End Of Year... and other endings...

We've come to the part of the year that I really don't put too much thought about... the END of the year.

And this year, the "END" comes in so many different ways.

If you haven't been listening to ShockNet Radio, then you probably don't know that the station will be shutting down at the end of this month.

This is not a temporary shutdown.  This is not the annual "Holiday Hiatus".  ShockNet Radio will come to an end at 11pm Eastern Time on Friday, November 29th. The station goes dark, the equipment gets broken down and sold and Studio B joins Studio A in obscurity.

Obviously this means there will be no more "Brutally Honest - LIVE" after this month.  The show needs a live radio station to make it happen, and there will be no more ShockNet Radio after this month, so BHL will come to an end.

Don't worry, I will have a grand finale on November 25th.  It'll be a special 2-hour final broadcast, and I have NO IDEA what I'll be doing for the last hour.

And I REALLY HOPE that you guys will tune for the shows on the 11th and 18th too!!!  I don't want you guys to think that I'M giving up on you before then, so please don't give up on me!  I'm not like some of the other hosts that I will not mention that have given up on their shows long before the plug is pulled on them.  I LIKE DOING THIS!  I WISH I COULD KEEP DOING THIS!  I feel just as let down as some of you that the decision was made to shut down SNR, but it wasn't my call and I have to accept the decision of those that made the call and were responsible for keeping my labor of love going for as long as it has.

That brings us to the question of "What next?"

Some people have asked that I return "Brutally Honest" to an hour or half-hour podcast like it used to be before going live.  I have a few issues with that. 

The first issue is that I don't have the time to dedicate to that kind of work like I used to.  I have work and a few projects on my plate, including the new AHTV series.  That's time, effort, and energy that I don't have to put into doing an hour or even half-hour podcast.

The second issue is a matter of spirit.  Losing BHL and ShockNet is taking a lot out of me.  This is a kick in the nuts on the same level as NC Soft suddenly killing my favorite MMO last year.  While I understand the decision of RJ and his wife to end the station (and their reason was a thousand times more credible than NC Soft's was), it still hurts, and I do not have it within me to try to pretend that I can "keep the magic going" by doing a self-published podcast.

That's not to say I'm hanging up the microphone and shutting down the soundboard!  I will most likely return to doing a weekly audio rant in 2014.  But it will be just one rant.  I'll have the details of that later on at this blog site.  Maybe some day when I can get someone else's attention and I have access to live radio I can bring "Brutally Honest - LIVE" back.  I just don't see that day coming anytime soon.

Next up... the weekly column.

I'm still doing the column, as I have been doing for the past seventeen years.  The last column for the year will be out on December 2nd, and it will be the annual "Brutally Honest Awards", and then that will be it for 2013.  However, unlike the radio show, the column WILL be back in January of 2014.  Believe me, I don't want to miss out on some prime commentating when it comes to the mid-term elections!

Now... let's talk comics and the future of Battlerock Comics.

"Future's Guardian" is still going on.  We are about mid-way through the "Psilence of Conscience" storyline and things are just starting to get interesting there.  The production schedule has been moved to a 45-day cycle instead of a monthly release because of some of the other projects on my plate right now.  We will be taking a break after the storyline ends, but that's only because there are some other comic projects that we need to concentrate on.  The series WILL resume afterward!  It is not being cancelled!

For more about that, please continue to visit the Battlerock Comics website.

So, that's pretty much it for now.  We have three more shows of "Brutally Honest - LIVE" to do, four more articles for the column for the year, the comic series is still going on, and, oh, AHTV makes its debut in December so you'll be able to find out why I have a face for radio!

Holiday?  WHAT Holiday?  :)