The Ninth Panel

2003-06-14T14:28:00.000Z

Everybody please note that this blog is now here. Please update your bookmarks accordingly. I thank you...

2003-04-01T10:48:00.000Z

As of today, I'm migrating the blog to my own server. From now on, you can find the Ninth Panel at http://ninthpanel.dyndns.org/blog/ Check it out. I will continue this page for a while, but soon it'll just redirect you.

2003-03-17T10:43:00.000Z

So what else is new? Well, I now have a beautiful daughter - Sophie Rebekah, born 4th March 2003. It's true what they say, y'know; nothing is quite like being a father. You cannot explain what it's like to just gaze down at this new little human being that you help create.

2003-03-17T10:33:00.000Z

Hmm. Safari still doesn't parse this blog properly.

2003-03-17T10:31:00.000Z

It's been a long time since I last posted (again), and I know that at least one person (hi James) misses my pithy insights into stuff. So here I am again. I think my last post had something about me migrating to a moveable type blog that I was going to host on my own server. Well, I tried, but I just couldn't get it to work on a win2000 box. I'm not exactly clueless at

2003-02-06T16:34:00.000Z

I think I've pretty much had it with Blogger. Now I'd got my own server, I think I'm going to relaunch the website using Movable Type. It'll give me a chance to flex my Unix and Perl muscles too...

2003-02-06T16:21:00.000Z

Brent Simmons' wonderful RSS reader/Weblog posting system NetNewsWire Pro is an absolute Godsend for Bloggers and people who read blogs. He's now posted handy instructions for configuring NNW with various blogging systems. Check it out.

2002-12-30T01:18:00.000Z

Is this working yet?

2002-12-22T23:19:00.000Z

Test two...

2002-12-22T23:18:00.000Z

Still trying to see if this works...

2002-12-22T23:17:00.000Z

Trying out NetNewsWire Pro's new blogging tool.

2002-12-19T15:15:00.000Z

Is this working? If it is, then there's a website you just have to check out: Technical Difficulties.

2002-12-19T15:01:00.000Z

Is this working?

2002-12-11T00:12:00.000Z

It's been a long, long time......since I posted anything. Wow. I've always been bad at posting a journal, but this is ridiculous. Anyhow, since I last posted, stuff has been a-happening. We've bought a house, and we're about to move in after having nearly the whole thing gutted and rebuilt; Liz is getting bigger every day with our very own 'lil swee'pea; and life has been one big roller-coaster.

2002-10-04T20:15:00.000Z

Joined a new online forum the other day. This one's called 'ComicsPro', and it's hosted on DelphiForums (which is worthy of a post in itself, being as they're so crap). It's pretty interesting in that it supposed to be for comics professionals, whether they're creators, editors, publishers or retailers. Some big names have joined up, and it's set to lead to some very interesting discussions about

2002-10-04T20:04:00.000Z

Where does the time go? It's been ages since I last posted, and all my good intentions have flown out of the window once again. All together now, "I must blog more... I must blog more..."

2002-10-04T20:03:00.000Z

Got some time on your hands? Bored? Then why not sign up for GameNeverEnding? It's absolutely superb, and something I'm probably going to regret ever signing up for...

2002-09-08T15:12:00.000Z

Just testing whether w.blogger is publishing properly to blogspot blogs yet...

2002-08-20T13:04:00.000Z

Ooh boy, it's been a while since I posted. They'll be throwing me out of the blogger's union if I'm not careful. I have good reason though - this last month has been the proverbial 'if it could happen, it did...' Firstly, I've been ill. I've had this bloody annoying 'flu type thing that gives you a bad cough and chest infection, and leaves you feeling like shit for days. I still keep

2002-08-05T13:49:00.000Z

Eagle eyed readers will notice the BlogTree logo down at the bottom of the sidebar. This is a wonderful project detailing the geneology of weblogs, and is a fascinating way of wasting a few hours if you're a blogging junkie like me. Blog authors can sign their blogs up, and then add parent and sibling blogs. If enough of us do this, it will be the furthest reaching index of the phenomenon that is

2002-08-03T22:44:00.000Z

I'm a member of Metafilter! At long bloody last! Yippee!

2002-07-27T10:57:00.000Z

Well, I finally got my hands on Eric Meyer's new book, Eric Meyer on CSS, and it's a great as advertised. Well done, Eric. A most marvellous read, and an amazing reference.

2002-07-27T10:45:00.000Z

Coutesy of Metafilter, here's the latest meme. All I can say is "Pie Gooood!"

2002-07-20T20:21:00.000Z

I've added borders to the blockquote declaration in the template so that there's better separation between posts. Every day I find out something more about CSS that blows me away. I've ordered Eric Meyer's new book Eric Meyer on CSS, and I can't wait to get my grubby little mitts on it. Eric's a real visionary when it comes to CSS, and he's a big influence on the way I approach building websites.

2002-07-15T15:29:00.000Z

Holy crap! I think we need an au pair pretty damn soon. Now if only I can convince Liz, my wife… Only joking Liz… Thanks to Ben Hammersley for pointing out this link…

2002-07-15T10:22:00.000Z

AAARRRGGGHHH!!! Metafilter's down! What are we to do??? Still, it might mean that when the new server's back up I might finally be able to become a member...

2002-07-15T10:01:00.000Z

Dirk Deppey from The Comics Journal emailed me to remind all you good people out there that the latest installment of the Comics Journal Audio Archive has been posted. If you haven't been checking these out, then where have you been? Dirk's been doing a great job in transferring classic interviews and panels to MP3 and then letting us all hear them via the Journal's website. This month it's the

2002-07-13T22:45:00.000Z

And now Blogger's having trouble with their template server... No, it seems to be back again...

2002-07-13T22:38:00.000Z

Man, what a day. Went to the Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition. This is normally crappy, but this year they'd really outdone themselves. Room after room of empty, soulless images and sculptures with no point or originality. It was like walking round a bad rural art show with delusions of grandeur. And it was filled with lots of pretentous bores talking loudly about the "Art". And, and, the list

2002-07-13T08:38:00.000Z

This is quite the worst use of browser detection and flash I've seen in a long time. And believe me, I've seen some bad sites. What's worse is that it apparently cost BT £1,000,000 to "create". So that's a million quid (a million? MILLION? How could anyone charge a MILLION POUNDS for a website?) wasted on a crappy, ill-designed and extremely difficult to navigate website, while we still can't get

2002-07-10T16:54:00.000Z

Thought I'd give kudos to Nick Bradbury, the creator of the wonderous TopStyle. This is by far the finest program for editing HTML and CSS if you're a hardened hand-coder like me. This is doubly amazing to me as TopStyle is a Windows program only. I run it on my PowerBook G4 using Virtual PC (another great program), and it's fab. If you're into building websites, you owe it to yourself to

2002-07-09T16:06:00.000Z

I'm now part of another blog. It's called Never Again Will He Mock My Power Vest!, and it's created by the members of the Thimble Theatre e-mail list. Which is nice. Check it out.

2002-07-09T15:58:00.000Z

Another day, another meme. Google! DayPop! This is my blogchalk: English, United Kingdom, London, Hanwell, Brad, Male, 31-35!

2002-07-05T14:25:00.000Z

You'll need a PC, or better still, Virtual PC on a Mac, to look at this, but it's well worth it. A lovely little novelty.

2002-06-20T12:27:00.000Z

Aquaman's lament. Thanks to Faz for pointing out this lovely song.

2002-06-11T21:56:00.000Z

Hurrah! The Web Standards Project is back, and in a new bloggy type look. If you've got anything to do with coding websites, then you really should go here, take heed and apply.

2002-06-11T09:41:00.000Z

I haven't posted anything about Arsenal recently. Which is strange, seeing as we dominated the domestic season in 2001-2002, winning both the league and the FA cup. A quite marvelous season, and one with lots of great memories for me. Foremost is the fact that the team really pulled together and worked for each other, a feat that is getting rarer in the modern game due to the current focus on

2002-06-11T09:10:00.000Z

Just testing out another new blogging tool - this time it's MozBlog, the blogging tool for Mozilla. Hopefully this will work nicely, as I do like Mozilla as a browser.

2002-06-10T21:03:00.000Z

Oops. I meant to link to Pete's personal blog, Pete Ashton Dot Com, when I wrote the link to bugpowder below. This really is a fabulous read, dealing as it does with Pete's life as a bookseller, comics buff and depression sufferer. As a fellow SSRI-taker (although I'm on Prozac, and he's on Seroxat), I can really relate to this side of his life. Nice one Pete.

2002-06-10T20:44:00.000Z

Thanks to Evan, comes news of some new blogs about blogs. Blogtoday and Blog About Blogs. I dunno, but I've always had fondness for meta- stuff (metacomics, metafiction, and now metablogs), so these are a must-link for me.

2002-06-10T20:37:00.000Z

Even though it's on my permanent blogroll, I thought I'd give a well overdue shout out to Pete Ashton over at BugPowder. It's the MetaFilter of the UK independant comics scene.

2002-06-10T20:34:00.000Z

I got my Bloggercode: B2 d- t- k+ s+ u f- i o x-- e- l+ c-- What's yours?

2002-06-05T21:35:00.000Z

Sheppeyscum is the funniest site I've come across this week. Perhaps someone will do a follow-up: essexscum…

2002-06-05T21:33:00.000Z

Marvel's dotComics has been around for a while, but I post the link here so that you, too, can sample the wares of the "house of ideas" without actually forking over any cash for them.

2002-05-28T18:36:00.000Z

More on the Scott Kurtz PVP strips currently running about so-called "alternative" comics. Check out pvponline and the comics urinal - The Comics Journal Message Board, and then here. Frank Cho, man. Ain't he a piece of work?

2002-05-27T18:36:00.000Z

Warren Ellis has been plugging his new sideline artbomb.net again. It's worth a look, as they seem to have a decent reviewing policy, and it's always nice to see stuff by Andi Watson.

2002-05-27T18:15:00.000Z

Scott Kurtz has always struck me as one of the more interesting web cartoonists out there. He's obviously got some chops, and the strip is funny on a regular basis. This last week, he's been doing a series about "alternative" comics. It's pretty good, but I somehow get the feeling that he's feeling a little bitter about something…

2002-05-27T10:53:00.000Z

Thanks to Metafilter, I came across this pair of themed articles — here and here. As you'll see, they're on my favourite subject: Comics. One is Pro, and one is Con. The article arguing for comics is ok, but the article against comics is simply the most breathtaking example of wrongheaded thinking I've seen in quite a while. Check it out.

2002-05-26T21:50:00.000Z

A new organisation has been formed to, as they put it, "[help] facilitate the teaching of comics in higher education". They're called the National Association of Comics Art Educators, and they have an excellent, informative website here. It's really great to see this happening in Anglophone countries at last.

2002-05-24T10:16:00.000Z

I've added a new commenting system, thanks to the fine folks at YACCS. Cool.

2002-05-20T19:10:00.000Z

Following on from the last post, lots of interesting links can be found here.

2002-05-20T18:59:00.000Z

Every now and then, you come across an article that you think "I wish I'd written that" This is one of those.

2002-05-20T18:31:00.000Z

Interesting article about Dave Cooper. Telling quote: "Cooper's entire Weasel series print run, which usually sells out, is now only 4,000 copies. Due to the low print run and the book's high production values, Weasel is sold to readers at about $7 apiece. Cooper puts an enormous amount of craftsmanship into every issue, creating a new oil painting for each cover, drawing tiny indicia for the

2002-05-20T17:30:00.000Z

There's currently no commenting system at work on this site. I'm hoping to implement the YACCS system by tomorrow...

2002-05-20T16:55:00.000Z

One horrible thing about leaving this beastie for so long is the fact that I'm now having to tweak the template in order to get everything working again. Bear with me while I do this necessary repair job...

2002-05-20T16:25:00.000Z

Wow. Has it been so long since I posted last. I guess it must be. Still, this isn't unusual for me: I often started diaries and journals (especially ones in the form of comics) only to give up through laziness. My bad. OK, here's some stuff you should look up: The latest in the TCJ MP3 files are up. These are snippets (long snippets, mind), of interviews and panels featuring famous

2002-02-08T16:16:00.000Z

I haven't blogged for ages. Typical. I often start things and then leave them for months when something else takes my fancy. A belated new year's resolution: I must blog more often.

2001-12-22T23:49:00.000Z

I'd just like to wish everybody reading this a very Merry Christmas, and a wonderful 2002. Personally, I don't see how 2002 could be any worse than 2001, but that's me.

2001-12-13T09:51:00.000Z

Some excellent news regarding Angouleme. This first piece comes from Dylan Horrocks, who writes: "I just found out that the l'Association edition of Hicksville has received two Alph'art nominations: Best Album and Critics Prize" Top work fella! The second comes from Paul Gravett: "And yes, (Andi Watson's) a nice guy - in fact, his work is being included in the 'unknown/little known'

2001-12-12T16:02:00.000Z

Just got in from having my first driving lesson for eleven years. Never hit anybody or anything, so I guess that's a start. Lots of people (including the lovely Liz) have told me that it gets easier, but it was just as hard, frustrating and downright scary as I remembered it being. Any tips?

2001-12-09T21:48:00.000Z

This, to me, shows that the arts establishment in this country have their heads completely up their arses. After the Late Review's banal (and frankly, tired) arguments on whether comics are art or not, we come to the awarding to the Turner Prize, the UK art world's annual prize for the piece of BritArtToss that will most get up the public's nose. And this year we have a doozy of a winner.

2001-12-08T16:57:00.000Z

More on the Ware award. Today's Guardian has a great "review" of Jimmy Corrigan by Raymond Briggs. It's really more about the age-old question "Are comics art?" than the book itself, but it's well worth a read. Here's a taste: "Now that Jimmy Corrigan has won the Guardian First Book Award, it can only mean that the strip cartoon has at long last become intellectually respectable. About time too.

2001-12-08T00:20:00.000Z

Trying out another blogging tool now. This one is for Mac OSX and is called BlogScript. It allows you to use anything as a blogging tool. You just copy the text you want to post, and then evoke the script. It even pings Weblogs.com for you automatically.

2001-12-07T23:12:00.000Z

Just checking out a new blogging tool. It's called iBlog, and it's a way to post without actually going to Blogger, or using that javascript pop-up window.

2001-12-07T18:03:00.000Z

Chris Ware's Jimmy Corrigan wins Guardian First Book Award. This is fantastic news. And bloody well deserved. Well done that man, and could this be the breakthrough we here at team comics have always wanted in the Anglophone world? Let's hope so. Next up, Joe Sacco!

2001-12-05T09:37:00.000Z

This needs no explanation. Enjoy. (Thanks to Memepool).

2001-12-05T09:27:00.000Z

Most everywhere you look on the wide world of weblogs, Chris Raettig's online journal has been linked to most copiously due to the fact that a minion from multinational "service" giants KPMG wrote to Chris to tell him that he was breaching their "linking" agreement (Linking agreement?) by having a link to them on his small weblog (oops, seems like I'm breaking the agreement too! Naughty me).

2001-12-04T23:33:00.000Z

The Boys done great. We beat Juve by 3 goals to 1. What a game, two from steady Freddie L, plus a brilliantly taken free kick into the top left corner by that man Henry. We looked a different side to the one that lost against Deportivo last time out - and we have done for the past couple of weeks. Beating Man Yoo has really put a spring in our step. Long may it continue.

2001-12-04T18:06:00.000Z

I'm becoming a complete geek. Even more so than before. I've spent a lot of my time playing with Mac OSX lately, which has meant getting into UNIX. Oof. And I thought MS-DOS was arcane. If you're just getting into OSX, I can well recommend Mac OSX Hints, a great resource for learning more without jumping straight into a horrible mess.

2001-12-04T18:03:00.000Z

It's Champions League time again. We're at home to Juventus, the Italian giants, tonight. Plenty of threat there in the shape of David Trezuguet and Del Piero. We really need to win this if we're going to go any further in this competition. Getting nervous again...

2001-12-04T17:55:00.000Z

Like everybody else in the blogging community, I've just signed up to BlogSnob. What a great idea. If you've got a blog (and if you're reading this the chances are you probably have), why not sign up today?

2001-11-29T15:45:00.000Z

Thanks to Metafilter (them again) for this link: What Did They Know is a fascinating look at suspect events and statements that happened just before 9/11. True or paranoid ravings? You decide.

2001-11-28T23:20:00.000Z

Sometimes I despair of Flash. And then sometimes, you come across something like this, and it gives you new hope. Link courtesy of everybody!

2001-11-28T14:36:00.000Z

Ah. Now it's back. And guess what? I was right – no comments!

2001-11-28T14:35:00.000Z

Not sure what's happening with the commenting system. I changed the code as per Snorland's instructions, but it doesn't seem to have made a lick of difference. Oh well. There's probably no comments anyway!

2001-11-28T14:18:00.000Z

Sorry for the truncated post below. It should end "Thanks to Metafilter for the link".

2001-11-28T14:14:00.000Z

Check this out. I don't know about you, but I'd like some of these toys (thanks to Metafilter for the link).

2001-11-28T14:07:00.000Z

I'm back. I haven't posted for a couple of days because I got a new Mac over the weekend. I'm now the (very) proud owner of a 667 MHz Titanium PowerBook. With 512 mb of RAM, 30 gig HD, DVD, Mac OS 9.2.1 & X.1 and an Airport card. It's a beaut. I've networked it up to my old G3 PowerBook, and I need to hook it up to the PC I got from a client. Home networking! Ooh, I love my macs... Now if only I

2001-11-24T22:49:00.000Z

Wow. You knew Chris Ware's Jimmy Corrigan masterpiece was up for a Guardian First Book prize, right? Well, if you go here, you can vote for it if you think it should win. And guess what? It's way ahead at 46% of the vote.

2001-11-24T14:37:00.000Z

Oops! Seems I rattled the cages of the people who populate the John Byrne Fan Site message board by having the temerity to suggest that: John Byrne will only be a small footnote in the annals of comics history. The Comics Journal will have a larger entry than Byrne. That the USA is not the only place in the world where comics are created. I won't go into all the to–ings and fro–ings as

2001-11-22T19:20:00.000Z

When you use CSS to position elements, make sure you can add up. I've discovered I can't. Oops. More tweaking.

2001-11-22T19:07:00.000Z

Check out reprocessed.org. It's built completely in XHTML & CSS, and it's lovely. Nice work fella!

2001-11-22T18:36:00.000Z

Just read on the Arsenal mailing list that there's a rumour going around that we're about to buy Nino Gomes from Fiorentina for £7 million. God, I hope so. He'd be mustard in the Red and White.

2001-11-22T12:12:00.000Z

I've added a form widget to open links in new windows. Thanks to Random Walks, a perfectly excellent blog for the code.

2001-11-21T22:27:00.000Z

Here's a link to the Official Speakers' Corner Homepage. Haven't had time to explore it yet, but it looks like a good web presence for one of London's must-visit places.

2001-11-21T22:18:00.000Z

So. It finished 2-0. We looked much better in the second half, but still never like we were actually going to score. Positives: Edu looked good when he came on, and Stuart Taylor was an improvement over Richard Wright who looks like he's lost whatever confidence he once had. Negatives: Too long to list. We really need to improve both in the league and in Europe, or it's another season with

2001-11-21T20:40:00.000Z

Well, it's half-time, and my worst fears are being realised. We're two-nil down, and we're playing like a bloody pub team. Not one of our players look like they can be bothered (with the possible exception of Wiltord and Cole, and that's being generous). Still, I bet Wenger will come out with some excuse or other. We might as well pack up and go home now.

2001-11-21T19:21:00.000Z

I decided to try posting from Opera - pretty difficult seeing as you only get a teenty-tiny window to do it in. Has anybody else seen this? I'm using Opera 5 for Mac

2001-11-21T18:06:00.000Z

Only an hour and three quarters 'til kick-off. Nervousness increasing with every minute.

2001-11-21T18:03:00.000Z

Pretty much everyone else has blogged this, but you really should check out the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. It's heaps of fun. Beware though, it's pretty intermittent at the moment. Apparently they didn't expect the amount of traffic they've been getting. D'oh!

2001-11-21T16:38:00.000Z

Here's one for all you interface geeks out there: Graphical User Interface Gallery. Look how far we've come! (thanks to Boing Boing for the link)

2001-11-21T16:27:00.000Z

More tweaking to the template. I do love to tweak.

2001-11-21T16:22:00.000Z

Some good news. The new Comics Journal should be out tomorrow. That means I have that, the latest issue of the Acme Novelty Library and the second issue of Draw magazine to pick up from my box at Gosh. Yay! Well, it's good news to me.

2001-11-21T16:20:00.000Z

Arsenal are playing Deportivo la Coruna tonight at Deportivo's ground in the second leg of the Champions League. Seeing as how we've haven't been firing on all cylinders lately, and Deportivo are probably the best team in Europe (at least technically), I'm a tad worried that we're going to get stuffed. Especially when you consider that the last time we played them, two years ago in the UEFA cup,

2001-11-21T13:47:00.000Z

There's a new build of Mozilla out. I'm using it to post this, and it's great. Go download it now, and support the efforts of the Moz team.

2001-11-20T23:29:00.000Z

This is somewhat amusing in a sick way. These tests seem to be a meme infecting (if you'll pardon the pun) the web at the moment. Here's another.

2001-11-20T23:04:00.000Z

I've just installed a commenting system (Snorland), so that I don't feel like I'm talking to myself. Although exactly how many people are reading this I've no idea...

2001-11-20T19:39:00.000Z

Michael Fraase is a new hero of mine. Read Fun with spammers in awe.

2001-11-20T19:06:00.000Z

Noticed this on the Arsenal.com site. So Steven Sidwell is staying on at Brentford for another month eh? That'll please my mate Twiggy, who's a dead keen Brentford fan. For my part, I hope we don't sell yet another good youngster just yet.

2001-11-20T18:30:00.000Z

Blogger's back. Yay! But blogspot appears to be down. Boo! I think I'll just give up.