Guild-building in World Of Warcraft

So I did what I have been speculating to myself about for some time, and started a new guild of my own on World Of Warcraft. The act of starting the guild, in itself, was quite a learning experience. Whilst it has changed over time, the present system with founding new guilds involves getting a charter, getting five signatures from unique players, and then turning it in to an NPC who basically hands you the keys to your new guild. So whilst I have my own guild that I am very slowly building up to what I want, I am also very slowly and staggeringly learning the ins and outs of running the damned thing.

So I have been thinking… what IS accessibility?

I make no secret of the fact that during the couple of years prior to this one, I ended up in contact with people who run several different organisations concerned with better access to society at large for various individuals with various disabilities. And I have seen the word accessibility bandied about with such abandon that the Man From Mars would think that Herd Humanity had decided that it was the new “cooool” catchphrase.

Lance Henriksen has done more to represent the autistic than Suzanne Wright ever will

In many writings, I have gone on about actors, films, or bits of music that represent the autistic, especially autistic adults, than efforts that are deliberately promoted as such. Part of this, I will admit, has to do with resentment. Josh Hartnett was once quoted as claiming that the reason his then-recent film Mozart And The Whale was met with such complete indifference at the box orifice was because someone out there did not want “the cause” getting out in the open. Given that the film is basically a lot of exaggeration of one type and promotion of the idea that the autistic remain children forever, Hartnett has, much like Anthony Kiedis or Julia Roberts before him, become one of a list of public figures I will get on a Queensland bus in order to avoid hearing from.

Language evolution, and language manipulation. A reflection.

We are all of us communicative creatures. Even the smallest, lowliest of other species on the planet we inhabit communicate with one another and attempt to communicate with us in varying ways. Indeed, about some species such as the bear, scientists even say that it is a matter of when, not if, they learn to communicate with our species in a manner that we can make sense of. That is a pretty sobering thought when you stop to consider that abstract and nuanced speech happens to be one of the few things that differentiate us from other species on this planet. But with that advantage also comes a heavy burden. As our language is the means by which we learn and teach others about our world, it means that our use of language and other communications can be one of the most effective means to control the minds of others. And as the saying goes, if you control man’s mind, you control man.

I hate the word “blog”, and a lot of others.

When I was young, several different sources, for different purposes, likened the English language to parts of different engineered items. Motorcycles, houses, and the sort. Words were bricks, with phrases and letters being like mortar and combinations thereof. Forgive me, it has been a long time since I heard the original explanations. Thing is, just as a house can only be as strong as the bricks that are used to construct it (and the other bits and pieces used in other stages of the process, let us not forget), your communication is only as strong as its components, too.