and see if I calmed down. I did not. I tweaked it a little tonight but here is my rant.
The UK Government looks like it is going to move forward with its plan to censor the internet. That’s right the “Great Firewall of London” is well on its way to becoming reality. A cross parliamentary inquiry decided access to certain perfectly legal parts of the internet should be opt-in. Which parts you ask? Well adult content, obviously. Why? For the sake of the children, also obviously.
Amusingly this law is devised by the kinds of people who try to claim pornography on their parliamentary expenses then blame it on their spouse. The same kinds of people who accidentally kill themselves during auto-erotic asphyxiation. Those who (mis)use the law to hide their own ‘infidelities’ and ‘moral failings’ from public scrutiny.
The freedom loving politicians of the UK want to censor perfectly legal internet content because children ‘might’ see it. Despite there being numerous solutions available to parents to censor their own internet connection the UK government thinks the internet should become pre-censored for parents too lazy or stupid to do their own parenting. People who want to look at porn will effectively have to put their name on a list saying they want to look at porn. That is not colossally bad idea at all.
The UK Government will have access to a big list of people who claim to like porn. A “pervert list” if you will. They will claim that they won’t ever have direct access to the lists that ISPs will be forced to keep but police will no doubt get access using warrants. The cops will probably sell the info to a Murdock owned news organisation at the drop of a hat. The other laws they are trying to get through at the moment will mean GCHQ will just have access anyway.
This “pervert list” of course will not be used to identify likely suspects if someone is sexually assaulted in your neighbourhood. If you go to court after being accused of such a crime it won’t be presented to the jury as evidence of your guilt. It won’t be used to suggest you “wanted it” if you are a victim of a sexual assault either. It will not ever be leaked to the press to create a moral backlash against you if your are politically inconvenient. Nor will it be used to check if you are suitable to work with children. Government agencies doesn’t abuse their powers like that. I mean it is not like they have been using anti-terrorism powers to do things track down people who let their dogs crap in the street or check if someone is really in the catchment area for a school is it? Teachers have never been hounded out of their jobs because they took part in perfectly legal activities the moral minority deemed immoral, right?
The blacklist used for this censorship will be perfect. It will contain the location of all the pornography on the internet and nothing more. There will be no life, business, finance or job destroying false positives. And even if there are they would be a small price to pay to make sure children don’t see nudy bits. They won’t spin it off as a quango or a charity (backup funding if they can’t pressure ISPs into funding it) so they don’t catch heat if it doesn’t work. The people responsible for deciding what gets blocked will not become unaccountable to anyone. Getting a site off unblock will not be nigh on impossible. Everyone remember when the Internet Watch Foundation blocked Wikipedia over an album cover? Think that would have got fixed so quickly if Wikipedia wasn’t one of the most popular sites on the internet?
The big lie is that the system will only be used to protect children from pornography. That is the justification, the excuse. Who gets to define what gets blocked in the first place? It may start off with just porn but you can guarantee that it will be extended later on to include violent video games, chemistry, criticism of religion, piracy, hacking, swearing, unpopular opinion, political opponents or whatever has people’s knickers in a twist that week. Either as a matter of course or ‘accidentally’.
After this is implemented I’d give a year before some ambitious politician sees political mileage in “turning off” access to the morally repugnant parts of the internet. To make the UK a very model of Victorian moral propriety. After all the mechanism to do so will be there. This is a free speech issue and anyone who says otherwise is a damned liar or a moron. Which I guess covers most, if not all, politicians.
Naturally anyone who argues against this will be labelled a dirty pervert who wants molest your children. A scaremongering sexual predator trying to muddy the waters to protect a deviant lifestyle. Which is complete horse shit. This is about censorship not porn.
Why does the internet even need to be censored to protect children? Why on earth should the government be doing it if it does? Don’t these kids have parents or guardians? Parents need to stop expecting the whole world to raise their obnoxious crotch fruit for them. You signed on for parenting when you let the damned thing be spawned. Do your job!
There are plenty of tools to monitor/manage your own internet connection. Many ISP’s offer opt-in censorship, you can use DNS services, net-nanny software or bloody well sit down with your kids when they use the computer. Ignorance, lack of time and poverty are not valid excuses. If they loved their kids they would make the effort.
I am perfectly aware there are many technical solutions that would get around this censorship without adding your name to the “pervert list”. That is hardly the point is it? Government sponsored censorship is very bad idea no matter the justification and it shouldn’t happen. Besides how long do you think it would be before circumventing the censorship will become an offence? Why is this thinking bad when other countries do it but good and noble when the UK wants to?
Perhaps we will have to hope that the EU will step in and protect us from our elected officials once again.
This seems to be the topic of discussion at the moment. So I thought I would give my take on it. Being both an atheist and someone who doesn’t see the point in marriage it all seems idiotic to me. Though perhaps that makes my opinion moo. You know, like a cows opinion. Why do people care so much what other people do? Seriously if gay people get married how does it make any difference to some god bothering bigot? It is not like it is going to be compulsory. Is it? Makes no difference to me if the delusional masses want to spend their Sundays talking to an imaginary friend. Not unless they attempt to force me to do it too or discriminate against me if i don’t. So why do so many theists care if gay people want to be as miserably married as straight people? They do tend to be of the religious don’t they?
It seems to me it all comes down to some people’s desire to control others. Some people’s sense of self worth is based on the validity of their beliefs and thus need to inflict them on others to prove they are right. That and/or they get off on bring able to dictate to others. I dislike Harry Potter but makes no difference to me if someone else likes reading those books. I might take the piss but I feel no need to try and get Harry Potter banned. Unlike some religious folk I might add. To sum up some people are just bastards. And oddly I’m not, which is a disturbing revelation.
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I am taking time out my lunch time of reading crap on the internet to point out why so many people are annoyed by today’s launch of the Raspberry Pi. As you would expect when the servers of both sites selling the much desired (by nerds anyway) Raspberry Pi died within seconds (no exaggeration ) of them being made available people voiced their displeasure on Twitter. Geeks not known for measured response and civil discourse. This drew out the internet’s White Knights who boldly charged to RaspberryPi’s defence. Naturally these serial dogooders did not understand why people are annoyed and put it down to a ‘sense of entitlement’. Which is fast becoming the goto buzzword for people who wish ignore other’s opinions.
This is the long line of product launches and online sales that have died a death because of website failure. RaspberryPi knew they had 100,000+ people after just 10,000 devices and the community constantly warned them they were going to have a problem. Their response was smug knowing smiles (virtual ones) and saying that it was all in hand. Everything’ they assured us’ would be fine. Those of us who doubted were mocked by the rest of the community as evil cynics. Guess what? Exactly what we feared would happen happened.
What was RaspberryPi’s response when everything went tits up? Their servers were fine (the site was replaced with a single static HTML page so no surprise there) it is the distributors who are at fault. We did warn them, not our problem. The buck well and truly passed. They spent the morning lording their media coverage and moaning about how people were being mean. Shock, horror people react badly when given the brush off. It turns out they had no contact at the 2 companies selling the product so couldn’t give any real explanations when things went south.
Frankly the launch was very badly handled. They should have announced the sites selling the devices in advance so people could register on them before hand. They should also have offered direct links to the products instead of telling people to search on the sites. Both these things would have reduced the traffic to the sites selling the devices by probably a factor of 10. They might have stayed up and just been slow had that been the case. It is apparent that RaspberryPi don’t have a close relationship with these partners. Not only did they fail to impress on them the volume of traffic they also made things much worse in their rush to maintain the hype.
Nobody would have been more than disappointed if these devices had just sold out really quickly. That happens. What has got people’s collective backs up is the sites dying under the load, the poor organisation and RaspberryPi’s attitude to the whole thing. People feel robbed of a chance and patronised to boot. Doubly annoying to many because they want to contribute and help out. Some us have seen first hand the deplorable state of IT education in this country and wanted to get hold of one of these devices ASAP so we could do our bit to turn that around. RaspberryPi seemed more interested in being all over the BBC than getting the devices into the hands of the people who will move the project forward.
On a different note whichever cock put this up on hotukdeals wants stringing up. Goodness knows how many of these devices will end up on eBay or stuffed in drawers because they are in the hands the chancers that populate that site. Cheers mate! In addition, after reading the discussion thread there I suspect YouTube has a rival for the most ill informed and idiotic commentators on the internet.
All that being said I still intend to support the project and do something helpful with my Raspberry Pi when I get one. My anger is making way to determination. Unlike some mine won’t end up as an XBMC media centre. Now the hype of launch has died down I expect things will go smoother here on in. Perhaps the bad experience will filter out the chaff and hopefully RaspberryPi will be better prepared in the future.
The official Marvel graphic novel collection has just started appearing in newsagents and is also available for subscription. First issue is £2.99 and the 2nd £6.99 (to get you hooked) with the normal price being £9.99. Now that is not cheap as there are two issues a month but what you get it is pretty awesome.
Graphic novels are usually £6-8 a piece and these are pretty decent quality hardback versions. They seem well bound and the paper is thick and glossy. They smell awesome too *sniff*. In the back of each issue is extra material like interviews and draft art. At the front is a handy summary of the events leading up to the story you are about to read. If you subscribe there are host of freebies too, including issue 3.
And if you have any doubt as to the quality of the stories here are the first 4 issues:
1. Spider-man: Coming Home by J. Michael Straczynski & John Romita Jr
So that is the creator of Babylon 5 and the guy who I think draws the best Spider-man. Plus the story is a cracker with some important implications (or they were until ‘One More Day’ *sigh*) for the Spider-man title.
2. X-Men: Dark Phoenix by Chris Claremont and John Byrne
Written by the Godfather of X-Men comics Chris Claremont (before he completley lost the plot and started churning out utter trash) and widely regarded as the best X-Men story of all time. The fact it was the basis of the third X-Men movie should not put you off.
3. Iron Man: Extremis by Warren Ellis and Adi Granov
Ellis would be the creator of Transmetropolitan (Go read it!) and Extremis is ranked as one of the best Iron Man stories and has very realistic artwork. Oh yeah and the retconned Iron Man origin story heavily influenced that of the Iron Man film and the Extremis armour itself being the basis of the Iron Man 2 armour.
4. The Ultimates: Super Human by Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch
You might have heard of Millar, he has this fairly popular comic and film called Kick Ass recently. The Marvel universe gets as 21st century reboot almost a decade before DC thought it was a good idea and Marvel didn’t kill off their main titles in the process. This is the first story of the Ultimate Universe’s version of the Avengers which sees them taking on a very nasty version of the Hulk. Both the Ultimate Universe and this title have heavily influenced the recent Hollywood films.
So if you don’t think you are getting your moneys worth in just the first couple of months then I sniff haughtily, vaguely in your direction. Basically it is good stuff.
If the Marvel Figurine collection (which also had for a few years) is anything to go by then a DC version is on the cards. It is probably just sitting, waiting to see how the Marvel version fairs. If that comes out too I’m going to be perpetually broke.