#Dana Estate

[alwaysbewoke]

[mariners-death]

I'm so normal about the lawyer posts

[brf-rumortrackinganon]

What a February

Well...what a great couple of days to be stuck in the office, amiright? (I work mostly from home but on occasion I have to go into the office and of course some nice little royal bombs get dropped when I can't be here.)

I've gotten some anons about what's happened but I won't be posting them (sorry, everyone!). Because so much has happened, I think it would just be confusing to rehash some of it, and other asks were also sent to Empress and Sassy (nothing wrong with that! They were doing answers in real-time and they've said pretty much the same things I'd have said).

So to recap recent events:

2/5/24: Buckingham Palace announced King Charles has cancer. Fortuntely it was caught early, Charles is doing/feeling well, he's beginning treatment immediately.

2/6/24: Harry catches a last-minute flight to London. Clarence House puts out a story "business as usual, nothing to worry about, King can still work and he is still working" (i.e., Harry go home).

2/7/24: Harry arrives in London. He goes directly to Charles, who is delaying travel to Sandringham to see him. Harry's PR says they met for an hour, Meghan wanted to say hello/wish him well via Facetime but Charles declined, and Harry went to BP for the evening. The Daily Mail tracked the comings and goings from Clarence House and realized the meeting lasted less than 15 minutes, from the time of Harry's convoy entering the grounds to Charles's helicopter leaving. It is further revealed that Harry spent the night in a hotel, William didn't return Harry's calls, Harry didn't want Camilla involved in the meeting, and none of Harry's "friends" offered to host him for the night. Also, William makes his first public engagements since mid-January when Kate's treatment began; Tom Cruise is there.

2/8/24: Harry flies home. He's papped at Heathrow entering the VVIP suite (as one does). Wait, Harry's not at home! He's in Las Vegas for the Super Bowl (or the Superb Owl) and makes a surprise appearance to present the Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year award. Sussex PR immediately begins telling everyone that Harry and Meghan will be attending the Super Bowl.

2/9/24: Lambrook School begins half-term break and the Wales family travels to Anmer Hall/Sandringham estate. Harry's appearance in Vegas gets picked up by the media.

2/10/24: Meghan's PR starts walking back their own rumors that they'll be in Vegas for the Super Bowl, citing the need to prepare for their Canada IG trip.

2/11/24: Super Bowl Sunday. No Harry and Meghan to be seen.

2/12/24: Meghan's PR reveals she spent the weekend cooking with Afghan immigrants in an Archewell initiative.

2/13/24: Harry and Meghan launch their newest rebranding effort with their new Sussex website with Meghan's coat of arms (rather than their joint coat of arms). Meghan announces a new podcast deal with someone no one has really heard of.

2/14/24: Harry and Meghan arrive in Vancouver for the "one year to 2025 Invictus Games." Meghan coordinates a photoshoot with outdoor activities; merches two outfits; and virtue-signals their "we're still royal" demands with Kate cosplay, a coat called Kensington, and a 'you can call us Sir/Ma'am' exchange caught on camera. In the evening they're papped going to a super-romantic Valentine's Day dinner date.

2/15/24: Day 2 of the Vancouver IG kickoff visit. They visit wheelchair basketball. Meghan gives her signature full-body contact-hugs. Sussex PR announce that the family has changed their surname to Sussex (from Mountbatten-Windsor) and this is the first time all family members have the same surname. Meghan also claps back at mounting criticism by saying "We will not be broken."

2/16/24: Day 3 of the Vancouver IG kickoff visit. Harry gives an interview to GMA's Will Reeve (son of the late Superman actor Christopher Reeve and his wife, Dana) in which he blabs about Charles's cancer and reiterates how much he loves his family, hinting that he's available to come back. Sussex PR also drops an article in the afternoon (with BP collaboration) announcing Harry and Meghan's plan to return with half in/half out; this is very clearly one of Charles's trial balloons from Clarence House.

(Today) 2/17/24: Backlash to the trial balloon is swift, so Clarence House backtracks immediately and does damage control. Kensington Palace announces that William will attend the 2024 BAFTAs tomorrow. Half-term break for Lambrook School ends on February 19th so the Waleses are traveling back to London/Windsor this weekend. And Hollywood has fought back by leaking about their Netflix deal, which contradicts a ton of Meghan's PR from 2020/2021.

Since some of you have asked for my thoughts, here you go. I am warning you now it's probably going to be my usual essay.

On the new website:

The new Sussex website is a problem. It conveys a legitimacy to the public that Harry and Meghan do not have, which The Queen and Edward Young made very sure was publicly known back in 2020. In particular, it's the use of Meghan's coat of arms, which signals palace support or endorsement. IMO, Buckingham needs to force them to take the coat of arms down.

I suspect they are using Meghan's coat of arms because a) Meghan believes it was personally awarded to her and is hers to use as she wants, whereas Harry's coat of arms probably comes with strings from the BRF and b) it's CYA if ever there's a divorce - if you look at it from a business standpoint, this is nothing more than Meghan branding the company with her name so she can prove ownership when they're splitting assets in a divorce, increasing her chances of getting the "company."

What about Archewell?

They're probably phasing out Archewell. It doesn't have the same visual connection to Harry and Meghan that Sussex does. I think they struggled so much with Archewell and were never able to get it off the ground in terms of a brand or an identity, in part due to the COVID-era launch. Sussex is a much stronger association for them and connects them more tightly to the royal identity. Archewell will probably be either their nonprofit arm or their content creator arm but it won't be as important going forward as it's been in the past.

Frankly, I would be surprised if Archewell v Sussex branding didn't come up in the brand analysis that WME did when Meghan first signed with them. We know they did a brand analysis because there was a ton of PR in August 2023 about Harry and Meghan becoming separate brands, which didn't work at all and they were back together as a "Sussex" brand in September 2023 with Dusseldorf Invictus Games. Seeing the success of "Team Sussex" in Dusseldorf definitely informed the website and the rebranding attempt.

What about the timing of all this?

They're taking advantage of the quietness from the royal family. They do this every year like clockwork when 1) the BRF is on summer holidays (July through early September) and 2) the BRF is on winter holidays (late December through early February). What is unusual about this timing is that it's taking place in mid-February and possibly well into March, which is a clear signal that it's the Sussexes taking advantage of Kate's absence to draw attention to themselves because Kate isn't there to steal their headlines.

And that it was a whole week of Sussex PR is not unusual either. It's their usual pattern when they have something big they want to promote and dominate the news with. It's cyclical at this point: first is a reminder of their royal status (Harry flying to Charles's bedside), then it's a reminder of their celebrity status (the Super Bowl appearance), then it's a big announcement (Sussex website), culminating in a set of public engagements/appearances (Invictus Games) with media attention. And to keep the attention coming, they drop breadcrumbs about the royal family to look like they're still "in," which buys them a few extra days of coverage because Charles falls for the bait every time.

The more interesting bit of timing in all of this is the Netflix article. Netflix wouldn't randomly give comments like this, so something must have happened behind the scenes for them to be pushed to this particular breaking point. I feel like perhaps the Sussexes may be trying to renegotiate their deals - maybe they asked for more money or maybe Meghan is trying to get more out of this 'Meet Me at the Lake' production than was agreed - and this is Netflix making it clear that it's over and done. I also have a niggling feeling that it might be connected to the upcoming film awards (BAFTA Film Awards tomorrow, Oscars on March 10th) - maybe they're trying to score tickets to parties using Netflix's name?

Are they really going to come back? Will Charles let them work again?

Analytically, the evidence points to 'no.' The trial balloon failed quickly faster than any other I've seen recently, which is and isn't surprising. It's surprising how quickly Charles backtracked since it had his implicit endorsement. It's not surprising that Charles pulled it down - he's as thin-skinned as Harry and Meghan both are when it comes to criticism.

But it's also more than just the trial balloon. It's everything else.

Charles wants them back on the family side. That's always been pretty clear. I think he waffles on having them back on the "work" side: on the one hand, the BRF needs the help since 10 of The Queen's 14 working royals are elderly (all 5 Kents, the 2 Gloucesters, Charles and Camilla, and Anne) and 2 of the remaining 4 are dealing with a signficant health issue and are temporarily out of commission - in the business sense, this is unsustainable and untenable succession planning. But on the other hand, no one wants Harry and Meghan back, for a litany of reasons including how much shit they've talked about the family (collectively and individually), the petty PR games they play for attention, and the Sussexes' general toxicity. And by 'no one,' I mean family members, courtiers/staff, others in the aristocracy (not getting invites to the Grosvenor wedding is a huge reflection of what "their kind" thinks of teh Sussexes), and the at-large general public.

Charles probably has entertained the idea of half in/half out now that he's in charge and the Sussexes are now lovebombing him (vs in 2020 when they were lovebombing The Queen) but his biggest opposition is public support - it took Charles 30 years and 4 significant deaths (Diana, Queen Mother, Philip, and her own forthcoming death) to get The Queen's support for Camilla to become 'Queen Camilla and, in turn, the public's support or the public's indifference.

Charles doesn't have that kind of time to get the institutional and public support to bring Harry back. He's got 10 years at best, which is now handicapped by a cancer diagnosis.

Beyond that, he doesn't even have Harry and Meghan's cooperation the same way he had Camilla's cooperation. Camilla cooperated with a 10-year wait to be liked well enough that no one would object to her marrying Charles. Camilla then cooperated with a further 17-year wait to be liked well enough that the institution would support her becoming Queen.

Can Harry and Meghan wait that long? No. They can't. They couldn't wait an extra year to get engaged. They couldn't wait to have their first child. They couldn't wait out the criticism from Fall 2018. They couldn't wait out the criticism from Summer 2019. Harry couldn't wait for the phone-hacking settlement. When they want something, they want it now. They buy completed projects and slap their branding on it vs. developing their own programs.

Can Harry and Meghan cooperate with anyone? No. They can't. They couldn't cooperate with William and Kate on the Royal Foundation. They couldn't cooperate with the courtiers for Archie's birth. They couldn't cooperate with the family on Megxit. They couldn't cooperate with the rota for tour coverage. They need to be totally and fully in control of absolutely everything. Their idea of cooperation is 'I tell you what to do, you do it.'

And because they're too impatient and because they refuse to cooperate, there's no way they'll support a 10-years long PR drive for Charles to rehabilitate their public image and get William's support. Heck, they can't even last a 3-month media rebrand. Charles knows that, which I suspect is why he may be trying to fast-track it but 1) when has fast-tracking something ever gone well for the BRF and 2) William is the linchpin holding it all together. Charles can't do anything without William's support. Yes, William is that powerful now - the public does pay attention to what he and Kate signal and the public would support them more than they would support Charles. Charles can't risk losing William's favor any more than he already has.

The third reason stopping Charles from taking Harry and Meghan back as working royals is Camilla and that Harry doesn't want her involved. He admitted it last week when he didn't contradict her leak about it. IMO, this reveals Harry's hand: he wants to position himself (or Meghan and himself) as Camilla's alternate, the way Charles often stood in as Philip's alternate. They want Camilla to retire so they can take her place in prestige, wealth, and attention. It's the only way they can "be better" than William and Kate, and they probably think it's how they can get "more" in the inheritance than William. Unfortunately for them, Camilla is Charles's line in the sand so no way will Charles let that happen after he spent 30 years getting Camilla to be able to sit next to him, and on top of all that, Camilla herself didn't wait 30 years to be Queen just for a pair of narcisstic glassbowl shitheads to usurp her at the last second.

That's the "working royal" side of it.

When you look at the "family" side of it, we know that Charles is more accepting of allowing the Sussexes back as family members, albeit with two strict rules:

No Meghan

No royal work

We know these are Charles's rules because it's already been communicated to us, most especially in the events around the Queen's funeral and his own coronation.

We also know these are Charles's' terms because Harry is publicly fighting against them this week, which suggests that these may have been reiterated (or relitgated, perhaps) during the <15-minute visit on February 7th.

"We all finally have the same surname for the first time as a family" and "maybe I'll become an American' is Harry's way of telling Charles and the courtiers that all four of them are a package deal and they all move together (like Archie's salt and pepper shakers). Meaning that if Charles wants Harry back, Charles must also take Meghan, Archie, and Lili too.

The Vancouver trip being such a royal rip-off is Harry's way of demanding royal work. His position is that he and Meghan must have the exact same lifestyle now that they had back in 2018: a palace residence, glamorous patronages, military honors, gushy praising media coverage, carriage processions, and equal precedence to the entire Wales family.

All this to illustrate that the dividing line is over the work aspect.

On one side is everyone saying "no, they can't work, they're just family." On the other side is Harry and Meghan saying "we're not just family, we're also working royals." And Charles is there smack in the middle saying "don't make my last years miserable" begging someone to give in. It's clear that Charles hopes it will be the institution (i.e. William) that gives in so he can fast-track the rehabilitation.

So no, I don't think Charles and the Sussexes will succeed in being part-time working royals. I think we'll see a lot of negotiating in the coming weeks and months (like Sussex demands for Trooping) and it may get loud and it may look frighteningly real, but that's only because William and Kate are on leave from work and their absence lets Harry and Meghan play offense. Once the Waleses are working again, or a new picture of Kate is released (I'm still hedging my bets for something celebrating Mother's Day next month), the Sussexes go back to playing on defense, and playing poorly.

We only need to worry if William, Kate, and Camilla appear to be changing their minds. They represent "the institution" to Charles, as well as public support (William) and establishment media (Camilla). William continues to tell everyone he isn't speaking to Harry. Kate's body language at the Windsor Walkabout keeps resurfacing. Camilla has leaked that Harry doesn't want to see her when he visits Charles and that she doesn't support the Sussexes coming back. There's nothing to worry about for now.

[my-gf-timothy-jackson-drake]

Bernard leaves his jacket at Tim's place after school, hoping Tim will bring it back the next day at school.

Tim does bring the jacket.

but also he's wearing it.

Tim's about to give it back after school but Bernard decides they should hang out at Tim's place again (so he can see Dana again of course) and he takes his jacket back when he leaves,,,, but leaves the one that he wore to school that day.

it's a big back and fourth of Bernard pulling a Cinderella and Tim seeing a jacket and being like "It's free real estate."

Darla sees this going on and just

[zahri-melitor]

Still speculating on 'where did the $50,000 go' as far as Jack's debts. Because.

We know Bruce is quite willing to give Dick and Tim, in particular, access to money in a manner that doesn't offend them (selling the Redbird for $50,000? Dick's famous 'inheritance' from John and Mary that just happened to be worth far more than his parents likely had unless there were serious life insurance policies?).

$50,000 was more than the median US household income for 2002 (which was $42,409), and it was tax-free. In terms of a cash injection into the household budget, it presumably was more than enough money for Jack to be meeting his regular debt payments for the loans for months or potentially even years. It would have covered Tim's school fees for at least a year, so he wouldn't have had to be pulled out. It was 'your debt issues don't need to affect your son's lifestyle outside of moving house' sort of money.

And what happens to that money? They give some of it to Mrs Mac to pay for her flight back to Ireland, and then the rest of it just...goes, but doesn't seem to change the situation in terms of how much of a financial hole Jack feels that he's in. (And again, if the Bristol house was owned outright, that was a far bigger contributor to fixing this problem).

That was the sort of money that Jack should have had as a savings nest-egg for emergencies, given their family situation.

Is that $50,000 doing what Bruce clearly intended it to do, and servicing Jack's debts for the next 6 months or so until War Games and Identity Crisis hit and he dies anyway, and anything further ends up being sorted out by his deceased estate? So Jack's supporting his family on the money brought in from Tim's car? (Plus Dana's salary, but it's Jack's lack of income that has caused this situation).

Did Jack throw it all onto the principal of the loans or into an offset? So while it was bringing down his loan repayments it wasn't actually helping with the problem of the family getting by until Jack found work?

And even after Tim has just contributed FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS to the household bottom line (plus the savings on not paying insurance premiums for a 15 year old's vehicle, plus whatever he's sold online for Jack, because Jack just wanted to have a garage sale and would have lost even more money that way), Jack has the hide to go 'and Tim can get a job' about their finances.

Why don't you get a job, actually, Jack. Not your 15 year old who you just pulled out of school before the end of the school year. He's already contributed more than he could earn in multiple years as a kid, by selling his beloved car.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

An excerpt from The Bezzle

I'm on tour with my new novel The Bezzle! Catch me next in SALT LAKE CITY (Feb 21, Weller Book Works) and SAN DIEGO (Feb 22, Mysterious Galaxy). After that, it's LA, Seattle, Portland, Phoenix and more!

Today, I'm bringing you part one of an excerpt from Chapter 14 of The Bezzle, my next novel, which drops on Feb 20. It's an ice-cold revenge technothriller starring Martin Hench, a two-fisted forensic accountant specialized in high-tech fraud:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865878/thebezzle

Hench is the Zelig of high-tech fraud, a character who's spent 40 years in Silicon Valley unwinding every tortured scheme hatched by tech-bros who view the spreadsheet as a teleporter that whisks other peoples' money into their own bank-accounts. This setup is allowing me to write a whole string of these books, each of which unwinds a different scam from tech's past, present and future, starting with last year's Red Team Blues (now in paperback!), a novel that whose high-intensity thriller plotline is also a masterclass in why cryptocurrency is a scam:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865854/redteamblues

Turning financial scams into entertainment is important work. Finance's most devastating defense is the Shield Of Boringness (h/t Dana Clare) – tactically deployed complexity designed to induce the state that finance bros call "MEGO" ("my eyes glaze over"). By combining jargon and obfuscation, the most monstrous criminals of our age have been able to repeatedly bring our civilization to the brink of collapse (remember 2008?) and then spin their way out of it.

Turning these schemes into entertainment is hard, necessary work, because it incinerates the respectable suit and tie and leaves the naked dishonesty of the finance sector on display for all to see. In The Big Short, they recruited Margot Robbie to explain synthetic CDOs from a bubble-bath. And John Oliver does this every week on Last Week Tonight, coming up with endlessly imaginative stunts and gags to flense the bullshit, laying the scam economy open to the bone.

This was my inspiration for the Hench novels (I've written and sold three of these, of which The Bezzle is number two; I've got at least two more planned). Could I use the same narrative tactics I used to explain mass surveillance, cryptography and infosec in the Little Brother books to turn scams into entertainment, and entertainment into the necessary, informed outrage that might precipitate change?

The main storyline in The Bezzle concerns one of the most gruesome scams in today's America: prison-tech, which sees America's vast army of prisoners being stripped of letters, calls, in-person visits, parcels, libraries and continuing ed in favor of cheap tablets that bilk prisoners and their families of eye-watering sums for every click they make:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/14/minnesota-nice/#shitty-technology-adoption-curve

But each Hench novel has a variety of side-quests that work to expose different kinds of financial chicanery. The Bezzle also contains explainers on the workings of MLMs/Ponzis (and how Gerry Ford and Betsy DeVos's father-in-law legalized one of the most destructive forces in America) and the way that oligarchs, foreign and domestic, use Real Estate Investment Trusts to hide their money and destroy our cities.

And there's a subplot about music-royalty theft, a form of pernicious wage theft that is present up and down the music industry supply-chain. This is a subject that came up a lot when Rebecca Giblin and I were researching and writing Chokepoint Capitalism, our 2022 book about creative labor markets:

https://chokepointcapitalism.com/

Two of the standout cases from that research formed the nucleus of the subplot in The Bezzle, the case of Leonard Cohen's batshit manager who stole millions from him and then went to prison for stalking him, leaving him virtually penniless and forced to keep touring to keep himself fed:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2012/apr/19/leonard-cohen-former-manager-jailed

The other was George Clinton, whose manager forged his signature on a royalty assignment, then used the stolen money to defend himself against Clinton's attempts to wrestle his rights back and even to sue Clinton for defamation for writing about the caper in his memoir:

https://www.musicconnection.com/the-legal-beat-george-clinton-wins-defamation-case/

That's the tale that this excerpt – which I'll be serializing in six parts over the coming week – tells, in fictionalized form. It's not Margot Robbie in a bubble-bath, it's not a John Oliver monologue, but I think it's pretty goddamned good.

I'm leaving for a long, multi-city, multi-country, multi-continent tour with The Bezzle next Wednesday, starting with an event at Weller Bookworks in Salt Lake City on the 21st:

https://www.wellerbookworks.com/event/store-cory-doctorow-feb-21-630-pm

I'll in be in San Diego on the 22nd at Mysterious Galaxy:

https://www.mystgalaxy.com/22224Doctorow

And then it's on to LA (with Adam Conover), Seattle (with Neal Stephenson), Portland, Phoenix and beyond:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/16/narrative-capitalism/#bezzle-tour

I hope you'll come out for the tour (and bring your friends)!

Between 1972 and 1978, Steve Soul (a.k.a. Stefon Magner) had a string of sixteen Billboard Hot 100 singles, one of which cracked the Top 10 and won him an appearance on Soul Train. He is largely forgotten today, except by hip-­hop producers who prize his tracks as a source of deep, funky grooves. They sampled the hell out of him, not least because his rights were controlled by Inglewood Jams, a clearinghouse for obscure funk tracks that charged less than half of what the Big Three labels extracted for each sample license.

Even at that lower rate, those license payments would have set Stefon up for a comfortable retirement, especially when added to his Social Security and the disability check from Dodgers Stadium, where he cleaned floors for more than a decade before he fell down a beer-­slicked bleacher and cracked two of his lumbar discs. But Stefon didn’t get a dime. His former manager, Chuy Flores, forged his signature on a copyright assignment in 1976. Stefon didn’t discover this fact until 1979, because Chuy kept cutting him royalty checks, even as Stefon’s band broke up and those royalties trickled off. In Stefon’s telling, the band broke up because the rest of the act—­especially the three-­piece rhythm section of two percussionists and a beautiful bass player with a natural afro and a wild, infectious hip-­wiggle while she played—­were too coked up to make it to rehearsal, making their performances into shambling wreckages and their studio sessions into vicious bickerfests. To hear the band tell of it, Stefon had bad LSD (“Lead Singer Disease”) and decided he didn’t need the rest of them. One thing they all agreed on: there was no way Stefon would have signed over the band’s earnings to Chuy, who was little more than a glorified bookkeeper, with Stefon hustling all their bookings and even ordering taxis to his bandmates’ houses to make sure they showed up at the studio or the club on time. Stefon remembered October of ’79 well. He’d been waiting with dread for the envelope from Chuy. The previous royalty check, in July, had been under $250. The previous quarter’s had been over $1,000. This quarter’s might have zero. Stefon needed the money. His 1972 Ford Galaxie needed a new transmission. He couldn’t keep driving it in first.

The envelope arrived late, the day before Halloween, and for a brief moment, Stefon was overcome by an incredible, unbelieving elation: Chuy’s laboriously typewritten royalty statement ended with the miraculous figure of $7,421.16. Seven thousand dollars! It was more than two years’ royalties, all in one go! He could fix the Galaxie’s transmission and get the ragtop patched, and still have money left over for his back rent, his bar tab, his child support, and a fine steak dinner, and even then, he’d end the month with money in his savings account.

But there was no check in the envelope. Stefon shook the envelope, carefully unfolded the royalty statement to ensure that there was no check stapled to its back, went downstairs to the apartment building lobby and rechecked his mailbox.

Finally, he called Chuy.

“Chuy, man, you forgot to put a check in the envelope.”

“I didn’t forget, Steve. Read the paperwork again. You gotta send me a check.”

“What the fuck? That’s not funny, Chuy.”

“I ain’t joking, Steve. I been advancing you royalties for more than three years, but you haven’t earned nothing new since then—­no new recordings. I can’t afford to carry you no more.”

“Say what?”

Chuy explained it to him like he was a toddler. “Remember when you signed over your royalties to me in ’76? Every dime I’ve sent you since then was an advance on your future recordings, only you haven’t had none of those, so I’m cutting you off and calling in your note. I’m sorry, Steve, but I ain’t a charity. You don’t work, you don’t earn. This is America, brother. No free lunches.”

“After I did what in ’76?”

“Steve, in 1976 you signed over all your royalties to me. We agreed, man! I can’t believe you don’t remember this! You came over to my spot and I told you how it was and you said you needed money to cover the extra horns for the studio session on Fight Fire with Water. I told you I’d cover them and you’d sign over all your royalties to me.”

Stefon was briefly speechless. Chuy had paid the sidemen on that session, but that was because Chuy owed him a thousand bucks for a string of private parties they’d played for some of Chuy’s cronies. Chuy had been stiffing him for months and Stefon had agreed to swap the session fees for the horn players in exchange for wiping out the debt, which had been getting in the way of their professional relationship.

“Chuy, you know it didn’t happen that way. What the fuck are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about when you signed over all your royalties to me. And you know what? I don’t like your tone. I’ve carried your ass for years now, sent you all that money out of my own pocket, and now you gotta pay up. My generosity’s run out. When you gonna send me a check?”

Of course, it was a gambit. It put Stefon on tilt, got him to say a lot of ill-­advised things over the phone, which Chuy secretly recorded. It also prompted Stefon to take a swing at Chuy, which Chuy dived on, shamming that he’d had a soft-­tissue injury in his neck, bringing suit for damages and pressing an aggravated-­assault charge.

He dropped all that once Stefon agreed not to keep on with any claims about the forged signature; Stefon went on to become a good husband, a good father, and a hard worker. And if cleaning floors at Dodgers Stadium wasn’t what he’d dreamed of when he was headlining on Soul Train, at least he never missed a game, and his boy came most weekends and watched with him. Stefon’s supervisor didn’t care.

But the stolen royalties ate at him, especially when he started hearing his licks every time he turned on the radio. His voice, even. Chuy Flores had a fully paid-­off three-­bedroom in Eagle Rock and two cars and two ex-­wives and three kids he was paying child support on, and Stefon sometimes drove past Chuy Flores’s house to look at his fancy palm trees all wrapped up in strings of Christmas lights and think about who paid for them.

ETA: Here's part two!

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

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/17/the-steve-soul-caper/#lead-singer-disease

[mariacallous]

RealPage says it isn’t doing anything wrong by suggesting to landlords how much rent they could charge. In a move to reclaim its own narrative, the property management software company published a microsite and a digital booklet it’s calling “The Real Story,” as it faces multiple lawsuits and a reported federal criminal probe related to allegations of rental price fixing.

RealPage’s six-page digital booklet, published on the site in mid-June, addresses what it calls “false and misleading claims about its software”—the myriad of allegations it faces involving price-fixing and rising rents—and contends that the software benefits renters and landlords and increases competition. It also said landlords accept RealPage’s price recommendations for new leases less than 50 percent of the time and that the software recommends competitive prices to help fill units.

“‘The heart of this case’ never had a heartbeat—the data clearly shows that RealPage does not set customers’ prices and customers do what they believe is best for their respective properties to vigorously compete against each other in the market,” the digital booklet says.

But landlords are left without concrete answers, as questions around the legality of this software are ongoing as they continue renting properties. “I don’t think we’re seeing this as a RealPage issue but rather as a revenue management software issue,” says Alexandra Alvarado, the director of marketing and education at the American Apartment Owners Association, the largest association of landlords in the US.

Alvarado says some landlords are taking pause and asking questions before using the tech. Software like RealPage “has made it much easier to understand what is happening in the market,” Alvarado says. “Technology has helped us in so many ways to make all these processes more efficient. In this case, it’s now borderline too efficient.” And members of the AAOA are asking questions about the legality of revenue management, she says. “The first thing landlords typically think is, what is the legal repercussion? Am I going to be in trouble for using this software? If the answer is maybe, it’s usually off the table.”

Dana Jones, president and CEO of RealPage, said in a statement released alongside the booklet that “the time is now to address a number of false claims about RealPage’s revenue management software, and how rental housing providers operate when setting rent prices.” RealPage did not respond to WIRED’s queries asking what prompted the lengthy statement in June. Officials appear to be narrowing in on RealPage, as the Justice Department is allegedly planning to sue the company, according to a report from Politico last week. The company declined a request to comment on the latest in the ongoing Department of Justice probe.

Allegations of price-fixing that may constitute antitrust violations have dogged the software company since late 2022, when ProPublica published an investigation alleging that RealPage’s software was linked to rent rises in some US cities, as the company used private, aggregated data provided by its customers to suggest rental prices. (In response to ProPublica's reporting, RealPage commented that it “uses aggregated market data from a variety of sources in a legally compliant manner.”)

RealPage’s software is powerful because it anonymizes rental data and can provide landlords and property managers with nonpublic and public data about rentals, which may be different from that advertised publicly on platforms like real estate marketplace Zillow. The company contends that it’s not engaging in price-fixing, as landlords are not forced to accept the rents that RealPage’s algorithm suggests. Sometimes it even recommends landlords lower the rent, RealPage claims. But antitrust enforcers have alleged that even sharing private information via an algorithm and using it for price recommendations can be as conspiratorial as back-room handshake deals, even if landlords don’t end up renting apartments at those rates. The reported antitrust investigation is ongoing.

RealPage’s algorithmic pricing model is among one of the first subject to scrutiny, perhaps due to its involvement in housing, a necessity that has ballooned in price as housing supply languishes. Typical rent in the US is just under $2,000, according to Zillow, up from around $1,500 in early 2020. “Housing affordability is a national problem created by economic and political forces—not by the use of revenue management software,” Realpage says. But renters can’t tell whether their rates are rising because of algorithms or not.

“It’s almost impossible to know if you are just a spectator or a victim,” says Shanti Singh, legislative and communications director with Tenants Together, a California-based coalition of tenants activists. If tenants call a hotline over raised rent or fees, “we’re not necessarily going to be able to see or connect that their landlord is using RealPage.”

The state of Arizona sued RealPage and nine landlords in February, claiming a conspiracy between the company and landlords led renters in Phoenix and Tucson to pay “millions of dollars” more in rent. That followed a similar lawsuit out of Washington, DC. In the capital’s greater metropolitan area, more than 90 percent of rental units in large apartment buildings were priced using RealPage software, according to DC’s attorney general.

The cases against RealPage puts algorithmic pricing to the test; as the technology becomes more common, antitrust law has yet to keep pace. Officials have other concerns around algorithms used for alleged hotel price fixing, as well as e-commerce algorithms. “The concern of regulators that algorithms can be used in ways that harm competition—that idea is here to stay,” says Ed Rogers, a partner at law firm Ballard Spahr who focuses on antitrust cases. “RealPage could end up really being a test case, not just for the real estate rental industry but for this aspect of AI and software and its role in a competitive landscape.”

The impact of algorithmic pricing varies greatly. Amazon has been accused of pushing up prices with a secret algorithm. (Amazon has said the “allegation that we somehow force sellers to use our optional services is simply not true.”) But others operate in plain sight, like dynamic pricing for rideshare costs, and don’t involve multiple companies sharing information. Not all of these algorithms are engaged in activity that may be considered anticompetitive. A Nevada judge in May dismissed a suit brought by hotel guests against several Las Vegas hotel operators, finding there was no agreement among them to fix prices using shared algorithms.

Yardi Systems, another US property management company, is also facing a class action suit regarding antitrust violations for artificially inflating rent prices. The company has said it did “nothing illegal,” as it does not mandate rent prices through its software or make “collusive pricing decisions.”

Typical rental costs in Phoenix have increased by more than about $500 a month from April 2020 to 2024, and by around $400 in Washington, DC, in the same period, according to Zillow.

Renters have also filed numerous class action suits against RealPage and property owners that have been consolidated. Some landlords named in those settled claims earlier this year. The court threw out a lawsuit regarding price fixing for student housing but has said the class action from renters can go forward. Attorneys representing some of the plaintiffs in the class action did not respond to requests to comment.

RealPage laid off about 4 percent of staff in June. “RealPage is hyper-focused on innovation and accelerating its business growth in 2024 and beyond, and as a result has made the decision to eliminate a small number of roles within the company,” Jennifer Bowcock, a spokesperson for the company, says. The layoffs were not connected to the antitrust lawsuit, she says. Thoma Bravo, the owner of RealPage, did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

As of 2020, RealPage said it was collecting data on some 16 million rental units across the US. There are 44 million renter households in the US, and nearly 22 million rental units are owned by for-profit businesses. RealPage grew when it acquired Lease Rent Options (LRO) in 2017, after clearing antitrust scrutiny by the Justice Department. The DOJ did not comment on questions from WIRED about its reported investigation into RealPage or its approval of RealPage’s acquisition of Lease Rent Options in 2017.

When asked about the latest in the probe, RealPage referred to a portion of its recent lengthy statement, which said: “The DOJ extensively reviewed LRO and YieldStar in 2017, without objecting to, much less challenging, any feature of the products.” RealPage also says that its “products are fundamentally the same today” as they were when the acquisition received approval.

In June, The New York Times asked assistant US attorney general Jonathan Kanter, the Justice Department’s top antitrust official, if he would view an AI tool communicating pricing information as the same as humans colluding, with the question referencing the reported RealPage investigation. Kanter replied: “I often say that if your dog bites somebody, you’re responsible for your dog biting somebody. If your AI fixes prices, you’re just as responsible.”

The Justice Department also last year filed a statement of interest in the RealPage combined class action lawsuit, as the case could become a precedent setter in algorithmic pricing. The statement mirrored Kanter’s argument that the method of price setting doesn’t matter, and algorithms are just the latest evolution in information gathering and sharing.

“In-person handshakes gave way to phone and fax, and later to email. Algorithms are the new frontier,” the Justice Department argued in a statement of interest it filed in the class action lawsuit against RealPage and landlords. “And, given the amount of information an algorithm can access and digest, this new frontier poses an even greater anti-competitive threat than the last.”

[martiandmichelle]

Is there a profile anywhere to match my Marti's? It seems to defy gravity that she can stand up straight!

Hey guys, it's Roxy. Those of us ladies who appear here on tumblr with Marti took a vote as to who should tell the stories we need to tell to bring you, our beloved readers and followers, up to date on what's going on both at Marchelle (our home estate) and at Studio M - our adult studio. It was almost a unanimous vote with only one dissent; I was the dissenting vote while everyone else voted for me. So I'll make a small start here and can hopefully finish it all next week since the studio is closed. Most of what I'll write will be in the past - some near, some far - but I'll start in the present, with, what else THE TITS.

I suspect all you Marti aficionados have already noticed from the photo that THE TITS are growing again - and quickly! But that's how it's usually been with Marti: several months of little to no boob growth followed by a short but rapid and intense growth. She's in that intense phase right now, and though she only recently graduated to a T cup at the rate she's growing she'll be a U cup sometime this winter. Fucking amazing!!!

Of course, at her size now, we all worry about whether the rest of her body and especially her back, shoulders and neck can continue to support her massive hooters. She says she has no pain whatsoever aside from some minor pain from her tits as they grow so quickly. She has a group of doctors, therapists (that would be Dana), a live-in nurse (Gina), a nutritionist (Gail), and a trainer working with her and monitoring her at least once a month. They all say she is perfectly healthy and truly seems to bear the weight of her breasts with no difficulty - well, except that the sometimes get in the way of everyday activities, like putting on her shoes.

As we said here earlier, Marti lost some 12 pounds during her sickness and yet her boobs actually grew! She's determined to keep the weight off and plans to get back to her rigorous work-outs after Christmas.

I'll try to write more later today, but in case I don't: MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!

[aprisolis]

˓⠀⠀﹪ :⠀⠀٬⠀⠀IVYRED.⠀⠀⸻⠀⠀is a fictional four-member girl group under kayak72 consisting of NAVA, SAANVI, MALEKA, and NERIAH. debuting on october 26, 2017, ivyred has largely been credited for reviving their label into vibrancy after their senior brother group, DIEM, saved them from bankruptcy.

based in new york city, the group was scouted by kayak72's creative director, romina richetti through a talent search looking for self-producing female artists throughout major cities around the world. though the group initially began with five scouted members, the fifth member, DANA, would be pulled out of the group by her parents who had previously been told she would be placed in a duo with her older brother DAX.

the group has often drawn parallels between themselves and diem. it is rumored that the members of the two groups do not get along and often are not present in the same rooms. seemingly fueling the fire, members avoni and neriah have been noted saying the diem boys were, "overgrown frat boys", following the scandal that alleged a member had offended the recording academy. unlike their counterparts, however, ivyred has drawn mass appeal, frequently selling out stadiums and even winning a grammy of their own for their album HONEY IN 2021.

&.&.    SECTION  ONE ,      the basics

GROUP NAME: ivyred

LABEL: kayak72 (2017 - present)

DEBUT DATE: october 26, 2017

DEBUT SINGLE: sorry not sorry

DEBUT ALBUM: ivy

GENRE: pop, r&b, bedroom pop

FANDOM NAME: ivymind

MOST POPULAR SONGS: 7 rings, deliver, kiss me more

&.&.    SECTION  TWO ,      the members

𓆩*𓆪 .⠀⠀NAVA RAHMANI-ALDERS, 1995: born the first child to real estate mogul, yasser rahmani and his second wife, janna alders, nava was frequently referred to as her parents' "trial child". growing up, she attained an independence that peeved her mother who longed for a mother-daughter relationship that she had not been lucky enough to have with her own mother. by her 10th birthday, the rahmani-alders family would receive their own reality show starring nava, her parents, older step-siblings, and her two younger brothers. nava was noticeably absent from appearing on the show, later claiming that her mother had instructed cameramen to only film her when she ate to "make sure she stayed away from the food". nava's interest in music was given to her by her grandfather who played an active role in taking nava to music and vocal lessons when her parents refused. after filing for emancipation in 2012, nava would go on to work as an assistant for producer, RAHIM NAQVI, eventually being recommended to romina for a spot in ivyred.

𓆩*𓆪 .⠀⠀SAANVI MISHRA, 1995: a relatively quiet child, saanvi was born a twin in northeast india to a college professor father and a surgeon mother. after receiving an offer for a position as chief of surgery at a hospital in boston, the family would pack their things and move to the united states. there, saanvi found a love of music that would bring her out of her shell, landing her opportunities to perform with her school across new england in various musical theater competitions. after graduating in high school, saanvi would attend julliard in hopes on one day performing on broadway. three years later, while in line for an audition, she would come across a flyer for kayak72 looking for artists to join a talent search. being the first member to pass through auditions, romina famously built the group around saanvi who takes on a leadership role within the group.

𓆩*𓆪 .⠀⠀MALEKA JACKSON, 1996: raised the sole child of yolanda and demarion jackson, maleka had grown up with access to almost every interest she could ever have. running through dance classes and jiu jitsu lessons and any and every sport her school offered was the only way to keep the young girl occupied. a beloved headache for her parents, the jacksons were more than willing to invest in their daughter's fixation on music in all of its forms. finally deciding to stick to cello and voice lessons, it wouldn't be long before maleka spent most of her time practicing her craft than following her rowdy cousins out on the weekends. though yolanda and demarion grew wary of her social development, the scholarship she would soon receive to attend the new england conservatory of music upon her graduation from high school. while there, maleka found the pressure of assignments and composition thrilling, even taking a chance to take on a side hustle laying cello backings for hip-hop tracks. her talents soon landed her an in with romina richetti who encouraged her to join her hunt for kayak72's next group.

𓆩*𓆪 .⠀⠀NERIAH DIMAS, 1999: born in los angeles to a composer father and a songwriter mother, neriah and her three siblings had always been surrounded by music. the four dimas children were frequently found running around their parents' shared brentwood studio so it wasn't much of a surprise when they began to have dreams of pursuing musical careers of their own upon coming of age. ever supportive, ario and nailah would chauffeur their children around the country to auditions and performances all in hopes of making their dreams come true. initially landing gigs as a child singing the national anthem at sporting events, neriah would eventually land a recurring role in disney channel's suite life on deck before becoming part of the regular cast for ant farm in 2011. after the show ended in 2014, neriah would join fellow disney channel alum, zendaya, as a fellow spy in k.c. undercover. her time on the show would end in 2016 after learning of kayak72's search for female talent. after her official exit from the show, she would disppear for a few months before emerging as the second member chosen for ivyred.

[burlveneer-music]

Outer Spaceways Incorporated : Kronos Quartet & Friends Meet Sun Ra - another Sun Ra tribute album from Red Hot Org, and what a list of contributors:  Georgia Anne Muldrow, Laraaji, Laurie Anderson, Jlin, Sexmob, Moor Mother, Secret Chiefs 3, Terry Riley, the Arkestra's centenarian leader Marshall Allen, and more

Cover Artwork by Lorna Simpson Courtesy of the Artist and Hauser & Wirth, New York with special thanks to Jennifer Hsu and James Wang from Lorna Simpson’s studio Publishing: All Sun Ra compositions: © Enterplanetary Koncepts (BMI) This is the fourth in a series of albums dedicated to the music and spirit of Sun Ra. Red Hot’s mission is to promote diversity and equal access to healthcare. The Sun Ra series is focused on Climate Justice and advocating for the basic human right to a healthy environment. Special thanks to Irwin Chusid and the Sun Ra Estate. Kronos Quartet / Kronos Performing Arts Association extend special thanks to Jim Newman and Jane Ivory for their support of this recording. John Carlin thanks David Harrington for helping elevate Sun Ra to his rightful place as one of the great American composers of the 20th century. Thanks to: all the artists who participated; kronos quartet / kronos performing arts association team: Janet Cowperthwaite, Mason Dille, Dana Dizon, Sarah Donahue, Reshena liao; Lorna Simpon’s studio, Jennifer Hsu, Chuck Mitchell, King Britt, 3db, Renee Dossick, Amy & Conwy Phillips, Brandon Stosuy, Shaun MacDonald, Linda Brumbach, Mark Christman

[enlightenedrobot]

May I ask, for the Betty Boop character free copyright, what versions of hers we can use? like if you don't mind be a little more specific for my dumbass self understands

Only if you don't mind ofc!

Wow, I never made a follow up clarifying the Betty Boop situation. So uh... the situation is complicated.

So like... to play things safe... Betty Boop actually *unambiguously* enters the public domain in 2 years. Which is to say the original version of Betty Boop as depicted in Dizzy Dishes will be free to use.

That said, I'm calling bull. There's dozens of variants of Betty Boop who don't look like the modern incarnation who have fallen into the public domain, and at times, it feels like there's more Betty Boop stuff in the domain than outside of it.

On top of that, the rights to Betty Boop are a complicated mess. From the wikipedia page:

Global Icons, btw, is the same company that also owns the rights to the images of serveral real life celebrities, including Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley... and like... that really sucks.

I'm not a legal expert by any means, but I think this all reads a bit familiar. Disney continues to claim ownership of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, even though that's a lie. The same can be said for DC and any of the Fawcett Comic characters.

What I can tell you is that there's definitely a single recognizable variant of Betty Boop who has fallen into the public domain, with one rather extreme deviation from most other versions of the character.

Betty Boop was a redhead for exactly one cartoon, and nobody talks about that. Poor Cinderella is a solid Betty Boop short, and it's free for anybody to use. And this version of Betty, at least to me, reads as a different incarnation of Betty not commonly used in modern merchandise.

Use her. Call her Cindy or just remove the "Boop" from her name. Put her next to her unambiguously Public Domain friends Bimbo and Koko the Clown. Have her meet Steamboat Willie Mickey and Minnie. Put her into the spiritual successor to Epic Mickey that everybody wants but nobody seems to know how to make.

But allow me to back up for a second.

Right now, as we speak, big AI companies are scraping the art of millions of artists without pay. Original stories aren't being picked up by big networks... everybody wants big IP and indie projects aren't allowed a spotlight. And none of this is going to change anytime soon.

Now more than ever, we are morally obligated to steal art. Not just pirate it. Steal it. Bend it to our whims. Make our own version. Take advantage of parody law and fair use and produce our own frankensteinian creations.

In the future, copyright should belong to the artist, not a corporation. Showrunners who pitch cartoons should own the cartoons they produce; there's no reason Rebecca Sugar and Dana Terrace should be denied royalties for the cartoons they came up with. And in the event of an artists death, the copyright for a character should only by the artists estate for a short amount of time.

I'm sick of Disney. I'm sick of the Marvin Gaye Estate. I'm sick of Global Icons. If they're gonna take advantage of our hard work as artists, then we're morally obligated to take advantage of their IP.

[poemoftheday]

Poem of the Day 23 June 2024

Mediocrity in Love Rejected BY Carew, Thomas (1595 - 1640)

Give me more love or more disdain;

The torrid, or the frozen zone,

Bring equal ease unto my pain;

The temperate affords me none;

Either extreme, of love, or hate,

Is sweeter than a calm estate.

Give me a storm; if it be love,

Like Danae in that golden show'r

I swim in pleasure; if it prove

Disdain, that torrent will devour

My vulture-hopes; and he's possess'd

Of heaven, that's but from hell releas'd.

Then crown my joys, or cure my pain;

Give me more love, or more disdain.

[fishoutoflovebeach]

13, 15, 22 and 29

hehe :D

13: music most definitely. whether it’s belting out a song, humming or tapping a tune while working, or calmly scrolling tumblr or pinterest while listening through an album or two [or whatever song i play on repeat bc it be like that sometimes]

15: if one became a prophet of the melancholic cicada and the inspiring corvid, then thou-st will overcome trials — given thine prophetic visions haven’t already shown thee.

[or something like that — idk how to describe myself normally]

22: idk, i consider most of my favorite items my prized possessions. but its really really hard picking a favorite, so i have two to share ^^

one is my all time favourite book: the wolf in the whale by jordanna max brodsky. woagh this book has a lot and says a lot; and i have mentioned it before via a previous ask. i will never not stop talking about it :> [like i have mentioned before, it’s got graphic details, lots animal death and major character death, and sa and noncon as well]

another one is something [or somethings] i have gotten more recently, and omg omg omg. as an avid collector of many things [books, cds, pokemon tcg cards, vintage lps, ect.]; and a majority of my collection is second hand. so at an estate sale one day, i ran into my faithful companions fox mulder and dana scully from the x-files, in figure form that is. and im so proud of them

29: ‘will you still know who you are; when you come to who you are?’

knife edge - emerson, lake & palmer

[yo-sostenible]

También fue el sexto más cálido desde el comienzo de la serie en 1961. El bimestre julio-agosto solo fue superado en temperaturas por el de 2022 En su transcurso se produjeron dos olas de calor. Una de ellas tuvo una duración de 21 días, la segunda más larga desde que hay registros Fue un verano muy húmedo, con chubascos frecuentes en junio y un importante temporal de lluvias en Baleares en agosto Lo más probable es que el otoño astronómico sea cálido en todo el país y más seco de lo normal en el oeste peninsular y Canarias La Agencia Estatal de Meteorología (AEMET), dependiente del Ministerio para la Transición Ecológica y el Reto Demográfico (MITECO), ha publicado el resumen climático del verano de 2024. Tuvo un carácter muy cálido y se trató del sexto verano más cálido del siglo actual y de la serie histórica. Fue también un verano muy húmedo: el sexto más lluvioso del siglo XXI. TEMPERATURAS En la España peninsular, la temperatura media del verano (periodo comprendido entre el 1 de junio y el 31 de agosto de 2024) fue de 23,1 °C, valor que queda 1,0 °C por encima de la media de esta estación (periodo de referencia 1991-2020). Fue el sexto verano más cálido desde el comienzo de la serie en 1961, y también el sexto más cálido del siglo XXI. De los diez veranos más cálidos de la serie, nueve pertenecen al siglo XXI.  El verano tuvo carácter muy cálido en la mayor parte de la España peninsular e incluso extremadamente cálido en zonas del interior. En Baleares fue cálido o muy cálido, mientras que en Canarias tuvo carácter variable, resultando en conjunto cálido. A pesar de que el verano comenzó con un junio frío, julio fue muy cálido y agosto extremadamente cálido. De hecho, el bimestre julio-agosto fue el segundo con mayor temperatura de la serie, tan solo superado por el de 2022. Serie de anomalías de la temperatura media del verano en la España peninsular desde 1961 a 2024, tomando el período de referencia 1991-2020 Con datos aún provisionales, a lo largo del verano se registraron dos olas de calor. La primera transcurrió entre el 18 y 20 de julio, y llegó a afectar a 11 provincias. Más importante fue la ola de calor registrada entre el 23 de julio y el 12 de agosto. Llegó a afectar a 31 provincias en su momento de mayor extensión y, con 21 días de duración, se convirtió en la segunda ola de calor más larga en España de la serie histórica, tan solo por detrás de la ola de 26 días de duración registrada entre junio y julio de 2015. Más allá del verano, hay que señalar que el año 2024, con los datos desde el 1 de enero hasta el 15 de septiembre, es por ahora el segundo más cálido de la serie histórica, tan sólo por detrás del año 2022. Considerando ese período, los cinco años más cálidos de la serie, cuyo comienzo data de 1961, se han registrado desde 2017. PRECIPITACIONES El verano fue en su conjunto muy húmedo en cuanto a precipitaciones, con un valor de precipitación media sobre la España peninsular de 82,2 mm, valor que representa el 117 % del normal en el periodo de referencia 1991-2020. Se trató del sexto verano más lluvioso del siglo XXI y vigésimo tercero de la serie. La distribución de las precipitaciones fue irregular tanto temporal como espacialmente: junio fue muy húmedo, julio muy seco y agosto húmedo. Fue un verano muy lluvioso en zonas del centro de la Península e interior del Levante, mientras que en Galicia, Andalucía y Canarias fue muy seco. Hubo varios episodios de precipitaciones intensas en junio, como el que el día 11 dejó 80 mm en el aeropuerto de Palma, el registro más elevado en 24 horas en verano de toda la serie. También en Baleares, un episodio asociado a una DANA dejó precipitaciones muy intensas a mediados de agosto: el día 15 se acumularon en el aeropuerto de Menorca 93 mm, récord en 24 horas para el verano en este observatorio. Porcentaje de las precipitaciones respecto al promedio normal del período 1991-2020 durante el verano de 2024. PREDICCIÓN ESTAC...

[disparition]

Still Life 1

I am at a cafe that I first started coming to in the late 90’s. Over half of my life ago. Dana Street Roasting Company in Mountain View, California. It has been decades since I could call myself a regular. I don’t know who anyone here is except for Nick, the owner, and no one here knows who I am - not even Nick, though maybe he once did, a little bit. When I started coming here, when I actually was a regular, the place was called Jumpin Java. Nick still owned it then, the name change came about when he bought a roaster and started selling beans. In the old days, everyone who worked here was a punk who had moved from Austin Texas or somewhere close by, the was a group of five or six of them. The main figure among them was a guy named Aaron who managed the place. He wore tattoos from Wilson’s Illuminatus! Trilogy, constantly played loud industrial music in the cafe, and led the Texas punks. If you were sitting outside and he came out and hung with you for five minutes while taking a smoke break it felt like a great privelege, like being chosen for something. Like most people I knew in Mountain View, he has long since left, first for Arizona, and now I believe he lives in Washington. It was a lively place, for a small boring town like Mountain View, often hard to get a seat unless you knew someone who’s table you could join, and there was a little stage with live jazz and folk bands playing from Thursdays to Sundays, three tables outside for smokers, and also a whole alley where people hung out. There were two other main cafes in Mountain View in those days - Red Rocks and Cuppa Joe’s - which also had decent crowds and live music on the weekends. Also two corporate cafes further up Castro Street, a Starbucks and a Peet’s, but I’m not counting those. Also a branch of a local bagel chain, a fake French bakery, two good pho places, a ramen place, several Indian restaurants with good lunch buffet deals - one of which, Sue’s, also featured a gallery of art by the owner. Also several good dim sum places, a handful of American style Chinese food places, a couple of bars I was too young to have much interest in, a large Chinese grocery store, an excellent taqueria called Los Charros (for the food, but also there was a bartender working there with a famous mustache), a hippy ice cream shop, a small Hong Kong style bakery with great pork rolls, and a number of acupuncture and herbal medecine shops. If you were to sit at a table outside the cafe and look towards Castro street, you’d see an herb shop, an attorney’s office, a small real estate office, and then on the corner there’s Easy Food Company, a Chinese convenience store that sold a wide range of imported goods from snack foods to liqueurs to statues, where I used to buy Parliament Lights for $2.50 a pack.

This town has been through many drastic changes. The above description applies to when I was in my late teens and early twenties. When I came to the downtown area as a young child, it was different, like it came from a different era. Appliance stores that looked like they were from the 50’s, wooden boardwalks on the sidewalks, a weird fake “old west” vibe. But I didn’t spend much time here as a child so I don’t know much more about it beyond that superficial impression.

Now it is over two decades later since the time I describe in the first paragraph. The three tables are still here outside the cafe, and I’m sitting at one of them. But the inside is a jumble of upside down chairs, plastic milk crates, burlap sacks of coffee beans and burlap sacks of burlap sacks. There is nowhere to sit, no music playing, no schedule of upcoming live bands, and nowhere for any bands to play or set up anyway. But the outside part of the cafe is unchanged, and when I look towards Castro street I see the herb shop, the attorney’s office, the real estate place, and Easy Food Company, which still sells a wide range of imported Chinese goods from snack foods to liqueurs to statues and they probably still sell Parliament Lights too, though I’ve long since quit and I doubt they are $2.50 a pack.

Beyond Easy Food, Castro Street itself, is where the most drastic change has occurred. The most obvious change of course is due to the pandemic. Once busy with cars, the street has been blocked off up at California Ave all the way down to the train station, which means about five blocks of it are pedestrian only, and the restaurants and cafes have spilled out into the street. This happened back in 2020, and a number of neighborhing towns did the same. Some of those, like Palo Alto, have reversed course and opened their downtown areas back up to traffic. But in Mountain View this seems to be a more permanent situation, and personally I think it’s a drastic improvement. On evenings and weekends Castro street fills up with families eating at the many restaurants that now have tables in the middle of the street and there are musicians performing on street corners. But if you come here on a weekday morning there are few people around and the lack of cars provides a peaceful atmosphere.

The other massive change is due to the growth of the tech industry, but this is a change that has occurred in waves, again and again, over the course of my life. The phrase “Silicon Valley” is often used in the media and discourse as a shorthand term for the computer/internet/technology business regardless of location, but also Silicon Valley is a physical place, it’s the Santa Clara Valley, and Mountain View is very much in the heart of it. The growth of this industry brings influxes of people - people from all over, but mainly from other parts of the US, from China, and from India and other South Asian countries. My own family came from Massachusetts in the early 80’s. This was of course several decades before Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc. came into being. The main tech companies in those days were Sun, Hewlett-Packard, Apple still a fledgling but very quickly growing. In those days it felt more concentrated down in San Jose, Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, towns where you’d see these huge corporate “office parks”. By the time I left for college there was another ���tech boom” with a different suite of companies, this time around the internet. The age of Yahoo, Hotmail, Geocities, the personal web page, the AltaVista search. I wasn’t in the Bay Area at the time, and what I heard was that it changed a lot and then changed back. It was a bubble that burst. But it was to be one of several. There was another, later growth of the industry around a new set of internet companies - the ones we are dealing with now. Google in particular probably had more of an effect on Mountain View than most, when they set up a massive campus here. Now as I write this, any random person I see on the street in this town or a neighboring town has a good chance of either being an employee of one of those massive tech companies, or of being someone who was recently laid off by one of them.

In terms of this town, and my place in it, the change is both bad and good. The inequality gap has grown wider, and personally there is no way I could afford to live here now, unless my fortunes were to drastically change. I only come to this area a few times a year, when visiting my wife’s family, who are the only people I still know in this part of the Bay. All of the wonderful types of food that I describe in the first paragraph are here, and more, if not the exact same places. Los Charros is now called La Espuala, but the menu is the same, even if the guy with the mustache no longer works there. There are many good Indian restaurants, though they no longer offer cheap lunch buffets. Red Rocks, one of the other independent cafes, is also still around and even has an open mic night once a week, and more places to sit than Dana Street - but their coffee just isn’t as good. Some of the places are the same - one of the pho places that I used to go to on lunch breaks when I was a telemarketer is still here, and still looks the same. A lot of the other places are essentially just more expensive or “prestige branded” versions of the places that were here before, and there are a lot more of them, and even if I can’t afford to live here I can at least, sometimes, afford eating here, and in fact after I finish writing here I’m going to go to the Hong Kong bakery to get a pork roll.

During the time while I was writing this, someone came and joined me at the table to do some work on a laptop. After some time they mentioned that they “used to come here a long time ago” and I thought it was so odd that I was writing about the exact same subject, and wondered if this was someone I used to know. But further conversation revealed that by “a long time ago” they meant 2012, while I was thinking of the previous century.

If you’ve read all this, for whatever reason: this isn’t a story or a polemic. There’s no point to it. Just writing for the sake of writing, background without a foreground.

[dr-spencer-reids-queen]

Limelight: Part Two

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Female!Reader

Word Count: ~2.1k

Warnings: canon violence, canon language, canon talk of death, methods of kill

Author’s Note: I do not own anything from Criminal Minds. All credit goes to their respective owners. If there is any warnings that exceed the normal death/kills from the show, I will list them. If you’ve seen the show, then it’s the same level of angst unless otherwise stated

The house where Dana was found is owned by another person, obviously, who may or may not know the history of the house. If you're going to want to look at the cellar, then you have to be delicate with this in hopes the owner doesn't reject you.

Maybe that's why Hotch wanted you with him so you could do the talking.

"Shawn Overholt?" Hotch says once the man opens the front door. "I'm Agent Hotchner. This is Agent Rossi and Agent Y/N. We're with the FBI."

"You lived here for four years, right?" you ask.

"Yeah."

"I assume disclosures were made at the time of sale about what occurred here?"

"Yeah." Shawn closes the front door and steps outside to talk privately. "My son doesn't know about that, and I prefer to keep it that way."

"Of course. We understand. We'll be discreet. We just need to take a look at your cellar if you wouldn't mind."

"Right this way."

Shawn leaves his porch and takes you three to the side of the house where the entrance to the cellar is. It's overgrown with weeds and other plant life, but the doors are still operational and accessible. Shawn takes out his keys and unlocks the rusty lock.

"I've had it locked up since we moved in. It's kind of useless, anyway. It floods when it rains, it's really damp, and all the electrical's messed up. I hope you guys don't mind if I stay up here."

"We'll try not to take too long."

Shawn leaves you three to it and returns back to his son. Since the electrical doesn't work, you can assume that the lights won't turn on. You take out your phone and use the flashlight built into it to light your way since you don't have a flashlight on you. The cellar is musty, smells dirty, and is very creepy with what little light is seeping in.

"So, he's done with the tour of the main house. Before he goes, he asks the realtor to see the cellar. That's where he gets her."

"Contusion on the back of her head says he surprised her. He incapacitated her with a blunt object."

"Did you notice the neighbors? They were few and far between. She could have screamed as loud as she wanted, and they wouldn't have heard her," you state. "There were also rope burns on her wrists. He probably suspended her."

"He did it here," Rossi says, pointing to a thick wooden beam running across the top of the ceiling. "It's like in his drawings, and then he applied the current and watched her whole body spasm. He makes her dance."

"Where did he get the juice from? Cattle prod? Taser?"

"From the outlet," you say and point your flashlight at the tampered outlet. There are wires coming out of it as if the unsub messed with it to grab power from the house. "It's jerry-rigged. The clamp is still there. He didn't have to use a taser. He pulled power from the house."

"Handy guy."

You stand up and turn to the beam to get a closer look at it, but you see a naked woman hanging from the beam. You gasp and back up into Rossi, scaring the shit out of you. You scream and jump back, putting a hand to your racing heart.

"Are you okay?"

You turn back around to the woman, but she is gone.

"I saw Dana, but she's gone now. Sorry, I got scared. I'm okay."

This was the place the unsub killed the real estate woman, so there is no need for you to be here. After letting Shawn know you're done, you three head back to the police station. Rossi briefed the other half of the team. Spencer is on the phone with Penelope to figure out if there had been any murders in the same area or int he same fashion as Dana, and he places her on speakerphone so she can talk to everyone.

"There are three females ages thirty-one to thirty-eight that were discovered off freeways in Maryland, Jersey, and New York. All naked with burn wounds consistent with the signature. He disposed of all of the bodies in different states to avoid detection."

"Garcia, when were these bodies discovered?"

"Between '02 and spring of '03."

"After the real estate agent, he changed his methods," you observe. "He's a fast learner. Four kills by the age of thirty. Seems like he was just getting started."

"We connected three new bodies with missing person cases. So, with a total of four victims on the board, we were able to narrow down the unsub's type," Spencer says. "All women in their thirties, attractive, caucasian, and upwardly mobile. They are all college graduates, above-average income, and career women."

"Did you establish a cycle?" Jill asks.

"There was ten months between the realtor and the first of these victims. Then seven months, then three months."

"He's practically doubling his pace every time."

"As with most prolific killers, the cooling-off period tends to shorten after each murder. The last known victim was found almost five years ago."

"Five years? So, could he have stopped?" Jill wondered.

"Not this guy. It's possible we haven't found the bodies yet. He's been killing and getting away with it for five years."

"There might not even be bodies, per se," Spencer says in regards to your comment. "We know he wrote extensively about creating a homemade incinerator."

"So, how many are we talking, ballpark?"

"If you extrapolate the cycle in the last five years, he will have killed approximately nineteen more women."

"It's great stuff, guys. Keep me posted."

Jill leaves, and you narrow your eyes in suspicion. She is acting like she is in charge of this entire thing and you're only here to work under her. She really wants to catch this guy, and it's clear she will do anything to catch this guy. She's an open book, and you're reading her as if she is a children's book.

"She's too cocky," you reveal to your team members excluding Rossi and Hotch who are not in the room. "She wants to be the best even if that means cutting corners to do so."

"She does know we don't work for her, right?" Derek asks.

"Looks like we have a working profile, so I'll let Hotch know we're ready."

You get up and inform Hotch that you're ready to start, but Jill doesn't want to be part of this. She seemed pretty rushed to get out of here, but you're not focused on her right now. Right now, you need to give the profile to the men and women of the Philly PD in order to catch this guy.

"With four known victims, we should start by re-interviewing friends and family. We're looking for a white male in his thirties to forties. With his knowledge of circuitry and wiring, we think that he's either an electrician or an electrical engineer. It's a job that may give him access to a victim's home or workplace where he has the opportunity to observe his targets."

"The women are attractive, professional women. He sees them as strong, righteous, and unobtainable. He seeks to tear them down, to reduce them to basic sexual creatures and punish them."

"He's a true sexual sadist. A typology we refer to as anger-excitation, meaning he becomes sexually aroused by the suffering of his victims. Killing these women is an afterthought. Their pain is what he's after, and he takes his time to exact maximum stimulation."

"What about his trophies? He keeps their clothes, right?" an officer asks.

"Yes. We believe he's using them for rehearsal fantasies," you answer. "By dressing as his victims, he can relive the torture. It's during this time that he most likely pleasures himself in order to reinforce his association between suffering and gratification. When he becomes dissatisfied with this, he seeks out a new victim."

"Keep in mind, he's been doing this for a long time, and he's been thinking about doing it most of his life. He'll continue to evolve in finding new ways of challenging himself, increasing his stimulation threshold. There are no boundaries for this man."

JJ walks in, interrupting the profile. She doesn't look too happy, and when you figure out why, you're pissed... Just not as pissed as Hotch. The reason why Jill wasn't part of this profile briefing is because she gathered the press to talk to them without talking to your team about it. You can see it on Hotch's face and feel it coming off him in waves.

He is fucking pissed.

He has to stop the briefing early to watch the news since Jill is out there right now. Your team shuffles into an empty conference room to watch.

"He's an individual that we believe to be currently active within our community. If it were not for certain evidence brought to our attention in recent days, he may well have continued to operate without our knowledge. We're still investigating more specifics, past murders, and who might have been his victims."

"Do you know about this?" Hotch asks Rossi.

"No."

"But now that he is on our radar, you can rest assured that we will find him and bring him to justice," Jill finishes.

She cuts the press conference short and heads back to the police station, not expecting to be met with Hotch's wrath. He doesn't want to do this in front of everyone, so he takes her off to the side to counsel her. You walk closer to the room to hear what they have to say because sometimes, you're a nosy bitch.

"Agent, I don't know how you usually do things, but you need to let my team know if you're planning on holding a press conference."

"No, it wasn't a conference. It was just an announcement. We're sending half the cops in the city out to canvas. The story would have leaked. I was just putting a reassuring face on the situation."

"Your face."

"I'm the case agent."

"You're also outranked by every member of my team."

"Meaning what, you'll vote me off the island?" she scoffs, but Hotch isn't playing.

"Nothing tears a case apart faster than an agent trying to make his or her name on it."

"I'm trying to protect my city from what could be the most prolific serial killer since Charles Cullen."

"What about Michael Strenko, Florian Gall, and Christopher Hardgrove?"

"I don't know those names," she sighs.

"Those are Cullen's victims. Nobody remembers the victims. Everybody remembers the killer, and that's exactly what happens when an agent puts the story ahead of the case. The bureau doesn't need any more agents like that. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir," she nods.

You look over at the door to see Spencer waving at you. Him, Emily, and Derek are wanting to get something to eat, and you quickly jog over to them to join. The restaurant isn't far from the police station just in case you're called back urgently. You and Spencer are on one side of the booth while Derek and Emily are on the other side.

As soon as you're seated with your food, the gossip begins.

"I have no doubt she's highly capable. I'm just saying that I find her excitement level at the prospect of finding more bodies somewhat unsettling," Spencer backs you up.

"She is rushing into this, and she is going to get someone else killed or herself."

"Yes, thank you," Derek agrees with you and Spencer. "JJ said she was making up names for the killer."

"Yet, if she was a man, you'd say she had balls," Emily comments.

"Oh, don't even go there. This is not a gender thing."

"Right. Let's get back to Reid's map."

Of course Spencer brought the map to talk about work even though this is supposed to be a break from work.

"Alright, the nearness principle tells us that a killer won't travel far to abduct his victims, but this one's gone to great lengths to spread out his abduction and disposal sites. The only location I can attach a real meaning to is the storage unit."

"There are four victims and we got squat," Derek sighs.

"For years he's gone unchecked. I think it's only a matter of time before he grows comfortable and starts killing closer to home."

"Unfortunately, that only helps us if there's a fresh kill."

"So, there's a woman out there right now who has to die so we can do our job. Unbelievable," Derek sighs.

You take a forkful of your food and hold it out for Spencer to try.

"Take a bite."

Spencer leans in and takes the bite, smirking at you while maintaining eye contact.

"What about me?" Derek teases.

"Fine. Take a bite." You scoop another forceful and hold it out for him. He does the same as Spencer, but he doesn't smirk at you. "You're a child sometimes. Do you want a bite, Emily?"

"No, thank you," she chuckles.

You lean against Spencer's side and continue eating as the conversation switches to something a lot lighter than murder.

x

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