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Penny Arcade Makes Time 100
Precision noticed that Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins of Penny Arcade fame have made the Time 100. The writeup talks about Child's Play and PAX and lavishes deserved adoration upon the pair. I've always envied their ability to maintain control over their brand and use it for appropriately portioned good and evil ;)
I'm a big fan of the brand and PAX, but I really have a hard time finding anything enjoyable about their writing.
Perhaps 1 out of 10 comics are interesting and most often the writing drones on like I'm reading Moby Dick
"I scrolled up and down my Steam library yesterday, listlessly, without so much as a remembered thrill; all I wanted to do was play Blur for some reason, something I hadn't picked up in weeks but whose thirsting fronds were reaching up through some mental fissure. After a few rounds to loosen up, quite organically I found myself in a Party discussing the events of the day. The conviviality and natural flow of the conversation began to disintegrate as the race progressed, slowing and then ceasing altogether, like the dwindling reports from a bag of microwave popcorn."
They are arguably among the most influential people in an industry bigger than Hollywood...I'd say they deserve a place on the list.
Not bad for two nerdy dweebs who probably got swirlied in middle school.
Living With a Nerd
Honestly, congratulations. It's nice when good work gets recognized.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
And the fact that "Fruit Fucker" is in it with them.
"There are no facts, only interpretations." --Friedrich Nietzsche.
Kudos to them, but sadly this was a popularity contest where the likes of Justin Bieber and such were receiving votes.
I'd rather a wide-range, rational panel try to offer their opinions rather than open up a massive internet vote.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
I was impressed until I read the rest of the list, particularly this love letter to Glenn Beck........ written by none other than Sarah Palin herself.
Really, Time? Sure, he's pretty influential, and a demagogue to be certain. But casting him as an intellectual and a history buff? Have they ever even watched his program?
Jon Stewart had a great point last week: The Daily Show is as absurd and farcical as it's been since Day 1. However, the "real news" media are slowly inching their way toward the realm of absurdist comedy and entertainment.
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
Wait what, I don't even
When they commented that they have a bigger voice than Roger because the last time they checked they where above Oprah on the Time top 100 list.
I was like "NO WAY!" so I went, did some fact checking, and then voted to put them up to #1!!
Click the link here http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1972075_1976159,00.html
To vote for them!
How much is your data worth? Back it up now.
All they need is a decent web comic. Seriously the quality has dropped considerably in the last couple of years as it seems the comic is just an afterthought, they occaisionally put their heart into it and make a brilliant comic but for the mostpart I don't even chuckle anymore.
Monstar L
If you can show proof, great, but I sincerely doubt this.
You can only write off what you actually donate. So unless they're donating enough to make their net income zero, they're paying taxes on their advertising income.
The vast majority of money for Child's Play comes from donations, donations that go completely into the charity, and are completely unnecessary for your It's Just A Tax Shelter theory.
They've raised literally millions of dollars for sick kids to have games to play in the hospital.
You're full of shit and an asshole to boot for trying to tear down something as great as Child's Play.
The enemies of Democracy are
I have similar issues with PA. I used to read it, and thought it was quite humorous, but with the language and dialogue, it was like drinking your favorite soda (Mountain Dew) with a bit of raw sewage in it. After a while, I just couldn't do it anymore.
However, I must give them praise for standing up to Whacko Jacko Thompson. That guy really needed to be put in a box for his own good. Thank you, PA, for taking him on, and being a major factor (IMO) in shutting him up.
I like to read PA from time to time. I could do without the sophomoric language that seems to be thrown in simply to 'identify with the youth', but sometimes I really find the comic funny. But the Child Play charity is primarily just a tax shelter for PA. They make a lot on money on advertising and PAX, and use CP to avoid (or at least defer) paying taxes on it. Not that that's anything unusual for a corporation, but I hate when companies portray their 'charitable giving' as some grand altruistic philanthropy, when it's just a way for them to dodge taxes.
If the laws that allowed this type of behavior went away, so would the giving.
You do not understand tax laws as well as you think you do if you believe the primary motivation for charitable contributions is to dodge taxes. It's a secondary motivation. You don't come out ahead.
Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.
From what I've understood from their past posts and various interviews, they owe a lot to their business manager, Robert Khoo.
They like explaining how they actually sold their brand and rights away before Khoo came aboard. Luckily, the buyer disappeared into bankruptcy and nobody else has since claimed that ownership. I'm not too sure of the details and current veracity of this :)
Misleading titles? Inflammatory blurbs? Keep in mind that Slashdot is a tabloid.
I'm pretty sure they receive no tax breaks from Child's Play except perhaps what goes into the cost of advertising and running the event, which may reach into the thousands but not into the millions that the charity raises. Child's Play is a charity auction, which means the money and items donated are tax write-offs for those who are donating, not for Gabe and Tycho.
You're suggesting that people only pretend to like things that are popular. How did they get popular to begin with?
And why doesn't everyone here pretend to like Twilight? It's genre fiction and insanely popular. Maybe the Slashdot crowd likes XKCD because it is great, and they hate Twilight because it is crap.
Just maybe.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
Wow. It's hard to find the words. Yeah, there are reasons to be cynical about corporate charities, like how tobacco company Philip Morris spent tons more on advertising about how charitable it was than on actual charity...
But dude, you can't let that cynicism blind you to real charity. I don't think you have any idea how hard volunteers for Child's Play work every year. In the first year before they had any real logistics in place, a whole team of local volunteers worked night and day to physically process, store, load, move, and unload tons of toys for Seattle Children's Hospital. Even though now the toys go to hospitals directly, volunteers still help with the charity dinner, with various fund raising events around the country, with community efforts at PAX like the Cookie Brigade, etc.
Unless you have more evidence than a mere assumption, it is callous and insulting to all those volunteers to paint their hard work as nothing more than a 'tax dodge'. While I don't work for PA Inc, I know a lot of people who do, and I have heard nothing, not even a rumor, of any funds from PA revenues being somehow 'laundered' through CPC.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
You're right! Your "I don't think anybody finds it funny" argument is flawless. Now I realize that I only found their comics funny because I thought that, somewhere, SOMEBODY else thought they were funny. Eager to fit in, I quickly forced and tricked myself into enjoying it. THANK YOU for showing me the light.
I mean, why would I ever find awkward phrases like "Do you have snakes that come in sometimes? Don't stand for that shit!" hilarious?
All webcomics, hell all COMEDY is hit and miss. I cannot say that because one thing a person does is funny, everything else that that person does must necessarily be funny or else the first thing becomes unfunny. I find Penny-Arcade to be more often funny than not... so I like it. You might disagree.
So let me start: Penny Arcade is not funny. xkcd is not funny. Don't bother referencing them, we won't find them funny!
Since we're doing the whole opinions-as-facts thing: xkcd and Penny Arcade are funny because I find them funny.
It's neat that a lot of people seem to agree, but my opinion of their humor doesn't require it.
I find about 70% of the xkcd I run into funny.
Why is it so hard to only have politicians for a few years, then have them go away?
Here are we have popular geeks who make a living making little pictures and writing little stories for. Everyone loves them. They are witty and funny and frequently have sex with actual women and are everything you are not. Do you know there's a guy who has a whole boring ass blog about how xkcd isn't funny? Nobody reads it, because we all think xkcd IS funny. Penny arcade IS funny. You and the other haters are either too stupid to find the humor, or too jealous to admit it. Once you have achieved something in your life, I doubt you will feel the need to put other achievers down. Maybe you should try, you know, doing something, rather than bitching about the people who do.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
If the laws that allowed this type of behavior went away, so would the giving.
Yeah! It sucks that people get rewarded for helping people. If there were any justice in this world, we would severely punish charities. Only then could we be sure that the people were truly selfless.
OH NOES! TEH SWEARS!
I have never, and will never, understand this mindset. They're just words. Words are giving power and meaning only by the reader. To me, they're not a big deal, if anything they indicate that the authors are being honest and not filtering themselves just to fit in some moralist 'acceptable' box.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
Why are you bitching about people who bitch?
Wow. It's hard to find the words. Yeah, there are reasons to be cynical about corporate charities, like how tobacco company Philip Morris spent tons more on advertising about how charitable it was than on actual charity...
Right, or a great example today I heard on the radio. KFC is trying to raise $8.5 million to donate to cancer research. They're doing this by selling pink buckets of chicken at something like $8/pop, and donating $0.50 of each. This is the typical cynical corporate method of charity contributions: Making their donation dependent on product sales, advertising this fact, and thus trying to directly leverage their "generosity" into increased product sales. I wouldn't be surprised if they expected the extra sales to completely offset the donation itself.
If, instead, KFC just donated $8.5mil directly, even wrote that off their taxes, and didn't spend millions advertising their generosity, that would be fine. Getting some PR benefit out of charity is okay with me.
But dude, you can't let that cynicism blind you to real charity. I don't think you have any idea how hard volunteers for Child's Play work every year.
Yeah, he obviously has no idea what Child's Play is all about. There are a million easier ways to get the same tax benefit.
I have heard nothing, not even a rumor, of any funds from PA revenues being somehow 'laundered' through CPC.
Well I don't know about that, but I have heard rumors of foul play at the CP auction. ;)
The enemies of Democracy are
The money comes into PA from ads and whatnot, they direct most (if not all) of it Childs Play (therefore writing it all off as a 'donation' to themselves), and set themselves up as administrators (therefore avoiding paying payroll taxes).
Where's your source for this? Everything I've heard about the way Child's Play is set up is that they distance it from PA Inc. as much as possible for two reasons. The first being that they don't want the image of the comic to draw ire towards the charity. Secondly, they don't want the possible collapse of their company to take down the charity.
It seems is easy to be a guru on the internet. You can make lots of weird predictions, and some will be right.
Like this 2006 comic:
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2006/05/01/
And this today news:
http://ve3d.ign.com/articles/news/54532/Activision-Bungie-Sign-Ten-Year-Publishing-Partnership
And this part of the reason Penny Arcade is still relevant.. theres a lot of predictions, and some are right.
-Woof woof woof!
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation
This chap knows how to review a game.
I am not a gamer, barely play video games but this Brit makes a frankly dull subject come alive with incredible hilarity.
I hate Twilight for the same reason I hate Monster Cable.
Awww, FUCK! Why didn't I think of that first?
---
ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
Seriously.
Interesting, how they struggle to stay important, by judging others, and sucking the cattle into their reality.
Unfortunately, in actual reality, they are long fallen into irrelevance. Or has anyone of you ever bought a issue of the Time magazine? I honestly don’t know a single person. And I don’t know a reason why I should. (Hello Time marketing? *nudgenudge*)
It’s not that I don’t wish them all the best. It’s just, that maybe finding a new business model and purpose would be a good idea. :)
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
Oh great. So now you've gone from accusing them of using CP to dodge taxes on their advertising revenue to accusing them of laundering charitable donations into their own pockets.
Do you have any evidence for any of this? Do you have any proof that the two of them are paying themselves wages as CP's "administrators"? Do you have any proof that they have extracted "expenses" from the pool of donations that were not actually expenses of the Child's Play charity, but rather expenses of Penny Arcade or simply profit-taking?
Because that all would have to be spelled out on their tax returns, and if those "expenses" weren't really expenses then they can't be claimed and the IRS would be on them like flies on shit. So you're not just accusing them of cynically taking advantage of the tax code, you're actually accusing them of being tax cheats. The law is very specific on what can actually be counted as charity and what can't.
You're a real piece of work, you know that? People are out there making a real difference in children's lives, and all you have is baseless accusations founded on cynicism. Cynicism for its own sake is wrong and stupid. And it also doesn't help anyone, unlike Child's Play.
The enemies of Democracy are
Let's not forget that it has donated money towards hospital equipment as well.
As I have noted from your other armchair legal opinions, you do not understand the law. You do not know anything about Penny Arcade's corporate structure or how they pay their bills or Child's Play's bills. You are accusing a charitable organization of fraud without any basis in reality. Here is a quick sample from the FAQ on their website: Q. Does Child's Play charge administrative fees? A. We try our best to have every dollar that comes in go right back to the hospitals, but there is a slight administrative cost that does get paid for with donations (for example, shipping $200,000 worth of Nintendo DS' to dozens of hospitals worldwide is not free, sadly). Historically, these charges have not exceeded 2-3%. It's true that we're a non-profit, but unlike most non-profits, we're not in it to create a self-sustainable entity. We do it to give. Again, I ask you to please stop polluting the internet with misinformation. These people are doing good work to make the lives of sick children better. By defaming them you are taking trolling to a whole new level.
Speak for yourself, please. I find both funny. There are among (very few) things I read as soon as they update, checking several times a day. At any given time, there are probably several printouts of each pinned around my house.
CmdrTaco writes:
That reminds me of the time they signed away their book publishing rights and nearly lost the rights to their intellectual property and the name Penny Arcade. Except for that, I agree.
I'm a big PA fan, but they totally needed a business manager. And since I'm writing about him, I love this anecdote about Robert Khoo.
This is not my sig
So let me start: Penny Arcade is not funny. xkcd is not funny. Don't bother referencing them, we won't find them funny!
Coincidentally, you are not modded funny either. Instead you are modded troll. Which, I guess, in itself IS funny. We're laughing AT you, not WITH you.
But by all means, please enlighten us; what IS funny?
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
You've apparently missed all the heartfelt and often tearful thank-yous they get from parents with their kids in the hospital. I was in the room only a few yards away from the woman who broke down crying during PAX East thanking them for doing Child's Play because such things meant so much to her. It's on the episode of their reality show for PAX East that came out recently if you want to see it for yourself. Child's Play does make a real difference in people's lives and that shouldn't be discounted.
"I may not have morals, but I have standards."
You couldn't be more wrong. As an adult who recently went through 5 rounds of chemo and a bone marrow transplant. The 5 months overall I spent in the hospital over the last year were a lot better because I had an electronic outlet. For me this was my laptop and smartphone, for a child, it may be video game console. Don't underestimate how important it is to get your mind off the shiatty situation you are in.
There are lots of people and resources to give food, clothing, shelter and money. Of course, there can always be more. But don't denigrate a group simply because they found a unique and beneficial way of helping. Believe me its worth it and is appreciated.
I wish there was a fscking blue pill
If they wanted to help they would give food, clothing, shelter, or just money. Giving a shiny Nintendo DS to a kid with a three pound tumor in his abdomen, while his parents are slowing bankrupted by medical bills, does nothing...other than sooth the conscience of the giver.
This is quite simply not true. My oldest son was on treatment for leukemia for 3 years and 2 months, so I have spent quite a lot of time in the children's oncology clinic. The clinic we went to does not receive games from Child Play, but from other sources. The kids in the clinic love the games and they make it a lot easier to be stuck in a chair doing a six hour infusion. Yes, it's true, some of these kids need clothing or shelter, and a distressing number of the parents face bankruptcy. That doesn't make the games a conscience-soothing gift. They actually deliver a lot of value for the majority of kids stuck at the clinic.
Oh you mean PrincessRedDot (PRD) and maybe one or two others that in fact only make a living wage? I think you radically overestimate the financial scope of CPC's diabolical, faceless administration. You don't know anything other than your wild, baseless assumptions about CPC and its people. Whereas I have met and talked with PRD several times over many years. I have myself volunteered my time and with the help of my wife raised thousands for CPC through community events.
You want every charity to be run like a monastery that's your prerogative, but to act like CPC is some cabal of evil tax-dodging millionaire fat cats feeding off of an army of deluded rubes is so intellectually dishonest as to be disgusting and absurd. That is why your original post is rightly modded into oblivion.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
I find some of XKCD funny, but I probably find a higher percentage of XKCD Sucks funny.
I find about 70% of the xkcd I run into funny.
XKCD can be funny a lot of times, but I also find it frequently unbearably smug. Not old school nerd, more like the newer trendy hipster nerd thing that cropped up in the past few years.
Alright, I've lost it. As parent of a child who has benefited from Seattle Children's Hospital's care more than once, let me say you must truly be the most bitter, irredeemable, self-righteous, scum-sucking, ignorant, foolish, truculent, and repugnant bastards I have ever had the misfortune of wasting my time reading. If you can't understand the value of bringing a small amount of fun engagement into the lives of children who may very well die slowly in the most agonizing pain imaginable, then you yourself are worthless, inhumane excuse of a being.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
Prove that Child's Play has done this, or admit that you're lying. There are no other options.
WTF is time 100?
His user page says he has kids, but as a parent I can't believe it. Nobody with kids could be so dense and so callous as to fail to understand, let alone denigrate, the value of any enjoyable distraction to a child in pain. If it's true, I really pity his kids. He's one sick puppy.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
Yea I agree with this, and it wasn't always the case. XKCD used to be mostly hit for me, but the last couple years the smugness has been overwhelming.
Ogre Wedding Planners llc.
Jerry and Mike receive no payments from CPC, that's just wild, speculative bullshit on Itninja's part. Kristen Lindsay (AKA PrincessRedDot or PRD) does, I believe, and maybe one or two others, but those are living wages, not wild profits.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
You can also write off the income of anyone designated at 'administrators' of the charitable organization.
Before today I was completely unaware of Child's Play, so I visited Guidestar to have a look at actual numbers. This information is from their 2007 form 990 (the latest I found at Guidestar and the one that probably looks worst for expenses). It fully discloses Penny Arcade's affiliation (gee, the IRS cares about people trying to wash salaries and actually checks this sort of thing).
I have questions as a result of that (very quick and limited) review, but none in the area of trying to wash salaries. I'm curious about where the Project Manager expense actually goes. I'm curious about the disaster of an auction - why they did it, what they learned, whether they plan to try again. I fail to see evidence of the sort of fraud you are claiming.
Corporations get into charity for multiple reasons: good public relations, donating to related interests, belief in the cause. That doesn't make promoting or giving to a charity a fundamentally bad thing. Unless you have evidence to back up your claims, the evidence I've seen suggests they are unfounded.
XKCD can be funny a lot of times, but I also find it frequently unbearably smug.
So do I, and so do the authors of http://xkcdexplained.com/
World of Warcraft...
it's about 1/3 the way there. Pretty effing amazing for a game.
How much is your data worth? Back it up now.
Thank you for the informative background. I can illuminate the project manager a bit, she's Kristin Lindsay AKA Princess Reddot or PRD. I think there are some interviews out there on the intarwebs if you're interested. I think the 2007 auction was a flop because that was right about when the economy started to crash so people didn't really put as much into it that year. I doubt that previous or following years had similar failings.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
And why doesn't everyone here pretend to like Twilight? It's genre fiction and insanely popular. Maybe the Slashdot crowd likes XKCD because it is great, and they hate Twilight because it is crap.
maybe twihards like twilight because it's great and they hate xkcd because it's crap?
or perhaps it's just because different people enjoy different things? nah, couldn't be that.
http://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
To each his own... I'm one of the least socially conservative people I know, and don't meet many people's definitions of "moralist," but the cursing can detract me from a webcomic where it's gratuitious. It's just my personal preference. I used to read a lot of Penny Arcade but one thing that really drove me (and probably a decent number of female readers) away was the Fruit Fucker. It was way too creepy for me. Yes, yes, I know they still have lots of female fans, some of whom love the Fruit Fucker. And yes, I know to find a juicer creepy is weird on my part. But there it is. See? Personal preference. I'm not saying they should ban the little dude or "teh swears." Just that it's not for me.
I also didn't like the abrupt about-face they took regarding the PS3 the minute they started getting free stuff.
Last I checked the list was full of Korean Pop stars and Figure Skaters.
I would say that somehow S. Korea folks were really aware of this, and/or no one else cared.
I would say that "Time" hasn't quite figured out this thing called "Cyberspace" and perhaps their "Time" has long since passed.
I mean how many years ago was it when Stephen Cobare would join just about any internet voting thing, nominate himself, plug it on his show, and get bridges, space station equipment, and a variety of other crap named after himself. I think the ultimate joke was how stupid these "contests" were.
My personal favorite was up here in Canada where "This Hour Has 22 Minutes" a political satire comedy news show not unlike "The Daily Show" (predated it actually by many years) made fun of stupid politician (Stockwell Day) who wanted a referendum on ANY topic where someone could get 1% of the population to sign a petition. So they ran a petition on their website, and plugged it on their show to have a referendum about changing Stockwell Day's name to "Doris Day". They got the over 300,000 signatures they needed, proving that this was a very stupid idea. Gold, Jerry Gold!
No, definitely not. xkcd is terrible writing mixed with terrible art.
People only pretend to like things that are popular with what they consider their peer-group.
Usually things get popular by starting with a single person or small group of people that are influential within that peer group. The rest follow them.
Unfortunately, that is not even slightly true. Despite what some parents think (not that I'm saying you're one of them), having kids does not grant special insight into...well, anything really.
let me say you must truly be the most bitter, irredeemable, self-righteous, scum-sucking, ignorant, foolish, truculent, and repugnant bastards I have ever had the misfortune of wasting my time reading
That is a venerable dinner plate of adjectives. +1 Internet point for you, sir!
That is far funnier than any xkcd has been. Bravo
11 was a racehorse
12 was 12
1111 Race
12112
Pretending to like something popular is not as bothersome as pretending to hate something popular. Lots of people apparently hate Twilight, but when you bother to talk to them, few of them seem to know more than some vague complaint or parody they saw on the internet. As it seems, they criticize something they barely know about just because it makes them feel superior, somehow. Often these people are not nearly as judgemental with what they like, which may be of dubious quality as well.
Anyway, popularity shouldn't determine whether someone likes or dislikes something. Popularity isn't worth much, since different works are made for different publics. Preferences are subjective. Still, if I had to choose, I'd rather have people pretending to like something around me, since at least they are not putting so much effort in ruining the fun of other people.
http://goatkcd.com/ is the best realization of the comic, by far.
And why doesn't everyone here pretend to like Twilight?
Who doesn't like vampires who "sparkle" in the sun?
Moby-Dick is a great book. OK, It's a little harder to read than kindergarten reading primers, but droning on it does not do. You get everything from the technology of whaling to the problems of dealing with a psychopath on an isolated boat. It is a truly great American novel. But, like anything else with lots of food for thought, what you see in it is a measure of your own ability, not the writer's.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
It was more a case of the PS3 started being *available* and Sony pulled their head out of their asses. It was the same thing with the original Xbox. I do audio-production (and marginally participate) for a videogaming podcast, and the initial "what the fuck is sony doing, and why does the PS3 suck when the PS2 ruled) opinion slowly faded over time as the system began to be non-lame.
As for Fruit Fucker, I never really got what squicked people about it. It's a robot that fucks fruit. And? I mean, seriously.
Penny Arcade is not funny. xkcd is not funny. Don't bother referencing them, we won't find them funny!
Speak for yourself. I love both of these comics and have at least a dozen friends who do as well.
I think your post is more telling about yourself - you apparently laugh at things that you don't really like, and so think that everybody else does the same.
But nothing has more smug than old-school nerd. Those 70s era greenscreen worshipping neckbeards who whine because normal people are allowed to use computers now are the kings of thinking they're better than everyone else with no real substance backing the belief.
Wow, you really need a hug. I mean I've known some bitter nerds but damn, son.
Please come to my office. I do a lot of PowerPoint presentations, but my projector is about to die, and I think I could easily replace it with you.
No, definitely not. xkcd is terrible writing mixed with terrible art.
You sir, are a Philistine.
You're so full of shit.
One of my fondest possessions is a thank-you card with crayon drawings on it I received from Tulane's Children's Hospital in New Orleans for some video games I sent them through CP a couple years back. The donations get to the kids, and it really does make their lives better.
Maxim: People cannot follow directions.
Increases in truth directly with the length of time spent explaining them
In the Lacanian framework, we, as human beings, search for identity. To boil it down, two things must happen: we must be able to recognize ourselves, and recognize the Other. The technically minded see something of themselves in XKCD, and the gamer culture sees something of themselves in Penny Arcade. It has nothing to do with actually being funny -- it's merely a self-defining shared experience. (Self and shared: the schizophrenia of our times as espoused by Deleuze and Guattari.)
The disassociation from Twilight is about recognizing the Other. The people who frequent these fora recognize in themselves something that is inherently distinct from not only the content of the Twilight novels, but the fan culture surrounding them. It's not about the novels being good or bad: we don't like them as it encapsulates and represents Otherness.
I hope I die before I become as cynical as you.
Support a great indie game: http://www.abaddon360.com
Step 1: Company X donates to Charity Y.
Step 2: Charity Y publicizes Company X's donation in some way.
Step 3: Customer Z chooses to do business with Company X due, in part, to hearing about their donation to Charity Y.
Step 4: ???
Step 5: Villainy!
Someone needs to put a stop to this! If people choose to do business with companies because of their charitable contributions, well that's only going to encourage more charitable contributions!
Oh yeah, cus nothing says "down to earth" like meta-analysis.
Not that it wasn't funny. Or that xkcd isn't smug. Or that it isn't funny despite being smug.
The enemies of Democracy are
please, please, please tell me you have a/many tween(s) and you only came about that knowledge under the duress of being outvoted at the Sunday matinee w/ said tween(s).
Imagination drew in bold strokes, instantly serving hopes and fears, while knowledge advanced by slow increments...
I find Moby Dick to be quite a bit of fun. You just have to skip the plot and get into the geekery of whaling and sailing. Oh, and don't worry about accuracy.
ivan
Like to brew? Want to talk about it? Brattlebrew: groups.yahoo.com/group/brattlebrew
It gives you insight, in, you know, raising kids (considering you do some parenting, anyway).
It will not automatically give you a higher ground or morals, but it surely teaches you a few things.
Mu
Really? Have you read even an excerpt of any of the Twilight books? They make R. L. Stein look like the next Charles Dickens. They are romance novels written by a Mormon. I refuse to believe that anyone over 12 years old can enjoy Twilight without having some sort of mental disability.
Said, "It's just like dice but it's got more sides And it tells me who lives and who dies"
Maybe I'm a freak, but I have actually read an excerpt from one of the Twilight novels (I have a Kindle and downloading samples is very easy). It really is as terrible as the uninformed haters make it out to be, possibly worse. I also enjoy many things of dubious quality, my reading, gaming, television and movie preferences would make a critic in the field squeal. Its all about being honest with yourself, and giving things a fair shake. And, I'm sorry, but Twilight is awful.
Said, "It's just like dice but it's got more sides And it tells me who lives and who dies"
Time removed moot entirely because 4chan can and will do it for the lulz.
The overwhelming majority of the "smugness" is projected onto it, not anything that is actually expressed by the comic.
I agree, but I don't read it just for the funny. I read it for the occasional insightful and sad.
Most human behaviour can be explained in terms of identity.
"smug"? Too self satisfied? Too self satisfied for what? Should it be living up to some kind of greater "web comic purpose"?
The mix of hopeless squares and trolls in the comments there is priceless. I'm not entirely sure if the blog runner understands that their blog is ironic humour, but it doesn't really matter in the end.
Lets leave the middle east out of this.
I assumed that the /sarcasm wasn't needed. I was apparently wrong...
This is perhaps too harsh. XKCD is sometimes funny and sometimes insightful. Sometimes its not. Randall seems to have become more taken with himself over time which is a bad thing, because the art is brilliant if its a non-artist expressing himself the only way he knows how, OTOH its terrible if its from someone who thinks they are a gift to the art world.
PA used to be funnier and they do phone it in a lot of the time now, but they at least try to do some other things and take it in artistic directions that interest them, which I can respect.
I will say I've been reading qwantz for as long as those other two, and it is still funny, although it doesn't really evolve as a comic. <_< OK...that pun was terrible.
I hope you got reread all of that.
I agree w/ your post. I just said WoW was about 1/3 the way there. 2/3rds is a long way to go.
There is a huge gap though. Look at the time frame of the movies your talking about, they are vastly different by generation. If you were to ask the same SW crowd Who their favorite bands were it'd be Led Zepplin & Black Sabbath or Van Halen (David Lee Roth)
My generation might say Metallica and R.E.M. or Van Hagar
The current 15-25 yo population might say blink 182 or Lady GaGa or Cold Play
The comparison between mediums isn't the apples to apples either though, because, while I can show you an old movie like star wars, or Real Genius in a few hours, you'd look at it and go OMG that looks so cheezy & fake...
Imagine trying to show someone accustomed to the X-box 360 and make them sit through 15 hrs of Wolfenstein. I loved the game, and I wouldn't wish that on anyone...Today.
The comparison just isn't there, two totally different mediums.
When we talk about influence though, SW had a huge influence & it spanned multiple generations w/ a HUGE distance between releases of the 456 and 123!
WoW just started, and in the newest generations everyone knows what WoW is. Video games 10 years ago were where silent film was 100 years ago. The best videogames right now are at the level star wars was when it first came out. In the next 10 years, a convergence will happen, and video games will suck like star wars 1,2,& 3, but after that should grow into epic tales like LOTR, Harry Potter, IronMan (I), Avatar, etc..
How much is your data worth? Back it up now.
...it is entirely possible that Twilight is not crap and that slashdotters don't like it because the target audience is teenage girls, a demographic largely missing from this group.
Mind you, I said possible. I have not read the books nor seen the movies, but based on what I've read it probably is crap. I just brought this up to mention that there might be other considerations at play here. You made it sound like anything not liked by us must be of low quality, and that simply isn't true.
XKCD can be funny a lot of times, but I also find it frequently unbearably smug. Not old school nerd, more like the newer trendy hipster nerd thing that cropped up in the past few years.
See, that's the shit you get when nerds start getting laid.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
See, that's the shit you get when nerds start getting laid.
That's what I meant exactly! These new, sex-having nerds are poseurs, they didn't go through what we did.
I personally hope he's just trolling. Especially if you're right and he has kids.
"I may not have morals, but I have standards."
It's a little more like this:
Relationship Business Relationship - Shareholders In Penny Arcade
Name 1 Robert Khoo
President
Name 2 Keith G. Holkins
Treasurer
Name 2 Mike Krahulik
Secretary
Relationship Business Relationship - Shareholders In Penny Arcade
For the period, 10/01/07-09/30/08, the following amounts were paid by
Penny Arcade, Inc. to the Officers of Child's Play:
Michael R. Krakhulik Salary - $ 179,283.20
Keith G. Holkins Salary - $ 176,903.16
Robert Khoo Salary - $ 159,538.89
So, yeah....tell em again how this is a grad and noble venture.
I judt got a nre Kinesis keybiartf so please excusr ant egregiou typos.
What I am is the father of a son who has lost his sight (for awhile...it returned eventually...long story). When CP came to us in the hospital the dialog when something like this (a condensed version):
Hi! We would like to donate this Nintendo DS to you to make your son's scary and difficult time a little easier!
Gee thanks, but my son lost his vision.
Oh. Um, well....maybe you would like it instead?
It took a tremendous amount of self control not to punch this knob in the face. I mean WTH!? Give me money, food, clothes, pay for my hotel, but for Gods sake! I freaking video game??
Then when I took a look at CP's financing I lost all respect for them:
For the period, 10/01/07-09/30/08, the following amounts were paid by Penny Arcade, Inc. to the Officers of Child's Play: Michael R. Krakhulik Salary - $ 179,283.20 Keith G. Holkins Salary - $ 176,903.16 Robert Khoo Salary - $ 159,538.89
I judt got a nre Kinesis keybiartf so please excusr ant egregiou typos.
While I'm sure that your experience with your son was stressful and traumatic, what kind of self-centered, conceited asshole do you have to be not to be able to see that just because CPC couldn't do much for your son that does not negate the immeasurable value that they have provided to kids with cancer or other serious potentially fatal conditions. If you have a child in pain games are about the best way to get their minds off of that pain and brighten their mood however little. It's this fundamental lack of understanding that have made all your posts on this subject epic trolls.
How dense are you that you're bitching about Jerry, Mike, and Khoo's salaries. You're so fucking stupid that don't even read what you write yourself, so here's the emphasis: " amounts were paid by Penny Arcade, Inc. "
Yeah, that's right, money not from CPC, but just a disclosure of what they make as employees of PA Inc. from revenues of PA Inc. All of which are wholly separate from CPC, but are simply disclosed because they are coincidentally officers of CPC. Oh, the horror, they have jobs with another organization and they make money!!1 Idiot. Only one person is paid from CPC, Kristin Lindsay, and that was 37k in 2007. A living wage if even that.
So, yes, all of your allegations are demonstrably false, based on your own incapacity to understand how charities work or even what their tax disclosures mean. Though I should thank you, as without your ignorant cynicism as a foil I would never have had four +5 posts in a single topic. It takes an epic troll for that, and you were the right guy for the job.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit