Friday, October 29, 2004

Tuesday, October 26, 2004

Emil Novak of Queen City Bookstore on Out-of-Print TPs

ICv2 Talk Back

"Emil Novak of Queen City Bookstore in Buffalo, New York is concerned about the out-of-stocks on key comic trade paperbacks."

The Great Old Pumpkin

The Great Old Pumpkin, by John Aegard

Mafia Soldiers Support Bush-Cheney

Mafia Soldiers Support Bush-Cheney

"While the Mafia is not in the habit of endorsing presidential candidates, two Colombo family soldiers have spoken with their bulging wallets--and they want four more years for the Bush/Cheney ticket."

The Comics Outsider

A blog geared towards comics, and the infinite amount of rumors that swirl around that industry. Sometimes we can all be such a bunch of gossiping old women. But seriously, this is a very good blog and I think that people with an interest in comics should check it out. Funny and irreverent when it needs to be.

The Comics Outsider [via Colleen]

"A comics rumors website. Contents to be taken with a large handful of salt and then washed down with tequila and probably a half a lime. You'll find no spoilers here (well, unless someone gives me something to spoil but I'll put a big SPOILER somewhere to tell you) and no pimping of my creations because... well, I don't have any."

Monday, October 25, 2004

Area 51

While the warning (below) is from the top of the site's page, all of the links that I clicked on to check worked. The images are broken though, but don't use that as an indicator that you cannot find what you are looking for.

Area 51

"NOTICE: The page below has been permenently FROZEN as of January 2000. Due to resource limitations, this section of our website is no longer maintained, so some links may not work and some information may be out of date. We have retained this page for archive reference only, and we cannot vouch for its accuracy. Broken links will not be repaired, and minor errors will not be corrected. You are responsible for independently verifying any information you may find here."

Historian of Things That Never Were

A gigantic link page of timelines for television shows, movies, books, comics and even the settings from role-playing games. Nice help for those who want to use pre-existing settings, but do not have the time to compile all of this information themselves. A great resource for GMs with a time crunch.

Historian of Things That Never Were

"Edgar Governo: Historian of Things That Never Were"

Destiny!!!!

"Dungeon Majesty" is a cable-access TV show in Southern California of four young women sitting around a table playing Dungeons & Dragons with a male DM. Except intercut with the video of them playing is more video of the women in costume as their characters, acting with not-so-special effects and . . . well, you just have to see it to believe it.

Dungeon Majesty [via Daily Illuminator]

Tuesday, October 19, 2004

The Official Ninja Webpage: REAL Ultimate Power

The Official Ninja Homepage

Mystery Of Dr. Dan Burisch

Mystery Of Dr. Dan Burisch

"I was just going through a massive amount of collected data on my friend Dr. Dan Burisch and found this introduction by B.J. Wolf. I will follow this with how it all ended."

Blue Rose: The Roleplaying Game of Romantic Fantasy

While the system looks interesting (a variant of Green Ronin's Mutants and Masterminds system coupled with variants that they developed for use with d20), I am not certain of the viablity of the setting. But perhaps that is because it isn't something for me. It looks like an appeal to the fans of shoujo manga and anime, but is that a big enough of a gaming market to aim an entire game at them, instead of just developing themed supplements towards that market?

If this is an appeal to get women into gaming (while I applaud it), it seems a rather stereotypical approach. I do hope that it does succeed regardless of the intentions.

Blue Rose: The Roleplaying Game of Romantic Fantasy

"The official home on the Web of Blue Rose, Green Ronin Publishing's Roleplaying Game of Romantic Fantasy. This is the place to find Blue Rose fiction, previews, product support, and information about all of the Blue Rose products."

Monday, October 18, 2004

The X-Files Timeline

Some interesting extrapolations and the work of someone with a lot of free time. Not that your faithful web compiler has any geat shortage of that himself. If I have to explain the X-Files, though, you have certainly come to the wrong site. I may plug some of this into my upcoming Call of Cthluhu campaign.

The X-Files Timeline

Therianthropology

The timelines are particularly useful to prospective GMs and Players, wishing to fit werewolves and various other shape changers into their campaigns. Some of it is pretty useful for insertion as backgound material...and some of it can be quite goofy. You make the call.

Therianthropology

"Welcome to THERIANTHROPOLOGY 101. Here we hope to raise the awareness of the casual student as to the nature and history of the myriad shapeshifters that have walked, flown, swam, or crawled upon the surface of this Earth.

"At present, the resources offered are but meager. Therianthropology is a fledgling science, combining elements of Anthropology, Mythology, Cryptozoology, Parapsychology, and several studies of a more esoteric nature. Lycanthropology is but one of the disciplines a Therianthropologist may choose to specialize in, but it is considerably better accepted by modern society as a genuine science, as the Lycanthrope, or Werewolf, is by far the most well known 'Primal' in modern 'pop' culture."

The Secret Doctrines of the Assassins

An excellent resource for those wanting to use the historical Order of Assassins in their RPG Campaigns. I have used these guys and Thugees in games, since I tired of the ever present Ninja in games.

The Secret Doctrines of the Assassins

"Nothing is forbidden, Everything is Permitted."

Pulp Project1557

While it is known that I am not a fan of wikis...this site does seem to have some pretty good resources for Pulp Era gaming. Luckily, I don't have to wory about contributing to it. If you are a Pulp GM or Players, you should certainly check out this site for background material.

Pulp Project1557 (seedwiki.com)

Also, check out this site for historical maps of the NYC Subway system.

Friday, October 15, 2004

HIV virus deliberately created: Wangari Maathai

The Times of India

"Kenyan ecologist Wangari Maathai, the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, on Saturday reiterated her claim that the AIDS virus was a deliberately created biological agent." [Warning....pop-ups (but not so bad)]

WKMG-TV, Orlando

If this can't upstart a horror senario, I don't know what will....

Preserved Fetus In Medical Container Found At Mall

"A preserved human fetus was discovered inside a medical container Tuesday night in a mall parking lot in Orlando, Fla., according to Local 6 News."

Thursday, October 14, 2004

Notice!

Just so you (whomever you are) know, apparently my blog crashed at some point in the night last night and the template disappeared. So, this morning I went to make a post and was faced with a blank page. *sigh* I picked a new look for the page (hope you like it...not that it really matters) with a little more color. Luckily I was able to grab a cached copy of the blog from Google so all of the links and the news banner, and etc. will slowly but surely make a return to the page.

Edit: At this point, I am pretty sure that I have recaptured everything from the old page. Thank for Google and its cache function. Welcome, or welcome back, to Dorkland. Please be sure to look around and check out any of the many sites that have been linked to from here. The "Dork Links" are my permanent links, semi-regularly tested to make sure that they are not broken. They are a number of different things, from websites of strangeness, to game company sites and designer blogs.

Autonomedia is a favorite site of mine, they publish the books that most publishers are afraid of. I got a copy of one of my favorite books from them a couple of months ago. T.A.Z. is a great resource for GMs, particularly those running a "dark future" or perhaps a "post apocalyptic" game. It is full of ideas that you will never find in an RPG supplement. I am going to utilize ideas from it for my upcoming Call of Cthulhu game.

Random Punk

Here's a nice blog that I found through the Fudge RPG mailing list. There has been a lot of talk on their about LiveJournal and Blogs, and using them for gaming. Personally, I prefer to go with blogs...they are fun and free. I like blogs that don't have an agenda to them, and yet manage to stick to a topic...which this one seems to do.

Random Punk

Building a blogging community, one blog at a time.

Wednesday, October 13, 2004

Monte Cook's LINE OF SIGHT

Roll on d100.

LINE OF SIGHT: "Internet Message Board Wandering Monster Table"

Steven Sladdin

An interesting blog. There are entries on synaesthesia and graffiti that are interesting. I have used graffiti in contemporary games as vevers and magical writing for ritualized spell-casting. Hopfully, they will be more active in their postings. Of course, they seem to put a bit more effort in their postings than I do.

Steven Sladdin

Dictionary of Victorian London

An excellent resource for the Victorian gamer and GM, particularly for Call of Cthulhu games. An incredibly well researched and worked out site that is part dictionary, part quote book, and part atlas. The very well scanned and highly detailed maps alone are worth checking out this site. However, the maps...due to their level of detail and quality are quite big, so downloading might be a pain if you have a low-speed connection. All in all, a very good site.

Dictionary of Victorian London - Victorian History - 19th Century London - Social History

The entire website is available from the site's creator as a CD-Rom, for only $25 for us Americans, a good potential investment just to have all of this stuff in one place. Many RPG supplements aren't this well thought/worked out.

Tuesday, October 12, 2004

National Games Week (Site Goes Live 10/15/04)

It looks to me as if some of the other publishers (apparently White Wolf will be involved) are counter programing D&D Game Day. Personally, I think its a good thing. The more exposure to gaming the better, and higher of a profile of other game system besides just D&D promotes diversity in the big old happy international gaming community.

National Games Week (Note: Site goes live October 15th, 2004).

Blogs seem to be popping up without limits

Nice article, I love the quote.

Blogs seem to be popping up without limits - or rules

"At 100 mph, the car smashed through the guardrail and crashed into a blog." [via Rebbeca's Pocket]

The Lester Dent Pulp Paper Master Fiction Plot

The Lester Dent Pulp Paper Master Fiction Plot

Welcome

Hello. Just on the off chance that you are new to this place, I thought that I would send out a quick hello, and welcome you to Dorkland. Dorkland is what is know as a web log, or blog for short. These things have been around for a while, and different people use them for different things. I first heard of them after reading Rebecca Blood's book The Weblog Handbook.

A lot of blogs are used by their owners as personal journals, people talking about what they did with themselves each and everyday. Frankly I am not interested enough in my life to want to read about it, and I live it. So, I throw up links to things that I come across while websurfing and the occasional rant about something (politics is beginning to piss me off these days) but mostly the blog is just about those things that catch my eye for some reason or another that I think might come in handy later, or may be of interest to the handful of people who check this site.

I think that keeping a blog is a simple and very easy way for someone who wants to have a presence on the internet to do so, without a lot of time or effort. If you are interested in having your own blog, check out the Blogger site, it is who I use...and it is very easy.

Matrix Games Home Page

I have been remiss in not linking to Matrix Games (out in Sheffield Lake) where I fill in from time to time on Monday nights...sometimes completely changing some lucky person's character. If you are out that way, they have a pretty good store, friendly people and a good amount of space for gaming in the store. They run a number of weekly role-playing games of various sorts through out the week, and probably have room for more.

Matrix Games Home Page

Of course, I linked to them....and they returned the link to me (look at the bottom of the page). Jack (the owner) mentioned that he liked reading my blog (I apparently put the link up on their discussions boards) when a bunch of us were out last night, so I thought that I would throw him a link. Check out the site.

Thursday, October 07, 2004

FactCheck.org Cheney & Edwards Mangle Facts

Yes, I know that this isn't a political blog...and the stated goals of this blog have nothing to do with politics, elections, etc. However, I do feel that, as the election is getting closer, each of us has a responsibility (as Americans) to make sure that the proper information is getting out, and that each one of us is making as informed of a descion as possible when we enter into that voting booth on Nov. 2nd.

FactCheck.org Cheney & Edwards Mangle Facts

Its ironic that Cheney got the URL of the website that would show that those nasty democrats were lying about him wrong. "They know that if you go," Cheney said in the debate, "for example, to FactCheck.com (sic), an independent Web site sponsored by the University of Pennsylvania, you can get the specific details with respect to Halliburton." The site, as you can see above is factcheck.org. I know, a petty squabbling point.

Don't worry, this blog will soon return to its regularly scheduled geekiness.

Tuesday, October 05, 2004

It Is Cold Here In Cleveland

Normally, I don't do this sort of thing on here...but I guess that I need to vent.

It is a cold morning here in Cleveland, the morning of the Vice Presidential debate. Should I care? Of course I should. Am I really better off than I was four years ago? Sure, I've got a better job (sort of) but I am also a temporary at a company that turns out has a hiring freeze for its support staff, so even after almost two years (two years without any sort of vacation or extended break except for holiday weekends) of good work and service to the company...I am not going to get hired.

I just finished paying off my gas bill from last winter (even though I live in a tiny efficiency apartment with only my two cats) and the heat is coming on in the building tomorrow. Or at least I hope it is coming back on tomorrow. It really wasn't fun stepping out into the cold after showering this morning.

Am I better off than I was four years ago? No, I would have to say that I am not. Is Kerry going to do any better than Bush? I can't really say. Its gotten pretty sad when the deciding factor for choosing a president has become, "Well, he can't do worse." I would hope that he can't do worse. As much as I love living in Cleveland, it sucks that there aren't any jobs here and the whole city is going down the toilet because there isn't any money to stop it.

I saw some Republicans being interviewed on TV this morning about the debate, and one woman said that hopefully the City would keep up with the cleaning that they did for the debate. Everyone knows that regardless of economic conditions, a tidy city is a thriving city. Of course, I live on the other side of town from the debate so there weren't any road crews to pick up trash, or street sweepers cleaning the debris out of the streets in my neighborhood. Not even a sweep to get the hookers or the homeless people or the drug dealers out of the public eye. My neighborhood isn't holding the debate, so it doesn't really matter in the public perception of things.

To the candidates and the media, my neighborhood doesn't exist. John Kerry or George Bush don't hold rallies in my neighborhood, hell even Dennis Kucinich doesn't do that. When does the hope start in that area?

It is so much easier to just put a spit shine on the isolated part of the city where the media is right now, even as I type these words. I am sure that Chris Matthews and the people from CNN appreciate the effort that our mayor and our city is put forward on their behalf. I doubt if the Vice Presidential candidates even look out of the windows of their chartered planes and their limos in order to see what is going on in the world, what is really going on in the world.

Well, I am tired this morning, but it is more than just being physically tired. My soul feels weary this morning, because deep down inside I feel like it doesn't really matter. It doesn't matter who gets voted into the White House, because there is just too much of a vested interest in the status quo for too many. When are we going to get some real change? Thomas Jefferson had said that if we became fed up with the American government that we should just tear it all down, move things a little further West and build up something new and better.

That would be great, building a new and better government. It is also a pipe dream. Maybe that would have worked a few hundred years ago, but not any more. These things take on a weight and a strength of their own, and unfortunately there just aren't enough people who have the willingness, and the strength of their own, to fight the BIG fight...the fight that they are willing to fight even if they know that they might not win it.

Ok, I guess I should stop ranting now and go back to fuming...