This past weekend Molly and I went to the Gaian Mind Summer Festival. Gaian Mind is a series of events, based in Philadelphia, that highlight psy-trance. We arrived at the campgrounds on Thursday night and camped there until Sunday afternoon. Unlike my previous two expeditions to GMSF in 2007 and 2008, which were held at the Four Quarters Interfaith Sanctuary, the event was held at Ramblewood campgrounds.
...well not exactly right. I've downloaded several albums worth of music from one of my favorite music labels, 12k, which are collectively entitled Term. In an interesting statement, the fellow who operates the label, Taylor Deupree, decided to release this music, in it's digital download only format but without any of the trappings of traditional packaging. In his own words...
On May 1st, Ubisoft will be shutting down the Shadowbane servers for the last time. Xanther, Stray Bullet Games Designer and Lead Moderator posted this topic on both the Shadowbane forums and the SBG forums...
"We come to you now with regret and sadness, but also happiness and pride. Regret and sadness that it has finally come to this and as of May 1, 2009 the Shadowbane servers will be powered down once and for all. Yet happiness that it lasted so very long, and pride to be able to stand before such a passionate community to thank you for your undying support and unwavering loyalty to Shadowbane." Read the entire letter...
Two weeks ago I went to San Francisco for the Game Developers Conference. The flight out to the west coast was longer then I had anticipated, and the time change had my internal clock all screwed up for the entire week, but I got the chance to "visit" a few cities along the way (Denver, Los Angeles, and Chicago on the way back). The conference itself was pretty damn cool. Lots of gamer heads all talking about games, how to make them, why they make them, and anything else you could imagine about the game making industry. Everybody was friendly and in good spirits, which was totally refreshing. I also explored San Francisco proper as far as I was willing to by foot or rail (I didn't have a car). I didn't get to go to all the touristy places but I had a great time none the less.
Recently, I've been inspired to work on music. I really have this thing for entrancing, repetitive, and droning music, so while I was searching the web for new music I came across a minimal techno mix on YouTube that really inspired me to work on some techno tracks. There was a track by Itamar Sagi called Black Gold that really caught my ear. Sagi's music has a sound that reminded me of Deadbeat, an artist who releases music on Stefan Betke's (aka Pole) ~scape label. It was then that I remembered Molly telling me about Basic Channel, after which there was no turning back.
Having created two other, more serious in tone, blogs, zenasprime.net and 5h0cktr00px0rz.org, I've decided that a third was in order for my fun side. I wanted a place where I could share and discuss the things that I enjoy in a more friendly and personal manner. While I have registered accounts on some of the more popular social networking websites like facebook and *cringe* MySpace, as well as some of the more focused hosting service websites like YouTube and flickr, I don't like the idea of my data being imprisoned by whatever corporate policy is deemed worthy of the profit motive. Unlike most folks, I own and operate my own, collocated, server box. I don't really need their services outside of connivence and the possibility of excessive bandwidth usage. That doesn't mean I don't like their actual services nor deny their usefulness in this age of exponentially expanding information exchange. I'd just rather do it myself and by my own rules.
So here it is, my contribution to the social network that is the internet. Only without the social networking software and it's expanding compilation of family/friends/pseudo-aquaintences. However, if you would like to include me on your friends list, I'll enjoy sending you messages on occasion and even share a laugh or two at our convergence together in this journey of life. I've compiled a list of my various accounts on a page called "data", to which you can find a menu item for at the top of this website. If, however, you would like to respond directly on my blog, all registered users have access to post comments to any blog they are reading. I would greatly enjoy reading your comments so don't hesitate in dropping me a note here and there. I hope to hear from you soon. :D
