I used to make comics. I know that because strangers would look at my work and immediately share their most excruciatingly banal experiences with me:

— that time a motorised wheelchair cut in front of them in the line at the supermarket;
— when the dentist pulled the wrong tooth and they tried to get a discount;
— eating off an apple and finding half a worm in it;

every anecdote rounded of with a triumphant “You should make a comic about that!”

Then I would take my 300 pages graphic novel out of their hands, both of us knowing full well they weren’t going to buy it, and I’d smile politely, “Yeah, sure. Someday.”

“Don’t try to cheat me out of my royalties when you publish it,” they would guffaw and walk away to grant comics creator status onto their next victim.

Nowadays I make work that feels even more truly like comics to me than that almost twenty years old graphic novel. Collage-y, abstract stuff that breaks all the rules just begging to be broken. Linear narrative is ashes settling in my trails, montage stretched thin and warping in new, interesting directions.

I teach comics techniques at a university level based in my current work. I even make an infrequent podcast talking to other avantgarde artists about their work in the same field.

Still, sometimes at night my subconscious whispers the truth in my ear: Nobody ever insists I turn their inane bullshit nonevents into comics these days, and while I am a happier, more balanced person as a result of that, I guess that means I don’t make comics any longer after all.

  • 1 Post
  • 22 Comments
Joined 29 days ago
Cake day: November 23rd, 2024
  • haverholm@kbin.earthtoFediverse@lemmy.world•how do I microblog?
    6·
    3 days ago

    There are different ways of approaching microblogs — reading, writing and interacting. You have @s and hashtags in mind already, they’re a good way of finding conversations and engaging with people.

    You’ll find users who write interesting stuff about your favourite subjects — you’d want to follow those to get all their updates. That includes boosts/reposts, i.e. posts by others that those you follow share to spread a message. That will also help you find more interesting people and organisations.

    Now, interaction. I have come recently to Lemmy from Mastodon instances, and I see quite a bit of difference in the etiquette and forms of socialising. Two generalisations that I can think of:

    1. Mastodon and other fedi microblogs were built by users who were fed up by Twitter’s lax moderation of harassment, so they built in safeguards against that; Lemmy was made in reaction to the commodification and heavy handed enshittification of Reddit, but largely expect the same conversations here. They are not the same mentality.

    2. On Lemmy, you post a question or thought in a dedicated community to get answers or start a discussion. Each community has its own room where the discussion is centred around one subject. On the microblog side, you might imagine one big, sprawling social club where people mingle and form smaller groups to talk about one thing, then disperse and join other conversations. And sometimes they just talk about their pets or hobbies to nobody in particular.

    Sorry, I’m writing this over morning coffee and I know I’m only covering broad fragments of the microblog experience as it differs from using a forum. I hope it helps though.

  • haverholm@kbin.earthtoFediverse@lemmy.world•As a reminder, ClubsAll is still showing all of Lemmy's content without federating back
    4·
    4 days ago

    Look, at a glance it looks to me like you’re populating a monetised platform with content off the fediverse without attribution. That’s strike one.

    Then you seem to stall for time to implement federation while admitting your developer quit… and continuing the above content scraping. Strike two.

    And from what I read in this thread it appears you’re actively dodging defederation by using subdomains to keep scraping content. Strike three.

    My concern in this is the integrity of the fediverse and its users. Yours, apparently, is “saving” a platform that leeches content off federated platforms to make a buck off those users. I don’t see much chance of agreement on “what is fair”.

    @jwr1@kbin.earth, I stand by that request to defederate.

  • haverholm@kbin.earthtoFediverse@lemmy.world•Technology Connections' thoughts on Mastodon
    934·
    16 days ago

    “Ghost town” = Not driven to oversharing by algorithms.

    “getting shit” = nobody wanting to listen to a youtuber’s outrage bait.

    It must be confusing to log into the fediverse straight off of Youtube, though. “Why aren’t people compulsively clicking and subscribing to everything? How am I not being recommended radicalising posts by conspiracy theorists and terror organisations within five clicks?”

    “Honey, this is Mastodon”

    <switches to Blooskie>

    “Ah, much better!”

  • haverholm@kbin.earthtoFediverse@lemmy.world•Your explanation of federation that it "works like email" will be misunderstood
    282·
    22 days ago

    Why are nerds so insistent that people understand technology?

    Because technology forms the basis of the online environments we inhabit, and gives us the tools to tell how, say, our data is stored and processed.

    If you’re going to get in the water, it’s probably a good skill to be able to swim. If you’re going to drive a car and don’t have the faintest idea how the engine works, you’ll be at the mercy of manufacturers and mechanics.

    The solution to your issue is not that everybody should conform to the lowest common denominator of technology literacy, but that the general internet user should get a fucking idea of the environment they navigate.

    Stop being nerds

    Never.