Tag: jeansnow.net

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Art Debaser Design Meta Uncategorized Web

Digging Through the Archives

At long last, my archives are back. Most of them at least.

Some of you may recall that back in early 2014, I had the great misfortune of the web host I was using pulling the rug from under me, which meant that my entire website — which dated back to 2002 — suddenly disappeared.

And I didn’t have proper backups.

Eventually I did find some SQL database backups from 2011, which meant that I could probably eventually try to reconstruct the site, and then do some digging through the Wayback Machine for the missing 3 years. But I was so disgusted with what had happened that I wasn’t looking to self-host something right away, and decided to just use Tumblr, which is what I had set up quickly to keep on writing.

Jump to now.

A friendly poke the other day from my old friend Craig Mod came my way. He mentioned that it was a shame that all those archives of me covering the art & design scene in Tokyo/Japan during the 2000s weren’t available online anymore, and I couldn’t agree more. It was the kick in the ass I needed to just go ahead and finally spend the time required to getting all of this back up and available for everyone. After a post on Facebook to enlist some aid on what to do with that old database, it was another old friend from my Tokyo days (Michael, an ex-AQ staffer who was a pro at wrangling WordPress) who helped me out — I ended up creating a locally-hosted WordPress blog on my laptop, managed to connect to that old database (after a few modifications), and now I’ve taken the step of self-hosting a blog again (using the quick-and-easy WordPress hosting by name.com, which is the company I use for my domain hosting).

So a first step has been done, and it’s what you now see here. As you can see in the sidebar to the right (at least for now, as I imagine I’ll eventually settle on another theme to use), you’ll find full archives of the site, from the very first post on September 4, 2002, going to August 2011, and then the posts from the new Tumblr-hosted site I had from March 2014.

(I actually started writing regularly on the web in 1998, in the form of weekly columns about my life in Tokyo, all coded in HTML, but that content may truly be gone for good.)

Unfortunately, none of the images from those posts made it over — although I may still have some I can manage to add, as I found an old folder with a good amount of them — and I still need to try and find those 3 years of missing posts (as I mentioned, fingers crossed that I’ll be able to find them through the Wayback Machine).

But at least for now, it sure feels good to have a lot of this stuff online again, and I’ve been having a blast going back and randomly reading old posts. It reveals a younger me who is so excited by what he’s experiencing, deliciously naive (in a fun way).

Digital diaries from the Japanese front.

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Debaser Uncategorized

Cutting Edge

The joys of losing posts.

Last night I wrote a long post about my recent frustrations with the digital edition of Edge magazine, as of the latest issue. I was even positioning it as a sort of return of The Magaziner (the site I used to run about magazine culture). But I somehow lost the post before I was able to post it, and I don’t feel like writing it again.

Oh well.

I think it may have been a sign that if I am to bring back The Magaziner, I should do it properly, with its own site, structure, etc. I’d been feeling the itch of late to bring it back, but had let the domain expire earlier this year, and when I checked recently, found that it was grabbed by someone who just wants to sell for a grand.

How grand.

Who needs domains anyway, in this day and age. It’s vanity more than anything else. And besides, I still have JeanSnow.net.

Knock on wood.

*JeanSnow.net is no longer available*

(That’s what I imagine happening any second now.)

So that’s that, The Magaziner will remain in hibernation for the time being, until I have a really good idea on what to do with it. And hey, PauseTalk isn’t dead.

Dead Collector: Bring out yer dead!
[A large man appears with a (seemingly) dead man over his shoulder]
Large Man: Here’s one.
Dead Collector: Nine pence.
“Dead” Man: I’m not dead.
Dead Collector: What?
Large Man: Nothing. [hands the collector his money] There’s your nine pence.
“Dead” Man: I’m not dead!
Dead Collector: ‘Ere, he says he’s not dead.
Large Man: Yes he is.
“Dead” Man: I’m not.
Dead Collector: He isn’t.
Large Man: Well, he will be soon, he’s very ill.
“Dead” Man: I’m getting better.
Large Man: No you’re not, you’ll be stone dead in a moment.

Hopefully I don’t need to explain where that comes from.

So yes, no big post about the incredibly horrible new digital edition of Edge (it’s basically a PDF now with a few links, and doesn’t remember your spot if you exit the app and come back), no return of The Magaziner (although if you like magazines, take note that the current issue of all Conde Nast titles on iPad are free right now, until November 30, and that includes Wired and The New Yorker), and I’ve probably rambled on enough.

Since we had our first big snow in Montreal yesterday, I’ll leave you with this image by one of my favorite illustrators, Yuko Shimizu (and you can go read this interview with her).

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Uncategorized

Domain Dance Redux

The domain dance is not quite done yet, but things are mostly working.

As I wrote the other day, I decided to transfer my domains from GoDaddy to Name.com, and I’m pretty happy with what I see of the interface of Name.com, and how easy it is to set up things (like MX records to use Google Apps, etc.)

But there’s always something.

Following the hosting issues I experienced a year and a half go, I simply moved my sites to Tumblr, and was using my domains with those blogs. After the transfer, PauseTalk.org doesn’t have any issues, but for some reason jeansnow.net doesn’t want to stick – if you follow that URL, it does indeed go to Tumblr, but inside the Tumblr settings, it refuses to keep jeansnow.net as a domain for this blog (it saves it, but when you reload the settings page, it’s no longer there). Oh well. I’ve opened a ticket, we’ll see if anything comes out of it.

There are no issues with my mail though – I use Google Apps for that, and the domain switch went very smoothly. 

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, there’s not much that stresses me more than issues with domains, hosting, and the like. I still have never really recovered from losing my blog’s entire archives last year – basically, a history of my entire life in Japan – and so anytime I do something to change things in that space, I get nervous. 

But all of this has me thinking about this site again, which is a good thing, as it’s again making me want to make it a bit more active. 

Update: My jeansnow.net domain suddenly started working again over the weekend, so all’s well that ends well.