Welcome to notions of sentience, the LiveJournal of heaven_monument.

Here you'll find the following:
-Posts about my tumultuous and generally entertaining life
-Posts about the fandoms in which I participate
-Posts about internet phenomena like Youtube videos or other LJ communities
-Posts about other various happy things

Here you will not find the following:
-Posts about fanfiction. All my fanfiction has been moved to a personal community - arcanum_hm.
-Posts about my musical arrangements. They're in this community - ff_kh_arrange.

If you're new to LiveJournal, welcome aboard!

1. To read my most recent entries, which is where you are now, click "dream today" above.
2. To find an entry sorted by date, click "dream yesterday".
3. To read entries posted by my friends and the communities I'm watching, click "dream of you".
4. To read my profile, click "dream of me".
5. To view my memories - or favourited posts - click "the dream relived".
6. To read entries sorted by tag, click the tag you want (to the left, below the ads) or click "tags" to view the tags page.

Want to be my friend? Comment in any post and introduce yourself! 8D

Thanks for stopping by,

~HM

October 26.
Windows 8.
Hold on to your butts.

So you probably know that Oh No They Didn't! is LJ's largest community. It basically keeps LJ afloat. It focuses on celebrity news, pop culture, and other hot topics, and as an added bonus, it features the single worst populus that I have ever had the displeasure of associating with on the internet.


( A brief list of problems with ONTD's communityCollapse )


No more. I've had it. Many of ONTD's members need their internet licences revoked, and the mods should be punished for letting this kind of shit fester and ferment.
When 4chan becomes a better place to hang around than your community, you know there's a problem. (And 4chan's technology board, /g/, is a fantastic place to lurk as long as you're not offended easily and have a good nose for trolls. I've learned so much about tech in the last 2 years thanks to /g/. Still won't touch /b/ with a ten-foot pole, though.)

So I left.
I will miss the gifs, though.

Any other interesting LJ communities to which I should sign up?

I occasionally lament the fact that I will never be a thespian. I find most high literature extremely dull, most casual literature poorly written, most theatre incredibly dreary, most art films boring, and most musicals excessively campy. Granted, I haven't exactly sampled much of these media, but I haven't found someone who can say, "Okay, so you liked X, right? Then you'll love Y!"

Lucky for me I have friends who like anime!

This post describes what I liked and disliked about the anime I've watched, in the hope that you, my dear F-List, can recommend some more.


( TTGL, Lucky Star, Haruhi Suzumiya, FMA: Brotherhood, and more underneath!Collapse )


I'm now working my way through an anime called Jormungand, which is about a group of arms dealers who recently recruited a former child soldier. I'm only two episodes in and I'm intrigued, but it might turn out to be awful. Next on the list are Code Geass, Fate Zero, and others. Can you recommend anything? Please let me know! The whole internet is at my disposal!

IT'S HEEEEEEERE

http://finalfantasyviipc.com/au

It looks just like it did in 1997, but with slightly more polished textures.
For AU$12 (promo offer), I might just get it.

Then again, there's bound to be a million FF7 ROMs floating around the internet, and PS1 emulation is piss-easy: any modern smartphone can do it...

I personally believe S-E should just stop releasing new Final Fantasies for the time being and just go back to square one (no pun intended lol): cross-platform (PS4, next XBOX, Wii U, Windows/Windows Phone, Mac, even Android, iOS, etc) brand-new re-releases of every Final Fantasy title, with proper voices, non-synth music, 3D worlds, but the same (fixed if necessary) battle mechanics, plot, and designs as the originals.

I'd love a remastered FFX for Windows. I'd use it as an excuse to blow $1000 on a gaming PC :3

Shit like this makes me very frustrated.

http://www.engadget.com/2012/08/24/apple-v-samsung-decision/
Apple just sued Samsung and won over US$1 billion. These were for design patents regarding grids of icons, physical home buttons, and rounded rectangles. What a load of horse shit.
Samsung countersued Apple regarding 3G patents - things Samsung actually developed themselves, then offered to Apple for licencing, and were rejected - and lost, winning nothing.

Google purchased Motorola Mobility just in case this happened. Since Motorola essentially invented the mobile phone, they (and thus Google) own the rights to hundreds of patents, with which they can sue Apple into the ground.

Whatever happens next, this is a shitty, awful day for technology. All people reading this that live in the US: do not buy a mobile phone for at least a month, because shit's going to go down. Devices will get banned, updates will get pushed (and held up by the carriers for no real reason), and Samsung might never sell a phone in the US again.

*hugs Galaxy Nexus tighly* You're not going to take this away from me!

Update: Here are some of the things that Apple patented. From Engadget.com:

Patent number 7,469,381 is for the bounce back that occurs when you scroll beyond the edge of a webpage or document in iOS. Patent number 7,844,915 is for single-finger scrolling and two-finger zooming, while number 7,864,163 claims tap-to-zoom technology. As for the design patents, D618,677 claims the iPhone's edge-to-edge glass, speaker slot and display border, while D593,087 claims its rounded corners and home button, and D604,305 claims the grid-style icon layout in iOS. The last design patent, D504,889 is for the iPad's edge-to-edge glass, rounded corners, and thin bezel.

So... every device ever, that isn't made by Apple, is not allowed to have the following:
-Kinetic scrolling (i.e. the bounce-back once you've reached the end of a list, web page, etc. Android ICS replaces this anyway)
-Single-finger scrolling
-Two-finger zooming (aka pinch-to-zoom)
-Edge-to-edge glass
-A top-mounted speaker slot
-A clear border defining the edge of the display
-Rounded corners
-A physical home button, also rounded
-An operating system featuring grids of colourful icons
Just in case Joe Bloggs mistakes a supposedly "inferior", cheaper  product for a glorious iPhone. /rolleyes

Ironically, could this be fantastic advertising for Samsung? Whatever.

They say the best success is revenge.

This is my first work of fanfiction I've written in over a year. I wrote it with the express intention of putting the entire mess that was the implosion of Final Fantasy Fortnightly behind me, and to promote my new community (made with my dear friend, stardust808), Final Fantasy Zodiac (ff_zodiac).

As typical of me, I write Vossler fic. I've taken my headcanon of how he and Basch met, fused it with the 7000+ word epic headcanon I wrote for vieralynn (I hope she's happy she helped form this, despite our falling-out, yet I'm not sure if I should ask for forgiveness or demand she ask for it), added a dash of Robert Louis Stevenson, used the promise I made to stardust808 as motivation, and spat this out.

I'll be posting the entirety of the work here and also on ff_zodiac as an example of how full serialisation works, since I messed it up the first time.

Title: Follow Me (Part 1)
Author: heaven_monument
Fandom: FFXII
Characters/Pairings: Vossler, Basch
Zodiac Sign: Leo
Spoilers: None.
Rating/Warnings: PG for mentions of blood, wounds, and gore, but nothing graphic at all.
Summary: To live as the fourth in line means Vossler never gets to choose: instead, he follows. When 15-year-old Basch arrives in the dead of night, seeking asylum, 18-year-old Vossler seizes his opportunity to take the lead and change history. Part 1 of 2: the second part, focussing on Basch, will come next Zodiac cycle: Virgo, starting August 24.
Author’s Notes: Pre-canon, mainly set in 686 OV (20 years before canon). Huge amounts of personal headcanon involved, especially concerning Dalmasca's army, the recent history of Ivalice (especially Landis and Archadia) and Vossler's family, and so on. If you would like to read my 7000+ word headcanon epic, I'll provide you a link.
The personology and Zodiac themes invoked here are a combination of those from TVTropes, Birthday Personology at NetPlaces.com, and The Secret Language of Birthdays, a book written by Gary Goldschneider and Joost Elffers.

( Being the youngest of four meant that Vossler always followed someone else’s lead.Collapse )

End of Part 1

AN: The 27th of Leo converts to August 18. According to personological wisdom, those born on August 18 are “set for battle”, with a “fierce and unshakable spirit” that “would not be unusual [to fit in] a military career”. August 18 is known as the day of endurance, and those born on August 18 are adaptable, patient, and deep, but are prone to struggling with life’s encounters, obsessiveness, and unnecessary combat. Sounds like someone we know?

By contrast, our blonder half’s birthday of the 29th of Virgo converts to September 20. Also according to personological wisdom, those born on September 20 are “selfless” and “live to help others”. A Taurus decanate adds “personal charisma”, which means that people will “follow dutifully” when one speaks. September 20 is known as the day of the manager, and those born on September 20 are organised, shrewd, and observant, but occasionally overconfident, overemotional, and inflated. This is almost 100% Basch, though I'm not sure he could be described as "overemotional"...

NB: I will not be explaining the plot, listing the cast, or writing a million words on this pseudo-review. You'd best hit up Wikipedia, IMDB, or TVTropes for more info. This entry just explains how I came to see the movie, and what I thought of it: its techniques, casting, and direction.

There are no spoilers, so if you haven't seen The Avengers, you may read without fear. :D

I understand that I'm incredibly late to the Avengers party, but with uni kicking my ass, I postponed it until last night. I went with my parents to a 7:30pm screening, but even though I purchased tickets about an hour early, we were squeezed into the front row of a very small theatre in the cinema complex (with 25+ theatres of various sizes). My neck still hurts.

The pain was worth it.

I have not seen any of the individual character films, barring bits-and-pieces of Iron Man 2. My friend - who is a huge comic book geek, especially when it comes to Marvel and DC - explained to me one lunchtime a few weeks ago the basic plots of the individual movies, which helped greatly. My parents had no idea what was going on, though, but I could tell they enjoyed it.


( Cut for length and opinions.Collapse )

I'd give it four out of five. I would like to purchase it on DVD, but I wouldn't watch it over and over again like I would X-Men 2 or X-Men: First Class, which I consider to be better superhero-themed action-drama films.

Super exciting university news: it doesn't suck any more.

Yes, it's getting much harder and requires orders of magnitude more thinking to get through the day, but university doesn't suck. In fact, it's quite good. I've made a bunch of new friends, I'm now part of an international honour society (Golden Key) and will probably join the committee next year, and I'm about to start advertising piano lessons around my university for extra cash. :3


( Science lurks under hereCollapse )
Also, today I was accepted into a research scholarship, which would involve me working 200 hours over the next year (and a half?) on a casual basis, and being paid $4000 for it. It would look fricking amazing on my bare-ass CV, which I desperately need to fill to gain an 80-hour industry ~experience (basically an internship) next year, which is a third-year subject and is therefore required to complete the degree.

It's clear that I've left the mess of ff_fortnightly behind me, and stardust808 and I have plans to start another Final Fantasy community with a strong zodiac motif, a fresh and exciting premise involving prompts, and a strong focus on controlled syndication to third party sites like Tumblr and FF.net. If you're interested, watch this space, because it's likely membership will be moderated.

If you're an ardent follower of technology news like me, then you know what the "cloud" is with regards to information technology. For the uninitiated, the "cloud" refers to internet services like file storage and transfer, web applications, and software as services. For example, if you have an Android device, then you're using the cloud to keep your contacts in sync. Many cloud services are extremely convenient to average users, especially if they're free (and many of them are), and if you have internet access wherever you are.

Recently, Google joined Microsoft, Apple, and other, smaller third-party developers in creating a cloud storage service. It's called Google Drive, and like its competition (SkyDrive, iCloud, Dropbox, Box, SugarSync, etc), it allows you to store whatever kind of files, documents, photos, videos, music, Chrome bookmarks, and whatnot, on an offshore server linked to your Google Account.


( More info about Google Drive and its competitors belowCollapse )

Here's some links to help you compare services:
http://www.engadget.com/2012/04/24/google-drive-vs-the-competition-dropbox-skydrive-icloud/
http://www.theverge.com/2012/4/24/2954960/google-drive-dropbox-skydrive-sugarsync-cloud-storage-competition

Call it the Post-PC era, or the PC-plus era, but it looks like cloud storage might make USB flashdrives and external hard drives a thing of the past soon enough.
Now get cloud-hopping, because while it might be a buzzword, cloud services are here to stay!