Ding 43!

By Shamus Posted Sunday Aug 24, 2014

Filed under: Landmarks 99 comments

Today is my birthday. Good day so far. My wife got me a Canon EOS M digital camera. She’s been gently hinting that I should do some video content, and I think this gift is her way of hinting even harder. On one hand, I’m really uncomfortable doing any video content where you can see me. I’d prefer to just talk and hide my face behind images and game footage. I’m not young or photogenic, so maybe I should leave the camera work to those sorts of people. On the other hand, I watch plenty of videos from creators who do not have faces for television, as it wereAlthough I really dislike videos of ONLY talking into a camera. I think a mix of head-shots and footage is a good balance between production costs and production values. And sometimes you can do things with facial expressions that are harder to convey with just vocal inflections..

So if you want to weigh in on the debate, this might be a good time to do so. Would you like to see me do something along the lines of SuperBunnyHop, where you mix a talking head with game footage? I don’t feel strongly either way. I really like doing videos, but they take so damn long that they devour the time I spend writing prose. Using self-footage might make it easier to make videos without making sacrifices elsewhere. I don’t know. Tell me what you think.

It’s become an accidental tradition to write autobiographical things at this time of year. Well, either that or depressing calculations regarding how long I’ve been alive and how much time I’m likely to remain so. That’s no fun. So let’s tell a story…

It’s the summer of 1982. It’s the dark year in my life. My brother and I have become part of the tribe of middle-school boys that forage for amusement in this pre-internet wasteland.

There are very, very few pictures of this period of my life. That’s my brother Patrick on the left, me on the right. I’ve been told that Cthulhu has that same wallpaper in his dining-room.
There are very, very few pictures of this period of my life. That’s my brother Patrick on the left, me on the right. I’ve been told that Cthulhu has that same wallpaper in his dining-room.

The town where we live has fallen on bad times. The economy here is based on two businesses: Pullman makes railcars and Armco makes specialty steel. Pullman closed down last year and put half the town out of work. Crime is up. Poverty is up. Drug use is up. While history will record that this is when the country began crawling out of the horrible depression of the 1970’s, we don’t know that yet and so people have no reason to believe that things will ever get better and every reason to think they will continue to get worse.

As an 11 year old kid, all of this is opaque to me. I just know that people are monumentally unhappy everywhere we go, and as far as I can tell grim nihilism is normal for adults.

Which means we’re very keen to stay away from adults and find something interesting to do. There is only so much time you can put into the same five Atari games, so this means going outside. Our tribe has decided that climbing on rooves is a good source of entertainment. As entertainment goes, trespassing for its own sake is pretty lame, but we do our best to make it interesting. We climb up fire escapes, over fences, up trees, and out of windows to reach places we shouldn’t. Then we sit around and talk tough about stuff we pretend to understand (fighting, cars, girls) while some of the older kids smoke.

It’s a stupid waste of time and a great way to get chased around by the police.

Today we’re on the roof of a little apartment building. I hate this place because it’s right next door to where I live. I prefer to be a bit further from home for our roof-climbing. It kind of kills all sensation of adventure and exploring to scale stuff in your own neighborhood. But the other kids want to climb this thing and so that’s what we’re doing.

We lived in the lime green house. (It was white in 1982.) We were climbing on the roof of the building in the middle of the picture. I realize it looks sort of small now, but when I was 11 it felt like scaling the Chrysler building.
We lived in the lime green house. (It was white in 1982.) We were climbing on the roof of the building in the middle of the picture. I realize it looks sort of small now, but when I was 11 it felt like scaling the Chrysler building.

The houses have all merged together here, turning half the block into one big roof. We can get there by going into a little alley, climbing a wooden staircase, and then using a pile of wobbly buckets to boost us up to where we can pull ourselves up using a window sill.

Like all climbing projects, this one is boring the instant it’s over. We’re ambling around on the roof and there aren’t any challenges left. The fun was in getting here, not being here.

There’s another apartment building that’s not part of this multi-structure roof. It’s a story taller, so this roof is even with the third-floor balcony on the opposite building In the image above, this other apartment is directly behind the red-brick building, so you can’t see it from this vantage point. Trust me, it’s there.. The gap between them is only about six feet. It’s probably close enough to jump, if you’re feeling like risking your life for no reason. If you miss, it’s a three-story drop straight down to concrete.

The other kids find a wooden plank long enough to span the distance, and we lay it down between this roof and the opposing balcony. The two heights don’t perfectly match, and the grade of this roof means the board is a little wobbly on the near side. You can reach the other side by taking a single step onto the board and then hopping to the balcony. The boys put a brick down on one side of the board and a paint can on the other, in a hilariously superstitious gesture intended to hold it still. The objects look like tripping hazards to me, and I seriously doubt either one is heavy enough to keep the board from rolling out from under you if you take a bad step.

The kids all cross, leaving me alone on the roof where we started. They’re messing around on the balcony and looking for interesting things to do. There’s a door that leads into the third-floor unit, but it’s locked. The apartment is uninhabited right now. We can see it’s empty inside. Everyone looks at me, expecting me to hop over.

See, while I’m deeply dysfunctional on many levels, the one thing I do have going for me is a well-developed ability to appraise risk vs. reward. In school, I rate gold stars and letter grades for what they are: Things with absolutely no intrinsic value. Adults act like I’m supposed to want good grades and approval, but I see no value in any of that. So I don’t see the point in doing work for a worthless reward. Likewise, I notice this wooden plank represents a massive risk (death) for zero reward. If it was the only way onto the balcony, then it might be worth considering. But I could get to where the other boys are by simply returning to ground level and climbing a different staircase. There’s no reason to take this risk.

Also I’m nearly immune to peer pressure. The other kids are acting like I’m being a sissy for not wanting to hop across the board, but I don’t care to risk my entire life to win their approval. So I announce that I’m going back down to the ground floor and I’ll come up the long way. Everyone rolls their eyes.

As I’m climbing down from the roof, to the window sill, to the buckets, I lose my footing. The buckets – which are all empty and insubstantial – fall out from under me. I try to recover by putting more weight on the window sill and my leg goes right through. I fall on my back in a shower of glass. I end up with half my body hanging in this empty apartment. One piece of glass digs deep into the back of my leg.

There is really a lot of blood now. I don’t think I’ve ever seen this much blood at once. I screamed as I feel, and the other boys have come running. They extricate me from the pile of glass and we escape the scene as quickly as possible.

This is a whole new level of pain for my 11-year-old self. Blood has filled my shoe, and comes oozing out when I put my foot down. I’m leaving a trail of bloody footprints as I go. I stop at the corner to lean against the mailbox and wait for my head to stop spinning. I move on when the size of the growing blood puddle begins to freak me out.

I get home and mom takes me to the hospital. It only takes a few stitches to pull the wound closed. The gash is deep, not long.

The next day I notice the right side of my right foot is completely numb. I didn’t notice this at the time of the accident because of all the pain. After the trip to the hospital I figured the numbness was a result of the local anesthetic they gave me before they sewed me up. But now it’s clear that this is the result of the accident. Everything on the right side of my foot – from the ball of the heel up to the ankle, has lost all sensation. I keep poking it, waiting for sensation to return. I tell the doctor about it the next time I visit, and he doesn’t know what to make of it. He says the nerves are all towards the front of the leg and that he’s not sure how I could have gotten nerve damage based on the position of my injury.

I hobble around the house for a few days. Mom finds the owner of the apartment building and arranges for me to pay for the window. It’s $30, which is about a year’s worth of birthday and Christmas money to me.

So I’m going to miss out on a year’s worth of money. I ruined a bunch of my clothes. I spent a couple of weeks in pain. And I sustained some level of permanent nerve damage. Even thirty-two years later, I can poke that spot on my heel and it’s still not quite right. It tingles, like when a limb has fallen asleep.

It’s not a horrible thing to have happen. It’s about par for the course, as childhoods go in those days. But I’ve always been bitter that I’m the one who got hurt when I was the only one who refused to stupidly risk his life on that plank.

 

Footnotes:

[1] Although I really dislike videos of ONLY talking into a camera. I think a mix of head-shots and footage is a good balance between production costs and production values. And sometimes you can do things with facial expressions that are harder to convey with just vocal inflections.

[2] In the image above, this other apartment is directly behind the red-brick building, so you can’t see it from this vantage point. Trust me, it’s there.



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99 thoughts on “Ding 43!

  1. newplan says:

    Sounds to me like the moral of the story is to not be a pussy and just take the plank.

    /sarcasm

    Well told story – really pulls the reader in.

    1. ET says:

      The real moral of the story is to assess all situations, even the ones ostensibly “safe”. Those paint cans totally aren’t an OH&S-approved climbing device. Where’s your ladder and safety harness? :P

      Sucks your foot is numb. At least you have somewhere you can put burning coals, to make people think you have super pain powers! :D

    2. MadTinkerer says:

      I think the lesson is that if you are a good kid who accepts gold stars and letter grades, then you will be perfectly safe when attempting dangerous stunts. But if you are a bad kid who refuses to accept the phoniness of the system, windows will spontaneously shatter and hurl glass shards at you even if you avoid dangerous stunts.

      Remember, kids: conformity == physical safety. Do your math homework if you don’t want to anger the windows.

      1. Eathanu says:

        That’s strange. I never did any of my homework, but hurricanes and tornadoes (and brush fires, and earthquakes and rains bad enough to cause flooding when I lived in Cali) know to keep a ten mile radius.

        Then again, I crushed my knees when I was 12 while just rollerblading down a hill, so it’s more correct here to say that nonconformity causes self-induced injuries, sure, but it also gives you weather-bending powers.

      2. atomf says:

        >Do your math homework if you don't want to anger the windows.

        Oh, is that why PCs give me so much trouble?

      3. ngthagg says:

        I thought the lesson was “don’t take decorating tips from Cthulu”.

    3. Well, I was so resistant to social pressure that I never actually went and did dangerous things with stupid “friends” in the first place–and I had no childhood injuries at all*! Mainly because, no doing dangerous things. Amazing how that works. Shamus just didn’t take it far enough. (I also never cared about the gold stars etc. and would occasionally tell my teachers they were wrong in front of the whole class–not to curry favour with the rest of the class, who didn’t like me anyhow, but because they were wrong and there was no internet to contradict people on yet)
      Of course, you can only get away with completely ignoring your peers if you have something else to do. I had a lot of books. And lego.

      *scrapes, bruises and road-rash don’t count. A bit of time on a bicycle and that’s guaranteed, right? No broken bones, stitches, nerve damage, wrecked joints etc.

  2. somniorum says:

    Happy birthday sir! I, for one, am very happy that you managed not to kill yourself back then. If I could manage it, I would totally get you a fully-feeling leg for your birthday.

    But unfortunately I’m not a wizard. : (

    1. ET says:

      He just needs to hold out for like…thirty more years! Cloning, brain tranfers, and medi-gel! :D

      1. Nick Powell says:

        Reapers tho.

    2. Paul Spooner says:

      Sometimes scars are worth keeping around. They remind us of our past, ills, mistakes, and sacrifices. The story probably wouldn’t have been nearly as good without the scar.

      So, I don’t wish it was healed. I just hope it was worth it.

      Happy Birthday Shamus! May you have many more years of gaining and bearing scars.

  3. Thomas says:

    Happy birthday! Penblwydd hapus!

    1. Dragomok says:

      I concur.

    2. Anorak says:

      Bendigedig.

      ….and that’s about the extent of my 14 years of mandatory welsh language lessons. Except for being able to pronounce the longest railway station name.

  4. Akri says:

    At the start I was like “man, why couldn’t my childhood have been that interesting?” but by the end I was like “nevermind, I’m good.”

  5. The Rocketeer says:

    Just find someone in your readership that looks plausibly nerdy, in a fake, Hollywood sort of way, and overdub your voice onto footage of them. Simple!

    1. MadHiro says:

      Sounds like somebody is volunteering.

      1. The Rocketeer says:

        Well that’s a bit bold of you, but if you think you’ve got what it takes, go ahead and ask!

  6. ET says:

    I too, like this style, and dislike talking heads. Like, I can already hear your words being spoken, I don’t need to see your face. If it’s for particular emotion/emphasis, then for a few seconds is cool. :)

    EDIT:
    Oh no! The parent of this comment ended up in the moderation queue or something. Don’t reply, or we’ll end up with all orphaned comments! :S

    1. Dragomok says:

      I also really like this style. In fact, I’m a little bit sad that Chris/Campster doesn’t do his videos that way anymore.

      1. ET says:

        Well, the good news is that the bug isn’t in effect on this comment. The bad news is you like to ignore warnings. :P

        1. Alexander The 1st says:

          Nonconformity, man. We’d all be sheep if we just heeded your warning. :p

          (Awaiting the inevitability of this comment being orphaned.)

          EDIT: Aww….

  7. Danny says:

    I’d obviously be happy with whatever content you choose to give us, but for myself I prefer prose. Lots of news sites seem to be going to video over prose (apparently for big operations it is cheaper/easier…less so for one person doing it solo) and I’m therefore always happy when I see a new prose-based post on here.

    1. ET says:

      I too, like your written stuff. Maybe make the videos a once-in-a-while thing? Your choice, though. :)

    2. I’m also basically a prose man. Plus videos tend to take a long time; I only have so much room in my day. I can justify spending a couple minutes reading Shamus’ witty, well-turned, often informative prose about games I don’t play and programming I don’t know how to do. Because witty and all that.
      Spending half a freakin’ hour watching video about games I don’t play is a bridge too far, so I largely ignore that part of the site.

    3. Flying Sock says:

      Another vote for prose. Much to little of that recently.

      Congratulations on surviving another year, may there be many more.

    4. Unbeliever says:

      Yet another “me too”. I’m here for your amazing WRITING. Video content is always ignored…

      1. Jeff says:

        Exactly the same here.

        I can read prose from almost anywhere at almost any time. If I’m in a position where I can be watching a video, I can be doing innumerably more interesting things – like playing a video game. (This is why the idea of watching a stream of someone else playing a video game baffles me.)

        If I was in a position to watch these types of videos, I could be watching an actual movie (or finally start watching Game of Thrones). Consequently, I also completely ignore any and all videos.

  8. Benjamin Hilton says:

    Happy Birthday!

    Also this post reminded me how quickly time passes, I swear it wasn’t that long ago that I was reading DING 42!

  9. When it comes to video production, most everyone of the peeps I watch all say the same thing: video quality is pretty much irrelevant if you don’t invest in a good audio setup, so if yer wife reaaaally wants you to move forward on that, she’ll get ya a quality mic next.

    1. ET says:

      Even just a medium-quality mic which you can clip to your shirt collar* would be a very good addition. I’ve seen so many videos where the person is recorded from like 15 feet away, with the mic in the camera, so when they turn up the volume, all the background noise is turned up as well. Gotta take advantage of the inverse-square scaling of sound volume! :)

      * Heck, if you could find a way to use a headset mic from a set of gaming headphones, that’d work too.

  10. Taellosse says:

    My vote, for whatever it’s worth, is to keep going primarily with prose. I’m always way more reluctant to watch a video than read an article (in part a holdover from when my usual internet speed was more dodgy than it now is most of the time). I don’t mind – even enjoy – the occasional video, though. Maybe one a month or so?

    1. syal says:

      He should compromise, and make a video of himself talking in subtitles.

      1. Deoxy says:

        I second this – just trying to conceptualize it is enjoyable.

    2. Kacky Snorgle says:

      MORE! TEXT! LESS! VIDEO!

      (Dunno why I’m channelling Sylvie & Bruno today, though….)

  11. Galad says:

    Aww Shamus, you couldn’t have remembered a happier story, huh? :P

    Either way, cheers on 43 and hoping on at least another 43 of enjoying entertainment and life in general! :)

    And hey, go ahead, try out new things. If it doesn’t work out, you can always ditch them for the usual things that have been proven to work, since they’re not a massive investment.

  12. Fede says:

    Well, “I'm the one who got hurt when I was the only one who refused to stupidly risk his life on that plank” is only one way to look at this.
    The other way is, “I was going to fall somewhere, and I was smart enough to avoid falling where it would have killed me”.

    Anyway, thanks for sharing this story, and happy birthday!

    1. Good point. For that matter, Shamus would likely have climbed down along that route eventually even if he did go across the board, so he could have knuckled to the peer pressure, survived going across the board and back, and still injured himself afterwards when he climbed down.

  13. milos says:

    I don’t mind the idea of a face cam video. I don’t particularly have a need to have a face to face experience in my critic videos, but if you think it makes your job a bit easier I’m all for it.

    Also, happy birthday Shamus! May the next one take a bit longer on it’s way.

  14. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Happy birthday Shamus.

    As for the childhood story,while I was a kid I was jealous at people for doing permanent damage to themselves,breaking limbs,gaining scars,while all of my falls resulted in no permanent damage at all.Even my worst fall,from a balcony some 3 meters up,when I smashed my head against the edge of the pavement,resulted in only a couple of hours of unconsciousness,and a week long bump on my head,nothing more.But when I got older,Ive realized how happy I am to be Bruce Willis from unbreakable.

  15. Ygor says:

    Happy birthday! Hope you had a great day!

  16. Chamomile says:

    More content is good. So if you produce more content by writing than by doing video, keep writing. If you can produce as much content with talking head video as with writing, then I’d say give it a shot. It’ll make your wife happy and while you might not have the face of a Hollywood star, no one I interact with on a daily basis does. You look better than a lot of people whose talking heads I watch.

  17. Tuck says:

    Happy birthday and whether you write or speak more as you go on, thanks for all the content!

  18. Joakim says:

    I will join the choir of people who vastly prefer written content. It is much easier to consume and if it also easier for you to produce, that seems like a win-win. :)

    Oh, and Happy Birthday! :D

    1. Otters34 says:

      It’s pretty weird seeing what happens when people write words based on how they sound, versus when people say words based on how they read them.

  19. MrGuy says:

    I'm not young or photogenic…

    Shamus Old?

  20. Congratulations on another successful trip around the sun!

    I would love to see video content that included your face. I think someone’s level of photogenic-ness has more to do with their personality that their actual physical appearance, and you seem like a very nice person who would be fun to watch.

    Also, take some comfort in the fact that you are a guy. If you were a woman, your appearance on camera would be MUCH more harshly criticized.

    1. Nidokoenig says:

      It feels slightly awkward saying this, but I don’t get where Shamus gets the idea he’s not photogenic. He’s pretty hot, IMO, though I probably have more interest in older men than he does and I’ve only seen his posed stills. But yeah, being a guy, Shamus really only has to worry about the occasional bit of slightly creepy positive attention and possibly friendly teasing from the Spoiler Warning crew.

      1. Otters34 says:

        You’re on to something there, Nidokoenig! Though you may want to keep that on the lowdown near Mrs. Young…

        Like Chris moving away from showing his face on Errant Signal, the problem seems more in the mind than in reality. Both of them even go with the same claim of “But I’m HIDEOUS!” when that’s…dubious.

        Ever since he grew a beard, Mr. Young’s always had this vaguely Trotskyish air of assurance and intelligence, and he’s certainly not lacking in interesting and well-reasoned things to say. Somehow I doubt having the face to go with the voice would lessen either!

        And that is horribly true, Beldotti.

  21. Clint Olson says:

    “In school, I rate gold starts and letter grades for what they are: Things with absolutely no intrinsic value.”

    I’m guessing that “starts” should be “stars”.

    1. syal says:

      So, your school didn’t have the thing where everyone who was in class five minutes early got extra credit?

  22. Clint Olson says:

    Also, I’m agreed with some of the others that your main strength seems to be prose. I absolutely adore your writing, and would be sad if you gave it up in favor of video content.

  23. Gilfareth says:

    Personally, I’d love to see you do Errant Signal/SuperBunnyHop-esque videos with some talking head aspects to it. It’s not so much a problem of being super photogenic (Arin Hansen isn’t exactly the best looking guy, but he sure has gotten popular) so long as it helps produce more stuff. :D

  24. Sean Riley says:

    Youtube content relies less on being photogenic and more on being charismatic. It’s about screen presence. I mean, Jim Sterling? I would not call a handsome man. But DAMN if the man doesn’t bring the presence.

    You can decide for yourself if you think you can do that. And by that, I don’t mean Jim Sterling. Thank God for him and all that, but we don’t need two of him. :)

    1. Jokerman says:

      I have no idea what you are talking about, Jim is gorgeous.

  25. Geebs says:

    Sural nerve injury, probably.

    The video content you’ve done so far has all been fantastic, but it’s all basically been you reading one of your articles out over some footage; I guess this is an opportunity to try out a new style. I tend to think that entire videos of talking-head stuff make the broadcaster look like a crazy single issue obsessive, but a mix of talking-head plus footage usually works.

    That and reaction videos of course. People love reaction videos.

  26. Drexer says:

    Happy Birthday Shamus! Speaking as one who was also born this day, it’s always fun to have your looking-back autobiographical posts to read.

    Do use the camera if you feel like it could be a nice change or experiment, I think it would be counter productive to include it in any kind of Let’s Play, but using it in conjuction with some game footage in a specific discussion of a theme might be just what it’s good for.

    1. syal says:

      It’s only a good idea in a Let’s Play if all eight of them do it and they’re spaced out Brady Bunch style with the game in the center and everyone angling their heads so it looks like they’re staring at the game footage.

  27. Zak McKracken says:

    There’s really no need to put your face in front of the camera when doing video content… you can film entirely other things, like your hands doing stuff, or you could make stop-motion videos explaining things, or … oh, anything!

    Oh, and that camera is suited to make proper photos as well, so that’s a bonus, I’d say.

    A very happy birthday to you, all the best, and hope this site becomes even awesomer because of it.

    1. Alexander The 1st says:

      “or you could make stop-motion videos explaining things”

      Now I’m picturing Shamus using stop-motion video for car analogies.

      1. ET says:

        Shamus’ Stop-Motion Car Analogy Hour! Featuring Mumbles!
        (cue toy cars, pulling banner with show’s title)

        1. MrGuy says:

          Can we re-create the Railroad Tycoon episode with stop motion?

        2. Unbeliever says:

          THAT’S IT!!!

          Shamus, you do the audio of yourself talking. Then get Mumbles to film herself lip-synching or otherwise acting out your words. Poof, more attractive face on camera, plus comedy gold as she does her interpretation of your intended material…

    2. Akri says:

      That Vi Hart video was fantastic. 30 minutes of my life well-spent.

  28. Jack DeCoeur says:

    It’s strange, I read almost all of your content, but I only seem to post once a year. Around this time.

    As others have mentioned, a very interesting story. I wouldn’t begin to guess what the moral should be.
    As for the video? I’d almost certainly watch it, regardless of format. You always seem to have something interesting to say.

    Anyway, Happy Birthday Shamus, hope it’s a good one!

  29. Lisa says:

    Firstly, Happy 43rd!

    While I tend to read prose more, I do try to find time to watch any videos you produce. So I’m in the ‘give it a go’ camp.

    And you are cute and interesting to watch, so that’s a bonus too!

  30. Talby says:

    I would LOVE to see Shamus do video analyses along the lines of his previous written deconstructions. (like the Thieves Guild series, the Mass Effect 2 plot analysis, the Mordin Solus character analysis, etc.) Also, happy birthday Shamus.

  31. Fizban says:

    Happy Birthday! Like Dameian Lucifer above I was always a little jealous of not breaking any bones or getting any real injuries when I was a kid. I rolled my ankle a few years ago and was mostly fascinated by almost having a real injury. But if I’d actually taken any real damage I’d probably wish I hadn’t so probably better this way.
    I wouldn’t mind seeing some mixed talking head/other footage. While I normally don’t watch videos from say, Facebook, I pretty much watch or read anything that goes up here. Your voice on Spoiler Warning and other videos is good and if you find a way to put some face in it won’t detract.
    It would be nightmare to set up and Josh’s lack of face would defeat a lot of the point, but Spoiler Warning with picture in picture for all the hosts would be an interesting experiment. Get to see just how everybody breaks down.

  32. Cinebeast says:

    Happy birthday! I’m interested to see more video content from you, but only if you feel it’s a comfortable extension of your writing.

    That childhood story was pretty messed up. The worst injury I’ve ever experienced occurred when I was nine — I climbed underneath a trampoline (while it was in use) and got my head kicked into the concrete floor, splitting my chin open. It was ugly, but I certainly wasn’t pooling blood everywhere.

  33. Neko says:

    Happy Birthday!

  34. Kathryn says:

    Happy birthday!

    My vote is always for text. I dislike videos and podcasts for two main reasons: (1) it takes significantly longer to listen to talking than to simply read the text and (2) it is excessively rare for anyone to provide transcripts for either video or podcasts. (I do understand that for the majority of content providers, the cost/benefit assessment is solidly in favor of not bothering with a transcript.)

    That being said, if you provided transcripts, I would definitely take the time to watch your videos. You have the gift of making any subject interesting. When you were talking about your mom’s job, you literally made watching paint dry sound interesting!

    1. Paul Spooner says:

      I agree, transcripts are where it’s at. Searchable means text has more longevity and usefulness than video, even if video is more fun and easier to produce.

      Hey Shamus, I’d be willing to type up the transcripts if you don’t have the time. I’ve done enough of it myself that it’s not too much trouble. You know where to find me.

  35. NMD says:

    This may be the weirdest gaming related community I ever seen. Any other gaming related community would be jumping at the idea of seeing the content creator making video instead of prose. You should make a survey one of these days to see what is the average age of your fans. I would not be surprise if more than half are over thirty . I think you should try to do the extra videos.

    I wouldn’t worry about you not being photogenic or young. In my years of consuming youtube content what matter is a good distinctive voice and a lot of charisma. Which you have a lot of so you do fine and you’re not bad on the eyes either. Base on the few recent pics you seem to have all the adorkableness of stereotypical Hot Nerd with the extra confidence and perspective that only come with decades worth of life experience. Which is in my opinion… is hot. I am gonna stop before I start sounding creepy and start throwing arbitrary number to measure your hotness.(FYI You are a 7.7925140 jk) So yeah it be cool to see you in a video.

    Your childhood story reminded me of mine. Me and my cousin wanted to check the second floor that was still under construction. When we went to the second floor he dare me to jump to the first floor. I said to go first so he jump and landed just fine. I was not immune to peer pressure as you were as a kid but my fear of heights won out so I chicken out.Thankfully unlike in your story there was a concrete stairs for me to get off relatively safely(No hand rails). I am now grateful I didn’t I could have seriously hurt myself. My Cousin didn’t mock me for not jumping at least. He was a good lad like that R.I.P cousin you were quite the daredevil. Anyway happy birthday hope you have many more.

    T.L.D.R: I WANT TO SEE PRUTY OLDER MAN FACE IN MY STUPID BOX NOW!

  36. Disc says:

    I don’t really care about seeing the person’s face, especially if it’s a longer video. More often than not when it’s just somebody talking about stuff, I just put the video on the background and listen while doing something else on the PC.

    Unless you’re doing comedy or something else that might require you to use body language and have more of a presence, I just don’t see much value in it. I don’t mind if it’s there, but I find “talking head” videos (ie. most vlogs) most of the time pretty freaking boring and not really engaging in the fashion that would glue me in and keep watching when they speak for prolonged periods.

    1. syal says:

      Face videos work best as bits of downtime; you show some footage of whatever topic, and then you show your face and give people time to process what they just saw.

      Which is part of why it doesn’t really matter how photogenic you are; you’re really just a background to the topic you’re discussing.

  37. Paul Spooner says:

    I think the “talking head” style video is dumb, but I would be very interested in alternate video content. For example, you’ve talked before about how most of your “writing” time is spent doing things other than typing. You have to think about stuff lying in bed in the morning, or while playing minecraft. Take some footage of you doing that stuff, and make a video about how “down time” is important for creative work. You could work in some points about how video game companies shouldn’t work their employees so hard while you’re at it.

  38. BitFever says:

    Happy birthday!
    While that incident sucks all kinds of donkey butts at least you got a cool scar and a story out of it ;)

    As far as you using the camera or not goes I don’t care ether way. I love your content for your thoughts and opinions. You could put out videos that are just footage of a brick wall with your voice over and I’d still watch cause the visual content isn’t the driving force behind what makes your work entertaining for me.

  39. sofawall says:

    Man, you know it’s a real-life story when it ends completely unsatisfactorily. :P

  40. Trix2000 says:

    Happy birthday!

    I’m personally ambivalent on the video. Doubt I’d dislike it at least, but I enjoy your content as-is too.

  41. Phantos says:

    Happy Birthday, Shamu! May your day be free of DRM.

  42. BuschnicK says:

    Please no videos. I have been a long time reader of your blog and in all those years I have watched maybe a total of 30 seconds or so of your videos. Video content just doesn’t work that well for situations where I turn to an RSS reader (e.g. commuting on a train). They also force a pacing on me which I really don’t like.

  43. noahpocalypse says:

    Three METERS? No way could a little eleven-year-old jump that. That’s about 10 feet, about the height of a single story building. I’m 5’7″, in fair shape, and I don’t think I could jump that. Did you actually mean three meters? (*Questions his own athletic ability and estimation ability*)

    Don’t let my seeming outrage (it’s not actually outrage, just surprise) in the above paragraph detract from the following, though: Happy Birthday! Well, happy late birthday anyway.

    1. Shamus says:

      Hm. I didn’t account for the fact that stuff seems really big when you’re young. And now that I think of it, 11 year old Shamus shouldn’t be speaking in metric.

      I’m going to edit the post.

  44. Orophor says:

    Happy Birthday Shamus! Thanks for another year of thoughtful articles, interesting podcasts, and amusing let’s plays.

  45. Oh, yes–Happy Birthday!
    Whether or not you start doing video of your personal mug with the camera, I hope you have fun with it and with anything else you might have received and had good cake and stuff. If you haven’t had cake yet, or are planning to have cake again in the future, here’s the closest thing I can do to giving a gift via prose: My family’s chocolate cake recipe, which is the best chocolate cake anyone I know has ever tasted. Every single time we feed this cake to people, they break out in “OMG this is the best chocolate cake I’ve ever had!” sorts of exclamations. Use it wisely.
    The rest of you I guess are collateral benefit (like collateral damage only nicer).

    Perfect Chocolate Cake

    Cake:
    1 cup unsifted, unsweetened cocoa
    2 cups boiling water
    2 ¾ cups sifted all-purpose flour
    2 tsp baking soda
    ½ tsp salt
    ½ tsp baking powder
    1 cup butter or margarine, softened
    2 ½ cups granulated sugar
    4 eggs
    1 ½ tsp vanilla

    Frosting:
    1 package (6 oz) semisweet chocolate chips
    (Or you can use the same amount bittersweet chocolate””may actually be better)
    ½ cup light cream
    1 cup butter or margarine
    2 ½ cups unsifted icing sugar

    Filling:
    1 cup heavy cream, chilled
    ¼ cup unsifted icing sugar
    1 tsp vanilla extract

    In a medium bowl, combine cocoa with boiling water, mixing with a wire whisk until smooth. Cool completely. Sift flour with soda, salt and baking powder. Preheat oven to 350F. Grease well and lightly flour three 9″ circular cake pans. In a large bowl of an electric mixer, at high speed, beat butter, sugar, eggs, and vanilla, scraping bowl occasionally, until light ““ about 5 minutes. At low speed, beat in flour mixture (in fourths) alternating with cocoa mixture (in thirds), beginning and ending with flour mixture. Do not overbeat. Divide evenly into pans; smooth top. Bake 25-30 minutes, or until surface springs back when gently pressed with fingertip. Cool in pans 10 minutes. Carefully loosen sides with spatula; remove from pans; cool on racks.
    Frosting: In medium saucepan, combine chocolate, cream, butter; stir over medium heat until smooth. Remove from heat. With whisk, blend in icing sugar. Chill frosting in fridge, bringing out and whisking every 5 minutes, until it holds shape (approx. 40 minutes).
    Filling: Whip cream with sugar and vanilla; refrigerate.
    To assemble cake: On plate, place a layer, top side down; spread with half of cream. Place second layer, top side down; spread with rest of cream. Place third layer top side up.
    To frost: With spatula, frost sides first, covering the whipping cream; use rest of frosting on top swirling decoratively. Refrigerate at least 1 hour before serving.

    Purple Guy notes:
    The cocoa and icing sugar it’s probably not a bad idea to sift after you measure them. It’s just that if you sift them first it throws the amount off; I think that’s what they mean.
    I didn’t use an electric mixer, just a big bowl and an electric beater.
    The greasing and flouring is important, and even so you have to be pretty careful getting the cake out of the pans.
    The icing: Every five minutes, bah. Do that and it takes hours and hours, gets frustrating as all get out. Just shove it in the fridge and let it set. It gets a bit hard, but let it warm up a couple minutes and stir it and it’s fine. It’s tougher to handle when too soft than when too hard. After you’ve iced the cake, you really do want to keep it in the fridge; this icing gets pretty sloppy if it gets warm.

    1. SteveDJ says:

      But… the Cake is a Lie!

      Belated Happy Birthday

  46. Forrest says:

    So Shamus, what you’re saying is that you’re the opposite of Achilles? Invincible only in your heel.

    Good story though! And Happy belated birthday!

  47. The Specktre says:

    I’d be cool with it if you wanted to make SuperBunnyHop-style videos.

    RE: Story: Dang dude. :|

  48. Deoxy says:

    I generally don’t watch the videos. At all.

    Ever.

    So yeah, I’d vote for more text. Yay!

    Also, happy birthday – many happy returns… just not quite as close together, eh? Seems we’ve been having a bad bout of time dilation or something…

  49. Thomas says:

    If you make videos, please consider taking some pages out of Computerphile’s book, and don’t restrict yourself to speaking Directly At The Camera. Speaking to a camera operator slightly to the side is more interesting, visually speaking, and tends to make lighting easier and more flattering. Also, the slight change in angle makes it much easier to express with your hands, because they won’t be going straight at the lens so frequently. Also, obviously, it helps to cut to other footage regularly, even if it’s just a paper sketch or some MS paint diagrams.

  50. MichaelG says:

    If this guy can get 200,000 views for playing an Oculus Rift game, think of what you can get: http://youtu.be/3Kee7q_jTAs

    As for childhood adventures, nothing beats hospitalization for paralysis at age 7, so there…. :-)

    Happy Birthday!

    1. Chris Robertson says:

      Then, of course there is Howtobasic. Incredible viewer numbers from behavior that might make you question his mental state. Watch at your own peril.

  51. Tintenseher says:

    I think, as with any Internet venture, the best option is to try it a few times and go from the responses there. Personally I think a healthy mix of video and text will give you the widest range of expression. After all, there are certain things it’s easier to show than tell, and vice versa.

    Happy birthday, though, and many more. Looking forward to whatever comes our way.

  52. Hamilcar says:

    I personally don’t watch any of your video content. I am sure that it is good, but I just don’t have the time to sit down, screw with my security settings and watch a fifteen minute- half hour video. If I do turn on a video it simply to LISTEN to it while I do some other work.
    I come to your blog to read your great writing. When I see a video, I am disappointed.

    So please, no more video content. Just keep writing.

  53. Ciennas says:

    Happy Birthday Shamus!

    Thank you for putting this blog here. It’s been a treat so far.

  54. Cuthalion says:

    Late happy birthday, Shamus! Fun story.

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