Thursday, April 4, 2024

Some Heavy Metal Internet Things

A few HM-related Internet Things from recent months.

I mentioned that Lostboy's heavymetalmagazinefanpage.com was updated recently.  I think this is a Big Deal for Heavy Metal Magazine fans, especially those who, like me, enjoy looking through the information about the magazine and its contents to understand some of the connections over the mag's long history.  I've searched through the Magazine List for info for posts and just learning many many times.  I'm encouraged by the implication Lostboy is getting more active with HM and may continue updating the site, which would be awesome.

I recently signed up for the Heavy Metal Discord.  It still exists since The End, and it's apparently just mostly fans and hangers-on like myself.  Kinda quiet, but I'm trying it out.  It seems similar to how the old internet forums used to work, with people writing things and others responding.  I see things, learn things, speak up a bit.  Indeed, I learned that some people (like Lostboy) have ordered items from the HM website, and received some of them!  For some it seems an acceptable risk to get some of the issues that they somehow still have available.  I still don't recommend ordering from HM, but it's interesting to hear that it's operating on some level.

The Heavy Metal web presence still lurches on, frozen in its deathly grimace (the horrid motion comic on the main page, and the We Are Back on the shop page, are more than ironic), social media still ending with Mr Lees' vomitous discharge from over a year ago.  Will any Heavy Metal miracles happen, or will the plugs be pulled when no one touches them over years?  A sad end.

Perhaps worse, I was dismayed to see Philippe Druillet releasing eNn-eFf-Tees of some art on the new druillet-digital page.  I was hoping for something more ... substantial ... than costly vaporware.  Who could possibly have thought that was a good idea?

More happily, the excellent Hydrogenesis by Caza from Heavy Metal Magazine February 1979 was featured on the SciFiArt tumblr page.  Great site for cool images, with Heavy Metal seen frequently.  Certainly this mid-70s work of Caza is worth a mention as one of the finest examples of great stuff in the mag's early years. 

Here?  I'm especially slow making posts these days, for all the ideas I've got.  More updates to the blog are overdue, but they are mere thoughts at this point.  No matter.  No hurry.  I've got some time left of my brief existence, and only myself to amuse.  Traffic is up, though 70-80% of it is from that bot from "Singapore" (sometimes "Hong Kong").  They seem to like that Bits post.  Still, a few more humans seem to come along these days.

More to come, until then, thanks


2 comments:

tarbandu said...

Bots from Singapore / Hong Kong ?! Very cyberpunk-y.......

fred said...

yeah, they've been busy. They're not as focused as the russian bots from '15, that made the old post МЕДОВЫЙ МЕСЯЦ the most-hit blog entry of all, but they've surpassed previous traffic max hit-counts by far. Here? why bother?