May your fireworks be bright, and your barbecue nicely charred.

The OTW is doing a "personal fannish history" post for otw_onlinecon, so I figured I might as well share my own story. Kind of interesting for historical purposes, at any rate.

( I actually know the approximate date I discovered fanfic, because I wrote it down in my diary at the time. It was 1997, or thereabouts. )

Okay, you guys.

You all need to go out, RIGHT NOW, and read Cory Doctorow's new book Little Brother.

And I do mean now.

Why?

Because it's good. It's really really good. It's about freedom, and the right to privacy, and what happens when the need for the illusion of safety triumphs over the rights of the individual citizen. It's a good read, it's scary-plausible, and it'll make you want to go out and do awesome tech-y things and participate in flash-mobs and maybe even get excited to vote.

It really is just that awesome.

Plus? You can even read it online for free here; it's available under a Creative Commons license, like all of Cory's other work. That's where I just finished reading it; I plan to go out tomorrow and buy the hardcover. And possibly donate another copy to a library donated.

So go. Read. And then share it with everyone you know.

/pimp

I need an excuse to go see that again. Any takers?

So apparently I'm psychic? Or something.

( image under the cut )

May I present to you, my offering for IPSTP Day: a translation of the first chapter of Ushio to Tora! It's a really fun youkai manga by Kazuhiro Fujita, I highly recommend it. Since it's a translation of someone else's work, I'm not going to be posting it to the main comm, but feel free to pass the link to this around.

The first volume of the manga (as well as the next 32 volumes) can be downloaded here. I'll keep on translating it for as long as my interest holds out.

( Ushio to Tora v1 ch1 )


And now to get back to writing my paper...

Just a reminder, y'all, that International Pixel-Stained Technopeasant day is coming up again on the 23rd~

Holy crap! My ceiling light just tried to kill me.

Y'know those glass things that cover the light bulbs? Those thick, heavy glass things? Well, apparently when I switched out the light bulbs last week, I didn't put it back on properly or something. It stayed up for a week and a half, but suddenly tonight it decided it'd had enough, let go, and shattered all on the floor. I was sitting not a foot away. If I hadn't been sitting at my desk at an angle, actually, it would have pretty much got me right in the head.

Gah.

Quick short story rec: Wikihistory, by Desmond Warzel. Hilarious.

Yokohama Dialect, a (parody) textbook for foreigners learning Japanese from 1879. Funny even if you don't know Japanese.


Speaking of Japanese, I seem to have taken it upon myself to practice by translating manga, whee. Should be done with chapter one of Ushio to Tora in a day or two, at which point I'll post the script. I'm enjoying myself a whole lot more than I expected...

OMG, I did NOT see THAT coming...! Bwahahahahahahaha! Oda-sensei, you are MADE OF WIN!


*howls with laughter*

You are a dog

Or maybe you are a mosquito, you certainly can't be human. The highest pitched ultrasonic mosquito ringtone that I can hear is 21.1kHz

Find out which ultrasonic ringtones you can hear!

This is why I hate it when my grandparents turn the cable off without turning the TV itself off-- it whines at this really irritating high pitch that I can hear but they can't.
I can hear up to 17.7kHz just fine without turning my computer volume up at all. 19.9 I can hear if I turn it up about halfway. I can hear 21.1 if I turn it up all the way, though it's more of a pressure than a sound at that level. I'm using headphones, though.

Does anyone want an Aviary invite? I've got five four three two left. So far I'm pretty impressed with the site.

For those of you who don't already know, there has been a strike scheduled for Friday, March 21st, 2008, during which we hope to have many members of LiveJournal provide LJ with absolutely no content for twenty-four hours. This means no posting and no commenting. If you post elsewhere and have it set up to be posted through a feed on LiveJournal, don't do it. Stay away from LiveJournal for twenty-four hours. That can't be too hard, can it? I know some of you are probably quite active on LiveJournal and will find it hard to stay away for an entire day, just as I will, but this is something that needs to be done, to show the people running LiveJournal that we're watching the changes they are making, that we're paying attention, that we're discontent, and that we want to be heard and taken in to consideration. We are not simply users who can be tossed to the side and ignored. We are the people who make up LiveJournal. Without us, without the content we create, without our words, our voices, our creativity, our participation, there would be no LiveJournal. This is a fact, and it needs to be realized and understood and then taken in to consideration when making decisions regarding the way that LiveJournal is run. The strike is only a few days away, so there isn't all too much time to prepare. While this is unfortunate, it isn't enough to keep this strike from taking place. It will take place, the second it is meant to, and it would be best to have as many people take part as possible. Please, spread the word. Spread it fast. There are only a few days to organize this. If you find that you care about LiveJournal or care about the people you interact with on LiveJournal or simply want it to remain a place where you can entertain yourself without constant censorship and money-hungry practices being thrown in without the consideration of those who use the service, act now. If you don't wish to spread the word, that is fine, but please: refrain from using LiveJournal on Friday, March 21st. Do something else for a change. It's for a good cause. (:

For background on this strike and why it is being held, please read the following posts:
http://beckyzoole.livejournal.com/394838.html
http://beckyzoole.livejournal.com/395310.html

To find out exactly when the strike begins and ends, depending on where you are located, please see this:
http://beckyzoole.livejournal.com/395125.html

What's this about?

* It's about free and ad-free LiveJournal accounts being abolished for new members, ignoring the advice from the newly-formed Advisory Board.
* It's about LJ staff trying to sneak this decision in under the radar, and when people found out, telling the users it was done 'to make the signup process less confusing'.
* It's about LJ staff failing to apologize for trying to hide the facts from view and for lying about the actual reasons for their actions.
* And finally, it's about the latest decision to hide certain user interests from the list of Most Popular Interests, some of them being fanfiction, bisexuality, sex and depression. This decision was not announced or explained in any way. Users found out for themselves.(ETA: Accorcing to m03m, this last one has been restored to its original form.)

-Taken from the journal of m03m

AND ICONS TO SUPPORT THIS:



*(The code to repost this announcement, should you choose to do so, can be found HERE.)

Gateworld: Mitchell's superpower is getting beaten up. And us h/c-ers love you for it, Mr. Browder. *g*


In other news: I am sick. Sick as a dog. Woke up like this on Saturday, and I keep coughing up really nasty crap, which I know none of you actually wanted to know, but I felt like sharing anyway. Thankfully it's spring break, otherwise I'd be missing a ton of classes. As it is I'm getting very familiar with my bed and the ceiling above it.

I've been catching up with Naruto lately, starting aaaaaall the way from the beginning. I wasn't as far behind as I thought I was-- only a year and a half instead of three years, hah. I don't have much to say-- okay, well, that's not entirely true, I have a ton I could talk about but no energy to write it all up-- but I just want to go :( :( :( at you all. Also, ( brief spoiler ).

So... tired...

*totters over into a corner and falls over*

I have a part-time job now. It's only for six weeks, and it's grunt work, but it pays pretty well. I hadn't realized until today exactly how difficult it was going to be to fit 20 hours of work in amongst my classes, though, but I'll manage somehow... just gotta keep focused on the money... *sigh*


Quick rec: CSI: Death By Chocolate. A young man is found in the desert, having been drowned in chocolate. Who would want him dead, and what does he have to do with a reclusive chocolatier from London? (CSI x Charlie and the Chocolate Factory xover)

OMG SO AMAZINGLY AWESOME. This is one of those crossovers where you go, okay, there's no way this could work. AND YET IT DOES. Really, really well done. ♥♥♥ Y'all all need to go and read it, like, now!

6 shot dead, including gunman, at Northern Illinois University

That's where my cousin goes to school. Thankfully, she's okay.

ETA: Apparently my roommate's cousin goes there, too. She's okay as well.

So, for anyone who's been, is Dragon*Con worth going to? I'm kind of in the area for the first time ever, and I probably won't be able to go to Comic Con again this year (*pout*), so I need to get my yearly con-going experience in somehow... Also, how fast do the hotels get filled up? Are they expensive? Anything else I should know before I even start thinking of going?

Meme snagged from bluebren.

Comment, and I will do all of these things:

1. Tell you why I friended you.
2. Associate you with something.
3. Tell you something I like about you.
4. Tell you a memory I have of you.
5. Ask something I've always wanted to know about you.
6. Tell you my favorite user pic of yours.


...After all of which you are supposed to post this in your LJ.

Yep, it's me again. School started a few days ago so I've been kinda busy figuring out classes, figuring out the campus (which is MONSTROUSLY HUGE), etc. Everything looks good so far, and I like the roommate (another LJ-er/fanficcer, yay! I seem to have good luck with that sort of thing), so I'm pretty optimistic about this semester. Taking all required classes this time around, which I've been told can get pretty boring, but at least that'll get them out of the way.

And in the meantime I've finally caught up with my flist, so if you see random comments from me showing up days after you posted, that would be why. (I had to go back ?skip=460! Geez, people.)

------

I know I've got several Dresden Files fans on my flist, so in case y'all missed it, here's the info about Butcher's new novelette 'Backup' coming out this Halloween, copied from the jim-butcher.com release:

( info under the cut )

I know I can't possibly be the only one who made an embarrassingly squeaky fan-girl squeal of JOY when I read that description. Right? ♥♥♥

Going to be mostly incommunicado* the next few days-- I'm headed off to grad school. Wish me luck!



*(emails will reach me but I probably won't reply, phone calls will reach me and I might reply)