#.it's bizarre to me that top posts only seem to show up on mobile

[deltalunaris]

On Why I’m Leaving Re.ddit For The Foreseeable Future (+ Twi.tter & Tu.mblr-related Announcement)

(TW: mental health-related discussion, anti-survivor sentiment & bigotry, abuse & trauma mentions. Website names are altered to prevent bots & bad actors. Long Post, TL;DR at the bottom.)

Yep, nope. Not doing this Re.ddit thing anymore. I’ll report blatant ToS violations (ex. death threats, bigotry, obvious scams, ban evaders especially), and I’ll be suspended instead of the offender because of “report abuse”.

[ID: A message from the admins, stating that the account has been temporarily banned for three days for report abuse. The name of the sub where they claim the abuse happened is censored to prevent community brigading.]

To top it all off, I haven’t reported ANY posts since my first suspension (which, as you’ll see, was entirely wrong & I was immediately forgiven after I sent an appeal). Just yesterday, I got suspended again, and the “link to where the abuse occurred” is a 404. Not a [deleted] & [removed], a straight up 404.

[ID: A screenshot of a re.ddit webpage depicting a bright red banner stating “Your account has been suspended from Re[.]ddit for 2 days. Click here for more info.” The page itself displays a 404, stating: “Sorry, there doesn't seem to be anything here.”]

Censored the sub’s name out of extreme caution (i.e brigading), and also because it’s not their fault to begin with. After my first suspension, I talked to the mods of two mental health-related subs (one is shown above, the other below), and those who spoke to me stated that it’s an admin decision, not their own.

Apparently, when you report, most options listed go to the sub’s mods AND the admins (except options such as “this breaks [sub’s] rules”). So even if the mods say you were in the right (which was the case with my first suspension, hence why it was immediately reversed), the admins can decide against that and suspend you anyway.

It’s why I only ‘report’ posts to the mod team directly, as they have invited me to.

Otherwise, I have not used the actual report button out of genuine worry that this will happen again. Which is did, obviously.

(Apologies for the different format between screenshots. While trying to see if the 404 above showed up on desktop as well, I discovered that I can only access my re.ddit inbox via my 3rd party mobile app (preferred posting method), which is GENUINELY bizarre. Trust me, I looked, tried to type in the inbox URL itself, nothing. I just get guided back to "This account has been suspended.” That means that, if I were just a desktop user, I literally wouldn’t have any idea as to what caused the suspension like I do on mobile.)

(IMPORTANT EDIT: Now that I’m un-suspended, I finally can access my inbox through the previously tried methods. As such, I have updated all images to be in desktop format for consistency’s sake + the important addition of my side of the discussion I had with a mod. Genuinely unsure of if this was a bug or not.)

[ID: A mobile screenshot showing an inbox and three messages. The first one at the very bottom is from the re.ddit admins, stating that the user has been banned for three days by their team for “report abuse.” The second one immediately after is a suspension review, stating that the appeal request was reviewed and the suspension lifted. The third is a user message stating: “No problem, happy to help! Though I'd like to apologize if I did the reporting process wrong, as I ended up getting temporarily suspended for 'report abuse' (thankfully I appealed & was near-immediately forgiven). I must have misclicked the wrong option, as that definitely was not in my intention, but I apologize nonetheless. However, this is the second time this has happened when reporting an evident rule/ToS break in r/ [redacted] . I definitely remember selecting the appropriate option that time (inciting violence), and I was still given an admin warning despite the offender's post being taken down. I hope this isn't a larger, administrative-related issue, as that means people will be more hesitant to report, which complicates subreddit moderation even further. Would you happen to know what's going on in that regard? If not, no worries, I'll just continue reporting problematic accounts via modmail if that's okay. Safer for the both of us, as well as other users, that way. Cheers, thank you for the good work you do, and apologies once again. - Delta”. In response is a moderator message, stating the following: “Hi, I'm sorry that's happening to you! Unfortunately, I don't know very much about how re[.]ddit handles reports like that. I know that when you hit the report button, most of the options listed go to reddit admins as well as show up in our mod queue. The option that definitely does not get sent to reddit admins is "this breaks r/ [redacted] 's rules". I know it's not a perfect solution, since re[.]ddit should take action against people who are violating the ToS. But if you just want to report stuff to us, that's a good option. You can select "custom response" if you want to add more information. Just remember that reports are anonymous and we can't respond to you if you go that route. Otherwise, modmail works too.”]

So, with this all having been said, I think I’m done with Re.ddit for now.

I’ve come to a point in my recovery where, as much as I recognize the importance of being involved in a community of survivors, I refuse to tolerate blatant administrator abuse in order to do so.

It’s one thing if I misunderstood/misconstrued something, and made a false report. I’m autistic + severely dissociative, so it could happen. In turn, I do what I can to rectify my mistakes and apologize. It’s just the right thing to do, and I’m not afraid of taking accountability & responsibility.

However, as in the (thankfully working) example above, I am reporting BLATANT sub/ToS violations. This one involved a ban evader (with multiple alts) who was posting highly triggering content that involved sadistic themes, death wishes, and the putting down of other survivors in general:

[ID: A subre.ddit post with the title “Anyone ever happy that other people have trauma and that other people have to face shitty things?”. It has been removed and locked by the subre.ddit moderators, with the stickied mod comment stating: “This has been removed for violating Rule #1. This is not the appropriate place for this kind of rant. The focus of this community is peer to peer support.”]

I could grab the actual post via whatever Re.ddit post retrieval app is still around (RIP Ce.ddit), but I refuse to because it was really, REALLY bad. The title alone should give a very clear impression of that, ESPECIALLY when it was posted to a subre.ddit where highly vulnerable survivors go to find help and validation.

I also don’t want to give said ban evader anymore attention than I already have.

So, with all of this being said, here’s my final verdict:

As of 4/20/2023, I will be winding down my Re.ddit usage as a whole, and focusing on my Tu.mblr usage instead.

I MAY return at a later point, especially as I’m trying to expand my reach to service more future clientele via commissions. However, it will depend on if I get this suspension appealed as well. If not, I will permanently stop using my Re.ddit account as to avoid a full ban.

Why? Because I have written many resourceful posts for survivors (especially of severe NS/FL trauma like myself), and I would hate for all that to go down the drain. Many have publicly stated & privately DMed me expressing their gratitude for as much, which has emphasized to me the importance of my work.

I’m not doing this for karma. If anything, my re.ddit account was a massive outlet for all that I was dealing with, especially after escaping severe, life-threatening abuse. It’s the good, the bad, and the very, very ugly of my former abused life, some of which I still feel very traumatized and embarrassed over. I fight with myself on the daily to not outright delete said posts- even account- in general.

I just happened to write in ways that resonated with others, which is all that I’m striving to do. I don’t want anybody else to feel as horrifically lonely and ashamed as I did at the beginning of my recovery. May my creativity always express my truths, and validate the truths of others especially.

In similar news, I will likely not be returning to Twi.tter either.

I am only keeping my accounts where they are because of the mass username theft that started ever since the site went up in flames. A shame, but I feel confident in my decision. Especially when that site as a whole did severe damage to my recovery while I was using it. I became very bitter, frightened, and aggressive to (albeit very real) IRL threats that weren’t anywhere near me.

Thus, I made the critical decision to step away, for the sake of my recovery. I am very happy to announce that that was one of the best decisions I have made regarding social media usage. Unless there are significant changes for the better, I refuse to return to one of the biggest stressors in my recent history.

It didn’t matter how I curated my feed, but it did matter that I curated it out of my life (for now). I, and everyone who could be/is affected by my actions, are much, much better off.

Otherwise, hello Tu.mblr!

Ever since my first aesthetic account all those years ago, I always had a feeling that I’d make a definite comeback at some point. Over a decade later, the self-fulfilling prophecy has come true, but for reasons I’d least expect.

Since it’s exceptionally dated, I will revamp this blog as much as possible, so that it is befitting for a multimedia artist like myself. As aforementioned in past posts, I will still reblog the art of others here, but I’ll be making a more personal side-account for my mental health & survivorhood musings. I may cross-reblog from one to the other, depending on the post’s themes.

I continue to insist that this blog, as well as any other blogs of mine (unless posted otherwise), ARE 16+ AT VERY LEAST, 1.8+ RECOMMENDED. Due to the prevailing themes in my artwork, there will be discussion of tagged traumas, though no NS/FW or highly graphic details will be given here.  

For your own safety, please abide by ALL posted age warnings. I can, and already have, blocked those who interact with my accounts in ways that are inappropriate for their publicly stated/shown age.

I also reserve the right to block at will, ESPECIALLY if I suspect that an interacting user is a minor under 16.

Please respect my boundaries, and refrain from interacting/DMing/sending asks if you are under 16. Failure to avoid doing so will result in a PERMANENT BLOCK as soon as I notice.

Those who are above the age of 16, but under the age of 18, are on thin ice. I continue to reserve the right to block, including for the safety of the minor in question. Genuinely nothing personal, all about protection.

In addition, I do not give out my Discord to ANYBODY but verified clients & very, VERY close friends. Unless you are either of those, please respect my privacy. I do not administrate/moderate ANY ACTIVE SERVERS EITHER, and I have no plans at all to do so for the foreseeable future.

Do not ask me to make a server. Do not ask me to moderate any servers.

All this & more will be in my boundaries page once it goes online.

-

Anyways, to those who did: Thank you for reading. I know this post will just be a speck in the sand, but it’s very important that I put all of this on the record.

More to come soon. Stay tuned.

-

TL;DR: Re.ddit admins can & will suspend you over valid reports, even if subre.ddit moderators have EXPLICITLY mentioned that you were in the right.

As such, I will likely not return to using the site, even if my suspension appeal is successful. I have written many resources, especially for fellow survivors of severe NS/FL trauma, and do not want to risk their deletion. Many have expressed their gratitude for them, which is why I feel this particular sacrifice must be followed through.

In addition, I will not be returning to Twi.tter either, and will merely hold my usernames for security reasons. Said site caused significant damage to my recovery, and I- as well as those close to me- am sincerely better off not being in such a high-stress, high-toxicity environment.

Tu.mblr, on the other hand, will be my new home base. I will be revamping this blog into a dedicated art + art inspo blog, as well as making a more personal blog for trauma & recovery discussion. However, I continue to insist that my blogs are 16+ at LEAST, with the recommendation of 1.8+ due to severe trauma themes. No NS/FW or highly graphic details will be given, but there may be NS/FL warnings.

Stay tuned for more, including a boundaries page.

Thank you for reading.

[dokifluffs]

Pregnant | Osamu, Kenma, Akaashi, Sakusa

Pairings: Osamu X Reader (female), Kenma X Reader (female), Akaashi X Reader (female), and Sakusa X Reader (female)

Genre: fluff!!! Pregnant reader!!

Author’s Note: im having some v domestic vibes and baby fever so might as well share it with you all too! Happy reading~ 

Warning: all post time skip! Pregnancy (duh)

Pregnant | Iwaizumi, Bokuto, Atsumu

Osamu: 

Crickets chirped into the darkness of the clear summer sky, stars twinkling as far as the eye could see as his keys jingled in the door, the cool air conditioning greeting him as he stepped in

The plastic bag of steaming hot onigiris rustled with every step and move he made

You sent him a text asking if he could bring home some onigiris, craving for some especially since you had been home all day while he was at work before he would have to take off on maternal leave when your arriving son would be brought into the world

The kitchen lights were off but the living room lights and tv were still on playing a random house hunting show

He approached your sleeping body, laid on you side with a pillow in between your legs, your arm draped over the side of your belly, the other acting as your pillow  

He set the bag gently on the table and knelt down in the space between the table and the couch right in front of you

“Y/N, honey,” Osamu’s voice was as gentle as a summer evening breeze, the kind that just made anyone feel good as they relaxed on a grassy hill, taking in view of the colorful sky as the sun set in the distance

“I’m home,” he leaned close and pressed a kiss to your forehead

Seeing you after being away all day, it made him wonder what you did at home all day, how bored you must be, how tired you must be

He caressed your cheek, tilting his head to take your sleeping face at a better angle

“Y/N,” his voice was silky and light in a quiet singsong way, almost humming your name while speaking it as he grazed the back of his fingers over your plush, smooth cheek

You reached your hand from your belly to his, a small smile pulling at your lips as you brought in close to your nose and took a deep breath

What he did not expect was you biting into his hand

“Y/N, honey, wake up.,” he laughed as he carefully shook you awake, trying to pull his hand back

It didn’t hurt, more like you were nibbling on him but this was one, if not most, bizarre thing you had done in all of your pregnancy

“‘Samu~ welcome home,” you woke and smiled sleepily, reaching your arms up as he leaned in to meet you halfway

He helped you sit up and opened the bag of onigiris, some new and not even on the menu yet, before you could even ask about them

You sat close, leaning into his side as the two of you ate, the tv on more of a background sound before he turned it off, giving his undivided attention

“This is so good,” you spoke, mouth partially full with one of the new onigiris, your craving being satiated as always provided by your loving husband, Osamu

“Are ya sure?” He asked, a little serious but mostly joking. “It didn’t feel that way when you were chompin’ on me earlier.” He stuck his hand out with the lightest marks made by your teeth moments ago. “Were ya that hungry?” He rubbed your shoulder with his hand, taking another bite of his own onigiri

Your eating came to a cease, laughter coming out as you set your onigiri down in your lap to take Osamu’s hand. “I’m so sorry,” you said totally unbelievable with all the laughter and giggles erupting from you, it could only make Osamu smile himself hearing your laughter

He didn’t even realize how long he had heard it but it felt so good, it felt nostalgic that made him love you even more

“Did it hurt?” You traced your finger over his skin, looking up to him

“Nah, I’m jokin’, eat.” He traded his onirigi to his other hand so he could hand you yours from your lap

It was your craving after all

The two of you ate one after the other, sitting comfortably side by side as if time didn’t exist

It didn’t take long at all before the bag was empty but the two of you stayed put in the living room with both hungers satiated

The room filled with a comfortable silence as as your bodies melted together

Your hand rest over Osamu’s as he rubbed your belly, reality setting in for him, and even you, for the nth time since you announced your pregnancy

This was really happening

You were his wife, you were going to have his child, both your love for each other in a new life

He was going to have you by his side just like this and you were going to have him, just like this

And one day, there will be a tiny pair of feet in between and he couldn’t wait

Kenma: 

Your steps sounded louder and louder as you went down the stairs, feeding the insecurity of your looks now that your belly was swelling bigger as time went on, days and weeks, months passing to your due date to the newest addition of your family with Kenma

A new Kozume brought to the world :)

Time was ticking

The hem of your oversized t-shirt tickled your thighs as you walked waddled toward Kenma in the living room, the wooden floors creaking with every step, it just poked and prodded at your insecurities

You paused right in the middle, the couches a few strides away but you couldn’t move another step

The sight of your body in the tv was the cherry on top- your plumped up body, the clear weight gain, especially your stomach although you were pregnant

But still

You felt so much bigger, you even stayed off of social medias seeing your old pictures and your recent ones families had taken, posting them

The difference was so great, it made your heart race, a chilling panic ghosting through your body, raising goosebumps over your arms

“Y/N?” Kenma’s voice pulled your mind out of the clouded thoughts of your mind. “What’s wrong?” He paused his game, standing to his feet, over to you in his comfortable sweats and kodzuken shirt with a simple white aesthetic that was eye catching but not overbearing

“I’m so much bigger,” you looked to him with glistening eyes, visually upset over your weight gain from pregnancy but it was bound to happen to everyone who got pregnant. “I’m so ugly,” you felt disgusted, your voice cutting off at the end and you wanted to turn away, head back upstairs, and hide under the covers until tomorrow

“I guarantee you that you are not ugly,” he rubbed his finger to the back of your hand on your belly, a little thing he did as he asked “permission” to hold your hand before he took it into his own

“Come with me,” he led you over to the couch he sat at earlier, the gray leather couch

He sat leaning onto the arm rest and some pillows, his legs spread open and patted the open space between

“I won’t fit,” you shook your head, completely sure you were way too wide to fit in between Kenma’s legs

Kenma was very much a stick, pretty thin, not too much taller than you but this just seemed impossible for you, especially since it felt like you were double his weight and width despite it being not true at all

“You will,” he reassured

You hesitated before sitting down, biting back all your thoughts and reasons as to why you should sit somewhere else or you needed to be anywhere else so you didn’t have to feel this way

But Kenma was right

His legs were own both sides of you and he eased your back to his chest

“Wait, Kenma, no-“ you tried to sit up, only to unable to because of your belly

“I’m too heavy.” Heat rushed up to your head, your want, no, need to leave eating you from the inside

“You’re not. Relax with me tonight.” He brought his arms around your body, handing you his personalized switch with animal crossing opened knowing this was one of your favorites

“Just play,” his voice was soothing to your ears, calming your heart

As you ran his character around his island, the more Kenma gave you tips, making light fun of the way you played, your thoughts and fears about your body slowly began to dissipate

With your mind wrapped up in the game, the more you let everything go

He was always able to read others and analyze things well, encased in his shell from a young age of being an introvert

But there was something about you, along with Kuroo and Hinata and others, who were able to coax him out of his shell

You were so wrapped up in the game, you hadn’t even realized Kenma’s hands resting on your belly behind yours holding up the switch, occasionally rubbing it as he let out a gleeful hum with his chin resting on your shoulder, watching you play, pointing out things you may have missed or advice on what you could do to maximize profits

Akaashi: *S/N* = Story Name 

Akaashi’s hand was soft in yours as you excitedly led him up the stairs toward the finally finished nursery

He, along with the help of your father, painted the room a light beige color and when the paint finally dried, brought in all the furniture like the cribs, changing station

All that was left was for you to decorate it as much as you wanted and you absolutely made sure he saw none of it until now

You opened the door revealing a complete nursery, he didn’t know where to look first but most notable was the mobile above the crib- little owls hung and when turned on, they rotated in a circle that made it seem like they were flying

“Push that button,” you stood right beside him, holding his arm, your heart pounding in your chest out of excitement

And that was when he heard it- the lullaby from a music box he had gotten you when he proposed to you a couple years back. And here it was, a tune that you two’s child will be growing up hearing

The sound of the device was so soothing, it made akaashi feel like he was just meeting you last week and getting down on one knee to propose to you yesterday

“It’s our song, Keiji,” you rest your head on his shoulder. “And it’s going to be theirs.” You brought his hand up to your belly as he turned to you, his gaze never leaving you, his eyes trained to your smile as you looked down to your bump and the feel of his touch on you

The way your eyes shimmered when you looked up, the same smile he could never get tired of in his life, it made his heart swell so big in his chest

He leaned his head close and cupped your face, bringing his lips to yours. He had to show his love for you, to thank you for being with him in this life, thanking whoever or whatever brought you to his life

You certainly changed it and he wouldn’t do anything to change that

“What was that for?” You laughed, stealing another small kiss from his lips as he pulled away, his sea green eyes as enchanting as always when he opened them

“The song reminded me how much you truly mean to me, my love.”

It felt like you were in high school/ university all over again- his simple, straight-forward words that were always able to reduce you to a blushing mess

“What should we read them tonight?” Akaashi smiled as he knelt down in front of the little shelf filled with children books, mostly gifts from his and your mother, as you sat back on a small couch adjacent to the crib

“Anything,” you chimed from behind

With that, Akaashi chose S/N and took his seat beside you. You draped your legs over his and rest your head on his arm as he opened the book and began to read the story

It was as clear as you remembered from your own memory, the images and scenes from your own childhood playing so vividly in your mind

Akaash’s voice was so smooth as he read aloud, voicing the character(s) with ease, it naturally made you a bit lethargic yourself hearing this story

Guess bedtime stories still worked even tens of years later

As the story came to an end, as Akaashi read over the happy ending, his story came to a stop as you raised your head, gasping

“What, what is it?” He suddenly set the book to the table beside it as he sat on the edge of couch, turning to you as you stared down to your belly. “Are you hurt?” He began to grow a bit frantic, his panic growing when you didn’t respond

“No, no, no, Keiji, the baby moved,” you looked up to him, your smile slowly spreading on your face, melting away his fears as relief washed over him

“Look feel!” You snatched his hand and placed it on your belly and it was true

The little baby moved inside of your belly, kicking the side of your tummy right into Akaashi’s hands

The doctor suggested to begin doing activities with the baby such as well as movement being something that was going to happen soon

But neither of you thought so soon

You were wide awake at this point as you felt your child move inside, a sensation you’ve never felt before, only seen in videos

“Hi, baby,” you spoke to you belly, a tear escaping from your eye as you looked up to Akaashi, your love for him and the two of you overflowing. “We’re your parents,” your voice quieted down to a mere whisper

The two of you sat astonished watching the little movements that lasted for about a minute, your hands never leaving each other, staying on your belly

This was real, this was your reality, your life with the one you loved so much

And he loved you with every bit of him, he couldn’t imagine what he would do in another life without you

Sakusa: 

It felt like your nausea combined with your cold was going to be the end of you if not the constant kicking from your daughter in your belly at your organs and even your ribs some times

You winced in your seat on the couch, hand over your belly as you took deep breaths through your stuffed nose through pain on top of all the things that was going through your body

Sakusa felt his heart drop beside you, wearing double masks over his face to make extra sure he wouldn’t catch any of your germs from your cold and morning sickness

“Another kick?”

“Mmhm,” you nodded your head, pushing though it. “I feel cold…” you closed your hands around the extended sleeves of the oversize sweater you wore, leaning closer to Sakusa

He tried not to mind this too much but it was like an irritating itch that wouldn’t go away, the fact how you hadn’t showered or anything today yet making it execrable for him

“How about a bath then?” He hesitantly rubbed his hand over your clothed shoulder but got over his lifelong phobia for a second

You were going to be by his side for the rest of his life. He had already seen and touched every bit of your body

You were bearing your guy’s child. This couldn’t go on forever

His touch was so simple, so light, it fed a hunger for him you didn’t realize you had deep inside but at the same time, it took you by surprise

The Sakusa you met years ago wouldn’t even sit or stand, let alone breathe, within two to three feet to anyone and years later, after marriage, and now with the start of a family, he was climbing the obstacle of his fears step by step

He knew, he told you with his own words he was never one to share a loving touch or caring words. He wanted to, god he wanted to so badly to let go of his cares and worries and fears but he couldn’t. It was etched into his skin and body, imprinted for his eyes and mind to constantly see and think about

But he wanted this to change. He wanted to do and say so many things to you to show his love that he deeply felt for you, it moved him and tore him on the inside

“Yes please,” you nodded

Sakusa had you walk in front of him, making sure you didn’t lose your balance going up

He took care of everything, adding soaps to the bath at the perfect heated temperature that would be perfect to soothe you as well as take care of some germs

Steam arose from the bubbly water

The two of you took off your clothes and he was the first to get in, his muscles instantly relaxing with the therapeutic temperature

You followed suit, feeling the subtle creeps of awkwardness

Again to your surprise, Sakusa took hold of your shoulders and carefully leaned you back into his chest with his legs crossed loosely beneath your legs

He brought his arms under the water, his hands looped around your abdomen and found their place on your belly

As soon as his touch was on you, you took in a sharp inhale, jolting in the water that created a little wave among the bubbles floating

“She’s been so active today,” Sakusa commented as he rubbed his hand in a circle on your belly, the other holding your hand as you gripped onto him through the pain

“Mmhm,” you gave a pained hum, eyes shut as you continued to breathe deeply

Sakusa could see the clear pain you were in, all the nausea and emotions that were all pent up in your body, it made guilt prick at his heart as he imagined all the times you probably wanted to reach out to him so he could hold you to help you though this but refrained

He could see your figure so clearly in his mind, reaching out but pulling back

Enough was enough

He pulled his arm from the water with a prominent splash and took off his masks, setting them neatly to the side

“I’m sorry you’re going through all this pain, Y/N.” Sakusa leaned close and pressed a kiss to your cheek, stifling his obsessive phobia internally. “Please never hesitate to reach out to me… I want to be a better husband for you…” He admitted

It felt so good to say this- it felt better than washing his hands or putting on a new mask

“I’ll be better,” he vowed more to himself than you

“Omi, it’s okay but thank you. I won’t.” You rubbed your hand over his forearms under the water, your chills from earlier long gone now  

It was like magic

With Sakusa’a hands rubbing your belly, it was like your daughter sensed this and her kickings finally ceased for the rest of the bath

“She’s not even born yet but she’s already daddy’s girl,” you leaned your head back to his shoulder, smiling tiredly to Sakusa as his lips mirrored yours

“You’re my girl now and forever, though. She’ll just be my little one,” he leaned close and pressed his lips to your forehead

~~~~~ Thanks for reading! Masterlist for more! Please do not repost anywhere else!

Tags (let me know if you wanna be tagged for all my haikyuu posts): @yams046  @mazey-chan  @sunboikyo00  @kara-grayson04​  @fortheloveofbakugo​ @tsumtsumsemi​ @osamuonigiri @1-800-wholesome @yamagucci​ @realityisoftendisapointing@plantisnotplant @k-eijiakaashi​ @pink-panda-pancakes​ @differentballooncollection​ @osamusamusamu@therainroguefanfiction​ @euphorihan@turquoiselace​ @macaronnv  @oxmaddy​​ @mrkoala4prsdnt​​ @curiouslilbeast​ @plantisnotplant@therestless101​ @abcdaichi​ @oyasenpai​ @kaaidalupita​

[makeste]

BnHA 6th Popularity Poll Reaction Post - Risky Spoiler-Dodging Edition

hey guys, so seeing as the results from the 6th popularity poll were leaked today, I figured I would do a separate reaction + analysis post this year, rather than piling it in as an extra on top of the chapter reaction post tomorrow. I figure this makes more sense anyway, since they’re really two completely different things. also this way I can write as much as I want lol.

also, just fyi, I am still completely unspoiled for chapter 293. and probably the smart thing to do to keep it that way would be to log off tumblr and hold off posting this until tomorrow, but I apparently have no impulse control today so oh well. anyway, so I’m hoping you guys will keep this spoiler-free if you don’t mind! as always, I would prefer to just jump right in completely unaware tomorrow like Troy returning to the study room with the pizza boxes lol.

okay so this first part is just going to be my predictions. fyi I am writing this part on Wednesday night, and then I’ll add on the results part on Thursday or Friday (ETA: Thursday, apparently, since I am impatient.)

okay so first of all, just as a refresher, this poll was open to Japanese voters from Aug 3 to Sep 30. meaning chapters 279 through 285. meanwhile last year’s poll took place around the tail end of the MVA arc. so between then and now we had Heroes Rising, the Endeavor Agency arc, and the War arc up to the part where the 1-A kids took on Gigantomachia in Gunga, and started battling Tomura in Jakku. so technically only a couple of arcs, but a LOT of stuff going down in them. oh and season 4 of the anime as well

so! firstly, I predict that my truculent africanized honeybee son will hold on to his crown at #1, coming off a year in which he did some internship-boosted soul searching, borrowed OFA in movie canon, and finished out the voting period as the my-body-moved-on-its-own character development MVP. like CALL ME CRAZY lol, but I’m pretty sure his title is safe. and then after him will be Deku and Shouto as usual

Aizawa should hopefully also have a strong showing because the dude had a banner fucking year. reunited with his old dead friend, took on Tomura with his hopelessly inept hero pals, and then chopped his fucking leg off. he had better be in the top 10. his fucking leg died for this, idk what else he has to do

Endeavor also stands a decent chance of doing well given the internship arc and the final episode of season 4. which I’m sure will go down just swimmingly if that does happen lmao. especially if he somehow manages to rank higher than...

Dabi, which I don’t think he will btw, but you never know. anyways though, but I’m thinking Dabi’s going to have a stronger showing than in past years (in the last poll he only got 367 votes and was ranked 19th). mostly because of his fight in the Gunga mansion, and his cheekily censored name reveal to...

Hawks, who is also going to rank pretty high here, I think. might be he loses some points for killing off Twice, but his back was basically to the wall there. and he has always been very popular, and I think season 4 will also give him a boost, along with his heavy involvement in the first half of the War arc

Tomura was already in 6th place last year and I think he cracks the top 5 this year. he’s gotten exponentially more popular since the MVA arc, and got a boost in the last poll even though his flashback had only just barely happened, and he hadn’t finished Awakening yet and all that stuff. anyway, so he’s only gotten cooler and more tragic since then so I think he makes a big play here

Kirishima, Momo, Tokoyami, and Mina should also hopefully do well, since the poll opened right in the middle of all that Gigantomachia action, and Toko had just got done being an absolute badass and protecting his birb dad. I don’t think he’ll quite make it to the top ten, but he should

and last but not least, I’m hoping that Mirko will come out and take the polls by storm, although I have no clue how popular she is in Japan lol. she’s clearly Horikoshi’s favorite though. she SHOULD be everyone’s favorite, but I mean, we’ll see how it goes

anyway that’s it as far as predictions! and so now, through the magic of writing stuff at different times, we will fast-forward to the part where we actually find out the results!

OH MY GOD YES, STEAMPUNK KHLKSLLKL. HERE FOR IT. JOLLY GOOD SHOW. 5 STARS

Kacchan looks SO COCKY and SO HAPPY and SO ADORABLE, YES I SAID IT. he is adorable as FUCK. I don’t quite know what it is about this particular Kacchan that just screams “LOOK HOW FUCKING CUTE MY STUPID, LOUD SON IS WITH HIS BIZARRE WINDOWPANE-LOOKING CONVERTIBLE SUNGLASS GOGGLES and his POORLY TIED CRAVAT”, but I think it’s because he looks like if a Digimon character and a FMA character had a baby

anyway, so it looks like most of the people present here are more or less who we expected to see. except that I can’t tell for sure if that’s Dabi or Shindou, and if it’s Shindou I’m going to punch somebody in the face so you will have to excuse me

Iida wearing a TRENCHCOAT and a TOP HAT with ENGINE EXHAUST GOGGLE ACCENTS is my new favorite Iida of all time. take note how there is no possible way he can wear those goggles with them sitting on top of his hat like that. plus he’s already got glasses on. these are just purely for aesthetic and IF THAT AIN’T JUST THE STEAMPUNK WAY

Deku out here speaking softly and carrying a lead pipe. Kacchan you best look out. seems like he’s done watching you take first place year after year while he languishes in the number two spot. your only hope is that he trips while attacking you because his boots are unbuckled

Shouto’s standing over there with the rest of the non-first-and-second-place characters, but what are the odds his results are actually within spitting distance of Deku’s same as always. anyway he doesn’t mind, though. also his outfit is by far the most sensible one here, but if you look closely he’s got some sort of fire extinguisher/jet pack thing strapped to his back that’s got a control switch on his belt. Shouto are you jetpacking or putting out fires

Kirishima out here all “I’m not sure what steampunk is so I’m just going to take off my shirt and pose”

AIZAWA WITH THE EYEPATCH SKLKSDLKFJLSKJLDFKJSLDFFJLDKSJFL:KS. SIR. SIR. also, lowkey furious that Horikoshi refuses to show us the automail leg that he is clearly sporting here but which we just can’t see, SHOUTO MOVE GODDAMMIT

Endeavor has TWO fire extinguisher-slash-jetpacks. THE BETTER TO... WHATEVER. look at you here in the top ten again. you really live for that controversy

HAWKS OUT HERE WITH HIS STEAMPUNK BEATS BY DRE AND HIS WEARING A RING ON EVERY FINGER. nice to see you’ve still got your wings there, kiddo. then again Deku still has both of his arms too so who even knows what is going on

BUT SERIOUSLY THOUGH, IS THIS DABI OR SHINDOU. as if I don’t know the truth deep down in my heart. y’all I am gonna flip lmao. it’s not that I dislike Shindou, strictly speaking. but just... I can’t explain what it is, but if you put him and AFO next to each other and told me “you can only punch one”, I would be having a serious crisis. just, THIS FUCKING GUY, idek. STOP SMILING

Tomura looks like he just wandered onto the set here by mistake and has no idea where he is or what is going on. it’s because you’re wearing a bigass severed hand that’s blocking your entire view, Tomura. just take the hand off your face my sweet murder dumpling

anyway! so I managed to also find a link to the full poll results while somehow managing to avoid spoilers, and then I wanted to compare the results to last year’s poll, and so I made... this

hopefully you can all see this. if you’re on desktop you might be screwed, but on mobile you should be able to click and enlarge it. I mean, assuming you actually give a fuck about boring poll analysis spreadsheets lmao

anyway, so there were actually 13k fewer votes cast this year which is a bit of a surprise. is the series not still growing in popularity? do people apparently have better things to do during their quarantine lol

anyways but despite this, and despite getting 8k fewer votes overall, Kacchan still managed almost twice as many as his closest competitor. well fought, Deku. please put down that pipe

I somehow always underestimate the power of ship popularity to influence these things. but for example, it looks like Present Mic got that Vigilantes Trio bump. ride that wave for all it’s worth my man! hell, you got me on board

Iida fucking Tenya somehow got some sort of POWER BOOST out of NOWHERE which I can’t explain at all lmao, but I’m here for it. NOT BAD FOR AN OLD MAN

Sero managed to get the exact same number of votes in both 2019 and 2020. clearly the most loyal fans in the business

Mirko being all the way down at #20 is, of course, a travesty, and I hereby nominate her to be the one to punch Shindou in the face

ngl though, the lack of a single female character in the top ten hurts just a bit. it’s not overly surprising, but still. the worst part of it is that even if you kicked Shindou to the curb and moved everyone else up one slot, it would still be all dudes since Mic beat out Momo by a margin of a little more than a hundred votes. hard to stay mad at Mic for too long, though. ah well

Tomura actually lost a bunch of votes which is a genuine surprise to me. I know the villain standom isn’t as dominant in Japan as it is in Western fandom, but still. you can go ahead and punch Shindou too I guess

Tokoyami lowkey doubled his vote count over the past year while hiding down there at #18. he is slowly becoming more powerful. biding his time

anyway so I think that’s it! I mean not really, but I’m getting kind of tired lol. so just, you know, insert the usual gripes at Overhaul’s ranking here, although we can be happy about Magne making her way onto the list (r.i.p.), and Mineta and AFO taking a very satisfying slide down (all the way out, in AFO’s case; good riddance you bum). Hadou also got a huge boost which is awesome. Mustard’s persistent ownership of the #36 spot will forever remain a mystery to me, but oh well

anyways, this was fun. and I really do feel like everyone is looking away on purpose so that when Deku brains Kacchan with that pipe in about two seconds from now, there will be no witnesses, oh my fucking god

[thefloatingstone]

Last time I made a playlist of recommended youtube channels to enjoy while in lockdown or self quarantine, I focused on individual videos while also recommending other videos from the same channel.

I thought I’d make another list only this time I’m going to be recommending playlists or series on youtuber instead of just individual videos.

This is gonna go exactly like last time, so check out any of these that might seem interesting to you, and hopefully I can give you something to look into if you want something to watch but don’t feel like watching a Netflix or Crunchyroll show.

Last time I tried to put this under a read more break but it didn’t work and I ended up posting this long-ass post on everyone’s dash. Well I decided to do so again here. hit J to skip to the bottom of the post if you don’t feel like reading this whole thing. If you’re on tumblr mobile; why?

In no particular order;

Cinemassacre movie reviews and topics

All of you already know James Rolfe as the AVGN. I started watching him before Youtube was even a thing, before he was even signed on with Screwattack. Back when his videos could only be seen on his own website (or for some reason included on the free DVD you got with the local video game magazines). However, I eventually outgrew the outrage style humour of the AVGN episodes... but then James started doing Monster Madness where he would talk about his love for horror movies, and this where I learned about his vast knowledge about movie history and even films I had never even heard mention of before! I think it’s safe to say, he got me to be interested in movie history just as much as movie production and film as a viewing experience.

I recommend this playlist which is a hodgepodge of James talking about old horror movie franchises, talking about his first experience with Power Rangers as someone who didn’t grow up with it, or how Bob Ross is a childhood hero of his. It’s an excellent play list that’s really laid back but you learn a lot of stuff from it. James is very informed for the most part and it leads you to wanting to check out a lot of these things too, just because he’s so passionate about it.

If I ever get over my weird hang up about speaking out loud, these are the kinds of videos I’d like to make.

Vinesauce Vinny: The Neverhood

Vinny is by no means a new Let’s Player, having been on Youtube for over 10 years now, but I only started watching him a few months ago. I started with this playlist when I saw he was doing The Neverhood, a game I had heard about but never seen played before. The Neverhood is a bizarre game, as a point and click PC game from the 90s where the entirety of the video game was made with stop motion and clay. Something that sounds so insane you would say it’s impossible if not for the fact that it exists. The claymation itself is extremely well done, and the game has a really weird and absurd sense of humour. Just the strangest things happen in this thing. Now couple that with Vinny’s very dry and straightforward delivery and you have probably one of the funniest Let’s Plays I’ve watched in a long time.

This is also “short” for a Let’s Play series. With only 4 parts to it, the longest video only being a bit under and hour and 30 minutes. It’ll still take up a good chunk of your time, but it’s not as daunting as some of the other Let’s Plays I’ll mention on this list.

Team Four Star: Pokemon Shield Nuzlocke

Exactly what it says on the tin. The guys from Team Four Star play Pokemon Shield with Nuzlocke rules. They’ve done several Nuzlocke runs in the past, but I find the Pokemon Shield is the best one they’ve done. Especially since a lot of the needless fluff and grinding has been edited out. So unlike some of their previous series you don’t see a lot of Kieran and Grant running in a circle for an hour trying to catch a specific pokemon or trying to get to a certain level.

It’s also hilarious as they have a lot of “house rules” for the Nuzlocke often involving the exercise bike they.... have..... for some reason.

It’s very good and the gym battles become SUPER hype with the Nuzlocke rules and the music.

Baywatching

Having been going to a few years now, watch Allison try her very best to go through and do a video series where she talks about summarises every episode of Baywatch.

.... Ever. Single. Episode.

She’s not even close to done yet (and now she’s introduced Baywatch Nights AS WELL) but her trying to explain the batshit insanity of this show, it’s over the top characters, it’s insane plots and behind the scenes weirdness with all the enthusiasm and love for this slice of 90s is amazing. Please enjoy a good thick chunk of inside jokes, silly character voices, and a whole lot of ?????

Brutal Moose: Shenmue

Probably one of the most chill channels on all of Youtube, Brutal Moose aka Ian, prefers playing games you wouldn’t think would make for good Let’s Plays. And maybe they don’t, objectively. A collection of playlists covering Truck Simulator, Nancy Drew, Hidden Object games etc etc, spliced in with old commercials from drive in theaters from the 50s,60s and 70s. Ian’s Let’s Play channel is great for just putting on and letting play for company while you’re drawing or grinding in a video game or playing Stardew or something.

I recommend his Shenmue playthrough as Ian completely fell in love with the game and went on to play both the sequel and the newly released third game. Ian genuinely adores the weird voice acting and all the menial tasks and mini-games you can do. I watched this a lot in 2018 when I was going through a rough time, and it really helped me in a strange way to just put Ian on and listen to him talk to the chat and drive a forklift around for like 4 hours straight before going to Tomato Mart or wasting all his money on the gacha machines.

A Measured Response to “In Defense of Dark Souls 2″

At some point, big name youtuber Hbomberguy made a video called “In Defense of Dark Souls II”. I’m not subscribed to Hbomberguy but I enjoyed his video on why Sherlock (the BBC show) is trash. (come to think of it I should have added that to the first list). And it seems the video on Sherlock was really good and well argued.... and it seems his “In Defense of Dark Souls 2″ video... was not.

Using subjective language, bad representation of facts, or simply outright getting certain information wrong, Hbomberguy′s video on Dark Souls II is, at best, a man trying to argue that he likes Dark Souls II because it is “Objectively good”, rather than simply accept he likes it... because he likes it.

MauLer is kind of an asshole, but I have learned more about dissecting someone’s argument and deconstructing what they have said watching his response series than I have in any english or debate class I have ever had.

The response is over 10 hours long, but this is because MauLer takes time with each and every statement he takes umbrage with, discussing what is being said, discusses why it is false or dubious, and then compares with actual facts and research.

If you ever want to know how to to distinguish subjective opinion from objective fact in someone else’s argument regarding... ANYTHING really, I highly recommend this series.

I may not like MauLer as a person, but DAMN if he doesn’t know how to deconstruct an argument in a logic, emotionless way.

John Wolfe: Maize

Maize is a stupid game. a Stupid stupid game.

It involves sentient corn, and underground secret genetics lab, a Russian bootleg teddy bear that hates everyone, sentient corn, and a crumpet.

This game IMMEDIATELY went on my wishlist after watching this playthrough. Please watch John try and figure what the actual fuck is going on in this Monty Python-eque weird black comedy. It’s stupid, it’s weird, it’s bizarre and it’s honestly one of the funniest games I’ve seen streamed.

Hollywood: a Celebration of the Silent Era

This is not a youtube playlist. I mean it IS, but what this actually is, is a TV series released in the UK in 1980 covering the Silent Film era. As it was made in 1980, it includes interviews with many of the silent film stars who were often still alive during this documentary’s production. Each episode covers a specific theme of the silent movie era. One episode is about comedies, one is about WWI, one is about Westerns etc etc.

It’s a fascinating series, because it focuses on the silent era which, in modern day, I think many people unfairly think of as “those first few years of movies before movies really became a thing.” And that’s such a shame and really not true. The artistry, camera tricks, and raw nature of this early era of film making is so important and produced films which can still be watched today easily, possibly even easier than a few modern movies as often the very fact that the films are silent means they are universal, regardless of what language you speak.

I think an episode or two might have been turned to private or copyright claimed in this playlist, but I know if you do a search on youtube you can find the episode uploaded by someone else.

Diamanda Hagan: Bonekickers

Bonekickers is the show Mathew Graham made before he went on to work on the new Dr. Who. It is about archaeologists and it is God-fucking-Awful.

It is.... look. Ok. I like Archaeology a lot. But this isn’t a show that’s bad “if you like history” or “if you know things about archaeology”. This show is bad because it doesn’t make a single fucking lick of sense, all the characters are awful and terrible, and even if you understand what’s going on in the story you’re still going to be screaming “WHY????” at the screen as each new baffling stupid piece of the puzzle slots into place.

Diamanda Hagan has 0 time for this garbage and she’s going to walk you through each episode to show you how truly horrible this piece of garbage is.

Cry Plays: Ori and the Blind Forest

With Ori and the Will of the Wisps releasing recently, now is a great time to go and watch Cry playthrough the first Ori game. an absolutely gorgeous piece of work with a beautiful soundtrack and really likeable character designs and a sweet story, Ori is a great game to put on, sit back, and just let it wash over you. Cry’s playthrough is also great because although its a Metroidvania game, Cry fast forwards the parts where he backtracks for a long period of time, so you don’t get stuck watching him run back and forth as he tries to figure out where to go next or anything like that.

Cry also recently started playing the sequel as well!

If you enjoyed this list at all, please consider tipping me for a coffee

☕️ Ko-fi ☕️

[cryoculus]

soulmate au wit oikawa where soulmates feel each others pain and oikawa isnt the one who hurt his knee, his soulmate is a soccerplayer and got slide tackled. i really love your work, tysm!!!! 💐

» Word Count: 6,080 wordsCross-posted on AO3

Omg i was looking for references on what to base the scene where the soulmate gets tackled from and this is what i imagined! Just scrub the video to 0:14!  I know jack SHIT about soccer though. Everything in this work was purely based off research, so feel free to leave me a message if you spot some errors!

And MAN this was meant to be a short scenario with quick transitions but it turned into a whole drama bomb. You can keep scrolling if you’re not up for a 6000-word oneshot ++ as usual, my shit is terrible on tumblr mobile pls bear with me.

Oikawa loved the thrill of the game.

The incessant beat of his heart against his chest, the adrenaline that surged through his veins, the buzz of confidence that washed over him as he hit powerful serves at the other side of the court – he was enamored with his own capabilities, so to speak.

Today was like any other day. Seijoh was hosting a practice match against Datekou and Oikawa was in top form. They were already down to a match point in the second set. But just before he could land the killing shot that would decide the winner, he halted mid-air as a searing sensation ripped through his knee.

The volleyball bounced aimlessly for having been forgotten. Oikawa fell on his side against the hardwood floor, clutching the afflicted knee to his chest as agony bloomed across his nerves. He bit his lip, not allowing himself to utter a single sound as everyone else on the court crowded around him.

“Coach, Oikawa’s injured!”

The sound of your knee popping from its sockets from where the enemy defender, Yamanaka, kicked you from the side was sickening. Even through the incessant cheer of the audience in the stands, you could hear it loud and clear. The moment the sole of her shoe made brutal contact with your knee, Yamanaka even brushed her torso against yours, roughly toppling you off balance and forcing your kneecap to absorb the impact of your fall.

For a moment, your vision darkened from the agonizing pain that flared up your right knee as you fell onto the grass. A scream ripped its way from your throat, your hands scrambling for purchase to alleviate the mind-numbing sensation that burned through your nerves. You’re sure that your leg was twisted in an unnatural angle, too.

The distant sound of a whistle rang in your ears. Even through your current state, you were hyper aware of everything that’s happening around you. Players from both your team and the opposition flocked around you with concerned stares. Your best friend, Harada immediately crouched beside you, careful not to move your injury.

“Hey, (Name)!” Her eyes were wide with dread. “Can you hear me? Can you stand up?”

You shook your head with minimal effort, groaning as you did your best to remain still to avoid inflaming your knee. A few moments later, a couple of medics arrived in the scene, telling the others to give you some space to breathe. You wanted to tell them that you could breathe fine, but your voice failed you.

As you were being carried onto a stretcher, you could see one of the referees giving Yamanaka a red card. She only shrugged, as if getting penalties was a regular thing for her. But before she could step off the field, she took the liberty to cast you a self-satisfied smirk.

A sob unknowingly made its way from your lips, gaining the attention of one of the medics that was about to bring you to the first aid station. He murmured something about everything being okay in the end and that you’d get to play with your teammates soon enough.

Today really wasn’t your day.

“So,” Doctor Yamano began, “what seems to be the problem here?”

Iwaizumi nudged Oikawa, who was fidgeting nervously under the professional’s gaze. For some reason, he harbored an inexplicable discomfort around doctors. Whenever he visited one, it was either because he was sick or sustained an injury. Frankly, he wasn’t a fan of both.

“While we were playing a practice match against another school earlier today, I…” His voice trailed off. How the hell was he supposed to explain it to him?

Yamano hummed. “Yes?”

He sighed. “…I felt my right knee give out.”

“Did you apply the proper first aid procedures, Oikawa-san?”

Oikawa nodded, recalling the urgency in Coach Irihata’s voice as they lugged him to Seijoh’s infirmary.

“Is it severe? It probably isn’t if you’re not in the emergency room, I presume?”

He scratched the back of his head, laughing nervously. “It felt serious. I really thought my whole career was done for just because of a practice match.”

Yamano nodded in understanding. “Did you have your knee x-rayed already?”

“Uh, no.”

He sighed before lacing his fingers together. “Well, I’ll be needing a clear image of it so I can make a proper diagnosis, Oikawa-san. I’ll write you up a request form to show the radiologists.”

“Ah…” Oikawa wanted to tell him that it really wasn’t necessary. That maybe going here was a mistake because his knee still looked pretty much intact, save for the dull throb that pestered him throughout the day. Iwaizumi even jokingly berated his soulmate for getting such a severe injury. But Oikawa didn’t really know how doctors reacted to that.

So when he was given the green light to get an x-ray, Oikawa told Iwaizumi that he’d be all right on his own and that he should get going. There was obvious apprehension in his best friend’s eyes, but he indulged Oikawa’s request, regardless.

He was glad. If there truly was something wrong with him, he wouldn’t want Iwaizumi to be there to see how bad it was. He already worried about him far too much than Oikawa deserved.

“You go here often?”

You shot the guy that was sitting a few seats away from you in the waiting room a bizarre look. If you could recall perfectly, you were in a radiology center, not a bar.

“I’m not even from here,” you explained gruffly, pressing your legs closer together. They exchanged your uniform with a hospital gown to minimize the pressure on your knee as much as possible. The injury was beyond what the stadium’s first aid medics could manage, thus the impromptu trip to the Sendai Medical Center. But before the doctors could assess the severity of your condition, they needed a visual.

“Hmm, so am I.” The stranger sighed miserably. “I live in another district, but this is the only hospital that covers my insurance. So, where you from?”

Your brows scrunched up at his nonchalance. Did you not look distraught enough for him to just leave you to your own devices? Maybe he was just like that as a person?

You exhaled. “I’m from Hyogo.”

His noticeably brown eyes widened in surprise. “What’re you doing all the way here, then?”

“You ask a lot of questions, don’t you?”

A soft-hearted laugh escaped his lips as he flashes you a cheeky grin. “When I see cute girls looking like their whole world just ended before their eyes, it’s kind of my thing to swoop down and comfort them.”

“Like a knight in shining armor of sorts?” you snorted.

He shrugged. “Take it as you like. All I’m saying is that I’m a pretty good listener. It’s not like we’ll cross paths again for me to hold anything you tell me against you, right?”

You managed to give him a lopsided smile. The gravity of everything that’s transpired today was slowly beginning to weigh down on your shoulders.

When the coach’s assistant arrived in the hospital, the game had already been concluded. Without their main offensive player, Mikage Shihan had to surrender their title to Aomori High for this year’s tournament.

When the news fell upon your ears, the sting of loss almost rivalled the throbbing ache in your knee. But before you could get emotional about your own hastiness, the nurse that attended to you in the emergency room informed that they needed an x-ray so the doctors could treat you accordingly.

Your eyes trailed back to the chatty stranger. He’s gazing at you expectantly and though there’s something about that sympathetic look he’s giving you that’s making warmth dance across your skin, you weren’t really the type to confide in people you just met.

Just as you were about to reject his offer, the door to the room where they conducted the x-rays swung open. The person inside called out your name, saying the machine was up and running. Talk about being saved by the bell.

You gave the stranger a curt nod as you tried to stand up from your seat, almost crumpling to the floor when the sharp pain from your knee shot up in your leg again, but you resisted it. Too many people have seen you in this sorry state already. You didn’t intend to add more to the list.

When the door closed behind you, you completely missed the way Oikawa Tooru clutched his own knee in a deathly grip as the pain, that he’s now realizing really wasn’t his own, came to life once more.

His knee was fine, but he’s pretty sure he accidentally stumbled into his soulmate in the process. At first, Oikawa didn’t know if Iwaizumi would understand, but thankfully he did.

“It happens,” he told Oikawa as they were heading home from practice. “Not everyone experiences it though.”

Iwaizumi told him about how Hanamaki and Matsukawa used their own bond to grate at each other’s nerves. Oikawa did a double-take on that one. He asked Iwaizumi why they didn’t bother telling him, their most trusted friend, about their status as soulmates. Iwauzmi smacked his head, reminding him how much of a chatterbox he was and that Makki and Mattsun wanted to keep it private.

“Ow!”

The woman that’s overseeing your therapy shot you a concerned look. You’re in the middle of doing the exercises that aid in rehabilitating the torn ligament in your knee, and you were on the last of your reps when suddenly, you lurched forward as if a ghostly hand had smacked you upside the head.

“You doing all right there, bud?” your therapist asked, placing a hand on your shoulder.

You rubbed the side of your head, still stinging from the contact (or lack thereof). “I feel like my head was spiked by a volleyball player.”

She laughed. “Really now?”

“Yeah, I’ve been feeling it really often. One time, I was eating and my face nearly pummelled into a bowl of ramen.”

“Your soulmate must piss a lot of people off, then.”

You stared at her, but laughed it off as one of her jokes. Surely, she didn’t mean you actually had a soulmate right? Only a few people were blessed enough to be given one. Besides, whoever got stuck with you as a soulmate would be damned to the achingly slow healing stage of your knee for an indefinite amount of time.

But a hopeful part of you wished that, if you did have a soulmate, they wouldn’t be an athlete like you. Your own tribulation would only weigh them down in ways you can only imagine.

Oikawa could bear with the pain.

On good days, it was just a faint throb in his knee that he could ignore for the most part. His performance wouldn’t be easily affected by a twinge of pain. He had a pretty high tolerance for it, after all.

But there were also times like these when he’d wake up in the middle of the night, clutching his leg as he stifled a scream. What were you doing in such an ungodly hour?

He laid in his bed until the agony subsided back into the usual telltale throb that reminded him that though it’s no longer volatile, the sensation was still there. You were still in pain. He didn’t like the idea; not one bit.

That was the first time he looked you up. He clumsily spelled out your name on the search engine in the way that he remembered the x-ray technician from nearly a month ago pronounced it. He expected to see links to social media accounts you probably owned, but instead he was faced with a bunch of news articles from online high school sports magazines.

Curious, he clicked on the first link.

“Hyogo’s Own (Surname) (Name), Out of Commision for Good?”

Oikawa vaguely recalled you mentioning that you were from Hyogo and nothing else. It was a district far off on the other side of the country. It would take more than twelve hours to drive there, yet he had  found you sitting in a hospital in Sendai with a dead look in your eyes. He always wondered how exactly you wound up waiting to get an x-ray of whatever was afflicting you so far away from home, but the pieces slowly came together as his eyes grazed every word in the article.

“The coach of Hyogo’s Mikage Shihan is yet to release a statement with regards to their star player’s condition. But from what we’ve gathered from the team’s captain, Matsumoto Hiyori, she sustained a severe injury in her right leg. Some speculate that it was a dislocation, but others insisted that it was just a torn ligament. Whatever the cause may be, the football scene would be having scarce glimpses of one of Japan’s top three high school strikers, both in the male and female divisions.”

Your back collided with the wall as Harada roughly pressed you against it, holding you by the shoulders as unveiled fury burned in her eyes.

“Do you really want to end your whole career because of your own stubbornness?” she spat.

You have half the mind to tell her that your career would end sooner if you didn’t practice, but Harada would only remind you that you were given a three-month probation from any sporting activities. You hated that your doctor was right, that Harada was right, but could they blame you?

Soccer was all you had – it’s all you’re good at. You wanted to feel the rush of running through the field, the sun glaring at your skin, and the sound of grass crunching under the soles of your shoes. You ached for it.

“Just one month more, (Name),” she whispered, her fingers trembling. “One more and you’ll be free to play again. But right now…your knee still needs to heal.”

You knew that. You knew it far too well more than Harada or anyone else could ever understand. The burden of waking up every morning, feeling like your knee was going to snap off its sockets at any moment was already fair enough of a warning. But you couldn’t help yourself. You needed to move, to constantly be doing something because you’d rather incapacitate yourself entirely than spend another second feeling worthless. Seeing everyone do their drills on the field as you watched them between the barrier of a chain-link fence ate away at your sanity more than you expected it to.  

The door to the locker rooms abruptly creaked open as your team’s goalie, Suzuhime, and your captain, Matsumoto, made their entrance, shattering the tension that nearly suffocated you.

Their gazes, oh how sick you were of those pitiful gazes they sent your way. Why did they always look at you like you wouldn’t be playing alongside them anymore? It infuriated you to no end and the frustration that’s been building up in your chest for weeks just…burst.

“Why does everyone have to keep deciding what I can and can’t do for myself?” you snapped. “It’s my body, it’s my career, why do you have to meddle with what I want to fucking do with my life?”

Poison might as well dribbled from your chin at the sharpness of your tone. The two newcomers shot you wide-eyed stares, unused to your seething behavior, but Harada remained unfazed. She’s known you since you were children and even if you were a collected person for the most part, she’s borne witness to your rage a handful of times. And she knew how to handle the situation accordingly.

You were armed with an arsenal of even more hurtful things to say, but before any of them left your lips, the sting of Harada’s palm smacking against your face snapped you out of your haze of indignation.

The frown you didn’t know you’ve been making loosens as your lips parted in surprise when tears fell from Harada’s eyes.

“You’re not the only one who’s hurt by this, you know?” she interjected with a shaky breath. “We hate seeing you in pain. We hate it when you try to push yourself to limits you can’t reach anymore. So please just–” she exhaled, “–try to understand why we’re keeping you from training.”

Matsumoto came forward, pulling the two of you in a tight embrace. Suzuhime muttered something about unwarranted affection, but joined in regardless. You couldn’t react. You never really thought of it that way until Harada slapped you with the truth (no pun intended).

“Can you promise me one thing, as your captain?” Matsumoto pressed her lips in a thin line.

You nodded.

“Focus on getting better. The field won’t disappear, but your career can. Wasn’t that one big shot university in Tokyo eyeing you for a sports scholarship? You can’t lose that.”

And she was right. There was more to your life than this measly little slip-up. In five years give or take you’d be laughing at this whole thing like it was an inside joke. Everything was going to get better.

With that, you wiped the tears that ran across Harada’s cheeks, mumbling an almost inaudible apology.

“Man, you guys are too uptight,” Suzuhime whined. “Let’s all just get some pork buns like we used to!”

The idea never sounded better.

“What’s up with you?” Iwaizumi spared Oikawa a mindful glance. Their captain was rubbing his cheek instead of warming up for practice.

“I think she got slapped,” he muttered.

Hanamaki, having found out about Oikawa’s newly discovered soulmate bond, cackled. “You want to return the favor?”

“Shut the fuck up, Makki.”

“A soulmate?” Harada cocked her head to the side. “Don’t you have one, Suzu?”

Redness crept up Suzuhime’s face for having been singled out. “Um, yeah. It’s my childhood friend. You don’t know him. He goes to another school.”

Matsumoto scoffed. “That’s just high school girl-talk for ‘my soulmate doesn’t exist’.”

“Hey! He does, too!”

Harada waved away their impending banter, her attention solely on you. “So you think you have a soulmate?”

You nodded, eyes drifting towards your half-eaten pork bun. “They get hit a lot. I’m worried they’re in an abusive environment.”

“How sweet,” Suzuhime sighed. “My soulmate doesn’t care about his health at all. He always gets into scuffles and the bruises take ages to heal. When I talked to him about it, he just shrugged it off!”

“If he exists, that is,” taunted your captain.

“Matsu, I am going to tape your damn mouth.”

“I’d like to see you try.”

“Ignore them,” Harada told you. “So, what do you plan on doing about it?”

You’ve been asking yourself the same thing. Soulmate bonds are a surefire way of determining that someone was out there fated to be with you. But the tricky part was finding them. They could be anywhere in the world and the only means you had to contact them were the shared sensations of pain you felt on both ends of the bond.

Your eyes drifted onto the black knee brace you’ve been coerced to wear for the duration of your therapy. It served as a visual reminder of what had happened. But then again, the dull ache that made itself known every now and then still haunted you. Did your soulmate feel that slight ounce of pain, too?

“I think,” you sighed, “I’m just going to wait it out.”

This was bad.

Oikawa Tooru was known for his exceptional talent as a setter and a jump server. He wouldn’t have the audience from the stands hyping him up when it’s his turn to send a merciless blow towards their opponent. But jump serves were the only serves he made, since he refused to settle for anything less. This put an unnecessary strain on his knees that he knew, from the start, he would pay for when the time comes.

That time was now.

He hissed as Iwaizumi soothed the taut muscles in Oikawa’s legs. Matsukawa handed their ace an ice pack, which he placed over their captain’s aching knee.

“Is it yours?” Iwaizumi asked.

“I don’t know,” he admitted.

Matsukawa snickered at the side. “Of all the soulmates you could have ended up with, they just had to be an injury-prone idiot, too.”

Normally, he would’ve told Mattsun off for being mean, but honestly, he couldn’t have been more right.

“Shouyou’s playing volleyball now?” you clarified to your mother, who was giving you your afternoon massage.

She hummed. “Your aunt told me their school’s fighting to qualify as Miyagi’s representative for nationals. They got us tickets to watch their semifinals game.”

You couldn’t ever picture your little cousin, Shouyou, being able to touch the top of a volleyball net. He never even showed the vaguest interest in any kind of sport! Whenever his family visited yours in Hyogo a few years back, you always tried to get him into soccer one way or another. But he was as stubborn as an ox. Now, you’re hearing he’s playing to qualify for a national-level tournament for their prefecture?

“Miyagi, huh? That’s where I…” You frowned. No, you weren’t going to dwell on it any longer. “When’s the game?”

“This Friday, but we’re leaving on Thursday night. Your father’s driving.”

School wasn’t particularly hectic this time around, so you shrugged, agreeing with your mother to go all the way back to the place where some of your dreams were crushed. It wouldn’t do anyone harm, right?

Things were looking pretty dire for Seijoh. The little chibi – no, his entire team wasn’t letting up at all. It annoyed Oikawa more than it should. How did they still have that much determination left? 

Oikawa’s breath came out a little shaky as Mr. Refreshing and the little shrimp attempted to send the ball back to Seijoh. But Oikawa saw through the feint. Sugawara set it into the ace’s direction instead, who promptly slammed it down with unparalleled precision. Hanamaki was quick to react, diving for it without a second’s hesitation. The receive was off and it was flying away from the court, but Oikawa’s feet moved before he could even set a plan in stone. 

He forced his legs into sprints as he snapped his arm and pointed an index finger in the direction of the person he trusted most. His eyes flashed with fiery determination and the flames spread to Iwaizumi’s as well. It seemed impossible. It would be one of the riskiest sets he would have to make in his whole career thus far, but if he didn’t take it, he would just be admitting defeat. 

Oikawa launched himself into the air, twisting his torso in the direction of Seijoh’s ace and put the ball back in play all the way from where he set it from outside the court. Iwaizumi nodded in understanding, bending his knees for the sole purpose of connecting it. Naturally, the rules of physics still applied in a volleyball game and gravity eventually brought Oikawa back on the ground, at the cost of his back colliding with some of the metal chairs set aside. 

But Iwaizumi didn’t disappoint. He was already flying, arm pulled back in a spiking stance before the ball could even come to him. He trusted Oikawa’s accuracy enough to make this shot possible. There was no one else that could pull this off.

The captain grit his teeth, struggling to get back on his feet, but a sheet of black cloth was on the floor, making him lose traction in his shoes. The urgency in his action made him slip, his bad knee – your bad knee – colliding with the floor. The familiar sting in his bones flared back into life, but he couldn’t afford to pay it any mind.

He was running. Running even if his knee screamed for him to stop. Running even if his lungs burned for a breather. Running because even if Iwaizumi connected his set with a beautiful spike, that blasted Karasuno delinquent was definitely going to receive it–

A pained scream momentarily distracted him from everything happening on the court. It was strange. He never let what was going on in the stands distract him from a game, whether it be Seijoh’s supporters egging them on or some other matter than didn’t require his attention. 

But he could see it. The way you crumpled on the stairs a few levels above in the stands, clutching your knee to chest as you howled in agony. His heart stopped at the sight. 

What were you doing here?

“It hurts! It hurts!” you sobbed into your father’s shirt, fingers clamped around your aching leg. The all-too familiar pain erupted in your knee at the very same time that familiar face slipped on the court. You knew it wasn’t just a coincidence that the chatty stranger from a few months back was in the very same match as Shouyou. 

“Shh, we’re going to get your meds, baby,” your father cooed as he carefully hooked his arm under your knees and supported your back with the other. “Just hold out for a while.”

You could vaguely hear your mother apologizing to your aunt, but all your mind could focus on was how beautiful his eyes were. They were looking straight at you with crackling intensity. But before you could spend any longer drowning in those hazel eyes, your father carried you out of the stands, whispering words of consolation in your ear. 

“Oikawa-san!” 

Yahaba’s shout pulled Oikawa back into focus and he could clearly see Tobio running about on the court, going into position for their freak quick. A menacing smile graced Oikawa’s lips. That’s what he wanted – for his junior to use their ultimate weapon and fail. 

But something was wrong.

Iwaizumi, Kindaichi, and Kyoutani – the three of them, at the same time, lunged in an attempt to sully the ball’s trajectory. But they shouldn’t. The chibi’s arms were angled too obtuse. The shot was definitely going outside. He was about to bark at them to stop being a couple of idiots, but there was no reversing it.

Even if you can’t stop it, touch it, that’s what Oikawa always told them. He shouldn’t go back on his own teachings now. 

The chibi’s spike grazed Iwaizumi’s fingers. Out of instinct, Oikawa pulled his arms to the side in a pathetic attempt to receive, but he knew it was in vain. If only he stood a few feet at the back, maybe he could have had better odds. 

But fate has always been cruel to the ordinary. 

As all eyes were on the outplayed volleyball, none of the players dared to draw a breath. But seeing that Oikawa was already their last line of defense, it collided with the floor, the echoing sound imprinted in his mind for the rest of his days.

Seijoh had fallen.

“When I find that boy, I’m going to beat him to a pulp,” your father flatly proclaimed when you finished your story. The three of you were back in the Hinatas’ living room, your mother having soothed your knee with her otherworldly massage. 

“Dad, no,” you pleaded, but knew he didn’t mean the threat. At least, not entirely. 

“I’m going to have to agree with your father, sweetie,” your mother caressed your hair. “He must know what’s going on with you by now. He should be more careful.” 

You rolled your eyes. “Mom, I should have been careful. Who knows what he went through when I got slide tackled in the Aomori game.” 

She hesitated before sighing in defeat. Your parents then shared a look, presumably having a telepathic conversation as to what your next course of action should be. 

But before they could make that decision for you, Shouyou emerged from the hallway. 

“You’re…soulmates with the Grand King?” 

You didn’t know who this ‘grand king’ was, but he probably meant the chatty stranger turned volleyball player you met eyes with earlier today. You shot Shouyou a pained smile.

“Yeah.”

“Iwa-chan, I don’t get why we’re in rival territory. Why won’t you just tell me?” Oikawa simpered as Iwaizumi dragged him along further inside Karasuno’s campus. A few girls they passed by shot him knowing glances, which was odd. Most females would swoon at the sight of Oikawa Tooru.

“Shut up, Shittykawa,” Iwaizumi dismissed before letting go of his best friend’s collar when they arrive at the school’s gym. “Someone wants to see you.”

Oikawa narrowed his eyes. “If it’s Tobio-chan, tell him to forget it! As if I’ll let him gloat about their victory in my face.”

“Dumbass, it’s not him! None of the players are looking for you!”

“Then why are we even here in the first place?”

“Uhm, hello?”

It’s been months since Oikawa’s heard that voice, but even now, he could still associate your face with it. You peeked your head from inside Karasuno’s gym. The sound of volleyball shoes scraping against the polished floor spilling from inside almost made Oikawa nostalgic, but he was preoccupied with something else entirely.

You grinned at him, but your eyes held a hint of shyness in them. Oikawa didn’t know whose breath hitches, but he’s definitely having a hard time taking in oxygen at the sight of your face, more vibrant than the first time he saw you in Sendai. His eyes glazed over the knee brace slapped on your right knee – it looked painfully similar to the one he needed to wear in games. 

“I’m sorry I gave you such a hard time,” came your sheepish apology. “If I’d been more careful back then, you could’ve beat these guys… But I was rooting for Shouyou from the start, so…”

Oikawa didn’t know anyone named Shouyou, but he must have been someone close enough to you that you’d go all the way from Hyogo to watch their game against Karasuno. He made sure to shower whoever Shouyou was with infinite affection for finally, finally bringing you back to him.

Shit, he’s hot. 

You didn’t remember mister chatterbox from the hospital being this attractive. Maybe you just had such a terribly pessimistic view of the world at the time that you missed how unfairly good-looking he was.

You could feel the warmth spreading all over your face at apologizing profusely for your past mishandling of your current predicament. But he dismissed all of your concerns with a lighthearted laugh that sounded like a symphony in your ears.

“(Surname) (Name), Japan’s number three striker, is apologizing for an injury she didn’t even mean to get? You’re quite the saint, are you?” The way your name rolled off his tongue tugged at your heartstrings more than it should. Stupid soulmate bonds, making you lose composure all the damn time.

“You know who I am?” you queried, rather amused with this revelation.

He offered a nonchalant shrug. “I do my research.” 

The two of you stood there, carefully taking in each other as much as you could. You almost felt bad for the friend he brought with him, who stepped aside as to not interrupt your first meeting with your soulmate. But knowing that he’s the boy who’s always getting smacked in the head, the one that made you feel the sting of a service ace on the tips of your fingers, and the very same guy that powered through the burden you unknowingly shoved into his plate all with an award-winning grin on his face, it was all worth it. 

This was Oikawa Tooru, one of the most amazing setters in the high school volleyball scene.

But why did he look like he was about to cry?

Oikawa couldn’t help it. He threw his arms around you and took a long whiff of your scent. Ever since he ensured your identity, he couldn’t help but think of all the times your pain was transmitted to him. Those days were difficult for him, alone, already, what more for the person actually suffering the affliction?

Gentle fingers tangled themselves in your hair as he pulled you as tight as he could into his own body. His arms shook with the sheer emotions coursing through his veins and–

“Why are you crying?” 

He sighed, placing his hands on your shoulders. You eyed him bizarrely, but concern was lining your features, nonetheless. 

“I hurt you.” 

You snorted. 

“I’m pretty sure I’ve hurt you more times than the other way around,” you retorted, smiling up at him. “What kind of athlete would I be if I had a shitty pain tolerance?”

His eyes widened, taken aback with your reply. Admittedly, he already planned his first meeting with you in his imagination dozens of times. Only he didn’t expect for it to be in Karasuno, a day after his last volleyball game in high school. But he imagined himself letting his emotions lose, apologizing for hurting you, and you clasping his hands in forgiveness. He didn’t exactly write it in the script for you to take the blame, yourself, too. 

You were simply full of surprises.

You spent the rest of the afternoon talking and talking until the sun was beginning to bleed into the horizon.

Oikawa Tooru was an interesting person. He loved volleyball, had a penchant for milk bread, and admitted that he may be quite the narcissist at times. He told you that Tobio-chan, one of Shouyou’s teammates, was a junior that finally surpassed him. (There was a bitter undercurrent to his voice as he told that part.) He was going to Tokyo for college and–

“For real? I’m headed for Tokyo, too,” you chuckled, lacing your fingers together on your lap. 

Oikawa quirked an eyebrow. “Do you happen to be on a sports scholarship as well?”

You hummed, smiling playfully. “I dunno. Could the number three high school striker of Japan be able to land a scholarship even after this shitty injury?”

“Hmm…probably not.” Oikawa shook his head.

That reply garnered a pout. “Why not?”

He shrugged. “I haven’t seen her play yet. She’s seen me play, and we both know that my skill is already university-tier.” 

“Yet, you still lost,” you sighed dramatically.

The offended look on his face was priceless. “You didn’t have to go that far!”

You bellowed a hearty laugh, clutching your stomach at the puppy eyes he’s sending your way. Never could you have imagined that same boy from the radiology center being gifted with a whimsical persona so in tune with your own. Weirdly, you’re thankful for the injury that linked you to him. 

But as your laughter died down, the sun had already set. Your mother told you to be back with Shouyou and from the looks of it, the boys were already cleaning up inside the gym. 

You glanced at Oikawa, who was contently gazing at you with a small smile. 

“I’m going back to Hyogo tonight,” you imparted. 

He gave you a curt nod. “Have a safe trip.” 

“What, you’re not going to proclaim your love for me and force me to never leave your side again?”

Oikawa wrinkled his nose at such a bold statement. “You’re pretty, but not that pretty.”

“Hey!”

“I jest. I jest,” he chuckled, tucking in a lone tuft of your hair behind your ear. The graze of his fingers against the skin of your cheek made your lips part in a mute sigh. 

“All I’m saying is what’s there to fret about when we have–” he gestured towards your knee, “–this bonding us?” 

“You saying you want me to get injured again, Tooru?”

“Oh, say my name again.”

“Pervert!”

“No! It really sounded nice in your voice!” 

“(Name)-neesan!” 

Your heart almost sank at the sound of Shouyou’s voice. He emerged from the entrance with his gym bag slung across his shoulder. With a polite smile, he asked if you were ready to go.

You almost told him that, yes, you were, but that’s until Oikawa hissed at him like a cat.

“You’re the Shouyou that brought us together?” he accused with thinly veiled apprehension, to which Shouyou laughed.

“That’s right, Grand King! You owe me now!”

“I owe nothing to any of you Karasuno folk!” 

You rolled your eyes to pull Oikawa into an abrupt embrace, which effectively snapped him out of his hostility towards your younger cousin. He stammered with his words, but they remained forgotten when you whispered in his ear:

“See you in Tokyo.”

[diaryofanundeadman]

.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

#1yrago My RSS feeds from a decade ago, a snapshot of gadget blogging when that was a thing

Rob Beschizza:

I chanced upon an ancient backup of my RSS feed subscriptions, a cold hard stone of data from my time at Wired in the mid-2000s. The last-modified date on the file is December 2007. I wiped my feeds upon coming to Boing Boing thenabouts: a fresh start and a new perspective.

What I found, over 212 mostly-defunct sites, is a time capsule of web culture from a bygone age—albeit one tailored to the professional purpose of cranking out blog posts about consumer electronics a decade ago. It's not a picture of a wonderful time before all the horrors of Facebook and Twitter set in. This place is not a place of honor. No highly-esteemed deed is commemorated here. But perhaps some of you might like a quick tour, all the same.

The "Main" folder, which contains 30 feeds, was the stuff I actually wanted (or needed) to read. This set would morph over time. I reckon it's easy to spot 2007's passing obsessions from the enduring interests.

↬ Arts and Letters Daily: a minimalist blog of links about smartypants subjects, a Drudge for those days when I sensed a third digit dimly glowing in my IQ. But for the death of founder Denis Dutton, it's exactly the same as it was in 2007! New items daily, but the RSS feed's dead.

↬ Boing Boing. Still around, I hear.

↬ Brass Goggles. A dead feed for a defunct steampunk blog (the last post was in 2013) though the forums seem well-stocked with new postings.

↬ The Consumerist. Dead feed, dead site. Founded in 2005 by Joel Johnson at Gawker, it was sold to Consumer Reports a few years later, lost its edge there, and was finally shuttered (or summarily executed) just a few weeks ago.

↬ Bibliodyssey. Quiescent. Updated until 2015 with wonderful public-domain book art scans and commentary. A twitter account and tumblr rolled on until just last year. There is a book to remember it by should the bits rot.

↬ jwz. Jamie Zawinski's startling and often hilariously bleak reflections on culture, the internet and working at Netscape during the dotcom boom. This was probably the first blog that led me to visit twice, to see if there was more. And there still is, almost daily.

↬ Proceedings of the Athanasius Kircher Society. Curios and weirdness emerging from the dust and foul fog of old books, forbidden history and the more speculative reaches of science. So dead the domain is squatted. Creator Josh Foer moved on to Atlas Obscura.

↬ The Tweney Review. Personal blog of my last supervisor at Wired, Dylan Tweney, now a communications executive. It's still going strong!

↬ Strange Maps. Dead feed, dead site, though it's still going as a category at Big Think. Similar projects proliferate now on social media; this was the wonderful original. There was a book.

↬ BLDGBLOG. Architecture blog, posting since 2004 with recent if rarer updates. A fine example of tasteful web brutalism, but I'm no longer a big fan of cement boxes and minimalism with a price tag.

↬ Dethroner. A men's self-care and fashion blog, founded by Joel Johnson, of the tweedy kind that became wildly and effortlessly successful not long after he gave up on it.

↬ MocoLoco. This long-running design blog morphed visually into a magazine in 2015. I have no idea why I liked it then, but indie photoblogs' golden age ended long ago and it's good to see some are thriving.

↬ SciFi Scanner. Long-dead AMC channel blog, very likely the work of one or two editors and likely lost to tidal corporate forces rather than any specific failure or event.

↬ Cult of Mac. Apple news site from another Wired News colleague of mine, Leander Kahney, and surely one of the longest-running at this point. Charlie Sorrel, who I hired at Wired to help me write the Gadget blog, still pens articles there.

↬ Ectoplasmosis. After Wired canned its bizarre, brilliant and unacceptably weird Table of Malcontents blog, its editor John Brownlee (who later joined Joel and I in editing Boing Boing Gadgets) and contributor Eliza Gauger founded Ectoplasmosis: the same thing but with no hysterical calls from Conde Nast wondering what the fuck is going on. It was glorious, too: a high-point of baroque indie blogging in the age before Facebook (and I made the original site design). Both editors later moved onto other projects (Magenta, Problem Glyphs); Gauger maintains the site's archives at tumblr. It was last updated in 2014.

↬ Penny Arcade. Then a webcomic; now a webcomic and a media and events empire.

↬ Paul Boutin. While working at Wired News, I'd heard a rumor that he was my supervisor. But I never spoke to him and only ever received a couple of odd emails, so I just got on with the job until Tweney was hired. His site and its feed are long-dead.

↬ Yanko Design. Classic blockquote chum for gadget bloggers.

↬ City Home News. A offbeat Pittburgh News blog, still online but lying fallow since 2009.

↬ Watchismo. Once a key site for wristwatch fans, Watchismo was folded into watches.com a few years ago. A couple of things were posted to the feed in 2017, but its time has obviously passed.

↬ Gizmodo. Much has changed, but it's still one of the best tech blogs.

↬ Engadget. Much has changed, but it's still one of the best tech blogs.

↬ Boing Boing Gadgets. Site's dead, though the feed is technically live as it redirects to our "gadgets" tag. Thousands of URLs there succumbed to bit-rot at some point, but we have plans to merge its database into Boing Boing's and revive them.

↬ Gear Factor. This was the gadget review column at Wired Magazine, separate from the gadget blog I edited because of the longtime corporate divorce between Wired's print and online divisions. This separation had just been resolved at the time I began working there, and the two "sides" -- literally facing offices in the same building -- were slowly being integrated. The feed's dead, but with an obvious successor, Gear.

↬ The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs. Required reading at the time, and very much a thing of its time. Now vaguely repulsive.

↬ i09. This brilliant sci-fi and culture blog deserved more than to end up a tag at Gizmodo.

↬ Science Daily: bland but exhaustive torrent of research news, still cranking along.

The "Essentials" Folder was material I wanted to stay on top of, but with work clearly in mind: the background material for systematically belching out content at a particular point in 2007.

↬ Still alive are The Register, Slashdot, Ars Technica, UMPC Portal (the tiny laptop beat!), PC Watch, Techblog, TechCrunch, UberGizmo, Coolest Gadgets, EFF Breaking News, Retro Thing, CNET Reviews, New Scientist, CNET Crave, and MAKE Magazine.

↬ Dead or quiescent: GigaOm (at least for news), Digg/Apple, Akihabara News, Tokyomango, Inside Comcast, Linux Devices (Update: reincarnated at linuxgizmos.com), and Uneasy Silence.

Of the 23 feeds in the "press releases" folder, 17 are dead. Most of the RSS no-shows are for companies like AMD and Intel, however, who surely still offer feeds at new addresses. Feeds for Palm, Nokia and pre-Dell Alienware are genuine dodos. These were interesting enough companies, 10 years ago.

PR Newswire functions as a veneering service so anyone can pretend to have a big PR department, but it is (was?) also legitimately used by the big players as a platform so I monitored the feeds there. They're still populated, but duplicate one another, and it's all complete garbage now. (It was mostly garbage then.)

My "Gadgets and Tech" folder contained the army of late-2000s blogs capitalizing on the success of Gizmodo, Boing Boing, TechCrunch, et al. Back in the day, these were mostly one (or two) young white men furiously extruding commentary on (or snarky rewrites of) press releases, with lots of duplication and an inchoate but seriously-honored unspoken language of mutual respect and first-mover credit. Those sites that survived oftentimes moved to listicles and such: notionally superior and more original content and certainly more sharable on Facebook, but unreadably boring. However, a few old-timey gadget bloggers are still cranking 'em out' in web 1.5 style. And a few were so specialized they actually had readers who loved them.

Still alive: DailyTech, technabob, CdrInfo.com, EverythingUSB, Extremetech, GearFuse, Gizmag, Gizmodiva, Hacked Gadgets, How to Spot A Psychopath/Dans' Data, MobileBurn, NewLaunches, OhGizmo!, ShinyShiny, Stuff.tv, TechDigest, TechDirt, Boy Genius Report, The Red Ferret Journal, Trusted Reviews, Xataca, DigiTimes, MedGadget, Geekologie, Tom's Hardware, Trendhunter, Japan Today, Digital Trends, All About Symbian (Yes, Symbian!), textually, cellular-news, TreeHugger, dezeen.

Dead: jkkmobile.com, Business Week Online, About PC (why), Afrigadget (unique blog about inventors in Africa, still active on FaceBook), DefenseTech, FosFor (died 2013), Gearlog, Mobile-Review.com (but apparently reborn as a Russian language tech blog!), Robot's Dreams, The Gadgets Weblog, Wireless Watch Japan, Accelerating Future, Techopolis, Mobile Magazine, eHome Upgrade, camcorderinfo.com (Update: it became http://Reviewed.com), Digital Home Thoughts (farewell), WiFi Network News (farewell), Salon: Machinist, Near Future Lab, BotJunkie (twitter), and CNN Gizmos.

I followed 18 categories at Free Patents Online, and the site's still alive, though the RSS feeds haven't had any new items since 2016.

In the "news" folder, my picks were fairly standard stuff: BBC, CNET, digg/technology, PC World, Reuters, International Herald Tribune, and a bunch of Yahoo News feeds. The Digg feed's dead; they died and were reborn.

The "Wired" feed folder comprised all the Wired News blogs of the mid-2000s. All are dead. 27B Stroke 6, Autopia, Danger Room, Epicenter, Gadget Lab, Game|Life, Geekdad, Listening Post, Monkey Bites, Table of Malcontents, Underwire, Wired Science.

These were each basically one writer or two and were generally folded into the established mazagine-side arrangements as the Age of Everyone Emulating Gawker came to an end. The feed for former EIC Chris Anderson's personal blog survives, but hasn't been updated since his era. Still going strong is Bruce Sterling's Beyond the Beyond, albeit rigged as a CMS tag rather than a bona fide site of its own.

Still alive from my 2007 "Science" folder are Bad Astronomy (Phil Plait), Bad Science (Ben Goldacre), Pharyngula (PZ Myers) New Urban Legends, NASA Breaking News, and The Panda's Thumb.

Finally, there's a dedicated "iPhone" folder. This was not just the hottest toy of 2007. It was all that was holy in consumer electronics for half a decade. Gadget blogging never really had a golden age, but the iPhone ended any pretense that there were numerous horses in a race of equal potential. Apple won.

Still alive are 9 to 5 Mac, MacRumors, MacSlash, AppleInsider and Daring Fireball. Dead are TUAW, iPhoneCentral, and the iPhone Dev Wiki.

Of all the sites listed here, I couldn't now be paid but to read a few. So long, 2007.

https://boingboing.net/2017/12/29/my-rss-feeds-from-a-decade-ago.html

[ubourgeois]

Top 30 Films of 2018

I’m actually getting one of these out at a fairly reasonable time! I’m a champion.

Compared to last year, I would say 2018 had fewer films that I really loved, that shook me and immediately registered as important - but also, more films that have grown on me over time, that were clever and inventive in ways that convince me to look past their shortcomings (or reevaluate if they are shortcomings at all). Plenty of odd, perhaps imperfect movies made it far up the list, and I think I ended up privileging that weird streak more than usual this year. But hopefully that makes for interesting reading here.

I found making this list that a couple of the big arthousey hits of the year (Eighth Grade, Burning, The Rider, and others) ended up slipping into the basement of the top 50. Keep an eye out for a rejoinder post following this in a couple days where I hash out my thoughts on those. For now, top 30 after the jump:

30. Unsane dir. Steven Soderbergh

Remember when Tangerine came out and everyone was like, “wow I can’t believe this was shot on an iPhone” and it was a whole thing? Well, I can believe that Unsane was shot on an iPhone, and that’s really for the better. Ever the innovator, Soderbergh follows Sean Baker’s lead by taking full advantage of the logistical advantages and distinctive appearances of iPhone-shot footage, putting together a film that uses its hardware not as a flashy obstacle to be overcome but as a driver of its look and feel, proving at least for now that mobile-shot films are viable (though we’ll see how his next one turns out). The film itself is good too - Claire Foy gives a wonderfully prickly performance, and the claustrophobic visuals make for a great psychological thriller.

29. Cold War dir. Paweł Pawlikowski

Expanding on the aesthetic territory he explored with Ida, Pawlikowski brings another black & white, Polish-language period piece about identities split between different (religious, political) worlds. Cold War is the more complicated and perhaps less focused film, but also the more alluring one, with a luscious love story, incredible music (Łojojoj...), and great, showy performances from Joanna Kulig and Tomasz Kot. In other words, it’s luxurious, romantic Euro-arthouse fare. Probably best watched with a full glass of wine in hand.

28. Ready Player One dir. Steven Spielberg

A film that many accused of “pandering” to audiences for its many blink-and-you’ll-miss-it nods to 80s nostalgia and gaming culture, Ready Player One was on the contrary seemingly uninterested in anything of the sort. It managed to accomplish something more meaningful by packing the film so dense with nerd-bait that it becomes just texture and noise - Tracer popping up in the background of random scenes ends up being less of Overwatch reference and more of a piece of plausible set dressing in a VR social media hub. This contributed to RPO being not only a technically impressive but a visually overwhelming effects film, packaged around a seemingly knowing 80s blockbuster pastiche (the story, the character types, even the music cues were too old-fashioned to be on purpose). A film both smarter and easier to like than the discourse around it suggested.

27. Widows dir. Steve McQueen

I do really wish that McQueen would go back to making demanding, brutal films like Hunger, but if he simply has to become a commercial filmmaker I guess I don’t mind this. Surely the ensemble film of the year, with the entire cast firing on all cylinders - Daniel Kaluuya as the sadistic enforcer/campaign manager in particular impresses, though naturally Viola Davis, Elizabeth Debicki, Cynthia Erivo, and even Colin Farrell make for compelling characters in this twisty, nervy heist film. The action scenes are all impressively mounted (if a bit few and far between) and there are enough McQueen-esque florishes to keep things interesting in the interim (that long car scene!). Great moody popcorn stuff.

26. An Elephant Sitting Still dir. Hu Bo

Elephant has gotten a lot of press for two reasons: its nearly four-hour length and its director’s untimely death shortly after its completion. The length is important because it beats you into submission, forcing you to accept its rhythm and smothering you in tight focus on its main characters until you feel like it’s your own POV (I wasn’t really into it until, uh, the two hour mark, but then somehow I was hooked). Hu Bo’s death is important because knowing that, the sensation of being trapped, pressured, and disoriented by the Current State of China (ever the popular subject matter) feels all the more palpable and, maybe unfortunately, grants the film some extra layer of authority, or at least urgency. If I ever have the time or energy, I would love to revisit this film - I expect it will one day be seen as a landmark.

25. Make Me Up dir. Rachel Maclean

A bizarre little bit of sugary pop-feminist techno-dystopia, pulling off a sort of cinematic cousin to vaporwave by way of Eve Ensler. What unfolds is pretty insane, involving dance numbers, incomprehensible lectures on dodgy gender politics, and sets that look pulled out from a cheap children’s TV show. It’s definitely a marmite film - how well you connect with this will depend heavily on your tolerance for clearly-fake CG, well-trodden feminist talking points, and pastels - but for those with the appetite for this brand of political kitsch then this is just about the best version of itself imaginable. 

24. Liz and the Blue Bird dir. Naoko Yamada

Naoko Yamada out Naoko Yamada-s herself. A standalone spinoff of Hibike! Euphonium that focuses on members of the secondary cast, Liz makes good on the sensitive, subtly-executed love story that the show ultimately failed to produce (not quite Adolescence of Utena-tier course correction, but we’ll take it). This is a film propelled by the tiniest gestures - a hand tensing behind the back, a nervous flicker of the eye, a cheerful bounce in the step - in that way animation can provide that seems not incidental but hugely, blatantly filled with meaning. While A Silent Voice was a great breakthrough for Yamada as an “original” feature, it’s Liz that feels like the more mature film, and a promising indicator for what lies ahead.

23. Sew the Winter to My Skin dir. Jahmil X.T. Qubeka

Maybe the most surprising film of the year is this, an action-biopic about John Kepe, a South African Robin Hood figure, that almost entirely eschews spoken dialogue in favor of visual storytelling, physical acting, and clever audio design. But this is not some pretentious, austere arthouse film substituting gimmicks for actual character; Sew the Winter to My Skin is an engaging, fascinating, and unexpectedly accessible historical epic, prioritizing mythic bigness over simple recitation of fact. While it demands some patience at first (with no dialogue, it takes a bit for the film to properly introduce its cast), it quickly shows itself to be an inventive, exciting, and occasionally funny adventure that proves Qubeka as a truly exciting voice in South African cinema.

22. Mom and Dad dir. Brian Taylor

Forget Mandy, THIS is the crazy Nic Cage movie of the year. A slick, rapid-fire horror comedy that feels almost like a music video at points, Mom and Dad has what’s surely Cage’s best unhinged performance in years as well as a great, more restrained turn by Selma Blair. The violence is ludicrous, the premise is nutty, and the sense of humor is utterly sick - that the film manages to squeeze out a surprisingly coherent commentary on suburban family life on top of this is a minor miracle (a scene where Cage destroys a pool table proves strangely thoughtful). For all the broadly acclaimed “serious” horror films in recent years, like this year’s kind of boring Hereditary, groan-filled A Quiet Place, and mostly incoherent Suspiria, I more appreciate this breed of deranged, funny, and tightly focused effort. It doesn’t need to be that deep.

21. Good Manners dir. Marco Dutra, Juliana Rojas

I’m going to mark this write-up with a **spoiler warning**, as I think it’s basically impossible to talk about this film without giving the game away. Good Manners has one of the best genre switcheroos in recent years, starting off as a proper Brazilian class drama (think Kleber Mendonça Filho) with a lesbian twist before explosively transforming into a horror movie that reveals a hidden monster-coming-of-age story that’s nearly unrecognizable as the same film from an hour before. As delightful as this bit of narrative sleight of hand is, it can’t justify a good film alone, which is where the great lead performance by Isabél Zuaa and the mesermizing, inventive matte paintings of the São Paulo skyline come into play, making this fantastical, genre-bending film a true original of the year.

20. The Miseducation of Cameron Post dir. Desiree Akhavan

There’s a tendency in the queer teen film genre to sometimes drift towards miserablist portrayals of growing up; to emphasize the hardship, nonunderstanding, and isolation to the expense of other experiences. Cameron Post manages to avoid this path even as it explores the dreadful premise of life in a conversion camp by balancing the solidarity, humor, and defiant joy hidden along the edges of the camp experience with the cruel, dehumanizing nature of the place. The film works, then, not only as a statement against conversion therapy and the real harm it does to all participants, but also as a lively, triumphant teen movie that feels more powerful than the lazy, doom-and-gloom approach.

19. Minding the Gap dir. Bing Liu

Few films capture the particular small city Midwest atmosphere quite like this one, a very raw documentary that feels very much like the first feature it is - but in a good way. Cut together from years of Liu’s amateur footage as well as new material of its subjects (the director and two of his old friends), a documentary that at first seems to be about the local skateboarding culture stretches out to many other topics: domestic violence, race relations, middle-American economic anxiety. The film, perhaps because of its closeness to the director and his relative inexperience, manages to take on a quick-moving scattershot approach, weaving stream-of-consciousness from one topic to the next, while still giving each the time and weight it deserves. 

18. The Green Fog dir. Evan Johnson, Galen Johnson, Guy Maddin

A hard film to sum up, though at its heart not a terribly complicated one. Ostensibly a very loose reconstruction of Vertigo using clips from other material shot in San Francisco, from The Conversation to San Andreas to Murder, She Wrote, this new, uh, thing from Maddin and the Johnsons is a short, sweet, and really quite funny collage less interested in slavishly reenacting its inspiration than making funny jokes with movie clips. Some highlights include Rock Hudson carefully watching an *NSYNC music video on a tiny screen, a long sequence admiring Chuck Norris’ face that doesn’t seem to match any particular part of Vertigo, and a number of scenes of dialogue with all the speech cut out, leaving only awkward pauses and mouth noises. It’s high art!

17. Sorry to Bother You dir. Boots Riley

Boots Riley’s transition from long-standing underrated rapper to breakout auteur has been wild to witness. Sorry to Bother You is certainly one of 2018′s most original and distinctive films (what other film is it like, exactly?), and any complaints about unsubtle politics or overpacked narrative can be easily counterbalanced with the film’s sheer verve and oddball energy. Like Widows, it’s another of the great ensemble pieces of the year - Lakeith Stanfield and Tess Thompson are great as usual, and of the supporting cast Armie Hammer emerges as the standout with an incredibly funny halfway-villainous turn, plus a great bit of voice casting with David Cross. Leading candidate for this year’s Film of the Moment.

16. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse dir. Robert Persichetti Jr., Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman

The problem with comic book movies a lot of the time is that they’re somehow too embarrassed to own their source material. Into the Spider-Verse succeeds because it emphatically embraces its roots, not only visually (the cel shading, impact lines, and even text boxes that make up the film’s look) but also narratively, by adopting the multiverse concept in earnest and milking it for comedic and dramatic effect. It’s an incredibly innovative (not to mention gorgeous) animated film that not only raises the standard but expands the scope of superhero films, giving new hope to a genre that has been stuck spinning its wheels for years. Plus, it has probably the only post-credits scene actually worth the effort, which is a very special sort of victory.

15. Museo dir. Alonso Ruizpalacios

A playful, thoughtful heist film that gets the actual heist out of the way as soon as possible. Two suburban twenty-somethings pull off a daring robbery of Mayan artifacts from the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City, then set off on an ill-fated roadtrip to fence the goods. There’s a certain magic to this film, in its approach that is at once totally reverent and mythologizing but also eager to take the piss out of everything (the recurring motif of Revueltas’ The Night of the Mayas suite does both), and in how it turns this story into something of a love letter to the history and geography of Mexico. Very mature, well-balanced filmmaking in Ruizpalacios’ second feature.

14. BlacKkKlansman dir. Spike Lee

The best Spike Lee joint in a long, long time. It taps into the freewheeling, confrontational energy of his best work, but almost as a career victory lap as he makes a game out of outfoxing Klan members. There’s plenty of humor and tension here, with a great, dry leading duo in John David Washington and Adam Driver, and a funny turn from Topher Grace (!) as David Duke. Even if it does play it a bit safe with an easy target and wraps up a bit too easily (a quick flash-forward to Charlottesville as a postscript notwithstanding), it should be fine, I think, for a film to indulge in the simple pleasure of overcoming obvious villains in a glorious fashion. For all the recent films that give nuanced and serious takes on racism in America, one ought to be about the joy of blowing up the KKK.

13. Mirai dir. Mamoru Hosoda

Since he’s started making original features, Hosoda has been taken with relatively high-concept storylines, from his “debut” The Girl Who Leapt Through Time to Wolf Children, but Mirai is certainly his most ambitious yet. Nearly every choice about the film is a bit weird: from the unusual, compact layout of Kun’s home to Kun’s very believable, nearly alienating (to an older audience) childish behavior to the simply bizarre logistics and metaphysics of Kun’s fantastic adventures. The time- and space-travel antics Kun and Mirai get up to never seem entirely literal or entirely imagined, somewhere between childish fable and psychological sci-fi, a mixture that culminates in a surprisingly existential climax for an unabashed children’s film. After the quite safe The Boy and the Beast, it’s exciting to see Hosoda branch out into such a complicated and strange project, certainly the most daring animated feature of the year.

12. Support the Girls dir. Andrew Bujalski

A bubbly, sensitive, and lightly anarchic workplace comedy in that most essential of American institutions: the Hooters-flavored sports bar off the highway. Bujalski continues to prove himself an observant and funny writer, putting together a fascinating ensemble of characters brought to life by a perfectly-cast ensemble (Regina Hall is flawless as advertised, and Haley Lu Richardson brings us one of the most adorable characters in cinema). I don’t think I’ve seen a more charming film about workers’ solidarity and the lively communities that find their niche in liminal spaces. 

11. First Reformed dir. Paul Schrader

Edgy priests are in a certain way low-hanging fruit; the tension is automatic, the contradiction inherently compelling. It’s a lazy symbol that can be milked for cheap profundity when employed, if you will, in bad faith. That’s why it’s so important that First Reformed, for all of its alcoholic, violent, libidinous angst packed into Ethan Hawke’s (masterfully interpreted) character, is also a great, genuine film about faith besides. It’s a Revelations film if I’ve ever seen one, about facing down the apocalypse with no way of understanding God’s plan, about living on the precipice of a collapse of belief, about accepting mystery. It’s the only film I saw this year that communicated actual dread, but even then still, somehow, bizarrely hopeful. 

10. Birds of Passage dir. Cristina Gallego, Ciro Guerra

Ciro Guerra (now with partner Cristina Gallego co-directing) follows up the excellent Embrace of the Serpent with another powerful portrait of an indigenous community that, under the pressure of colonial influence, gradually devours itself. In the new film, however, this takes the form of a traditional gangster film, from the humble beginnings and runaway success to the explosions of violence and crumbling of an empire. Birds of Passage shows the origins of the Colombian drug trade with the native Wayuu people (a counterpoint, Gallego explains, to the much-celebrated Pablo Escobar narrative), and in doing so still finds room to organically and respectfully depict the traditions of the Wayuu, as well as showcase their beautiful language, which makes up much of the film’s dialogue. Best film in the genre since at least Carlos. 

09. The Favourite dir. Yorgos Lanthimos

Though I really admire Dogtooth, I’ve found myself increasingly disappointed in Lanthimos’ output since that film. Alps was fine but clearly minor; The Lobster started strong but fizzled out; Killing of a Sacred Deer was ultimately too self-consciously bizarre. With The Favourite, we’re finally back in exciting, unsettlingly weird territory, Yorgos having found that his very mannered style of English dialogue works superbly in a costume drama context. He also gets great, uncharacteristically emotive performances (compared to, say, the last two Colin Farrell outings) out of his central trio of Olivia Colman, Rachel Weisz, and Emma Stone, with especially great work coming from Stone, who I think has discovered that all of her best roles take full advantage of the fact that she looks like a cartoon character. It’s wonderfully perverse, incredibly funny stuff, with one of the great, inexplicable endings of the year - fair to call it a Buñuel revival.

08. Bisbee ‘17 dir. Robert Greene

A documentary that tackles a shocking forgotten chapter in American labor history - a group of strikers deported from their mining town and left for dead in the desert - as well as the potential of historical reenactment to act as communal therapy. Greene moves a bit sideways from his usual performance-centric subject matter to show a different kind of performance meant not to affect the audience but the performers themselves, breaking through decades of near-silence on Bisbee’s tumultuous small town history. It’s also a remarkably multi-faceted film; though it would certainly be easy to side fully with the strikers, Greene makes sure to document the perspectives of current Bisbee citizens who sympathize with or even celebrate the decision to deport, complicating the emotions and politics of the reenactment in genuinely interesting ways. A powerful, important documentary.

07. Asako I & II dir. Ryusuke Hamaguchi

Unwieldy and annoying English title aside (especially considering all the possible translations of Netemo Sametemo), Asako seems on the surface like nothing more than a cheap TV romance. It hits many of the same beats and adopts much of the visual style associated with this vein of visual media, particularly in the music video-esque, almost-supernatural meet-cute that opens the film. But hidden beneath these affectations is a shockingly cold un-romance, a story with an inevitable bad end that you’re tricked into thinking might not come to pass. By employing so many stylistic and even verbal cliches, Hamaguchi reveals how these internalized these storytelling devices are, and how they not only can’t prepare us for the complications of actual relationships, but even shift our expectations away from reality. It’s an absolute gut-punch of a film, covered in a seductively sweet carapace. 

06. Sweet Country dir. Warwick Thornton

In a fairly large shift from his previous Samson and Delilah, Thornton has put together one of the best and most unusual Westerns in recent years. Featuring great, earthy performances from its nonprofessional cast (plus a bit of Sam Neill and Bryan Brown for good measure) and a weird, almost Malicky flash-forward structure, the film explores a not-widely-depicted history of exploitation of indigenous Australians. It’s a sad film, showing a fairly exciting lead-up to a somewhat deflating moment of unjust violence - but of course, many of the best Westerns aren’t about good triumphing, either. It’s the film on this list that most grew on me over the course of the year, having not impressed me at first but then blowing me away on a second viewing. 

05. Leave No Trace dir. Debra Granik

For all the buzz surrounding Winter’s Bone - a film that still holds up after so many years - it’s a bit surprising that it took Granik eight years to put out a follow-up, but I guess it’s worth the wait. Unlike Bone, Leave No Trace is a kind, gentle film, leaving behind the edgy Ozarkian drama of its predecessor for a similar but more forgiving setting of woodland communities in the Pacific Northwest. It initially seduces you with Ben Foster’s outdoorsy survivalist lifestyle, cut off by seemingly uncaring state officials, but gradually revealing, through the second thoughts of his daughter (Thomasin McKenzie, in a shall we say Lawrencian turn), the downsides and flawed motivations for their lifestyle choice. It’s a quiet and thoughtful film, melancholy and optimistic in equal measure. Makes one hope Granik can get another project off the ground sooner. 

04. Roma dir. Alfonso Cuarón

I mean, what else can we say about Roma? It’s about as good as claimed, beautifully shot, framed, written, acted, whatever. It’s at its best, sort of ironically, when Cuarón breaks up the quiet personal drama for some of his characteristic action-y set pieces (a Children of Men-esque protest sequence and the climax on the beach are particularly memorable), but he also shows his talent in handling relatively uneventful family scenes, using the layout of the house to facilitate some surprisingly interesting camera movements. I’m happy that Cuarón, who could easily transition into a more boring prestige Hollywood filmmaker if he so chose, is using his industry clout to pull together neat little films like this. 

03. The Old Man & the Gun dir. David Lowery

What a completely pleasant film. A film that walks a dangerous tightrope - one of nostalgia, roguish charm, and incessant aw-shucks optimism - that can easily fall into twee, navel-gazing hell, but that miraculously pulls it off, resulting in a genuinely spirit-lifting character study of an almost folkloric figure. Robert Redford’s good in this, but of course he is - that’s the whole point. Perhaps more appropriate to say that this film is good for Robert Redford, that it rises to the occasion of celebrating his career in full and pulls it off without appearing trite or disposable. As good a (reportedly) final outing as anyone could ask for.

02. I Do Not Care If We Go Down in History as Barbarians dir. Radu Jude

A nearly three-hour, densely conversational, nakedly didactic examination of the historical effects and contemporary sources of fascism and ethnic nationalism that somehow flies right by. Radu Jude, a relative latecomer to Romanian cinema’s rise to international prominence, makes a strong argument for being his country’s best and most important filmmaker, taking on complicated, controversial, and infrequently discussed subject matter about Romania’s troubled past. If you can get past Barbarians’ sort of user-unfriendly exterior (Iona Iacob opens the film by introducing herself and explaining her character, which tells you the sort of thing you’re getting into), it should prove to be a remarkably stimulating and even fiendishly funny ride. 

01. Shoplifters dir. Hirokazu Koreeda

If you’ve spent the ten years since Still Walking wondering what exactly Koreeda is trying to do anymore, then this is your answer. He’s spent most of the last decade pumping out the same nonconventional family drama over and over again (everything from I Wish to After the Storm, at least) so he could hone his skills like a weapon and create the perfect, ultimate version. With a pitch-perfect cast (Koreeda regulars Lily Franky and Kirin Kiki are the standouts, but Sakura Ando, Mayu Matsuoka, and the two child actors more than hold their own), and probably the perfect expression of the chosen family, spots and all, that has consumed much of Koreeda’s career, Shoplifters is one of its director’s career-best films, showcasing all of his talent for depicting delicate, intimate moments and bringing smart, complex ideas to seemingly straightforward premises. The most exciting Palme d’Or winner in years and easily the best film of 2018.

[zekethegm]

Fun with Lovecraftian things part 4: Romance

So this is happening. Also part 4 will be in a couple parts so I guess this is 4.1? Apparently what I am doing is called a slow burn so hope you like those.

Also I have to post from mobile because of a crasht desktop so I can't slap a Read More in here. Ill try and come back and edit it sometime.

    Kate sets her phone aside and turns on her voice recording app. “The idol arrived this morning. It is currently 1:05 pm, I hope they were careful with this thing.” She reaches slowly into the crate and grips the base of the golden idol, she begins to lift it out very carefully, coaching herself to be cautious as she raised it.

    “Ah, hell!” she exclaims releasing the idol into the crate with a thud as she withdraws her hand, shaking it out. “Did no one check for nails inside? Ow, damn when was my last tetanus shot.” Kate looks at the back of her hand and uses a nearby paper towel to contain the bleeding. As she tends to her wounds her eyes notice speckles of blood on the work table and her face goes white in fear.

    “No, no, no. Pleeeease.” She peers into the crate pre-emptively wincing at the sight she expects to see. Blood on the crate, on the packing materials and yet, strangely, none on the idol. Kate breaths a deep sigh of relief and thinks no further about it, she is more than willing to accept her good luck.

    After bandaging her hand she deletes her first recording and starts over. “The idol arrived this morning, it is currently 1:20 pm. Here we go.” She grips the golden sculpture by its base and pulls it out onto the worktable. While not particularly tall it is solid and heavy. “Alright this idol is believed to be from the lost religious practises of the Tuttoke people. The entire thing is solid gold, the base seems to be an organic shape, clearly the image was more important than its pedestal. This is a depiction of Pl’thad’grthain as evidenced by the four arms and mass of tentacles in place of legs. The head is a rather exact hexagonal prism shape with the hexagonal faces as the top and bottom of the head. It is unclear if this is deliberate or if this sculpture is unfinished.”

    Kate sits back in her chair and marvels at the statue. She leans in towards it and rubs her thumb across the blank face of the head. “What were you all about?” She whispers, half to herself, half to the statue.

    “Your sacrifice has gained my attention, mortal.” A voice says.

    Kate nearly falls out of her chair. “What? Who? You scared the hell out of me!”

    “Repeat your question unto me and receive my words, mortal.” The voice seems to wrap around her brain and squeeze.

With every word a dark shadow wraps itself around her mind, she places her head in her hands and grips tightly. “Agh! Please stop. Whoever is doing this, it really hurts.”

A hum seems to hang in the air as the voice returns. “Amateur! Do you not guard yourself against the great powers?”

The force of the first word pulls Kate from her chair to the floor, she squirms and groans on the clean, white tile. “Just. Stop.” She ekes out.

The idol slides off the table, seemingly of it’s own will and lands upright beside her. “Lay my image down and draw what you see on your body. Do so quickly with any ink you have or carve it into your flesh if you must.”

Kate pushes the idol over and scrambles for a pen in her pocket. A strange pattern, a mass of triangles and parabolas cluster at the base of the idol. She copies it quickly onto her forearm and immediately she feels relief, as though a snake had uncoiled itself from her very sanity. She slowly rises to her knees and then up onto her chair with some effort.

“Now.” The voice returns, “What is it you desire of me?”

Kate blinks around the room, confused and unsure of anything. “I just want you to go away.” She pleads.

There is silence for a moment. “You called me here to cast me away?” The voice seems quieter now, less authoritative.

Kate shakes her head, holding it with one hand. “I didn’t call you. I feel like I would remember that.”

“Your blood.” It replies. “It called to me as it dripped onto my image.”

Kate looks at the bandage on the back of her hand and things suddenly begin to make sense while also becoming increasingly bizarre. “That was an accident.”

“Oh.” The air becomes deathly still. Though her desk fan is on there seems to be no breeze. “Then my presence is unwanted.”

“Yes. Very much so. Please. Go.” Kate says, the throbbing in her head completely subsiding.

The statue rights itself from its position on the floor. “Perform the ritual once more, with the sigil now and true intention I assure you that you will be satisfied with the results.”

“No, I’m not cutting my hand a second time, I didn’t even want to do it the first time.” Kate says.

“Then I will leave you be. Before I go, you must know that you have the most magnificent presence.” It states.

Kate gives a confused look to nothing in particular. “What? Thank you? Never heard that one before.”

“Then you have been robbed of your due honor. Your presence is the greatest art the cosmos has ever seen. Stars have died and painted the void with their death throes and they wither in comparison to your impression on reality.” The voice responds with no small amount of enthusiasm.

“Wow. Ok. Who are you exactly?” Kate asks, visually scanning the room for speaker systems and cameras.

“I am Pl’thad’grthain. You gave of your blood and asked my question and I heard you.” It says.

Kate flops back against her chair and stares slack jawed at the idol. “No.”

“Yes.”

“You are the god of the Tuttoke people? I-I’m talking to a god?”

“I have been called many things by many beings. God is among them, yes. The Tuttoke were a devoted gathering of humans, I enjoyed their worship greatly.

Kate looks to her phone and sees that it is still recording. “Tell me everything. What happened when you first showed up? What is on my arm? What is presence? And also the complete history of the lost Tuttoke people. Where did they go?”

The atmosphere almost seems to vibrate as a low chuckle comes from inside Kate’s own thoughts but also from the very air. “I am a thing outside of your time and matter, I obey only the laws of physics which convenience me and even now I do not speak your tongue but the very words of reality. It is your brain which orders the energies of my will into your words. By that nature my speech is destructive to both mind and body, the sigil allows my weaker devotees to survive a conversation.”

“Now.” Kate’s computer screen begins frantically flashing images and pulling up foreign websites. “Presence is something difficult for your kind to comprehend, you do not possess the organs to witness it. It is as though you had no eyes, the realm of light would be lost to you. Presence is a form which every object has. This form is the impression of that object upon space and time, it encompasses past, present and future as well as all opportunities missed and yet to come. Each thing has a unique presence, like a sculpture they are of varying sizes, colours, shapes, textures and so much more.”

“And mine looks good?” Kate asks.

“As your blood called to me, my attention was turned toward you. From my realm outside of all things I looked upon your presence first and I was stunned. By your time I should have answered immediately after your blood hit my image but I was captivated and delayed.” The voice replies.

Kate blushes a little. “Wow.” She was not without attention from men but they never seemed particularly interesting. Strange and unbelievable as it was, she very much enjoyed the idea of stopping a god in its tracks with her beauty. She cleared her throat. “Now about the Tuttoke.”

“They gave themselves to me. A disease surged across the lands and so they all called to me and asked that I would take them before their bodies were wracked with illness. So I did. Every last one and all their belongings were taken to a place beyond light and time. There they became a part of my ceaseless creating and recreating, living eternally in some form or another.” It says.

Kate envisions the final hours of the Tuttoke and starts wording the introduction to her thesis on their history. She leans back in her chair, tipping the front legs just off the ground. “Tell me more.”

“Not yet.” The voice replies. While the words have come from all directions of the room they have been gradually coming together. Now the voice seems to be coming from directly in front of her, as though they were perched upon her worktable. “Tell me about you.”

Kate falls backwards out of her chair.

Ok. Tag time @sincerestaffect @typeaadventures @hypnocutiegypsy @raiswanson @creativityflows @cogwrites @paper-shield-and-wooden-sword @siarven @asttralhell @my-words-are-light @beautifulimposter25 @ravenpuffwriter

[mozgoderina]

Maverick Sculptor Makes Good (New York Times Magazine) / Martin Puryear

"I'm basically kind of a maverick," Martin Puryear says. "I've always felt - and maybe this goes way, way back to my earliest years - I really feel like an outsider. I never felt like signing up and joining and being part of a coherent cadre of anything, ideologically, or esthetically, or attitudinally. I never felt compelled to do that."

At a time when artists arrive suddenly, unleashing a storm of publicity and taking over New York for a season or a few years, Martin Puryear is a breath of fresh air. The Chicago-based sculptor describes himself as a ''builder, a maker'' and a long-distance runner. His belief that the race will continue to be run by his work long after he is gone has made him wary of success and fame.

This extraordinarily versatile 46-year-old artist may be the least known of all major contemporary sculptors. He is surely the first artist ever to have been included in exhibitions and installations at all four major Manhattan museums, as well as at the New Museum of Contemporary Art, before having his first solo show in a New York gallery. On Thursday, that will change when an exhibition of his work opens at the David McKee Gallery, on 57th Street.

Puryear's independence is hard-won. He has always resisted what he feels others expected him, and blacks in general, to be. Many contemporary artists are determined to forget the past. For Puryear, it is essential to remember. He has developed a way of working that moves backward and forward at the same time. His sculpture is immediate, right there. It is also eternally restless.

Unlike many prominent contemporary sculptors, who prefer hard materials, such as steel and stone, Puryear works deliberately, with his own hands, in wood. His large, uncluttered studio is filled with hundreds of clamps, files and planes, as well as stacks of wood from all over the world. In and around the center of the concrete floor, the parts of his sculptures are cut, joined and assembled. Sculptural ideas are leaning in the corners and hanging on the walls - opened, like bottles of wine, and left alone to breathe.

Puryear's sculptures of rings, arcs, nooses, huts and guardianlike figures do not insist. They pulsate and lock in softly, promising regularity and stability, delivering metamorphosis and change. His circles and arcs chart trajectories of movement; the works are in some way about movement, but they are also about place. They may seem to fly and roll through space, but they are not about speed. ''I think my work speaks to anybody who has the capacity to slow down,'' he says.

Puryear's lack of dogmatism reflects the range of his interests and his ''somewhat nomadic'' existence. He has lived in Sierra Leone, as well as Sweden and Japan. He has lived in Washington, Nashville and Brooklyn, as well as Chicago, where he moved in 1978. He travels constantly, in a variety of ways. Suspended like a mobile from the ceiling of his studio is the canoe that he and his brother Michael, a cabinetmaker, used in 1981 for a monthlong trip down the Noatak River, in Alaska.

Puryear looks at sculpture, architecture, painting and furniture, and he is fascinated by trades such as shipbuilding and patternmaking. He speaks with respect not only about artists with impeccable modernist pedigrees - Constantin Brancusi, Robert Morris and Sol LeWitt - but also about realists like Stanley Spencer, Lucian Freud and Andrew Wyeth, as well as Old Masters like Paolo Uccello and Pieter Bruegel.

These manifold interests are concentrated in works of expansive simplicity. ''Self'' was made in 1978, just after Puryear's studio in Brooklyn, where he had lived for four years, burned down. The sculpture is a highly polished, 5-foot-9-inch-tall black monolith, roughly conical in shape, with one side at a right angle to the floor. The closed, upright, irregular mass seems fixed, almost stuck to the floor, but it also seems to turn in different directions and climb through space. Its mountainous, hutlike, phallic shape could have risen from the ashes of a tribal fetish, or tumbled out of a Chinese painting.

As impersonal as the sculpture may seem, it is extremely quirky. Like so many of Puryear's works, it seems pure and simple, but it is in fact a bizarre hybrid, a bundle of surprises and oppositions. Its eccentricity has a great deal to do with the way it was made. Monolithic sculptures have traditionally been heavy, carved from blocks of stone. ''Self'' is hollow and light. It is a wooden shell, constructed by crisscrossing layers of red cedar and mahogany in a shipbuilding technique. Although the work may seem inevitable - to have emerged suddenly, all of a piece - it was, in fact, assembled layer by layer, piece by piece.

''Self'' is essentially private, even autobiographical, but ''River Road Ring,'' installed in 1985 in the River Road subway station near Chicago's O'Hare Airport, was made for the public. It is 27 feet 6 inches in diameter, suspended like a halo, or a ceremonial tribal crown, above the escalator and entrance. ''It's a conduit,'' Puryear said. ''It's an image of what that station is on the line. It's a hollow tube that goes back in and comes up and puts you in the direction in which you want to go. One end points toward O'Hare, the other toward Chicago.''

Here, too, from each angle, the work changes - rotating, opening up and flattening into a straight line, shifting from circle to ellipse. The ring appears seamless, intact, but it, too, was constructed, built with innumerable pieces of laminated mahogany. Because this large ring, its two ends overlapping slightly, like two ends of a string waiting to be tied, is in fact hard wood - because a round form was constructed by bending and assembling material that would not seem to lend itself to a circular shape - the sculpture is edgy, disquieting. The halo seems so taut that it could snap.

In both ''Self'' and ''River Road Ring,'' Puryear has employed geometric shapes so generalized that they seem to belong to no one. Yet they are unmistakably his. Each sculpture seems organic and contrived, predetermined and chosen. There is a sense that the shapes are the only ones possible, but they are the result of a long sequence of conscious decisions. Both free will and determinism seem, almost miraculously, to have been embraced. So do craft and ''high art''; African, Asian and Western art, black and white. In Puryear's quietly subversive sculptural world, separatist notions of any kind are inconceivable and anachronistic. His work does not so much argue as assume that everything is now tied together, whether anyone wants it to be or not.

MARTIN PURYEAR was born in Washington, in 1941. He is the oldest of seven - five brothers and two sisters. His father, Reginald, is now a retired post-office clerk and supervisor. His grandfather was a Baptist minister from Virginia; he went to Nova Scotia to serve a black congregation and stayed. (Nova Scotia was a haven for fleeing slaves, and until the 1960's had the largest black population in Canada.) His mother, Martina, is a retired teacher. The children grew up in a household in which culture mattered.

Puryear is 6 feet tall; without an ounce of fat. Although he rarely appears to be in a hurry, he seems almost incapable of acting without purpose. He is warm and guarded, discreet and firm. His eyes are always animated. There is a bit of a kid in those eyes, something whimsical, cagey and mischievous, but also supremely confident. His eyes make him seem mobile no matter what the rest of his body is doing.

Sometimes he glides, but other times he rolls from heel to toe in a way that makes a point of his black urban roots. His feeling for public art is, in part, a response to his need to make art that people he grew up with can understand. He is very familiar with the history of black artists in the United States, and when he feels their predicament is not respected his voice softly bristles. Like his sculpture, Puryear's manner is so easy that the slightest shift in intonation can seem like an earthquake.

Puryear's forms and craftsmanship flow from black history. His elegant sculptures, resting quietly on a floor or wall, can suddenly reveal themselves as nooses, whips and traps. ''I've been reading a lot by Langston Hughes lately,'' he said. ''It's been really, really pleasurable for me, because he loved people, he really, really loved people, and he was a very secure black person.''

Puryear's work has an almost oracular quality. No matter how many components a floor piece has or how many parts seem to have been splattered against a wall, the works seem to have emerged with a rush. They may stop, start and change direction, a sculpture shaped like a top may seem too large and another like a shrine may seem too small, but everything presents itself with the seamless narrative flow of a storyteller. The immediacy of presentation may also suggest the breathless, musical cadences of a black preacher.

Puryear lives with the artist Jeanne Gordon, his wife of one year, in a converted factory bought and renovated by five artists in the north end of Chicago. He made most of the couple's furniture - including sofabed, Japanese screen, potrack and wooden bathtub.

Puryear's inclusiveness has made him a key figure in contemporary sculpture. On one side are the Minimalists and their heirs. They make work modeled in some way on Minimalism's absoluteness, economy of shape, rejection of the artist's touch and insistence that art define itself in relation to its environment. On the other side are artists exploring an almost dizzying array of sculp-tural approaches, from organic abstraction to unfamiliar treatment of familiar materials, to various forms of figuration.

Puryear has obvious links with sculptors such as Scott Burton and Siah Armajani, who feel no affinity for the tradition of heroic, individualistic sculpture. Burton and Armajani are working to lead sculpture further from the studio and gallery by making public art, for specific sites, that functions as furniture and architecture.

Like them, Puryear makes large-scale functional works. He calls them ''amenities'' - making a clear distinction between his public, functional work and his ''sculpture'' - and they are easy to be around. Puryear has designed ''amenities'' for New Orleans and Seattle. Working with the architect Leo A. Daly, he has designed the fountain, benches, pavilion, and a system of arbor and trellises at the Chevy Chase Garden Plaza, in Maryland, a project expected to be completed next spring.

Other contemporary sculptors are involved with nature and the earth. They range from artists like Michael Heizer who draws upon and shapes the landscape, to Mel Kendrick, who carves wood sculptures that retain something of the coolness and ''objectness'' of Minimalism, to Petah Coyne, who gathers wood and soil and assembles them into highly personalized effigies.

In the remarkable ''Bodark Arc,'' at the Nathan Manilow Sculpture Park in University Park, Ill., Puryear has used a wooden arch and bridge, and a ceremonial bronze chair, to draw the earth into a bow and arrow shape -representing a collaboration between African and American Indian culture. Puryear's sculpture is filled with references to nature: ''Vault'' looks like a tree trunk that has been reincarnated as a head and a safe deposit box. ''Sanctuary'' resembles a birdhouse on wheels.

One of Puryear's essential dialogues has been with Minimalism, which he encountered as a graduate student at the Yale Art School. Puryear has learned from the Minimalist sense of precision, economy and proportions. He admires Donald Judd's ''cogency of thought.'' And the power of Puryear's work, like Richard Serra's, has a great deal to do with spatial imagination. Like Serra, Puryear has the ability to make sculpture that is known by the body before it is articulated by the mind. Puryear's gestures and armatures can be experienced as extensions of skin and bones.

But Puryear rejects the dogmatism of Minimalism, its resistance to associations and its rejection of craft. The impersonal working methods are what made him realize that he was ''absolutely not a Minimalist.''

He explains: ''The hand means too much to me. The risk-taking in the process of building and making something means too much to me.

''I never did Minimalist art, I never did, but I got real close. . . . I looked at it, I tasted it and I spat it out. I said, this is not for me. I'm a worker. I'm not somebody who's happy to let my work be made for me and I'll pass on it, yes or no, after it's done. I could never do that.''

IN SHORT, PURYEAR IS VERY definitely a post-Minimalist, and he is a key bridge between the 1960's and 80's. In his ability to work privately and publicly, to make sculpture for himself, driven by his obsessions, and to make work that is accessible to the public, he has managed to combine a traditional view of sculpture as something made by an individual working in the studio, and a view of sculpture as something made in collaboration with others for a community.

In some artistic and academic circles, the idea of the heroic individual, creating himself from scratch, has been fiercely attacked. One reason so many artists have their work fabricated is that its impersonality and often its smooth reflecting surfaces tend to call attention not to the individual artistic self, but to conditions surrounding the work.

Puryear believes both in anonymity and in the self. He is drawn to folk artists. ''I have a certain kind of nostalgic belief in anonymity,'' he says. ''I mean these folk artists who spend their whole lives working without even knowing that they're artists, and they have this kind of compulsion. Somehow there's a part of that that I take a lot of solace in.''

But he also believes that art can come only from the individual. ''I taught for two years at Fisk, which is a black college in Nashville,'' he said, ''and there were times when I found it hard, or a struggle, let's say, to encourage students to find themselves, because they were so busy being members of a group.

''My encouragement was to find the you in there. That's what's going to have to make the art; not your history, not your culture. Those things are reflected. They're never going to go away. That's in your nature. It's in who you are. But there's a you in there that's even more crucial than that, and you've got to find it and you've got to release it.''

Labor has become a source of deepening conflict for Puryear and for art in general. Any artist working on a large scale almost has to have that work realized by others. The time involved in making his work means Puryear cannot keep up with the ideas that now race through his mind.

''I am finding out that I don't want to get involved in enormous commissions, in building them myself,'' Puryear said. '' 'River Road Ring,' that was a mammoth undertaking, months and months to screw in clamps, of laminating layers, months and months of it, and it was so monotonous that it wasn't work in which I profited from the ruminations involved. My mind was tied up, my hands were tied up, and I couldn't get real busy with new ideas at the time.

''And still I had this compulsion to control it, to not give it up to anybody else. And I couldn't have afforded to have specialists - people who had that kind of specialized knowledge, building it. I could afford my own labor. I couldn't afford somebody with the same level of skill. It's a strange situation.''

Puryear's independence can be found in other black sculptors. Mel Edwards, Betye Saar and Houston Conwill are also hard to classify. Conwill's installations, using simple shapes, elaborate and interpret history and myth. In his ''Lynch Fragment Series,'' Edwards uses the syntax of steel sculpture to compose an accusatory lyric poem about violence, vigilance and transformation. In Saar's intimate boxes and installations, domesticity bristles with superstition and danger.

The work of these artists is marked by a fierce pride, belief in evocation, respect for craft, and feeling for the expressive potential of sculptural language. Most important, there is a deep attachment to memory. In contrast, major mainstream artistic developments of the last 20 years, including Minimalism, have generally insisted on focusing attention on the present and future. This alone would explain why Puryear could go only so far with Minimalism, and why he and other black artists remain outsiders.

Puryear began as a painter. ''I was lucky enough as a really little kid to see a guy painting a portrait on my block, a black guy painting in oils a portrait of somebody right out on the street. And I was just transfixed to see in it an absolute likeness. I remember it was like grisaille, it was black and white, it was like monochromatic. . . . I couldn't have been more than 6 years old, but I just couldn't believe it, it just . . . and it was a black guy, painting another black person, with his easel and paints and everything and a palette, right in front of the apartment. And it just blew something open in me.''

At Catholic University, in Washington, Puryear first majored in biology. Today, he finds inspiration in zoos as well as in galleries and museums. For example, he is fascinated by birds. Puryear calls the works in the David McKee Gallery show that opens this week ''decoys'' (they all feature bases and long necks).

In his junior year of college, he changed his major to art, and was exposed to the abstract, so-called color-field paintings of influential Washington artists such as Kenneth Noland, who was teaching at Catholic University. ''In a sense I had to work my way through abstraction,'' he said. Now he sees ''students who accept that as a given from a very early age and who start out making abstractions. I had to really fight my way there, out of my habits of a very meticulous realism.''

The importance of Puryear's two years in Sierra Leone as a Peace Corps volunteer, from 1964 to 1966, can hardly be overemphasized. When he went there, he had made carvings in wood and stone, but he was primarily a painter. There was a tradition of black American painters, including Romare Bearden and Jacob Lawrence, but there was not a comparable tradition of black sculptors.

The years in Sierra Leone provided him with a rich source of imagery, shaping his feeling for wood, for crafts, and for a particular approach to craftsmanship - that of the carpenter, not the carver.

The villagers treated him both as a foreigner and almost as a brother. ''The name for me was the same as for Europeans,'' he said. ''They had a word, pronounced 'pumwei,' which meant European or foreigner or white man. It was very clear to me that I wasn't one of them.

''On the other hand, I'm not sure whether it was because of my personality - I was friendly and took pains to make friends - or whether they were more open to me because of my race, but I know that I had some very, very close relationships while I was there. I felt I was really privileged.''

He found he could hold onto his roots by working with wood. ''I became close to some carpenters, some woodworkers there,'' he said. ''That was pretty moving to me, to see people working without technology. I was taught a lot by just watching them work. That's where I was first exposed to people who worked with wood with any real skill.

''I saw some carvers but I didn't relate to them quite as much as to the carpenters. I guess I had a feeling that the tribal carving of art was something that was really theirs. And I almost didn't quite trust that I could get close enough, because it was generally a secret thing. Magic has to do with secret rituals, most of all.''

It is hard to imagine a sculptor more sympathetic than Puryear to the metaphorical and sculptural possibilities of wood. ''I'm real aware that I'm working something that has recently been alive,'' he said. ''Wood's moving all the time, as you work. It's shrinking and swelling all the time.''

What enables him to combine, juxtapose and piece wood together is joinery. ''It's really a science of penetrations,'' he says. ''It's a beautiful science, really. And it's something that I've enjoyed looking at, to see how different cultures deploy it. I mean, there are some givens that are the same for Egyptian beds and doors, through European fine furniture making, up to the present day.''

That timelessness is essential. ''I really feel it as I work,'' he said. ''I think it's the thing that maybe gives me a feeling of a certain amount of legitimacy, given the fact that this is such a technological society that looks away from all that stuff. It's like, how in the world can you justify this way of working today? And yet, the connection to the past, there's value to it, for me.''

In art, the attitude toward craft is inseparable from the attitude toward memory. ''Memory is a real crucial key to where the work comes from, like a genesis, or some kind of seed, or origin. The process of working, for me, releases it, and a lot of the time, by working, by labor, by physically developing something and changing it and manipulating it, I think there's something that gets folded back into the work. It's like cooking.''

The paradox here is crucial. On the one hand, Puryear's involvement with wood and craft is extremely traditional. On the other hand, the way he constructs and assembles wood, using techniques that also reflect some of the most celebrated methods of avant-garde art, including Constructivism and assemblage, is largely responsible for the freshness and freedom of his work.

AFTER THE PEACE CORPS, Puryear spent two years in Sweden, studying printmaking at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, in Stockholm; his sister Rachelle, a printmaker and weaver, has lived in Sweden for the last 13 years. He made etchings and explored Scandinavian crafts. And he began for the first time to work ''constructively,'' cutting and weaving strips and pieces of wood into sculptural form.

Sculpture was the only medium that could accommodate all that he had seen and lived, and the complexity of his history. ''The difference is so great when you go into the third dimension,'' he says. ''It's not simply a two-dimensional thing expanded. It's like an infinitely multiple view, an infinitely multiplied sense of possibilities, spatial possibilities. That's what interests me.''

And what Puryear has been doing over the last 20 years is of interest to a larger and larger audience. He has helped construct a bridge that had to be built. On one side is the absoluteness, conceptual clarity and matter-of-factness of the 1960's, on the other the internationalism and pluralism of the 80's. He is not going to abandon the past. Nor is he going to abandon the modernist imperative of transformation and change. His work is taut, and it is elastic. To compose all this into a controlled, unbroken song is no small feat.

  Source: New York Times Magazine / Michael Brenson. Link: Maverick Sculptor Makes Good Illustration: Martin Puryear [USA] (b 1941) ~ 'Maquette for Big Bling', 2014. Birch plywood, maple, 22-karat gold leaf (102 x 23 x 104 cm). Moderator: ART HuNTER.

[deltaengineering]

Winter Anime 2017 Part 3: The one where I get lazy

It’s that time of the season where I didn’t get around to doing these posts for a couple of days, which at least gives me an excuse to go through a lot of shows very quickly. I’ll start with the especially worthless shorts.

Nyanko Days

Nyanko Days is 2 minutes of a friendless highschooler cat-lady-in-training hanging out with her moe archetype cats. Can’t say it isn’t cute, but... yeaaah.

One Room

It’s pretty incredible that One Room is apparently an original, since it’s essentially the final boss Dark Souls Male Gaze Simulator 2017 of VN adaptations: Four minutes of your moeblob neighbor asking the viewer to study with her, presented in first person. And man, that guy just can’t keep his eyes from wandering. I’m not going to lie, compared to the usual dumb comedy short this is at least something else, even though it’s obviously terrible. The funniest thing is that the already have Female Gaze Simulator 2017 lined up for next season.

Piace - Watashi no Italian

Back to things you’ve seen before, this is Working in an Italian restaurant. It being so short prevents any character stuff from occurring so it’s just manzai comedy, moeblobs and boobs with a slightly weird character design. Unlike the last few seasons bishoujo shows are not rare in this one, so I don’t see why you’d take this over any of the others.

Chiruran - Nibun no Ichi

I have no idea what this is supposed to be, since it’s apparently a spinoff of something else? In any case it’s some vaguely Touken Ranbu-ish thing where chibi boys with swords are cute. Whatever.

Kemono Friends

We’re done with the shorts now, but this is the one show that I can’t believe isn’t one. Not only is it classic short material (cheap and badly animated CG, gijinka hangout concept, based on a mobile game), it also has about enough content to fill 2 minutes. But it’s not two minutes. This isn’t the worst show I’ve watched this season, but it has to be the most boring: a girl who is a girl and a girl who is a serval walk around for 24 minutes and talk about... well, nothing, unless you count dropping properly capitalized jargon words like “Friend” a lot. Oh, and there’s a few instances of completely laughable “action”. Suffice it to say that the barebones personalities on display here can’t sustain this, and the only other Friend who shows up briefly is a hippo who doesn’t manage to add much variety. So it doesn’t even do a good job of showing off the game’s character designs, which was clearly the intention here. The studio must have been very surprised that Nexon paid for 12x24m of this, and their struggle to fill that may be amusing to think about but doesn’t make this any more watchable.

ACCA - 13-ku Kansatsu-ka

Someone sure likes their handsome guys in uniforms. ACCA is shameless styleservice: Apart from the pretty boys (and girls) in broad-shouldered suits and ties, this features great art direction, a very pretty setting and cool jazz music. It’s just that the content is almost gleefully anti-interesting: What we have here is basically Rolling Girls, but about a guy with bedroom eyes who travels around looking cool while smoking, eating cake and... auditing. Yes, looking at spreadsheets has never been this stylish. Somehow this entire thing seems like the result of a dare, but I can’t help being intrigued nonetheless. The style can carry it for a bit, and maybe the plot will pick up. And if it doesn’t, it’s still possible that I can get used to it being mainly about its own presentation - Non Non Biyori for hepcats and male tailoring afficionados, essentially. Gonna keep an eye on this.

Chain Chronicle - Haecceitas no Hikari

It turns out that Chain Chronicle had some movies previously, and while I can’t say if those help with understanding it, it’s never a good idea to drop the viewer right into a huge brawl involving about 30 characters with no introduction whatsoever. I get the appeal of opening your series with everyone getting spanked by the final boss right at the start, but come on. After that’s over, Chain Chronicle turns out to be, well.. a serious mobile fantasy game adaptation. Which means all your favorite rare cards show up for a second and then some generic plot about saving the world from the Dark Lord starts. It seems to have quite a bit of money behind it, but if it has any amount of originality or ambition, I'm not seeing it in the first episode and that’s where it needs to be for me to give this a second thought.

elDLIVE

eIDLIVE is a Weekly Shounen Jump manga by Akira Amano, whose main work is Hitman Reborn, but is mainly known to the more discerning crowd for the Psycho-Pass character designs; my first impression is that the main character looks a whole lot like Akane. But unlike Butcher-brand grimdarkness, eIDLIVE is a silly action comedy that seems to trend young even for the Jump crowd - read, it’s a bunch of random nonsense with outrageous faces. It splits the difference between juvenile humor ala Heybot and a standard shounen superhero plot, and that’s pretty painful both ways. The only thing it has going for it is that it has a colorful, stylized presentation, but looking like a more stylish HeroAca doesn’t sufficiently endear it to me either, especially since a Jump adaptation by Pierrot is likely to be rather... long, both in runtime and in slow plot bullshit.

Gabriel DropOut

Guess what, Dogakobo is adapting an ostensibly funny manga about cute girls again. And of course it looks pretty nice as usual; so let’s talk about the source material. Gabriel DropOut is about angels (and demons) that visit a regular high school for some reason. Its one joke is that the angels range from lazy slobs to outright rotten, and the demons range from responsible and nice to being too stupid to be evil. What a twist! The astute watcher may notice that this is essentially Sansha Sanyou with the conceit much more clearly pushed to the forefront, and this doesn’t even have the occasional crazy sakuga outbursts of Sansha Sanyou while not being any more interesting. In a season where this type of show is making a strong comeback, I see no reason to bother with it unless you need to watch all of the bishoujo anime.

Hand Shakers

If you told me that Hand Shakers is a subversive art piece from the fringes of the superflat movement, I would be inclined to believe you. Of course, that’s probably not the intention here: this is GoHands, and making eye-searingly ugly and garish anime is just what they do. And they’ve outdone themselves this time, their trademark Instagram color gradient filter is only the start here. An out-of-control camera that highlights the Google Sketchup-tier 3D backgrounds (with the added benefit of the 2D foregrounds often not quite matching up, to nauseating effect), the CG “special” effects that Gonzo did better in 2004, the outright use of photo cutouts for anything too complicated to model, the bizarre character work that resembles a cheap mid-2000s eroge, the random wandering highlights on shiny objects; if this was Takashi Murakami or Inu Curry, we’d all be scrambling to see the hidden meaning in this dumpster fire that could easily double as a scathing parody of KyoAni’s recent love of postprocessing. And ironically that meaning wouldn’t even be hard to find, since the story (as far as I was able to follow it, reading the subs is hard when your eyes are bleeding) could also double as a satire of shitty shounen plots: A guy gets superpowers by holding hands with his waifu and has to fight other pairs in ridiculous relationships; clearly someone thought this was very meaningful indeed, especially when the enemy pair is an asshole and his BDSM sub (incidentally a plot point last seen in none other than Valkyrie Drive). On top of this, the script does the impressive double whammy of only blatantly expositing via lots of jargon without actually explaining anything.

So yeah, Hand Shakers is absolutely, stupefyingly horrible, to the point where I’m totally down to watch it. It’s probably not meant to be a genre sendup like Mayoiga was, but with a bit of Death of the Author it can easily double as one. And hey, it’s still easier to digest than Occultic;Nine.

Idol Jihen

You know, an anime about a version of Japan where politics are run via idol competitions really has no business being this fucking boring. With that setup, you’d at least expect it to be a comedy (or better yet a satire - just read the above sentence again, it basically writes itself), but somehow it only manages to be a slightly above-average regular idol show, with as little as you can say about those as usual. Usual characters, usual music, usual ganbaru. Seriously, it’s pretty amazing how little the politics aspect ends up mattering, that must have taken some effort. I didn’t really feel Macross Delta, but that at least did a better job making its “idols where they don’t belong” subject matter work. It’s possible that this show discovers its potential somewhere along the way, but if the beginning was a fakeout intended to show that this is run-of-the-mill idol shenanigans, it may have done a little too well at that; my takeaway was mainly that silly universe aside, yes, I’ve seen this before, and no, I don’t need to see more of it.

Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon

So after years of “Dogakobo is the new KyoAni while KyoAni is off doing their own thing”, KyoAni is back in the game of adapting ostensibly funny manga about cute girls. I’m not shocked that the results are pretty much identical, this is what happens if you adapt 4koma humor in a flat, colorful style and put some effort in it. Maidragon (the manga) is, if nothing else, better than Gabriel DropOut, but not decidedly so. Production values aside (and while nice, Maidragon is no Nichijou and not even a Sansha Sanyou), it’s just the standard magical girlfriend shit of yore; that the main character lucking into a magical maid is female here makes very little difference in practice. Kobayashi as a character is at least a bigger draw than the usual nothings in something like this (and definitely bigger than zany boob dragon maid Tohru); she’s moody, somewhat acerbic and a maid fundamentalist - i.e., anti-fanservice/cosplay maids. If I’m going to watch one of these shows, it might as well be the one that has me as the main character... but it’s entirely possible that I get tired of this very quickly.

Kuzu no Honkai

Kuzu no Honkai (aka Scum’s Wish) is based on a hyped drama manga, so I expected to see the next 3-gatsu, and I’m still not convinced by 3-gatsu a whole season in. But where 3-gatsu is overall still mostly a warm iyashikei blanket where even Rei’s depression due to hilariously tragic backstory seems mostly intended to elicit wanting to give him a hug, Scum’s Wish is, for better or for worse, the real deal: A sexually charged story about awful, not even remotely likeable characters, most closely related to something like Aku no Hana. As of episode one it pulls no punches with the horny kisses and it’s noitaminA, so it’s a looker too - it’s cool how everything is in shoujo sparklevision except when it comes to the making out, which comes across as pretty grimy. In theory I’m all for something like this, but well... watching a girl fuck some other guy because she can’t fuck her brother, who is fucking some other girl, who is the one that the guy fucking the first girl can’t fuck, is just not what I’m into, especially if I’m not even supposed to like the characters. Pity Fuck: The Animation is something that I feel like I shouldn’t disregard on its first episode alone, but I felt the same way about Aku no Hana and didn’t end up finishing that either.

Little Witch Academia

So here we go, the other big name of the season. Unsurprisingly, the LWA TV reboot is still LWA, so it’s pretty good. The animation remains pleasantly cartoony and expressive and it’s generally made with a lot of care. I still can’t help feeling slightly let down by it though: The basic concept of LWA already got threadbare halfway through the second movie, and since this just starts from the beginning again, there definitely isn’t anything new. The best I can come up with is that it’s even more of a Harry Potter clone than it was before (yes, that is actually possible), but that’s not winning it any points. Another weird thing is that the action, while hard to criticize on a technical level, comes across as strangely unengaging - I usually blame the editing in these cases. In any case, LWA is entertaining to watch for now but it has to go somewhere with its story and characters really soon if it wants to fill 24 episodes of TV anime. I can only forgive it treading water again for so long, no matter how well it’s put together.

Marginal#4 - Kiss kara Tsukuru Big Bang

And finally, here’s the idol boyband anime of the season. The only one, if I’m counting correctly. We used to get more even half a year ago, and to be quite honest I can’t really tell the difference anymore. It’s like all of those with all the characters one of those always has and comes in the variety without the self-insert main girl, if you want the finer details ask your local UtaPri specialist. Really the only thing that raises an eyebrow is that this is about four guys who try to start a school club while already being in an idol group, which seems slightly backwards? Having your cake and eating it too, maybe? Apart from that incredible innovation, possibly the most forgettable show in a forgettable genre.

[velmaemyers88]

Tech Stocks Google, Snap, Twitter Jump Higher

Another busy day in the land of tech stocks, and the news is still (mostly) good. You’ll recall that on Tuesday, Snap impressed and on Wednesday it was Facebook’s turn. On Thursday, the good cheer spread to Google, Intel, and Expedia, though Amazon was less pleasing. And by Friday morning, Twitter was in on the party, too.

Given how much ink and/or pixels we’ve spilled on the story of the “tech-lash” and all the regulatory problems ahead, it’s worth noting that the core businesses of the largest companies are still chugging ahead. In an economy where the U.S. gross domestic product is growing at less than 3%, Snap’s revenue grew 48%, Facebook grew 28%, and Google increased 19%. Even “disappointing” Amazon grew sales 19%. And it’s all been pretty well anticipated on Wall Street, as these same companies have (mostly) been among the best performers on the stock market as well. As of yesterday’s close, Snap’s share price was up 221%, Facebook’s 53%, and Amazon’s 31%. Google was lagging with only a 9% gain, but it’s up another 8% in premarket trading this morning.

“Like a championship boxer that had been momentarily and unexpectedly knocked to the canvas, Alphabet delivered a series of well-timed punches that returned them to previous winning form,” analyst Michael Nathanson observed.

It’s always clever to predict that things are about to change, but most of the time, they stay the same. A body in motion tends to stay in motion, as Sir Isaac Newton phrased it. The basic trends feeding the tech giants, like the shift to online entertainment and e-commerce and the proliferation of more computing power and connectivity to more people and more places, continue unbated. It will take some awfully significant regulatory changes to alter that momentum.

Next week, we hear from Apple. Wall Street analysts expect Tuesday’s report will show that sales came in around $53.4 billion, unchanged from last year (when Apple’s revenue was still growing a healthy 17%). Falling iPhone sales should be offset by rising sales of services, wearables, and maybe iPads, according to the consensus view. But apple’s stock price has also risen a healthy 32% in 2019. Let’s see if Tim Cook & Co. can keep the party rolling.

Aaron Pressman

On Twitter: @ampressman

Email: aaron.pressman@fortune.com

NEWSWORTHY

Called it. The much-rumored sale of Intel’s flailing smartphone modem business to Apple for $1 billion is finally official. The two companies confirmed the transaction on Thursday, though Intel retains the right to use the modem tech in non-phone devices likes PCs and cars. Not-so-confirmed is the closing of T-Mobile’s merger with Sprint. The latest hang-up is the Justice Department apparently trying to convince the 14 state attorneys general that have sued to block the deal to back down. That led to the bizarre situation on Thursday of Minnesota AG Keith Ellison issuing a statement blasting the deal, then pulling the statement off his web site, then having his spokesman say “it wasn’t supposed to happen.” Stay tuned. The DOJ has scheduled a mystery press announcement for 11 a.m. ET on Friday.

Called it, II. Speaking of news events you probably anticipated, Japanese billionaire Masayoshi Son’s SoftBank Group closed the fundraising for its second massive tech investing fund, dubbed the Vision Fund 2, with $108 billion commitments from investors including Apple and Microsoft.

Called it, part three. Okay, I know those last two items were fairly predictable, but this one was an absolute lock. Remember at the height of bitcoin mania in late 2017 when small-cap stock Long Island Iced Tea Corp. changed its name to Long Blockchain, sending its share price up almost 300%? Now the FBI is investigating the company for possible insider trading and securities fraud, Quartz reports. Shocker.

So called it. Predictable? This one was fated, set in stone, undeniable. the Senate finally released a redacted version of its investigation of Russian attacks on the 2016 election. You will not be surprised to learn that the attacks were far more extensive than previously reported and that vulnerabilities likely remain, even as Mitch McConnell is blocking action on a bill to bolster election security. Sigh.

A small addition. We noted yesterday that Chinese ride service Didi Chuxing created a new joint venture with Toyota. the venture also includes a third party, GAC Toyota Motor, which itself is a joint venture between Toyota and Guangzhou Automobile Group.

FOR YOUR WEEKEND READING PLEASURE

A few longer reads that I came across this week that may be appealing for your weekend reading pleasure:

Apple Music’s Next Era–And the New Leader Spurring Global Growth (Billboard) “You hear Tim talk a lot about humanity–how we’re at the crossroads between the liberal arts and technology,” says Oliver Schusser. “It’s got to be both.” The new leader of Apple Music (the Tim in question would be his boss, Apple CEO Cook) is relaxing in his sun-drenched corner office at the company’s Culver City, Calif., headquarters on a June morning, explaining–in his typically measured way–why the service he oversees hasn’t gone all-in on algorithms.

The Video Game Industry Can’t Go On Like This (Kotaku) The wheels of the games industry keep turning, in spite of the strain. So how much bigger can video games get? Video games are only getting more costly, in more ways than one. And it doesn’t seem like they’re sustainable.

Khashoggi fiancée Hatice Cengiz: ‘Jamal was not their enemy’ (The Financial Times) The doctorate student talks over the chain of events that led to the Saudi journalist’s killing in Istanbul.

Everything you ever wanted to know about the Rosetta Stone (The British Museum blog) You’ve probably heard of the Rosetta Stone. It’s one of the most famous objects in the British Museum, but what actually is it? Take a closer look…

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

With all the problems Facebook faces in Washington, D.C., it needs all the allies it can muster. Apparently, co-founder and former top exec Chris Hughes won’t be among them. Hughes, it seems, is making the rounds on Capitol Hill to explain why Facebook should be curtailed. It’s kind of…ironic, given his half a billion dollar haul from Facebook stock. But as Washington Post reporters Elizabeth Dwoskin and Tony Romm discovered, that hasn’t stopped Hughes from making the anti-Facebook case.

After House lawmakers embarked on their broad antitrust investigation of Facebook and its fellow tech giants in June, one of the first people they consulted was Hughes, said Rep. David N. Cicilline (D-R.I.), chairman of the House Judiciary subcommittee on antitrust law. Hughes quietly paid a visit to members of the House’s top competition-focused panel earlier this month, meeting with lawmakers and their staff members to pitch many of the issues he raised in his op-ed.

Hughes presented his views as a former Facebook insider, something that lent credence to his arguments, Cicilline said. “It’s remarkable and significant to me and my colleagues that someone with such a role in creating the company has the capacity and courage, really, to say, ‘We have some challenges, some things to look at.’ ”

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Proposed Federal Law Adds to the Backlash Against Facial-Recognition Technology By David Z. Morris

Netflix’s Cancellation of ‘Tuca & Bertie’ Renews Criticism of Its Perplexing Algorithm By Isaac Feldberg

‘Doesn’t Pass the Smell Test’: Investors Question Recent Developments at WeWork Ahead of IPO By Rey Mashayekhi

Why WeWork Embodies Everything You Need to Know About Investor Sentiment Right Now By Ben Carlson

3 in 10 U.S. Homes Don’t Have Broadband: Study By Chris Morris

Ripple’s CEO Worried About Regulatory Backlash Over Facebook’s Libra Plan By Jeremy Kahn

160 Million Government Records Exposed in Data Breaches Since 2014, Study Finds By Natasha Bach

BEFORE YOU GO

A long-time science fiction staple is turning into reality. A SpaceX rocket last month lofted the Planetary Society’s LightSail 2 spacecraft into orbit and, on Tuesday, it was time to test the craft’s futuristic feature: a solar sail. The tiny craft, about the size of a shoebox, successfully deployed the sail, which can catch photons from the sun to generate thrust. There’s even video.

This edition of Data Sheet was curated by Aaron Pressman. Find past issues, and sign up for other Fortune newsletters.

Credit: Source link

The post Tech Stocks Google, Snap, Twitter Jump Higher appeared first on WeeklyReviewer.

from WeeklyReviewer https://weeklyreviewer.com/tech-stocks-google-snap-twitter-jump-higher/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=tech-stocks-google-snap-twitter-jump-higher from WeeklyReviewer https://weeklyreviewer.tumblr.com/post/186562357727

[reneeacaseyfl]

Tech Stocks Google, Snap, Twitter Jump Higher

Another busy day in the land of tech stocks, and the news is still (mostly) good. You’ll recall that on Tuesday, Snap impressed and on Wednesday it was Facebook’s turn. On Thursday, the good cheer spread to Google, Intel, and Expedia, though Amazon was less pleasing. And by Friday morning, Twitter was in on the party, too.

Given how much ink and/or pixels we’ve spilled on the story of the “tech-lash” and all the regulatory problems ahead, it’s worth noting that the core businesses of the largest companies are still chugging ahead. In an economy where the U.S. gross domestic product is growing at less than 3%, Snap’s revenue grew 48%, Facebook grew 28%, and Google increased 19%. Even “disappointing” Amazon grew sales 19%. And it’s all been pretty well anticipated on Wall Street, as these same companies have (mostly) been among the best performers on the stock market as well. As of yesterday’s close, Snap’s share price was up 221%, Facebook’s 53%, and Amazon’s 31%. Google was lagging with only a 9% gain, but it’s up another 8% in premarket trading this morning.

“Like a championship boxer that had been momentarily and unexpectedly knocked to the canvas, Alphabet delivered a series of well-timed punches that returned them to previous winning form,” analyst Michael Nathanson observed.

It’s always clever to predict that things are about to change, but most of the time, they stay the same. A body in motion tends to stay in motion, as Sir Isaac Newton phrased it. The basic trends feeding the tech giants, like the shift to online entertainment and e-commerce and the proliferation of more computing power and connectivity to more people and more places, continue unbated. It will take some awfully significant regulatory changes to alter that momentum.

Next week, we hear from Apple. Wall Street analysts expect Tuesday’s report will show that sales came in around $53.4 billion, unchanged from last year (when Apple’s revenue was still growing a healthy 17%). Falling iPhone sales should be offset by rising sales of services, wearables, and maybe iPads, according to the consensus view. But apple’s stock price has also risen a healthy 32% in 2019. Let’s see if Tim Cook & Co. can keep the party rolling.

Aaron Pressman

On Twitter: @ampressman

Email: aaron.pressman@fortune.com

NEWSWORTHY

Called it. The much-rumored sale of Intel’s flailing smartphone modem business to Apple for $1 billion is finally official. The two companies confirmed the transaction on Thursday, though Intel retains the right to use the modem tech in non-phone devices likes PCs and cars. Not-so-confirmed is the closing of T-Mobile’s merger with Sprint. The latest hang-up is the Justice Department apparently trying to convince the 14 state attorneys general that have sued to block the deal to back down. That led to the bizarre situation on Thursday of Minnesota AG Keith Ellison issuing a statement blasting the deal, then pulling the statement off his web site, then having his spokesman say “it wasn’t supposed to happen.” Stay tuned. The DOJ has scheduled a mystery press announcement for 11 a.m. ET on Friday.

Called it, II. Speaking of news events you probably anticipated, Japanese billionaire Masayoshi Son’s SoftBank Group closed the fundraising for its second massive tech investing fund, dubbed the Vision Fund 2, with $108 billion commitments from investors including Apple and Microsoft.

Called it, part three. Okay, I know those last two items were fairly predictable, but this one was an absolute lock. Remember at the height of bitcoin mania in late 2017 when small-cap stock Long Island Iced Tea Corp. changed its name to Long Blockchain, sending its share price up almost 300%? Now the FBI is investigating the company for possible insider trading and securities fraud, Quartz reports. Shocker.

So called it. Predictable? This one was fated, set in stone, undeniable. the Senate finally released a redacted version of its investigation of Russian attacks on the 2016 election. You will not be surprised to learn that the attacks were far more extensive than previously reported and that vulnerabilities likely remain, even as Mitch McConnell is blocking action on a bill to bolster election security. Sigh.

A small addition. We noted yesterday that Chinese ride service Didi Chuxing created a new joint venture with Toyota. the venture also includes a third party, GAC Toyota Motor, which itself is a joint venture between Toyota and Guangzhou Automobile Group.

FOR YOUR WEEKEND READING PLEASURE

A few longer reads that I came across this week that may be appealing for your weekend reading pleasure:

Apple Music’s Next Era–And the New Leader Spurring Global Growth (Billboard) “You hear Tim talk a lot about humanity–how we’re at the crossroads between the liberal arts and technology,” says Oliver Schusser. “It’s got to be both.” The new leader of Apple Music (the Tim in question would be his boss, Apple CEO Cook) is relaxing in his sun-drenched corner office at the company’s Culver City, Calif., headquarters on a June morning, explaining–in his typically measured way–why the service he oversees hasn’t gone all-in on algorithms.

The Video Game Industry Can’t Go On Like This (Kotaku) The wheels of the games industry keep turning, in spite of the strain. So how much bigger can video games get? Video games are only getting more costly, in more ways than one. And it doesn’t seem like they’re sustainable.

Khashoggi fiancée Hatice Cengiz: ‘Jamal was not their enemy’ (The Financial Times) The doctorate student talks over the chain of events that led to the Saudi journalist’s killing in Istanbul.

Everything you ever wanted to know about the Rosetta Stone (The British Museum blog) You’ve probably heard of the Rosetta Stone. It’s one of the most famous objects in the British Museum, but what actually is it? Take a closer look…

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

With all the problems Facebook faces in Washington, D.C., it needs all the allies it can muster. Apparently, co-founder and former top exec Chris Hughes won’t be among them. Hughes, it seems, is making the rounds on Capitol Hill to explain why Facebook should be curtailed. It’s kind of…ironic, given his half a billion dollar haul from Facebook stock. But as Washington Post reporters Elizabeth Dwoskin and Tony Romm discovered, that hasn’t stopped Hughes from making the anti-Facebook case.

After House lawmakers embarked on their broad antitrust investigation of Facebook and its fellow tech giants in June, one of the first people they consulted was Hughes, said Rep. David N. Cicilline (D-R.I.), chairman of the House Judiciary subcommittee on antitrust law. Hughes quietly paid a visit to members of the House’s top competition-focused panel earlier this month, meeting with lawmakers and their staff members to pitch many of the issues he raised in his op-ed.

Hughes presented his views as a former Facebook insider, something that lent credence to his arguments, Cicilline said. “It’s remarkable and significant to me and my colleagues that someone with such a role in creating the company has the capacity and courage, really, to say, ‘We have some challenges, some things to look at.’ ”

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Proposed Federal Law Adds to the Backlash Against Facial-Recognition Technology By David Z. Morris

Netflix’s Cancellation of ‘Tuca & Bertie’ Renews Criticism of Its Perplexing Algorithm By Isaac Feldberg

‘Doesn’t Pass the Smell Test’: Investors Question Recent Developments at WeWork Ahead of IPO By Rey Mashayekhi

Why WeWork Embodies Everything You Need to Know About Investor Sentiment Right Now By Ben Carlson

3 in 10 U.S. Homes Don’t Have Broadband: Study By Chris Morris

Ripple’s CEO Worried About Regulatory Backlash Over Facebook’s Libra Plan By Jeremy Kahn

160 Million Government Records Exposed in Data Breaches Since 2014, Study Finds By Natasha Bach

BEFORE YOU GO

A long-time science fiction staple is turning into reality. A SpaceX rocket last month lofted the Planetary Society’s LightSail 2 spacecraft into orbit and, on Tuesday, it was time to test the craft’s futuristic feature: a solar sail. The tiny craft, about the size of a shoebox, successfully deployed the sail, which can catch photons from the sun to generate thrust. There’s even video.

This edition of Data Sheet was curated by Aaron Pressman. Find past issues, and sign up for other Fortune newsletters.

Credit: Source link

The post Tech Stocks Google, Snap, Twitter Jump Higher appeared first on WeeklyReviewer.

from WeeklyReviewer https://weeklyreviewer.com/tech-stocks-google-snap-twitter-jump-higher/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=tech-stocks-google-snap-twitter-jump-higher from WeeklyReviewer https://weeklyreviewer.tumblr.com/post/186562357727

[weeklyreviewer]

Tech Stocks Google, Snap, Twitter Jump Higher

Another busy day in the land of tech stocks, and the news is still (mostly) good. You’ll recall that on Tuesday, Snap impressed and on Wednesday it was Facebook’s turn. On Thursday, the good cheer spread to Google, Intel, and Expedia, though Amazon was less pleasing. And by Friday morning, Twitter was in on the party, too.

Given how much ink and/or pixels we’ve spilled on the story of the “tech-lash” and all the regulatory problems ahead, it’s worth noting that the core businesses of the largest companies are still chugging ahead. In an economy where the U.S. gross domestic product is growing at less than 3%, Snap’s revenue grew 48%, Facebook grew 28%, and Google increased 19%. Even “disappointing” Amazon grew sales 19%. And it’s all been pretty well anticipated on Wall Street, as these same companies have (mostly) been among the best performers on the stock market as well. As of yesterday’s close, Snap’s share price was up 221%, Facebook’s 53%, and Amazon’s 31%. Google was lagging with only a 9% gain, but it’s up another 8% in premarket trading this morning.

“Like a championship boxer that had been momentarily and unexpectedly knocked to the canvas, Alphabet delivered a series of well-timed punches that returned them to previous winning form,” analyst Michael Nathanson observed.

It’s always clever to predict that things are about to change, but most of the time, they stay the same. A body in motion tends to stay in motion, as Sir Isaac Newton phrased it. The basic trends feeding the tech giants, like the shift to online entertainment and e-commerce and the proliferation of more computing power and connectivity to more people and more places, continue unbated. It will take some awfully significant regulatory changes to alter that momentum.

Next week, we hear from Apple. Wall Street analysts expect Tuesday’s report will show that sales came in around $53.4 billion, unchanged from last year (when Apple’s revenue was still growing a healthy 17%). Falling iPhone sales should be offset by rising sales of services, wearables, and maybe iPads, according to the consensus view. But apple’s stock price has also risen a healthy 32% in 2019. Let’s see if Tim Cook & Co. can keep the party rolling.

Aaron Pressman

On Twitter: @ampressman

Email: aaron.pressman@fortune.com

NEWSWORTHY

Called it. The much-rumored sale of Intel’s flailing smartphone modem business to Apple for $1 billion is finally official. The two companies confirmed the transaction on Thursday, though Intel retains the right to use the modem tech in non-phone devices likes PCs and cars. Not-so-confirmed is the closing of T-Mobile’s merger with Sprint. The latest hang-up is the Justice Department apparently trying to convince the 14 state attorneys general that have sued to block the deal to back down. That led to the bizarre situation on Thursday of Minnesota AG Keith Ellison issuing a statement blasting the deal, then pulling the statement off his web site, then having his spokesman say “it wasn’t supposed to happen.” Stay tuned. The DOJ has scheduled a mystery press announcement for 11 a.m. ET on Friday.

Called it, II. Speaking of news events you probably anticipated, Japanese billionaire Masayoshi Son’s SoftBank Group closed the fundraising for its second massive tech investing fund, dubbed the Vision Fund 2, with $108 billion commitments from investors including Apple and Microsoft.

Called it, part three. Okay, I know those last two items were fairly predictable, but this one was an absolute lock. Remember at the height of bitcoin mania in late 2017 when small-cap stock Long Island Iced Tea Corp. changed its name to Long Blockchain, sending its share price up almost 300%? Now the FBI is investigating the company for possible insider trading and securities fraud, Quartz reports. Shocker.

So called it. Predictable? This one was fated, set in stone, undeniable. the Senate finally released a redacted version of its investigation of Russian attacks on the 2016 election. You will not be surprised to learn that the attacks were far more extensive than previously reported and that vulnerabilities likely remain, even as Mitch McConnell is blocking action on a bill to bolster election security. Sigh.

A small addition. We noted yesterday that Chinese ride service Didi Chuxing created a new joint venture with Toyota. the venture also includes a third party, GAC Toyota Motor, which itself is a joint venture between Toyota and Guangzhou Automobile Group.

FOR YOUR WEEKEND READING PLEASURE

A few longer reads that I came across this week that may be appealing for your weekend reading pleasure:

Apple Music’s Next Era–And the New Leader Spurring Global Growth (Billboard) “You hear Tim talk a lot about humanity–how we’re at the crossroads between the liberal arts and technology,” says Oliver Schusser. “It’s got to be both.” The new leader of Apple Music (the Tim in question would be his boss, Apple CEO Cook) is relaxing in his sun-drenched corner office at the company’s Culver City, Calif., headquarters on a June morning, explaining–in his typically measured way–why the service he oversees hasn’t gone all-in on algorithms.

The Video Game Industry Can’t Go On Like This (Kotaku) The wheels of the games industry keep turning, in spite of the strain. So how much bigger can video games get? Video games are only getting more costly, in more ways than one. And it doesn’t seem like they’re sustainable.

Khashoggi fiancée Hatice Cengiz: ‘Jamal was not their enemy’ (The Financial Times) The doctorate student talks over the chain of events that led to the Saudi journalist’s killing in Istanbul.

Everything you ever wanted to know about the Rosetta Stone (The British Museum blog) You’ve probably heard of the Rosetta Stone. It’s one of the most famous objects in the British Museum, but what actually is it? Take a closer look…

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

With all the problems Facebook faces in Washington, D.C., it needs all the allies it can muster. Apparently, co-founder and former top exec Chris Hughes won’t be among them. Hughes, it seems, is making the rounds on Capitol Hill to explain why Facebook should be curtailed. It’s kind of…ironic, given his half a billion dollar haul from Facebook stock. But as Washington Post reporters Elizabeth Dwoskin and Tony Romm discovered, that hasn’t stopped Hughes from making the anti-Facebook case.

After House lawmakers embarked on their broad antitrust investigation of Facebook and its fellow tech giants in June, one of the first people they consulted was Hughes, said Rep. David N. Cicilline (D-R.I.), chairman of the House Judiciary subcommittee on antitrust law. Hughes quietly paid a visit to members of the House’s top competition-focused panel earlier this month, meeting with lawmakers and their staff members to pitch many of the issues he raised in his op-ed.

Hughes presented his views as a former Facebook insider, something that lent credence to his arguments, Cicilline said. “It’s remarkable and significant to me and my colleagues that someone with such a role in creating the company has the capacity and courage, really, to say, ‘We have some challenges, some things to look at.’ ”

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Proposed Federal Law Adds to the Backlash Against Facial-Recognition Technology By David Z. Morris

Netflix’s Cancellation of ‘Tuca & Bertie’ Renews Criticism of Its Perplexing Algorithm By Isaac Feldberg

‘Doesn’t Pass the Smell Test’: Investors Question Recent Developments at WeWork Ahead of IPO By Rey Mashayekhi

Why WeWork Embodies Everything You Need to Know About Investor Sentiment Right Now By Ben Carlson

3 in 10 U.S. Homes Don’t Have Broadband: Study By Chris Morris

Ripple’s CEO Worried About Regulatory Backlash Over Facebook’s Libra Plan By Jeremy Kahn

160 Million Government Records Exposed in Data Breaches Since 2014, Study Finds By Natasha Bach

BEFORE YOU GO

A long-time science fiction staple is turning into reality. A SpaceX rocket last month lofted the Planetary Society’s LightSail 2 spacecraft into orbit and, on Tuesday, it was time to test the craft’s futuristic feature: a solar sail. The tiny craft, about the size of a shoebox, successfully deployed the sail, which can catch photons from the sun to generate thrust. There’s even video.

This edition of Data Sheet was curated by Aaron Pressman. Find past issues, and sign up for other Fortune newsletters.

Credit: Source link

The post Tech Stocks Google, Snap, Twitter Jump Higher appeared first on WeeklyReviewer.

from WeeklyReviewer https://weeklyreviewer.com/tech-stocks-google-snap-twitter-jump-higher/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=tech-stocks-google-snap-twitter-jump-higher

[buddyrabrahams]

10 biggest surprises of the NFL season so far

The NFL is constantly full of surprises, and it’s not often there aren’t at least a handful of unexpected events to mull over. In Week 2 of the 2018 regular season, the NFL once again failed to disappoint.

Through two weeks of the season, very little has gone according to plan or expectations. Surprise teams are making profound leaps forward, while other powerhouses seem to be lacking identity. New head coaches are struggling, players at the end of their careers are thriving and rookies are slowly finding their way.

Here’s a look at the top 10 surprises so far:

10. New York Giants’ offense is nonexistent

Coming into the season, many expected the Giants to establish themselves as a strong offensive team with Eli Manning, Odell Beckham Jr., Sterling Shepard, Evan Engram and Saquon Barkley. However, through two weeks, that has not been the case. The Giants are averaging just 14 points per game, their offensive line has been atrocious, Manning isn’t mobile enough to extend plays, and defenses are easily taking away the deep ball. Despite all those superstars, the team has been rendered one of the worst offensive units in the league.

9. The curious case of kicking woes

Kickers are people, too. And like most people, they are prone to mistakes. However, in Week 2, those mistake came en masse. In fact, it was almost like a bizarre invisible illness that affects only kickers spread through the NFL, causing some crucial and game-changing misses. Browns kicker Zane Gonzalez missed two extra points and two field goals, Viking kicker Daniel Carlson missed two overtime field goals, and Packers kicker Mason Crosby missed a game-winning field goal. Gonzalez and Carlson were released, but Crosby, who made five field goals in the game, kept his job.

8. Patrick Mahomes is the real deal

Saying a player is “the real deal” sometimes gets lost in translation. When it comes to Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, it not only means he’s proven himself capable of playing in the NFL, but through two weeks, he has looked like one of the best gun slingers in the entire league and should be considered an early MVP contender. In Week 2, the 23-year-old threw for 326 yards and a wildly remarkably six touchdowns in a shocking victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers. Mahomes now has over 580 yards passing, 10 touchdowns and no interceptions on the season.

7. Antonio Brown suggests a trade

During Sunday’s game against the Chiefs, Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown was caught on camera in a heated exchange with offensive coordinator Randy Fichtner. Shortly after the game, in which Brown hauled in nine receptions on 17 targets for 67 yards, a former Pittsburgh public relations staff member tweeted that Brown should be thankful for playing on the same team as Ben Roethlisberger because he wouldn’t put up the same numbers elsewhere. Brown exploded, tweeting out “Trade me. Let’s find out.” Brown then declined to show up to work on Monday. Trouble brewing?

6. New head coaches are struggling

The NFL debuted seven new head coaches in 2018, from Pat Shurmur with the Giants to Matt Patricia with the Lions and from Frank Reich with the Colts to Mike Vrabel with the Titans. In Week 1, they went winless. In Week 2, three finally landed a win (Matt Nagy, Mike Vrabel and Frank Reich), but none of their teams have looked pretty through the early season. Combined, they now sport a record of 3-11. There aren’t usually high expectations for new coaches, but the collective futility of the group is a bit eyebrow-raising.

5. 21K open seats for Redskins’ home opener

For 50 straight years, the Redskins have sold out every single home game. However, during their home opener against the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday, not only did Washington fail to sell out the game, but there were more than 21,000 empty seats. That’s a far cry from a team that averaged 88,090 fans per game as recently as 2007 and 75,175 per home game just last season. 57,013 is an embarrassment for Dan Synder and the entire Redskins organization, but fans have grown tired of the poor on-field product.

4. Two ties after two weeks

Ties in the NFL are relatively rare, so when the Browns and Steelers finished in a 21-all deadlock in Week 1, many figured it would be the final overtime anomaly of the season. But in Week 2, history immediately repeated itself as the Vikings and Packers battled to a 29-29 tie thanks in large part to some of the aforementioned misses by kickers, and a controversial call. Since overtime was implemented in 1974, there have never been more than two ties in any one season, while two ties have only occurred in three seasons (2016, 1997 and 1986). Ironically, in two of those seasons, the two ties also came in back-to-back weeks.

3. Josh Gordon traded to the New England Patriots

Just prior to a Week 2 game against the Steelers, Cleveland Browns general manager John Dorsey announced that wide receiver Josh Gordon would either be released or traded after showing up to team facilities late and acting out of the ordinary. Then, on Monday, in one of the most New England Patriot-like moves ever, they acquired the embattled receiver in exchange for a 2019 fifth-round pick. The team later revealed that Gordon, who had injured his hamstring during a photoshoot he lied to the Browns about, would be healthy enough to play in Week 3.

2. Bills’ Vontae Davis retires at halftime

In one of the most shockingly unexpected decisions in NFL history, 10-year veteran Vontae Davis put on his street clothes at halftime of a 31-20 loss to the Los Angeles Chargers, told his Bills teammates he was quitting, and then walked out. Shortly thereafter, Davis hit social media to announce he was retiring. He said he meant no disrespect to his teammate or coaches, but admitted he couldn’t play at the level he was accustomed to and that became evident during the Week 2 game. Bills head coach Sean McDermott insists it won’t be a distraction, but how could it not be?

1. Fitzmagic is very, very real

Through two weeks of the season, well-traveled veteran Ryan Fitzpatrick can literally do no wrong. He opened the season replacing the suspended Jameis Winston by throwing for 417 yards and four touchdowns (five total) in a victory over the New Orleans Saints. Then, in Week 2, he tossed four more touchdowns and again threw for over 400 yards in a defeat of the defending Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles. If that weren’t enough, he stole DeSean Jackson’s attire for one of the most memorable and epic post-game press conferences of all-time. FitzMagic is undoubtedly very real and great for the NFL.

from Larry Brown Sports https://ift.tt/2DaJiel

[roypstickney]

50 Creative Ideas Your Marketing Team Can Use to Improve SaaS Product Adoption & Awareness

It’s Day 2 of Product Marketing Month. Today’s post is all about accelerating your marketing teams productivity with some creative new SaaS product adoption ideas. — Unbounce co-founder Oli Gardner

You don’t need a big budget or a six-week-long strategic planning session to get started with product marketing. Sure, you’ll need to do this eventually, but it shouldn’t put on hold your product adoption and awareness tasks. Educating customers and prospects about the power and utility of what you’ve worked so hard to build is easier than you think, and today I’ll show you exactly how we think about SaaS product adoption and awareness at Unbounce.

Back in 2012 we launched The Landing Page Conversion Course (LPCC for short), and as part of the rollout, I sat down and rattled off 25 quick and easy things we could do to create awareness. It took me less than ten minutes. I then grabbed Cody and Dan, and headed to a local bar to continue the session. Between the three of us, we notched it up to sixty before our first pint was done.

Getting scrappy is a great way to mobilize your team. These impromptu brainstorms not only created over 50 ideas we could implement really quickly, but it uncovered some that would become part of a larger strategic vision. Also, one of our dogs is called Scrappy, and he’s very cute.

Last week I sat down and repeated this exercise for the new products Unbounce: popups and sticky bars. Even though my focus was our own products (you can check them out via the 3 orange buttons in the nav ^^^), the majority of this list can be applied to any business, SaaS in particular.

You can create your own list like this too

I’d encourage you to repeat this exercise, starting by yourself, and then with some team members. Encourage them to come up with crazy and ridiculous ideas, as this will help expand your minds into ideas you’d typically consider off limits. After all, setting up a stall outside a conference (not your own), handing out bacon to tired hungover attendees as they arrive in the morning, might seem bizarre, but I guarantee you’ll be the favorite sponsor of the event.

Help us out by sharing your best ideas

With the collective wisdom of all of you reading this, we should easily be able to come up with 50 or 100 more ideas, so please drop them in the comments below and if they’re awesome I’ll add them to the master list with your name/company/product listed beside them.

Below are 50 ideas you can get started on today, broken into two parts, SaaS product adoption, and SaaS product awareness.

.pmm-collapse{ cursor: pointer !important; display: block !important; background: #DCECF2 !important; padding:10px !important; font-weight:bold !important; font-size:18px !important; } .pmm-collapse-section .pmm-collapse + input{ display: none !important; /* hide the checkboxes */ } .pmm-collapse-section .pmm-collapse + input + div, .pmm-collapse-section .pmm-collapse + input + p + div{ display:none !important; padding:0 20px !important; } .pmm-collapse-section .pmm-collapse + input:checked + div, .pmm-collapse-section .pmm-collapse + input:checked + p + div{ display:block !important; }

Part One: SaaS Product Adoption Tips

Click on the ideas to show the full description and instructions.

1. Write your own “50-ways to promote our product” document

Take a first pass at it yourself, then run a brainstorm with a shared Google doc. Take a different approach from a conventional brainstorm (where you plaster a wall with sticky notes). Instead, have everyone bring their laptop to the session. Have the team verbalize their ideas, and then enter them into the shared doc. It’ll make the process much faster.

2. Experiential content

The primary technique for content marketing is to provide educational content that helps people become better at their job – in the hopes that they will eventually end up buying your product. This is great, except for when they don’t know what your product is or why they should care.

To enhance the impact of your content, try showcasing it directly in your content. This won’t apply to every business, but if you offer any kind of website tech you can try it. If you do it right, you can create an experience that is better than the content alone.

For example click here to see a sticky bar appear at the top of the page.

I just demoed our sticky bar product by asking for your participation.

The on-click trigger is one of many options available in Unbounce, including scroll down, scroll up, entrance, exit, and timed delay.

Brainstorm ways that you might be able to show your product in the context of your content.

3. Get meta with self-guiding templates

If your software involves building something, a great way to help with onboarding and adoption is to drive first-time evaluators into a self-guided experience within a template. That way you can show them exactly how to use the product, inside the product! #inception

Here’s the “Builder Basics” template we created for this purpose. You can use it to get the full builder experience in less than 10 minutes or less, which is perfect for showcasing initial value and improving your Time to Value (TTV) metric.

This concept allows people to try your tool without needing to already have an idea they want to build and launch. You can also use it to specifically guide people to using the features you’ve identified as having the ability to create those all-important ah ha moments.

4. Try-before-you-buy demos

This is something we’ve wanted to do at Unbounce for years, and it finally became a reality in December. Essentially it’s a live session inside the Unbounce builder so people can get a hands-on experience without signing up.

With an interactive sandbox experience like this, the only barrier to entry is the complexity of the product or the clarity of how you communicate its use. And because we’ll be linking to ours from tens of different campaigns and contexts, we’re using entrance popups to speak directly to the message and source that led people to the demo, as well as introduce how the demo works.

You can check out the try-before-you-buy demo here.

Entry popups are a brilliant way of scaling this idea as we can use referrer or URL or cookie targeting to show the right message to the right people.

5. Give early access to preferred customers

We gave some of the top brands that use Unbounce beta access to the popups release, which was a great way to source a high-profile testimonial, like this one from Campaign Monitor.

6. Create multiple product demo formats

Not everyone likes to consume content the same way. To combat this, on our demo page we offer three lengths of video: 2 mins, 10 mins, 30 mins, and live 1-on-1 sessions.

7. Send postcards to all customers not currently using your new product

A delightful and unexpected postcard can be a lovely touch, and if people have signed up for your product or products, you’ll most likely have their mailing address. It’s important to remember that your product marketing should be focused on your customers as much as those who are prospects. Your goal here for a single product is getting dormant accounts to adopt the product. For multiple products your goal is awareness and adoption or ones that people haven’t used yet.

8. Try a guided product tour within the app for new additions

Something else we’ve learned is that, beyond email onboarding, those handy product tours in app can be a great way of guiding someone through new additions to a SaaS product (or otherwise). You can try out something like Appcues to add a guided tour when you go from one product to two to ensure 1) people notice something’s new, and 2) they can discover its features in a quick, interactive way.

9. Ensure you know every step involved in product adoption (and track them all)

Largely we’ve talked about awareness in this post, but product marketing needs to go beyond this, too. It’s all about who can successfully use your product, fulfilling its initial promise of value. As legendary onboarding expert Samuel Hulick advises, you need to determine all the ah-ha moments leading up to where customers find value. I.e. in a journey, what exact tasks do people need to complete before they’ll see even the smallest amount of value you advertised?

As an example, for Unbounce popups and sticky bars, we identified that for evaluators to be successful in their trial using these, they must a) build b) publish c) add the line of javascript to their site d) collect 10+ conversions. (Ten or more helps us ensure they aren’t 1-2 from simply testing the product themselves).

It’s key once you outline your product’s ah ha moments that whatever they are, they’re trackable from inside your product. This ensures you can truly measure adoption and understand where people get stuck.

10. Create onboarding materials mapped to your identified ah-ha moments

Taking Sam’s advice above, when we identified our ah-ha moments to product adoption, we started tracking them, made our dashboards, and then began creating educational content designed to help people over tricky steps. You can do the same for your products, too. Either via emails, or something like a skip ahead guide for product setup, similar to the one we made:

The resource above was delivered to those who started a trial within their onboarding emails. They could skip through the progress bar of ah-ha moments or must-do tasks to see value quickly.

Part Two: SaaS Product Awareness Tips

Click on the ideas to show the full description and instructions.

11. Send a handwritten letter to a customer every day for a month

Get everyone on the marketing and customer success/support team to write one letter per day for 30 days. Cap the time at 15 minutes per letter. If possible take a look at how they use your product: “I loved your landing page for the blah blah” etc. (check with your boss or legal as to whether it’s okay to mention their work – in my experience as long as you’re not making it public it’s very cool).

Here’s the product marketing kicker: don’t sell or mention the product in the letter – keep it personal and thankful – but follow your signature with a fun and made up job title that mentions the new product or feature.

For example: Oli Gardner, Chief Unbounce Sticky-Bar-with-Geo-Targeting Champion

I just mentioned the new product, and one of its features. In a delightful manner.

Bonus points if you create some content (like a custom landing page) that ranks for the keywords in that job title (and has your face on it).

Side benefit bonus: your coworkers get to rewrite their own job title every day for a month.

12. Company-wide email signatures

Ask your entire company to change their email signature to promote your new products. This can gain some exposure to different segments of potential customers. For example, your developers run in different circles than marketing, so their email conversations might connect with a different functional buyer persona. This also has the benefit of mobilizing the whole company with the same message, which is beneficial in its own right. Here’s an example email that our events manager sent to the company to help increase awareness for an event we were hosting at Hubspot’s INBOUND conference.

(Click for full-size image)

13. OOO Autoresponder

We like to have fun with our Out Of Office email autoresponders at Unbounce. Something funny or different can be a delightful way to respond to your customers and prospects when there might be a delay in responding. From a product marketing perspective, you can use this opportunity to talk about your new products or features. Try emailing me at oli@unbounce.com to see my current OOO autoresponder.

14. Test the clarity of your homepage value proposition

Try running a 5-second test using UsabilityHub.com to see what percentage of people can determine what your product(s) is in five seconds. Not only will you get a sense of how many can figure it out quickly, but you’ll get insights about how people might be misinterpreting your value prop. To turn this experiment into a product marketing effort, you can recruit free test participants via social media or an email list, effectively getting your product’s UVP in front of people.

15. Add a sticky bar to your blog

If you look at the top of this page and scroll, you’ll see how the navigation bar sticks to the top (and gets slimmer to maximize the viewport). Our web developer made this. You can use a sticky bar to do something similar. If you click here, you’ll see a sticky bar with the same content appear, and because it was created in the Unbounce builder, a developer would never have been needed.

Note: I made it appear at the bottom because if it appeared at the top you wouldn’t really see it because it’s so similar to the header.

16. Twitter bio link

Add a link to your Twitter bio that leads to a product landing page. Double down by asking your employees/coworkers to change their Twitter header image for a period of time. You can’t add links in the main body of the bio, but you can add one below.

17. Poll customers in your app/website/blog

With a “Did you know that we have this product/feature?” to gauge awareness and create it at the same time. Have Yes/No/Tell me more options, with a link out to a landing page or product page if they say “Tell me more” or “No”. The product marketing gold in this one is that if they say “No”, you’ve made them aware of the product by simple virtue of asking the question. BOOM.

18. Influencer testimonial outreach

Offer early access to your product (or a free account) to influencers in your industry. If they get value from using it, ask for some social sharing love, and ask them for a testimonial you can use as social proof on upcoming campaigns and your website. We recently released an amazing Landing Page Analyzer and asked Rand Fishkin if he’d try it out and provide a testimonial. Here’s what he sent back to me:

Brilliant.

19. Remove confusing terminology: erasing the umbrella term from the app

As I mentioned above, we called our new products by an umbrella term “Convertables”, including in the Unbounce app sidebar. We’ve now removed that and replaced with “Popups & Sticky Bars”. Sometimes you gotta get out of your own way, and call a spade a flippin’ spade.

Note that this was a fairly simple interface change, but there is still a massive amount of code that our engineering team had built based on the previous hierarchy. That will remain for now as we run these experiments, but it was a substantial barrier in getting buy-in to make these changes.

Overall, if you’re not being 100% clear about the context of use in the naming of your products, don’t stick with a name because you came up with it, be prepared to pivot for the sake of both awareness and adoption.

20. Listen to some product marketing podcasts

Here are a few to get you going:

Product Marketing 101 by Uberflip

The Product Marketing Podcast by Josh Duncan

Former Apple Sr. Director of Product Marketing Michael Gartenberg

How we do Product Marketing at Trello with Jessica Webb

Product Marketing is the New Content Marketing by Unbounce

21. Become a guest on podcasts

Reach out to your favourite podcasts to get on them as a guest. It helps if you have an influencer on your team. Typically, most interviewers will give you at least a small window to give your product a shout out.

22. Host or guest on a Twitter chat

Position yourself as an expert (I’d say thought leader but that term is kinda gross), by hosting or giving big-time participation to a Twitter chat session. If one exists related to what you do, join in, and offer to co-host or just help out. If there isn’t one, just f#**** make one. Start something. It’s not that hard. If it fails, so what?! Try things. Try things all the time. You’ll become a better marketer if you try.

23. Skywriter

You heard me. Get a plane flying over your city writing a romantic red script-style message in the sky. This tip comes courtesy of my wife Nicole, cos she’s hilarious.

24. Record videos of you miming what the product is and does

Another gem from Nicole. Clarity is the most important part of your product’s value proposition, and as you will find out if you follow my advice with a 5-second test, not everyone gets it. I can’t imagine a more fun way to get your team describing what you do. Have them all mime it, then make a video and share it with the world. I guarantee a great time, and you’ll probably also have a team more aligned on your value prop – and perhaps some ideas for a better headline.

25. Sponsor conferences and show product videos during the breaks

Wistia does a great job of this (after all they are a professional video hosting company with amazing viewer analytics, HD video delivery, and marketing tools to help understand your visitors.)

26. Give away conference swag tokens when people try the product

This is something we tried at CTA Conf in 2017 and it was awesome. In the “Product” tent, we had a bunch of workstations set up with gamified tasks which exposed the best product features. Two of the best were:

Drag & Drop Match For this challenge, we had two screens: one showing a completed landing page and the other where the Unbounce app was open and you had to replicate the completed page from jumbled components. You had to match the two pages by dragging elements, changing widths, colors and page sections.

Lock Box There was a locked box with sweet sweet swag inside, and to get the combination, you had to trigger a popup or sticky bar using all of the available triggering settings: click, entrance, exit, scroll down, scroll up, and timed delay. Each one had a number on it that made up the combination for the lock.

So good.

27. Give away an extra conference swag token when people correctly answer key questions about the product

We also had some quiz questions that people could answer to get more tokens. It’s a wonderful way of marketing your products while also giving people some cool swag to remind them of you often. Your swag does need to be legit, otherwise people won’t really care enough to participate.

28. Repurpose all product marketing content on personal and business Medium, LinkedIn

This is really simple and obvious, yet hardly anyone does it. Take the content you write for your blog and repurpose it in as many other formats and places as possible. For Medium write a more personal and transparent version, for LinkedIn create a shorter version and link back to the main article. Stick some slides containing visual highlights on Slideshare.

29. Target important search keywords/phrases with simple product feature videos

Have you talking to the camera and/or showing the coolest features of the product – and tailor them for specific search terms. For instance, we have a feature called Dynamic Text Replacement, that allows you to pass keywords from your AdWords campaigns to your landing page, increasing the relevance and often your Quality Score too. So for that we’d want to create a video called “How to use Dynamic Text Replacement to increase AdWords Quality Score”, and another called “How to use Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI) to increase AdWords Quality Score”, as that’s an industry term for the same thing. And always have a CTA at the end of the video, driving people to a landing page.

30. Add a p.s. mention to all of your drip campaigns

If you have any email drip campaigns running, add a p.s. at the bottom of each email with a mention of your new product. As always, send it to a dedicated landing page if you can.

31. Create Twitter header images with unique shortlinks to a LP to gather attribution

Update your Twitter profile header image, and include a text bit.ly link (or similar). This will let you track its impact. You can see mine here.

32. Add GA event code/pixels to your digital collateral materials

If you have any content or tools that are in Google Sheets you can add a Google Analytics event pixel to know how many times it’s opened and which tabs are being viewed. This could help you understand what’s drawing people’s attention.

Here’s how to do it. Choose (and protect) a cell somewhere in your sheet(s), and paste this code into it:

=image(googleanalytics(“UA-xxxxxxxx-1″,”Doc Name”,”Sheet Name”))

Obviously replace the xxxxxxxx with your GA account ID, and the doc and sheet names.

33. Link to product demos if you have a “branded free plan”

When customers are on our free plan, there is a small “Built with Unbounce” strip at the bottom of the page. Link this to your best product demo.

34. Update your blog bio to include a product mention

Here’s what mine looks like currently. It talks directly about Product Marketing Month, and this now appears at the end of the 300 blog posts I’ve written!

35. Sidewalk chalk around conference location

If you put on events (meetups or a conference), bring out your inner child and write & sketch cute product references on the sidewalks around the event location. Pro tip: the curb beside a crosswalk traffic light is the best spot as people have to stand and wait. It really works, after all, the “Look Right” paint that we’re all use to seeing was created because British wartime prime minister Sir Winston Churchill was visiting New York City and got smoked by a cab because he was looking the wrong way (cars drive on the left in the UK).

36. Send postcards to customers who are using your new product, to say thanks

If you segment your customer list by those who have adopted your product, a simple thank you card is a lovely surprise. Make sure you include a link to a landing page to ask them for feedback or a testimonial. You should always be sourcing fresh commentary to add to your marketing collateral. A bonus for this approach could be that you might get some love on social media which helps spread the word through your customer’s networks.

37. The seasonal value prop challenge

On mother’s day record videos of your coworkers’ moms describing what your product does. Gold, Jerry, gold. Dads for father’s day. A robot text-to-speech audio generator for cyber Monday. Spread that golden poop on social.

38. Add explicit product asks/mentions to your blog

Look at Google Analytics for your top 20 highest traffic blog posts, then comb through them for opportunities to add a contextual explicit ask of the reader. Such as: “You can create a blah blah, like that blah blah in the photo, by using blah blah, click here to see it in action.” Pro tip: try to put this in the first two paragraphs, as older blog posts, even with high traffic, can often be bounce traps where people run at the slightest hint of a bygone expiry date.

39. Remove the publish date on your top 10 blog posts with one line of CSS

Following on from the last one, if you show an old date, many people will leave. Remove it, and some people spend their time wondering when it was published. It’s a constant dilemma for marketing teams.

No harm in experimentation though, so throw in a single line of CSS to set the ID or class of the meta info (date etc.) to hidden. {.blogMetaEtc: display:none !important;} will most likely work.

Replace .blogMetaEtc with the actual class or ID. Then after a week/month (depending on traffic levels), look in GA to see if the bounce rate or time on page is different.

Note that both of those metrics can be a bit shady if it’s the only page they visit on your site, as GA can only produce a real number if you visit more than one page. But you might spot something. If you DO find that people spend more time on the “no date” version, you can focus on getting more product mentions on those posts.

40. Duh, ask your team to Tweet about the product. But do it right.

Mind blown, amiright?! Might seem basic, but how often does your team Tweet about new products or product features, or customer case studies etc.

Probably very rarely.

So just ask them! But don’t waste people’s time with a long-winded and generic, “Can you Tweet this?” email.

That shit drives me bonkers, it’s total amateur hour.

Send them a three-line email that says, “Hey team, it would really help if you could give our new product launch/feature some love on social.

Here’s a Click-to-Tweet ready to go, and here’s one for LinkedIn.” etc. etc. for the social channels that matter for you.

Include a p.s. “p.s. I would like to bug you to help like this once per month, so expect emails with that frequency. Thank you!”

41. Do a flash mob. Seriously.

Grab 20 people from your office and go do a dance outside the local art gallery. Choose some awesome 80s music and wear company t-shirts underneath a plain white/white/green one. Rip ‘em off and dance like tomorrow is a great day for signups.

42. Caption 10 of your videos on Facebook

Captions can really increase the number of times your video is watched as many people can’t or don’t want to turn up the volume. Facebook’s Power Editor can automatically caption your videos. Give it a try, and if it’s not an accurate enough translation you can still do it manually.

43. Do a blog takeover. Like this one.

If you didn’t get a chance to read the first post in Product Marketing Month, you might not know that the blog design you’re looking at was a very rapid overhaul for this category only. It took one of our developers a days work to set up a different WordPress template that is way more product focused.

44. Update any blog/website images that don’t reflect the latest version of the product

Start by doing a Google image search for your brand, company, products, founders, and see what shows up. I guarantee you’ll see a bunch of old logos and old product screenshots, not to mention some old hair (on the founders) :D Find those images and update them.

45. Audit and optimize your default video thumbnails

Wistia has shown that the default image on your videos is critical to optimizing for more plays. If your product marketing involves videos, then you need people to press play or what’s the point? This post has some great ideas.

46. Launch new products/tools on ProductHunt.com

This doesn’t have to be your core product. It can be anything that you’re releasing. We launched the Landing Page Analyzer there and managed to get to the #2 spot for the day, earning us a place in the PH newsletter.

47. Collect new customer feedback and share it directly on your site via a sticky bar notification

Similar to how some ecommerce stores have a small notification appear when “Ashley from Minnesota just bought the Hawaiian Luau Shirt in Blue”, you too can share feedback from your customers and funnel this positive feedback directly onto your site via sticky bars designed to look like small push-style notifications.

In SaaS, for example, you can use a Hotjar poll to collect 2-month onboarding feedback, and then use sticky bars to funnel a the positive feedback onto your site using the on-scroll trigger. This can help address purchase anxiety by helping current prospects see who’s already starting trials and providing terrific feedback about their onboarding experience.

48. Use your login/logout screen wisely

If you’ve got proper app security, it’s likely that your customers are automatically logged out after a given period, and will often see the login screen. This is a perfect opportunity to showcase your new products or even old ones that need a bit of love. This was a big learning for us, as we were only starting to use a portion of it (but look at all that space!!).

49. Trigger product release interstitials from your most-used in app buttons

In Unbounce, one of the buttons you push most often is to “create”. People are very used to hitting this button, making it the perfect place to add an interstitial notification.

An interstitial is just a fancy way of saying a gateway experience that you pass through.

Something along the lines of “Did you know that you can also create website popups and sticky bars with Unbounce?” We haven’t done this yet, but the idea came from the product team during a brainstorm.

Personally, I think it’s genius.

50. Trigger product release interstitials from your website login link

If you have a login link on your website (don’t we all?), check Google Analytics to see how many people are clicking on it. It’s very common behaviour for people to come to your homepage every time they want to log in, which in and of itself is critical info as you should be filtering it from your website traffic.

Like the in-app “Create” button, this is a brilliant way to present an interstitial popup to tell returning customers about your latest and greatest, with a simple button to continue on their way.

Phewf! That was a lot of tips. I hope they help you get more people seeing and using your products. Let’s open this puppy up! Share your own tips below and if they rock, I’ll add ’em to the post (with attribution).

— Cheers Oli Gardner