keris post made me think about how carlos is the thing that grounds cecil but whats the thing that grounds carlos? ive joked about carlos having an identity crisis if his status as a scientist, hero, good neighbor and husband, is being threatened but— hear me out

part of the episode with donnie kevin and charles is charles making it clear that donnie is a part of his life, and therefore he is going to influence it and kevin has to be okay with that in order for them to work…… and thats such a different dynamic to a couple who decide to have a child together after being married, but the point is that children take up space in your life, and they change who you are just be existing….. carlos is no longer just defined by being a scientist, cecil is no longer just defined by being a radio host. they’re parents, fathers. that will always be who they are because this is a choice they have made, and their child will influence their life and choices for the rest of their lives. they can’t run away. they cant move on. they cant go somewhere and decide they like it better (looks at carlos) they cant pretend that their child doesn’t exist to absolve themselves of responsibility (looks at cecils mother😒) so despite the love and care and utter adoration, a child is also a commitment that is to seriously be considered

the adults have all fucked everything up, and they cant see past the despair they’ve been so thoroughly steeped in….. but children are so new to the game, so hopeful, stronger than they realize…… insightful because they’re applying their own logic that is less influenced/curated by the world they’re navigating ( a world, canonically, that is trapped in a time loop where adults literally cant escape the hand they’re been dealt) so what is it time to do? seriously consider the children.

i hope that esteban is the thing that grounds carlos! physically in night vale, but also in who he is as a person, and what he gets up for every single day. Cecil too for that matter— if his station or voice is taken from him— Because how lovely would a story be if it were to be a fathers love of their child trumping all else, for a child’s mere existence and joy and wonder of the world to soothe away the pain of abandonment and loss of direction?

huntokars love of her town became the very thing that destroyed it, but a fathers love for their child can be the very thing to save it!

So I'm currently unemployed because I got fired for taking too much sick leave (it was legally sketchy blah blah blah but in the end I just can't work and take care of myself and investigate my mystery health problems at the same time). So I've been spending more time writing!

I really admire your writing and loved Hunger Pangs. I'm looking forward to the poly elements developing and I'm wondering if you have any advice for writing about poly. I've made one of my projects a snarky take on "write what you know" ... Apparently what I know is southern gothic meets Pacific northwest gothic, chronic illness pandemic surrealism, and falling back-asswards into threesomes.

I know this is a very open-ended question and I don't expect an answer, I'm just curious about it if you have the energy. As a writer, trying to write honestly / realistically about polyamory/enm, I'm curious if you have any thoughts on what's different about portraying monogamy or nonmonogamy in books, romance or erotica or otherwise.

I'm trying to read examples but it's hard to find examples that fit the niche I'm looking at. Excuse me if this question is nonsense, it's the cluster headaches.

I'm sorry to hear you've been dealing with all that and solidarity on the cluster headaches. But I'm glad you're finding an outlet through writing! And I hope you're happy with an open-ended ramble in response because oh boy, there's a lot I could talk about and I could probably do a better job of answering this sort of thing with more specific questions, but let's see where we end up.

There's definitely a big difference between writing polyamory/ENM (ethical non-monogamy) and what people often expect from monogamous love stories.

Just even from a purely sales and marketing standpoint, the moment you write anything polyamorous (or even just straight up LGBTQIA+ without the ENM) you're going to get considered closer to being erotica/obscene than hetero romances. It's an unfair bias, but it's one that exists in our society. But also the Amazon algorithm and their shitty, shitty human censors. Especially the ones that work the weekends. (Talking to you, Carlos 🖕.)

So not only do you start out hyper-aware that you're writing something that is highly stigmatized or fetishized (at least I'm hyper-aware) but that you are also writing for a niche market that is starving for positive content because the content that exists is either limited, not what they want, or is problematic in some fashion i.e. highly stigmatized or fetishy. And even then, the wants, desires, and expectations of the community you're writing for are complex and wildly varied and hard to fit into an easy formula.

When writing monogamous love stories, there is a set expectation that’s really hard to fuck up once you know it. X person meets Y. Attraction happens, followed by some sort of minor conflict/resolution. Other plot may happen. A greater catalyst involving personal growth for both parties (hopefully) happens. Follow the equation to its ultimate resolution and achieve Happily Ever After. 

But writing ENM is... a lot more difficult, if only because of the pure scope of possibilities. You could try to follow the same equation and shove three (or more) people into it, but it rarely works well. Usually because if you’re doing it right, you won’t have enough room in a single character arc to allow for enough growth, and if ENM requires anything in abundance, it’s room to grow.

And this post is huge so I’m going to put the rest under a cut :)

There's also a common refrain in certain online polyam/ENM circles that triads and throuples are overrepresented in media and they may be right to some extent. Personally, I believe the issue isn't that triads and throuples are overrepresented, but that there is such minuscule positive rep of ethical non-monogamy in general, that the few tiny instances we have of triads in media make it seem like it's "everywhere" when in actuality, it's still quite rare and the media we do have often veers into Unicorn Hunter fetish porn. Which is its own problematic thing. And just to be clear, I’m not including this part to dissuade you from writing "falling back-asswards into threesomes." If anything, I need more of it and would hook it directly into my brain if I could. I'm just throwing it out there into the void in the hope that someone will take the thought and run with it, lol.

I’d love to see more polyfidelitous rep in fiction, just as much as I’d like to see more relationship anarchy too. More diversity in fiction is always good.

Another thing that differs in writing ENM romance vs conventional monogamy is the feeling like you need to justify yourself. There's a lot of pressure to be as healthy and non-problematic as possible because you are being held to a higher standard of criticism. Both from people from without the ENM communities, and from the people within. Granted, some people don't give a shit and just want to read some fantastic porn (valid) but there are those who will cheerfully read Fifty Shades of Bullshit and call it "spicy" and "romantic," then turn around and call the most tooth-rottingly-sweet-fluff about a queer platonic polycule heresy. That's just the way the world works.

(Pro-tip for author life in general: never read your own reviews; that way madness lies. I glimpsed one the other day that tagged Hunger Pangs as “ethical cheating” and just about had an aneurism.)

And while that feeling of needing to justify yourself comes from a valid place of being excluded from the table of socially accepted norms, it can also be to the detriment of both the story and the subject matter at hand. I've seen some authors bend so far over backward to avoid being problematic in their portrayal of ENM, they end up being problematic for entirely different reasons. Usually because they give such a skewed, rose-tinted perspective of how things work, it ends up coming off as well... a bit culty and obnoxious tbh.

“Look how enlightened we are, freed from the trappings of monogamy and jealousy! We’re all so honest and perfect and happy!”

Yeah, uhu, sure Jan. Except here’s the thing, not all jealousy is bad. How you act on it can be, but jealousy itself is an important tool in the junk drawer that is the range of human emotion. It can clue us in to when we’re feeling sad or neglected, which in turn means we should figure out why we’re feeling those things. Sometimes it’s because brains are just like that and anxiety is a thing. Other times it’s because our needs are actually being neglected and we are in an unhealthy situation we need to remedy. You gotta put the work in to figure it out. Which is the same as any style of relationship, whether it’s mono, polyam or whatever flavor of ENM you subscribe to* And sometimes you just gotta be messy, because that’s how humans are. Being afraid to show that mess makes it a dishonest portrayal, and it also robs you of some great cannon fodder for character development.

Which brings me in a roundabout way to my current pet peeve in how certain writers take monogamous ideals and apply them to ENM, sometimes without even realizing it. The “Find the Right Person and Settle Down” trope.

Often, in this case, ENM or polyamory is treated as a phase. Something you mature out of with age or until you meet “The One(tm).” This is, of course, an attempt to follow the mono style formula expected in most romances. And while it might appeal to many readers, it’s uh, actually quite insulting. 

To give an example, I am currently seeing this a lot in the Witcher fandom. 

Fanon Netflix!Jaskier is everyone's favorite ethical slut until he meets Geralt then woops, wouldn’t you know, he just needed to find The One(tm). Suddenly, all his other sexual and romantic exploits or attractions mean nothing to him. Let's watch as he throws away a core aspect of his personality in favor of a man. 

Yeah... that sure showed those societal norms... 

If I were being generous, I’d say it’s a poor attempt at showing New Relationship Euphoria and how wrapped up people can become in new relationships. But honestly, it’s monogamous bias eking its way in to validate how special and unique the relationship is. Because sometimes people really can’t think of any other way to show how important and valid a relationship is without defining it in terms of exclusivity. Which is a fundamental misunderstanding of how ENM works for a lot of people and invalidates a lot of loving, serious and long-term relationships.

This is not to say that some polyam/poly-leaning people can't be happy in monogamous relationships! I am! (I consider myself ambiamorous. I'm happy with either monogamy or polyamory, it really just depends on the relationship(s) I’m in.) But I also don't regard my relationship with a mono partner as "settling down" or "growing up." It's just a choice I made to be with a person I love, and it's a valid one. Just like choosing to never close yourself off to multiple relationships is valid. And I wish more people realized that, or rather, I wish the people writing these things knew that :P

Anyway, I think I’ve rambled enough. I hope this collection of incoherent thoughts actually makes some sense and might be useful. 

----

*A good resource book that doesn't pull any punches in this regard is Polysecure by Jessica Fern. It's a wonderfully insightful read that explores the messier side of consensual non-monogamy, especially with how it can be affected by trauma or inter-relationship conflicts. But it also shows how to take better steps toward healthy, ethical non-monogamy (a far better job than More Than Two**) and conflict resolution, making it a valuable resource both for someone who is a part of this relationship style***, but also for writers on the outside looking in who might have a very simple or misguided idea of what conflict within polyam/ENM relationships might look like, vs traditional monogamous ones.

** The author of More Than Two has been accused of multiple accounts of abuse within the polyamorous community, with many of his coauthors having spoken out about the gaslighting and emotional and psychological damage they experienced while in a relationship with him. A lot of their stories are documented here: https://www.itrippedonthepolystair.com/ (warning: it is not light material and deals with issues of abuse, gaslighting, and a whole other plethora of Yikes.) While some people still find More Than Two helpful reading, there are now, thankfully, much, much better resources out there.

*** Some people consider polyam/ENM to be part of their identity or orientation, while others view it as a relationship style.It largely depends on the individual. 

Armada Review episode 9-13

I am putting the read more so that you do not have to read all of this if you do not want to. This is a review for episodes 9-13  season 1 and again, a reminder, these are my thoughts, if you don’t agree with what I have to say that fine but please respect my thought and opinions on what I think about the serious.

Okay so we at the end of this season which mean will be going into season 2 and oh boy I am hipped because that things started to fall into place and kinda where I watch the serious more. But where not here to talk about season 2 and we not here to talk about season 1 as a whole, that in another post which here is the link if you want to read the summer of my review for the whole season as a whole and what I think was good, what need to be fix and what things really made it good or bad.

Anyway, so here the review for 9-13 starting with.

season 1 episode 9 Confrontation:

Okay, so this is the episode that come back from a previous episode of which was call Carnival, and if you read my review on that episode that was the episode that was just not a good episode in my opinion. So you think I would hate this episode too. No, it not that bad and in fact it make more of a point of why that episode was pointless. So it pick up with the bullies Billy and Fred, talking about seeing the Autobots and them talking about how they might be evil or not good, and them saying some thing about them being from the future. Which just made me laugh and insert joke here: 

I know I’m a nerd.

But it was mostly them talking about what happen and how no one, saw anything that day. Even thought I call bull shit on that, but still the bullies see are young main children hero heading to the Autobot base and try to follow them, before all of the kids are confuted with Cyclonus, who kidnaps the the bullies, which turn make the Autobot have to go and get them, they ask for the min cons they say no, they fight. Which end up with the other main kids and bullies getting taken hoisted by Megatron, which in turn force them to have to give up there min cons to save the kids, however Rad is able to use Laserbake to shock Megatron into drop the other kids expect himself, which then Fred, fight back with Laserbeak and even ask Megatron min con why they can’t be friends which stunts him because I guess he never thought about that? And then it end with Hotshot kick Fred out of Megatron hand saving him and having the Depections retreat. Fred and Billy are welcome into the team, even thought they are later not show in this season expect till the last of this season episode 13 Swoop. 

So overall this episode has some pro and cons to it. The pros, I like that they show that this kid can get kidnap by the Depections and that even thought technically Fred and Billy are not on the Autobot team or with the other kids Optimus still calls them his kids and want to project them and the Autobots care about them too. I also thought it was interesting about Fred talking to the Megatron min con not only is that brave to do but this could have gone into a very interesting scenario, does the min con really follow Megatron because it wants too or does it do it out of fear, which you could say he does do it out of fear but he almost seem like he could have made a choose to not listen to Megatron. 

Which if they had gone that route, rather then having Fred get upset and leave, I think it would have been interesting to see what Megatron does and how he act to a min con not listening or obeying him. He already wanting more power and to control the min con, to just have one not obey him, would have show us that the min con have in fact choose and even could have show what Megatron would do to a min con who didn’t listen to him. They could have even gotten dark and crush the min con and that would have made interesting impact to the serious. 

However, they didn’t do that but if they had, I think it would be just amazing to see them dare to do something like that to a min con during the first season. I mean we do see him later in this season forcing a min con to wake up, but to see him kill one would just be interesting. 

So the cons, this episode had too many back and for, kids are kidnap, then they are not, and then they are again. They don’t fight for every long and I feel like the other kids were a little to mean to Fred and Billy in the began when Alexia ask if they were going to join them and they laugh it off as if they are not important. I am summing they are for jokes. But honestly, I think if any character should be treat with more repeat it Fred, he always the butt of the joke about bring fat but he really has a good heart and I just feel bad that he treat so wrong. Maybe that why I somewhat like this episode but at the same time didn’t think this is one you need to see. The only reason to see it would be because you would need to know why Fred and Billy are know part of the Autobot team. Other then that it an episode you could skip. 

The next episode however, oh boy here we go!! 

Season 1 Episode 10 Underground: 

Oh my god, this was the episode that I love the most only because of one reason and one reason only. It gave us Smokescreen!!

No, no, not that Smokescreen, that from Prime.

Yes!! This beautiful old guy that I like to call grandpa of the team and you can not tell me otherwise. That what he is to me and always will be! He is the wonderful commandment of Kup and Ratchet or any older mech from the transformers serious and I just love him so much! 

But I getting off track, so this episode is about there being a min con in the city subway, the Autobot, children and Depiction are looking for the min con down in the subways. The children fine the min con on their own, are attacked by the min con that the Depiction told to search by themself because they can’t really transformer down in the subway like the Autobots can. 

The children run from the min con and some mysterious robot, that they children think it might be a Depiction when it only are good old friend Smokescreen who come to save the children from the Depiction who tried to kill them to get the min con, which cause them to get buried by rocks, Cyclonus get his first min con which is somewhat strong but isn’t really that as strong as Starscream. They retried and the Autobot go to save the kids only to see there good old friend Smokesceen has project the children and has finally reunited with the Autobot after he got separated from them when they first when to come down to earth and is know part of the Autobot team!

This episode start off a bit slow but it is worth it at the end to fine out that we get a new Autobot join the team, and this is where the serious become really inserting because of reason I will later talk about in other season to come as why this become inserting and make the show really good.

 For know Smokesceen off the bat, has this old man, won’t take shit from anyone, and is a really close friend to everyone, he also a very good fighter and I just love his voice, it the type of voice that sound very kick ass old man voice that you get from a lot of characters in show. It just a good voice that fix the character so well. I just loved how he fight with his hook and he just is overall a good interaction to talk about other Autobot past as well as being helpful for in the next episodes with fighting the Depiction because they are know out number with this new addition to the team.  So I do recommend this episode just because it bring in a very cool and wonderful character to the mix!

The next episode is season 1 episode 11 Ruin

This episode was really interesting and began to bring up a lot of question which I loved so much!

So the Autobots get this messaged from a hologram of a girl from a ancient city that has sank along time ago. They messaged at the began is asking for help, they go down to the city and are right way having to fight the Depection while Optimus who has the children, get shot at and has to quickly bring them into the city before he leave to fight the Depection while the chidren have to go into the city because they have to look for the min con. While they are there, they fine out the truth of why their city was sank to the ground and discover a truth about how powerful the min con are especially the min cons that form the Star Saber and how dangerous it is for them to be in the wrong hands.

 The Depection get one of the min con that forms the Star Saber and The city falls and get distorted and leave Carlos heart broken about not being able to save the pretty hologram girl who he was very much wanting to save her image and help her from being erased, which then Rad comforts him and tell him that he might see her again some day. 

So, first I just want to point out this, I was looking at the wiki for Carlos and the first thing it has on there for an instruction to him is this: 

If you having a hard time reading it, I’ll just get you to the point you to the words that is very cringe and focus on this pacific episode. “Fantasizes about holographic dead girls” no joke, that is what it say! 

It blow my mind that is the instruction to Carlos in the wiki has for poor Carlos and I want to defined him on this because this is a bad instruction to a character that isn’t really that bad. First it is only one girl not girls! He not think about hologram girl all the time, just one.

Second Carlos, just is a kind and caring person who just wanted to keep her image alive. He wasn’t fantasying about her because he thought she was beautiful, even thought she is and he did like her look. I think there was more to it then just that. He wanted to save her from being erase and forgot by time.  He wanted to make her last moments not so sad and painful, even if she not real and is only a hologram. Yes, this serious can be corny and silly, but Carlos, just care about her and want to saver her that it.

Other then that this episode was good, and it help bring around the idea about maybe no one should be controlling the min cons and that there might be more to the story then what the children or audience know. We can’t just assume that what the Autobot are doing better then what the Depection are doing. Yes, they wear the end and purple badges but there more to it then just that and this episode and the next one, it wonderful bring that up and make you question what they are doing.

With that said in the next episode Season 1 episode 12 Prehistory

In this episode Rad start question the Autobot about why they need the min cons. He ask why they can’t just stop fighting and why do the Autobot get to make the choose and not the min cons. Which then Optimus Prime, start talking about the history of their war, about foreshadowing a big mystery about the min cons that they just came out of the blue and that they where very strong and where stared to be use by the Depections and other to fight in the war. He talk about sending them away, and later in the show, they another signal for a min con which is most like the Star Saber that has been foreshadowing for some time again and they go to get it off of an amusement park that as a volcano that is active and is going off. The Depection and Autobot start fight, the children hide with the autobot min cons, until the see the min con in the volcano and the min cons that are working with the Autobot finally start help and make the Rad see that the min cons do in fact have a choose to fight with the Autobot or not. 

After a while they are able to get the min con and finally are able to convents the children to keep believing in them and trusting what they are doing is right.

This episode brought a lot of question and also made me think about things. On one hand, yes what the Autobot are doing is right, they trying to save the min cons from going into the wrong hands, but also at the same time the problem raise with them want to use them to project them, and yes, the min cons that are working with the Autobots do want to help but it does set up a lot of question if what they are doing is right and if when everything is over, will thing be change or will they turn on the min cons. 

It really make you think with both of these episode together about if the Autobots are really good or not, and why they are still fight for so long before the min cons came into being, they say the Deceptions were righting to gain power, but because I have read mtmte and other comics it make me think that maybe Optimus is somewhat make the story a bit more different then it really is, honestly I think the Depections want to be treat equality and the Autbots didn’t want that again we don’t get the side of the story from the Depections and even if we did we wouldn’t be sure if we could turn Megatron to tell the story correctly or not, maybe Starscream would but it bring up a question about trust in story and what other say. This episode is really intresting and I love to know what you think, do you think Optimus might have been elaborating the story a bit or do you think he was being honest?

Finally we get to the last episode of the season and the one of most turning point of the serious. 

Season 1 episode 13 Swoop

In this episode the Depection figure out a way to brake into the base and try to steal the two min cons that make the Star Saber, the Autobot try to project them with there base, meanwhile Fred and Billy get caught up in all of this when there being show around which cause the Autobots to lower there defeats because they have to project the kids from getting hurt, the other Alexia, Carros and Rad go to save Fred and Billy from getting hurt and are even able to trick Cyclonus in a very claver way. Which then the Autobot have to face off with each Depection to get them either trap, hurt or even both, to keep them from getting the min cons.

However, Megatron is able to make them form into the Star Saber but luckily Hotshot is able to not only use the min cons but also us it to damaged Megatron a little bit before he retires and the Autobot know have the powerful Star saber which is given to Hotshot to use to fight the Depections. Megatron scream that he will get them next time you know team rocket style and that is the end of the season!! 

So with this episode how did I feel well. 

It was okay! It wasn’t as good as the other once before it, but for the finally, it was a good episode to end on. It show the Autbots how they would handle if the Depections did brake into their base. How each one use there strangest and teamwork to keep everyone safe. Even the kids thought of a great idea that was very good way to get ride one of the Depections. Optimus and Megatron had a good fight and I thought it was great that Optimus didn’t get the Star Saber and Hotshot was the one to use it because he was able to use his skill and the in encouraging of the kids to fight Megatron. I also thought it was so cool to see Megatron antler be cut off like that showing how strong that sword is and how embarrassing that has to be get his ass kick not by Optimus but by young Hotshot. So overall this is a good episode to end the serious and wrap up everything nice for the most part and really hypes you up for the next season.  

So, I do recommend this episodes the biggest one I think not to miss are the episode 10-13 just because they bring the whole serious together and it just a lot of fun. The animation is good in this episode too, even thought there are some funny moment with the animation but mostly there really well draw and the music is good too. Overall yeah, I say go watch this episode sometime soon because there worth watch them and I had a lot of fun rewatching this episode. It brought me back to my childhood and why I love Transformers so much. 

Three Minutes to Eternity: My ESC 250 (#230-221)

#230: Dschinghis Khan -- Dschinghis Khan (Germany 1979)

"Die Hufe ihrer Pferde, die peitschten im Sand Sie trugen Angst und Schrecken in jedes Land Und weder Blitz noch Donner hielt sie auf"

"The hoofs of their horses, they lashed in the sand They carried fear and horror in every country And neither flash nor thunder stopped them"

One of my favorite songs to jam to is Boney M's "Rasputin". A disco-influenced song about the life of "Russia's greatest love machine", it's energetic while telling that of a myth. I mention this because Dschinghis Khan is compared to this often, in all the ways.

Only this time, it's about the great conqueror Chinghis Khan, who took over the whole universe (and lasted for a very long time). From how he struck fear across the steppe to fathering seven children in one night, he is seen as the embodiment of masculinity.

While entertaining, sometimes I'm put off by the gimmickry. It can be argued that it wouldn't age that well today, because it can be seen as culturally appropriative or mocking Mongolian culture. But for what it's worth, it's enjoyable and still a classic today.

Personal and actual ranking: 4th/19 in Jerusalem

#229: Louisa Baïleche -- Monts et Merveilles (France 2003)

“Oh, mon amour Où es-tu, mon amour?” “Oh, my love Where are you, my love?”

A definite case of love at first listen for me—Monts et Merveilles is a calming ballad, albeit with sad lyrics about the end of a relationship. The instrumentation is quite nice; it reminds me of songs that stood out on the charts during that time. It also had the "ethnic style" percussion in the bridge, which made me think that France Televisions wanted to mix what worked in the last two years (ballads) with the ethnic sounds from the 1990s (as Louisa is half Kablye, an Algerian ethnic group)

Despite it, it got a pretty low result—though it may be because 2003 was a stronger year songwise compared to the two years that came before it. Or it maybe because of the hair getting into her face that took away from the experience...

Personal ranking: 5th/26 Actual ranking: 18th/26 in Riga

#228: Hakol Over Habibi -- Halayla (Israel 1981)

"הלילה, הלילה, יהיה זה הלילה נאמר דברים שלא אמרנו מעולם"

"Tonight, tonight, it will be the night We’ll say things we’ve never said before"

On a random note, whenever I would search up Idan Raichel's "Hakol Over", Hakol Over Habibi would be one of the first search items that pop up. I would completely ignore it until now, when they actually participated in Eurovision!

That said, Halayla is very groovy song which plays with the disco vibe of the 1970s and the highly energetic choreography that would define 1980s Israeli Eurovision entries. The instrumentation is quite awesome, with the mix of piano, strings, and I think accordion setting up the vibe. (And it switches well from minor to major and back again , which can go awry when done wrong).

The members seem to have a ball on stage, and Kikki looks beautiful in her dress, which was fitted that way because she was pregnant at the time!

Personal ranking: 5th/20 (though it jumps around often...) Actual ranking: 7th/20 in Dublin

#227: Wind -- Laß die Sonne in dein Herz (Germany 1987)

"Manchmal bist du traurig und weißt nicht warum Tausend kleine Kleinigkeiten machen dich ganz stumm Du hast fast vergessen wie das ist, ein Mensch zu sein Doch du bist nicht allein"

"Sometimes you feel sad and you don’t know why Thousands of little reasons are making you dumb You nearly forgot what it’s like to be a human being But you are not alone"

Wind has the interesting distinction of participating three times and coming in second twice out of those three. The first one, "Fur Alle" was seen as such as a big contender that there were bets made against it winning. And then it didn't.

Laß die Sonne in dein Herz didn't come that close to winning in 1987, but I can argue it's the better song of the the three.

It catches you right away with the reggae influences, which creates a relaxed vibe throughout the song. It builds up well with every key change--it does get repetitive at times (especially with the choruses), but never boring. And while it shares a similar theme to Fur Alle, it doesn't come off as either derivative or charitys-single like.

(That said, I did grow to like Fur Alle eventually, but this one was more instantaneous.)

Personal ranking: 7th/22 Actual ranking: 2nd/22 in Brussels

#226: Charlotte Perrelli -- Hero (Sweden 2008)

“This is a story of love and compassion Only heroes can tell.”

The better Charlotte song, in my opinion. The song she won with, “Take Me to Your Heaven” is a complete vintage track, almost influenced by ABBA-nostalgia going on at the time. “Hero” , while still on the same schlager vein, modernizes the production a little bit, to the point I imagine it would be a good pop song of that era.

Alongside that, Hero has some compelling lyrics, one which could summarize the hero's journey in general. I wouldn't be surprised if somebody were to write a Eurovision jukebox musical, they would use this in some format.

That may be the case on why l like it better, but it could also be because it should’ve done better in the contest. The fact the jury wildcard saved Charlotte is a reason why they're around, but the fact there was a wildcard which kicked out the actual tenth placer (North Macedonia's Let Me Love You) could be totally flawed too.

Personal ranking: 6th/43 Actual ranking: =18th/25 (with France) in Belgrade

#225: Carlos Paião -- Playback (Portugal 1981)

“Podes não saber cantar nem sequer assobiar, Com certeza que não vais desafinar, Em play-back, em play-back, em play-back,”

“Maybe you don't know how to sing or even how to whistle But you won't sing out of tune for sure, In playback, in playback, in playback”

This is so modern and infectious it’s unbelievable. From the introduction to Carlos’ biting lyrics to the choreography, it makes one wonder why it got neglected in the voting. 1981 was a strong year, sure, but this song is definitely one of the best of that field.

Playback, as the title suggests, is about the pervasiveness of lip-synching in the music industry. One day, nobody will have to learn how to sing because the playback will save them. They can all focus on the performance without taking note of the song.

It's eerily relevant to Eurovision today, considering we don't use live music anymore and backing vocals can be mimed. I have mixed feelings about the latter, because one side argues it allows different genres of music to appear, but the other argues it reduces artistic credibility. I prefer having live vocals; if a delegation wants to use them on the track (e.g. looping), it should be on a case-by-case basis.

Maybe that's why it somehow made the ESC250 the last two years...

Personal ranking: 4th/20 Actual ranking: =18th/20 (with Turkey) in Dublin

#224: Emma -- La mia città (Italy 2014)

“E dimmi se c’è davvero una meta O dovrò correre per la felicità”

“And tell me if there really is a destination Or I have to run for happiness”

The black sheep of Italy’s post-comeback output, and coincidentally the only song completely chosen internally. That being said, La mia citta is still a good song, and for me it’s better than some of the fan-favorites out there.

Admittedly, I prefer the punchy verses to the chorus, with the latter reminding me of something out of P!nk's discography, but I revel on Emma’s energy and her letter to the city of Rome. We have struggles about the place we are from, but still try to sing its praises when we can!

The staging was a bit tacky at times, but I did like the aesthetics of it—particularly her laurel wreath. Her costume had a good concept also, but is also overdone it in terms of the bejeweled top.

(As for the Sanremo winner that year, Contravento, it feels like a bit of a grower. The clarinet intro really takes one in, but there has to be a whimsical, sweet staging to accompany the hopeful song. Had they done so, a left-side finish would've waited for them)

Personal ranking: 6th/37 Actual ranking: 21st/26 in Copenhagen

#223: Brigitta -- Open Your Heart (Iceland 2003)

“Everything you share with me Turns a little darkness into light And that is how we’re meant to be Truth will keep the light shining brighter”

Also known as, the woman who originally came from Husavik! The difference is that Birgitta was the lead singer of the group Irafar. Open Your Heart reminds me of songs that end up on DCOM (Disney Channel Original Movie) soundtracks—it can actually work in the end, but also in the beginning to introduce the characters and/or their circumstances. The random running order really helped it with being first, haha! Beyond that, it's an optimistic song, helped with the guitar influences which ground it in the era. Plus, the production and lyrics add to this feel, encouraging even the shiest to open up their feelings. Also, I like the flowery aesthetic that Birgitta has, from one in her hair to the larger one (which I think is real?) on her microphone. Personal ranking: 4th/26 Actual ranking: 8th/26 in Riga

#222: Tomas Ledlin -- Just nu! (Sweden 1980)

“Han vill dra iväg, kanske ner till Paris Och hitta äventyret på något vis Inte sitta här på stans konditori Och låta tankarna, bara fladdra förbi” “He wants to go away, perhaps down to Paris And find adventure somehow And not just sitting here at the local café Just letting the thoughts flutter by” The 1980s saw the genre New Wave come to vogue, and Just Nu was a valiant attempt on the genre, especially considering the direction Eurovision would go later. From the opening notes, I got the punkish notes from the instrumentation, and the lyrics definitely add to the feeling of being free from societal expectations, crying out "right now"! (which is funny, because I learned Romanian at one point and nu means no in the language. So I keep thinking it's "just no!" against conformity) Tomas also shows quite the attitude on stage--he just struts into the stage with a boyish charm and kickstarts the song. With his looks and usage of the microphone stand, he portrays this rebellious character well, though the orchestration could’ve been improved with the strings and flute. Personal ranking: 2nd/19 Actual ranking: 10th/19 in Den Haag

#221: Lea Sirk -- Hvala, ne! (Slovenia 2018)

“Moje ime je Lea in/Za vas imam nov lik!” “My name is Lea/ And I have a new character for you!”

I love the opening lines for this song—it immediately sets the tone and has a strong statement alongside it. She's Lea, and she won't let anything down on She asserts that she can’t be sold out, and has a great attitude to accompany the trap beat, which reminds me of a K-pop song for some reason. The staging fits the song to a T--though it didn't need any changes from the NF, haha. As for the fake break, I don't have any strong opinions on it, but it definitely kept up interest for the song. A nicer touch was the Portuguese line in the end. Either way, it was a surprise qualifier in its semi that year, and it was one surprise that I greatly welcomed. Hvala da!

Personal ranking: 8th/43 Actual ranking: 22nd/26 GF in Lisbon

“Where do you come from, where do you go?  What is your scene, baby, we just gotta know!”

I said I was gonna make an appreciation post for Yvonne Craig’s ’66 Batgirl, so… here she is, Barbara Gordon, that Dominoed Dare-Doll out to strike at the heart of crime!

The network wanted to introduce Barbara Gordon to the show almost immediately after her “Million-Dollar Debut” in the comics, and being renewed for a third season gave them the perfect opportunity.  After airing a short presentation to introduce the character, featuring Babs in a much pointier mask fighting off Killer Moth and his goons, they were given the green light to properly usher her into the show.  The rest, of course, is network television history; and while a lot of people can agree that the third season of the show was largely a series of missteps, Batgirl was definitely not one of them.

What makes Babs so interesting in this show is that she’s the perfect demonstration of how femininity and badassery don’t have to be mutually exclusive.  She’s naturally a very warm, charming, and eminently helpful person who goes out of her way to look after her family and her community. She’s a bookworm who works at the Gotham City library and studied almost every subject.  She’s very much a daddy’s girl who almost never fights with her father and regularly invites him over to watch TV with her.  She loves to cook and entertain guests.  She loves classical music and museums of all kinds.  She dresses like Jackie Kennedy at a thrift shop.  She loves to surf and swim and has a thing for charming jocks.  She keeps a gorgeous apartment full of trinkets and vintage furniture with a little parakeet named Charlie to keep her company.  And she visibly wears striking eye makeup even under her Batgirl cowl.

For God’s sake, her Batgirl motorcycle has ruffles on it!

But absolutely none of that takes away from what a devastatingly competent crimefighter she is.  In fact, she uses her reputation as an underestimated Girly-Girl ™ to her best advantage, similar to the way Babs does in Batgirl: Year One.  People tend to not pay her any mind because she’s a girl who can’t possibly do anything interesting in her spare time?  Gives her plenty of time to build her own Batgirl Cave in the back room of her apartment, complete with a revolving wall for ease of access to her costume station, an early computer and switchboard with a Lucite screen, a forensic chemistry set, and an elevator lift for her motorcycle!

People expect her to be soft and meek?  Perfect opportunity to take people by surprise by scaring them out of her apartment, even out of costume, and fully turn the tables on them as Batgirl, the fierce bruiser who loves nothing more than a sharp verbal takedown followed by a good scrap!  Punching isn’t a ladylike thing to do?  No rule saying you can’t ballet-kick their noses up into their brains and grab the nearest blunt object to use as an improvised weapon!

Woman crimefighters aren’t expected to be as clever as the Dynamic Duo?  Time to surprise everyone by using common sense and book smarts to solve cases instead of Bat-Deduction and breaking out of deathtraps by being genuinely resourceful rather than relying on deus ex machina (she does get the occasional assist, but this girl freed herself from self-tightening garotte wire.  That counts for something.)! 

Every time someone on the show tries to sell her short, she gets around to proving them wrong within seconds, and it’s the most satisfying thing to see.  Her biggest flaws as Batgirl were that she could be a little too rough and sometimes unintentionally cruel (such as the time she sprayed Louie the Lilac with sentient rot because she thought he was just bluffing).  But with time and experience she learned better and continued to improve as Gotham’s newest protector—a job she took very seriously, but still had a sense of humor about.

Interestingly, in her first couple of appearances, Babs seemed to be very aware of the fact that people were going to end up comparing her to Batman and Robin, and it manifested in a rather competitive spirit.  She constantly kept secrets from them, even ones that pertained to the case they were working on, and she would even hide evidence from them so she could have the satisfaction of busting the bad guy first.  They didn’t seem to trust her on principle at first, especially Batman, who believed that it was in women’s nature to try to outdo men in everything (holy sexism, ya douchecanoe); and she apparently decided that it wasn’t worth the effort to change their minds.  When they asked her about where she got her information, she would be deliberately vague and mention things like tarot cards and tea leaves—“all part of a woman crimefighter’s arsenal”—as a sort of Take That against them.  And at the end of almost every episode, she would disappear without a trace while their backs were turned, making them wonder where the hell she could have gone.  Eventually the three came to trust each other much more and fall into an easier and more cheerful rapport, but she would still disappear on them when the job was done.

One of the biggest shakeups on the show was that the member of the original “Batfamily” she was closest to was none other than Alfred!  He was the first to stumble upon her secret identity, and she made him swear to secrecy “as a gentleman’s gentleman.”  And he kept his word and continued to serve as her confidante, meeting with her in secret when she didn’t know if she could trust Batman. Every opportunity there was to help Babs, Alfred took it, no matter what, whether it was freeing her from a particularly tricky trap or helping her track a criminal across Gotham.  The two of them quickly developed a really adorable familial relationship based on mutual trust and affection, and you could tell how fond of each other Yvonne Craig and Alan Napier must have been.

The one vastly different addition you could possibly quibble with about this Babs is that there’s this rather aggressive effort to try to pair her up with Bruce.  Her father is very in favor of the idea of the two settling down together (even though Babs is fresh out of college and Bruce is at least in his late thirties).  And while Babs thinks Bruce is a nice enough guy, all of their “dates” end up being rather awkward since Bruce is a colossal dork out of costume, and she honestly just finds him a bit boring.  Besides, “he’s no Batman.”  She has a rather thinly disguised hero-crush on Batman and often wonders who he is under the mask—one can only imagine her reaction to finding out it’s the same guy who would rather watch the news in the back of his limo than talk to her. The attempt at shipping is there, but it never really goes anywhere, so… dodged a bullet there.

And in case anyone is wondering about her and Dick, while they aren’t romantically interested in each other at all, they do make a fantastic team and seem to view each other as brother and sister or at least good friends.  There are entire subplots of episodes where the two team up to save Batman’s bacon, and it’s glorious.

All in all, Yvonne Craig—once a dancer for the Ballet Russe and then a character actress who’d performed opposite Perry Mason and Elvis Presley—gave the world one of the defining heroines of the 1960s.  One who never stayed a damsel in distress for long and was spunky, witty, rebellious, kindhearted, determined, free-spirited, and more than capable of holding her own with the boys.  If anyone remembers anything about the third season of Batman, it’s Batgirl in all her purple glory, and her legacy has endured for so long that even Gail Simone has gone on record saying that when she writes Barbara Gordon, it’s Craig’s voice she imagines.

Unfortunately, Batman’s third season would be its last; even with hopes for a fourth season on the horizon, the destruction of the sets meant that the Terrific Trio would never set forth again on the small screen.  Fortunately, though, this wouldn’t be the end of this Batgirl—she was given another chance in cartoon and comic book form!

In The New Adventures of Batman, she takes on Catwoman to clear her own name from the taint of crime, singlehandedly rescues Robin from both the Joker’s and the Riddler’s henchmen with nothing but brute force, and adds a whole new passel of gadgets to her utility belt, including her own grappling hook gun and a makeup compact that conceals pocket sand she can use to blind her assailants.

In the recent Batman ’66 standalone comics, she gets to help Batman face off against Lord Death Man in Japan, takes on the Joker and Catwoman multiple times, helps free her father from Bane’s clutches, outwits all of the Big Four through simple office politics out of costume, and singlehandedly fends off the Bookworm and Queen Cleopatra with ingenuity and a good pimp slap respectively.

In Batman ’66 Meets the Man From U.N.C.L.E., she battles Poison Ivy’s plant goons (accidentally decapitating one of them with a single kick) travels with the Dynamic Duo, Napolean, and Illya to Monte Carlo to face off against Hugo Strange and his new international crime syndicate, and almost throws hands with Strange all by herself.

In Batman ’66 Meets Wonder Woman ’77, she graduates from Batgirl to Batwoman (Kate Kane’s initial appearance never caught on, it would seem) and takes her place as the new police commissioner of Gotham City after her father retires.

And most recently, in Archie Meets Batman ’66, she and Dick Grayson go undercover as transfer students to help flush out the new supervillain threat plaguing Riverdale and its students, facing off against the Joker and Catwoman in particular so far while dealing with the rabid crushes Archie and Betty have on them.

And as long as people still show an interest in this iteration of Babs, there will probably be more content still to come.  Not gonna lie, this is my favorite version of Barbara Gordon in any medium—I love her personality, her approach to challenges, her fighting style, her relationships with the rest of the cast, and even her costume.  Maybe one day, in a new Batman ’66 comic, we’ll get to see more of a supporting cast for her—bring in Cassandra Cain, Stephanie Brown, Frankie Charles, Jason Bard, and all of the characters we’ve come to know and love from the greater DC canon!  Hell, even better, give her a chance to become Oracle and pave the way for new Batgirls inspired by the good she’s done for Gotham!  But for now, we should all take the opportunity to appreciate the most iconic Barbara Gordon and the legacy she left behind.

Before I go, I thought I’d leave you guys with a snippet from the Man From U.N.C.L.E. crossover comic that I think best encapsulates this Batgirl and why she does what she does.  If ever Barbara Gordon had a mission statement, this is it, and I can never commend the comics enough for recognizing what makes her so special.

pandemic songs + self discovery

My Spotify Unwrapped for 2020 looked remarkably similar to every other year of my life recorded on the platform. The number one song, for what has to be at least four years running, is an ambient track from a video game that I listen to while I’m working. Most of my top musicians are a mix of film and television composers and Enya. This is true even in a pandemic. So many of my existing musical influences are still here to weather the many storms of life that are ahead — whether I am ready for them or not.

In every moment where I was not working, I was listening to a lot of music. Pouring over my Spotify, I’m able to see so many different moods and feelings. I have always kept one enormous playlist that lets me go back and know exactly what music I was listening at various moments in my life. Moments in time where the world felt like it had lost its balance, but music kept me grounded. Kept me thinking about the past, present, and future. The way I see it, the best is still yet to come for everyone. Better times are on their way. People I don’t yet know are coming into my life. Places I haven’t lived in yet will be here soon. And there will be even more songs that will define those moments in time for me. 

I didn’t know the songs I’d be listening to during the pandemic and yet, here we are... with the music that defined this uncertain time in my corner of the world.

“Say So” — Doja Cat

In the aftermath of getting knocked out with one of the worst flus of my life for a week this year, I spent the remainder of February desperately trying to regain my strength and sense of self. Little did I know that in March the entire world would change because of the coronavirus. This song feels like the last music video of our “normal” time. Nostalgic for roller skating rinks and hanging out with friends.

“Geyser” — Mitski

Have you ever heard a song that emotionally rocked you to the core so badly that you had to get into the fetal position and think afterwards? This one did it. Screaming while crawling and rolling around in the dirt is a real 2020 mood.

“Too Late” — The Weeknd

The entire After Hours album, and the red suit character, is a real quarantine/lockdown mood if there ever was one. Abel can’t miss.

“The Chain” — Fleetwood Mac

Everyone else might have been on a Dreams kick, courtesy of the Ocean Spray skateboarder but I was all about The Chain. 

“Me And You” — NERO

In the movie montage of your life, this is the song that plays to emphasize you’re a boss who can do anything. I stopped drinking for the better part of this year, which is pretty cool. Then I attempted the keto diet. That lasted for... less than 48 hours. The message is simple: I will just exercise instead of giving up carbs!

“Ocean of Mine” — Kennedy One

Before I started paying for Spotify Premium, I was trapped in a world of endless commercials. Once in a great while, the streaming service would recommend music that I might like. Kennedy One’s Ocean of Mine was one of those recommendations. I listened to this while I had my first crown put on at the dentist. You know I love anything that sounds like the wind, the water, and the promise of the shore.

“Joan of Arc on the Dance Floor” — Aly & AJ

These sisters came through so many times in 2020! The Up All Night event on YouTube and the Viper Room streaming show made it feel like concerts had, in a slow but sure way, been able to make a return. Just in time to kiss 2020 goodbye we have an explicit version of Potential Breakup Song... MVPs!

“Moscow Invitational 1968″ — Carlos Rafael Rivera

Many hours spent writing require a specific kind of soundtrack for staying in the zone. The moment I heard this score play during The Queen’s Gambit, I knew it was going to be part of my background noise whenever I’m working from this moment moving forward. It’s inspiring to listen to and helps me stay even more concentrated on the task at hand. Whatever challenges are ahead, I know I can reach them and keep leaping onward to the next hurdle and beyond.

“forget me too” — Machine Gun Kelly feat. Halsey

This is why we need concerts again: recreating a mosh pit feeling alone in your bedroom is simply not possible.

“Shine Ibiza Anthem 2019” — Paul van Dyk, Alex M.O.R.P.H.

In a pre-COVID world, I had plans to see Ultra 2020 in Miami. In a post-COVID, vaccinated world, I still have these plans for the future! I so look forward to the return of music festivals again, particularly those of the eat, sleep, rave, repeat variety. 

“Violence” — Grimes & i_o

This is my December song that will carry into January and beyond. I love, love, love it! (RIP Garrett Lockhart.)

As 2020 comes to a close, I have discovered some things about myself. 

There were three times I cried, and I mean sobbed my eyes out, during this pandemic. The first was during the news of the initial lockdown. That was pure fear and confusion and chaos. The second was when I started to see news footage of miles-long lines of people waiting for food to feed their families. That was an aching sadness that I felt deep in my bones because a lot of people lost their jobs and had nowhere else to turn for food. And the third was when I heard Governor Newsom ordered 5,000 body bags for California. Hearing news like that makes it impossible to never un-hear it again. It’s the reality of how badly this virus has rampaged our country.

It really bothers me when I see people saying that they want normal again. I get the root of the desire which is that you’d like to enjoy a drink at the bar or have a dinner out or spend time with friends, etc. But there were a lot of problems with our normal world. Too many. To me, it feels like signaling that you’re okay with continuing to live in a society where so many people have to work multiple jobs to survive, the healthcare infrastructure is buckling, and the education system is completely fractured (among many other issues!). 

What it seems, at least to me, is that people only want the aspects of normal that they were fortunate enough to receive but come at the expense of others. I suppose the best analogy is to consider the super rich. Once they exit their bunkers, they will want someone, likely paid on barely liveable wages, to make and serve them brunch. One can only hope this time has changed enough people to do and be better, but human nature is a fairly predictable beast. A number of people failed what I consider to be a basic human experiment and revealed seriously selfish true colors. I could rant about this topic for awhile — and believe me, I have THOUGHTS — but it’s too easy to dwell on bad news and opinions. 

There was a lot of good, just news in the mix. Some of it made the news, some went under the radar, but it was still there and it’s still happening. Here’s a few links:

There has been an animal discovered by scientists (a jellyfish-like parasite) that does not need oxygen to survive.

CRISPR was injected into a live patient’s eyeball this year, to treat genetically-caused blindness.

PG&E plead guilty to 85 counts in the 2018 Camp Fire, the same fire that wiped out Paradise, California. 

A Michigan jeweler named Johnny Perri buried $1 million of gold, silver, and diamonds for a real-life treasure hunt this summer.

Princess Beatrice and Edo Mapelli Mozzi had one of the prettiest, socially distanced weddings I’ve ever seen.

American Girl launched a new doll, Courtney, born in 1986. (They’re catching up to my age now!)

And the 2021 Super Bowl is inviting healthcare workers to attend the big game.

In the post-coronavirus “new normal” when I have been vaccinated, I know some aspects of my life will go back to their bubble. A lot will change though. 

What I really want is to do is get involved, hands on, in the community again. I want to volunteer at local food banks, soup kitchens, and/or churches for a few hours each week, when possible. (I also have a thought surrounding the idea of making a whole bunch of travel-size feminine product care kits for women in need if this isn’t already happening...) And if I can’t physically be there, then I want to donate and offer support in other ways. I am not helpless. I am a helper, as Mr. Rogers would say, and I would like to be able to help out more and contribute to the well-being of others once it is safe to do so.

I hope people will find it inside of them to want to work together again and come together as a community. It means a lot of hard work and energy and time, but it’s gonna make our world a lot better — far beyond the normal one we left behind.

I Was Given Lemons and I Made Lemonade: What Beyoncé’s Album Says About Contemporary American Race Relations

I Was Given Lemons and I Made Lemonade: What Beyoncé’s Album Says About Contemporary American Race Relations

    The release of Lemonade brought with it a public fervor. More than any other record last year, it spurred think pieces and discussion by the public and major music publications alike. Some were quick to praise Beyoncé’s visual narrative album as a complex and textured take on feminist politics and black identity. Others founds its themes of infidelity to be nothing more than manufactured drama with the intent to sell records — an example of commercial spectacle at its absolute worst. 

     What quickly became clear was that, regardless of the kind of conversations that were being had, they were certainly being had at an alarming rate. Something about Lemonade, beyond merely its commercial significance, had struck a chord with the American cultural conscience.

     It’s hard to talk about Lemonade without mention of its creator’s cultural clout.  Beyoncé, the R&B artist and business mogul, has been at the epicenter of American culture for sometime now. With six platinum studio albums and 62 singles, Beyoncé has cemented herself as one of the most successful solo artists of the century. And Beyoncé’s relationship with the American masses – at times messy and controversial – is emblematic of something else about American authorship and how impossible it is to navigate the constructs of the American race binary. Three particular moments, isolated in this paper, each suggest something significant about contemporary race relations: 1) Beyoncé’s Super Bowl performance and the subsequent White Rage that followed; 2) the release of Lemonade and the questions of authenticity that swirled around the record; and 3) Beyoncé’s loss to Adele at the Grammy’s.  Each of these moments say something unique about the racial dynamics that rendered themselves so explicitly within the past year, culminating in the emergence of a new radical right regime. 

                                                                  ***

  “So when the national anthem started playing, I was not looking at the ground. I was praying. The lord’s prayer. My hands went up in the air. I wore black gloves, to represent social power, or black power. I wore socks — not shoes —  to represent poverty. I wore a scarf around my neck to symbolize the lynchings, the hangings, that black folks when through while building this country.” 

John Carlos

      American sports institutions have long been a hotbed of racial and political tension. From the black power salutes at the Olympics in 1968, to Muhammad Ali’s anti-Vietnam speeches on University campuses, to Colin Kaepernick’s recent refusal to stand for the national anthem — the legacy of black athletes using their respective sports institutions as platforms for protest are well documented. And the reaction of the White masses is just as visible. But often this history of white violence is borne less from an ideological disagreement than from the threat posed by a black presence in spaces largely characterized by their whiteness.        Claudia Rankine, in her popular novel Citizen, details how the arena of sports is often defined by the expectations and ideologies of its white audience with an essay on Serena Williams’ treatment by the tennis umpires. Williams place in American culture runs largely parallel to Beyoncé’s: both are entertainment titans, masters of their respective crafts, and powerful wealthy Black women who are often in the spotlight. Her presence on Lemonade itself speaks to this parallel. Rankine describes how the experience of being a black woman in a white space is often itself enough to garner a reaction from the American masses. Serena becomes the victim of aggressions from line judges in several major tournaments, where a series of egregious calls over the course of a number of years altered the course of key matches. This came to a head in 2009, as Serena reacted to a bad call with an expletive tirade launched in the direction of the line judge: “I swear to God I’m fucking going to that this fucking ball and shove it down your fucking throat, you hear that? I swear to God!” (29). Rankine calls this reaction somewhat laudable, or at the very least, understandable. It’s a response borne from “being thrown against a sharp white background” (29).       And it was another sharp white background where the first defining moment of 2016 came for Beyoncé. On one of the most watched national events of the year, Beyoncé performed her recently released “Formation” at Super Bowl 50 in front of the largest T.V. audience of 2016, and the third biggest U.S. audience in history. After some muted and sterile performances by Coldplay and Bruno Mars, Beyoncé entered the frame, introduced by the pounding thump of a bass drum. She assumed center frame, surrounded by fire, and was quickly joined by her dancers  — all black women, dressed in a black ensembles, hair styled into afros.       Although Beyoncé’s “Formation” music video alludes strongly to issues of police violence, the Super Bowl performance itself hardly warranted much in the way of critique. Beyoncé spoke exclusively through matters of style: the afros, black clothing, and hip-hop inspired dance moves. There was nothing in the way of lyrical or spoken ideology. And yet, Conservative media was quick to react. David Clarke, a regular contributor to Fox News, posed the question: “Beyoncé in those Black Panther-type uniforms, would that be acceptable if a band, a white band came out in hoods and white sheets in the same sort of fashion?  We would be appalled and outraged” (“Interview with David Clarke”). Rush Limbaugh followed suit, suggesting that perhaps Beyoncé because Beyoncé was a woman who was probably “not a big sports fan,” she likely read an article that was recently run in the “Huffington Puffington Post — which claimed that the Carolina Panthers were the first NFL team to be unapologetically black.” Out of this confusion, “it's understandable that Beyoncé might have thought the Black Panthers were playing in the game, and hence her tribute to the Black Panthers” (The Rush Limbaugh Show).  Michelle Malkin joined the conversation on Twitter, writing, “Cuz nothing brings us all together better than angry Beyoncé shaking her ass & shouting "Negro" repeatedly.”         It is no secret that this American reaction had nothing to do with politics or overt displays of ideology, and everything to do with the performance and its proud declaration of blackness — itself a frightening threat to white bourgeois power. And it’s worth taking a moment here to reflect on Clarke’s comment, as it's the most explicit reaction to matters of black style among any of the conservative commentators. While style might not be a spoken ideology, it plays an important role in establishing and influencing one. It was the Black Panther’s who recognized this better than anybody: “This brother here, myself, all of us were born with our hair like this. And we just wear it like this. Reason for it you might say, is like a new awareness among black people that their own natural appearance, physical appearance, is beautiful,” stated one member of the Black Panther Party (Stanley). Style has the potential to disrupt norms and operate as a genuine act of subversion.       And it was this style on display at the Super Bowl that was clearly the source of the outrage. Because for every empty critique of Beyoncé’s homage to the Black panther party was another critique that framed the performance as a danger to The Great American (White) Family. Rudy Giuliani referred to the Super Bowl show as a “terrible” display of  “a bunch of people bouncing around and all strange things.” He continued, ”Let's have, you know, decent wholesome entertainment, and not use it as a platform to attack the people who, you know, put their lives at risk to save us” (“Fox and Friends”). Laura Ingraham similarly lamented the death of wholesome television: “So in ‘Formation,’ women dressed like prostitutes. That's the message to little girls today...This is only 8:43 p.m. last night, Eastern time. 8:43 — no family hour. Family hour is over. There is no family hour” (“The Laura Ingraham Show”). In his book Race Matters, Cornel West talks about the taboo subject of “black sexuality.” He writes, “Americans are obsessed with sex and fearful of black sexuality” (West 83). West claims that this fear is derived from myths about black sexuality that still persist today. Which form of these myths Beyoncé is seen for is relatively unclear: is it the “seductive temptress” Jezebel (West 83)? The “evil, manipulative bitch” Sapphire (West 83)? It hardly matters. The presence and threat of black sexuality itself is enough to garner a visceral response, enough to elicit the White rage that became so visible a sentiment in our past electoral season.        West argues that it is a cultural space occupied by both artists and athletes that presents an opportunity for a dialogue about black sexuality, that “when white and black kids buy the same billboard hits and laud the same athletic heroes the result is often a shared cultural space where some humane interaction takes place” (84). It’s easy to push back against this claim. As has been noted historically by many a cultural commentator, America has always had a relationship with black culture that has been more parasitic than symbiotic. The valorization of black music does not equate to a similar valorization of black people.        This is certainly relevant in the case of the Super Bowl, where this shared cultural space is complicated by the aging demographics of the National Football League. While the NBA has been quick to adopt youth and millennial culture as its backbone and has offered its players at least some semblance of a political platform, the NFL has taken an almost totalitarian and apolitical stance on matters of politics, and especially issues of race. This may have less to do with the political good-will of the NBA than with each institution’s respective capital audience. According to a 2015 Nielsen report, 43% of the NBA’s viewership is under 35 years old: one of the youngest fanbases of all sports. In addition, 63% of  NBA viewership was done on behalf of African-American viewers (“Hoop Dreams”).         Beyoncé’s performance at, say, the Super Bowl as opposed to the NBA Finals is different than not only in the sense of the magnitude of viewership but in the dynamics of its space. The National Football League is the same organization that’s recent decline in viewership was arguably tied almost directly to the Colin Kaepernick protests. When white America is watching, blackness seems remarkably more offensive. Perhaps nothing sums up better the extent of the white reaction more than that of Tomi Lahren, America’s blond alt-right spokesperson: “What is it they are trying to convey here. A salute to what? A group that used violence and intimidation to advance not racial equality but an overthrow of white domination?” She continues: “You’re just like President Obama, Jada Pinkett Smith, Al Sharpton, and so many others — you just can’t let America heal. Keep ripping off the historical band aid. Why be a cultural leader when you can play the victim, right?” (“The Blaze”).        Lahren’s slip here is remarkable: remarkable for the way it simplifies the ideology of one of America’s most radical, successful, and powerful black organizations; remarkable for its acknowledgement of white domination ; remarkable for its blatant acknowledgement of racial violence and the total erasure of its historical implications.       This white fear of the black body and black sexuality, ironically, strengthen the relevance and importance of Beyoncé’s project. Is not the only way to combat fear of the black body by making that same black body hypervisible? Is that even possible within the confines of an American cultural enterprise that puts a premium on black style but continually devalues and destroys the black body? How can black creators resist a framework that “either liberates black people from white control in order to imprison them in racist myths or confines blacks to white ‘respectability’ while they make their own sexuality a taboo subject?” (88). 

                                                             ***

     Months after her Super Bowl performance, the release of Lemonade drew another wave of reactions spanning the full breadth of American cultural commentators. The conversations this time had nuance, lacking some of the vitriol that came with the world stage of Super Bowl 50. And yet, the questions that replaced the outrage seemed troublingly loaded, complex, and difficult to answer.      In her article “Why We Shouldn’t Be Afraid to Critique Beyoncé,” Zeba Blay argues that it’s okay to have conversations about Beyoncé’s position in contemporary culture. These conversations further “important discussions about the ways in which we underestimate femme feminist women, about the roles that capitalism and consumerism play in Beyoncé’s work, and about what we should (and shouldn’t) expect from our feminist and pop cultural icons” (n.p.).      This points to an interesting phenomenon: so much of the conversation surrounding Lemonade became less concerned with the content of the record than a conversation and critique of Beyoncé: her identity, her role in American life, the authenticity of her messages. When was the last album where so much of the criticism hinged on questions of authenticity and authorial intent? Infidelity, a major thematic strand of Lemonade, was often central to this critique. The media and critical commentary was quick to frame the album’s narrative as a commercial ploy to sell records, a cheap attempt at manufacturing an artificial drama between two music industry titans. Yet, this is a gross simplification of the scope of Lemonade’s thematic ambition. Much of what Jenna Wortham had to say about the “Formation” video rings true of the record as a whole, it’s not just a record about police brutality, or infidelity —  “it’s about the entirety of the black experience in America in 2016, which includes standards of beauty, (dis)empowerment, culture, and the shared parts of our history” (n.p.).  Lemonade borrows quite heavily from contemporary poet Warsan Shire. Her poem “For Women Who are Difficult to Love” is recited by Beyoncé as the voiceover track for many of the visual album’s most pivotal and evocative narrative moments: like when Beyoncé walks a deserted street, baseball bat in tow, smashing car windows. Shire grapples with many of the same questions Beyoncé does: how does any black woman manage to level the varying identity expectations continually imposed upon them? How are feelings of reactionary violence (“so what did you want to do love / split his head open?”) reconciled with adherence to traditional notions of femininity (“and you tried to change didn’t you? / closed your mouth more / tried to be softer / prettier”)? (n.p.)      And yet, the aforementioned inquiry makes sense, and is almost impossible to ignore.  Lemonade remains available today exclusively on Tidal, a streaming service that Beyoncé and Jay-Z have joint ownership in. Both artists are industry moguls. And this was the year where a dissatisfaction with the status-quo became a rallying cry for both sides of the political spectrum. It is worth asking: how do we remedy questions of capital intent with those of aesthetic authenticity? And in their influential work “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception,” Adorno & Horkheimer frame the answer quite simply — you can’t. Art made in the era of mass industry is art made for the purpose of consumption. Mass produced art is “nothing other than style,” and incapable of “creating truth” (103). It’s purpose is purely industrial. It exists solely for mass consumption.       This critique was raised not only by the white masses but among prominent critics and writers as well. In bell hooks blog post “Moving Beyond Pain,” she argues that we cannot divorce the process of listening/viewing Lemonade from its status as a commodity object. This, however, is not necessarily a problem for hooks. While hooks acknowledges that the “celebration” of black female bodies is also impossible to differentiate from their “exploitation,” she differentiates that the commercial intent of Beyoncé’s record is quite different than many other commercial contexts (“Moving Beyond Pain” n.p.). This is commercial art created for the sake of ascribing value to black women.      And yet, hooks has reservations about Beyoncé’s brand of feminism. In this context of high-stakes relationship drama, the black woman remains in the “victim” position to which her only escape is violence. Hooks states, quite controversially, that violence “does not create positive change” (“Moving Beyond Pain” n.p.). Additionally, Beyoncé’s conception of feminism lacks an intersectional approach, and is situated closer to the Hillary-Clinton-class-enemy brand of feminism than a true radical feminist ideology. Beyoncé adopts a contemporary conception of feminism that ultimately is not rooted in resistance in patriarchal domination but which is tied to it; and that is concerned ultimately with matters of capital self-interest. Ultimately, hooks questions the merit of the fictive space that Lemonade occupies: a world in which words like “Intuition, Denial, Forgiveness, Hope, [and] Reconciliation” are seen as effective combatants to racism and misogyny. In 2016, mainstream feminist ideals ultimately rang hollow: the wage gap feminism of the Democrats was not enough to rally a progressive base that wanted something lasting and systemic; and the radical right, angered by the very idea of a woman president, retaliated with fervent vulgarity. While hooks ultimately finds Lemonade as falling short of its feminist potential, is not the very fact that it puts such a value on black life, on black representation, and on the pure celebration of black culture a radical politics in and of itself?       At the conclusion of her article, hooks asks a question of Lemonade that speaks to a point about black women authorship in general: how can one move beyond celebrating pain and instead look to how it can be transcended? What does a transcendent feminist politics look like? How does black authorship escape the condition of a parasitic consumer culture?                                                              ***

On February 12, 2017, Adele’s album 21 won album of the year at the Grammy Awards. In her speech, she talked about why she couldn’t accept the prize:

“...but tonight winning this kind of feels full circle, and like a bit of me has come back to myself but I can’t possibly accept this award, and I’m very humbled and very gracious but, the artist of my life is Beyoncé, and this album to me —  the Lemonade album —  is just so monumental, it’s just so monumental, and so well thought out, and so beautiful, and soul bearing. And we all got to see another side to you that you don’t always let us see. And we appreciate that. And all us artists here, we fucking adore you. You are our light, and the way you made me and my friends feel, the way you made my black friends feel, is empowering, and you make them stand up for themselves. And we love you, we always have, and we always will.” (“Adele’s Grammy Acceptance Speech”)

     Adele’s speech is important for a couple reasons. The first is that it speaks to a critique that has become rather common of the Grammy’s the past couple of years: victories by black artists have been confined to the Hip-hop, Urban Album, and R&B categories. Not a single black artist has won album of the year since 2004; a black woman hasn’t won the category since Lauryn Hill did so in 1999. Meanwhile, the last few years have featured some high-profile snubs, including Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly in 2016, Beyoncé (again) in 2015, Kendrick Lamar (again) in 2014, and Frank Ocean in 2013. The Grammy’s failure to recognize the relevance and cultural significance of certain artists is partially the reason why it has lost some credibility in the past few years, with several high-profile artists refusing to attend the ceremony, and others speaking out publicly regarding their declining cultural clout and position as an outdated, archaic institution. It’s become impossible to define what it exactly is that can win you an Album of the Year Grammy. It is not solely commercial success (see: Beck’s win two years ago) neither is it totally critical reception. What you’d guess is that the recipe lies somewhere in between: an album that has popular appeal and that is critically viable; that speaks to a certain condition of the American politic at that time; that promises to reshape cultural trends in a way that is both significant and lasting.      So what wrong? That inquiry feels almost ludicrous in a year where the stakes felt so high. It’s difficult to reconcile a relatively meaningless spectacle like the Grammy’s with the current American sociopolitical turmoil, where the threat of violence against marginalized people is real and tangible. In that way, maybe hooks was right: there is a limit to what the fictive imagination can do and say. But sometimes, the politics that play out on the small stage say something profound about the politics that play out in the midst of our real and frightening reality. They lead us to conversations, to discomfort, and to the promise of something different.      And that brings us back to Adele’s speech. Somehow, Adele’s awkward and imperfect display of appreciation for Beyoncé and her art made startlingly visible what was so obviously playing out before our very eyes. The moment Adele marked her “black friends” was the moment that the thematic concerns of Beyoncé’s album became visible on the world stage. And on this world stage, Beyoncé’s album made sense only as one thing — a “black” album. And that was, arguably, Beyoncé’s intention. But despite the declining clout of the Grammy’s, the album’s loss felt profound. And glaringly obvious. No other outcome made more rational sense with the context of contemporary American race relations. And that’s why it matters so much       As easy as it is to fault Adele for the deficiencies in her speech, it’s also sort of admirable for the way she is able to cut through the codes and signifiers that even Beyoncé seemed unable to do. In her own acceptance speech for Lemonade’s win in the Best Urban Album Category, she stated: 

My intention for the film and album was to create a body of work that would give a voice to our pain, our struggles, our darkness and our history. To confront issues that make us uncomfortable. It’s important to me to show images to my children that reflect their beauty, so they can grow up in a world where they look in the mirror — first to their own families as well as the news, the Super Bowl, the Olympics, the White House and the Grammys — and see themselves. And have no doubt that they are beautiful, intelligent and capable. This is something I want for every child of every race. And I feel it’s vital that we learn from the past and recognize our tendencies to repeat our mistakes. (“Beyoncé’s Grammy Acceptance Speech”)

      Beyoncé employs an “us” that is shifting and uncertain: sometimes clearly alluding to the black experience, at other times alluding to a collective American experience, and even, at one point, alluding to “every child of every race.” She certainly is not entering any All Lives Matter territory here, but is it fair to call her an activist?  Beyoncé speaks about race like an American who is afraid to say the wrong thing. And although her performance and her album spoke very clearly in matters of style, it’s strange to see Beyoncé speak so carefully around matters of race, of police brutality, of problematic gender expectations and matters of black beauty, of violence against black lives. It’s clear what she’s talking about, but the ideologies remain invisible, unspoken — to use Morrison’s phrase, “playing in the dark.” And that seems strange for an artist that seemed so concerned with, in the context of their art and performances, making visible the black American experience.        Lemonade goes to great lengths to subvert our concept of the literary imagination. Less talked about than it’s visions of blackness are its spots of whiteness: like when Beyoncé jumps to her death in an all-white dress, or when she’s surrounded by a blindingly white mise-en-scene. It’s an album where the black/white binary is turned on its head; where blackness takes center stage and pushes whiteness to the periphery — but where the threat of the white imagination is still present. And here we are on another national stage, with whiteness somehow pushing Beyoncé to the periphery, the world re-orienting itself. Despite Adele’s best intentions, her refusal of the award means little. What does it mean for a white women to refuse an award and offer it to another artist’s work because she understands its importance for her black friends?      I think again of Serena Williams and Rankine’s essay: of being “thrown against a sharp white background.” On Lemonade and it’s most popular single “Sorry,” -- viewed over 213 million times on YouTube -- Serena Williams makes an appearance. And although she doesn’t appear in any other songs, her appearance is memorable because, like Beyoncé, she is so clearly a symbol for everything Lemonade is trying to do. For what she represents to American culture and the American people. For her tendency to inspire white rage and overt displays of racism (see: Serena’s appearances at Indian Wells). For her position as a successful black woman and the significance that holds to other women and girls of color.       And I wonder, in the context of the Grammy Awards, where that moment of rage — one that looked like Serena yelling at the line judge — was for Beyoncé. Why was it Adele who got to speak on her behalf? Looking back on Kanye’s infamous Taylor Swift incident, it seems oddly more sensible now, less like an awkward and personal attack on Taylor Swift than a genuine but misguided effort to right an injustice.        The Grammy Awards affair makes it again clear how impossible it is to define what “success” means for black authorship in America. If a genuine radical politics is the goal for black authorship, than why does it matter who wins what popularity award? And adversely, 2016 was a year where not just black texts, but black texts about race were tremendously successful commercially. And what did these commercial accomplishments mean for black and marginal people? It seems difficult to answer anything in a time of such complete and uncertain political chaos. But if it’s true that the “subject of the dream is the dreamer,” is there anything else to do than dream (Morrison 30)? Maybe the fictive world holds more weight than we care to believe.

  Works Cited "Adele's Grammy Acceptance Speech". GRAMMY Awards. CBS.  Television. Transcript. Adorno, T. & Horkheimer, M., 1944. “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as  Mass Deception.” In T. Adorno and M. Horkheimer. Dialectics of   Enlightenment. Als, Hilton. "Prince, Cecil Taylor, and Beyoncé's Shape-Shifting Black Body." The New Yorker. The New Yorker, 20 Dec. 2016. Web. 10 Apr. 2017. bell hooks. "Moving Beyond Pain." Bell Hooks Institute. Bell Hooks Institute, 09 May 2016. Web. 10 Apr. 2017. bell hooks. "Racism and Feminism." Theories of Race and Racism: A Reader. New York, NY: Routledge, 2009. 373-402. Print. "Beyoncé’s Grammy Acceptance Speech". GRAMMY Awards. CBS.  Television. Transcript. Blay, Zeba. "Why We Shouldn't Be Afraid To Critique Beyoncé." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 10 May 2016. Web. 10 Apr. 2017. Caramancia, Jon, Wesley Morris, and Jenna Wortham. "Beyoncé in 'Formation': Entertainer, Activist, Both?" The New York Times. The New York Times, 06   Feb. 2016. Web. 10 Apr. 2017. Carlos, John. “1968 Black Power Salute.” 100 Great Sporting Moments. Web. Clarke, David. “Interview with David Clarke.” Interview on Fox Business. Television. Giuliani, Rudy. “Fox and Friends.” Fox News.  8 February 2016. Television. Hebdige, Dick. Subculture, the Meaning of Style. London: Methuen, 1979. Print. "Hoop Dreams: Multicultural Diversity in NBA Viewership." Nielsen. N.p., n.d. Web. 08 May 2017. Ingraham, Laura. “The Laura Ingraham Show.” Courtside Entertainment Group. 8 February 2016. Lahren, Tomi. “The Blaze.” Mercury Radio Arts. 8 February 2016.   Limbaugh, Rush. The Rush Limbaugh Show. 08 February 2016. Television. Malkin, Michelle. "“Cuz nothing brings us all together better than angry Beyoncé shaking her ass & shouting "Negro" repeatedly.” 7 February 2016, 5:43 PM. Tweet. Morrison, Toni. Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination. New York: Vintage , a Division of Random House, 2015. Print. Rankine, Claudia. Citizen: An American Lyric. , UK: Penguin, 2015. Print. Shire, Warsan. “For Women Who Are Difficult to Love.” Bandcamp. 2014. Web. Nelson, Stanley. The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution. , 2015. West, Cornel. Race Matters. Boston: Beacon, 2001. Print

right/wrong/neither

I recommend listening to this song while reading; it helps me focus and it might help you too. :)

When I began our class in public art in sound and listening, my way of thinking was very much rooted in discernible outcomes and notions of success. This was largely a product of the environments I had existed in growing up: intense, competitive academic spaces, playing sports, going to a well-regarded college. Even in my first year at Brown, the notion of comparative success was pushed forth; I was denied entry to classes due to a comparatively worse portfolio, writing sample, or application. Not only were opportunities to learn limited, once in class, creative assignments I submitted were deemed poor in quality because they were not up to par with the level of the rest of the class or did not meet expectations of a rigid rubric imposed by the professor. I questioned why the system existed in the way that promoted uniformity and rewarded following rigid instructions over organic growth and learning.

Even at a place like Brown University where a liberal education is championed, I felt limited in my ability to make choices for myself, questioning my every decision and my place on campus. Why did every decision I made feel “wrong”? Why did I constantly feel like I was in the “wrong” place, doing the “wrong” things? It was around this time of self-doubt that we read Miwon Kwon’s “The Wrong Place” and Judith Halberstam’s The Queer Art of Failure. For a long time, it had been explained to me that the greatest growth and discovery was made when I failed, when things didn’t work out, but I was still resistant. Halberstam’s writing expressed a similar sentiment in a way that spoke to me greatly. As Halberstam explains in the introduction, “Failure preserves some of the wondrous anarchy of childhood and disturbs the supposedly clean boundaries between adults and children, winners and losers,” and later points out that “[failure] provides the opportunity to use these negative affects to poke holes in the toxic positivity of contemporary life” (Halberstam 3). Halberstam’s argument recognizes the importance of positivity but also the ability for negativity to shift our perspective and view things through a different or critical scope.

In a similar vane, Kwon’s writing recognizes that objective rights/wrongs are nonexistent, but our relationship to objects, beings, and places is what defines our sense of right and wrong: “The determination of right and wrong is never derived from an innate quality of the object in question, even if some moral absolutes might seem to preside over the object. Rather, right and wrong are qualities that an object has in relation to something outside itself… The more important point here is that it is we who are wrong for this kind of ‘new’ space” (Kwon 38-39). Kwon explains that ending up in the “wrong” place can often lead us to new discoveries about ourselves that we would miss if we follow rigid, “correct” paths. I really love one of her closing statements in the piece:

“Often we are comforted by the thought that a place is ours, that we belong to it, perhaps even come from it, and therefore are tied to it in some fundamental way. Such places (‘right’ places) are thought to reaffirms our sense of self, reflecting back to us an unthreatening picture of a grounded identity. This kind of continuous relationship between a place and a person is what is deemed lost, and needed in contemporary society. In contrast, the wrong place is generally thought of as a place where one fells one does not belong—unfamiliar, disorienting, destabilizing, even threatening. This kind of stressful relationship to a place is, in turn, though to be detrimental to a subject’s capacity to constitute a coherent sense of self and the world” (Kwon 42).

Kwon and Halberstam’s discussion of failure and place bring me to one of the first posts I made on our class soundblog, a podcast profiling the artist Emily A. Sprague, a founding member of the band Florist and an independent artists as well, working primarily in ambient music and creating with Eurorack modular synthesizers. Hailing from a rural community in the Catskill Mountains, Sprague explains how space has shaped her processes of creation: “Every studio I’ve ever had has been in the place that I’ve been living in… You learn from that, being in spaces that aren’t ‘Studio Bs’… You just learn to work with what you have” (Sound + Process). On her origins, Sprague later explains, “Community has always been something that I’ve known to be incredibly hard to find and also the best and most rewarding and inspiring thing that you can experience. I’m from a small town in a pretty rural area; I didn’t really find people until I was older than I really felt a part of a community with, with making music” (Sound + Process). Like Halberstam’s argument, Sprague has repeatedly tried and experimented with space and technique, creating new ways to approach modular synth and pushing the boundaries of genre. Like Kwon explains, Sprague has made new discoveries in her process of making through the space she’s in—not that place is right or wrong, but just that they are different, and produce a different result.

With her process of making rooted in modular synthesis, it is hard to deny Sprague’s precedents. On June 7th, 2017, Sprague made an Instagram post of a single book on a hardwood table: Daphne Oram’s An Individual Note of Music Sound, and Electronics. Daphne Oram, born in 1925 and passed away in 2003, was one of the central figures in the development of British experimental electronic music (Anomie Publishing). Oram declined a place at the Royal College of Music to become a music balancer at the BBC, and she went on to become the co-founder and first director of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop (Anomie). Leaving the BBC in 1959 to pursue commercial work in television, advertising, film and theater, Oram also made her own music for recording and performance, continuing her personal research into sound technology. Sound technology was a passion Oram cultivated since her childhood in rural Wiltshire (Anomie). Eventually her home in Kent became an unorthodox studio and workshop, which she crafted on a minimal budget (Anomie). Additionally, Oram developed her pioneering equipment, sounds, and ideas at her home studio. A significant part of her personal research was the invention of a machine that offered a new form of sound synthesis – the Oramics machine (Anomie). Her biography further cements her as influential to contemporary electronic artists, with Oram’s contribution to electronic music receiving considerable attention from new generations of composers, sound engineers, musicians, musicologists and music lovers around the world (Anomie).

Like Wendy Carlos, Oram was a pioneer of synthesizer music and technology, definitively changing the ways her contemporaries approached synthesis, as well as generations for years to come. It seems as though Carlos, Oram, and Sprague are inextricably linked. As Carlos focuses intently on her studio in her website/primary form of external communication, it is evident that the artist considers her studio as a point of pride and importance (Wendy Carlos website). If Wendy Carlos’s studio is Persian rugs, felines, and the crackle of a fireplace on a frigid winter day and Oram’s is a quiet converted oasthouse, then Sprague’s studio is a surfboard leaned against a corner next to a human-sized floor plant as sun pours in through a skylight on a warm California morning (Kheshti). Like Kheshti’s relationship with Carlos, I feel connected to Sprague in a similar way. I do not mean to equate our relationships or interpolate myself in the discussion of electronic musicians, but I do find great joy in listening to electronic music and feel that it is an important part of my life, similar to the way Kheshti describes.

There is something extremely childlike, imaginative, and fantastical about home studios. They are places for experimentation and imagination, mostly unbounded by judgement or criticism, creating a place to take risks and make new discoveries. In many ways a home studio allows for a democratic education of sorts, a place where a creator can speak their own language and have internal dialogue, unrestricted by rigid constraints that may be imposed externally otherwise, and even explore the inherent fun in learning (hooks 43-44).

The ability for these artists to create in unexpected places and to push the boundaries of their genre and craft remind me of Fluxus artists like Yoko Ono or Alison Knowles. There is an ambiguity in place and correctness of a Fluxus score. They are not defined by doing things in a certain way or a certain place or for a certain outcome, but doing for the sake of doing, trying, experimenting, learning, and moving forward. I recently watched a film that referenced Yoko Ono’s “Ceiling Painting, Yes Painting” (1966), where the person interacting climbs a ladder to a magnifying glass in order to discern a tiny speck on the ceiling that reads “YES” (Guggenheim Bilbao). I think this piece is beautifully poetic in a number of ways, but specifically for its affirmation in discovery, and doing so in a playful, almost childlike and imaginative manner. On this note, I want to include some scores I wrote throughout the course of the semester for consideration, reflection, and response (dots indicate separate scores):

sit on a bench and be the last to break eye contact with a stranger • collect fallen leaves from the ground into a paper bag and deliver to someone • learn the language of a Tree and have a conversation • ask a loved one (or a complete stranger) to name a favorite song and listen to it in full • listen to your breath as you run up a steep hill and walk down slowly; listen to your breath as you walk up a steep hill and run down slowly • cut holes in an umbrella during a rainstorm and listen to the irony pour through • get a bicycle and ride across America • hold your palms and fingers gently over the tips of grass at dawn and wipe the dew across your cheeks • do nothing • sitting cross-legged on the floor, recount in detail to an audience (of any or no size) the most recent dream that you can remember • make a friend • look at the Atlantic Ocean; turn 180 degrees; walk; look at the Pacific Ocean • grab a cactus / smash a guitar • move fast so that wind becomes music

Through all these artists, authors, activists, and beyond, like Ono, Knowles, Carlos, Oram, Halberstam, Kwon, hooks, Kheshti, it is clear that approaching things not with notions of right or wrong, but with the intention of discovery, experimentation, and playful imagination is a valuable way of living. In the inscription to hook’s Teaching Community, the author quotes Paulo Freire: “It is imperative that we maintain hope even when the harshness of reality may suggest the opposite.” In many ways, these figures stand for just that: a rejection of the harshness of reality through creativity, experimentation, discovery, and a love for learning.

Bibliography

“Ceiling Painting, Yes Painting (1966).” Guggenheim Bilbao, http://yokoono.guggenheim-bilbao.eus/en/artworks/ceiling-painting-yes-painting.html.

“Daphne Oram – An Individual Note of Music, Sound and Electronics.” Anomie Publishing, Anomie Publishing and The Daphne Oram Trust.

“Emily Sprague: SOUND PROCESS #8.” SoundCloud, 2017, https://soundcloud.com/sound-and-process/es_ep8.

Halberstam, Judith. The Queer Art of Failure. Duke University Press, 2011.

Hooks, Bell. Teaching Community. Routledge, 2003.

Kheshti, Roshanak. Swithced-on Bach. Bloomsbury Academic, 2019.

Kwon, Miwon. “The Wrong Place.” Art Journal, vol. 59, no. 1, 2000, pp. 33–43. JSTOR, doi:10.2307/778080.

“Wendy Carlos.” Wendy Carlos, http://www.wendycarlos.com/.

Hi, there! I hope you have time to respond. So, I've noticed a lot of people feel unsure about how Descendants 2 is going to turn out. And I was wondering what your thoughts are about the sequel, judging by everything we've seen so far (pictures, teasers, music, etc). I know sequels tend to be less than stellar than their predecessors, but I just wanted to know your opinion on D2. Feel free to use any examples to explain (Such as the information we've gotten). Thank you.

Hi! Thanks for sending me an ask. I’m afraid though, that I won’t be able to give you as in-depth of an answer as you deserve.

 For a while now I’ve been mostly standing clear of Descendants 2, so I haven’t seen a lot of the trailers and stuff. This is due to a combination of busy-ness, apprehension about the sequel, and not wanting to fill my blog with Descendants 2 posts until I know whether or not I’m going to like it.

But there are a few things that I can say about it.

I am excited to go back to the Isle of the Lost. I think the set design is amazing and I was a little disappointed that so little of it was seen in the first movie. Assuming that a good reason is given for the group to go back there, I’m looking forward to it.

I also like the fact that it seems like the 2nd movie is going to address the fact that the Core Four are not 100% Auradonian OR 100% Isle of the Lost. It was made clear in the 1st movie that where you come from doesn’t define what kind of person you are. They don’t have to act “preppy” or like the majority of “Good” people just because they chose that side, and they don’t have to be “Evil” just because they were born on the Isle. They chose Good (and I am SO hoping that the 2nd movie doesn’t throw that character development away for angst’s sake) but they still have had experiences that no one else in Auradon has had. I’m hoping that they will embrace that they’re different, and have their own way of doing things, while still retaining the beneficial character development of the first movie, and not go back to being “villains.”

There’s also a ton of things I’m worried about regarding the sequel. It seems like they’re going to ignore the friendships between anyone but the girls and the boys, respectively. While I love the relationships between Mal and Evie, and between Carlos and Jay, I’d really like to see some development between the girls and the boys– especially Jay and Mal since they’ve known each other the longest.

Also, if they put a Bal breakup in this movie just for the sake of it I swear to Mickey. Same goes for love triangles and needless romance/forcibly pairing everyone up. Please no. No. No. Just– Please. Please no.

I’m not particularly fond of the characters’ new hairstyles either… But then, is anyone?

And I haven’t heard anything about the Core Four��s parents either. Are we just going to forget about them now? And what about Lizard-Mom? I hope none of the other characters— like the Auradon kids (especially Jane and Lonnie.. and we’re still waiting on that apology from Chad) – aren’t forgotten about either. Please don’t leave a ton of loose ends.

And oh gosh, I’d love to see some more of the villain and hero kids’ magic. There is so much potential there.

That’s what it all comes down to really. I feel like this movie has so so much potential, and I’m afraid that they’re going to waste it and go the typical rout instead.

But here’s hoping. In any case, we’ll get some new material for edits and fanfics at least.

fifth harmony, camila cabello and laucy

so this post is a really long time coming. i’ve been wanting to write something about this for a while now but i wasn’t sure what the point of the post was going to be or where i would go with it. i still don’t really but my main reason for writing this is to just gather my thoughts on everything that’s happened since mid novemeber in regards to fifth harmony. this post isn’t exactly about one thing in particular, but a multitude of things that have happened.

i kind of want to divulge into the whole bad things drama with camila but i’ve already made a post about that which you can read here (although it was written haphazardly when she announced that it was being released). the only other point that i’d like to make about bad things is that some fifth harmony tour shows (in europe) were cancelled to promote her single with machine gun kelley (see here) and she was also performing at every jingle ball this year with him to promote the song. this shows the favour the label had toward camila over the four other girls which i’ll probably getting into a bit later on in this post. i believe that label has, in some ways, always favoured camila. she didn’t drop epic/syco when she left fifth harmony, she is still signed to them even now.

now, let’s get on to the good stuff - laucy. so, i think it was right in the middle of november when the pictures of lauren and lucy kissing were “leaked”. i put leaked in quotation marks because we still do not know if they were purposely put out there to make lauren uncomfortable, the photographer put them out there unknowingly or the photographer put them out there knowingly - for pr.

my laucy heart was literally palpitating when i saw these pictures but as soon as i did, i wanted to scream because, oh shit - lauren had been outed, right? despite camren shippers saying it was “just a friendly kiss” (aw bless their naivety, i mean - does that look like a friendly kiss?) i think everyone knew that the kiss represented much more than that. now let’s have a look at the date that these pictures were released - the pics were “leaked” on the 13th of November 2016.

lauren made no comment on the pictures and still hasn’t. in fact, she’s made no comment on the status of her relationship or if she’s even dating lucy or anyone else for that matter.

then, on the 18th of November, lauren comes at as bisexual to billboard in an open letter to trump supporters.. “i am a bisexual cuban-american woman and i am so proud of it”.

i have plenty of points to make about lauren’s coming out. before i indulge in them - i want you all to remember that sexuality can only be defined by the person to who it belongs to. when lauren denied her interest in girls and said she was straight - she was straight. now that she is saying she is bisexual - she is bisexual, meaning she is interested in boys and girls. if, in the future, she retracts this statement - then she is who she says she is.

so - were the pictures accidentally posted? no - they were not. they were purposely put out there to tease fans and the public - to gauge a reaction as how people would deal with lauren kissing a girl.

but why, you ask. well - what else happened when the pictures were released? mid november right?... well in fifth harmony’s second statement, they reveal that they were informed in “mid november” that camila would be leaving the group. camila cabello - the face of fifth harmony, was leaving the group! so of course this meant that they needed someone else to become the new face of fifth harmony. somebody to take over.

why am i so adamant in my belief that they were released and not unintentionally leaked? because this is how the music industry works. little to nothing is left to chance. everything happens for a reason.

then, lauren came out. was her coming out in response to the pictures of her and lucy kissing? or was it as she says, because of Trump?

i don’t believe that for a second. why? because the article was sent to billboard. it had to be approved. billboard had to want to post it for lauren. these things don’t happen in a second. they take at least a day. they were an appropriate response to the pictures without mentioning the pictures (for those outside of the fandom).

also - lauren couldn’t just “come out” without getting permission. we all know that all of the girls have such strict contracts (which has now been changed a little thanks to our saviour, dina la polt). lauren’s coming out was negotiated - they weighed up the pro’s and cons and decided in favour of it because most of the fandom already speculated lauren wasn’t straight and also because of her featuring on afterellen previously etc. syco/epic deemed it okay for her to come out and that is why she was allowed. lauren’s coming out also serves a purpose for epic/syco - it paints them in a positive light, showing that epic/syco aren’t monsters who closet their clients.

is lauren actually bisexual? yes. there would be little to no benefit for her to come out if she wasn’t actually bisexual. a straight image is much more marketable than a non-straight image. so yes, whilst the label did allow lauren to come out - it was ultimately her decision. but, she may have been coerced slightly - to put herself into the limelight since camila was leaving. the timeline all makes sense.

what else happened about three weeks after lauren came out? she announced that she had collabed with duo marian hill for a song.

with lauren’s name out in the media because of her coming out, it was a perfect opportunity for her to drop her collab.

is lauren and lucy’s relationship pr? no. why? lucy is hardly well known apart from in latin america because of her dad, carlos vives. in a society that is heavily homophobic it was inevitable that he would be asked about his daughter’s actions, to which he responded -

carlos vives is very careful not to label the kiss. he doesn’t say that it’s a relationship. he says it’s a symbol. this coincides with lauren’s letter to trump. lauren doesn’t come out because the pictures were leaked, but because she wants to prove something to trump supporters (according to her story line).

also see what lucy had to say about the leaked kissing picture - here.

i do not know if lauren and lucy are in a relationship because it has not been confirmed. but i will say this - whatever they are, it is real and we should respect that. i definitely think that their relationship is being flaunted for pr, however. it has a lot of positives to be used as pr. it gives lauren publicity and that in turn gives fifth harmony publicity. first it was camila engaging in publicity stunts, but because she was leaving, their label had to have another way to get media and fan attention. so whilst laucy’s existence isn’t pr - the fact that it is kinda in our faces a lot, is pr.

i haven’t even bought up camren in this post once but i do feel as though i should make a comment about it. camren shippers probably make up the majority of the fifth harmony fandom. mid november (when the pics were leaked and lauren came out as bi, they were also informed that camila was leaving) which would be the perfect opportunity for lauren to come out as bisexual. why? to kill camren rumours...although camila was still in the band when lauren came out. the label played it well - fans had no idea that camila was leaving so lauren coming out - appealed to camren shippers a lot and fifth harmony gained a lot of attention. but it also killed camren rumours when camila left. a win-win situation in that regard. especially with lucy popped into the mix.

then, lauren was caught at the airport with weed. the reaction from fans and the media was, to say the least - quite humorous and positive. was this pr? or was lauren’s name being dragged through the industry? or was it a honest mistake?

in my opinion - it was an attempt to get lauren’s name dragged. lauren has always been one to voice her opinion and if you upset one of your superiors (which it is likely she could have done) then they can play you because you’re just a puppet. but lauren’s reaction was one of nonchalance. it seemed she was un-bothered - which is why the whole thing could’ve been a stunt. this would work in fifth harmony’s favour because it got lauren (and them) a lot of attention. i guess we’ll never know.

i think i’ve covered mostly everything about laucy but now i want to quickly look at the statements released by both fifth harmony and camila cabello, when camila decided to leave.

on the night camila was leaving, they all had a jingle ball performance. camila first performed with mgk that night.

then she performed, for the last time ever, with fifth harmony

(oh hey, look at that smile!)

that same night fifth harmony released a statement announcing that camila is leaving. and no, they weren’t “just” informed - camila craftily added that into her statement.

this was a bombshell for nearly everyone. sure, most of the fandom could see that camila wanted to leave. but after the revival of ot5 moments (yikes, dinah) this was such a confusing time for camila to leave...right? things seemed on the rise so a lot of people couldn’t understand her reasoning...even though we saw it coming from miles away. lol.

their statement was short and abrupt and obviously written on behalf of them by their management. i definitely think their management wanted to get the upper hand and create a narrative before camila and her team could come an spit lies (as they have been doing).

then we were given camila’s statement which some people took as more meaningful because she talked about bunnies and rainbows. but her statement too was orchestrated by her team. did you all catch the grammatical inconsistencies throughout? yeah - one person did not write that.

see how she craftily inserted the words “just informed”? she’s so smart. but fifth harmony’s team weren’t having it and they fired back with their second statement - not admitting defeat. there was so much confusion and so fifth harmony, in my opinion, did the right thing in releasing their second statement - to clear up any confusion. some people, of course, were too blindsighted to see wrong and right, even after everything.

all 3 statements - both fifth harmony’s and camila’s statemnts were all released on behlaf of them and are not completely theirs. one thing’s for sure however, there is an underlying narrative that none of us know about and perhaps we never will. what i can say is that camila fucked over 4 girls for her solo career as revealed by this billboard article - camila even went as far as to suggest that the four other girls take a hiatus so she could release her own solo music - and then have fifth harmony to fall back on. it’s safe to say that a lot of the articles written from billboard and other news outlets do favour camila (because one of her team works for billboard) but they are very telling. it’s also telling that camila has had so many articles written about her since she left - victimising her.

there’s a lot i could say about camila’s departure but i think that’s a story for another time.

with that i leave you with the rise of h4rmony!

other posts

lauren and lucy - just friends?

laucy timeline

laucy at christmas

upcoming posts

mike jauregui + chris jauregui and their problematic behviour

follow me on twitter @rosesnormani and follow our twitter @5hexposing

-L

YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki Responsibility Push Angers PewDiePie

(Bloomberg) –YouTube spent 2019 answering critics with some of the most drastic changes in its 15-year history. With each step, it gave those activists, regulators and lawmakers more reasons to attack its free-wheeling, user-generated business model.

Susan Wojcicki, YouTube’s chief executive officer, announced her goals in April. “My top priority,” she wrote, “is responsibility.” Her company spent the year trying to traverse an almost impossible tightrope: nurture a growing community of demanding creators, while pledging to police troubling videos and protect millions of underage users who officially shouldn’t even be watching. The efforts pleased almost no one and highlighted an existential quandary. Every time YouTube tries to fix something, the company, an arm of Alphabet Inc.’s Google, risks losing the neutrality that it needs to thrive.

“They know that every time they are successful catching problematic content or removing it, this just raises expectations,” said Mike Godwin, a senior fellow at think tank R Street Institute and a trustee of the Internet Society. “It’s a never-ending cycle of increasing demands for these dominant platforms to operate fairly.”

As 2020 begins, the largest online video service is being dragged deeper into political fights over privacy, copyright and content moderation. In response, YouTube is trying to preserve the sanctity of its status as an online platform with little liability for what happens on its site. Instead, that burden is increasingly falling on the shoulders of regulators, video creators and other partners.

Nowhere is that more evident than YouTube’s approach to kids. A landmark privacy settlement this year with the Federal Trade Commission is forcing YouTube to split its massive site in two. Every clip, starting in January, must be designated as “made for kids” or not. The overhaul puts billions of ad dollars at stake and has sparked panic among creators, who also now face new legal risk. The company isn’t offering creators legal advice or ways to salvage their businesses. It isn’t even defining what a “made for kids” video is on YouTube — and has argued to the government that it shouldn’t have to.

“Creators will make those decisions themselves,” Wojcicki said last week. “Creators know their content best.”

YouTube privately considered taking more control. Earlier this year, it assembled a team of more than 40 employees to brace for the FTC decision. The team was code-named Crosswalk — as in a way to guide kids across YouTube’s chaotic streets. Among its proposals was a radical one, at least by the standards of Silicon Valley: YouTube would screen every video aimed at kids under the age of 8 in its YouTube Kids app, ensuring that no untoward content crept into the feed of millions of tots around the world. A press release was even drafted in which Wojcicki said professional moderators would check each clip, according to people familiar with the plans. Yet at the last minute, the CEO and her top deputies ditched the plan, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing private deliberations.

The rationale was clear to some at YouTube, one person involved in the project recalled. Hand-picking videos, even for kids, made YouTube look too much like a media company, not a neutral platform. A YouTube spokeswoman denied the idea was turned down because it put the company in charge of programming, but she declined to comment further on the decision. In a recent interview, Wojcicki made it clear that her content-moderation push only goes so far, telling CBS News that even being liable for video recommendations would destroy the essence of the service.

“If we were held liable for every single piece of content that we recommended, we would have to review it,” she said. “That would mean there would be a much smaller set of information that people would be finding. Much, much smaller.”

YouTube’s balancing act between media publisher or hands-off internet bulletin board has sparked intense debate internally. For some business partners and employees, this year’s decisions leaves them with the impression that the company is unable to take a serious stand.

“What is the mission of this company? People don’t even know,” said Claire Stapleton, a former YouTube marketing manager who left this year after clashing with Google over employee protests. “YouTube is so ill-equipped to manage these massive challenges.”

The YouTube spokeswoman said the company has made significant investments to better protect its online community. Over the last 18 months, the results of this effort include an 80% reduction in views of videos that violate its policies. YouTube also increased viewership on videos from “authoritative news publishers” by 60%, according to the spokeswoman. “While there will always be healthy debate around this work, we’ll continue to make the hard decisions needed to better protect the openness of the YouTube platform and the community that depends on it,” she added in a statement.

No episode in 2019 typified YouTube’s arduous search for middle ground more than the Maza affair. In June, gay journalist and YouTube creator Carlos Maza accused Steven Crowder, a conservative YouTuber, of repeated harassment. The Vox reporter put together a montage of clips from Crowder’s YouTube channel to highlight what Maza said were homophobic and racist insults.

So, I have pretty thick skin when it comes to online harassment, but something has been really bothering me.

— Carlos Maza 🌹 (@gaywonk) May 31, 2019

After saying it would review Maza’s complaints, YouTube concluded the comments were not in violation of its policies, angering some of its own employees. YouTube staff held a private call to explain its rationale to Maza, who remained unconvinced. “It was very awkward,” he recalled.

(3/4) As an open platform, it’s crucial for us to allow everyone–from creators to journalists to late-night TV hosts–to express their opinions w/in the scope of our policies. Opinions can be deeply offensive, but if they don’t violate our policies, they’ll remain on our site.

— TeamYouTube (@TeamYouTube) June 4, 2019

Crowder, meanwhile, devoted a 21-minute video to rehashing his comments. After days of criticism, YouTube removed ads from his videos, angering him.

At a conference about a week later, Wojcicki apologized to the LGBTQ community, but defended YouTube’s decision to keep Crowder’s videos on the site. Removing his clips, or banning him from YouTube, would have put the company in an untenable situation, with millions of viewers asking “what about this one?” for hundreds of comedy, hip-hop and late-night TV-show videos, the CEO said.

Two months later, a group of LGBTQ YouTube creators filed a class action lawsuit accusing the company of discrimination. The case mirrored similar charges from across the ideological aisle — a filing from PragerU, a conservative video channel, which has accused YouTube of censorship. In fact, the lawsuits were brought by the same attorney. “It just looks like YouTube is taking the maximum amount of time for a solution that pleases no one,” said Stapleton, the former employee.

YouTube spent the months after the Maza episode rewriting its harassment policy. The update, announced earlier this month, set new rules that would now treat Crowder’s videos as violations subject to removal. Like clockwork, the decision riled other creators. Felix Kjellberg, YouTube’s biggest star, who posts as PewDiePie, declared he was leaving the video site and blamed the new policy. “We have this anarchy system, okay,” he said. “If YouTube knows what’s good for them, they’ll keep their [expletive] hands out… Don’t come and ruin it for us.”

While criticism comes from all sides, YouTube’s challenge is practically insurmountable: More than 500 hours of footage are uploaded every minute. And the company’s software is still unable to gain a thorough understanding of the content before people start watching. “You are trying to keep free speech going and, at the same time, you’re trying to make sure crud doesn’t get in, and trying to make sure that people who watch aren’t getting affected. It’s a really, really, really hard problem,” said Diya Jolly, a former YouTube executive who left in 2017. “Susan is doing an awesome job.”

Wojcicki’s task is set to become even more difficult. The European Parliament has approved rules that make YouTube liable the moment anyone uploads a video that violates a copyright. That could force YouTube to take down content from popular creators, while hiking its legal bills and hurting ad sales. Wojcicki used Google’s political muscle and invited creators to lobby against the regulation, but she has failed to stop it. According to one former senior employee, the fight often claimed as much of the executive team’s attention in 2019 as the more-public battles over children’s privacy and inappropriate content.

Even in the U.S., the walls are closing in around YouTube. Republican and Democratic lawmakers have proposed peeling back protections that have shielded internet companies from liability for decades. YouTube’s dominance may draw antitrust scrutiny. Lawmakers are also considering tougher copyright laws, egged on by YouTube’s rivals in media and music. “That’s where there is a lot of money at stake, and people have valid objections,” said Jeff Kosseff, an assistant professor at the U.S. Naval Academy and an expert on internet law.

For now, though, YouTube’s biggest challenge is kids’ privacy. In September, the FTC fined Google for illegally tracking children for its ads business, forcing significant changes to YouTube’s operations. On Nov. 13, YouTube sent an email to tens of thousands of creators about the coming “made for kids” designation. If marked as “made for kids,” videos will lose lucrative personalized ads and other valuable features, including user comments. If clips aren’t labeled this way, and the government decides the footage is indeed reaching children, creators can be fined thousands of dollars.

“We know this won’t be easy for some creators, and that this required change is going to take some getting used to,” the company wrote in the email. YouTube has also advised many of them to “lawyer up,” according to partners. A recent regulatory filing went further, with Google estimating the changes will mean YouTube creators “who make mostly child-directed content will likely lose a majority of their revenue.”

In contrast, YouTube itself emerged relatively unscathed. Google paid a $170 million fine, a tiny sliver of its profit. The FTC settlement on the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, or COPPA, focused on YouTube, not other parts of Google. The internet giant worked hard to limit any broader impact on the rest of its businesses, according to one former executive. Best of all for YouTube, it doesn’t need to screen clips before they go up, nor is it liable for any infringing videos.

The FTC is now rewriting its COPPA rules and has invited public comment. In a filing, Google told the agency it was worried about any laws forcing it to “identify and police” videos aimed at kids. The company was, in effect, arguing it couldn’t know for sure the age of its audience and shouldn’t be punished for that.

Critics were appalled. Lindsey Barrett, a staff attorney at Georgetown Law’s Communications & Technology Clinic who worked with complainants in the FTC case, found it hard to imagine the contortions required for Google to make this argument. “Our entire business is based on being able to slice and dice our audience, and see who’s watching what,” she said. “But we couldn’t possibly tell you if there’s a child here!”

The YouTube spokeswoman said the company has done its best to comply with its COPPA obligations, as it understands them, and has asked the FTC for more clarification on the rules.

The company is “not answering the questions everyone wants,” said Greg Alkalay, chief executive officer of BatteryPOP, a children’s media company. “YouTube’s success comes from its creators. They built a beast and don’t know how to wrangle it.”

–With assistance from Ben Brody.

  The post YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki Responsibility Push Angers PewDiePie appeared first on Businessliveme.com.

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Everything You Should Know About Machine Learning

Programming Computers: Then and Now I find it fascinating that today you can define certain rules and provide enough historical data to a computer, reward it for reaching closer to the goal and punish it for doing bad, which will get it trained to do a specific task. Based on these rules and data, the machine can be programmed to learn to do tasks so well that we humans have no way of knowing what steps it is explicitly following to get the work done. It’s like the brain, you can’t slice it open and understand the inner workings. The days when we used to define each step for the computer to take are now numbered. The role we played back then, of a god to the computers has been reduced to something like that of a dog trainer. The tables are turning from commanding machines to parenting them. Rather than creating code, we are turning into trainers. Computers are learning. It has been called machine learning, for quite a while now (defined in 1959 by by Arthur Samuel). Other names being artificial intelligence, deep simulation or cognitive computing. However now, it really has picked up and based on the amazing things it can help computers do now, it is clearly going to be the future of what the IT industry will transform into. What made Machine learning reach this inflection point it is at right now? Three things: 1.We now have better algorithms. 2.Drastic explosion in computing power. 3.We as human beings have amassed a large amount of data that the machines can learn from. Formal definition (from 1959): “Field of study that gives computers the ability to learn without being explicitly programmed.” Everyday Examples of Machine Learning at Work

Sounds a wee bit like fiction, but it’s all around us. Consider the Gmail’s spam filter, or the way Gmail can sort through your stuff and classify them into primary mail, updates, promotions and social. Have you ever wondered how Google news reads millions of news articles every day and sorts them into categories for you to find? And the way Facebook sorts through thousands of posts and lets only the ones it thinks you would like on your wall? Of which I’m not a big fan.

Note how Google news can gather the similar stories from a number of sources and put them together. This is not the task of a human being, or even a massive team – updating hundreds of such stories every minute. Imagine the number of jobs machine learning will cut!

The best one in my opinion is the way my Google photos app (Play store, Apple app store) can return a picture of “sea” from the photos I had clicked at a beach 9 years ago. Manually, even by using all that I know about my own life, I would have taken hours to sort through my own photos and find it! And Google photos search can sort through thousands of my old pictures, understand which one has a sea in it and show it to me within a fraction of a second. It indeed is fascinating! The best part, it automatically uploads newly taken pictures and can clean your local disk if you tell it to. Plus, you get to store unlimited number of photos (if they are less than 16 megapixels). I no longer store pictures on my iPhone. If you are wondering, let me also tell you, Google did not pay me to say all that. Yes, it is that cool of an app. The Game of Go – Conquered Thanks to machine learning, far more complex artificial intelligence has now learned to defeat the human champion of this game called Go. At the first glance, Go looks like a simple game with players taking turns to put black and white stones on a 19×19 grid. A player get’s to choose from around 200 moves when it is his/her turn (the number is 35 for chess). And if you think about the whole game, the number of possible positions the stones can be put on a Go board exceeds the number of atoms in the universe!

Demis Hassabis of Google DeepMind with the world Go champion, Lee Sedol. Go is a game like chess, which unlike chess requires a player to make moves which involve a profoundly complex way of “feel and intuition” which had been hard to make computers understand, until now. Recently, if you had been following the news, you must have heard that an AI programmed by Google’s engineers, AlphaGo defeated the human world champion of Go in the past decade, Lee Sedol, over and over again. The five match series ended in a 4-1 win for AlphaGo. The live streams of all the matches are available for anyone to watch on YouTube. The inner workings of AlphaGo were published in a highly reputed scientific journal. It reports how the Google’s AI bot learned to master Go by combining a variety of techniques such as Monte-Carlo tree search and Deep neural networks that were trained by showing a huge number of past human Go matches to it. And they go rogue too With a mind of their own, machines are no less humans anymore. They learn from us and evolve with us. Thus they are prone to learning from our biases. The very app I was lauding before, Google photos, which has a tagging system based on machine learning, created a furor just last year by tagging two dark skinned people as gorillas. Google engineer quickly apologized for the AI’s f*** up and as a quick fix removed the tag of gorilla altogether. This wasn’t exactly the system going rogue, but needed a long term fix to clearly distinguish between dark skinned humans and primates. Google is working on it.

One major example of an AI going rogue always brings up the example of the Microsoft’s twitter bot Tay. It was designed to learn from the humans of Twitter and start conversing like human beings. It was an experiment about “Conversational Understanding.” Now, based on how people talked, learning from everyone’s micro-blogs, trolls included, the AI in under 24 hours learned to be a racist a$$h0|3. Although not even close to reaching Skynet like rogue levels, this is still a slightly frightening thing about AI. Learning machine learning Far from all of the complex algorithms Google, Facebook and the other large corporations with immense amount of talent can manage to create, I believe everything has a humble beginning. I mean even the individuals who make up the team of AlphaGo must have each started from the bottom because humans are not born with the complete knowledge of machine learning pre-installed in their minds. Agreed, they must have started much earlier, must have amazing brains and a range of other random factors that might have contributed to their superior state. So what? Thus, utilizing the free course ware available to everyone with a decent internet connection, I decided to start learning about machine learning myself. So what if I do not reach that level. The very joy of learning it comes with, is a thing enough for me to stick. In my search for the course material I landed on this springboard page that listed 9 courses, classified into three groups – beginner, intermediate and advanced machine learning courses with three courses in each category. Fascinated by all of these amazing feats that a computer can be trained to perform, I wanted to dip my own toes in it too. With no idea of what this course would cover and if I would even be able to understand it, I bravely started the beginner machine learning course offered by Stanford on Coursera (link). It being a self-paced course, I went all in for the first 3 days. In these three days I covered 3 week’s course material, including all of the assignments and quizzes. Soon I realized that was quite a bit of information. So I spent the next two days reviewing notes and taking up a self-designed project. I will soon be updating the progress on this project here. For the hint, it was an idea I got from my recent Los Angeles trip while I was waiting in line for the Harry potter ride. From whatever little understanding I have about Machine learning, I believe that it is a technique which parents a range of algorithms that can help a computer get trained. To my surprise the first course I am taking involved the basics of what I was already doing during my research – fitting data to curves. Although in my research I had be doing much more complex fitting to get measurable parameters from the collected data, the course inclined towards talking about the actual inner workings of regression in statistics to specifically build the foundation for more complex machine learning algorithms to come later. I never knew that simple regression / fitting was a part of machine learning, moreover an essential building block! In my opinion, anyone who deals with any kind of data must take this course, just for the fun of it. You will definitely learn something useful. My goal for now is to be able to program neural networks at some point in the future. Later, I want to be able to implement neural evolution algorithms, which I suppose is based on a genetic algorithm and allows biology like implementation to computer programs. Extremely fascinating, but then I’m talking about something I do not know much about. http://awesci.com/everything-you-should-know-about-machine-learning/ #ajpinfo READ MORE:

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#Blog New Post has been published on http://www.titoslondon.co.uk/when-did-bad-taste-become-good-fashion/

When did bad taste become good fashion?

Full disclaimer: I wrote this article to formulate my own thoughts on camp and kitsch—how the two concepts evolved, where they overlap and how often one is mistaken from the other. In a world of people obsessed with perfecting every tiny detail of their digital footprint, where’s the place for the (nearly synonymous with bad taste) aesthetics of camp and kitsch—especially in fashion? Why are they thought of in the same breath, and, if both are considered below the exacting standards of sophistication, what has brought them back into the sartorialist’s vocabulary?

It all started with Balenciaga’s ironically ugly and overpriced handbags—all worth an eye roll and a can-you-believe-this head shake. The latest, gift-shop poster leather shoppers, made me prod further into the relevance of such print on a $1,790 handbag. The piece is a prime contender for the kitsch camp. And this was not the first time Balenciaga has mocked the It-girl essential with something so painfully garish as a gift-shop poster and whack!—laid it out in the midst of high-brow fashion, perhaps to elicit a reaction; remember the much-memed Blanket Square and the Ikea-inspired Carry Shopper? Demna Gvasalia rarely fails at shocking his audience, but he isn’t the only designer to walk down this road of supposed bad taste.

Tom Ford’s autumn/winter 2018 show bore an overriding ’80s touch—sequinned trousers and jackets aplenty. Take a closer look at the collection and you will see a jumper with the brand’s logo emblazoned in hot-fix rhinestones, not entirely unlike the designer label’s many rip-offs. It’s as though Ford openly challenges you take on a brazenly gaudy wardrobe. Alessandro Michele, current creative director at Gucci who once worked with Ford, has a taste for irreverence himself. From working with Trouble Andrew aka Gucci Ghost on capsule collections to deliberately misspelling the logo of the storied Italian house as ‘Guccy’, Alessandro Michele has long mixed high-brow and low-brow on the runway.

Meanwhile, at Comme des Garçons, Rei Kawakubo married sculptural pieces with Betty Boop and seemingly endless yards of ruffles, lamé and lace. Kawakubo’s work softly approached exaggeration, raising it into a near crescendo of fury.Notorious for not explaining her work to the audience and leaving it to individual perception, the Japanese designer, who was honoured with an exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art last year, took us behind her mindset recently: “Camp is really and truly something deep and new, and represents a value we need. For example, there are so many so-called styles such as punk that have lost their original rebel spirit today. I think camp can express something deeper and give birth to progress.”

What is and isn’t

Here begins our journey of telling one apart from the other. German modernist writer Herman Broch wrote, “The maker of kitsch does not create inferior art, he is not an incompetent or a bungler, he cannot be evaluated by aesthetic standards; rather he is ethically depraved, a criminal willing radical evil.” Broch argued that this depravity, this willingness to go against what’s safe, is what defines kitsch in the first place. “The essence of kitsch is the confusion of the ethical category with the aesthetic category. It is not concerned with ‘good,’ but with ‘attractive’ work; it is the pleasing effect that is most important,” he said. Kitsch is usually the characteristic of a object—the Balenciaga handbag and the Tom Ford sweatshirt are prime examples. Often filed under tacky, something that appeals to a mass audience over those with better taste, it is an aesthetic that one loves to hate.

Camp on the other hand is a term most often used in reference to art, and celebrates exaggeration and lack of pretence. “Camp is esoteric—something of a private code, a badge of identity even, among small urban cliques,” wrote Susan Sontag in her essay Notes On “Camp”. “The hallmark of Camp is the spirit of extravagance. Camp is a woman walking around in a dress made of three million feathers. Camp is the paintings of Carlo Crivelli, with their real jewels and trompe-l’œil insects and cracks in the masonry. Camp is the outrageous aestheticism of Steinberg’s six American movies with Dietrich, all six, but especially the last, The Devil Is A Woman. In Camp there is often something démesuré in the quality of the ambition, not only in the style of the work itself. Gaudí’s lurid and beautiful buildings in Barcelona are Camp not only because of their style, but because they reveal—most notably in the Cathedral of the Sagrada Familia—the ambition on the part of one man to do what it takes a generation, a whole culture to accomplish.”

Camp and kitsch overlap constantly, and despite the literature separating one from the other, what both aesthetic sensibilities succeed in delivering is a sense of pride in subverting the norm. For instance, while Kawakubo’s clothing is a product that can be worn and hence categorised under kitsch, the designer addresses a sensibility that’s not entirely practical and offers the wearer a story, instead of being just another object in their wardrobe.

When bad fashion is in good taste

Why does fashion, an industry deeply vested in correcting aesthetic flaws, even associate with these? The answer is simple. Style is never just about clothing. Fashion is the collective emotion of thinkers and trend spotters reacting to their current environment. Think of RuPaul’s Drag Race—well in its 10th season and taking over Netflix feeds worldwide. Think of the unraveling gender binaries, the strengthening dialogue around inclusivity, and of the pressing need to find one’s identity in the vast, open expanse of social media—however radical it might be. Think of meme accounts like Freddiemade and Siduations, which offer humorous commentary on pop culture fashion. Somewhere in a world full of people hellbent on projecting the most ideal version of themselves, is a counterculture questioning this very chase for perfection. We may not see camp or kitsch in their traditional definitions now, but their presence in the current context can’t be ignored—which is kind of their point.

Sontag wrote, “Camp sees everything in quotation marks. It’s not a lamp, but a “lamp”; not a woman, but a “woman”. To perceive Camp in objects and persons is to understand Being-as-Playing-a-Role. It is the farthest extension, in sensibility, of the metaphor of life as theatre.” Did anyone say Off-White?

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Armchair Analyst: Your complete guide to the Week 10 MLS slate

May 4, 201812:54PM EDT

This is the weekend 2018 officially rounds the quarter pole, by Sunday night 98 of 391 regular-season games will officially be in the books. We throw some numbers around here in this column, and elsewhere, and some of them mean more than we’d like them to and others much less, but here’s the one that really matters:

3.3

That’s the current goals per game in MLS in 2018. The league as a whole hasn’t been scoring at that rate since 2001, and has only gone over 3.3 for an entire year twice (in 1996, MLS’s debut season, the leaguewide average was 3.37 gpg, and it was an insane 3.57 in 1998).

I like goals. So I like what I’ve seen so far in 2018.

Let’s look at Week 10:

Friday Night

Toronto FC vs. Philadelphia Union

8 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

Naturally given all that, the second-lowest scoring team in the league just happens to be last year’s treble winners and this year’s defeated CCL finalists, Toronto FC. They’ve got six goals and four points through six games after banging home 74 for 69 points in 34 games last year en route to the greatest season any MLS team has ever had.

We all know why they’re off to a slow start. Injuries and midweek international dates have taken a toll, and here they are at the start of May eight points below the playoff line. Given how good the East is, they need to start winning now.

The Union are in a similar situation, and they have a plan: Stop Michael Bradley from dictating the tempo of the game (whether he lines up at d-mid or CB), and get out on the break:

“For me, I’m sure what a lot of teams try to do is disrupt his game,” Union midfielder Alejandro Bedoyatold ProSoccerUSA.com this week. “They try to put pressure on him and get him away from the ball so other guys make plays because he’s probably one of the only guys on that team that can ping a 60-yard ball or get it to [Sebastian] Giovinco on the counterattack.

“As long as we get him off the ball and disrupt his flow as much as possible, I think we’ll be alright and be able to handle the rest. Looking at tape, they’re a team that can be countered on and we just have to be opportunistic and take our chances.”

I’m less convinced that TFC can be countered on, and more interested to see how they plan to handle the Union’s cross-heavy attack. I think there are goals at the back post for Philly in this one, but they can’t just settle for hitting cross after cross, and Borek Dockal has to be just as aggressive about getting into the box as he was last weekend.

Saturday Slate

Montreal Impact vs. New England Revolution

1 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

So after two months I feel like it’s safe to say that the Remi Garde era has not been kind to the Impact. They’ve conceded 21 times in eight games, and whether they put two men behind the ball or 10, it doesn’t seem to matter. Teams figure out a way to crack them open:

The Revs don’t have nearly the same patience or explosiveness as Atlanta, but they are murder when they see any sort of hesitation or loose distribution from an opposing backline. New England’s been selective about how and when they use their press, but what really matters is that when they unleash it, they come in waves.

Expect to seem them on the front foot for a good chunk of this one. And if that’s the case, expect to see the Impact try to Route 1 it to Ignacio Piatti at least a little bit.

New York Red Bulls vs. NYCFC

1:55 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

Bradley Wright-Phillips has been beyond human thus far in 2018:

Goals + Assists Per 90, MVP Seasons Past 10 Years Ranked

1) ’15 Seba: 1.23 2) ’14 Keane: 1.17 3) ’12 Wondo: 1.09 4) ’08 GBS: 1.06 5) ’17 Valeri: 1.02 6) ’11 DeRo: 0.90 7) ’16 Villa: 0.85 8) ’13 Magee: 0.81 9) ’09 LD: 0.75 10) ’10 Ferreira 0.70

2018 BWP so far: 2.05

— Tutul Rahman (@tutulismyname) May 1, 2018

And for the record: David Villa is at 1.24 G+A per 90 so far in what’s been an injury-plagued start to the season.

Obviously it is fun to conceive of this as two of the league’s great forwards going mano a mano, and on some level it is always that. On a bigger picture level, it’s “Can the Red Bulls disrupt NYCFC’s fanatical devotion to building from the back?” and it’s also “Can NYCFC punish RBNY for throwing both fullbacks so high, so hard, so often?”

Minnesota United FC vs. Vancouver Whitecaps FC

2 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

MNUFC got themselves a nice and necessary home win last weekend, and made what I felt was a pretty good trade on Tuesday when they picked up Eric Miller from the Rapids, and obviously Darwin Quintero has fit well. Despite their never-ending injury battles, they are a better and more balanced and deeper team than they were a month ago, even if defensive midfield and central defense still appear to be season-defining problems.

This game won’t be about those two spots, though. This game will be about being responsible with the ball and not letting the ‘Caps go vertical. Vancouver are under 40 percent possession so far in 2018 – a staggeringly low number – because they really only want to do one thing: sit deep, turn you over and get out on the run. And in Alphonso Davies, they have this:

Davies is currently the most vertical 1v1 player in the league, and is the most successful high-volume dribbler. He has elite pace, and he’s also got elite change-of-pace, and a great (plus improving) first touch. To all of that he’s added a more precise last touch, as he’s creating and finishing chances this year that he simply didn’t see last year.

Simply put: If the Loons turn the ball over anywhere near Davies, I think they’re cooked. If they don’t, they should end up in good shape here.

LAFC vs. FC Dallas

3:55 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

One of the things I’ve been talking about with my colleagues over the past two months is the effect Marco Ureña has had on LAFC. He’s amongst the most unselfish runners of any center forward on the continent, and his passing – he has five assists, which is tied for the league lead – sort of speaks for itself. Obviously his finishing is awful, which is why he’s bounced around so much in his career, but with plenty of goalscorers around him that hasn’t been an issue so far with LAFC.

But now Ureña’s out. He’s got facial fractures which means he’ll be gone for the next month (and probably longer, since he’ll be at the World Cup after that) and this, my friends, is the Black-and-Gold’s first big hurdle. Ureña hasn’t given his team goals, but he’s given them shape and definition when pushing forward whether it’s been in their usual 4-2-3-1 or the 3-5-2 they’ve toyed around with here and there.

The obvious solution here is “just put Adama Diamande into the lineup,” though that sentiment may be at least a little bit misguided as the Norwegian international hasn’t played since February and almost certainly lacks match fitness. Same goes for Lee Nguyen, though the idea of Nguyen, Carlos Vela, Diego Rossi and Benny Feilhaber in the same XI is intriguing in a sort of “let’s see how many true 10s and false 9s we can get onto the field together” way.

By the way, Dallas have been very good recently, and it seems like internal competition for spots is finally paying some dividends in terms of mentality. They’re not sleepwalking through games anymore, and while that didn’t help change the final result at NYCFC last weekend they were far more competitive than most teams who venture to Yankee Stadium these days.

LAFC’s defense is similar to NYCFC’s in that both take tons of risks, both with and without the ball. If the Dallas midfield is able to draw those defenders upfield, they’ll be able to send runners through on goal.

Seattle Sounders vs. Columbus Crew SC

4 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

Here’s a very good breakdown of how different the Sounders look, week to week, depending upon who’s playing underneath center forward Will Bruin:

The Sounders used two different No. 10s in their last two games, and they couldn’t play the position more differently. https://t.co/PdsvsStiwT

— Sounder At Heart (@sounderatheart) May 3, 2018

I called Cristian Roldan a “false 10” in that role because his job isn’t necessarily to be a playmaker. Rather, it’s to run and combine, to sniff out overloads and to drag defenders around. He doesn’t create chances; he creates space.

When it’s Clint Dempsey playing that role the whole focus is “let’s do what we can to get him on the ball in the final third and then see what happens.” Both approaches have their merits.

As for Columbus… it’s hard to write the same take 34 times a year, right? They still do pretty much what they’ve always done under Gregg Berhalter, and their two weaknesses – not enough goalscoring from the flanks, and an error-prone central defense – are still their weaknesses.

Chicago Fire vs. Atlanta United

8:30 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

A month back Veljko Paunovic made the decision to start flipping Bastian Schweinsteiger between central midfield and sweeper, alternating between a 4-3-3 and a 3-5-2. Chicago have responded with a 2-1-2 stretch – obviously not great, but much better than their 0-2-0 opening to the season – during which they’ve played mostly credible defense and mostly covered up for everybody’s weaknesses by figuring out a way to play to each other’s strengths.

Schweinsteiger’s been organizing the backline, and on occasion stepping into the midfield to create useful overloads. This is what the sweeper’s supposed to do, and he’s been good at it.

That said, the sweeper as a positional/tactical choice went out of vogue 20+ years ago and never really came back for a reason: It’s a fundamentally reactive way to play defense, and fast, front-foot teams could punish any side that played with a classic sweeper. Teams got smarter at understanding where the gaps were and faster at exploiting said gaps, and no amount of emergency defense or after-the-fact organizational ability could change that.

Which is to say: I like Atlanta’s chances on Saturday.

Houston Dynamo vs. LA Galaxy

8:30 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

This graphic is very easy to read. The dotted red line is actual points. Look where the Dynamo are on their particular curve:

And here’s the West, where the spread of points is a lot tighter. SKC is the best of the group, but there aren’t clear favorites, and even San Jose at the bottom isn’t too far off pic.twitter.com/tpsSyZJyga

— Kevin Minkus (@kevinminkus) May 1, 2018

They haven’t been finishing, and their defense has not been good enough to make up for it. At some point that stops being an unfortunate trend and starts being “well, you are what you are” – which is a journey the Revs made last year.

Houston have only two wins in two months: Back in Week 1 they blitzed Atlanta 4-0, countering them to death. And a few weeks back they beat Toronto’s USL team 5-1, capitalizing on the Reds being catastrophically short-handed.

Other than that they’ve gotten two draws and three losses, and I’d say they left points on the table in four of those five games. 

Sporting KC vs. Colorado Rapids

8:30 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

One of the most entertaining games of the year was back on March 24, a 2-2 draw between these two teams in Colorado. The Rapids were up 2-0 inside the first 10 minutes, and during the subsequent 80 SKC battered the door down before finally coming up with a point.

The raw number of long-balls the Rapids hit has come down since then, but they’re still the most Route 1-reliant bunch in the league, as 20.1 percent of all their pass attempts are long-balls. Despite protestations to the contrary they are, indeed, a long-ball team.

And it’ll be interesting to see how SKC handle that from a defensive perspective. They’re much better on that side of the ball than they were in March, but are still slower to get pressure upfield than in years past – obviously having a bunch of new personnel being one of the reasons for that. None of their preferred starting front three have what I would consider to be exceptional defensive instincts, and that has, at times, left the backline exposed (especially since both SKC fullbacks push way up).

It’s been an ongoing project to fix the above, and credit to Peter Vermes & Co. for collecting a bunch of points while making some necessary adjustments. Three of their last five outings have been very good defensively – last weekend at New England was a legitimately excellent performance – and beyond that, Tim Melia’s been able to save them some points here and there.

San Jose Earthquakes vs. Portland Timbers

10:30 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

It is two months into the season and I have no idea what the Quakes do well. They’re near the bottom of the league in expected goals because they generate fewer shots than last year, their defense has been a mess and they allow a ton of useful possession to teams in and through central midfield. Their doesn’t seem to be a unifying approach to… really, to just about anything.

The same is nearly true of the Timbers, but not quite and it’s because we know one thing for sure: This continues to be a devastating counterattacking team. Two weeks ago Portland hung back in their own defensive third, invited NYCFC forward and then cut the Cityzens up in a 3-0 win. It wasn’t the beautiful game, but it was effective and it got them three necessary points.

For MLS, point totals after Week 9 are mildly predictive of the final point totals. NYRB 2016 had the best recovery season. pic.twitter.com/50oPTKjsJ4

— Charles Wilson (@andthenthehex) May 1, 2018

If I’m Portland I do damn near the same thing in this one. There’s every reason to think that the Quakes will over-extend themselves pushing their fullbacks up, and no reason to think they’ll be able to stop the ball through central midfield once the counter’s on.

Sunday’s Capper

Orlando City SC vs. Real Salt Lake

5 pm ET | Match Preview | TV & streaming info

I don’t entirely agree with my colleague Bobby Warshaw’s take here that Orlando City are just scraping out some points:

They’ve legitimately been the better team in each of their last three outings, and in the previous two some good adjustments from Jason Kreis earned them the points. They have depth and flexibility in attack, and that’s been their main asset. Since Cristian Higuita’s been inserted into the starting lineup they’ve been harder to play against through central midfield – in the last three weeks they’ve only allowed goals on set-pieces or long-balls, none through build-up play – and that’s allowed them to do more with the ball.

It’s been a process and they’re not where they need to be, but this doesn’t feel like the early-season, 2017 version of the Lions. That team was scraping out wins they didn’t deserve, and were eventually exposed.

As for RSL, they’ve taken one of 12 available road points thus far, and have been outscored 9-1 in their last three away games. It has been neither good nor cohesive, and while they did some fun stuff in attack during the first half of last week’s eventual 2-0 loss at Vancouver, it felt typical of this year’s Claret-and-Cobalt in that they would advance into the final third with the ball but then create nothing meaningful once there.

They have nine goals in eight games, and just one is from a center forward. This is a song we’ve heard before.

One more thing to ponder…

A & B are the same color.

Happy weekending, everybody.

Series: 

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Armchair Analyst: Your complete guide to the Week 10 MLS slate was originally published on 365 Football