Messages

And of course, Scojo (now known as La La) is still available to all on the sadly defunct alt.comics.2000ad.  It used to be a damn good newsgroup in the late 1990's, I can tell you.

Link: http://groups.google.co.uk/group/alt.comics.2000ad?lnk=srg&hl=en" target="_blank">Alt.comics.2000AD (so sad)

Lest it be forgotten... there's Scojo's classic attempt to re-enter society under a new name.

A small excerpt:

Relector: i will be at dreddcon 4 with my good looks and sexual charisma
arthurwyatt: gary, its no good, no matter how much I goad him he'll never start hassling the diggle forum.
Relector: looking for men to share the evening with
arthurwyatt: ...and i will kill you. I'll probably get a guest pass just for the purpose of it too.
GordonR: better bring somethign with your name and address on it too, so the hospital staff can contact your parents
Relector: we can have passionate nookie, art
GordonR: :->  ;->  ;->
arthurwyatt: oh god, thats worse than claibers withered penis
GordonR: heh
garywilkinson: gordon: lol.... and writing your blood group on your arm
Relector: i am not gay, art honest
Relector: for real
arthurwyatt: yes you are
Relector: im not
arthurwyatt: You so clearly are
GordonR: my feelings too
garywilkinson: you are so gay
Relector: I dont dip my candle in that scene
Relector: ur jealous cos i am hamdsome
GordonR: you like the idea of other men thinking about how handsome you are?
garywilkinson: only gay men think there are handsome. and are obsessed with cats
Relector: thats me then!
arthurwyatt: and want to fuck Robert Patrick.

Link: http://f4.grp.yahoofs.com/v1/gP8ORIYg0znVEgkd_Afic_ObPvHFItamozAn6xjOr_qOVGPejgW4Ax2BnDfHGWbJMXiTxeUPGLtkXXVgSGBQb5FiCcTpiAtQ/Best%20chat%20log%20ever....htm" target="_blank">Best.  Chat.  Log.  Ever

Do take a look at the Argue With Scojo yahoo group... particularly posts from mid-2003...

Link: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ArgueWithScojo/messages/2047" target="_blank">You have much to learn, young funter...

[ALL!!!!!!!!!!!]

No!!!  You fool, do you know what you've done???

YOU'VE DOOMED US ALL!!!

ALL!!!!!!!!!!!

This is still my favourite internet image ever...

http://www.gothicroseantiques.com/Copy_of_ape4.jpg">

Peter Kay's excellent acting abilities and popularity mean that this is a great choice.  As long as he plays a hideous alien beastie, I'll be happy.

Going back on-topic?

?Children at the two family centres sing a variety of descriptive words in the nursery rhyme to turn the song into an action rhyme.  They sing happy, sad, bouncing, hopping, pink, blue, black and white sheep etc.  This encourages children to extend their vocabulary.?  
- Press release from the charity Parents and Children Together, which runs the nurseries in question.  

This press release has not been reported by any national UK newspaper or broadcaster, despite being released via the Press Association.  As per usual, a combination of tabloid press need to sell product and some people?s eagerness to believe anything about the mythical PC lobby has collided to produce a ?scandal? out of almost nonexistent ingredients.

but if its a man in the 'Chair' its Chairman and if its a woman its Chairwoman...why do they ignore the simple?

Cos its a pain in the arse changing the stationary every time you change the gender of your glorious leader.

I dislike a lot of silly P.C. nonsense- this does not make me racist, sexist or homophobic.

Nor does it make you "anti-PC" - I was more talking about the likes of the Daily Mail.  Then again, you're a Tory so you probably read the thing.  It's probably your dream to become their political cartoonist.  See that Daily Express reader?  That's you, that is.



BTW, what sort of silly PC nonsense do you dislike?  Funding for black lesbian theatre groups?

;)

There is a mistaken belief out there that "Baa Baa Black Sheep" originates in the slave trade.  In fact, it predates trafficking in African slaves by over 300 years.

Investigations suggest that this is a rare case where the "non-PC" (i.e. racist, sexist, homophobes) brigade haven't particularly twisted the facts.  This Stewart Chamberlain chap appears to have thought about the idea of a white child singing "baa baa black sheep" at a black child, as a form of bullying - which, incidentally, does go on - and, inspired by an old idea from America, brought in "baa baa rainbow sheep" as a substitute.  

It's an unintelligent action for several reasons.  1) The original purpose of the rhyme was to educate children about real animals, but there's no such thing as a "rainbow sheep".  2) As Garamin says, it buggers up the rhythm something awful.  3) By censoring the word "black", it separates out and suggests there is a stigma to blackness.

However, I do think that the motives of the tabloids in whipping up a storm about this (It was the front page headline of at least one) are deeply suspect.  The action was misguided but not malicious, and comes from the same benevolent impulses that mean that most children today don't sing "eeny meeny miny mo, catch a nigger by his toe" in the playground.

Oh, and by the way, this isn't the first time...

Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/600470.stm" target="_blank">News from the year 2000

I can see it now:

"Little Plum um heap annoyed, readers!"
(Reader's voice) "Why?"
"Because um heap white men raped Little Plum's wife, scalped her and set fire to um teepee!  Me go now cut out white men's genitals and stuff them in his mouth!"
Big Chief (lying ill and drunk under a poisoned blanket) "Good luck!"

Any answer about whether these will be available in the Future Shop?

Mark, thanks - that's a much more comprehensive answer than I could have possibly hoped for.  I'd never considered the printing/colour balance issue before, so that's genuinely useful.

Oh, and you just sold a copy of Glimmer Rats, by the way.

You make a good point there - is there any way of seeing Harrison or Langley's shiny happy computer originals on our screens?

If you haven?t seen it yet, there?s a really good interview with Mark Harrison in this month?s Megazine.  I guess you could argue that the rest of this question contains


SPOILERS


Aiee! {Cough}


Anyway, it raised a question which has always puzzled me, and which I was hoping all the artistic types who hang about here could help with.

Harrison talks about the process of rendering all his spaceships etc in some clever software that allows him to create 3-D models, spin them about to get the best angle.  He also talks about the integration of photography, paint and line art into one funky blended whole.  He admits that the process of rending these infinitely detailed miniature worlds became such an obsession for him that it started to be unhealthy.  He also mentions Clint Langley and says that the guy must be in heaven or hell?

So, here?s the question.  If both Harrison and Langley are working so hard and being so painstaking, and I have absolutely no doubt that they are, how come their art is frequently murky, obscure and difficult to make out?  So often I get the feeling that ?this would be such great stuff - if only they?d turn up the lights a little!?  It occurred to me that I might just be over-rating them, and all the murk and dinginess is there to cover up flaws in the art, but then I think back to Langley?s beautiful line work on Slaine, or Harrison?s astonishingly good early Dredds, and that explanation doesn?t seem to me to wash.  

So - is it a glitch in the process of transferring the image file to the printed page?   If so, isn?t there a way of compensating for it?    Or is it inherent in this sort of computery work?  Matt Smith clearly thinks that these two, among others, are redefining comic art (check the Meg editorial) ? so why does it feel so jerky?