Spacehamster’s Blog

I borrowed a copy of Neil Gaiman’s Endless Nights from my local library last week. Unfortunately, it was at that exact moment that my mother was visiting, and she happened to flip through the book.

American Gods. Sandman. Death: The High Cost of Living. Of all the Neil Gaiman books why did she have to flip through that one?

Mom: Are you reading pornographic novels now?
Me (patiently): No Mum, Neil Gaiman’s novels aren’t pornographic.
Mom: But there’s a picture of a man sucking a woman’s breast! That’s pornography!
Me: I don’t read Neil Gaiman’s stories for the naughty pictures. And that image is perfectly in keeping with the story.
Mom (panicking, not listening): My eldest son is buying pornography!

Granted, that particular story illustrated by Milo Manara is rather risque, but it is perfectly appropriate for the story Neil wanted to tell. He has such a vivid and fertile imagination, and now my mother thinks he’s a smut writer.

Why me?

The first episode of the 2nd season of Doctor Who has just been shown on UK TV. What’s been fascinating about the new series is watching Doctor Who fandom’s reaction to the new series - which has, mildly, been quite tepid. Go ahead and read the postings in the Outpost Gallifrey forum if you don’t believe me. It’s amazing that a series that is so popular with a mainstream audience is so incredibly unpopular with fans. The first series received a hostile negative reception. There were accusations that Russell T. Davies was inserting “a gay agenda” in the series, in an effort to corrupt children. There were criticisms of Murray Gold’s music. And then there was the violent reaction of fans to the news that Christopher Eccleston was leaving. A reaction so violent that the forums were shutdown for several days.

In summary, hardcore “true” fans of Doctor Who hate the new series.

Why? Because this series isn’t as gritty or dark as the audio adventures and books they’ve been reading. It doesn’t contain any “traditional” elements that the fans can latch onto. This is Doctor Who revamped and made to entertain a 21st Century mainstream audience. It’s not meant to be watched by hardcore fans that want “The Champion of Time” and adult themes like sex and violence.

As someone who thoroughly enjoyed the new series (warts and all), I’m going to do my best to avoid the New series forums in the interim. I have no problem with criticism - everyone’s going to have gripes with certain aspects of the series. But it does tend to take the personal enjoyment out of things, when the only thing the “true fans” do is criticise and tear things apart.

No, I’m not referring to the washing detergent. Ajax is a new web design paradigm, the goal which is to give web-based applications the same level of user interactivity and functionality that you’d find in a Desktop application. If GMail is any indication, Ajax has already been a partial success.

I’m investigating whether it’s feasible to use Ajax in a web-based project that I’m about to work on. As the application requires a considerable amount of user-interactivity, Ajax looks to be the best candidate for the job. It’s either that or go back to the JSP/Javabeans-powered design I was using previously. A design which, despite my best efforts, was clunky to maintain.

It’s still early days yet - I’m still investigating different Ajax development tools. The most prominent being Backbase. Hopefully there are other tools out there that can be used. There will also be an Ajax-plugin available for Eclipse. The biggest problem is which server technology can be used. We use Microsoft’s IIS (Internet Information Server) at work, but most examples use the Open Source Tomcat server instead (which I personally prefer). After several bitter experiences with Microsoft on my current project, I’m not looking forward to using Micro$oft technology again.

**Sigh** Why can’t we just use Open-Source like everyone else?

I’ve been reading Neil Gaiman’s blog for about two years now, as I was just as intrigued by the life of a writer as I was by his writing. Up til’ now I’d only ever read Neil Gaiman’s work in the comics - two Sandman anthologies, Death: The High Cost of Living and ‘The Books of Magic’. They were all great reads. I’d never gotten into his novels until now, mostly because I enjoyed seeing artists weave their creations around Neil’s wonderful writing.

Out of curiosity, I borrowed ‘Stardust’ from my local library - and about 5 pages in I was hooked. With most other authors I’d read in my youth (Tom Clancy, Clive Cussler), there’s a tendency to immediately hook you from the very first paragraph. Neil’s novels seem to be a slow burn - he uses his prose to weave a world and then entraps you with a compelling narrative. I’d borrowed ‘Stardust’ for two whole weeks but I finished the entire novel off in one night - that’s how compelling it was.

I’d seen one correspondent on a mailing list dismiss Neil Gaiman’s writing as ‘juvenile’. I think the truth is that to enjoy Neil Gaiman’s writing, you must be willing to suspend your disbelief and let your imagination soar. His goal isn’t to write elaborate prose for the ultra-literary elite - it’s to use words to weave magical worlds that we, the reader, can get lost in. And that’s not the kind of thing that’s going to win the praise of the literati glitterati.

So if you love being enchanted by modern-day fairy tales and fables being written for a adult audience, then Neil Gaiman is definitely for you.

So in addition to shelling out $80 for Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion, Betheseda and Microsoft also want users to pay for downloading mods as well. Mods (modifications to a game) were once the purview of enthusiastic fans, and were always for free. So I find this attempt by Betheseda to cash in on the modding craze a little bit mercenary in nature. I’m not willing to pay $5AUS just so my horse can have access to some new armor. Especially when you consider that several free mods have already been released for the PC already. One recent example was a mod that gave you magical weapons at the very beginning of the game. If it’s a choice between a whole variety of magic weapons or paying to have my horse laden with armor, I’ll choose the weapons thanks.