| Upgrades and Fixes, Busy Busy! |
[08.23.2009 - 2:23am] |
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Matrix Revisited (Blu-ray music) |
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I'm excited to tell you that we've upgraded a bunch of things in the Fast Food Anime site the past few days!
Share link: You can now share any of the items on our site through your social networking accounts! You can also bookmark, e-mail or print the page through the handy little Share button.
Item browsing links: On an item's individual page, you can now easily click to the previous or next volume in the series! For example... If you are on the page for a manga's 3rd volume, you'll see links to volumes 2 and 4. It's a lot easier than going back to the main series page for the linkage. ^_^
Multiple shipments: Orders requiring multiple boxes can now be tracked individually. Shipped items are denoted separately from items not yet shipped. Multiple tracking numbers will also be clickable through the Order History. Prices and totals are also visible in your Order History.
Various fixes: Snacks and other product pictures have been added. We also plugged out a variety of small bug fixes that came up. If you notice something going weird with our site, please let us know so we can fix it. ^_^
This year has been incredibly busy for us, with more conventions than we've ever done. There seems to always be a backlog of stuff to do, but no one here says that's a bad thing! LOL... I hope you think that the ongoing web site work is useful. I want Fast Food Anime to become a destination point for anime savings and as an information resource.
Development of Otaku Antics is progressing, and we hope to have it available sometime in 2010. It will be worth the wait, and you can sure believe that, ninja bretheren!
Have a great one!
- John "Pindarrrrr"
Ninja Shogun, Fast Food Anime
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| No Brand Con - Favorite Moments |
[05.02.2009 - 11:45pm] |
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Leftfield - Rhythm & Stealth CD |
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Cross-posted from the No Brand Con forums, here are some of my fave moments of No Brand. This is one of my absolute favorite shows to attend every year, and I hope you can tell why.
- Seeing everyone that I see several times each year, those that I only see once a year, a few that I haven't seen in a few years, and meeting so many new peeps. I wish I wasn't as tired and frantic so I could hang out more.
- Seeing friends Ray and Moy spend hours working to solve the 13 puzzles for the raffle. That was a great idea.
- Realizing on Friday, after the 6-foot-6 Ray spent Thursday night sleeping on the 5-foot-10 couch in the hotel room, that the couch actually folds out into a bed.
- Tracking the progression of Housekeeping's cleaning patterns over the course of the weekend. One day only the beds were made, the next only changed towels, another only emptied trash. One day, we believe the entire room will be clean... one day.
- Standing up in the Mann Auction, taking my place at the front of the stage, and instantly turning the event from PG to PG-14... then seeing ALL of the cell phones, digital cameras, and video cams raise up to capture the moment. We also raised a lot of money for the Red Cross.
- Starting a conga line at the rave... and turning it into a circle, with neither a beginning nor an end. Harmony was achieved that night. That was the only time, in all of the anime raves I've attended, that I've seen that happen.
- Pac-Man at the rave with his 40 yellow glowsticks of awesomeness.
- Vinnk loading Pac-Man into his van on Sunday. (I have a cell phone pic!)
- Microsofting nearly all of Rising Stuff's leftovers on Sunday. For the 4th year.
- Vinnk n' Peso's persistence in offloading their mystery bra into various places of the Fast Food Anime booth. Then our attempts to foist it back upon them. Then finding it later stashed back in our stuff. Then seeing Tiffany taking a shot in returning the wayward undergarment... only to find it finally hidden amongst the Microsofted boxes of CDs!! Vinnk n' Peso, just you guys wait until next year. You're taking your mystery bra back to Japan one way or another!
I'm incredibly psyched for ACen next week, and hope I can survive it all!
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| Live Blogging RETURNS! |
[04.10.2009 - 4:28pm] |
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Anime OP / ED Collection |
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What does a Pinder with nothing really to do... do?
Real-time blogging!
Have fun. :)
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| Anime Detour panel, with Otaku Antics preview |
[04.01.2009 - 10:10pm] |
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Hi everybody!
I'm busy preparing for heading out to Anime Detour, but I'm also preparing for my panel at the convention.
Scriptwriting: From the Stage to the Page (featuring Otaku Antics!)
FRIDAY, 9:00 p.m., Programming 4 - Meet the real-life Pinder as he discusses his techniques in bringing ideas to life in a script form. Learn how to write for actors' and artists' strengths, working in conjunction to bring out the best in your script. And get an exclusive look behind the scenes at the upcoming manga series, Otaku Antics! A page of the script with 4 pages of storyboards will be exclusively available ONLY at this panel! And, y'know what... The Otaku Antics artist, Shannon Townsend, will be a Guest at Anime Detour. Might be fun to get the Otaku Antics handout packet autographed after the panel! ;-)
Wow, it's busy, busy! Anime Detour will be convention #6 of 10 over 17 weeks, and #2 of 5 in a row for us. It's a challenge keeping sane (and consistently stocked with anime goodies), but it's a lot of fun. I hope to see a lot of you at Anime Detour, and hope you can make it to the panel. It's always a blast to talk about Otaku Antics with others.
Have a great weekend!
- John
President / CEO, Fast Food Anime
Writer, Otaku Antics
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| Fast Food Anime Update Addendum - Series + Snack page |
[03.19.2009 - 11:46pm] |
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3-19 Update - Just fixed the Series pages! Now the columns are more even, for less scrolling. The snacks page finally uses both available columns! 8D Items are listed alphabetically within each format category, making it easier to find your favorite character's stuff on their Series page. So now all the Kon plushies are grouped together, Roy keychains are together, and even Sasuke patches are together. You get the idea. Squee away, fangirls. Squee away.
Have a good night!
- John
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| Fast Food Anime - Fun upgrades and Ergo Proxy |
[03.18.2009 - 5:42pm] |
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Ergo Proxy Soundtrack CD 1 |
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Heya everybody!
It's been a really hectic year here so far, and it's just getting started. We're in the middle of a huge convention season, going to 10 conventions over the span of 17 weeks. Next weekend, Animarathon, will just be #4 of 10. The last show in this spree will be the largest in the Midwest, and thankfully our shortest drive - Anime Central. It's nice living in the Chicagoland area...
Fun upgrades!
Advanced Search - Finally, we can search better! The seach engine was originally designed in a rush, so it's nice to go back and fix it up. It may not be perfect... but it works really well now! 8D
Convention database - For years, even since the old green site, I've wanted to be able to dynamically update the site with convention information. Now, we do. ^_^ The list in the left column will update automatically with the next 5 conventions in the Fast Food Anime schedule as we travel throughout the year.
And on our full convention listing, you can get all of the necessary details on a single page. From web site URL to registration costs to hotel room block rates to guest lists, even to Google and MapQuest maps to the convention location - it's all there! I eventually plan to automatically have system-wide banner notifications of when we're out of town (so you know when we can't answer e-mails right away or ship orders immediately). Just a way to get a little more information at your fingertips.
Would you like any more info on the convention pages, or any extra search features? Let us know!
Recent viewing - Ergo Proxy
Wow, this show was cool. I finished it a week or two ago, and was really energized by it. It's similar in style to Stand Alone Complex, Texhnolyze, and Witch Hunter Robin... and is a stylish sci-fi adventure with the occassional furious action sequence. If you're into the darker atmospheric shows like I tend to be, this'll be WELL worth your while. And that opening theme kicks somethin' serious.
Until next time, enjoy the awesome new Pocky that we just got in!
Like winter chocolate... mmmmmm, powdery...
- Boss Man Pinder
Head Cheese, Fast Food Anime
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| Life as a writer, and shameless panel plug |
[03.08.2009 - 10:15pm] |
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Y'know, it's really weird to live with people for years when no one else knows them.
I recently began writing new material for the upcoming Otaku Antics series, and realized that I hadn't written anything new in nearly 2 years. The last I'd tweaked a completed script was a year and a half ago. I have known this cast of characters for so long - they'd lived in my mind since the initial rough script was jotted out. They are second nature to me now. I can imagine how, at a convention, a real-life Becky would react to a real Kelli suddenly glomping Hinako, knocking over Tyler, which scares little Kubichin and confuses Pinder.
As a writer, it's difficult living with these characters, and a finished script while I write a new one. I'm writing gags and stories that won't be read by anyone for over a year, and jokes that will be brand new in a few months (volume 1: Store Trek) were written 2 years ago. It's like living in a time vacuum. I'm used to the "old" stories and want to tell everyone about the new stories I'm writing... but I can't because everyone still needs to read the original ones! lol
Being caught between 2 points in story timeline is odd. I hope I can make it out alright. Stone and Parker, famous for South Park spoke in an interview years ago on the differences between working on movies and television. TV has a much shorter development cycle, from concept to finished product, which was attractive to them. They found it frustrating to live with a script for a long time before showing it to people. I can understand that, though there is also something to be said of having the time to fine-tune a script over a period of time. I like having that period of time to touch things up to maximize its potential impact once it is released, even if I want to blast through material and keep things rolling. I'm too much of a perfectionist to fly too quickly through a project. I wonder what writers of weekly manga sections in Japan go through.
I'm obviously excited about telling everyone about Otaku Antics, and hope everyone finds some enjoyment out of it... There's a lot of fun just in the raw scripts. I have a hard time bottling the enthusiasm when I imagine the pictures that will convey the aspiring classic situations and manga-inspired moments. Oh, and lemme tell ya - it's gonna be a real challenge to find all the hidden otakuisms that we're hiding in the frames and pages. ;-)
Oh, and BTW, everyone. Going to Anime Detour? I'll be running my "Scriptwriting: From the Stage to the Page" panel. Check it out! Lots of looks at, teasers of, and shameless shilling for Otaku Antics!
Have a good one, y'all!
- John
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| Fast Food Anime upgrade - User Accounts |
[01.12.2009 - 1:33am] |
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The user account upgrade is complete and now in use on the FastFoodAnime.com web store! Ordering works just like before, but now you can input your shipping info so checking out next time goes quicker and smoother. Also, you can track your order, seeing if it has shipped and using our one-click system to check on your Delivery Confirmation number!
Wholesale customers and applicants - We will be e-mailing all of you initial login information within the next few days. With this, you can easily browse our site and place an order. And like with everybody else, order tracking is extremely easy. ^_^
Coming soon - International USPS and domestic UPS shipping options!
We still have a lot of site improvement ideas that we want to implement, though those may take some time. The convention season is coming up quickly for us, and I will be programming the eagerly anticipated Rate My Cosplay website for a hopeful Ohayocon launch. Check out our panel and show off your mad cosplay skillz with your friends in a fun (and ego-boosting) way!
Got any ideas for features that you would like to see integrated into the site? Send us some ideas!
And as a reminder, our convention schedule for 2009 has been posted. See when we'll be in your area!
Enjoy the new upgrade, and let me know how it works for you! ^_^
- John... "Pinder" the programmer
President/CEO, Fast Food Anime
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| Monday Upgrade! |
[01.09.2009 - 10:38pm] |
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Godsmack: Live DVD |
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Good news, everybody -- The user-account upgrade will launch sometime late Sunday night / early Monday morning!
I'm incredibly excited for this upgrade, as it will streamline and simplify the back-end process of fulfilling your orders... and allow amazing ordering access to all of your orders. Wholesale, library, or end user - everyone will be able to manage and track their orders with the new system. Not sure if your order has shipped? Want the tracking number? Not only will these be automatically e-mailed to you after you complete your payment, but you can check your order status on our site!
Standing back from things for a moment, I'm amazed that we are able to continually increase our efficiency with our minimal staff. We still aren't up to the level I want - Mr. Ambitious Perfectionist here - but I'm excited by the future possibilites. We will still be using PayPal as our online payment processor for the time being, but by the end of the year we will be securely accepting payments directly through our site. And I'd like us to unveil a few fun social aspects surrounding your orders... and personal collections. Would you like to see how your anime collection stacks up to mine? ;-)
What features would you like to see integrated into the site? E-mail us your ideas!
Our convention schedule for 2009 has been posted, too. Check it out and see when we'll be in your area!
Have a great weekend, and check out our new upgrade on Monday! ^_^
- John, "Boss Man Pinder"
President/CEO, Fast Food Anime
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| Fast Food Anime 2009 Convention Schedule |
[01.08.2009 - 10:20pm] |
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Patlabor movie 2 DVD |
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Here it is! This listing is subject to sudden and random changes, but here is the planned 2009 Fast Food Anime convention schedule. You can always view the current schedule on the Fast Food Anime convention listing page See y'all when I get in town! ^_^
| Convention |
Date |
City |
Ohayocon
| Jan 30 - Feb 1
| Columbus, OH
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Kawa Kon
| Feb 13 - 15
| St. Louis, MO
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Anime Milwaukee
| Feb 27 - Mar 1
| Milwaukee, WI
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A & G Ohio
| Mar 13 - 15
| Cincinnati, OH
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Animarathon
| Mar 28
| Bowling Green, OH
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Anime Detour
| Apr 3 - 5
| Minneapolis, MN
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Anime Punch
| Apr 10 - 12
| Columbus, OH
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No Brand Con
| Apr 24 - 26
| Eau Claire, WI
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Anime Central
| May 8 - 10
| Chicago, IL
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OMG!con
| June 5 - 7
| Peducah, KY
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JAFAX
| June 27 - 28
| Allendale, MI
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Otaku Omaha
| July 3 - 5
| Council Bluffs, IA
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Ikasucon
| Aug 7 - 9
| Ft. Wayne, IN
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AnimeIowa
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| Coralville, IA
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MatsuriCon
| Aug 28 - 30
| Columbus, OH
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Reactor
| Sep 18 - 20
| Chicago, IL
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Sogen Con
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| Souix Falls, SD
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Tsubasacon
| Oct 9 - 11
| Huntington, WV
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Youmacon
| Oct 29 - Nov 1
| Detroit, MI
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Anime Nebraskon
| Nov 6 - 8
| Omaha, NE
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Daisho Con
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| Stevens Point, WI
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