Author Archives: Michael Lylyk

Films are great.

It’s funny how often I’m interested in things where other people around me are otherwise apathetic.

In circles, if you bring up how much you enjoy something it is (more than) often met with “I don’t really care for it,” “I haven’t watched it in years,” “That is terrible,” “Garbage,” “It just doesn’t interest me,” to name a few.

Maybe I’m guilty of it myself (because that kind of stuff rubs off on a person) but it’s discouraging enough to never want to bring anything up, if only because you know it doesn’t matter to them.

Sure it’s things like Youtube Channels, or even recently the Olympics. But those are the kind of things that don’t bother me. I imagine I’d be a wreck if I were insulted about no one loving winter as much as I do. Continue reading →

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Goty 2017 and why it’s better to be late than never

I know, it’s like 16 days into the new year and I simply haven’t made an attempt to write anything related to video games. (albeit in a very long time, irregardless of ‘game of the year’ lists.)

But, here is my attempt to fix that. Because I’m going to be honest, a lot of my focus toward the end of the year was to just produce video things. I think I would have to credit my friend Geoff for that. After being a regular contributor to his twitch talk show for almost the entire time it was on, I ended up catching the streaming bug pretty hard myself (Although these days it seems to be mostly about Overwatch, Truck Driving and cleaning up dead bodies.) 

And putting more focus into content for my NewsFriends podcast, as well as freelance video jobs I literally had zero time to think about anything to write.

So I went home for a bit, and I had time to think.

IMG_0607

Pictured: A giant cigarette.

Continue reading →

Haunting the shell

Wow, it’s been getting pretty close to being an entire year since I wrote anything on this blog. (I feel like I don’t have much time for writing these days, even when I should technically be making a career out of it) I did something this weekend that made me want to type.

See, I watched Ghost in the Shell over the weekend. We’re not talking the classic 1995 anime that we all hold dearly, but the new Live action jaunt starring Scarlett Johansson. Truth to be told, I was morbidly curious to see it, because of the chatter of how bad it is.

I get that way you know, wanting to see what all the fuss is about.

So I asked my friend to come with me, (cause I don’t like watching movies alone.) and I was prepared to be very disappointed.

But in the end, I actually enjoyed it.

This is the part where I would talk about why I enjoyed it in much more detail, but for the sake of argument I suppose I should add a disclaimer: Continue reading →

Wasting breath on Link

There seems to be a fundamental belief that the year we live in dictates how the state of the world should be. How we progressed in technology and human rights is because it’s the year 2016. So it’s only fair that our fiction should reflect that as well.

It’s 2016, why isn’t Link a female?

Granted, I think the only reason why people were convinced Link was going to be female in “Breath of the Wild”, is from the very first teaser trailer. A cloaked hero suddenly unravels and jumps off of their horse to reveal an effeminate looking hero of Time.

[He always has had that look, but when you compare him to most male protagonists in video games, he might as well be a woman.] Continue reading →

The trumpet’s call

Security was tight.

Police crowded around The Thomas & Mack Center in Paradise, Nevada, anticipating what was sure to be a hotbed for protesters.

Truth to be told, what took place here was an important move for Donald Trump. Having taken full control of the Republican primary, and feeling more power than he’s ever had in his entire career as a ‘businessman’ he felt it was time to make that gamble.

He had all the chips, why not go all in, in the “gambling capital of the world”.

The crowd roared as Trump waddled his way to the stage, waving one hand in the air and doing the ‘finger gun’ with the other. Was he pointing at anyone in particular? There’s been a lot of talk in the news for the past couple of weeks, police were investigating a series of violent acts that were potentially linked to Trump’s rallies.

He assures the press that they’re all ‘just having a good time.’ Continue reading →

How I spent my summer ‘vacation’

wheresnews

In about two or so weeks, I’ll be coming back to Langara for my second and (hopefully) final year in the school’s journalism program. In which, by design, I should be a budding journalism with the integrity of an ox and the work ethic of an… ox?

It’s funny to say that I’ll be coming back, because in truth I’ve never really left the building. As most of my other classmates have been pursuing a summer of work/leisure, I’ve been biding my time. Left to my own devices using the school’s devices, to endeavour in what most people would argue is a ‘startup’…

…When I’m calling it “for fun-sies”.  Continue reading →

busy crazy

It’s a strange place to be in. Newsfriends is a strange beast that keeps me busy, but in a good way. Not a waste of time, it feels like business. It feels like work. It helps me get work.

I’m going to be doing a lot of filming this month. It’s what I’ve always wanted to do, and I get to do it in a way that’s fun and exciting and means something. It took a while to build up a foundation for these things. But I’m pretty grateful for journalism school is what I guess I should be saying. I got a knack for these things.

I love that it’s growing. I love watching it grow and it’s even more amazing that it gets people interested in it’s growth.

My biggest regret is that I wish it happened years ago with things and people that mattered (that still very much matter)  But it’s all life lessons isn’t it? Never give up and all that Jazz.

Have ya’ll been listening to the podcast? watching the videos? have you subscribed to these things? Probably should. just saying.

I wanted to just make a post that let’s me reflect on things, but I’ll have a proper update again. Something metrics wise that I’ve been finding interesting.

Keep yourself posted,
NewsFriends out.

 

I can’t help but be interested in analytics

As you know I’ve been acting as grand poobah for Newsfriends.net for some time. It’s never really my intention to be the most active for it, but my creative controlling nature has me constantly poking and prodding at the seams thinking “What can we do? How can we do it? when can we do it?”

There’s an incredibly strange story that has something to do with a solid object shaped like a poo, It’s honestly a bit hard to understand why the story could get a lot of attention but here we are in this world we live in. Continue reading →