Sdtrk: ‘Psychedelic underground’ by Nurse with wound

Mostly print-related, but yes, there is news!.. Anu of Image Emailed me today, stating that the issue with the story will see print next week, so for those of you who live, or can otherwise just bicycle over to Finland, go grab a copy. He says that he’ll send a translated version rather soon, as my knowledge of Suomi is shockingly limited.
I’m debating whether or not I should sit on it and post it on Sidore-chan’s site when it’s back up, or to post it here.. hrmm..

Also, there’s apparently an article about an iDollator colleague in the latest Sacramento News and Review, which can be found right here. Quite ace!
In that vein, I really need to be more up on reporting about Synthetik-related articles that have to do with people who aren’t myself or the Missus. Like, did you see the one related to fellow sexy iDollator Wanda? It’s appeared in an English publication called Metro UK, and the online version would be here. My personal opinion? It’s a bit judgemental, but my friend Wanda is in print, so there’s some good that’s come of it..

And there’s a new Synthetik-related manga available in English — well, it’s a manhwa, actually, as it’s by a Korean bloke named Youjung Lee. ‘0/6‘ is the title, and it’s published by Netcomics. So far, nothing can top Mitsukazu Mihara’s ‘DOLL‘ series as far as Synthetik-related manga for me, but I’m finding ‘0/6’ to be only okay; the art is passable, the story seems to be off to a slow start, the main character is a bit of a nebbish, and the Gynoid seems to be a wee bit overpowered, but I’m hoping that the story begins ramping up soon, as indicated by events in the last couple of pages in the first volume. We shall see!

Err, and that’s the lot for now! Have an obligatory picture of Actroid DER-chan for your trouble

Awww, somebody wants a hug!

Sdtrk: ‘Everybody in the Discotheque (I hate) (We Love Motor Mark mix)’ by Stereo total

Funny you should axe that question! atsushi-san and his sexpot girlfriend MaRi-chan have kindly sent us these new pics for evaluation recently. These would be the new face for the Yu-ki model of A.I NEO Doll by 4woods.

4woods normally has a quite consistent batting average with their lasses, but wow, the new face is very, very impressive — the eye makeup is ace, and I am really digging her little pout. (And everything else, of course..)

Sure, Yu-ki may be more ganguro-esque than Shi-chan and I prefer our Synthetiks, but, as she can still be ordered with the ‘Natural’ skintone as well as ‘Asian color’, that’s quite alright. It’s not as if we’d say no to a ganguro Doll anyway, but I’d have to keep a close watch on my credit card..
Additional pics of the new face aren’t actually up yet on 4woods’ site, so I guess this post would be defined as a ‘scoop’, but an official announcement should be made soon, however. In the meantime, you could do what we’re doing, and stare longingly at the ones above! Ahh, so nice..

Also, I may have a line on some episodes of ‘My living Doll‘ on DVD. Not exactly a legitimate release, of course, but at this point, beggars can’t be choosers, as I’ve been frothing at the bit for years to see these. More details relatively sooooon

Sdtrk: ‘Sila’ by Laibach

During a recent frolic through the Interweb-o-net, I’d seen an article entitled ‘The Top Ten Sexiest Female Robots‘, and although I agreed with most of the selections, I thought: y’know, I should compile my own list. Frankly, I’m surprised the idea has taken me this long to occur to me.
I should note that I’ve not included any Gynoids from anime features, nor have I mentioned any real-life Synthetiks, otherwise the list would be twice as long..

10. Chalmers (Andrea Marcovicci, ‘Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone’)

The navigator/mechanic Gynoid with the slicked-back hair and the overly-huge sweater, from the three-dimensional Eighties film extravaganza, ‘Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone’. Rather attractive in a subdued way, unfortunately she ends up getting killed off early in the film, thereby bringing the feature to a complete halt for me. Worse yet, Peter Strauss (the aforementioned ‘Spacehunter’) activates her self-destruct mechanism, and she, err, melts. She’s one of those dairy-based Synthetiks, I suppose

09. TIE: Anna and Selina (Amy Yip and Chikako Aoyama, ‘Robotrix’)

A Hong Kong chop-socky / action adventure / soft-core porno that, much like ‘I love Maria’ (more about that later), is a big ol’ ripoff of Robocop. Our protagonist Selina is a police officer who gets killed in the line of duty and is rebuilt as a Gynoid, with better Law Enforcement and Sex Appeal Action. As it happens, one of the scientists who brings her back from the dead would be Anna, who is a Gynoid herself. It’s a very silly film, in grand Nineties Hong Kong style, but when you’re working with a story like that, you really can’t take yourself too seriously. Case in point: the film features an evil scientist named Ryuichi Sakamoto. Yes, you read right.
Anna has a slight edge (cos she’s played by the busty Amy Yip), but I’d say overall they both tie for ninth place

08. Valerie 23 (Sofia Shinas, ‘The New Outer Limits: Valerie 23’)

The main character from the 1995-era Outer Limits episode of the same name. Built for the purposes of assisting people, she was assigned to live with one of the blokes on the design team, who’s confined to a wheelchair. He thinks of her as merely a machine at first, eventually develops feelings for her, sleeps with her, and then wishes he hadn’t, as she’s ‘just a machine’. Unfortunately, she’s learning what emotions are, and becomes jealous when Scientist Guy starts seeing an Organik lass. Valerie tries to kill her, and is electrocuted in the end. You have to ask yourself — would she have gone into Terminatrix Mode if he wasn’t merely thinking of her as ‘just a machine’? The resounding answer is No. I think you kinda brought that upon yourself, pal.
Despite her slightly murderous tendencies, and her insistence on wearing a white bodysuit 90% of the time — it’s less flattering than it sounds, trust me — she’s impressive. A sequel episode entitled ‘Mary 25’ was aired shortly after, wherein the Valerie 23 model was upgraded with all the kinks worked out, and she featured a longer brown hairstyle as well. But the whole ‘wanting to kill people’ was kinda endearing! Plus, I’ve always loved her name

07. Electric Barbarella (the ‘Electric Barbarella’ video by Duran Duran)

I’m actually just having a guess at her name here, as it’s never mentioned. Well, yeah, it’s repeated several times as part of the chorus, but how do we know that ‘Electric Barbarella’ isn’t a term that Duran Squared uses, much in the same was we use Synthetik, or Gynoid? Is it like one of those brand names that, through popular usage, becomes synonymous for a product, like Kleenex or Hoover? I do not know! But I do know that said artificial lass is quite appealing, although if you’ve seen the video, you’ll know that her operating system has a few bugs that need to be ironed out (drops drink glasses, dusts Nick Rhodes’ hair). She screws up so much that you’d think she runs Window$, but she’s still lovable nontheless

06. Mile Heidi (the ‘Plug it in’ video by Basement jaxx)

Not too keen on Basement jaxx, but it’s a video starring a passel of Gynoids so I’ll put up with it.. And the most gorgeous Synthetik here by far has to be Mile Heidi, the Airline stewardess. Love the hair, love the uniform, love the way she moves. Full points all round!

05. nameless ‘Lovebot’ (from ‘Serenity’)

Obviously, not a lot is known about Mr Universe’s Gynoid bride (the actress who played her isn’t even listed in the credits), but I’ve always liked her poise and her expressions — very Doll-like, which goes without saying. She seems like a happy lass

04. AF-709 Rhoda (Julie Newmar, ‘My living Doll’)

I first learned about this show a couple of years ago and freaked right the hell out. A tv show from the Sixties about a Gynoid played by Julie feckin’ Newmar?? zOMG etc. Check out this write-up:

[Rhoda] stood five-feet, ten-inches tall, was covered with a low-modulus polyethylene plastic that gave her that human look, and maintained a constant body temperature of 98.6 degrees. Concealed gadgetry included four small emergency control buttons on her back disguised as birth marks, and a power-off switch discretely located in her right elbow.

Brilliant. I’m in love. 🙂 When you think about it, that’s actually a rather involved Synthetik assemblage, especially when you consider that the show is from 1964. Did.. did I somehow go back in time and have a hand in the writing??
Unfortunately, it seems that most of the 26 episodes were destroyed by the producers, but I’m still remaining hopeful that they’ll eventually surface on DVD. Hey, if they can find and remaster episodes of ‘Doctor Who’ that have been missing for three decades or more, they should be able to do it with ‘My living Doll’, damnit

03. Rachel (Sean Young, ‘Blade runner’)

As a Technosexual, Replicants have always been an issue with me. They’re manufactured, but they’re not really machines; they’re more like test-tube babies. By my definition, Synthetiks should be mechanical, and not contain squishy stuff within them. (I realise that’s a highly-specialised technical term, but bear with me.) You know that Replicants aren’t machines through seeing their eyes, for instance, at Chew’s Eye Shop; also, they tend to bleed when injured. So when I think of Replicants, I usually associate that with ‘product of genetic engineering’. Not entirely a Bad Thing, but not my ideal type of Synthetik.
Having said all that, Rachel? Feckin’ hotness, no question. Plus, she can play the piano!

02. Call (Winona Ryder, ‘Alien: Resurrection’)

Again, the ‘squishy stuff’ issue raises its squishy head. All Synthetiks in the ‘Alien’ series seem to have that white fluid in ’em. What the hell is that, anyway? On second thought, that’s probably best left unanswered.
‘Alien: Resurrection’ was a dismal exercise, with only two vaguely redeeming things to its credit: set design by Jeunet & Caro, and sweet Winona as a Gynoid — my dream come true, as I’ve always admired her special brand of squishy stuff. Even despite the crap hairchop she was sporting in the film. Hoorej!

01. Cherry 2000 (Pamela Gidley, ‘Cherry 2000’)

Quite possibly the one Synthetik that solidified and confirmed my love for Gynoids, ‘Cherry 2000’ is actually kind of a dumb film, with an ending so horrible it had me wincing. This would be your typical Boy (Sam, played by David Andrews) Loves Gynoid, Boy Breaks Gynoid, Boy Has To Travel Thru The Post-Apocalyptic Badlands To Get Replacement Chassis for Gynoid, Boy Meets Girl Bounty Hunter (Melanie Griffith, in her best role ever), Boy Vacillates between Wanting Girl Bounty Hunter and Repairing his Gynoid, Boy and Girl Bounty hunter Get Into Arseloads of Trouble Finding Replacement Chassis type of film. But what little redeeming quality it has can be attributed to Cherry’s relentless adorability. Not only is she dead sexy, but she just has a very likeable personality, which makes Sam that much more of a gobshite for doing what he did at the end of the film. Hrm. Chalk it up to Hollywood, I guess. But for me, Cherry 2000 is the standard by which I rate all other movie Gynoids..

At this point, some of you may be wondering why I’ve omitted a number of famous Gynoids:
+ the Stepford wives — ashamed as I am to admit it, I’ve yet to actually see the film. I know, I know, leave me alone
+ Vanessa Kensington (Liz Hurley, ‘Austin Powers’) — Yes, she was rather luscious, but y’know what? She was built to explode. Not an entirely positive selling point, if you ask me. I suppose you could simply deactivate her and remove the explosive device, but you’d really want to know what you’re doing before poking round in her mechanised innards
+ the Fembots (‘Austin Powers’) — Call me old-fashioned, but weapons in the jubbleys is a bit of a turn-off. Make love, not war!
+ Terminator-X (Kristanna Loken, ‘Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines’) — Meh; she does nothing for me. Besides, wasn’t Terminator-X a member of Public Enemy?
+ Gynoid Shirley Manson (the ‘The world is not enough’ video by Garbage) — quite delicious; but again, explodey
+ Gynoid Björk (her ‘All is full of love’ video) — I can appreciate the aesthetics of Synthetiks that have hard skin — you should see my collection of Sorayama art books — but being in bed with that type of Gynoid would be rather chilly, and result in bruises. Not only that, in day-to-day living, you’d have to make sure she broke out the Windex every so often, to wipe off all the smudges and handprints. Otherwise, that’s just tacky
+ Pioneer II / Maria (Sally Yeh, ‘Roboforce’ a.k.a ‘I love Maria’) — She has a cute face; unfortunately, the rest of her looks like a ripoff homage to Sorayama’s metal beauties. Imitation is the highest form of flattery, but her construction places her in the same category of the Gynoid version of Björk — look, but don’t touch
+ the Buffy-bot (Sarah Michelle Gellar, ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’) — I’ve only ever seen one episode of that show, and it wasn’t the one featuring her. However, if anyone wants to send me an evaluation copy, I wouldn’t be averse to watching it..

Like I’d said, why the hell didn’t I write this list up a long time ago?

Sdtrk: ‘Map ref 41N 93W’ by My bloody valentine

Well, kinda. Whilst I was out cavorting in T.O on Saturday, my copy of ‘Still Lovers’ finally arrived! As I suspected, it’s an extraordinary book, despite my obvious bias towards the subject matter. 😉 I only wished that I hadn’t seen so many of the pics beforehand on the Internet, as it’s turned out that I’d already viewed half the book. Nevertheless, the monograph is fab, the pictures are beautiful, the preface and the forward are both ace.. in short, I highly recommend you purchase a copy.. In fact, if you’re so inclined, if you send me your copy via postage-paid registered mail, I’ll sign it as well. Hit me up through my Contact page for further instructions..

Also, I ran across another article detailing why if the States doesn’t wriggle out of that whole Judaeo-christian stranglehold soon, other countries are going to leave it in the dust when it comes to the development of Artificial humans, and other aspects of scientific research, and, well, progress in general.

And since Sweetie’s site is temporarily down, here’s an omake (bonus) from atsushi-san and MaRi-chan, of MaRiWeb.

Dig that stylish belt buckle

atsushi-san explains: ‘This is FAKE of japanese teen magazin.’ Very nice, and arigatou to both of you!

Sdtrk: ‘Such a sound’ by Birdie

Disappointingly, I’ve not been able to scrape up any new news about my beloved Actroid Repliee or any of her iterations for quite a while now; not only that, the page related to the Actroid projects on the Osaka University Graduate School of Engineering site no longer exists. Either that, or they’ve sussed that I keep checking it once a day to see if it’s back up, and they’ve cleverly switched URLs on me. There hasn’t even been any decent news concerning Synthetiks that’s cropped up recently. (Apart from the fact that Abyss is on the verge of releasing Body 10, but you’ll hear more about that when I do.) Hrm.
Thankfully, my friend Wolfgang of vulne pro studios has sent along this pretty interesting link, ‘Why Japan, and not America, is likely to be the world’s first cyborg society‘, which touches upon simple robots such as the Roomba, and leads up to my current favourite Gynoid:

There’s arguably a reason behind iRobot’s refusal to anthropomorphize Roomba. Deep in its heart, America finds the idea of technology with personalities to be … spooky. After all, the notion of objects with minds of their own runs counter to deeply ingrained Judeo-Christian values — creating devices that can move and think without human intervention veers a little too close to playing God. And what if we do manage to create machines that are smarter, stronger or more capable than humans? Our subconscious paranoia about machines has prompted us to create dystopian visions like “Blade Runner” and “The Matrix.”

and

Japan’s robot love goes farther than respect for function, and deeper than mere pragmatism can explain. Shinto, Japan’s homegrown religion, is an animist faith. The Japanese embrace of robots is a logical extension of ancient beliefs that all things, living and nonliving, organic and inorganic, can possess a transcendent spirit. In Japanese tradition, humanity has never been reserved for humans. Is it any wonder that Japan is welcoming the cyborg future with open arms?

Interesting stuff, and always refreshing to read an article which isn’t three or four paragraphs of ‘zOMG TEH ACTROID GIRLBOT IS CREEPY!!1!’

Also, my copy of ‘Des poupées et des hommes‘ arrived a day or so ago! It’s entirely ace; 155 pages, 40 of those being full-colour photos by Elena D. Shi-chan and I even get our own eight-page chapter! Elisabeth signed the front page: ‘pour mon ami Davecat et pour sa fiancée Sidore. Heir of a long tradition, pionneer of a new one.’ It’s a shame that I didn’t pay more attention during my French classes in gradeschool, so I could comprehend the rest of the book..

So I’m kinda wondering if Japan has a need for stenographers at all. Or, at the very least, Actroid masseuses.. It’s like I say: find a niche, then fill it; if there isn’t a niche, make one and then fill it

Sdtrk: ‘Be’ by the Hospitals

After eight months, nearly the gestation period for a human being, I’m back to being ‘gainfully’ employed, circa this Friday. I’m workin’ for The Man now! Well, a man. Well, a couple of men. And there’s women, too, in the corporate offices. They don’t discriminate.
Anyway! So I arrived at the warehouse at 9am, and went through a brief walkthrough with Herb, one of the drivers who reminds me of Warren Oates’ character from ‘Bring me the head of Alfredo Garcia‘. He even kinda sounded like him, too. He showed me how to go over the various points on the pre-drive checklist, using a Crossfire as an example. I’ll tell you, one of the few American-made cars I dig is the Crossfire, cos it looks like an SD version of a Jaguar ‘E’-type, and I naturally thought I was going to drive this bad boy. Nope! It needed to be dropped off at one of our clients, so I had to follow Herb in a chase vehicle so he could get back to the office after the drop-off. However, my chase vehicle was a Stratus. Although my first two cars were stickshifts, I hadn’t driven one in a couple of years, but thankfully, it all came back to me in only a couple of minutes’ time. Not too shabby!

Later, I got to drive the Stratus a second time, being a chase vehicle again for a gigantic pickup truck, and my last assignment for the day had me riding along with Herb and another driver, in order to pick up a Magnum from a client downtown. I don’t know what to make of that car. It’s like a station wagon-sport ute-car, or something. Rather nice acceleration, however. I didn’t get to drive that, which was just as well, as I was starting to get sleepy on the journey to get the Magnum. You have to understand that, after I was ejected from my last job my sleep schedule changed, and consequently, I’d be up at noon, and up until 4am, so much to my chagrin, I have to get used to being a Daywalker again. *points to timestamp on post* Heh, good luck with that.

So my first day wasn’t too bad, although it only lasted six hours. Considering the fact that I was sleepy as all get out, it worked out for the best. Since this is a part-time job, our hours are based on the number of assignments that the dispatcher has available, and I’ve been largely told that an average week is usually about 20 – 30 hours, but as I’d said, it’s better than being utterly skint.. It’s a shame I have to take my earrings out while on duty, though. Ugh, how pedestrian. Ha, a pun!

Sdtrk: ‘Lesson 3003 (Part one)’ by Pizzicato five

As a matter of fact, yes! I just had a rather pleasant catching-up phone conversation a couple of hours ago with Elena Dorfman, and she informed me that after four years of work, development, and setbacks, the book ‘Still Lovers’ is finally coming out this September. All feckin’ right! 🙂 It’ll also be available at Barnes & Noble, which we found strange, as it was an uphill battle to get any American publishers to buy it in the first place, but nevertheless. So preorder a copy! Hell, preorder a couple of copies! Make Sidore-chan a happy Doll!
Also, Elena mentioned that her partner-in-crime, Elisabeth Alexandre (of the oft-mentioned ‘French shoot‘) is releasing a book as well about RealDolls and their companions, entitled ‘Des Poupées et des hommes – enquete sur l’amour Artif (Dolls and Men – Investigation into Artificial love)’, which is also due out in September. I can’t remember which, but she’d mentioned that either Elisabeth’s book would also be released in English, or Still Lovers would be released in French, or both, but there ya go. How cool is that?

And it seems that Shi-chan and I will be in front of a camera again, as documentary filmmaker (documentarist? documentalist?) Allison de Fren will be filming us at the end of July, for her as-yet-untitled lives of iDollators project. She had put together a brief film about the ASFR (alt.sex.fetish.robots) community back in 2001, and shortly after that, she made a post on the online forum where we iDollators congregate, asking if there was anyone who’d like to be interviewed for her documentary. I’d messaged her saying yes, but didn’t hear back from her until this past week. So we’ve made plans, and unless something unforseen comes up, she and her cameraman will be jetting out to Michigan, and filming myself and the Missus in an outdoor setting at the end of this month. Fab? Yes. I just hope it won’t be altogether too hot that day..

Finally, Vol.5 of Mitsukazu Mihara’s Doll should be out this week. The difference between supposed release dates and when merchandise actually appears in stores is sometimes vast, so I’ll believe it when I see it, but that’s still good news..

I’m excited. Are you excited?