Just downloaded the perfect trailer encode. 100 megabytes T.T But it was worth it. Gawd. I want the movie now so bad. The need overwhelms my soul.
Now listening to: "Believe" Yellowcard
Condolences to all affected.
Hmm, long time without updates, eh? Well, the past week has just been fabulous - in both good and bad ways.
First off, the NKF fiasco. It's funny how greed leads to stupidity, and stupidity leads to downfall. Obviously, if the Durai guy didn't try to sue SPH, which, may I add, Singapore's only paper and thus has much influence, he might not have found himself in such deep shit.
Honestly, it is quite surprising how the public went up in such an uproar over his salary. I mean, c'mon! Did everyone honestly believe NKF was some goody-two-shoes charity with only the welfare of its patients in mind? Someone must have been leeching off the funds. I'm only surprised it wasn't more than $600,000 per year.
Then again, if Durai could get the company to pay for his car, what ever is stopping him from using it to pay for his house? Pfft. Worse still, I find it strange to see people supporting him. May I say, "Wow, how stupid can one get?"
Today, while reading the forum page, I saw someone actually agreeing with NKF's tatics on garnering donations. Amazing. I never thought I found have saw a person as blind as that writer, but today I have. God bless me.
As a charity organisation, its first and foremost goal is to ensure the care of its patients. You don't make sure your own salary is high. No. 600,000 dollars is not the way to go. It isn't justified, no matter what you say. If you wanted a high-paying job, you don't work on a non-profit board. Pay in a charity is low or just sufficient for oneself most of the money gather should be channelled to the sick. Reward in this line of work isn't money; it's the satisfaction and joy of seeing an ill person surviving to see the sun the next day. It is about the subtle smiles, the infectious, lively laughter they have when they escape Death again. It was never about money, or recognition or anything "entitlements" shit like what Durai had.
A charity lives and pracitically breathes on the public's trust. An organisation that pleads on the people's morals and ethics should have an upstanding integrity on their own. This isn't just about the gross amount of money Durai had entitled himself to, or how they had lied to the public with a straight face. It was how they ran NKF like a business-oriented company, and in doing so, slowly blinding themselves to their original goal: to help.
I'm a cynical person, but I'll give them the benefit of a doubt: perhaps they did start out as a group that wanted to help. Yet, through the years as they aggressively targeted the public with emotional-blackmailing shows and adverts, NKF has obviously been gradually intoxicated by the scent of money, slowly losing sight of whom they were. They ran themselves as a business-oriented organisation, and with that, place getting money as the topmost priority, with the patients themselves added almost like an afterthought. In their wealth and success they forgot what it was to be poor and only sought to be rich.
Business isn't charity. You don't "help" in the corporate world, you backstab. You plunge knives into each other's backs, and as they wither and die you take over them. And thus, it was like that: NKF grew bigger, and the smaller charities died out. People thought it was the only charity. . . with that sort of insane publicity I'm not surprised.
I never liked NKF in the beginning. I long suspected the CEO of NKF already had like half a million per annum as his salary. Rest assured, I won't donate to NKF. Ever. It's not really about being selfish (tho' I have doubts about those to seek the subsidies. . . I've seen them dyed their hair even when they're supposed to be poor and dying), but honestly, 30.5 years more before the reserves runs out on current subsidy rates is alot. Nothxsverymuch, I'll keep the money to myself for my own family and friends.
Moving on, episode 38 of Gundam SEED DESTINY had a new opening/ending song. Wings of Words by Chemistry is the opening song and also by far the worse opening song ever. Gawd. Horrible, Terrible, just plain Shitty. Kimi wa Boku ni Niiteiru by See-Saw, the the ending song, is the best ending song so far. Best, Gosu, Holy Fucking Shit kind of good, with a side dish of exaggeration. Kinda balances out, I guess.
Also, Harry-fuckingpieceofcrap-Potter, Book 6 is out. Wonder if there's more loopholes being added into this cliche plot. Gah, I'm too lazy to write a tirade for this. Potter can eat shit and bite the dust for all I care, and even if it's ending is the best thing that graced the Earth (impossible, but fans can dream), it still doesn't discount how bad the starting was. Or how much the book has twisted something as amazing as magic to a mundane, annoying plot device.
Now listening to: "Kimi wa Boku ni Niiteiru" by See-Saw
Slacking off from my studies, I've come here to post this: The Gosu Arts and Techniques of Fanfiction writing, by yours truely.
Honestly, the stuff I see people churning out can be bloody retarded. I have seen great fics. I have good fiction, with a plot so well written it leaves you craving for more. I have seen these stories, these little kilobytes of information contain a better insight, a more indepth and engaging tale than the original itself.
Reading fanfiction is a daunting job, and shouldn't be attempted unless you want to be: 1. fall into a hopeless pit of dank addiction which you never really be able to get out of; 2. spent time sifting through the massive piles of fiction, dividing it into THE shit, or just plain o' shit. It's quite sad to see many fics falling to the plain shit section, because they basically have a crappy plot and/or they have horrible english.
Take Harry Potter for example. I hate the books with a fiery passion, but for some reason, I like the fanon. Strange, I know. So anyway, while on my epic quest (seriously epic, considering thereare 193417 fics in the HP section) to find a good read, I saw several things:
1. Anything fic with chapters that have below a thousand words are usually crap.
2. Trends happen. There was a trend of "harry-becomes-an-elementalist-or-some-stupid-crap-like-that" some time ago, and for a while you could see a few pages straight filled with these sort of trashes, drowning the good fics who started in trend in their stupidity.
3. People seem to have no creativity. At least, on FF.Net. I mean, c'mon, every "six-year-fic", or in other words, some great re-write by some random guy ends up like this: Harry mopes, then he snaps out of it, then he decides to become stronger by "training". Somehow, in one summer, he becomes g0su, and can basically own everyone. Through training, he also gains some sort of godly body, which every girl suddenly wants. Wait, there's more! Ginny also becomes hot, like a Greek Goddess, and thus through mutual lust, the two find "love". Add in some angst, some spice, and alittle oh-so-sick-sweet-love-crap, and there you go, a typical fiction.
Honestly, its completely stupid. Oh, did I forget to mention: somehow, Harry would have a birthday bash, which he has never gotten, and after years of building up his emotional walls the boy decided to go all crying and wussy-like in front of his friends and reveal his terrible past. Oh, how completely realistical.
This goes the same to Naruto fiction. Even if you go copy a basic ploltline, the least you could do was make it different. Like not the same. C'mon! In HP, I believed some guy posted a fanfic that had a Harry-going-to-Azkaban-but-innocent plot, and a Harry/Bellatrix pairing. Honestly speaking, it was a decently-written fic, but at least the plot was original. He twisted in a way that the Potter guy was the Lord of Azkaban (through some lame-o method, but we can forgive that), and added the Bellatrix pairing quite nicely. . . at least as nicely as it could go. I've never seen a realistical HP/BB pairing on FF.Net, so what the hell. Anyway, not half a week after the fucking thing was posted, pages of fanfics started to pop out, with HP becoming lord of something, usually Azkaban, and marries Bellatrix, despite the fact that she killed his closest family. Gosh, how completely original. In fact, even Naruto has better fiction, despite the more linear plot.
The one thing about fanfiction is that no matter how you twist it, unless its a crossover (which has special rules), you should always try to fit it in with the original universe. Evil!Harry and Demon!Naruto, or Killer!Kira is fine, but you must explain them carefully and not too technically. It ruins the fic, or at least to me it does, when you put stupid shit like a character named "anne" in Naruto, or somehow Bellatrix becomes lovely-dopey and "good" and regretful of her actions after like, what, 20 years of pure torture and death? That's a retarded transition.
Yup, I'm a crazy Fanfiction Reader. Maybe I'll write more on this. Scratch that, I will write more on this ;)
Now listening to: "Gifts and Curses" Yellowcard.
I rest my head on my arm, leaning against the seat in front of me for support. My eyes swivel; the black orbs darkening as they traced imaginary, intricate patterns on the wooden floor. I scanned the ground, and a wispy ghost of a smile peeked through my blank facade. Faint amusement welled up in me, like a soft caress against my skin as I saw the winding wood grains lay sprawling in the irregular strips of wood. They were a dizzy landscape of shifing sand dunes, ebbing up and down in long, lazy sweeps.
Time was not a matter, and the air hung heavily on me. Silence reigned, and the sweet, sickly taste of anxiety filled the large hall. I licked my lips, tasting the invisible fear, sniffing the honey-like syrup of tangy worry that wafted around me like a thick, slow-swirling swamp. It was delicious; a tantalising taste that left a growing crave in my stomach. I lapped hungrily, my mouth soaking the human emotion. It was intoxicating, this fear, and I enjoyed every drop of it. It was refreshing, like ancient wine that tickled my throat. . .
Then I was jerked back to reality, and my joy was lost. I felt my humanity rearing its digusting head, and I tried to hold its weakness back. My strength left me, and I felt myself shuddering in tingling nervousness. I wanted to scream, but my body did not obey. The rush of emotions suffocated me, drowning me in a numb, painless agony. I felt my muscles quiver; my chest heaving as breaths came in short and quickly.
Soon the panic wore off, and I regained use of my body. My. . .humanity receded, but not before leaving its loathesome taint of vulnerability onto my perfectness. It angered me, and my eyes flashed a dangerous red. I held my rage back, and set my mind back into calmness.
I sat back, waiting, watching, and quietly observing this failed, fragile species.
