2014-08-07
Art for today brought to you by Dazhbug! You may check out a higher-resolution version of this strip over on the GoComics mirror!
Skin Horse
By Shaenon K. Garrity & Jeffrey C. Wells
Art for today brought to you by Dazhbug! You may check out a higher-resolution version of this strip over on the GoComics mirror!
This explains so much.
Yeah, I was wondering.
Well, if there was any question that those speech bubbles were deliberately placed…who is that?
I don’t know who she is, but I know whom she reminds me, specially the way she speaks, but not her choice of beverage.
Helen Beta had a coffee machine (the better to inoculate you with, my dear). …Helen Gamma?
Oh! OH! I KNOW!
It’s totally Helen & Dave’s daughter.
Also: Jonah still has wrenchie with him, that is so adorable.
You know, a key plot point of the Narboniverse is that there are plenty of Mad Scientists who AREN’T Narbons. She could just as easily have her face hidden to make her more mysterious and therefore foreboding without having a specific secret to hide from us.
All you can say with certainty about that beverage is that it’s not in a paper box. Or even that there’s anything in that cup. Implications of panel one notwithstanding.
I will point out that Nera calls her “Mom” in Panel #1.
We do know that Nera’s mom is into some hardcore stuff, but we’ve never seen her face or heard her name…
…The fact that she was more worried about Area Effect Psionics than …well anything else, says more about this world than I really want to know.
She might be more worried about other things if Jonah had hormones.
Who do you think had them removed?
So, speaking of the question of who owns the copyright on creative works generated by non-human animals… http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/08/monkeys-selfie-at-center-of-copyright-brouhaha/
Wow, that’s actually a really interesting article, for a number of reasons. My main thought on the whole thing: I agree that Wikipedia is a trifle overstepped in declaring the images public domain, but not for the same reasons as the original photographer. If the monkey took the pictures, doesn’t that mean he owns the copyright? How would it differ from, say, a human of equal intelligence taking the shots? Or a human with average intelligence but who is otherwise unable to communicate, for whatever reason?
Under current law, a monkey cannot be a person and therefore has no legal standing to hold or enforce a copyright. A human is a natural person, so even if he or she lacks or loses the ability to enforce a copyright, he or she can hold a copyright and it can be enforced on his or her behalf by a guardian or trustee.
In the Narboniverse, nonhuman sapients have been acknowledged as persons and so can assert the same IP rights as other natural or artificial persons.
I’ve heard there’s a campaign to have cetaceans legally declared to be people. Which, yeah, would hopefully get Huey P what he wants. Mind you, plenty of non-Western humans have had trouble getting paid and credited for samples of their “mystic ethnic sounds”.
I’m all for that. They actually DID do that in India, though I haven’t heard how it went.
Persons, not people. They’ll never be human, but they can be persons with all the legal rights that people and other legal persons have.
“he or she can hold a copyright and it can be enforced on his or her behalf by a guardian or trustee.”
That was my thought on reading the article about the monkey. The photographer should just apply for guardianship of the monkey (and also if Wikimedia really wants to make that argument, then they should be paying the monkey for use of its photos). Even if he doesn’t get guardianship, maybe he can get royalties from the inevitable comedy movie based of the story.
Fascinating! Thank you!
I imagine that sometimes, Nera’s mom walks around in a pink skirt and green striped stockings.
With a purple cardigan, of course. And if anyone would know about cuteness-related area-effect psionics, it’d be her. Good call, jdreyfuss!
I guess “Mom” is just another one of those characters whose face we never will get a good look at…
Unless we see it tomorrow, hence “real fear”.
My guess is that the “real fear” will come when she knocks out the wall and shows them Daisychain’s real form.
Once more Skin Horse has sent this older, non-gamer fan to google to further his education. One question however. The first site that comes up for area effect psionics seems to flatly state that vermin with hive minds can’t have such powers.Other sites don’t appear to consider non-humans at all. I assume these rules don’t apply here. Also I think it’s the mouse who is about to know ‘real fear’.
I follow whatever rules I feel like! Mua ha ha ha ha!
Also, it would be very silly if this entire comic followed D&D rules. For one thing it would mean that everyone would be perfectly healthy and operational until they reached 0 HP and instantly keeled over.
Someone needs to read the Arms and Equipment Guide, v3.5 It provided for realistic “wounding” as you lose health, I don’t know if it’s been translated to 4.0 yet though, as I still run 3.5 since I have most of the source books memorized.
Yeah, I don’t own that one. It’s just as well. I complain about the lack of realism but rest assured that when I played Shadowrun, I groused even more heartily about the excessively-detailed injury debilitation system there. Basically you cannot make me happy.
Have you read The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents?
Well, the collective is about to get his/their comeuppance. Cuteness-boosted psionics are probably not going to match whatever Nera’s mom is cooking up.
Of course, we still don’t know how many of them there are in the building. 😀 This could be more fun than I first expected.
…In a handful of dust.