#Vocal Workshop

[genshinmp3]

Polumnia Omnia from The Unfathomable Sand Dunes Yu-Peng Chen, Yijun Jiang, HOYO-MiX

[lottieurl]

ive used 48 different performances and videos (oldest is from 2014 and newest from like literally 2 days ago) and it's 20 minutes long

[inspectorcosmo]

I tried voicing Teeter-Tauter

og footage by mpg (the man the myth the legend himself)

[pebblezone]

Weird Al beach boys song best ever shitting My pants and decomposing

[huishengchang]

講座 - 從聲音創作實驗：人聲的療癒性與集體感｜張惠笙

2022臺南國際人權藝術節

這是一場重新認識與體驗「聲音」的表演講座。講師張惠笙，是一位聲音藝術家與藝術治療師，也是聲音組織「聽說」的共同創辦人，現長駐臺南。她的實踐以不同面向交織而成，側重於社群連結、同在感，以及非言語交流的各種可能。作為音樂家，她以演出作為對特定場域的回應，靈活運用不同的音色和肌理，放大空間本身的聲響質地，同時回應現場的社群狀態。此外，長期透過工作坊，運用人聲去開發各年齡層與不同障礙者的出聲；運用純粹的聲音，無語言也無音調，探索個人解放與自由之療癒性。多種表演合作也運用身體感知體現（embodiment）探索更廣的環境議題，重思人與萬物的共存共生。此次演出講座，將帶大家一起表演集體感知詩譜《藻礁娘親》，回應大潭藻礁議題。

[cwcsolutions]

Pitch Perfect yet?

What a super voice… Alright, listen up! That got your attention, didn’t it? Learning how to pitch your services like a pro is gonna give you some awesome superpowers. Picture this: you’ll become the smooth-talking, credibility-oozing guru that clients can’t resist. First off, let’s talk street smarts. When you pitch properly, you’ll be dropping knowledge bombs left and right, making those…

[sodapopboy]

ponyboy curtis who used to cry when his father, mother, or brothers talked to him with even the slightest tone of disappointment or raised their voice a decibel

ponyboy curtis, who can’t vocalize why he’s upset when he’s really upset— who confuses everyone (besides johnny, since he does it too) when he completely goes silent after arguing with darry a moment ago

sodapop curtis, who was thrown into high school and expected to be a second darry curtis but couldn’t learn anything that wasn’t hands on, his only a’s coming from gym class or that mandatory workshop class

sodapop curtis, who cannot lock in for the life of him unless you give him a puzzle he has to put together or a car that needs fixing (both are the same to him)

darry curtis, who couldn’t stop talking about football after getting his hands on one for the first time when he was nine, whether it was at the dinner table, the locker room, or with ponyboy (who was never the sporty type when he was smaller)

darry curtis, using the little amounts of money his parents gave him to go and buy books about sports, making the sunday game a mandatory watch (he can’t have his routines interrupted or else he’ll get MAD.), and knowing an abnormal amount of information about the dallas cowboys

the curtis brothers, who feel things differently, but love each other all the same

[matchadobo]

KIDD; what are we?

wc: 555

summary: you ask kidd the burning question during the act.

warning/s: 🔞nsfw, afab reader, smut-fluff, actual seggs

"what are we?"

kidd blinked at you, he was frozen. he was still inside you, cock throbbing and heavy. you were holding onto his face, your eyes teary and cheeks flushed. he had his hips prying your legs open but his movements came to a stop at your statement. his face was close, so close you could see his eyes shaking.

he took a lot of staring before snorting and chuckling. "you know what we are, bunny. you just wanna hear me say it, aye?"

his hips resumed to rock back and forth, leaning back as he looked down at you. smiling as he gazed at you sinfully. your grip on his arm tightened at his impact.

he was right. you two are not in an official relationship; no vows had been made, no confessions, nor had you two moved further than keeping your beds warm. but you two are clearly aware that you two belong to each other. aware that it's only him and only you in his life. aware that nobody else other than the both of you can make you feel as good as each other do. aware that you two want to take it further but are just tiptoeing because you two don't want to break whatever you two have. that's why it's been static.

so when you two came and finished, it was quiet. contrast to the usual nights where you two never ran out of things to talk about. you wanted to say something but what? where do you even start?

"if i said i want more than sex," kidd cleared his throat. "would that change anything?" kidd turned his head to the side, full attention on you.

"i always think to myself, do those kisses mean anything or do you just want to keep my cock warm? do the kisses on my scars mean anything or you just whore over me? do the reminder to fuckin' eat as you barge in my workshop just an invitation for sex or do you actually care about me? are you being patient with me because you genuinely wanna be or just so i still grow fond of you?"

this was the first time kidd had been so vocal about your relationship. that must be why tears are streaming down your cheeks as you listened to his deep, hoarse voice. his golden eyes were burning with genuine concern and anticipation of what you're about to say.

"i care about you. i kiss you because i want to. i kiss your scars because i want you to feel safe and i want you to love your scars. i make sure you eat because i don't want you to get sick from starving yourself. i'm patient with you because i want to. i'm doing everything because i want to. because i love you." and it all spilled out of you, not missing a heartbeat.

and kidd held your gaze firmly while you do so. his cock soft on your stomach, your breasts squished in his embrace, your cunt brushing on his thigh, and your legs entangled with each other. a single tear fell from kidd's eyes.

"of course you do," he chuckled. "but it ain't always you who does the sappy shit, got it? let's have a date tomorrow, sort this all out, aye?"

tumblr formatting is kinda weird?? i don't see some buttons lol. ANW boutta reach 500 oml, i got an event prepared for you guys! i'm soooo excited to be writing again bc college welcomed me with baptism through fire honestly! so hectic. but here we are, i'd love to get my drive back and accept some requests. i hope the absences don't bore you guys ;=;. i swear look forward to the event! i anticipate your requests!

spoiler: i'll be accepting a total of 15 requests for the duration of the event, so 15 fics??? can u imagine????

[hikarry]

I'm a big apologist of Aziraphale/Wilde for jealous Crowley reasons and I do wish there were more fanfics about the topic. Or even not about Wilde, just the men in the gentleman's club. Crowley was supposedly asleep at the time but he is clever, he would figure it out somehow (memorabilia Aziraphale keeps in the bookshop, for example) but I don't think he would really bring it up. He would be jealous in silence.

On the other hand, I'm also an apologist of Crowley/Da Vinci. It's not everyone that has a bloody sketch of the Mona Lisa with the message "For my friend, Antonio" or something along those lines (I think it was written in Italian? I can't remember anymore). And Crowley has kept it in pristine condition for centuries!

By now, everyone knows Leo was queer, yes? Fantastic.

Crowley is attracted to art like music and statues, but you know what else? Engineering! Because he used to be a Star-Maker, and what was Leo besides an amazing artist? An engineer! Do you really think Crowley wouldn't be attracted as hell by his inventions? Especially the flying machine?

Now, with the idea that they knew each other and probably spent a lot of time together in the workshop and drinking and what not...well, have you looked at Crowley? He's gorgeous! And artists are attracted to pretty things. My headcanon is that Leo painted Crowley at least once.

Now, a good story would be if the painting was lost in time and eventually found and it made a tour through the best museums and made a stop in London, eventually.

Aziraphale would be excited, Crowley would be curious, and they would go together.

When they arrive in front of the painting Crowley goes very still and Aziraphale gasps.

"But! But that's you!"

"Mhnn eh how would I know? Plenty of red heads back then in Italy, I assure you."

Aziraphale points at the picture.

"I would recognize that face anywhere, Crowley!"

"Aw, angel, would you? What a flatterer."

"That's not the point! This painting...this painting is gorgeous. But aren't you a bit too...au naturel?"

"Agh, eh, I mean. Plenty of semi nude paintings to go around from that era."

"Yes, but in that case the artist and the muse were quite close." Gasp. "Anthony J Crowley, you had a...a thing with Leonardo Da Vinci?! While I was in Spain?!"

"Ngk. I wouldn't call it a thing. More like...a tiny thing."

So yeah, while Crowley is jealous on the inside, Aziraphale (especially if they were already in a relationship) would be very obvious about it and very vocal. Even petty if we want to go down that route.

"Please, angel, you've been avoiding me for 2 days."

"I refused to be kissed with the same lips that kissed Da Vinci."

"Oh yeah? What about your 'friend' Oscar Wilde?!"

Aziraphale gasps and blushes.

"Why the hell would you bring Wilde into this conversation?!"

Crowley steps closer.

"I know exactly what you did with him back in the 1800s. And yet I never complained did I?"

"...since when?"

"The 40s."

"And you never told me you knew?!"

"Because I don't care! I mean, I do, it hurt a little. A lot. But I got over it. That was a century ago, Aziraphale. And I have you now, don't I? I won in the end."

Sorry, I easily get sidetracked. My point is: more Crowley/Da Vinci fanfic or even art are needed.

[jennifer-jeong]

haiii!! could I put in a request for boothill x an alcoholic engineer reader who’s personality takes a complete 180 when drunk? Like when sober they’re really quiet and a total introvert but when drunk they’re basically a party animal/super hype(the reason why they drink so much is because it helps them forget about their life problems like taxes and student loan debt, if I had to compare the reader’s personality to a character I’d say hiroi kikuri from bocchi the rock) but they’re like crazy smart when it comes to machines and stuff and even fixes up boothill from time to time

headcanons or a small fic is fine^^

HII I’M SO SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG I’ve just been out of the groove of writing for a bit but your request is so cute and I wanted to take a shot at it. Thank you for your request and I hope you like it!

Fluff + Suggestive | Boothill x GN!Reader A Few Drinks

CONTENT Fluff, suggestive, him flirting with you, you flirting with him, getting handsy, alcohol consumption, pet name usage, no reader pronouns used, CHARACTERS ARE 18+

WORD COUNT: 1227

It was a regular Friday afternoon in your personal workshop situated in your home on a planet not far off from Penacony and easily accessible via space anchors. The planet was mostly made up of plains, your house sat near a pond and was surrounded by grass and your tiny gardens that you filled with flowers and succulents. You were an excellent engineer working both for corporations as well as taking on smaller private contracts/projects occasionally. You were currently working on a specific cyborg’s finger joint, putting the finishing touches on the cybernetics before he came to have it attached to his robotic body.

You heard a familiar clicking of boots against the sidewalk to your open workshop door before an equally familiar greeting from the cyborg cowboy.

“Heya sweetheart, how ya been? Hows my dumb fudging finger treatin ya?” he chirped, his voice slightly grainy and robotic due to a lack of organic vocal chords.

You swivel around in your chair, giving him a small smile. “Your pinky was pretty messed up but I managed,” you replied quietly, a little anxious talking to the -handsome- man you knew killed people on the daily.

“Ah, ya always fix me up fine and dandy, I knew you’d be able to help,” he said as he walked towards your workbench.

You gave him a small chuckle at the praise and turned around to grab the fixed finger. “Thanks… now just have a seat on the-” you were cut off by turning slightly and being met with his face awfully close to yours. He had leaned over your shoulder to take a closer look at your work, his hands held behind his back.

Your eyes widened as you froze for a moment, unintentionally staring at him before looking away. He was looking at your work but when you turned away he took the opportunity to scan over your flustered self, grinning slightly at how cute you were.

You always treated him so sweetly, disregarding what he did for work because you knew about his past. How could he not find you adorable?

He pulled away to walk towards the table that doubled as an operating table when he or your other clients needed bigger fixes.

“Here?” he says knowingly.

You nod quickly before grabbing a few tools and setting up to attach the part back to his synthetic nervous system.

It was a painful few minutes of him watching you intently as you worked. He was sitting up, leaning back on his right hand, legs spread as he got comfy. His left hand was propped up into a sleeve to keep it still as you worked on it. You tried hard to not look up at him despite knowing he was staring down at you the entire time, probably with that teasing grin he always wore around you.

Once you were done and he finished paying you (with a generous tip no less), he suddenly wondered what you’d be doing since the work week just ended.

“So, whadda ya doin after closin’ up shop today? Ya ever go out for Friday happy hour?”

You whipped your head around to him at the mention of drinking before looking down at the ground, hoping you didn’t seem too eager to talk about alcohol.

“Y-yeah, I go every weekend,” you replied.

He raised an eyebrow and chuckled, “really? Ya didn’t really strike me as the drinkin’ type darlin’.”

You swallowed at his use of pet name.

“Yeah… it helps me get my mind off work and shit,” you shared with him, figuring it was fine to tell him about it since you already started to get to know each other pretty well during his visits. It was hard to explain, but you trusted him.

“Huh… Well, let’s fudgin’ go then!” He says, jumping off the table. “Lemme know when ya ready darlin”.”

“W-whoa there darlin’” Boothill says for the nth time after you two got to a vintage looking club in the city. You were stumbling a bit as he tried to prevent you from knocking anything over or getting yourself hurt. You kept bumping into him, grabbing onto his arms or his chest to stabilize yourself.

It was your turn to fluster the man.

After all the times he’d made you shy and bashful, him feeling your hands all over him in this context and not during some sort of repair procedure was really setting off his sensors.

You giggled in your drunken state and dragged him by his hand to the crowded dance floor. The current song was just ending and you heard the first few beats of one of your favorite songs. The crowd clearly also liked the song as you all started getting hyped. You started jumping and dancing in front of him as you held his shoulders. You even grabbed the attention of some nearby girls as they encouraged you and you did the same to them.

Boothill’s expression slowly morphed from curious shock to an endearing smirk as he laughed at your total 180 shift in personality as soon as you had a few drinks. His hands found your hips as you continued to dance all over him while he moved with the rhythm.

It was also in this moment that he realized exactly what you were wearing too, it was a pretty, skin tight top and ripped shorts, completely different from the baggy overalls and t-shirt you usually wore in the workshop.

He felt his body’s cooling system kick in a bit harder.

You noticed his eyes on you as you always did, but this time, with alcohol in your system, you decided to do something about it.

You pushed him into a nearby bar stool, forcing him to sit down and lean against the bar counter. You stood between his legs, hands on his chest as you leaned towards his face.

“Thanks for coming out with me Bootie~” you said with your eyes lidded, batting your eyelashes at him. His breath hitched at the sudden nickname usage that you’ve call him by before.

“I’ve been stressed about shit recently but this is fun” you giggle, “we should do it more often,” you add, looking him up and down, something he doesn’t miss.

He relaxes slightly, hands finding their place on your waist again as his signature grin comes out. You could tell he was still pretty flustered though, he was into it, but still a bit shy.

“You’re always looking at me like that, Bootie,” you say as you trace a finger on the underside of his jaw, making him look at you. “I don’t say it when I’m not drunk… but I hope y’know I don’t mind it,” you say with a smile and lidded eyes. Your finger trails off the bottom of his chin as he ever so slightly chases your touch.

You giggle again at his reactions to you, feeling a bit giddy knowing that he was as into you as you were into him.

You push off him to run back to the dance floor, calling out to him with the nickname you just gave him.

The cowboy adjusts his hat before blinking a few times, smiling, and exhaling the breath he didn’t know he was holding.

He follows you back to the dance floor as he thinks “I’m fudged.”

|| MASTERLIST ♡ || Thank you for reading! ||

[niconote]

SAVE THE DATE :: dal 15 al 17 dicembre 2023 Terrò un Workshop di gruppo al @si.ateliersi Via San Vitale 69, BOLOGNA :: i posti sono limitati :: iscrizioni entro il 10 dicembre --- NICONOTE Strumento Voce/Immaginazione Un laboratorio di studio, riflessione e creazione Ven 15 dic, 15h - 18h sab 16 dic, 10h - 13h e 14h - 18h dom 17 dic, 10h -13.00 e 14h - 17h posti limitati info e iscrizioni entro il 10 dicembre: workshop@ateliersi.it Una masterclass intensiva rivolta a tutti coloro interessati alla vocalità. Molte sono le discipline legate alla voce e al suo disegno. È un tuffo nell’ ascolto di sé, una sosta nell’ascolto profondo del circostante. Si lavorerà attorno ad alcuni testi. Si analizzeranno alcune partiture, fino alla sperimentazione di una messa in voce, attraverso esercizi di creazione vocale. Riflessioni drammaturgiche e di composizione, sulla pertinenza delle scelte sottese alla motivazione dominante. In definitiva è un laboratorio sulla Vocalità e sulla drammaturgia sottesa alla creazione di un paesaggio vocale. Esistono tante voci e tante tecniche ma al di là della scelte dei linguaggi espressivi ciò che da sempre preme a NicoNote è la ricerca dei suoni della voce, strumento che è materializzazione di molteplici stati e visioni. Un approccio alla Vocalità che abbraccia la tecnica vocale a 360° mutuando pratiche e studi sulla vocalità provenienti da diversi mondi musicali, teatrali, performativi fino a pratiche di meditazione sonora. La ricerca vocale di NicoNote alias Nicoletta Magalotti sintetizza molti anni di lavoro sulla VOCE nella pratica teatrale e musicale, nell’ incontro di studio con maestri tra i quali Gabriella Bartolomei, Yoshi Oida, Roy Hart Theatre, Akademia Ruchu, Tiziana Ghiglioni, François Tanguy, nello sviluppo di un percorso artistico e di un metodo didattico personalissimo. posti limitati info e iscrizioni entro il 10 dicembre: workshop@ateliersi.it

[mostlysignssomeportents]

FTC vs surveillance pricing

Support me this summer on the Clarion Write-A-Thon and help raise money for the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers' Workshop!

In the mystical cosmology of economics, "prices" are of transcendental significance, the means by which the living market knows and adapts itself, giving rise to "efficient" production and consumption.

At its most basic level, the metaphysics of pricing goes like this: if there is less of something for sale than people want to buy, the seller will raise the price until enough buyers drop out and demand equals supply. If the disappointed would-be buyers are sufficiently vocal about their plight, other sellers will enter the market (bankrolled by investors who sense an opportunity), causing supplies to increase and prices to fall until the system is in "equilibrium" – producing things as cheaply as possible in precisely the right quantities to meet demand. In the parlance of neoclassical economists, prices aren't "set": they are discovered.

In antitrust law, there are many sins, but they often boil down to "price setting." That is, if a company has enough "market power" that they can dictate prices to their customers, they are committing a crime and should be punished. This is such a bedrock of neoclassical economics that it's a tautology "market power" exists where companies can "set prices"; and to "set prices," you need "market power."

Prices are the blood cells of the market, shuttling nutrients (in the form of "information") around the sprawling colony organism composed of all the buyers, sellers, producers, consumers, intermediaries and other actors. Together, the components of this colony organism all act on the information contained in the "price signals" to pursue their own self-interest. Each self-interested action puts more information into the system, triggering more action. Together, price signals and the actions they evince eventually "discover" the price, an abstraction that is yanked out of the immaterial plane of pure ideas and into our grubby, physical world, causing mines to re-open, shipping containers and pipelines to spark to life, factories to retool, trucks to fan out across the nation, retailers to place ads and hoist SALE banners over their premises, and consumers to race to those displays and open their wallets.

When prices are "distorted," all of this comes to naught. During the notorious "socialist calculation debate" of 1920s Austria, right-wing archdukes of religious market fundamentalism, like Von Hayek and Von Mises, trounced their leftist opponents, arguing that the market was the only computational system capable of calculating how much of each thing should be made, where it should be sent, and how much it should be sold for.

Attempts to "plan" the economy – say, by subsidizing industries or limiting prices – may be well-intentioned, but they broke the market's computations and produced haywire swings of both over- and underproduction. Later, the USSR's planned economy did encounter these swings. These were sometimes very grave (famines that killed millions) and sometimes silly (periods when the only goods available in regional shops were forks, say, creating local bubbles in folk art made from forks).

Unplanned markets do this too. Most notoriously, capitalism has produced a vast oversupply of carbon-intensive goods and processes, and a huge undersupply of low-carbon alternatives, bringing the human civilization to the brink of collapse. Not only have capitalism's price signals failed to address this existential crisis to humans, it has also sown the seeds of its own ruin – the market computer's not going to be getting any "price signals" from people as they drown in floods or roast to death on sidewalks that deliver second-degree burns to anyone who touches them:

https://www.fastcompany.com/91151209/extreme-heat-southwest-phoenix-surface-burns-scorching-pavement-sidewalks-pets

For market true believers, these failures are just evidence that regulation is distorting markets, and that the answer is more unregulated markets to infuse the computer with more price signals. When it comes to carbon, the problem is that producers are "producing negative externalities" (that is, polluting and sticking us with the bill). If we can just get them to "internalize" those costs, they will become "economically rational" and switch to low-carbon alternatives.

That's the theory behind the creation and sale of carbon credits. Rather than ordering companies to stop risking civilizational collapse and mass extinction, we can incentivize them to do so by creating markets that reward clean tech and punish dirty practices. The buying and selling of carbon credits is supposed to create price signals reflecting the existential risk to the human race and the only habitable planet known to our species, which the market will then "bring into equilibrium."

Unfortunately, reality has a distinct and unfair leftist bias. Carbon credits are a market for lemons. The carbon credits you buy to "offset" your car or flight are apt to come from a forest that has already burned down, or that had already been put in a perpetual trust as a wildlife preserve and could never be logged:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/03/18/greshams-carbon-law/#papal-indulgences

Carbon credits produce the most perverse outcomes imaginable. For example, much of Tesla's profitability has been derived from the sale of carbon credits to the manufacturers of the dirtiest, most polluting SUVs on Earth; without those Tesla credits, those SUVs would have been too expensive to sell, and would not have existed:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/11/24/no-puedo-pagar-no-pagara/#Rat

What's more, carbon credits aren't part of an "all of the above" strategy that incorporates direct action to prevent our species downfall. These market solutions are incompatible with muscular direct action, and if we do credits, we can't do other stuff that would actually work:

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

Even though price signals have repeatedly proven themselves to be an insufficient mechanism for producing "efficient" or even "survivable," they remain the uppermost spiritual value in the capitalist pantheon. Even through the last 40 years of unrelenting assaults on antitrust and competition law, the one form of corporate power that has remained both formally and practically prohibited is "pricing power."

That's why the DoJ was able to block tech companies and major movie studios from secretly colluding to suppress their employees' wages, and why those employees were able to get huge sums out of their employers:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_Litigation

It's also why the Big Six (now Big Five) publishers and Apple got into so much trouble for colluding to set a floor on the price of ebooks:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Apple_(2012)

When it comes to monopoly, even the most Bork-pilled, Manne-poisoned federal judges and agencies have taken a hard line on price-fixing, because "distortions" of prices make the market computer crash.

But despite this horror of price distortions, America's monopolists have found so many ways to manipulate prices. Last month, The American Prospect devoted an entire issue to the many ways that monopolies and cartels have rigged the prices we pay, pushing them higher and higher, even as our wages stagnated and credit became more expensive:

https://prospect.org/pricing

For example, there's the plague of junk fees (AKA "drip pricing," or, if you're competing to be first up against the wall come the revolution, "ancillary revenue"), everything from baggage fees from airlines to resort fees at hotels to the fee your landlord charges if you pay your rent by check, or by card, or in cash:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/07/drip-drip-drip/#drip-off

There's the fake transparency gambit, so beloved of America's hospitals:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/13/a-punch-in-the-guts/#hayek-pilled

The "greedflation" that saw grocery prices skyrocketing, which billionaire grocery plutes blamed on covid stimulus checks, even as they boasted to their shareholders about their pricing power:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-06-12-war-in-the-aisles/

There's the the tens of billions the banks rake in with usurious interest rates, far in excess of the hikes to the central banks' prime rates (which are, in turn, justified in light of the supposed excesses of covid relief checks):

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-06-11-what-we-owe/

There are the scams that companies like Amazon pull with their user interfaces, tricking you into signing up for subscriptions or upsells, which they grandiosely term "dark patterns," but which are really just open fraud:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-06-10-one-click-economy/

There are "surge fees," which are supposed to tempt more producers (e.g. Uber drivers) into the market when demand is high, but which are really just an excuse to gouge you – like when Wendy's threatens to surge-price its hamburgers:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-06-07-urge-to-surge/

And then there's surveillance pricing, the most insidious and profitable way to jack up prices. At its core, surveillance pricing uses nonconsensually harvested private information to inform an algorithm that reprices the things you buy – from lattes to rent – in real-time:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/05/your-price-named/#privacy-first-again

Companies like Plexure – partially owned by McDonald's – boasts that it can use surveillance data to figure out what your payday is and then hike the price of the breakfast sandwich or after-work soda you buy every day.

Like every bad pricing practice, surveillance pricing has its origins in the aviation industry, which invested early on and heavily in spying on fliers to figure out how much they could each afford for their plane tickets and jacking up prices accordingly. Architects of these systems then went on to found companies like Realpage, a data-brokerage that helps landlords illegally collude to rig rent prices.

Algorithmic middlemen like Realpage and ATPCO – which coordinates price-fixing among the airlines – are what Dan Davies calls "accountability sinks." A cartel sends all its data to a separate third party, which then compares those prices and tells everyone how much to jack them up in order to screw us all:

https://profilebooks.com/work/the-unaccountability-machine/

These price-fixing middlemen are everywhere, and they predate the boom in commercial surveillance. For example, Agri-Stats has been helping meatpackers rig the price of meat for 40 years:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/04/dont-let-your-meat-loaf/#meaty-beaty-big-and-bouncy

But when you add commercial surveillance to algorithmic pricing, you get a hybrid more terrifying than any cocaine-sharks (or, indeed, meth-gators):

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/tennessee-police-warn-locals-not-flush-drugs-fear-meth-gators-n1030291

Apologists for these meth-gators insist that surveillance pricing's true purpose is to let companies offer discounts. A streaming service can't afford to offer $0.99 subscriptions to the poor because then all the rich people would stop paying $19.99. But with surveillance pricing, every customer gets a different price, titrated to their capacity to pay, and everyone wins.

But that's not how it cashes out in the real world. In the real world, rich people who get ripped off have the wherewithal to shop around, complain effectively to a state AG, or punish companies by taking their business elsewhere. Meanwhile, poor people aren't just cash-poor, they're also time-poor and political influence-poor.

When the dollar store duopoly forces all the mom-and-pop grocers in your town out of business with predatory pricing, and creating food deserts that only they serve, no one cares, because state AGs and politicians don't care about people who shop at dollar stores. Then, the dollar stores can collude with manufacturers to get shrunken "cheater sized" products that sell for a dollar, but cost double or triple the grocery store price by weight or quantity:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/27/walmarts-jackals/#cheater-sizes

Yes, fliers who seem to be flying on business (last-minute purchasers who don't have a Saturday stay) get charged more than people whose purchase makes them seem to be someone flying away for a vacation. But that's only because aviation prices haven't yet fully transitioned to surveillance pricing. If an airline can correctly calculate that you are taking a trip because you're a grad student who must attend a conference in order to secure a job, and if they know precisely how much room you have left on your credit card, they can charge you everything you can afford, to the cent.

Your ability to resist pricing power isn't merely a function of a company's market power – it's also a function of your political power. Poor people may have less to steal, but no one cares when they get robbed:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/07/19/martha-wright-reed/#capitalists-hate-capitalism

So surveillance pricing, supercharged by algorithms, represent a serious threat to "prices," which is the one thing that the econo-religious fundamentalists of the capitalist class value above all else. That makes surveillance pricing low-hanging fruit for regulatory enforcement: a bipartisan crime that has few champions on either side of the aisle.

Cannily, the FTC has just declared war on surveillance pricing, ordering eight key players in the industry (including capitalism's arch-villains, McKinsey and Jpmorgan Chase) to turn over data that can be used to prosecute them for price-fixing within 45 days:

https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/07/ftc-issues-orders-eight-companies-seeking-information-surveillance-pricing

As American Prospect editor-in-chief David Dayen notes in his article on the order, the FTC is doing what he and his journalistic partners couldn't: forcing these companies to cough up internal data:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-07-24-ftc-opens-surveillance-pricing-inquiry/

This is important, and not just because of the wriggly critters the FTC will reveal as they use their powers to turn over this rock. Administrative agencies can't just do whatever they want. Long before the agencies were neutered by the Supreme Court, they had strict rules requiring them to gather evidence, solicit comment and counter-comment, and so on, before enacting any rules:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/18/administrative-competence/#i-know-stuff

Doubtless, the Supreme Court's Loper decision (which overturned "Chevron deference" and cut off the agencies' power to take actions that they don't have detailed, specific authorization to take) will embolden the surveillance pricing industry to take the FTC to court on this. It's hard to say whether the courts will find in the FTC's favor. Section 6(b) of the FTC Act clearly lets the FTC compel these disclosures as part of an enforcement action, but they can't start an enforcement action until they have evidence, and through the whole history of the FTC, these kinds of orders have been a common prelude to enforcement.

One thing this has going for it is that it is bipartisan: all five FTC commissioners, including both Republicans (including the Republican who votes against everything) voted in favor of it. Price gouging is the kind of easy-to-grasp corporate crime that everyone hates, irrespective of political tendency.

In the Prospect piece on Ticketmaster's pricing scam, Dayen and Groundwork's Lindsay Owens called this the "Age of Recoupment":

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/03/aoi-aoi-oh/#concentrated-gains-vast-diffused-losses

For 40 years, neoclassical economics' focus on "consumer welfare" meant that companies could cheat and squeeze their workers and suppliers as hard as they wanted, so long as prices didn't go up. But after 40 years, there's nothing more to squeeze out of workers or suppliers, so it's time for the cartels to recoup by turning on us, their customers.

They believe – perhaps correctly – that they have amassed so much market power through mergers and lobbying that they can cross the single bright line in neoliberal economics' theory of antitrust: price-gouging. No matter how sincere the economics profession's worship of prices might be, it still might not trump companies that are too big to fail and thus too big to jail.

The FTC just took an important step in defense of all of our economic wellbeing, and it's a step that even the most right-wing economist should applaud. They're calling the question: "Do you really think that price-distortion is a cardinal sin? If so, you must back our play." Support me this summer on the Clarion Write-A-Thon and help raise money for the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers' Workshop!

https://clarionwriteathon.com/members/profile.php?writerid=293388

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/2024/07/24/gouging-the-all-seeing-eye/#i-spy

[ayasuki]

6th Bakugou x Reader FANFIC RECS

some are short but they're good hehe (most of these are suggestive :P)

> • 𝑹𝒆𝒄 𝑳𝒊𝒔𝒕

" Dream Eater " by justatypicaltrash

dream eater!bakugou x reader

warning: slight angst

bakugo is an eternal living dream eater.

" I Like You, Okay?! " by kikyo-bnha-imagines

bakugou x fem!reader

summary: katsuki struggles to confess to his crush.

" Workshopped Romance " by itsmm4hiii

pro-hero!bakugou x fem!reader

summary: working for a hero costume designer has its perks like; meeting heroes, playing with cool technologies, getting you're name out- y/n didn't  really expect her own boss will try and hook her up with a customer. 

" Blood Moonlit, Must be Counterfeit " by irisintheafterglow

pro-hero!bakugou x reader

warning: swearing ofc cuz it's bakugo, mentions of drinking and alcohol, halloween party, first meeting, emotionally constipated katsuki and reader is kinda oblivious lol

summary: a guy at a party has a really good dynamight costume, and you two get to talking about your favorite heroes.

WARNING | beneath the cut are slightly suggestive to full on smut fics

" no title " by moominsuki

bakugou x fem!reader

warning: ch. 359-362 spoilers kinda. a little suggestive but fluff all around

summary: katsuki hates being off the job. but what he hates more is being treated like glass, especially by you.

" as the years go by " by quitesins

pro-hero!bakugou x fem!reader

warning: suggestive, slight nsfw, friends to lovers, unrequited love ig? virgin!reader, drabble

summary: being friends with bakugou since UA, watching each other change as the years go by, but still having room to learn more, so much more.

" no title " by izvmimi

warning: palace drama au, multiple wives, fem!reader, brief explicit sex.

" One More Time " by yanderenightmare

warning: derogatory dirty talk, spanking, angsty but with a fluffy ending

" no title " by dreamland03

bakugou x reader

warning: mention of sex like once, drinking, mention of trauma, bad self image

" Come Sit " by saturnorbits

bakugou x fem!reader

warning: cock-warming

summary: after a long day, all you need is bakugo.

" Feral " by smiley-babe

wolfhybrid!bakugou x fem!reader

warnings: aged up characters, lowkey monster fucking (hybrid bakugo has wolf ears, a tail, and fangs), knotting, HUGE breeding kink, no specific dynamics, biting, small blood kink (if you squint), marking/ bonding, heat/ rut behavior, panty sniffing, kind of rough sex, oral (f receiving), and fingering

summary: taking in a wolf hybrid already didn’t seem like a good idea, but when spring hits… all hell breaks loose.

" Personal Trainer!BKG " by bakubunny

personal trainer!bakugou x plus size!fem!reader

warning: oral sex (m receiving), rough sex.

" On To Better Things " by savnofilter

prohero!dilf!bakugou x fem!reader

warning: angst, strangers to lovers

sfw | toxic & abusive relationship, toxic baby daddy, mentions postpartum, mental health, arguing, mentions of legal proceedings, counseling, drama, cultural family expectations, love bombing, manipulation, a man being a hypocrite, reader low-key needs a new circle of people around them but that's neither here nor there, reader loves their daughter to pieces </3, reader's daughter is a hand full but we stan!, reader spaces out a lot, "our kids are best friends but we never met before and so happen to be single" trope.

nsfw | fingering, cunnilingus, groping, praise kink, reader has multiple orgasms (2, hinted 4), reader is a bit shy as it's been awhile and feels nervous, vocal queen reader, clothed sex, protected sex, comforting!bakugo, non-established relationship.

" Swipe Right " by ryukatters

bakugou x fem!reader

warning: dubcon, quirkless/college! au, jealousy, possessiveness, breeding, creampie, unprotected sex, cum eating, cunnilingus, overstimulation, praise, biting, bkg gets a little rough with you, and bkg's also a fucking simp

summary: your boyfriend decides to make a fake tinder profile for you just to see how many matches you get. he comes to a realization just how many other people want what’s already his.

" no title " by katbakubae

bakugou x fem!reader

warning: language, dom!bakugou, possessiveness, jealousy, (mild) stalking, name calling, spanking, rough oral.

summary: sick of your boyfriends lack of time with you because of his busy schedule, you decided to take some time for yourself. unfortunately, letting that happen was never an option for him.

[heckinconfusedparade]

Woe! Sonic character headcanons be upon Ye!

Sonic:

- Learned how to cook while raising Tails and got really good at it

- Hedgehog Gordon Ramsay

- Can’t bake for shit tho

- Made up a lullaby that he sings to Tails to help him sleep. It’s been effective since the kit was 4

- In the warmer months, Sonic scouts out nice places for his annual picnic with Amy. He loves hanging out with her and enjoying sweets!

- Has a memorial for Chip with his necklace somewhere hidden

- Ran before he could walk

- Bothers Knuckles on Angel Island at least twice a week

- He and Shadow spar every week

- Bro has a bunch of Knick knacks and trinkets from his adventures

- Has a lazy day every once in a whilel

- He does vocal warm ups every morning as part of his little routine, even if he doesn’t plan on singing that day. It’s good to warm up before doing a lot of speaking!

Tails:

- He’s so sweet but so sassy

- Will sass a grown man to death

- Hugs people he really loves with his tails included

- He has a blacksmith place somewhere

- Had to have an intervention for his mint addiction (unsuccessful)

- His love language is gift giving! His gifts are one of a kind

- He made Shadow a gun for Christmas. It has bullets that explode on impact. It’s a tiny rocket launcher

- Used a chaos emerald to give a box Chaos Control so he can warp stuff back to his workshop

- the box defies logic, and he can fit literally anything in it

Amy

- If anyone insults or puts down her besties it’s ON SIGHT! EVEN IF ITS THE BESTIE SAYIN IT ABOUT THEMSELF (looking at you, TAILS)

- Refuses to let anyone go hungry. Angel to anemic and diabetic community!

- Spars with Knuckles to practice her hand to hand combat

- Meets up with Sonic in the coldest part of winter so they can hibernate together

- Loves her picnic dates with Sonic!

- Got Vanilla to homeschool Tails so at least the kid can have credentials to go into higher education in the future if he wants

- Loves thrift shopping! One man’s trash is this gals treasure!

- Crystal girl

- Shares Taylor Swift album theories with Shadow. They both go crazy for it

- She took Cream, Rouge, Blaze, and Sticks on a road trip. It was the most chaotic thing to hit the roads that summer.

Knuckles:

- is the reason a mountain has a giant crack in it

- vibe checks buildings for faulty wiring with his electro signal echidna stuff

- Bro moves the soil around his island to promote healthier plant life

- Bro is the single teen dad of many many many Chao

- Tries to leave the island whenever he can. He has a map of places that Sonic marked because they made him think of him!

- Taught Tails how to throw one hell of a punch and how to use his namesakes in combat

- Secretly looks forward to Rouge’s visits because he finds the sparring fun

Shadow:

- His room is usually only illuminated by a lamp because the sun shines directly in his window, and the ceiling light is too bright

- the lightbulb in the lamp changes colours. Rouge calls it his Mood Lamp

- If Sonic doesn’t show up to their weekly sparring, he gets concerned and indirectly searches for the dude. He’d rather die than admit he’s concerned tho

- Taylor Swift karaoke night with Amy

- Plays Project SEKAI

- Has a garden full of beautiful flowers dedicated to Maria. Amy and Sonic helped find flowers and seeds, and Knux provided the soil. They didn’t ask to get involved, nor were they asked, they just found out from Rouge and decided to help Shadow out

- He cannot fucking cook

- He cannot fucking bake

- There’s very few things he can actually make BUT HES LEARNING

- Learning to enjoy life as it happens. He’s stopping to smell the roses and appreciate what he has right now, and tries not to lament about the past or future

Rouge:

- Sometimes visits Angel Island just to bother Knuckles

- She has a pair of boots that has spikes on the toes

- Taught Tails how to steal

- She’s Cream’s favourite guest to bring to a tea party because of all the drama she brings with her.

- Is the reason Tails is a gossip

- She played Thief Simulator and had the greatest time ever

- Watched analysis videos of people trying to solve heists she committed

- Pretended not to listen when Amy infodumped to her about crystal energy, but she actually finds it very interesting

Omega:

- Trusts Tails with his life

- Because he can’t fit through doors or knock without breaking them, he stands outside the window waiting for someone to notice him outside

-or he just breaks the door anyway because why not

- Loves fireworks, wants to fire them on his own

- Absorbs every insult he hears Sonic make, as well as searches up on the internet to add to his database just so he can insult Eggman in a way that matters.

[itsallmouthwashing]

Band AU bullet points / slight timeline of events

This IS an AU, and they’re MY barbies I can make them kiss when I WANT /silly

Here are general bullet points for the Band AU with a slight timeline of events. Reblogs are so appreciated :)

If I write out a scene that's here I'll link the post and reblog this post as a sort of master list? Maybe? I'll figure it out. Also here's the playlist for the AU :)

Cw: mentions of parent death, implied neglect, drug abuse, assault, ooc characters

A little context---

Band Name: Tulpar

Record Label: Pony Express Records

Genre: Rock and Metal 

Canon divergence note: Anya does get assaulted, but by her boyfriend instead of Jimmy. I don’t really have a character set up for the boyfriend yet, but I wanted to keep that as an element of her story 

Curly on guitar and vocals, Jimmy on guitar and scream vocals, Anya on bass and fills for drums, Daisuke on drums and synth/keyboard, fills for bass sometimes when he’s feeling confident and Anya wants to switch it up

Swansea is their manager right before they go pro and remains their manager when they sign with P.E Records! He is the one the band has to impress with their new songs. If he doesn’t like it, it doesn't get used 

Curly and Jimmy formed Tulpar in their junior year of high school. Originally it was going to remain the two of them(Curly was learning drums), but the two clicked with Anya and Daisuke almost immediately during senior year (they were both transfer students). 

It for sure took convincing for Jimmy to let them join the band. He made them ‘prove’ they were ‘worthy of finding a place in their art’

They totally fucking blew him away (Curly was a little smug about it after Jimmy conceded.)

Jimmy does bond with Dai and Anya over the years

Dai is the one to propose they go pro. His parents have lots of connections in Hollywood and production, so it’d be easy to find someone willing to listen to them and give them a chance on the billboards

Jimmy gets a little pissy about this (he’s huge into actually working for things in life and hates the idea of using connections to get his success) and storms off without saying anything (normally he’d be dragged out of the room screaming. He’s been working on his temper since senior year. Curly literally slapped it into him that the world isn't highschool and he needs to change the way he acts around people if he wants to retain friendships)

But Jimmy’s mom dies. His dad can't take the grief and follows her into the afterlife. Jimmy breaks down and he’s lashing out at every turn

The rest of the crew take it for months and months, with Curly explaining that Jimmy's really going through a lot and should be patient. He would talk to him later if he hasn't calmed down in a few days

But it just gets worse over the days 

Jimmy is constantly putting down the rest of his bandmates but mostly targets Anya as she is the most insecure of the group and finds it easier to spit poison at

One day she visits Curly to discuss this (Salt and Mouthwash scene here)

Jimmy ends up apologizing but it takes time for things to return to normal for all of them

Dai brings in Swansea, a music critic for them to workshop songs with

He goes full manager mode, disapproving of songs the crew thought for sure he’d love and approving ones they were really on the fence about

Insert training montage here

Swansea eventually brings them in front of P.E Records execs

After a brutal five week waiting period, Tulpar officially signs with Pony Express records

To celebrate, the crew goes out clubbing. Anya hooks up with a girl for the first time. Lesbain shenanigans ensue in the bathroom. Jimmy and Curly get a little too drunk. Daisuke pukes outside of the car (and tries really hard to not puke inside the car. He fails.) 

Sleepover at Curly’s house (they all forgot they had exams in the morning and Curly’s house is right next to the campus.) Jimmy gets flirty and lonely when he’s drunk and through the heightened emotional states of it all, he goes in for a kiss

Daisuke stumbles into Curly’s room thinking it’s the bathroom. Almost pukes on the carpet like an ill cat. 

They startle apart and when Curly comes back from leading Dai to the bathroom Jimmy is already asleep (he’s a little faker- he’s just embarrassed)

Exams go like shit the next morning and everyone is too stressed to go back out and get their cars so it’s a week-long study session at Curly’s while everyone crams

Song writing breaks that become too frequent. Swansea suddenly appears to oversee the studying (Dai’s parents sent him over to check on him, but he finds a reason to stay and supervise. Writing breaks become nonexistent) and he actually helps everyone with studying. He’s the one to propose flash cards and Anya hs to scream into a pillow because why didn't she think of that sooner? Then again when she realizes She did, but her flashcards were in her car. Which was at the bar. Which was an hour away because they’re all idiots. 

Swansea and Curly get her car for her and convince her to take a break from her own material while they’re out (Dai just asks her to help him with studying.)

Jimmy like a fucking DOG keeps himself from begging to go with them, but Swansea says “I’ve known how to drive longer than your daddy’s been shooting into socks. Anya’s car will be safe with me, kiddo,” and pushes Curly out the door lmao

On the way, Swans and Curly have a little heart-to-heart and Swans reveals he’s been family friends with Dai’s parents for years and they’re actually large shareholders of the record company. 

Curly doesn't care, not really, but he feels his stomach drop and his heart drown in fire. Jimmy could never find out about this. He can hardly keep the radio on during his solo drive back

When they arrive back at Curly’s, Dai and Anya are passed out on the couch while Jimmy sits wide awake at the dining-room table. Swansea sees no reason to stick around (“I went to the club for the first time in twenty years, Grant. I need to get home and sleep it off.”) and dips. 

Exams go a little better, but on the last day Anya gets pulled over on her shame-stop to Burger King. She has a panic attack during the stop and it gives her the idea to write HAMMS IN A GLASS. She’s caught humming it and tapping on the coffee table one day while Swansea is over discussing logistics or whatever with Curly. He full stops their conversation, tells Anya to polish it and have it to him by the end of the week (“Motherfucker I might not have a degree if I think about anything other than my tests and where the fucking rotator cuffs are, PLEASE”), and then LEAVES (“Guess I’ll find what our budget will be after you’re finished…”)

She tries to workshop it with Dai between classes (he’s in an engineering course, but their buildings are pretty close together)(Ive only taken online college classes please) but Dai is becoming increasingly unavailable. She turns to her boyfriend. The night they work on it, he gives her a drink to help her relax from all the stress she’s been under

But he takes advantage of her that night. When she realizes what he’s done she flees to Curly’s house. Her boyfriend follows her, accusing her of cheating when she gets to the door and Curly is there to catch her. 

Curly tries hard to deescalate the situation, but when Jimmy catches wind of what’s happening at the door he makes his appearance (anya had no idea why he was there (gay reasons) but grateful for the surprise help). Jimmy punches his FUCKING lights out (“I didnt do it for you, Anya. That guy was pissing me off. So I took care of it… Now he won’t mess with either of us, alright?”). Everyone thinks it’s a little hot, even the guy getting punched (hey, everyones having a gay awakening this evening, huh?)

Anya stays the night, thwarting Jimmy’s plans to dick Curly down sexual style at last.