XXx6x6x6-ChA0z-Funktionz66x6xxxxxxxxx

Challenge

Thu, 10 Apr 2008 18:05:57 GMT

One thing I know, is that I don't like to back down from it.
Most people ( and I probably mean you ) live their lives without a good enough form of it. Do nothing astounding, do nothing that is actually dangerous.
I'm really tired of looking on and seeing people screaming blue murder from their little zones of safety. As if drug and alcohol abuse are something profound, and the world needs another Hunter S Thompson. Seriously, we've got enough 'antiscocial' 'heroes'. Find a new gimmick. Everyone is claiming it, I'm getting bored of it.
The world, for some ( unsurprising ) reason, still seems to think such things are worthy of reverence. I don't. I really don't think it's important at all.
Too many people acting strong without strength, too many people acting morose without something real to be sad about. I think you need a little more challenge.
Not that life needs to be harder, no, life is hard enough.
People just need to step out more. Put something on the line.
Really, people fool themselves all the time. They act out in petty, silly little ways that are completely controlled. Acting out within little boundaries,already ready built for them. With safety back within arms reach at all times. I can just shrug at it all.
Human nature thrives on danger, and it's probably one reason why we're all so stale.

People are striving for mediocrity.
I don't want to hear any more shitty stories from people.
I don't care for lies.
I don't care for people's dumb stories about raving and licking asshole.
You're not special.
People are starting to really bore me.

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 16:40:30 GMT

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ihsahn

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kristoffer_Rygg

Every time either of these two musicians release an album, genres are broken in half. Take note of this.

The future sound of music

Wed, 19 Mar 2008 13:49:54 GMT

Lately, due to wanting to break out more and experiment. I've been considering returning to 'conventional' music after the completion of this RSK record ( due next month or so I guess, TAFE not withstanding ). I'm also contemplating a real change of focus after TAFE ends. ( June! )
I've decided to do the strangest thing I've ever considered doing, music wise.
I want to purchase ( or at least extensively try ) an 8 string guitar, after seeing how Ihsahn uses one ( In a non shitty way, would you believe. ), I've decided it'd be an interesting path to walk down. I'm always looking for something new, and I think this would be an interesting path to take.
Since I started returning to my musical heritage lately, I've noticed a large shift in my compositional techniques. These days I'm alot more mindful of rhythms, and unconventional ones at that. Being lately very inspired by experimental Jazz in my RSK compositions. I've been taking that approach back to my guitar and drum music, and been opening up a whole world of new doors to explore.
I think I'd like to experiment more with more 'rhythmic' forms of music than merely the metal I grew up on. Lately I've been experimenting more and more with how 'aggression' and that concept of 'darkness' is actually formed in music, and with Restrukture I quickly found new ways to push the barriers in.
So lately I've been looking outside the established norms of total overdrive and heavy double bass and looking more to forgotten methods, looking back about thirty years and taking a new slab to pile atop what I've learned.
So, there'll be plenty of exciting things to come musically from me.
But lately, with the stresses of TAFE. ( Which, despite my happy go lucky attitude, are fucking me. ), I've been focusing more on visual arts. With eleven new pieces done this year, and a whole lot of 'free' art.
I'm quite inspired, but also quite adrift. But it's interesting times, as always.
Project planning fucking sucks. I just finished a roughly 20 page project plan for the SCI site I'll be building for my TAFE final assignment.
I have ten more weeks to finish this, including a shopping cart and associated shit.
( hint hint! We need to sell shit! haha also call me Sam! )
Also, I've devised an interesting dynamic page loading method using XML parsed through AS3 loops to build individual artist pages from content XML files dynamically and instantly. Making updating a breeze. Also finished programming the MP3 player and discography apps already!
Time to go off and watch cartoons while drawing.

Wanna see something more relevant and intelligent than my TAFE course?

Tue, 11 Mar 2008 11:08:17 GMT

http://www.forum.acousticblackmetal.org/viewtopic.php?t=169

Mon, 18 Feb 2008 03:49:53 GMT

https://www.totse.com/community/showthread.php?t=2100278
^^^ Best... Ever.

Seven Down, forty three to go. Tech Styler, even wilder off the chain...

Edited

Sat, 09 Feb 2008 19:32:46 GMT

It seems that Optus is still using graffiti in their advertising to try and identify with the "youth". I now feel that little bit more anger that I really, really needed.

Some good quotes for you all

Thu, 24 Jan 2008 17:43:37 GMT

"All warfare is based on deception."
- Sun Tzu

"When your opponent sets up a straw man, set it on fire and kick the cinders around the stage. Don't worry about losing the Strawperson-American community vote."
- James Lileks, "The Daily Bleat"

“I'm not upset that you lied to me, I'm upset that from now on I can't believe you”
- Nietzsche

“Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than the Word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind.”
- Thomas Paine

“Love ceases to be a demon only when it ceases to be a god.”
- Denis de Rougemont

"After Dr. Johnson said patriotism was the last refuge of a scoundrel, the cynic Ambrose Bierce amended it with, "I beg to submit that it is the first." Then H.L. Mencken jumped in: "But there is something even worse: it is the first, last and middle range of fools."

"We have to remember that what we observe is not nature herself, but nature exposed to our method of questioning."
- Werner Heisenberg

"Rudeness is the weak man's imitation of strength."
- Eric Hoffer

"Dishonest people are seldom dishonest in only one aspect of their lives."
- Marc McYoung

The significant problems we face can not be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.
- Einstein

"It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong."
- Voltaire

"A time comes when silence is betrayal."
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

"If a Nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be... If we are to guard against ignorance and remain free, it is the responsibility of every American to be informed."
- Thomas Jefferson

"None are so hopelessly enslaved as those who falsely believe they are free."
- Johann Von Goethe

Encrypting transactions on the Inter Net, for example, is as Purdue computer scientist Eugene Spafford has remarked, "the equivalent of arranging an armored car to deliver credit-card information from someone living in a cardboard box to someone living on a park bench."

The moral, Schneier came to believe, is that security measures are characterized less by their success than by their manner of failure.
- Charles C. Mann, "Homeland Insecurity",

"To be, or not to be- that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them."
- Shakespeare, Hamlet

"The human being created civilization not because of willingness but of a need to be assimilated into higher orders of structure and meaning."
- Morpheus, Deus Ex

"any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic",
-Arthur C Clarke

"I don’t like competition. I want to be the only fucking man in this world. I want an army of my sons and then find a planet to attack."

"Actually I like to let people in for free but charge them to get out."

- Peter Steele

"The heaven that rolls around cries aloud to you while it displays its eternal harmony, and yet your eyes are fixed upon the earth alone."
-Dante

"You can always hear the people who are willing to sacrifice somebody else's life. They're plenty loud and they talk all the time. "
"A guy says house and he can point to a house to prove it. But a guy says come on let's fight for liberty and he can't show you liberty. He can't prove the thing he's talking about so how in the hell can he be telling you to fight for it?"
-Dalton Trumbo, Johnny Got His Gun

"There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there always has been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."
- Isaac Asimov

"It really is of importance, not only what men do... but also what manner of men they are that do it. Among the works of man... The first importance surely is man himself."
- John Stuart Mill

"Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

John Watson, one of the founders of modern behaviorism once wrote that personality “is the end product of our habit system”

"...It is urged that man knows that whatever is must either have had a beginning, or have existed from all eternity, he also knows that whatever is not eternal must have had a cause. When this reasoning is applied to the universe, it is necessary to prove that it was created: until that is clearly demonstrated we may reasonably suppose that it has endured from all eternity. We must prove design before we can infer a designer. The only idea which we can form of causation is derivable from the constant conjunction of objects, and the consequent inference of one from the other. In a base where two propositions are diametrically opposite, the mind believes that which is least incomprehensible; -- it is easier to suppose that the universe has existed from all eternity than to conceive a being beyond its limits capable of creating it: if the mind sinks beneath the weight of one, is it an alleviation to increase the intolerability of the burthen?"
- Shelley, the necessity of Atheism

"What progress we are making. In the Middle Ages they would have burned me. Now they are content with burning my books."
- Sigmund Freud

"Some of the early-20th century Chinese thinkers who were concerned with modernizing China recognized the necessity of breaking down small-scale social groups such as the family: "(According to Sun Yat-sen) The Chinese people needed a new surge of patriotism, which would lead to a transfer of loyalty from the family to the state. . .(According to Li Huang) traditional attachments, particularly to the family had to be abandoned if nationalism were to develop to China." (Chester C. Tan, Chinese Political Thought in the Twentieth Century," page 125, page 297.)"
- Ted Kaczynski

If ignorance of nature gave birth to gods, knowledge of nature is made for their destruction.
-Shelley

"Because modern institutions depend on the transmission of a certain world view and then willing acquiescense in the truth of that world view by the populations into which it is being exported. In other words a kind of cultural brainwashing is necessary for modern cultures to work at all. The consequences of the acceptance of this situation of brainwashing is further acceleration toward catastrophe."
- Terrence McKenna

"Stay away from needle drugs. The only dope worth shooting is Richard Nixon."
- Abbie Hoffman

""Your enemy is never a villain in his own eyes."
- Robert Heinlein

“The human voice carries entirely too far as it is... And now you fellows come along and seek to complicate matters.”
- Mark Twain, speaks about the invention of the telephone.

"My power is discombobulatingly devastating I could feel is muscle tissues collapse under my force. It's ludicrous these mortals even attempt to enter my realm."
- Mike Tyson

( The full collection of Mike Tyson quotes, hilarity from start to end. )

"Nobody needs to tell me how to be black."
- Condoleeza Rice

The world is the sick one

Mon, 21 Jan 2008 10:18:04 GMT

Funktioning like junkies. All of you, couldn't even make good ghosts.
Have page after page, turning to transkribe.
Lost somewhere in the dawn... Been on the haunt. Sold pressure gage for purpose. Still living on railz...
We'll Repay all we stray...

And a rest in peace for those who died.
I'm glad 'you know who' ( no names ) got out of there alive, it's sad about the others. I didn't know the others. Poor guy, I just hope they don't piece two and two together. Then he'll be in some real shit, poor guy, he was living on a knife THEN....
It's a sick world... what can we say?

Wheelz in Motion

Fri, 11 Jan 2008 17:25:10 GMT

Two down,
On the haunt, tunnel vapourz.
Street beat psychoskan, gun metal chrome crush.
Heh,
Made a new arrangement work.
An old island found new in the city heart.
And an arrangement in the works to bring some cheer to others.
Revisit the old skillz set.
Heh,
It's too dark in here.
Just the way it should be.

Four trackz:
Restrukture - Tenementz EP -

01:: Tenantz
02:: Murder
03:: Revenge
04:: Tenementz

20 minutez. AMSG

This release expands further on the desperate theme of God Inc. Standing on the edge of reason, and a leap of faith over the threshold. The battle between Gods, the battle of the self.
Musically, you're trapped inside the war of the mind...

( oh yeah, and Monstersphere. Nine minute long, Restrukture's first, and [ let's pray to our heathen gods that... ] only, trance lead track. )

A short essay on Electronic Music

Tue, 08 Jan 2008 17:55:35 GMT

A short essay on Electronic Music
by TZ

The advent of electronic music has neither been a quick phenomenon nor a well understood one. At this point in time, we are almost headed forty years into an age of 'all electronic' music's existence. However, it's artistic merit and potential to date still remains largely misunderstood and ill-received.
One might say that all music, in the context of it's production has been an extension of the capabilities of combinations of technologies; The drum-kit and the guitar the fundamental bases of instrumentation, other resonant and acoustic instruments, and eventually to the advancement to electronic keyed instruments. From the very beginning music's production and performance has consisted of working within the framework and confines of one technology or another, and as technology has progressed we have been continually broadening the scope of our musical production to the outer reaches of what the current technology will allow. From performance, to recording, to production and post production. The boundaries of what can be considered to be competent art has progressed at the same rate of our artistic possibilities; in this age digital art is as recognized and applauded as conventional art.
With the advent of the personal computer's role in digital music production, certain limitations applied to more traditional and conventional music production have been circumvented or abolished. Even in the most popular music new techniques are applied which fall beyond the scope of conventional playing, more than people readily will realize.
While one of the ever present and most important artistic distinctions remains to be an aptitude in manual dexterity and physical control, modern music production has offered alternate pathways to achieving the same, or similar goals. For many, the enduring view on electronic music remains as 'cheap' and 'simple', not without good reason. For the vast majority of electronic musicians, the enlarged production framework means little more than cheaper and faster means of producing songs with more analytical than abstract artistic leanings, from the established norm these suppositions arise.
While electronic music offers many short-cuts and alternatives to the end goal of producing recorded music, the framework's outer limits provide sonic and textural possibilities that more conventional music is incapable of. As such, the possibilities of electronic music remain far more open ended and limitless. One of the most enduring and genuine accolades of musicianship remains to be inventiveness in taking the performed or produced music to the outer possibilities contained within the technological constraints of it's medium. Electronic music should only be revered by the same criteria.
Judgment of art connotes a measure of an artist's mastery of a medium, a measure of their ability contained within their framework of operation. In a field within which the possibilities of textural sonic production are far higher, a higher standard should be applied.
Electronic music offers artists the possibilities to work in artistic terms beyond the constraints of manual dexterity. While this is seen by some as the prime characteristic of electronic music's perceived 'inherent cheapness', this allows artists to work within the realms of sonic texture, a focus given to the sound itself, existing parallel in importance to it's expressed musical notes.
The circumvention of physical constraints in electronic music offers musicians the opportunity to create complex and unnatural sounds ( among sounds found naturally in the world around us ), to effectively evoke a wide range of emotions generally thought impossible with conventional instruments.
Electronic music also offers musicians the ability to seemingly 'craft new instruments'. Each particular instrument's playing conventions are made up of both physical and functional constraints, and simply, what produces pleasurable music. Electronic music offers artists the ability to create new instruments much less imposed by constraints, and played with new conventions. Thus the scope of the music itself is immediately broadened.
While some will inevitably still view electronic music production as a crass short-cut, the potential of it's medium for producing evocative art beyond the bounds of established norms should cement the field within the bounds of respect.

On another note:
Mastering will be completed by next week, the countdown begins!

Also, incase anyone hasn't seen this film....
Falling Down
I recommend you familiarize yourself with it, I just re-watched it today. Brilliant work, incredibly expressive. You can feel D-FENS' loss of grip and frustration, ( Though at times you will not entirely be able to identify with him, especially when he seems to find the 85c cost for a 'soda' to be an exorbitant price and justification to wreck the man's shop. [ 85c, what a dream!] )
The movie is deliberately designed not to build a clear hero of D-FENS, but were it not for his stalker tendencies, his very short fuse coupled with his often irrational behavior and his egocentric view of the world, one could very easily empathize with his frustrations. Such as his dissatisfaction with the moronic gangland behavior, his annoyance at the smug fast food manager, and his lament at the fact that his defence work, which he views as helping the world ( questionable, but... ) earned him a pittance in comparison to a plastic surgeon who only profited from a world riddled with personal insecurities.
While the ending offers a poor substitute for the closure the character deserved, the movie remains highly evocative and at times troubling. By toying with your ability to empathize with D-FENS through his vigilante behavior against common dissatisfactions tempered with his obsessive and frightening behavior, the movie creates a much more gripping and tense atmosphere.
Also, as a bit of trivia, Rammstein once parodied this film in one of their photoshoots:

Hilarity ensues.

Good movie. Definitely worth seeing

Internet

Mon, 07 Jan 2008 15:05:29 GMT

Oh yeah, and after I get this mastering completed...
I'm thinking of severing my internet connection for a while.
So I can stop killing my time doing useless things, rediscover the things I'd rather be doing but always procrastinate away from, like playing guitar and drawing.
Sever ties with piss poor friends and useless myspace associates ( "WE SHUD TOTALLY CATCH UP LOL", don't even start. )
The internet is a cesspool of social disease anyhow. Sure, it is a harbor of knowledge too. But I am also subject to the slings and arrows of human folly, and the concept that someone's inane message on myspace might just be important keeps on dragging me back.
Instead, I think I'd rather focus my time more usefully.
And yeah, if people are really my friends they'd be calling me to talk anyway, instead of waiting for me to come onto myspace or MSN which I hate anyway, or worse alternatives.

Alea Iacta Est
Up yours!

Social Problems

Mon, 07 Jan 2008 14:35:34 GMT

As a society, we are holding the compass upside down.

Intelligence should be the true deciding factor of power. Lest we, as a society, arm too many men of too little foresight with the crowns of Kings. Too often the social perspective of power manifests itself as brute force alone, be that career drive, charisma or general hardiness. But these traits are not alone indicative of intelligence, and too often in our society are misconstrued as being thus.
The primary concern of our world should not be movement itself, but rather the movement's destination.
The justification of power cannot solely exist as the perpetuation of power itself.
Too often society, through it's own lackings of foresight, grants power to men and groups of questionable moral intent. Our society should sit back for a moment and examine in greater detail exactly what quality of men we are favoring in our democratic processes.
Through the progression of ages, society has installed a matrix of social filters to decide those fit to rule over the pockets humanity divides itself into. With the advent of humanity's moving into safer ages, the criteria dictating ruling entities within society has undergone several major paradigm shifts; Society's measures of an individual's worth in the modern world rest primarily upon monetary standing. A characteristic which in reality only measures an individual's determination and monetary drive, which exists inherently seperate from any real form of virtue, determination itself cannot exclusively measure one's intent within a society.
Through these shifts, society has created an inverse and highly polarized social power dynamic.
The concept of career progression revolves centrally around submission to pre existing socially constructed idols, favoring a fatal single mindedness and myopia among it's adherents. In reality, an individual's willing submission entirely to the dollar is indicative only of a human nature devoted to manipulating the existing power structures into a lever serving as a means profit at the loss of others.
Such individuals should not be favored to lead by any civilized and forward thinking society.
Leadership is not a position that should not come with a generous salary, as a trait fruitful leadership is earned only through a social awareness measured at all times by the contextual society's perceptions of direction and a common good. A leader, both literally and figuratively should only exist within the bounds of the society they control, not above or otherwise separate from it.
From this modern progression, the worth of large scale societies must be called into question by their adherents. Too often leaders exist far alienated from the problems plaguing their domains. Too busy counting money in their ivory towers to notice the elephant in the room. Almost as a placebo given in lieu of solution to these problems, councils are delegated to make decisions on smaller, community levels. However, this exists mainly as merely a microcosm of the same dilemma.
A Leader should live in the middle of a community's strife, at the bottom of the social barrel. History will only ever measure a community, regardless of it's scale by it's manner and severity of failure, rather than the secluded pockets of isolated opulence that accumulate inside it. A leader should live in the worst suburbs, within the housing projects, within the poorest areas. Thus ensuring their decisions are benefiting and affecting the most downtrodden areas of the modern kingdom.
A continual problem of any given large scale society echoing it's way through the ages has been the distribution of wealth. From the middle ages onwards, societies have largely been made up of few haves and many have-nots, and in direct corrolation, the interests of the ruling class have always been deeply rooted in ensuring the continued wealth of the burgeoise at the expense of the lower classes.
In order to ensure a stable and livable future for humanity, forward thinking societies must be forced to re-evaluate their goals and social values. Looking beyond existing power lattices to find actual solutions to the actual problems facing society.
Many are quick to say that the poor only suffer the slings and arrows of their own idle hands. However, the world we are approaching is one of an exponentially increased hositility and unfairness. One in which the best interests of the individual within the community are not ignored in lieu of addressing the best interests of the ruling class. Poverty is a vicious psychological cycle which is perpetuated by a lack of education, encouragement and opportunity. This is the fact that most governments choose to ignore, the fact that real changes start at the bottom of a community, not at it's top.
In order to ensure a sensible future there is alot we as a society need to think long and hard about.

I think I had some scope creep there. But I got annoyed at something halfway and lost my train of thought.
By the way:

http://www.halexandria.org/dward027.htm

Something I think you all should see....

Fri, 04 Jan 2008 14:38:12 GMT

A real eye opener....
Goes to show you how much power really rests in the hands of corporations, note the links between specific areas of importance, such as education, healthcare and insurance...
While this mostly applies to America , the ramifications of these shady business allegiances stretch worldwide.
Very strange and frightening,

http://www.theyrule.net/2004/tr2.php

The game is on...

Thu, 03 Jan 2008 17:19:26 GMT

Let's set the ball rolling,
One down...

Wed, 02 Jan 2008 15:20:19 GMT

MMVIII
Those iron clock hands of time fall over again and the earth reaches it's point of origin once more.
It's two thousand and eight.
A year in review, looking backwards and forwards.

Off the Gridlinez
Started the Year in a cemetery, ended it in the Industrial estate. The latter, a far better place to start the year, covered in ink and dust... basking in the distant signal noise roaring past on the highway as we wandered past the refinery. Peering through the trees and fences into where they construct those freight trains. The lights, smoke pouring into the dead sky, gray plumes glowing against the dull blue.
The factory district, dead quiet. Dead. The humming wires sending everything past us, back to civilization...
Far from civilization, the beach alive with distorted, overdriven square wave... Sitting in the company of a past hero... Really, those like me can see the looks in eachother's eyes. I was there less than five minutes before he started talking to me. Set some names in stone to last forever more on the concrete... 2008, in an instant, we saw the fireworks go up from the beachfront, beacons shining fluorescent orange across the ocean.
Aesthetically, this was incredible... The walk back would have looked a million times better had we known how it was going to end.
The private freight line, nothing looks quite like it...
Hitching a ride, stowed away on a terminated bus, back into the CBD. Crawling with diseased life. I stashed some warez in the city beforehand, time now to claim them. ( If only I'd never left them! ), My intention, to start the year how it should progress... unfortunately, The inner west CRAWLED, with regular filth and the other, special filth, police... They plugged my special hole into the drains, assholes... And my other plan has to wait for another night. So for the moment, that plan has to stand still.
The night ended after I found good old Bradley Smith, waiting at St Peters station, ( Brad, of Brad the Lad fame. ) So we talked for ages, until I had to get back to Central, 6am rolled around so instead of going back to wreak havok I ended up getting home, to be exhausted thereafter.
( I'll get the cans later this week! )

God Inc
This year, putting the final touches on Destrukture, starting and finishing God Inc. The lasting legacy of a year in this tangled mess... Through the course of this album, starting with Exile through Opsiz, I learned far more about music than I had ever anticipated myself gaining. The album was the practical application on the run, of everything I kept learning through the year. Represented everything I lived in this year... Everything will sound like your mental state, in one way or another.
God Inc was carving everything in stone,the patterns in my head and on my skin.
Industrial, Restrukture, a rejection of everything Industrial... Industrial music to shatter Industrial people. The drums in particular... Consider that my proverbial English salute to the Frenchman that is the Industrial scene, rather than flirting with the patterned and cookie cutter mockery that Industrial music uses as an excuse, I'd rather flirt with the more chaotic of humanistic elements.
I've learned worlds about Aesthetic and musical texture since the days of Destrukture... Where DSK was bursting energy, GI was a slow moving pulse, stealthy, calculating, burning down the linez.
A stab at the God Inc.
"And we burn... on your eyes...."

Ten Thousand Yearz
Gone Insane, stuck on Railz. It's so strange that something could take more than a year to complete... But here we are, at roughly just over a years work into what should be a monstersphere of experience beyond the grid.
Gone insane, stuck on Railz, it took on a life of it's own... Moved my hands... It comes and goes, and I write as the spirits move me, but they never give me more than a weekend off!
Feels incredible, the paper moves under my hands.

Stress, Sanity...
My world moves quite differently now.
Life is one large experiment really, exposing yourself to a world full of different stimuli and seeing how you react... Ironically enough, this lends itself to the conclusion that by the time you know the most about yourself, you're ready to die anyhow...
However I don't think many people apply correct scientific method to their learning approach through life.
I look to another awful year optimistically as always, heavy veined though, with that pessimism for which I'm known. I have a lot I wish to accomplish with another 525,600 minutes of my life . Including a truly terrible new year's resolution, which will keep me both working, and on my toes. I'm really not sure what to do with TAFE this year. Progress is progress, in the 'grown up' sense, where I'm encouraged with a firm and painful grip on my shoulder to move forward with my life. Which seems counter productive since I'm working outside the box on much more meaningful pursuits as it is. But I don't think I need say too much more on this.
All we know how to do is be young, and I don't know how much longer I can survive 'being young', before I'm just old and crazy. I'd just like to exist in the dead zone a while... Everyone works to fund their passage through life, to fund their music, to fund their art... they work so hard that they forget why they were working in the first place... and then they turn around and glare at me, mouth their stupid pieces to my face about 'progress' and 'the real world'... because I dared never to forget and to put something else first.
I'd rather be fired a million times, as long as I kept moving, people stagnate... As long as I have a story to tell it's worth everything.
Dreaming in the madhouse
Living at home at least affords me a corner which I can stain with my nature... However lately It's been a little too dark and the madhouse a little too mad.
There's still so much pressure on the youth to be 'grown ups', play families, play farmer and buy land, buy cattle and a controlling share in dysfunction from the powers that be. Being a child afforded me no room to be 'myself', but being an adult affords me no room to dream senselessly... so the transition is being a rough one thus far. ( as if that will end! )
However I haven't stopped dreaming yet... And I don't think I will...
Still plenty of rooftops for me, even as urban consolidation ( both metaphorically and literally ) reduces them to graveyards filled with more zombies.( Metaphorical, unfortunately not literal ) The people I shared them with for years, a few individuals who helped me discover that world beyond ( the dreamworld hidden inside the architecture of this brave new world ) are the ones still around... and the few still around. I'd like to thank you all for keeping this world worth living in.
A few memories of a summer day a few years ago now. Something that's written into the Chaos Chapter... that golden rust, something I can't forget, and couldn't ever.
I just got a master key, to all locks of a certain brand designed for servicing by construction electricians.... May the madness never end. Rooftops katz, still have a future to run in!
Things are strange in my world.
Institution
I got distinctions in nearly all of my TAFE subjects, even though my level of care bordered precariously on non existent throughout the latter half of the year. This year coming should be even worse, hurrah!
I worked half the year away before getting fired for one of my greatest social engineering achievements yet!
I'll be back though, admittedly, one could view this as my defeat.... But the way I see it... Going back there is the easiest option, one which I can bail at any time with no tangible consequence. So it's convenient.

The Tenementz
Things are empty right now inside, but that only leaves a wrecked landscape to run rampant around in for a while.
Works conveniently.
Since TAFE ended, Life right now exists without any consequence. ( Hardly any ), which is a double edged blade. But artistically, I flourish.

Thoughtyard

Morality...
What's to come...
In the year past, I realized something... Something for all of us to spend a moment thinking on...
As the world gets meaner, we all seem to become meaner people, more hardened, tempered by heat, annealed into harder steel...
But really, should we act first? Or just simply wait to react?
The world is full of mean, shitty people... I don't know why I want to buy a share of the disease, even just as a protest... It's something I have to think about as I look down into the middle of the volcano. I'm angry, so very angry at the world, how it treats people, how faceless and cruel it truly is. Read 'The Paradox of our time', It's very true. This world is impersonal, unforgiving and cruel, zero tolerance and maximum punishment for anyone who files against the grain.
I want to kick against the pricks, just for a laugh, just to upset the status quo. But as Nietzsche said:
"He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. And when you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."
Same goes for us all, It's something to look at for all of us:
Make sure that while you're waiting for the world to become fair, that you're ready to be fair yourself. Because if you're treating others unnecessarily cruelly, you'd never notice if the world ever did turn. ( Not that it will, really ever be fair. But you should be able to grasp the sentiment. )
Hardship builds character they say ( also attributable to that other famous quote from Nietzsche 'What does not kill me will only make me stronger.' ) But Hardship builds A character of us.
However, I look around the world and I don't see anything changing, so my natural instinctive reaction is just to kick back with my ass out and make everyone frown. It works wonders for me really...
Though, my view on morality itself has changed, and my sitting largely outside of 'society' has shown me how redundant most of these morals are. I don't know where to stand...
Something I have to think about as I keep walking with my head first.
Art is king....

Running through the world with my heart as the compass....
Another year in the dreamhouse.

Merry Krampus

Wed, 26 Dec 2007 10:41:39 GMT

Merry......... krampus////

Edit: yes I am aware this is a day late.

Well, it looks like the 'silly season' has reached it's festive, explosive climax. It's almost sad, It's Christmas day, the dream is dead. The lead up to sexmas has always been far better than the day itself.
Now as an adult, there's still something quaint lurking deep in the back of my mind... Thanks to a society completely sickened and intoxicated on some kind of odd capitalist, consumer conditioning, I spend crapmas eve possessing some glimmer of optimism. Lurking deep, far back in the darkest depths of my already considerably diseased mind. Perhaps it's just the aesthetics of the world, and as much as I've spent the past few years hacking XXXmas apart, I do admit I enjoy the nice lights... the night being lit by rows of Xmas lights, house after house in the suburbs, the stores all full of shiny tinsel, fairy lights and associated paraphernalia... I do enjoy that, but it's the STORES aspect of it I dislike.
Originally, if you believe everything you're told, Crapmas was about the birth of Jesus.... Which when looked at logically and historically doesn't make a lick of sense considering no one has any definite clue where Jesus was born, let alone when ( date or year, when you consider this, it becomes even more ambiguous. ) But all this aside,the religiously inclined might venture to say that as long as we celebrate it at all, then it's better than nothing. ( Also note the many different locations given for Jesus' birth in the bible, hymns and popular culture. )
Moving on a little, as the world became a little more sensible, Crudmas slowly began to morph into a much more relative and relevant incarnation. One where the basis of Christmas celebration and tradition revolves around the celebration and unification of the family unit. With some vague, shy nod still being given to the king of the Jews for posterity's sake, or for the hell of it *wink*.
To most people, this makes alot of sense... the word 'family' is tossed around alot, but in this case, treat 'family' as being entirely subjective. For example, I'd rather spend Christmas with the sane.
But, examined in a sideways glance, along the modern context, if you failed to see much of Christmas revolving around the family you wouldn't be proven at all incorrect or near sighted. It seems that like everything in modern culture, the almighty dollar ( Jesus has his revenge I guess ) continues to win out in it's relentless krusade. Claiming a nice, big fat slice and investment in everything the individual can hold dear.
You'd have to be some kind of jaded, screwed up asshole like me to not want to spend hundreds of dollars you can't really justify, let alone afford on a bunch of people, all striving to get away with the LEAST possible effort in return, right?
Not exactly.
Money is something so vapid and meaningless in comparison to actually caring about eachother, and that's what everyone's forgotten really. Anyone stuck in the doldrums of that evil swearword 'full time work' will know the sinking depression and mindless time slipping associated with the working week. And how at the end, or midway, you're presented with some feeble paycheck. Which supposedly represents the value of your time multiplied by the value of your individual virtue. ( Hardly. ) You probably ended up with ~$500 sitting there, and ontop of the rest of the savings which you can't find anything meaningful to spend on, you have a good amount of money with which to buy meaningless trifles to appease a seemingly never ending army of ungrateful children, ever absent relatives and other unwanted ingrates. Melted lightly atop of all societies crass consumer leanings, shitmas becomes more of an exercise in self blame and guilt than it is a genuine act of care for those you love.
And that's why I'm so bitter.
Because people don't care about eachother. Ask any kid what Christmas is about and they'll either say Presents or Jesus. ( And this might beg the question where anything to do with family ever came from, who knows? )
Sure, everyone likes presents, but so often people just buy ANYTHING, which might vaguely suit other people, without any real care or thought.
What good are these consumer crudmas leanings when the family structure is still so loose? So fallen apart and so distrustful?
Doesn't matter what families buy eachother if they still can't function as a family unit. As far as I see it, there is a world of more important things, but I guess monetary rewards and pale peace offering are loosely acceptable.
( Yeah, for those people who know my cliche-mas story this year, this is pretty much it. I want to return that shit. Doesn't sit right on me. This crud mas is solemn and silent.)
Nevertheless, despite the huge amount I silently sit and smolder in the furnace of my dispassion over cokemas...
I've managed to find one cockmas fable that I like...
The fable of...
Krampus

to quote wikipedia:

The word Krampus originates from the Old High German word for claw (Krampen). In the Alpine region the Krampus is represented by an incubus in company of St Nicholas. Traditionally, young men dress up as the Krampus in the first two weeks of December and particularly in the evening of December 5 and roam the streets frightening children (and adults) with rusty chains and bells. In some rural areas also slight birching especially of young females by the Krampus is part of tradition.

Wow.... just wow. It'll be fairly obvious to you why this appeals to me.
However, in this day and age there really isn't a great way to frighten children. And the societal 'powers that be', probably wouldn't be too impressed at your creativity should you discover one.
Though birching sounds like an amusing enough activity. Just in-case you couldn't be bothered clicking 'birching' up above, here it is for you now:

Birching is a corporal punishment with a birch rod, typically applied to the recipient's bare buttocks, although occasionally to the back and/or shoulders.

More information on the many other Christian plagiarisms of Pagan tradition can be found below.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krampus#Krampus

and also at:

http://www.rotten.com/library/occult/deviltry/krampus/

Here's an artist's rendition of the jolly creature I found for you.

And look how happy he looks! Wonderful!

With some luck next year Krampus should be back to settle some scores. Kick ass and take names. The way Christmas was intended to be.
Though thanks to the efforts of the wonderful people I saw I had a lovely krapmas eve and a nice XXXmas day.
Goodnight world, you'll hear more from me shortly.

only 345 more days till MORE KRAMPUS! YESSS!!
Oh and Merry Krampus to you all.

Mon, 24 Dec 2007 02:50:56 GMT

http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/article/20070912/NEWS/70912004

It's disgusting that our society chooses to even humors these ingrates.
I'm interested to know what makes them think that their moral right is of any worth whatsoever? What makes them think that their opinions are so important that they can decide what's morally good for everyone else?
Morality consists of so few universalisms and so many subjectivities.
Stupid freaks.
If it's a public school, then God has no place within it's walls. And his servants can go drown too.
Regardless of the book's merit, an author has the right to discuss whatever subject they should choose. It then becomes the individual's moral duty to themselves only to decide whether or not they should read it, take it in, or act on it. I, among a world full of people, don't need some freaks deciding what's good for me. I do a good enough job on my own.
The book seems fairly cliche, predictable and 'oh so teen', but regardless, an individual should be smart enough to read any book dealing with promiscuous sexual relations ( among other taboo subjects; drugs, crime, freedom of press) and be able to decide for themselves where their moral ground is. Are they so insecure in their morality that they can't deal with the problem of being confronted with any other choices?

“I honestly believe that it should not be at school, because at my school they teach abstinence and no sex before marriage, but then all the book is teaching is how to do those things,” she said.

Absurd! what an inconceivable dilemma, a book might contradict what the educational system is teaching them!
What I don't understand is why a public school is teaching them such things to begin with, I thought society grew out of such harmful anachronisms in the sixties!
Also, let's not ignore the elephant in the room; she says the book is 'teaching how to do these things', well, one might assume the end choice is left up to her. I'm going to make a large assumption in guessing that she's of the religious bend ( since they're generally the only people who make such crass complaints ), it begs the question as to how strong someone's faith in their own answers is when they're trying so damned hard to strangle the competition!
Not even their awful bible should be banned, any literature should leave itself open to rational discussion. If something is wrong, you should be able to prove it wrong or immoral with your words alone, and even then, you're only left with your right to choose what you as an individual take in. You can't just suppress any literature that doesn't run congruous with your own moral leanings!
The topic of teenage sex should be left open, while I personally don't think that saturating YOUNG children with it is helpful, the older teens should get well comfortable with the subject. The book is intended for older teens, the rest of this statement should seem very obvious to you.
Part of the reason why society is so confused and screwed up on sex is because of things like this. Society treats sex like your life must either consist of it 0 or 100 percent, no middle ground, no happy medium, nothing in-between. You have the media, tapping their 'primal instincts' vein, screaming down your throat that sex should be running your pissant lives. And on the other hand you have the conservative moral right, screwed and rooted deep in their fears, whispering to you at your every turn and footstep that sex is immoral and wrong.
This culture seems to breed more of a fear of sex than anything else, and it seems very clear that this girl is so very indoctrinated, and at such a young age too.
One might say, that sex has been the CORNERSTONE of civilization itself, since the VERY BEGINNING. ( Think about this one for a moment. ). Since the very first moment life came into being, procreation has been ever present. So you'd think by now, after many thousands of years of intelligent human life, we would have learned to deal openly and honestly with the topic of sex?
Same thing goes for drugs, how can something thousands of years old, still be treated as such an awful taboo? it's the same problem. The zero or one hundred dilemma. All you can see in the media, is either vicious condemnation or rampant glorification of drug use/abuse. You see the same society that damned a genius like Timothy Leary into the ground over NOTHING, making a celebrity and hero out of Pete Doherty, for no good reason at all. ( The man is a fucking idiot, has nothing intelligently artistic to offer. ) How can society still be fascinated with such a simple taboo?! Drug abuse is not the slightest bit profound, it's as old as the drugs themselves.

I read the first chapter of the novel in question online, doesn't seem too amazing. Seems fairly simple.... And I'm fairly certain the book probably has a message at the end. I wonder if, maybe if this ape actually finished the book, maybe she might realize that it's not simply a how-to guide, but a story? And maybe you don't have to treat a character's actions like they're your own?
Idiots.

Also, here's something funny for you.
Her grandmother says she's 50? And the grand-daughter is 15? Grandma also says she's raised ( and I quote ) 11(?) sets of kids....
That's interesting... For grandma to be 50, that would mean that someone along the way got pregnant as a teenager wouldn't it? That'd make the mean age of this family's breeding around 17 wouldn't it? Fairly hypocritical that. Looks like someone's been sinning!

Enough of this crud. Krampus article coming later.

Just in case you were wondering:

Thu, 20 Dec 2007 15:15:51 GMT

http://www.isitchristmas.com/

Make sure you keep checking, unless something unexpected happens!

Commissions

Sat, 15 Dec 2007 17:26:16 GMT

Oh yeah, and If you want a personalized canvas similar to the one in the last thread, I'm thinking of accepting commissions. Don't worry, It's fun for me. I don't charge much, but my work isn't that awesome, so be warned I guess.
Commissioned canvases are accepted one at a time and cost according to desired size and work involved. I'll probably regret this later, but I thought I'd give it a go, considering I don't really want REAL work, ( but alas, I'm going to need it ASAP )
You give me a word, and I do your canvas.
It's fairly cheap too.
If I end up deleting this, assume that I realized that posting anything at 4am is a bad idea.
To get something done, just contact me via email, on Myspace or failing that, on here. You should probably have access to at least one of these mediums.

Brickz and Basikz

Fri, 14 Dec 2007 17:09:16 GMT

Mental grief topography...
I know those grooves, I mapped those ravinez.
You spend long enough bricking yourself in and you'll call any four wallz home.
It's easy to get yourself into a mess, but hard to get yourself out. These are the interactions by which all exchange flows through this world. Feeling that rust creep from the floor and up through my legs, planting them to the ground, nails creeping through the floor and growing into my feet, now heavy, gilded and leaden with the feeble promise that everything flows in one way; that if I just let the river take me It'll flow back to home, where I can shut up, sit down and hide.
I don't think I can truly believe that the individual can possess a destiny, That there is a predefined script appled to us. I think destiny is something the mind can only look back on, As we experience it, destiny is written by actions. Destiny is history. Sure, I believe in some way, that all possibility can be calculated by the mathematical computation of every possible factor, that to some extent determinism must be true in some macrocosmic sense. But that doesn't apply, we still have choices. This is the now.
The joy lies in the writing the formula, reaction, boiling and unraveling.
Lately life's been full of choices, no's, yes's. Spent too long making excuses about life. Hiding in bad, safe zones.
There's a time to be reckless...
But something inside burned, to go back, to rewrite something and blot it out. Live in the now, because every victory, no matter it's weight in gold, wins something back for you. Back from this world.
The world is only growing colder, harder, growing so mean. But I'll get meaner again, be fearless once more. Cast all that aside. Harden myself like stone again.

The night air was cold and I looked back and forth, the world is empty. Something in my head screamed against the signal noize, but something in my hand screamed to me, my head didn't know my true name, but my hand's knew...
They always would.
I turned my head and I saw myself climbing that fence, My foot in the groove in the gate, my shoe pulling myself up on that lock. I didn't even need to move. I felt pulled, I can't even explain that to someone who has never been in that position. My breath grabbed in me and I exhaled, you could see the vapour dying in that cold air. Every muscle tensed, blood pumping.
I landed on those familiar stonez and that spark hit through me.
My hands moved at lightning speed, took over my hungry body. My brow dropped it's weight again, and I smiled in a way I haven't in so long.
Back on the linez.
Move, you're moving now.
Quick as lightning, I moved. The poetry of the hand, the body, the mind.
Train linez, the slow decline. That familiar scent, bronzing the air. My mind deaf to the world. My eyes and ears stuck in a different world. I moved like clockwork. Tight, precise.
A train was due in a few minutes.
Pulling round that distant bend, that wet resonant noise cutting through the night air. Nothing can stop me, I was done here already.
The station blared over the loudspeaker, and the lights creeped distant, pulling inwards. I pulled myself back over and got to my feet. Pulled my belt tight and zipped up my jacket.
I win. You can't touch me.
Back on the linez.
Get back up.
Stay high forever.
The cold air couldn't burn me anymore.
No fear.
All these choices.
I couldn't have cast my denial If I wanted to.
Anyone can say whatever they like... I don't care anymore. I don't have to.
I am here, and I won't go.
I'm far from home and I don't care. Because this is new territory and I'll show it what I've learned. Take my fists back into the monstersphere and fight my shadow, to crush it forever.
All I know is how to be young, and I'll be young as long as I can burn at that rust.
Too familiar, set me free now as a shade in this world.
Until my injuries catch up, Until I can't climb, can't run, can't fight. My left knee is fucked, my back is fucked, I've cracked my right shin, broken both my arms, wrists and knuckles. But I'm not done. You'll need to crush my skull, sever my spine.
I'll set it all in stone. Brickwork. Brickwork poetry.
In these past few weeks.... I've cut the chainz free.
Set something aside and run as a shade again.
I'm writing my destiny now.
No more living to die slowly.
Tonight I live to die quick another day.

Arts and crafts day with the damned.

Thu, 13 Dec 2007 08:20:06 GMT

I've been doing these for a little while now, so I thought I'd share the process with you, from start to finish of how I accomplish it, so you can mimic me in the comfort of your homes.

Step 1 - The sketch

Paper + 0.5 pacer, about 5 leads + About 3 erasers, plus a few hours.
Probably looks better on paper than anywhere else... and this brings us to...

Step 2 - The Copy, and begin cutting
At this point, you'll probably not want to damage your original sketch, so use a scanner ( or photo-copyer ) to make a copy of the original. You'll need to print this onto thick paper somehow ( I don't recommend regular copy paper for cutting, can be extremely frustrating and quite temperamental. ), I did this by feeding the sketchpad paper through the printer feed. (note, the first time I did this it clogged the printer, make sure your paper fits FIRST, I use about 150GSM)

Step 3 - Cutting ( Yes this is really as fun as it looks! )
This part is self explanatory, but certainly not easy, nor is it quick. So not quick.

Step 4 - Frustration and cigarette break(s)
Be sure that you tested your cutting skills beforehand!

Step 5 - Meltdown averted / Progress
Progress at last. I guess I can untie my family now.

Step 6 - The fruits of your labour.

If you were following this correctly at home, your work should somewhat resemble this one.
A small piece of useful advice at this point is to use some spray lacquer or hairspray to add weight to the stencil. It adds some durability, especially considering the points. Also, the more weight you give it, the less the paper will curl and lift off in the process of spraying onto it.

Now, with this part, I forgot to take some photos during the act itself, but really... it should seem fairly obvious what I did with the stencil.

First I sprayed the canvas with the black background color, I used a fairly light coat at this point. Then I placed the stencil on the canvas, ( I used some small pins to hold the edges down, since the pressure of spray-paint tends to lift them off at times, also wind. ) and then sprayed on the background colors.
( alternatively, you can do this entire process backwards, and cut a stencil consisting of the INSIDE of the piece itself, though this is much quicker ( and points don't lift up half as much, doesn't need any pinning down ) , it has it's problems; such as 'filled sections between letters', It's also harder to guage proportion when dealing with spaced out letters ( if you're using technical styles that is, for simpler styles the inside of the piece might be a far better option ) . It's not impossible though, that's how I started doing this. But through trial and error, I've decided this method is worth the extra effort to avoid the drawbacks of the other method. )

And yeah, not many people do the process like I've done it here, alot of people simply draw the piece itself on, fill and all with paint markers. This is just simply how I choose to do it.
The resulting product is a canvas with the blob shape of the piece in black surrounded by the background colour. Mine looked great just like this, but in this form the product is simply not acceptable.
While this is a quantum leap forward...
Step 6 - Get those cigarettes ready...

Now we begin outlining the sketch, you'll require some form of manual dexterity to accomplish this.
Step 7 - You probably won't feel like talking anymore...

Yeah, I made a lot of visible mistakes. There's one really obvious one that I couldn't fix without making it worse.
The worst part is the black cutbacks which didn't quite match the fill colour, but thankfully, for some reason you can't see this in the photos.

Step 8 - Starting the shadow

Around this point things are starting to really take shape, with this canvas I chose not to opt for an innerkey or aura, unlike my other pieces and canvases. I'm a big fan of that negative and hollow look.
Plus the parts where the stencil lifted slightly when I did the background created a neat glow anyway. ( check the bottom sections of the 'R' )
I also went for that concave 3d look with drop shadow rather than connecting, which is just my preference.

just need to fix those awful cutbacks a bit, finish the shadow off, ( which may take multiple coats with the paint marker to get the desired opacity. ) and....

Step 9 - Finish

In the cupboard with the rest you go. Where I don't have to look at you.

I hope everyone had fun there.
Next week, I'll bring you 'How to build a $10 lamp out of a $3.50 can of spraypaint.' ( I'm serious. )

Mon, 10 Dec 2007 04:10:13 GMT

Note to self, Read through articles before posting.... ($@*(@($@(*$2.
Also, updated Lad Guide v2 in the works....
That should give you all enough suspense.

You, Worms.

Sun, 09 Dec 2007 16:01:26 GMT

Ah, what will become of me...
I often wonder. About eight hundred years ago, perhaps I could have been the court fool. About one thousand five hundred years ago, perhaps some kind of shaman, or witchdoctor ( oh what a dream! )... Career choices today, however, don't seem to be so straightforward.
Gone are the days of the wandering bard or minstrel, replacing it are the stale, slow days of the bard sitting comfortably in that idiot box lighting your living room.
Of the dawning of new ages, Mark Twain had this to say on the invention of the telephone:
The human voice carries entirely too far as it is... And now you fellows come along and seek to complicate matters.”

This age, is truly a very daunting thing.
It's even stranger to consider, that my art, that being the art I've chosen to pursue as the breadwinner of my talents, is in reality the art of creating something which is ultimately an intangible and non physical thing. I don't know if that makes me part of the problem or just a passive part of that solution. Nevertheless; ( to the point/rant now )
Something I've been thinking about for quite some time, is the idea of satisfaction in one's employment... and from this, the modern condition: That slow, beating pulse of dissatisfaction, and a growing unquenchable stress and depression that we're slowly losing our collective grips on.
Now, I try not to jump too much on stereotypical lefty bandwagons, since I detest them so... but I really do see something wrong with the modern way of life.
The corporation: revolving primarily around the exchange of some kind of good or service to the general public for monetary commodity, not a difficult concept to grasp... but what sets the corporation aside from the humble company is it's modular employment setup and it's pro profit leaning.
But so what? Doesn't everyone want to make a dime?
I guess so, but in this day and age that dime has seven figures and It's split amongst the top ten percent.
And where you come in,
Working in something even vaguely resembling a corporation is commonly an incredibly depressing thing. Due to a modular departmental setup, you'll most probably find you're only slaving away on a cog of something much larger, something you don't even know, or touch... something completely intangible... how can you gain satisfaction from that?
Think about that call center I slaved away in... I make calls to decrepit fucks with one foot in the grave, trying to solicit money which my corrupt organization shares with the PCYC... If you think about that for a second.... how fucking corrupt is that? What am I Actually doing? What am I working towards? Nothing that helps either myself nor the world. Just something which ( at best ) leaves people with some kind of vague feeling of satisfaction, which ( if you're lucky ) barely outweighs the doubt and guilt involved. ( or just plain hoodwinks the customer )
What the fuck are we doing?
According to the 2006 census ( provided I read it correctly Check here for yourself ) Only around 16% of the population is self employed. If you include those employed in family businesses the percentage still won't get above 25%, and I very well understand the fact that not every dream can be realized in self employment, but I just don't think people are even trying any more.
I think too often we're becoming little more than invisible and unimportant gears in large, faceless machines. Working our lives away to accomplish things which don't even benefit or satisfy ourselves, god forbid benefit or satisfy mankind.
Now, myself, I'm struggling in ways with my choice of career, It's a difficult one, ( for reasons I won't go in to here. ), but at least, at the end of every day, at the end of every job. I can say, I built something, and as a direct result of my skills, I benefit accordingly. At the end of every job, I have some pride, something I enjoyed ( to an extent ) doing, something I challenged myself with. And someone who benefits directly from my skills. I don't know if I can articulate this well, so bare with me...
Even as logical and analytical as programming can be, ( even though I specialize more in art and design ), it's still an art in itself, and when I'm working on this level, I can see my creation functioning, and I can feel the satisfaction.
I think of Shaun in his job, ( even though I haven't spoken to you in a while, hope this still applies! ) but at least at the end of a project, as huge as they are, there is a product, and your skills directly helped shape that project. So there is a tangible end result that means something. ( Just thought about your job, because it was always something I wanted to do! haha )
Working in a faceless corporation, calling people up to suck their blood and eat their bones, you have no satisfaction. Working in an office, crunching numbers, inputting clipboard data retrieved by shithead salesman canvasing the poor... You gain nothing, you contribute nothing... nothingness.
And my own artistic leanings aren't the only issue being addressed here, so much industry seems to be operating for no known benefit other than finding new ways to weasel people out of money in increasingly clandestine ways. Call centres, marketing.... investment, banking.... It's all bullshit. Do we really need these things as a civilization?
Maybe I'm just going crazy, but I think the longer people slave away in the gears of this machine, It's becoming a self replicating disorder in itself. We're just getting dulled, having our dreams stolen. Stolen by simple things like money, and the drive to have nothing but money, because it's so hard to get, in this day and age that we forget the things we dreamed of doing.
In decades long gone past, people still hated working, people always have and always will. But at least once, a hard days work meant a hard days pay, and so many more people worked in ways that more directly benefited the world.... Reached out and touched the world, society. They, in their indirect ways, helped others, created things, used their minds and pushed their own boundaries.
Of course, all manner of menial employment has always been necessary, but never more than today. And our money means so much less, it's worth so little, but we need to work so much harder to get the same worth.
90% of the wealth lies in the hands of 10% of the population, and our government focuses on the prosecution of minor crimes to increase revenue, never even addressing the causes of these problems.
People need opportunity to get rich, of course. Free enterprise is the only way it can work, but It's not wealth the world is after, it's domination. The human spirit is truly flawed somewhere inside, if it created this mess.
Now there's hardly any room for independent businesses in many industries, especially clothing, furniture, etc etc etc.
I don't know the solution, but I can see some kind of a problem here....
I think I've just ranted far beyond any kind of coherent point, I don't know... ( I have a bad habit of this ), but maybe something can be gained from that.

Wed, 05 Dec 2007 15:17:32 GMT

http://www.totse.com/community/showthread.php?t=2076096

As long as people with these kind of minds remain in the world, the hilarity will surely,never, ever end.

Saying something in your own language.

Wed, 21 Nov 2007 15:43:00 GMT

William S Burroughs casually remarked at one point that words themselves don't contain a built in definition. Structure and form in itself contains no built in definition either, and in the larger patterns that we see in the world, we can see a kind of macrocosm of art formed if we choose to look. An accidental beautiful creation.
Slow vision, looking out at the world as if it is a solid object. As if all the people were solidified and completely still, moving quick enough to form solid lines. The world's patterns coming visible.
Structure itself is an art-form in it's own way. Explored artistically by few, but that only makes finding the few that do the more rewarding.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revs

“We think art should be dangerous,” Revs told a freelancer for ArtForum magazine in a 1994 interview. “Everybody's into safe art,” he continued, “doing safe things in their studio. We’re bringing danger back into it. It's got to be on the edge, where it's not allowed.”
Known for such unorthodox views, Revs also refuses to sell his work. He’s even gone as far telling a Times reporter that “once money changes hands for art, it becomes a fraudulent activity.” This idea that art should be of pure expression, unconstrained by society’s wants or expectations, is manifest in the work Revs undertook in New York’s subways.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hw4YkmHlIQg

Thanks to Leeroy for showing me this too,
I found the video moving in a strange way, the character of Revs, how he believes in what he's doing, as well as the dedication he applies to making sure that sculpture doesn't move.

"That diabolical streak that's in me, that's in everybody."