#Do we like this meta format? usually I just put the quotes together and get you all to draw the conclusions yourselves

[sierrabravoecho]

Does Jaime’s golden hand point towards him being the valonqar?

What stands out to me is the shared meaning of the golden hand for Jaime and Tyrion, which is introduced for both as a symbol of their station - the gold chain of office for Tyrion as Hand of the King, and Jaime's golden hand as a replacement for his sword hand. Tyrion and Jaime see the qualities associated with each as central to their personalities and their worth to the court and to the realm. Tyrion was chosen as Hand for his intelligence and cunning. Jaime was raised to the kingsguard for his daring and skill with a sword.

For each of the Lannister brothers, the first mention of their golden hands are linked to their respective lovers:

We also have proof of both of these women being unfaithful- Shae with Tywin and Cersei with Lancel and the Kettleblacks (and Moon Boy for all we know).

Tyrion gets his revenge for this unfaithfulness by strangling Shae with his golden hands - the chain of office for the Hand of the King:

But how might this foreshadow Jaime being the valonqar?

Well, up until this point, we have seen Jaime enact justice with his golden hand (to RonCon for his mistreatment of Brienne, and to Ryman Frey for his incompetence and mistreatment of Edmure):

We’ve also seen him fantasise about how he might carry out further acts of what he views as justice (again using his golden hand):

He's even dreamed of how he might use his golden hand to punish Cersei:

In light of all of this, it's interesting to consider the Maegi's prophecy, which states that Cersei will be strangled to death by her younger brother:

Given that Tyrion exacted revenge on his unfaithful lover by choking her with his golden hands, it's not outside the realm of possibility that Jaime will be the one to strangle Cersei (an unfaithful lover, and someone who he thinks deserves justice for her actions).

[yourlocalenglishmajor]

Commonplace Book

Hello everyone! This is my first post on this blog, and it is going to be a project for my college English course! Feel free to read through it if you’re interested; if not, that’s okay, this is really just for my professor ^^

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Piece 1: “Big Guns, Small Dicks”

Unfortunately, this piece does not have a specific author or creator; I found it on State Street in Madison last summer. It is an anonymous piece of graffiti that speaks to the movement it was created during. For those who may be less familiar with Madison, Wisconsin, it is considered a very liberal and even leftist city, especially with how frequent and powerful the Black Lives Matter protests were. This was created during those protests, as well as hundreds of other works all along historic State Street. As ACAB - All Cops Are Bastards - protests went hand in hand (usually) with BLM protests, the phrase “Big guns, small dicks” is a jibe at the police and its racist foundations and use of excessive force.

It best relates to class through the conversations about race and equity we’ve had. Our readings have been centered around a diverse cast of authors instead of the one viewpoint of the cisgender, heterosexual white man, which is something the BLM movement also aimed to achieve. In addition, although it has not been a focal topic yet, we have talked about police brutality and how it impacts POC most; another key point of the BLM movement. Lastly, we talked about what mythic America, or the American Dream, really is, and why it is never realized for so many people. The Black Lives Matter movement is all about how the American Dream is something almost no one can truly achieve, and how it leads to othering and a sense of disillusionment with the effectiveness of our society.

Piece 2: Vonnegut’s Slapstick

For my second piece, I chose to utilize a work of a famous satire writer to draw comparisons to our coursework. As for the image, I took a picture of the copy I own and edited it. Kurt Vonnegut’s Slapstick centers around two twins who are geniuses together, but entirely stupid on their own; they are neglected by their parents, who are a family of renown and ashamed of having deformed children. Their parents look at them as if they are to be pitied for the very nature of their existence. They use this to sneak around and live lives of luxury, continuing this ruse of being entirely stupid so that they may live as freely as possible in their circumstances. 

In this work, the children are quite literally tossed in a house and locked away to prevent others from seeing them; this is something I personally connect to the concept of silencing, which happened frequently during the BLM movement. Protesters, peaceful or not, were arrested; protests were escalated by cops far more often than by protesters, but that was generally ignored and used as a way to disregard the protests as nothing more than “riots”; large platforms such as Twitter and Instagram incorrectly labelled some posts as “misinformation”. Voices were silenced all over the internet. In addition, some white allies were not using their platforms to actually help/spread information, but were using them to spew white guilt and accomplish very little. As L. Ayu Saraswati says in her textbook Introduction to Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies, Interdisciplinary and Intersectional Approaches, “Guilt as a response to...racism...does very little to contribute to efforts toward social change as it recenters whiteness” (page 15), basically saying yes, these folks are speaking their mind and are at least partially aware of their privilege, but their feelings of guilt without taking action are not actually doing anything to help what they feel guilty for.

Piece 3: The Hymn to Demeter

My last selection will be an ancient work known as the Hymn to Demeter, and the version I am using is translated by Gregory Nagy. I am using this statue of Demeter and Persephone as the visual accompaniment to this analysis. This piece was originally written to be performed orally by a poet/performer as praise to Demeter. It details the kidnapping of Persephone, Demeter’s daughter, and the subsequent founding of the Cult of Demeter in the city Eleusis. 

When Persephone is first kidnapped, it is said that “she cried with a piercing voice, / Calling upon her father, the son of Kronos, the highest and the best. / But not one of the immortal ones, or of human mortals, / heard her voice” (lines 20-23). To me, this draws clear parallels with the silencing of victims of police brutality and their families. Public outrage did nothing to bring accountability to Breonna Taylor’s killers or the flawed justice system that let them get away with it. The victim’s family was silenced and the movement to convict her killers has died down since it happened almost a year ago. 

Additionally, it is later revealed to Demeter through Rhea that this kidnapping was not only endorsed by but planned by Zeus himself. As Greek households were patriarchal, it was not uncommon for a father to arrange a relationship/marriage without informing the daughter or allowing the daughter to meet her betrothed first. This endorsed act of violence can also be paralleled to the actions of the police; their brutality is actively supported by a flawed, racist justice system, just as the actions of Hades were actively supported by the all-powerful Zeus. What’s more, nobody stood up to Zeus or questioned his actions because of all the power he has, which is another perfect example of how this parallel functions.

Lastly, Demeter’s pure rage and grief is reminiscent of the rage and grief of the black mothers who lost their children to police brutality. Last semester, I attended a Theater of War performance known as “Antigone in Ferguson”, and after the performance was over, there was a discussion led by a panel of educators and victims of police brutality. Several of them were mothers who told painful stories of how their children, usually sons, were murdered and how they are still trying to find a way to keep living. Their powerful grief is parallel to Demeter’s; the only difference is that Demeter gets her child back.

A Meta-Commentary

My process in finding these works and deciding which would draw the best parallels was to find a bunch of subjects I thought would work well and then cut down on them. I knew the “big guns, small dicks” would be included for sure, as it was an image I took myself and had good parallels to draw right off the bat. It’s a good way to catch someone’s attention! And the message is powerful. Seeing all the graffiti on State Street last summer was impactful, but this simple phrase stood out to me and was (I believe) the only picture I took out of all the graffiti down there. The Kurt Vonnegut work I included because I like the comparison between how the twins are treated in the book and how folks who were active and open about their opinions were silenced; also, I’d be lying if I failed to mention that part of the reason is because I adore Kurt Vonnegut and wanted to find a way to bring a work of his into this. My third choice, the Hymn to Demeter, was chosen because it’s a cool way to connect one of my other classes to this one. In addition, it’s a good piece to reinterpret as an allegory for how the justice system enables the wrong people and fails the right ones.

Also, although I did not choose many direct quotes, I think the parallels I drew between the content of these works is substantial! I put a lot of thought into how I worded things and what content actually related best to the works of this class, specifically the themes we’ve discovered so far in Claudia Rankine’s Citizen. The heaviness of the book relates well to the power behind each of these pieces, especially the first one, as the message is plain and simple but impactful. The prose and structure of Rankine’s work is incredibly unique and not directly paralleled in any of the pieces I chose; however, the Hymn to Demeter is written in a very specific structure that is almost poetry? It’s a very confusing structure, because it does not seem to have any meter or consistency, but is still patterned in a specific way. This may be a result of translation, it may have been intentionally created this way by the original writer (who is not known; the transcript of this hymn was found in a stable in Moscow in 1777), or it could be a byproduct of the format itself as a hymn. The repetition Rankine takes advantage of in Citizen is actually something Vonnegut is known for as well. Several of his works have anaphoric phrases; Slaughterhouse V has both “po-tee-weet” and “and so it goes”, and Slapstick has the comedic “hi-ho”, used as a way to break the tension of the work, as it is supposed to be satire. This repetition and the more casual grammar these authors both share give their works a heavy feeling (cut far more frequently in Vonnegut’s than in Rankine’s) that also works as a conversational element, making both of the works feel like the audience is also in the narrative itself.

Commonplacing is a valuable step in making powerful literature more accessible to people! Providing unique and interesting analysis of a work makes it much easier for people to casually consume! Additionally, using platforms like Tumblr for this analysis makes things even more accessible, as anyone can see it and Tumblr allows posts to be any length! Opening thoughtful literature and analysis to the public like this also allows for good, guided conversation on a variety of subjects, and creates interest for the works in their entirety. This can easily inspire people to pick up a copy of their own of any of these works if someone is interested enough in how these can be interpreted! (If any of you are interested in the Hymn to Demeter, I used the one found at this website , it’s free ^-^)

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A big thank you to any of you who read this all the way through (including you, professor)! I’ll be doing more fun and less serious literary analysis on this account as well, so if that’s something you’re interested in, stay tuned!

[michaelandy101-blog]

How We Elevated Our Consumer’s Leads by 751% on Much less Than £1K Per Month [Case Study]

New Post has been published on https://tiptopreview.com/how-we-increased-our-clients-leads-by-751-on-less-than-1k-per-month-case-study/

How We Elevated Our Consumer’s Leads by 751% on Much less Than £1K Per Month [Case Study]

It’s a typical misunderstanding that working with a small price range for web optimization means you possibly can’t generate outcomes. How will you presumably make sufficient enhancements to the positioning in so few hours per thirty days?

Properly, for us at Tao Digital Marketing, our work with Fleetcover goes to point out that outcomes could be achieved by specializing in an important modifications within the little time you have got.

On this case examine, we’ll break down how we elevated leads by 751%, key phrases by 259% and impressions by 535% on a price range of lower than £1,000 / $1,347 per thirty days, equating to in the future’s work. That’s a small spend for web optimization, however making the proper modifications on the proper time, and focusing our efforts on an important facets, generated these constructive outcomes.

Aims

Our targets had been much like what each web site in the end needs to realize: generate leads for the enterprise and enhance online visibility for related search phrases.

To be just a little extra particular, we picked this consumer up in March 2019, however in fact, outcomes usually began to choose up from November 2019 as Google began to crawl the positioning extra recurrently.

Our targets/KPIs for the following 12 months had been primarily based on numbers from April-November 2019, as beneath:

Improve leads from 175 to 500

Set up a brand new chat perform on the positioning and acquire 50 leads via it

Improve web site clicks from 2,200 to five,000

Improve key phrases ranked for from 229 to 500

The target market was companies that want fleet insurance coverage. This spans a variety of industries, from these working coaches and taxis via to motor commerce.

Our technique targeted on technical web optimization and content material creation. There was one massive concern, although: we didn’t construct the positioning ourselves, nor did we have now the extent of entry that might permit us to make any design or basic modifications that might help web optimization and lead technology. In flip, our technique needed to be closely content-driven.

Our technique

1. Add a chat perform

In November 2019, we added the ��TawkTo’ chat perform to the positioning which has helped generate leads. After analyzing when their viewers was visiting the web site, we discovered that the majority customers had been on the positioning late at night time and on weekends.

With their group being out of the workplace and unable to reply any cellphone calls throughout these timeframes, we thought it will be of worth to supply an online chat perform to assist seize inquiries so potential prospects wouldn’t be postpone or pissed off! This may put them better off in comparison with their opponents who weren’t doing this.

We carried out the bot so it seems on the tab as a message notification, drawing individuals’s consideration to the web page even when it isn’t the lively tab. To this point, 330 inquiries have been made via this perform.



Fleetcover Chat Bot

  2. Implement technical web optimization

Tweaks that help technical web optimization are maybe a few of the most necessary modifications you can also make to see actual outcomes. We carried out this by:

Optimizing web page titles

Creating meta descriptions that had been between 100-155 characters, utilizing key phrases that naturally match

Utilizing the optimum picture sizes that every web site required

Utilizing alt textual content for pictures

Implementing inner and exterior hyperlinks the place attainable

Using FAQ schema on the extra incessantly searched questions

Optimizing the sitemap by eliminating URLs that would not help natural search

Utilizing the robots.txt file to level search crawlers in the proper course

Creating 301 redirects. There have been numerous outdated pages in addition to 404 errors that wanted to be addressed

Making usability tweaks to the design. We had been very restricted in what we might obtain on the positioning because the incumbent weren’t massively useful by way of the entry they might give us. We had been capable of get spherical this in sure areas, an instance being the ‘Get a Quote’ buttons. We had a sense consumer metrics mattered on this aggressive market, so we did our utmost to capitalise on this.

three. Optimize the “Get a Quote” type

We added warmth mapping and anonymized customer recording to the positioning. After we analyzed the information, it turned very obvious that many individuals weren’t filling out the “Get a Quote” type because of it being too lengthy — like standing on the backside of a mountain, making an attempt to work out the proper path to the highest! The unique type had virtually 10 questions, which overwhelmed the consumer and resulted in low conversion charges.

Step one in all Fleetcover Quote type

Step two of Fleetcover Quote type

We’ve had nice success utilizing multi-step types on different consumer’s websites, so we determined to create one for Fleetcover. We had all of the questions wanted to supply a full citation, however cut up all of it up into easier-to-digest tabs and user-designed icons, moderately than simply textual content.

Our new type was constructed creatively and had 4 steps, making the method simpler. With this modification alone, leads from the shape grew from 175 earlier than November 2019 to 1,489 over the previous 12 months (751% enhance).

four. Focus closely on content material creation

Instance of Fleetcover service web page (HGV fleet insurance coverage)

Service pages

Content material creation is an space the place we actually received the possibility to display artistic aptitude alongside information evaluation. We began by reviewing Fleetcover’s service pages, and fleshed out the content material to make it extra partaking.

Instance of Fleetcover service web page (FAQs)

Key phrase analysis and search intent

Over time, we continued to research keywords, focusing closely on understanding the search intent behind them, and creating detailed content material and FAQs to fulfill the viewers’s wants and Google’s understanding of these intents.

One matter we’ve been specializing in is the rise of electric vehicles and the way this may develop and have an effect on the insurance coverage trade. As the event and recognition of those autos progresses, we’re going to take a look at how we are able to use this in our content material technique.

Formatting and elegance

Together with clear, pure CTAs on the finish of every piece was actually necessary, not solely to spherical out the articles, but in addition to encourage readers to make use of Fleetcover’s dealer service. See an instance from our piece about business car insurance beneath.

As well as, using a easy however efficient tone of voice helped to fulfill the wants of potential shoppers and provides them the knowledge they want in an easy method. When specializing in key phrases/phrases that include trade jargon, we all the time embrace details about what the phrase or phrase means for these with informational intent a couple of specific matter, for instance ‘fleet breakdown cover’.

Outcomes

Gross sales

We achieved the objective of gaining extra gross sales, as web site conversion charges jumped from three% to 14%, and leads elevated from 175 to 1,489 (751%). This huge enhance (pleasantly) stunned us as we’re working with a web site with a site authority of 22 in a aggressive trade, so to realize these outcomes so rapidly was an ideal enhance for each ourselves and Fleetcover.

Fleetcover was beforehand spending a substantial quantity on buying leads from different corporations, whereas now they’ve invested into web optimization, which has considerably elevated the variety of leads they generate. With web optimization, these leads are of a better high quality than PPC leads, and are subsequently extra possible to make use of their providers. There’s no need for Fleetcover to buy leads now, because the enterprise is turning into its personal worthwhile arm of Walmsleys Insurance Brokers.

Rankings

We’ve helped Fleetcover acquire online visibility for sure key phrases comparable to “fleet insurance brokers” (#1) and “fleet insurance quote” (#2). Their positioning for “Fleet breakdown cover” has additionally moved from #15 to #four, and “fleet insurance quote” has moved from #10 to #2. The principle profit of those rating enhancements is the large enhance in visitors!

We additionally gained prime spot for the principle key phrase of “fleet insurance”, however this has since been taken by one of many juggernauts (excuse the pun) of the trade. We’ll be again, however for now, area authority reigned supreme.

In April 2019, Fleetcover was solely rating for 229 key phrases, they usually now rank for 824, a 259% enhance.

Site visitors

As talked about, we noticed outcomes starting in November as Google crawled the positioning extra actively and located extra related content material. Subsequently, April – November 2019 is our “before” comparability for what we’ve managed to realize over the previous 12 months:

April – November 2019:

November 2019 – November 2020:

Impressions: 1,880,000 (up 322%)

Due to greater than exceeding our set KPI targets, we had been shortlisted for 3 web optimization awards this 12 months, and Fleetcover’s CEO had solely good issues to say:

“For years we’ve been looking for a company to do exactly what you have done and I can honestly say in 12 years of being involved in marketing, this is the first time that any marketing company has proactively gone ahead and done something for us in this way. I’ve whinged about it for so long that it made my day when it dropped in my inbox. Really chuffed.”

Properly, that simply speaks for itself, doesn’t it?

Source link

[lakeblue1]

HSC Advanced English Tips (’17)

Here’s a guide to the train wreck that is Advanced English. I came 8th in a cohort of 112, but I got the 2nd highest mark in trials. Trust my advice at your own discretion.

Here are some of my study tips for English:

General Essay Stuff

I’m really lazy so for my HSC I ended up memorising an essay plan (for more information see this guy: https://atarnotes.com/dealing-with-english-for-maths-students/) and honestly it worked out for me this year. It’s pretty solid most of the time, so if you do use it, use it at your own discretion and try and have backups

Try and know some ~fancy~ technique names bc teachers love that stuff and it makes you sound smarter. Don’t be afraid to use semicolons and colons and dashes, I don’t think they actually care and it signals to them “WAIT! I’M NOT DONE WITH THIS IDEA YET!”.

Okay so on the topic of water and bathroom in the middle of the exam: I’m against it. It’s only 2 or 3 hours, and you could be spending it writing those few extra words that mean all the difference when you’ve got 1 min left-- Of course, if you get really anxious or panicky then a bathroom break is important if it’ll help you calm down quickly. Take care of yourself, and be honest when you need a breather

I’ve been told I’m really good at introductions and conclusions but tbh they just follow the same format:

Introduction: This is my thesis, usually some derivative of the question or a unique thesis if I feel up to it; this is an optional sentence elaborating on my thesis if there’s a “yes, but” component, or if I couldn’t express my whole thesis in a grammatically correct way. This introduces my first text, with name, title, year, and general summary of how it relates to the thesis. This introduces my second text, see format in last sentence. This is a third text if I’m a baller. This is a sentence that links all two/three texts in terms of purpose, technique, effect on responder, or whatever. This sentence summarises my thesis, occasionally omitted if it’s Module A or C.

Conclusion: This is a summary of my thesis, with a pretty transition word at the beginning (I tend towards As such, Overall, or Thus). This summarises how my first text relates to the thesis, as explained in my body paragraphs. This summarises my second text, and so on. This is an optional summary sentence linking all the texts again. This is an imperative philosophical ending, usually about how bad things help us grow as a person, bad people will eventually get retribution, or how with enough perseverance society will start to change for the better.

Discovery

Section I

Honestly there’s not much you can do to ‘study’ for it, but you should be familiar with literary and visual techniques (though they haven’t given a visual in two years *grumble grumble* we got a mango poem instead…)

Get your literary devices here! http://literary-devices.com/

Section II

HAHAHA what is creative writing. Here’s your chance to write the cutest happy lil things or the most dark and depressing story (I’ve got both)

CLICHES MY TEACHER SAYS NOT TO DO: tears/crying, school setting, exam setting, meta-stories about the marker marking your story about the marker marking your work about…

I know some people have said they memorise and adapt a full story, or just go into the exam with a character and some plot ideas, but I can’t work that flexibly, so what I do is I write Vignettes. Little snippets of a story that you can piece together in many different ways to show different things about discovery.

For me, my character is a sailor in the 17th century, so vignettes I’ve written include: the death of his parents, his recruitment into a pirate crew, learning about how to be a sailor, his first time killing a person, first time trying alcohol, etc.

Trust me, it makes it so much easier to adapt your story. And you remember more or less the same amount of words

Pick a topic you ACTUALLY LIKE. No brainer. They’re not gonna take this last bit of freedom from us without a fight. I watched Pirates of the Caribbean for the first time a few months before we started Discovery, so my creative was about pirates and the 17th century Age of Sail (still can’t believe I did that…)

And then RESEARCH. Research the heck outta that time period, or that sport, or that music, or whatever. It’s gonna take time, but if you like it enough it’s soooo worth it. And it builds verisimilitude (authenticity)

Plus you learn some cool stuff! Did you know middle names weren’t popular until the mid-1700’s? Or the Age of Piracy happened because nations stopped fighting and sacked all of their sailors, who became pirates, and then they recruited those pirates back into the Navy to fight the growing number of pirates. Idiots, them.

Section III 

Probably the part you’re most familiar with. Essays! Yay....

Really really really make sure you know your rubric. Cuz when you do, you can quote whatever the hell you want out of the rubric and kinda tweak the question/thesis a bit to include the part of the rubric that you want (*cough* memorised..)

If they ask for two RTs, USE YOUR MODULES ONE! It’s better than nothing, and chances are you know your analysis better than the unseen texts

Same goes for Modules, use your Discovery RT if you’re hardpressed for 2

Modules

Module A-- King Richard III and Looking for Richard

Okay so I actually didn’t understand LFR at all when I first watched it (like wth is this old dude going on about Shakespeare and there’s so many random cuts and whatnot)

They can really ask any part of either text so be prepared. Know your stuff for the main values (power, providentialism, female frailty, morality, etc) and the more obscure stuff you can usually adapt a pre-written response

Module B-- Speeches

THIS IS MY STRENGTH SO IF YOU GOT QUESTIONS HIT ME UP

I didn’t know this until two days before the HSC but if they prescribe a text that you are NOT prepared to talk about, you only have to mention 2 or 3 quotes and its analysis and then link it to a speech that you actually know

So your paragraphs goes a bit like: 1. Speech you like, w/ two quotes from the prescribed 2. Another speech you like

And unless they say “MAKE DETAILED REFERENCE TO”, you’ll be fine honestly.

So just memorise 3 quotes from each speech and know a few of them in depth

But only if you’re desperate. Try and know analysis for most of them

Different from the other modules, you CAN (perhaps should) talk about the entire speech in one paragraph and then the other speech in another paragraph, as opposed to integrating it

Just make sure to link it by topic sentences-- e.g. “Similar to Sadat, Keating also attempts to address concerns he sees in society, but on a much smaller scale.”

For this reason, you can memorise analysis for a speech to put in a paragraph, cuz it either answers the question or it doesn’t. Just tweak the topic and summary sentences.

Tbh doing 3 speeches should not be scary-- it might even be easier! Cuz you don’t have to go into as much detail for each speech!!

Honestly, each speech in a 2-speech essay has 450 words, while each speech in a 3-speech essay has 300 words.

Module C-- Brave New World

Ok People and Politics is interesting but I hated BNW-- and rightly so, cuz I think Huxley meant for us to hate the people so that we can better criticise aspects of the World State (hence satire = promoting change)

I talk a lot about context, because it goes a lot into representation-- if you read my essay plan for Mod C, most of it is about Huxley v changes in society that he disapproves of

English is actually a tolerable subject when you’re not cramming it for an exam. Any questions send em here and I’ll do my best to answer and give feedback <3

Good luck!