- Special Message! 2002-07-01 11:09:20 Happy 20th Birthday, Mikey! Here's hoping you don't see me typing this to you even though you're sitting right next to me at work! Uh...SURPRISE! Dunno what else to say, 'cept we'll have a fun day after work. *huggles* VegettoEX owns me!
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2002-06-23 12:08:13
Yatta! This is the first real weekend I've had this summer where I'm not stressing out over something. My summer class ended Friday, so I have no studying to be concerned with. Yesterday was my sister's graduation party, where my boyfriend and I put in a quick appearance. After that, it was clean chillin' from there!
We finished up the Buffy season 2 DVD boxset the other day. Holy crap. How was I not into this show sooner?! It's so friggin' awesome, and I have a purely hetrosexual crush on Sarah Michelle Gellar and Allyson Hannigan. I think I relate to Willow way too much...
OK...um...I s'pose I should actually talk about AMVs for once, since that whole forum is about to become prevalent in my life again! For starters, I'm gonna be on the Shoujocon AMV panel, which should be quite an experience. I've never done anything like this before, but I'm sure it'll be fine.
Dang, with all of the Otakon pre-screenings done, I'm way scared about the results. I dooomed myself in two ways this year with my submission. One, it's a drama video, and it's always hard to make it in that category. Two, my video is, as they say, "artistic suicide." It's not because of the anime I used, cuz I used something rather obscure, so it's not over-used (crap....maybe *because* it's not well-known that people may not like it. Oh well, I like it). The song I used isn't over-used, so that wasn't artistic suicide. But it's the group I used who did the song that will attract groans. But hey, I picked the song for my video because it fit my idea perfectly, so screw what anyone else thinks! Yes, so, if it actually gets into Otakon, you can see it there, and at Shoujucon, assuming it plays there, too.
With the summer class over, and now I just have to worry about my job, I think I now have enough time to start an actual new music video project (sorry Bebop trailer that was made inbetween projects... dang, there I go personifying AMVs again!). Mike and I will be working together again for this one, since we've never made a *real* AMV together, just trailers. I've already started ripping all 8 DVDs, so I'm just about set to go! We were discussing the video last night, and how the story should progress. Originally, I thought this thing would be a comedy video. But, the more we thought about the scenes we used, and the lyrics of the song, the more we realized... this thing is serious/drama! The song itself is highly upbeat and fun, but the lyrics are kinda depressing and just... not nice. However, I think it's because of the nature of the song, and the anime itself, that we'll be able to come up with a video that's original, and different from the other stuff out there done to this anime. More on this AMV project as we start working on it!
Well, I'm gonna go re-watch my Otakon video submission to convince myself it doesn't suck. ;_; Then I'm gonna go watch Scott Melzer's DDR2 video and then tell myself that I do indeed suck. :P -
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
2002-06-19 16:54:22
AbsoluteDestiny: Wai, an Ebichu video!? You are my new god. :D I love that damn lil' hamster. I'm afraid to see what you did with that show in the video. Look forward to seeing it sometime!
Gah, my lil' sis graduates high school today. Better do the whole family thang and get going... I feel so old. -
mmmm...Gut Bombs!
2002-06-15 23:10:07
After a crazy week of work and school, I actually had a nice, relaxing day at home. Sometimes I feel like I don't know the meaning of the word "relax". Even though I feel like the laziest person in the world, I do constantly feel as though I need to be doing *some*thing. Today started off kinda icky, since I just stomped around, thinking of something to do. Father's Day shopping was already done, no tests to study for this week, and my new AMV project (which is actually just a remake of an old video) had to be scraped due to inexplicable DVD ripping issues (why is something that should be the color green turning out orange? It makes no sense!). I think the highlight of my morning was watching a re-run of my favorite episode from season 2 of "X-Men: Evolution" (my fave ep. being "Joyride", btw. Lance/Kitty all the way!!), and dropping off lunch for my sis at her job. But, since I was just chillin' at home today with just my mom around, we decided on a nice mom/daughter night sorta thing. It felt nice to do, because I don't spend as much time around the parental units as I used to, so I guess I sort of miss outtings like these.
Anyways, after playing an hour's worth of DDR and feelin' all good and exercised out, I made it all worthless by grabbing a burger at Wendy's. It's OK to splurg once in a while, right!? *remembers the amount of money she spent on DVDs this week. Shit.)
After that, my mom and I went to the Blockbuster that my boyfriend works at on weekends to go rent a chick flick. I must say, Mike's such a cutie in his little Blockbuster outfit, I just wanna huggle him to death! Oooooo, I hope he doesn't read this when he gets home tonight. ^^;
We ended up renting "Legally Blonde" cuz it looked cute, and I always had an interest in seeing it. The movie was a lot better than I had originally thought!
So, all in all, what started off as a dull day turned out to be very enjoyable, and I actually learned to take it easy. Whoa... I should try it more often!
AbsoluteDestiny: Thanks, I'm glad you enjoyed reading about the topic. No, I haven't studied what you mentioned, but I think there's a class in the Communication major that covers that sort of thing. Maybe I should look into it. It sounds neat. :) -
I dun got me a education!
2002-06-13 17:45:15
This summer, I'm taking a required class for my major. What's funny is that this class is actually a pre-requisite for the major (Information Technology)... and I've already been accepted to the major. if I had my way, which I don't, I wouldn't have to take the class. I figure, "it's an introductory class, and I've already taken 6 or 7 classes for the major, so I don't need this." That, and the fact that I gotta get up 6:20 in the morning every weekday for this thing is killer. Fortunately, this course is proving to be pretty interesting! There are a lot of things Mike and I (we're taking the class together, as he is a IT major hopeful *crosses fingers* Damn low rates of acceptance...) disagree with the teacher about, but that makes it more fun, since we can then bitch about subjects discussed in class later on.
Anywho, this part of the week, we're discussing gender, race, and technology, namely the Internet. While I don't consider myself a raging feminist by any means, the issues surrounding gender and Internet use has always interested me. Ya don't run a fan site in a male-dominated genre for five years and not pick up on a thing or three. :P So, in class today, we got some fun research facts that were right up my alley. I've copied some of this information from our class notes:
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Gender Differences
The Digital Divide
Computer Couture Or Digital Downgrading?
Gender differences in computer-mediated communication
-Study by Susan Herring: University of Texas
-Based on scholarly listserv
-Key factor for non-contribution was "intimidation"
-Men accepted intimidation as normal behavior in listservs, women dismayed that human beings treat each other this way
-68% messages posted by men had adversarial style: criticism, ridicule, promoting own importance
-Women’s postings: hedging, apologizing, asking questions rather than making assertions
Gender differences in computer-mediated communication
-Women displayed more personal orientation: revealing thoughts and feelings; supporting others
-Men do most of talking and attracting attention to themselves; dominated discussions of even women-centered topics and lists
-Women trying to gain equal hearing on male dominated lists were ignored or trivialized
-Women engaged in little or no flaming
-Conclusion: different communications ethics in online environments
Male Online Style: characterized by adversariality: put-downs, strong and contentious assertions, lengthy postings, frequent postings, self-promotion, sarcasm, authoritative stances, flaming (insults, inappropriate language, strong negative emotion)
Female Online Style: characterized by supportiveness (expressions of appreciation, thanking, community building and acceptance: and attenuation (hedging, expressing doubt, apologizing, questioning)
Conclusion: different communications ethics in online environments
Men value:
-Freedom from censorship
-Freedom from external authority
-Open expression
-Agonistic debate as means of advancing knowledge
Women value:
-Politeness
-Consideration
-Taking responsibility for own actions
-Developing sensitivities to others
Causal Factors
-School Internet users: middle class young men
-Most contributions made to newsgroups made by men
-Girls using Internet news groups likely to be personally insulted for expressing views
-High incidences of sexual harassment in newsgroups, listservs and chat rooms
-Films: portray men as technically competent
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I hate to say it, but for the most part, I'd have to tend to agree with a lot of the information provided by this study. I don't like to think all guys are jerks (OK, maybe just a little! ^_^), but the male behavioral patterns listed here seem to be right on the money. Based on what I've seen on message boards, etc. over the years, I do get the impression that guys are more likely to take these actions than girls.
That's not to say girls can't be total bitches, because they certainly are. However, when I think about it, the forum right here in the AMV.org looks like it reflects this study. I think I can count the number of females on one hand that actually post on the message board. Maybe there are more female AMV creators out there that aren't voicing themselves on the board.. Who knows, maybe we really are a huge minority. This is just pretty interesting to me. :)
OK, on a lighter note, I finished off vol. 1 of Excel Saga. That's some dang weird stuff. My fave scene so far: a blatant parody of Digi Charat (apparently, Excel Saga and Digi Charat aired at the same time. That's so funny!. There's also a ton more anime in-jokes in this thing. I'm glad I bought this DVD. It's a nice treat!
Whoa, I love home LANs! While Mike is staying over at my house, he bought over his computer so we could connect him to our home network. While our computers are networked, I'm helping him with his web site, since it's kinda been dead for about half a year. This is pretty fun! I wanna help him get up his site faster, so I'm basically posting old site content into the new layout and uploading shiznit. *squeal* Helpful lass I become!
I've got an insane headache. Maybe the computer screen isn't the best thing to be looking at. And so, I depart!
JOURNAL: MeriC (Meri Cantoni)
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