THURSDAY 26 APRIL
After a good night’s sleep — exhaustion and jetlag rendered me blissfully insensate — I was up with the lark at 8am, and ready to do my part as an ambassador for iDollator culture. Or make a complete tit of myself, one or the other. Matt, Bronwen, and I were to meet Sarah and Kelly in the hotel’s lobby cafe for brunch at 11am, so we could meet in person, and go over minor details of our panel. We’d be joined by fellow iDollator Z-Dr, who lives a number of miles north of the Bay Area; as we told him we were in town, he took the opportunity to meet up with us for the first time since DolLApalooza 2011.
typed for your pleasure on 14 May 2012, at 12.50 am
Sdtrk: ‘Folk window’ by Hair stylistics
Speaking engagements! Everyone does them! From Crispin Glover, to John Waters, to Henry Rollins, to Crispin Glover! That’s both Crispin Glovers, incidentally. Crispins Glover.
Since roughly 2005, various students have come a-callin’, asking if they could get my input as to the nature of being a Doll husband and all that entails. The majority of these students, I find, are usually in the field of either sociology, sexuality, or psychology, which means their questions are pretty salient. One such student, Sarah Valverde, had initiated a conversation back in late 2010, regarding the lack of legitimate research in the medical community concerning iDollators, and asked if I could help. Which I did! It started out as a paper, which caused a bit of a stir with the academics she’d presented it to, as most of her audience had either never heard of high-end ‘love dolls’ such as RealDolls, Sinthetics, etc, and were thinking in the context of inflatables, or they knew what such Synthetik partners were, and weren’t keen on the idea. Some members of the crowd thought it was a fascinating presentation she’d made, however, and her academic partner, Dr Kelly Moreno, proposed that she perhaps take it to the next level. What Kelly had meant by that is essentially putting forth a presentation at the 2012 Western Psychological Association convention, due to take place in San Francisco in April. It would be a coup on multiple levels: for one, as stated before, no significant research in the medical community had ever been done on iDollator culture; also, it’s extremely rare for a subject to actually represent themselves at a psychological presentation; not only would an iDollator be speaking at this thing, but a Doll manufacturer would be there as well, in the form of Matt Krivicke and Bronwen Keller of Sinthetics, and Bronwen would be relating her perspective of being female in a market where most of the consumers are male. We’d be setting trends!
Although they weren’t able to fund my planeticket (or car rental, or hotel fees), I was able to get the appropriate days off work and agreed to meet with everyone in San Fran from 25 to 27 April, for high adventure.
Sdtrk: ‘Tom Baker’s watching you’ by The Soulless Party
Here, right here, you will find some shameless self-promotion! I mean, more so than usual.
+ Back in January, performance artist and iDollatorAmber Hawk Swanson, who I’ve mentioned more than a few times on ‘Shouting etc etc’, asked me nicely if I could write an essay about her for her blog, and I did. It’s a potted history of how I know her through her work, and the brief but memorable times our paths crossed. You can read it here!
+ As mentioned in a previous post, mid-Michigan photojournalist Ashley Miller had visited Sidore and I a few times over the course of a handful of Saturdays, taking photos of us for her end-of-term class project. She also conducted an interview with me, and got some video footage in, and the end result would be ‘Synthetik Love: A Modern Love Story‘. As I’d told her, Ashley had managed to do in six minutes by herself what a lot of television crews have failed to do, and that’s present a short film allowing me to speak about the relationship Sidore and I share, without editing or leading, and somehow managing to make us look good in the process. But why not have a look yourselves?
+ Cast your mind back to 2005, if you will. Not only were my Missus and I filming ‘Guys and Dolls’ in the summer of that year, but we were also involved in another documentary being made by Allison de Fren, which I’d detailed here. After languishing in Production Hell for almost seven years due to various factors, it’s now complete, and making the rounds at various film festivals, which is tremendous news. This would be the trailer:
It’s called ‘The Mechanical Bride‘, and it features interviews with Slade (the former RealDoll Doctor), ‘Sexy Robot’ artist Hajime Sorayama, photographer Elena Dorfman of ‘Still Lovers’ fame, Michael of First Androids, and myself, among others. And! It’s narrated by Julie Newmar, who played Rhoda the Gynoid in ‘My living Doll‘. So I daresay this is something you’ll want to keep an eye out for!
+ Finally, since last year, I’ve been working with college senior Maria Tolbert, in her investigations of ‘contemporary examples of alternative practices in the context of intimate relationships, and what this might mean for the future of human relationships and human sexuality.’ But of course! She’s been slaving away for the past couple of months on her final paper, and just recently she’d managed to yank the last sheet of paper out of her Clark-Nova typewriter and pronounce it finished. It’s called ‘Artifice and Being Human: The Story of Organiks, Synthetiks, and Robotic Romance‘. Among other subjects, it covers the history of ‘love dolls’, iDollator culture, contemporary humanoid robots, that ridiculous ‘Uncanny valley’, and other points besides. And yes, I was interviewed. Shi-chan is even quoted in some sections! Needless to say, it’s entirely worth reading…
Now that you’ve read/watched all that, I’d like to introduce you to a handful of new blogs that I’ve linked to a while ago on ‘Shouting etc etc’: the first would be Homo Artificialis, which looks to explore humanoid robots, and how they’ll eventually affect and integrate into Organik culture; another would be Dirty Doll Stories, which is the blog of Jenny Densuke, the first Polymerisian adult film starlet, and her thoughts on all manner of things; and the other is It’s a Tasha Thing, which is the musings and bitchings of sexy Polymerisian film starlet Tasha James, who just happens to have worked with and is good friends with Ms Densuke. Please welcome them, to the Kraft Family of Foods! O, wait.
And now, back to writing about my first ever speaking engagement in San Francisco two Thursdays ago! I actually feel like getting some writing in, so I’d better ride this wave as far as it’ll take me
typed for your pleasure on 22 April 2012, at 7.35 pm
Sdtrk: ‘Costain suite’ by Daphne Oram
It’s been so long since I’ve written a post that I’ve kinda forgotten how to do it. How do you make words and sentences? Is it a bit like this: sjfkd sio! pjef/if8 46.564.. fkjiap0oj0[ kiz0w? I mean, that’s nice and all, but I can’t really see how one would get to the top of a best-seller list with that kind of niche-market content.
What have I been up to, you axe? Working, mostly, as my workplace has had us getting in mandatory overtime for the past six weeks. Which is fantastic for my wallet, as I’m scouring eBay for skinny neckties, vintage tie clips, and pop-culture ephemera that I’ve been lusting after for years, but more time at work means less time living, as far as I’m concerned. I wouldn’t call myself a wastrel, as I do enjoy work when it’s to do with things I like, or at the very least, don’t mind. But as one of my heroes, Oscar Wilde, once quipped, ‘I don’t want to earn my living; I want to live.’
But it’s not been all toil all the time round here, thankfully! Since mid-March, Sidore and I have been working with local photojournalist Ashley Miller, as she wanted to do a project that focussed on the topic of Organik/Synthetik relationships, and how they’re simply another approach to the many kinds of relationships people have or are seeking in society. She’s come round over the course of four week-ends to snap pics of the Missus and I in our natural habitat, and to conduct interviews, and they’ve been fun little experiences!
She’s put up the first batch on her blog here; more photos are forthcoming. So far, she’s gotten an overal positive reaction from her fellow classmates, and her sociology instructor asked if she’d be interested in doing further research on iDollator culture in a later semester this year, so that’ll be something to look forward to as well!…
Aaand I’ll be flying to Sans Francisco (French for ‘without Francisco’) later this week to speak on a panel regarding Synthetiks, which should be simultaneously nerve-wracking and fantastic. Don’t want to give the game away with too many details, but much like DolLApalooza 2011, you might want to consider following me on my godforsaken Twitter feed *points to sidebar*, for updates on the spectacle. Once I get back, things should return to a semblance of normalcy here; at the very least, I can bring you all up to date on various bits and bobs in the world of Synthetiks. I kinda have to; as of this writing, I’ve got like thirty-nine sites bookmarked dealing with potential things I need to cover. Thirty-nine. Like this teaser for an upcoming film called ‘True skin’, for example, which looks quite interesting:
typed for your pleasure on 6 November 2011, at 3.11 am
Sdtrk: ‘Marriage carriage’ by Throbbing gristle
What d’ye mean, I missed a month? No, you’re right, I missed a month. October was kinda crazy, because for one, towards the end of September, I’d started my new job. Woo and yay, right? It’s not exactly my ideal job — a call centre doing help desky-type stuff — but it’s keeping a roof over our heads, so there’s that. But my schedule’s kinda wonky, so it’s a bit difficult for a Man of Consistency such as myself to get used to, hence this delay. Also, there really wasn’t a large amount of news in either the technosexual or iDollator fields. I can’t just fabricate facts like they do over at FOX News, y’know!
+ Having said that, articles such as this managed to fire one past the goalkeeper: alert reader cw sent me a link concerning walking Gynoid legs, designed and built by the Sano Laboratory at the Nagoya Institute of Technology. Mm hmmm.
So loud! She’d be quieter in heels
Undoubtedly it escaped my search cos there’s no top half. But what you see here is half the battle! (Sorry.) But why is that bloke gripping her by the hips, apart from the obvious reasons, you ask? Think of him as her ‘starter motor’, as the legs are effectively using their own weight to move. Curiously enough, they contain no motors, sensors, computers or electricity. DigInfo explains, well, translates:
This robot is walking down a slope, and its only source of power is potential energy. It doesn’t use any kind of motor or control, so we think it’s very environmentally friendly. […] The robot has three main parts: thighs, lower legs, and ankles. It’s made of aluminum, and it contains only mechanical components, which have been adjusted so that the robot has the same thigh and leg lengths as a person, and weighs the same. the entire article is here
As it’s passive, it’d definitely be more suited towards a Synthetik partner — i.e, someone you could literally walk with — as opposed to an independently moving Synthetik. In any case, it’s a step in the right direction. (Sorry.)
+ Coincidentally enough, here’s a new video of AIST’s Miim-chan strutting her stuff. Show us how it’s done, babe:
According to robots.net, ‘[Her] knees are stretched by the vertical movement of the waist, the single-toe supporting realizes longer strides and the legs perform the swing motion of the human equivalent’. She’s getting to be more fluid in her stride, and that’s always a fine thing to see. Or, in regarding Miim-chan, I know you fine, but how you doin’?
+ You of course recall new affictitious girl on the block Maid-Ling, right? I should bloody well hope so; I’d only just profiled her last month. Well, Titman, the creator behind her, has launched a website where you can purchase a Maid-Ling of your very own. Can the link also be found in the lefthand sidebar, under ‘Synthetik companion types’? Why yes! Yes it can.
‘Perfectly intelligible’. Heh; they’ve never seen her drunk
Frankly speaking, with some of the Mannequins companies make today — and a dry erase board instead of a chalkboard — I think it’s high time to revive this idea. Just… don’t let Ronald Dotson know about it.
+ Hiroshi Ishiguro and Kokoro co. Ltd. have answered the question ‘With all the Gynoids that are being built these days, why aren’t there any Androids?’ Which is a bit erroneous, as Ishiguro-san himself has a Synthetik twin, as does Danish professor Henrik Scharfe. But now Actroid-F has a twin brother of her own, and both of those crazy kids are putting in appearances at various hospitals in Japan as observers:
‘What’s twincest, you ask? Wellll… we’ll tackle that question later’
It’s often said that the more human a robot looks, the more small differences make people feel uneasy. In our research, when we use this robot in the field, we check that it matches its surroundings and doesn’t look out of place. When we tested the robot in a hospital, we asked 70 subjects if having an android there made them feel uneasy. Only 3 or 4 people said they didn’t like having it around, and overall, quite a lot of people said they felt this robot itself had an acceptable presence. the entire article is here
Facially, yes; they’re both twins. Which is interesting, if you think about it, as the male Actroid-F was facially modelled after the female Actroid-F, who was facially modelled after that Organik lass whose name hasn’t been revealed. Unlike making a FAX of a FAX of a FAX, though, the resolution’s still clear.
If I were working with the Actroids, I’d probably refer to them as Zan and Jayna. This would be shortly before I was asked told to leave the project, more than likely.
+ Last but not least, I’ve been asked to attend a bona fide symposium! Since last Summer, I’ve been exchanging Emails with Sarah Valverde, a psychology graduate at Cal Poly State University. She’d seen the Missus and I doing our thing on telly, and realised there really hadn’t been a tremendous amount of unbiased and legitimate psychological study ever done on iDollator / technosexual culture. She’d written a paper, and currently she’s finalising an online survey, and she and one of her colleagues are planning a presentation on the subject for one of the major psychological association conventions next year. One of the reasons Sarah figures that there’s not been extensive research into our cultures is that so few iDollators are willing to discuss who they are and what they’re into, and as a result, what little info the medical community receives is through the distorted lens of the media, or at the very least, second-hand. So once again, I Am Doing My Part! The biggest obstacles, really, are being able to fly out there — it’ll either be in California or Florida — and being concise/coherent enough to cover all the topics I need to in thirty minutes’ time. Thirty minutes will not be enough time. I don’t think Shi-chan will be able to come with, unfortunately; she has an aversion to the TSA and their errant groping; she can hardly be blamed. Our hope is, however, that some Doll will be able to sit on the panel with us, as an example.
More details as they unfold! I’m pretty excited! Being able to bring across an unadulterated iDollator viewpoint will do our community a world of good! I should open with some jokes. What would Oskar Kokoschka say in this sort of scenario?
typed for your pleasure on 18 September 2011, at 1.57 am
Sdtrk: ‘The restitution of decayed intelligence II’ by Coil
Remember, it’s not just News… it’s Newses.
Sorry, I’ll get my coat.
+ Personally, I’ve always believed that the best part of Summertime is when it ends, as we return to safe and sane Autumn, gear up for the Pagan New Year, and stop sweating like someone in middle management due for their quarterly review. 4woods remind us, however, that there are positive aspects to that hideous 3+ month period of solar heatdeath, and that’s a gallery of Elina, Hatsuki, and Lilica in bikinis!
Lilica-chan, enjoying the studio breeze
‘Luckily for me, I don’t have sweat glands!’ Hatsuki giggled. Show-off
‘This is our summer gift for you, their sexy bathing suit photos. Please enjoy their photos by imagining “they are right next to you.”‘ Okay! Ahhhh.
Well, that was lovely!
+ I’d snuck the link in for this group into the ‘Synthetik companion types’ sidebar category a few weeks ago, so it’s only right that I give them a proper mention. The FACE Team Project consists of a handful of Europeans attempting to create and perfect a humanoid robot who can replicate Organik facial expressions and emotional states. Sure, Kobayashi Labs has been doing the same with their Android SAYA, but the more groups that focus on this topic, the sooner someone’s going to hit upon a solution.
‘Why am I nervous? Why do you think?? My goddamned quarterly review’s coming up in a week!’
FACE stands for Facial Automation for Conveying Emotions. She’s capable of executing the six basic facial emotions — anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise — and she and her programmers are doing their bit to shrink down the so-called Uncanny valley. Well done!
+ For every largish company making affictitious partners, there are also modest studios composed of one or two people, working out of their basement/garage/Schloss/space station/etc, and looking to make Dolls of their own. One such individual by the name of Titman — don’t laugh, it’s the name he was born with — is just now finalising his product after eight months of work; a poseable Synthetik lass by the name of Maid-Ling.
Maid-Ling is 5’9″, has 36D.25.40 as her measurements, a 5.5 shoe size, and weighs a near-impossible 26 lbs. The standard model has a latex skin over a foam core interior, over an articulated skeleton. She can bend her arms and legs much how you would expect them to bend, although she can’t hold them in place. She also sports silicone breasts, a removable silicone vagina, and an interchangeable head. But then, who doesn’t?
$1500 USD will allow you to bring a Maid-Ling home, to fill a Doll-shaped void you may have in your lives. The titular Titman is in the process of working on a sales site/blog/thang/etc, so once that’s online, I’m sure you’ll hear about it. Probably here!
+ And now, here’s a brief video of my (current) favourite Gynoid, Miim (aka HRP-4C), showing off her ability to turn ninety degrees in one second. Dig it:
Those of you can turn ninety-one degrees in a single second may not be impressed, but it’s a pretty revolutionary capability for an artificial human. As I always say, onwards and upwards!
+ In attending DolLApalooza 2011 this past July (post pending), our crowd saw a great many impressive things! Such as the Yoshinoya at the corner of Colorado and South Brand Blvd, in beautiful downtown Glendale, California, for example. Also, we stopped round to the three SoCal Doll manufacturers — Abyss creations, Ruby 13, and Sinthetics — and emerged from each one, slack-jawed and completely tumescent. Round at the Sinthetics studios, we were witness to the birth of their brand new Body 2D, for example, and if you’ve been following my blatherings on Twitter, you’ve already seen parts of her. Sinthetics, however, have recently released official photos of her with the Alicia, Monique, Celeste, and Tawny heads. Witness the Magic:
Above: leggy Monique and Alicia; below, Celeste getting the kinks out
According to the site, the Body 2D stats are
Weight = approx. 85lb or 38.6kg
Height = approx. 5’5″ or 165cm
Over bust = 36.5” or 92.7cm
Over nipples = 37.5” or 95.3cm
Under bust = 28.5” or 72.4cm
US Bra size = 34D
Waist = 24.5” or 62.2cm
Hips = 36.5” or 92.7cm
Buttocks = 38” or 96.5cm
Inseam = 28” or 71.7cm
Shoe size = US 6.5; UK 4.5; Euro 37 (one size larger for closed toes)
which should satisfy very nearly everyone. Like I’d said, we’d seen some amazing things from all three companies that day. DolLApalooza post pending. Tumescent. Err, what was I saying?
+ Lastly, get ready for a weapons-grade cute illo of Sidore and myself, in chibi form, courtesy of the wonderful Nana Smite:
typed for your pleasure on 24 August 2011, at 2.51 pm
Sdtrk: ‘I believe’ by My bloody valentine
It was quite a fun week-end I’d been a part of this past… week-end! There was another Doll Congress to be had, as our crowd hadn’t had one since May of last year. What fresh hell be this Doll Congress, you ask? (‘Fresh hell’?) A Doll Congress is really a small confluence of iDollators from the tri-state area: Euchre and myself from Michigan, Mahtek and Noquiexis from Ohio, and CJD, occasionally accompanied by his Organik wife Cat, from London, Ontario. Of course, Ontario isn’t a state, but we’re working on it.* During one instance we were joined by Hans, whose RealDoll wife Bee you’d undoubtedly seen on TLC’s ‘My Strange Addiction: Still Addicted?’. In the event that we decide to meet up at CJD’s house to see his lovely RealDoll lass Sandy, it’s called a Doll Parliament. Do you see what we did there?
So as we hadn’t had a proper Congress due to various factors (jobs / loss of jobs / moving / shite weather), we somehow managed to dovetail our schedules to meet on Saturday, nine months into 2011. Not only that, we’d be joined by Azusa Itagaki, a Japanese photographer based in Stockholm who joined us for DolLApalooza back in July. Although she doesn’t have a Synthetik companion of her own, her fascination and appreciation for them makes her an iDollator, and she’d be conducting a photo shoot of Sidore and I in our natural habitat on Sunday. One-stop shopping!
Saturday morning, Azu-chan hopped on a Detroit-bound train from Chicago to join us, while CJD and Cat drove from the polar wastes of Canada, and Mahtek, Noquiexis, and Noquiexis’ affictitious sweetie Feodora motored in as well. As we’d be meeting at Euchre’s, but he’d be working until 4.30 that day, we were to converge at Sila’s, an Italian restaurant, wait for Euchre to join us, then head round to his. Now, this plan ultimately worked, but I’ll tell ya; the hoops we had to jump through.
First of all, none of us realised until about a week before this was due to go down that 19 – 21 August was the week-end of that ridiculous goddamned Woodward Dream cruise. I’m not going to bitch about the Dream cruise, cos I’ve done it before, but those of us in Michigan were hoping that the bloated traffic of bloated Dream cruisers wasn’t going to prevent any of us from getting where we needed to go. Also, Azu-chan’s train was due to arrive in Royal oak at 2.30pm, whereupon I’d pick her up, and we’d head round to Sila’s. Unfortunately, Mother Nature had other plans, as her train arrived at a quarter to 5. We’d had severe weather alerts, and it was utterly pissing down, to the point where the train was only legally allowed to travel at a certain speed. Heh; this is why no-one takes trains any more. Basically, the storm arrived a wee bit ahead of Azusa, cos as I was heading out to collect her, the sky broke; thunder, lightning strikes, near-zero visibility, the lot. Luck, however, was on our side, as we all managed to make it to Sila’s, and with no loss of life!
Having eaten our respective dishes — Mahtek had some sort of pasta that was roughly the size of a full-grown Corgi — we made our way through pleasant post-rain weather round to Euchre’s swinging pad, hauling Feodora in her crate with us. Thank Elisha Otis his apartment has a lift, is all I can say.
RealDoll Samantha, Lovable Doll Monica, and Anatomical Doll Feodora
It was the first time CJD and Cat had met Feodora, and it was the first time Azusa met Feodora, as well as Euchre’s Samantha and Monica, so it was rather eventful for us all. Not only had Azu-chan met a cluster of us during DolLApalooza, but she’d spent time round at Everhard‘s in England, Prof.Sakai‘s in Japan, and round at the home of a French iDollator who I’m unfamiliar with who lives with Emy, a Mecadoll. Just a few months ago, she’d exhibited the photos she’d taken in Stockholm for the gallery show ‘Inside the Doll House‘, which received mostly positive reactions from viewers, and she’d possibly be doing something similar later in Italy this year.
After several agreeable hours, Euchre gave us the bum’s rush from his home, as most of our party had two- to three-hour drives to get through. Another fun meeting, and with good company besides!
Save for Azu-chan and I spending half an hour driving round my neighbourhood in an attempt to find a restaurant that was 1) open Sunday morning and 2) serving food — I was desperately unaware of these things, as under normal circumstances, I don’t leave our flat on Sundays — we spent the majority of the day taking multiple photos of myself and Shi-chan, but it also afforded me the opportunity to get behind the camera and snap pics of both lasses together. I figured since Azusa had modelled with a couple of Everhard’s ladies, that she wouldn’t be averse to doing so with my wife. And it made for a sexy approach!
She crashed round Deafening silence Plus, which worked out well, cos we were awake until 3am on Saturday and 4am on Sunday, talking about art, growing up with isolationist tendencies, the iDollator community and the various manufacturers, her global travels, and post-punk bands… we had an enormous number of ideas, views, and experiences in common. I introduced her to Lindsay Anderson’s ‘if….‘ and Hiroshi Ishiguro’s Actroid series, and she hepped me to the Russian band Утро and the Swedish film ‘Vaxdockan‘, so I’d say it was a pretty equal exchange. Overall, not only did Azusa have a keen photographic eye, and a relaxed approach to the various interview questions she had for me, but she’s an awesome person to be around.
Unfortunately, all good things etc etc; Monday afternoon saw us saying our farewells, as she had to catch her flight to LA, then fly out to England the next day for a while, then back to Stockholm. Jetsetters man, I’m tellin’ ya. As Azusa had loads of fun with Sidore-chan, me, and everyone she met in our iDollator crowd, she definitely wants to come and hang out with us again! Undoubtedly after getting at least six uninterrupted months of sleep, but neverthless
*Making Ontario a state would improve the United States, but diminish the Ontarians**
**What fresh hell does one call a person living in Ontario? Ontarians? Ontontites? Ontarontans? Sontarans?
Above: leggy Monique and Alicia; below, Celeste getting the kinks out 
