bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

I have a couple of important things
to finish today, so just notes:

*  Tweetr: best desktop app for
Twitter I've found so far.

*  8hands: very interesting desktop
app.  Windows-only right now, as it's
in early Alpha, and generally Not
Right Yet: but it's a desktop app that
monitors multiple social networks
for you.  I have mine watching
MySpace, Flickr and Facebook
simultaneously, reporting new
events and messages in realtime.
Could be massively useful in the
long term.  At least for me.

*  Very into desktop apps right
now.  Pownce's desktop app finally
started working properly the other
day; its most interesting use is as
a system to push files between a
group of friends, much more
smoothly than regular IM achieves
it.  I'm there as

http://www.pownce.com/ellis

right now, so if there's anyone I
know who's still using it, ping me.

*  (My eyesight still gives out when
scanning the list of people following
me on Twitter to see if there's
anyone I know there.)

*  Am still amazed at how busy The
Club Of Mars is.  Glad to see 800-odd
of you having fun with it.  

http://clubofmars.ning.com

*  I'm at the pub and don't have URLs,
google the things.

*  Trying to stop myself from
buying a bunch of domain names --
I don't have time for new projects.

*  Except that Ariana and I spent
the weekend (across 8 hrs time
difference) testing a new idea I
specced out the other week, and
we might get that up on its feet
for private testing in another week
or so.  And I need to come up with
a name for that today, too.  Gah.

*  (She basically smashed three or
four systems together to create
a slowchat: asynchronous rolling
group conversation -- like a super-
charged version of the old IRC
always-open channels people used
to live in.  Anyone remember that?
Where you used to sign in when you
got up and sign out when you
crashed?  Or, of course, the old
chat room on WEF, which served
the same purpose for many.)

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warrenellis: Someone stop me from buying another domain name before it’s too laaaaate

warrenellis: Siege, of all people, is now sending me mail from an iPhone. There is something indefinably Wrong about this.

warrenellis: Website re-skin for the new season progresses. Having some ideas for web stuff. Would like them to stop now.

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

If you happen to stay in the Drake
Hotel in Toronto during the month
of September, you will be presented
with a copy of CROOKED LITTLE
VEIN.  All month.  Anyone who checks
in.  Whether you want it or not.
And, when you retire to your room,
you will find on your phone there
a recorded message.  From me.
Talking about CROOKED LITTLE
VEIN.

How bizarre is that?

Of all the promotional stunts I've
been involved with, this one is by
far the oddest.

*   *   *   *   *

In other news: THE ENGINE closes
around midnight UK time tonight.

Now, I did say that I had other plans
for online stuff following the closure
of The Engine.   They go like this:

*  I'm being poked and prodded by
a few people about maybe starting
(again) a private community space
for friends and fellow travellers,
but I don't know about that.

* However, when FREAKANGELS
starts later this year, it will come
with its own state-of-the-art(ish)
community space, built on the very
accessible Vanilla system.  It will
be unlike the Engine in almost every
way, and very much a fresh start.
Like FREAKANGELS the comic, the
community will be funded and
hosted by Avatar Press.

Obviously, we'll do the major
announcement when the comic
itself launches in a couple of months
or so.  But I said I'd mention what
was next before the Engine closes,
and so I have.

iForward!

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warrenellis: I must be mad, I’m looking at POD book services…

bad signal
WARREN 

I just found out, through a letter
from my half-sister, that my
stepfather died a couple of weeks
ago.  Never got on with the bastard
particularly well; one of those people
where it was hard to tell if he was
massively bipolar or just an arsehole.
He got run over some years ago,
to the laughter of many, and had
a morphine pump installed in the
leg that got wrecked.  It seems that
mistakes were made during a
recent surgical overhaul of the pump,
and he died at home of deep vein
thrombosis a week later.  Evidently
my brother found him.  He'd been
dead a few days, I gather.

Hadn't spoken to him since my mum's
funeral.  His funeral's today, and,
as I say, I just found out.  The date
stamp on the envelope suggest our
local postal service has worked its
usual magic, and smoke signals would
have been a better option.  So, no,
I'm not there, though it might have
been worth popping along just to
make sure he's dead.

Still, I learned a lot from the man,
stupid evil old shitbag that he was.
Including, I think, looking at his
behavior over the years and deciding
that that's not what a man is.  That
said, he gave me the first job I
ever had --  a Saturday milkman
at age 16, one of the worst jobs
you can conceive of, and hugely
instructive.

We came to an understanding, over
the years, and I know he had a
certain respect for me, for doing
things my own way.  And, he once
told me, for moving out at 18,
which he said he couldn't have done.
Of course, at the time he told me
that, I didn't know he'd destroyed in
a fit of anger a box of books I'd left
at the house.

Still and all...not going to be a very
productive day, I think.  That's no
way to go.

Goodbye, you spiteful old bastard.
Sleep well.

-- W

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Warren Ellis: “The (Jack) Kirby tradition is to create a new comic.”

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Just found  this out: if you order the Sub Press limited edition
of CROOKED LITTLE VEIN  by the end of Tuesday, they'll
knock $15 off the cover  price.

http://subterraneanpress.com/index.php/2007/08/27/announcing-crooked-little-ve

in-by-warren-ellis/

--  W  

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bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Someone’s just unearthed a post I wrote on, I think, MySpace, possibly
a year ago. And I don’t remember writing it. Which doesn’t bode well,
really. It may have been one of those “hey someone else is looking
after my daughter I can drink the entire whisky cabinet” weekends.
The post reads:

“I have decided that the next stage of my Conquering of the world
requires that I take a flock, or perhaps coven, of Internet Wives.

“For the men reading this, I believe I also require an army of
Eunuch Guards to attend them.

“It’s a horrible fate for you all, I know, but you can’t stand in
the way of the Future.”

What’s worse: I am completely sober (if hopped up on Turkish coffee),
and I’m wondering if there isn’t some kind of web badge or merch
I could get out of this. If people are freaky enough to wear the HOLY
SLUT ARMY t that Donna Desborough knocked out, then maybe
an INTERNET WIFE t….

…no. I need more coffee. And possibly a slap.

– W

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bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Subterranean  Press are to produce a special limited edition of
CROOKED LITTLE VEIN, with a  new cover by my old friend
Clayton Cubitt, better known to the world of  pervert photography
as Siege ( http://www.claytoncubitt.com/ ).

All  editions will be signed by myself and Siege.  Siege, of
course, might  just wipe his cock on the signature sheets.
Hell, so might I.

All  details live at the following  link:

http://subterraneanpress.com/index.php/2007/08/27/announcing-crooked-little-ve

in-by-warren-ellis/

I  would ask you to remember: I'm not the publisher, nor am I the
vendor,  distributor, postman or any other bloody thing, and cannot
answer any  questions that may surface like gristly lumps in the
sewage treatment plant  of your mind.

-- W  

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bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

National holiday, here in the mother
country.  But not for me.  Too
much to do.  Hit a slowdown point
on two jobs, where I can't quite see
where to go next.  Mike Moorcock
had a formula for that, when he
was writing fast: descend into a
minor character.  But that doesn't
always work when you're writing
in 22-page units.  Not getting
enough bloody sleep is the problem,
but deadlines don't move.

Reviews continue to come in on the
novel.  Mostly positive, amazingly:
I've had two or three beatings, but,
to my great amusement, one of
them seemed not to have read the
book -- "quoting" things that aren't
actually in the book is always a red
flag -- and the others seemed to
have had their sense of humour
surgically removed.  On the whole,
I seem to have gotten away with it.
Which was the absolute best I could
hope for.  Though if I ever meet the
Entertainment Weekly reviewer
who called what I do for a living
"picture books"....

And last week I wrote a couple of
hundred words on BATTLESTAR
GALACTICA for a Rolling Stone
feature on the autumn US tv
season.  I'm presuming that'll be
out sometime next month.

Back to work.

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Warren Ellis: watching rugby with daughter = ++good. Wales being stomped by France is also ++good.

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

A drunk and  bad-tempered little thing, it  is:

http://suicidegirls.com/news/politics/22173/

I crawl away  now.

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Warren Ellis: 2/2 , bombs

Warren Ellis: 1/2 Sunday Hangover written. Time to sleep + dream of being able to bomb the shit out of my enemies using only my mind. And, I suppose, bombs

Warren Ellis: oh my god i swapped my blood for red wine

Warren Ellis: Today? The Work. Tonight? The Drunk. Later tonight? The Suicide Girls column. Oh dear god.

bad signal
ME

For those who were interested in
this -- and for those laughing at
me, you bastards -- I sorted out
the kit I'm carrying in Teh Bag. 

The bag itself is a weathered-looking,
leathery satchel thing -- not enough
pockets, not really big enough, but
it'll do for now.  It contains:

*  Sony Cybershot P200, 7.2
megapixels.

*  A ruled Moleskine and a blank
Moleskine -- one for notes, one
for sketches.

*  A black Pentel gelpen, a cheap
propelling pencil.

*  1GB Sandisk Sansa mp3 player
with noise-cancelling earbuds.

*  Treo 600.

*  Treo foldaway keyboard (no
longer made!).

*  Baggallini travel pouch zipped
into the back for holding bank books
etc.

*  Docupen R800 handheld mobile
scanner.

*  Nokia N73 phone.

*  Nokia bluetooth foldaway
keyboard for the N73.  Which is
amazingly useful, as the phone has
excellent email and websurfing
provision.

*  Dynamo windup micro-torch.
Which has its uses, believe me, as
we tend to take weekend breaks in
the country, often miles from any
streetlight.

*  Gelert 8x21 monocular.  Also
for country travel.

*  Victorinox Swiss Champ knife and
survival kit.  Not my favourite
Swiss knife, but since I can't find my
Huntsman, this'll do double-duty
in the garden.  The survival kit
holster it sits in has useful pockets
-- I can get rid of the signal mirror
and other Ray Mears-style stuff
and repack it with plasters and meds.
Also comes with a handy sharpening
stick.

*  Currently MIA -- a wind-up phone
charger I got for Xmas.

Obviously, I can't leave the country
with any of this shit.  But in daily
life I always found myself wanting
one of these items and not having
them on me.  I mean, clearly there's
something wrong with my life that
I'd find myself deep in East Sussex
woodland, miles from civilisation,
and wanting a monocular (or a
signal mirror, come to think of it).
But one day I may need to whittle
myself a coracle out of a tree
stump and then fashion a sail out
of ferns, bark and forty feet of
nylon cord.  In the dark.  While on
the web.

Shut up.

-- W

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Warren Ellis: I glow in the dark. BECAUSE I CHOOSE TO.