About damn time. Doc talks at "40 going on 14"

For 20 years, I've known Joel, Mike and Pat. We've been through a lot, even if we haven't all kept in touch as often as we'd like. We met through performing on stage and playing D&D and Shadowrun in college, and lived in the same dorms and later apartments for years before marriage, moving away and the rest of it meant our respective paths diverged for a bit. In those years, at one time or another, we've all worked as comedians – stand-up, improv, internet radio, etc. We just never collaborated the way our friends and spouses always hoped we would. Until now.

From "A Midsummer Night's Dream," I'm far left holding a brick, Pat is dressed as a Lion next to me, and Joel is the blonde with the goatee on the far right. I have strange friends.

It is no secret here that when I am gainfully employed, I don't post nearly as often as I'd like to on this blog, or even to my Twitch/YouTube channels. I'm still out there experiencing geek culture, and still feeling the effects of my months being unemployed, but I post when I want to, not because I need to anymore. I've come to terms with that. I like these outlets to be a labor of love, not one purely of obligation, because the content is always better when I'm inspired, rather than required to create it. The collaboration I've found in this podcast, called 40 going on14... well, it is inspiring.

A few words to talk about the other folks on the podcast - Longtime readers already know Joel from his guest blogging here, but unless you already follow his own blog, where I have had the privilege of writing for myself, you might not know about his podcasting history. He was a part of The Awful Show, and is now one of the Undercover Unitards, bringing comedy and music to the internet weekly. He also does a more personal show, The Sunshine Happy kPants Hour (the "k" in kPants is silent.) Mike and Pat have influenced a lot of the events that inspired me to write here about movies, games and comics. Since college, we've shared trips to Gen Con, various roleplaying campaigns, and done comedy together whether on-stage or off. Pat has recently been doing stand-up back in his home state of Texas, and Mike was at the helm of another show not so very long ago called "TikiGeeks."

Mike and I at Ed Debevic's, back in our college days.

The podcast takes on elements of pop culture that we remember from when we were growing up, and seeing those things repeating themselves now that we are approaching middle age. For our first show, we all watched both Conan The Barbarian films (1982 and 2011) and ran them through the paces of what we all thought about them. It was a hell of a lot of fun to create, and I'm pretty proud of the finished product, especially for a first try. If you haven't tried podcasts before, but have a 30-minute or more commute when you might listen to talk radio... give us a shot one day out of your week. I think you'll be glad you did. I know I'm happy helping make it.

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Blog Gadgets

“Weird” Al Yankovic – The Man, the Myth, the Breakfast Cereal.

This week, a geek icon has made his way into the news at the center of a controversy. “Weird” Al Yankovic posted on his blog that he had been nearly ready to announce a new album, he was waiting on artist approval for the final song, which would likely be the big single for the release. As a parody artist, all of "Weird" Al's music is protected from allegations of copyright infringement, but his personal policy is to obtain artist permission before commercially releasing a song based on their work.

"Weird" Al's classic look, maintained throughout the 1980s.

“Perform This Way”, based on Lady Gaga's “Born This Way” was written with the intention of being the final song on the new album. When he contacted Gaga's management for permission, he was told initially that she needed to hear the song before giving permission. He forwarded over the lyrics, assuming that if she knew the tune to her own song with his alternate lyrics, this would be enough. Her people sent back a message “She needs to HEAR the song, or the answer is no.” So, assuming the best about others, Yankovic recorded the song, a not inexpensive undertaking. He further offered to donate profits from the song to charity, and the answer came back: “Gaga says no.” The controversy over the situation raged from geek to geek over the internet, and Lady Gaga's manager assumed responsibility, saying that he never actually played the parody for her, she loves it... the answer is now yes. Hmm.

“Weird” Al is an artist that is loved by many, but especially by geeks. He's done several Star Wars parodies, he plays the incredibly nerdy accordion, and of course... his hit “White and Nerdy” hits most items on any geek's checklist of interests. Not all his fans are nerds or geeks (even if we rightly consider him one of “ours”,) Dave Grohl said that he knew that Nirvana had finally made it when “Weird” Al recorded “Smells Like Nirvana,” and Kurt Cobain called him a musical genius. Presidents of the United States liked his version of their hit “Lump” (“Gump”) so much, that they used his words to end the actual song in the live recording. Chamillionaire credited Yankovic for his Grammy for “Ridin'”, saying the exposure from “White and Nerdy” was incredible, with European fans telling him how they'd heard “his version” of the “Weird Al” song.

This isn't the first time that permission, or the lack thereof, has resulted in a scandal. Representatives for Coolio told Yankovic that the artist had given the okay for a parody of “Gangsta's Paradise”, but the artist himself was not a fan of 1996's “Amish Paradise.” This made “Weird” Al change his policy, insisting he needed to hear from the artist themselves regarding permission. James Blunt gave Yankovic the go ahead to record “You're Pitiful”, a parody of “You're Beautiful”, but after the song was recorded and ready to go, Atlantic Records rescinded permission. Rather than defend the song under Fair Use in court, the song was not commercially released, though “Weird” Al performs it live (at least once while wearing an “Atlantic Records SUCK” shirt.)

"If Madonna's allowed to reinvent herself every 15 minutes, I figure I should be good for a change at least once every 20 years."

After 35 years making music, from parodies about food recorded for the benefit of the Dr. Demento radio show in the late 1970s, through the feature film UHF which he wrote and starred in, and to present day, one nerdy favorite has remained current and relevant. He typically outlasts the musical careers of the people who inspire his comedy, and his writing remains clever and his humor typically ages well, even after the original song is forgotten, the parody remains.

My cynical side questions whether the Gaga controversy is truly the work of a manager overstepping his bounds and embarassing the artist he is supposed to represent, or whether this is a case of backpedaling after a public backlash. After all, Lady Gaga was the target of the ire of a lot of “Weird” Al fans after this story broke, and what has Coolio done lately? Seems like being on the wrong side of one of these scandals doesn't work out very well for an artist. What do you think?

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Blog Gadgets

I Pity The Fool.

 There's a reason that I've been making assurances for two whole days about the lack of a “gag post” for today's entry. Geeks and geek websites LOVE April Fool's day. Technology sites, gaming websites, webcomics, all love to come up with a phony image, new product/feature announcement or other humorous changes to their day-to-day web presence.

Social media is no exception, as YouTube gets in on the gag themselves, and your friends on Facebook, Twitter followers and other similar sites are likely to make phony updates to snare people who are both gullible and don't own a calendar. Don't get me wrong, I like these a lot, but some years, it feels like certain sites are trying too hard.

Mushroom Kingdom Hearts? Gmail Motion? Seven Dead in Protests in Syria? Wait... that last one wasn't funny.

I'm going to link to a lot of the sites I'm talking about, but April Fool's jokes are frequently posted for a day, and then removed from the web, so if you come across this article on April 2^nd or later, keep in mind that some of the links won't lead to anything funny. The usual suspects have turned out their annual April Fool's gags, and for me, two of the biggest and best have always been the World of Warcraft official Website, and ThinkGeek, the online shop for many, many assorted geeky products.

WoW has had some really good jokes over the years, announcing fake races like the Alliance Wisp, who is basically a sentient ball of light, and the Horde Ogre-Mage, who has two heads and is controlled by you and a randomly selected second player at the same time. This year, so far, we've seen three “announcements”, the first of which is most effective (and annoying) if viewed first.

• “Crabby”, a googly-eyed “Dungeon Helper” that pops up randomly on your screen to offer tips and advice is a great parody of Microsoft's “clippy”, the annoying paperclip assistant.
• The further announcement of the Tomb of Immortal Darkness dungeon, the gag being that you can't actually see anything (it is too dark), and “new gear” to give you tools to deal with the lack of light like a pet bat with a sonar ability, are almost as good.
• The fake “patch notes” for the next patch are potentially the funniest, but you'd only get the joke if you already play the game.

Oh, Crabby. Damn thing actually Rickrolled me with a link to Rebecca Black's "Friday."

Thinkgeek has announced a long list of new products for this year, from the fairly innocuous Star Wars Lightsaber popsicle, Angry Birds Pork Rinds, to the less believable “Original Shirt Plate” or Official Playmobil Apple Store Playset... and the big one, the USB Minecraft Nether Portal. These last two are the best of the joke products, in my opinion, and the concept and photography on both are examples of why I turn up on Thinkgeek once a year.

• The Apple Store Playset has a small Genius Bar, miniature Apple employees selling tiny iPods, iPads and iPhones, and a Keynote theater where Steve Jobs can announce new products, using a REAL iPhone as a screen for his presentation. Of course, there are optional add-ons (sold seperately.)
• The USB Minecraft Nether Portal features a desktop version of the square gateway to a blocky version of hell, where documents can be “filed where they belong” after being pushed through the mystic portal to the land of lava and zombie pigmen.

Who could forget the classic ThinkGeek Unicorn Meat? This year's entries are less likely to provoke threats of legal action.

There are countless pages of geeky April Fool's Day pranks out there this year, but these were some of the best, in my opinion. Were there any particularly awesome ones, from this year or years past that were your favorites? Discuss.

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Blog Gadgets