#Capture from Your Browser: | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

mostlysignssomeportents · 1 year ago

Text

I assure you, an AI didn’t write a terrible “George Carlin” routine

There are only TWO MORE DAYS left in the Kickstarter for the audiobook of The Bezzle, the sequel to Red Team Blues, narrated by @wilwheaton! You can pre-order the audiobook and ebook, DRM free, as well as the hardcover, signed or unsigned. There's also bundles with Red Team Blues in ebook, audio or paperback.

On Hallowe'en 1974, Ronald Clark O'Bryan murdered his son with poisoned candy. He needed the insurance money, and he knew that Halloween poisonings were rampant, so he figured he'd get away with it. He was wrong:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Clark_O%27Bryan

The stories of Hallowe'en poisonings were just that – stories. No one was poisoning kids on Hallowe'en – except this monstrous murderer, who mistook rampant scare stories for truth and assumed (incorrectly) that his murder would blend in with the crowd.

Last week, the dudes behind the "comedy" podcast Dudesy released a "George Carlin" comedy special that they claimed had been created, holus bolus, by an AI trained on the comedian's routines. This was a lie. After the Carlin estate sued, the dudes admitted that they had written the (remarkably unfunny) "comedy" special:

https://arstechnica.com/ai/2024/01/george-carlins-heirs-sue-comedy-podcast-over-ai-generated-impression/

As I've written, we're nowhere near the point where an AI can do your job, but we're well past the point where your boss can be suckered into firing you and replacing you with a bot that fails at doing your job:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/15/passive-income-brainworms/#four-hour-work-week

AI systems can do some remarkable party tricks, but there's a huge difference between producing a plausible sentence and a good one. After the initial rush of astonishment, the stench of botshit becomes unmistakable:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/jan/03/botshit-generative-ai-imminent-threat-democracy

Some of this botshit comes from people who are sold a bill of goods: they're convinced that they can make a George Carlin special without any human intervention and when the bot fails, they manufacture their own botshit, assuming they must be bad at prompting the AI.

This is an old technology story: I had a friend who was contracted to livestream a Canadian awards show in the earliest days of the web. They booked in multiple ISDN lines from Bell Canada and set up an impressive Mbone encoding station on the wings of the stage. Only one problem: the ISDNs flaked (this was a common problem with ISDNs!). There was no way to livecast the show.

Nevertheless, my friend's boss's ordered him to go on pretending to livestream the show. They made a big deal of it, with all kinds of cool visualizers showing the progress of this futuristic marvel, which the cameras frequently lingered on, accompanied by overheated narration from the show's hosts.

The weirdest part? The next day, my friend – and many others – heard from satisfied viewers who boasted about how amazing it had been to watch this show on their computers, rather than their TVs. Remember: there had been no stream. These people had just assumed that the problem was on their end – that they had failed to correctly install and configure the multiple browser plugins required. Not wanting to admit their technical incompetence, they instead boasted about how great the show had been. It was the Emperor's New Livestream.

Perhaps that's what happened to the Dudesy bros. But there's another possibility: maybe they were captured by their own imaginations. In "Genesis," an essay in the 2007 collection The Creationists, EL Doctorow (no relation) describes how the ancient Babylonians were so poleaxed by the strange wonder of the story they made up about the origin of the universe that they assumed that it must be true. They themselves weren't nearly imaginative enough to have come up with this super-cool tale, so God must have put it in their minds:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/29/gedankenexperimentwahn/#high-on-your-own-supply

That seems to have been what happened to the Air Force colonel who falsely claimed that a "rogue AI-powered drone" had spontaneously evolved the strategy of killing its operator as a way of clearing the obstacle to its main objective, which was killing the enemy:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/04/ayyyyyy-eyeeeee/

This never happened. It was – in the chagrined colonel's words – a "thought experiment." In other words, this guy – who is the USAF's Chief of AI Test and Operations – was so excited about his own made up story that he forgot it wasn't true and told a whole conference-room full of people that it had actually happened.

Maybe that's what happened with the George Carlinbot 3000: the Dudesy dudes fell in love with their own vision for a fully automated luxury Carlinbot and forgot that they had made it up, so they just cheated, assuming they would eventually be able to make a fully operational Battle Carlinbot.

That's basically the Theranos story: a teenaged "entrepreneur" was convinced that she was just about to produce a seemingly impossible, revolutionary diagnostic machine, so she faked its results, abetted by investors, customers and others who wanted to believe:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theranos

The thing about stories of AI miracles is that they are peddled by both AI's boosters and its critics. For boosters, the value of these tall tales is obvious: if normies can be convinced that AI is capable of performing miracles, they'll invest in it. They'll even integrate it into their product offerings and then quietly hire legions of humans to pick up the botshit it leaves behind. These abettors can be relied upon to keep the defects in these products a secret, because they'll assume that they've committed an operator error. After all, everyone knows that AI can do anything, so if it's not performing for them, the problem must exist between the keyboard and the chair.

But this would only take AI so far. It's one thing to hear implausible stories of AI's triumph from the people invested in it – but what about when AI's critics repeat those stories? If your boss thinks an AI can do your job, and AI critics are all running around with their hair on fire, shouting about the coming AI jobpocalypse, then maybe the AI really can do your job?

https://locusmag.com/2020/07/cory-doctorow-full-employment/

There's a name for this kind of criticism: "criti-hype," coined by Lee Vinsel, who points to many reasons for its persistence, including the fact that it constitutes an "academic business-model":

https://sts-news.medium.com/youre-doing-it-wrong-notes-on-criticism-and-technology-hype-18b08b4307e5

That's four reasons for AI hype:

to win investors and customers;

to cover customers' and users' embarrassment when the AI doesn't perform;

AI dreamers so high on their own supply that they can't tell truth from fantasy;

A business-model for doomsayers who form an unholy alliance with AI companies by parroting their silliest hype in warning form.

But there's a fifth motivation for criti-hype: to simplify otherwise tedious and complex situations. As Jamie Zawinski writes, this is the motivation behind the obvious lie that the "autonomous cars" on the streets of San Francisco have no driver:

https://www.jwz.org/blog/2024/01/driverless-cars-always-have-a-driver/

GM's Cruise division was forced to shutter its SF operations after one of its "self-driving" cars dragged an injured pedestrian for 20 feet:

https://www.wired.com/story/cruise-robotaxi-self-driving-permit-revoked-california/

One of the widely discussed revelations in the wake of the incident was that Cruise employed 1.5 skilled technical remote overseers for every one of its "self-driving" cars. In other words, they had replaced a single low-waged cab driver with 1.5 higher-paid remote operators.

As Zawinski writes, SFPD is well aware that there's a human being (or more than one human being) responsible for every one of these cars – someone who is formally at fault when the cars injure people or damage property. Nevertheless, SFPD and SFMTA maintain that these cars can't be cited for moving violations because "no one is driving them."

But figuring out who which person is responsible for a moving violation is "complicated and annoying to deal with," so the fiction persists.

(Zawinski notes that even when these people are held responsible, they're a "moral crumple zone" for the company that decided to enroll whole cities in nonconsensual murderbot experiments.)

Automation hype has always involved hidden humans. The most famous of these was the "mechanical Turk" hoax: a supposed chess-playing robot that was just a puppet operated by a concealed human operator wedged awkwardly into its carapace.

This pattern repeats itself through the ages. Thomas Jefferson "replaced his slaves" with dumbwaiters – but of course, dumbwaiters don't replace slaves, they hide slaves:

https://www.stuartmcmillen.com/blog/behind-the-dumbwaiter/

The modern Mechanical Turk – a division of Amazon that employs low-waged "clickworkers," many of them overseas – modernizes the dumbwaiter by hiding low-waged workforces behind a veneer of automation. The MTurk is an abstract "cloud" of human intelligence (the tasks MTurks perform are called "HITs," which stands for "Human Intelligence Tasks").

This is such a truism that techies in India joke that "AI" stands for "absent Indians." Or, to use Jathan Sadowski's wonderful term: "Potemkin AI":

https://reallifemag.com/potemkin-ai/

This Potemkin AI is everywhere you look. When Tesla unveiled its humanoid robot Optimus, they made a big flashy show of it, promising a $20,000 automaton was just on the horizon. They failed to mention that Optimus was just a person in a robot suit:

https://www.siliconrepublic.com/machines/elon-musk-tesla-robot-optimus-ai

Likewise with the famous demo of a "full self-driving" Tesla, which turned out to be a canned fake:

https://www.reuters.com/technology/tesla-video-promoting-self-driving-was-staged-engineer-testifies-2023-01-17/

The most shocking and terrifying and enraging AI demos keep turning out to be "Just A Guy" (in Molly White's excellent parlance):

https://twitter.com/molly0xFFF/status/1751670561606971895

And yet, we keep falling for it. It's no wonder, really: criti-hype rewards so many different people in so many different ways that it truly offers something for everyone.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/29/pay-no-attention/#to-the-little-man-behind-the-curtain

Back the Kickstarter for the audiobook of The Bezzle here!

Image:

Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

Ross Breadmore (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/rossbreadmore/5169298162/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

#pluralistic #ai #absent indians #mechanical turks #scams #george carlin #comedy #body-snatchers #fraud #theranos #guys in robot suits #criti-hype #machine learning #fake it til you make it #too good to fact-check #mturk #deepfakes

2K notes · View notes

munsonsmixtapes · 2 months ago

Text

Sharing is Caring

steddie x reader

summary: Steve and Eddie decide to have an open relationship and despite that, Eddie decides to keep the girl he met in a chat room a secret. Little does he know that Steve is keeping a secret of his own.

cw: brief mention of struggle with sexuality

ladybaggins has requested to chat!

ladybaggins: hi

eddiethebanished69: hi

eddiethebanished69: fan of Bilbo hm?

ladybaggins: of course

ladybaggins: that’s my husband

eddiethebanished69: so that’s my competition?

ladybaggins: we’re not exclusive. Why? Are you flirting with me, Eddie the banished?

eddiethebanished69: what if I am?

ladybaggins: then I would be prompted to ask if that’s you in your pfp

eddiethebanished69: it is

ladybaggins: fuck-

eddiethebanished69: can’t tell if that’s a compliment or insult

ladybaggins: definitely a compliment

eddiethebanished69: good

ladybaggins: are you in a band or something? I see you’re playing a guitar in your pfp

eddiethebanished69: yep

eddiethebanished69: but I won’t share my band name to protect my anonymity if you don’t mind

ladybaggins: of course I don’t mind

ladybaggins: what genre are you categorized as?

eddiethebanished69: heavy metal

ladybaggins: that’s hot

ladybaggins: I mean-that’s hot

ladybaggins: that’s really cool

eddiethebanished69: have a thing for metal bands, hm?

ladybaggins: maybe-

eddiethebanished69: you are already becoming very interesting, Lady Baggins

eddiethebanished69: well, I should go make dinner. Same time tomorrow?

ladybaggins: I wouldn't miss it! Until then, Eddie the banished.

Eddie leans back in his chair at his desk, smiling to himself as Steve enters the office. He doesn't know why, but he's quick to close the tab where he was talking to you. He has nothing to hide, especially since he and Steve recently decided that they wanted to have an open relationship. So he's not cheating on Steve and he definitely doesn't feel ashamed. He just wants to keep this to himself because he shares everything with his boyfriend. This is something he's going to keep between himself and his web browser. And you, of course.

"Hey, honey," Steve says as he drops a kiss to the top of Eddie's head. giving his shoulders a squeeze as he does so. Eddie lets out a hum as this is the one thing that he loves the most that Steve does. It just a sweet gesture that showed Eddie just how much Steve loves him.

"Hey," Eddie turns in his chair, puckering his lips, asking for a kiss and Steve is quick to oblige, resting his hands on the arm rests on the chair while leaning down and capturing Eddie's lips between his two. Once he pulls away, Eddie pats his lap and Steve is quick to sit as Eddie turns to face the desk again, opening up the city building game that Steve loves to watch him play.

This is their favorite activity of the day. No matter how many times they do it, they never get bored. Steve loves the way Eddie's hands rest on his thighs and Eddie loves how Steve will lean his head back on his shoulder. It's the perfect setup.

Afterwards, the two of them head to the kitchen where the Chinese food that Steve had picked up on his way home from work. The table is already set and they sit in their respective chairs, eating is comfortable silence.

Steve is rubbing his foot up and down Eddie’s leg and Eddie takes Steve’s free hand, bringing to his lips for a gentle kiss. Eddie doesn’t know how he got so lucky as to have someone as amazing as Steve, but he’s not going to question it. And he certainly doesn’t take it for granted either. He’s always quick to tell Steve just how much he loves him and how grateful he is to have the man in his life.

It goes both ways. Steve is equally grateful for the man sitting across from him, wondering why he had been so rude to him in high school when he’s nothing but a sweetheart. He sometimes still can’t believe that Eddie gave him a second chance when their paths crossed again when they realized that they were going to the same university.

Eddie always knew he liked men, very secure in his sexuality and Steve thinks that’s one of the many reasons why he disliked Eddie. Because he was always unapologetically himself, always seen going on dates with different men and women around town and Steve envied that.

Steve also was always attracted to men even though he would try to deny it. He just liked that guy’s pants and wanted to know where he got them or wanted to know that other guy’s workout routine so he could get jacked like him.

Steve didn’t fully come to terms with the fact that he was bisexual until his senior year of high school. Everyone was playing spin the bottle and his landed on Evan Thompson from his English class. He always thought the guy was cute and would have even gone as far to say that he had a crush on him. But kissing him was a whole other thing.

Steve went for it anyway since rules were rules and even though it was just a quick peck, up until he kissed Eddie for the first time, that was the best kiss he had ever had.

That night, he went home and couldn’t get Evan or the kiss out of his head, wondering what was wrong with him and why he was thinking about it so much. He didn’t think about guys in that way. He was just confused because he hadn’t kissed anyone in a while.

But after a long conversation with Robin, they both came to the same conclusion. That Steve was bi and that there was nothing wrong with that. And accepting it was like a giant weight had been lifted from his chest. It was like he could finally breathe for the first time.

He tried to date men when he moved out of Hawkins and went to college, but it never seemed to go quite right. He was ready, he knew it, but he just couldn’t quite get comfortable enough to be himself.

That is, until he officially met Eddie towards the end of their freshman year. It was a lame party and the two of them shared a joint out on the back porch of the house.

Eddie was the first person Steve officially came out to other than Robin and besides her, he was the only other person who really saw him. To him, he wasn’t Steve “the hair” Harrington, he was just Steve.

Chemistry built pretty quickly and before either of them could stop it, the two of them were making out, the joint long gone, their hands now tangled in each other’s hair.

And afterwards, Eddie walked Steve back to his apartment and the rest is history. They’ve been together ever since.

After dinner and plenty of kisses, Eddie retires back to his office, wondering if you had messaged him again while he was eating, but there’s no new messages nor a green dot next to your profile pic.

He can’t stop thinking about you and he doesn’t know why. He hasn’t really been attracted to anyone else since he got with Steve, but you’re different and he can’t quite put his finger on it.

He thinks it’s because he’s still got it. He’s able to flirt without being too awkward and you seemed to be into it. He wonders if you’ll message him tomorrow and flirt with him some more.

#stranger things #eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie x y/n #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x fem!reader #eddie munson fluff #steve harrington #steve harrington x reader #steve harrington x you #steve harrington x fem!reader #steve harrington fluff #steddie #steddie x reader #steddie x fem!reader #steddie x y/n #steddie x you #steddie fluff

173 notes · View notes

sunni-stuff · 1 year ago

Text

Good things happen to those who wait.

—★! Tags: NSFW, MDNI, AFAB! Slow?? Sex toys, a man way too big, size kink. Fingering.

★- Part 4 here!!

You regret missing it. The night GD streamed, you were stuck at work and time was not on your side. Even if you managed to show up, you doubted you could compete with those who had bottomless wallets for donations. By the time you got home, the stream had ended and a lucky winner had claimed their prize, leaving you frustrated at being outdone by someone with more money to spare.

After that, there was a complete lack of communication. No live streams, no new videos. Total silence for five long months. You couldn't help but constantly check his page, refreshing it so frequently that your browser started suggesting it the moment you typed in his name. It was necessary; what if he suddenly returned and started streaming while you weren't paying attention? That would be unacceptable. So you remained his dedicated watcher, eagerly anticipating his return to once again capture your heart and even cause some inevitable arousal.

With no new posts to peruse, you exhausted all of the content already shared on his page. His previous streams and videos became a regular part of your nightly routine – laptop open, legs spread, fingers working their magic as you reached climax again and again. But in just a matter of weeks, this routine grew stale and your fingers failed to satisfy you. You craved something real, something similar to the man who had become your obsession.

On your day off, you made a choice to be daring and try something completely new. Not too far from where you live, there was a sex shop with its bold black exterior and eye-catching logo, "Don't ask, Won't tell." You never thought you'd ever have a reason to step foot inside until today. Trying to remain inconspicuous, you dressed casually in a gray hoodie and shorts, praying that no one from your complex would spot you as you wandered around the small store.

You quickly located the Dildo section in the far corner of the store, it was strategically placed away from prying eyes, giving you the freedom to browse without feeling self-conscious. The selection was overwhelming; there were dildos of all shapes, sizes, and colors that you didn't even know existed. A row of bright and vibrant toys caught your eye, ranging from hot pink to deep purple. Upon closer inspection, you noticed that some were smaller than others and angled differently - some leaning more to the right or left. Curious, you read the label below that simply read "beginners." Were these meant for beginners? You couldn't help but feel a little cocky; surely you could handle more than just beginner-level toys.

Your gaze drifted down to the shelf below, where a collection of dildos labeled as "intermediate" caught your eye. They were all around 5 inches long, a decent size, and you found yourself reaching out to touch a deep blue one that fit perfectly in your palm. But upon closer inspection, it wasn't the right one. It wasn't like his - GD's. You needed something that would remind you of him.

So you moved on to the last row, where the sign in bright red read "Expert". These dildos were flesh-colored and ranged from 6-8 inches in size. They looked almost identical to his. You picked up a realistic-looking one with a caucasian skin tone, measuring at 7 pushing 8 inches. It was thick and veiny, standing tall and proud unlike the ones in the first row. This was the one you wanted - it was as close as you could get to experiencing him.

You approach the cashier, trying your best to avoid making eye contact with her. But her questioning look, as if asking "are you sure about this?", burns your face with embarrassment. The transaction is completed hastily, almost as if the cashier wants you out of the store before it becomes too awkward. You grab the discreet black bag from her hands and make a hasty exit.

You let out a deep sigh as you leave the shop, knowing all that was left to do was walk back to the apartment. It was a simple twenty-minute trek, maybe twenty-five if you got unlucky and had to wait for a red light at the stopwalk. You started on your way, clutching the shopping bag tightly, afraid that passerby's might try to peer inside. As you rounded the corner, a single raindrop landed on your head, followed by more until it was pouring without warning.

The unexpected downpour caught you off guard with little time to react. You were positive that the forecast called for clear skies, so you didn't bother bringing any protection. As droplets of water hit your skin, your eyes dart around in search of shelter. Finally, you spot the bus stop with its small roof offering some relief. With bare ankles splashing through puddles, you hurry towards it.

Taking shelter at the bus stop was a much better option than attempting to walk in this downpour. It was already raining hard enough to make a twenty-minute walk feel like eternity, and you would have been completely soaked if you had attempted it. Now, at least, you could relax a bit, knowing that you were somewhat protected and dry. All you had left to do was wait for the storm to pass. As you take out your phone from your pocket to check the weather app, a sudden shadow looms over you and a large figure squeezes into the small space next to you.

You quickly lifted your gaze from your phone and had to tilt your head back to meet the imposing figure who squeezed into the already cramped area. It was a man, who paid no attention to you whatsoever. He was wearing a black hoodie with the hood pulled tightly over his head and a black surgical mask covering his face except for his piercing brown eyes. Those same eyes locked onto yours as he noticed you staring at him.

Your body tensed up, and you averted your gaze, avoiding looking at him altogether. You couldn't help but think, "Could he be any more intimidating?"

The two of you stood next to each other in utter quietness for what felt like an eternity. He kept his gaze fixed ahead while you found yourself inexplicably fascinated by your own shoes. A sudden, loud splash caught your attention and you looked up just in time to see a group of children running by, gleefully splashing and playing in the puddles.

The combination of mud and water was heading straight towards you, ready to create a messy situation. But before it could hit you, he smoothly stepped in front and took the full force of the splash. He grunted as the liquid hit him, but he shook his head and glanced at the kids who seemed oblivious to the mess they had caused.

You were taken aback by his sudden actions, and you couldn't help but look back and forth between him and the mess on his previously spotless hoodie. The stain was large, surely leaving a big wet spot. "I- I mean, you didn't have to do that." You cursed yourself for saying the wrong thing as he raised an eyebrow. "Damn, that’s not what I meant."

He shakes his head and lets out a low chuckle. " 'S okay."

As soon as he spoke, you froze in place. His voice was unmistakably deep and one that you had heard before. You couldn't help but wonder if you were overreacting. Out of the corner of your eye, you observed him as he attempted to wipe away some moisture on his hoodie with a handkerchief. As far as you could tell, there were no visible tattoos on him.

Apart from that, you couldn't help but sympathize with him. He didn't have to do this at all. It was refreshing to see chivalry still existed, and the least you could do was assist him. "Do you live close by?" you inquire, causing him to pause and turn his gaze towards you.

They say that everything in life is predetermined by fate, and it seems like fate had a plan for you when you asked that seemingly innocent question. Little did you know, your simple act set off a chain reaction of events. He lived far away, but you couldn't let him go on with that stain on his hoodie. So after the rain stopped, you brought him back to your apartment complex and showed him to the laundry room.

“Just give me a moment to grab my detergent. The stuff the landlord gives us is terrible.” You told him, motioning for him to take a seat on the nearby chair, which he did without saying a word. You quickly went up to your apartment and threw the bag on the couch before heading into the bathroom to retrieve the detergent. As you headed back downstairs, the scene in front of you left you speechless.

The man had removed his jacket and tossed it into the laundry, his back tense and facing away from you. He was dressed in a grey t-shirt that revealed his defined forearms. You couldn't help but recognize the tattoos decorating his skin. Could it really be him?

You had to act casual, not let your excitement show. You didn't want to seem like some creep and scare him off like a desperate fool. Taking a deep breath to calm your nerves, you approach him with a gentle smile and present the bottle of detergent. "This will make your hoody spotless and leave it smelling amazing."

He turns his masked face towards you, revealing dirty blonde hair and a weathered complexion. It's not the kind of wear and tear that comes with age, but something else. "You have a staring habit," he says bluntly, catching you off guard. You didn't even realize you were staring at him.

You feel like you're about to jump out of your skin, but you manage to compose yourself. "Sorry," you apologize quietly as you approach the washing machine. You pour in a generous amount of detergent for his jacket and close the lid with a firm click. "The washers here aren't great, so if you want, you can come up to my apartment until it's finished." Normally, you wouldn't invite a total stranger into your home, hell you wouldn't have even let him see which complex you lived in, but your curiosity gets the best of you.

He stands there with his arms crossed, scanning you from head to toe. His intense gaze makes you feel exposed, as if he can see right through you. "I'll only be here until it's finished," he says in a smooth yet cautious tone. After all, you are a stranger. He understands that and so do you.

With a nod, you lead him up to your apartment, locking it behind you once you step in last. He seems to pause, taking it all in, glancing around at every little thing but not touching.

After a brief nod of your head, you guide him up to your apartment and lock the door behind you as soon as you both enter. He takes a moment to survey the space, his eyes scanning every detail but not daring to touch anything. You set your keys down on the kitchen counter while he settles onto the couch, trying to get comfortable. His gaze falls upon the black bag resting nearby, and although he doesn't reach for it, he does lean in closer to see what's inside.

You step out, and he's back to his usual self, sitting motionless as if nothing had happened. You realize you completely forgot about the bag in your hand; it was an easy oversight. Smiling at him, you take a seat in the armchair across from him, but he catches you off guard. "You seem like the last person who would shop at that kind of store."

As he speaks, you feel a pang of confusion and want to confront him about his words. However, your attention is diverted by the black bag you left out in the open. Your face flushes with embarrassment and your jaw drops, but you're unable to utter any words or even come up with an excuse.

His smirk grew as he observed your flustered reaction. The crinkles at the corners of his eyes gave it away. "I was just joking, didn't think it would make you so shy."

You huff and lean back in the chair, feeling defensive. You can't bring yourself to meet his gaze as you say, "I'm not shy. I just…"

"Just?" He teased, casually draping an arm over the couch.

Feeling self-conscious, you defended yourself with a shy tone and blushing cheeks. “It’s perfectly normal to want a change.” you explained.

All he does is hum, but his eyes are fixed on you. Those damn eyes that seem to see right through you. "A little big don't you think?" He nods towards the bag.

You widen your eyes in surprise and finally gather the courage to confront him directly. "That's quite a bold topic to bring up with someone you barely know," you say.

"Coming from the woman who allowed a stranger into her home without even knowing my name, that's rich, love."

Touché.

“So whats your name then?”

“Simon.”

“Mines is y/n”

The two of you began to talk or rather you talked up a storm. As you spoke, he sat there and actually listened. Despite being the one to do most of the talking, he let you vent about work for almost ten solid minutes without interrupting. All he did was nod along, showing that he was truly paying attention.

You asked about his job and he wasn't very forthcoming, only mentioning that he traveled frequently. You ventured to ask his age and discovered he was twenty-eight years old. He didn't seem eager to talk about himself, so you changed the subject out of respect for his privacy.

He wasn't exactly the most exciting person, but he had his moments. Every so often, he'd tell a cheesy dad joke that made you giggle. You loved seeing the sparkle in his eyes whenever he cracked a joke. The two of you were having such a good time together that before you knew it, an hour had passed and you could hear the familiar beep of the washing machine downstairs. "Hold on, I'll grab your hoodie," you say as you get up and step out of the apartment for a moment.

He sat alone, quietly anticipating your return. By chance, the two of you had crossed paths, a coincidence he was grateful for because… he knew who you were. He noticed you struggling to make connections in your mind while he had already recognized you.

He had come across your profile on his streaming platform. You were a new fan, which he could tell based on your activity. How? Your profile picture was of yourself, and you never participated in the chat or donated. This piqued his curiosity about you, but he didn't bother reaching out at the time. However, when he saw you waiting at the bus stop in the same city as him, he took a chance and decided to approach you.

Now he was currently sitting in your apartment while you were busy downstairs. His gaze kept returning to the toy inside the bag, a flimsy and unnecessary item in his opinion. Why would someone like you need a toy? Surely you had a boyfriend, right? He heard your footsteps approaching and quickly turned to watch as you entered the room. "Why the toy?" he asked curiously.

You approached him and handed him his jacket, just cleaned and now carrying a hint of lavender. He brought up the dildo again, but you were feeling more assured this time. "As I said before, I wanted to experiment with something different."

He snorted in disbelief at those words, reaching over and holding up the black bag. "Why would you need this when you have a boyfriend, right? You do have one, don't you?" Simon secretly wished that you didn't have a boyfriend. You were too beautiful to be with someone who couldn't satisfy you.

You feel heat rush to your cheeks as you quickly take the bag from his hand and set it on the ground. "No, I don't have a boyfriend and so what if I have a dildo, what's it to you?”

For the first time, Simon is at a loss for words. He's confused, and even he doesn't understand why he cares so much. What he says next surprises not just you, but himself as well. "I could do better."

How the hell are you supposed to react to that? What would be an appropriate response? Was it meant as a joke, maybe? "Yeah, right, and pigs can fly." You try to rebut with a half-hearted tone, still uncertain of how to handle the situation.

As he sits up, his posture becomes rigid and his gaze locks onto yours. His eyes, a deep brown like icy orbs, possess an inexplicable warmth when focused on you. He takes a moment to assess you, his gaze lingering on your hips before meeting your eyes once more. You can feel the weight of his stare, as if he is trying to read your every thought and emotion. His expression remains stoic but there is an intensity in his eyes that cannot be ignored.

The realization washes over you like a wave, leaving behind a tingling sensation that starts in your toes and travels up your spine. He's serious…actually serious. Your heart races as his intense gaze bores into yours, causing a familiar heat to pool in the pit of your stomach and spread through your body. Your intuition spikes, confirming what your body already knows - there's only one man who can make you feel this way. It's ironic, really, that getting turned on was the only indication that he is the mysterious streamer you've been pining after for so long.

A bead of sweat forms on your forehead as you struggle to maintain a composed exterior, but inside you can't deny the desire that surges through you. Simon practically offered himself on a silver platter, you couldn't let this opportunity slip by. You could feel the tension in the air as he waited for your response. "Prove it then," the words escaped your lips in a rush, betraying your eagerness. But it was too late to take them back now. The anticipation and lust swirling between the two of you was palpable, like electricity in the air. Your pulse quickened as you prepared for what was to come next.

After hearing your confirmation, Simon's eyes darken, their once warm hue turning into a deep and intense shade. He slowly rises from his seat on the couch, his tall frame easily towering over you. Without saying a word, his large hand comes to rest on your hip, gently brushing his thumb in tender circles. His touch brings a sense of warmth that radiates off of him, causing you to tremble slightly. You can feel how gentle he is with you, knowing exactly how to handle you with care and tenderness.

With a firm grip on your waist, he gently guides you onto his lap. His strong thighs support your weight effortlessly, as if you were weightless in his arms. Simon tenderly presses his lips against your neck, his surgical mask now discarded, leaving his warm breath and soft kisses to trail down your neck and over your shoulder. The feeling sends shivers down your spine and causes you to squirm involuntarily, releasing a shaky gasp from your lips.

Desperate to catch a glimpse of his true identity, you strain your neck to see his face, but he squeezes your waist possessively. You felt his warm breath on your neck as he murmured, "You'll get to see if you behave, love." A soft kiss was pressed to the sensitive skin at the nape of your neck, making you whine with need. Despite your curiosity, you couldn't resist the calming effect of his embrace. The need to know his true appearance still lingers, but you trust in his promise and enjoy the moment with him.

His rough hands glide up and down the curves of your body, pressing firmly against your back as he pulls you closer. You can feel his chest rising and falling against you, and you can't ignore the bulge in his pants pressed against your plush ass. Despite the thick fabric of his jeans, you can sense every inch of him. He is just as large and intimidating as you had seen from watching him on screen. Perhaps even too big for you to handle. Simon's hand ventures underneath your hoodie and slips beneath your shirt, his calloused fingers tracing slow circles on your stomach. Though they are rough and coarse, they mold you like soft dough in a baker's hands. You feel like a piece of bread ready to be shaped according to his will.

With a deep sigh of relief, you let your eyes flutter closed, the tension slowly draining from your body. Soft moans escape your lips as his hands work their magic, easing away the stress and bringing a sense of pleasure to every inch of you. Your eyes snap open as one hand ventures underneath the band of your panties and gently strokes between your legs. You can feel the corner of his lips curl up in a confident smirk against the sensitive skin of your neck. "Already so wet," he whispers huskily, making you crave more of his touch.

Simon's fingers glide over your clit, causing it to quiver under his touch. He's exploring, trying to figure out what turns you on. When your body responds with a subtle yearning for more, he applies pressure with his index and middle finger, gently swirling them around your sensitive spot. You inhale sharply, almost unconsciously closing your legs at the sensation of a new hand wandering all over your body.

As Simon's fingers glide over your body, you feel a rush of electricity shoot through you. His touch is tentative at first, exploring the curves and crevices of your skin as if he is mapping out every inch. When he finally reaches your clit, it feels like a firework has been lit inside of you. Heat spreads from the contact point to every nerve ending in your body. You can't help but huff as he presses down with his index and middle finger, creating a slow, tantalizing swirl against your sensitive nub. Your breaths come in quick pants as your body responds to the unfamiliar sensation, arching towards his touch and almost closing up in surprise.

Gently, Simon nudges your thighs apart with his own, a low growl escaping him as he nibbles on your ear, his breath is hot against your skin. “That's a good girl,” he whispers, his voice gruff and full of desire. “Let me take care of you.” His touch is featherlight, teasing and electrifying, making it hard for you to focus on anything else. As one hand wanders up and down your body, the other finds its way to your perky breast, kneading and caressing it gently. Simon is determined to leave no part of you untouched, his actions attacking all of your physical senses at once.

A sharp pinch on your hardened nipple elicits a tiny squeal from you, and he responds by gently kissing your cheek. His lips trail up and down your jawline, providing comfort for your cry. Your slick has already coated his fingers, and it now seeps through not only your shorts but also your panties. He can feel the wet spot on his knee, evidence of your arousal. "Your pretty cunt doesn't get enough attention," he remarks, observing the way you're leaking all over him with a smirk on his face.

He uttered that word, "pretty," in such a raw way that it only made you more aroused. He noticed how wet you were and withdrew his fingers, teasingly waving them in front of your face as you try to catch your breath. "Look at the mess you've made," he says, running his fingers against your lips. You obey and open your mouth, tasting the salty slickness on your tongue.

The vulgarity of his words shot dopamine straight to that lust-filled brain of yours, and you couldn't deny the fluttering arousal that followed. He noticed this and pulled his fingers back from between your legs, holding them up to your face. Your breath came in short gasps as he taunted you with your own slick moisture glistening on his fingertips. "What a mess you made," he said, rubbing his fingers against your lips, encouraging you to open them. You complied eagerly, tasting the tangy saltiness of yourself on your tongue. It only made you want him more.

You suck on his finger, savoring the taste of yourself as your tongue laps at it with eagerness. The taste of yourself lingers on his skin, sweet and intoxicating. Simon's eyes are glued to you, mesmerized by your actions. His pants feel unbearably tight, but he knows he must take things slow and loosen you up before he can have you completely.

“Want me to keep going?” Simon asked in a commanding tone, and when you nodded, he shook his head. "I need words from you, Doll. Tell me what you want."

Your lips feel swollen as you bite down on them, feeling a wave of embarrassment wash over you. But you can't forget your current position and the events that led to it. "I want more Simon, please."

Simon grunts and nods, taking his finger out of your mouth and holding onto your hips with both hands. He guides you to lean against his strong chest, positioning you so you can see his face. His rugged appearance, with a fresh stubble brushing against your soft skin, adds to his appeal. A cut on his nose gives him a rougher look, but it only makes him more attractive. He uses his fingers to collect your wetness and spreads it over your clenched opening. Taking advantage of your distraction, Simon slowly inserts his index finger into your tight hole.

He can't help but groan at the incredible tightness he encounters with just one finger. Your walls squeeze and cling onto him as if your life depends on it. It's a good thing he's taking the time to loosen you up, because if his cock were to experience this level of tightness, he'd have you pinned down on the couch in no time, causing your knees to shake uncontrollably.

You flinch at the sudden intrusion, his large index finger feeling almost intrusive as it slowly enters you. It fills you more than your own fingers ever could. Simon tenderly kisses the side of your lips, reassuring you. "It's okay, I've got you…I've got you." He pauses to make sure you're comfortable before continuing. His fingers continue to explore with care, his thumb gently pressing against your sensitive clit to mask any pain with pleasure. A deep moan escapes him as he feels your walls pulsating around him, making his cock throb in anticipation within his boxers. It begs for attention.

You looked up at him, your eyes blinking rapidly as you flinched when he slowly inserted another finger into your tight and slippery opening. It was a bit too much to handle, but you forced yourself to bear it with clenched teeth and an open mouth. Your cheeks were flushed and your skin had goosebumps all over from the stimulation. The pain gradually turned into a hint of pleasure, causing your nipples to harden in response. His two fingers moved in and out at a slow pace, your whimpers of discomfort slowly transformed into moans of pleasure. Simon quickly found a rhythm, picking up speed until there were wet slurping sounds coming from the movement of his fingers inside you.

The intensity of the moment was immeasurable. The sight of you writhing on his lap, your body shuddering and your walls gripping around his fingers, drove him to grunt loudly in response. He could feel his own cock throbbing and pulsing with desperate need as he watched you shatter before him. With deliberate care, he curved his finger and found a sweet spot deep inside you that made your toes curl and your eyes roll back. Taking note of this, Simon altered his rhythm and started moving faster, his fingers thrusting in and out with an almost frantic pace.

But he didn't forget about that special spot, and each time he hit it, it sent waves of ecstasy through your body, leaving you breathless and craving more. You were starved for touch, and Simon could tell by how eagerly you pushed against his hand, your hips seeking out his fingers no matter how deep they delved inside you. He was playing you like a skilled musician, knowing exactly which strings to pluck to elicit the most intense reactions from your body. And despite only having just met him, Simon seemed to have a better understanding of your own body than yourself.

He knows that adding a third finger now would be too much for you to handle. Instead, he expertly curls both fingers inside of you and uses his other hand to pinch and tweak your swollen clit. The pleasure is overwhelming and has you seeing stars and cumming far too soon. Your whole body arches off of him, your legs trembling like leaves in the wind as your orgasm crashes over you uncontrollably. You weren't given any build up or time to prepare, it came on full force and ready. When you come down from your high, he pulls his fingers out of your quivering core, holding you close with one arm while the other shifts you slightly for comfort. His pants are now slick with your release, evidence of your intense climax.

Mindful of your orgasm, he gently lifts you up and places you onto the plush couch. You sit there for a moment, heart racing and breath catching in your chest. Your mind is dizzy with pleasure, trying to process everything that has transpired. Suddenly, a metallic clank and a loud zip interrupt your thoughts, causing you to open one eye and peer up at Simon.

He stands directly in front of you, blocking out the rest of the world with his strong body. As your eyes trail downward, you come face to face with the very same girthy cock that had captivated you on screen. Up close, it was even more daunting and intimidating than before. Thick veins pulsed along its length, the tip glistening with precum from being pressed against his boxer briefs. His heavy balls hung low and full, adding to the overwhelming image before you.

"You didn't think this was over, did you?"

♡! This one is really long but I don't like how I did the sex scene that much. o(TヘTo). Expect more of Simon talking in the next!!

˚ ✦ . Taglist (People who commented): @theirkenfiles @@crazy-phan-girl13 @forgotten-lego-piece

#simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon ghost x reader #simon ghost smut #simon riley #simon ghost x you #simon riley x you #cod x reader #call of duty #simon ghost riley x you #ghost x you #simon ghost riley x reader #simon ghost riley smut #call of duty smut #mayadarlings

681 notes · View notes

ihatedtoadmit · 6 months ago

Text

Art study

pairing: Bang Chan x gn! reader

genre: ...suggestive

warnings: nothing actually happens, so none besides teasing

word count: ~1.3k

summary: You're doing an art study on muscles, and who's a better candidate for reference than your wonderful boyfriend who keeps feeding his delulu fanbase with half-naked pictures?

a/n: Well well well, Nat, you don't have to pay to see me write something like this after all (if you will ever see this, because no chance am I tagging you or anyone, dear). Here, have fun, this is the most spice anyone can get out of my asexual ass.

↳ Main Masterlist

You were a very reserved person, something your partner knew all too well. Every touch the two of you shared throughout the entirety of your relationship had no heat behind it, each one only fueled by pure adoration and love. Never once did a kiss turn hungry, hell, there had barely been any kisses the two of you had shared due to your lack of need for the action. Chan knew it all too well, and while he craved more, he also respected it. The last thing he wanted to do was to make you uncomfortable, and so he’d never stepped over that line.

That was the exact reason for his current shyness, the confusion that wanted to sit onto his face hard to mask. There he stood in your doorway, the desk before your hunched form cluttered with pencils and little crumbs of dirty erasers. You were entirely too focused on the task at hand to notice your boyfriend's presence, the song that flowed through your headphones much too loud to hear any footsteps or even words. And so you continued drawing, clueless about anything as your lover watched you work, eyes flitting between your sketch and the endless reference pictures on your screen.

Pictures about him, his back fully on display and unclothed.

A touch broke you out of your concentration as you erased a line for the fourth time, scaring you into throwing away the pencil in your clutches just so you could tear the headphones off your head.

“Interesting art you have there, love.” - Chan mused, yet his skin was as flushed as ever.

You joined him as you could feel your own skin heating up, ashamed that you’d been caught like this. Eyes looked at everything besides your boyfriend, yet you found comfort in that warm touch of his.

“I was just… doing a study, on muscles.” - the words were but a mere whisper, hand quickly reaching to minimise your browser and just hide it from a certain pair of prying eyes.

Still, there was a feeling clawing at the cage of your soul, ripping at the flesh to be let out and rampage freely. It was feral and vicious, planting a thought into your head that seemed impossible to get out, no matter how alien it felt. You could feel your breath hitch at the image that popped into your head, memories of the images you had been staring at for a while now overlapping.

The hand on your shoulder gently squeezed, breaking you out of your derailing thoughts.

“I don't mind, baby, it just… caught me off guard? Glad you enjoyed my performances though.” - Chan’s voice was light, mixing well with the shyness he was trying to hide.

It only urged that fierceness inside to break free, granting you a surge of confidence you would have never had otherwise.

Without any words you finally glanced up at the man you loved, finding him utterly handsome; you would hone your artistic skills for the rest of your life just to capture a fragment of that beauty. His skin was dusted with a faint red, ears painted by the deepest of shades. Those eyes you loved to get lost in were alight with an emotion you had seen them only hold whenever he looked at the boys, and it took your breath away within a heartbeat.

Your body moved on its own, towering over him as you now stood. His hair was still slightly wet from the shower he must have just taken, and you just knew he had been originally on his way to his room to swap his bathrobe for those comfy, black clothes he loved to don in his free time.

He searched your gaze, unsure, yet trusting. His hands comfortably placed themselves onto your hips; their touch was warm, the man before you always running hot. It was something you loved as he balanced out your always cold hands wonderfully, reaching the perfect temperature you both enjoyed.

“Hey, love. How was work today?” - you asked, leaning closer than usual as you swiped those dark curls out of Chan’s face. He leaned into your touch, eyes closing for a second as he thought about his answer.

“The usual, although Hyunjin managed to piss off Minho again. It was a shoe this time that was the weapon, by the way.” - there was an airiness of joy to his words, yet no laugh accompanied it.

No, Chan was entirely too enamoured with the look you were giving him, as if you were worshipping him with your eyes alone. And maybe you were. With each look you studied the way your lover's skin moved, the shadows conforming accordingly. It lured you in, as if Chan was the siren and you were his prey, fated to be drowned in the vast oceans and seas.

He didn't move as you took him all in, hands eventually unable to keep themselves away. Your fingers were cold against the warmth of his fair skin, and you could hear his breath hitch, the muscles inside his neck moving beautifully.

There was something different in your touch, that much he knew, yet he wouldn't have it any other way.

As if you had never seen anything like it before, your hands glided over any free expanse of skin you could reach, memorising how the muscles hidden beneath curved and jumped at your touch. Never once did your eyes stray, wanting to remember every little detail. You wanted your art to be perfect, after all, to represent the real thing as closely as possible and that meant every little detail in their complete glory.

Your eyebrows furrowed as the white robe blocked you off, and so you slightly slid it off from one of Chan's shoulders. His hold on you tightened and you glanced at him briefly, seeing an intensity burning in those dark eyes, one you had never seen before.

You were playing with fire, and you could feel the heat of the danger.

Despite the clear wanting signs, you ignored them much like Icarus, hands now gliding down your lover's arm. Each touch held meaning, praising him in silence, singing odes about this man’s beauty. There was something so intriguing about watching the muscles connect to skin and bone, oh so perfectly toned and reacting to every touch of yours.

You stepped even closer, breaths mingling together as you reached into his robe, mapping out the vast skin of your partner's back. Every dip, every rise and imperfection was noted inside your head, the scorching star in Chan's eyes only growing in intensity as time passed. Your eyes flitted between those deadly stars and his neck, seeing it strain, muscles so tight that they jumped out of the skin in that lovely V-shape you could never grow bored of.

Then, as if something snapped, he gripped your waist with incredible force, not giving you a chance to escape. Despite that, no fear took residence inside you, your now warm fingers still laid peacefully on his shoulders.

“And what do I owe this extremely special moment to, baby?” - his words were a deep rumble, eyes begging for an answer with desperation.

“For being the most beautiful human to grace this planet, my wonderful love. Be my muse, please. Let me draw you, let me study you.” - you answered, one hand now cupping Chan's cheek tenderly, despite the uniquely heated situation.

As if that was the magic word to undo his binding, your lover moved, hauling your taller form easily onto the bed with him. There you were now, sat on his lap as he looked up at you expectantly, the intensity and love never diminishing in those bright eyes of his. Your sketchbook was still sitting beside you on the bed where you had originally thrown it at, hands itching to take it and immortalise what you had engraved into your mind in the past few minutes.

“I'll be your muse whenever, baby. All you needed to do was ask.”

201 notes · View notes

preseriesdean · 10 months ago

Note

if you don’t mind me asking, could you share some of your favorite fanfics or authors? thanks ❤️

oh hi hello!! yes of course!! i actually haven't read any spn fic in a while but i have spent a lot of time organizing my bookmarks. i'm going to assume that you meant samdean fic but i'll add a few non-samdean ones at the end.

authors!

@zmediaoutlet (deadlybride on ao3)

candle_beck (ao3)

@goshen-applecrumbledore (ao3)

whereupon (livejournal)

Linden (ao3)

sevenfists (ao3)

there are so many more great authors but these came to mind :)

fics!

i am going to list my forever-favorites first - the ones i would recommend to anyone and everyone, screaming-from-the-rooftops kind of love - and then many many more under the cut.

beloved by urchinesque (2016, 1.9k, NR, warning: death) It might be the gentlest thing that's ever happened to them.

in my opinion everyone should read this once. it's quick. they die. it's-- happy, somehow. beautiful. i think about it all the time.

Last Day on Earth by candle_beck (2009, 10.8k, E) A list of things to do if you only have one day to live, presented in inconvenient non-list form.

last year my best friend and i were pondering which fic felt quintessential to samdean for us and somehow settled on this one. i still agree with the choice.

Odysseus, American by coyotesuspect (2010, 10k, M) Dean finds Peter O'Toole's recording of the Odyssey in a bin marked “Audio" in Casa Grande's only used bookstore. The place smells like cigarette smoke and old books, and it reminds him of Sam. Stanford era.

my favorite stanford era fic. i think it captures dean's loneliness and desperation beautifully.

A man with his insides out and his outsides off by britomart_is (2016, 5.3k, E, time travel, underage) They say there are only two stories in the world: man goes on a journey, and stranger comes to town.

another fic i want everyone to read. it's so short and feels like a novel. sam is messed up and dean is in love and everything is miserable.

Breathing Hard by whereupon (2009, 9k, E) The day Dean figures it out.

this is so simple and yet-- everything to me. i can't think about dinosaurs without thinking about this fic, which doesn't tell you much, but you'll see. sometimes this is really all you need.

The Last Outpost of All That Is by gekizetsu (2008, 59k, E) The world ends while they’re asleep.

this fic has stayed with me my whole life. i thought about it even during my years away from spn and fandom entirely. they're alone and you don't know why and they build their life together and you end up wondering, is this hell or heaven? whenever i come across a screenshot of the last couple of paragraphs i want to cry.

see things so much clearer by deadlybride (2020, 11.7k, E) Sam's been acting oddly. Dean learns how to use the history on an internet browser and finds out why.

this is a fic that hits the spot for me personally so well. another favorite preseries fic. i love the idea of sam using livejournal, and of dean finding out this way.

Stay The Distance by lazy_daze (2011, 24k, E) Sam is dependent on Dean's touch and closeness after the wall falls - Dean's presence reminds him of why he chose to wake up, and keeps the memories at bay, allowing Sam to function.

i love enmeshment, and i love that here it's literal. i love that they're just sort of fine with it.

more fics below!

in absolutely no particular order whatsover. please check the warnings and tags on these before reading!

Recall by De_Nugis (2012, 6.3k, E) Sam's having a hard time telling what's real and what isn't, especially when it comes to some voicemails from Dean.

Living in god's blind spot by applecrumbledore (2022, 25k, E) Of all the situations Dean didn’t need his dad to see him in, ‘getting off to being pushed around by a guy’ was in the top three. And ‘a guy’ was a massive glossing-over of reality. Any guy—any other guy—would be bad enough, but Sam was fucking cataclysmic.

Almost At Home by balefully (2008, 24.3k, E) Sam graduates from high school in early June in rural Tennessee. He and Dean start the summer with an all-nighter of celebration; the day after, while both fight hangovers, John calls to assign them their first hunt by themselves.

they said it was the fall of man by jukeboxhound (2016, 7.4k, M) Sam gets his soul back on a Monday.

When I Fall Asleep It Is Your Eyes That Close by britomart_is (2009, 1.9k, E) Post-Season Two. Sam is alive. Dean is happy.

Life As We Know It by sevenfists (2007, 13.7k, M, curtain fic) On the morning that Sam woke up, Dean ran five red lights on the way to the hospital, his half-empty coffee cup sloshing in the holder.

tied up like two ships by orphan_account (2014, 3.1k, E) Dean liked to hold hands.

Gospel Truth by Cerberuss (2020, 15.2k, E, case fic) ‘DOES YOUR BROTHER KNOW THAT YOU WANT HIM?’ Individually placed letters, bold and tinged brown with the weather. Sam can’t look away and he prays, dream dream dream.

Buy You A Mockingbird by candle_beck (2011, 10.3k, M, underage, outsider pov) A genuine horror story.

because you want to die for love by hathfrozen (2021, 27.3k, E) Sam and Dean settle into their Heaven—and into each other, too.

the constant vow by deadlybride (2022, 119k, E, fem dean-ish) They've just finished up a pretty standard job and are killing time in snowy Wisconsin when Dean wakes up no longer looking like Dean. That's just the start of their problems.

This Fortress Made of Us by mickeym (2009, 10.8k, E) Sam really didn't do very well without his brother. Coda for Mystery Spot.

State of Love and Trust/As I Busted Down the Pretext by cormallen (2010, 2.9k, M) When you know exactly what your brother's thinking, there are some chances you just don't take.

Quiet with the Rain by Linden (2014, 5.3k, T) Dean can spot an undercover cop at thirty paces, a hooker at twenty, and rims that will match his baby's at ten. But the fact that his little brother is in love with him—that, he can't see worth a damn.

have a cigar by deadlybride (2020, 5.6k, E) What happened with Andy and Ansem unsettles Sam. Dean doesn't seem worried.

Heart Shaped Balloon by winsive (2022, 18.5k, E, underage) Sam and Dad are fighting. No surprise, but it's the weekend before Valentine's Day and Dean isn't missing out on the chance to bang a cheerleader just to console his bratty little brother. He does bring back a heart shaped balloon for him, though. It's not supposed to be cursed.

Bare by gracerene (2022, 2.2k, T) Of all the things Dean hasn't done before, Sam never expected something as innocuous as skinny dipping to be on the list.

Speechless by candle_beck (2008, 11.2k, T, case fic) Dean loses his voice and their rapport is only moderately impaired.

Like It Was Yesterday by nomelon (2014, 4.9k, T, fem dean, amnesia) Sam can't remember a time when Dean wasn't there. Dean is always with him. Sam's whole life, there's never been anyone else.

Like a Ghost with Two Voices by Dyed_Red (2022, 46k, E) To cure Dean from the Mark of Cain, Sam has to let Dean, in all his demonic glory, possess him for 28 days. It goes about as well as expected.

Breathe You In (Choke You Down) by orphan_account (2021, 5.9k, E, pwp) Dean really likes the way Sam smells.

lost in yesterday by margaryes (2023, 1k, NR, john pov) John hasn’t seen his youngest son in 18 months.

Unraveling by Linden (2017, 855 words, E) No, he’d said, the first time Sammy had tried to kiss him, sixteen and half-drunk and stupidly beautiful, even though he’d wanted so badly to say yes.

pack up the moon by deathdreamt (2021, 5.9k, T, pre-slash) Sam storms back out from their room, his backpack on and his duffel hanging off his shoulder and isn’t it kind of tragic that his whole life fits in two bags. He looks suddenly much younger than he is, eyes shining. John is back at his guns, whiskey at his elbow, and Dean can hardly believe how rapidly his life is cracking down the centre.

Yesterday, minnesota by applecrumbledore (2022, 30k, E, case fic) Any initial awkwardness filtered away over a hundred miles of highway as Sam thumbed through the missing witch’s diary again. Some people had secret coke habits or secret second wives, and some people had passionate, pitch black, no-kissing sex with a family member every four to six months and never talked about it. You had to find ways to cope.

All Heartless Spectres, Happiness by orphan_account (2021, 5.6k, E) Lisa Braeden receives an email with the subject line, "You Deserve to Know." It contains a single video file and nothing else. (soulless sam)

The Palm Oasis by fictionallemons (2022, 12.3k, E, underage) John strands Dean and Sam at a middle-of-nowhere motel while he investigates possible demon omens in Arizona. The place is nothing to write home about, but at least it has a pool. Dean resolves to think of this as a vacation for him and his studious little brother, but when their money runs out sooner than expected, he considers turning tricks at a nearby truck stop so he can feed Sam.

Other Brothers by homo_pink (2020, 7k, M, underage, outsider pov) A callow boy can go from infancy to someone’s lover in the space of two wildflower summers.

Leader of the Pack by astolat (2007, 14.9k, E) Teaching old dogs new tricks.

Underground Wires by eggnogged (2012, 15.8k, E, fem sam, underage) It’s hard enough being a teenage girl even without all the extra crap: they move around all the time, her family is as far removed from normal as it’s possible to get, and she’s in love with her older brother. Sam has no control on any of it, she’s just trying to stay afloat.

Multitude of Sins by Linden (2015, 4.4k, T, outsider pov) Every now and again, Jim Murphy would look up from his altar and find the Winchester boys at the back of his church.

Like Arrows in the Hands of a Warrior by ADeedWithoutaName (2018, 10.3k, E, underage, dub con-ish, john pov) John Winchester loves his boys, and would take a bullet for either of them. He knows that he's doing it right, the way he's raising them, the things he's teaching them. Not every problem, however, has an easy answer. Like what to do after an incubus case in which their target got his pollen all over both of John's sons.

You Can't Lose What You Never Had by nigeltde (2016, 5.6k, E) You can't spend what you ain't got, and you can't lose what you ain't never had.

Flagstaff by Linden (2014, 7.3k, T, pre-slash, john pov) John tracked Sam down in Flagstaff, four days after he got home to find him gone.

I'll take my chance on a beautiful stranger by fleshflutter (2007, 3.8k, M, outsider pov) If Chase were a better friend, he might try to end the game now, before Brendan loses even more money. But if Brendan is a dick at Stanford, it’s nothing compared to how he is on break.

Cupid's Got A Gun by geckoholic (2012, 13.5k, E, non-con) Fuck-or-die, set in early S4. But they've been fucking for years, so that shouldn't be a problem, right? Wrong. Ever since hell, Dean's in no hurry to get that show on the road again.

Someone Else's Blood by sevenfists (2006, 6.7k, E) The first time, of course, was an accident. (pretend dating)

How Many Floors to Realize by lazy_daze (2009, 26k, E, swesson) AU from the end of It's A Terrible Life, in which Zachariah decides to keep stringing them along a little while longer, because damn if they aren't somewhat entertaining, right?

Worthless cartography by applecrumbledore (2022, 15.6k, E) Dean didn’t know what finally made him go for it. The djinn’s dream was a catalyst, but the call was coming from inside the house, and he’d been letting it ring for a very, very long time. (They get one night together right before Sam is taken to Cold Oak. Dean has to deal with that.)

The Space Between Sense and Memory by orphan_account (2021, 4.8k, T) There are a hundred unwritten rules on all the acceptable ways brothers should touch each other. There are hardly any ways at all to break them. Or; five times they follow the rules and one time they don’t.

Ions in the Ether by nigeltde (2019, 10.9k, E, case fic) When was the last time you trusted happy.

Crossed Wires by rivkat (2015, 10.9k, E) Dean thinks Sam is dead.

Crown and Anchor Me (or let me sail away) by Sena (2010, 23.7k, E, underage) Sam Winchester is fifteen years old, at yet another new high school in yet another state, he doesn't get along with his distant, distracted father, he's figuring out that he likes guys just as much as he likes girls, his clothes never fit and his limbs ache at the joint ever since his growth spurt started, he has to study for the PSAT and, oh yeah, he's a little bit in love with his brother, Dean, who's taken a break from hunting monsters to work at a local garage for minimum wage.

Wear Him Lika a Habit by sevenfists (2008, 2.2k, M) Their first kiss isn't an accident. It's anticipated well in advance, discussed for weeks, argued over, second-guessed.

Amor Prohibido by phoenixflight (2020, 3k, M, underage) They spent the spring of Sam's sophomore year living in a shitty apartment south of San Antonio. Every Friday night the clearest channel played three hour marathons of a Spanish soap called La Casa del Corazón. There was a mutually understood truce about watching it, because the alternatives were infomercials or creepy kids’ cartoons that futzed into static every fifteen seconds.

Open Road by Mollyamory (2010, 2k, T) Sam's old enough to know what's good for him.

It's the Blueprint of Your Life by queenklu (2011, 38.4k, time travel) Sam jerks awake in the middle of the night and everything goes to hell. Well, not literally, though Dean is staring down the barrel of less than a year before his deal comes due. In the midst of dealing (or not dealing) with his impending death, a killer ghost ship, and Bela showing up out of the blue, Dean also has to figure out what’s going on in Sam’s head to make him so twitchy, why he’s suddenly breezing through this case while writing endless notes in a notebook he won’t let Dean see.

North of Wednesday by Mollyamory (2008, 3.5k, G) Sam's behind the wheel before he realizes he doesn't have the keys. Coda to Mystery Spot.

non-wincest fic.

dean/omc. We Drank a Thousand Times by glorious_spoon (2010, 43k, M, warning: death) They meet in a bar fight in North Carolina when Dean is nineteen, broke, and desperate, then again when a hunt brings the Winchesters into town a few years later. Neither one of them ever puts a name to it but every once in a while, through the years, Dean finds his way back.

dean/cas: terror & desire intertwined by rupertgayes (2022, 39k, M) Faced with Castiel suffering a fate worse than death, Dean makes the decision to let Cas use his body as a temporary vessel. All things considered, Dean thinks, it could have gone worse.

gen, sam&dean: what lasts by deadlybride (2021, 17.2k, M) Not long after they move into the bunker, Dean loses a leg. Most of a leg. After the hospital, Sam brings him home, and they figure out how to live with what remains.

gen, dean-centric: To Repair Broken Men by procrastin8or951 (2015, 3.1k, T) Dad and Sam keep fighting. Dean can't fix his family, so he fixes things around the crappy apartment they are staying in.

dean/michael: our hour came round at last by orphan_account (2015, 1.8k, NR, pwp) "I want to be inside you," says Michael, low and velvet and hungry and that really shouldn't turn Dean on but it does.

dean/lucifer, dean/cas: exploratory by sp8ce (2022, 4.9k, E, non-con) One night, Castiel proposes he and Dean have sex. Except it's a little more complicated than that.

dean/cas: for a healthy heart by Askance (2013, 2.4k, T) A strange black box appears in Castiel's bedroom one afternoon.

gen, sam&dean: charmer & gentle by Askance (2015, 3.7k, G, outsider pov) The afternoon girl calls them Big and Tall, the strangers who come in late every now and then, buying this or that. The night girl doesn't think those names fit quite right.

dean/cas, past sam/dean: whose wings, though tattered, shall carry me home by fleshflutter (2009, 2.2k, T) There is a breeze moving across the field. It stirs the long grass in lapping waves like the sea. Castiel runs his fingertips through it and remembers flying.

#asks #fanfic #wincest #whatever it is #anon i have you to thank for getting me back into spn fic <3 i've been rereading some of these over the past few days #i was going to post this for ww yesterday but i fell asleep :( so here you go now sdfksdfh

250 notes · View notes

lifebloa · 8 months ago

Text

İO-GAMES-2025 - DEVASA+

These browser-based multiplayer games have taken the online gaming community by storm, offering a unique blend of simplicity and competitiveness that appeals to players of all ages. Whether you're looking to battle against others in real-time or collaborate in a delightful, chaotic environment, IO games provide a thrilling escape from your daily routine. In this blog post, we'll explore various aspects of IO games, including how to access them without restrictions, the most popular titles in the genre, and tips for unlocking your gaming experience.

As the world of online gaming continues to evolve, the rise of io games has captured the attention of players around the globe, combining simple mechanics with highly addictive gameplay.

One of the best places to explore the exciting realm of io games unblocked is at https://io-games-2025.github.io/, where players can dive into a variety of thrilling and entertaining games without the hindrance of restrictions, making it an ideal site for those looking to enjoy the best of these experiences.

Whether you are an experienced gamer or a newcomer eager to join in on the fun, accessing io unblocked games provides a fantastic opportunity to enjoy seamless gaming without barriers, allowing for endless hours of enjoyment

İo Games

When discussing the evolution and popularity of online gaming, one cannot overlook the immense impact of io games, a genre that has captured the attention of millions across the globe through its simple yet engaging gameplay mechanics, which allow players to enter a world of competition and collaboration instantly.

The appeal of io games unblocked lies in their accessibility; players can often access these games from various locations, whether in a school setting or at home, without the restrictions typically imposed by firewalls, allowing for a seamless gaming experience that fosters both casual play and competitive spirit among friends and strangers alike.

Moreover, the concept of io unblocked games has revolutionized how gamers interact with one another, as these easily accessible online platforms enable innovation in game design, giving rise to diverse game modes, styles, and strategies that keep players engaged for hours on end.

İo Games Unblocked

In recent years, the popularity of io games has skyrocketed, captivating players across various age groups with their simplicity, engaging gameplay, and competitive nature, making them a staple in the online gaming community.

One of the most significant advantages of io games unblocked is that they provide players with the opportunity to enjoy these games anywhere, whether that be at home, school, or in a public space, without facing the frustrating restrictions typically set by network administrators.

Additionally, the availability of io unblocked versions means that gamers can easily access their favorite titles without worrying about pesky firewalls or filters, allowing them to dive into fun and challenging adventures on platforms that support unblocked content.

İo Unblocked

When it comes to enjoying the online gaming experience, io unblocked games have become a popular choice among players who seek both entertainment and accessibility, as they provide a vast array of engaging options that can be played directly in the browser without hefty downloads or installations.

The appeal of io games lies in their simplicity and competitive nature, allowing players to jump right into action, whether they're engaging in a thrilling battle royale, a strategic team-based game, or a unique multiplayer experience that keeps them coming back for more fun.

Many gamers, especially students or individuals in restricted environments, have turned to io games unblocked options to bypass limitations imposed by schools or workplaces, ensuring they can continue to enjoy their favorite gaming experiences

1K notes · View notes

ms-demeanor · 2 years ago

Note

Since some people might want a Mac, I'll offer a Mac equivalent of your laptop guide from the perspective of a Mac/Linux person.

Even the cheapest Macs cost more than Windows laptops, but part of that is Apple not making anything for the low end of the tech spectrum. There is no equivalent Mac to an Intel i3 with 4 gigabytes of RAM. This makes it a lot easier to find the laptop you need.

That said, it is possible to buy the wrong Mac for you, and the wrong Mac for you is the 13-inch MacBook Pro with the Touch Bar. Get literally anything else. If it has an M2 chip in it, it's the most recent model and will serve you well for several years. Any new MacBook Air is a good pick.

(You could wait for new Macs with M3, but I wouldn't bother. If you are reading these guides the M3 isn't going to do anything you need done that a M2 couldn't.)

Macs now have integrated storage and memory, so you should be aware that whatever internal storage and RAM you get, you'll be stuck with. But if you would be willing to get a 256 gig SSD in a Windows laptop, the Mac laptop with 256 gigs of storage will be just as good, and if you'd be willing to get 8 gigs of RAM in a Windows laptop the Mac will perform slightly better with the same amount of memory.

Buy a small external hard drive and hook it up so Time Machine can make daily backups of your laptop. Turn on iCloud Drive so your documents are available anywhere you can use a web browser. And get AppleCare because it will almost certainly be a waste of money but wooooooow will you be glad it's there if you need it.

I get that you are trying to help and I am not trying to be mean to you specifically, but people shouldn't buy apple computers. That's why I didn't provide specs for them. Apple is a company that is absolutely terrible to its customers and its customers deserve better than what apple is willing to offer.

Apple charges $800 to upgrade the onboard storage from a 256GB SSD to a 2TB SSD.

A 2TB SSD costs between $75-100.

I maintain that any company that would charge you more than half the cost of a new device to install a $100 part on day one is a company making the wrong computer for you.

The point of being willing to tolerate a 256GB SSD or 8GB RAM in a Windows laptop is that you're deferring some of the cost to save money at the time of purchase so that you can spend a little bit in three years instead of having to replace the entire computer. Because, you see, many people cannot afford to pay $1000 for a computer and need to buy a computer that costs $650 and will add $200 worth of hardware at a later date.

My minimum specs recommendations for a mac would be to configure one with the max possible RAM and SSD, look at the cost, and choose to go buy three i7 windows laptops with the same storage and RAM for less than the sticker price of the macs.

So let's say you want to get a 14" Macbook pro with the lowest-level processor. That's $2000. Now let's bump that from 16GB RAM and a 512GB SSD to 32GB and 2TB. That gets you to $3000. (The SSD is $200 less than on the lower model, and they'll let you put in an 8TB SSD for $1800 on this model; that's not available on the 13" because apple's product development team is entirely staffed by assholes who think you deserve a shitty computer if you can't afford to pay the cost of two 1991 Jeep Cherokee Laredos for a single laptop).

For $3000 you can get 3 Lenovo Workstation laptops with i7 processors, 32GB RAM, and a 2TB SSD.

And look, for just $200 more I could go up to 48GB RAM and get a 4TB SSD - it costs $600 to upgrade the 14" mac from a 2TB SSD to a 4TB SSD so you could still get three laptops with more ram and the same amount of storage for the cost of one macbook.

I get that some people need to use Final Cut and Logic Pro, but hoo boy they sure are charging you through the nose to use products that have become industry standard. The words "capture" and "monopoly" come to mind even though they don't quite apply here.

"Hostile" does, though, especially since Mac users end up locked into the ecosystem through software and cloud services and become uncertain how to leave it behind if they ever decide that a computer should cost less than a month's rent on a shitty studio apartment in LA.

There's a very good reason I didn't give mac advice and that's because my mac advice is "DON'T."

#sorry i swear i know you're being nice #i am incapable of being nice when talking about apple #i was a total apple fangirl until the unibody #which is the domino that started all the other companies pulling shit like soldered RAM #they said 'fuck you - users shouldn't service their own computers' and I say 'fuck apple - users shouldn't use macs'#and that has been my stance on the matter since 2012 #which was the last time i bought a macbook because i knew i'd never buy a computer that would fight me to change my own battery

475 notes · View notes

sadhours · 1 year ago

Note

helloooooo :3

i wanted to request something for kurt kunkle where he has a twitch streamer!gf ? >.<

i just adore cute little kurt 🩷🩷

you’re streaming on twitch, just chatting and you’re loading up a TikTok compilation sent by a chatter when you hear the door of the apartment close, alerting you that your boyfriend kurt is home from his spree shift. he was streaming himself, you had it on your phone on silent, just to make sure he had at least one viewer. you’d shouted out his stream on your own but not many people actually went over to watch him. you’re not really surprised, you’re mostly referred to as a booby streamer as is.

kurt walks into the room, smiling all smitten at you as he pulls up his gaming chair and sits beside you, waving to the webcam.

“how many viewers do you have?” he asks as he leans closer to the screen, his grin widening as he sees the number, “holy cow! five thousand!”

you giggle as you lace your fingers and plant a kiss on his cheek, “everyone say hi to kurt!”

he throws up a peace sign, his eyes struggle to keep up with the chat. not quite as trained as you are to catch the meaningful commentary. he frowns as he reads comments about himself and you reach over to squeeze his thigh. you find him so sweet and endearing, you know he’ll capture his own audience enough.

“we’re watching some TikTok’s and then i might play something, we’ll see,” you tell kurt as you smooth your palm against his thigh. “did you have a good night?”

“interesting night, missed you though,” he mumbles, finally making eye contact with you. you flush as you squeeze his thigh again and lean closer to kiss his cheek.

“missed you, too,” you tell him honestly before pressing play on the video. but you can’t tear your eyes away from kurt. watching his enthusiastic reactions to the TikTok’s. his loud laugh and his innocent eyes. his hair falling just over his eyebrows with every cackle. he offers meaningless commentary while you continue to stare at him. heart swelling in size with the absolute adoration you hold for him.

his eyes dart back to the chat, comments about how you’re looking at him and he meets your eyes, cheeks flushed with flattery.

“you’re so cute, kurt,” you confess, honestly.

“you’re cute!” he argues back, lips thin with embarrassment.

“no, you are,” you giggle and can’t help but lean closer to capture his lips in a kiss. kurt kisses back slowly, hand moving to wrap round your waist from behind.

you bite his lower lip and he parts his lips, allowing your tongue easy entrance. you forget you’re live, kissing him with want and desire and his hand comes up to cup your cheek. tongues clashing and it’s sloppy… suddenly, you’re shocked back to reality. looking to the camera, you giggle and exclaim, “TOS! TOS! I have to go! see you all later!”

quickly you end stream and close out of the browser. kurt looks at you with his shy, tight lipped smile. you climb into his lap, kissing him and giggling into it.

#kurt kunkle #kurt kunkle x reader #kurt kunkle fluff #kurt kunkle fic

257 notes · View notes

saiscribbles · 2 months ago

Note

i dont know if i asked you this already but i meant to for a while n got nervous. I'm trying to get into streaming the making of my art and i make comics but my rough draft art is super messy so i wasn't sure if I should only film while drawing the lineart and color on top of the sketches or if i should do everything? I know it's ultimately my decision but I really admire your art and want to do well for my followers

I'm gonna be honest, I tend to dislike being watched while I sketch, but I do it on stream anyway. You might find drawing and chatting actually makes you more comfortable and not overthink what you're doing. But in the end its up to you what you want to work on when streaming your screen!

And for a streaming set up, everything I use can be used for free!

First I stream with OBS: https://obsproject.com/

I've created my entire streaming layout all in there.

The header, frame and section headers are all just PNGs modified for my look from a free streaming graphics set. The header and frame slowly slideshow through two images, one with more of a glow than the other, for the slight light pulsing effect. The background is just a looping no attribution video from Vecteezy. The main window is a window capture of my art program. The music player is a window capture of iTune's mini player. You can size and rearrange things like this anywhere you want on the screen.

For my Pngtuber I use Veadotube Mini: https://olmewe.itch.io/veadotube-mini

Which is freeware but I kicked them $20 cause I use it so much. It's very simple to use and supports animated gifs!

For the chat, superchats and that tip scroll up there I use a free service called Stream Elements: https://streamelements.com/

You can set up all sorts of alerts with it and get a ton of animation, sound and TTS options. And then you just include it in OBS as a browser source!

I hope that gives you an idea how to get started!

#Art Advice #Streaming Advice #Guess these are tags now lol

32 notes · View notes

sweetnsour1 · 10 months ago

Text

10:38

Micro Fluff, bakugou feat. bakusquad’s brain cell

“The fuck you idiots doin’ now?”

Kaminari was sitting in a chair, wrapped in Shinso’s capture scarf, feet in two of Bakugou’s favorite mixing bowls (that were now dead to him. He would immediately be buying new ones that he’d keep locked safely away from these unhygienic morons.), which were full of what he assumed was water. Sero still had a flashlight shining at Kaminari’s face although it had been rendered nearly useless when Bakugou had turned the kitchen light on. Mina used the lighting change to slide her sunglasses back over her eyes, crossing her arms over a blazer that was two sizes too big for her.

“Truth verification.” Her tone was cold and harsh and a bad impersonation of someone Bakugou had no chance of guessing at.

“Bakubro…can I get some help?” Kaminari’s eyes flew back to his reflection in Mina’s shades as she tsked at him.

“Who’s the one askin’ the questions here?”

“You?”

“Was that an inflection?”

“No? I mean…no? Fuck. No.”

“That’s better.” She leaned back in the chair, only staying upright because Kirishima unhesitatingly shifted to meet it before it toppled past the point of no return. She continued as if nothing had happened. “Now I’m going to ask you again…”

Kaminari gulped.

“Did…you…eat…my mother fuckin’ leftovers?”

“No?” Kaminari jumped within the restraints as crackles moved across the surface of the water around his ankles.

Mina hopped up, tossing the glasses on the table before grabbing a blindingly yellow phone with a black lightning bolt, waving it in the air above her head as she skipped out of the kitchen.

“Fantastic. You remember what I promised would happen to your browser history if you ever stole my food again?”

“Idiots,” Bakugou mumbled the word into the fridge as he grabbed his own food, ignoring the groans of regret coming from behind him. He wasn’t going to get involved with their nonsense if he could help it. He had better things to do…like tap his way to Mina’s live feed so he could enjoy this play out.

Masterlist

#bnha #bnha fluff #bnha imagine #bnha drabble #bakusquad #bnha bakusquad #bnha Bakugou #Bakugou #mha #mha fluff

81 notes · View notes

kopw · 2 years ago

Text

g1 season is upon us! i'm too lazy to gif every match myself! the world needs gifmakers like you! yes you!

this guide includes: basic gifmaking, actions, how to blur on-screen graphics, coloring tips catered specifically to wrestling footage (mainly aew and njpw), how to add subtitles, what tags to use

what you will need:

photoshop (i currently use cc 2017 for windows which you can grab from this post by birdysources)

kmplayer (for extracting frames)

what you might need depending on what you're looking to gif:

4k video downloader (for downloading videos off youtube)

vkopt (browser extension that lets you download videos off vk)

step 1: getting the footage

if you're directly downloading from a site this step is super easy. just make sure to always go for the highest quality of footage available (for njpw this is nowhere near 1080p, and even aew's 1080p footage is pixelated in places—but don't let this deter you!)

if you plan on giffing something off a ppv, chances are you might need to torrent the event. if you can, look for versions off fite with either web or webrip in the title for the best quality. this applies to weekly television too (fite doesn't have picture-in-picture). always seed your torrents. yes, even that one match from 2012. especially that one

you can also get recent shows off watchprowrestling dot co (previously org) which includes njpw tour shows and indie events as well. check out indy★wrestling★group on vk for smaller promotions and japanese promotions outside of njpw (tjpw, stardom, noah...)

step 2: choosing a clip

wrestling footage quality is not consistent. entrances with too many flashing lights or small particles will have huge quality drops, so unless it's something really special, don't put yourself through that. close-ups are generally your best friend but don't shy away from clips with lots of movement (you do sometimes want to gif the wrestling parts of wrestling too)

step 3: extracting frames

open your video in kmplayer. go to the part that you want to gif (though, i suggest leaving a bit of fodder before and after the actual clip. you can always trim the frames down later and it's better to start off with more). then, press ctrl + g

this should bring up this window:

your settings might be different if it's your first time downloading the app so just copy what you see here

kmplayer automatically captures into its own folder, which you can change if you want, but i just left it as is. i recommend pinning the folder you regularly use to the quick access menu in your file explorer

hit start, start the video, let it capture frames for however long, and then hit stop on both the extractor and the video itself. and now you have a bunch of frames in a folder. cool!

step four: converting frames to layers

open photoshop. this will take ages but open it. go to file -> scripts -> load files into stack...

this will bring up this window:

click browse... and select all the frames you just extracted. depending on the number of frames, this might take you a bit. then hit ok and let your layers load into photoshop. this will take a long time (saying this as someone whose laptop tends to heat up to the temperature of an egg pan at this point in the process)

step five: actions

i use actions (user-built series of recorded commands, meaning you don't have to click everything manually) for everything except coloring. i use a mishmash of like three different actions that i never bothered to organize. these are the two most important ones:

actionpack #1 by giulia (i use the setup and save portions from this one)

squishmoon actions by lildohnut (i use the hd sharpening from here, first layer on 0.3 for close-ups and 0.2 otherwise, and the second layer at the suggested 50%)*

*most sharpening settings you'll find are made for current films and tv shows so you do have to make some adjustment to fit your crunchy wrestling footage

step six: sizing

pick a size for your gif! here is a handy chart:

as for height, it can range anywhere from 300px-540px and beyond. most people go for 350px-450px. 400px is the sweet spot

personal preference: adjust canvas size not image size and fit your footage accordingly. some footage (looking at you aew) can have an odd black bar at the bottom, and manual resizing can help getting rid of it. if you just resize the whole image that will stay there and bother you

additional tip: guidelines

9/10 times you will leave your footage centered. however, there are times when this can look a bit awkward, depending on the framing, in which case i like bringing in a few guidelines. go to view -> new guide layout...

rule of thirds is generally good for drawing the eye to certain places. these settings will divide your canvas into nine squares that help you reposition your main gif layer

optional step: blurring pop-up graphics and banners

so, you have your sharpened, resized gif... but the sharpening made the small text and other unwanted elements on your screen shrivel up like raisins. you can leave it as is, people won't mind, it's a wrestling gif, who cares. but, if you want, you can just blur it out

i'm at least a little bit certain that i'm personally the guy who brought this over from k-pop tumblr (not saying i invented the concept, i just love being a trendsetter) and so i can give you a few reasons as to why people do this. such as:

adding subtitles over pre-existing, burnt subtitles (example: njpw post-match comments off njpwworld and not youtube)

getting rid of elements that might distract people from the focal point of the gif (the hotties... and the moves. mostly the hotties)

it makes your otherwise milquetoast sharpening look a little better in contrast

it's gonna be ugly either way so it's a pick your poison type of situation. if you do want to try the blurring method, you will need a basic knowledge of filters and layer masks

step-by-step blurring process:

duplicate your gif layer

blur the layer on top (i typically go for a 4.0 gaussian blur; for this, go to filter -> blur -> gaussian blur...)

apply a layer mask to the blurred layer and make the layer mask black (this will remove the blur effect, don't be scared). to access the layer mask just click on it. you can press alt before clicking to "enter" the layer mask (though you won't see your gif this way)

go in with a soft round brush (or any brush) with white and draw over the bits you want blurred. this is the tedious part

profit?

here's a comparison:

it's really down to personal preference ٩(ˊᗜˋ*)و

i convert my base gif layer and the blurred layer into a smart object before moving on with my process because sometimes photoshop likes to do this thing where it only applies the blur to the frame you're on. you can avoid this by combining the layers manually

if you're working with njpw footage and your clip plus coloring combination allows you to, you can also just go over the banner with black and blend it into the background. it's by far the best option but there's so rarely an opportunity to utilize it (i did it in the little header i made... go back and look at how beautiful she is)

step six: coloring

the big one. oh boy. prefacing this with: you can just skip coloring if you want. the sharpening settings i recommended earlier give a nice contrast to the gifs as is, so if it looks fine like that, you don't need any fancy colors. that being said...

my thought process going into coloring is to focus on skin tones and adjust everything around them. i don't tend to use psds, i always just manually color correct based on the actual footage i'm working with (venues differ, lighting differs, hues differ... incredibly hard to plan for all of it in advance). if i plan on making multiple gifsets of the same event/match, i do re-use settings, but sometimes minor adjustments are still needed

to begin coloring, you will need to use adjustment layers. you will pretty much need a basic knowledge of all of them (to the extent of knowing what the sliders and values do)

[1] i always begin with an exposure layer. this will remain above all of your layers (unless you plan on adding subtitles). here are my settings:

again, every layer you add after this will go below your exposure layer

[2] i add a selective color layer to further adjust the blacks. this will vary gif to gif but keep your adjustments small

[3] i add a vibrance layer. wrestling footage has major saturation problems that you can manage early on to make your life easier. take back a tiny bit (usually from -3 to -5) of vibrance before you begin your other color adjustments

[4] this is the big skin tone adjustment step using a curves layer. it does most of the heavy-lifting in my process. here is a video tutorial that explains the technique i use. it works the same with gifs as it does with images. the key differences are:

the image you are color picking off of shouldn't be a limited skin tone chart but rather an image of the wrestler(s) in natural (or as close to natural as you can find) lighting. i just go for renders used on the roster page. fan photography is way too edited to use here

try picking from a darker area of skin (shadows, midtones). it fits better with match lighting

this step will most likely correct color tints, but keep in mind that different promotions/shows/venues have different lighting. here are my personal observations:

aew dynamite and rampage have strong magenta tints

aew collision and roh honor club have strong red tints

njpw has a washed out blue tint

impact has a strong green tint

you can either lean into these (play around with making them really vibrant) or cancel them out using opposites on the color wheel (for example: to get rid of the magenta tint on dynamite, either decrease the magenta slider in your neutrals using selective color or add more green using color balance)

you will almost always have to add more cyan as well (either using color balance or channel mixer; channel mixer can also help you fine-tune skin tones with its blue tab—don't get rid of yellow undertones!)

[5] here is where i start fiddling around with manual adjustments that i seriously can't help you with... just add layers and change colors until you think it feels right. don't be afraid to start over if needed

[6] finishing touches! if you're like me you will have overcolored in the previous step. don't be afraid to add a saturation layer and decrease specifically the saturation of the reds (this will affect the skin tone; if you feel like you're on the right track but it's just too orange-looking, it's a saturation issue)

i also tend to add a black & white layer below the exposure layer up top set to soft light and lowered to 10% opacity. this gives you a bit of additional contrast that pulls the final gif together in my opinion

optional step: adding subtitles and watermarks

always add text layers above your coloring!

[1] subtitles

the font i use for subtitles is arial rounded mt bold, which you can download for free here. the point of subtitles is for them to be readable, so feel free to use any other font as long as it can be read with ease (nothing too thin or too blocky). if you plan on using the font i use, make sure to set it on faux bold and faux italics

font size differs based on the size of your gif, but it should normally be between 17pt and 23pt. i like to keep my tracking (letter-spacing) the same as my font size (so for 21pt subtitles i would have the tracking also at 21). i keep leading (the space between multiple lines of text) 3pt or 4pt

if there are two people speaking, i like setting the second speaker's text color to #ffd300. this is a generic yellow caption color that is still easy to read

after you have your basic text done, right click on your layer to add blending options. adding a stroke and a drop shadow can further help bring your text to the foreground. I keep my stroke (hah) at a simple 1px black. here are my drop shadow settings:

here is a more detailed guide about subtitles by clubgif

as for placement i add a horizontal guide at 95% and put my text on top of the line (while also keeping it centered vertically)

[2] watermarks

i personally don't use watermarks because i just don't care to, but if you want to add one, the same general ideas apply. just lower the opacity of your text layer at the end (if you want... again, a watermark is personalized)

step seven: timing

this is where you'll have to convert your video timeline back to a frame animation!

delete the frames that you don't need and then set a consistent timing (click on your first frame and shift + click on your last one to select all of your frames before adjusting). i like my gifs at 0.04, but depending on the footage you can go for 0.03 (newer bte episodes) or 0.05 (this also works if you don't have enough frames and want your gif a bit slower)

step eight: exporting

go to file -> export -> save for web (legacy)...

here are my export settings:

make sure to keep your gif under 10mb! if your file exceeds 10mb, you can't upload it to tumblr. you either have to cut some more frames or add compression to your gif (something i would never do, i always just cut frames)

additional tip: tagging

you have your gif! but how do you get people to actually look at it?

i always tag wrestlers* (full name, for both searchability and tag filtering purposes), promotions (initialisms like #aew over #all elite wrestling; if it's a more generic promotion name i.e. impact, go for #impact wrestling), tracked edit tags (#aewedit, #njpwedit; this not only helps source blogs find your posts and give them a bigger reach but it lets you browse other people's works). if you want to go the extra mile you can also include which event/video the gifset is from somewhere in your tags (if it's not already in the caption)

*even if you feel like it personally hurts you to tag that one wrestler you can't stand who happens to be in a match with your fave: do try tagging all wrestlers involved for ease of filtering, especially if you don't add image descriptions to your gifsets (tumblr's post content filtering system picks up on those)

general tumblr etiquette but don't cross-tag (i.e. tag a wwe gifset as #aew). no one likes cross-taggers. crossover events are exempt from this rule of course (forbidden door, multiverse united...)

additional tip: accessibility

don't use gradient text in your captions. screen readers can't read them!

if you can, include an image description. no matter how basic. this not only helps people with screen readers but the alt text of your gif is what's going to be displayed in case the gif isn't loading properly. here's a guide on how to caption gifsets by shangs

and you're done! all that's left to do is get silly with it. once you have the basics down you can virtually do anything. you can make those pretty graphics with blending. you can gif every single match of your fave in chronological order. sky's the limit

don't be discouraged if your gifs are not "perfect" from the get-go. this is a hobby just like any other hobby, and with time you'll get better at it. don't compare yourself to others and don't put your efforts down. only you can make the exact gifs you want to see

#aewedit #njpwedit #i spent all day on this... i hope it's at least a little bit helpful 🙏

200 notes · View notes

mostlysignssomeportents · 10 months ago

Text

The disenshittified internet starts with loyal "user agents"

I'm in TARTU, ESTONIA! Overcoming the Enshittocene (TOMORROW, May 8, 6PM, Prima Vista Literary Festival keynote, University of Tartu Library, Struwe 1). AI, copyright and creative workers' labor rights (May 10, 8AM: Science Fiction Research Association talk, Institute of Foreign Languages and Cultures building, Lossi 3, lobby). A talk for hackers on seizing the means of computation (May 10, 3PM, University of Tartu Delta Centre, Narva 18, room 1037).

There's one overwhelmingly common mistake that people make about enshittification: assuming that the contagion is the result of the Great Forces of History, or that it is the inevitable end-point of any kind of for-profit online world.

In other words, they class enshittification as an ideological phenomenon, rather than as a material phenomenon. Corporate leaders have always felt the impulse to enshittify their offerings, shifting value from end users, business customers and their own workers to their shareholders. The decades of largely enshittification-free online services were not the product of corporate leaders with better ideas or purer hearts. Those years were the result of constraints on the mediocre sociopaths who would trade our wellbeing and happiness for their own, constraints that forced them to act better than they do today, even if the were not any better:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/24/naming-names/#prabhakar-raghavan

Corporate leaders' moments of good leadership didn't come from morals, they came from fear. Fear that a competitor would take away a disgruntled customer or worker. Fear that a regulator would punish the company so severely that all gains from cheating would be wiped out. Fear that a rival technology – alternative clients, tracker blockers, third-party mods and plugins – would emerge that permanently severed the company's relationship with their customers. Fears that key workers in their impossible-to-replace workforce would leave for a job somewhere else rather than participate in the enshittification of the services they worked so hard to build:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/22/kargo-kult-kaptialism/#dont-buy-it

When those constraints melted away – thanks to decades of official tolerance for monopolies, which led to regulatory capture and victory over the tech workforce – the same mediocre sociopaths found themselves able to pursue their most enshittificatory impulses without fear.

The effects of this are all around us. In This Is Your Phone On Feminism, the great Maria Farrell describes how audiences at her lectures profess both love for their smartphones and mistrust for them. Farrell says, "We love our phones, but we do not trust them. And love without trust is the definition of an abusive relationship":

https://conversationalist.org/2019/09/13/feminism-explains-our-toxic-relationships-with-our-smartphones/

I (re)discovered this Farrell quote in a paper by Robin Berjon, who recently co-authored a magnificent paper with Farrell entitled "We Need to Rewild the Internet":

https://www.noemamag.com/we-need-to-rewild-the-internet/

The new Berjon paper is narrower in scope, but still packed with material examples of the way the internet goes wrong and how it can be put right. It's called "The Fiduciary Duties of User Agents":

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3827421

In "Fiduciary Duties," Berjon focuses on the technical term "user agent," which is how web browsers are described in formal standards documents. This notion of a "user agent" is a holdover from a more civilized age, when technologists tried to figure out how to build a new digital space where technology served users.

A web browser that's a "user agent" is a comforting thought. An agent's job is to serve you and your interests. When you tell it to fetch a web-page, your agent should figure out how to get that page, make sense of the code that's embedded in, and render the page in a way that represents its best guess of how you'd like the page seen.

For example, the user agent might judge that you'd like it to block ads. More than half of all web users have installed ad-blockers, constituting the largest consumer boycott in human history:

https://doc.searls.com/2023/11/11/how-is-the-worlds-biggest-boycott-doing/

Your user agent might judge that the colors on the page are outside your visual range. Maybe you're colorblind, in which case, the user agent could shift the gamut of the colors away from the colors chosen by the page's creator and into a set that suits you better:

https://dankaminsky.com/dankam/

Or maybe you (like me) have a low-vision disability that makes low-contrast type difficult to impossible to read, and maybe the page's creator is a thoughtless dolt who's chosen light grey-on-white type, or maybe they've fallen prey to the absurd urban legend that not-quite-black type is somehow more legible than actual black type:

https://uxplanet.org/basicdesign-never-use-pure-black-in-typography-36138a3327a6

The user agent is loyal to you. Even when you want something the page's creator didn't consider – even when you want something the page's creator violently objects to – your user agent acts on your behalf and delivers your desires, as best as it can.

Now – as Berjon points out – you might not know exactly what you want. Like, you know that you want the privacy guarantees of TLS (the difference between "http" and "https") but not really understand the internal cryptographic mysteries involved. Your user agent might detect evidence of shenanigans indicating that your session isn't secure, and choose not to show you the web-page you requested.

This is only superficially paradoxical. Yes, you asked your browser for a web-page. Yes, the browser defied your request and declined to show you that page. But you also asked your browser to protect you from security defects, and your browser made a judgment call and decided that security trumped delivery of the page. No paradox needed.

But of course, the person who designed your user agent/browser can't anticipate all the ways this contradiction might arise. Like, maybe you're trying to access your own website, and you know that the security problem the browser has detected is the result of your own forgetful failure to renew your site's cryptographic certificate. At that point, you can tell your browser, "Thanks for having my back, pal, but actually this time it's fine. Stand down and show me that webpage."

That's your user agent serving you, too.

User agents can be well-designed or they can be poorly made. The fact that a user agent is designed to act in accord with your desires doesn't mean that it always will. A software agent, like a human agent, is not infallible.

However – and this is the key – if a user agent thwarts your desire due to a fault, that is fundamentally different from a user agent that thwarts your desires because it is designed to serve the interests of someone else, even when that is detrimental to your own interests.

A "faithless" user agent is utterly different from a "clumsy" user agent, and faithless user agents have become the norm. Indeed, as crude early internet clients progressed in sophistication, they grew increasingly treacherous. Most non-browser tools are designed for treachery.

A smart speaker or voice assistant routes all your requests through its manufacturer's servers and uses this to build a nonconsensual surveillance dossier on you. Smart speakers and voice assistants even secretly record your speech and route it to the manufacturer's subcontractors, whether or not you're explicitly interacting with them:

https://www.sciencealert.com/creepy-new-amazon-patent-would-mean-alexa-records-everything-you-say-from-now-on

By design, apps and in-app browsers seek to thwart your preferences regarding surveillance and tracking. An app will even try to figure out if you're using a VPN to obscure your location from its maker, and snitch you out with its guess about your true location.

Mobile phones assign persistent tracking IDs to their owners and transmit them without permission (to its credit, Apple recently switch to an opt-in system for transmitting these IDs) (but to its detriment, Apple offers no opt-out from its own tracking, and actively lies about the very existence of this tracking):

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/14/luxury-surveillance/#liar-liar

An Android device running Chrome and sitting inert, with no user interaction, transmits location data to Google every five minutes. This is the "resting heartbeat" of surveillance for an Android device. Ask that device to do any work for you and its pulse quickens, until it is emitting a nearly continuous stream of information about your activities to Google:

https://digitalcontentnext.org/blog/2018/08/21/google-data-collection-research/

These faithless user agents both reflect and enable enshittification. The locked-down nature of the hardware and operating systems for Android and Ios devices means that manufacturers – and their business partners – have an arsenal of legal weapons they can use to block anyone who gives you a tool to modify the device's behavior. These weapons are generically referred to as "IP rights" which are, broadly speaking, the right to control the conduct of a company's critics, customers and competitors:

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

A canny tech company can design their products so that any modification that puts the user's interests above its shareholders is illegal, a violation of its copyright, patent, trademark, trade secrets, contracts, terms of service, nondisclosure, noncompete, most favored nation, or anticircumvention rights. Wrap your product in the right mix of IP, and its faithless betrayals acquire the force of law.

This is – in Jay Freeman's memorable phrase – "felony contempt of business model." While more than half of all web users have installed an ad-blocker, thus overriding the manufacturer's defaults to make their browser a more loyal agent, no app users have modified their apps with ad-blockers.

The first step of making such a blocker, reverse-engineering the app, creates criminal liability under Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, with a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a $500,000 fine. An app is just a web-page skinned in sufficient IP to make it a felony to add an ad-blocker to it (no wonder every company wants to coerce you into using its app, rather than its website).

If you know that increasing the invasiveness of the ads on your web-page could trigger mass installations of ad-blockers by your users, it becomes irrational and self-defeating to ramp up your ads' invasiveness. The possibility of interoperability acts as a constraint on tech bosses' impulse to enshittify their products.

The shift to platforms dominated by treacherous user agents – apps, mobile ecosystems, walled gardens – weakens or removes that constraint. As your ability to discipline your agent so that it serves you wanes, the temptation to turn your user agent against you grows, and enshittification follows.

This has been tacitly understood by technologists since the web's earliest days and has been reaffirmed even as enshittification increased. Berjon quotes extensively from "The Internet Is For End-Users," AKA Internet Architecture Board RFC 8890:

Defining the user agent role in standards also creates a virtuous cycle; it allows multiple implementations, allowing end users to switch between them with relatively low costs (…). This creates an incentive for implementers to consider the users' needs carefully, which are often reflected into the defining standards. The resulting ecosystem has many remaining problems, but a distinguished user agent role provides an opportunity to improve it.

And the W3C's Technical Architecture Group echoes these sentiments in "Web Platform Design Principles," which articulates a "Priority of Constituencies" that is supposed to be central to the W3C's mission:

User needs come before the needs of web page authors, which come before the needs of user agent implementors, which come before the needs of specification writers, which come before theoretical purity.

https://w3ctag.github.io/design-principles/

But the W3C's commitment to faithful agents is contingent on its own members' commitment to these principles. In 2017, the W3C finalized "EME," a standard for blocking mods that interact with streaming videos. Nominally aimed at preventing copyright infringement, EME also prevents users from choosing to add accessibility add-ons that beyond the ones the streaming service permits. These services may support closed captioning and additional narration of visual elements, but they block tools that adapt video for color-blind users or prevent strobe effects that trigger seizures in users with photosensitive epilepsy.

The fight over EME was the most contentious struggle in the W3C's history, in which the organization's leadership had to decide whether to honor the "priority of constituencies" and make a standard that allowed users to override manufacturers, or whether to facilitate the creation of faithless agents specifically designed to thwart users' desires on behalf of manufacturers:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/09/open-letter-w3c-director-ceo-team-and-membership

This fight was settled in favor of a handful of extremely large and powerful companies, over the objections of a broad collection of smaller firms, nonprofits representing users, academics and other parties agitating for a web built on faithful agents. This coincided with the W3C's operating budget becoming entirely dependent on the very large sums its largest corporate members paid.

W3C membership is on a sliding scale, based on a member's size. Nominally, the W3C is a one-member, one-vote organization, but when a highly concentrated collection of very high-value members flex their muscles, W3C leadership seemingly perceived an existential risk to the organization, and opted to sacrifice the faithfulness of user agents in service to the anti-user priorities of its largest members.

For W3C's largest corporate members, the fight was absolutely worth it. The W3C's EME standard transformed the web, making it impossible to ship a fully featured web-browser without securing permission – and a paid license – from one of the cartel of companies that dominate the internet. In effect, Big Tech used the W3C to secure the right to decide who would compete with them in future, and how:

https://blog.samuelmaddock.com/posts/the-end-of-indie-web-browsers/

Enshittification arises when the everyday mediocre sociopaths who run tech companies are freed from the constraints that act against them. When the web – and its browsers – were a big, contented, diverse, competitive space, it was harder for tech companies to collude to capture standards bodies like the W3C to secure even more dominance. As the web turned into Tom Eastman's "five giant websites filled with screenshots of text from the other four," that kind of collusion became much easier:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/18/cursed-are-the-sausagemakers/#how-the-parties-get-to-yes

In arguing for faithful agents, Berjon associates himself with the group of scholars, regulators and activists who call for user agents to serve as "information fiduciaries." Mostly, information fiduciaries come up in the context of user privacy, with the idea that entities that hold a user's data would have the obligation to put the user's interests ahead of their own. Think of a lawyer's fiduciary duty in respect of their clients, to give advice that reflects the client's best interests, even when that conflicts with the lawyer's own self-interest. For example, a lawyer who believes that settling a case is the best course of action for a client is required to tell them so, even if keeping the case going would generate more billings for the lawyer and their firm.

For a user agent to be faithful, it must be your fiduciary. It must put your interests ahead of the interests of the entity that made it or operates it. Browsers, email clients, and other internet software that served as a fiduciary would do things like automatically blocking tracking (which most email clients don't do, especially webmail clients made by companies like Google, who also sell advertising and tracking).

Berjon contemplates a legally mandated fiduciary duty, citing Lindsey Barrett's "Confiding in Con Men":

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3354129

He describes a fiduciary duty as a remedy for the enforcement failures of EU's GDPR, a solidly written, and dismally enforced, privacy law. A legally backstopped duty for agents to be fiduciaries would also help us distinguish good and bad forms of "innovation" – innovation in ways of thwarting a user's will are always bad.

Now, the tech giants insist that they are already fiduciaries, and that when they thwart a user's request, that's more like blocking access to a page where the encryption has been compromised than like HAL9000's "I can't let you do that, Dave." For example, when Louis Barclay created "Unfollow Everything," he (and his enthusiastic users) found that automating the process of unfollowing every account on Facebook made their use of the service significantly better:

https://slate.com/technology/2021/10/facebook-unfollow-everything-cease-desist.html

When Facebook shut the service down with blood-curdling legal threats, they insisted that they were simply protecting users from themselves. Sure, this browser automation tool – which just automatically clicked links on Facebook's own settings pages – seemed to do what the users wanted. But what if the user interface changed? What if so many users added this feature to Facebook without Facebook's permission that they overwhelmed Facebook's (presumably tiny and fragile) servers and crashed the system?

These arguments have lately resurfaced with Ethan Zuckerman and Knight First Amendment Institute's lawsuit to clarify that "Unfollow Everything 2.0" is legal and doesn't violate any of those "felony contempt of business model" laws:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/02/kaiju-v-kaiju/

Sure, Zuckerman seems like a good guy, but what if he makes a mistake and his automation tool does something you don't want? You, the Facebook user, are also a nice guy, but let's face it, you're also a naive dolt and you can't be trusted to make decisions for yourself. Those decisions can only be made by Facebook, whom we can rely upon to exercise its authority wisely.

Other versions of this argument surfaced in the debate over the EU's decision to mandate interoperability for end-to-end encrypted (E2EE) messaging through the Digital Markets Act (DMA), which would let you switch from, say, Whatsapp to Signal and still send messages to your Whatsapp contacts.

There are some good arguments that this could go horribly awry. If it is rushed, or internally sabotaged by the EU's state security services who loathe the privacy that comes from encrypted messaging, it could expose billions of people to serious risks.

But that's not the only argument that DMA opponents made: they also argued that even if interoperable messaging worked perfectly and had no security breaches, it would still be bad for users, because this would make it impossible for tech giants like Meta, Google and Apple to spy on message traffic (if not its content) and identify likely coordinated harassment campaigns. This is literally the identical argument the NSA made in support of its "metadata" mass-surveillance program: "Reading your messages might violate your privacy, but watching your messages doesn't."

This is obvious nonsense, so its proponents need an equally obviously intellectually dishonest way to defend it. When called on the absurdity of "protecting" users by spying on them against their will, they simply shake their heads and say, "You just can't understand the burdens of running a service with hundreds of millions or billions of users, and if I even tried to explain these issues to you, I would divulge secrets that I'm legally and ethically bound to keep. And even if I could tell you, you wouldn't understand, because anyone who doesn't work for a Big Tech company is a naive dolt who can't be trusted to understand how the world works (much like our users)."

Not coincidentally, this is also literally the same argument the NSA makes in support of mass surveillance, and there's a very useful name for it: scalesplaining.

Now, it's totally true that every one of us is capable of lapses in judgment that put us, and the people connected to us, at risk (my own parents gave their genome to the pseudoscience genetic surveillance company 23andme, which means they have my genome, too). A true information fiduciary shouldn't automatically deliver everything the user asks for. When the agent perceives that the user is about to put themselves in harm's way, it should throw up a roadblock and explain the risks to the user.

But the system should also let the user override it.

This is a contentious statement in information security circles. Users can be "socially engineered" (tricked), and even the most sophisticated users are vulnerable to this:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/05/cyber-dunning-kruger/#swiss-cheese-security

The only way to be certain a user won't be tricked into taking a course of action is to forbid that course of action under any circumstances. If there is any means by which a user can flip the "are you very sure?" circuit-breaker back on, then the user can be tricked into using that means.

This is absolutely true. As you read these words, all over the world, vulnerable people are being tricked into speaking the very specific set of directives that cause a suspicious bank-teller to authorize a transfer or cash withdrawal that will result in their life's savings being stolen by a scammer:

https://www.thecut.com/article/amazon-scam-call-ftc-arrest-warrants.html

We keep making it harder for bank customers to make large transfers, but so long as it is possible to make such a transfer, the scammers have the means, motive and opportunity to discover how the process works, and they will go on to trick their victims into invoking that process.

Beyond a certain point, making it harder for bank depositors to harm themselves creates a world in which people who aren't being scammed find it nearly impossible to draw out a lot of cash for an emergency and where scam artists know exactly how to manage the trick. After all, non-scammers only rarely experience emergencies and thus have no opportunity to become practiced in navigating all the anti-fraud checks, while the fraudster gets to run through them several times per day, until they know them even better than the bank staff do.

This is broadly true of any system intended to control users at scale – beyond a certain point, additional security measures are trivially surmounted hurdles for dedicated bad actors and as nearly insurmountable hurdles for their victims:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/08/07/como-is-infosec/

At this point, we've had a couple of decades' worth of experience with technological "walled gardens" in which corporate executives get to override their users' decisions about how the system should work, even when that means reaching into the users' own computer and compelling it to thwart the user's desire. The record is inarguable: while companies often use those walls to lock bad guys out of the system, they also use the walls to lock their users in, so that they'll be easy pickings for the tech company that owns the system:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/05/battery-vampire/#drained

This is neatly predicted by enshittification's theory of constraints: when a company can override your choices, it will be irresistibly tempted to do so for its own benefit, and to your detriment.

What's more, the mere possibility that you can override the way the system works acts as a disciplining force on corporate executives, forcing them to reckon with your priorities even when these are counter to their shareholders' interests. If Facebook is genuinely worried that an "Unfollow Everything" script will break its servers, it can solve that by giving users an unfollow everything button of its own design. But so long as Facebook can sue anyone who makes an "Unfollow Everything" tool, they have no reason to give their users such a button, because it would give them more control over their Facebook experience, including the controls needed to use Facebook less.

It's been more than 20 years since Seth Schoen and I got a demo of Microsoft's first "trusted computing" system, with its "remote attestations," which would let remote servers demand and receive accurate information about what kind of computer you were using and what software was running on it.

This could be beneficial to the user – you could send a "remote attestation" to a third party you trusted and ask, "Hey, do you think my computer is infected with malicious software?" Since the trusted computing system produced its report on your computer using a sealed, separate processor that the user couldn't directly interact with, any malicious code you were infected with would not be able to forge this attestation.

But this remote attestation feature could also be used to allow Microsoft to block you from opening a Word document with Libreoffice, Apple Pages, or Google Docs, or it could be used to allow a website to refuse to send you pages if you were running an ad-blocker. In other words, it could transform your information fiduciary into a faithless agent.

Seth proposed an answer to this: "owner override," a hardware switch that would allow you to force your computer to lie on your behalf, when that was beneficial to you, for example, by insisting that you were using Microsoft Word to open a document when you were really using Apple Pages:

https://web.archive.org/web/20021004125515/http://vitanuova.loyalty.org/2002-07-05.html

Seth wasn't naive. He knew that such a system could be exploited by scammers and used to harm users. But Seth calculated – correctly! – that the risks of having a key to let yourself out of the walled garden were less than being stuck in a walled garden where some corporate executive got to decide whether and when you could leave.

Tech executives never stopped questing after a way to turn your user agent from a fiduciary into a traitor. Last year, Google toyed with the idea of adding remote attestation to web browsers, which would let services refuse to interact with you if they thought you were using an ad blocker:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/02/self-incrimination/#wei-bai-bai

The reasoning for this was incredible: by adding remote attestation to browsers, they'd be creating "feature parity" with apps – that is, they'd be making it as practical for your browser to betray you as it is for your apps to do so (note that this is the same justification that the W3C gave for creating EME, the treacherous user agent in your browser – "streaming services won't allow you to access movies with your browser unless your browser is as enshittifiable and authoritarian as an app").

Technologists who work for giant tech companies can come up with endless scalesplaining explanations for why their bosses, and not you, should decide how your computer works. They're wrong. Your computer should do what you tell it to do:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2023/08/your-computer-should-say-what-you-tell-it-say-1

These people can kid themselves that they're only taking away your power and handing it to their boss because they have your best interests at heart. As Upton Sinclair told us, it's impossible to get someone to understand something when their paycheck depends on them not understanding it.

The only way to get a tech boss to consistently treat you well is to ensure that if they stop, you can quit. Anything less is a one-way ticket to enshittification.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/07/treacherous-computing/#rewilding-the-internet

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

345 notes · View notes