Listening to Critics

Scott Kurtz is the author of one of my favorite web comics. I read PvP every day, and have even used his strips to send messages to my wife. Scott has had a few controversial opinions, but I usually don’t pay much attention to them. Most of the time, Scott is just telling people the uncomfortable truth, and they don’t want to hear it. Beside: success speaks for itself, and you cannot argue with somebody who has had as much success as Scott has had. That won’t keep me from arguing right here and now, though.

In a recent post, “Why We Insulate”, Scott was trying to explain why the book “How To Make Webcomics” doesn’t have a chapter on dealing with critical response to somebody’s work. Early in the post, he states this:

Why we insulate ourselves from the notion that the external critic can EVER be right, is because their critique is moot in regards to the progression of our work.

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More Ticketmaster Stupidity

You might remember my scathing (non-deliverable) letter to Ticketmaster from a few months back. Not much has changed. I still don’t want to use Ticketmaster. But I decided to check on the availability and prices of some tickets today. And the process just made me laugh out loud in disbelief. Gather around everybody! Let’s poke some fun at Ticketmaster’s ridiculous “Are you really a human?” check.

The first word is “suitcase”. But what’s the second? “sibly”? What’s a “sibly”? That’s not a word in my dictionary. I’ll be suprised that turns out to be correct, and I refuse to type a word that doesn’t make any sense. Off to a bad start.

Ah jetzt ja. Eine Insel. Well, at least I can decypher this: “Kölnische”. “Titus”. No problem…if there wasn’t a freakin Umlaut in the word! Like 99.9% of all Ticketmaster customers, I’m using an US keyboard. How am I going to type this word without going through some serious extra pain to find the letter? Strike 2.

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John Edwards

Wow. I’m not here to comment on the morality of John Edward’s affair, America already has too many oh-so-holier-than-thou pundits (who often turn out to be hypocrits). I really don’t want to be one of them. But why the hell did he run for president with this as baggage?! It was certain to be uncovered and milked by mudslingers across the presidential spectrum. Why do you run for president when you know that that presidential campaign would have been doomed? That just doesn’t make any sense to me.

Heartless Care Bear

Maybe I’m the only person who finds this funny: this Care Bear doesn’t have the usual logo on his chest. That means that he is a heartless Care Bear. Something about that just makes me laugh.

Beyond Belief in EZQuake

I have added video of two Beyond Belief levels to the Quake page. I played the game using EZQuake and the high-res textures, which is pretty damn neat. Much updated graphics! Particle trails, coronas, distance fog, water effects… gives the game a whole new dimension. Check out these 1600×1200 screenshots, and head over to the Quake page to watch the video!

There’s a few definite problems with EZQuake, most stemming from the fact that it’s mostly designed to be a modern QuakeWorld client with multiplayer capabilities. Getting a single-player game going is a bit of a pain in the ass, especially for the uninitiated player. And a few items don’t seem to behave the way they did in regular Quake. The first BBelief map has an elevator that lowers the first Nailgun that the player gets, plus a monster, and this event is completely broken. The gun hovers in the air – it’s impossible to reach it, and the monster is nowhere to be found.

Those are definite annoyances, but checking out a bunch of maps is still a lot of fun!

Random Thought

You get a gold tooth at the dentist and the value of your body physically increases. Shouldn’t the life insurance premium go up as well?