Beyond My Geeky Life

 In what is a not at all surprising turn of events with the way the publishing market has been going for some time now, Marvel Comics is going to do some major changes and focus highly on their digital publishing http://goodereader.com/blog/digital-comic-news/marvel-phasing-out-retail-comic-distribution-to-focus-on-digital We know that e-books are taking off big time, making big bucks for publishing companies with little in the way of actual costs compared to traditional publishing. For good or ill this is the way that we are headed. E-books and digital comics are normally cheaper than their print counter parts (Not always, as I have seen some big name e-books cost as much as print), they take up a lot less room and are easier to carrying around. So there are is a lot on the plus side for going digital. I myself love the feel of a physical book. There is just something about actually turning the page. That is something you do not get from a digital book. I am also curious ...

I recently finished up the novel Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. I am still not fully sure what I actually read though. That is just the kind of read Snow Crash is. Now to try and explain Snow Crash and see if I can make any sense of it. Snow Crash takes place in California in the near future (Well, actually an alternate present that feels near future). According to Amazon.com it is a cyberpunk novel, which makes sense. Yet somehow while reading it there was nothing about it that registered as being Cyberpunk in my mind. In this world there is a government, as the Feds are still there, yet they somehow are not really running things. The rule of law seems to be that franchises are the real power. In this world your pizza delivery (and other) franchises are openly controlled by the Mafia. You are a citizen of whatever franchise you pledge your loyalty to.  The police are a pay for service organization and the prisons are all businesses, some being run out of the basement of...

In the last Amateur Skeptics podcast we recorded ( http://amateurskeptics.com/ )we ended the podcast by talking about G.I.Joe's 50th anniversary. Don't ask what that has to do with being skeptical. it is our podcast and we will go off topic as we please We had a good talk about the toy line's history and I got to show off my knowledge concerning the topic. And I was not even the one to put the story up for discussion. Our art guy (Yes, we have an art guy. That's how fancy a podcast we are) put together G.I.Joe style filecards from the 80's line for everyone involved in the podcast. I really liked mine, so here it is for all to see. Thanks Mac. The podcast, Episode 104: American Heroes, should be up some time this week.

Through a special Lego on-line program called Lego Cuusoo ( http://lego.cuusoo.com/ ) we have gotten a Back to the Future Lego set and will be getting Ghostbuster Legos in the very near future. The way Cuusoo works is that people propose ideas for possible Lego set and if the idea gets 10,000 supporters, it is up for consideration by the Lego company. If the project is doable, then it can move on to being an actually produced Lego set. Very often the reason for a project to get rejected is due to licensing rights. Well up until recently the idea of Legos doing any Doctor Who themed set was an impossibility due to the company Character Options owning the right to Doctor Who toys and producing a Lego like line of Doctor Who building toys. Lego has just made an anoouncemnt that something has changed. http://www.doctorwhotv.co.uk/lego-doctor-who-one-step-closer-61298.htm No actual information as to why they are now allowed to consider Doctor Who themes, as it seems that Character Opt...

We have now gone to both years of The Denver Comic Con and have our tickets purchased for this year's DCC with our tax refund. Up until this point I had not been overly excited about any of the guest. Yes, Bruce Campbell is cool and I will try to meet him if the line for him is reasonable. But for whatever reason him being there did not overly excite me. For a little while now they have been hinting at there being a big time Doctor Who guest and my family has been patiently waiting to learn who it will be. Today they announced that we will be getting Peter Davison, the Fifth Doctor. As it turns out my oldest boy is working on a Fifth Doctor's costume, so that is great timing. I just told him about the announcement and he was very excited. Last year we got to meet Colin Baker, the Sixth Doctor. It seems that DCC is going to keep things going strong for us. Now there is still time for them to announce more guests, as we have a few months before the convention so there is ...

About a year ago I started up this little video blog on youtube I called Opening the Package. I did it for a little while with my boys, but then I got sidetracked and left it alone for a while.  Jump to a few weeks ago when I felt like doing a few new episodes for it and now I have started it up again. Over the course of the episodes I have talked about a wide verity of action figures and toys. I express my views on toy collecting, the good and the bad. I give reviews on various pieces I have picked up. And I open and play with the toys. If you have an interest in toy collecting and wish to see my ideas on it, go check it out http://www.youtube.com/user/OpeningThePackage?feature=watch Some of them are a little long. I try real hard to keep them shorter, but I have a bad habit of loosing track of time when talking about something I am that passionate about. I'll keep doing these every so often as long as I am having fun doing them.

A little over a year ago the long running comic book The Amazing Spider-man reached issue 700. Marvel comics decided to make it a huge milestone by having Peter Parker die, trapped in Dr. Octopus's failing body. Otto Octavious had taken control of Peter Parker's body. In the end Octavious declared himself The Superior Spider-man, which was the title of the replacement series.  Basically you have Peter Parker's body being controlled by Dr. Octopus, except part of Peter is still in there trying to keep Octavious in check. I felt from the get go that this was a bad idea. I've read the first issue of The Superior Spider-man and was unimpressed with it. It just was not Spider-man and was not going to work. Now Marvel has come out and announced that Superior Spider-man is coming to an end and they will be starting The Amazing Spider-man up again. http://herocomplex.latimes.com/comics/peter-parker-to-return-in-new-amazing-spider-man-no-1-by-dan-slott For me there is no...