#How to sell on LinkedIn

[sociocosmos]

Sociocosmos: Your Gateway to Authentic LinkedIn Growth

Are you tired of the endless grind of building a strong LinkedIn presence? Sociocosmos offers a unique solution to help you elevate your professional network effortlessly.

Why Choose Sociocosmos?

Authentic LinkedIn Profiles: Buy high-quality, real LinkedIn profiles that align with your industry and target audience.

Targeted Connections: Expand your network with genuine connections to industry influencers, potential clients, and like-minded professionals.

Enhanced Credibility: Boost your professional credibility and establish yourself as an expert in your field.

Increased Visibility: Get noticed by recruiters, hiring managers, and business opportunities.

Time-Saving Solution: Save valuable time and effort by outsourcing the tedious task of building a strong LinkedIn presence.

How It Works:

Select Your Package: Choose from a variety of packages tailored to your specific needs.

Provide Your Requirements: Share your industry, target audience, and desired connection goals.

Experience the Magic: Our team of experts will curate authentic LinkedIn profiles and connections to elevate your professional network.

Elevate Your LinkedIn Presence Today

Don’t let a weak LinkedIn presence hinder your career growth. Join the Sociocosmos community and unlock the power of authentic connections.

[empireexperience]

If you’ve been posting sporadically—or not at all—because content creation feels overwhelming or unclear, you’re not alone. But consistency builds trust, and in a digital-first market, trust is your most valuable currency. You don’t need to post every day—you just need to post with purpose.

[mehmetyildizmelbourne-blog]

Why I Wrote the Substack Mastery Book & How Can Freelance Writers Benefit from It Now

This unique book is an informative, educational, and inspirational source for writers who want to start a Substack newsletter, build their audience, and grow with a supportive community.  One of the best ways to communicate and disseminate information, knowledge, and expertise is through writing a book, which is challenging for authors. Books never die, but they evolve in new forms that appeal…

[reasonsforhope]

"South African entrepreneur Phumla Makhoba is on a mission to solve the “global south housing crisis.” And she’s doing it by using clothing waste.

Her invention, Texiboard, is a material that combines fibers found in textile waste with lime cement to create a durable, affordable, and circular building material.

The result is a textured, white square, almost tile-like, that is created with recycled materials — not emission-generating wood or concrete.

“It can be used to make furniture, flooring, walls, or even your entire home,” Makhoba said in a video for social media account We Got Earth.

The first iterations of the Texiboard included colorful cotton threads that were compressed together, with multiple attempts to remove cracks and seams and perfect the ratios of size, shape, and material mass.

With her design firm, Studio People, Makhoba has been working since 2022 to perfect the TexiBoard. 

Makhoba has since created a solid panel, with shredded textile fiber and natural lime cement fully cured. Finally, it can be formed into a full sheet of building material.

Once realized, the Texiboard will confront the estimated 92 million tons of clothing waste generated around the globe each year. But it will also provide safe and stable housing that Makhoba says only 20% of South Africans can afford.

“Growing up, I saw two worlds: one with polished buildings, and one built from scrap,” she said in a video. “I always wondered, why do some people get homes that last and others get homes that leak?”

Now, the Texiboard design is available as an open-source resource, and Makhoba and her team host in-person workshops for locals living in shacks to learn how to build their own supportive and sustainable housing.

“Just having a roof isn’t enough,” Makhoba said. “A real home should protect you from the weather, work for your daily life, and not fall apart in five years.”

Her approach includes a full theory of change. Right now, Studio People is in the input process, building partnerships and funding to scale their operation. From there, they hope to develop a fully sustainable supply chain to manufacture and sell Texiboards and help build affordable housing for people in need.

Once that dream is realized, Makhoba outlines the tangible output of this work: Economically inclusive waste management, circular building materials, green jobs, and a sustainable housing and manufacturing market.

“Informal settlements can be transformed when we all work together,” she shares on the Studio People website. “Texiboard is the seed of innovation that will create updated trade jobs in the innovative building industry.”

Although the Texiboard is still being completely perfected, the goal is to provide a weather-proof, cost-effective, and circular way to house people by democratizing the act of building.

“Our goal is to create an egalitarian and sustainable urban environment, helping shack dwellers and youth out of poverty,” Studio People shared on LinkedIn.

“We empower the underdog, including people and businesses, to co-create solutions in our fight against the housing crisis, unsustainable building materials, and unemployment — one board at a time.”"

-via GoodGoodGood, May 28, 2025

[mathysphere]

Hey, so, this post here-- by @hadeelfamily, a woman trying to evacuate her family from Palestine-- is real. She is who she says she is. I'm certain of it.

I've donated myself, and will donate more; for the rest of the year-- or until their need is met-- one half of everything I get selling cross-stitch patterns will go to Hadeel Mikki and her family.

If you would like to see my research and reasons to be certain, it's after the cut.

The fundraiser is for a woman named Hadeel Mikki and her family-- her husband, two daughters, her mother, and her two brothers-- and includes two photos of her:

A search for her name brings up a long internet trail: as a programmer and former computer science major, Hadeel Mikki's been active online, and when she's posting about work stuff-- mostly web and app development-- Hadeel uses her real name and photo.

I found six different accounts, all using the same name, and all featuring photos of the same woman-- not all identical photos, but separate photos of the same person-- and all with activity dating back at least a year or more.

I've looked over the activity for each, and I do not believe there's any chance that they aren't legitimate.

Two of them are static freelancer websites, and another is an abandoned Pinterest account: the info there matches the others, but there's nothing current. On the other three (LinkedIn, Threads, and TikTok) the most recent posts are all variations on the same theme: "Please help my family. My young daughters are suffering. Please donate to help get us out of Gaza."

They're certifiably real accounts, and they link to the same GoFundMe. Is it possible that either her LinkedIn or Threads or TikTok account could have been hacked and hijacked into posting a scam fundraiser? I guess. But not all three, and not with the ability to post new photos and videos of her kids-- how would a hacker even get footage of a hackee's daughters in war-torn Gaza? You can't just hire some child actors. They need to match the kids from the family portrait.

This is not a scammer using someone else's name and photos, and this isn't an opportunistic hacker who managed to break in and hijack an account: this is a real woman trying to save her family.

I've looked through everything, and am myself convinced. I'll include summaries and screenshots of each account, along with the links if you'd like to check them out yourself.

On LinkedIn: profile from 2015, photo updated a year ago, liked and commented on various tech posts. Shared her GoFundMe four months ago.

On Threads: icon is her and her husband, shares programming content, "#ProgrammersCoffee" etc, and four months ago she shares a link to her GoFundMe. She has the same laptop as me.

On TikTok: early videos are about programming and app development, and the current ones are asking for help for her daughters, including photos and videos of the girls both before the war and now.

On Pinterest: nothing really there. Looks like she tried it out a long time ago and then dropped it. Still links to her long-defunct Google Plus account, even.

Five years ago she did have a board called 'Boyfriend gifts'. Must've gone well for her; they're married now.

[femmefatalevibe]

Femme Fatale Guide: Top Career Tips To Set Yourself Up For Success

Figure out where your skills and passions align. Then determine the lifestyle/work culture you thrive in and what sacrifices you're willing to make in your chosen career path (for some, it's always traveling/talking to people 24/7, working late hours, unpredictable/unconventional hours, potentially lower pay/less predictable income, etc.). It truly depends on your top values, your personality, and your goals/priorities in life.

First focus on getting incredibly talented at your craft. Find a mentor(s) who will push you with their feedback/suggestions. Take classes/skills courses/read books & articles to gain more applicable knowledge/hard skills. Join clubs, apply to internships, volunteer, and request informational interviews in your desired field.

Make your skills marketable. Create a professional resume and/or neat portfolio/collection of work samples. Discover and articulate your USP (that should essentially serve as the backbone of your elevator pitch). Frame your skills through a customer/business-centric lens. How does your experience/skillset solve their problems and help a company/client achieve their goals?

Build a network for yourself. Don't be shy to reach out to companies/individuals who inspire you. Speak with your secondary school teachers and professors for connections. Create peer-to-peer networks, too, so you can grow together. Be a fearless networker and connector. Help others, do favors, and make the person glad they met/hired you. Make it your objective to be memorable through your work ethic/providing high-quality work products and showing up with a motivated & overall positive attitude allows people to like and trust you with their time, clients, money, etc.

Master the art of a killer email/cold pitch. Especially in today's world, learning how to sell yourself through intriguing emails/LinkedIn messages is the key to unlocking potential success. One client or opportunity can create momentum that will be useful years down the line, too.

When in doubt, follow up – on an email, pitch, job opportunity, connection, etc.

Be ruthless and relentless with your research. For new contacts, connections, opportunities, and information to support your pitches/job interviews/networking conversations, new technologies, and trends within your field. Read everything credible you can get your hands on. Display working knowledge and practical applications of these concepts and how they can benefit the person in front of you/their business.

Create systems. For how you structure emails/pitches, conduct research, different types of workflows/ work template structures for different types of projects, time-blocking, client funnels, etc.

Get comfortable with rejection. Use it as a primer for self-reflection and refining your craft/processes or help you pivot your approach to help you achieve your goals. Never take business decisions on behalf of a company personally (and vice versa).

Give yourself breaks, but don't give up. Tapping out for good is the only surefire way to fail at an endeavor. Be flexible in your path, but zeroed in on your goal(s). Learn when to quit or pivot, and when it's time to coast or seek growth.

[sgiandubh]

Señorita Nothingburger

🎶When you see her, say a prayer /And kiss your heart arse goodbye 🎶

Lauren 2.0. Wow: after The Paid Companion, The Wannabe. Unlike the first round of revelations, this time the output has been totally disappointing. Very few things and zero context, which I have to say I was totally expecting, because it didn't exactly fit the agenda being pushed by Marple (amen!). Lightning never strikes the same place twice, right? And then, we had The Follow - a very interesting foolish, yet telling move: but on this, a bit further down the road, mind you.

So, let's ask ourselves along with La Ciccone: '¿Quién es esa niña?' For once, his IG follow has been very explicit:

Leading whoever to this account...

Elix Wellness is offering a very specific range of treatments, of which the one for hangovers really got me interested:

And yeah, even if I have apparently been scooped out by Marple on this one (my bad for sitting on it for a day), shamelessly using my patented methods (that is a lame joke), Lauren 2.0's LinkedIn account is, for once, very clear:

Her contract as a Travel RN was over by August 2023, as pointed out across the street:

And then she decided to go independent and open her own company. So, by far not a hooker - decent education, even, at NYU.

Lo and behold, who had Ibuprofen in his hotel room, in May 2023, when they were spotted on that NY Soho terrace, having lunch (didn't we laugh? you bet we did, it was one of my first posts in this fandom!)? S, of course. Hangovers could use both ibuprofen and a good IV cleansing treatment ( see above - such a common offering in that particular town, soon to be out of fashion - but hey: if she believes it can bring money, not my problem).

But... dating her? Not a chance in hell. You see, just a cursory survey of her IG account between the moment her contract as a Travel Registered Nurse was over and the moment her company started to be active, reveals a very busy Mediterranean summer, hitting all the possible cliches:

Before ending that contract, even, some days in Paris with her real interest, (again) checking all the tourist/romantic tropes you can imagine, from dining at the Au pied de cochon restaurant to having a quick macaron bite in the Luxembourg Gardens...

... then off to Paros, a posh island Greek destination, very much in vogue with the creative crowd, followed by (we are talking mandatory island hopping, here) Mykonos (unapologetically posh and very expensive, LGBTQ+ friendly destination - also beloved by the glam and glitz crowd)

Oh, hello Soho Roc House, part of the Soho Houses network - rings a bell? What a small world, really.

... a couple of days in Rome, followed by some quality family time (Mom and Pop, at a minimum) in Puglia, then Croatia (again, the glam crowd of Hvar island), back to Paris for a girls' trip (Montmartre, the Eiffel Tower and a couple other spots in the Marais and around the Rue de Rivoli - cliche forever):

... then back in Rome for cacio e pepe pasta, Piazza Navona and the Pantheon oculus (artsy girl, told you), followed by Positano and Capri (with Mom and Dad, again). Nothing to write home about, but still trying to sell herself as an up and coming influencer of sorts, perhaps.

Nowhere near S for the entire 2023 Sassenach Summer Tour. How is this equating with dating, that is really beyond me. Seriously. For instance, just before the second sighting, in NYC (June 10, 2023), she was having fun in the Algarve region and Lisbon (of course, Portugal). Probably posted those pics upon her return to NYC:

Dating? More like convenient pretext. He knew people would hang around that hotel (fans, autograph hunters, etc), especially during OL promo peak time. And he knew someone will take that pic, which was then conveniently placed in *urv's lap, for lengthy talks and more innuendo. Just as the first sighting was conveniently placed in Marple's inbox, to see if topic garners interest and sticks around/can be reused for further shits and giggles. Innuendo and nothing more would be my best bet: neither *urv, nor Marple had ANY positive idea about who she was, back at the time.

And now, the third drop was again placed in Marple's inbox, because attention had to be redirected to this particular gossip topic, in rather dire circumstances following Lauren 1.0.

And for your information, she does not follow S and he does not follow her. But he follows her newly opened joint: hangovers are a bitch, I know.

Why? I think it is clear enough why.

Who dunnit? I will let you draw your own conclusions, really. Again, it is rather plain to see. My belief is that this is not TPTB. And for once, I do not think he met her via Raya. Nope.

I took one for the team and listened to that podcast (if you are very foolish or brave or foolishly brave, you can do the same here: https://youtu.be/vBmcnhe2kwg?si=rRu5YCLHS3eZhuFs ). I mean, what is WRONG with those women? That is legit 14 year old bullshit talk about relationships (or the immature impossibility to have a satisfying one). They essentially explain in that podcast they have trouble decoding 'the man' in some relationships and the way they play out. I was laughing so violently my abs (or lack of them) hurt. At some point, I even thought it was some sort of sophisticated second degree, but NO (#cringe).

Also, I think I should be burning my pineapple pajama summer pants. Seriously. If you listen to the whole bullshit, you'll see there is no damn way to substantiate anything based on that. Zero connection.

[anincompletelist-etc]

hello and welcome to modern / unconventional epistolary prompts! :D

epistolary works are most typically known as correspondence of some sort between characters, but can be any form of records or documents! they can be a fun way to explore more about the character(s) you're writing and get to know them better, and to add a creative element to your work that's able to entertain readers while also revealing details relevant to the plot.

here are some general ideas, formats, plot lines, and literature inspo!

emails

texts

direct & instant messaging / social media

music playlists / songs

work or academic means of communication (like Slack, Google Docs, etc.)

pen pals

dating apps

customer support lines and/or complaint departments

birthday cards / postcards / letters

secret codes or scavenger hunts (scenarios in which you must solve a mystery or collect all of the necessary pieces before the message(s) is revealed)

grocery lists or to-do lists

written on the body / tattoos

telepathy

+ some more interesting formats!

written in the form of an academic essay(s) with written feedback, or a document that has been annotated by someone

newspaper clippings

told through photos (or typed descriptions of photos)

a transcript / manuscript / stenograph

audio recordings (voicemails, radio, podcasts, voice notes/messages, recording devices like tapes, etc.)

search history

online quizzes

short answer forms

dossiers

maps

lipograms

personal notes / journal entries

prescriptions

invoices

+

here's also some social platforms that might offer different landscapes for communication:

Tumblr! :D (posts & messaging)

Reddit (posts & messaging)

Twitter (tweets & dm's)

Instagram (photo sharing & dm's)

buying and selling sites like E-bay or Facebook Marketplace

YouTube

LinkedIn

+

(p.s. if you're writing on ao3, you can find some of the skins for different social sites or formats here and here for a start!)

letters that devolve or change over time

letters that at first appear to be between two characters but are later revealed to be written by only one person

letters that are left for one another at/in a physical location or exchanged in person (bonus points if communication between the characters is higher stakes (frowned upon/unexpected/forbidden))

multi character / group scenarios with the above prompts, or a - known or unknown - third party stumbles upon the correspondence and changes the dynamic (the character voices must be more distinct so the reader knows who's speaking -- unless keeping it a mystery serves the plot!)

+ some books & literature that feature epistolary style elements for further inspiration or reading!

Several People are Typing by Calvin Kasulke

This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone

Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke by Eric Larocca

Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn

Dear Martin by Nic Stone

The Appeal by Janice Hallett

Meet Me at The Museum by Anne Youngson

The Color Purple by Alice Walker

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

--

please feel free to reblog with your own ideas, recs, or tips!

x

[hannahssimblr]

That evening after I drive home the house is a battlefield. As soon as I let myself into the hallway the sounds of some escalating conflict are sweeping through from the kitchen, but it doesn’t surprise me. It’s been this way for months. I just toss my car keys onto the table and head upstairs. 

“Think about the way you make me live!” My mother shrieks as I shuffle through my desk drawer to retrieve my iPod and the noise cancelling headphones I use for my laptop. My dad says something in response, his rumbling tones infuriatingly calm, unfazed. He always speaks to her with such a patronising air of reasonableness, so honestly it’s no wonder she’s going insane.

“Ivy?” I knock on her bedroom door, “I’m back. Can I come in?”

Her voice is quiet within, “Yeah.”

“Hey, what’s up?” The noise from downstairs is louder I come inside, but Ivy’s room is right above the kitchen. I know she has been listening. She is perched on her bed kneading a corner of her blanket in her little hands, body tense and static like a startled cat. 

Mom raises her voice even further in shocked outrage, “What are you saying? Do you regret our children?”

“I just bought a cool new album,” I say, “do you want to hear it?”

“What’s it called?”

“Contra. You remember Vampire Weekend, right?”

“Um...”

“You liked their last album.”

“Did I?”

“Here,” I climb to my knees in front of her and plop the headphones onto her head. They’re big on her and want to slip down towards her jaw until i carefully adjust them while she watches me with interest. Everything I do is interesting to Ivy, even my thumb circling the dial on my iPod as I navigate to the first song on the album. I grin into her face, “can you hear me?”

She nods, so I crank it up, “how about now?”

She gasps, “It’s so loud! I can’t hear you!” 

“Good,” and I sit right by her, on the floor by her bed while she lays back and tries to hum along to songs she's never heard before. She does it in mom's car every time the radio comes on, which is apparently irritating, but I don't think so. She's a musical kid who is just trying to work something out in her head.

As I listen to her weird little melodies I doodle with a ballpoint pen I found in the pocket of my jacket. I've flipped to the back page of one of her school copy books, and I know she doesn’t mind, she can bring them into school and tell her classmates that she did them if she likes. 

Every now and again pieces of the argument are clear enough to understand, mostly mom’s side. “You do nothing around here, what are you talking about?” She screams, “You just sit in your office all night and-” some muffled aggression. Then at one point she brings up Fergal from work, which is a poor choice, because it really sets dad off. I know this because I finally hear a shocked “how dare you!” from him, which seems fair, actually. 

Fergal from work is her boyfriend. Or was, maybe, I don’t ask. All I know is that Fergal from work exists and that my mother was having an affair with him for, like, two years or something. I googled him when I first started hearing his name thrown around like daggers through the rooms of this house, and he’s pretty much how you might imagine a Fergal. He’s older, weedier and less good looking than my father, with hair so fine and light that his eyebrows are hardly visible and a hairline like the tide has gone out on it, but his smile is sort of kind. His LinkedIn picture has him smiling broadly and the lines on his face and around his eyes suggest that he’s spent a good chunk of his life doing just that. Smiling. Aside from likely being nice, he’s probably ten times more interesting than Christopher too, which has to be the real selling point. I bet that listens to her when she talks to him and makes her laugh, if she’s still capable of that, so I can’t really be angry with her about Fergal. I might have done the same thing as she did if I ever felt so trapped.  

I must be listening too obviously because Ivy slips the headphones off. “What are they saying?”

“Stupid shit, Ives, it’s not interesting.”

She pauses and says in a very small voice, “Do you think they’ll get a divorce?”

I turn to her, “They might. But I don’t think it’d be such a bad idea. Do you?”

She shrugs. 

“At least if they divorced they’d stop fighting.” At least eventually.

“They fight a lot,” she whispers, “I hate it.”

“Yeah, same.”

“What will happen to us? What if neither of them wants us?”

This surprises a laugh right out of me, “It's not like they'll have a choice. Did you think we’d get thrown into an orphanage or something?”

“Maybe.”

“I think you’ve been reading too many of those Jacqueline Wilson books about the kids from broken homes. Next time we go to the library we’ll get you something a bit less sad and tragic, do you think?”

She shrugs, but I'll get her into Goosebumps yet. I am determined.

“You want to know what I think?”

 A nod.

“I think them being divorced would actually be fine, because at least they wouldn’t be doing this all the time,” I tilt my head toward the floor, shaking with the reverberation of the slamming patio door, “And also we probably wouldn’t have to be around dad half as often.”

Ivy looks conflicted, “Well I don’t not want a dad.”

I almost tell her that Christopher isn’t that interested in his role as her father and the way that he interacts, or more accurately fails to interact with her, is not normal, even if it’s what she’s used to, and that I bet Fergal would be a better dad, but I figure it’s probably not the wisest to mention any of that. 

“He’ll still always be your dad, just like how mom will always be your mom and I’ll always be your brother, you know? No matter what happens or how things change. You're made from him, you know? That doesn't just go away.”

“I don’t want change.”

“Everything changes, all of the time.”

“I don’t like it.”

“You don’t have to. Things move on whether you like it or not, and you have to accept it.”

Her eyes fill with tears, “I don’t want you to move away either.”

“No, c’mon,” I scramble onto her bed and pull her into my chest, “I know, but I can’t stay here forever, I’m an adult now, I’m going to have to go, but it’s not right away…” 

“Yes, but soon.”

I hesitate, “Oh, Ivy, it’s, like-”

“And then it’ll be just me, and everything will be different,” as tears overflow I understand that it’s not just about this, it’s about everything, all of the chaos and the disruption that I cannot fix. I just shush her and rock her side to side. It’s hard for her, but I refuse to lie to her about what might happen. 

“I need to move away, I feel like I don’t have another option.”

“But why?”

“I- I think you’ll get it when you’re older, maybe. It's just very important to me.”

“I won’t see you anymore.”

“Yes you will, maybe not as much, but you’ll get used to it really quickly. And imagine if I went to college somewhere really exciting, you could come and see me and we could do all kinds of fun stuff, yeah? Like if I’m in Paris, imagine, I could take you to Disneyland.”

She sniffles, “Paris?”

“Yeah, you loved Paris a couple of years ago, right?”

She nods and rubs her eyes, “Could we try and go up the Eiffel Tower again?”

“Duh, and you’d be old enough not to be so scared.”

“Maybe-” a thick swallow “maybe even your new house would have a balcony and we could see it from there.”

“Oh, for sure, and we’d get pastries from the bakery downstairs in the mornings, they'd just so happen to be best ones ever, and there’d be a man playing the accordion outside- no, everywhere, like, no matter where we go, he’s there with his swirly little French Guy moustache...”

She giggles, “Is he following us around?”

“Oh, yeah, a total stalker, actually. Maybe we’d have to call the French police on him.” 

We both laugh as she dries her face with her sleeves. Coming up with all the very French things we would do in Paris, every detail down to the layout of my beautiful Haussmann style apartment overlooking the Seine is nice.

I'm not stupid, of course, I know perfectly well that the reality of a move to Paris would involve me and Michelle stuffed into a Chambre de Bonne tiny enough to touch both walls at the same time, tripping over half baked art projects and every possession we own, our pent up frustration causing us to have screaming matches that would wake up the whole arrondissement, but it’s nice to be an idealist for a minute or two. 

“Where else could you live?” she asks me once we’ve exhausted all of the parisian stereotypes and run out of hypotheticals. 

“Hmm, how about Amsterdam?”

“Oh! Anne Frank lived there, we read the book at school last year.”

I tell her that yes, if I lived there I’d take her to see the house with that stairway hidden behind the bookcase, and then we would... cycle around the place and annoy everyone because she’s so unsteady on her bike. I make up a story about how she keeps swerving out of her lane and getting in everybody's way, eventually causing a giant bike pile up along the canal like some sort of rat king of Dutch cyclists.

“Where else!”

“Um, Berlin...” and I purse my lips and try to think of things to do in Berlin that are appropriate for a nine year old, but for some reason all I can think of is a surly line of leather clad druggies in front of a techno club. “They like going to nightclubs, I guess…”

“I can go to a nightclub.”

“Yeah, as if! You’d hate it, it’s just loud music and everyone bumping into you. Hey, you know there’s one nightclub in Berlin that’s so exclusive that they only let the coolest people in Europe inside? You have to wait in line for hours and if they think you’re even a little bit uncool then they send you home.”

Her eyes get wide, “Really? Hm. I think I could get in.”

The idea of Ivy being let into Berghain makes me guffaw, “Oh, you think so, do you?”

“Yeah I’m cool enough!”

“No you aren’t.”

“I am,” she leaps up and pretends to strangle me while I hold her at arm's length, “there’s no such thing as a cool nine year old.”

“There’s no such thing as a cool eighteen year old either.”

“Uh! There is, you're looking at one. I would get into that club, no doubt.”

“No you wouldn’t, they wouldn’t even let you in the line.”

“Nah, they’d beg me to come in because I’d make it cooler.”

“They’d see you coming and pretend to be closed.”

As we laugh and make stupid, childish jokes at one another I’m aware of an acceptance I feel with her that I don’t around other people. I’m never really so blatantly stupid and goofy in public, but Ivy, who has become my favourite person in the world, no matter what I do or say it’s funny, and she never thinks I’m weird, at least not in a bad way. I can fully let my guard down. Even though the fighting has stopped I don't really want to leave, but the moon has risen now, and the grasshoppers are chirping. Ivy has to sleep.

I gather up my headphones and iPod and get up, despite her protests and attempts to come up with more funny things we might do as we galivant through fictional Europe.

“You're stalling,” I say, “you know well you have to go to sleep now.”

“No, no! Just one more thing!”

“Nope! Sorry! And don’t forget to brush your teeth, or I’ll tell dad.”

She pulls her ugliest face. She knows I’d never, but it’s funny, like telling a christian kid that Satan is watching.

I shut the door very gently. It's not particularly late, maybe ten, but the house is morgue quiet, almost eerie, like the aftermath of a hurricane. 

Beginning // Prev // Next

[sztupy]

Hungarian entity that Taiwanese pager company said it authorised to produce and sell devices denies making them

Lili Bayer in Brussels and Michael Safi report for the Guardian:

The CEO of a Hungarian entity which a Taiwanese company said it had authorised to produce and sell pagers has denied making the devices, saying she was just an “intermediate.”

Gold Apollo, a Taiwan-based company, said in a statement today that it had a partnership with the Budapest-based BAC Consulting KFT, and had authorised BAC “to use our brand trademark for product sales in designated regions, but the design and manufacturing of the products are solely the responsibility of BAC.”

“Regarding the AR-924 pager model mentioned in the recent media reports, we clarify that this model is produced and sold by BAC. Our company only provides the brand trademark authorization and is not involved in the design or manufacturing of this product,” it added.

BAC Consulting was registered in Hungary in 2022 and provided a Budapest address on its website – the same address used by multiple companies.

On its website, which was live early Wednesday but later became unavailable, BAC Consulting provided long yet vague descriptions of its work.

“With over a decade of consulting experience, we are on an exciting and rewarding journey with our network of passionate experts with a hunger for innovation and discovery for the Environment, Innovation & Development, and International Affairs,” according to the company’s LinkedIn page.

Cristiana Bársony-Arcidiacono presents herself on LinkedIn as the CEO of the company. Her LinkedIn page describes her as a native speaker of both Hungarian and Italian.

Bársony-Arcidiacono and BAC Consulting did not respond to questions from the Guardian. Reached by phone, Bársony-Arcidiacono asked how the paper got the number and then hung up.

However, she confirmed to NBC that her company worked with Gold Apollo.

Asked about the pagers and the explosions, Bársony-Arcidiacono said: “I don’t make the pagers. I am just the intermediate. I think you got it wrong.”

Asked about the Hungarian company, EU foreign affairs spokesperson Peter Stano said at a press conference on Wednesday: “let’s not jump to conclusions at this stage.”

“The reasons and how it was done, how it was organised, needs to be investigated,” he said.

Asked about the CEO’s claim on LinkedIn that she also works for the European Commission, a spokesperson said “she is not a staff member, never been.”

[mehmetyildizmelbourne-blog]

The Strategic Move: ILLUMINATION Community’s Commercial Arm for Charitable Success

The ILLUMINATION publications have been providing full free service to all community members, now made up of 32,000+ freelance writers globally through our volunteer workforce on Medium.com since March 2020. It has been an absolute pleasure for our team o

Discover the Strategic Benefits and Impact on Our Nonprofit Mission and Join Our Exciting Journey for Freelance Writers Globally Dear Writers and Readers,  Medium is a wonderful community and now we are integrating and enhancing its value it with Substack community to give a competitive advantage to our writers and delight our readers better with new synergistic input. Collaboration for writers…

[siflshonen]

The first thing I have to tell you is: I’m really grateful for my job. One of my previous clients was, to put it simply, evil and stupid.

The second thing I have to tell you is: this new job is kind of a total shitshow. I traded an evil and stupid employer for a foolish, desperate, and short-sighted one.

The third thing I have to tell you is: Everything I just said is open knowledge.

Not only does my employer have a reputation for being 20 pounds of chaos in a five-pound bag, but I signed an NDA when I was hired and nothing I have to say is a trade secret. In fact, I spend most of my time communicating bits of it to the public in more flattering language. I’m only cagey with some of these details because, while one could figure out my real-life identity from what I’ve already said, I don’t want it explicitly spelled out in the front of a Tumblr post, of all places. My personal information is promiscuous, but it’s not a free-use exhibitionist whore, for god’s sake.

I work for a nonprofit comedy theatre that does pretty much everything, but has a specialization and reputation for improv comedy. On paper, I am the full-time marketing staff with support in the form of a part-time communications manager and an occasional hired third-party contractor. Every day is a new “emergency” that never truly qualifies for or reaches the level of crisis management, but it sure gets treated like it does.

My absolute favorite story of this nature being: before I was hired, a director wanted to do a Guns N’ Roses-themed improv one-off—advertised and everything. It wasn’t selling well in advance, but more importantly, the cast thought it was stupid. They overpowered the director and decided they’d do an *NSYNC show instead about three days before curtain. I’m told it “sold better”, but considering the timeline and the audience’s tendency to procrastinate in buying tickets for this particular type of show, who’s to say?

Whenever I get to overwhelmed by a last-minute change in programming and how much messaging must change, I recall the moment the youngest member of the cast self-assuredly recounted to me, “We’re DOING *NSYNC!” and then I remember that nothing I’m doing is actually that important. We’re just doing *NSYNC and praying that people like it—specifically people within ticket-buying distance of the theatre. Each show may be treated like a digital project for the purposes of marketing, but it sure isn’t in reality.

What this means is that the greatest consequence for any errors I put out regarding showtimes, misspellings, or confusing information is a bunch of people on the social media channels correct me in the comments—which is increased engagement, might I add—or talk amongst themselves about how, “The marketing for this place is really bad. What do they even do all day? How could they miss that?”—which means that people are paying attention to what’s goin’ out in the first place. While a show can fail, my efforts can’t fail as long as I keep making them since, to a certain extent, it’s true what they say: any press is good press.

But the bane of my existence is the theatre’s social media, which unfortunately takes up most of my time. As a person, I just plain-vanilla hate it, which is why I have a Tumblr—the social media platform for people who hate social media—and as a professional, I know many of the most common influencer strategies are not sustainable if social media is not one’s whole-ass entire job. And even then, it’s not always sustainable depending on what one is doing.

My feelings are not a secret.

“Everyone, I know it makes you miserable, but as your marketing person, it is my job to remind you—this is 2025. You can’t do anything anymore without proving it on social media. LinkedIn is a progress report. Whenever you have a production meeting, a lunch meeting with other theatre professionals, or even attend shows here or at other local theatres, I need you to take a picture. You can post it on your own profiles and tag the theatre, or you can send it to me and I will post it directly to the company page. But you have to do it,” I said last week to a room of thoroughly whelmed individuals. “Remember: you know you’re doing it right if it makes you miserable and like you just gave away a piece of your soul and sacrificed time that you will never get back.”

Or, more to the point: “Remember—we’re driving sales. A good rule of thumb is that the thing you don’t want to give up or show to others is the only thing of any value, so that’s exactly the kind of thing I’m going to come ask you for.”

However, my attitude is not shared by the younger members of the talent pool. This is a mixed blessing. Sometimes, they’ll volunteer to help me make silly, nothingburger videos to feed the content machine between meaningful announcements. That is, they say they will ‘til I hit ‘em with the ol’ ground rules.

“Whatever you do must relate directly to the theatre or the current show taking place there with which you are involved,” I say. “I don’t share self-promotion or individual ensemble members’ projects that don’t relate to the theatre. If I promoted one performer’s project and not another ‘cause I just didn’t know about it, they would probably rip me apart, and then try to do the same to each other.”

Any support I’m offered dries up real fast after that. But I know this is probably the right call because, once, I saw the dawning of understanding bloom on one of the older performers’ faces.

“Oh. You’re right. Because we’re the worst kind of people,” he said.

“Nah,” I said. “You’re just actors.”

“Yeah. Like I said: the worst kind of people,” he repeated—as serious as a heart attack.

So, apparently, I work with the worst kind of people.

[beardedmrbean]

OAKLAND, California — The organizers of California Forever, a tech billionaire-backed plan to build a new city outside San Francisco, pulled their initiative from the local Solano County ballot in a surprise move on Monday.

The plan is supported by Bay Area tech investors and venture capitalists, including the co-founders of LinkedIn and Netscape, seeking to transform the wheat fields 50 miles north of San Francisco into a futuristic city.

Organizers hoped to use the ballot measure process to win approval in Solano County more quickly, bypassing much of the red tape and planning requirements typically involved in such projects. The California Forever campaign said it will continue to work on the project and return to the ballot for zoning approval in 2026.

But the withdrawal nevertheless marks a setback for a campaign that has already spent over $2 million to bypass the typical county planning process and rezone nearly 20,000 acres of wheat fields for urban development. It also shows how even campaigns with major resources can run aground in the face of local resistance, with farmers, small-town mayors and recent college graduates banding together in recent months to lobby against it.

Jan Sramek, the CEO and founder of California Forever, said pulling the ballot measure would not impact their “ambitious timeline” to build the new city. He said in a statement they were simply reordering the steps needed to complete the project to allow for more community input, while also arguing California no longer offers the same “opportunity and optimism” that it used to.

His group will now try to push the plans forward through the normal county planning process, which includes negotiating environmental impact reports and development agreements. Solano County Supervisor Mitch Mashburn said California Forever has agreed to reimburse the county for these costs.

“Delaying the vote gives everyone a chance to pause and work together,” Mashburn said in a statement. “With the ballot measure off the table, it will be far easier.”

California politicians skeptical of the project quickly applauded the move and said the county process would allow it to be properly scrutinized. Democratic Rep. John Garamendi, whose district contains Solano County, called the original plan a “pipedream” and said in a statement California Forever’s decision would ensure the community was “sustainable, transparent, and beneficial for all residents.”

State Assemblymember Lori Wilson, also a Democrat representing the area, said the plan for a new city could offer benefits to the county, but only after careful consideration.

“The initiative being pulled is the best outcome for Solano County,” Wilson said. “Now we can properly vet the full impact of the development without lingering ballot deadlines.”

California Forever organizers had tried to soften their approach to the project over the past year, including by rebranding it as the East Solano Plan, amid local resistance and skepticism. They shifted from suing farmers who refused to sell their land for the project to promising to build a state-of-the-art sports complex and new urgent care facilities in the county, among other sweeteners.

That approach seemed to be showing early returns after their plan won the support of the Bay Area Council, a business-backed public policy and advocacy organization, last week.

But local opposition groups argued Monday’s decision showed the project still had an uphill battle to win broader support.

“You can paint it a lot of different ways, as they obviously have, but they pulled their initiative because they knew they weren’t going to win,” said Sadie Wilson, whose regional Greenbelt Alliance nonprofit had led the main opposition group to the plan. “This is a major victory.”

[mxjackparker]

hi! sorry if this isn't something you're comfortable answering publicly, but do you have any advice for someone starting full-service sex work? the conventional wisdom i've been able to find online is that you should ask your SWer friends for advice when you start out, but i don't know any irl, hence asking here...

for context, i'm US-based and have been (anonymously) selling solo videos online for a few months for a bit of cash while job-hunting, and i'm stillll unemployed and just so fucking done with the job search that i'm considering really leaning into sex work instead. i know it's not easy money and it can be dangerous, but i don't really have other good prospects and honestly i think i might kind of enjoy it? in that i like having sex and trying out new stuff sexually and talking about sex/sexuality with people, and frankly so far filming myself jerking off and posting it on the internet has felt way less degrading than doomscrolling linkedin and writing endless cover letters that will probably never be read by an actual human. i've found a website called tryst that has queer-friendly options (i'm a trans guy) but like. i feel like i have no idea what to do/how to prepare for actually seeing a client??

like i said, i understand if you don't want to give concrete tips or if it's too difficult to give general advice to stranger on tumblr; also, i really admire the work you're doing with writing about sex work, and even if i don't end up going the FSSW route i'm glad to have learned so much about the politics and history of the industry through your blog.

Hey! Totally fine to ask me things like this, and you're also welcome to e-mail or DM me with specific questions and I'll always keep that private and confidential.

I wrote this transmasculine guide to sex work a while back that I think would be helpful to you if you haven't already read it. It has general tips, though it's a little lacking in examples of sites and leaves out options like Rent Men and Bedpage etc. To work out where it makes the most sense to advertise, I'd suggest looking up sex workers in your area on social media or just other trans guys selling sex in the US to see what sites they're advertising on.

As for my biggest pieces of advice based on my experience:

Find community with other sex workers as soon as possible once you start, whether that's through joining online groups or in-person events if there are any near you. This will mean you have people who understand, who you can go to if something bad happens, and allow you to learn from the experiences they share with you.

Get a separate phone and sim card for work. Beg people you know for their old shitty second-hand ones, buy a cheap sim card under a false name, whatever you have to do. Your number is connected to your identity and no matter how careful you are someone will be able to trace it back to your real name and info if you don't get a separate device and number.

If you're someone who currently enjoys sex either with a partner or casually, don't neglect it once you start selling sex. You might think that since you'll be having way more sex, a lack of sex will be the opposite of your issue, but it feels different when it's for work and you don't want to develop a patter of treating all sex you have like it's work. That's less likely to happen if you maintain your current patterns in addition to work. (Disregard if you're not sexually active with others currently, out of preference.)

Decide on sexual boundaries in advance and stick to them even if you change your mind in the moment with a client. Example: if you decide no anal and then you're with a client and you feel like you might actually be fine with it, err on the side of caution and wait until after the booking to think about it again for the future. A sense of pressure can fall on you when there's a financial incentive without you realizing that's what it is at the time.

Find methods of self-soothing and plan what you'll do after bookings in advance, in case you have a bad experience.

Look into sexual health clinics that are sex worker friendly in advance, so you know you can be honest with them and they won't refuse to test you more frequently than people with a smaller number of partners.

These pieces of advice are from all over, but they're a bunch of the things that have been on my mind most recently and that came to me first. If you have specific worries, feel free to ask about them and I wish you ever bit of luck if you decide to start selling sex.

[degenezijde]

Overheard a dude explaining his AI company to two women, what I gathered was

The ai crawls LinkedIn to check which companies have people changing roles recently, or moving over to a different company, which predicts how well it'll do on the stock market, so they can buy and sell stocks based on that

It also identifies CEO's and looks for their personal email address, and then books an online appointment with them - 'this gives us a way in and we gather more info that way'. Didn't catch what the next step was in turning this into 'viable company' but uuuuuum

[mummer]

first of all that blurb of your book sounds incredible. second of all, i don't know how much you do care about its commerciability and this could very well be a bit of anecdotical coincidence, but kinda stumbled on several "weird things happening at teenage summer camp" books in a row so it does feel that it could find its niche.

thank youuuu ;w; and that’s encouraging!! i think the main problem is just that i have no confidence in my ability to sell myself whatsoever and i dont have patience for the annoying self-marketing writers have to constantly do lol. i refuse to capitulate. im trying to make good art that’s personal and interesting why am i on linkedin. So writers cant be secluded frightened loners anymore……