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wa-royal-tea · 1 year

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(Transcript & Translations under the cut & here - Click Pics for HQ Version!)

@thebrixtons

News Anchor: After the disastrous speech given by Princess Catalina at the veteran’s banquet a few days ago, people’s views of the Princess has began to change for the worse. Many has expressed their anger towards the Princess’ “insensitive” remarks during her speech—

Talk Show Host (Alex): What was she thinking? Does she really think she’s doing something with that speech?

Talk Show Host (Iman): Someone needs to give her a reality check. Does she think that just because she’s about to marry into the royal family, she can excuse what her grandfather did? What a joke!

Person 1: I knew something was off about her! Alfie must’ve been blind if he can’t see it.

Person 2: I know! I don’t want her to be our Crown Princess. So out of touch.

Tweet 1: OKG SHE APOLOGIZED COR HIM NOT APOLOGING ???? WHAT ABOUT THE WAR CRIMES ????

Tweet 2: Our??? What do you mean “our”??? You’re not one of us! Stop including yourself in this!

Tweet 3: amenda yang dia pakai tu?? Dia ingt ni majlis anugerah skrin ke?? 🤢 [What the hell was she wearing?? Does she think this is a movie award ceremony??]

Tweet 4: the way she stumbled over her words lmfao somebody send this girl back to gb

Reply to tweet 4: i’ll pay for the plane ticket

Tweet 5: Why Catalina Beauchamp’s actions are disgusting. Ini bebenang🧵 [A thread]

Tweet 6: Her dad LITERALLY fights for the enemy. Satu family tu sampah 🚮 [The whole family is trash]

Tweet 7: First it was Alfie with his scandal, now her. Y’all are made for each other. #Sampah [#Trash]

Tweet 8: I want Marie back!!! #NotOurPrincess

The Wind Palace, Ahtolia (12:00pm)

Sofia: Oh god almighty...

Alfie: Mum...

Sofia: No. Let me talk first.

Sofia: *sighs* This...was a disaster.

Catalina: I-I’m so sorry, auntie. I didn’t know it would be like this.

Sofia: It’s already been done. People all around the country are livid. There’s even an online petition asking for the engagement to be called off.

Alfie: You can’t—

Sofia: I know, and I won’t. That petition won’t change anything.

Sofia: How did this happen, Catalina? Did you not have someone proofread your speech?

Catalina: I did! Alfie proofread the speech for me before I gave it to Anna. He said it was fine.

Alfie: She’s telling the truth, mum. I checked and it was all good. It was longer but I thought Lina cut the speech to make it shorter that night.

Catalina: I didn’t. Another page of the speech went missing, a-and I panicked because it was the final page. S-so I improvised on the spot.

Sofia: How can it go missing? Is no one doing their job properly?

Catalina: I don’t know. I already made sure to give all of the speech to Anna and she said she’ll proofread it again and set it up for me.

Alfie: Could it be someone is trying to sabotage Lina?

Sofia: What do you mean?

Alfie: I think this could be a sabotage. Lina has been getting wrong information in the past and was purposely misled. Remember the thing with the Prime Minister’s wife? Lina told me that no one informed her that Mrs. Sanjay is strict when it comes to customs.

Sofia: Hmm...

Alfie: What do we do now, mum?

Sofia: For now, you both should lay low. I already talked about this with Mary. We’ll postpone the tour until the heat dies down a bit.

Catalina: But—

Sofia: It’s for the best, Catalina. This is not a small thing that could be cover up in one day. Your speech clip has gone viral. The best thing for you now is to lay low while your mother and I do some damage control.

Sofia: Take a break, you both. That’s the least you can do now.

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rockyroad2rome · 1 year

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Tom and Greg decide to join tumblr.

Day 1

Greg creates an account.

Tom creates an account and follows Greg.

Greg does not follow him back.

Day 2

Greg gives Tom crabs.

Tom tips Greg in gratitude.

(Tom can’t stop thinking about crabs and takes Greg out for seafood. Greg orders the most expensive lobster. Tom pays).

Day 3

Greg creates a quote post that says “Just putting it out there” - (Greg Hirsch).

Tom likes the post.

A sugar-daddy-bot writes a comment under the post and Tom doesn't appreciate the competition. He argues with it until Greg turns comments off.

Day 4

Tom gets logged out and can't remember his password.

Greg’s quote post goes viral and he gains 50 followers.

Day 5

Tom resets his password and logs back in.

Greg receives 35 notifications that Tom has liked all his public likes

Day 6

Greg is offline. He is driving to Canada.

Tom changes his icon to C-3PO and tries to join the Star Wars fandom. He makes a couple of hilarious (he thinks) posts pretending to be C-3PO and gains a few followers.

Day 7

Greg is still offline.

Tom gets into an argument about the original cinematic release of Return of the Jedi and accidently reveals his true age when he tells people he watched the film in it’s opening week. His new followers disappear and he is suddenly unable to reblog any of their posts - it's probably just a glitch.

Day 8

Greg posts several photos of Canadian landscapes.

Tom reblogs them all with derogatory comments about Canada in the tags.

Day 9

Greg is offline.

Tom deletes his tags about Canada and replaces them with ♥.

Day 10

Greg writes a drunken rant complaining about his grandad.

A concerned follower tells Greg that she is there if he wants to talk.

Tom writes “Fuck your grandpa” 67 times in the comments.

The concerned follower tells Tom that she is there for him if he wants to talk.

Day 11

Greg makes yesterday's post private

Tom starts following a health food blog and shares his opinions about spinach.

Day 12

Greg is back from Canada and posts his road trip playlist.

Tom doesn't recognise any of the bands but likes it anyway.

Day 13

Tom wakes up early and reblogs several pics of eggs, omelettes and pancakes from a breakfast food blog.

Greg likes them all.

They go for breakfast irl.

Day 14

Tom reblogs more egg dishes.

Greg does not like any of the posts.

Greg reblogs 20 posts about the musical Hamilton.

Day 15

Greg reblogs more posts about Hamilton (most of which were created by 'concerned follower').

Tom ignores these posts.

Day 16

Greg makes a cryptic post that says “Had a pretty great night last night ;)”.

Tom likes the post and writes ‘???’ in the comments.

Day 17

Greg likes a post by ‘concerned follower’ that says, “Thanks Greg, seeing Hamilton at the theatre last night was a dream come true... can’t wait for our next trip!”.

Tom unfollows Greg.

Day 18

Tom is offline

Greg only makes one Hamilton post.

Day 19

Tom has taken a spontaneous holiday to the Mediterranean with Shiv. He posts glamorous photos of seaports, yachts and beaches. #second-honeymoon, #Billionaire-aesthetic

Greg posts a photo of his in-tray and the trashcan in his office. #intern-life, #actually-working, #grey-aesthetic.

Day 20

Tom is offline. His romantic getaway has been gate-crashed by Logan and the rest of the main Waystar team - a business opportunity has arisen and the company needs to use the Mega-Yacht as their HQ.

Greg has been left behind. His trashcan is now filled to the brim with paper balls. #bored #new-high-score #holding-down-the-fort.

Day 21

Tom reblogs thirty motivational posts about success, initiative and loyalty. It’s a big day for Waystar and he plans to be part of the action.

Greg reblogs the least annoying post and leaves it untagged. He is distracted - he has been sucked in by the ‘conspiracy theory side’ of tumblr and is engrossed by the number of theories surrounding Waystar-Royco.

Day 22

Tom is offline. The Waystar deal fell through and Logan blames him. Shiv declares their getaway a disaster and heads to Milan with Roman to try and salvage the deal.

Greg has run out of real work and is now scrolling tumblr 9-5 at his desk courtesy of the company wi-fi. He messages the main conspiracy blogs on anon to confirm their suspicions - they have no idea how deep the rabbit hole goes.

Day 23

Tom has a bad day. Roman sent him a dozen photos of the family celebrating with champagne after Shiv saved the deal... well, they both did, Shiv helped, it was basically all Roman... ‘wish you were here Wambsgans’.

Greg is offline. His work Wi-Fi privileges have been revoked and he has had to spend the afternoon explaining himself to HR and the IT department. He is offered a week off until work picks up/Logan returns to deal with him.

Day 24

Tom writes a gloomy emotional post about his first date with Shiv and how nothing lasts forever.

Greg is at home. He still checks Tom's blog and is growing increasingly concerned. He accidently likes then unlikes the post. Hopefully Tom didn't notice.

Day 25

Tom is offline. He is travelling back to the USA alone.

Greg is feeling nostalgic and reblogs posts about his favourite childhood films. #Saw-this-film-with-my-dad #skipped-school-for-this-one, #mom-put-this-on-to-keep-me-quiet, #childhood-classic, #sad-ending-dog-dies, #still-love-musicals.

Day 26

Tom has gone to visit his parents. He fills his blogs with snowy landscapes, Midwest comfort food and articles about growing up in Minnesota in the 80s.

Greg divides his time between streaming films and rebloging his favourite teenage movies. #best-film-ever? #soundtrack-rocks #so-dumb #twist-ruins-it, #over-rated, #watched-it-high, #stole-it-from-blockbuster #kinda-gay-but-I-liked-it.

Day 27

Greg is summoned to the office to explain himself. He would certainly never tell Logan how to run the company, but perhaps it is time that Waystar recognises how valuable corporate image management is at a microblogging level. Now, if someone were to keep an eye on negative rumours and extinguish spurious stories before they develop into lawsuits, would there be an angle there perhaps? Just a little guy with a new job title and salary increase, using tumblr as a work tool to protect Waystar’s corporate interests. Logan agrees to mull it over.

Tom has been dragged to visit all his closest relations and is offline for most of the day. He does, however, start checking Greg’s blog a little more frequently.

Day 28

After persuading Logan that purchasing tumblr.com would be a catastrophic move because, ‘that website is already unprofitable and pretty much dead - you can quote me on that,’ Greg is back at work with a new job title and an increased salary. He creates a second tumblr account for the office and gets to ‘work’.

Tom spends most of the day helping his Father set up a tumblr account to promote their family wine business. By this time tomorrow 50,000 tumblr users will be seeing blaze ads for Spätburgunder wine whether they want to or not and if that doesn’t increase sales of their earthy, agricultural tasting wine nothing will.

Day 29

Greg is having a quiet evening in and reblogs a list of the top 100 classic films, horror films and action films. #63-not-bad, #81-college-horror-movie-nights, #35-need-to-catch up. He sends the lists to Tom

Tom caves and reblogs the posts #100-hasn’t-everyone-seen-these films?, #15-would-rather-be watching-classics, #49-watched-these-with-the-fly-guys.

Greg reblogs a list of the top 100 gay films. #50-down-50-to-go

Tom starts following Greg and Greg follows him back.

Day 30

Tom flies back to New York overnight

Greg wakes up to discover that Tom has given him crabs – he returns the favour. They meet at lunchtime and go for seafood irl. Logan pays (he gave Greg a restaurant voucher to reward him for his ‘initiative’).

Day 31

Greg is offline.

Tom is offline.

Several weeks later 'concerned follower' posts a photo of herself outside a theatre. Tom and Greg are standing behind her, hand in hand. They are smiling. The post is simply tagged #they-were-mutuals

#tomgreg #tom wambsgans #greg hirsch #tom x greg #succession hbo #succession #cousin greg

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black-arcana · 7 months

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“To protect your freedom, you have to be active": How Within Temptation's new album Bleed Out was inspired by a world in crisis

Within Temptation's new album Bleed Out is their most fired up to date, proving there's much more to them than just being "the symphonic band"

(Image credit: Tim Tronckoe)

In September 2008, Within Temptation visited Kherson, a port city in the south of Ukraine, just north of the Crimean Peninsula. The Dutch metallers were nearing the end of a year-and-half-long tour for their fourth album, The Heart Of Everything, and it was their first time in the Eastern European country.

Two days later, they would play a show in the capital, Kyiv, but it’s Kherson that sticks out most vividly in their minds: a former Eastern bloc city on the rise, the beautiful tree-lined streets, the wide Dnieper River. During their stay, they were treated to a ceremonial tour with the mayor and invited, poignantly in hindsight, to plant a tree for peace.

“They put us in national clothing and gave us traditional food,” vocalist Sharon Den Adel says, remembering the warm welcome. “We had an amazing few days.”

When Russian president Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Kherson was the first major Ukrainian city to fall. Russian troops occupied the city from March to November, before it was recaptured by Ukrainian forces. “The resistance there was really strong,” says Robert Westerholt, Sharon’s husband and Within Temptation co-founder/studio guitarist.

“Every night, they would come out and literally slit throats of Russian soldiers, [come] out of corners and attack them in every way they could. They were really paranoid, the Russians, they never felt at ease there.”

That staunch defiance inspired the band to write Cyanide Love, one of several songs on the band’s new album, Bleed Out, about the Ukraine War. ‘Sunflowers will soon be growing over your grave,’ sings Sharon over tense synths and downtuned guitars, a reference to a viral video on the first day of the invasion: a Ukrainian woman offers sunflower seeds to a Russian soldier with the harrowing wish that they bloom in his pocket after his death. ‘You’ll take it, you’ll face it / The barrel of my smoking gun.’

“We really hope to go back [to Kherson] one day,” says Robert, and his voice aches with sadness.

We’re sitting in the stylish but homely kitchen – all high ceilings and tall windows – of Sharon and Robert’s house in a pretty, peaceful countryside town, 40 minutes from the manic tourist bustle of Amsterdam.

The couple have lived here for 15 years, and it’s very much their haven. As we talk, their two sons are next door playing a videogame on the TV. Their friendly black labrador, Charlie, demands a head stroke, and gold balloons strung across the front door celebrate their daughter Eva’s recent high school graduation.

But it’s also Within Temptation HQ, the base where they’ve masterminded the band’s shift from ethereal, dark-edged symphonic royalty to a powerhouse of modern heavy metal (see: 2019’s Resist). We’ve been invited here for a world-exclusive playback of Bleed Out, the band’s eighth album, which, at the time of our visit, hasn’t even been officially announced.

As Robert leads us through the house, we pass a rail in the hall that holds several leather jackets, and an enormous canvas bearing the artwork of The Heart Of Everything. Inside the white-walled studio, art and guitars hang on one wall above a low sofa. Sharon and Robert seem relaxed and excited to talk about the new album, although even now they’re still making last-minute changes.

Up until yesterday, the album had a different title; on the few tracks we were sent in advance, it was The Ultimate Sacrifice. The new name, Sharon says, is stronger, and more representative of the real-life struggles that have inspired some of the songs.

She was in Sweden when she heard about the invasion of Ukraine. Her immediate response, like many others, was one of shock and fear, admitting that the old-fashioned method of warfare – troops and tanks on the ground – was not something she had expected to see in her lifetime.

“Maybe that’s naïve, but not in Europe,” she says, curled up barefoot on a nearby armchair. “Kyiv is only a two-and-a-half-hour flight by plane [from the Netherlands]. It’s the same distance as Spain, where I’m going in a few days.”

Before they press play, they show us the artwork, which depicts a hooded figure in shades of black and red. “It’s dark,” Sharon notes, “because the album is dark.”

While Within Temptation’s last record, Resist, blew their sound up to supercharged proportions, just one listen of Bleed Out is enough to confirm that this is Within Temptation’s biggest, heaviest record so far. Stepping things up a level was necessary to match the severity of the source material.

Opener Go To War sets the tone with a colossal guitar part and an apocalyptic choir, a chorus dripping in grandeur, and a marriage of synths with the unmistakable mechanical judder of tech metal. The latter influence, Robert says, has filtered into the band’s sound not through bingeing on Meshuggah albums, but because its cold, almost cruel, mechanical nature best helped to paint a picture of a universe in crisis. “Somehow this [sound] resonates with that.”

The title track follows in the same vein, anthemic and cinematic, with hints of the epic symphonic and gothic doom of their earlier material. It all sounds huge – built to fill the massive rooms the band have become accustomed to playing these days. “Certain elements have come back in, that made us in the beginning,” says Robert. “They still inspire us.”

When we suggest it’s a culmination of every step in the band’s sonic evolution, Sharon agrees: “But with an extra layer of heaviness.”

“We have been searching for this for quite some time, to have a sound that is heavy, but still has this melancholy and beautiful storytelling lines,” she continues. “And finally, it happened on the very last few songs [we wrote]. Sometimes you have just one song that opens the door.”

It would be easy to draw parallels between Within Temptation’s current approach and a band like Sabaton, who have made a career out of songs that go big on bombast and heroism. Robert is quick to shut the comparison down. “We’re not making war songs. We’re not doing history lessons,” he says, arguing that the band didn’t find inspiration in the grim reality of the battlefield. “It’s more the drive of people and their personal stories. We won’t be going onstage with a tank.”

Within Temptation are reluctant to call this a “political” album, but there’s no doubt it’s their most socially aware yet, far removed from the fantastical tendencies of old. For our listening session we’ve been joined by the band’s manager, Martijn, perhaps a sign that, while Sharon and Robert are keen to discuss the inspirations behind the album, they’re cautious about the sensitivities involved.

Go To War, Cyanide Love, Worth Dying For and Wireless directly reference the invasion. The latter talks about the danger of propaganda. “I remember that I was in Russia once and saw something on my own social media,” says Sharon.

“I asked someone sitting next to me, ‘What are they saying?’ And the guy said, ‘Yes, these Americans, blah, blah… completely the opposite of what I’ve been reading on social media where I’m living. If you don’t go deeper, if you don’t search for more information that tells you the story from different perspectives, then you will believe the state television. So that’s why it’s important to tell stories, to give counterweight.”

The band almost called the track Mark Of Cain, a reference to Cain murdering his brother Abel in the Book Of Genesis. “Russia sees their neighbour country as… something that belongs to them or like family,” continues Sharon. “It’s like you wear the Mark Of Cain, everybody knows you killed your brother.”

Meanwhile, Sharon says the title track was written about Iranian woman Mahsa Amini, who was arrested for allegedly breaking hijab rules and died in the custody of the country’s morality police. Her death sparked nationwide protests.

“It’s inspirational that some people are willing [to protest], knowing when they take off their scarf, what’s going to happen to them,” she says. She viewed the protests as a generational conflict: “There’s a lot of women taking a lot of risk to do that, but also men from their own generation supporting them and also getting into trouble… the older generation are trying to keep things how they are, and the younger generation are ready [for] change.”

We haven’t heard Within Temptation this fired up in ages, but their initial intention wasn’t to make an album. They had spent the last two years releasing singles – Entertain You and The Purge in 2020 and Shed My Skin in 2021, all of which appear on the record – and enjoying the off-cycle immediacy of being able to write, record and upload. Following the outbreak of war, though, writing between their home and the Swedish studio of long-time collaborator Daniel Gibson, the remaining material came together over six months.

Other topics are discussed on the record, too: Ritual is a tongue-in-cheek, double-entendre-heavy paean to female sexual expression. Shed My Skin is about living by your own rules, free from the judgement of others, while Sharon describes Entertain You as “a song for the misfits”. It was inspired, she says, by a video she saw on social media.

“There was a trans woman who was walking in England, and she was bullied by three young guys. She’s not there for their entertainment, but they’re using her for entertainment because she’s different. I wrote that song [to say] we’re beautiful in our own way. To share some love.”

While some of the tracks were written and recorded almost three years apart, what holds the album together is the theme of freedom. “To protect your freedom, you have to be active,” says Robert. “If you’re passive, then you’re going to lose it. It’s about personal freedom, but also freedom for your country, for your friends, family… everything.”

“It’s a record about the unbreakable desire of humans to live free from tyranny and oppression,” agrees Sharon. “How many also are willing to give so much to achieve this not only for themselves, but for others and future generations. As an artist you have this platform, and we can talk about bubblegum. But I can also talk about things that matter.”

Having listened to the album in full, we decamp to a nearby brasserie for lunch, and to continue the conversation. Sharon drives, and as we cruise through the cool shade of the forest next to their home, she motions towards a large sand dune that meets the trees – a bizarre natural phenomenon where the cover art for her 2018 solo album, My Indigo, was shot. She’d like to record more solo work, she later tells us.

“One day, but not at the moment, because I need a little time. It’s been a rollercoaster. I have been writing songs since the war started, before that we had the pandemic, and after that we had to do all the shows that we couldn’t do during Corona.”

Once at the restaurant, we are shown to a table in a private corner outside, tucked away beside the hedges, where Robert and Sharon order us food and drinks. Clearly well-known, several members of staff come over to greet them during the rest of our interview.

Our conversation takes us all over: to Taylor Swift, an artist Sharon respects, and whether they would ever do Eurovision given the rise in metal acts (the answer is no, although Sharon was once on the Dutch judging panel).

We soon get back to the album – whenever an artist wades into the kind of matters discussed on Bleed Out, someone always complains that politics should be kept out of music. Have they received any backlash? “I deleted a message yesterday on Facebook,” says Sharon, explaining that a fan/troll had taken umbrage with the band’s song Raise Your Banner, from 2019’s Resist, which Sharon has taken to dedicating to Ukraine at their live shows, often waving a flag onstage.

“He said, ‘You’re preaching about freedom and then you preach war. You slut.’” She pauses to let the language sink in. He had complained about the lyric, ‘Blood for freedom.’ “It means you would give your life to have freedom,” she argues. “So, if he had put five minutes of effort into reading the lyrics, then he would know Raise Your Banner is taking a stand.”

“What annoys me a lot is that people say, ‘Don’t talk about politics’,” adds Robert. “It’s not even politics. It’s your opinion as an artist. Artists have opinions. That’s what art is for. That’s what makes it interesting.”

In 2021, Sharon was invited by Kerrang! to write a comment piece for International Women’s Day, and chose to argue the importance of access to abortion. Her research for the piece revealed vastly differing approaches across Europe. “There were people who didn’t understand my point of view,” she says of the response to the essay, as lunch arrives at the table. “Not everybody is in the same place at the same time when you write an article like that. But backlash is also a good thing, because then it gets the attention that it needs.”

The track Don’t Pray For Me from the new album makes the argument for bodily autonomy: ‘I don’t need your absolution, so don’t hold that sword over me / For my confessions I don’t need a church / I don’t need salt to know where it hurts.’

“We were fighting for that and talking about it [when I was in my teens], and we’re still fighting the same battles,” she says, explaining that the issues facing women are increasingly at the forefront of her mind, especially given her own daughter’s coming of age. “It doesn’t seem like we have stepped forward yet.”

Within Temptation have always been equally fascinated and horrified by the human predisposition for destruction and harm, whether it be towards our planet or fellow man. As far back as 2004’s The Silent Force, the haunting Forsaken painted a desperate picture of the end of days. ‘Our time has run out, our future has died / There’s no more escape… We’re the last of our kind.’

They also grappled with the futility of war in 2007, on Our Solemn Hour, from The Heart Of Everything, which interspersed symphonic excess with excerpts from Winston Churchill’s Be Ye Men Of Valour speech.

In 2020, they had started planning a stage production worthy of their grandiose vision, although the pandemic put their plans on ice. Instead, their blueprints became The Aftermath, a CGI livestream in 2021 which took place in a post-apocalyptic world. It depicted the band performing in the remnants of a ruined landscape, escaping to space as the planet burns in a fireball below – a sobering statement on the man-made challenges facing us today.

“It was a thought experiment of what would be very possible in the future,” says Robert of his sci-fi vision. “There were two thoughts behind it. One, we are getting more aware that we’re really destroying our planet and ourselves. That’s pretty obvious right now. But the second thing is the big perspective – it’s quite logical that people, at a certain point, will definitely [abandon Earth and] go into space.”

Another subject the band are interested in is the increasing, perhaps dangerous, control modern technology has on our lives. They’re huge fans of Charlie Brooker’s Netflix series Black Mirror, while a similar narrative rippled through 2019’s Resist. Their live shows have become increasingly futuristic in theme, while the video for recent single Wireless was made using AI. We mention that Black Mirror actor Aaron Paul voiced concerns about AI, and that soon we might not be able to tell what’s real and what’s not. “I think that’s already the case,” says Sharon.

We ask about the rise in AI-created music online, and if they worry about the artistic implications. Robert is dismissive. “Music is not just about listening to something, it’s the whole story around it, where you are at a certain place,” he says. “We’re very interested in what it can do. It’s one big experiment.”

How would you feel if someone used AI to make a Within Temptation song, and people thought it was an official track? “What I could find difficult is they could make lyrics, that are offensive, that I didn’t write, and people might think I did,” says Sharon.

Robert shrugs. “But then you can tell them you didn’t.”

“But if they can’t tell the difference…” Sharon perseveres.

Robert is still unconcerned. “If it’s not on your official website… it’s really no issue at all.”

Sharon looks at us with a wry smile. “So even we have our discussions about that.”

When Within Temptation were able to resume touring after the pandemic, they brought The Aftermath to life. Rescheduling their long-postponed Worlds Collide UK arena tour with Evanescence, suddenly they were operating, conceptually and visually, on a whole new level.

Their pyro-packed stage production even included a huge humanoid head. They cite Iron Maiden, who they have toured with several times over the years – the most recent outing being on 2022’s Legacy Of The Beast run – as their main inspiration. “Those bands who do something special visually have always inspired us to do the same,” says Sharon.

And while they’ve been a bona fide arena band in mainland Europe for years, it felt like, finally, they’d cemented the same status in the UK. “I think everywhere the venues will now be a bit bigger,” smiles Robert. “We felt it was a milestone in our career. We didn’t care too much about what we were making [financially] with the show, but just to make it the most memorable show that we could. We never thought that we would reach this far.”

Sonically, too, it feels like Within Temptation could go anywhere. While Bleed Out is littered with symphonic elements, it’s a musical label that now feels uncomfortable, something they’ve long outgrown. “We don’t feel like a symphonic band,” says Robert.

Sharon agrees. “But I don’t know what to call ourselves now either. I don’t have a new box to put ourselves in.”

And even as they’re making the final changes to Bleed Out, their minds are fixed on the future. As hectic as the last year has been, the process of making the new album has got their creative juices flowing.

“It’s so funny. As soon as we finished [Bleed Out] we were like, ‘We want to make another album.’ But we’re going to take our time for the next one,” she insists. “We were working full force from our house [during the pandemic]. I loved what I was doing, but at the same time I was also very tired. So I can’t wait to have a little bit of a break. This summer, we have a few festivals and then I have some time to really get both feet on the ground.”

She won’t take her foot off the gas for too long, though. After 27 years of constant innovation, Within Temptation don’t know how to stand still. “What I feel like now is actually writing again,” she laughs, shaking her head. “It’s very strange and positive!”

#sharon den adel #robert westerholt #within temptation #interview

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aricastmblr · 2 months

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collapsedsquid · 1 year

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Billionaire Elon Musk is routinely followed around Twitter headquarters by two “bulky” bodyguards—even when he goes to the restroom, according to a Twitter engineer. The two bearded guards went viral back in January after they accompanied Musk at a securities fraud trial, and appear to have accompanied him to Twitter after his $44 billion purchase of the social media site. A Twitter engineer identified only as Sam told BBC News: “Wherever he goes in the office, there are at least two bodyguards—very bulky, tall, Hollywood movie bodyguards. Even when [he goes] to the restroom.” He said the constant use of bodyguards suggested that Musk, who has sacked a huge number of Twitter staff including coders, does not trust his remaining staff at Twitter HQ in San Francisco.

Mr Musk you need to embrace Gaddafi thought, have some sort of Amazonian guard squad.

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mariacallous · 1 year

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The “Twitter Files” are to journalism what cosplay is to superheroism: an occasionally convincing imitation of the real thing. Though I shouldn’t insult cosplayers so: They bring joy and beauty to public life, while the Twitter Files are merely proving to be grist for the likes of QAnon and other extremely online individuals addicted to viral outrage. The latest round, this time curated by ex-New York Times editor Bari Weiss, was meant to show that Twitter did indeed engage in the dreaded “shadowbanning” of far-right imagining and discriminate against conservative accounts by completely hiding them from the general public in an act of “woke” censorship perpetrated at the highest levels.

But Weiss revealed both less and more than she wished, and in the process helped confirm what should already have been obvious after Matt Taibbi’s first round of Twitter Files posting: The confected scandals supposedly revealed by this PR-friendly access to Twitter’s internal systems offer a theatrical transparency that occludes the lack of the real thing under Musk’s leadership.

Part of the problem lies in the actual definition of “shadowban.” The term has come to mean whatever people want it to mean, with all the ideologically useful flexibility of words like “woke.” This has allowed Musk’s right-wing fans to play gotcha with an old tweet from Twitter HQ that categorically denied shadowbanning. “But, aha!” they seem to say, “Now intrepid journalist Bari Weiss has shown this is not so!” Weiss took advantage of this deliberate slipperiness when she claimed, “What many people call ‘shadowbanning,’ Twitter executives and employees call ‘visibility filtering’ or VF,” and implied her sources said they were exactly the same thing.

But all she showed was that Twitter was doing what it had always said it was doing. First and foremost, “visibility filtering” covers everything, including user-generated filtering. If you’ve blocked or muted anyone, they’ve been visibility filtered for you, in company parlance. It also covers the way tweets from openly suspended accounts would be rendered invisible to the public. Without linking to it, Weiss selectively quotes from this 2018 Twitter blog post by former trust and safety lead Vijaya Gadde and former product lead Kayvon Beykpour where they categorically said, “People are asking us if we shadow ban. We do not.”

The trouble for the mob is that there are more words in this post. Gadde and Beykpour set forth a clear definition of shadowbanning: “deliberately making someone’s content undiscoverable to everyone except the person who posted it, unbeknownst to the original poster.” This, they asserted, was not done—and nothing in the Twitter Files proves otherwise. Musk enthusiasts have deemed this mere weaselly wordplay. But, shockingly, there are still more words in this blog post. To wit: “We do rank tweets and search results. We do this because Twitter is most useful when it’s immediately relevant. These ranking models take many signals into consideration to best organize tweets for timely relevance. We must also address bad-faith actors who intend to manipulate or detract from healthy conversation.”

This ranking is explained in further detail with examples and an FAQ about a recent incident where some Republican politicians (along with Democratic politicos and a whole lot of other non-conservatives) were temporarily unable to be autosuggested through search. That was quickly fixed, but Gadde and Beykpour were clear that Twitter always had, and always would, engage in ranking and filtering based on a variety of factors. In other words, the thing that Weiss actually “uncovered” was something Twitter admitted to over four years ago. It’s even in Twitter’s terms of service.

In short, no one’s tweets were unfindable to the public without the poster knowing about it: If they were suspended or banned, naturally they’d be aware. De-amplification—affecting a person’s ranking in search results and the like—is rather different. Some might call it “freedom of speech but not freedom of reach.”

The people playing semantic games are Musk and his propagandists, performing a pantomime of transparency while glossing over a range of issues. Matt Taibbi revealed that the Trump administration made requests of Twitter all the time—but we know nothing about what they were, which were acted on, and why. Weiss revealed that the transphobic account Libs of TikTok was actually being given preferential treatment: No moderation decision could be made about the account without consulting higher-ups, a privilege afforded to very few on the platform and doubtlessly implemented to avoid upsetting the ever-voluble online right. Why?

But, more than that, there has been absolutely no transparency about Musk’s decisionmaking since his arrival. Where are his emails? When can we gain insight into how he’s single-handedly made numerous content moderation decisions already? When will be allowed to verify that his public statements match his private reasoning? When will we learn how critical decisions about staffing were made? The answer is: likely never, in the absence of effective legal action.

Musk’s Potemkin transparency is meant only to flatter him by ginning up false scandals about Twitter’s previous leadership (whom, it must be noted, he has made rather rich with his purchase). It paints a fictive image of Twitter as a dictatorship that Musk has liberated to the adulation of cheering masses. That, aside from its general utility to the right wing’s bottomless politics of grievance and self-victimization, is the chief aim of this entire enterprise. For the populist right, it offers a Zeno’s paradox of a conspiracy, where the ultimate revelation is just one more viral Twitter thread away.

It is difficult to take people seriously when they complain about Twitter having been led by a group of titled individuals with managerial responsibilities making management decisions while they simultaneously cheer the consolidation of those tasks in the hands of one man. What Musk offers is not transparency: It is caprice. His idiosyncratic whims, for which we can only take his word without any mechanism of appeal or accountability, are the content moderation policy. It beggars belief that anyone could see this as an improvement.

This mirrors the broader fiction about the takeover promulgated by Musk’s fans: that he has somehow emancipated the company and made it more democratic and accountable. But in corporate governance terms, he has simply moved from the oligarchic democracy of a publicly traded company—which, not for nothing, was required by law to disclose a great many things to the public—to a personalist dictatorship.

What he dreams of is freedom from any accountability. He’s not liberating “the people,” he’s liberating himself: taking Twitter private was about ensuring he’d not be accountable to shareholders or a board, and that he could disclose only what he wanted. In a typically brazen move, after granting ideologically captured stenographers unfettered access to Twitter’s tools to promote a message he approved of, he sent an email threatening his own staff with legal action if they ever leaked anything. Transparency indeed. Musk dreams of a world where no one tells him “no.” It’s a solipsistic dream shared by too many of his fans.

The sort of people who worship at Musk’s feet online—especially his newfound cadre of right-wing posters—are the sort whose every accusation is a confession or an aspiration. Rest assured that everything they have falsely accused Twitter of doing is what they seek to do to their many ideological enemies. Indeed, it’s already happening, with no transparency about the reasoning, no clear TOS violation to cite, and no process of appeal. His every move is a mockery of the idea of transparency. Is the public afraid that Musk’s gutting of content moderation staff and CSAM teams in particular will lead to a surge in such vile material? Just falsely imply your former coworkers of covering for pedophiles. Right-wing populists steeped in QAnon conspiracies will cheer you on, you will look revolutionary, and all the while things will just get steadily worse.

The one potentially good thing to come out of this mess is Musk’s pledge to make Twitter’s VF more visible to end users, telling them if they’re being deranked and why. I’d actually welcome this, but it’s just another Musk promise; as with all else, one has to watch what Musk does rather than what he tweets. And what he’s doing points in an unsettling direction.

Musk’s most enthusiastic supporters lived in a delusional dystopia of their own making. Now they want revenge for the imagined slight. It won’t be pretty.

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invisibleicewands · 2 years

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youtube

Michael Sheen just performed a new World Cup speech to Wales' stars and it's somehow even better than the original

Michael Sheen has performed a fantastic new rendition of his now iconic World Cup speech to stunned Wales players at their Vale of Glamorgan training base.

Sheen's impromptu speech on sports-comedy panel show A League of Their Own earlier this month rightly went viral after he was asked by host Romesh Ranganathan to deliver a hypothetical pre-match team talk to Wales players ahead of their World Cup encounter with England.

The speech, brimming with passion and delivered with gusto, sent shivers down the spines of every Welsh man, woman and child in the land, as well as many people who aren't from this small corner of the world, which you can read about here.

Wales boss Rob Page admitted that when he first watched the initial speech from A League of Their Own, it made him "well up" and he wanted to get Sheen into camp as soon as possible. And on Monday morning, just hours after Wales were defeated by Poland at Cardiff City Stadium in the Nations League, Sheen entered the camp to deliver yet another spine-tingling new speech.

Port Talbot-born Sheen, an acting icon known for his work in The Queen, The Damned United, Twilight, Frost/Nixon and much, much more, was presented with a Wales jersey, with his name and the number 22 on the back, before he addressed the squad.

"When I did the speech on A League of Their Own, it was specifically for the England game," Sheen began. "But I couldn't come and see you and not give you something to go with.

"My song is the words I speak. So I will try and customise what I did before and give you something to take with you."

Sheen's new rendition was far broader and included nods to the Merthyr Rising and the power of the national anthem. But it was very much centred around the team having the backing of the whole nation when they take the field for that first match in Qatar.

Sheen's speech finished and it left a moment or two of stunned silence around a large conference suite at the team's Vale of Glamorgan training HQ, before rapturous applause broke out.

Sheen was then embraced by Page and Gareth Bale, who presented him with a personalised, commemorative bottle, emblazoned with the words 'Yma o Hyd', before the squad signed his shirt.

Michael Sheen's new speech in full

Yma o hyd, yma o hyd,

I hear the voices singing,

Speed your journey, bois bach,

One nation, singing with one voice,

A song of hope, a song of courage,

A victory song that floats through the valleys, like a red mist,

Rolls over the mountain tops, like crimson thunder,

A red storm is coming to the gates of Qatar,

It sparkles and crackles, with the spirit of '58 and Jimmy Murphy's boys,

It turns the pages of the history books,

And finds Rob's page, waiting, still to be written,

What would you write in there, boys?

Dare you write your names on that page?

64 years and far from home, far from the old land of our fathers,

Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau,

When you are standing there listening to that song of songs start up,

Shoulder to shoulder with the lads in this room,

Team-mates, friends, brothers, princes, all selected by the divine,

When you are standing there, side by side, and that holy song begins,

Close your eyes and feel the breath on the back of your necks,

Because that's every man, woman and child in this old land standing there with you,

At your backs, that's the people of Wales, your people,

Feel their breath quickening with yours,

Hear their blood drumming in your ears,

Pounding through your heart,

Bursting through your chest,

That's the blood of Wales, your blood, red as the ancient book of dreams,

Red as the rising flag of Merthyr,

Red as the great wall of Gwalia,

Because that's what you carry with you, boys,

Across 64 years, across half the span of the world,

It's there, on your chest,

It's there, at your back,

It's there, at your side,

They always say, we are too small, too, slow, too weak, too full of fear,

But yma o hyd, you sons of Speed,

With that red wall around us,

We are still here.

#Michael Sheen #Wales #Football

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theyoungturks · 1 year

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youtube

A Missouri Republican defends marriages between 12-year-olds. Ana Kasparian and Cenk Uygur discuss on The Young Turks. Speaker McCarthy, #ProtectOurKids From Legalized Grooming https://tyt.com/petitions Watch TYT LIVE on weekdays 6-8 pm ET. http://youtube.com/theyoungturks/live Read more HERE: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/missouri-mike-moon-defends-child-marriage_n_64372e01e4b0ac40918962ff "A Missouri state senator apparently wants to block gender-affirming care for transgender youth but is OK with 12-year-olds getting married. Republican lawmaker Mike Moon is going viral for comments he made Tuesday while arguing for a bill he introduced to ban gender-affirming care for the state’s transgender teens."* *** The largest online progressive news show in the world. Hosted by Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian. LIVE weekdays 6-8 pm ET. Help support our mission and get perks. Membership protects TYT's independence from corporate ownership and allows us to provide free live shows that speak truth to power for people around the world. See Perks: ▶ https://www.youtube.com/TheYoungTurks/join SUBSCRIBE on YOUTUBE: ☞ http://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=theyoungturks FACEBOOK: ☞ http://www.facebook.com/TheYoungTurks TWITTER: ☞ http://www.twitter.com/TheYoungTurks INSTAGRAM: ☞ http://www.instagram.com/TheYoungTurks TWITCH: ☞ http://www.twitch.com/tyt 👕 Merch: http://shoptyt.com ❤ Donate: http://www.tyt.com/go 🔗 Website: https://www.tyt.com 📱App: http://www.tyt.com/app 📬 Newsletters: https://www.tyt.com/newsletters/ If you want to watch more videos from TYT, consider subscribing to other channels in our network: The Watchlist https://www.youtube.com/watchlisttyt Indisputable with Dr. Rashad Richey https://www.youtube.com/indisputabletyt Unbossed with Nina Turner https://www.youtube.com/unbossedtyt The Damage Report ▶ https://www.youtube.com/thedamagereport TYT Sports ▶ https://www.youtube.com/tytsports The Conversation ▶ https://www.youtube.com/tytconversation Rebel HQ ▶ https://www.youtube.com/rebelhq TYT Investigates ▶ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwNJt9PYyN1uyw2XhNIQMMA #TYT #TheYoungTurks #BreakingNews 230413__TB03MarriagesReCut by The Young Turks

#IFTTT #YouTube

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bionicparrot · 1 year

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((New XVerse Muse Dropping!))

((Say hello to the bastard that got my muse page devoured by the abyss!))

Name: Lyre

Alliance: None ((But does do business with Mavericks and Irregulars)) Position: Head of the black market reploid/human exchange. Personality: As a griffon he considers himself king of both land and sky. He's pompous, arrogant and greedy but surprisingly cordial to those he sees as business partners. He's also a charmer and has managed to smooth talk many unfortunate victims onto the auction block. Those that do not make it to auction be the civilian or hunter could very well find their programming tweaked to serve as part of his crew.

Background:

Originally designed to help contain reploids that have been infected by the maverick virus at the peak of the viral outbreak. Lyre was put in charge of his own force. One that worked adjacent too and with Hunter HQ.

He excelled at what he did. Living for hunting and trapping. The more dangerous the maverick the more thrill he found in the hunt. To the point where many started to question the ethics of his orders.

Ethics aside his work in helping contain the maverick virus outside of Hunter HQ's jurisdiction was unparalleled.

After Sigma's third defeat Lyre started to notice the writing on the wall when it came to Hunter HQ pushing their control. He'd find his worries justified after news of the repliforce incident reached their base. This was enough for him to leave, taking whatever troops decided to stick with him along with as much military equipment as they could manage completely crippling the regions defenses.

He's spent the last few decades building his power by indulging in the thrill of the hunt and selling off his prey to the highest bidder on the black market.

Lyre is an obsessive hunter/trapper at heart and will use whatever underhanded tactic he needs to capture his prey with as little damage as possible so as to not lower their value.

His favorite targets are the hunters themselves.

Relationships: He's been hunting down Odyssey (XVerse Triage) for the past decade. At first he was simply planning on selling her directly to the mavericks but after so many years of hunting with no success and still having little to no information on her it has grown into a mild obsession. He'll pay a pretty zenny for any information that will lead to her capture.

((Rough armor draft))

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maxrakun · 2 years

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Sam and Kit gives Wally a present back at CLADE HQ, because this man…is just something. Director Scratch gives them permission to let him crash at their place due to “injury”. If you watch “The Good Place”, you’ll get some of the references. It’s on Netflix if you haven’t already checked it out, I highly recommend a watch.

Kit: And we’d like to present you the Agent starter kit!

Sam: *whispers to Kit* Is he gonna like the tea-

Wally: Oh, lookie there! A stress ball with a dumb corporate logo! *Finds the tea* Is this…

Sam: Yep! Chamomile tea accompanied with honey.

Wally: Huh, interesting. *Dumps the entire thing on the table and trick shots it to the recycle bin*

Kit: Damn, this flying squirrel knows how to aim.

Wally: Oh, guys! Look! *Pulls out something* A Director Scratch diet book? Since when did she get into the health industry?

Sam and Kit: I don’t know.

Wally: *Sarcastically* This is all garbage that I have no real use for!

Sam: Uh…

Wally: Kidding! Ha, I wouldn’t depreciate a gift from you two!

Kit: So, you like it-

Wally: Not only like it, I LOVE IT! Hell, this tea should help me energize my body!

Sam: Just be sure to stir it for five minutes!

Wally: Thank you…oh, I should mention that, no I wasn’t a failed DJ, I was pre-successful. Don’t give me that remark, got that?

Kit: Well, that explains the unusual noises in Bill and Jill’s new song. EDM lover, huh?

Wally: More like a rock person, or maybe pop? You know, I’m more like attempting something futile with so much confidence it crashes and burns. Except this time, I went viral! Curse you blessed internet!

Kit: Like Sam’s unmatched intuition?

Sam: *Irritated* Don’t remind me of the times I got flung into the sky!

Wally: Cool your jets, leopard, you didn’t get hurt.

Kit: Anyways, um, I guess you can stay here until…actually why are you crashing at our room?

Wally: No reason, just wanted to hang. Oh, I got a 12 out of 12 on that one quiz about types of plants and their Latin name.

Kit: *Confused* You fucking lied?

Sam: *Awkwardly* …Congrats?

(I swear to fucking god this show somehow took over my brain, and I say, no regrets bitch)

#the creature cases #sam snow #kit casey #wally bunker #netflix #netflix cartoon #headcanon #incorrect quotes fanfiction #incorrect quotes

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marcopollio · 8 months

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Check out this listing I just found on Poshmark: Posh SWAG sweatshirt Poshmark top shirt y2k poshfest poshfixings.

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news4580 · 10 months

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Richard Gere Hugs PM Narendra Modi, Performs Yoga With Him at UN HQ in US; Photos Go Viral

Curated By: Dishya Sharma Last Updated: June 21, 2023, 22:00 IST New York, United States of America (USA) Richard Gere meets PM Modi at UN HQ. (Pic: Reuters/Twitter: ANI) Richard Gere met PM Narendra Modi at the Yoga Day event that took place at the UN HQ. Hollywood actor Richard Gere joined Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Yoga Day Event taking place at the United Nations HQ. The…

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dearsam112 · 1 year

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mariacallous · 1 year

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Twitter has been taken over by its least interesting troll for $44bn. When Elon Musk took a stake in the platform, he claimed it was to ensure the “future of civilisation” and preserve a “common digital town square”. Roughly translated, that means the world’s richest man has bought his favourite megaphone.

Musk, with 112.1 million followers, is an obsessive Twitter tryhard: the attention economy’s biggest attention-seeker. From baselessly calling a British diver a “pedo”, to his baffling stunt at Twitter HQ – turning up with a kitchen sink and uttering the punchline, “let that sink in” – he clearly thinks comedy is his metier. He reminds me of Christopher Hitchens’ barb about an enemy: he “thinks he’s a wit and is half right”.

Musk says that buying Twitter is “not a way to make money”. That’s certainly true. The company struggled for years to make a profit. It makes 90% of its current revenues from advertising to just 217 million “monetisable” users (and illegally using their private data to target ads at them). But this is just a fraction of monthly active users on sites like Facebook (2.8 billion), TikTok (1.2 billion), YouTube (2 billion) and Instagram (1.4 billion).

However, Twitter has been great publicity: not just for Musk’s zeppelin-sized ego, but also for his businesses. Tesla spends next to nothing on advertising, but Musk’s actions generate acres of free coverage.

Like Donald Trump, Musk has a grasp of the potential of Twitter. Its salience has never been due to business success, still less to technology. As editor Nilay Patel points out in an article on The Verge, its success is political. Twitter attracts a disproportionate share of addicted opinion-formers like journalists, politicians, writers and celebrities, the sort of people Musk wants thinking about him.

Yet, in buying his platform, Musk has also bought$13bn of debt. Twitter was previously repaying over $50m a year to its creditors. It will now, according to some analyses, have to find more than $1bn a year to merely pay back the interest. Even if Musk isn’t out to make a profit, he can’t ignore such losses. Stemming the haemorrhage will now be a top priority for him, either by charging users a subscription fee for verified accounts or, more likely since charges might drive away users, cuts.

The notoriously capricious boss had already indicated that before backtracking, he would sack 75% of the workforce to help balance Twitter’s books. But now, having already sacked four of Twitter’s top executives – he allegedly claims to have done so “for cause”, apparently in a bid to avoid tens of millions of dollars in compensation – he is also looking for job cuts across Twitter.

Among the easy cuts for Musk would be staff who enforce measures to restrict disinformation, spamming and abuse. Only illegal speech should be restricted, he says. This position – allegedly that of a “free speech absolutist” – would mean that Twitter, already a frequent alibi of repressive governments, would march in step with those regimes. More free speech for trolls and racists, less free speech for dissidents. But it’s a throwback to the years during which Twitter claimed that the best response to “bad speech” was more speech (meaning, more content to monetise).

For all the talk of a “common digital town square”, Twitter has always thrived on angry disputation driven by news and entertainment. This puts the company in a bind. On the one hand, the relentless nastiness is what makes the system so compulsive: the gut-punch of an insulting, racist or stupid tweet in your feed incites the cathartic banging out of quick, angry replies. Likewise, it has thrived on the emotional contagions that drive the viral spread of far-right disinformation, from Islamic State to QAnon. Without them, Twitter would be more boring than it is. And the advertisers would have a less captive audience.

On the other hand, it has repeatedly lost high-profile users over trolling and disinformation. It has been forced, over the years, to ramp up its moderation efforts and ban high-profile users like Trump who, in 2017, was estimated to bring in $2bn a year for Twitter. Despite such gestures, it has been losing its most active and profitable users, who are losing interest – no doubt in part due to sheer exhaustion – in Twitter beefs over politics and celebrities.

Musk may think he can relight the old fires, but Twitter is not alone in struggling. Facebook user growth in Europe and North America flatlined years ago. Instagram growth is slowing. Average time spent on platforms, after soaring in 2020 due to Covid-19 lockdowns, is likely to slide. All social media platforms, indeed most tech firms, are facing tough times as advertisers slash budgets. Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg has been searching for the next profit model for years: witness his failed cryptocurrency enterprise and his struggling “metaverse” project causing the parent company, Meta, to plummet in stock markets.

The social industry may be approaching a moment of crisis wherein growth, revenue and long-brewing problems of political legitimacy coalesce in favour of a rupture. The industry has already fragmented on the right, as far-right users alienated by the moderation policies of industry giants form their own social media ecologies. But many others have long hankered for an alternative to the exploitative, manipulative and addictive systems designed for the enrichment of billionaires like Zuckerberg, Musk and TikTok boss Zhang Yiming.

The difficulty has not been the absence of open-source alternatives, like Mastodon. Indeed, some Twitter users responded to Musk’s takeover by trying to trigger an exodus to Mastodon. The problem is the “network effect”. The old platforms offer users advantages precisely because of the number of users they have. To make a dent in that would require a migration numbering in more than just thousands.

But we should keep our eyes open. It is just possible that – Musk being Musk – he will do something stupid and offensive enough to catalyse the crisis that at last loosens the grip of the billionaire monopolists.

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