I already get to try out my new Version Vibrant Update system's capacity to function the way I intend it to for the duration of our wait for the relaunch. I've marked the new stuff with a "New" designation in bold so you know what's been added since last time. I've also noted the edit date at the top for everyone's convenience as I intend to do every time.
An anonymous tipster send me an interesting piece of the Version Vibrant puzzle the other day, so I was faced with a difficult moral dilemma. I had to ask myself, should I post said information? Should I keep it to myself? Should I let the anger from the other day allow me to seek some kind of personal vengeance for the social snub? Or, should I stick to my morals and refrain from releasing the "unofficial" information? It was not an easy choice to for me to make, but it's one I'm happy I did finally make. There's a saying "revenge is a sucker's game" and with that in mind, this is what I chose: I decided simply to keep that piece of information to myself. If nothing else, I'd like to use this opportunity to demonstrate the level of integrity I know I can bring to any project. I think I will let this be the best test of my mettle, and it wasn't even planned.
In my local Borders yesterday, I saw a book on railways covering much of West Virginia in the late 1960's running up the Ohio River from Huntington, and across the state's other rails as well. There were several photos which caught my eye along the CSX spur which is now a State Park, and the 70+ mile hiking trail I've posted photos on before (the North Bend Rail Trail). Tunnel #9 outside of Ellenboro (the tunnel is no longer there - either the railroad cleared it out to make room for larger trains, or the state took it out as a safety hazard when they took the Right of Way back after CSX abandoned the spur), and the Depot in Pennsboro which still stands and looks almost exactly like it did in the 1960's. My Mom and I were interested in that book, but at $60.00, we didn't feel it was worth the money to get a couple photos of the track in the town we now live as well as along the trail we've hiked parts of. I can't even recall the name of the book, but I'll bet almost anything the photographer (who was working on for the railroad at the time) has photos of the other defunct tunnels, and maybe even the spur that ran through what's now North Bend State Park. If I get up to Borders again, I'll make a point of collecting some information to try to find that photographer/author, just to see if can get some information on that rail spur, and maybe some of the railroad era artifacts that still populate it even today.
Comments
scorchbird12:
On Version Vibrant Updates:
I think that's natural, there's no way Adam can appease everyone on site here, so there will be stuff to like and not like about the whole thing. I've already said one of my favorite bits about Version Vibrant is the multiple blogs under one account, that's going to be cool for lots of reasons, and I already have ideas about how to use that feature alone. I don't like the mandate of BB style input coding (or not being able to outside source images for a while), those will prove to be headaches, especially if the BB code won't let me do simple things like float my images the way I want (I hate blank space around images).
On Thoughts:
I haven't exactly been Mr. Friendly-dragon of late myself. It's quite all right, you come around when you feel up to it. I know there are days I get on here, see a field of blue in the backroom and just go "Ugh, I'm not doing this today." It's not that I don't want too, there are times I don't have the energy to get around to everyone, so I don't.
I was hung on the word too when I first saw it. I'm happy to know there's actually a word for what my art is. That means I can market it much better.
It's an unfortunate truth in the world, money makes it go round. I'll take all the luck I can get, thanks.
For most things one can rant here easily, there are a few things that have to be taken to the "Underground", but a good rant here every now and then is worth it. Hopefully it'll get better for rants and other things with Version Vibrant, but we'll just have to wait and see.
Funny thing about this whole situation is that it's remarkably similar to the one in 2004 when what we have now came to be. Just reading through Adam's archives will show that. Adam's admitted the current spread (back when it was orange and gray) was rather bland, so hopefully the new look will have more pop to it. I think everyone gets tired of the same thing after a while, and the change will be neat and new for us. I'd like to see TheO become more dynamic, you know, changing it's look more often, with holiday themes, and stuff like that too, those kinds of things would keep the interest up. I check out Google every holiday I know of just to see if they have a special logo for the day.
Tenshihoshino:
That's quite all right, I don't get around to sites like yours as often as I should. I hope the distractions aren't difficult ones for you, those can be tough to get out of again.
I'd like to think I'm good enough to make a little bit of an income off my art too. Hm, I need to dive into some reading material on that subject again. I think, especially in the anime/manga circles, pyrography isn't widely seen, that gives it a certain charm to it which a lot of people seem to find appealing. I hope that's a strong selling point.
I think we're more likely to see it come in February (if it don't get pushed down again) than in January when it was originally projected. It'll be here sooner than not though, I hope.
kitbug69:
Hm, I didn't realize my writing style would hold a younger audience, especially in the mood I've been in lately. Hope my sour mood doesn't rub off.
I started out doing it for myself really, then, when it became apparent that there were a lot of people still in the dark about the whole Version Vibrant release, I made a promise to everyone here that I would keep anyone and everyone who reads my blog informed as best I can about what's coming. Now, I'm not posting speculations or rumored information, I cut the "pending confirmation" pieces from my breakdown to try to keep the rumor mill quiet, and I'm not posting information that's not been made "public" yet either. I'd like to think I'm honoring that promise as best I can, but I know that I've fallen a little short of that with the podcast situation. I suppose I could if I bent over backwards to respect the terms of their creative commons license report that information, but I'm not willing to do that. I'm going to keep to my promise as best I can, I'm going to keep adding publicly available material to the breakdown, and I'll link to that in my posts whenever it gets an update.
Thanks for the luck I could use it. For the family helping out, it's not a matter of "if they will", but more of "if they can". My Mom's not working anymore, my Dad has little left over from his paychecks after taking care of bills and such, and my sister's got obligations of her own to take care of, so I have to be considerate of those things when asking. I know they'd all pitch in if they could.
Well, being a dragon of wisdom and clarity, I tend to be apprehensive of presenting a foul mood to others. I know I can be viciously mean and completely insensitive when I'm clouded by anger. I know venting frustrations is part of the (very biased sounding name here) "human" condition. I still don't have to like what I become when I am venting.
Yensid:
That's a possibility, I'm not on LiveJournal, so I'm unfamiliar with their layout/functionality. I'm not entirely sure if the premium accounts came up in relation to Version Vibrant specifically or not, but I do know Adam was mulling the idea of a premium offering back in '05. I know that somewhere he did clearly state that there would be a free version, and the premium would be like an upgraded version with some extra stuff not available to the free users. Maybe here (comments), or here (this is specific Version Vibrant premium info) is where that was mentioned. I'm too tired and lazy to read through all that to find the specific reference point. Consumers like choices, so having a choice of HTML or the other coding should be considered for future development at least. I know his argument that enabling HTML would allow users to "hack" their sites is moot. Look at DeviantArt. Granted you have to be a paying user for it there, but if you are, you can apply CSS to your blog, and does it "hack" the whole page? Does it take over and render the dA format unrecognizable? No, it's only applied to the blog portion of the page, and nothing else. If they can do it, Adam can certainly figure out a way to do it on Version Vibrant as well.
If I can still do stuff like that to the left there, I'll be okay with the new system. I'm very particular about how an image appears, even when I link to my own artwork, I throw out much of the formatting portion of the code that's in the "share box" and do up everything on my own for that. I like to have text around my images, like a normal document, I don't like big gaps of empty space, I like to have my text "padded" a little off the sides of the images so that everything looks coherent. Images that are too big for the page should be sized down while preserving the aspect ratio so that they don't distort, and small images should be left alone. Yeah, text links to image galleries are not always attractive or convenient. That's why I use thumbnails for that kind of thing unless I want the image to be a surprise, though I don't have that hyperlink border showing for images, which means you look at a linked thumbnail and see it like a regular embedded image on the page here.
The code I use is actually simple, once I learned how to do it I was surprised that it took me so long to learn it. It doesn't work as well on larger images, anything over half the pixel width of the post area (my posting area is 490px wide) will be difficult with this code. Smaller images like my "moods" (the images in this and last paragraph), and the standard roughly 160px thumbnails tend to work out all right. I use a CSS class to float my images, which makes it easy, cause I can apply that class to images, or even "invisible" tables to have something line up on the left or right margin and still have the text wrap around it like professional print publications. If you want to try to experiment with the code I've gotten to work, here you go:
.rightfloat{ float: right; margin-top: 5px; margin-left: 5px; margin-bottom: 5px; }
and
.leftfloat{ float: left; margin-top: 5px; margin-right: 5px; margin-bottom: 5px; }
Those are the MyO formats of the code, you don't want any line breaks in it to use it here, cause those foul it up (that auto line-break thing formats the intro affects the post styles as well). The class names can be changed as well as the margins to put more or less space between the edge of the image and the text. 5px is my preference, but that's just me. Of course, add those to your stylesheet otherwise they won't work. When you go to post an image after the img part of the code, before the src, you type class="rightfloat" (or whatever you change the name to) to float an image on the right (Dragon image above) or class="leftfloat" (or whatever you change the name to) to float an image on the left (Silly image above).
The fact that other sites can do both HTML and BB style code tells me he could do it here if he were so inclined set it up that way. I know I'd appreciate it as would many others here. One thing that's not been made clear, and I know Adam posted it somewhere that the premium would be above and beyond a free offering. Right now, I wouldn't be able to pay for a premium offering here, I'd have to hang out on the free version cause my finances aren't digital, I have no way to pay for it, and given Adam's lack of enthusiasm for offline payment methods (See that "Limited Edition" T-Shirt project), I wouldn't be able to put the money down for it even if I had it on hand.
You'll have to check your state and local governments on that one. I can tell you how WV was structured in 2001 when my first business attempt failed horribly, and that was that a business license was a must (in WV it's basically a thing to confirm you're collecting sales tax, and sending it to the state every quarter) First time registrants get it for nothing, but after that, there's a fee to register a business (so this time around, I'll have to pay to register my business when I get to that step). Other details were there has to be a physical business location (ie. street address, no PO or PMB addresses) within the state, though business operations could be regularly conducted through a PO box. I also have a "sticky wicket" so to speak, in that the pretentious, snooty, snobs of the farce that is the historic district I live in have a "mandate" that no one can run a business from a home in the district at all. They stick their nose where it don't belong more than they do any good to preserve any history around here, which generates it's own set of problems. I don't need anything near that much to start up myself, I could make $200.00 or even $300.00 work, but if I could get that kind of capital, I'd be well off to a reasonable start. I would, if I could get that kind of money to start with, put some into securing a commercial property where I could work and keep inventory away from home (keep the nosy busybodies out of my hair), as well as get the supplies I need to do a decent looking promotional brochure or catalog. Loans are out of the question, there's just too many obstacles in getting one that's small enough to get me started but big enough to provide the financial momentum I need right now. Can't say that I ever noticed any special privileges with having a business license, mine failed without ever making a cent, so I never got that far. Ebay owns, or is owned by, PayPal, just for the record there. Tread lightly with them is all I'm saying.
Thanks to our overly paranoid President and post 9/11 rules, I have to go through a Broadway number to even get a bank account (tell me, is this the face of a terrorist? On second thought, don't answer that), cashing a check without being an account holder at a bank here is next to impossible. Having someone else cash checks for me all the time would be a problem in terms of business reputation as well after a while, so it's not something I'd want to make a habit of doing. I think Postal money orders will have to be the preferred transaction choice till I can set-up something better, and establish an account at a bank to work from. I'll see what kind of material I can dig up on doing this right the second time around, hopefully enough to get me started at least.
Hope the Expo went well for you. I've never been to a Home and Garden thing like that before, I know I'd enjoy something like that, I love working with plants, and outside, especially in the summer. I can't do it the way I want to though cause I burn like flash paper, hot, bright, and fast.
the real yojimbo:
I can always ply my skill in cooking (if anyone would hire around here), so that almost negates the starving aspect, almost.
AngelBest Dream:
In my experience, it's always good to start at the beginning and work your way to the end. Makes things much easier that way.
Skill and Strength aren't a problem for me, putting together the scratch to make it happen, that's something else. You know, that's not a bad idea actually, combining my wood art with some glass etching (something else I want to try my hand at) might just make a really good looking piece. When I get more involved, I'll have to give that kind of thing a test run to be sure it can go. For now though, I'll stick to wood and see what happens.
Best of luck to you, I hope you have it better than I do in that regard. Seven years running trying to get a job and nothing to show for it isn't exactly a confidence builder. In all honesty, I probably won't have too many customers from here on MyO, I understand the dynamic around here, and there's not a whole lot of people looking to buy art on site, or they're not able to buy art for any number of reasons. That said, I'd be grateful to anyone who bought my art, but I wouldn't want anyone to feel obligated to buy it just cause you know me.
I suppose that is an irony of some kind, I never really thought about that. I think I will do a pyrography tutorial of sorts when I get into the swing of things, just to give everyone a look at how the art is done, or at least how I do it. I think it's one of those things you have to see to really put together how it works.
Thank you, I know my readers all appreciate the work that went into getting that information up here. The primary reason I put that together (well aside from doing it for myself) was so that as many people as possible would be on the same plane of understanding about what's going on. Many people had questions about Version Vibrant, so I've attempted to direct people toward the most relevant information to answer those questions. I leave the choice of linking to the content up to my readers (and the passers-by who happen to see it as well), I don't want to come off as shamelessly plugging my work, but I will offer this, if you have readers who are having some trouble grasping the scope of Version Vibrant, maybe linking them to my breakdown in a casual context would be appropriate.
I'm all too familiar with the "behind closed doors" attitude when it comes to people around me. I don't know if it's intentional on their part, or accidental, but I feel (perhaps erroneously so) I deserve at least some form of acknowledgment or consideration given the completely voluntary nature of my going out of my way to collect and disseminate Version Vibrant information to a wider audience. The things that the podcasters were allowed to discuss only added marginal new details to already widely available key points of which I have posted in my breakdown. The other things they were shown are things I can't even speculate on as I have no information to go on at all, and without even the most vague of clues, I don't want to contribute to any unsubstantiated rumors. If any rumors start to fly, I'm not going to knowingly take part in them. I suppose it is easier to close off outside, "unpredictable" elements like me, it ensures a presentation skewed in the direction those doing the shutting out prefer, or at least it ensures a controlled presentation.
Just for the sake of argument, I did a Google "site search" (which searched only myotaku.com) here, I ran the keywords "Version Vibrant" and the abbreviation "VV" through the engine, and in both cases, my site came out on top of Adam's in link order. In the case of the "Version Vibrant" keywords, I was the number one listing (top spot, first page) in the "site search". I was in the number 2 spot in the "VV" search (Adam isn't even on the first page). With data like that, it shows who really needs to be keeping whom in the dark. I don't think I need to point out that such "strategic" moves as closing off actively engaging members can actually do more to hurt rather than help a tense situation. I'd gladly work alongside the staff to do a written presentation of Version Vibrant, had I seen it. Thing of the matter is, with many people posting sweet nothings about how great hearing about Version Vibrant is easier to understand that reading about it to the podcaster's weak effort, people like me will draw the short straw every time, even though we can communicate worlds better if given the chance.
Trust is difficult to develop from a one-way acquaintenceship. It's hard to know whether you can trust a person if you don't test them. I know Adam has met some of the members here in person, I know he's met some of the other staff members in person, and I suppose having that sense of reality to the usernames may make certain users appear more trustworthy than others (just because they have a "real" face"). I'm not going to say that's the case here, I'm just thinking out loud. You may have a bit of a point there about that, Adam does seem to shy away from written content of certain structure, maybe that's part of the situation, again, it's not something I can comfortably state without adding that it's merely speculation on my part.
I believe the military term for my temper would be "incendiary", when it goes off, it it goes everywhere, and it commands respect and attention. When it's at that point, there is no controlling it, the best thing for others to do is take a step back and watch till it calms enough to not get burned in the process of helping me through it.
I'm always at the ready to fly, never know when I need to make a quick get-away.
All us little peon members can do is watch, wait, and wonder. Those creatures out there with psychic, or third eyes are encouraged to keep them trained on Version Vibrant as well their physical ones. Can't be too careful now, can we?
The woods stayed silent, the mountains trembled, and the oceans calmed their tempest.
Tact doesn't change, it's always going to be the same, though there are times I use it less than others. Like I went over already, I could have posted that piece of intel that was passed along to me, but I chose to take the high road and neither reveal the source nor "publish" the unofficial information. That is diplomacy at it's finest, and that's the message I'm going to continue to convey throughout this Version Vibrant event. I think more than any type of aggression, doing what I am will speak louder the message I want to say.
