I'm making a career of evil.

Having officially had 'enough', I've decided that my previous motivations in life were largely misdirected. As such, I've decided to move towards my back-up plan: villainy.

Now, as I see it, I need the following things to be successful as a villain:

1. A theme.
2. A series of bizarre hang-ups to use as a motivation for unfocused revenge.
3. Henchpersons.
4. A new wardrobe and 'villainous style'.
5. A doomsday device.
6. A stack of evil schemes.
7. A nemesis.

I am taking suggestions for all of the above, and I'm taking applications for #3. I specifically need interchangable goons, eccentric assassins, and a second-in-command.

Trent's Evil Organization, Ltd. is an equal-opportunity employer.

My Uncle Truman

I know everyone is waiting for news of my trip, and it will come in a large, well-thought out post. I don't have internet very much out here and so I have to keep things short until I get back to Tulsa. This, however, warranted borrowing a computer.

My uncle Truman died yesterday at about 3:30 in the afternoon. I say died for a reason, because "passed on" fails to express the loss that I, and the world itself, is faced with. My uncle Truman (actually my great uncle) was a remarkable man. He lived longer and better than any human has a right to hope for, and was my inspiration in many things. Even in the twilight of his life he was teaching watercolor painting to the others in his shared community. He was a strong, noble man, and is worthy of remembrance.

He is survived by his wife, Mildred, and a large family that includes myself.

In other news, my sister was in a car accident. Fortunately, she is alright, even though the airbag failed to deploy. I am relieved beyond all knowing that she is going to be well. 

-Trent  

Breaking the Chains of User-Created Content Exploitation

Ok, I believe strongly in user created content. Heck, its the best way to get a lot of things done. Seriously, look at Spore!

But sometimes user-created content gets exploited. And that's the situation with Wikia, a wiki-hosting company that, up until now, hosted the Transformers Wiki. In short, because their advertising system was made to support a lowest-common denominator system, they began imposing increasingly limiting rules on how people ran their wikis, to the point that those hideous animated, noise-making ads started being put within the body of the wiki entries themselves.

That's right. You go to read about, say, Blitzwing, or, say, me, and there would be a two-inch square screeching monstrosity howling at you to buy Pringles like some rabid baboon. And this would be displacing, and in some cases, covering up content.

Well, it was Wikia's servers, so one might argue that they were within rights (though not ethics) to change their rules constantly and outright mislead their contributors (who, BTW, make their money for them.) But it was also within the rights of those contributors to beat feet outta there. And they did. The whole thing is now located at www.tfwiki.net, thanks to bold culture heroes like David Willis (the Shortpacked dude, as some know him). The wiki has taken control of its own destiny, and that to me is what the internet experience is all about.

I don't do much contributing to the wiki, since I currently have a hand in producing TF fiction. But I did write their press release for the move, I support their move and the motivations and principles behind it, and I encourage everyone to check them out. This isn't your standard dry wiki: its informative and irreverent, the way the internets/interweb/tubes/webway/snarkzone/that Tron Place ought to be. After all, nothing that considers me worthy of an encyclopedic profile probably shouldn't take itself seriously.

Really, check it out:

Trent Troop @ TFWiki.net

And no, I didn't create my own page.