Was just looking through my friends list, at all the people who aren't here any more, and noticed Andre Baldy and Brett Lenon are still on there :) Too bad the forum that was on seems to be gone now, and the wayback machine doesnt have much of it...
I did get a cool shirt out of it :)
ID:1663450
 Aug 21 2014, 11:01 pm
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Tom wrote:
Although that contest was a lot of work and didn't make us any money... I almost didnt mention it, since I knew it had to have been a ton of work, and I dont want to encourage anyone to start asking you to run another contest, because that's what you need to do to 'save Byond'... ;) | |
Very nice!
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Hard to believe that picture was taken almost eight years ago.
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Wearing the shirt inside your house defeats the purpose, Nadrew. You're supposed to wear it in public where other people can see the link and go to BYOND.
I am disappoint. | |
EmpirezTeam wrote:
Wearing the shirt inside your house defeats the purpose, Nadrew. You're supposed to wear it in public where other people can see the link and go to BYOND. Moving past that the picture was 8 years ago, you already made a mistake by implying Nadrew goes into public. | |
Hard-Boiled Contest VI
It was 7:44 on a Saturday night, but who gives a fuck about the time? Not me. I was on Facebook reading about the Greek yogurt an old flame had for lunch. Nostalgia used to be better than this. You could think fondly on the one that got away and the friends you used to have. Now you get to see them grow old, just like you, and complain about their everyday shitty lives. Way to kill good memories, eh? And then there's the people who just don't get that you've moved on, like Mike who keeps sending me invites to events in B Town. I don't know. Maybe I wanted to connect with the friends I'd lost. Maybe I thought I could live the life I had the chance to live years ago, to correct some of the mistakes I'd made. I sent Rose a friend request and some messages. Seven years we haven't spoken, and she adds me the same day. I still haven't heard back from her. Simon died in the nursing home, I expected that. Lea is married and sends me cards on the holidays. The inn is - well. It's better if I don't think of the Inn. I used to tell myself that I knew when to leave. Hell, I got out of B Town, didn't I? I could smell a rotten situation long before anyone else knew it was coming. I was always ready to get up and go, to chase down the next big thing. When I first came to B Town it was on a whim. I had a friend who decided to move there and open a club with his business partner Edrik. Back then, B Town was booming, and there was a lot of room for growth in entertainment and nightlife. I was drawn to the opportunity to make money hand over fist, to establish a new brand in a new town. Maybe I just wanted to get out of Aylwood. I had a good thing going there; a thriving business, friends who were like family to me, and then there was Rose. Maybe - eh, who knows? I don't know what I was running from; I never did know when to stay. But things are different now. The Great Recession hit B Town like a freight train. All those recently gentrified neighborhoods were suddenly underwater with debt. Those who could get out fled in droves. In some neighborhoods, whole streets were in foreclosure while long time residents slept in nearby parks. Most of the new businesses folded or moved out of state. Edrik's club is still open, but as a shadow of its former self. The big biotech company, the one that was at the center of the Brett Lendon affair, survived by restructuring and selling off its assets. You can now buy bubble tea out of the same building where hundreds of liquid-cooled servers kept "the ranch" online. There's a thought I'd rather not remember. The town kept going, though, as all towns must. Communities pulled together and rebuilt, neighborhoods reclaimed their character, and the next batch of crooks and politicians are rebranding B Town all over again. Just today, Mike posted an article about the whole town going "high speed". There's even a picture of Mayor Hehre connecting the ceremonial last fiber optic cable. They want to be the silicone valley of the east within 5 years, and they're starting with the network infrastructure. How many open tabs is too many? It'll be 4am before I read all of these, and I don't even want to. What is it about B Town that forces me to look. Here's an article about new bicycling infrastructure parallel to I495. Here's a Flickr account that just posts pictures of the west side's abandoned docks. Here's an abandoned blog from a teenaged resident. Here's a press release about that Biotech company's new 5.0 compatible release. Everything looks so, well, normal. Why am I uneasy? I didn't even realize I had put on my coat. I didn't realize my "hard luck" stash was out of my desk drawer and in my wallet. Somewhere, in the back of my mind, long dormant neurons had been firing and mapping out train lines and bus schedules. A network of roads, dendrites, coffee shops, and rumors from here to the B Town of the past. A B Town that wasn't so front-facing and investor friendly. A town without PR agents and a brand trajectory. A city that was an island that spoke only to itself. Why couldn't I find any comments from B Town residents on B Town blogs? Why couldn't I find any Facebook groups or webrings (is that still a thing?) where people from the city spoke to each other. Each tab is like a message in a bottle. I briefly wondered what the land lady would think of all those weird tabs, articles, and PR cruft open on my computer. I wondered what they'd do with the kipple I left, well, wherever this is. I wondered why I had stayed here for so long. Anywhere has got to be better than here. Then again, I never did know when to stay. | |
That was wonderful.
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Although that contest was a lot of work and didn't make us any money, I've long that that that kind of thing could be successful as an independent venture. You'd have constant interactive scavenger hunts that people could play for a fee, integrating the web, videos, games, etc.