WHAT IS ST!M: a ranty rave by Georgia Rucker, the art director of ST!M June 13, 1996

I can't believe that I am forced to write on a barf bag, fer crying fucking CDF out loud, or "une barfe bagge" as i thought was so funny in hi skool. but i dont have a laptop. i wish i did, i tell ya, because, earlier, stuck in the newark airport for 7 hours while AA got their shit together to find a new plane, I realized _this_ was the ripest time for ker-ruising the web. i never have enoough troll time at work, it's always, make these little shapes that make STIM friendly. i have never really lusted for "web NOW" as much as NOW. the infiteness of the www compared to the sad stack on the airport mag rack. i bought wired and ended up looking at the laptop ads more than anything. SURE, i would do some gen X posing if you give me a cute & strong portable puter.
but, i will scratch away on this bag while an excited suit in the coach seat behind me does excel behind me on _his_ portable puter, to share about the graphic language of STIM. the language needs to be sort of clear so you know where you are, for example, the LSOT button on the bottom of every page takes you to the MANDALA! it looks like an airport map -- go to any terminal! click on any dot! or the baggage claim, which, is really, this WHAT IS STIM page (LOL, claiming I have baggage with this site when all I can think is "has this gif been exported?" "is this background to loud fer words" "how many people read STIm in text only, sob?!"). so the main pages, STeM (bluish), STATIC (reddish), and DYNAMIC (greenish), are different in this issue, in order to work towards heightened clairty. STeM is peppered (ya know, in an orderly fashion) with "tags", those black rectangles, that represent and link to EACH section of STIM. people said before they couldnt really figger out where the editorial was. well, each section of editorial, or STATIC, (as it really ought to be known now as it is static - culled cuts of chaos), has its lil tag on STeM, the second page of the site, which links to the individual section itself - its splash page and article list. All the DYNAMIC things, such as the BULLET-IN-BOARD (our packed conferencing area - go now!), have their tags on STeM too; and then the few sort of random things, such as STRAP ONS. If you ever get lost, or want to know which STATIC sections are full of fresh articles, go to STeM.
(Maybe our names are obtuse, but a) that gives you, kind clicker, more connotations, more riffs, etc etc, for your already perhaps web-beat mind, and, furthermore, b) makes "my job" "fun" - clear graphics for phun words! shaping the obtuseness! whatever!)
no but rilly, that "attitude" is really not STIM, that slipshod "whatever". we strive to make you some good nooks and crannies on the web. new, fertil cracks of fresh words. we know you need something to read while at work, and something to download FOR at home. we grind away here in our cubes, then try to still to have some hours of live-culture-gathering, then report earnestly. for me, that means, don't just pump out the 50s graphics, (though I long, so often, at the start of a fresh Illustrator page, to endlessly draw and fill cheerful kindney shapes and dots), it means, make new shapes! odd little fake click n grab shapes! new colors! animated gifs! look what color the nyc sky is today, what shiny new plastic is being worn, etc., and then compute.
i think every issue will sharpen away on those main pages till they are hopefully so graphically intuitive that you will feel like you are in the midst of your own crazy research paper organizational system, happily stacking like starred or hearted or whatever index cards, seeing the outline in your hed....
till then, other than compaining about animated gifs, cause I will always think they are bumpin if artists understand them, like the bigtwin himself does, email me and let me kno whatchu think.
sorry if this is unclear, ahm an ahhrt person, bla bla, ya kno.

Georgia came and visited me in Portland in June. While here, she wrote this review/instruction on STIM, her current graphical design outlet. I have many links to stim on this site (like that blue thing at the top of the page), so check it out! Georgia lives in NYC, right in the heart of Manhatten. I envy the artistic population of NYC, the plethera of culture, the people to meet... Georgia misses trees, healthy air, laidback people... To read about "druggie romance" and "slacker sleaze" spanning the twin cities of Portland and NYC, read Michael H.'s book BONG WATER. (I'd give you his full last name, but I lent the book to a friend. I think it was Hodgeson... look for a colorful book dominated by a yellow background on the shelves of your nearest hip bookstore.) ----- WAG!