Introduce Yourself

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  • @jesss: i went indeed, far too good to miss. It was largely my motivation to join the forums as i was up for the preshow meet but school got in the way in the end. I am easily addicted to forums but always find myself lacking time at some stage so get scared and run.
  • Personally, I think it all started with a mondegreen. The word "addictive" isn't all that commonplace, and when it's used with imprecision in ordinary parlance, it may be pronounced so that it sounds like "addicted" to some folks.

    Not that I'm ungrateful, mind you. The idea of Socrates opening the minds of kids in Plano, TX is an intriguing one. It would have been nicer if he'd taken the 20 West out toward Midland, and done some good there, but I supposed it was too late. He was kind of stuck there in Plano amid the murmuring pines and the hemlock.
  • Alas, for the hemlock!
  • edited March 2008
    AACK, it wasn't a mondegreen, it was a typo. I just fixed it and then saw the later comments.

    English major, is I!

    ETA: My husband just came up behind me and I had to explain the whole darn thing too. Signing off, now!
  • my b/f refers to holland 1945 as his favorite upbeat genocide song. i have not heard anything else of theirs (they being the nonaligned dairy hostelry), but it is pretty nifty.

    also, it is 1:30am. i blame that and not me for my sad attempt at humour. muahahaha.
  • Let's see what I need to catch up with:
    Jesss, I have reason to believe the forum admin could be induced, say, to delete or severely edit all posts that discuss the typo that embarrasses you -- he'll PM you his PayPal info... ;)
    [seriously, if that's the most embarrassing typo you've ever wound up with, you are extraordinarily lucky.]
    Also, since I'm supposed to be keeping things organized, I suppose I should probably go and start moving things around -- a surprising many people don't bother changing their threads from "JoCo Music", even when the thread fits perfectly into another category. Dear, dear. (Maybe I'm the only one who cares, but moving threads into different categories is, as I've said, the only bit of my current role that JoCo actually intended for me to do when he appointed me admin.)

    Plano isn't quite far enough into East Texas to be really piney, but excellent "Evangeline" pull, Jinx. :)
  • yep...no pines here.
  • Rob's saved me from the Dreaded Double Post, so here's an overlong question:
    Having spent the better part of my lunch hour moving thirty-odd threads from "JoCo Music" to more appropriate categories, I have to ask, is there a better way to set this up?

    "JoCo Music" is intended to be, if I understand JoCo's original category description correctly, the part of the forums for discussions specifically pertinent to JoCo's music -- e.g., favorite rhymes in JoCo songs, discussion of song meanings. And the umbrella, I guess, is supposed to expand as far as things like your favorite JoCo playlist orderings and what your first JoCo song was and things like that.

    But it's such a catch-all title that a lot of people think, and think reasonably, that their threads, which really belong in other categories, can fit under "JoCo Music" -- these examples are made up, but you get the picture:
    "These are the chords to a JoCo song" (should be "JoCo Tabs")
    "I heard a JoCo song on the radio today" (should be "JoCo Fame")
    "This is my recording of a JoCo song" (should be "JoCo Projects")
    "Here's a list of the music JoCo played at his show last night" (should be "JoCo Gigs")
    "Check out this news about Kenesaw Mountain Landis, subject of a JoCo song" (should be "Everything else")

    Of course, there are also times when threads that manifestly have nothing to do with JoCo's music end up in that category because people don't know or don't care to change the category settings from the default.

    But is "JoCo Music" too hard to define? Is it way too broad? Is it unclear what ought to be in that category and not another? (JoCo set up the categories in the first place, but right now the sifting into categories is mostly based on my judgment, which everyone is invited to question.)

    Is there another title for the category that would make it clearer? "Music Discussion" sounds as though it's only for discussions of the technical merits of the song, which is narrower than what I understand the current purpose of the thread to be (things like "Which songs would you use to introduce a new person to JoCo?" might be excluded, for instance). Or should those two things be separate? Should we split "music discussion" into its own category? I'm not sure what to call the "new person" thread's category, though. And I'm not sure the divide between one type of song discussion and the other is that easy to bright-line.

    "JoCo Songs" might be only slightly better than the current category title, and "JoCo Originals" seems to cut out the covers without solving much.

    I don't know. Bail me out, group mind!
  • possibly if the new post function did not have a default option but forced you to actually look at that option and evaluate the choices for appropriateness people would demonstrate more thoughtfulness in choosing a category? other than that all i can think to suggest are a wide range of unhelpfully overelaborate new category titles for the music section.
  • I don't know what to say about the Joco Songs/Joco Music category name but I really like the idea of not having it default to a specific category. Does Vanilla support pulldown menus or is that just crazy talk.

    Don't worry about the typo posts, Bry. They spurred on an interesting conversation anyhow. But I should really do better than that, I fix typos and edit posts FOR A LIVING! You are sweet to offer to bury my mistakes though!
  • I don't know that the categories are even needed. Is there anybody here who does anything with those thread categories? Do they facilitate searches in some way?

    I think back in the very early days of my reading, I used to block the Tab threads, but I'm not sure if I do currently, nor do I know how to check.

    If there is nobody using that feature of the site, why don't we just fold them all together and be done with it?
  • I personally don't see the need, unless your aim was to make the person worry profusely as to whether they put it in the right category or not. Not that I know what that's like of course...*Shifts eyes*
  • BryBry
    edited March 2008
    Well, blocking / ignoring categories is definitely one motivation -- blocking the Tabs threads, for instance, is not a bad idea for people who don't care about tabs. (Similarly, one of the several motivations for the creation of the "Forum Games" category was that a forum member mentioned privately that he or she wanted to ignore all of that kind of stuff -- he or she can identify himself or herself if he or she wishes.)

    Also, there may yet come a time when the forum needs to be transferred to some kind of phpBB system, and without categories that would be a bit of a mess.

    But I do use the categories, at least for quick browsing; lately I've gotten at least three months behind on recategorizing threads, so they haven't been that useful to anyone, but I'm not sure the system needs to be abandoned quite yet.
  • I forgot to Introduce myself!

    Harro everyone. My name obviously isn't actually Jester, but I use it occasionally for online stuffs. My name's Jay. I first heard about Jonathan Coulton about a year ago, maybe a bit more, from Spiff's "Re: Your Brains" video. Been a big fan ever since.

    Short and (semi-)sweet.
  • Hi Not-Jester/Jay, nice to meet you.
  • @three08: Holland, 1945 is a favorite of mine. Neutral Milk Hotel is actually my favorite band.
  • Welcome, Jay. Are you an addict yet?
  • I'd say I'm pretty much an addict. That, plus I have a huge man-crush on JoCo, but I'm pretty sure everyone here does amirite?

    ..amirite?



    ...guys?
  • ^There's no shame in that, regardless.

    ...

    *flees*

    Anyway. Hey. New here, finally posting after a couple months of lurking. Haven't been a JoCo fan for very long-- I got addicted after hearing Code Monkey for the first time at an anime convention last November. (Yeah, I'm a nerd in more than one way.) Hopefully I'll stick around here and not get bored and leave. Quick, capture my attention before it's too late!
  • I have no crush on JoCo, which is probably because I am so very, very, very old. It strikes me as odd, though, except for the fact that I kind of regard him like a George Plimpton figure, standing in the shadows of some bar or other -- well, I don't actually go to bars much, but maybe an inn or something -- whispering "get creative! go and do your thing, whatever it is!"

    There's a collegial feel about it generally, but sometimes it feels as if he's really nagging.

    Is this my equivalent of the recurring JoCo dream appearances?
  • Welcome, JesterJ -- thanks for finding / bumping this thread, too, by the way!
  • I kind of regard him like a George Plimpton figure, standing in the shadows of some bar or other -- well, I don't actually go to bars much, but maybe an inn or something -- whispering "get creative! go and do your thing, whatever it is!"
    jinx - I second that. JoCo has been very inspiring to me in this respect.

    And Jester J - if it's wrong to have a man crush on JoCo, then I don't want to be right.
  • Well by going on that urban dictionary definition i would surprised if anyone here doesn't have a man crush on him.
  • No man about it, it's a full on crush for me.
  • Dunno about the definition of man crush - very heterocentric. We need an encompassing term for "person who I admire in a non-sexual way even though said person meets the requirements for sexual attraction" ;-)

    @Sporksmith/jinx: So it's not just me then? Damn it, JoCo is definitely some kind of muse.
  • Thank god he claims to be lazy. If the guy were constantly starting magazines and joining circuses and so on, he'd be insufferable!
  • @Borba- maybe some variation on androgynous or androgyny. Something to indicate an appeal to both sexes in a non-sexual admiring way.
  • squid-crush? :)
  • Squid crush everything!
  • Actually, that reminds me, speaking of being creative, *and* speaking of crushing everything...

    About a week ago I started drawing \ doodling as a creative outlet. I'm terrible, but I'm trying not to get too hung up on the quality of the work right now, just enjoying it as a creative outlet. Well, the other night I drew my laptop, which happened to be in front of me, then I drew some tentacles, then I drew a squid to go with the tentacles, which happened to be by the laptop, so...

    I crush a laptop like you

    It has all kinds of problems, which I especially realized afterwards when I *looked* at a picture of a squid, but thought yinz might find it amusing anyhow :)
  • I love squid-crush! Sounds like a soft drink concentrate ("For suckers, by suckers. With suckers")

    And that just reminded me of a letter I saw in the paper this morning (be warned that bad puns are a prerequisite to reader letters of this genre...)
    "I was very impressed and not a little jealous after reading your article about the mating habits of the octopus. It sounds like they have an absolutely kraken sex life while, on the other hand, I can't remember the last time I had a kiss and a cuttle."
  • Spork- my drug of choice is crayolas...
  • @JoAnn - woah woah, too advanced for me ;). Seriously though, I've been trying to just play with very basic concepts and slowly work my way up. It'll be a while before I feel ready to attempt to use *gasp* color
  • edited April 2008
    squid crush?

    Okay, okay, I have a better one coming.
  • Sporksmith: Totally enjoyed your laptop/squid mashup. It would be a fun endeavor, to do more exploratory creative work starting off with a JoCovian theme and going in our own directions. I found this inspirational!
  • @monkeybiznis1: Shall we perhaps say that JoCo's aura has hermaphrodysiac qualities?
  • edited April 2008
    Okay, here's a real Squid-Crush. I uh...haven't used Photoshop in ages (a year or so?) so I completely forgot how to do borders of text *cough*. Imagine the black text as being white with a green outline.

    Yeah.
    (I was bored)
  • edited April 2008
    Ooh, lovely! I'll have a six-pack.

    ETA: Of course, going back to Sporky's (you don't mind if I call you that?) original, you could also derive the iCrush, a must-have iconic portable garbage compactor. "iCrush Everything" works well as a slogan then.
  • Heh. Nice. Does it come in ink flavor?
  • Heh. Nice. Does it come in ink flavor?
    That's a flavor we've been considering, not entirely sure about it yet. The tests groups haven't been too kind...
  • yes borba, that seems to be appropriate.
  • Hi, everyone. I'm trix. I got the box set a few days ago and wonder how I've gotten along this long with out it.
  • ughhh. Ink flavor? Have you ever seen someone chew on a pen and it bursts in their mouth? I don't think they enjoy it. That also reminds me of some book I read once where the main character became a vampire of sorts and drained the ink from books. It thoroughly freaked me out though since I was around 7 or 8, and the idea of people drinking ink as sustenance seemed really disgusting. Just throwing it out here but maybe you should make a flavor called "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Deliciousness" or "Deep Sea Delight".
  • Hi trix, we've all been there. Its called Life Before Conversion. I can't even remember what it was like anymore.
  • Hey, trixiescamp, welcome to the forums! Yeah, I've found the best way of dealing with addiction is to spread it to other people -- gets it out of your system, like.

    [That's a total lie -- there's no cure. But pretend you don't know that. ;) ]
  • I can remember monkeybiznis1- it was empty. So very very empty...
  • @ JesterJ - Hah, nicely done!

    @ Borba - Your iCrush idea intrigues me. Hmm.... :)

    @ Jinx - Thanks! Yeah, there's so much vivid imagery in JoCo's stuff. It's easy to get inspired :). Hmmm, could be an interesting and easy group project. Something like sketch\photoshop-a-week. Pick a song every week and everyone creates an image... Would anyone else be interested in doing something like this? We could pick a song and start a thread for it.
  • Ahhh, I think this is the start of a beautiful friendship.

    Two months ago, I had never heard of Jonathan Coulton. I mean, seriously. Can you IMAGINE? Now, I can't get his songs out of my head, and he is absolutely dominating my iPod. Not even the Beatles can hang with him anymore.

    For my journey from there to here, I can blame (I mean thank) some since-forgotten blog link to Spiff's Re: Your Brains video. Enjoyed it, bookmarked it, forgot it. A week or two later, another link brought me to Spiff's Code Monkey video. Damn, that's good.

    I watched Code Monkey over and over, loving it more each time. Great job, JC! Great job, Spiff! Realized that this was the same guy who sang Re: Your Brains. Same guy? I have got to check this out. I have got to check out some of this Coulton fellow's other music. I wasn't overly hopeful though. How many times have you done that? Found a great new song or two by an artist you've never heard of, then eagerly dug deeper only to find..... one hit wonder, and nothing more.

    That initial skepticism turned to hopefullness, happiness, and finally outright amazement as I dug in to the JC universe. I simply couldn't believe what I was hearing. Beautiful music, staggeringly clever lyrics. Maybe I used too many monkeys? I waved with my flipper? Stupid insistence on scanning my iris?? Dolphins are all PHONIES?? I used to think They Might be Giants were witty, but they're not in this guy's league. Ha ha, fat chance, as the saying goes.

    And to find that his story is as good as his music.... damn! I The guy found out his wife was pregnant, and quickly decided to QUIT his well paying cubicle job to become a Rock Star. Are you KIDDING ME? If I ever stumbled in to a movie and saw that plotline, I'd get up and walk out and ask for my money back. It's just that improbable.

    I have since spread the Coulton gospel to my mother. She is in her mid-70's, and nobody's idea of a geek or nerd. Not JC's stereotype demographic, is what I'm saying. I burned a CD of the Second Life concert and gave it to her. Gave her another CD with a selection of thing-a-week songs and a few others.

    She called me the next day at work, and said "This guy is a genius, isn't he?"

    Yes mom, he is.

    Of course I don't have to tell any of you that, now do I?
  • Well done the mom! What had she been listening to before?
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