linkmachinego.com
14 February 2001
[comics] Now this is what I call content… the New Yorker has put online it’s archive of cartoons… I’ve searched for the artist Kalo in the database and come up with… nothing. :(
13 February 2001
[morrison] Here is a transcript of Grant Morrison’s DisInfo TV episode‘…Coca-Cola is a sigil, the McDonalds ‘M’ is a sigil, these people are basically turning the world in to themselves using sigils. And if we don’t reverse that process and turn the world in to us using sigils, we’re going to be living in fucking McDonalds! Magic is accessible to everyone, the means of altering reality is accessible to everyone, and when everyone starts doing it we’re going to see our desire manifest on a gigantic scale. Everyone’s desire. What happens when everyone’s desire becomes manifest?’ [via Ms Woo]
[internet] Disturbing report on the BBC’s Panorama about an internet community of paedophiles called Wonderland… Here’s a transcript of the TV programme. ‘The first thing anyone does when they get online is go looking for the porn, it’s just one of those things. And I found that fairly easily and within 24 hours I’d found the child porn as well. I didn’t expect to find it at first, I thought well it’s an urban myth, it’s just something you hear about on the news and there it was, it was sitting in front of me. I had people I could talk to. I had people that I could trade images with as well. But I had friends. I’d never had so many friends. I had friends all over the world.’ [Related Links: RegisterPaedophile says why he loves the Net, BBC NewsPaedophiles’ vast ‘lending library’]
[weblogs] A quick runthru of all the Barbelith Underground blogs — Plasticbag, Venusberg, shey.network, Kooky Mojo, Fridge Poet, Ms Woo, The Collective, Zenith, Rosa, Kali, Rollo, Kirk Nice, Haggar, Grant, Jack Fear, Dayglo, Bizmunth and finally LinkMachineGo. ‘I’m not entirely sure what kind of world will exist when I have fininshed, but I know it will be better for everyone. If I have any faith, I have faith in the unexpected, the unpredictable.’— Niles Caulder, just before he gets his head ripped off by the Candlemaker, Doom Patrol #57.
12 February 2001
[year] Guardian Unlimited explains… Why we hate February. ‘The dullest, wettest, cruellest month is upon us. Oh well, at least it’s short.’
[comics] Interesting page about an unpublished Vertigo comic from Grant Morrison, Pete Milligan and Jamie Hewlett — Bizarre Boys. ‘BIZARRE BOYS, VERTIGO VOICES’ most irreverent title, is a story within a story within a story. It’s about some fictional characters called the Bizarre Boys, and about the writers who write them, and about the writers who are writing about the writers… There are two voices telling the tale of BIZARRE BOYS, and they don’t agree with each other at all. BIZARRE BOYS is a comic about a comic and about the process of putting together a comic. It’s a sparkling tapestry of post-modernism and a fast- moving breathless chase across time and space.’ [via the Warren Ellis Forum]
[aids] Excellent website with lots of information on the controversial / disturbing theory that AIDS origins lie in a early polio vaccines contaminated with viruses from chimpanzee kidneys. [Related Links: Scientists rule out polio link to Aids]
[magic] Guardian Unlimited interviews Paul Daniels (I think there is a Louis Theroux TV interview with him next week)… ‘Daniels’ autobiography, Under No Illusions, published last year, little endeared him to an already wary public. It was thick with bumptious notations (“No, it’s not a trick photograph. I was trading in the Bentley on the left for the one on the right. Now there’s posh!”) and toe-curling sexual detail (“Once I got upstairs, Debbie was lying stark naked on the bed – eat your heart out fellas! She was wearing the sort of sleeping blindfold you get on long-haul flights. Printed on it was Do Not Disturb. But further down her body she had a sign that said Disturb!”) He also alleged that he had slept with more than 300 women.’
11 February 2001
[comics] Brief reviews of London Comic Shops… the top three are the best shops in London… Gosh: ‘Fight through the superheroes on the ground floor and head for the stairs at the back of the shop. The lead to a basement full of alternative & independent stuff. Usually a couple of shelves of self-published bits.’
6 February 2001
[LMG] I’m all blogged out… taking a break for a couple of days. Not taking my laptop with me… just a Rio, a Colour Gameboy… and a few books. :) LMG returns at the weekend.
[morrison] Grant Morrison updates his website and has published good news for sad, lonely, fanboys everywhere: ‘”Sex is out of the question for me” admits once-promising Olympian John with a chuckle. “When you add my spinal injuries and other morbid disabilities to the obesity I’ve suffered since the accident well, you have the chemical combination for loneliness right there in the palm of your hand. That’s mostly why I started putting aside my spare time for poring over lists and charts and I can assure fans that 2001 will be be a hard and horny one for comics enthusiasts worldwide.”‘
[rap] Eminem: Courting controversy, Public Eminem No1 — BBC News and the Sunday Times on Eminem. ‘”I would quite genuinely shoot the little bastard,” said Julie Bindel, founder of the action group Justice for Women and a researcher at the child and women abuse department at North London University. “He is misogynist scum who will influence some women and men. Rather than censor him, though, I wish someone who took offence at his lyrics would leave him in a coma.”‘
5 February 2001
[infinite fanboys] I have not got the time to investigate this archive of Internet Fan Fiction… but it looks pretty comprehensive. If you find any amusing / sick / insightful fan fiction let me know
[comics] Long, fascinating behind the scenes expose of the formation of Image comics in the early 90’s from The Comics Journal. ‘The story he wants to tell is, in the final analysis, not the Story of Comics but the Story of Todd McFarlane. “The comic-book world could blow up tomorrow,” he told the Journal. “I’m taken care of. The guy you got to worry about the least is Todd McFarlane. I’m bulletproof. I will make no apologies for anything Image has done. I left Marvel to be free. Eight years later, is Todd free? You’re fucking right he is. I can’t even envision the day when I would go back to the plantation and do Spider-Man or Heroes Reborn. I’m free, goddamn it! I’ve got everything I want!”‘
4 February 2001
[fraud] A reckoning at the Russia house, SW16. Fascinating look at a massive credit card fraud operation run by a Russian in London… ‘Confident they now had enough information, officers carried out dawn raids on addresses across London, including those of the two main suspects, but even they were surprised by what was found at Tanov’s home. The 33-year-old Russian had turned a small bedroom into a credit card factory, at a cost of no more than £3,000, complete with computers, embossers and hologram making equipment, capable of producing near perfect replicas of Visa, Amex and Master Card.’ [via Beesley]
[norfolk] According to to the Sunday Times Norfolk is new playground of the rich. ‘But the north Norfolk coast is emerging as the rural retreat of choice for the monied classes, providing for London’s elite what the Hamptons of Long Island offers New Yorkers. Drawn to the bracing sea air, quaint villages and fresh seafood, the urban wealthy are colonising the area, sending house prices soaring and spawning a proliferation of designer boutiques and delicatessens. Indeed, the lure of Blakeney, Wells-next-the-Sea and Burnham Market has become so strong that some of America’s glitterati have forsaken the Hamptons for a trip to Norfolk.’
[comics] Nice Evan Dorkin fan page with lots of scans of his work from Dork!
3 February 2001
[cock] Flame of the week over at the Register: ‘And quit writing the word “cock” on every page of the register! It makes you sound like peanut eating jizz mopers! It’s bad enough that you write about lesbian disabled porn in between mastubatory frenzies, but having cock thrust upon each page is disgusting!’
[buffy] The Edible Buffy… you’re probably thinking it’s some nasty fan site dedicated to Buffy Fan Fiction but you could not be more wrong… ‘There are already a bazillion Buffy sites on the Internet, some specifically devoted to episode synopsis and analysis, the stars, the villains, and even the show’s philosophy. I figured I’d make my site slightly less redundant by exploring a heretofore untouched aspect of BtVS: the food.’
[comics] Another of those Previews Guides to the comics coming out in April 2001 this time from popImage. What I’ll be purchasing… Ministry Of Space #1 and the following collections: Jar of Fools, Soundtracks by Jessica Abel, and the complete edition of Box Office Poison.
2 February 2001
[nose] For anybody who comes to LMG for pictures of Danniela Westbrooke’s Nose: Gak Attack. ‘It’s class A Entertainment’
[blogger] Long, involved post on Metafilter about the breakup of Blogger. Matt Haughey: ‘Thousands of young and old alike, beginner and expert started using their website to communicate their voice, build a brand, feed an ego, and spread their ideas through weblogs. At the center of it all, was Blogger.com, and it showed no signs of stopping. But backstage, things were falling apart…’ [Related Links: Evhead, Haughey, Saturn, Megnut on Blogger]
1 February 2001
[our reptile rulers] David Icke publishes conclusive proof that Prince Charles is a shape-changing lizard.
[weblogs] Tom wins Best European and GLBT weblog at the 2001 Bloggies… Congratulations Tom.
[comics] SFX Magazine interviews Warren Ellis — Part One, Part Two.‘…Marvels trying to make a bit of money, bless ’em. They’re in business and that’s what they are there for, but no-one really needs a Ghost Rider film. It’s not important. Its not going to be a life changing event for anyone and its not going to a life changing event for comics. You are not going to come out of Blade or the X-Men and say “Bugger me, I’ve got to get the Yellow Pages and find a comic shop and buy loads of comics, because this was really good”. It’s more “That was alright, now down the pub.”‘
31 January 2001
[plug] The Updated UK Blogs List continues to grow… it’s a quick way to surf around all the UK weblogs which have recently updated…
[meme] Yet another Whassssupppp! parody… Ayuuuupppp! ‘Watching footie, supping some ale.’ [via Frownland]
[comics] Dan from Venusberg on the Superfriends‘Now, I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen Superfriends, but it has filtered so deep into my geek consciousness that I sincerely believe that I remember whole episodes. Most peculiar.’ I’ve never seen it either but I know exactly what he means… [has it ever been broadcast in the UK?]