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[David Bird]

Does anyone else get Bad Signal? Its Warren Ellis' e-mail journal. Instead of a blog, Ellis sends out his thoughts to a mailing list. He is usually entertaining, if not thought provoking (though he spent much of last week complaining about tech problems).

You can subscribe here: http://www.flirble.org/mailman/listinfo/badsignal

I thought it might be interesting to have a discussion thread about Bad Signal, in order to give readers a chance to discuss.

This is today's:

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Officially Running On Empty again,
I think. The Copenhagen trip can't
come soon enough for me -- these
things are the closest thing I get
to holidays.

Comps of PLANETARY 25 arrived
today, so I'm assuming it's out on
Wednesday. You'll know it by its
Russian propaganda-poster style
cover. The episode ties up a couple
more things and introduces a twist.

Lost a chunk of last night to re-reading
WAITING FOR GODOT. Beckett leaves
you with such a sense of bloody
misery that you forget the funny
moments. As did, of course, most
of his imitators. On one level -- and
the more you think about it, the
more disturbing it gets -- GODOT is
Laurel And Hardy In Hell. Very post-
modern, for a modernist. He's
instructive reading for a speculative
fiction writer. I think it's EMBERS --
the one in the house by the sea,
but there is no sea? -- that always
put me in mind of William Hope
Hodgson's HOUSE ON THE BORDER-
LAND. A very Irish kind of apocalypse.

I'm thinking about apocalypse a fair
bit right now for this new project.
Apocalypse in comics has become
a fairly cuddly thing of late. "You are
only being born" is the thing I like
least about Grant's INVISIBLES: the
message being that we are absolved
of responsibility for the awesome
fuckups of the last ten thousand
years because we were silly,
naughty children. It wasn't our
fault. The surprise of Alan's
PROMETHEA is that he let's the
story go where it wants to, and it
doesn't transcend its pulp origins --
the enlightened post-apocalypse is
a place where people hug, see dead
people and have new and interesting
consumer goods to buy.

These are nice ends of the world,
where the living don't envy the dead
and there is no state of awful, brain-
crippling fear. The world we knew
is over and everything's going to be
all right.

It's nice that there are happy endings.
But it shouldn't be forgotten that
Pol Pot thought Year Zero was a
happy ending. But the somewhat
challenged society of Cambodia at
the time, the borders of whose
country must've seemed very like
the edges of the world, could be
forgiven for thinking it was the
apocalypse. They were quite
literally sent back to the Stone Age.

That's what societal paradigm
shifts look like. Piles of bodies.

That's what I'm writing about today.

Happy Monday.

--- W

Interesting comments on others' views of the end of the world. I haven't read either the Invisibles or the end of Promethea (couldn't get past the first couple of trades), so I don't know the specifics.

If you go to the sign up page, you can also find an archive.

[Known Human]

That's a really cool idea...

[Lord Simian]

Indeed, I used to get it on my old e-mail account...

[David Bird]

Should we quote each time or just go ahead with discussion?

[Croaker]

I get it, but it's not to my regular email account, so I don't always read every one of them. They're usually interesting, though!

[Lord Simian]

Should we quote each time or just go ahead with discussion?

Whatever floats your boat.

[Fo Leon]

Should we quote each time or just go ahead with discussion?

quote and discuss would be the more reader-friendly option.

[David Bird]

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Go and read this:

http://www.zenarchery.com/2006/03/25/net-funded-journalism/


-- W

The link is to a writer who wants to do a story, but can't afford the trip. He's asking his readers to pitch in. There's an online comic that did this a couple of years ago. (I can't for the life of me remember the name, but I'll post it once I'm home.) Anyway, it worked for them.

[David Bird]

The comic mentioned above is Something Positive: http://www.somethingpositive.net/

The guy who does it, R.K. Milholland, also gave us this classic:



Which someone turned into this animated avatar:

[David Bird]

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

I have an abiding love for cheap
crappy devices. I love bad cameras.
(Did a whole book with one.) I like
things that cost next to nothing and
ONLY JUST work.

I bought this Thing off Ebay for
peanuts at the weekend. It's called
a Digital Box. Because, apparently,
they couldn't think of anything else
to call it. It's got 128MB of flash
memory, and takes SD cards (I
Amazon'd myself some cheap 1GB
SD cards). It's the size of a PDA and
claims to play mp3s and video,
records audio and takes photos
with a 5MP camera that interpolates
into 10MP images -- so you know
right away that the camera's going
to be for shit. The most expensive-
looking thing about it is the hard
carry-case it comes in. It even has
a crappy-looking flash built into
the back. It comes with wires that
supposedly allow you to record TV
programmes straight out of the
television onto the SD card.

The battery's charging right now,
and I'm really looking forward to
seeing how crap it's going to be. I
figure it's going to fail at almost
everything. With some fucking
around, I think I might be able to
load torrented tv shows on to the
SD card, though god knows if it'll
play them. The photos will probably
be distorted and noisy. I think
maybe it claimed to shoot video
too, and that will be horrible. I love
it.

Sometimes you want a camera that
captures everything perfectly (I'm
replacing my lost Sony P-200
because it did exactly that). But
sometimes you want a camera that
imposes its own perception and
just stranges things out a bit.

I mean, if it works, I can watch The
Daily Show in the pub and load a
movie on to the thing for the hop to
Copenhagen next month. If it
doesn't, I can take crappy photos
and possibly record some crappy
video and I'll have another camera
to play with.

But you've got to love the fact that
at at least one stage of testing, they
had a box that did all these things
for absolute pennies. And I wonder
what else I can make it do.

I'll start testing it tomorrow. Crappy
photos may appear on my Flickr
tomorrow night.

I always wanted the Box that Nathan
Spring had on STAR COPS.

---
Sent via mobile device

I don't need a bad camera to take bad pictures. I can do that with a good camera!

[David Bird]

Three more today:

One:

Drama over with. Fucking artists.

Two:

Whoops! That went to the wrong email address. And now
you know exactly how foul-tempered I am most of the time.
And how much I need more coffee.

-- W

I wonder what that was about.

And three, more on the new camera:

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Some Signallers poked me about the lack of detail
on Box, so here you go:

It's a Mega Pix M500, also known as a Megxon M500,
also known as a Megapix PMP.

I bought mine off eBay, but here's one of the few pages
with details on this weird little device:

http://www.extremevision.co.uk/megapix_pmp5.htm

And, yes, mine is called Box now. Box came with a
video converting program that shoots files into the
avi format Box likes, and the first test was successful.
I have now watched Guy Maddin's HEART OF THE WORLD
on Box while standing outside having a cigarette.

The camera's flash is military in nature. I took a picture
outside at midnight. The flash lit up the street like
a bomb had gone off, and the resultant image looks like
it was shot in the Gobi Desert at noon. Under floodlights.
I was blind for about a minute. This supposed 15-in-1
device has a 16th application as a non-lethal weapon
for disabling muggers, rapists, medium-sized crowds
and charging rhinosauruseseses.

[Zero]

I used to get it on my LJ syndications, but the cranky old bastard just filled up my friends page with his insanity. This I like better.

[Technofear's Revenge]

I do, but I very behind in them at the moment. I tend to store a couple of days worth up and then read them all at once, but I haven't been in that account that has them in for a while.

I might go over there in a minute, to be honest...

[David Bird]

This I like better.

Good to hear.

Today's:

bad signal
ME

JONES #6 arrived in the post this
morning. That means it'll be out
next week, I guess. And since
PLANETARY 25 didn't come out this
week, I guess that'll be next week
too.

My replacement Sony P-200 turned
up this morning too, as did three
1GB SD cards for Box. Along with
the Treo, the keyboard, the phone
and the Manly Rugged Archos MP3
Player, my travelling gear is
complete once more.

And it all takes up less space
than a laptop, really. It's the 21C,
and I should be able to carry an
office in my pockets, right? I
thought about upgrading to the
Treo 700w, the new Window Mobile
wifi-ready version of the Treo,
but the reviews are not good. Maybe
I'll look at going from the Treo 600
to the 650 at some point, but I'll
probably wait and see what the
next version of the Treo does.

If TV Thing Prime goes all the way,
I'll have to invest in a laptop. Which
is a bitch. But that's a long way off.

Anyway. That's me ready for the
road again.

Talking of which, Josh Ellis got the
funding he needed for the Trinity
trip, so he's off on the road soon.
Nice work all round.

And now I have to write a MINISTRY
for the Pulse, without a single good
idea in my head. Shit.

Good news about the Josh Ellis trip. I wonder if I could get funding to go to San Diego ComicCon...

[David Bird]

Today's was sent out twice (so you know its important!):

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Yesterday just devolved into chaos,
and there was no time to clear my
head enough to write a MINISTRY.
So the next one will be next week.

Today, I move diepunyhumans.com
to its new server space, and take a
look at the Lussumo Vanilla install
notes to see if it's something I can
set up myself. It'll be weird to see
the Filthy Monkey again. If I can
set it up, then all that remains is to
write the forum structure, breaking
sections down by topic. Science,
Design, Grim Meathook Future,
Spimeworld etc. Do I split Design
into Fashion and Design, or assume
both work under the same header?
Or does Fashion come under Art?
Or does Art become Arts and take
in music? Need to give this some
thought.

I tell you, I don't know where the
week's gone.

Marvel sent me a stack of photocopies
the other week, and I'm only now
getting around to studying them.
Joe Quesada dug out some obscure
stuff to amuse me. I'm horrified
to find that I actually remember
some of this from the Marvel UK
reprint stuff my little brother used
to buy circa 1980 -- he's the Star
Wars fan in the family, and used
to get things like STAR WARS
WEEKLY way back when. There
was another sf comic from Marvel
UK around the same name, the title
of which escapes me. (I was reading
2000AD.) Anyway, some of you
remember The Curse Of Ellis, my
near-eidetic memory for pop
culture trash, and I actually recall
some of this stuff. STAR-LORD (not
the UK fortnightly of the same
name). SEEKER 3000, which in a lot
of ways was Doug Moench's dry run
for his later SIX FROM SIRIUS. (SIX
is worth seeking out for Paul Gulacy's
stunning, vivid colour art.) MONARK
STARSTALKER, where Howard
Chaykin was clearly warming up
for AMERICAN FLAGG.

It's odd stuff. STAR-LORD, especially,
must've been state-of-the-art
mainstream sf comics in 1979 or
whenever it was done, with a Chris
Claremont script and art by the
young, eager-to-impress team of
John Byrne and Terry Austin.

Marvel and I are looking for a project
or two to fill my schedule now I'm
done with the Ultimate stuff, and
we're also looking for material to
interpolate into another project,
which is why I'm looking at this stuff.
I'm hired at Marvel for a very
specific job, which I don't lose sight of;
reconditioning old properties to get
them earning money for the
company again. I work short-term
and never get confused about
ownership or intent. I find it tough,
entertaining work, and it goes to
a submarket that never really
orders or reads my other work. It's
like working in two different
businesses at the same time, and
probably has more parallels with
my videogame work, though it's
more rewarding. I'm switching
between two different focusses,
and it's keeping me sharp, I think.
And I get a stupid amount of
creative freedom at Marvel that
lets me try new stuff in front of
an audience. Which is important.
You never know how new material's
going to play until you get it up on
its feet in front of an audience.

And with people seriously looking at
the single as a vector for innovation
again (we've been talking about
this on The Engine)...well, it's an
interesting phase in my career as
restless hack.