Quote from: Mega`Adnan on March 31, 2019, 12:17 PM
Find me.

Spoiler! View

Picture with my university friends (Farewell trip)

definitely back row, all the way to the right

Quote from: TheKomodo on March 26, 2019, 02:48 PM

Quote from: skunk3 on March 26, 2019, 04:15 AM
2014 Mazda 3 hatchback... not my car but the same car/color. I like it but I'm never buying a new vehicle again. Such a waste of money.

Can you not just take a picture of yours lol? Or is it a dirty girl?

Well when I saw this thread I didn't feel like going outside and taking a photo. I could just do a quick Google image search... done.

I upgraded my stock stereo system with JL Audio component front speakers, JBL rear speakers, and dual JL Audio 12" subs in the hatch! Not the most impressive system ever but I don't need mega power in a fairly small car. Aside from that I haven't done any modifications to my car. For me a car is just a tool to get from point A to point B, but I do have to drive a lot so a decent sound system is required.

2014 Mazda 3 hatchback... not my car but the same car/color. I like it but I'm never buying a new vehicle again. Such a waste of money.

Quote from: TheWalrus on March 24, 2019, 09:25 PM
I got my tattoo at a house party last week

Well since the image is linked from Myspace I'm gonna have to disbelieve that lol...

And stars... smh. One of the most ubiquitous and cliché tattoos there is. 

Let me be clear by saying that I don't hate these people. Several of my friends have tattoos (at least one) and probably 75% of the people I know under the age of 30 have a tattoo.

The reason why tattoos and piercings irk me is primarily because women tend to get more of them than men, and I personally find them unattractive. A couple of ear rings and maybe a small nose ring is fine, but when a girl has like 15 tattoos and 14 piercings, it's excessive. From experience I have come to the conclusion that these people are superficial, shallow, vain, lack confidence, are usually hipsters of some sort, and have all sorts of miscellaneous issues going on with them.

I think that body modifications in general are a silly waste of money. Do you know how much it costs to get a full sleeve tattoo by a decent artist? Spending that much money just to have someone draw permanent pictures on you is f@#!ing retarded.

I've had the chance to get free tattoos on a couple of occasions in the past but I turned down the offers because even though they would have been free, it's still a matter of permanency. I love Worms but would I get a super sheep tattooed on me? No. (But maybe a worm roping lol...) I love Street Fighter, Star Wars, D&D, synthesizers, and DJ'ing but would I get any stuff like that tattooed on me? Nah. Why bother? Just so I can look at it every once in a while or show it off to others like I'm so cool for having a tattoo?

Tattoos used to mean something. You got one because you were a world-traveling sailor, or a gangster, or a biker, or some sort of tribal warrior. They meant that you were a badass in some way. These days any dipshit 18 year old can go to a tattoo parlor and get tatted up for no reason whatsoever aside from that they want to be 'cool.' I respect personal freedom and all but I feel like it's clout stealing. Having a tattoo nowadays means absolutely nothing and I just felt like ranting about it lol.

This is just my personal opinion and I was just curious if anyone agrees with me.

In my experience I have found that MOST people who have many tattoos and/or piercings pursue those sorts of body modifications for a couple of reasons:

1. It is trendy and a lot of people are trendsters.

2. They have self-worth / self-esteem issues.

3. They want to be visually identified as tougher or even sexier than people without those sorts of modifications.


To me, seeing someone covered in tattoos screams: "PLEASE LIKE ME!" These people so desperately crave attention and validation and other shallow, damaged people give them props on their new ink because they too are shallow and damaged.

I also hate all of the canned, cliche responses that people give when asked about getting tattoos, like: "Oh I just really love art" or "My tattoos have a deep personal meaning" or some other shit like that. Quit lying, people. lol. I can't wait until this shit isn't trendy anymore and everyone is open and vocal about how they regret their decisions. People get PISSED when I talk about why I think tattoos are a stupid waste of money and that they usually signify self-esteem issues because I'm slicing right through their veil of rhetorical bullshit.

It's truly sad how annoying women have become. I live in a very liberal city and if you want a shot with women here you basically have to act like a beta cuck f@#!boy, unless you are black, in which case you can treat women like dog shit and they will never leave you. If you support Trump even in the slightest people think you are a piece of shit. If you have anything bad to say about Obama, Clinton, Sanders, etc... you're also a piece of shit. If you think progressive values suck, you're either ignorant or a piece of shit. Or both. If don't support every new social justice warrior hot topic you're a bigoted hater. If you don't praise feminism and kiss ass by saying things like "women can do anything men can do, but not vice-versa" then good luck. On top of all of those nauseating personality traits, tons of women these days are covered in tattoos and piercings, which I think looks like absolute shit.

Quote from: Anubis on March 20, 2019, 08:22 PM
We are closing in on a transitional era for humanity, that means practical skills like cooking, house making etc. all become mundane and unimportant because we will have technology slowly, bit by bit replace all day to day chores. We also work towards a society where we have more people than jobs, that means more people will have no actual job that benefits the civilization and need to be occupied elsewhere. It's not as bad as some of you make it out to be, yes, we are losing our "traditional" life where everything is clearly separated with family and job and technology. It all melts itself into everything we use and care about. At one point resources and energy will become a lot less valuable to us and we will freely distribute the wealth more equally once the majority of goods are produced by machines that are fueled by free energy. I think everything we currently develop is still more positive than negative once it's done. The main issue is that money and as a result of this driving factor, corruption and lobby work has too much say in our world.

A lot of skunks complaints are very subjective, which makes sense since he speaks his mind, but when judging if the world is getting worse you have to be as objectively as possible. Things like buying a music record online or in a store with a physical copy are completely irrelevant and don't determine if the world is getting worse. If that was the case you could make a case that since the start of humanity the world has gotten worse because instead of using cattle plough we are now using tractors that let us cultivate more efficiently. Efficiency does not undermine respect for the art. It's all more accessible and because of that, a faster world. Is a faster world inherently bad? No, it just works faster and has no impact on you individually unless you let it be. A human does not work faster than 100 years ago, our muscles and brain power is the same as before. We just utilize the brain and muscle power in a more efficient way through the use of technology which then seems like we live faster. The farmer from 100 years ago was just as exhausted after work as any of us that work a physical demanding job, probably even more since less protection for his well-being was in place.

Most of us are in the mid 30s, and I remember it crystal clear when I was young and the "old generation" of 30+ complain about the new stuff, I always said I will be open to change, I accept the world is ever-changing and since profit/capitalism hasn't changed, anything that currently changes is the same that would happen 30 years ago, just that technology wasn't as developed to do it. If 30 years ago smart phones were a possibility, they would have existed. So they are not bad or worse, they just weren't feasible to realize, and as long as money is the driving factor we will continue to see faster aka. more efficient use of our time. In the end most consumer technology is to save time, being able to play games on your phones saves time to do other things when you come home from work. I see this as a positive not a negative. We end up with more time when everything works faster. The problem is, that most individuals feel "forced" to do everything. You can still enjoy a full evening of reading and turn off your connection to the "cyber world". People just don't have the will power and you are 100% to blame if you find yourself in such a situation. You are still in control of your life, don't watch stupid mainstream news, or tv shows. There is so much available to you, you just have to pick and choose. Or choose to close the channels and press "x" and do something offline.

The reason why I say that getting music online vs. going to a physical store and buying physical media is 'worse' is a combination of a few things:

1. Hardly anyone actually PAYS for music anymore, so it's taken for granted. There are a lot of people who pay for services like Spotify and others, but that's a relatively paltry amount of money compared to actually buying albums. CDs were roughly $15 each when they were popular... a single Spotify account is what, $5? There's also a lot of people who pay for digital files but let's be real... most people just download mp3/flac files or if they are super lazy they will just listen to something via YouTube.

2. People are potentially more exposed to music than ever before, which means that not only is it taken for granted (oversaturation) but they also get turned off, even subconsciously, because they have to sift through so much garbage to find good stuff that resonates with them. This results in an overall drop in interest. This is especially true on Soundcloud, etc.

3. Most people these days aren't audiophiles and listen to their music with shitty ear buds or Bluetooth speakers that sound like garbage, so they aren't getting the full experience of music. I also feel like car audio enthusiasts are a bit more rare than they used to be but that's just speculation. In my experience it seems that most people are very casual music listeners these days. I remember in the 80's and the 90's virtually everyone had a decent hi-fi system in their house and/or a home theater system with a good amp and speakers. I don't know ANYONE these days with a home theater sound system. AT BEST they have a soundbar under their TV, which of course sounds like crap in comparison.

4. Not having to go to a physical store = not having to put in actual real life effort = people take it for granted and it loses some of its value/appeal.

5. Songwriting in general has just gotten so boring and lazy in comparison to decades up to the 90's, and younger people don't know any better unless they dig.


I DO think that things being faster and more efficient kind of is a bad thing in certain ways. It places higher expectations on people, which is more stressful. The internet is creating whole classes of people who refuse to engage in real life because they can virtually interact with people via the internet. It's really sad. People can get away with being complete shut-ins these days because the internet allows them to. They can work from home, order food online, order groceries, order basically everything they need to survive. Heck, they can even get a prostitute lol.

Every interaction I have ever had with ANO has been negative both on here and in the game.

To answer the question directly - Yes, I do think that the world is getting worse.

I only have experience with the so-called "Western World." I've never actually been out of the United States and a lot of my views have an American/Western bias.

That said, I am a critical thinker and I pay more attention to social/political/cultural issues than most people I know, and I am also 38 so I have a bit of life experience. For me, the best and worst thing to ever happen to humanity is the internet. Regional differences are rapidly disappearing and societies are becoming more and more homogenous. This includes accents, preferences, values, and so on. The internet was great back when it was simple and mostly for nerds. Nowadays it's a staple of virtually everyone's life, especially younger folks. I personally think that the internet has affected women worse than men. It has allowed men to be more intrusive and domineering, it has desensitized men to sex and intimacy (because of free porn everywhere) and placed a burden on young women to act like porn stars and not have any morals. It has also made women even more competitive towards each other than ever, which is why every chick these days uploads a million selfies on various social media platforms constantly and also uses a bunch of goofy filters. Another thing is that women are naturally more 'follower' types than 'leader' types (debate this if you will, but it's true) and as such they are far more likely to be brainwashed/indoctrinated by bogus information floating around social media, and are far more likely to be swayed into becoming fake ideologues and championing totally absurd ideas, like 3rd/4th wave feminism, social justice, et al. There's a lot to talk about in regards to women and the internet but for the sake of brevity I'll leave it there.

Internet is also terrible for men in many ways too. It de-incentivizes men to go out and pursue women because not only are women being programmed to be something repugnant to many guys, they also have a virtually limitless supply of free porn so any time they have that natural urge to f@#! they can instead just jerk off to some smutty video, which in the long run is damaging psychologically and even spiritually in a sense. There's also a million time-wasting distractions available online (such as gaming) so men are doing less and less traditional hobbies like crafting, mechanical work, carpentry, etc. It's basically serving to extend boyhood well into the 20's and even beyond. It has also made it much harder for men to find decent women because women are so used to being bombarded with dick pics, solicitations, dating websites, etc... The standards of women these days are higher than ever before and ironically they have less to offer than ever before because they are more unattractive inside and out. (Leftism, SJW mindsets, feminism, obesity, sluttiness, lack of traditional feminine roles/skills, etc.)

Aside from internet we just have more technology in general, and more technology = more productivity = increased demands = increased stress and lack of happiness. All the while the rich keep getting richer, the middle class shrinks, and the poor get slightly less poor.

Our food is all junk. It's all processed and full of chemicals, hormones, preservatives, and so on... not to mention tons of added sugars, which is why diabetes is on the rise worldwide, and we are learning that diabetes and blood sugar issues is killing millions of people.

Smart phones constantly track and monitor everything people do, and who knows what kinds of effects all of these signals are having? Personally I am scared to even think about 5G because from things that I have seen and read on the internet it will be extremely dangerous and likely used as a form of population control. Of course that is conspiracy theory stuff but look into it yourself if you want to know more.

Even in the summer time I rarely see kids outside playing. They're all indoors with their phones and tablets, sitting in AC, eating sugar, and developing warped minds from internet access. No decent parent would give their kids unregulated/unfiltered access to the internet until they are at LEAST 15-16 years old... in my opinion.

Not that gossiping was never a thing, but it's more prevalent and easier than ever before now.

As we can see in the media, many people have f@#!ed themselves when it comes to public positions both inside and outside of government because of things they have posted online, even well over a decade ago. Maybe the scrutiny is a good thing in some respects but overall it is terrifying to me.

Art is kinda irrelevant anymore. Most people don't give a shit. Literature has fallen off... not that there aren't good books being written, but I'd wager that there are less avid readers today than there was 25 years ago because people spend a bunch of time online and think that counts for reading. (It doesn't.) Music matters far less to most people these days because it's essentially free. The days of physically traveling to a record store and spending money on physical music are long gone and as a result people lose respect for it. Most popular music these days is complete trash, especially modern rap. Rap music in the 90's definitely had a lot of controversial material but at least it was presented in such a way that it was usually thought-proviking or at the very least artistic. Nowadays it's a bunch of autotuned idiots talking about rampant drug use, hypersexuality, deviant sexuality, lack of respect, lack of morals, designer clothes, et al... and the worst part of all is that it all sounds the same. Hiphop was originally all about individuality, having one's own style. These days everyone bites. ("Biting" means copying someone else in hip-hop culture.) Movies aren't nearly as good or as original as they used to be. It's just a bunch of over-the-top special effects/CGI. Look at all of the shitty movie reboots/remakes. The ratio of deep, thought-provoking, artistic films compared to bullshit ones is at least 30:1 in favor of the bullshit.

The wealth gap continues to increase and will continue to increase until we hit a point by which the top ~5% of wealthiest individuals will utterly control everything. They basically already do but the effects are going to become worse and more pronounced. The middle class is dying off and eventually we're going to have a master class and a servant class.

Many younger people no longer have any practical skills. The parents are to blame here. How many people know how to cook nowadays? How to garden? How to fix something? I know tons of women these days whose culinary expertise consists of microwaving shit...

Lots of people keep having children at younger and younger ages, which has a ripple effect across generations because you're having a kid being f@#!ed up from having a bad childhood due to the bad decisions and/or irresponsibility of their parents, and that kid ends up having a kid at a young age and so on... This is due to a decline in values, family, morals, even religious beliefs.

Speaking of religious beliefs, Muslims are breeding at a rate that is going to outstrip most of the world, and many places are dealing with forced migration because of some elite agenda. Islam and Western culture don't mix, and guess what? The Muslims are taking over. Reports indicate that within just a few decades much of Europe will be predominantly Muslim and non-white... and this isn't some conspiracy theory bullshit, it's actual fact backed by evidence. Meanwhile, places like Japan (which is highly homogenous) are slowly going extinct because people aren't reproducing. They're just working themselves to death and the population is aging. Japan as we know it could literally cease to exist by the end of this century at this rate unless something changes.

I could go on and on and on about this topic. I think life was better before smart phones, before ubiquitous high-speed internet, etc. What's really sad to me is thinking about younger people who have never known a life that didn't include internet and cell phones. They have no idea what they're missing, and to them, living in a society without those things probably seems primitive and boring to them. I feel like everything was more 'real' back then. It was more connected where it matters - locally. I feel like living in modern society is like being bombarded with poison and mind control constantly. It's soul-sucking.   

My 2 cents:

If you want to make it in the industry as a DJ or producer it basically has to be your life, and/or you have to be INCREDIBLY talented and have a unique style that sets you apart from the rest.

I've DJ'ed since high school and although I never really tried to 'make it' I know a few people who have... some who have made it and some who haven't but wanted to. Making it in DJ'ing completely depends on where you live. It is most competitive in Europe by far because you not only have to be technically skilled, but you need to be the whole package... producer, established label owner or artist, have your own style/taste, constantly keep up on new and older music, and be willing to travel and oftentimes work for free or less than what you deserve. These days you also need to have a squeaky clean social media record too because social justice warriors and internet trolls will tear you apart if they find anything at all. Also, as lame as it is, but being 'sexy' is also a plus.

It also depends on what you consider 'making it.' Do you want to play at local parties? Local clubs? Play at high end clubs? Play at festivals? Personally I think the festival circuit is trash because each DJ has maybe 2 hours to play so they don't take chances and don't have enough time to get really 'out there' and experimental. In the U.S. you're basically gonna be stuck playing local parties/weeklys/monthlys unless you live in a bigger city that actually has a 7-days-a-week sort of night life scene. You will also have to play for free a lot of the time because bar/club owners don't wanna pay anyone shit because for every one DJ who is worth their salt there are twenty other kids who have a laptop and some kind of Serato controller and a hard drive full of pirated MP3's. Also, most venues do not supply any sort of equipment at all aside from sound, and some places can't even supply sound... and if they do most of the time the sound system is garbage. I personally feel that playing a 1-2 hour set is a waste of time unless it's hip-hop. For dance/electronic music I want at LEAST 4 hours to play so I can take people on a journey. So keep in mind that if you are going to travel and DJ a bunch you have to deal with the logistics of transporting all of your stuff, which isn't a problem if you are going to play somewhere that is going to provide equipment but depending on your media of choice it can still be a pain. I prefer to play vinyl but transporting two turntables, a mixer, and a couple of crates of records is a pain in the ass... so sometimes I just bring a laptop and a Pioneer controller, or sometimes I will bring the decks but use control vinyl in conjunction with Serato or Rekordbox. These days I don't go out and play that much anymore because everyone wants to hear 'bass music' EDM these days and don't have the attention span or taste to enjoy actually deep, creative music.

DVS1 recently put out a video interview and he talked about the current state of DJ'ing and the difference between club/rave culture and festival culture and says that they are basically entirely different things and I agree with him. I hate festivals and DJ worship. DJ's need to be up in a booth, out of sight of the dance floor and the hype of an event needs to be based upon the quality of the sound system and location rather than 'so-and-so is gonna spin!'

As far as production goes, a lot of the aforementioned stuff still applies. These days EVERYONE is a 'producer.' There's even a million YouTube tutorials for every conceivable thing so even a total beginner can get up and running in no time. The problem with this glut of producers these days is that very few people are original and have their own sound and style. Everyone else just basically tries to emulate artists they admire, and poorly. Everyone buys sample packs (or pirates them) and everyone uses the same hot/new VST synths and the same presets because most people don't bother learning how to actually program a synthesizer aside from maybe tweaking a couple of parameters. People just focus on the mastering part of it because they want their crappy, cookie-cutter track to sound as 'professional' as possible even though it sucks. There are no interesting melodies and harmonies, no interesting chord changes or inversions, etc. It's just basic loops arranged and stacked. I know I'm sounding negative here but DJ'ing and production are really important to me even though I haven't actually finished a song of my own in several years now due to a lack of passion because of depression. I still buy and eventually sell all kinds of hardware bits of gear to learn them inside and out just because I like learning about the technology and become intimately familiar with the unique sonic characteristics of each thing. (Currently my 'toy of the hour' is the Analogue Solutions Telemark synthesizer.) That said, I am a music junkie and I'm constantly digging, buying vinyl, exploring Spotify, etc... and when it comes to newer independent music I get frustrated because so much of it is total shit. If it's not good enough to see a proper vinyl release on a decent label it's probably not worth my time.

tl;dr -

DJing: To make it you basically just need to put in a bunch of time playing for free and establishing yourself and your style. If you 'keep it real' and play more experimental sets you will likely not be as popular to crowds as other DJ's who play safe music choices, even if you are respected by the real music heads. To make a living DJ'ing you either have to sell out, be lucky, or have connections.

Producing: Making it as a producer is 10x as hard as making it as a DJ because it requires far more talent. My advice would be to not look for sample packs, stems, templates, etc. Just make whatever comes directly from your soul regardless of 'genre' or whatever. Tutorials for basic tips and techniques are fine but just be yourself. Good and interesting songwriting/composition is far more important than mastering polish. Also, it's good to at minimum have a decent mic for recording external sounds and voices because people who work 100% 'in the box' are missing an organic element... so record hand claps, DIY percussion, sounds, your own voice, etc. Read up on how recording sessions used to work before easy and cheap digital multitracking and get really good at playing an instrument. It doesn't matter which one, but you need to be good at at least one. Also, learn to sight read music instead of just randomly clicking scale-quantized notes into a grid on a DAW.

Quote from: TheKomodo on March 07, 2019, 10:29 PM

Quote from: Anubis on March 07, 2019, 10:01 PM
Well, teachers/professors get paid. I would happily teach noobs roping for money. It's our hobby and freetime we use. So it makes sense we wanna spend it with quality people.

Not all of them get paid, some volunteer, some experts have more money than they know what to do with, but teach out of passion and curiosity, call it legacy, hope and passion for the future of mankind.

And I wasn't just speaking about paid professions, I mean friends teaching other friends, enthusiasts teaching other enthusiasts, like going to a skatepark and watching, practising, and learning from the best there

Or hanging around with other musicians...

Everybody is born stupid with the potential for greatness, nobody is an expert on 1st attempt.

I just think it's selfish to think in the manner skunk wrote above.

The thing is, I don't feel any sort of obligation to play or teach. Playing W:A is a recreational activity and drawing a comparison between Worms players and educators (paid or not) is a bit disingenuous, don't you think?

If I don't feel like spending my time playing with random noobs, that's not selfish, because in order for it to be selfish I would need to have some sort of obligation to play with them. I don't. Furthermore, the reason why W:A is so inactive these days isn't necessarily because of people not wanting to play with noobs, it's more due to a domino effect of long-time friends and adversaries fading away from the game (for various reasons) and losing interest. I think that a lot of people are like me in the respect that they would prefer to play with others who they know well and also respect skill-wise, especially when a lot of people who play this game have been around for a very long time by normal gaming standards.

I have gone out of my way more times than I can possibly remember over the years to help noobs, teach them, answer questions, etc. I've definitely paid my dues, so to speak... so when I boot up W:A and want to play a game I don't want to spend my time facepalming and watching people derp around, fail, and generally waste my time. I like playing against the best players I can find, and I'm sure some noobs do too... but f@#! 'em, they're noobs.

And hi Toxic! The Push 2 is a great controller. I sold mine a few months ago to fund a drum machine I wanted and I really regret it. Sorta. I'll get another one.

Quote from: Kradie on March 06, 2019, 10:13 AM

Quote from: skunk3 on March 01, 2019, 05:06 AM
Not too many that play often. Every time I've logged into W:A lately it's been totally dead, aside from maybe a handful of random noobs and idle snoopers.

Again, these ''random'' can surprise you with their intellect, & can evolve.
I can mention a couple of ''unfamiliar'' names here. But they don't matter to you, because they have not compete in league, or are from the old generation.

Regardless, there are still people around like Walrus & Saltyk, that's about it.
I did however encounter franz aka flowingwater 2 years ago. We had a lengthy warmer.

We've talked about this before.

I have played with literally thousands of randoms over the years and that's well and good but these days when I jump on WormNET I want to play with people I know, or at the very least people who are aware of rules, can speak and understand English well, have some degree of skill, and aren't idiot trolls. I don't give a crap if people play in leagues nor do I care what 'generation' they are from. I don't want to play with noobs, period. It's a waste of time. If I want to play randoms and roll the dice I have Worms WMD for that.

Anyway, I see Salty and sometimes Walrus on Snooper but I haven't seen them active when I've logged in lately... then again, I typically log in and log off fairly quickly if I see that AG is dead, as it usually is these days. I don't use Snoopers (I hate them) and I don't have the patience to sit around for ages hoping that someone will want a game. Thank goodness I've accumulated quite the circle of friends who play WMD because I can still get my Worms fix. (But not my roping fix, sadly.)

Quote from: TheKomodo on March 02, 2019, 07:39 PM
Who can forget such socially winning classics as:

MMMbop - Hanson
Wannabe - Spice Girls
Livin' La Vida Loca - Ricky Martin
Good Vibrations - Marky Mark
Ice Ice Baby - Vanilla Ice

And so much more

FWIW I actually like those last 2 songs.

Quote from: l7cx1Cl on March 03, 2019, 07:48 PM
Dang that sucks.  Have u tried CBD?

I use CBD sometimes but it doesn't help all that much. It's much better at dealing with joint pain than Crohn's issues.