Twitter’s Dead, And That Sucks

Audio Version

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Elon Musk, in his infinite wealth I mean wisdom, has decided that non-paying Twitter users are only allowed to view 600 tweets per day. Hell, even paying Twitter users can only see 6000 tweets per day, which is also not nearly enough. This effectively kills Twitter.

We’re supposed to say, good riddance! That solves that! That’s one less distraction for my day! Or some variance of these words. Because that’s sticking it to the man. Good! I didn’t want your stupid website anyway, billionaire! And maybe some people legitimately feel this way. But I don’t. Well, apart from directing ire at the idiot billionaire, that is.

I joined Twitter nearly fifteen years ago, at the age of 13, which means I’ve been using the site for over half of my life. And as an introvert, it’s become my favourite way to keep up with my friends and people I admire. People often talk about what a toxic cesspit Twitter is, but it turns out that if you unfollow news sites and brands and toxic people, mute a bunch of depressing words, and block any assholes you come across, you can – could – make that site a far more pleasant experience. For me, Twitter is not this toxic cesspit which I’m finally free from being chained to. It’s a social media feed full of people I like talking to each other about things we all like. It’s been one of my primary ways of socialising for a good while now.

So for some idiot billionaire to come and take that away for idiot billionaire reasons is actually quite a blow. I’m not going to pretend to celebrate. It sucks! I already feel cut off from people who’s thoughts I enjoy reading on a daily basis. There’s other platforms but the vibe is different with every single one. YouTube and Twitch are less of an open two-way channel. Instagram is less immediate, or thought-focused. Facebook is… Facebook. And there’s no unified Twitter alternative that we’ve all decided to migrate to without incident. Twitter is a legitimate form of communication that an idiot billionaire has just stamped all over, and its absence is going to affect the way I perceive the world moving forwards.

Hopefully this post ages like milk and the change is reverted. But let’s be real, unless he’s even dumber than we all thought, he’s killing Twitter on purpose at this point.

My Current Creative Projects

Okay, so this is partially a post to consolidate all of my ongoing creative projects into one handy place, and partially me patting myself on the back. But I figure that while this stuff is all well ordered in my mind, it might be nice to put it all in one place for all to see. Who knows, you might just discover something new about me.

Youtube Videos

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I am on Youtube under the name of Kritigri, and I quite consistently upload three gaming-based videos a week. Would you believe me if I said I didn’t plan it this way? I have the one weekly video series but the other two weekly uploads just tended to fall in place by themselves. It was only when I noticed the pleasant symmetry of video thumbnails on my page that I decided to try and make it a constant in my life.

The Weekly Waypoint

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Previously named The Weekly Deathmatch, this is my weekly video series where I ramble about whatever I please, though it’s almost always related to gaming, or whatever fictional media I’ve consumed that week. These videos typically aim for the ten minute mark, and are made up of pre-recorded gameplay and post-gameplay commentary. Tomorrow we hit episode 120, meaning I’ve been at this for well over two years, with no intention of stopping anytime soon.

Edited Gameplay Compilations

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Basically, the videos with yellow text in their thumbnails. These make up two thirds of my weekly video content, and are compilations of bitesize clips taken from games I’ve been playing. This all began some years ago when I discovered the DVR function built into Windows 10 which allowed me to save the previous thirty seconds of gameplay at the push of a button. I started a separate (now repurposed) Youtube channel to dump these on, but soon began experimenting with editing these videos together, trimming off the seconds of silence and making them around 5-10 minutes in length. Given the extra effort and care, I moved these videos to my main channel.

Twitch VODs

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The aforementioned repurposed Youtube channel is now home to on-demand versions of my Twitch streams, as well as highlights taken from said streams to be consumed in a more bitesize format.

Twitch Streaming

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Okay, so this isn’t so much of a constant in my life as my Youtube videos are; the only schedule I have regarding streams is on a Monday, when I stream the live recording of my podcast with my friend Reece (more on that later). My spontaneous streams, though, which can occur anywhere between five times a week to once every five months, are of whatever games I feel like playing. Sometimes it’ll be a live service style game or an MMO like World of Warcraft, where I can hang out without the pressure of completing some arbitrary objective. When I do want to punish myself, however, I’ll start up a full playthrough of a game like LEGO Star Wars, which is a bad example given that it’s the only one I’ve ever finished.

Podcasting

This is a very new and recent occurrence. After many years of consuming podcasts while commuting or grinding out some achievement in a videogame, I’ve finally decided to start dipping my toe into the podcasting business myself, and so far, I’m having a wonderful time.

Pictures Without Pictures

Click here to go there on Spotify

Here’s the weekly livestreamed podcast I mentioned. The basic premise is that I don’t watch a lot of movies, but my friend Reece totally does! So every week we pick a movie, watch it through and convene on Monday evening to discuss our thoughts on it. Episodes are typically an hour to an hour and a half long and you can find it on proper podcasting apps like Spotify, and Apple Podcasts, and Google Podcasts! It’s well exciting. Out of all my projects, this is the one I’d be most thrilled for you to check out right now. Next week we’re discussing Jurassic Park…

Kritigri FM

Click here to go there on Spotify

Ah, okay, so, bit of a cheat, this one. I’m essentially using a podcast feed to upload audio versions of these very blog posts, once I get around to finishing up my monthly series. I also record audio versions of my gaming blog posts (featured below if you’re unaware), and the occasional podlet-exclusive candid review of a show, or a game that I’ve recently played, or, erm, the concept of achievements! It’s a bit of a grab bag, but don’t blame me, blame Anchor for not allowing multiple podcasts per account (though otherwise it’s a godsend of a service).

But I hear you asking… why bother with audio versions of these blog posts? Well, besides accessibility, I just think people are more likely to listen to a 3-6 minute audio version of a blog post than to read the 1000 words contained within. Plus, there’s bloopers, and they’re well fun. Also, it’s neat to practice my voice for future potential projects. And it’s weirdly satisfying to do!

Blogging

Ah. This is as close as we’ll get to a “writing” subheading for now, I’m afraid, but hey, it counts in my book. Hah, get it? Book? Totally an intentional pun that I didn’t just catch on the read-through.

Perpetually Perturbed

Click here to- wait, no, you’re already here

Well, you’re already here, aren’t you, so I don’t have a huge amount to teach you here. You’ll already know about my monthly blog post series, which is autobiographical in nature and tends to discuss mental health, the state of the world, and my miscellaneous musings. You’ll possibly know also that this is a part of The Tombstone Project, my lifelong memoirs (god I hate that term) which intend to preserve some semblance of my personality long after I’m dead, if anybody cares to read them. Self-absorbed? Potentially. Morbid? Absolutely! But it gives me some peace of mind.

I’ve also recently re-committed to reading actual frickin’ books, and will attempt to review them as I go. You can already read my latest review, the newest WoW novel by Madeleine Roux, here. I’m currently working my way through Star Wars: Thrawn, but despite an interesting first third of the book, I’m finding the second third to be a bit of a slog.

32 Bit Brain

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Did you know that I have a sister blog? It’s all about videogames, which, you may have noticed, are a bit of a running theme in my life. But if I love gaming so much, I may as well write about it, and while I don’t have any concrete weekly or monthly blog posts publishing over there, I have been experimenting with some new series, one documenting a journey to collect achievements, the other a retrospective of my oldest gaming memories. I may need to work on those titles, though.

I’ve also decided to start reviewing games that I’m finished playing, much in the same vein as I review books. You can find the first of these reviews right here.

What Else?

What, that’s not enough for you? Greedy…

I mean, there are smaller things which I don’t count as productive but I enjoy working towards as a larger task. Completing certain game series, and their achievements. Expanding my knowledge of history with podcasts. Educating myself on movies, which is what drove me to start Pictures Without Pictures in the first place. And there’s always actual, physical work which I attend five nights a week, if you want to be thorough about it. That’s certainly not productive, though. Reductive, maybe.

Thank you for taking the time to look at my creative projects, though. I’d be thrilled if you gave these a try, but if not, I’m chuffed you took time out of your day to give it a gander. Follow me on Twitter at @Kritigri for a glimpse at future projects when they arise.

Big Mouth, Small Audience

Before starting this blog post, I’d like to remind my readers that this blog will soon be changing to the domain name kristianrichmond.wordpress.com. If you frequent this blog via bookmark or web address, be sure to adjust your navigation accordingly.

I have a feeling that this will break a multitude of links across my blog posts, where I refer to earlier blog posts. Please bear with me if this happens.

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I’ve been churning out all sorts of content on the internet for almost a decade now, from the honestly too-young age of 12 to the 21 year old creature that I am today. And whilst a decade might not seem like long for other age ranges, teenage years are extremely formative and developmental to who you ultimately become as a person, and therefore much of my growth as a person and as a creator has been documented across various stations of the internet throughout this half of my life. Many of these have been deleted, privatised, or otherwise locked away never to see the light of day again – much to the benefit of anyone who would stumble across the inane blatherings of my teenage self. Others still exist.

It all began with my Youtube channel back in 2007. Youtube was a very different place back then. Monetisation wasn’t really a thing, and the idea of a single Youtuber having a million subscribers was ludicrous. It was more of a hobby. And 12 year old me wanted in on that hobby. And so, with no video editing or creating experience, none of the necessary equipment to do so and being far too young to create anything watchable, I set out on my mission to become one of the popular Youtubers I aspired to and watched. The results looked a little like this feat of video-making ability. Oddly, this Youtube account amassed the largest audience I’ve ever received for my content, and whilst the videos obviously improved in quality over the next 5 years before I shut it down, it’s still something I find strange. I use the account nowadays to upload 30 second gaming clips for my own archiving purposes, and to share.

It didn’t stop there. I won’t bore you with a full account but my creative instincts caused me to branch out into contributing to short story and poetry websites and starting multiple blogs (none of which were as well maintained or frequently updated as this one). I also discovered social networks along with the rest of my generation and joined Facebook for my ‘real life’ contacts, and Twitter to create and voice my internet persona. Twitter is, I think, a keystone for the topic of this blog post.

I’ve been tweeting for nearly nine years now. According to my profile statistics, I’ve tweeted a grand total of 32,708 times, but for all of those tweets across all of those years, I’ve amassed only 200 followers. And as contradictory to the existence of this post it may seem, I’m perfectly fine with that. I value my followers. I’d probably still be tweeting if I had 10% of that number. And that, finally, is where the name of this blog post comes into play. The question I ask myself every six months or so. Am I just simply talking to myself? I have a low interaction point with my 200 followers. This blog has been updating almost weekly for a year now and it has little over a hundred (very much appreciated) readers. Blog statistics tell me that each blog post gets less than 10 visitors, and whilst I’m aware that many people read from their feed or their emails, I’d be lying if I said that this statistic, among others, wasn’t disheartening. It’s easy to interpret these as being signs pointing towards me being boring or unlikable, and on some days this is all too believable.

But enough whinging. Rationalism tells me that people like myself form the bulk of the internet’s content creating community. It may feel like there’s an abundance of successful people with large audiences, but that’s merely because you don’t hear about or see those with followers in the hundreds. And whilst part of me does wish for an audience to give my words and creations some gravity, a larger part of me acknowledges that most of what I do is out of either enjoyment, practice or ventilation. Even if I did feel defeated at the notion of talking to myself, I’ve proven to myself before that just giving up these outlets for discussion and creation causes me to slowly crumple inwardly, making for more moments of anguish and irrational upset than before. So hey, if nothing else, it’s therapeutic!

Bloggin’ ‘Bout Vloggin’

I used to watch a lot of vloggers on Youtube. In fact, I think I watched them more than gaming videos, which is pretty much my go-to if I’m going to watch anything on Youtube. Over time, however, my tastes have changed, and I’ve mostly moved away from the genre. I’ve grown to find most vloggers to be self-obsessed or narcissistic, with clickbaitesque titles such “I ALMOST DIED!” when in reality they’ll briefly mention how they crossed the street and almost hit a parked car. But they’re not all bad.

TomSka has recently begun a weekly vlog series which documents his life as a comedy content creator on Youtube, and I personally find it interesting not just for his humour, but how he deals with issues such as low self-esteem and additionally, how independent his life is (which is sort of a niche interest to me right now given that I’m still yet to fly the nest). I’ve watched his comedy sketches and occasional topical vlogs (where he sits down at a desk and discusses a topic as opposed to documenting his daily life) for many years, and it’s great to see more of the guy.

Cory Williams (or SMPFilms, or DudeLikeHella) is another Youtuber who I’ve been following for many years. His philosophy and outlook on life is one that aligns quite closely with my own, and having stuck with him as a viewer through some turbulent years it’s legitimately gratifying to watch him fulfill goals of happiness within his life, from California to Alaska. I highly recommend giving his videos a watch, even if you’re not into vlogs.

These are pretty much the only vloggers I watch now, and whilst they’re not the only decent vloggers out there, they’re a breath of fresh air out from some of the narcissists and cash grabbers that are currently pumping out videos. People like Tom and Cory interest me from an autobiographical standpoint (and they make me laff, oh mah days), and from what I can tell, both of them seem to share this interest themselves.

However, I didn’t write this blog just to plug my lunchtime viewing habits. One of the reasons why I perhaps criticise vloggers so much is the fact that I used to do some vlogs myself, around late 2012 / early 2013, towards the end of my A-Levels. The idea was that I’d document the final days of my life as a student of my school, and whilst I certainly had fun shooting videos, I can retrospectively side with my absent viewership when I say that they certainly didn’t hold too much substance in an already over-saturated genre of entertainment. Whilst I’ll admit that my vlogs weren’t awful, or a baseless grab for attention like those I criticise, I can’t exactly justify the entertainment value of a burned out and often cynical student who lacked motivation in his studies and would often speak loudly over his friends.

Blogging, then, mightn’t be so different, except for the fact that you’re currently looking at a block of text instead of my overwhelmingly underwhelming face. (I know, that’s a lot of whelm.)  This is why I’ve always steered my blog away from being solely about me; in fact, up until recently, there have been hardly any blog posts about myself, and this spike of self-interest has mostly come about due to a period of transition in my own personal life (i.e leaving university). However, I also think it’s different in that I can conduct myself more in text than I can in conversation with a camera. In conversation, one cannot go back and restructure sentences, or lose readers based on manner of speech and quality of video. Regardless of this, though, I’ll probably keep things weighted more on the topical side of things than the personal. If there’s one thing I’ve discovered from my long-abandoned vlogging project from days of old, it’s that my personal life isn’t all that different from the other thousands of vloggers and bloggers, and I can far more enthusiastically write about my perspectives on certain topics than what I had for breakfast.

Okay, Here’s an *Actual* New Year’s Post

I fully expect to contradict the opinions I presented in my previous blog post “Turn of the Year”. But self-contradiction is fun, right?

So I, like everyone else, enjoy evaluating the previous year before stepping into the next. The only problem is I usually forget about everything that’s happened in the year and end up waffling for fifty paragraphs about the last three months or so. But I won’t exactly be doing that here, because, well, I’ve never really been all that personal on this blog. If I wanted to, I could write endless blog posts about what’s going on in my brain, but I know from experience that that’s a terrible idea for a plethora of reasons. I actually have loose plans to write a blog post on that, so look forward to that vague possibility!

So instead of giving you my life story, I’ll try to keep things relevant.

Whilst it’s true that I started my Creative Writing university course in September of 2013, 2014 has seen most of the action in that regard; the majority of my first year and the beginning of the second have, of course, occurred in the last twelve months. And it’s a positive! Being the only guy in my year / group / class / whatever can be a downer at times, but I definitely like the people on my course. My one flaw in that regard is that I’m nowhere near sociable enough to know them that well outside of uni. And on the subject of university, I’m currently lacking some direction on my current pieces of coursework, so that’s quite lame. But I’ve got the opportunity to study something I love, and I got a First in my first truly important piece of coursework, so I can hardly complain, right?

On the subject of positives, I became an Uncle this year! Twice! My step-sister introduced us to the ever-cheerful Molly in September, and just last week (yes, Christmas Eve) my other step-sister welcomed Chloe to the world! As cousins who are essentially the same age, I expect a lifelong rivalry of biblical proportions.

A bunch of other stuff has happened this year that hasn’t been quite so awesome. Some of it’s personal, some of it’s to do with the world (and I know everyone always says that past year sucked, but 2014 really has been quite miserable in world news), and all of it makes me want to exclaim “ugh” in a magical way which will resonate with every living human being and cause them to turn their heads and nod in a consolidatory show of empathy. (There is no reason for consolidatory to not be a word, damnit.) But, seeing as the world does not revolve around me (or you, or anyone really, you’re mad if you think it does) I’ll have to make do with my sporadic Twitter rants.

My New Year’s Resolution. I know we went over this in Turn of the Year, but whatever, it doesn’t hurt. My resolution is going to be linked to this blog. As I’m sure you’re aware if you follow my blog (<3), I don’t update this place very often. My average is maybe one post every month and a half or so. And the reason for this is I’m always trying to filter what I write about. I try to make sure that it isn’t about something that only a limited amount of readers have knowledge in, that it’s something I can write at least semi-professionally about, and that it isn’t too self-centered, as we’ve already talked about. This has led to my blog posts being about one of two things: society, or writing. Usually society. And considering I’ve never studied any form of sociology, I think it’s time to change that.

Starting January 1st, or whenever the hell I feel like it, I’ll be writing more blog posts about more types of things! About how I’ve inherited my sister’s love for cheese, or how Steven Moffat is both a good and terrible writer for Doctor Who, or how the webcomic Questionable Content is really very awesome. I want too write about why Eastenders is rubbish and how I just listened to an audiobook/adventure/thing (Dalek War) and it’s opened my eyes to a new way of storytelling. Would you stick with me if I decided to branch out and write about those things instead of just why humanity is a bit shit?

Anyway, New Year’s food beckons! I shall publish this and get back to you in 2015! Thank you for reading my blog! The only thing better than rambling to oneself is rambling to other people!

A Change of Name

Perpetually Perturbed is a blog name I’ve had in my mind for a few months now, and the only thing that stopped me from using it was the importance of my name coming up on Google. The old name (and new tagline), Kristian Richmond’s Musings and Meanderings, was not only a mouthful but incredibly ham-fisted. The only reason for this was because I wanted anyone who was searching for me (that’s you, future employer!) to be able to find this blog easily as an example of my non fictive writing.

Well anyway, fast forward to today’s somewhat less than mind-blowing seminar about making a WordPress blog. Whilst learning all about how to make a WordPress account, I came to realise that since I have my full name as the domain name for this site, I don’t really need it in the title, too. So I went with the idea that’s been floating in my head for a while, and now the place feels fresh.

There have been and may be more changes to the blog coming soon, depending on what this theme supports and allows me to do. Watch this space! And if you’re ever curious about just what changes I have made, I record all of it on the Changelog page.

Welcome To My Domain

Cue evil laughing.

Sorry. I couldn’t resist.

So today I have some news for you, to do with the blog. If you haven’t already heard me talking about it, then take a little gander at the URL up there. Yup, that fancy, shiny new one. This is the part when you ask me “what was the point?”

This post is mostly justification.

Digital Footprint

From what I’ve heard, it is incredibly important for writers these days to be able to be found online, especially aspiring authors. This is why my full name is in the title of this blog, as it should come up on Google when you type my name. (So far I’m on about page four, although this new domain might have set me back a bit for now.) I’ve heard – and I’m not entirely sure it’s true – that a having a domain such as .com or .net will cause you to leap up the results in Google searches. I get the feeling that .wordpress.com would have me listed as just a profile on a pre-existing website, whereas .net will categorise me under having a website of my own..

Professionalism

I wasn’t joking back in my first post when I said I’m taking this seriously. This is a writing project, and as such should be treated with the effort it deserves. Having my own domain proves that I’m willing to put more time and effort into this; using the free domain provided is too easy.

Motivation

This wasn’t free! I’m not shy in revealing (considering you can find out for yourself) that this is costing me £15 a year. Hardly the most taxing thing in the world, but if I’m spending money on this blog, then I’ll be more likely to stick with it. In theory. And no, I doubt I’ll pay for the WordPress upgrades you can get. They’re like £80 a year. I, ah, think not.

Why .net?

.com was taken. Grumble grumble. The expiry date for kristianrichmond.com was February 25th, so it felt like fate. I spent the entirety of the 25th checking the domain and attempting to register it. And the entirety of the 26th, where the whois was still telling me it should be expired by now. And by the 27th, it had magically been renewed two days before. Mutter mutter grumble. They’re not even using it for anything!

I could have gone with .me or .co, but they cost like an extra $10 (so £6). That’s not too much, sure, but I’m picky; I’ve not seen .me or .co domains being very widely used and I feel like if they’re as rare to everyone else as they are to me, then people might think they’re just one of those cheap naff ones that people use when everything else is taken. There goes your professionalism. If I didn’t care about that, I’d have gone and got a free .tk domain. (Those haven’t worked well for me in the past, though.)

As for .net itself… I’m a network! I… work… on the… net. No? Well I’m not .organised, that’s for sure.

Other Factors

It’s more memorable.

It’s less typing for your beautiful fingers.

It’s nifty to say.

It’s my name! As a website! Squee!

The shorter the URL, the better.

And one more thing; I know that somebody is itching to tell me where I could have gotten this domain name a lot cheaper and how I’m doing everything wrong and wasting my money and oh god the whole world is going to implode because of my tomfoolery. Well, here’s what I know about web hosting in as little as one paragraph:

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I’m happy to pay for the convenience, if I’m honest. And people will tell me how easy it is and that it isn’t inconvenient, but it’s done now, so oh well!

Hopefully I’ll have a normal blog post coming up about what it’s like to write a screenplay for the very first time. For the meantime, though, I’ve got some serious hoovering to do.