crazed monkey

Maybe it’s because I just started reading Scott McCloud’s Reinventing Comics, but two recent reviews of online comics seem to be lacking:

• Slashdot: Comics On The Net – A Business Primer
• Kuro5hin: Web Comics Reviewed

I feel that the comics reviewed in that second article are disappointing, albeit somewhat entertaining, forays into the genre. Most, if not all, of the featured comics would easily be at home in print. Personally, the online comics which stick in my mind are the ones which push the envelope. For instance, although I read When I Am King a while back, it still sticks in my mind. Even though it came out a couple of years ago, it’s still innovative. Why haven’t other comics followed?

Here’s what the standards geek in me wants to see: a fully standards-compliant comic (both CSS and XHTML) drawn in SVG and taking full advantage of the infinite canvas. If I had more artistic talent, I’d be devoting myself to that cause. Damn, that would be cool.

Posted on June 27th, 2003 in culture - No Comments »

The Memory Hole (via This Modern World By Tom Tomorrow):

At 9:03 AM on 11 September 2001, the second airplane hit the South Tower of the World Trade Center. President Bush was in Florida, at the Emma T. Booker Elementary School, listening to children read. Chief of Staff Andrew Card came over and whispered in Bush’s ear, “A second plane hit the second tower. America is under attack.”

You really need to see the video. It boggles the mind and makes you want to reach into your monitor and throttle the President for not taking immediate action. What in the world could have been going through that guy’s head other than “My country needs me to get to safety now“? This brings to mind a Get Your War On panel from a year ago.

Posted on June 26th, 2003 in politics - No Comments »

CBC’s Metro Morning ran an item this morning regarding a photo of the Toronto skyline in all its smog-laden splendour. A postcard with the same picture is being auctioned off on eBay in order to raise awareness of the dangers of air pollution.

A 2000 report put out by then City of Toronto Medical Officer of Health determined the number of deaths due to air pollution:

We quantified the air pollution risk in Toronto using two different methods and found that there were between 730 and 1,400 premature deaths, and between 3,300 and 7,600 hospital admissions each year associated with air pollution breathed by the public at large.

In addition, Health Canada performed their own survey for Ontario:

Health Canada says smog is responsible for 7.7 per cent of all the premature deaths in Toronto, Hamilton, Ottawa, London and Windsor.

If a similar report came out with “SARS” substituted for “air pollution” and “smog”, you can bet that the entire southern portion of Ontario would be placed under an immediate alert and long-term quarantine amid calls for a massive overhaul of the provincial health care system. Instead, the province is calling for limits on BBQ usage and, in true fashion, attempting to place the blame on someone else, none of which are solutions. The province needs to start by introducing strict mandatory emission controls instead of voluntary caps which are easily broken. If the province truly intends to keep the coal-burning plants running until 2015, we can start with those. Sure, it will cost money in the short run, but it will save thousands of lives and could very well create jobs in the process.

Posted on June 26th, 2003 in science - No Comments »

Last night I headed out to the Toronto launch of the 2003 Varia compilation CD at Kathedral. My number one reason for going was to see acidasia perform in The Scroll and Ögenix. This was something I had been wishing to witness since I first heard of acidasia’s band membership.

The Scroll opened up and started off with numerous sound problems due to the inept and inattentive sound technician with which the event was cursed. Despite this, the band held their own and recovered excellently, successfully remaining in character throughout the set. The Scroll had an excellent stage presence, with the two lead vocalists acting off one another, giving a somewhat tongue-in-cheek performance with a subtle sense of humour. Each was dressed for their roles: Deeh, the male lead, in stilettos, fishnets and a scandalously short miniskirt, and acidasia sporting long black hair in thick curls, a black patent leather skirt slit on either side and thick-soled black boots. On a couple of tunes the duo sang to each other, giving the impression of a storyline. In retrospect, it would have been interesting to see this aspect of the set emphasised into an operetta of sorts. If done properly, this format could escape pretentiousness and enhance the atmosphere of the performance. Then again, perhaps The Scroll were already doing this and I’m just a little slow to figure it out.

Next up was Ögenix, the other band with which acidasia is involved. What a tight outfit this was. The instrumentals were note-for-note dead-on, which was astounding given the speed at which the two guitarists, Deeh and SET, were going. This, combined with Gabriel’s aggressive use of the synth and vocals, made for an energetic performance of well-organised chaos. If that wasn’t enough, Ögenix replayed a track at double-speed to close the set. Acidasia tells me that the band has been together and rehearsing for quite a while, and it truly shows. From what I saw Sunday evening, Ögenix is the one to watch out of Montréal, and they were performing under far from ideal conditions. I could write more, but you really need to see these guys.

Scrape followed in the next act with some dark beat poetry from the Underworld. The band consisted of one member on synths and a second front-and-centre on ghoulishly-vocoded vocals, miraculously filling the stage with his gesturing presence. The vocalist was not that large and yet somehow his arms seemed to encompass the entire stage.

Pulse Plant closed off the Varia portion of the show with a live techno set. I wasn’t paying that much attention and there’s not that much one can say about a lone man tweaking knobs onstage.

After the show some of us, including the members of The Scroll and Ögenix, headed out to a suite at the Marriott for the after-party. Apart from a loud and bawdy but relatively tame version of “truth or dare”, everyone was fairly well-behaved, depending on what your expectations were. Sure, there was the woman clad in latex fetish gear fellating a mid-size brass onyx statue, and an ice bucket emptied on an innocent and unsuspecting friend of mine, but that’s to be expected where there’s absinthe involved.

Ah yes, the absinthe. SET graciously shared his bottle of the stuff (apparently as real as it gets these days, labelled as such on the bottle) with everyone who asked, myself included. To serve, SET poured most of one shot in a glass, and placed a sugar cube dipped in the remainder on top of what I can only describe as a small metal plate punched with a few holes. This plate was then placed over the glass while SET poured a shot of Figi water. The sugar cube was then lit and allowed to burn for a few seconds, causing it to melt, before it was transferred to the glass. The resulting blue flames were put out with the shot of water. I can’t really describe the flavour, which was somewhat sweet from the sugar and cool, not warming like scotch, and with barely an aftertaste. The buzz was clean and smooth, almost imperceptible with more of a mental drunkenness than a physical one. Absinthe is definitely something I would like to try again, although it is quite expensive. Thanks again to SET for sharing.

I finally headed home at around 6am, giving me just enough time to put in a few hours of sleep before heading into work. Remarkably, I felt rested and even now don’t feel incredibly tired. I haven’t been able to stay up that late and with so few ill effects since my university days. I’ll probably pay for it yet, however.

Posted on June 9th, 2003 in culture, music - No Comments »

Canadians are smug responds to my post on the Canadian right’s propensity to imagine support:

The Crazed Monkey disagrees with me that Canada is a conservative country. Sadly for monkeys, numbers don’t lie. If you look at the 1997 election, the percentage of popular vote cast for the Alliance and PC parties combined slightly edges the Liberal party. Again in 2000, the combined conservative count is only a couple of points shy of the Liberals.

First off, I’d like to credit my colleague for basing his argument on the results of prior elections, which are certainly better representative of public opinion than poll results. Here is a summary of the results, ignoring fringe parties and including results from previous years:

One can quickly see that Smug Canadian is slightly off in his totals. The combined support of the PC and Reform/Canadian Alliance is 0.2% percentage points less than the Liberals in 1997 and a few percentage points less in 2000. For all intents and purposes, they are equal. Despite this, our friend still claims that we are a conservative nation. Yet he fails to consider the NDP, and an indeterminate number of BQ votes which would fall left of centre. With these, small-l liberal support rises above the 50% line. Looking back at the results of previous elections, one can see that the mood in Canada has been predominantly left-wing since 1974 (I grew weary of transcribing data from the Political Database of the Americas), save for in the 1984 election. Using political party support as a basis for political ideology, it should be clear that Canada has been and continues to be a liberal nation.

What is amazing about our electoral system, of course, is the disparity between the votes cast for a party and the amount of the legislature it controls

Ah yes, Canadian political reform. I’m surprised that my colleague seems to endorse this idea. If the popular vote dictated control of the House, the Liberals would have won the 1979 election. Furthermore, the left, consisting of the Liberals and the NDP, would have had control of the house for the past 40 years (yes, as far back as the early 60s), excluding 1984. A nightmare as far as my friend is probably concerned.

Considering the media situation in Canada, it’s incredible that anyone votes conservative at all; in the last election the Alliance was demonized for justly criticizing a corrupt government.

Naturally, blame the media. When the left tries to use this argument, they are accused of underestimating the public and labelling them as unreasoning sheep who only think what they’re told to. It isn’t all that difficult to be an informed voter, rise above the rabble of the media and filter out opinion and bias from news. For House debates, the Hansard and the Parliamentary channel do not lie. These days, political parties have their own websites which they can use to provide an unfiltered message to the public. During elections, there are paid political broadcasts. The point is, there is no end of resources for voters to make an informed vote come election time. Blaming the media is no excuse.

I still stand by my assumption that Canada is not a conservative country as Smug Canadian claims. As our friend says, “Sadly for monkeys, numbers don’t lie.”

Posted on June 6th, 2003 in politics - No Comments »