Foreword
Before I actually compose this post, I wanted to make sure that I wrote down some thoughts that I for sure want to get across. The time is 1824, I should be giving a presentation on the Battle of the Atlantic right now on Facebook Live, however, Facebook has proved to be so incompetent that it doesn't understand that you can have a mic without a camera. Furthermore, it doesn't seem to understand the notion that in order to say that permissions are being denied by the browser, it first has to present the option to the browser to enable them in the first place.
Needless to say, I was and am very disappointed, and have thus scrapped any future plans of using Facebook as a media platform outside of posting pre-recorded content or the daily history posts. Way to break sh*t Zuckerberg...
Rescheduled Upcoming Event
I know at least three of you were looking forward to this and you will be happy to know that the presentation for the Battle of the Atlantic has been rescheduled. A post will be forthcoming on that shortly. This presentation will take place on twitch.tv (a link will be supplied in the header and in the event post), and no registration is required. We are looking at 30 July at 1900 CDT. Twitch was selected due to some additional endeavors I have been examining and wanting to launch into along with some additional reasons included in the announcements below.
Stay tuned for the latest updates on this.
Hey there everyone, it's time for your July update on the Havoc.
It has been a busy last few weeks here. We did have to push a monthly topic back from June to July and that post will be forthcoming next week. Also coming by the end of this week is the fan's choice post which went to the Bockscar - an appropriate subject as we head into V-J Day+75. Lastly, the weeby content has been separated into a site now referred to as "Alter." Couple these things with the new sections, content, and everything else - that's a lot of stuff happening on it's own. I haven't even mentioned work yet (it's a lot), or school yet (it's a lot), or the fact that I'm battling with a new computer (that's...not a lot). So let's dig right into these updates for the month of July and look outward at the month of August.
The Havoc On-Air
I'm sure you all read the beginning of this post and some of you were confused. To put that into perspective, one of the things that I've been interested in doing for a while is providing more dynamic content and different forms of media to the subject matter that interests me. COVID-19 presented a sparkling opportunity to do just that, so I am. On Air is a feature that I've been talking about now for over a year. It actually pre-dates the relaunch of the site in July 2019. The notion of this was to provide podcasts, streams, or videos that were a bit less than professional than I'd provide to work, but still educational.
The first step in this was testing the concept of video-based history posts, which I have now rolled out starting last weekend. These are three to five minute videos over PowerPoint that tackle subject matter similar to what is posted on Facebook each day. The presentation format allows me to serve a bit more content in a form that's a bit more dynamic. Those will now be posted weekly on Saturdays on YouTube and on Facebook, as well as in the On Air section of the site.
The second step was what failed the evening I'm making this post: educational and possibly entertaining presentations on specific subject matter. Originally I was going to keep these on Facebook Live, but due to Facebook's incompetence that has now been entirely scrapped and will be infused with the third step which included extending history "shows" and topics through twitch.tv. A complete breakdown of scheduling for twitch.tv will be posted for the month of August shortly, and this schedule should hold mostly true.
Eventually there will be some form of podcast or show out there, but we're (I used the plural - keep reading for the why) still looking into the logistics of such a thing at this time. Stay tuned...
The Weeby Havoc
There's a few of you who visited this site for some random anime or game obsession of mine that are trying to figure out where all of those posts and contents went. They were all moved to their own website at the beginning of the month as part of a project to streamline the main site and make it a bit more official. The Havoc itself has always been about me delivering educational content within my own interest set, and while I suppose you could say my ramblings on TV shows and video games could be seen as educational, it's not in the vein that I have the rest of the site in. Therefore, I moved them to a site aptly called The Alter Havoc.
That site has not yet officially opened yet, but all of the content that I had here is now available for viewing over there. You can access it via http://alter.melodichavoc.com - and you can even register an account over there. I did not opt to include SSL over there because I'm not handling any kind of sensitive information like I might be on the main site. Any content that could be seen as sensitive is still managed here on the main page. If you were here for history, or general information on history, all of your stuff is still in the same space it's always been. I have no intentions of touching any of that - it is here to stay.
Sister Sites and a New Plurality
In May I hinted at a new project on the horizon regarding Rock Island Arsenal and small arms development programs. This was part of a project which included a sister site that was and still is on the books to get launched sometime in the September-October timeframe. Because of this, I added a second administrator to the site who will eventually be causing some kind of history trouble with me. Those of you who know me also know him, but I'm not in the market of revealing ahead of my authority.
In the coming year or so, two other sites will join this ongoing project.
I'll post more updates on that as they come...
tl;dr
Stuff is changing. Change is good. Go ahead, say you don't like it (I won't hear you anyway).
I found via my last letter to the public that my reach hit every single person I called out, although Bob still remains in the lead with most comical rebuttals. With that in mind, stay tuned for additional updates that will be coming over the next couple of days and as always, do stay safe.
- The Kid
