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#facebook year in review
kaldurcalm · 3 months
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My dad's friend died and I need people to understand that sometimes I want to be able to send a message that conveys, like, a medium amount of emotion.
I'm trying to find a sympathy gif to send him and they're all like "my deepest sympathies" "with heartfelt emotion" "when someone becomes a memory they become a treasure" and I need the gif makers to back up two steps and just let me send a flower or something.
Sorry is enough. We're not close enough for all that. Let me have a middle option please.
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junielepost · 2 years
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romy350-romyakari · 1 year
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My sanctuary for random music collection is in shambles 💦
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Or well more like it is in shambles bc I use Android.
Hope they get to sorth it well eventually since I miss some of the tracks on my list.
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eggmeralda · 5 months
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I wish I was able to explain the concept of ruth a lot better bc then I could be like "this is a ruth moment" "progressing onto the next stage of the ruth arc" etc and everyone would know what I mean
#having a week+ long feud with various couriers over a missing john leyton compilation album is a certified ruth moment#i can't explain it but tis#she's so hard to explain she's my oc she's a self insert she's a prophecy she's my future self she's me in the present she's a concept she#she's basically a joke me and my sister had of a 31 year old woman who's someone's weird aunt#but she was based on a pic of me when i was 19. and then we were like that's just me in the future#and we'd say random facts about ruth based on vibes#but then so many of them came true??#a few years ago one of us was like ''i can see ruth becoming really invested in coronation street''#and look where i am now. 28 years deep into it#''ruth definitely fancies some early 60s pop singer and buys all his albums and like. her facebook photo is a pic of them together''#and like. I've never met john leyton and currently don't have any albums bc i'm having drama with royal mail atm but other than that?#''ruth has a youtube channel where she reviews and compares biscuits from different supermarkets'' is the most recent prediction#it's too recent that it is nowhere near happening yet but. it's only a matter of time#also ruth used to have two golden retrievers named lily and jasmine. but it's slowly turning into one cocker spaniel named lilyjasmine#but at this point lily and jasmine are not dogs. they are a concept. a way of life. a vibe#two matching salt and pepper containers. two moths that fly into the house. a pair of flip flops. they are all lily and jasmine#anyway#ramble#ruth vibes
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writingwithcolor · 5 months
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Naming International POC Characters: Do Your Research.
This post is part of a double feature for the same ask. First check out Mod Colette's answer to OP's original question at: A Careful Balance: Portraying a Black Character's Relationship with their Hair. Below are notes on character naming from Mod Rina.
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@writingraccoon said:
My character is black in a dungeons and dragons-like fantasy world. His name is Kazuki Haile (pronounced hay-lee), and his mother is this world's equivalent of Japanese, which is where his first name is from, while his father is this world's equivalent of Ethiopian, which is where his last name is from. He looks much more like his father, and has hair type 4a. [...]
Hold on a sec.
Haile (pronounced hay-lee), [...] [H]is father is this world’s equivalent of Ethiopian, which is where his last name is from. 
OP, where did you get this name? Behindthename.com, perhaps?
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Note how it says, “Submitted names are contributed by users of this website. Check marks indicate the level to which a name has been verified.” Do you see any check marks, OP? 
What language is this, by the way? If we only count official languages, Ethiopia has 5: Afar, Amharic, Oromo, Somali, & Tigrinya. If we count everything native to that region? Over 90 languages. And I haven't even mentioned the dormant/extinct ones. Do you know which language this name comes from? Have you determined Kazuki’s father’s ethnic group, religion, and language(s)? Do you know just how ethnically diverse Ethiopia is? 
~ ~ ~
To All Looking for Character Names on the Internet:
Skip the name aggregators and baby name lists. They often do not cite their sources, even if they’re pulling from credible ones, and often copy each other. 
If you still wish to use a name website, find a second source that isn’t a name website. 
Find at least one real life individual, living or dead, who has this given name or surname. Try Wikipedia’s lists of notable individuals under "List of [ethnicity] people." You can even try searching Facebook! Pay attention to when these people were born for chronological accuracy/believability. 
Make sure you know the language the name comes from, and the ethnicity/culture/religion it’s associated with. 
Make sure you understand the naming practices of that culture—how many names, where they come from, name order, and other conventions. 
Make sure you have the correct pronunciation of the name. Don’t always trust Wikipedia or American pronunciation guides on Youtube. Try to find a native speaker or language lesson source, or review the phonology & orthography and parse out the string one phoneme at a time. 
Suggestions for web sources:
Wikipedia! Look for: “List of [language] [masculine/feminine] given names,” “List of most common [language] family names,” “List of most common surnames in [continent],” and "List of [ethnicity] people."  
Census data! Harder to find due to language barriers & what governments make public, but these can really nail period accuracy. This may sound obvious, but look at the year of the character's birth, not the year your story takes place. 
Forums and Reddit. No really. Multicultural couples and expats will often ask around for what to name their children. There’s also r/namenerds, where so many folks have shared names in their language that they now have “International Name Threads.” These are all great first-hand sources for name connotations—what’s trendy vs. old-fashioned, preppy vs. nerdy, or classic vs. overused vs. obscure. 
~ ~ ~
Luckily for OP, I got very curious and did some research. More on Ethiopian & Eritrean naming, plus mixed/intercultural naming and my recommendations for this character, under the cut. It's really interesting, I promise!
Ethiopian and Eritrean Naming Practices
Haile (IPA: /həjlə/ roughly “hy-luh.” Both a & e are /ə/, a central “uh” sound) is a phrase meaning “power of” in Ge’ez, sometimes known as Classical Ethiopic, which is an extinct/dormant Semitic language that is now used as a liturgical language in Ethiopian churches (think of how Latin & Sanskrit are used today). So it's a religious name, and was likely popularized by the regnal name of the last emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie (“Power of the Trinity”). Ironically, for these reasons it is about as nationalistically “Ethiopian” as a name can get.
Haile is one of the most common “surnames” ever in Ethiopia and Eritrea. Why was that in quotes? Because Ethiopians and Eritreans don’t have surnames. Historically, when they needed to distinguish themselves from others with the same given name, they affixed their father’s given name, and then sometimes their grandfather’s. In modern Ethiopia and Eritrea, their given name is followed by a parent’s (usually father’s) name. First-generation diaspora abroad may solidify this name into a legal “surname” which is then consistently passed down to subsequent generations.
Intercultural Marriages and Naming
This means that Kazuki’s parents will have to figure out if there will be a “surname” going forward, and who it applies to. Your easiest and most likely option is that Kazuki’s dad would have chosen to make his second name (Kazuki’s grandpa’s name) the legal “surname.” The mom would have taken this name upon marriage, and Kazuki would inherit it also. Either moving abroad or the circumstances of the intercultural marriage would have motivated this. Thus “Haile” would be grandpa’s name, and Kazuki wouldn’t be taking his “surname” from his dad. This prevents the mom & Kazuki from having different “surnames.” But you will have to understand and explain where the names came from and the decisions dad made to get there. Otherwise, this will ring culturally hollow and indicate a lack of research.
Typically intercultural parents try to
come up with a first name that is pronounceable in both languages,
go with a name that is the dominant language of where they live, or
compromise and pick one parent’s language, depending on the circumstances.
Option 1 and possibly 3 requires figuring out which language is the father’s first language. Unfortunately, because of the aforementioned national ubiquity of Haile, you will have to start from scratch here and figure out his ethnic group, religion (most are Ethiopian Orthodox and some Sunni Muslim), and language(s). 
But then again, writing these characters knowledgeably and respectfully also requires figuring out that information anyway.
~ ~ ~
Names and naming practices are so, so diverse. Do research into the culture and language before picking a name, and never go with only one source.
~ Mod Rina
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roysexton · 1 year
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New Year’s Resolution … legal marketing edition … #lmamkt
Honored to have my New Year’s resolution included in a feature in Of Counsel Magazine! “Another personal resolution that carries firm-wide repercussions comes from the Detroit offices of the international law firm Clark Hill by marketing director Roy Sexton, who also serves as the 2023 president of the Legal Marketing Association – LMA International. ‘My New Year’s resolution,’ he says, ‘is to…
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rajbanshi-pa · 1 year
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Hasi
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zee-rambles · 1 year
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Lets. D0. This.
(Please note: Post will be updated as I find more resources and think of more strategies)
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(Please do not re-use gif without permission…unless it’s to save Rise…)
Mutant May
YOU can watch Season 1 and Season 2 of RISE right HERE!
So I’ve seen a a lot of people still wondering if Rise of the TMNT can be saved.
There’s is a lot of hope, especially with the boom of fans joining the fandom after the movie dropped last year, people making more art on tumblr, twitter, tik tok, and so on. But also a a lot of doubt, especially after JJ Conway’s post on twitter.
BUT…I still think there is a chance…a GOOD chance. WITH ORIGINAL CAST AND CREW! Why?
We live in the internet. Information is more then easy to get out now thanks to social media. There is all kinds of ways to get the word out to people. Let’s abuse it. 😎
Fans have brought back shows before.
We need a MAJOR push through social media, more fans, more art, it’s up to us…and I think we can do it!
Fans convinced Netflix to bring Sense8 back for a finale
Fans convinced fox to bring back “Futurama” after it was cancelled in 1999.
Hey Arnold got the jungle movie thirteen years after the show was cancelled
Animaniacs got a 3 season revival 22 years after it stopped airing.
Brooklyn 99 was cancelled in 2018, and the fans convinced NBC to pick up the series.
Arrested Development was canceled after 3 seasons, but AFTER it was cancelled, it grew an audience and they made it come back!
Fans saved the original Star Trek in the 60s with letters.
They did it. Why can’t we?
So what can we do?
Well…
1. PETITIONS TO SAVE RISE that we can all sign…
PETITION 1 (The strongest one, but the more petitions signed, the better!)
PETITION 2
PETITION 3
PETITION 4 (save the content that was cut/we missed)
PETITION 5! (Make an ROTTMNT season 3)
2. Pester Nickelodeon and Netflix on social media (THE BIG ONE Y’ALL, THIS IS THE MOST DIRECT AND IMPORTANT)
Be polite, be non-toxic (don’t be rude or mean, the boys would not want that, and the Nick/Netflix won’t listen), but be LOUD, PASSIONATE, AND ANNOYING! Ask for DVDs of the show/movie, and then BUY THOSE DVDs!
MAKE SURE TO ASK FOR THE FULL ORIGINAL CAST AND CREW TO COME BACK, INCLUDING ANDY SARIANO AND ANT WARD.
Sample DM/Letter (but try to come up with your own. Too many repeats and they will ignore it)
“Dear Nickelodeon/Netflix/Viacom, I can’t tell you how much Rise means to me, and I really love that you put the show on air. But it was not fair that the show was cancelled before it got the chance to reach the audience it deserved, only because of a few bad reviews and a lack of advertising. The show is great, there’s tons of fans, tons of art, and people, including me, want so much more! Please bring it back! We want the original crew to come, Flying Bark, for the show to get it’s full second season restored, and it’s five season run like it was originally intended. People hated the 2012 TMNT when it came out, but it got it’s chance and now there are people that love it. Why can’t Rise of the TMNT have the same? It’s clear that the creators love their work and there’s a growing fan base for it. Rise just came out at the wrong time, but it deserves it chance to shine.”
The more personal you made the letter, the more you say what Rise means to you, the better.
As for me? I’m sending them a picture of Pizza Pigeon with the #wewantmoreriseoftheTMNT and #saverottmnt
Request movies/seasons on Netflix.
Ask for Rise Season 2, another season, another movie. Just keep asking!
Nickelodeon’s facebook page (Look, I know that facebook is a relic at this point, but the more people go there and PESTER Nickelodeon, the better!)
Rise’s facebook page
Leave good reviews. Share. Leave TONS of comments
Nickelodeon’s instagram
Nickelodeon’s Twitter page (treat carefully, there be Musks out there…only use if you are over 18)
Nickelodeon’s TikTok
Niceklodeon’s letter inbox
Nickelodeon, 1515 Broadway, New York, NY 10036
Rugrats was brought back because fans bombarded Nickelodeon with letters saying they wanted it back. Might as well cover our bases. This one is a BIG DEAL!
Nickelodeon’s Corporate Number
1-212-846-2543 Call them! Annoy them! Ask how we can get their attention! Tell them why you love this show! Why it deserves to come back.
Contact Paramount
Paramounts Request form
Official Fan Page Rise’s Instagram
The more followers the better.
Netflix’s instagram
Netflix’s facebook
Netflix’s Twitter (Treat carefully. There be MUSKs out there…only use if you are over 18)
SPAM NICKELODEON’S EMAILS!
If anyone has any more, any deeper more direct points of contact, or more ideas, please share!
3. Leave good reviews for Rise anywhere and raise awareness everywhere you can!
One of the key reasons Rise did not do too well because it was unfairly review bombed before people could give it a chance…so get out there on tik tok, IMDB, Rotten Tomatoes, and ESPECIALLY youtube.
Make reviews! Analysis! JOKES! Support other content creators! When the Rise Reanimated video comes out, share it like no tomorrow!
No one paid attention when How to Train Your Dragon came out, but word of mouth and people saying it was good, made it the success it was. Let’s repeat history!
Anytime there is NEW RISE CONTENT on Nickelodeon’s YouTube channel, watch it, share, spread it.
Share this post on social media, across various sites, use the information here to spread awareness about how people can help and what they can do. Be relentless! (Like Leo in Lair Games)
Ask influencers to review, react, and give RISE a chance without placing judgement.
4. Make. ART!
Draw, Write, TWEET, Make MERCH, Sell MERCH, Make Tik Toks, Videos on YouTube, posts on instagram, discord, what pad, demanding more Rise, spreading the word, and just showing how much you love this show! Not only will it attract attention, but it’s also good for all of us. There will be more Rise content either way.
Make sure to @ nickelodeon on ALL of your art! SPAM THEM! ANNOY THEM! DROWN THEM IN LOVE FOR THIS SHOW! Demand DVD’s and Blue rays of the SHOW AND THE MOVIE! It’s not fair that we can’t have access to it!
PLAY THIS GAME!
If you see official Rise MERCH in the while, buy it if you can! Also support as many rise content creators as you can. If you can’t draw? Write! If you can’t create! Like! Share! Comment! Support each other!
Rise April ART Challenge
Keep in mind…there WILL be pushback.
Companies as big as Nickelodeon and Viacom care about their bottom line: $$$…money. BUT pushback, whether they are taking down your videos on Tik Tok, striking artists on twitter, mean that they’re taking NOTICE. So don’t. Give. UP!
One last thing to remember: DO NOT harass fans for enjoying other versions of TMNT
Even though Rise is the first and only TMNT I have ever loved, I don’t believe in shaming other fans for looking forward to, or enjoying other TMNT series. Gatekeeping like that was what stopped Rise from (heh) Rising as high as it should have. All Rise fans are welcome, and all TMNT fans are welcome. Rise deserves to reach more fans, it deserves another season, and it does not need to knock down other TMNT series to do it. Show them your love and your need for more Rise, without making other TMNT fans feel unwelcome.
Share, spread the word, give it your best shot! A village can move MOUNTAINS! SO let’s do it.
So that in the near future…we can MAKE THIS JOKE!
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odinsblog · 1 year
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IN THE FALL OF 2020, GIG WORKERS IN VENEZUELA POSTED A SERIES OF images to online forums where they gathered to talk shop. The photos were mundane, if sometimes intimate, household scenes captured from low angles—including some you really wouldn’t want shared on the Internet.
In one particularly revealing shot, a young woman in a lavender T-shirt sits on the toilet, her shorts pulled down to mid-thigh.
The images were not taken by a person, but by development versions of iRobot’s Roomba J7 series robot vacuum. They were then sent to Scale AI, a startup that contracts workers around the world to label audio, photo, and video data used to train artificial intelligence.
They were the sorts of scenes that internet-connected devices regularly capture and send back to the cloud—though usually with stricter storage and access controls. Yet earlier this year, MIT Technology Review obtained 15 screenshots of these private photos, which had been posted to closed social media groups.
The photos vary in type and in sensitivity. The most intimate image we saw was the series of video stills featuring the young woman on the toilet, her face blocked in the lead image but unobscured in the grainy scroll of shots below. In another image, a boy who appears to be eight or nine years old, and whose face is clearly visible, is sprawled on his stomach across a hallway floor. A triangular flop of hair spills across his forehead as he stares, with apparent amusement, at the object recording him from just below eye level.
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iRobot—the world’s largest vendor of robotic vacuums, which Amazon recently acquired for $1.7 billion in a pending deal—confirmed that these images were captured by its Roombas in 2020.
Ultimately, though, this set of images represents something bigger than any one individual company’s actions. They speak to the widespread, and growing, practice of sharing potentially sensitive data to train algorithms, as well as the surprising, globe-spanning journey that a single image can take—in this case, from homes in North America, Europe, and Asia to the servers of Massachusetts-based iRobot, from there to San Francisco–based Scale AI, and finally to Scale’s contracted data workers around the world (including, in this instance, Venezuelan gig workers who posted the images to private groups on Facebook, Discord, and elsewhere).
Together, the images reveal a whole data supply chain—and new points where personal information could leak out—that few consumers are even aware of.
(continue reading)
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nansheonearth · 9 months
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[Image description: Two smartphone screenshots of a Facebook post by a person named Sheila Toll posted 2 Sep. It is black text on a white background and the post is public. The post reads:
I am a Family Doctor and I want to keep a promise made to a patient. 
Julie was a healthy, post-menopausal woman in my care who came in for a periodic health examination. One of my routine questions, in what is called the “Review of Systems”, was to ask if she had experienced any vaginal bleeding. 
She said “No” but then laughed and added, “Other than when my period came back for a few months last year”. 
All health care professional are taught early on that ‘vaginal bleeding in a post-menopausal woman is Cancer of the Uterus until proven otherwise’. This comment by Julie was, therefore, a red flag (no pun intended) prompting further questions, an examination and an ultrasound of her pelvis. 
Julie was surprised to see me so concerned, especially since the symptoms had not recurred over many months. 
Sure enough, a pelvic ultrasound and tissue sampling confirmed Cancer of the Uterus. 
Julie underwent a hysterectomy and radiation therapy. She is now healthy, cancer-free and is expected to stay that way. 
After all this was done, Julie sat ME down for a talk. She told me she’d had no idea a ‘short return’ of her period after menopause was a danger signal. Furthermore, she addressed the topic with friends over coffee and discovered that, out of 20 women, NONE of them knew this symptom was abnormal! She admonished me to “Tell women this! Don’t assume we know it!”
From that day on, I have kept Julie’s advice in mind when talking with post-menopausal patients. But recently my wife suggested that I should take this to a wider audience. 
So, Julie, this is for you:
If you are a post-menopausal woman and your period ‘comes back’ or you have even one episode of vaginal bleeding, TELL A HEALTH CARE PROFESSIONAL and insist on having it investigated! 
Wishing you all good health and long lives. End image description.]
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ms-demeanor · 7 months
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sex work is work, no problem with that, but spamming sex work absolutely everywhere now is not okay. bot or not, it is not okay to shove your probably fake/stolen tits or ass into everyone's face even where kids are. it is absolutely the lowest, cheapest trash doing that. are these people showing their barely covered up pussy to school kids on the street to maybe get a customer? because they are doing exactly that on the internet. if you cant find customers and need to lower yourself to std ridden junkey trash standards who missed the way and entitled themselves to begging for money outside trash town, zero support from me!
Yeah you really sound like someone who supports sex workers. That's what I always think when I hear people using words like "disease-ridden" and "junkie" - 'wow, that person must be SUCH an ally. braver than any US marine, thank you for your service, person who believes sex work is work but thinks STIs or drug addiction are 'trash'.'
So, point by point:
It's not absolutely everywhere. You don't see people trying to link their onlyfans on facebook most of the time (i've actually never seen it but i could believe it is happening, though it's not common because FB has real-name policies that are unfriendly to sex workers). You're unlikely to see fansly links as sidebar ads on cspan. People aren't linking their pages in the amazon reviews. You're seeing it "everywhere" because you're not going anywhere. Tell me you spend all your time on two to three platforms without telling me you spend all your time on two to three platforms. Instagram, tiktok, twitter, and tumblr are full of people who are promoting all kinds of brands and one of those kinds of brands is sex work.
Those are also all platforms that have age restrictions and behavior standards, and of all of them tumblr is the one that has the history of being the most openly sexual and the least connected to legal identities. People are linking to their diy porn because of the culture of these websites both currently and historically. I once posted a video on this website of me bringing myself to orgasm in a public bathroom stall then inserting a dildo into my vagina before I went on stage and performed a set with my band. I did it for free and for fun five years ago, the week before the porn ban hit.
What I'm saying here is that the culture of this website has a much longer history of openness about sex and sexuality and the visual presentation of sex than it does of being full of people who think teens shouldn't see nipples. This is an *extremely* reasonable place to post information linking to porn that you make and to use cute pictures of yourself to do so.
It's also really easy to tell that these people aren't bots or using stolen images because the whole point of the live platform is that you can click through and go talk to them. Strange Aeons did just that and you can see what happened. (click on that video for a fun cameo at 6:04) Turns out live users are just a bunch of people (not networks stealing images the way that actual porn *bots* on tumblr do) and the ones who are trying to do sex work on the live platform itself get banned.
But also kids too young to see the occasional boob shouldn't be on tumblr! (like, seriously, define kids. what age is too young to see the kinds of images allowed by the tumblr live tos? how about the ones banned by the tumblr live tos? How old should you have to be before someone shows you an ahegao face on a hoodie in public? What should the punishment be for the ahegao fashionistas for exposing six year olds to anime tongues? What should the minimum age be to go on the beach and see men in speedos? Fifteen, or is that still abusive to children? Maybe we should make it twenty to be safe, or better yet why don't we make it twenty AND ban speedos? this is what you sound like, you fucking asshole). Tumblr has age limits and people under that age limit shouldn't be looking at most things on this website. A smiling woman in a bikini top or a dude with his abs out are fucking nothing compared to the kind of damage you personally and specifically are trying to inflict with your shitty ideas.
Posting t&a on tumblr is not at all comparable to doing street level work and soliciting children for a number of reasons, but I'd just like to really take the time to point out that you just compared the profile pics on tumblr live to sexually soliciting a child. You literally did the "x group i hate are pedophiles" thing, which is exactly why it's such a huge problem that any and all types of nudity have been stigmatized online. We have created an entirely new paradigm of "pedophile" that means "existed around a child while wearing tight pants." You are such a fucking clueless, sanctimonious pile of shit that you can't even see that that's what you're doing. This is literally, exactly kink at pride discourse.
And that's even if I grant you that these people are posting t&a! Go look at the live leaderboards, you don't have to accept the ToS to see the leaderboards! We are talking about *at most* saucy pin-up levels of eroticism. I have seen fucking holiday cards with more visible cleavage than any of the top 200 tumblr live streamers right now.
The only thing in your final sentence that makes any sense is that you are positioning tumblr as trash town.
Yeah. I'm actually not at all impressed by tumblr recently and that has a lot more to do with the influx or resurgence of nuance-allergic, anti-sex, whiny shits like you than it does with a banner that i can scroll past in a quarter of a second.
I want people reading this to really, really sit down and think about what they're calling assault or hypersexualiztion or whatever. We are talking about profile pictures. You are so offended by a bar of 4 profile pictures at the top of your dash that you're comparing regular ass humans (some of whom are sex workers and some of whom are just streamers who took thirst trap selfies) to the real life solicitation and abuse of children.
TOUCHING GRASS IS NOT ENOUGH FOR YOU PLEASE GO INTERACT WITH ACTUAL REAL HUMANS WHO DON'T KNOW WHAT DASHCON OR MILKSHAKE DUCK ARE. YOU ARE CRITICALLY INTERNET POISONED AND IF YOU TALKED TO SOMEONE AT THE DMV AND DESCRIBED IT AS ASSAULTING CHILDREN TO HAVE SOMEONE IN A BIKINI ON A BILLBOARD THEY WOULD IMMEDIATELY BEGIN TRYING TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO GET AWAY FROM YOU. THINK OF THIS POST AS THE CARBON MONOXIDE DETECTOR TELLING YOU THAT THE SHADOWS YOU'RE SEEING AREN'T ACTUALLY DEMONS BUT THAT YOU ARE GOING TO REALLY REGRET IT IF YOU DON'T GO OUTSIDE.
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Big Tech disrupted disruption
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/08/permanent-overlords/#republicans-want-to-defund-the-police
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Before "disruption" turned into a punchline, it was a genuinely exciting idea. Using technology, we could connect people to one another and allow them to collaborate, share, and cooperate to make great things happen.
It's easy (and valid) to dismiss the "disruption" of Uber, which "disrupted" taxis and transit by losing $31b worth of Saudi royal money in a bid to collapse the world's rival transportation system, while quietly promising its investors that it would someday have pricing power as a monopoly, and would attain profit through price-gouging and wage-theft.
Uber's disruption story was wreathed in bullshit: lies about the "independence" of its drivers, about the imminence of self-driving taxis, about the impact that replacing buses and subways with millions of circling, empty cars would have on traffic congestion. There were and are plenty of problems with traditional taxis and transit, but Uber magnified these problems, under cover of "disrupting" them away.
But there are other feats of high-tech disruption that were and are genuinely transformative – Wikipedia, GNU/Linux, RSS, and more. These disruptive technologies altered the balance of power between powerful institutions and the businesses, communities and individuals they dominated, in ways that have proven both beneficial and durable.
When we speak of commercial disruption today, we usually mean a tech company disrupting a non-tech company. Tinder disrupts singles bars. Netflix disrupts Blockbuster. Airbnb disrupts Marriott.
But the history of "disruption" features far more examples of tech companies disrupting other tech companies: DEC disrupts IBM. Netscape disrupts Microsoft. Google disrupts Yahoo. Nokia disrupts Kodak, sure – but then Apple disrupts Nokia. It's only natural that the businesses most vulnerable to digital disruption are other digital businesses.
And yet…disruption is nowhere to be seen when it comes to the tech sector itself. Five giant companies have been running the show for more than a decade. A couple of these companies (Apple, Microsoft) are Gen-Xers, having been born in the 70s, then there's a couple of Millennials (Amazon, Google), and that one Gen-Z kid (Facebook). Big Tech shows no sign of being disrupted, despite the continuous enshittification of their core products and services. How can this be? Has Big Tech disrupted disruption itself?
That's the contention of "Coopting Disruption," a new paper from two law profs: Mark Lemley (Stanford) and Matthew Wansley (Yeshiva U):
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4713845
The paper opens with a review of the literature on disruption. Big companies have some major advantages: they've got people and infrastructure they can leverage to bring new products to market more cheaply than startups. They've got existing relationships with suppliers, distributors and customers. People trust them.
Diversified, monopolistic companies are also able to capture "involuntary spillovers": when Google spends money on AI for image recognition, it can improve Google Photos, YouTube, Android, Search, Maps and many other products. A startup with just one product can't capitalize on these spillovers in the same way, so it doesn't have the same incentives to spend big on R&D.
Finally, big companies have access to cheap money. They get better credit terms from lenders, they can float bonds, they can tap the public markets, or just spend their own profits on R&D. They can also afford to take a long view, because they're not tied to VCs whose funds turn over every 5-10 years. Big companies get cheap money, play a long game, pay less to innovate and get more out of innovation.
But those advantages are swamped by the disadvantages of incumbency, all the various curses of bigness. Take Arrow's "replacement effect": new companies that compete with incumbents drive down the incumbents' prices and tempt their customers away. But an incumbent that buys a disruptive new company can just shut it down, and whittle down its ideas to "sustaining innovation" (small improvements to existing products), killing "disruptive innovation" (major changes that make the existing products obsolete).
Arrow's Replacement Effect also comes into play before a new product even exists. An incumbent that allows a rival to do R&D that would eventually disrupt its product is at risk; but if the incumbent buys this pre-product, R&D-heavy startup, it can turn the research to sustaining innovation and defund any disruptive innovation.
Arrow asks us to look at the innovation question from the point of view of the company as a whole. Clayton Christensen's "Innovator's Dilemma" looks at the motivations of individual decision-makers in large, successful companies. These individuals don't want to disrupt their own business, because that will render some part of their own company obsolete (perhaps their own division!). They also don't want to radically change their customers' businesses, because those customers would also face negative effects from disruption.
A startup, by contrast, has no existing successful divisions and no giant customers to safeguard. They have nothing to lose and everything to gain from disruption. Where a large company has no way for individual employees to initiate major changes in corporate strategy, a startup has fewer hops between employees and management. What's more, a startup that rewards an employee's good idea with a stock-grant ties that employee's future finances to the outcome of that idea – while a giant corporation's stock bonuses are only incidentally tied to the ideas of any individual worker.
Big companies are where good ideas go to die. If a big company passes on its employees' cool, disruptive ideas, that's the end of the story for that idea. But even if 100 VCs pass on a startup's cool idea and only one VC funds it, the startup still gets to pursue that idea. In startup land, a good idea gets lots of chances – in a big company, it only gets one.
Given how innately disruptable tech companies are, given how hard it is for big companies to innovate, and given how little innovation we've gotten from Big Tech, how is it that the tech giants haven't been disrupted?
The authors propose a four-step program for the would-be Tech Baron hoping to defend their turf from disruption.
First, gather information about startups that might develop disruptive technologies and steer them away from competing with you, by investing in them or partnering with them.
Second, cut off any would-be competitor's supply of resources they need to develop a disruptive product that challenges your own.
Third, convince the government to pass regulations that big, established companies can comply with but that are business-killing challenges for small competitors.
Finally, buy up any company that resists your steering, succeeds despite your resource war, and escapes the compliance moats of regulation that favors incumbents.
Then: kill those companies.
The authors proceed to show that all four tactics are in play today. Big Tech companies operate their own VC funds, which means they get a look at every promising company in the field, even if they don't want to invest in them. Big Tech companies are also awash in money and their "rival" VCs know it, and so financial VCs and Big Tech collude to fund potential disruptors and then sell them to Big Tech companies as "aqui-hires" that see the disruption neutralized.
On resources, the authors focus on data, and how companies like Facebook have explicit policies of only permitting companies they don't see as potential disruptors to access Facebook data. They reproduce internal Facebook strategy memos that divide potential platform users into "existing competitors, possible future competitors, [or] developers that we have alignment with on business models." These categories allow Facebook to decide which companies are capable of developing disruptive products and which ones aren't. For example, Amazon – which doesn't compete with Facebook – is allowed to access FB data to target shoppers. But Messageme, a startup, was cut off from Facebook as soon as management perceived them as a future rival. Ironically – but unsurprisingly – Facebook spins these policies as pro-privacy, not anti-competitive.
These data policies cast a long shadow. They don't just block existing companies from accessing the data they need to pursue disruptive offerings – they also "send a message" to would-be founders and investors, letting them know that if they try to disrupt a tech giant, they will have their market oxygen cut off before they can draw breath. The only way to build a product that challenges Facebook is as Facebook's partner, under Facebook's direction, with Facebook's veto.
Next, regulation. Starting in 2019, Facebook started publishing full-page newspaper ads calling for regulation. Someone ghost-wrote a Washington Post op-ed under Zuckerberg's byline, arguing the case for more tech regulation. Google, Apple, OpenAI other tech giants have all (selectively) lobbied in favor of many regulations. These rules covered a lot of ground, but they all share a characteristic: complying with them requires huge amounts of money – money that giant tech companies can spare, but potential disruptors lack.
Finally, there's predatory acquisitions. Mark Zuckerberg, working without the benefit of a ghost writer (or in-house counsel to review his statements for actionable intent) has repeatedly confessed to buying companies like Instagram to ensure that they never grow to be competitors. As he told one colleague, "I remember your internal post about how Instagram was our threat and not Google+. You were basically right. The thing about startups though is you can often acquire them.”
All the tech giants are acquisition factories. Every successful Google product, almost without exception, is a product they bought from someone else. By contrast, Google's own internal products typically crash and burn, from G+ to Reader to Google Videos. Apple, meanwhile, buys 90 companies per year – Tim Apple brings home a new company for his shareholders more often than you bring home a bag of groceries for your family. All the Big Tech companies' AI offerings are acquisitions, and Apple has bought more AI companies than any of them.
Big Tech claims to be innovating, but it's really just operationalizing. Any company that threatens to disrupt a tech giant is bought, its products stripped of any really innovative features, and the residue is added to existing products as a "sustaining innovation" – a dot-release feature that has all the innovative disruption of rounding the corners on a new mobile phone.
The authors present three case-studies of tech companies using this four-point strategy to forestall disruption in AI, VR and self-driving cars. I'm not excited about any of these three categories, but it's clear that the tech giants are worried about them, and the authors make a devastating case for these disruptions being disrupted by Big Tech.
What do to about it? If we like (some) disruption, and if Big Tech is enshittifying at speed without facing dethroning-by-disruption, how do we get the dynamism and innovation that gave us the best of tech?
The authors make four suggestions.
First, revive the authorities under existing antitrust law to ban executives from Big Tech companies from serving on the boards of startups. More broadly, kill interlocking boards altogether. Remember, these powers already exist in the lawbooks, so accomplishing this goal means a change in enforcement priorities, not a new act of Congress or rulemaking. What's more, interlocking boards between competing companies are illegal per se, meaning there's no expensive, difficult fact-finding needed to demonstrate that two companies are breaking the law by sharing directors.
Next: create a nondiscrimination policy that requires the largest tech companies that share data with some unaffiliated companies to offer data on the same terms to other companies, except when they are direct competitors. They argue that this rule will keep tech giants from choking off disruptive technologies that make them obsolete (rather than competing with them).
On the subject of regulation and compliance moats, they have less concrete advice. They counsel lawmakers to greet tech giants' demands to be regulated with suspicion, to proceed with caution when they do regulate, and to shape regulation so that it doesn't limit market entry, by keeping in mind the disproportionate burdens regulations put on established giants and small new companies. This is all good advice, but it's more a set of principles than any kind of specific practice, test or procedure.
Finally, they call for increased scrutiny of mergers, including mergers between very large companies and small startups. They argue that existing law (Sec 2 of the Sherman Act and Sec 7 of the Clayton Act) both empower enforcers to block these acquisitions. They admit that the case-law on this is poor, but that just means that enforcers need to start making new case-law.
I like all of these suggestions! We're certainly enjoying a more activist set of regulators, who are more interested in Big Tech, than we've seen in generations.
But they are grossly under-resourced even without giving them additional duties. As Matt Stoller points out, "the DOJ's Antitrust Division has fewer people enforcing anti-monopoly laws in a $24 trillion economy than the Smithsonian Museum has security guards."
https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/congressional-republicans-to-defund
What's more, Republicans are trying to slash their budgets even further. The American conservative movement has finally located a police force they're eager to defund: the corporate police who defend us all from predatory monopolies.
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Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg
CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en
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secondbeatsongs · 2 years
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Hello! I'm Julie from Cariona and I just want to ask if you're interested in doing ads/promotions here on Tumblr? If yes, how much do you charge per reblog?
For proof of legitimate promotions, you can check @catchymemes, @sulfatto, @isnt, and many others.
Website for reference: http://cariona.com Over 200 five star Facebook reviews: https://www.facebook.com/carionaproducts/reviews
Please feel free to respond here or reach out to us on [email protected] for more details! Thank you once again and have a great week!
absolutely fascinating that you decided to send this as an ask, when you also DM'd me. unfortunately, you may realize that this was a mistake - you see, asks can be responded to publicly.
so, allow me to respond:
hi, Julie! I'd never heard about Cariona before, so I decided to go poking around, and I learned something!
well, I learned a few things, actually. from your site, Cariona seems to be a small business that sells reusable menstrual products. and while I will never advertise a product that I haven't used, there's nothing wrong with wanting people to promote your company.
I have, however, found a few problems.
the first thing I found was this post by @crafiet from May 12th of last year, saying that shortly after making a purchase on your website, her debit card info was leaked, and used to make facebook ad purchases.
it seems that at least back then, your payment system was insecure. I'm really hoping you've fixed that, because. yikes.
and when I messaged crafiet to ask if it was okay if I linked to her post, she also mentioned that even though your website says you ship from Georgia, her package came shipped from China, and took a long time to arrive.
that's pretty sketchy.
the next thing I found was some folks talking about receiving cards with their orders that have a QR code on them with the words "Scan For God's Message To You", and that on the other side, have this bible verse:
O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee: my soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is. Psalm 63:1
fun fact! that's from the King James Version (which I have a lot of thoughts about, but I'm not going to get into that right now).
additional fun fact! that particular psalm is from that time David fled to the wilderness because Jonathan's dad was trying to kill him.
and that's why I have to talk about the verses that follow it:
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(ID in alt text; link to the NIV version if you want it)
so...are we like 100% sure it's god that David is thinking about here? because...I mean...that's pretty horny, right? and all of this while on the run from his boyfriend's dad?
I'm not saying anything, but like...¯\_(ツ)_/¯
it's a weird verse to choose for this, that's all.
anyway, back to you, Cariona: after seeing people talking about the bible verse cards, I decided to poke around your website more, and allll the way at the bottom of it, finally found your "About Us" page, which ends with this:
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...look. there's nothing inherently wrong with being christian. but to say "we do not wish to impose any beliefs on our customers", and to then put bible verse cards in people's orders? that's sneaky, and I don't like it.
I also think it's a bit sneaky that you've flagged your tumblr account as pro-trans on shinigami eyes. at least, I assume you flagged it yourselves, because I didn't find a single post on your blog that mentions trans issues.
(though you have, entertainingly, reblogged some stranger things fanart, and a castiel cat cosplay)
and while your website uses very gender-neutral language, your "About Us" page doesn't say anything about being inclusive of trans people, just that you don't "discriminate against anyone who has a different belief than ours."
unfortunately, that's not good enough for me. I have this sneaking suspicion that "trans people are the gender they say they are" counts as a "different belief".
lastly, since you say on your website that people can message you asking about your faith, I had a friend do that!
baptists. you're baptists, which is a pretty conservative denomination.
and according to you, part of that 10% you donate goes to your local churches, and some missionaries. who are also probably baptists.
so.
in the end, I just...don't trust you? I don't trust that the 10% you're donating is going to organizations that aren't homophobic or transphobic. I don't believe that you're not trying to impose your beliefs on others, because that's what you're obviously doing. I mean, your "About Me" says that one of the reasons you built this company is to spread the gospel.
and I especially don't like it that you reached out to me (an openly queer person) for promotion without mentioning that you're an evangelical company.
so to answer your question, Julie: no. I am not interested in doing ads or promotions for you on tumblr. and honestly, you probably picked the wrong website for this kind of thing.
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headspace-hotel · 2 years
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What feels so strange about growing plants, and making friends with plants, and generally being aware of my ecosystem, is that it's not a "head" knowledge, it's a "hands" knowledge.
It feels strange for me, at least. My formative years were spent in a homeschool co-op that was roughly 50% anti-vaxxers, so in spirit, I'm the sort that has yelled "just believe science!" until my throat hurt. I've clung to peer-reviewed papers, as an abstract concept, as the sole beacon of truth in a dark world, and found Facebook groups full of people that thought just like me: if it's not proven, if it's not science, it's false, and science is truth.
There are online communities of people who "believe in science," and t-shirts that affirm the wearer to "believe in science." This is not the worst place you can be, in a world where people believe things like "eating lemons makes your blood more alkaline, which cures cancer" and "polio was renamed to ALS in order to hide the fact that polio vaccines don't work."
However, science is not a doctrine. It's a process. It points to truth, but it doesn't produce truth as an end result. There is no end result. The results are endless, actually.
What word do I use to describe what I've been doing? I'm gardening, sure, but that makes it sound like I do things to plants, when mostly, the plants do things to me. I'm learning about the living things already around me. I've learned to identify so many plants, and I know about what role they serve in the ecosystem.
"Gardening" is a difficult word because it means planting things in the ground and tending to them, but plants plant and tend themselves. So since we have to use the word "gardening," we have to think of plants as either belonging to a garden or not, depending on whether a human put them there. Plants either grow on their own or a human, a "grower," "grows" them. Isn't it weird how that verb is transitive?
However, I understand now that even knowing the name of a plant is, in some way, "gardening" it, because it affects my behavior toward that plant, which is the thing that "gardening" is, just in a different amount.
Humans can transport seeds and plants, supplement nutrients and water, but this is just participation. A gardener doesn't create plants, they help them to grow. So it follows that any act of "helping" is also gardening—thinning out a stand of wild plants, moving a wild plant from one spot to another, choosing not to mow a wild plant down.
I have more of something than I used to. The thing that I have more of now is knowledge, but a lot of this knowledge isn't facts. Ecology is a science. Scientists study ecosystems. It is possible to know facts about ecosystems. But ecosystems are not made of facts.
I know that most people desperately need to know more about the ecosystems around them. They need to know about the plants and trees near them. I think this is literally essential to saving the world as we know it. But they don't need to learn facts—not just facts. They need to learn something Else.
For the past several months, I have been learning things that are not facts. I hesitate to call them skills. But they are like skills. Both gardening and plant identification are impossible to fully teach from a book or a written resource, because you have to know not what something is, but what it is like.
I rely on my senses—feeling the suppleness of a twig, the dampness of potting soil. Identifying plants is so hard starting out because the qualities that identify them best have to be experienced.
Back when I was first learning to identify trees, I discovered that there was a black walnut tree at the end of our road. I was just then entering the extremely frustrating reality of how many plants there are and how few photos of them at all growth stages exist on the internet. I didn't know what a fucking "petiole" was. Leaves all just looked like leaves and I wanted to cry.
But I tore a twig from one of the trees down at the end of the road, and I instantly knew it was a black walnut tree! And I couldn't describe to you how. I caught a whiff of the smell of the crushed leaves, and it pulled up a memory of the walnut trees at the farmhouse when I was a child, dropping their heavy green fruits all over the grass. I'm not even sure how to describe the smell. It's very fresh and spicy, but earthier and less "clear" than the word "fresh" would suggest.
And I identify a lot of plants in ways that you can't just...depict. Alianthus altissima, tree-of-heaven, is hard to draw or photograph in a way that lets you see through the picture what makes it distinctively Alianthus altissima. The best way to identify it is by its odor. Tear off a leafy twig and smell it—it smells exactly like peanut butter and the mustiness of a damp basement.
I am learning things that don't exist in books, that are specific to my immediate surroundings. The specific community of organisms found in my backyard, what they're doing. How my plant and animal neighbors are related, and how their relationships change.
I am learning just how little we know. There are so many plants, so many local plant communities. There are more relationships in an ecosystem than there are scientists that could possibly study them. I look up a question about a particular plant and there's just...nothing.
I have to use my own knowledge, my own observations. I have to do tiny science every day, where Big, Capital S Science can't help me. "Is this non-native plant harmful enough that it is better to get rid of it even if I can't replace it yet, or is it providing enough benefits to other organisms that it is better to let it stay?" Sometimes no website or book or article can answer this. Constantly I encounter this kind of question, and I have to observe and decide myself. I have to trust that I can be taught by my ecosystem, and that this knowledge is, in its own way, valid.
It is uncomfortable to be here. I want to convey my knowledge to others, but it sometimes feels almost pseudoscientific, superstitious. I want to be rational and rely on the experts, and teach other people to do so; I know that what "seems" right often isn't, and that personal observations are flawed, even useless, in many areas. But not only are these fuzzy, instinctual observations sometimes all we have, they are an essential skill that is needed to save our world.
There's also the fact that research doesn't happen fast enough to function all alone as a guide. Invasive species lists on state websites are basically decades out of date and not regionally specific enough. The Callery/Bradford pear tree, bane of my existence, is not "officially" designated an invasive species to my knowledge, and there is relatively little research on its role as an invasive species, but it is declared invasive, primarily by common consensus that it's Satan in tree form. Crowding and shading out other mid-succession shrubs and trees, forming thick, almost monoculture masses of ugly glossy foliage replacing whatever else would have grown there.
And the severe threat of the Bradford pear is specific to my region; its particular severity may be specific down to the square mile of land I live on. Some scientists may be studying it, but they're not studying my state, my county, my neighborhood.
It's insane how many TYPES of forests there are. You would think that within a specific biome and climate, a forest is a forest is a forest, but no. There are a bajillion specific associations of trees with specific relationships that form special ecosystems. It's insane how many types of moth there are, too. And it really blows your mind to look up a moth's host plants and read that we're not really sure of the full range of plants its caterpillars can eat.
You'll be reading something and it will say "We don't know this" but you will know, because you've seen it—and then you think to yourself, well, isn't that what people say about Nessie and Bigfoot and little green aliens? Can we trust what we observe for ourselves? Can we trust people to know what they see?
Maybe not—but we have to.
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gentlebeardsbarngrill · 2 months
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03/01/2024 Daily OFMD Recap
OMG is is already march? Today's a long one yall.
= Cast & Crew Sightings =
= Samba Schutte =
More BTS! The particularly exciting part about this post was Samba's words:
"Last scene of the season, it was a heavy one which required extreme focus and emotion, and I decided to clown around☠️ What were they gonna do, fire me?👀 #readtheroom #ourflagmeansdeath #ofmd #ofmdseason2"
A lot of folks are feeling like there are two important points in this message:
"Last scene of the SEASON" (vs series)
"I decided to clown around"
=Vico Ortiz =
Needed more reasons to love Vico? They're a Good Omens fan as well!
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== Don't Panic! ==
Many of you have probably heard about a lot of Our Flag Means Death Props being sold off at auction. Several crew-mates have made some excellent points as to why not to panic yet. I saw a tweet somewhere and now of COURSE I can't find it, but just a reminder, props are not the SET itself. The Set not being sold off is a huge plus, props come and go.
Thank you to @OFMDBingo42 and @cumulativehchaos for your thoughts and reassurances regarding this!
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And a final note I whole-heartedly agree with from @chaotickraken91
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== New Charity Fundraisers! ==
#WeeJohnWonday Fundraiser
A new fundraiser in aid of @KristianNairn's favorite charity, Team HAVEN Belfast will be going live on Monday, March 4th! If you'd like to see last years documentation/receipts please visit #HonoringKristianNairn Source: @ForceMonument's Twitter
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== Smiles for Samba! ==
It's finally #SmilesForSamba day! Thank you to everyone who contributed to the scrapbook and fundraiser in honor of Samba!
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== Watch Parties and Events ==
== Reminders! ==
Last chance for Season 2! Marathon tomorrow! Saturday 8am CST / 2pm GMT
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= March 2 - Captain's Orders =
Tomorrow is #CaptainsOrders! Our Captain Rhys Darby has said more than once that getting out into nature is so incredibly important and healing. Weather permitting, try to get outside tomorrow even for a little bit and get some fresh air! Src: @rebels_rascal / Graphic by @SharpenYourSword on Twitter
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== #WereWolvesWhen ==
With all the buzz going around regarding "We're Wolves" being scripted finally (from the Wellington Paranormal Podcast). Our Vianton Crew have asked fellow Rhys Darby fans to start spreading the word on "We're Wolves". Wanna help? You can hop onto your favorite social media and share your favorite parts of WWDITS or werewolves in general!
Please use the following hashtag #WereWolvesWhen!
== Save OFMD Crew Updates==
=Transparency Policy=
Clarification edits have been made to the Financial Transparency Policy. The next full review period will start on May 22nd Transparency Policy
= Immoderate Citrus! =
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For National Sunkist Citrus Day, the SaveOFMDCrew wants you to send them all your citrus-related favorite! Reach out on any of their socials: Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Tumblr
= Billboard has been Scheduled! =
The #BeABillboard campaign to SaveOFMD will go live in London's Leicester Square on 11th, 12th, 18th, and 19th of March. Are you in London? Feel free to go check it out!
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== Adopt Our Crew ==
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Today @AdoptOurCrew hosted a These Thems watch party! There was a whole lot of engagement and they were kind enough to share some BTS bits that Vico shared with them! Check them out over on Instagram!
I've posted the images here as well for those of you who don't have access. All photos and posts regarding #TheseThems are courtesy of @adoptourcrew!
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Didn't get to join the Watch Party? Check out These Thems On Youtube!
= More AOC Analytics! =
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= #OurFlagTurns2 Bingo =
Did you know that our friends over at @adoptourcrew are running a Bingo game in celebration of OurFlagMeansDeath turning 2 on Sunday? Give it a whirl if you'd like! Feel free to hop on over to them on Twitter or Instagram and let them know how it's going!
Twitter / Instagram
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== Fan Spotlight! ==
More cards from @melvisik! Thank you for letting us collect them all! Today is Con O'Neill!
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== Dgdd Gwyl Dewi Hapus! (Happy St David's Day!) ==
Happy St David's Day all! Several fans are honoring our lovely David Jenkins on this Welsh holiday! Thank you @wastingyourgum for the dedication and the translation!
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== Articles ==
TV Shows That Were Canceled In 2024
== Love Notes ==
Hey my darlings. As you can tell, today has been a very VERY long day. There is just SO MUCH going on. I don't know about you but it feels like something's building. Maybe it's just til OFMD's 2rd anniversary on Sunday the 3rd, idk, but i've got a good feeling.
Either way though, whatever that hype is, it's so nice to see everyone having fun and engaging so much. You are all so wonderful and deserve to smile and enjoy yourselves.
You are allowed to be loud and excited about things! In fact, please be! It makes us all excited too, and I love "seeing" you smile and in your element.
I'm off to bed, but I'll leave you with @thelatestkate's latest picture that's so very true. You deserve to be considered. You Count. Love you all.
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== Daily Darby / Today's Taika ==
I'm a bit lazy tonight so we're doing a combo, but to be fair it's one of my faves. Gif courtesy of @shegoesbyjoy
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i learned that in 2013, a US company was running a routine security check and noticed that someone had been constantly logging into their system from China. Straight away, the company believed it was hackers and hired Verizon to root out the problem and secure their systems.
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It didn’t take them long to realize it wasn’t hackers, it was actually a US employee of the company who would only be referred to as Bob.
The quiet and unassuming programmer was outsourcing his job to someone in China. Bob hired a programming firm in China to do the work for him and paid them one-fifth of his 6 figure salary.
Over the years, Bob earned the reputation as one of the best developers in the whole building and received outstanding performance reviews for his well-written code.
As they delved deeper into their investigation, they discovered that Bob had a very relaxed workday. Work at 9 am, where he surfed Reddit watching cat videos. Lunch at 11.30 am, and then at 1 pm, he would browse eBay. From 2.30 to 4.30 pm, he was browsing Facebook and LinkedIn. Finally, sending an email to update management before leaving.
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