----------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------subversion (sub-ver'shon)(n), Act of subverting ; overthrow; destruction; ruin. subvert (sub-vert')(vt), To ruin utterly; to overturn; to pervert . --------------------------------------------------------------[su bversion 1.0]-- Ûßßßßßßßßßßßßßßßßßßßßßßßß ßßÛ ² ²Ü þß ÜÜÜ°°°°°±±±²²ÜÜ ² ± Þß Ü±°°°°ßßßßßß °°±±±²²Ü ± ° ܱßßßß±²ß ° Û ²ÝÜܲ²²±±±±±ÜÜÜß Ü   °ß ܲ²²²±±±±±±±±°°°Ü ÞÝ ° ±Þ²±±±±±±±±±±°°°°ÛÛÛÝ ± ²ßÜ Ü ßßß±±°°° ßÜ ² ²°°±±±±ÜÜÜ ²Üþ   °° ² Û°°°°±±±±±±±±²²ÜÜÜÜßß °  Û ÛÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜÜ ÜÜÛ  "Stupid motherfucker, you thought you would last .   Well, took the wrong path, now your name is in the  past."  -Biohazard 1.1 -- Welcome Yes, welcome to the first installment of Subversion. For tho se that thought that perhaps the name referred to some sort of program, please note t he fine introduction by a certain Mr. Webster. This is a sort of monthly col umn I decided to start sometime last night while on IRC. E-mags and groups  come and go, and I never think of anything clever to say when I have the chanc e. So, I will think of this as kind of an article-of-the-month project. As lu ck would have it, it appears to appear (?) in this month's Teklordz pack. Act ually, I wrote an article in the Teklordz March Artiphaks that was originally intended for the first release of Atomic Delusions. I don't know why A.D. nev er came out, but it didn't. But I got a lot of feedback regarding my article . Some good, some bad, some ugly (and some from a local sysop's 16-year-old sister who wanted to...nevermind). In any case, I decided to make this an o ngoing thing, so now you know. Nobody is making you read this, by the way. Issues will be numbered as this one is (ie. subversion 1.0), and will come out on a more-or less monthly basis. Hopefully, I will line up some interviews,but it's just my own personal rantings for now. Now, on to business. 2.2 -- How to be Heard Of (in the Scene) Oh, the mystery of it all. How does a newcomer to the art of ANSi ge t heard of?Once upon a time, a person had to draw and draw and  draw. Then they had to download an art pack and apply. This usually meant calling long-dist ance, unless the group was local or there was a member nearby. Then, out of nowhere, the gods saw fit to create IRC. In their infin ite wisdom (or folly, as some may suggest), they created #ansi. All those wides pread ANSi doodleheads could now meet, chat and verbally abuse each other in a w ay they hadnever imagined possible. At first, groups merely p icked up members through chance meetings during late-night chat sessions during which some unk nown artistwould send an ANSi to someone, who sent it to someo ne else, who had a cousin who knew a guy at school who called the same board as some guy from s ome group. Pretty soon, groups were forming right on IRC, by people continents a part. There was a run-on sentence up there somewhere. Where it had once taken not only talent, but also the income or phrea king skills(or generous parents) to afford LD calling to those  enticing art boards just an area code or two away, an Internet account has made it so much easier . But now there is a new factor in judging a would-be artist: personality. You  can be a jackass on a local board, and your reputation will stay there. If yo u are a jackass on IRC, the whole art scene takes notice and brands you as su ch. But conversely, if you are one cool dude (damn, you're smooth), you might  very well become "leet" and that's that. You still have to draw something once  in awhile,but public relations is the name of the game. If p eople think you are "leet" enough, they will forgive sub-par art ability. If you CAN draw, you should be writing this instead of me. 2.3 -- The Rights and Wrongs of Reviving a Group Just as IRC has an interesting affect on individuals (see above), it does on groups too. Local groups with no outside ties can die out with about  as little notice as with which they started. Sometimes long-lost members would  spring for the cross-country call to the WHQ only to discover that someone p ulled the plug on their group months ago. Not so anymore. Now people can hear of a group on IRC. They see a pack, and their in terest is set on this group. They think it looks cool, and apply. Other peopl e do the same. Then, one day, the group dies. A local group would've stayed dead, but a well-known group with a definite net presence is missed. People wh o were members (or even just really liked the group) say "Hey, was really neat! We can't let it die!" My first example is Union. Union WAS a cool group. It has its ups a nd downs. It died, then came back, then died again. Like the end of a horror f lick, there is a last-minute reference or scene that damned near insures a sequel, or revival in this case. So it was with the final Union pack. Sure eno ugh, an attempt was made to revive it. As I recall, it was Cybernary who und ertook the task of recruiting (and sometimes re-recruiting) artists for the "new " Union. It was a mix of former members and non-members...I can talk about thi s cuz I wasone of the non-members who was in on it. At this point, someone should have said "STOP!" and put an immediate end to the whole revival idea. I for one had always wanted to be in Union and n ever made it. After months of practice, I thought it was my lucky day when Cyb ernary brought up the concept of restarting Union. I got in, even though I was alreadydrawing on a regular basis for two other groups. T his didn't seem to present a problem -- I drew what I thought to be a really cool pic and submitte d it. Time passed. Then, several weeks later, I got word that the revival was not going to happen. Why? Too many people wanted to dual-group, and weren't getting anyth ing done. There was no revival pack. Of course, the almost-but-not-quite-ex-Un ion-guys didn't disappear, being that it was an IRC-based group. Many of them  tried to start new groups together, often ending in merger or failure. Why (a gain)? Simple: the original Union members who came back couldn't toss their current obligations out the window, and the new-generation recruits joined to  say that they were in Union because, as likely as not, they had always wanted to join but never had the chance. Call it a lack of loyalty if you want, but  I look at it like this...who would drop everything to join a group that had alr eady died, revived and died again months before? Not me, I must admit. A Union it was not. Misplaced loyalties ruined otherwise good intent ions. ----- Enter Anemia. I had never heard of Anemia until my local group, FoS,  almost entered into a three-way merger with them and TMS. I got to know two  of the Anemia guys, Silver Blade (Essbee) and Coug pretty well. I had never  seen an Anemia pack or heard of them before, and I wasn't really impressed wh en I saw their stuff. The feeling was mutual, and the merger never happened, but there weren't really any hard feelings. Anyone with a brain and Internet a ccess should know who Essbee is (unless #ansi was +i or ya got banned), and  knows that he was, at the least, an interesting person. Anyway... Anemia took off fairly quick from that point, at least in my eyes. T hey got better, until they released a somewhat disappointing pack...I forget which month it was...and death seemed imminent. Yet somehow, they came bac k with a rockin' pack and things seemed OK. Then Essbee left the scene. Ou ch. The group faded from view for awhile, then was rumored to have merged wit h someone else. However, Anemia didn't stay dead. Yours truly was informed, one cold  March day,that there was going to be an ANE-0496.ZIP turning up after all. A couple weekslater, someone offered that pack after having been released only a couple hours before. Coug and Virt had brought back Anemia, still more or less in tact. It's too soon to tell how successful Anemia will be this time around,  but they did one thing right -- they revived the group for the right reasons.  Anemia wasn't ready to die out so soon. The members who really wanted to ke ep it alivestuck around to try again. Anyone who didn't care isn't on the roster. 2.4 -- Why it's OK to Pay/Charge for an ANSi For some reason, people have a problem with the concept of a bunch of  colored blocks being worth money. I've decided that a little Q&A will clear this up. Q: I'm not charging people to call my board, so why should yo u charge me for the ANSi I requested from you? A: I'm answering a question with a question...why aren't you charging people? Just because you don't charge people for access doesn't mean you c an't. If an artist charges you, that's his right. It's also your right to tell him to shove the ANSi up his ass. But just as running a board takes w ork and time (which some people feel is a good reason to charge for access ), it also takes work and time to draw an ANSi for the same board. Q: Do you really think you're so good that I'm going to pay y ou for a pic? A: You must think he's that good if you want an ANSi from him  in the first place. Q:  won't charge me! He said he'd accept l eech access on my board instead. A: Congratulations, that wasn't a question. If you want some one else to draw for you, get them to and quit whining. Somebody in Hawaii might n ot want to call your board in New York. They might not want free warez. They might want some honest-to-God cash. If you just want to whine, waste so mebody else's time. Q: OK, I'll pay you. What does that get me that makes it bet ter than a picture by someone who works for free? A: That all depends on the artist. It should, above all, get  you a high quality ANSi. Not to say that artists who work for free cut corners, but the $$ you spend should provide insurance that it will really be a work of ar t. Some artists will give priority to paying requests. Others will...well , that's all really business...their business. 2.5 -- Enough Already That's it for this first issue. I hope it gives you something to thi nk about. One man's opinion might not mean much, but then again, I don't think I'm alone in a lot of my views. From the previous feedback I've received, I kn ow some of you dig what I'm saying. I don't greet people for the sake of greeting them, but I do have a f ew to thank for their input: ts, mcb, Extreme, Syntax Error, Royal Assassin, Amnesia, and everyone else who read my earlier stuff and responded. I try to hit the topics that I see discussed on IRC, boards and in my conversations wi th local members of the scene. Hope you enjoyed issue #1, and take it easy. o-tron fos/teklordz/trilogy ss xrist@primenet.com -------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------If you have questions, comments or wish to r eceive future issues of Subversion directly in e-mail, please respond to the address listed above .  (c)`96 O-Tron -------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------SAUCE000496 Subversion O-Tron Teklordz 1996041355P