Cammy’s Comic Corner – Indie Comics Episode – Vol. 8
In this special episode, I review The Chair (Alterna Comics) written by Peter Simeti and art by Kevin Christensen & Peter Simeti. Like dark and creepy stories involving prison? Look no further!
July 1, 2010
Cammy’s Comic Corner – Book Of The Month – Irredeemable Vol. 1
The Book of the Month for July 2010 is none other than Irredeemable – Volume 1 (BOOM! Studios) written by Mark Waid and art by Peter Krause.
The perfect selection for those who like a little creepy to go with their terrifying!
June 28, 2010
Cammy’s Comic Corner – Indie Comics Episode – Vol. 7
In this special episode, I review the hardcover Hybrid Bastards! (Archaia) by Tom Pinchuk and Kate Glasheen.
A funny must-read for all you Greek Geeks!
June 27, 2010
Cammy’s Comic Corner – Episode 132 (6/27/10)
Hot damn what a good week for comics! Pick Of The Week goes to Jason Howard & Ryan Ottley for Sea Bear & Grizzly Shark #1 (Image). Fast Five picks include Green Lantern Corps #49 (DC), Amazing Spider-Man #635 (Marvel), 28 Days Later #12 (BOOM! Studios), Batman: The Return Of Bruce Wayne #3 (DC), and Fantastic Four #580 (Marvel).
This week was a good one to be a comic book fan.
June 21, 2010
Cammy’s Comic Corner – Episode 131 (6/21/10)
No Pick Of The Week, but that doesn't stop me from having a nice little Fast Five! Picks include The Boys #43 (Dynamite), Four Eyes #4 (Image), Atlas #2 (Marvel), The Walking Dead #73 (Image), and Darkwing Duck #1 (BOOM! Studios).
Don't forget to subscribe to Geeky Talky now that it's officially on iTunes!
Cammy’s Comic Corner – Episode 131 (6/21/10)
No Pick Of The Week, but that doesn’t stop me from having a nice little Fast Five! Picks include The Boys #43 (Dynamite), Four Eyes #4 (Image), Atlas #2 (Marvel), The Walking Dead #73 (Image), and Darkwing Duck #1 (BOOM! Studios).
Don’t forget to subscribe to Geeky Talky now that it’s officially on iTunes!
June 19, 2010
Cammy’s Comic Corner – Indie Comics Episode – Vol. 6
In this special episode, I review the webcomic The Angry Penguin (www.TheAngryPenguin.com).
Do yourself a favor and check-out this great webcomic pronto!
June 16, 2010
Technology For All
This post is a response to my friend Kate Mitchell’s recent thoughtful blog post on human-computer interaction. She wrote from the perspective of a computer scientist, and my response is from that of a user experience designer.
I hear a lot of people complain about how cell phones and Facebook are taking over our lives, creating the expectation that we should always be available. But is that true? I think that hinges on whether or not these things force us to do anything. Since they don’t, I think we might need to reexamine the problem.
People might feel pressure to check their email every five minutes, but that pressure is internal, not external. Before the internet, people felt pressured to stay near a telephone. Before that, they eagerly awaited the mail courier or religiously went to gathering places to stay in the social loop. The pressure isn’t new.
To show how the pressure to always be on call is actually something of an irrational social anxiety that comes from within, consider this: when is the last time you got mad at somebody for not responding to your email or Facebook message within five minutes, or got angry because your call went to voicemail instead of being answered immediately? Thankfully, that kind of entitlement mentality is rare, or else we wouldn’t be able to turn off our mobile devices at the theater, which most people manage to do without a problem. You probably haven’t decided to shun anybody for those things, so you shouldn’t worry about the world conspiring to shun you.
In short, the problem is our own insecurity, not the technology.
Another interesting complaint that Kate mentioned in her post that got my attention as a user experience designer was her statement that “The profound satisfaction of getting to know a machine is something that disappears with ease-of-use.”
Her opinion reminds me of the one held by a lot of Gentoo Linux developers. They resisted making the installation process easier for a long time because they wanted people to learn all about their system, which they felt the difficult manual command-line interface installation would make people experts in. And I suppose that it’s a good sign that a computer scientist or a programmer feels that way since in a way, that shows that they really love what they do.
However, as a user experience designer, I’m interested in a different sort of profound satisfaction. My field is all about making technology and information more accessible. I enjoy tinkering with Gentoo Linux and other “advanced computer geek things,” but if everybody that made them felt the way that Kate and the Gentoo developers felt, then a lot of people wouldn’t be able to use technology.
It might be fun for some of us, but computers weren’t invented so that people could sit there and figure out how they work or how to use them. They exist to enable us to do things, and the harder a computer is to use, the more of an obstacle it is to accomplishing things with them. I don’t fear complexity, but I do think that unnecessary difficulty is undesirable.
Graphical user interfaces, mouse and keyboard interfaces, and sites like Wikipedia all come together to make it easy for everybody to access all of human knowledge, not just an elite group of users. I think that’s wonderful, and that kind of thing is why I hope to be a part of helping even more people take advantage of all the things that computers, the internet, and the rest of modern technology enables.
And rest assured, plenty of people will still be interested in the computers themselves. I sure am.
June 13, 2010
Cammy’s Comic Corner – Episode 130 (6/13/10)
The good titles return this week after a very disappointing last week! Pick Of The Week goes to John Layman & Rob Guillory for Chew #11 (Image). Fast Five picks include Booster Gold #33 (DC), House Of Mystery #26 (Vertigo), G.I. Joe: Cobra #5 (IDW), Daytripper #7 (Vertigo), and Batman #700 (DC).
Remember to go watch the World Cup games after you're done reading your comics!
June 8, 2010
My CA 2010 Primary Endorsements
You have until 8:00 pm to vote, so don’t miss it!
Some resources I used when making my decisions are SmartVoter.org, DailyKOS, and the Union Tribune.
I’m a nonpartisan, so I got to choose what ballet I wanted. I selected a Democratic ballet. If you have a different ballet, then we’ll still at least have the propositions in common, so I’ll start with those.
- Yes on Prop 13 – Seems like everybody is agreed on this one. Haven’t heard any counterarguments, and I think it sounds pretty sensible.
- Yes on Prop 14 – Going against DailyKOS’s recommendation on this one. People still only get one vote, but this way, they’d have more choice in where they could use it during future primaries because they wouldn’t be automatically shackled to the party they’re registered with. Not such a big deal for me since I already have this privilege by being a nonpartisan. Also, I don’t buy the argument that this is actually a roundabout trick by the party bosses to somehow actually end up with more power. If anything, I think it would just force them to be less vicious and immature in their ads since they’d have to care more about centrists instead of just appealing to party hardliners and radicals.
- Yes on Prop 15 – I don’t like how only people with gobs of money are capable of winning. By letting candidates decide to use public funds in exchange for not going over a limit, more qualified people to would be able to run and would have a realistic shot against the kind of corrupt candidates that get zillions of dollars from corporate interests. And it would be optional anyway for the candidates, so when Scrooge McDuck decides he wants to run for governor, he could still decide to forego this and use his own considerable funds.
- No on Prop 16 – Corporate lobbyist legislation. PG&E got this onto the ballet to make more money by restricting what people can do to serve their interests. No thanks.
- No on Prop 17 – Corporate lobbyist legislation. This time, it’s from Mercury Insurance. They just want to be able to charge you for changing your insurance provider. No thanks.
- Yes on Prop H (Coronado) - Going against the Union Tribune’s recommendation here. I realize this measure is almost certainly going to lose on account of so much money being dumped into the campaign against it (all those silly “Kiss the tunnel proposal goodbye!” banners with bright red lips went unanswered as far as I could see), but I’m supporting it because it’s true that Coronado needs to study the different proposals on how to deal with traffic for now and the near future. This vote is not for or against the tunnel. It’s for or against studying what the tunnel would mean, as well as other traffic solutions. Also, in the voter information pamphlet, I found the argument against it to just be very, very poorly crafted. I’m sure that the opposing side has a legitimate case, but they did not make it in the pamphlet, and meanwhile, the proponents of Prop H made their case very well.
And now, for the Democratic primary candidate recommendations. I’m just going to say who I’m voting for. I think they’re all reasonable candidates that everybody in California (not just the far left or the far right) could see positive change under, but I’d encourage you to look into them for yourself, of course.
- Jerry Brown for Governor (Peter Schurmann would also be very good)
- Gavin Newsom for Lieutenant Governor
- Kamala Harris for Attorney General (Ted Lieu would also be very good)
- Dave Jones for Insurance Commissioner
- Barbara Boxer for Senator
- Mary Salas for 40th District
- Ben Hueso for 79th District
- Tom Torlakson for State Superintendent of Public Instruction
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