#Data subject

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

the fact that shakespeare was a playwright is sometimes so funny to me. just the concept of the "greatest writer of the English language" being a random 450-year-old entertainer, a 16th cent pop cultural sensation (thanks in large part to puns & dirty jokes & verbiage & a long-running appeal to commoners). and his work was made to be watched not read, but in the classroom teachers just hand us his scripts and say "that's literature"

just...imagine it's 2450 A.D. and English Lit students are regularly going into 100k debt writing postdoc theses on The Simpsons screenplays. the original animation hasn't even been preserved, it's literally just scripts and the occasional SDH subtitles.txt. they've been republished more times than the Bible

[aiolegalservices]

Article 22 of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)- Automated Processing Decision

Article 22 of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) deals with the right of individuals not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing, including profiling, which produces legal effects concerning them or similarly significantly affects them. In other words, the GDPR prohibits organisations from making decisions about individuals’ data that are based solely on…

[trashmammal-7]

If I was friends with Data I would let him infodump about whatever he wants whenever he wants. Rip to the crew of the Enterprise but I'm different.

[homoquartz]

here's the data i have pulled from the Rotten Tomatoes renewal/cancellation list (left) AND the Deadline renewal/cancellation list (right) for 2024.

i'll be putting this into some more digestible graphics and then i will proceed to be extremely annoying.

(also i will define what the difference is between queer and queer-embracing, it's to do with the prominence and number of queer characters)

[scificrows]

Okay, my brain refuses to think about anything other than Murderbot, so I looked at every use of the word "friend[s]" in TMBD and... created some pie charts. Normal human activities.

Some Thoughts™ I had while putting this together (under the cut):

In All Systems Red, Murderbot notes that the PresAux crew are all close friends (twice! and goes on to explain their internal relationships which I think is very cute). This is pretty much the only use of 'friends' in ASR, except for when Murderbot says that SecUnits can't be friends with each other.

It seems that this may be one of the first times Murderbot has ever really been around a group of friends before? Murderbot notes that this is not the norm for its contracts and admits that the fact that they are all friends and the way they interact with each other make it actually enjoy that contract (before!!!! the hostile attack, so it already enjoys this contract before they start seeing it as a person etc ghghhhh). [Inference: Friendship seems enjoyable.]

The first character that calls Murderbot its friend is ART in Artificial Condition. Murderbot immediately refutes this (and then goes on to call ART its friend to its clients for the rest of the book). [Inference: Maybe ART is Murderbot's friend. And maybe that is... agreeable]

Rogue Protocol has more than twice as many instances of the word 'friend' as any of the other novellas. Why? Miki. Friendship and its implications for non-humans are a central theme because Miki is friends with everyone. Murderbot initially scoffs at the notion that Miki and Miki's humans are friends. At the end of the book, after witnessing how desperately Don Abene tried to stop Miki from trying to save them, and her grief after its death, Murderbot has to admit that she had in fact been Miki's friend. [Inference: Humans can be friends with bots and can sincerely care about them]

In Exit Strategy, Murderbot tentatively uses the word "friends" for its humans for the first time (several times actually). It questions whether it can actually call them its friends or not and later realizes that it had been afraid what admitting that the humans are its friends would do to it. At the end of the book, Mensah tells Murderbot the PresAux crew are its friends, which is the first time a human has directly said that to it (at least on-page). [Inference: Humans can and want to be Murderbot's friends]

In Network Effect, Murderbot seems to be more habituated to the word 'friend', confidently calling ART and Ratthi its friends, like it is no longer just trying the concept on unsure if it fits. There are many instances in which other characters refer to MB as ART's friend or the other way around and Murderbot's humans refer to Murderbot as their friend several times. Generally, there seems to be less hesitancy, because yes, all of them are Murderbot's friends, why wouldn't they be. [Inference: SecUnits can have friends. This SecUnit has friends. They care about it a lot.]

Conclusion: The Murderbot Diaries tell the story of a construct that does not seem to consider the possibility of friendship for itself and is fine with that - until it accidentally starts caring a little too much and suddenly more and more people annex it as a friend (ew) to the point where it can no longer deny that this is happening and has to begrudgingly admit that yes, it has friends now and maybe that is actually not a bad thing.

[deeper-x-deeper]

thinking about the hypnosis "I'm going to break your mind" thing but in the way that I'm going to put it back together differently every time just to see what happens. It's not really fun to break a toy unless you're doing it to put it back together in various creative ways. rearrange the parts just to see if they'll still fit together. over and over until you become my greatest creation

[star-wrld]

I actually related to fig a lot when she said she didn’t know if she wanted to be a bard anymore. I know that at least in my case when deadlines and expectations are put on a topic I love I always begin to resent it. Fig undoubtedly loves being a musician but I think the academic expectations are disillusioning her from her craft

[naamahdarling]

Just read an article about a study in the UK of cat breeds and lifespan and they concluded the average lifespan of all breeds was like 11 or 12 years, which sounds INSANE, so I kept going and nope, nope, they didn't fucking account for cats that went outdoors.

Your study is MEANINGLESS then! Literally it provides zero trustworthy data! It tells you NOTHING about cats' NATURAL lifespan!

Control! For! Outdoors!

[jesterbabey]

and you know what, it pisses me off when these dipshits are critiquing data's poetry and they're all like, "oh its too technical, its not emotional enough" fucking shocker? that it sounds like it was written by the guy that wrote it?? "it isnt deeply connected to you" or whatever, like ?? oh the guy writes a poem (first time btw like damn) that is technical and unemotional, when he struggles with seeing himself as technical and unemotional, and thats not connected to him?? god forbid he use poetry to process his thoughts and identity like the rest of us and you dont happen to like it, fuck off

[andyoullhearitagain]

Comparing the social status of robots in Star Trek vs Star Wars is so funny because yes the military tried to declare Data property and yes that one dude was like "I don't think an android should be captain," but meanwhile in Star Wars everyone's like "this robot can feel pain, right? Good, because I want it to suffer."  Deanna is like "omg Will you can't ask him to google something just because he's an android" and in Star Wars we meet our hero because he bought two dudes off the black market. 

[crimeronan]

every day indeed sends me emails.

[frogeyedape]

I am so unbelievably pissed off. FUCK HOAs

Oh, my trash/recycling bin can't be visible except on pickup day? Ok whatever fine I hate you but I can deal with this

Weekly inspections?????? FU FU FU FU FU

SECOND NOTICE ALSO WE'RE CHARGING YOU MONEY TO SEND YOU CERTIFIED MAIL OF THIS TOTALLY LEGIT TOTALLY SECOND NOTICE OF WHAT IS ACTUALLY A VIOLATION cue me: checks notes. Hmm. My recycling bin was. on the curb. on recycling pickup day. You know. The day it has to be out. The day it is motherfucking ALLOWED TO BE FUCKING OUT AND VISIBLE.

so. 1) not a violation

I have sent them the trash AND recycling pickup schedules, which are DIFFERENT, btw

I have disputed the fact of the violation

I have disputed the linking of this "violation" to a previous violation MONTHS AGO--their "first notice" in this case was a "Courtesy Notice" LITERALLY 5 MONTHS AGO and they've done so many inspections since then and my bin CLEARLY WASN'T OUT IN THOSE INTERVENING MONTHS so WTMFH

So I am posting like a crazy person here instead of sending the absolutely deranged email I almost sent (I did send a slightly less deranged version with the disputes, and requesting a hearing)

OMG. It has been. Less than one hour since I learned this fun fun news. My bin was out YESTERDAY, y'all. YESTERDAY. I am going to blow a gasket

[cordspaghetti]

i think learning to sew would fix me…

[dkettchen]

absolutely unintelligeable meme I made during bootcamp lecture this morning

[incorrectfatui]

Crucabena: I lost Clervie.  Dottore: How did you LOSE your own kid?!  Crucabena: To be fair, she is very small.

[aro-culture-is]

quick note - this blog is gonna be sparse again for at least this week. trying new medications and tbh initial side effects are not super pleasant + actual effects build up. as a result: currently as if unmedicated for mental health, with anxiety+ side effect, extra fatigue, dizziness, and fatigue. it's uh, sure something.

totally recognize that most of y'all know we're absent at times due to health things, just wanted to give a heads up that this one is at least anticipated.