Caveman Joe

Experimenting with a new layout

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 01:57:09 +0100

I'm feeling sunny and nice. Let's try some new website layouts. And let's also completely drop support for Internet Explorer six.
Like a fucking ROCK.

(seriously though, if you're using IE6, go away and don't come back until you're running something that properly supports 24-bit .png's)

Paintings for sale...

Tue, 27 Mar 2007 01:28:16 +0100

I know, I haven't updated this (or Culture Shock) in ages. I've had other things on my mind.
But this post is to pimp some excellent paintings done by a very good friend of mine, and going cheap on eBay! Grab yourself a bargain, here:

Batman!
Tank Girl!
Marv!

Happy bidding, and expect actual updates at some point soon. :)

Never "Work" with your computer again

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 21:13:22 +0000

While I was beginning myself-employment, I took a couple of agency jobs here and there �one or two-day affairs, for a little extra cash as a safety net �and some of them were data entry jobs.

In a data entry position, you carryout the work that nobody's gotten around to automating yet. You copyrows and columns of numbers from one application to another, all day,every day, until you quit, get sacked or write a script that doesyour job and sell it to the company.

Naturally, you get extremely boreddoing this sort of work. And really, when you think about it, isn'tusing a computer to work a perfect waste of both a computer and ahuman being?

Humans invented computers to do ourwork for us, not to simply be a sinkhole in which to throw our timeand souls. They're supposedto do the boring stuff � our job, as human beings, is to tell thecomputer what to do, and then let it sit there and do it while we goand do something more interesting. If you use your computer in anyother fashion, you're doing it wrong.

A computer can domenial, unskilled jobs a million times faster than we can. If thereis no decision making involved, or if said decisions can be based onpredetermined parameters, then there's no need to waste the precioustime of any human being in performing this sort of worthless task.

Computers are forworking. Humans are for creating.

I realised withmy last data entry position that most people's conceptions of whatcomputers are actually for are at best extremely vague, and atworst outright wrong. That's when I decided to write a seriesof articles for newbie computer users, detailing a few ways in whichyou can help your computer better understand your intentions, and howyou can more reliably interpret the computer's feedback. This is thefirst of those articles � future articles will include morepractical advice of steps you can take, in line with these concepts,to ensure that you never �work� with a computer again.

To furtherillustrate my original point, let's highlight some strengths ofdigital and analogue intelligence that should be apparent, but whichmany employers seem to have overlooked.

Digitalintelligence is fast, and focussed. It takes orders withoutquestion, and never gets bored or distracted. If it has a set oforders which require no decision-making instinct, or if thosedecisions are easily made based on very simple pre-establishedparameters, it can fly through its work without breaking a sweat. Itcan multiply a twenty-digit number by another twenty-digit numberwithout biting its lip. Digital intelligence is cold, logical, andaccurate.

Analogueintelligence is vibrant, creative and adaptive. If a human beingcomes across a problem with his or her plan, then (s)he can find someway of fixing it and simply carry on. Human beings can have ideas,can construct them, analyse them and revise them to perfection. Ifit's obvious that a plan won't work, a human will know without havingto run through the plan until an error is found. Analogueintelligence is less easily surprised than digital intelligence, andbetter equipped to cope when something goes wrong.

When you send acommand to a computer, be it by moving the mouse, pressing a key,telling it to start a new E-mail or whatever, that command is takenin by a front-end of intelligence that's clever enough to understandyou � I'm talking Windows, here � then it gets passed throughlayers of translation that become stupider and faster, until thebroken-down steps of the command you issued is fed into a machine sostupid it can only talk in terms of whether something is on or off,but so fast that it can turn a billion things on or off before youcan blink. The results are then fed back up through several layersof translation laid down by human programmers, and finally theeffects are shown in a language that a human being can understand �their effects on the screen. All of this happens in slices of timetoo small for us to notice, but the act of pressing down with yourindex finger has to be translated into a myriad different formsbefore the computer reports back to you that you have, in fact, justclicked something.

Is it any wonder,then, that we rarely get along with our computers? We speakcompletely different native languages � the fact that we cancommunicate at all is remarkable. And with so many different layersof translation in between, the fact that you're reading these wordsis evidence of arguably the greatest technological effort since theinternal combustion engine.

Speaking ofinternal combustion engines, let's go off on a brief tangent toaddress the perceptions of the average computer user � how do youview your computer, when you're interacting with it? Do you believeit's no more a part of you than the Pizza Hut across the street? Isthere a degree of separation between your mind and its processor? I'll bet there is. But what about your car?

When you drive,do you think of your car as separate to you, or is it an extension ofyour physical form? In simpler terms, if somebody rear-ends you atthe traffic lights, do you say �My goodness, his car just connectedwith my car� or do you exclaim �That stupid oaf just hitme!� Do you think �I'll have to make my car go faster, or I'llnever make it in time,� or �I'd better speed up, or I'll belate�? I'll bet you a pint that you view your car as an extensionto yourself, and I'll bet you a bag of crisps that it's the same waywith a handful of other devices � and unless you're a sysadmin or apower user, I'd wager the next round that this principle doesn'tapply to your computer.

WHY THE HELLNOT?!

It's just adevice! It's another machine, like your car! Why doesn't it feel asmuch of a part of you as your car, your phone, your screwdriver, yourboots?

Well, there areplenty of reasons. For one thing, we've had over a hundred years toget used to our cars, and change our cars so they get used to us �we have long-term intimate knowledge of our cars, but computers andhumans are still awkwardly grinning at each other like shy teenagers. For another thing, it's far easier for the average human being toaccept a physical extension of his/her form than a logical one �and if a computer is to be regarded as a part of oneself, then it'dbe more an extension to the mind than an extension to the legs.

But the singlebiggest reason why your computer doesn't feel like an extension toyourself is that you're not used to it, and perhaps more importantly,it's not used to you.

You take yourlessons and find out how the gear stick works, and what pedal makesthe car go and which one makes it stop � there, you're used to yourcar.

You fine-tuneyour engine, play with the tension on your pedals, adjust your seat,your mirrors, the steering column, find some nice music on the stereoand adjust it to an appropriate volume � now your car is used toyou.

You buy your newcomputer, read some For Dummies books, write an E-mail for Steve andsent it to Susan � there, you've started getting used to yourcomputer. But, shy of telling it whereabouts it is in theworld and who you are, is your computer used to you?

You're going tohave to change yourself in order to get used to your computer �you'll have to learn new concepts, get used to different ways ofthinking about things. But crucially, many people forget to helptheir computers get used to them, or simply don't know how. And whena machine is completely under your control and has no instinct toresist change, it's much easier to change the machine than itis to change yourself.

Imagine drivingaround in your car without adjusting the seat or mirrors � havingto move your head around so you can see what's behind you, and havingto slide forwards in your seat to reach the pedals. That alonesounds like a nightmare to me � having to wrestle with your ownbody in order to interact with your car. But given that your car isa physical extension of your body, and your computer is a logicalextension of your mind, is it any wonder that so many people haveproblems interacting with their computers, when they have to wrestlewith their minds in order to get a job done?

You shouldn'thave to perform mental gymnastics to use your computer � yourcomputer should do the work to help you understand it,not the other way around.

Unfortunately,your computer can't do that. It lacks reason, adaptability andcommon sense. On the other hand, it will follow orders - so,over the coming weeks, I'm going to show you some cold, hard ordersthat you can give to your machine, in order to help it to understandyou. Some of these will involve software, some will involvehardware, some will be intangible concepts with tangible results. But all of them will involve change of some kind, be it to your wayof thinking, or your computer's way of working.

Hopefully, by theend, you'll never have to �work� with your computer again.

Where's Culture Shock gone?

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 21:10:22 +0000

If you're looking for Culture Shock, it's moved! It's now available at culture-shock.net (took me EIGHT FUCKING YEARS to get that domain name), and I'm in the process of rebuilding it.
CavemanJoe.co.uk is gonna be my Blog of Random Articles and Such, and not a dumping ground for other projects. Woo!

Loaders

Fri, 25 Aug 2006 00:41:06 +0100

There was a common but secretivesaying among the few humans left on the factory floor; �It's notover 'til the fat bitch screams.�

The fat bitch was screaming whileJulia made her way down the production line, PDA and stylus in hand,cringing at the stench of rotten vegetables and fear. At the shoutedcommand, the machines wound down to idle and their monstrousoperatives stood silently, staring straight ahead, on �break.�

Julia turned back to Fat Bitch,replacing her scowl with an obvious fake smile. �You don't have toshout so loud, you know � they can tune out the noise of themachines and only hear your voice.�

Fat Bitch returned the fake smilewith another one even less convincing and far more patronising,yellow teeth showing. �That as may be,� she said with an air ofcondescension, �I'd like to hear my own voice sometimes,thank you very much Julia.�

Julia nodded and turned back to herPDA, directing it towards the bruises evident on loader nineteen'sshoulders, the burns around its flanks, taking pictures. �Do youoften have to beat the loaders? Have they given you problems?�

�Ah, Nineteen. Imogene. That onein particular, yeah, it gives us problems. The others, you know, youcan give them a good slap and they'll know they've done wrong. Nineteen just doesn't learn. You can beat it and whip it and shockit, but it just doesn't sink in. It's like banging your bloody headagainst a brick wall.�

Julia grimaced. Ever thought oftrying something else? �I can imagine so, Miss Hammond. Wecan take it in for retraining, if you can spare the loss ofproductivity.�

Hammond shrugged. �We've gotspares."

Julia looked up, the loader's muzzleeighteen inches above her head. It was looking down at her, watchingas she took pictures. She showed it a weak smile. It blinked ather, painfully - one eye was clearly infected.

Hammond called over to her. "What'reyou gonna do, electro-shock therapy?�

Julia fought back an impulse, andresponded neutrally. �When punishment doesn't work, we essentiallytear down their personalities and rebuild them as we do from whenthey're new. It's mostly psychological.�

�You'd not be far wrong to give ita good kick around every now and then, too. It's the only thingthese buggers understand � but then, they're like that, aren'tthey? Stupid.�

Julia shook her head, seething,unable to stop herself. �Not that stupid. If they comeacross a problem, they'll try a variety of things to overcome it. Ifit's clear that one approach isn't working, they'll try somethingelse.�

Julia looked very carefully atHammond. She wished she could be surprised that the barely-veiledinsult went totally over her head.

Fat, Stupid Bitch shrugged. �Whatever.�

***

�You're safe, now. Take newclothes from the box, and then sit down.�

Peter looked in the wing mirror, andwatched Julia guiding the loader into the back of the van. A Type B,this time � a four-armed, dog-faced, ginger-furred animal designedfor versatility in manual labour. It clambered awkwardly into theback, fumbling on legs with reversed knees intended to bear loadsthat would otherwise need a forklift truck. The suspension dippedvisibly under its weight, and Julia closed the door.

�So,� said Peter as Julia climbedinto the cab, �was it as bad as last time?�

Julia sighed. �Can you roll me oneup?�

Peter grimaced. �That bad, huh?� He produced a pre-rolled cigarette and handed it to Julia.

Julia smiled. �I see you're notentirely surprised.� She took the cigarette, lit it, breathed.

Peter watched Julia's shoulders slumpas she exhaled, blowing the smoke out of the window. He waited forher to relax before asking. �Who's in the back?�

�Nineteen. Apparently he stoppedresponding to commands in the ways they've come to expect, so theytook away his loincloth; when that didn't work, they beat the shitout of him.�

Peter rolled his eyes. �Figures.�

�Well, we'll try reprogramming himfrom the ground up, see if that works. I just hope those dickheadsdidn't make it too much worse.�

Julia turned around and lookedthrough the window to the back of the van. Nineteen was fitting aclean new loincloth onto himself; the cheap white fabric was a starkcontrast to the matted, filthy ginger fur.

�Himself?� Yes, perhaps...this one seems to be more male than the others.

Julia winced at the state ofNineteen's arms; both pairs were showing angry purple bruises beneaththe fur. There were no laws yet to protect loaders from cruelty;Julia sometimes wished there were, in spite of how much it would hurtbusiness, and consequently, the already vulnerable economy. Granted,they didn't feel emotions, or �think� in ways that a person couldunderstand, but their responses to pleasure and pain stimuli remainedas they should be. A loader wasn't much good if it didn't know whenit was being punished or rewarded.

Nineteen sat down in the awkward waythat Type B loaders managed; their knees bent backwards, a creaturedesigned to stand up to twenty-hour work days, not to enjoy thesimple pleasures of a chair. Julia turned her attentions back toPeter.

�All right. Let's get this guyback on track.�

Peter nodded and started the engine. �You know who I really feel sorry for? The poor bastards stillworking in the factory. Watching the loaders getting beaten up, andknowing that their employers would do the same to them if it wereallowed, and that at any minute they could be out the door, replacedby an animal that can follow orders and doesn't ask for a cigarettebreak or a cup of tea.�

Julia sighed as the van started toroll forward. �There will always be laws to protect people. And besides, what do you think the remaining humans in that factoryare employed to do?�

She took another drag of her roll up,and looked out of the window. �When you're up to your arse indebt, with four hungry kids to feed, and the only work going isunskilled manual labour... It must feel cathartic to beat up thethings that took your old job.�

***

Imogene stood in line with six otherloaders, in a warm, safe, comfortable place. Imogene handledvegetables; he didn't know what these other loaders did, but he wasaware that they, like he, were sad loaders, and they were here to getbetter. They were his friends. A kind lady went down the line,accompanied by a kind man, waving a little machine around the otherloaders' heads. Imogene knew that the machine told the kind peoplehow sad each loader was.

There was another Nineteen in theline with him, but he didn't know how many the other Nineteenbelonged to. Imogene's full and proper name was Nineteen of FiftyTwo, Morrisons' Warehouse, Rudheath. That identified him as siblingto lots of other loaders just like Imogene.

Well, just like Imogene only happier.

When the other Nineteen had themachine waved around her head, the kind man and the kind lady shooktheir heads and looked very sad, and talked into the machine. Imogene wanted to work, to make the kind people feel happy again, butthere wasn't anything to do. And besides, he'd been asked to standstill - so he redoubled his efforts towards being as still as hepossibly could be, his breathing shallow, his muscles rigid.

The door opened and another kind manwalked in, who also looked very sad. He took the other Nineteen bythe hand and led her away, back the way the man had come in. Thedoor shut behind them.

Imogene reached out to his sister, totry to find out where she was going, maybe to cheer her up a little. She was going downstairs, quite deep under. He felt her reach backto him, pleased that he was watching while she moved around.

The kind man and lady were stillwaving the machine around, finding out how sad the other loaderswere, when the connection got cut off somehow, and Imogene lost hissister. He reached out again, to try to find her, but she justwasn't there.

He sent some good feelings towardsthe area where he last felt her, in case she came back.

***

�Nineteen of fifty two, Morrissonswarehouse, Rudheath.� Emerson gestured with chubby fingers towardsthe display. �The MRI showed unusually high levels of activityaround this section, and neural pathways have formed in placesyou wouldn't expect from a Type-B in manual labour.�

Julia frowned. �Is Chris not heretoday?�

"No. Why?"

Julia shrugged. "It doesn'tmatter." Well, for one thing, he wouldn't try to put himselfin a position of power by giving me half the information andexpecting me to come up with the other half, no questions asked. He'd just bounce his way through the situation like the daftbleach-blonde work-experience-boy he truly is, explaining thingsusing metaphors and analogies that an idiot could understand.

That's what he is, he'shalf-genius, half Saturday boy - he's like some kind of� of idiotinterface, dumb on one side, clever on the other�

�Did Nineteen do anything unusualon the way over here? Did you notice anything odd about the way helooked at you, or how he stood? Anything at all?�

�Yes, yes, and yes. He's beendriven half-mad by abuse, John. I'd have thought just abouteverything he did would seem screwy.�

Emerson nodded, biting his lower lip. Best not patronise her - she might be offended if I spell it outfor her�

�I ask again, John, what's so oddabout him that I had to come to bloody Birmingham to see you?�

�We don't know yet, Julia." Or perhaps I had better keep it simple. "But he'sa special case, that much is certain.�

Julia sighed, arms folded. Ifucking hate Birmingham. �So we're gonna kill him, orwhat?�

"No. We've not seen any violentimpulses, or any resentment of authority. Even towards the boss whoordered him beaten up, or the men that did it.�

�So we're preserving him forstudy?� Julia looked through the one-way mirror. Nineteen waskept busy with building blocks, sensors and electrodes strapped overhis body and head. Small, green eyes peeked out over the top of along, dog-like snout, lazily scanning here and there while his upperarms worked. The larger, clumsier lower pair sat unused by hissides. �Good to see that you're keeping him busy.�

Emerson nodded. �Yeah. He needsit. Hey... can I show you something?�

�Sure.�

�Wait here.�

Emerson stepped through the door,into Nineteen's room. Nineteen was building a long, low wall.

�Nineteen?� Emerson's voice camethrough the speaker mounted beneath the window. Nineteen looked up. �Would you rather carry on working with these blocks, or -� heturned to a box lying along the side of the room, opened it, andpicked up a bundle of wires and electronics components - �would youprefer to put this together for me?�

Julia felt suddenly uneasy. A loaderwasn't supposed to have preferences for different types of jobs �sometimes they developed a fear of doing a particular job if itinvolved pain, or excessive heat or cold, but in a safe situationlike this, Nineteen shouldn't care.

Nineteen blinked. Julia resentedEmerson for trying to get Nineteen to make a decision that wasclearly beyond his scope. He should know better.

Nineteen reached his lower right handtowards Emerson, while his upper arms continued moving the blocksaround. Emerson placed the components in Nineteen's strong,oversized hand, and patted him on the head. �Good,� he said, insoothing tones. �I'll be back shortly.� He walked back into theroom with Julia, closing the door gently behind him.

�I wouldn't say that wasparticularly unusual,� said Julia, �him wanting to do both likethat. In fact I'd say that was pretty good.�

�Watch,� said Emerson, turningback to the window. �See what he does when he thinks we're notlooking.�

Julia smiled. �A loader withsecrets? He'll finish the wall first, you know that as well as Ido.�

Nineteen continued building the wallfor a few moments, then abruptly put down the blocks and picked upthe electronic components.

Julia's eyes widened. �Whoa.�

�Yes, Julia. I would say so.�

Julia turned to Emerson. �Whatdoes this mean?�

Emerson shrugged. �As I'vementioned, Julia � we just don't know yet. But there are othersick loaders that need our attention, and we could do with this roombeing cleared. We're going to reassign him as a short-term domesticservant to somebody onsite, see if there's other work he'd be bettercut out for. Obviously he'd be monitored closely.�

�A Type B in a Type E setting...it's interesting, but... wait, is that why you called me in?� Julia frowned. �To offer me a house-loader?�

Emerson shook his head. �No. Icalled you in to ask you if he had done anything unusual on the rideover, and you answered my question. Diane's going to put a form onthe canteen noticeboard in Chester that you can sign if you want him. We're thinking we might rota him between houses. Or we might justput him in a raffle,� said Emerson, smiling.

Julia shook her head. �My husbandharbours no resentment towards loaders, but I don't think he'd wantone in the house.�

�Pity. I thought I'd give youfirst refusal, since you picked him up. Y'know, it's a little toosoon to say, but I think we might end up using him as a template.�

Julia frowned. �You want to breedfrom a loader who clearly favours one type of work over another?�

�It's a sign of intelligence. IfNineteen is unusually clever, but still retains utter respect ofauthority, he and others like him could be useful as heavy domesticservants, perhaps the basis for the Type R's. I doubt he'll be goingback to Morrisons' warehouse, whatever happens.�

Julia smiled. �That, at least, isgood news.�

***

NOTICE OF OPPORTUNITY

Type-B Loader number 19/52, Morrisonswarehouse, Rudheath, recently began to exhibit abnormal behaviourwarranting domestic relocation � preferably to a safe, controlledarea, inhabited by experts such as ourselves.

To that end, we are soliciting atemporary owner for the above loader and a home in which he will beemployed as a domestic servant, impulses monitored via implant24*7*365.

A little information about 19/52:

Gender identified as approximately70% male. Weight 24 stone, 6 ounces. Height 7'2". Ginger furcolour. Given name of �Imogene.� Evidence of abuse fromwarehouse staff at Morrisons. Shares common personality traitsevident in Type-B loaders, and the following abnormalities:

Shows occasional passive unwillingness to co-operate in certain tasks (informal exchange, Ingrid Hammond, Morrisons warehouse)
Shows willingness to pursue one task over another task equal in terms of comfort (laboratory observation)
Shows willingness to retain information from authority figures (laboratory observation)
Evidence of unusually high intelligence (laboratory observation)

Anyone willing to rehouse Imogenewill be relieved from most of their work-related duties for almostthe entire duration of the observation (minimum two weeks, maximumthree months), but will be required to document his behaviour andmake notes of any useful or unusual patterns. They will also berequired to sign a contract releasing Ikawa Laboratories from anydisruption of business, injury, destruction of property or deathresulting from his presence, howsoever caused.

If you are interested, please leaveyour name and staff number below.

Thanks!

~John Emerson, Behavioural AdjustmentEngineer

Julia scowled. �Peter, look atthis!�

Peter glanced over her shoulder, Twixbar in hand. �What am I looking at?�

�It's that loader we took back fromMorrisons. Y'know I told you about John wanting me to take him home? He's only gone and written this to make the loader seem... well,unhinged! And look � he hasn't even mentioned that you'd bepaid normal rate for sitting on your arse. The newbies are gonnaassume you'd have to take your holiday days, or not get paid at all.�

Peter scanned the page. He grinned. �He wants you to take him. Look, there's no volunteers.�

�Well, yeah. Bastard.�

Peter laughed. �Efficient bastard,too. Well, what are you going to do about it?�

�I'm going to sign my name, righthere,� said Julia, taking a pen from a pocket and writing onthe notice. �Nobody's going to be the first, and I knowhe's not dangerous, so I'd better drum up some interest.� Sherecapped the pen. �There. People trust me around here. My nameshould be enough.�

When she turned around, Peter cockedan eyebrow at her. �Someone's got a very high opinion ofthemselves.�

Julia shrugged. �Yeah, and?�

Peter grinned. �And what aboutyour husband?�

�I'm not actually going to takehim, Pete. I just... Hell, I just don't want there to be nonames on that list, okay?�

�Sounds good to me, by your twistedlogic at least. Imogene, huh?�

�It's not that unusual. Mostlaymen don't see the difference between a male and female loader. Ifound a loader once that'd been named after his owners' ex-wife.�

Peter cringed. �Beaten up?�

�Of course.�

***

In a sleeping household, Julia laywide awake. The baby was asleep, the house clean, her husband sated. He lay to her right, a semiconscious weight smelling of sex.

She looked towards him. She openedher mouth, and closed it again, opting instead to lay a hand on hisshoulder. He wriggled and sighed, sweat from his skin slick onJulia's palm.

She had a good life, for thesefragile times. Both husband and wife were employed, and they couldafford to have some of the things they wanted. Julia earned morethan her husband � almost twice as much, in fact, while he worked ajob threatened by the ever-cheapening loaders she cared for � buthe resented her little, if at all.

�Graham?�

He didn't answer, but twitchedbeneath her touch, a little inquisitive eddy in his sea of sleep.

Julia sighed, and turned her eyesback to the ceiling.

Her life was all right � she keptherself busy. There was always plenty to do, and she went to bedeach night feeling as though she had done real work, falling intodeep, usually dreamless sleep.

It'd be nice to have a little helparound here, is all. A big, friendly puppy that can do the dishes,sweep the floors, and provide some primitive kind of company whenGraham's working nights.

And I'd be able to stay home for acouple of weeks. Take care of Stephanie. Let her see my face andsmell me, lest she replace me with her babysitter, forget what herown mother looks like.

Julia sighed. It's a bit late tobe considering this now. My name's already down. She rolledover onto her side, her bottom gently touching her husband's, nofurther contact between them. I should be worrying about whatGraham will think when I bring Imogene home.

She sighed. If he objects, will Ibring Imogene here anyway? How will he react then? Will he bebothered about it enough to resist more strongly? Bothered enough to�put his foot down� in that embarrassing way, and make me returnfire, then have a bloody good sulk about it?

Julia turned over to face herhusband, who shifted and sighed in semiconscious protest at theconstant movement. She reached out and stroked his hair.

I'm missing Graham more and more,these days.

I miss him even when he's standingright in front of me.

She reached over to the bedside tablefor her vibrator and earplugs, as Graham began to snore.

***

�So. I take it you've toldGraham?�

Julia sighed. �No.�

Peter leaned in across the table. �It's been a week, now. And there are still no names down. Areyou going to take yours off the list?�

Julia looked up, Crunchie barhalf-eaten on the table before her. �They'll put him to sleep.�

Peter winced, and there was a briefsilence. He slid his hand across the table, palm up. Julia lookedat it for a moment, then placed her hand inside his. She closed hereyes.

Peter looked at her with sympathy. He knew well enough not to ask her why she cared about Imogene, whyshe cared about every other loader, troubled or not. �You need totell him that. Let him know there's no other way for Nineteen tolive. I'm sure he'll understand.�

Julia looked up. Peter's eyes werevaguely Asian � beyond that, his ethnicity was hard to nail down, aface from many countries. In the past few years, he would have hadto put up with almost as much misplaced anger as the loaders, fromwhite British morons whose eyes were round enough and hair lightenough for them to consider themselves �pure.� He understood �or, Julia corrected herself � she thought he understood, heshould understand, everything that Imogene was going through. Considering that Imogene could only handle base, primitive emotions,Peter probably understood Imogene better than Imogene himself.

She spoke very quietly, eyes on herhand inside Peter's. �Over the past week I've let myself get alittle too attached to a loader with a death sentence, Peter.�

Peter squeezed her hand gently. �Occupational hazard.�

Julia smiled, squeezed back, thenwithdrew before the exchange could become dangerous. �Happens tothe best of us, now and again.�

They sat in silence for a fewmoments. �So,� asked Peter, �what are you going to do?�

Julia looked up, fingers curlingaround her Crunchie bar, eyes wet.

***

And that's yer lot. Right now the story stands at sixteen and a half thousand words, just over three thousand three hundred of which are posted here.
I reckon I've got about another third to go before the story reaches the end, and then perhaps another thousand words to wind it down. I have a bad habit of writing novella-length fiction, which I really should curb - my GF Emily had the idea of writing this to be as long as it wants to be, no longer or shorter, and if needs be I could then write another story or two about the creatures of Ikawa Laboratories and then submit the pair (or the three, whichever) as a single novel. God knows I've got enough ideas for weird-looking industrial creatures.
I've been toying with the idea of Ikawa's creatures being used for military purposes as bio-organic weapons - but that's probably because I've been playing lots of Resident Evil lately. ;)
The story does get political, but I doubt it'd get as political as one about Ikawa's military role. After all, a soldier (usually) gives his consent to fight in a war.

Comments/critique are welcome, but anonymous commenting is turned off to stop spam. You can, however, use your LiveJournal or Blogger.com login to post a comment here.

Until next time,

~Caveman Joe

Projects update

Sun, 20 Aug 2006 15:41:22 +0100

Here's a quick update to what's going on lately regarding my myriad projects:

JAMMAFOREVER.COM
The new version of Dinosaur Comics - The Arcade Game is in playtesting phases, and you can download it from the JAMMAForever website. For those unfamiliar, DCTAG is the world's first open-source arcade game. By arcade game, I mean a game to be fit into an arcade cabinet, that takes coins and has an operator's menu and everything. You can download the game for free, fit it into a cabinet, put that cabinet in your local chip shop / coffee house and earn money from it - the license lets you do just about whatever you want with it. It's based on Dinosaur Comics, by Ryan North.

STAINLESS DESIGN / HOSTINGFORAQUID
Both of these are going so well, now, that I can officially call myself self-employed. No more turning up at some office at 9:45am and answering to angry short men demanding explanations for my lateness, yay! More time for updates, double-yay!

FICTION
"Loaders" is coming along brilliantly, at fifteen and a half thousand words. I'd post it on the site, but I've got an eye on a publisher for this one, so... no. If I know you, E-mail me and I'll send it to you. Critiques are always appreciated.
(well, maybe I'll post the first chapter. Maybe.)
Culture Shock is, of course, totally fucking stalled as always. As it has been since I wrote Saint in 2000/2001.
Saint is also stalled, although less so than Culture Shock. The whole concept of Culture Shock is too big, too zoomed-out for me to concentrate on it like I used to. Saint was always just a story about a boy and a girl, which made everything easier. It was based on the assumption that the reader was already following Culture Shock, so I could leave out all the details about the race, the world, and the physics - which actually worked in its favour for people unfamiliar with Culture Shock. In CS, I have to look at the race from a human's POV, so everything has to be more detailed.
Also, I'm still dicking about with illustrations and animations for Culture Shock - although I love doing these, they distract time from actually telling the story, which sucks a bit.
Right now the plan is to finish Loaders before I commit any more time to Culture Shock. And, probably, to finish Saint first, too.

PROGRAMMING
I'm a partner in a project that involves as much social and physical engineering as it does software engineering. It's taking up quite a lot of my time - but unfortunately, I'm not at liberty to discuss it here. :) (at least, not until the patent comes through)

And that's about it. Now, I decide whether to post the first chapter of Loaders or not.

Later.

God-Awful Spammers seize cancer awareness domain name, fill it with incest porn

Thu, 13 Jul 2006 01:36:06 +0100

I got some pretty nasty spam posted in my Comments a while back - and decided to do a little research on the spamvertized domain, try to find out IP ranges they use for posting, that kind of thing. Already pissed off that they'd be posting this kind of crap on my site, I wanted to take some kind of retaliation.

LACRC.org is an incest video site. That doesn't even make the needle twitch on my give-a-shit-o-meter, I'm a grown up and can handle these things. Posting a hundred links to it on my site, though - now that's got me a tad miffed.
I tapped the domain it into Google and had a little look around. What I found was... interesting.

Among the predictable waves of comment spam and guestbook entries, Google found a result that took me to this website. Yup, a fucking .gov TLD.

Apparently, the LACRC.org domain name used to belong to the Latin American Cancer Research Coalition. All right, now it's fucking personal. I don't care how much you need the money - nothing can possibly justify squatting on the domain name of a cancer research centre to generate a few bucks in referrals for other spammy websites. Never mind that the spamvertized sites are full of incest porn - they could be full of flowers and kittens, it'd still be a fucking embarrassment to humanity! This shit is so God-awful it's almost funny. It's like Santa Claus eating a five-year-old girl's pet rabbit. A five-year-old girl with cancer and no legs. (What? I find that image hilarious)

The E-mail address at the National Cancer Institute bounced my mail, so right now it looks as though they don't even know.

I fired off a quick mail to the host telling them what was going on, and one to the admin for the cancer institue - now I'm considering employing the SpamVampire on this site, firstly to take that motherfucker down just on general principle, and secondly as a deterrent to possible future spam. What do you think? Furthermore, have you ever seen a spammer do anything more comically evil? Comments are enabled.

Very pissed off,

~CMJ

TwistedLibrarian.com

Tue, 11 Jul 2006 17:38:23 +0100

This is a quick post to pimp my girlfriend's site, Twisted Librarian. We designed it together, and I don't think I've been so pleased with the layout of a site that I was involved in since... well, a good couple of years. It runs on GeekLog, like this site, so all the functions should seem familiar.
If you want to buy anything from Amazon, please consider doing so through TwistedLibrarian, as we get a cut of the sales. Moreover, I've been giving Culture Shock away for free since... what, 1999? 2000? Something like that, anyway, and I've still not got enough cash to buy a pizza. :)

How to cheat at dialogue - write in Real Time

Sun, 18 Jun 2006 20:31:31 +0100

I submitted my new story, "Loaders," to a critique group recently. Of course, since it was a critique group, it got picked to bits, the good parts highlighted with the bad - but the majority of the positive attention was paid to the dialogue.
The dialogue in "Loaders" was intended to be as realistic as possible. People make inefficient use of words, swear, ramble, let their sentences run on, allow themselves to be distracted, and in general completely fail to communicate as effectively as someone would if their dialogue had been pondered over, written out and revised umpteen times before they said it. Thus, the characters came alive, and it prompted me to write a little article on dialogue.
Among a human's list of Big Things That Must Be Done, the need to communicate is set just under the need to eat, drink and sleep. It ranks higher, even, than our need for love, or sex. Given that communication is one of the most important features in the life of any human being, rendering effective speech patterns in fictional characters can often prove difficult. In this article, I'll be examining some of the best ways to write your dialogue for use in fiction, games or indeed any format in which you must decide how your characters will communicate, making use of the Real-Time Cheat and showing examples from "Loaders."
Hit "Read More" for the full thing.
Dialogue, whether communicated to other characters or expressed internally, plays a pivotal role in your story however you're going to express it. It is your most direct interface between the personalities of your characters and the psyches of your readers, the most subtle yet fundamental way of showing how a story will unfold. Too many writers allow their dialogue to take a back seat to their storytelling - but how is your story to tell itself, without the aid of your characters and their speech and thoughts?
Your characters' colloquialisms and speech patterns will tell of their education, their background, their ethnicity. It will also show how they feel about another character, however subtly.
Orson Scott Card - a total prick, but he writes a decent story - once said that when you're fleshing out the personality of a given character, you're not just paying attention to that given character, but to one character to the power of all your other characters.
Darker might behave entirely differently around Rain than she does around Gevauden, or Amael. Hane might tone himself down for formal gatherings, or refrain from using stronger words or images around his captain. Their speech patterns will be affected as a result.
I'm going to assume you can string a sentence together with competence, so I won't bother going over fundamentals/obvious stuff like "Use Dialogue to Show Instead of Tell" and "Condense BackStory Through Use of Speech." I'm not here to spout the same regurgitated advice you can find anywhere else on the Internet. This is what I've found works for me, and it's up to you what to do with the information.
I've always found that the ideal way to write dialogue is, just as with all of my other writing practices, to cheat. I have a single overruling method that I use to pull off all my psychological tricks to make a story and dialogue to flow smoothly, and that is to write in real-time.
I've not come across any other articles discussing this method of writing, so I thought I'd give it a bit of attention here. When you write in real-time, you write a story in such a manner that it would take an equal amount of time for a reader to speak your story aloud as it would for the events in your story to unfold, barring scene breaks.
I find that by adhering to this rule, everything else falls into place quite naturally. For example, when you come to a part where dialogue must be broken up lest your prose develop a "Talking Heads" feel, and you find it appropriate for a character to pause and find his bearings before moving on (as people do in real life), I'd consider having a character perform some action that takes roughly as long to dictate aloud as it would for him to perform the action.

Peter laughed. �Efficient bastard, too. Well, what are you going to do about it?�
�I'm going to sign my name, right here,� said Julia, taking a pen from a pocket and writing on the notice. �Nobody's going to be the first, and I know he's not dangerous, so I'd better drum up some interest.� She recapped the pen. �There. People trust me around here. My name should be enough.�
When she turned around, Peter cocked an eyebrow at her. �Someone's got a very high opinion of themselves.�
Julia shrugged. �Yeah, and?�

When Julia writes her name on the paper, her dialogue stops - and she stops speaking, for a second or so, at the point where it would be appropriate for her to do so to add the proper rhythm to her speech. When she turns around, there's a pause in the flow of the conversation while Peter gives her a funny look - a pause of the same length that it would take for you to read the description of what's happening. Try reading the excerpt at normal conversation speed, speaking the dialogue aloud (or under your breath, whatever). It's easy to see how the real-time cheat can provoke a half-decent sense of uniformity to the rhythm with which your story tells itself.
I could waffle on about this all day, but I'm sure you've got writing to do - so I'll finish up with a simple "Try it," and leave with another Loaders excerpt that shows the same method.

�So. I take it you've told Graham?�
Julia sighed. �No.�
Peter leaned in across the table. �It's been a week, now. And there are still no names down. Are you going to take yours off the list?�
Julia looked up, Crunchie bar half-eaten on the table before her. �They'll put him to sleep.�
Peter winced. He slid his hand across the table, palm up. Julia looked at it for a moment, then placed her hand inside his. She closed her eyes.
Peter looked at her with sympathy. He knew well enough not to ask her why she cared about Imogene, why she cared about every other loader, troubled or not. �You need to tell him that. Let him know there's no other way for Nineteen to live. I'm sure he'll understand.�
Julia looked up. Peter's eyes were vaguely Asian � beyond that, his nationality was hard to place. In the past few years, he would have had to put up with almost as much misplaced anger as the loaders, from white British morons whose families had been around long enough for them to consider themselves �pure.� He understood � or, Julia corrected herself � she thought he understood, he should understand, everything that Imogene was going through. Considering that Imogene could only handle base, primitive emotions, Peter probably understood Imogene better than Imogene himself.
She spoke very quietly, eyes on her hand inside Peter's. �Over the past week I've let myself get a little too attached to a loader with a death sentence, Peter.�
Peter squeezed her hand gently. �Occupational hazard.�
Julia smiled, squeezed back, then withdrew before the exchange could become dangerous. �Happens to the best of us, now and again.�
They sat in silence for a few moments. �So,� asked Peter, �what are you going to do?�
Julia looked up, fingers curling around her Crunchie bar, eyes wet.

Once again, a new website...

Sat, 10 Jun 2006 15:36:48 +0100

I got pissed off with the whole Web 2.0 thing. I was getting tired of blog engines, content management systems, RSS feeds and all that them new-fangled bells and whistles that all the cool kids have. I missed my 1997 website - yes, the one that used frames, DHTML effects, static backgrounds, and even a Flash introduction. In short, it was a mess - but it was my mess, made from scratch. When I wanted to update it, I wrote the HTML myself.
I kinda miss having a website that I can piss about with to such an extent. So, I wiped the old Geeklog site clean, and put up a page that would serve as a "hub" to all my other sites - just a collection of images pointing to links. God Damn, but did that get boring fast.
I had a bit of a fiddle with Joomla, another CMS system based on the Mambo core. It's an impressive engine, but there are still things, important things, that I would miss about Geeklog. The ability for people visiting my site to leave comments using their LiveJournal logins, for example.
So, yeah, I've gone back to Geeklog. :) It's not perfect by any means, but it's still the nicest CMS I've ever used.
Anyway, you can expect updates to Culture Shock in here, along with new fiction, programming projects and other Caveman Joe stuff.

TTFN,

~CMJ