How a Computer Works - Part 1 (Components)

I am about to teach you on a real fundamental, connecting up electronic components level, how a computer actually works. Before I get into the meat of this though (you can just skip down below the fold if you don't care), here's the reasons I'm sitting doing so in this format:

Like a decade or two ago, companies Facebook pushed this whole "pivot to video" idea on the whole internet with some completely faked data, convincing everyone that everything had to be a video, and we need to start pushing back against that. Especially for stuff like complex explanations of things or instructions, it's much more efficient to just explain things clearly in text, maybe with some visual aids, so people can easily search, scan, and skip around between sections. It's also a hell of a lot easier to host things long term, and you can even print out a text based explainer and not need a computer to read it, keep it on a desk, highlight it, etc.

People are so clueless about how computers actually work that they start really thinking like it's all magical. Even programmers. Aside from how proper knowledge lets you get more out of them, this leads to people spouting off total nonsense about "teaching sand to think" or "everything is just 1s and 0s" or "this 'AI' a con artist who was trying to sell me NFTs a month ago probably really is an amazing creative thinking machine that can do everything he says!"

We used to have this cultural value going where it was expected that if you owned something and used it day to day, you'd have enough basic knowledge of how it worked that if it stopped working you could open it up, see what was wrong, and maybe fix it on your own, or maybe even put one together again from scratch, and that's obviously worth bringing back.

I'm personally working on a totally bonkers DIY project and I'd like to hype up like-minded people for when it gets farther along.

So all that said, have a standard reminder that I am completely reliant on Patreon donations to survive, keep updating this blog, and ideally start getting some PCBs and chips and a nice oscilloscope to get that mystery project off the ground.

Electricity probably doesn't work like how you were taught (and my explanation shouldn't be trusted too far either).

I remember, growing up, hearing all sorts of things about electricity having this sort of magical ability to always find the shortest possible path to where it needs to get, flowing like water, and a bunch of other things that are kind of useful for explaining how a Faraday cage or a lightning rod works, and not conflicting with how simple electronics will have a battery and then a single line of wire going through like a switch and a light bulb or whatever back to the other end of the battery.

If you had this idea drilled into your head hard enough, you might end up thinking that if we have a wire hooked to the negative end of a battery stretching off to the east, and another wire stretching off to the east from the positive end, and we bridge between the two in several places with an LED or something soldered to both ends, only the westernmost one is going to light up, because hey, the shortest path is the one that turns off as quickly as possible to connect to the other side, right? Well turns out no, all three are going to light up, because that "shortest path" thing is a total misunderstanding.

Here's how it actually works, roughly. If you took basic high school chemistry, you learned about how the periodic table is set up, right? A given atom, normally, has whatever number of protons in the core, and the same number of electrons, whipping all over around it, being attracted to those protons but repelled by each other, and there's particular counts of electrons which are super chill with that arrangement so we put those elements in the same column as each other, and then as you count up from those, you get the elements between those either have some electrons that don't fit all tight packed in the tight orbit and just kinda hang out all wide and lonely and "want to" buddy up with another atom that has more room, up to the half full column that can kinda go either way, then as we approach the next happy number they "want to" have a little more company to get right to that cozy tight packed number, and when you have "extra" electrons and "missing" electrons other atoms kinda cozy up and share so they hit those good noble gas counts.

I'm sure real experts want to scream at me for both that and this, but this is basically how electricity works. You have a big pile of something at the "positive" end that's "missing electrons" (for the above reason or maybe actually ionized so they really aren't there), and a "negative" end that's got spares. Then you make wires out of stuff from those middle of the road elements that have awkward electron counts and don't mind buddying up (and also high melting points and some other handy qualities) and you hook those in there. And the electron clouds on all the atoms in the wire get kinda pulled towards the positive side because there's more room over there, but if they full on leave their nucleus needs more electron pals, so yeah neighbors get pulled over, and the whole wire connected to the positive bit ends up with a positive charge to it, and the whole wire on the negative bit is negatively charged, and so yeah, anywhere you bridge the gap between the two, the electrons are pretty stoked about balancing out these two big awkward compromises and they'll start conga lining over to balance things out, and while they're at it they'll light up lights or shake speakers or spin motors or activate electromagnets or whatever other rad things you've worked out how to make happen with a live electric current.

Insulators, Resistors, Waves, and Capacitors

Oh and we typically surround these wires made of things that are super happy about sharing electrons around with materials that are very much "I'm good, thanks," but this isn't an all or nothing system and there's stuff you can connect between the positive and negative ends of things that still pass the current along, but only so much so fast. We use those to make resistors, and those are handy because sometimes you don't want to put all the juice you have through something because it would damage it, and having a resistor anywhere along a path you're putting current through puts a cap on that flow, and also sometimes you might want a wire connected to positive or negative with a really strong resistor so it'll have SOME sort of default charge, but if we get a free(r) flowing connection attached to that wire somewhere else that opens sometimes, screw that little trickle going one way, we're leaning everyone the other way for now.

The other thing with electricity is is that the flow here isn't a basic yes/no thing. How enthusiastically those electrons are getting pulled depends on the difference in charge at the positive and negative ends, and also if you're running super long wires then even if they conduct real good, having all that space to spread along is going to kinda slow things to a trickle, AND the whole thing is kinda going to have some inherent bounciness to it both because we're dealing with electrons whipping and spinning all over and because, since it's a property that's actually useful for a lot of things we do with electricity, the power coming out of the wall has this intentional wobbly nature because we've actually got this ridiculous spinny thing going on that's constantly flip flopping which prong of the socket is positive and which is negative and point is we get these sine waves of strength by default, and they kinda flop over if we're going really far.

Of course there's also a lot of times when you really want to not have your current flow flickering on and off all the time, but hey fortunately one of the first neat little electronic components we ever worked out are capacitors... and look, I'm going to be straight with you. I don't really get capacitors, but the basic idea is you've got two wires that go to big wide plates, and between those you have something that doesn't conduct the electricity normally, but they're so close the electromagnetic fields are like vibing, and then if you disconnect them from the flow they were almost conducting and/or they get charged to their limit, they just can't deal with being so charged up and they'll bridge their own gap and let it out. So basically you give them electricity to hold onto for a bit then pass along, and various sizes of them are super handy if you want to have a delay between throwing a switch and having things start doing their thing, or keeping stuff going after you break a connection, or you make a little branching path where one branch connects all regular and the other goes through a capacitor, and the electricity which is coming in in little pulses effectively comes out as a relatively steady stream because every time it'd cut out the capacity lets its charge go.

We don't just have switches, we have potentiometers.

OK, so... all of the above is just sort of about having a current and maybe worrying about how strong it is, but other than explaining how you can just kinda have main power rails running all over, and just hook stuff across them all willy-nilly rather than being forced to put everything in one big line, but still, all you can do with that is turn the whole thing on and off by breaking the circuit. Incidentally, switches, buttons, keys, and anything else you use to control the behavior of any electronic device really are just physically touching loose wires together or pulling them apart... well wait no, not all, this is a good bit to know.

None of this is actually pass/fail, really, there's wave amplitudes and how big a difference we have between the all. So when you have like, a volume knob, that's a potentiometer, which is a simple little thing where you've got your wire, it's going through a resistor, and then we have another wire we're scraping back and forth along the resistor, using a knob, usually, and the idea is the current only has to go through X percent of the resistor to get to the wire you're moving, which proportionately reduces the resistance. So you have like a 20 volt current, you've got a resistor that'll drop that down to 5 or so, but then you move this other wire down along and you've got this whole dynamic range and you can fine tune it to 15 or 10 or whatever coming down that wire. And what's nice about this again, what's actually coming down the wire is this wobbily wave of current, it's not really just "on" or "off, and as you add resistance, the wobble stays the same, it's just the peaks and valleys get closer to being just flat. Which is great if you're making, say, a knob to control volume, or brightness, or anything you want variable intensity in really.

Hey hey, it's a relay!

Again, a lot of the earliest stuff people did with electronics was really dependent on that analog wobbly waveform angle. Particularly for reproducing sound, and particularly the signals of a telegraph. Those had to travel down wires for absurd distances, and as previously stated, when you do that the signal is going to eventually decay to nothing. But then someone came up with this really basic idea where every so often along those super long wires, you set something up that takes the old signal and uses it to start a new one. They called them relays, because you know, it's like a relay race.

If you know how an electromagnet works (something about the field generated when you coil a bunch of copper wire around an iron core and run an electric current through it), a relay is super simple. You've got an electromagnet in the first circuit you're running, presumably right by where it's going to hit the big charged endpoint, and that magnetically pulls a tab of metal that's acting as a switch on a new circuit. As long as you've got enough juice left to activate the magnet, you slam that switch and voom you've got all the voltage you can generate on the new line.

Relays don't get used too much in other stuff, being unpopular at the time for not being all analog and wobbily (slamming that switch back and forth IS going to be a very binary on or off sorta thing), and they make this loud clacking noise that's actually just super cool to hear in devices that do use them (pinball machines are one of the main surviving use cases I believe) but could be annoying in some cases. What's also neat is that they're a logical AND gate. That is, if you have current flowing into the magnet, AND you have current flowing into the new wire up to the switch, you have it flowing out through the far side of the switch, but if either of those isn't true, nothing happens. Logic gates, to get ahead of myself a bit, are kinda the whole thing with computers, but we still need the rest of them. So for these purposes, relays re only neat if it's the most power and space efficient AND gate you have access to.

Oh and come to think of it, there's no reason we need to have that magnet closing the circuit when it's doing its thing. We could have it closed by default and yank it open by the magnet. Hey, now we're inverting whatever we're getting on the first wire! Neat!

Relay computers clack too loud! Gimme vacuum tubes!

So... let's take a look at the other main thing people used electricity for before coming up with the whole computer thing, our old friend the light bulb! Now I already touched a bit on the whole wacky alternating current thing, and I think this is actually one of the cases that eventually lead to it being adopted so widely, but the earliest light bulbs tended to just use normal direct current, where again, you've got the positive end and the negative end, and we just take a little filament of whatever we have handy that glows when you run enough of a current through it, and we put that in a big glass bulb and pump out all the air we can, because if we don't, the oxygen in there is probably going to change that from glowing a bit to straight up catching on fire and burning immediately.

But, we have a new weird little problem, because of the physics behind that glowing. Making something hot, on a molecular level, is just kinda adding energy to the system so everything jitters around more violently, and if you get something hot enough that it glows, you're getting it all twitchy enough for tinier particles to just fly the hell off it. Specifically photons, that's the light bit, but also hey, remember, electrons are just kinda free moving and whipping all over looking for their naked proton pals... and hey, inside this big glass bulb, we've got that other end of the wire with the more positive charge to it. Why bother wandering up this whole coily filament when we're in a vacuum and there's nothing to get in the way if we just leap straight over that gap? So... they do that, and they're coming in fast and on elliptical approaches and all, so a bunch of electrons overshoot and smack into the glass on the far side, and now one side of every light bulb is getting all gross and burnt from that and turning all brown and we can't have that.

So again, part of the fix is we switched to alternating current so it's at least splitting those wild jumps up to either side, but before that, someone tried to solve this by just... kinda putting a backboard in there. Stick a big metal plate on the end of another wire in the bulb connected to a positive charge, and now OK, all those maverick electrons smack into here and aren't messing up the glass, but also hey, this is a neat little thing. Those electrons are making that hop because they're all hot and bothered. If we're not heating up the plate they're jumping to, and there's no real reason we'd want to, then if we had a negative signal over on that side... nothing would happen. Electrons aren't getting all antsy and jumping back.

So now we have a diode! The name comes because we have two (di-) electrodes (-ode) we care about in the bulb (we're just kind of ignoring the negative one), and it's a one way street for our circuit. That's useful for a lot of stuff, like not having electricity flow backwards through complex systems and mess things up, converting AC to DC (when it flips, current won't flow through the diode so we lop off the bottom of the wave, and hey, we can do that thing with capacitors to release their current during those cutoffs, and if we're clever we can get a pretty steady high).

More electrodes! More electrodes!

So a bit after someone worked out this whole vacuum tube diode thing, someone went hey, what if it was a triode? So, let's stick another electrode in there, and this one just kinda curves around in the middle, just kinda making a grate or a mesh grid, between our hot always flowing filament and that catch plate we're keeping positively charged when it's doing stuff. Well this works in a neat way. If there's a negative charge on it, it's going to be pushing back on those electrons jumping over, and if there's a positive charge on it, it's going to help pull those electrons over (it's all thin, so they're going to shoot right past it, especially if there's way more of a positive charge over on the plate... and here's the super cool part- This is an analog thing. If we have a relatively big negative charge, it's going to repel everything, if it's a relatively big positive, it's going to pull a ton across, if it's right in the middle, it's like it wasn't even in there, and you can have tiny charges for all the gradients in between.

We don't need a huge charge for any of this though, because we're just helping or hindering the big jump from the high voltage stuff, and huh, weren't we doing this whole weak current controlling a strong current thing before with the relay? We were! And this is doing the same thing! Except now we're doing it all analog style, not slapping switch with a magnet, and we can make those wavy currents peak higher or lower and cool, now we can have phone lines boost over long distances too, and make volume knobs, and all that good stuff.

The relay version of this had that cool trick though where you could flip the output. Can we still flip the output? We sure can, we just need some other toys in the mix. See we keep talking about positive charges and negative charges at the ends of our circuits, but these are relative things. I mentioned way back when how you can use resistors to throttle how much of a current we've got, so you can run two wires to that grid in the triode. One connects to a negative charge and the other positive, with resistors on both those lines, and a switch that can break the connection on the positive end. If the positive is disconnected, we've got a negative charge on the grid, since it's all we've got, but if we connect it, and the resistor to the negative end really limits flow, we're positive in the section the grid's in. And over on the side with the collecting plate, we branch off with another resistor setup so the negative charge on that side is normally the only viable connection for a positive, but when we flip the grid to positive, we're jumping across the gap in the vacuum tube, and that's a big open flow so we'll just take those electrons instead of the ones that have to squeeze through a tight resistor to get there.

That explanation is probably a bit hard to follow because I'm over here trying to explain it based on how the electrons are actually getting pulled around. In the world of electronics everyone decided to just pretend the flow is going the other way because it makes stuff easier to follow. So pretend we have magical positrons that go the other way and if they have nothing better to do they go down the path where we have all the fun stuff further down the circuit lighting lights and all that even though it's a tight squeeze through a resistor, because there's a yucky double negative in the triode and that's worse, but we have the switch rigged up to make that a nice positive go signal to the resistance free promised land with a bonus booster to cut across, so we're just gonna go that way when the grid signal's connected.

Oh and you can make other sorts of logic circuits or double up on them in a single tube if you add more grids and such, which we did for a while, but not really relevant these days.

Cool history lesson but I know there's no relays or vacuum tubes in my computer.

Right, so the above things are how we used to make computers, but they were super bulky, and you'd have to deal with how relays are super loud and kinda slow, and vacuum tubes need a big power draw and get hot. What we use instead of either of those these days are transistors. See after spending a good number of years working out all this circuit flow stuff with vacuum tubes we eventually focused on how the real important thing in all of this is how with the right materials you can make a little juncture where current flows between a positive and negative charge if a third wire going in there is also positively charged, but if it's negatively charged we're pulling over. And turns out there is a WAY more efficient way of doing that if you take a chunk of good ol' middle of the electron road silicon, and just kinda lightly paint the side of it with just the tiniest amount of positive leaning and negative leaning elements on the sides.

Really transistors don't require understanding anything new past the large number of topics already covered here, they're just more compact about it. Positive leaning bit, negative leaning bit, wildcard in the middle, like a vacuum tube. Based on the concepts of pulling electrons around from chemistry, like a circuit in general. The control wire in the middle kinda works in just a pass-fail sort of way, like a relay. They're just really nice compared to the older alternatives because they don't make noise or have moving parts to wear down, you don't have to run enough current through them for metal to start glowing and the whole room to heat up, and you can make them small. Absurdly small. Like... need an electron microscope to see them small.

And of course you can also make an inverter super tiny like that, and a diode (while you're at it you can use special materials or phosphors to make them light emitting, go LEDs!) and resistors can get pretty damn small if you just use less of a more resistant material, capacitors I think have a limit to how tiny you can get, practically, but yeah, you now know enough of the basic fundamentals of how computers work to throw some logic gates together. We've covered how a relay, triode, or transistor function as an AND gate. An OR gate is super easy, you just stick diodes on two wires so you don't have messy backflow then connect them together and lead off there. If you can get your head around wiring up an inverter (AKA NOT), hey, stick one after an AND to get a NAND, or an OR to get a NOR. You can work out XOR and XNOR from there right? Just build 4 NANDs, pass input A into gates 1 and 2, B into 2 and 3, 2's output into 1 and 3, 1 and 3's output into 4 for a XOR, use NORs instead for a XNOR. That's all of them right? So now just build a ton of those and arrange them into a computer. It's all logic and math from there.

Oh right. It's... an absurd amount of logic and math, and I can only fit so many words in a blog post. So we'll have to go all...

CONTINUED IN PART 2!

Meanwhile, again, if you can spare some cash I'd really appreciate it.

Zechs Marquise / Milliardo Peacecraft:  A Heel Turn for the Greater Good

Zechs Merquise is the main character of Gundam Wing. 

Ah, you thought it was Heero, or maybe Relena, didn’t you? Well, judging by the first act of the series, this is clearly not the case!  

Zechs is the very first character we’re introduced to. He’s mysterious, handsome, ultra-competent. He shows concern for civilian safety and the safety of his men. He takes personal risks, fights on the front lines. He demonstrates right away that he has a strong ethical code that places great importance on the moral conduct of soldiers. His subordinates look up to him, his superiors value and respect him. We get all of this in act one of episode one.

Absolute hero material, so far! Hard to see why he's being framed like antagonist. Whatever, I'm sure he'll be on the winning team in no time! Just like Quattro Vegeta, or whatever.

By episode three, we’re introduced to the Tallgeese, a mobile suit that matches all the criteria for being the Big Damn Hero Machine that a protagonist would use: it’s ancient, it’s got a history, it’s the progenitor suit, it’s got no bells or whistles, it demands great strength and skill from the pilot but offers unmatched performance to those who can overcome its challenges. It’s the perfect suit for Zechs, and obviously the next step in his hero’s journey! This is the part of the story where he can finally meet the terrifying, so-far unbeatable enemy on equal footing. 

...But of course, OZ is also introduced in episode 3. So now we know that Zechs works for some faceless, secret military organization– but that’s fine, right? It’s the Alliance military that’s the Big Bad Guy, and Zechs seems to be part of some elite special unit that’s only for brave, self-sacrificing soldiers! OZ hasn’t done anything really bad yet, while on the other hand, the Gundam pilots have been a bunch of mercilessly violent loose cannons who’ll kill anyone who gets in their way.

In episode four, we meet Noin, an immediately likable and equally skilled OZ officer who has a deep personal connection with Zechs. Already this is a power couple we can get behind. We watch as Noin suffers a humiliating defeat and a barrage of misogyny from a Gundam pilot, who kills a bunch of young recruits in their sleep. Definitely not a good look for the Gundam Team! while Zechs and Noin (and Treize, in a more literal sense) come out of this episode smelling like roses. 

Just look at them! They’re going to make such a great team. I hope they give those homicidal Gundam kids what for!

It’s only when episode five rolls around that we finally see what OZ is really about: assassinations, covert schemes, foul play, political manipulation, and the ruthless accumulation of power. Uh oh! 

But surely, Lady Une is the real baddy here, and Treize is no more than a shadowy puppet master whose true motives remain mysterious. Zechs and Noin are still such obvious Good Guy candidates, they really ought to be the main protagonists of this show by now! The big scary OZ that the Colony rebels warned us about seems a far cry from the OZ we’ve seen so far. Even after the point where OZ becomes the new uncontested Bad Guy, Zechs and co. keep their noses pretty clean.

And then! Then Zechs reveals his tragic past, his double-identity, his secret Count of Monte Cristo/ Man in the Iron Mask plot to avenge the ruin of the Sanc Kingdom and the deaths of his family, the noble house of Peacecraft! How romantic, how dashing! His quest continues to best the Gundams, but this takes on the hue of personal enlightenment; Zechs wants to defeat the Gundam pilots to prove he is capable of being a “True Soldier”, worthy of the power he’s been given, worthy of what has been sacrificed to his cause. 

Boy, that’s some hero behavior! And it gets even better: Zechs and Noin leave OZ to begin championing the Sanc Kingdom and its policies of Total Pacifism. No one can say Zechs isn’t one of the good guys now, right? He even dresses up all spiffy in white and becomes an ambassador to promote peace in the colonies! 

–Or rather, he tries to. 

Because despite having gained a reporte with a few of the Gundam pilots, he still hasn’t managed to ally with them. They still view him as an enemy, no matter how hard or how desperately he tries to convince them that he’s turned over a new leaf. 

He can’t beat them, and he can’t join them. Why?

Pictured: the saddest boys in the universe.

The second act of Gundam Wing is a crucible where every character is forced to re-evaluate their place in the ongoing conflict. You can see and feel his frustration building as the future spirals out of control. 

What is the purpose of Zechs Merquise, or of Milliardo Peacecraft?

He has refused to be OZ’s mascot, the Lightning Count. He’s not capable of bringing peace to the colonies by himself. He can’t join the Gundams in their fight against OZ. He can’t even protect the Sanc Kingdom, because the very act of fighting in its name is used as an excuse to wipe it out. 

He bids a heartfelt adieu to his Big Damn Hero Machine, the Tallgeese, and finds himself in possession of its polar opposite: the Epyon, a machine made to scour its pilot and the world of hypocrisy. 

Finally, Zechs has his answer– the reason why his purpose eludes him, why all his best intentions go astray, why the harder he tries to align his moral compass to the Gundam pilots or embrace his pacifistic inheritance, the more lost he becomes: He is not the hero. 

He has been trying and failing to be a hero since episode one because this isn’t a story about noble, heroic, chivalrous warriors doing battle in order to gain personal clarity and strength.

It’s not about man-vs-man conflict resolving in a test of skill. If it were, Zechs would have been victorious and completed his hero’s journey by now, and the show would be over. 

But that was never the role he was meant to play. That’s not what the stage requires. The third act begins as he accepts a new mantle, and becomes the villain history needs in that moment to bring everything together.

“Zechs considers this place his grave. [...]He intends to pay for the sin of purging humanity, all by himself.”

–Not to purge humanity of “violent earthlings”, as his White Fang propaganda speech stated, but to purge the current generation of the means to wage mechanized warfare, and of the desire for combat and retribution itself, in order to finally bring the cycle of war between the earth and space to an end. 

…But of course, nothing ever really ends, does it? History dances forward, with or without you, and all the sacrifices and fail-safes in the world will not stop new challenges from arising. 

Nevertheless, if it is possible to choose, by means of noble principle, to be a villain for the sake of the greater good, in the full assurance of one’s own destruction and revilement, then surely that is also in some winding, definitionally tragic way, a path to heroism– and if this is so, then Zechs is strong (and disillusioned) enough to take it. 

I do not think that the series supports the idea that his actions or their consequences are justified– only that they achieve their immediate purpose: setting the stage for peace. For now.

...And Now, An Important Note on Gundam Meta:

Zechs is what is referred to in the parlance of the Gundam fandom as a “Char Archetype”, or “Char Clone”-- a term I think is of debatable accuracy. For a longer discussion on Char Aznable and his role in MS Gundam, please see the entry: The Char Aznable Problem.  But I want to make it clear that knowing about Char’s backstory IS NOT a necessary prerequisite to understanding Zechs’s story. 

Zechs and Char share a lot of DNA as characters, that’s unavoidable– a masked man in red who poses a threat to the main Gundam pilot is a staple of the genre; he’s deliberately an homage to Char, as much an expected feature of a Gundam series as... well, Gundams. That much is not in question. 

However: Char’s motivations only make sense in the context of the original Gundam series; if you try to apply the same logic within the structure of Gundam Wing, it becomes gibberish. But the gibberish is by design– If you don’t understand the context behind Zech’s late-series genocidal spiel on why “earthlings are the ultimate threat to peace so we must destroy earth, the source of all conflict yadda-yadda blah-blah”, then… yeah, you’re up to speed. No one else listening to White Fang’s broadcast understood it either. It’s MEANT to sound like the ramblings of an extremist madman who poses a catastrophic and unavoidable threat to both Earth AND the Space Colonies he claims to represent. That’s the basic nature of his Ozymandius Gambit: invent something scary enough that everyone has to band together to fight it.

So you don’t need to know about Char to understand Zechs– but knowing about Char does make Zech’s role (and Treize’s role!) in Gundam Wing that much more interesting.

Zechs is not a Char Clone, he is a conversation with the idea of Char, taking a theme and transposing it into a new composition.

--Anyway, it’s a little unfair to try and force a comparison between Zechs and Char, when Char had MS Gundam, Zeta Gundam, and Char’s Counterattack to do everything he did, and Zechs only had Wing. 

Now, I’m not a mathematician or anything, but I’d say that makes Zechs roughly…

Three times faster.

might be a long shot but i think i remember u mentioning the article "against exercise" by mark greif & was wondering if u might have a link 2 an un-paywalled version or a pdf you'd be willing 2 share? the n+1 mag has a paywall that 12ft ladder can't get rid of...not sure if it's published elsewhere 4 free but i'm struggling 2 find it so thought it couldn't hurt 2 ask!

yes verso books has it posted for free :-)

The gym resembles a voluntary hospital. Its staff members are also its patients. Some machines put you in a traction you can escape. Others undo the imprisonment of a respirator, cuing you to pump your lungs yourself, and tracking your heart rate on a display. Aided even by a love that can develop for your pains, this self-testing becomes second nature. The curious compilation of numbers that you are becomes an aspect of your freedom, sometimes the most important, even more preoccupying than your thoughts or dreams. You discover what high numbers you can become, and how immortal. For you, high roller, will live forever. You are eternally maintained. The justification for the total scope of the responsibility to exercise is health. A further extension of the counting habit of exercise gives a precise economic character to health. It determines the anticipated numbers for the days and hours of one’s life. Today we really can preserve ourselves for a much longer time. The means of preservation are reliable and cheap. The haste to live one’s mortal life diminishes. The temptation toward perpetual preservation grows. We preserve the living corpse in an optimal state, not so we may do something with it, but for its own good feelings of eternal fitness, confidence, and safety. We hoard our capital to earn interest, and subsist each day on crusts of bread. But no one will inherit our good health after we’ve gone. The hours of life maintenance vanish with the person. The person who does not exercise, in our current conception, is a slow suicide. He fails to take responsibility for his life. He doesn’t labor strenuously to forestall his death. Therefore we begin to think he causes it. It may be a comfort to remember when one of your parents’ acquaintances dies that he did not eat well or failed to take up running. The nonexerciser is lumped with other unfortunates whom we socially dis- count. Their lives are worth a percentage of our own, through their own neglect. Their value is compromised by the failure to ensure the fullest term of possible physical existence. The nonexerciser joins all the unfit: the slow, the elderly, the hopeless, and the poor. “Don’t you want to ‘live’?” we say. No answer of theirs could satisfy us.

Hiii I love your art! What website do you use to make keychains/phone charms?

Hi! There’s 2 I use primarily, Zap creatives and Vograce.

Zap (based in England) has better value for small charms, and sometimes you can get discounts depending on what you order. Both sites do this rotation of sales every 3 days, so with the right timing, you can get things very cheap. However, Zap is not without a lot of downsides. For one, it has a charge for every additional design after 6, and you can only pick between total count quantities of 1, 25, 50, and so on. Economical shipping can take up to 12 weeks, and courier shipping is like $25. Also, (very recent problem, just happened with this batch) the colors vary after reordering even if the same artwork is used, in the right photo below, new is on the left, old on the right. The colors are very bold which I like, and discrepancies from the original artwork are normal and to be expected, but not at this scale. Very noticeable in characters with brown skin 🤨. Also I submitted a complaint ticket and didn’t hear back until a week later and after I had to bother them.

Vograce (based in China) is better for the 2.5 in, and generally has very good public communication and care for their customers. The price for the 1 in. option and 2.5 in are about the same, so it is slightly more expensive per unit (don’t be fooled by the initial ppu, there’s a ~50% discount after orders of like 25 or something I forget exactly). However, you can submit as many designs and quantities as you’d like, I usually link a google drive for them. I have noticed the dpi is not as high, however I am comparing their 2.5 to the 1 in from Zap so maybe they have that capability idk. Color wise, they recently just made a big deal about upgrading their machines and I can say they are pretty spot on. They tend to be slightly more saturated (notice Marisa’s boots and patchouli’s hair below), and a little darker (you can’t tell the difference between dark red, dark blue, and black). Shipping is also better, the middle option for shipping is much better and only extends the time by like 2 days from the rapid transit.

Vograce is the company I use for stickers as well, as their fancy glittery metallic whatever ones are the same price as the regular ones and go for about $3 for 10 stickers. Very good value, I have no idea how water resistant they are but they are coated.

I’ve been kinda mad at Zap lately especially for the Marina blunder so I’m thinking of switching to Vograce even though it’s pricier. I just need to check their printing resolution and all that.

Have any headcanons to share about Kyle? Also, your feelings on Bow x Kyle?

Hmm, I can think of a few:

I've read a fanfic once where Kyle found a diary (which belonged to someone else in the Horde, but they don't know what happened to the original owner). I like to think Kyle confides in a diary to talk about his days and his private thoughts, especially the "negative" ones.

I imagine Kyle being interested in tech like Bow. He seemed to know how to repair the vehicle he, Lonnie and Rogelio got stuck in during that storm (s4). Kyle might secretly take some broken devices or pieces of robots to dismantle them. Idk if he would be the kind to build robots like Entrapta, though. But I think he likes playing with machines when he's stressed or after he's been kicked out of training.

This one is very personal, but I once imagined Kyle and Adora being close friends when they were younger. However, with Shadow Weaver erasing Adora's memories, and Catra being extremely possessive of Adora, Kyle realizes Adora doesn't seem to recognize him, and ends up not treating him well because of Lonnie and the other cadets. This is really just me liking angst + the potential of Adora and Kyle being friends or siblings in some way.

As for Bowkyle, I am the captain of Bowkyle, lmao. Just kidding. But these two are one of my favorite pairings in the show. That is, I like what it could've been if the writers weren't so mean to Kyle. If anything, I'm sure those boys would be besties. Bow seemed to feel out of place as he's "the only one who's not a princess" (at the very least Bow isn't harshly bullied by his peers, even if some characters might mock his passion for arrows though), while Kyle must feel like he doesn't belong in the Horde. They both really value friendships and sadly they're taken advantage of. Not to mention that, ironically, they both finally snap in s4, but their character arcs don't really go anywhere. Bow's case is more infuriating considering he's the black best friend character and he has little to no arc in the series overall. Kyle's arc also made me sad because he had to nearly kill himself for Lonnie and Rogelio to actually give a shit about him.

Overall, I think Kyle would've been a great addition to the Rebellion. He and Adora could rely on each other when it comes to Horde trauma (plus Kyle could tell Adora about the memories she lost of their friendship if you count my last headcanon), besides Kyle possibly telling the princesses about what the Horde might be planning (I will never forget he risked his life to tell Bow where Glimmer was, and Kyle was still thrown away). He and Bow could be friends and be totally annoying (affectionate) around each other. Like Bow would show Kyle his arrows and they would talk about tech for hours and hours. I think Kyle deserved better friends. If Scorpia did, why not him, too?

I Will | Frenchie (ft. Jim Jimenez)

MASTERLIST | AO3 | KO-FI

Relationship(s): Frenchie x gn!reader (romantic), Jim Jimenez x Frenchie (platonic), Jim Jimenez x gn!reader (platonic)

Summary: A series of mostly unrelated vignettes loosely based on a face-value reading of I Will by Mitski; when you’re trapped aboard Blackbeard’s Revenge as part of his new crew, your relationship with Frenchie develops.

Warnings: Typical pirate things, non-sexual nudity. (Let me know if I need to add any)

Word count: 1.2k

(A/N: There’s not enough fics for Frenchie on here so I’m going to try to change that. I wouldn’t say I’m a hero but... well, what other word could you possibly use? I threw in some platonic!Jim because I can’t help but wedge platonic things into my romantic fics. I’m guessing my interpretation of what is currently known as post-canon will one day be completely disproven when season 2 comes out, but let’s forget about that because I loved writing this. I’ve been listening to the same three Mitski songs over and over (Washing Machine Heart, Nobody and, of course, I Will), despite wanting to actually explore her discography more, and I’ve even started writing an Izzy x OC fic where their dynamic is going to be kind of like those songs (though I might also write some reader-insert fics based on those bops too, since my OC fic’s going to borrow from some of the stuff I’ve written for this blog anyway). [Insert obligatory begging for OFMD requests here])

It took you a while before you fully adjusted to sleeping in a bed (specifically Oluwande’s old bed), which was partially because you shared it with Frenchie. It was made for one person, but neither of you had wanted the other to sleep on the floor (despite the fact you both were more than used to it). Though, the two of you soon realised that you quite enjoyed sharing a bed, or the sentiment of closeness that came with it.

The physical reality of sharing such a small bed was a self-conscious nightmare, at least to start with. The idea of waking the other up with one wrong toss or turn was mortifying. Somehow, though, neither of you minded when you’d wake up with the other’s arms secured around your waist, or the other’s head resting on your shoulder. It was actually quite nice. Thanks to the relatively close friendship you’d developed while aboard the Revenge, neither you nor Frenchie thought it really meant anything, until it actually started to…

That bed was where the terror of being aboard Blackbeard’s ship could melt away beneath the moonlight until the sun came up and Izzy came banging on the door. And, soon enough, it became the only certain place that you and Frenchie could explore and express these strange, new feelings that had been awakened.

━━━━━━━━━

Frenchie’s knee bounced up and down as he sat on the edge of your shared cot, which his hands were gripping tightly. He turned around to look at you once again. You were still unconscious, even hours after the raid.

He’d done everything he could: tended to the wound, wiped the grime off your face, brushed away your stray hairs. Now, you just had to wake up.

He grabbed your limp hand and stroked your knuckles with his thumb.

Jim glanced up, still sharpening their knife.

“They’re gonna be okay. Captain Bonnet survived worse, even when he wasn’t exactly built for it...”

“It’s not just that.” he sighed

Jim watched as Frenchie gazed at you worriedly.

“The Captain’s not gonna throw them overboard ‘cause of this. He won’t let Izzy do it either.” Jim insisted. “They both seem to think they’re a shit pirate, sure, but they know they’re the most efficient worker on this ship. Without Y/N, odds are this ship’d be a total shithole. That counts for something.”

Frenchie’s uncertain eyes met Jim’s.

“If they were planning on killing them, the Captain wouldn’t have bothered telling us to patch ‘em up or gave them time to recover. And, if either of them ever do plan on killing Y/N-” They twirled their knife in their hand. “I’ll sure as hell have something to say about it.”

As if on cue, you stirred, groaning as your eyes slowly opened. A sigh of relief escaped Frenchie’s nostrils, while Jim couldn’t help the small smirk that tugged at their lips.

“Frenchie?” you mumbled hoarsely. “How long was I out?”

“Most of the day.” he shakily replied. “It’s night now, so…”

You shifted in an attempt to sit up. Finally letting go of your hand, he gripped your upper arms to help you.

“I’ll go get you a drink, yeah?”

Before you could agree, he had already pecked you on the forehead and left the room.

Jim chuckled.

“Oh, hey, Jim.” you greeted weakly.

“Hey. How’re you feeling?”

“Pretty good, considering I got stabbed a few hours ago.”

They snickered.

“Eh, well, at least you get a couple days off.”

“I do? That’s suspiciously merciful.”

“Nothing to do with mercy.” Jim shrugged. “Frenchie told the Captain he’d cover for you for a few days, and the Captain decided he’d rather you get better than worse.”

You smiled to yourself.

━━━━━━━━━

“You really don’t have to do this.” you muttered as Frenchie rolled up his sleeves again.

“I know.”

His fingers gently combed through your damp hair as he knelt behind the bathtub that neither of you had ever really been able to fit into in all your time aboard the Revenge.

You rolled your head back slightly beneath Frenchie’s soothing touch, a quiet sigh escaping your lips. You couldn’t help but shudder when your exposed, water-soaked skin brushed against the cool night air that had seeped below deck into the room Stede once generously referred to as the ‘state of the art ensuite’. It didn’t help that the bathwater was already lukewarm, having already been used by Jim (who had long since retired to bed) and Frenchie; Captain Blackbeard had decided that if the three of you could share a cabin, then you could also share bathwater.

“You alright?” he asked softly.

“Yeah. Just a bit cold is all. I’ll live.” you answered lightly.

He chuckled weakly. The comfortable silence that followed wrapped around you like a blanket.

After five or so minutes, he reached for the (also shared) towel that had been discarded on the floor not long ago and gently ran it over and through your hair, but he soon paused.

“Not being too rough, am I, dear?”

You grinned and suppressed a giggle at his endearing sincerity. It felt as though you were being tickled by a swarm of cliche butterflies in your stomach.

“No, love.” you assured him. “Feels quite nice, actually.”

You turned your head to face him (a manoeuvre that proved difficult and painful in your narrow, metallic container).

“Thank you.”

After a moment of hesitation, you placed a hand on his cheek and stroked it with your thumb, then leaned backwards to press a quick kiss to his forehead. You turned back around before you could see his smile. 

He continued to wipe away the moisture from your hair until it was dry enough.

“There.” he declared as he finished.

He rose to his feet, draped the towel over his arm and, having made his way around to the front of the tub, extended his hand to help you out of the tub. As you stood up, he averted his gaze and handed you the towel.

You scrubbed your wet skin with the towel.

“You don’t have to look away, you know.” you stated. “I mean, you can, if you want. Just don’t feel like you have to for my sake, is all I’m saying.”

He glanced over at you, keeping his eyes on your face. You smiled at him, and he shyly returned it.

“Could you pass me my clothes, love?”

“Yeah, sure.” he nodded. 

He crouched down, gathered the pile of your clothes on the floor and held them out to you. The towel fell to the floor and you grabbed them from him.

“Cheers.”

After you had tugged on your clothes, Frenchie held the door open for you. You bowed at him jokingly and he chuckled. Making sure no one was around, you pressed a quick kiss to Frenchie’s cheek, grabbed his hand and led him back to your shared quarters. It took a moment for his awestruck expression to be replaced with a grin.

━━━━━━━━━

Frenchie wrapped his arms around your waist as he pulled you closer to him.

“Night, darling.” he whispered.

Carefully, you rolled over in his arms and looked at him with a smile.

“Night, love.”

You reached up and cupped his cheeks, pressing a quick kiss to his lips. He grinned. You then lowered your hands, slid your arms around his torso and burrowed your face into his chest. Absently, he stroked your hair and kissed the top of your head.

Both of you drifted off to sleep with the same small hope: one day, you’d be able to share your love, without worry, outside of this bed.

story of love,please dont drink and drive

Jay Travis

I was walking around in the Walmart store doing some shopping, when I saw a Cashier talking to a boy who couldn't have been more than 5 or 6 years old..

The Cashier said, 'I'm sorry, but you don't have enough money to buy this doll. Then the little boy turned to the cashier and asked: are you sure I don't have enough money?''

The cashier counted his cash once again and replied: ''You know that you don't have enough money to buy the doll, my dear.'' The little boy was still holding the doll in his hand.

Finally, I walked toward him and I asked him who he wished to give this doll to. 'It's the doll that my sister loved most and wanted so much . I wanted to Gift her for her BIRTHDAY.

I have to give the doll to my mommy so that she can give it to my sister when she goes there.' His eyes were so sad while saying this. 'My Sister has gone to be with God.. Daddy says that Mommy is going to see God very soon too, so I thought that she could take the doll with her to give it to my sister...''

My heart nearly stopped! The little boy looked up at me and said: 'I told daddy to tell mommy not to go yet. I need her to wait until I come back from the mall.'

Then he showed me a very nice photo of him where he was laughing. He then told me 'I want mommy to take my picture with her so my sister won't forget me.' 'I love my mommy and I wish she doesn't have to leave me, but daddy says that she has to go to be with my little sister.' Then he looked again at the doll with sad eyes, very quietly..

I quickly reached for my wallet and said to the boy. 'Suppose we check again, just in case you do have enough money for the doll?''

'OK' he said, 'I hope I do have enough.' I added some of my money to his with out him seeing and we started to count it. There was enough for the doll and even some spare money.

The little boy said: 'Thank you God for giving me enough money!'

Then he looked at me and added, 'I asked last night before I went to sleep for God to make sure I had enough money to buy this doll, so that mommy could give It to my sister. He heard me!'' 'I also wanted to have enough money to buy a white rose for my mommy, but I didn't dare to ask God for too much. But He gave me enough to buy the doll and a white rose. My mommy loves white roses.'

I finished my shopping in a totally different state from when I started. I couldn't get the little boy out of my mind.

Then I remembered a local news paper article two days ago, which mentioned a drunk driver, who hit a car occupied by a young woman and a little girl. The little girl died right away, and the mother was left in a critical state. The family had to decide whether to pull the plug on the life-sustaining machine, because the young woman would not be able to recover from the coma. Was this the family of the little boy?

Two days after this encounter with the little boy, I read in the news paper that the young woman had passed away.. I couldn't stop myself as I bought a bunch of white roses and I went to the funeral home where the body of the young woman was exposed for people to see and make last wishes before her burial.

She was there, in her coffin, holding a beautiful white rose in her hand with the photo of the little boy and the doll placed over her chest. I left the place, teary-eyed, feeling that my life had been changed for ever...

The love that the little boy had for his mother and his sister is still, to this day, hard to imagine. And in a fraction of a second, a drunk driver had taken all this away from him.

Please DO NOT DRINK & DRIVE.

Now you have 2 choices:

1) Share this message, or

2) Ignore it as if it never touched your heart.

For those who prefer to think that God is not watching over us.... go ahead and delete this. For the rest of us..... pass this on.

The value of a man or woman resides in what he or she gives, not in what they are capable of receiving.

Chapter 217 Trivia

Can you believe it's been 25 chapters already?

The meeting Suika and Chrome call is held in the computer room, since that's the only hut with bricks. Exactly where they set up their little podiums I'm not sure, (SAL 9000 takes up most of the room) but it's convenient that the "voting machines"/the computer was right there!

"Senku Birds" is written on the presentation, which is likely a reference to the 1965 TV series Thunderbirds. It follows a group of 5 sons who pilot 5 rescue vehicles, with the goal of saving human life. The 5 vehicles are (very approximately) shaped like Chrome's rocket stages.

NASA's plans are a little more broad than just a rocket. OSAM (On-orbit Servicing, Assembly and Manufacturing) intends to build structures for future space constructs, such as larger telescopes and sunshades.

The ones who definitely know, or are implied to know, about the medusa's secrets are Senku, Tsukasa (who isn't here), Chrome, Xeno, Gen, Ryusui, and Ukyo.

Chrome says only the ones present should vote, which going by those shown in the room, are: Chrome, Suika, Xeno, Senku, Gen, Yo, Chelsea, Kohaku, Kaseki, Ryusui, and Sai, along with several random characters.

Neither group adds up to the 10 votes Sai sees, unless background characters were ignored and Sai himself didn't vote.

Or it's binary and there's only 2 votes haha!

It's no surprise that Sai managed to make a vote counter so fast, all it needs to do is add 1 to a value per vote. You'd also only need to store two values: one for total votes counted, and one for either option A or option B (subtract from the total to get the other amount).

That method doesn't even account for the fact that one CPU register holds 16 bits, which is less than the 10 votes they had, and could have been used to "count" the votes. It'd be harder to produce the final result, however.

Interesting fact, Thomas Edison's first patented invention was a voting machine meant for congress.

They didn't want it.

This seems to be an extreme simplification of existing fiber-optic cable networks, however the map itself is somewhat inaccurate making it hard to compare.

Very short trivia this week since there wasn't a lot of content, but soon we may have the return of (Google) Chrome!

Mahou Shoujo Magical Destroyers Episode 1: Rage Against Akihabara

So, how can you explain Magical Destroyers? A critical parody and mocking of conformism, religion, and even Otaku culture? Maybe it's as simple as leaving it at the fact that it's Jun Inagawa's vision extrapolated to an anime. But is it worth watching? Well, do you like it when things are made fun of? When at every turn expectations are upended and pushed to the side to make room for something totally different? Do you like things that are just the right amount of insane or unhinged? If so, then you'll like Magical Destroyers for quite a few reasons, though it's not a series without caveats.

So let's get the bad out of the way, it's restricted. Bibury isn't a masterclass studio that can make something out of thin air. I mean, counting Magical Destroyers they have a total of 5 anime that have aired so far. They're.... not good, to say the least. Not necessarily in terms of story or anything, but they're very limited in what they can do in regards to animation. That in and of itself is pretty apparent in this first episode through quite a few conservative scenes and ample use of slapdash CGI, like this almost comically out of place log.

As long as you're aware of the limitations, I think the better moments really do shine quite well. The environment art can be really stellar sometimes, the visual comedy is rock solid, and there's still a good share of Sakuga in it too.

So what about the story? For those that read my breakdown on the opening, I think it's rather self-evident about the core of what Magical Destroyers is about, but I probably should give a proper explanation.

So, the whole idea is that the government of Japan have been rounding up all of its Otaku under the guise of "protection". Putting them in jails, taking all otaku product with them, effectively eliminating them from the Japanese public. In a single week in 2008 the majority of Otaku were rounded up for "protection", aside from a handful that center around Otaku Hero. Since that day, Otaku Hero with the aid of Magical Girls and fellow Otaku has waged war in a resistance against his forceful "protection", and that's where we find ourselves now.

Essentially, up shit creek without a paddle. Though you'd nearly be a fool to take that sentiment at face value as first and foremost this is a farce. It's a story that's incredibly campy as it continually pokes fun at almost anything and everything, while mixing in moments so serious that they come off almost comical.

It screams of the writing skills of a first timer that thinks they can write a story for the ages because they're "not like other writers out there", and in the context of Inagawa's history it's a hilarious and well thought out approach that punctuates the already ridiculous setup and story.

The part that is clearly the most honed though is the comedy. It's well timed, expressed wonderfully through character acting, and is perfectly situational and unique to the characters that act it out.

There's a lot more that I feel I could get into, like the storyboards or overall direction to help sell that campy feeling, but I think it's pretty self-explanatory and not really anything out of this world. Magical Destroyers it Jun Inagawa's vision, simple as that. If you love the idea of acting out, of raging against the machine to preserve your individuality and right to existence as you are, then you'll like this show.

The Death Machine(tm) is highly charged today, and about to make your life miserable with what may well be the most devasting question yet. Neither option is good. But choose you must, lest it be chosen for you.

No one will ever know except you which you chose in this scenario. Millions of lives you will never meet, or a few hundred at most? Your choice.

An interesting quirk of this process is that if enough people vote on this poll, an amount greater than the population of Croatia could hypothetically be saved in total friend count, so it would actually be justifiable to pick the seemingly selfish option if you think this poll would receive enough exposure that that many people could be saved. If you're in to the purely life-counting method of calculating trolley problem decisions, that is.

Amalgam a.k.a. Black Ghost

Why, When and What: A terrorist group that profiteers from the chaos of war, and it seeks much profit in the collection and exploitation of Whispered. By creating new and advanced technologies and spreading them out in the right locations, they can cause a lot of havoc.  Formed by several multi-national corporations at the end of World War 2, they’ve been using advanced technology for half a century and, despite several setbacks, have shown no sign of truly stopping.  They sell to the highest bidders, including the worst of the worst.

Clout: Criminal 5, Financial 5, Governmental 5 (15) Locations: Large (3), Worldwide (10), Physical Secuirty (Military Level) (4) (7, 17-10 from Financial and Governmental Clout) Gear: Computers (Futuristic) (5), Laboratories (Full Scale) (5), Medical Facilities (Full Scale) (5), Workshops (Full Scale) (5), Training Facilities (Gym and Range) (3), Vehicles (Vehicle Fleet (2), Air Fleet (5), Military/Exotic (5)) Weapons (Full Metal Jacket) (5) (20, 35-15 from Clout) Total Cost: 42

Members of this organization will be covered at a later date. Amalgam Agent Motivation: Fight for Money and Power Critter Type: Human Attributes: Str 4, Dex 4, Con 3, Int 2, Per 3, Will 3 Ability Scores: Muscle 14, Combat 14, Brain 10 Life Points: 44 Drama Points: 0-3 Special Abilities: Hard to Kill 2 Maneuvers Name - Score - Damage - Notes Dodge - 14 - None - Defense Action Kick - 13 - 13 - Bash Punch - 14 - 11 - Bash Assault Rifle - 14 - 19 - Bullet

The average Amalgam agent is an elite mercenary, usually ex-military. With no scruples whatsoever about getting the job done at any cost. After all, they make a LOT of money.

Plan-1211 Alastor Motivation: Orders Critter Type: Robot Attributes: Str 8, Dex 6, Con 7, Int 2, Per 4, Will 7 Ability Scores: Muscle 22, Combat 18, Brain 12 Life Points: 70 Drama Points: 0-3 Special Abilities: Robot, Armor Value 18 (9 at Joints), Built In Weapon (Assault Rifle) Maneuvers Name - Score - Damage - Notes Punch - 18 - 21 - Bash Kick - 17 - 23 - Bash Machine Gun - 18 - 21 - Bullet, Rapid Fire Self-Destruct - 20 - 50/25/10 - Explosive

Alastors are not simply robot minions, they are downsized (7-8ft tall) Arm Slave mecha. They are piloted by AI, so they count more as robots than mecha, but they are far and above the average robot goon. They are used by Amalgam executives as personal bodyguards. Name: Cyborg Soldier Motivation: Fight for Money and Power Critter Type: Human Attributes: Str 8, Dex 6, Con 6, Int 2, Per 4, Will 3 Ability Scores: Muscle 22, Combat 16, Brain 12 Life Points: 72 Drama Points: 1-3 Special Abilities: Hard to Kill 2, Cyborg Maneuvers Name - Score - Damage - Notes Dodge - 16 - None - Defense Action Kick - 15 - 22 - Bash Punch - 16 - 20 - Bash Assault Rifle - 16 - 20 - Bullet

Cybernetic augmentation has been the purview of Amalgam since the 1960s. At first, they made a lot of high-end units with unique abilities (the "Numbers" series), but over time, they've refined the process into "Mass Production". Though the 'volunteers' are usually brainwashed captives, and often sold to organizations like Millennium/Shocker to serve as troopers. Executives at Amalgam either tend to be non-combat-oriented, Arm Slave Pilots, or self-experimental horrors.

another example of the thing i liked about this event…the columbian ideal of “all men are created equal” is just not lived up to and the contradiction it creates in people raised within it to believe in liberty, justice, progress, and equality but not really being able to live life according to those ideals unless you have power and money which…makes it moot in the first place. it works exactly the same in leithanian as it does in columbia, it’s just not a part of explicit law; policies written to punish for other things like “not having money for insurance” will eventually take out the undesireables or have them be enslaved to labor for the powerful in either case. and then it is not the “fault” of the state, it’s just the homeless and the poor and the impoverished didn’t do enough and are paying a due consequence.

loken was dorothy’s teacher; it’s obvious that he had a great deal of influence on her and both sought to pursue the ideal that “all people are born equal” as a pure concept versus taking into account for all the elements that create inequity because that contradiction is too bizarre to face. our society values fairness and equality; so why is this not reflected in reality? + being indunated with the idea since birth that your poverty and misfortune is always 100% your personal intrinsic individual responsibility and that you must simply have lacked talent or not worked hard if you end up in the margins. dorothy takes it one step forward from her teacher and says “it’s because didn’t have the opportunity to try….because of something they lack” which is also not the problem, the problem is that columbia at its core doesn’t really care about the value of people’s lives or efforts at all. all those ideals are pretty much just nothing and were a total lie regardless of if you made everyone intrinsically “equal” or not. because they already are, as humans, and this was ignored, because it’s all made to mantain a status quo and concentrate power in the preexisting ruling class. the only thing that matters to them is how you can contribute to that; as cheap labor, or as a talented arms developer, or etc.

that all being said it is weird because “awaken” WOULD have drastically disrupted the status quo. because arts usage isn’t like, race, or sex, or something unquantifiable and dictated by immaterial constructed categories: it’s weaponry. the primary function of arts in the game that we see is destructive force. being bass boosted at arts casting is how multiple disenfranchised groups in the game have wrested some level of power and influence whereas they'd normally remain utterly at will of their rulers, i.e. the sarkaz, and reunion. and here’s where the writing gets ??? because the counterargument provided is that it’s too dangerous to give the unionized masses armed power and they would be coopted by the powerful anyway (something that’s kind of like, ubiquitous to every arkn storyline dealing with the subject of revolution lol):

at first silence’s comparison seems wonky (not even counting that last line because ??? that's everyone anyways) because the distribution of diablous shards is limited and within the hands of the ruling class already, and the transmitter by dorothy’s directive would be distributed to literally every single person in columbia at least, but. im guessing ferdinand’s/the colonel’s plan was to distribute the transmitter to a ton of columbian soldiers and officials and take over the hub by sheer numbers, and then carefully control the distribution of the transmitter…but doesn’t that just not account for the fact dorothy had her own literal lake of the stuff and is the sole person who understands the mechanism of her research and had originally developed the transmitter and “machine” for mass and indiscriminate distribution. and also of course at the birth of the machine this small group of original hub members who were loyal to her had the sole control of an entity that could teleport anywhere and completely alter the construct of anything at will. how did ferdinand realistically plan to seize control of it…AND THEY OBVIOUSLY DIDNT LMFAO BECAUSE IT JUST DISINTEGRATED ITSELF BECAUSE THE DUDES IN THE HUB WANTED IT TO? anyway i get it’s supposed to me a bizarre in-itself-not-fully-literal represenation of…well schmovement but man what…

Clinical heterogeneity in patients with PASC has made it challenging to identify clear biological associations with the disease29. Here, we suggest that PASC should be subclassified into (at least) two distinct conditions, characterized by the presence (inflPASC) or absence (plaqPASC) of broad inflammatory signatures consistent with high neutrophil activity and ongoing B cell activation. Using high-dimensional proteomics in combination with machine learning-based modeling, we characterize clear signatures of generalized PASC strongly suggestive of dysregulation of discrete biologic processes underlying disease that may be tractable for both diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. While traditional feature-wise testing showed an inflammatory component to PASC as a whole, a finding largely in agreement with emerging literature, pro-inflammatory cytokines such as IL-6, IL-8, and IL-1B were not identified as strong candidates for the discrimination of PASC when modeling the totality of blood protein content. Instead, signatures of complement and clotting cascades, active antigen processing, and EGFR signaling were more consistently associated across the group, with the unanticipated identification of unique targets, such as epiregulin, that may hold important diagnostic value.

Likewise, proteomics-based clustering of PASC patients revealed a clear subset of patients closely associated with inflammatory immune signatures strongly suggestive of neutrophilic activity. Through readily-available clinical testing, these inflPASC patients displayed increased white blood cell counts driven by neutrophil expansion in comparison to plaqPASC counterparts, and showed significant increases in acute-phase reactants such as C-reactive protein, fibrinogen, and D-dimer. Associations with clinically-relevant autoantibodies, particularly those related to autoimmune vascular and clotting disorders, suggest that risk of micro-clotting, now widely reported in patients recovering from COVID-19, may be predictable through accurate identification of PASC subtype. However, these signatures are not readily apparent when taking the PASC cohort as a whole. It is important to note that even while these clinical markers are elevated within the inflPASC group, they do not necessarily reflect ‘abnormal’ test results in all cases. That is, the testing of any marker independently may not, by itself, indicate clear disorder. Instead, the elevation of multiple markers, even when within ‘normal’ ranges, seem to best reflect the broad inflammatory signals identified in the proteomics screen. This finding only emphasizes the need to develop tools capable of providing nuanced assessment across a variety of clinical parameters in patient classification. Similarly, it is important to acknowledge that plaqPASC is defined only as the absence of a clear inflammatory signature in the blood, and not as the absence of disease. As others have now shown30, and we show here (Fig 2b,h), biological associations can be readily identified across a wide spectrum of PASC independent of clear inflammatory signaling. It will be critical to understand how all of these signatures predict, and potentially contribute to, long-term patient morbidity.

Cellular immune signatures were correlated with the autoantibody signatures identified in the inflPASC cohort suggesting an increased emphasis of the EF B cell response pathway. Recently, this pathway has been directly implicated in the emergence of autoreactivity in severe COVID-19, with permissive B cell selective pressures leading to the emergence of cross-reactive clones capable of targeting both viral- and self-antigens22. However, in contrast with those studies, the prominence of the described effectors of that pathway, DN2 B cells and ASCs, was notably more muted in inflPASC patients. However, the presumed precursor to this pathway, aN B cells, were identified at almost a 2-fold increase over baseline. While more work is needed, these cells consistent with this phenotype have been previously implicated as an antigen-specific memory compartment within the context of yellow fever vaccination36. Here, they correlate with persistent reactivity against non-spike SARS-CoV-2 antigens. With previous studies in MIS-C identifying non-structural protein targeting as a feature highly related to autoreactivity, and previous implication of the aN populations in the emergence of de novo autoreactivity in chronic autoimmunity, it will be important to know if these cells may contribute to EF-derived memory responses and/or have a propensity towards self-targeting. Indeed, the identification of increasing autoreactivity in these patients at extended time points after COVID-19 recovery strongly suggests that an autoreactive memory compartment may be identifiable in these patients.

The overwhelming disease burden attributable to PASC worldwide10 demands that serious attention must be paid both to its accurate diagnosis as well as potential therapeutic avenues. The identification of a clear subclassification of PASC with a highly inflammatory presentation is an important first step. Based on these data, it is likely that these two PASC subclassifications may respond differently to the immunomodulatory therapies currently being investigated in large-scale clinical trials. Using machine-learning approaches, we have identified critical factors that can be used as positive classifiers of inlfPASC with a high degree of sensitivity and precision. Notably, while initial characterization of this heterogeneity required high-dimensional and unbiased screening, we found that a small subset of features that could be tested at scale, selected through novel assessments of feature potency, was nearly as performant when considered alone. Further, our integration of these data with classical in-clinic blood counts, clotting tests, autoreactive screening, and inflammatory marker assessment suggests that there may be several viable avenues to the positive identification of inflPASC patients without need for highly specialized technology. These assessments could be easily integrated into ongoing clinical trials to understand if therapeutics exert discordant effects on specific patient groups and reduce the potential for false-negative outcomes due to patient heterogeneity.

A critical question building upon these initial findings will be the stability of these inflammatory states over time. A surprising finding from these data, in combination with the published literature29, is the difficulty in discriminating disease subtype through symptom presentation alone. While trends do emerge, symptom presentation appears to be a poor discriminator of the inflPASC and plaqPASC groups despite their discordant underlying biology and identification of long-term physiological manifestations. As a result, it will be important to move beyond symptomatic presentation as a method of classifying patients, and understand how the signatures reported here might evolve over the course of disease. To this end, while our cross-sectional approach defines clear lines between plaqPASC and inflPASC, it is not yet clear if these presentations are mutually exclusive. In the case of reservoir-based viral reactivation as a main driver of PASC, as several have argued37, it could be that inflPASC manifestations are an observation of an inflammatory phase of cyclic reactivation rather than a discrete patient subtype. However, regardless of the stability of these manifestations, these data, taken together, point to an inflammatory process connected to altered long-term immunologic manifestations that may provide an abundance of therapeutic targets aimed at the alleviation of this debilitating disease.

Tips On Finding The Best Company For Search Engine Optimization

Some of the confusing terms and foreign language associated with SEO may be difficult at first, but do not let that prevent you from creating a great site. Read this article to get great tips on SEO that will help you along. Advertising is not the main focus when using SEO techniques to gain rankings for your site. While advertising elsewhere drives traffic to your site and increasing income, it doesn't boost your rankings. AP Style is generally a much more effective tool than SEO style. To do this, simply use your keywords throughout your writing, as much as you can, and still make it flow. If your chosen keywords and phrases are found throughout your page, you'll find that the search engines will rank you highly for those terms. A site map is an easy way to improve your search engine ranking. A site map will link your pages to each other. Having a site map available for visitors will increase traffic to the rest of your webpages. In Four Dots b2b SaaS , it makes your website easier to navigate which will increase overall traffic. Boost the rankings of the search engine with article exchange instead of link exchange. Four Dots b2b SaaS is posting a whole article by another owner of a website on your website along with a credit link, and them doing the same thing with an article written by you. Both site benefit because of the content, the links and the increase in traffic. You can greatly improve your ranking by including your keywords in a page's URL. Should there be special characters or numbers in the URL, you must consider whether people will actually search using them. This can hurt your search rankings. Include the keywords that relate to your site to get more traffic. You need to proofread your content, lest you leave the "r" out of the word "shirt." Make sure your website is readable by both man and machine. If your website or keywords have bad grammatical or spelling errors, then search engines may rank your site lower than you'd like. You can have a great site, but none are ever perfect. Always seek to improve what you have. Don't ever stop improving your SEO results. Your first priority when trying to get a higher ranking should be to write great, informative, and totally unique content. So you aren't overlooked by prospective viewers, make your content original, pertinent and differentiated from other sites. Viewers will stay on your site and come back often if you are giving them content that gives good info. Join the local Chamber of Commerce and Better Business Bureau for better search engine rankings. Since these usually link to your site, it helps with local search results. Additionally, potential customers will be more interested in your website based on a good Better Business Bureau rating. It will make them feel more secure about dealing with you. Writing your articles based on keywords will help to optimize your content for search engines. When you put keywords in that are relevant to your content, you can ensure that a search engine will ferret them out. Therefore, it's easier for readers who may be trying to locate your articles. You want to add the keyword into the title, the introduction, and a couple times within the body of the text. Be sure to use social media sites when looking to improve your site's SEO value. These social outlets allow you to reach out to your customers in real time, making their experience more personal. On-page Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is extremely important in marketing your articles, so do your research and optimize your site. Having a solid ranking for several keywords is an important aspect to having a site that actually gets visitors. It is crucial that you never make the mistake of posting any article to your website more than one time. Google will see this as cheating, and they can greatly reduce your Page Rank. It also reduces your link count, which also brings your ranking down. Eventually you'll have some success with search engine rankings by putting the SEO advice you got here to good use. This isn't about luck since the search engines are programmed. As long as you perform SEO properly and consistently, your pages should rank high.

Stick and Sachet Packing Machine Market Size, Share, Trends Analysis with Forecast 2024-2033

The global stick and sachet packing machine market was valued at US$ 7.2 billion in 2021 and it is anticipated to grow up to US$ 12.4 billion by 2031, at a CAGR of 5.5% during the forecast period.

Packaging machines are used for packaging products or components. The need for packaging machines to integrate with upstream manufacturing processes has resulted in the development of automation techniques for several sectors. This product area includes equipment that forms, fills, seals, wraps, cleans, and packages at different levels of automation. Packaging machines also include related machinery for sorting, counting, and accumulating.

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A stick pack machine is a single lane vertical form fill seal packaging machine where a roll of film is cut, multiple small stick pack bags are formed, and products are filled and sealed inside it. The main applications include small packagings such as sugar sachet, small ketchup sachet, and coffee stick packing machine.

Sachet packaging is extensively used in the cosmetics & personal care, food & beverages, and pharmaceutical industries. Sachets are small, sealed, flexible pouches manufactured from paper, plastic, aluminum foil, and cellulosic and contain liquid, powder, or capsule products. As they are cheaper than large-size packets, sachets are generally used either for promotional trial packs or to cater to low-income or price-sensitive customers who prefer economical packs.

Market Drivers and Trends

Sugar sachet packing machines, milk sachet filling machines, sachet stick packs, and tea sachet packing machines are some examples of sachet packaging machines that are increasing in demand, and the demand for small sachet packing machines is expected to drive the market’s revenue growth due to the presence of many food and beverage manufacturers.

Sachet packing machine is most extensively used in medicine packaging. Sachet packing machines can easily produce blister foils, slip packs, and easy-open pouches at high speed which has increased manifold due to the growing demand for pharmaceutical products are expected to drive the growth of the sachet packaging machine market.

Therefore, increasing demand in food and pharmaceutical sectors are boosting the global stick and sachet packing machine market growth.

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Research Objectives

Estimates and forecast the overall market size for the total market, across product, service type, type, end-user, and region

Detailed information and key takeaways on qualitative and quantitative trends, dynamics, business framework, competitive landscape, and company profiling

Identify factors influencing market growth and challenges, opportunities, drivers and restraints

Identify factors that could limit company participation in identified international markets to help properly calibrate market share expectations and growth rates

Trace and evaluate key development strategies like acquisitions, product launches, mergers, collaborations, business expansions, agreements, partnerships, and R&D activities

Thoroughly analyze smaller market segments strategically, focusing on their potential, individual patterns of growth, and impact on the overall market

To thoroughly outline the competitive landscape within the market, including an assessment of business and corporate strategies, aimed at monitoring and dissecting competitive advancements.

Identify the primary market participants, based on their business objectives, regional footprint, product offerings, and strategic initiatives

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Global Stick and Sachet Packing Machine Market Segmentation

By Type

Stick Pack Packing Machine

Sachet Packing Machine

By Product Type

Powder and Granule

Liquid Products

Others

By End User

Food and Beverages

Pharmaceuticals

Chemicals

Cosmetics

Others

Major Players in the Global Stick and Sachet Packing Machine Market

The key players studied in the global stick and sachet packing machine market are ARANOW Packaging Machinery, S.L. (Spain), Duravant LLC (Spain), Ilapak International SA (Switzerland), Körber AG (Germany), Matrix Packaging Machinery, LLC (US), Nichrome Packaging Solutions (India), OMAG Srl (Italy), SmartPac Verpackungsmaschinen GmbH (Germany), Syntegon Technology GmbH (Germany), and Universal Pack S.r.l. (Italy).

COVID-19 Impact

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in economic challenges owing to subsequent lockdowns. In 2020, the manufacturing industry was severely affected due to a drastic decrease in product demand, falling prices, and storage shortages. A swift decline in manufacturing revenues due to virtually nonexistent manufacturing demand and slow production capabilities had limited the expenditure on the production of stick and sachet packing machines worldwide. Thus, the COVID-19 pandemic negatively affected the global stick and sachet packing machine market in 2020.

However, in 2021, the manufacturing industry started recovering from the significant labor and supply chain challenges that triggered the production of stick and sachet packing machines.

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Research Scope

Scope – Highlights, Trends, Insights. Attractiveness, Forecast

Market Sizing – Product Type, End User, Offering Type, Technology, Region, Country, Others

Market Dynamics – Market Segmentation, Demand and Supply, Bargaining Power of Buyers and Sellers, Drivers, Restraints, Opportunities, Threat Analysis, Impact Analysis, Porters 5 Forces, Ansoff Analysis, Supply Chain

Business Framework – Case Studies, Regulatory Landscape, Pricing, Policies and Regulations, New Product Launches. M&As, Recent Developments

Competitive Landscape – Market Share Analysis, Market Leaders, Emerging Players, Vendor Benchmarking, Developmental Strategy Benchmarking, PESTLE Analysis, Value Chain Analysis

Company Profiles – Overview, Business Segments, Business Performance, Product Offering, Key Developmental Strategies, SWOT Analysis.

With Global Insight Services, you receive:

10-year forecast to help you make strategic decisions

In-depth segmentation which can be customized as per your requirements

Free consultation with lead analyst of the report

Infographic excel data pack, easy to analyze big data

Robust and transparent research methodology

Unmatched data quality and after sales service

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About Global Insight Services:

Global Insight Services (GIS) is a leading multi-industry market research firm headquartered in Delaware, US. We are committed to providing our clients with highest quality data, analysis, and tools to meet all their market research needs. With GIS, you can be assured of the quality of the deliverables, robust & transparent research methodology, and superior service.

The Art of Card Counting in Blackjack

In the world of online casino gaming, few strategies have captured the imagination of players quite like card counting in blackjack. Widely regarded as one of the most effective ways to gain an edge over the casino, card counting involves keeping track of the cards that have been dealt in order to predict the likelihood of certain cards being drawn in subsequent hands. While card counting is not illegal, it is frowned upon by casinos and requires skill, discipline, and a deep understanding of the game. In this article, we'll explore the art of card counting in blackjack and examine its effectiveness in online casinos.

At its core, card counting is based on the principle that certain cards are more favorable to the player than others. In blackjack, high cards (10s, jacks, queens, kings, and aces) are advantageous to the player because they increase the likelihood of getting blackjack (a two-card hand totaling 21) and improve the chances of the dealer busting. Conversely, low cards (2s, 3s, 4s, 5s, and 6s) are favorable to the dealer because they increase the likelihood of the dealer making a strong hand.

The most common method of card counting in blackjack is the Hi-Lo system, which assigns a value of +1 to low cards (2s, 3s, 4s, 5s, and 6s), a value of 0 to neutral cards (7s, 8s, and 9s), and a value of -1 to high cards (10s, jacks, queens, kings, and aces). By keeping a running count of the cards that have been dealt and adjusting their bets accordingly, players can gain insight into the composition of the remaining cards in the shoe and adjust their playing strategy to maximize their chances of winning.

While card counting can be an effective strategy for gaining an edge in blackjack, it is not without its challenges. Online casinos use continuous shuffling machines (CSMs) and automatic shufflers to prevent card counting and ensure the integrity of the game. Additionally, online casinos often use multiple decks of cards, which makes it more difficult for players to keep an accurate count of the cards that have been dealt.

Despite these challenges, card counting can still be effective in online blackjack games, particularly those with live dealers. In live dealer blackjack games, cards are typically dealt from a shoe, allowing players to keep track of the cards that have been dealt and adjust their strategy accordingly. However, players must be discreet and avoid drawing attention to themselves, as online casinos may take action against players suspected of card counting.

In conclusion, the art of card counting in blackjack is a fascinating and complex strategy that requires skill, discipline, and a deep understanding of the game. While card counting can be challenging in online casinos due to factors like continuous shuffling machines and multiple decks, it can still be an effective way to gain an edge in certain situations, particularly in live dealer blackjack games. By mastering the principles of card counting and applying them effectively, players can increase their chances of success and enjoy greater success in online blackjack games.

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