So this is pretty much a bit of a rage on my part. Wrote my first angry letter earlier today to a data recovery software producer (was actually my second, but my real first one got sent to a German guy who couldn't read it, I discovered, so that doesn't count).
I finally became fed up with seemingly reliable companies saying something on their website and then not living up to it.
Not to sound too naive or anything, but does everyone on the internet lie? The nicest people resort to shit-talking the second they get online. And I’m not here to ponder the psychology behind it or the pros and cons of this digital freedom - most of it is pretty matter of fact - but I must wonder when seemingly reputable companies jump on this bandwagon.
Do ethics and standards not translate onto the internet? You find companies that, in person, engage with their customers in a very professional fashion, but put them online and suddenly they’re swindling and tricking with the best scammers. It’s as though some companies see the internet as that wide open, liminal space where you can say and promise anything without threat of moral or legal repercussion.
And they may be right.
When was the last time you saw a headline such as “Nigerian Scammer Syndicate Brought to Justice” or “Online Instant Acne Cure Company Tried for Fraud”. Companies seem to have free reign to say and do whatever they want online and, so long as people are making money and those being taken in by these fraudster are across the oceans, well out of earshot, no-one seems to mind.
Sometimes you simply wish that you could put your hand through your computer screen and hit the chump grinning on the other side.
Anyway, the affore-mentioned company I targeted with my letter wasn’t as bad as the scammers I just mentioned, but I was at the end of my tether.
Maybe I was too harsh and maybe I wasn’t, but I’ll tell you what; I certainly feel a bit better.
Here it is:
----------------------------------------
You Arseholes
When I lost a very important file last night, I had no choice but to look for a free recovery program online. Guess who I came across?
I read you section on your free download and, finding no mention of limitations on your site, I made the very logical assumption that it was a trial version with an expiration date. So I downloaded it - hey, I only needed to retrieve one file. And everything worked perfectly.
After a night of searching, it found my file. You can imagine my emotions then when, so close to deadline, your program dangles my file in front of me like a carrot, demanding a registration code that I don’t have. A registration code that was not mentioned anywhere on your free download section.
There's a name for this in the real world; it's called 'ransom'.
You wankers have wasted my cap and my time. During the several hours that I spent waiting for your program to recover a file that it would refuse to give to me, I could have been searching for an honest company with functioning software and I wouldn't have another useless utility sitting in my Applications directory looking like a black and white, bucked-tooth Pac-Man dropping tablets.
It's not hard to be honest - hell, children and pets do it all the time. All it takes is a small disclaimer on you download site mentioning that actually, no, this download will NOT retrieve you data. It is, rather, a 14.8mb decorative window with as much functionality as a screensaver.
This would sit nicely right next to step three of your 'Quick Installation Steps' where is says, "[…] run the software to begin your data recovery process", which is, of course, a lie.
I can guarantee you that whatever absurd marketing tactic you are attempting to employ isn't working. Fire your strategist. His curious idea - "build customer loyalty by pissing them off" - is a lemon.
Idiots.
When I do purchase data recovery software, I can promise that it won't be Stellar Phoenix Macintosh Data Recovery. And if I feel this way, you can bet that there are hundreds of people globally who feel the same way.
That’s what makes the internet so great; you get to piss-off everyone at once.
Hugs and Kisses,
Brett
09 June 2009
26 May 2009
A long awaited post and a little more fiction
So it has been a long time since i posted anything.
I've been incredibly busy with my studies, with the occasional bit of freelance work to keep my free hours occupied. I haven't done much in the way of comic illustration in quite a while now, but i still got a few ideas up my sleeve.
What i have been doing a fair amount of recently is writing. My shorts are coming along well, and the newest plan is to have enough completed to my satisfaction by the end of next year to self-publish a small anthology (designed and laid out by myself, of course).
What is odd is how a number of my stories have begun shifting away from pulp horror to more dramatic intensity. That's not to say that they're becoming poignant or anything - heaven forbid - but more and more they've begun focusing on the characters rather than the action.
Hmmm... hope this doesn't mean i'm growing up.
Never fear though, there's still a decent smattering of gristle and gore, in between the occasional bouts of self-realisation and existential epiphanies.
Here's a bit of flash writing i did as a fun exercise.
It's actually a bit long to be considered flash fiction - around 800 words, i think - but my take out was the same. Trying to successfully condense a story into a single page is trickier than one would imagine. You eventually end up staring at the screen for two hours trying to decide exactly which last two words you should take out and whether you really need that last 'and'.
Anyway, here it is:
(P.S. it would'nt let me cut and paste from the origional doc, so have had to jerry-rig it. if there's a spelling mistake or a bit that should have been italisized and isn't, i'm sorry, but eh...)
A Crowd Gathered
The bullet took him just below his left eye. The socket crumbled inwards as his cheek-bone disintegrated under the force of the .45 caliber slug.
His sight doubled. He blinked and his left lid refused to respond.
This isn't what I expected, he thought as he dropped to his knees, This isn't how it's supposed to be.
A spasm ran through his body and he realised he couldn't feel his legs. He felt a tickling in his gut and thought that, very soon, his bowels were going to let go.
A cop's salary is worth more than this, he thought. The left side of his face was turning warm and a spreading section of his white, collared shirt began to cling to his breast. The stubble on his jaw tickled as thin, delicate waves washed over his cheek and slid affectionately down his neck and he thought of how embarrassing it would be to soil himself in front of all these people.
At least a cop has a pension.
Around him, people were screaming.
Colourful streamers still hung in the air.
He slowly raised his hand to his face. When he brought it away, a slick of red coated his palm. He held it up to his eyes and watched as thick droplets began to roll slowly down the inside of his wrist. His vision blurred, then snapped into sharp contrast. Everything flashed white then suddenly went grey. He was struck by a momentary panic at the loss of his sight before realising that he had fallen over - that the left side of his face now lay against the pavement. There was a sucking sensation as something thick and warm slid out of his skull, followed by an even more alien feeling: the cool touch of a breeze on the inside of his head.
It passed through, he thought, I can't believe it.
Shadows flicked past the edge of his vision. He tried rolling his eyes in their direction. His right eye twitched only slightly. From his left there was no movement at all and he suspected it had gone blind. The corresponding ear heard nothing but a high pitched ringing. The sound filtering through his right was muddy and indistinct and the hurried thumping of the footsteps around him seemed out of sync with the quickly passing shadows.
Where are you running? he tried to ask.
Just then he felt hands on his back and he was gently rolled over. The sudden, harsh light sent a painful jolt through his head but not even his right eye would blink this time. His left eye, as he had imagined, had gone dead. Through his dimming vision he recognised the uniform above him - all red and green with shining yellow - but try as he might he couldn't bring the name to mind. The person's face was a blur.
Behind his helper, more colourful uniforms flickered past, while darker silhouettes rushed in every direction. From a thousand miles away, he heard the squark of walkie-talkies. As his vision dimmed, he could see the last of the confetti as it drifted down from the sky to settle around him. From inside his chest, his lungs began to bubble as they slowly filled with blood.
Where are they running? he asked again, but from the lone figure above him there was no response as he cut open his jacket and shirt. Be careful of my badge, he nearly asked, but then remembered; he didn't have that badge anymore.
His vision was now a collection of white and grey silhouettes, but he felt he was thinking more clearly.
It won't be that bad, he thought, Isn't it better that it passed right through?
Yes, he was sure. There was less chance of infection.
His vision faded to white, but that was okay. He was a little sleepy and he deserved some rest.
What a stroke of luck that it passed right through, he thought as the lone figure above him worked in vain and, along side them, a far greater crowd had gathered; their attention elsewhere.
-end-
Brett Rex Bruton
15-04-09
I've been incredibly busy with my studies, with the occasional bit of freelance work to keep my free hours occupied. I haven't done much in the way of comic illustration in quite a while now, but i still got a few ideas up my sleeve.
What i have been doing a fair amount of recently is writing. My shorts are coming along well, and the newest plan is to have enough completed to my satisfaction by the end of next year to self-publish a small anthology (designed and laid out by myself, of course).
What is odd is how a number of my stories have begun shifting away from pulp horror to more dramatic intensity. That's not to say that they're becoming poignant or anything - heaven forbid - but more and more they've begun focusing on the characters rather than the action.
Hmmm... hope this doesn't mean i'm growing up.
Never fear though, there's still a decent smattering of gristle and gore, in between the occasional bouts of self-realisation and existential epiphanies.
Here's a bit of flash writing i did as a fun exercise.
It's actually a bit long to be considered flash fiction - around 800 words, i think - but my take out was the same. Trying to successfully condense a story into a single page is trickier than one would imagine. You eventually end up staring at the screen for two hours trying to decide exactly which last two words you should take out and whether you really need that last 'and'.
Anyway, here it is:
(P.S. it would'nt let me cut and paste from the origional doc, so have had to jerry-rig it. if there's a spelling mistake or a bit that should have been italisized and isn't, i'm sorry, but eh...)
A Crowd Gathered
The bullet took him just below his left eye. The socket crumbled inwards as his cheek-bone disintegrated under the force of the .45 caliber slug.
His sight doubled. He blinked and his left lid refused to respond.
This isn't what I expected, he thought as he dropped to his knees, This isn't how it's supposed to be.
A spasm ran through his body and he realised he couldn't feel his legs. He felt a tickling in his gut and thought that, very soon, his bowels were going to let go.
A cop's salary is worth more than this, he thought. The left side of his face was turning warm and a spreading section of his white, collared shirt began to cling to his breast. The stubble on his jaw tickled as thin, delicate waves washed over his cheek and slid affectionately down his neck and he thought of how embarrassing it would be to soil himself in front of all these people.
At least a cop has a pension.
Around him, people were screaming.
Colourful streamers still hung in the air.
He slowly raised his hand to his face. When he brought it away, a slick of red coated his palm. He held it up to his eyes and watched as thick droplets began to roll slowly down the inside of his wrist. His vision blurred, then snapped into sharp contrast. Everything flashed white then suddenly went grey. He was struck by a momentary panic at the loss of his sight before realising that he had fallen over - that the left side of his face now lay against the pavement. There was a sucking sensation as something thick and warm slid out of his skull, followed by an even more alien feeling: the cool touch of a breeze on the inside of his head.
It passed through, he thought, I can't believe it.
Shadows flicked past the edge of his vision. He tried rolling his eyes in their direction. His right eye twitched only slightly. From his left there was no movement at all and he suspected it had gone blind. The corresponding ear heard nothing but a high pitched ringing. The sound filtering through his right was muddy and indistinct and the hurried thumping of the footsteps around him seemed out of sync with the quickly passing shadows.
Where are you running? he tried to ask.
Just then he felt hands on his back and he was gently rolled over. The sudden, harsh light sent a painful jolt through his head but not even his right eye would blink this time. His left eye, as he had imagined, had gone dead. Through his dimming vision he recognised the uniform above him - all red and green with shining yellow - but try as he might he couldn't bring the name to mind. The person's face was a blur.
Behind his helper, more colourful uniforms flickered past, while darker silhouettes rushed in every direction. From a thousand miles away, he heard the squark of walkie-talkies. As his vision dimmed, he could see the last of the confetti as it drifted down from the sky to settle around him. From inside his chest, his lungs began to bubble as they slowly filled with blood.
Where are they running? he asked again, but from the lone figure above him there was no response as he cut open his jacket and shirt. Be careful of my badge, he nearly asked, but then remembered; he didn't have that badge anymore.
His vision was now a collection of white and grey silhouettes, but he felt he was thinking more clearly.
It won't be that bad, he thought, Isn't it better that it passed right through?
Yes, he was sure. There was less chance of infection.
His vision faded to white, but that was okay. He was a little sleepy and he deserved some rest.
What a stroke of luck that it passed right through, he thought as the lone figure above him worked in vain and, along side them, a far greater crowd had gathered; their attention elsewhere.
-end-
Brett Rex Bruton
15-04-09
03 February 2009
06 October 2008
Lectcha Sketch 13
OK, I've made the font a little bigger in number 12, so should be easier to read now (I just can't get a good save-for-web setting when it comes to fonts).
Without further ado, though, here is Lectcha Sketch number 13!!! "Rain Dance..."
Without further ado, though, here is Lectcha Sketch number 13!!! "Rain Dance..."
18 September 2008
Lectcha Sketch 12
The next Lectcha Sketch!
Yay.
Been a while coming. Oddly enough, I've posted this one now, even though I've been working on another for a while. It just so happened that this one popped up and got finished before the one that raised it's head earlier. Oh, well, them's the breaks...
I've decided to become a little more professional about these comix. I've started thinking that maybe, with just a little more effort, I can turn them into something - just what though I'm not yet sure. You may notice that I'm starting to draw some colour inspiration from other comic artists. Otherwise, I'm gonna start refining my style - maybe spend more than five minutes drawing them; little things like that.
26 August 2008
Perry Bible Fellowship
Ok, so i now that it's been ages since my last post, but life's been helluva busy the last few weeks. Got a bunch of ideas but no time to see them to fruition.
As a quick post, i thought i'd do something i've been meaning to for a while.
Some of you may have noticed that i have a link to something called The Perry Bible Fellowship. No, i'm not a weird, religious nutter. The site is the home page for the comic work by the illustrator Nicholas Gurewitch. He's had a pretty cool career, and if want to know more about it... well, you fingers work and god invented Wikipedia for a reason (a point of topic for a later post, by the way).
All i'll say is the guy is brilliant. His comics are just about as off-beat as they can get without going too much over the line (although some might debate that... but they're wrong).
So here's an example. If it tickles your prostate in just the right way, check out his site here.
Careful though, first time i visited i got stuck for hours trying to get through them all.
Thanks Nic
P.S. i've decided that capital i's are for losers. Dot, no dot - come on! it's the same thing. It's that flipping lower-case L that's got the problem.
As a quick post, i thought i'd do something i've been meaning to for a while.
Some of you may have noticed that i have a link to something called The Perry Bible Fellowship. No, i'm not a weird, religious nutter. The site is the home page for the comic work by the illustrator Nicholas Gurewitch. He's had a pretty cool career, and if want to know more about it... well, you fingers work and god invented Wikipedia for a reason (a point of topic for a later post, by the way).
All i'll say is the guy is brilliant. His comics are just about as off-beat as they can get without going too much over the line (although some might debate that... but they're wrong).
So here's an example. If it tickles your prostate in just the right way, check out his site here.
Careful though, first time i visited i got stuck for hours trying to get through them all.
Thanks NicP.S. i've decided that capital i's are for losers. Dot, no dot - come on! it's the same thing. It's that flipping lower-case L that's got the problem.
12 August 2008
Lectcha Sketch #11 1/2
So I'm posting two comics for a good reason: I had this brief moment when I thought that no-one would get the first one and so hastened into a second one (hastened being the operative word).
Posting them together because the second isn't really... um... good.
As it is though, I might enjoy it more.
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