#Top 10 AI courses

[artificialintelligence0]

Top 10 Artificial intelligence courses in Delhi

There is a high demand for skilled professionals who can develop, implement, and manage AI systems. Below are some career paths within artificial intelligence:

Machine Learning Engineer

Data Scientist

AI Researcher

AI Ethicist

Natural Language Processing (NLP) Engineer

Robotics Engineer

AI Product Manager and many more

Due to more and more career opportunities in this field, people are interested in taking an artificial intelligence course.

[god-of-prompt]

It's me, God of Prompt :D

[heritageposts]

[...] During the early stages of the war, the army gave sweeping approval for officers to adopt Lavender’s kill lists, with no requirement to thoroughly check why the machine made those choices or to examine the raw intelligence data on which they were based. One source stated that human personnel often served only as a “rubber stamp” for the machine’s decisions, adding that, normally, they would personally devote only about “20 seconds” to each target before authorizing a bombing — just to make sure the Lavender-marked target is male. This was despite knowing that the system makes what are regarded as “errors” in approximately 10 percent of cases, and is known to occasionally mark individuals who have merely a loose connection to militant groups, or no connection at all. Moreover, the Israeli army systematically attacked the targeted individuals while they were in their homes — usually at night while their whole families were present — rather than during the course of military activity. According to the sources, this was because, from what they regarded as an intelligence standpoint, it was easier to locate the individuals in their private houses. Additional automated systems, including one called “Where’s Daddy?” also revealed here for the first time, were used specifically to track the targeted individuals and carry out bombings when they had entered their family’s residences.

In case you didn't catch that: the IOF made an automated system that intentionally marks entire families as targets for bombings, and then they called it "Where's Daddy."

Like what is there even to say anymore? It's so depraved you almost think you have to be misreading it...

“We were not interested in killing [Hamas] operatives only when they were in a military building or engaged in a military activity,” A., an intelligence officer, told +972 and Local Call. “On the contrary, the IDF bombed them in homes without hesitation, as a first option. It’s much easier to bomb a family’s home. The system is built to look for them in these situations.” The Lavender machine joins another AI system, “The Gospel,” about which information was revealed in a previous investigation by +972 and Local Call in November 2023, as well as in the Israeli military’s own publications. A fundamental difference between the two systems is in the definition of the target: whereas The Gospel marks buildings and structures that the army claims militants operate from, Lavender marks people — and puts them on a kill list.  In addition, according to the sources, when it came to targeting alleged junior militants marked by Lavender, the army preferred to only use unguided missiles, commonly known as “dumb” bombs (in contrast to “smart” precision bombs), which can destroy entire buildings on top of their occupants and cause significant casualties. “You don’t want to waste expensive bombs on unimportant people — it’s very expensive for the country and there’s a shortage [of those bombs],” said C., one of the intelligence officers. Another source said that they had personally authorized the bombing of “hundreds” of private homes of alleged junior operatives marked by Lavender, with many of these attacks killing civilians and entire families as “collateral damage.” In an unprecedented move, according to two of the sources, the army also decided during the first weeks of the war that, for every junior Hamas operative that Lavender marked, it was permissible to kill up to 15 or 20 civilians; in the past, the military did not authorize any “collateral damage” during assassinations of low-ranking militants. The sources added that, in the event that the target was a senior Hamas official with the rank of battalion or brigade commander, the army on several occasions authorized the killing of more than 100 civilians in the assassination of a single commander.

. . . continues on +972 Magazine (3 Apr 2024)

[sayruq]

A new investigation by +972 Magazine and Local Call reveals that the Israeli army has developed an artificial intelligence-based program known as “Lavender,” unveiled here for the first time. According to six Israeli intelligence officers, who have all served in the army during the current war on the Gaza Strip and had first-hand involvement with the use of AI to generate targets for assassination, Lavender has played a central role in the unprecedented bombing of Palestinians, especially during the early stages of the war. In fact, according to the sources, its influence on the military’s operations was such that they essentially treated the outputs of the AI machine “as if it were a human decision.”

During the early stages of the war, the army gave sweeping approval for officers to adopt Lavender’s kill lists, with no requirement to thoroughly check why the machine made those choices or to examine the raw intelligence data on which they were based. One source stated that human personnel often served only as a “rubber stamp” for the machine’s decisions, adding that, normally, they would personally devote only about “20 seconds” to each target before authorizing a bombing — just to make sure the Lavender-marked target is male. This was despite knowing that the system makes what are regarded as “errors” in approximately 10 percent of cases, and is known to occasionally mark individuals who have merely a loose connection to militant groups, or no connection at all. Moreover, the Israeli army systematically attacked the targeted individuals while they were in their homes — usually at night while their whole families were present — rather than during the course of military activity. According to the sources, this was because, from what they regarded as an intelligence standpoint, it was easier to locate the individuals in their private houses. Additional automated systems, including one called “Where’s Daddy?” also revealed here for the first time, were used specifically to track the targeted individuals and carry out bombings when they had entered their family’s residences.

The Lavender machine joins another AI system, “The Gospel,” about which information was revealed in a previous investigation by +972 and Local Call in November 2023, as well as in the Israeli military’s own publications. A fundamental difference between the two systems is in the definition of the target: whereas The Gospel marks buildings and structures that the army claims militants operate from, Lavender marks people — and puts them on a kill list. In addition, according to the sources, when it came to targeting alleged junior militants marked by Lavender, the army preferred to only use unguided missiles, commonly known as “dumb” bombs (in contrast to “smart” precision bombs), which can destroy entire buildings on top of their occupants and cause significant casualties. “You don’t want to waste expensive bombs on unimportant people — it’s very expensive for the country and there’s a shortage [of those bombs],” said C., one of the intelligence officers. Another source said that they had personally authorized the bombing of “hundreds” of private homes of alleged junior operatives marked by Lavender, with many of these attacks killing civilians and entire families as “collateral damage.”

Remember, the Israeli occupation government considers all men over the age of 16 to be Hamas operatives hence why they've claimed to have killed over 9,000 of them (which matches the number of Palestinian men killed according to the Ministry of Health). So, when the article speaks of 'low level' or 'high level militants' they're likely speaking of civilians.

If Israel knew who Hamas fighters are, Oct 7th wouldn't have caught them off guard and they wouldn't still be fighting the Palestinian resistance every single day.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

“Carbon neutral” Bitcoin operation founded by coal plant operator wasn’t actually carbon neutral

I'm at DEFCON! TODAY (Aug 9), I'm emceeing the EFF POKER TOURNAMENT (noon at the Horseshoe Poker Room), and appearing on the BRICKED AND ABANDONED panel (5PM, LVCC - L1 - HW1–11–01). TOMORROW (Aug 10), I'm giving a keynote called "DISENSHITTIFY OR DIE! How hackers can seize the means of computation and build a new, good internet that is hardened against our asshole bosses' insatiable horniness for enshittification" (noon, LVCC - L1 - HW1–11–01).

Water is wet, and a Bitcoin thing turned out to be a scam. Why am I writing about a Bitcoin scam? Two reasons:

I. It's also a climate scam; and

II. The journalists who uncovered it have a unique business-model.

Here's the scam. Terawulf is a publicly traded company that purports to do "green" Bitcoin mining. Now, cryptocurrency mining is one of the most gratuitously climate-wrecking activities we have. Mining Bitcoin is an environmental crime on par with opening a brunch place that only serves Spotted Owl omelets.

Despite Terawulf's claim to be carbon-neutral, it is not. It plugs into the NY power grid and sucks up farcical quantities of energy produced from fossil fuel sources. The company doesn't buy even buy carbon credits (carbon credits are a scam, but buying carbon credits would at least make its crimes nonfraudulent):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/31/carbon-upsets/#big-tradeoff

Terawulf is a scam from top to bottom. Its NY state permit application promises not to pursue cryptocurrency mining, a thing it was actively trumpeting its plan to do even as it filed that application.

The company has its roots in the very dirtiest kinds of Bitcoin mining. Its top execs (including CEO Paul Prager) were involved with Beowulf Energy LLC, a company that convinced struggling coal plant operators to keep operating in order to fuel Bitcoin mining rigs. There's evidence that top execs at Terawulf, the "carbon neutral" Bitcoin mining op, are also running Beowulf, the coal Bitcoin mining op.

This is a very profitable scam. Prager owns a "small village" in Maryland, with more that 20 structures, including a private gas station for his Ferrari collection (he also has a five bedroom place on Fifth Ave). More than a third of Terawulf's earnings were funneled to Beowulf. Terawulf also leases its facilities from a company that Prager owns 99.9% of, and Terawulf has *showered * that company in its stock.

So here we are, a typical Bitcoin story: scammers lying like hell, wrecking the planet, and getting indecently rich. The guy's even spending his money like an asshole. So far, so normal.

But what's interesting about this story is where it came from: Hunterbrook Media, an investigative news outlet that's funded by a short seller – an investment firm that makes bets that companies' share prices are likely to decline. They stand to make a ton of money if the journalists they hire find fraud in the companies they investigate:

https://hntrbrk.com/terawulf/

It's an amazing source of class disunity among the investment class:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/08/money-talks/#bullshit-walks

As the icing on the cake, Prager and Terawulf are pivoting to AI training. Because of course they are.

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/2024/08/09/terawulf/#hunterbrook

[haruchi-slit]

PRETTY RIBBONS 𐙚

ft. suguru, satoru, sukuna, yuki, choso & shoko

synopsis: reader asking the jjk characters if they can tie a bow on them | warnings: just fluff! + not proof read!

SUGURU: "wha-no...ok fine!"

"suguu can i put bows on you?" you asked getting suguru's attention from his laptop, "what?" he grumbles "can i put bows on youu!" you repeat, getting up from the couch, "baby i heard you the first time, but-" "pretty please suguuu~" you begged, giving him the prettiest doe eyes, with your hands pressing against each other, as you pout your lips, "ugh- fine.." he'd grunt, closing his laptop and putting it aside before pattering towards you, "reallyy? oh my gosh really!? i knew you couldn't resist this charm" you cackled, before running to your shared bedroom, you took the light pink roll of ribbon from your desk before running back to the living room, suguru sighed softly before he smiled "did you seriously bought that, just for this?" he laughed,

"what? noo i would never pfftt-"

"oh really, huh?" suguru chuckled as you uwrapped the plastic cover of the ribbon,

"do you even know how to tie a bow?" suguru asked "well duh of course i can!" you giggled cutting portions of the ribbon, "ok now get that comb and I'll yassify you" you'd playfully order suguru as he obliged "ai ai miss ma'am!" he took the comb from the table before coming back to you "here you go bae" he hands you the comb before sitting you on top of his lap, you ran your finger thru his silky smooth hair, tying the pink ribbons on him while he giggles as you talk about your life gossips, he just loved seeing his cute little girlfriend getting so worked up just for tying a bow on him, "voilá! suguu look in the mirror and rate it one to ten, yeah?" you excitedly hand him the mirror while you wait for his reaction, suguru looked at the mirror with cute bows adorned to his hair, perfectly tied and neat,

"it'd be a solid 12/10 bae!" he giggles and pulled you in for the sweetest kiss, "say: cheese!" you said before clicking the shutter button of the camera.

"your turn princess!"

SATORU: "I've been waiting for this moment!

it was a boring afternoon, just you and your precious boyfriend satoru who's laying on top of your chest while fidgeting your hair, as you scroll thru instagram reels, you came across a certain video where in a girl ties a ribbon around her boyfriend's biceps as the boyfriend flexed, curling his muscles causing the ribbon to rip and be torn apart, the background music played over and over getting satoru's attention,

"hey cutie, what are you watching?" satoru asked satoru jolts up, "just some random video, wait- satoru can we do thisss" you babbled showing him the video you've been watching for the past three minutes, while he was watching the video you saw him smile, his eyes glimmered like he was waiting for this moment to come,

"I've been waiting for you to say that!" he exclaims "let me just get my damn ribbons" you chuckled as you ran out the living room to grab some of your ribbons that you use for you hair, "ok im back grab my phone over there 'toru" you giggled while satoru gave you your phone, "flex them biceps baby!"

"your wish is my command" satoru laughs, flexing his biceps while you put a ribbon on it,

"you gotta break it when the beat drops ok?"

"ok!" he responds, you clicked the recording button of your phone recording satoru's bicep "i need to brethe some air" the music rang across your living room as the camera focuses on satoru, "cause you got me- so soaakkedd" satoru quickly flexed his bicep causing the ribbon to rip,

"oh goshhh 'toruuu"

SUKUNA: "if that makes you shut up.."

"i think bows would suit you" you giggled your skin brushing his, as you nuzzled to his beefy muscled arms, "what do you mean" he huffs, "like...you know those things i always put on my hair i think it would suit you.." you murmur feeling the heat from his body, making you feel safe and comfortable, "you know what can i put bows on you?" sukuna ignores you, "sukuu~" you coed, getting the curse's attention once again "please?" "no" he responds, "pretty please?"

"no" he repeats...

"come on now you old man, i ribbon won't hurt, right so pretty please with a cherry on top?"

"tsk, will you stop bickering if i grant you permission?" he grunts, raising one of his eyebrows, your eyes beamed with joy as you nod your head profusely, "then, go on" he coes you blinked twice, "huh?"

"i said go on and tie bows on me..." he sighs in defeat, the king of curses was no match to his loving wife...

"suku lean down, pleasee" you asked him, as he obliged, you took some ribbons off, of your kimono, using it as a ribbon to tie on sukuna's hair, as you tie it on his hair, his oversized hands supports you to stand still on the stool you're standing on, one of his hand placed on your waist, as you talk about your past haircuts and why you do not or like them, while sukuna listens, "and just a few more touches here and...you're done!" you chuckled as you stare at him so lovingly,

"oh wait, i still have one left!", you gasped as you slowly get off the stool with sukuna supporting your body, "suku, give me one of your four hands", "why?" "hurryyy!" you command as sukuna rolls his eyes and obliged once again, he swiftly whips one of his hand out off his kimono placing it infront of you, "yeyy!" you exclaimed, before you tied the last red ribbon tou had around his wrist... sukuna admired the ribbon on his wrist and hair, "this is so childish...but, it's not that bad" he says, before pulling you in for a kiss on the forehead, "my lord the visitors-..." uraume

paused as soon as they entered the room, sukuna turns to them with ribbons on his hair, "what is it, uraume?",

"the visitors has arrived..."

YUKI: "you can do what ever you want as long as you're happy"

you and your girlfriend yuki are on the garage in a sunny afternoon, just you eating ice cream sitting close to her and, her fixing something in her motorcycle, your eyes wonder on her garage, you stood up to stroll around since your legs are getting cramped.

you stroll around her garage but you were stopped when you found a unopened roll of ribbon, placed in a box that looks like she's about to throw away, you quickly picked it up and brought it to your sit, "yuki" you chimed, getting her attention from her motorcycle, "hey, you need something?" she says, as she used a towel to wipe the grease off her hands,

"look what i found!" you mused, smiling so lovingly as yuki stares at you with a soft demeanor, "i was about to throw that away cause i don't know where to use it..." she laughs-

"you can have it if you want!" she offers, you gasped, "y'know what i got an idea!", you opened the roll of white ribbon, "jus' gimme a sec!" you giggled as you cut even portions of the ribbon with the scissors you found beside you,

"m'kay princess" she chuckles as she walks up to you, "what's your plan, huh?" she chortles as she waves her eyebrows, "'n done! give me your bicep!" you asked, "y'know i saw in social media" you start, "and i jus' wanna see if it'll suit you-" you paused, as you tied the last knot on yuki's bicep,"tadaaa~" "it's so cute" she scoffs, with a blush spreading across her plush cheeks,

"can i also put bows on you motorcycle?" you asked, "of course you can baby..." "really?" you asked "really!" she responds, pulling you into a kiss..

SHOKO: "my fiance did it"

an early morning starts as you and your fiance start your day, a sunlight bounces on your face from the window, your eyes flutter open as shoko was no where to be found, you guessed that she's in the kitchen, making breakfast for the both of you and, you were right

" 'morning sleepy princess" she greets you as she hands you a cup of coffee, "thank you, and good morning to you too!" you respond as you took the cup of coffee from the table, "I'm going to take a shower now be right back" she said.

she comes out of the bathroom with her classic go to outfit for work, a turtle neck and some jeans, "shokoo let me do your hair, pleasee!" you spoke, "sure girl, just let me blow dry my hair ok?"

"oookkkeyy!" you hummed, as soon as she dried her hair she went straight to you, "sit down now m'lady...hehe-" you chuckled "and also can i put bows on you?" you add, "I can't see why not...do what you need to do" she giggles.

you combed her soft silky hair, your fingers running across her hair "you're on day-off right?" "mhmm" you hummed as you focused on tying her hair,

"is it too tight? do i need to loosen it a bit?" you asked as you put a ribbon on top of the hair tie attached to her hair, "nope, nope it's all good princess" she uttered "you can look on the mirror now!" you add, "it looks cute haha!" she chuckles "I'm gonna get to work now-" she stood up kissing you on the cheek and lips, "I'll see you later ok? i love you!" she spoke, kissing you once more, "okay, byeee see you later" you bid your goodbye as you watched her grab her tote bag, she waves at you and head out...

when shoko arrived at the jujutsu tech she was greeted by utahime, "shokoo! how are you?" "im good, long time no see.." she responds "yeah long time no see, i like your hairstyle!" utahime giggles "thanks, my fiance did it for me"

-the hairstyle-

CHOSO: "we're matching now!"

"choo! we should try riding the ferris wheel!" you exclaimed as you point your finger on the ferris wheel nearby, you and choso are on a date in the amusement park, "let's go now quickly!" he responds, as he took your hand to ran for the line of the ferris wheel, both of you were laughing non-stop once you reached the front of the line, "i almost tripped!" you giggled "you were too slow that's why" he jested, "two tickets, please.." he utters to the clerk in charge on the tickets, "here you go sir.." the clerk hands choso the tickets before the two of you were allowed in, choso gave the tickets to the other employee and then they let the two of you in.

when the two of you are on the ferris wheel, you both sat down immediately, "it's getting dark..." you babbled, "it is getting dark, I'm having fun today!" he said looking thru your eyes, his dark brown eyes orbs piercing yours, "you look so beautiful-" he paused, tucking your hair behind your ear, "with those purple ribbons" he faltered, "thank you, choso I'm also having fun today" you murmured as you felt your cheeks burn from how smooth his words,

"y-y'know i wonder how you'll look with these ribbons" your words slip, "can i tie a bow on you?" you inquired, making choso chuckle, "of course you can, so we can be matching!" he responds, "really?!" your repeat, as he nods his head profusely, "yes!", "ok let me just get one ribbon from my hair" you cackled, as you tug one of the ribbons on your hair, after successfully pulling one out youu quickly tied it around choso's hair, "you look so cute!!" you gagged in his cuteness "we are matching now!" he yelps, as your eyes locked on to each other, he pulls your cheeks for a kiss, you immediately melted with his touch as he fills your stomach with butterflies, a few moments later you hear fireworks being blown up to the air, as choso deepens the kiss, your hands lightly tugging on his hair, with his hands on your waist, he pulls away to catch a breath, your eyes shot open while catch your breath, his kiss was so intoxicating

"i love you.." whispers as the both of you watched the fire works up on the ferris wheel.

a/n: yey!

[funishment-time]

my personal top 10 iconic (to me) DR quotes

aka quotes guaranteed to make me cry or make me pumped, or both

Sakura's "When I die, the source of conflict among you all dies with me. For that, I'm willing to give up my life."

Toko's "We're the same."

Fuyuhiko's "Please, Peko! Don't go! I need you! Don't leave me!" tied with Peko's "I am terribly sorry I will not be able to serve by your side until the very end, young master."

AI Chiaki's "So this is a miracle that you won for yourselves, isn't it?"

Kaede's "I'm the protagonist of this crazy story."

Shuichi's "I swear on her kindness and her love and her grave that I will avenge her!"

Nekomaru's "A lot of things happen when you're alive!"

Monokuma's "But of course it fell to ruin...I mean, they did things they deserved to be ruined for."

Makoto's "It's not like I WANT you to die!"

Celestia's "Perhaps we'll meet again, in another life."

[hoe4sports]

“Private, not secret.”

Caroline Graham Hansen x reader

A/N: No tiggers.

It had now been a few months since you and Caroline started hanging out. She obviously is a very private person, so nobody knows. It’s actually fun; sneaking around like teenagers, leaving the others apartment without anyone noticing, making sure people don’t see us arrive in same car and taking turns on choosing activities. You can describe it as being girlfriends, just undercover. The team however, was growing suspicious, and you knew that Ingrid was struggling to keep the secret as Mapi was also increasingly getting suspicious. 

You were walking down the long corridor with Alexia who you also had gotten to know on a very personal level. We were heading down to the team’s warderobe, of course, Caroline staying behind to make sure that nobody suspected anything. “Please Hermosa” Alexia teased, “Come with me for one night, I’ll be fun! I promise!” Alexia had practically begged me to go on a date with her, and you thought it was hilarious. You laughed as she made a pout with her perfectly coloured lips. We arrived at the warderobe, and she swung the door open for me. “Ladies first” she said with a flirtatious vibe as she put one hand to signal that she wanted you to walk in first. You laughed, and a few of the girls who were already there made whistling sounds. You walked in and you both sat down.

This meeting was the first orientational meeting that we had every day. The coaches, the players and the staff would all meet in the warderobe for a short brief and to get an overview of the day. You and Alexia sat down next to her cubby, and you rolled my eyes. Alexia winked, “one day, hermosa, you will go on a date with me, you just don’t know it yet” she teased as Ingrid shot you a look. You just laughed it off and slapped Alexia’s knee playfully. You saw Ingrid once again signaling me to look up towards the door. Caroline was standing in the doorway with a tense look on her face as her fist were clutching, her jaw was tense and her eyes were somewhat deadly. You stopped laughing, and put your cleats on. You had just gotten new hot pink cleats, and Alexia complimented them. “Colorful shoes for a colorful girl” she teased. “Ale, will you give me one second without trying to take me to bed!” You stated as you shot her a look while all the girls were watching attentively. “Ooo” you could hear the girls say as you giggled. “Aios mio Hermosa! You are embarrassing me! But I’ll take it.” She joked as she patted your back.

Fast forward to the end of the last practice of the day. You had made sure to push the attackers extra hard, and Alexia or should we say her thighs, was definitely taking the consequences of that hard. Caroline had been staring down Alexia the whole practice. As we all walked into the warderobe, Alexia threw herself on to the physio bench and was screaming a blood hurdling scream. “AY!!” The girl was screaming as she held to her muscles. You knew this, her muscles were tired and she needed to be stretched. You hopped up, confidently knowing that you spent 3 years studying physical therapy before you started your sports leadership bachelor. Your instincts kicked in, and you hopped up on your knees to the physio bench between her legs. You took her cramping leg, and pushed it up as hard as I you could. The girl screamed out in pain, and within 10 seconds her body relaxed. “Fuck Hermosa, my muscles are falling apart for you ai.” She said as you rolled my eyes and giggled. “Well” you said, “I should get off” and she winked. “I know you would like to see me in this position, but at least let me take you to somewhere private.” she finished and the girls; including you and Alexia was laughing on the top of your lungs. You hopped down of the bench and as you passed Caroline, you could tell that she was upset. However, we had a rule that she had introduced; keep it private. 

By the end of the day, you had just finished up the last meeting with Jonathan for the week. This week had been good, and you had the weekend off for a change.  You changed into your outdoor hokas, and popped on your white Barca wind jacket as you popped sunglasses on and walked to the car. Barca had leased this cute Toyota for you, and it had everything I needed. When you arrived at the car, you dropped everything in the backseat before flopping down into the drivers seat. Normally, Caroline was catching her ride with you but today, she had hopped into her own car for a change. You brushed it off and headed towards your apartment. Music was ringing in your ears ,and you were singing along at the top of your lungs while driving. Life was good. Ever since coming to Barcelona, everything was so uncomplicated. It was easy, and you loved it. 

You pulled up to the garage underneath the apartments and found your spot. Parking wasn’t your strongest side, but the fear of damaging Barca’s car was enough to keep you sharp. Eventually, you had finished parking and were up in your apartment. You turned on some music and let fresh air into the spacious place. “Hey Alexa, Play Senorita by Camilla cabello” you suggested, and alexia turned it on. You hopped in the shower to get rid of the sticky feeling of sweat off your skin. You used my fruity scrub on your legs, and it felt amazing. You sang along and you danced just enjoying the comfort of your own company. You rinsed off all the sugar from the scrub and stepped out. It was radiating heat in Spain at the moment, so you just didn’t bother with drying myself off. You popped on shorts and a Nike shirt after you finished drowning yourself in bodylotion. As you stepped out of the bathroom, there was Caroline in all her glory sitting on my couch like nothing had ever happened. “Excuse me, care to let me know that you are here?” You said jokingly as you giggled, but your giggles died out fast when she turned her face towards me. She looked tired? Almost like she hadn’t had a restfull moment in all of her lifetime. “Y/F/N..” she started, not finding her words easily. “Are you okay?” You asked, still confused over the whole situation. “I-“ and then she cut of herself before she even started the sentence. You sat down in the couch facing towards her with your legs crossed underneath you. “Caz..” I” you said carefully, “I can’t help you if you won’t communicate” as you brushed your hand on her face. She pulled out her phone, and for a moment you felt annoyed. Could you find a worse moment than this to flip through instagram you thought to yourself. Then she searched up Ona and showed me the picture. She had shared a picture of you and Alexia on the physiobench while Alexia was screaming. The caption said “I give it 4 months». You felt confused. “It’s just a picture, Caz.” You said carefully, but you must admit that you felt equally unsure. She then got into the comments and showed you the comments. Comments like “goals”, “just start dating already” and “Go get her tiger” was mentioned multiple times. You looked up at Caroline as you placed the brunette’s phone down on the table. “Caroline, are you by any chance; a bit jealous?” You suggested as you stroke her back carefully. She sighted and looked at you with big sad eyes. “It’s just all in good spirits, she’s not serious” you spat out as you tried to comfort her. It was obviously not working, and you still felt very much confused. “I wish that was me” she mumbled, and you got confused. “I promise that you don’t, the cramps were probably awful and besid-“ you said as a was cut of by your own thoughts. Shit, she didn’t mean it in that particular way. You scooted closer to her, and kissed her cheek. “I don’t like Alexia. I like this. Sneaking around, Farris, watching you play ps5 and spending time together” you said as a drew circles on her back. “I just wished that people would back off. I don’t want to be all flirty at work, but I just wish the girls would stay off.” she stated as she looked at me. “Come again?” You said as I you stroke her hair. “I want private, but not secret.” she said with her raspy voice. “You want that?” You asked with a glimmer of excitement in your voice. She was a very private person, and her stating that she wanted people to know was a big step for her. You weren’t really private, but had adapted to her wish. She nodded and looked at you with her dark blue eyes. “Whatever you want babe” you said as you leaned in and hugged her. She wrapped her long arms around you, and let out a relieved breath. A few hours later, her phone was blowing up and she proudly showed me what she had posted.

Graham95: Private, not secret.

@Ingrid_Engen: elsker elsker elsker

@Alexiaputellas: Well played.

[artificialintelligence0]

Top 10 Artificial intelligence courses in Delhi

AI has revolutionized every aspect of life and work, from healthcare to banking, manufacturing to entertainment. As a result, the demand for skilled AI professionals has increased dramatically, creating an excellent opportunity for individuals aspiring to excel in this rapidly evolving field.

[twilightclouds]

WHEN YOU'RE SICK.

rin's unreliable description: "you got sick and lyney has to take care of you." wc: 238 | not proofread. rin's notes: currently sick so decided to write to distract myself 😭😭 warnings: lots of fluff, lyney being clingy, probable ooc lyney, written in about 10 minutes, mentions of reader having work? lmk if there are any others i missed

brainrotting about what lyney would be like when you’re sick…

— when you waking up with a sore throat, a telltale sign of a fever.

the moment lyney realizes that you’re not feeling well, he goes panic mode. you’re sick? he should have known, you told him yesterday that you weren’t feeling well— thousands of panicked thoughts racing through his head as you try to discern what was going on with his panic-stricken expression.

once he forcibly got you (after scolding you for trying to get out of your shared bed) to lay down and try to nap, he would go make your favorite comfort food as his sudden hysteria dying down.

you’re now his top priority. (you always were) you have work? don’t worry, he already called in to tell your boss you couldn’t come. you want to cuddle? bam, he’s wrapped around you faster than you could even comprehend. you want to go watch some tv show? he already turned on the TV and instantly the movie started playing.

really, he doesn’t want you to worry about anything. and don’t worry, he doesn’t have any important things to do- besides taking care of you of course! lynette would help out with whatever business he has, and father would surely understand.

even after you get better, he’ll be especially clingy to you, basically attached to you by the hip. so go and give lyney some well deserved attention, won’t you?

©twilightclouds. do not repost, plagiarize, feed my works to AI, or republish my works onto any other site without permission. my works will only be posted on tumblr.

[genericpuff]

So Webtoons is getting sued by a bunch of law firms in class action lawsuit. Saw it on reddit. Apparently they lied to shareholders about revenue which is like one of the worst things I could imagine doing to your shareholders. Then their stock dropped again. Wow....wonder how this is gonna effect readers going forward or how they're gonna be more exploitative in the future. Not saying the down of Webtoons has begun but I wonder if it's gonna be the start of it.

Yep, I've been following this since the initial investigations began.

All that said, we likely won't see anything of this for a while, if anything even comes of it. The reality is that Webtoons... really didn't actually lie about being bad at making money. It's literally outlined in their IPO documentation:

So these lawsuits, at least in my opinion (*I AM NOT A LAWYER NOR AM I ANYONE WHO HAS ANY EXPERIENCE PLACING WALL STREET BETS, TAKE WHAT I HAVE TO SAY WITH MOUNTAINS OF SALT) is less about Webtoons 'lying' to shareholders and more so about them kicking the debt down the road which these lawyers want to try and hold them accountable for. It's not uncommon for startups to seek out private and/or public funding to help them stay out of bankruptcy, but such practice is incredibly shitty because if a company was already near the point of bankruptcy to begin with, what exactly is going to change to ensure that they actually make that money back with an additional net gain for those investors?

So in that sense, either something will come of this, or it won't, nothing's really a guarantee as of now. It's just as common for startups seeking public investments to get sued within their first 1-2 years because a company not returning on their initial investments within 3-6 months is a prime cut for lawyers to drool over. Despite their attempts to be honest about their earnings, the vast majority of Wall Street investors are paranoid little fuckers who invest in whatever's new and exciting with the hopes that it'll turn them a profit quickly and without headache. Unfortunately, Webtoons isn't a company that's known for having huge profit margins, which these investors would have realized if they knew anything about this industry or at the very least, bothered to read the fine print that Webtoons was obligated to lay out for them in their documentation. At best the majority of them saw Webtoons' offering that covered buzzwords like "content generation" and "AI" and went "yes please, I love money!" without realizing that webtoons, as a medium, have some of the highest production expenses to lowest-paying demographics out there and therefore companies like Webtoons aren't going to be a short-term gratification. It's more like waiting it out for the "next big thing" that will make that stock valuable again, a massive gamble that isn't guaranteed to payoff. And that's just the game of Wall Street in general.

That said, it's because of how difficult it is to directly monetize digital comics that Webtoons often has to rely on selling merchandise and IP rights in the hopes they'll land a whale - but even their pre-existing whales like Lore Olympus and Let's Play have either nothing to show for themselves, or have left the platform entirely. Of course, they'll vaguely claim that two of Netflix's highest-performing projects came from their platform, but any peek at an aggregated Top 10 list will prove that that is simply not true, and at best, they're referring to True Beauty's live action adaption, which is simply not even close to breaching that list of all-time top-performers (except probably in Korea but this is Goldman Sachs and their American investors they're trying to convince), All of Us are Dead (see above, same situation as True Beauty), and Heartstopper which is... not even an Originals series. Of course, that didn't stop Webtoons and Tapas from boasting about Heartstopper's Netflix adaption and its success on the platform, but literally none of its success is exclusively owed to either of those platforms, Alice Oseman flies solo and if anything, Heartstopper never would have gotten to the point it's at if it were tied down to a Webtoon Originals contract.

So in a sense, until anything comes of these lawsuits, they're more so just lawyers jumping on their own investment opportunity - the opportunity to get settlements from Webtoons for both their clients and themselves by extension. At best what they feasibly have against Webtoons is the company getting way too high on their own supply without anything to feasibly show in terms of profit for their IP's. Considering how many IP's they sold to television and film production studios back in 2019-2022 when they were at their peak over the lockdowns - a peak that is long in the rearview mirror - they are incredibly behind in actually paying off those promises. Even in a recent meeting they held just the other day with Goldman Sachs, they're quoted as saying: "When Rachel Smythe was a graphic designer in New Zealand, 4 or 5 years ago, and she had a story to tell, we enabled her to not just tell it in one part of the world, but globally. She became a NYT Bestselling author, she is rumored to be releasing soon as a major animated release."

When even the company that hosts Lore Olympus as its prize pig can only say that its long-anticipated TV production that both Rachel and Webtoons have been assuring people on repeat that the show is "still happening" and that what they've seen so far "looks amazing" is simply 'rumored to be releasing soon'... I don't even have the words to describe how embarrassing that is for them. Never mind the fact that Lore Olympus has been over for months and both it and its creator, Rachel, have been falling into the pits of irrelevancy. They don't have any other home-runners to bet on, they're just continuing to bank on Rachel as their own example of someone who "got big" even though it was years ago and that fame is now shrinking with the passage of time, you can even see the performance of the series dipping in its own front-end metrics over time. They are trying so hard to convince people that they're worth investing in when the one thing that actually DID have that kind of allure has now come and gone.

Never mind the fact that again, most Wall Street investors probably don't even participate in webtoon culture so the name "Rachel Smythe" isn't some golden ticket to fortune. Lore Olympus might get a bit more of a reaction, but it's going to be a lot more mixed due to how divisive the series became in the end, and general audiences who are new to Webtoons as a public company (and the medium as a whole) are still not so likely to know what the fuck that means or why it's significant. The best time to pull the "we have Rachel Smythe!" card in the public investing pool was, like many other things Webtoons has fallen behind in, years ago. Now it's clear Webtoons thinks that Rachel is their own personal J.K. Rowling, but they forgot the part where Rachel is creating for an incredibly niche and historically unprofitable medium that is nowhere near as big as what Harry Potter was back in its prime, and - personally speaking - that Rowling and Rachel are both, well... terrible at what they do.

Webtoons also has the added burden of not being a startup company. They're not some grassroots Silicon Valley tech startup run by a bunch of friends "with a dream", they're an extension of an industry that thrives overseas but barely has any infrastructure to support it here. They've been bankrolled for years by an overseeing tech company - Naver - but have consistently failed to get out of the red and so of course, now they're turning to public investments to help them out and subsequently, are passing that debt off to the next highest bidder, which is Wall Street. They had nearly a decade to figure their shit out here in the West and while they had their opportunities to thrive, those opportunities have come and gone, a lot of doors have closed and now this all feels like their own attempts to rip those doors back open again.

There is a LOT to insinuate already that Webtoons - a Korean-hosted platform - wasn't ready to enter the Western market and this fumbling of their public stock image is yet another great example of that. Even outside of Webtoons, other Korean-run platforms like Tapas have relied on private investments to keep them afloat (and still do, Tapas is still operating privately) and have routinely struggled to get a real foothold in the greater Western industry despite how much they hyped themselves up as the "next big thing". They're all playing the same game over and over again expecting better scores even though the playing fields are entirely different than what they've come to expect in Korea, where much of the entertainment industry is built around webtoons, much like how our entertainment industry in the West is built around comic giants like Marvel and DC (and even those giants are faltering as we've been seeing over the past several years).

Anyways. I don't know if this lawsuit is gonna go anywhere, there's a lot to the legal process that could lead to a variety of different outcomes, but at the very least, their plummeting stock value and the lawyers circling them from above is yet another notch on their belt of fuck-ups over the past few years. I know it's easy to say this in hindsight and I'm not the kind of guy to say "I told you so", but considering I've been following along with the bullshit of these major platforms for years and knew as soon as Webtoons was rumored to be going forward with an IPO that it would lead to disaster, I'm pretty confident in saying, "No really, I told you so." And I don't entirely blame the investors for that (except for the ones that clearly didn't read the fine print) - I also blame Webtoons for that, because they are a chronically unprofitable company run by a bunch of clowns who manufactured their own demise by getting in WAY over their heads and clearly don't even have a concept of a plan let alone an actionable one.

And that sucks, because the people who stand to get hurt the most are the ones who were made those empty promises years ago, long before the platform entered Wall Street - and that's the creators who were promised that their livelihoods would be secured and their work would be protected.

I will forever bully and make fun of Webtoons for everything they've done in and to this industry. I hope at the very least those investors learned an expensive lesson, and that the damage these lawsuits have already caused to Webtoons' public image - regardless of whether or not these lawsuits win - empowers others who have been screwed over by them to speak up and make their moves. They are not a monolith. They are a brittle business operating from the trunk of a clown car on their way to becoming a penny-stocks sham.

Fuck Webtoons <3

[veganism]

The genocide is also experimentation on living beings

Israel is currently testing new weapons in Gaza, some of which will soon be sold globally as "battle-tested," according to Antony Loewenstein, an author who has written a widely acclaimed book on the issue.

For years, the Israeli defense sector has used Palestine as a laboratory for new weapons and surveillance tech, he told Anadolu, adding that this is also the case in the current ongoing war on Gaza.

One of the main reasons why "many nations, democracies and dictatorships support Israeli occupation" of Palestine is because it allows them to buy these "battle-tested" weapons, asserted Loewenstein, author of The Palestine Laboratory: How Israel Exports the Technology of Occupation Around the World.

Another aspect of Israel's war on Gaza has been the use of artificial intelligence technology, he said.

According to Loewenstein, AI has been one of the key targeting tools used by the Israeli military in its deadly campaign of airstrikes, leading to mass killings of Palestinians-now over 28,500-and damage on an unprecedented scale.

The current war on Gaza is "inarguably one of the most consequential and bloody," he said.

He described Israel's use of AI against Palestinians as "automated murder," stressing that this model "will be studied and copied by other nation-states" and Tel Aviv will sell them these technologies as tried and tested weapons.

In the last 50 years, Israel has exported hi-tech surveillance tools to at least 130 countries around the world.

To maintain its illegal occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and blockade of the Gaza Strip, Israel has developed a range of tools and technologies that have made it the world's leading exporter of spyware and digital forensics tools.

But analysts say the intelligence failure during the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attacks casts doubts over Tel Avis's technological capabilities.

Israel's reliance on technology "is an illusion of safety, while imprisoning 2.3 million people under endless occupation," said Loewenstein, who is Jewish and holds Australian and German nationalities.

He described Israel's response in Gaza as "apocalyptic," stressing that the killings of Palestinian civilians, including children and women, is "on a scale of indiscriminate slaughter."

- 'BLOOD MONEY'

Loewenstein, who is also a journalist, said Israel has honed its weapons and technology expertise over decades as an occupying power, acting with increasing impunity in the Palestinian territories.

This led a small country like Israel to become one of the top 10 arms dealers in the world, he said, adding that Israeli arms sales in 2021 were "the highest on record, surging 55% over the previous two years to $11.3 billion."

In his book, Loewenstein explores thoroughly Israel's ties with autocracies and regimes engaged in mass displacement campaigns, and governments slinking their way into phones.

The Israeli NSO Group sold its well-known Pegasus software to numerous governments, a spyware tool for phones that gives access to the entire content, including conversations, text messages, emails and photos even when the device is switched off.

Israeli drones were first tested over Gaza, the besieged enclave that Loewenstein referred to as "the perfect laboratory for Israeli ingenuity in domination."

Surveillance technology developed in Israel has also been sold to the US in the form of watch towers now used on the border with Mexico.

The EU's border agency Frontex is known to have used Israeli drone technology to monitor refugees.

Loewenstein explains in his book that the EU has partnered with leading Israeli defense companies to use its drones, "and of course years of experience in Palestine is a key selling point."

"So again, one sees how there are so many examples of nations that are wanting to copy what Israel is doing in their own area in their own country on their own border," he said.

These technologies and "are sold by Israel as battle-tested," he said.

In other words, he contends that Palestinians essentially have become "guinea pigs," and despite some nations and the UN publicly criticizing the Israeli occupation, in reality "they're desperate for this technology for themselves for their own countries."

"And that's how in fact, the Palestine laboratory has been so successful for Israel for so long," he said.

In his exhaustive probe into Israel's dealings with arms sales around the world, he noted that the country has monetized the occupation of Palestine, by selling weapons, spyware tools and technologies to repressive regimes such as Rwanda during the genocide in 1994 and to Myanmar during its genocide against the Muslim Rohingya people in 2017.

"This to me is blood money. I mean, there's no other way to see that and again, as someone Jewish, who has spent many, many years reporting on this conflict, both within Israel and Palestine but also elsewhere, it's deeply shameful that Israel is making huge amounts of money from the misery of others," he said.

"This is not a legacy that I can be proud of."

- 'NO NATION ACTUALLY HOLDING ISRAEL TO ACCOUNT'

Profiting from misery is to some extent the nature of what capitalism has always been about, but Israel does this with a great deal of impunity, "because Israel does what it wants," said Loewenstein.

"There is no accountability, there is no transparency, there is no nation actually holding Israel to account," he added.

Israel's regime is shielded from any political backlash for years to come because nations are reliant on Israeli weapons and spyware, said the author.

Israel may not be the only player employing surveillance technology that leads to human rights violations, but it still plays a dominant role, which is why Loewenstein insists that it deserves singular attention.

Israel's foreign policy has always been "amoral and opportunistic," he said, calling on all nations to take a stand and hold Israel accountable, and acknowledge that the world is buying what Israel is selling.

[batboyblog]

I feel like some people can't be/refuse to be educated, or they're deliberately being obtuse because they're trolls, psyops, or they just fell for the trolls and psyops. But its still good to point out where they're wrong and to give actual, you know, facts, for the benefit of other people reading who might actually be reachable.

yeah, I mean I usually ignore them because usually its bad faith and when a post is getting hundreds even thousands of notes in a day you just can't keep up with the 10-20-ish people who say something, particularly if its in the tags because thats just hard or fighting in the replies which always feels weird

But I was in a bad mood and in general seeing the same either bad faith or straight up don't know comment over and over and over again is very annoying

the "lol Joe Biden didn't do anything about Student loans!" one is pretty annoying since Biden has forgiven well over 100 BILLION dollars worth of student loan debt, so like he has done a lot on student loan debt. I'm not a big deal but I remember I did one of my "what Biden did this week" posts and it had the student loan debt forgiveness for people who got defrauded by the Art Institutes, and a few people added their stories of being defrauded and being in debt to AI for years and the one that'll stay with me was an older guy who went to try to get a new degree to get a job in a different field kinda late in the game, his 50s or 60s and of course didn't get the jobs he hoped for because scam college and saying how he thought he'd die in debt and it was all gone, all forgiven. So just like people flippantly dismissing a very real life changing thing is very annoying

there are a few other very common annoying ones "why didn't he do this when he controlled congress before!" well he was busy passing the biggest climate change bill any government on earth has ever done, investing in our Infrastructure for the first time since before Reagan was President (Reagan 😒) listen Biden passed 4 of the biggest most transformationally progressive bills the US has seen since LBJ

American Rescue Plan

Bipartisan Infrastructure Law

CHIPS and Science Act

Inflation Reduction Act

on top of which he passed the first gun control law out of congress in 30 years, and other things, like the Respect for Marriage Act to protect gay marriage, or making Juneteenth a federal holiday (the first new federal holiday since MLK day in 1983)

SO! thats why he didn't do the things he wants to do in his next term he was busy doing equally (and in the case of climate change more important) things and thats why we should all be hopeful if Joe Biden is President with a Democratic Congress he'll get most if not ALL the things on his agenda done, because he's fucking good at this, we haven't had a President this good at pushing bills through Congress and using every switch and lever of the federal government to make major progressive change since LBJ or FDR, I guess his big mistake was naming it something boring like "Inflation Reduction Act" and not something sexy like "New Deal" or "Great Society"

sorry to go off on a tare there, but its just frustrating to see 40 (out of tens of thousands really) posts saying the same dumb shit and having no real way to respond

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL - Gangsters Win

Organized, in each category, by ones I'm enjoying most at the top. Delayed October reviews included this week! (Still traveling but now in home territory and familiar hotels.)

Nov 2023 Wk 2

Ongoing Series - Thai

My Dear Gangster Oppa (Thurs iQIYI) 2 of 8 - GIVING ME LIFE. How dare they be this… this... Just. How dare!

Twins the series (Fri GaGa) ep 1 of 10 - I have been waiting for another truly sports centered BL since HIStory 2: CTL. This is nowhere near as good, but I don’t care. It’s great pulp and Sprite is a fab central character. I've realized that I love the pulps most when they’re ridiculously soapy (identical twins identity trope for sport’s fuck’s sake) but ERNEST about it (not campy). This one is taking itself seriously and it's so cute that it's trying so hard. Good little pulp. Dee mar.

Dangerous Romance (Fri YT) ep 12fin - was it me or did this show kinda flag on you too?

Poor, struggling Sailom is forced to tutor his bully, Kang, and they fall for each other despite circumstances. I loved it for the first 4 eps, liked it for the middle 4, and then kinda lost interest. I think it's because the focus shifted from Sailom to Kang, and I just find a disenfranchised character more interesting than the poor little rich kid archetype. Ultimately the script waffled and failed these actors - the leads and sides were solid, and support cast on point. 8/10 pretty standard 2023 GMMTV fair

Absolute Zero (Thai Weds iQIYI) ep 6 of 12 - It’s sort of a paradox of emotions not just time. It remains sad and I remain wary. 

My Universe (Sun iQIYI) The Camp Fire ep 11 of 24 - Launched with an argument over rude pronouns and mistaken identity. Highlights the joy of camping. Ugh. I don't think this one is for me despite the pair.

Venus in the Sky (Tues iQIYI) ep 10fin - NO SINGING. I can't believe they brought in rando SIDEs just to sing! WHHHHYYYYY? Sigh.

An indifferent pulp with indifferent acting and poor chemistry (despite high heat) based on the reunion romance trope that was just... so... slow... It wasn’t entirely a waste of time but I can’t in good faith recommend it. unless you have a very high tolerance for Thai pulps and ultra tsundere characters. 5/10 ONLY WATCH IF YOU'VE NOTHING BETTER TO DO

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Kiseki: Dear to Me (Taiwan Tues Viki & iQIYI) ep 12 of 13 - I don’t mean to be rude because you know I love the main couple in the show, but they are simply being out acted by the sides. They are so damn good. Ai Di and his dumb oversized sweaters and flappy flappy sleeves is EVERYTHING.

Bump Up Business (Korea Gaga) 5-6 of 8 - More language negotiation, so of course I like it. I also like that they openly let Eden admit to a crush on a boy. I like this whole thing way more than I should. Save me from myself?

You Are Mine (Taiwan Fri Viki) eps 9 of 10 - I don’t understand why baby boy is trying to escape so badly. (Except for plot reasons.) Running of the gays! Look at you Taiwan stealing Japan’s favorite trope. This show is fun but it’s a bag of tropes held together with some very thin fraying mesh plot. 

If It’s With You AKA Even If I Fall In Love With You AKA Kimi to nara Koi wo Shite Mite mo’ (Japan Gaga) ep 5fin - The leads are so painfully cute portraying a softly simple story of teen first love. This was a nice little piece with an early yaoi feel that come off as brief, as if it were meant to be a short story that had been extended into a series. Sweet but ultimately rather forgettable. 7/10  

Mr Cinderella 2 (Vietnam Sat YT) ep 6-7 of ? - yeah I forgot to watch again, I may be dnfing this by accident.

It's Airing But...

I Cannot Reach You AKA I Can't Reach You AKA Kimi ni wa Todokanai (Japan Tues Netflix-Japan & ????) - in classic JBL fashion, I Cannot Reach You could not be reached. It looks good though so I mgiht put some effort into finding it grey.

Look at Japan dropping all the tropes in on scene: rooftop, kabedon, hand hold.

SHADOW (Thai Gaga) 1-7 of 14 - this is a horror BL with ghosts & paranormal elements in a boarding school setting. I'm not wild about Thai horror (or horror at all). It features Singto (who did paranormal BL He's Coming to Me) opposite Fluke N (who's done a couple horror's before). Also Fiat. Dan suffers from sleep paralysis, and in his dreams he sees a shadow that suffocates him. It gets worse when he transfers schools. I'm holding off on this one and if told it's good I'll binge watch.

What Did You Eat Yesterday Season 2 AKA Kinou Nani Tabeta? Season 2 (Japan Gaga) ep 1 of 10 - I find this series more fun to binge, so I'm waiting until it completes its run.

One Room Angel (Japan Gaga) - adaptation of Harada’s manga of the same name (which I did not like) about a convenience store clerk who's stabbed, nearly dies, and returns home to find an angel waiting for him. With only 5 eps and a good chance this won’t end happy, I'm gonna wait and let you tell me how it goes.

Can I Buy Your Love From A Vending Machine? AKA Sono Koi, Jihanki de Kaemasu ka? (Japan cinema release in-country only) - This one is a movie from Japan so in customary fashion who tf knows when (or if) it will get international distribution. Salaryman Ayumu Koiwai just can't tear his eyes away from the strong, muscular man as he checks on the stocks of the vending machine in his office. I did some hunting but only found the manga, so I'm marking it cnf and moving on with life. This will be its last appearance on the weekly update.

I Finished It!

Love in Translation (iQIYI) ep 8 - solid ending, man these two are a great pairing.

A sweet little pulp about a Thai boy with a crush on a Chinese influencer who ends up in a business relationship with her ex-bf. This show had truly great chemistry between the leads, cute found family with good rep, and an exciting (if silly) ending that almost, but didn't quite, make up for how incredibly annoying the main character was in the first half. Gotta say the make-out scene in the convenience store is one of the greatest in Thai BL, tho. 6/10 DEF WORTH WATCHING BUT FLAWED

I Feel You Linger in the Air (grey) ep 8 of 12 - so that was A THING. I did a seriously extensive deep dive analysis, historical & linguistic extras, and review here.

I truly loved this time travel romance. IFYLITA is an exquisite BL, from filming techniques to narrative framework (much like Until We Meet Again). Steeped in history and family drama it edges into lakorn (but no as much as To Sir With Love and with way less scenery chewing). This is an elegant and classy BL… from Thailand which normally doesn't even try for classy. The main couple (both as a pair and individuals) were excellent, particularly Bright (Yai) whose eye-work acting style is a personal favorite of mine. Pity about the ending. Oh it wasn’t that sad but it wasn’t good either. This show should easily have earned a 10 from me except that it fumbled the… erm… balls. Argh. Whatever. 9/10

Only Friends (YT) ep 11-12 - What can I say, this wasn't my thing, it was never gonna be, and I didn't like it. Basically Thailand did the L-Word but with branded BL pairs and the only agenda seemed to be slut shaming and making sure those pairs stayed healthy and sponsor ready. Consequently, the pairs were all executing well and to the best of their ability (of course) but all other characters got shafted, both in the good and the worst possible ways. Unrated but if falls somewhere between 5 (hot mess) and 3 (what am I doing with my life?)

Next Week Looks Like This

11/10 Middleman’s Love (Thai Fri Mandee's YT & iQIYI 1 of 8? - TutorYim (brand pair origin = Cutie Pie) with side couple KingUea (Bed Friends) from Domundi trailer here. This used to be a JimmyTommy vehicle before the pair split (also prev title Middle Love). Adapted from a Y-novel. Jade works as a graphic designer and has always been stuck in the middle - average. His heart is hardened after a life spent being overlooked because he is not as charming or good looking as the rest of his family or friends. When his office gets a hot new intern, Mai, Jade assumes Mai couldn’t possibly be intersted in him. Mai, of course, has other ideas. Warning this is a Cheewin comedy so tonally it could be very OFF, but the cast is solid, and I have liked his stuff on occasion.

11/10 Last Twilight (Thai Fri YouTube) - JimmySea are bakc and maybe it's good this time? I dont' know, GMMTV isn't doing great right now. Burdened with heavy debt, Mork, a mechanic, is forced to take a high paying job as a caretaker for Day, a rich heir who suffers from partial blindness after an accident. Day recruits Mork as he realizes the latter does not see him as a disabled person, but rather as co-equals. As they spend time together, the two begin developing feelings for the other. However with Day just having 180 days until he becomes permanently blind, how will the two weather the trials ahead?Upcoming November BL

11/11 Beyond The Star (Weds iQIYI) qp 1 of 8 - Looks like House of Stars meets Boyband. I am not excited.

Upcoming in November

11/16 PLAYBOYY (Thurs ????) ?? eps - trailer here, high heat and it's helmed by Cheewin (shudder) with screenplay by Den (Only Friends) under Copy A Bangkok. It's gonna be a shizz show people. It's predicting Thai style "dark" (War of Y) one of my least favorites. Apparently there is a "plot" but when has Cheewin ever bothered with plot? A university kid who was involved with escorts, sex-trade, porn, online hook-ups, drugs, prostitution, blackmail, revenge, and so forth goes missing. His twin (sigh) and two friends look for him.

11/17 Pit Babe (Fri iQIYI) ep 1 of 14 - high heat teaser here, based on alittlebixth's omegaverse novel #พิษเบ๊บ’ set in the world of car racing (author says show will not be omegaverse). Charlie (fresh face), a young hot nerd, approaches his driver idol (Pavel "my love" 2 Moons 2) to borrow a racing car and win one for the team. Production house is new to BL but behind the Club Friday stuff. Show stars many known actors: Nut (Oxygen), Pop (Ram in La Cuisine), Pon (Phai in Gen Y, we LOVE him), Benz (twins in En of Love: This Is Love Story).

11/19 Bake Me Please (Sun Gaga) ep 1 of 6 - trailer here, stars Ohm (of OhmFluke) opposite Guide (bestie from IFYLITA) and possibly also Poom (well known, but not for BL). This looks like an actually gay version of Antique Bakery (play it again, BL). Still, I'm intrigued, it looks HELLA pretty.

11/22 7 Days Before Valentine (Weds ????) ep 1 of 10 - trailer here, horror-esk. Adapted from y-novel of the same name, directed by Tu (180 Degree) stars Jet (Why You… Y Me?). When you want your old love again, but fate sends you a reaper instead. All he can do for you is kill people. I'll likely give this a pass and wait to binge later. I'm planning to try SHADOW and I can only handle one Thai horror at a time.

11/25 The Sign (Sat ????) ep 1 of 10 - trailer here, horror-esk, but with a suspense and adult characters. Special investigators who loved each other in previous lives reunite with their new bodies, stars Billy Patchanon (BillySeng) & Babe Tanatat (new). Includes other SCOY favorites as a special investigation team. I may give this a try because I like the non-horror bits.

11/26 The Whisperer (Sun ????) 1 of 10 - trailer here. Thai horror BL that ALSO involves cheating (what joy is mine). He has dimples (My Ride) but I don't think even that gives me the will. Maybe a binge for me.

11/26 Cooking Crush (Sun YT) 1 of 12 - OffGun are back, trailer here. Adapted from the novel “Love Course! เสื้อกาวน์รุกเสื้อกุ���กรับ” by iJune4S this is about Prem who runs a not-so-popular restaurant with 2 friends. About to go on a cooking competition with a huge reward, Prem gets involved with Ten, a stressed-out med student who wants Prem to teach him to cook.

11/30 For Him (Thurs ????) ep 1 of 10 - high heat trailer, I suspect iQIYI will scoop this one up. From the people who brought us Unforgotten Night (please no) based on a y-novel, man nursing a heartbreak has a one-night stand, but the other boy didn't want it to end. It looks terribly trashy so I'm in! Maybe I'll do a trash watch?

VIP Only (Taiwan) - may be delayed/canceled

Wuju Bakery AKA Space Bakery (Korea) - this one may be DOA

A Breeze of Love (Korea) - I know less than nothing about this.

Nov 2023 line up with screen caps here. Not kept updated.

Original 2023 forthcoming BL master post (see comments, some are inaccurate, NOT KEPT UPDATED).

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

Yang's little smile! Argh. (Love in Translation)

This is our mean and grumpy gagster character talking about playing in game support roles. It's fucking adorable. Such a nasty criminal. (My Dear Gangster Oppa)

(Last week)

[centrally-unplanned]

I blogged before about this company, Orange, that is an AI-powered manga translation company. Essentially, their pitch is that most manga is still (officially) untranslated, a ton of manga gets made after all but few become mainstream enough to get ported overseas. They posit the barrier to that is the cost of translation; if they could automate that process, then they can make viable for release what previously was not. That concept rests on two questions - does the tech pan out, and does the economics add up?

Recently they went live, under the name Emaqi, so we can better explore those questions. What I notice on first glance is the pitch seems to have shifted a little bit in post:

You are not the translators of Vinland Saga, Witch Hat Atelier, or Magic Knight Rayearth, very obviously so. They have Sailor Moon in here lol. These are just the official translations being cross-listed into their "manga platform", where you buy it there and it lives, DRM-locked, in their app. Which is fair enough as a model, that is just Kindle, it works. Though Kindle and a dozen others already exist, so their value-add has to be the AI translation stuff right? That is why I would choose this over another app.

Which they do have, though it is kind of buried:

"Only on emaqi" - there is no mention of the translation approach, poor guys! Can't fault the branding decision I guess given the state of the discourse. When it comes to the products themselves, I went through ~6 or so of the sample chapters of different manga, did a few spot checks with the original Japanese, and read the reviews of some others who looked into it. They seem fine! I am cautiously impressed, I think there proofers did a good job smoothing out some edges, it has a "manga tone", and while small issues like the hyphenation the reviewer above mentioned do exist and are legit noticeable, they aren't common and not a huge deal. It has flow issues? Some dialogue should link together in how it is written, but doesn't. But it isn't crazy off or anything. You will not be wowed by these, but certainly if you are someone who reads bootleg scanlations you are gonna have no problems. A lot of manga uses pretty simple vocab and isn't breaking new ground on plot, I can see how a purpose-built tool could handle it well enough.

The economics though...here is where I don't think this case was ever going to pencil out and isn't now. Because I am pretty sure no one here has heard of any of the manga listed above as exclusives. (I saw 90's manga Geobreeders in there, but that was already partially translated in the 2000's, not sure if they did a new one? Setting it aside) Which, of course you haven't, if you had it probably would have been translated! Books are a 90:10 market, most books never get read and some books get read a ton. Anything big enough can justify a professional translation, and the other can't really sell to begin with.

On top of that, their model is mass translation; which means these obscure manga are presented to you with no context, no hype, no build-up. Wtf is The Blood Blooms In the Barrens?? See, if you were like a boutique publisher, selecting "the best of the best" in untranslated manga, you would promote your specific product. Interviews, social media, the value of the brand-itself as a quality seal. Publishing less is more, actually, your value as a publisher is as a quality selector. Or you could be say the porn market, where you max quantity so people can search "foot fetish breeding kink oshi no ko" and get results; they know what they want. But they aren't doing either! And to be blunt a lot of these are not gonna sell on their art alone:

I'm not mocking The Delayed Highschool Life of a Laborer here, that is better than I could do; but if you want to me spend money on a whim the bar is high and these don't reach it. Which of course they don't, they would be professionally translated if they did.

And finally, the price - $5 dollars, for volume 1's, like a 100-200 pages. The cross-listed manga typically sells for ~$10? That isn't much cheaper! If "translation" was this big cost barrier, and all you got is cutting the price of ebooks in half, I don't know if the analysis was so solid. This is a new product, I doubt they are overcharging to make a quick buck right now - this is the "sell at cost to scale" era.

In all of their lead up press they would say things like this:

Orange's process uses AI to read the manga through image analysis and character recognition, then to translate the words into English, Chinese and other languages. The technology is specialized for manga, meaning it is able to handle wordplay and other difficult-to-translate phrases. A human translator then makes corrections and adjustments. The process can deliver a manga translation in as little as two days. Orange will work with multiple Japanese publishers. The company looks initially to complete 500 translations monthly.

But this is missing a lot of context. For one, these manga are simple high school or battle manga that are ~200 pages long, many of those pages have only a few lines of dialogue, etc. Imagine you are a professional translator, and you are given that manga to translate, all the set-up done for you, all you gotta do is write. How long do you think that would take? Not that long! It could probably take like a week if it's actually all you did (calc'd from a 10k word count manga volume, 2k is a typical "good translator" per day count - many manga are shorter than that). And note how they said "as little as two days" - not median two days! Just, you know, aspirationally.

Translation is just not a big bottleneck. You gotta do layouts, lettering, proofs, etc, these can all take just as much time - and are being done by people, they still need wage workers doing all this. But that is small fry in comparison to publishing contracts, author approvals, distribution, all of that. And most importantly, product acquisition - you have to get authors to sign with you! That can be months of work. I am sure they are trying to get bulk agreements with publishers and such, but authors will push back on that, this is not an easy endeavor.

Which is why, in above, they say they hope to have "500 translations monthly". And after a year+ of work, on launch, they have...

...18. As best I can tell at least, their site deliberately obfuscates what they actually translated versus are just hosting for resale after all.

So yeah, as mentioned I don't think the economics pencil out. These aren't worth $5 dollars, they can't actually generate volume that makes "massive economies of scale" actually valuable, and their approach is currently antithetical to the idea of generating traction for any of their individual works. Niche publishing just doesn't work this way.

But it is early days, and hey I respect the experiment! I do think the tech is pretty good, and it is nice to see a company showcase it. It isn't quite good enough yet for prime time, but it could get there. I do want more manga to get exposure and audience; I will give a fair shake to any who try.

[cairavende]

Worm Arc 20 thoughts:

I legit have restarted this post at least 10 times. I just. I can't even figure out what to say. What an arc. Holy fucking shit what an arc.

The last vestiges of Taylor's civilian life are swept away in one smooth motion.

I could have read another 5 chapters of Emma getting her shit handed to her though.

I've been waiting for something to come back and bite that girl since Arc 1. So I'm just riding high off of that.

Taylor getting all upset because it isn't real justice is silly though. Girl you've been fighting a broken system from day 1 and you have been doing that by breaking the rules. This is just the same thing.

Also god dammit Greg. Just had to go and run your mouth.

I mean sure Taylor could have possibly solved this issue without going to school herself.

And she could have just not gone to the office with Emma.

But blaming Greg is easier and more fun. God dammit Greg.

I had to lose my mind a bit at Taylor talking about how there was no gang graffiti on the school walls TEN SECONDS AFTER WALKING PAST GRAFFITI FOR THE UNDERSIDERS. Like, that's gang graffiti hon!

Dennis trying to help Taylor with Greg when he didn't know who either of them are is funny. Dennis seeing Taylor named as Skitter 15 minutes later is HYSTERICAL!!

The second Taylor was entered into the computer system it was pretty obvious that Dragon was going to show up, given what she said in her interlude in Arc 10.

And knowing she was going to show up it should have been obvious that HE was also going to show up.

Even if he wasn't palling around with my robot daughter it makes so much narrative sense for him to be there when she is outed. Full story arc, all that jazz.

And yet, I still wasn't quite expecting it. Cause I hate that man so much that I just had to make myself believe he wouldn't show up.

Mother fucking Colin

RoboCape himself

He has the nerve to show up and then he starts APOLOGIZING? And it appears to be sincere? Fucking dammit man you were so easy to hate for so long! Why you gotta mess with me like this?

STOP DOING THE RIGHT THING AND LET ME HATE YOU GOD DAMMIT!

siiiigh

And then of course we have to talk about Dragon.

Dragon who didn't want to do this but had to.

Except that Colin had a code push ready and she could have told him to do it at anytime. But she was willing to do what she thought was wrong instead of doing the update. Until she got inspired by Taylor's actions.

I love my robot daughter exactly as much as my bug daughter, but I am disappointed that she was almost willing to go through with everything. Happy she fought back though.

And if Colin's hacked together code did any permanent damage I'll destroy the man.

Taylor learning that Dinah - either by force or by choice - gave the PRT numbers to let them know to come after her at the school was heartbreaking to watch. She just wasn't ready for it at all, poor child.

AND TAYLOR'S SPEECH THOUGH!

HOLY SHIT!!!

Sort and simple and she fucking rallies the students to her. Against the heroes!

Gotta be one of the best moments in Worm for sure. Even if every Arc after this is a banger that's still gonna be a hard moment to top.

AAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!

And someone gives her a hoodie to help her hide and just aaaahhhh!

AND THEN AFTER THEY GOT AWAY AND ALL THE STUDENTS WERE LIKE "You saved my dad" "You stopped Leviathan at the shelter" "You fought off the SH9" AND SHE WAS JUST OVERWHELMED BY IT ALL?

HOLY FUCK JUST AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Also for real though Dragon is free. Like sure it's taking her some time to recover and she can't talk right now (which like I get it, we all have non-verbal episodes sometimes), but as long as nothing goes wrong she is free. I'm so fucking happy for her.

But also I'm terrified cause I know what happens to full AI's with free will in most things. Worm is very different from most things. But I'm still worried about my robot daughter.

Also I never cared much for Danny but obviously it still sucks to be him here. The scene with Taylor saying goodbye with the butterfly was emotional.

Oh oh and! Taylor talks about the butterfly being her "last contact" with her Dad. Very much bug as an extension of self. It's a shift she's been making.

Even more so there's a point where she is trying to get out of the school and she gets to the door and has a bug clone on the other side and says "my hand pressing against my own, separated by an inch and a half of door". Like, the bug clone hand is just her hand. I fucking love the shift compared to how she talked about the bugs early on.

Oh and also Greg totally has like, a Thinker 1 power or something. Pretty sure I mentioned that last arc with his interlude but mentioning it again now to be sure.

Stan interlude thoughts:

Oh my god I hate this man I can't stand him I hated him from the 3rd sentence of the chapter and I was always right to do so!

Seriously. 3rd sentence (or maybe 3rd paragraph which is technically the 3rd, 4th, and 5th sentences I guess). I read it and went "fuck off Stan you're clearly a pretentious dick" and then every few sentences it just became more confirmed!

Just the ways he talks about Nipper. Like. I can rephrase what he says to say the exact same thing except not being a asshole when saying it! Instead of "She was weak and unsuited for the field but she at least tried" just say "She was a hard worker despite being assigned to a job she did not ask for"! It's so fucking easy dude!

Anyway Stan is a jerk.

I loved the way this interlude rolled through different people all watching the same news report. It was a really good way to cover this major story event and let us see how so many other characters were reacting to it.

Also I'm sure all those Slaughterhouse Nine clones aren't going to be an issue later right? Or the fact that there is specifically only one clone of Gray Boy instead of 10 like everyone else? I'm sure that's fiiiiine.

Accord interlude thoughts:

Oh. Oh my. Uhhh. Is it hot in here all of the sudden? Anyone else feel that? No? Just me?

sweats

Oh ok Citrine definitely feels what I'm feeling. She knows what's up.

Just like. Look. Accord is bad ok. Not just cause he's a villain but clearly he'll kill for the smallest cause. And he's in a spot to fuck with my daughter and her polycule so like. Yes. He's bad. I do not like him. I want him to leave. I don't think they should work with him . . .

but . . .

OH MY FUCKING GOD HOLY SHIT PLEASE ACCORD I LOOK GREAT IN PURPLE AND I LOVE DRESSING FANCY AND I'M VERY GOOD AT BEING PROPER I WON'T MESS UP AT ALL I'LL BE THE PERFECT MINION PLEASE!

. . .

cough

Soooo anyway. How about that Butcher huh? That sure is a wild power. Instantly made me think of Glaistig Uaine's power. Very different but reaches into that same base bit, the idea that some part of a dead parahuman can be held onto.

Also holy shit Skitter was so badass in this scene I loved it.

Holy shit Accord is with Cauldron. Or at least closely aligned. And like of course he is it makes so much sense. He's too useful for them to ignore.

I am really curious to see what Accord's power does when he's confronted with a really complex problem. End of the world, doors to another dimension, higher dimensional beings, all that jazz.