#also i remember when i first watched malignant; there were certain shots that i just know they used Suspiria as inspiration for

[lesbianwithchainsaws]

I'm slowly coming to the realisation that I would be the most annoying person to watch horror media with because at this point I could tell you exact scenes and movies that said media has taken inspiration from/copied/done an homage to. I watch so many horror movies that I just start recognising them in other stuff

[monaluxstrashblog]

#3 - Dearest Wish

This relates to my first prompt as it’s the same characters. Check out @raltiamod for more about the Elksni breifly mentioned - he’s a guardian too!

A man Wishes for the return of his dead niece

Duncan was certain the Ahamkara were, in fact, faeries. All the evidence was there. They were beautiful but terrible to behold in their true form. They fed on desire, twisting it to their own whims until their target was but a shell. If they did grant your wish, they took something from you - your luck, your grace, your happiness, or if you were very unlucky, your life. They loved riddles and word games, and were most often playful in their malignance. 

There were some differences. He’d never gotten one to count salt, they didn’t care about iron, and the little bastards could lie, and did so with abandon, which felt like some cosmic bullshit to him. They fey couldn’t lie because if they could lie then they could just do whatever they wanted, and no clever hero could out-smart them. But he was sure that long ago the wish dragons had visited Earth, and these were the fair folk the old tales talked about.

Not that many remembered the old tales anymore. Such was the way of time, he supposed. The Awoken were sort of fey-ish too, he supposed. Those born after the distributary, those born here, those born who had never seen the Exodus Green; they didn’t consider themselves human. They were their own people, isolationist and xenophobic as hell. Which seemed very human to Duncan but, well, he wasn’t the one making the rules. They were incredibly long lived, and many had some minor psychic or psionic power. Duncan had a way with animals. 

His niece had loved the Ahamkara. She hand-raised a hatchling once, after finding it deep in the forests. She fed it scraps of meat and little desires, harmless things, and would stub her toe for a week afterwards and say it was worth it. It grew up to be mild in temperament, preferring to bask in the sun and catch birds than trick people off the cliff. 

She’d been livid when it was slain. Sounded like the Prince for a week or two, the way she carried on about the Risen. He didn’t exactly disagree with them, for slaying all the beasts. They were, objectively, dangerous as hell. They were also unlike the Fey in that there was really no safe way too deal with them. No wording or contract that could spare you from their trickery. The Little Beast she’d raised had said something once that stuck in his mind like a thorn - “All reality is like the sea, and a warm wind where it shouldn’t be, summons ill for sailors.” It saddened him somewhat though, that they were all gone now. Like the cosmos were less for it.

She was gone too now. And to add insult to injury they’d laid her to rest where she fell in the Tangled Shore, fighting the Scorn, where he couldn’t get to her. That’s what he told himself anyways - he couldn’t leave his duties in the Dreaming City. Once, he’d gone to see the prince, and curse him for dragging his family into this mess. She’d always been fond of him, and he’d told her it was foolish to be fond of a Sov. Both twins were selfish and cruel, and he trusted neither. The Prince had joked that was what made him such a good Crow. 

It was on the worst cycle of the second repeat that he went to see the brothers. The Dreaming City was now caught, forever repeating itself, thanks to Riven, and honestly Duncan almost didn’t blame her given that she’d been locked away for who knows how long. Maybe the Awoken did deserve her fate. It weighed on him though, to be caught in the repetition. Like a maddening nightmare. 

Huginn and Muninn had been laid to rest in the Harbinger’s seclude, all that was recovered of them being their skulls. He remembered when they would bask here, in the spray of the waterfall, and tell stories to whoever passed by. They’d been fond of Sjur, and had been found not far from her when she’d been recovered. Cheeky bastards calling themselves after Odin’s ravens. These days if you were still, and listened with your mind, you could still hear Huginn’s storytelling, if he was in the mood. Or probably would be able to hear him if the entire Seclude wasn’t crawling with Taken.

Duncan swore and dove behind a rock as bolts from a Taken Vandal’s line rifle embedded themselves in the wall where he had been. He notched an arrow to his bow, Beast’s Talon -- because the little bastard was amused to now be his weapon -- and fired into the eye of the Vandal, dispersing it into mist. He wished he could do the trick where the Risen summoned grenades out of thin air, but instead planted one of his own limited supply in a cluster of Psions. Another hail of arrows followed, as he dove from one point of cover to another. 

He wasn’t sure what he was going to do about the Knight. Fire bloomed around his feet and he swore again, diving backwards. Too busy to use both hands he sent a throwing knife into the eye of a phalanx and bolted across the platform, swerving into Muninn’s niche. The skull was completely surrounded by a blight, and Duncan furiously slashed into it until he could see one of the tusks. The Knight was getting closer, reinforcements blooming out of the blight. He gripped the tusk, “Alright ye squirrely bastard - if this is how it’s gonna be, do your worst. I just want her to live, I dunnae have to see it.” He felt a chuckle deep at the base of his skull.

He drew his sword, refusing to die cowering with the dragon’s head, and rolled out of the way of another solar barrage. Cutting down three Psions in a single swing, he turned to dual with the knight. Just in time to watch a solar orb, the size of a basketball, appear at the things feet. It shrieked, stumbling away as it burned up. A hail of gunfire was coming from the corridor, where the portal was. Two Guardians and an Elkisni. “S’not what I asked for Munnin,” He grumbled, drawing his bow and taking down another sniper before they could get a shot off. 

The Guardian’s made quick work of the Taken, embarrassingly efficient, but he supposed they could wholesale pull explosives out of their ass. The one who was in less armor and more of a robe could throw a fireball twenty paces. 

“Are you ok sir,” The robed one bounded over to him, sweeping her hands and one of her feet to summon a glowing pool of light, that soothed the burns on his legs. Not that he noticed much, because he knew that voice. She popped her helmet off when he didn’t respond, and he felt his bow fall numbly from his hand. “Sir?”

His little girl. Alive. Reborn. She didn’t remember him. 

Munnin chuckled in his mind again, as he tried to wrap his brain around what, exactly, he was supposed to do now. 

[linkfyi-blog]

Meanwhile in India

Regulate social media for sure, but don’t discount its benefits.

Press Council acts as a check, which is probably why print media is considered more responsible. TV at least admits to the need of effective regulation. For social media, however, there are no checks whatsoever.

Mankind has gone through different ages when people’s lives have been dominated, or majorly influenced, by an invention or breakthrough, even by certain ideas. The industrial revolution led to a major transformation. There was the idea of nationalism which created different countries. There was socialism — as opposed to capitalism — which changed the way societies were governed and economies run. There have also been great medical discoveries that have benefited us in countless ways. However, for several decades now, we have been in the age of information technology.

It began with the discovery of radio and the first newspapers. Then, the coming of big-screen cinema. Later came television. In fact, TV has become so popular that many leading newspapers in the developed world have either had to close down or, additionally, go digital. But in the last two decades or so, another form of media has taken the world by storm — social media. Led by Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter and Instagram, with the smart cell phone and computer as its main medium of communication, it has probably overtaken TV as far as viewership is concerned. As a major influencer, too, and opinion-maker, social media is not too far behind TV.

Nevertheless, it’s the regulatory framework for the media that has become highly controversial and contentious. In most countries, there are regulatory bodies that monitor content. Here, there is the Press Council, usually headed by a retired senior judge. If a party is aggrieved by a news report, it can complain, the Press Council hears both sides and gives its ruling. The offending publication, if found guilty of misreporting, is obliged to publish an apology. If the aggrieved party is not satisfied, it can go to court and sue the publication for libel. That threat, along with the censure of the Press Council, is a powerful check on misreporting. Which is probably why in India at least — and I daresay in many other parts of the world as well where there is freedom of expression — the print media is considered more responsible and credible and, therefore, taken more seriously than the electronic media.

Yet, when TV “live” reportage first burst on to the world scene, it blew the print media away. Perhaps the most dramatic TV reportage of this kind was the shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald, two days after he had assassinated US President Jack Kennedy. Oswald was apprehended after he killed a policeman just after shooting Kennedy. He was first lodged in the basement of the local police jail. When he was about to be transported to a more secure jail, TV cameras and reporters were present. Jack Ruby, owner of a nightclub, emerged from the crowd and shot Oswald, killing him. Millions worldwide saw the footage “live”. Though Ruby was later sentenced to die, a conspiracy theory emerged that Oswald had been silenced so that he could not disclose the other conspirators.

The other “live” event that everyone remembers is of course the tragic downing of the twin towers of the New York World Trade Centre. In India, “live” TV coverage came into its own in Kargil. And then, with the terror attack in Mumbai. There was live reporting of the event, just outside Taj Hotel, little realising that the terrorists inside were watching on TV what was being disclosed. Since then, there has been self-regulation in the coverage of such events.

However, no regulatory framework acceptable to private TV channels has yet emerged. There is admittedly an “Information and Technology Act”, but it is ineffective. The result is that TV channels do what they please. This has showed up in the coverage of the suicide (or murder) of the late actor, Sushant Singh Rajput. A virtual trial by media is taking place, with the law courts playing little role. A drug angle is also being played up and Bollywood maligned. Lawyers on both sides have happily appeared on TV, whereas they should really have confined themselves to court.

But at least Indian TV is admitting that effective regulation is needed. For the social media, however, there are till now no checks whatsoever. Smart phones and computers lend themselves easily to hate speech and fake news. The trouble is, much of this is made to sound credible. Cambridge Analytica, whose former head has just been barred in the UK from running a company or even being a director for seven years, is a good example of the menace. The social media organization played an insidious role in at least two major elections, that of the US and India. In India, in 2018, both the BJP and the Congress accused each other of using Analytica in polls across the country. The CEO admitted having offered clients “unethical services”, which included bribery and honey-traps.

But let’s be fair. Social media has become an indispensable vehicle. It is here to stay. Want material on a particular subject? Just key in Google Search. Schools and colleges worldwide have mostly been closed since the pandemic struck last March. Some 1.3 billion students, which is the population of India, have been affected and classes have had to be taken online. Can you imagine the disruption this would have caused if social media had not been there? So, when a regulatory framework is eventually put in place, the benefits that the social media has brought to our lives also need to be acknowledged and taken into account.— The writer is a veteran journalist

Courtesy:  Rahul Singh

#LinkFYi #SocialMedia #SocialMediaIndia

[loraleislysiren]

Siren Song - 12

“Only you, Hermione, would choose to meet up in the library on the weekend,” Ron Weasley pointed out to his Gryffindor compatriot. Harry, Hermione, and Ron stood outside the the heavy wooden doors leading to Madam Pince’s domain. “We’re not technically meeting in the library, are we? I just thought it would be an easy point of reference for Y/N to find. She’s new, remember? The library is one of the first places I learned to find when we were new at Hogwarts.” Hermione believed her rationale to be sound, but the lanky redhead was not convinced. “Yeah, well, not everyone is you, Hermione. Not everyone spends all their time in the library. It isn’t like she’s a Ravenclaw. In fact, she’s a Slytherin. And I’m not quite sure why you’re making us hang out with a Slytherin. I mean, have you ever met a Slytherin that was half decent, Harry? I haven’t.” Ron turned to Harry and the boy with the lightning bolt scar momentarily contemplated his friend’s question before responding, “Well, no. Not really.” “Exactly my point,” Ron continued. “Are you sure she’s not a complete snake, Hermione? You barely even met her. Why are we even doing this? This is a terrible idea and I’m regretting it already.” “Ronald, stop. She might happen round the corner any moment and hear you. We’re doing this because she genuinely seems like a nice person who could use some friends. She’s been kind to me today each time we spoke. Besides, she dislikes Malfoy. Remember Charms earlier today when she soaked him with her Aguamenti charm? Anyone who dislikes Malfoy can’t be all that bad, even for a Slytherin.” Harry shrugged, “I suppose you’re right Hermione. If she doesn’t like Malfoy, maybe she’s got better judgement that the rest of the Slytherin lot.” Ron sighed, annoyed that he was outnumbered by his friends. “Maybe she just won’t show up at all and —“ But before Ron could finish his sentence, the Slytherin girl appeared around the corner at the end of the hall. Hermione elbowed Ron and and whispered, “Please be nice to her. Do not embarrass me.” Ron replied with a roll of his eyes. The boy who lived, however, was eager to meet Y/N. He hadn’t been able to stop wondering about her since the night before and his heartbeat quickened when the Slytherin came into view. What was she like? She certainly was beautiful he thought. Y/N approached the trio and smiled warmly, “Hey Hermione. Hello—” And upon noticing the dark-haired Gryffindor, Y/N exclaimed louder than she intended, “Holy shit, you’re Harry Potter!” He should have been use to this reaction by now, but Harry hadn’t anticipated this response from Y/N. He smiled humbly at the girl and acquiesced, “Yes, I reckon I am.” A slight blush crept over Y/N's cheeks as she attempted to hide her surprise at meeting Harry Potter. “Wow, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be weird, it’s just that even though I grew up in a different country, you’re still really famous over there. They teach about you at Ilvermorny and you’re in our textbooks. Hermione didn’t tell me that I was going to meet you. Okay, I’ll stop gushing now…” She paused, embarrassed by her overt enthusiasm at meeting Harry. “Sorry, I’m being super awkward,” she laughed nervously. “I’m Y/N. Apparently very awkward Y/N.” Harry and Hermione shot bemused smiles to the Slytherin. “And I’m Ron. Not so famous as Harry, but definitely standing right next to him,” Ron interjected feeling mildly annoyed and moderately invisible. Y/N, much to her chagrin, turned quickly to Ron at not having acknowledged him, “You must think I’m really rude. I’m sorry, Ron. It’s nice to meet you. I didn’t mean to ignore you or anything…” Instead of finishing her thought, Y/N flashed the redhead her winningest smile with the hope he didn’t immediately think she was an ass. “S’okay.” Ron shrugged. “I’m use to it,” he said a bit more lightly. “It’s not every day you get to meet a celebrity.” Harry deflected, “So Y/N, any place around the castle that you would like to see in particular?” He watched her hair gently brush across her collarbones as she shook her head in indifference. “I was hoping you three might be able to show me something cool. It’s whatever you all think I should see.” She smiled again and Harry felt his chest explode with warmth. Her smile was captivating. Hell, she was captivating and Harry couldn’t believe she was about to spend time with him. And Ron and Hermione too… “We thought that we would just give you our tour of the castle,” Hermione spoke up. Maybe show you some places you haven’t been yet. There really is loads to see at Hogwarts, lots of interesting history and —“ Ron interrupted, “Hermione makes it sound boring like she’s about to take you on some educational tour. That’s not what we’re going to do. We’ll show you cool stuff, I promise.” Ron was warming up to the idea of being friendly to this Slytherin who was easy on the eyes and not a complete twat. “Right, let’s get a move on before Madam Pince complains about us being too loud or something.” The quartet began roaming the halls as all three Gryffindors spouted information regarding various locations or attributes about the castle that felt important to them. About the time they had entered the near desolate girls’ bathroom occupied only by Moaning Myrtle (and were explaining the previous year’s encounter with the basilisk and the Chamber of Secrets) Ron not so surreptitiously asked Y/N, “So why are you in Slytherin?” Y/N looked puzzled, “What do you mean? The sorting hat put me there.” “What Ron means,” Hermione tried to atone for the ginger’s bluntness, “is that you don’t seem like a typical Slytherin.” Ron kept on, “What Hermione is dancing around is that Slytherins are dodgy gits. And you don’t really seem like a dodgy git.” The Slytherin girl furrowed her brow, unsure of how to respond. Harry desperately didn’t want to offend Y/N, “Ron’s trying to say that Slytherins have a certain reputation. All the houses do. Gryffindors are brave, Hufflepuffs - kind, Ravenclaws - smart, and Slytherins… they have a much… darker reputation.” “How so?” “Well, Slytherin tends to attract wizards who practice the Dark Arts. Voldemort,” Ron shuddered when Harry spoke the name, “was a Slytherin.” “But wasn’t Merlin a Slytherin too? I feel like I read that somewhere. Merlin wasn’t a dark wizard, he was incredibly talented and definitely not evil.” Y/N felt pride swell inside her as she sought to defend her house. “Yes, you’re correct about that,” Hermione nodded in agreement. “Not all Slytherins are bad, it just seems that in addition to housing You Know Who, the Slytherins that we have encountered have been cruel and malicious.” “Like Malfoy?” Y/N wondered aloud. Harry admitted readily, “Exactly. Malfoy is an arrogant prick, and so are his friends Crabbe and Goyle. It’s just that we haven’t really met a Slytherin who’s been nice to us before.” Harry ran his fingers through his dark hair, mussing it up further. Y/N smiled at Harry, taking his words as a compliment to her character, “I’m glad that I don’t fit the mold then. I also don’t think all Slytherins are jackasses or evil like that. They can’t be. It sounds like we get a bad reputation from a few people who ruin it for the rest of us, which sucks.” “Besides maybe you, I doubt that,” Ron insisted emphatically. “I don’t know. I had a Slytherin who was really sweet to me all day.” Y/N was thinking of Blaise. “He was kind to me, helped me find classes, and stood up for me against Malfoy.” She didn’t think it was necessary to tell them she had kissed him earlier… Ron cocked his head to the side and explained with fervor, “That’s because you’re a Slytherin. Slytherins don’t like the other houses. They only like each other.” “Or is it that the other houses, not everyone of course, don’t like Slytherins?” Y/N realized she was treading on thin ice with Ron, but she was loyal to her house and felt compelled to defend it. “I’m not sure. I’ve not been here long at all, so I can’t make a good judgment call on people I’ve not had a chance to get to know yet. But I don’t think it’s fair to generalize an entire group of people. Just like I think it’s bullshit of Malfoy and others to hate on those who have no-maj parents.” Out of the corner of her eye, Y/N saw Hermione grin at her words. Harry smiled at Y/N next, the green eyed Gryffindor appreciated the girl’s passionate candidness; it wasn’t every day, or ever, that he had seen a Slytherin demonstrate her fidelity to Muggle borns. “You have to admit, Ron, she does have a point there.” Frowning because he realized there could be truth to her argument, and he perhaps was wrong, Ron shrugged lazily, “Okay. Maybe she does.” Ron’s bias gave way as the corners of his mouth turned upward and any tension felt before dissolved into nothingness. “Bloody hell, Harry, ‘Mione, she’s feisty this one. Fred and George are going to love her. Their my older brothers by the way. Fifth years.” Ron directed his last statement to Y/N. “I’d love to meet them.” Deep inside, though, Y/N was troubled by what the trio had just explained to her about darkness and maliciousness manifesting within the house of Slytherin. Two distinctly malignant thoughts, secrets which had plagued her from childhood, again pervaded the fringe of her mind. She pushed this unpleasantness away swiftly, as she always did, to focus on something less unsettling. Harry saved her from her thoughts, “I’m glad you decided to spend time with us tonight.” He smiled at the Slytherin and found her countenance overwhelming his emotions; she was positively radiant. Hermione and Ron quickly glanced at one another, understanding that Harry was bewitched by Y/N. “So,” Harry attempted to regain his composure, “what’s Malfoy done to you, Y/N? He seemed to cozy up to you in the Great Hall last night…” “Ha, you noticed that? Well, he found out that I'm apparently a blood traitor because I could give a rat’s ass about someone’s blood status. Aside from branding me a blood traitor, he’s just been a general jackass to me. He stole my wand, which was why I drenched him in Charms. And, get this, he told me I couldn’t sit near him in the Great Hall. As if it’s some wonderful privilege to be close to him. He’s annoying and so is Pansy Parkinson. Do you know her? She just hangs all over him… I don’t know why…it’s gross. And when I left the common room tonight, she called me a stupid slapper for ruining a dumb little game she was playing.” Ron raised his eyebrows, “She called you a stupid slapper?” “Yeah. I don’t even know what that means. I assume it’s something insulting though.” Hermione frowned and pulled at the hem of her shirt uncomfortably, “It’s a derogatory term used to insinuate that someone has loose morals.” “She basically called you a slut,” Ron didn’t mince words. “I can’t stand that girl. She’s bullied Hermione before too. She just goes along with whatever Malfoy wants. She’s not a nice person.” “Wow. I guess I can see why you don’t have a high opinion of Slytherin. We do have some vile people in our house… but I hope I can change your mind, to some extent, that we aren’t all bad.” “You are. Changing our minds that is,” Harry spoke up. Hermione glanced at her watch, “It’s about to be curfew. Should we continue this tomorrow?” “Curfew already? Seems early still. But I guess it has been several hours we’ve been hanging out,” Y/N didn’t want the night to end with her new friends. “Sadly yes, it is about curfew time. But we’d love to see you tomorrow too. We can show you the Black Lake and you can meet Hagrid. It’s just best not to get caught out after curfew. We don’t want any house points deducted, or worse, detention.” “Wouldn’t that be awesome if we had some magical invisibility cloak or something we could use to sneak around after curfew?” the redhead said knowingly; Harry and Hermione flashed him a look telling him to shut his big mouth. Y/N laughed, “I guess that would be awesome. I wish. Well, I would definitely like to hang out with you three tomorrow. I’ve had fun tonight.” “Us too,” agreed Harry. And with that, they discussed and made plans for the next day. As Y/N walked back to the dungeon, she contemplated her new friendship with the Gryffindors. Upon walking into the Slytherin common room, however, she was jerked out of her reverie by the drawl of a familiar voice. “L/N. Hey, L/N. Hey blood-traitor!” The voice belonged to the platinum blonde who was sitting again by the fire next to Crabbe and Goyle. “Where’d you go? Try to drown yourself in the Black Lake yet? You'd be doing us all a favor. Zabini’s not here right now for you to harass. He’s probably rinsing his mouth out with disinfectant still from your obvious desperation.” Y/N's eyes shone with determination and fight, “Did it take you all night to think of that, Malfoy? That’s precious that you spent all night thinking of something clever to say to me. Too bad you failed.” Draco leered at Y/N, “You wish, filthy blood-traitor. You wish I spent all night thinking of you.” The Slytherin girl laughed heartily at her aggressor, “No, no, not really, Malfoy. Nice try though.” She turned away from Draco and walked to her bedroom. As Draco sat there fuming at Y/N's temerity, he briefly thought to himself that he was glad he got to see Y/N again that night. Although their interaction could generally by described as strained and unpleasant, Draco was nonetheless satisfied with their encounter. And as Draco sat by the fire, tuning out Crabbe and Goyle, immersed in his own thoughts, Y/N was lying on her bed, replaying the conversation she just had with Draco. Y/N, smiling to herself, was also satisfied with their encounter.

[shitizsrivastava]

TB#10 || How Facebook Marketing is changing the face of business and why you should delve in it too.

Gary Vaynerchuk opened one his seminars asking people whether they have heard the name of a company called Wish.com. No hands were raised. It was then he told them that this company’s turnover is more than 6 Billion dollars. Then he waited for few seconds to note their reactions and they were spot-on what he was expecting.

Wish. Com is an e-commerce company like eBay and Amazon started by two young programmer friends at google and yahoo, which sell products directly to its customers and the most astonishing fact about that company is that it spends nearly 98% of its marketing money on Facebook advertising.

I reckon that when Facebook was opened to people in 2004 anybody literally thought that it would become such a giant marketing tool.

As of 2018, it boasts of more than 2. 3 billion active users. When Myspace died a few years after the advent of Facebook, the active users of myspace literally emptied by 2012. Orkut suffered the same fate. People thought maybe in a few years Facebook will face the same destiny.

Facebook proved them wrong. In fact, the destiny of Facebook is on ever-rising slope ever since they came into existence. The recent scandals like the Cambridge Analytica Data Scandal that maligned the name of Facebook briefly did not affect its user base, instead, it just kept on growing.

That is where the genius of Zuckerberg comes in. He didn’t start gloating in the glory of his billions of dollars in the bank and neither he got immersed in the intoxication of his massive popularity, instead he invested his time in researching, data finding and changing Facebook to make it better and better year after year, something that Orkut and Myspace didn’t do and you know what happened to them.

Facebook has become the premier marketing tool for business companies, top fortune 500 companies too, to promote their websites, products, values, contents and what not.

Earlier it was difficult to market your product as there were no absolute means. Companies hired marketing teams, advertising teams, research teams, analytics team which would cost them millions of bucks with no guarantee of sure shot results.

But today, all that team of hundreds of people have got concentrated to just one person whose only qualification is that he knows how to do facebook. Anyone on Facebook can open his page for free and do his own marketing, advertising, research, analytics and get done with all the work in few hours, costing him only a few hours and literally no money.

The old concept of opening an office and operating from there so that you meet people and impress them with your team, work and infrastructure has gone in the past and is now well replaced with a Facebook page where you can show your entire infrastructure, team and work where both the parties can see it from the convenience of their home and do business in their pyjamas.

Social networks earlier were just social networks but today nearly every social network has turned itself into a marketing tool and is helping thousands of business and startups to sell their ideas, profiles and products.

I pity people who are on facebook and yet avoid talking to people on it, refrain from adding friends on it and protect their profile like it has some secret information when the entire premise of social media is to share your life with other people. If it contains personal stuff, it is your fault so you better not put it there. It is as simple as that.

I use Facebook for my personal benefits. not for sharing my personal life. These days meeting people in their offices is very difficult so I contact most of the people on Facebook and nearly every time they would reply to me without ever asking where my office is.

I don’t have to take appointments anymore and I don’t have to bother calling their secretary again and again and bombarding them with my resume and visiting card. My profile is now my resume and my profile is now my visiting card.

Most importantly I have used Facebook to arrange workshops, seminars and inform people about my work. Imagine this — earlier I had to make DVDs and CDs of my work and force people to watch them because there was process attached to it on their part also. They had to take the DVDs out, put it on the DVD player and watch it but they would close it if the first few seconds were not good. Most of the time they would not even watch it.

Today however they will at least take a look because they don’t have to do anything. While scrolling their feed if my video pops up, it plays automatically and no matter whether they chose to watch it or not, they get to at least know about it.

I also use Facebook as a means to update myself on what is going in the world and in the lives of people. I am a filmmaker and facebook updates me about who is doing what in the film industry all the time. My entire knowledge of the film industry and whos who mostly comes from Facebook. Facebook is my magazine, my directory and my newspaper.

When Facebook realized that marketers are using its users to promote their products through profiles, messages and pages they started offering their own services.

Now you don’t even have to own a website to become influential on the internet. All you have to do is make a facebook page, post content and start increasing your followers so that you can shout about your products and work on it.

Yes, I do understand that with due course of time the digital marketing on Facebook and other platforms have become complex and now there are courses offered to teach people how to reap the maximum benefits from it.

Institutes like IIMs and other top universities all across the world now have Digital marketing as a major in their curriculum. Philips Kotler has even written a book about Digital Marketing. So yes, the abundant case studies and the analytics is a little complex, but then it is an only a little complex. I can assure you that if you will watch only ten videos on any digital marketing topic, you won’t need the eleventh video to find yourself expert in doing it. It is not obvious but at the same time, it is not that difficult that only people with a certain degree can understand it.

However, let me make it easy for you. No one still knows exactly how the digital marketing works and the more rules and case studies they are creating every week, more exceptions to those rules and case studies are popping up every day on the internet. They are guessing in the guise of chapter names and specific works, that’s it.

If you meet a digital marketer, he would throw heavy words on you like CPC, CPA, CPM, CTR, organic views, backlinks, bounce rates, crawler and many more but when you get to know what they mean you will realize that they are just random jargons and means the most obvious thing. Like CPC means cost per click. How difficult it is to decipher it? Backlinks are links to previous articles in the current articles that take you to other articles which helps in increasing user time on your website. Was that difficult to know? I don’t think so.

Facebook is pretty easy and simple to use. Just remember this one rule — show, don’t tell.

Put a lot of photos on Facebook to attract people to your page. There might be things which you think are not very important which you can put in simple text and post it as a status but try to avoid that. Try putting texts on photos and ahem, try to attach a human face next to it. It affects people psychologically and makes them want to read it. The mind thinks in terms of images and the more images you will use to define your ideas, the more successful you will get.

Facebook does not have too many restrictions on their posts like many other social networks. Some websites only allow photos, some allow mostly texts but Facebook allows everything and the interface it uses is really simple which makes it all the more useful for people, even people who haven’t handled internet before. My parents who are not tech savvy can use only Facebook and WhatsApp on their mobile. I tried introducing them to other social networks but they just don’t get it. There is a reason why more than 2 billion people are using it every day.

You don’t have to employ yourself in posting content every day. The best part of social media networks these days is that they are very friendly to marketing people and inviting more and more people to use their platform to promote their products. Making it complex will limit its use too few specialized people. The interface of Facebook is designed simple because they want more and more people to feel powerful and not helpless. If they find you suffering from a problem and simultaneously they find more users suffering from the same problem than they will introduce a new algorithm to make it useful for you. That is why they keep collecting data from users, their browsing patterns and keep asking them for their reviews. Constant updates on their interface is what makes facebook stand out.

Use Facebook wisely and it can turn your business into an overnight success. There are numerous courses like LinkedIn Learning, Lynda, Udemy and myriads videos on YouTube to teach you everything you want to know about it. Start working.

[flauntpage]

Simply Not Enough: Five Takeaways from Jets 3, Flyers 2

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  Well… they scored. Twice actually.

Not enough.

Nolan Patrick returned to the lineup from his “upper-body injury” for the first time in nine games. That’s a plus.

Not enough.

Brian Elliott had another really good start – that makes five in a row for him.

Not enough. 

Much maligned to start the season, the one other thing that has been pretty steady for the Flyers in recent games has been their defense, and they were relatively good again last night.

Not enough.

Hey, they earned a point on the road against a good team in a difficult building in which to play.

Not enough.

But Radko Gudas looks like he’s going to be suspended for slashing someone in the neck – although the referees didn’t give him a game misconduct until after seeing a replay – which isn’t allowed.

ENOUGH! On both fronts.

Yes Flyers fans, this was another frustrating one-goal loss. They seem to be paramount these days. Much in the way one-run losses crippled a last-place Phillies team this past season, they’re starting to plague the last place Flyers a little now too.

And maybe that’s just the sign of a team that’s getting closer and just doesn’t have that killer instinct to put a game away.

Or maybe it’s a sign there isn’t enough talent on the team to get it done.

Either way, things aren’t looking very hot for the Flyers right now, and at some point, someone is going to have to identify where the issue is for a team that has stagnated both in style and philosophy.

But for now… to the takeaways.

1) Drought’s over… sorta

It didn’t take long for the Flyers to snap their goalless streak. All of two-and-a-half minutes actually:

The Flyers scored. http://pic.twitter.com/YwyUkq0nsx

— Chris Jastrzembski (@CFJastrzembski) November 17, 2017

And then they scored again, less than three minutes later:

POWER. PLAY. GOAL. http://pic.twitter.com/Q9OnFd2ot8

— Chris Jastrzembski (@CFJastrzembski) November 17, 2017

But what do you see on those goals? Here’s a clue: it’s something familiar.

That’s right. They were scored by the usual suspects. Jake Voracek and Sean Couturier with Claude Giroux involved in the action.

Voracek’s tally snapped a 158:36 span of hockey without a Flyers goal. They were starting to sneak eerily close to a franchise record for an inability to score, and only came 41 minutes short.

But there’s a more daunting number that still exists:

263:23

That’s how long it’s been since a player – any player, defense included –  other than Voracek, Couturier or Giroux scored a goal. That’s more than four games. It’s more than 13 periods.

It’s unacceptable.

Something has to give. Dave Hakstol has to stop waiting for it to happen and he needs to break up his top line. It doesn’t need to be a permanent breakup – just until the offensive flow can start to regenerate through the lineup. But it needs to happen.

But how do you do it? How do you mix and match and keep lines equally responsible defensively as offensively?

Let’s break it down.

  2) A new lineup

First thing’s first. There’s a clog at right wing. Voracek is a lefty shot, but doesn’t like playing left wing. He prefers the off wing. Always has, always will.

I remember former Flyers coach Craig Berube telling me once that if Voracek was willing to learn how to play the left side, he would have much more lineup flexibility.

When I asked him why he just didn’t put him over there and force him to learn, he just gave me a glance and said, “I want to keep my job.”

Well, he didn’t keep it much longer after that conversation.

I wasn’t sure if that meant Voracek had former GM Paul Holmgren’s ear, or word came down from above to Berube that Voracek had to play right wing, or what the case was, but Voracek has remained on the right wing since Day One in Philadelphia, and it doesn’t seem like that’s going to change either under the Ron Hextall/Hakstol regime.

So, who do you move off the top line?

Well, Voracek. Quite simply because you need to plug another right wing there since he has to take a right wing spot in the lineup somewhere.

Conventional wisdom would tell you to put Wayne Simmonds there, but I don’t think that’s a good idea. First of all, Simmonds is in the second longest stretch of his Flyers career without a goal (11 games), so he’s pressing a bit. Not to mention, he’s still likely not completely recovered from a groin injury that has been hounding him for a month.

But most importantly, he changes the way the line is playing.

Simmonds isn’t a playmaker like Voracek. He plays a game too similar to what’s working for Couturier right now – go to the net and make things happen in front.

With two guys like that on the top line, it leaves Giroux as the only creator, and defenses would clamp down on him and force others to create the offense – which they wouldn’t be able to do with any regularity.

No, instead, Giroux and Couturier need another playmaker on the other side.

Enter Travis Konecny.

The young winger has speed to burn, is incredibly creative and is an offensive risk-taker, often forcing defenders to make a quick decision, sometimes one they don’t want to make.

His skating ability will still give Giroux some room to operate on the left side and not clog the middle for Couturier.

Now, Konecny is still prone to defensive lapses – and I know that’s what frustrates Hakstol about him – but playing him with Couturier, who is one of the top five most defensively responsible forwards in the entire NHL, will help cover for those occasional errors in judgment.

He also doesn’t have Voracek’s heaviness with the puck, which could affect puck possession a little bit, but there has to be some trade off to improve the lineup elsewhere.

Now the second line is where things would get really new.

With Patrick back in the lineup (more on him in No. 3 below), I’d love to see a line full of creative types play together, especially if you can coach it in such a way to keep them away from the other team’s top scoring line via a smart deployment strategy. Maybe give them only offensive/neutral zone starts. Maybe make a quick line change if the top unit from the other team is out there against them. Whatever… be smart about their use 5-on-5 and you could end up with something special here.

That combination would be Jordan Weal, Patrick and Voracek.

Again, three different styles, but if you want to instill confidence in Patrick’s game, and get Weal more chances to score, you play them with one of the league’s best assist men.

So where does this drop Simmonds?

Onto a third line I love for grit, puck possession, energy, and reliable defense that you can throw out with confidence against the other team’s top unit without much worry.

This line would be Michael Raffl, Scott Laughton and Simmonds.

Yes, I know I’m breaking up the best fourth line in Flyers history, but again… we’re talking temporarily here.

And yes this diminishes Simmonds scoring opportunities a bit, but it puts him into a role where he doesn’t have to press as much, and can still get to the front of the net. Put this group out there when Shayne Gostisbehere is on the point, or even Ivan Provorov, guys who know how to get the puck to the net, and watch them collect the trash and put it in the bin where it belongs.

Not to mention, Simmonds creates space and Laughton and Raffl are good enough to make things happen with a little room.

Finally, the fourth line, using players that are here mind you and not elsewhere in the organization, would be Dale Weise, Valtteri Filppula and Taylor Leier.

This isn’t a brutal fourth line and actually has a little bit of skill with Filppula and Leier that can take advantage of the fourth line of the opposition.

Ultimately, I’d like to see Mike Vecchione of the Phantoms get a chance here in this spot, but if we’re using what’s on this team right now, this is what I’d go with.

I could also swap Weise with Matt Read and not be disappointed. I don’t want to see any more of Jori Lehtera. I’ve seen enough.

Point is, something needs to change. Because this is one of the most dreadful scoring droughts for 15 of 18 forwards I’ve ever seen.

  3) Patty’s back

Patrick returned to the lineup for the first time in almost a month for the Flyers. He did so in his hometown of Winnipeg. He started on the second line, but didn’t play much. just 7:32 of ice time. He didn’t look especially good or noticeably bad. He just existed.

The thing is, he didn’t miss all this time with his “upper body injury” – a.k.a. concussion.

No, he could have played sooner. The Flyers just wanted to work on his game with him. When you hear a 19-year-old player say the things he said, I can assure you he is parroting what his coaches are telling him.

Here’s what he told the Courier-Post’s Dave Isaac before yesterday’s game:

“I think I need to move my feet a little more. I think too much out there. I was thinking instead of moving my feet and making plays. I think I need to contribute a little more offensively and stay good defensively and keep improving on faceoffs. I think those are the main things.”

Yeah… it wasn’t the concussion keeping him off the ice. It was the slow adjustment to the NHL pace.

Patrick will ultimately be just fine. The Flyers are going to baby him a little bit and only use him in certain situations, but it’s good to have the No. 2 overall pick back in the lineup. He just needs to start showing everyone why he was picked there.

  4) Steady goaltending?

Those two words are rarely used together in reference to hockey in Philadelphia, but, for a few games at least, Elliott has been really strong for the Flyers.

Brian Elliott coming up big again. http://pic.twitter.com/hrrMvn1VKy

— Chris Jastrzembski (@CFJastrzembski) November 17, 2017

O.K. he didn’t look great in the shootout last night, but most goalies don’t. But in the game, he was excellent again. He made another 31 saves.

In his last five games, he’s allowed just seven goals (1.39 GAA) and has a .954 save percentage. And yet, he has only one win in that stretch.

That’s a tough break. But, he’s keeping his team in every game. He has to with the ineptitude in scoring. I expect he’ll be back in net tomorrow against Calgary, since he was the Flames goalie last year, and probably doesn’t get a game off until next week, when the Flyers play three games in four days around Thanksgiving.

He’s been a recent bright spot for the team while the struggles have been so incredibly noticeable elsewhere.

  5) Gudas and the Stripes

Sounds like the name of a bad bar band, no?

O.K. first, here’s the play – which is definitely a penalty and probably deserving of some league discipline, especially with Gudas’ reputation:

Radko Gudas has been given a game misconduct for this play.

What do you think of the call? http://pic.twitter.com/tTL5rQnF6E

— NBC Sports Philadelphia (@NBCSPhilly) November 17, 2017

One could argue that it was just the way Gudas came down and landed on the back of Mathieu Perrault’s neck. But, you still need to be in better control of your stick there.

Gudas has dodged suspensions before, and maybe he does again here – especially since the league isn’t as quick to hand out suspensions if there weren’t injuries involved, which is stupid, but hey.

However, I think Gudas gets one here. It may be just a one game suspension, but I think it’s a send-a-message type pf suspension.

Gudas has regressed so far this season after having a very good showing for the Flyers last season. Andrew MacDonald is close to returning, and when he does, it might not be a bad idea to sit Gudas for a game or two to make him remember that he plays precariously close to the edge. When he stays on one side, he’s effective. When he plays on the other side, he’s reckless and ineffective.

But the grander scale issue here is the scoreboard officiating.

Now, full disclosure, I didn’t watch the first part of the game live. I went back and saw it on DVR after the fact, but I didn’t need to see what happened more than once.

The penalty was originally called a slashing minor on Gudas. But then, the in-arena scoreboard showed the replay of the video, the officials looked up and saw it, huddled together and decided to change the call to a slashing major and a game misconduct.

That’s not allowed.

You can not use replay to change a call – and yet these guys did.

They tried to explain to the Flyers that they didn’t, but that was some serious B.S.

Once again, Dave Isaac from the Courier Post was all over it and reached out to a league official (I’m pretty sure I know which one, because there is one who answers emails during games all the time – and he would be the right person to go to).

Here’s what the official told him via email:

“The Situation Room is unable to confirm the exact sequence of events which occurred between the officials on the ice.”

Translation: Yep. They looked at the video.

That’s a disgrace. The league needs to stop protecting these guys from continued abuse of the rule book or finding loopholes in the rules to justify their poor decisions. There have been far more egregious mistakes in the first 19 games of this season than I can remember.

Whether they ultimately got the call right or not is not the point. The point is, allowing this to happen sets a precedent for the future of the game – and a bad precedent at that.

Not only does the NHL need to do something about this, but they need to address it publicly, otherwise they will be continued to be viewed as a flim-flam operation not just by me, but scores of other writers and fans of this sport.

  Simply Not Enough: Five Takeaways from Jets 3, Flyers 2 published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv