#beauty roundup

[petrovna-zamo]

[kazz-brekker]

alucard and olrox both in season 2 of castlevania nocturne…we shall be simply overwhelmed by vampire hair

[abirdie]

Gael García Bernal in Eva no duerme (2015, dir. Pablo Agüero)

Gifs are all 540px wide so you can click to see larger.

[other gael filmography gifsets]

[fieriframes]

[Flavor's dynamite. Lot of texture, lot of seasoning, totally unique. Beauty is in the eye of the gazer. In one plate, you're getting all different types of flavors and textures.]

[bloodmaarked]

➳ monthly book round-up: april

read:

never split the difference: negotiating as if your life depended on it, chris voss + tahl raz. 5*. read 14 march 2023 – 14 april 2023.

the final strife, saara el-arifi. 4*. read 31 march 2023 – 16 april 2023.

how beautiful we were, imbolo mbue. 5*. read 16 april 2023 – 29 april 2023.

currently reading:

empress crowned in red ciannon smart. started 17 april 2023.

[shesamreads]

I read 14 books in January. How did I read 14 books in January?

I started listening to audiobooks at work, which is great because data entry can be a slog. I also cut into my crafting time because sometimes I just don't feel like pulling a project out.

My Goodreads goal is 48, which is 4 books a month. I can definitely do that! I can't say I'll keep January's energy up the whole year, though. I know we already have a busy February.

Still, a pretty good start.

[madegeeky]

Epic Free Games (til 19 Jan. 2023, 10am cst)

First Class Trouble is a game where players work together and against each other to survive a disaster. The goal is to shut down a deadly A.I. Some players are impostors, secretly playing as human-looking killer robots intent on betraying the other players.

Gamedec is a single-player cyberpunk isometric RPG. You are a game detective, who solves crimes inside virtual worlds. Use your wits to gather info from your witnesses and suspects, getting to the bottom of deceptive schemes. You are the sum of your choices.

[alexsmithson]

Monthly Roundup: July 2024

What an incredibly productive month it's been! I'll see you all in August!

What an incredibly productive month it’s been! July flew remarkably faster this time around, more so because I returned to work at the beginning of the month following my two-week annual leave for the last two weeks of June, and it’s been incredibly busy and productive since! The time away from work the last two weeks of June helped massively as I feel much more relaxed and recharged, and this…

[xxmarvelouslifexx]

January Round Up

Fun camping trip with my cousins

Survived my first major public event for work (not sure if this is a highlight but it was a momentous occasion)

Started getting better on the Lyra hoop

[lindsaytimberlake]

Model Lindsay Timberlake for fashion designer Maria Bangsgaard Køster of North Country Maiden - Western Roundup Fashion Show, Nashville Boogie Vintage Weekender (2015)

PHOTO: Allison Kortokrax (kortophotography.com)

[philharmonica]

january rotation 🍎🎵

new year, new name: rotation flows better than music round up

the breaking hands by the gun club || a gorgeous song! yes, the lyrics make me sad, but I'm just slow dancing to the music all by myself. I only know a few of this band's songs but they sound so different, love the versatility!!

strange by galaxie 500 || this song makes me want to go (for a walk? a solo road trip?) with no particular direction

heartland by the sound || ^similar to above but this time I have a destination in mind and it's the best version of myself and I'm improving every day

new town by life without buildings || this makes me feel like I absolutely need to make changes in my life

caeser on a tv screen by the last dinner party || this chorus has a similar rhythm/flow to a part of a musical that I like to it's automatically on this list but on a realer note I'm excited for their debut

whom are you dancing for? by art fact || this is exactly the kind of dark(ish) synth music I like

all over the world by pixies || not really sure what this song is about but I like the contrast of the monotone vocals with the harsh guitar

the diamond sea - radio edit by sonic youth || this is exactly the kind of sonic youth music I like, they should do more of this and less of that guitar noise (they're just not good at that, sorry not sorry)

free by the martinis || I need to feel the wind through my hair. sidenote this is from the movie empire records, which I love and think everyone should see (it truly has a great soundtrack in addition to great plot and funny characters and being so personal to me)

[mostlysignssomeportents]

It all started with a mouse

For the public domain, time stopped in 1998, when the Sonny Bono Copyright Act froze copyright expirations for 20 years. In 2019, time started again, with a massive crop of works from 1923 returning to the public domain, free for all to use and adapt:

https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/publicdomainday/2019/

No one is better at conveying the power of the public domain than Jennifer Jenkins and James Boyle, who run the Duke Center for the Study of the Public Domain. For years leading up to 2019, the pair published an annual roundup of what we would have gotten from the public domain in a universe where the 1998 Act never passed. Since 2019, they've switched to celebrating what we're actually getting each year. Last year's was a banger:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/20/free-for-2023/#oy-canada

But while there's been moderate excitement at the publicdomainification of "Yes, We Have No Bananas," AA Milne's "Now We Are Six," and Sherlock Holmes, the main event that everyone's anticipated arrives on January 1, 2024, when Mickey Mouse enters the public domain.

The first appearance of Mickey Mouse was in 1928's Steamboat Willie. Disney was critical to the lobbying efforts that extended copyright in 1976 and again in 1998, so much so that the 1998 Act is sometimes called the Mickey Mouse Protection Act. Disney and its allies were so effective at securing these regulatory gifts that many people doubted that this day would ever come. Surely Disney would secure another retrospective copyright term extension before Jan 1, 2024. I had long arguments with comrades about this – people like Project Gutenberg founder Michael S Hart (RIP) were fatalistically certain the public domain would never come back.

But they were wrong. The public outrage over copyright term extensions came too late to stave off the slow-motion arson of the 1976 and 1998 Acts, but it was sufficient to keep a third extension away from the USA. Canada wasn't so lucky: Justin Trudeau let Trump bully him into taking 20 years' worth of works out of Canada's public domain in the revised NAFTA agreement, making swathes of works by living Canadian authors illegal at the stroke of a pen, in a gift to the distant descendants of long-dead foreign authors.

Now, with Mickey's liberation bare days away, there's a mounting sense of excitement and unease. Will Mickey actually be free? The answer is a resounding YES! (albeit with a few caveats). In a prelude to this year's public domain roundup, Jennifer Jenkins has published a full and delightful guide to The Mouse and IP from Jan 1 on:

https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/mickey/

Disney loves the public domain. Its best-loved works, from The Sorcerer's Apprentice to Sleeping Beauty, Pinnocchio to The Little Mermaid, are gorgeous, thoughtful, and lively reworkings of material from the public domain. Disney loves the public domain – we just wish it would share.

Disney loves copyright's other flexibilities, too, like fair use. Walt told the papers that he took his inspiration for Steamboat Willie from Charlie Chaplin and Douglas Fairbanks, making fair use of their performances to imbue Mickey with his mischief and derring do. Disney loves fair use – we just wish it would share.

Disney loves copyright's limitations. Steamboat Willie was inspired by Buster Keaton's silent film Steamboat Bill (titles aren't copyrightable). Disney loves copyright's limitations – we just wish it would share.

As Jenkins writes, Disney's relationship to copyright is wildly contradictory. It's the poster child for the public domain's power as a source of inspiration for worthy (and profitable) new works. It's also the chief villain in the impoverishment and near-extinction of the public domain. Truly, every pirate wants to be an admiral.

Disney's reliance on – and sabotage of – the public domain is ironic. Jenkins compares it to "an oil company relying on solar power to run its rigs." Come January 1, Disney will have to share.

Now, if you've heard anything about this, you've probably been told that Mickey isn't really entering the public domain. Between trademark claims and later copyrightable elements of Mickey's design, Mickey's status will be too complex to understand. That's totally wrong.

Jenkins illustrates the relationship between these three elements in (what else) a Mickey-shaped Venn diagram. Topline: you can use all the elements of Mickey that are present in Steamboat Willie, along with some elements that were added later, provided that you make it clear that your work isn't affiliated with Disney.

Let's unpack that. The copyrightable status of a character used to be vague and complex, but several high-profile cases have brought clarity to the question. The big one is Les Klinger's case against the Arthur Conan Doyle estate over Sherlock Holmes. That case established that when a character appears in both public domain and copyrighted works, the character is in the public domain, and you are "free to copy story elements from the public domain works":

https://freesherlock.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/klinger-order-on-motion-for-summary-judgment-c.pdf

This case was appealed all the way to the Supreme Court, who declined to hear it. It's settled law.

So, which parts of Mickey aren't going into the public domain? Elements that came later: white gloves, color. But that doesn't mean you can't add different gloves, or different colorways. The idea of a eyes with pupils is not copyrightable – only the specific eyes that Disney added.

Other later elements that don't qualify for copyright: a squeaky mouse voice, being adorable, doing jaunty dances, etc. These are all generic characteristics of cartoon mice, and they're free for you to use. Jenkins is more cautious on whether you can give your Mickey red shorts. She judges that "a single, bright, primary color for an article of clothing does not meet the copyrightability threshold" but without settled law, you might wanna change the colors.

But what about trademark? For years, Disney has included a clip from Steamboat Willie at the start of each of its films. Many observers characterized this as a bid to create a de facto perpetual copyright, by making Steamboat Willie inescapably associated with products from Disney, weaving an impassable web of trademark tripwires around it.

But trademark doesn't prevent you from using Steamboat Willie. It only prevents you from misleading consumers "into thinking your work is produced or sponsored by Disney." Trademarks don't expire so long as they're in use, but uses that don't create confusion are fair game under trademark.

Copyrights and trademarks can overlap. Mickey Mouse is a copyrighted character, but he's also an indicator that a product or service is associated with Disney. While Mickey's copyright expires in a couple weeks, his trademark doesn't. What happens to an out-of-copyright work that is still a trademark?

Luckily for us, this is also a thoroughly settled case. As in, this question was resolved in a unanimous 2000 Supreme Court ruling, Dastar v. Twentieth Century Fox. A live trademark does not extend an expired copyright. As the Supremes said:

[This would] create a species of mutant copyright law that limits the public’s federal right to copy and to use expired copyrights.

This elaborates on the Ninth Circuit's 1996 Maljack Prods v Goodtimes Home Video Corp:

[Trademark][ cannot be used to circumvent copyright law. If material covered by copyright law has passed into the public domain, it cannot then be protected by the Lanham Act without rendering the Copyright Act a nullity.

Despite what you might have heard, there is no ambiguity here. Copyrights can't be extended through trademark. Period. Unanimous Supreme Court Decision. Boom. End of story. Done.

But even so, there are trademark considerations in how you use Steamboat Willie after Jan 1, but these considerations are about protecting the public, not Disney shareholders. Your uses can't be misleading. People who buy or view your Steamboat Willie media or products have to be totally clear that your work comes from you, not Disney.

Avoiding confusion will be very hard for some uses, like plush toys, or short idents at the beginning of feature films. For most uses, though, a prominent disclaimer will suffice. The copyright page for my 2003 debut novel Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom contains this disclaimer:

This novel is a work of fiction, set in an imagined future. All the characters and events portrayed in this book, including the imagined future of the Magic Kingdom, are either fictitious or are used fictitiously. The Walt Disney Company has not authorized or endorsed this novel.

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250196385/downandoutinthemagickingdom

Here's the Ninth Circuit again:

When a public domain work is copied, along with its title, there is little likelihood of confusion when even the most minimal steps are taken to distinguish the publisher of the original from that of the copy. The public is receiving just what it believes it is receiving—the work with which the title has become associated. The public is not only unharmed, it is unconfused.

Trademark has many exceptions. The First Amendment protects your right to use trademarks in expressive ways, for example, to recreate famous paintings with Barbie dolls:

https://www.copyright.gov/fair-use/summaries/mattel-walkingmountain-9thcir2003.pdf

And then there's "nominative use": it's not a trademark violation to use a trademark to accurately describe a trademarked thing. "We fix iPhones" is not a trademark violation. Neither is 'Works with HP printers.' This goes double for "expressive" uses of trademarks in new works of art:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogers_v._Grimaldi

What about "dilution"? Trademark protects a small number of superbrands from uses that "impair the distinctiveness or harm the reputation of the famous mark, even when there is no consumer confusion." Jenkins says that the Mickey silhouette and the current Mickey character designs might be entitled to protection from dilution, but Steamboat Willie doesn't make the cut.

Jenkins closes with a celebration of the public domain's ability to inspire new works, like Disney's Three Musketeers, Disney's Christmas Carol, Disney's Beauty and the Beast, Disney's Around the World in 80 Days, Disney's Alice in Wonderland, Disney's Snow White, Disney's Hunchback of Notre Dame, Disney's Sleeping Beauty, Disney's Cinderella, Disney's Little Mermaid, Disney's Pinocchio, Disney's Huck Finn, Disney's Robin Hood, and Disney's Aladdin. These are some of the best-loved films of the past century, and made Disney a leading example of what talented, creative people can do with the public domain.

As of January 1, Disney will start to be an example of what talented, creative people give back to the public domain, joining Dickens, Dumas, Carroll, Verne, de Villeneuve, the Brothers Grimm, Twain, Hugo, Perrault and Collodi.

Public domain day is 17 days away. Creators of all kinds: start your engines!

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/2023/12/15/mouse-liberation-front/#free-mickey

Image: Doo Lee (modified) https://web.law.duke.edu/sites/default/files/images/centers/cspd/pdd2024/mickey/Steamboat-WIllie-Enters-Public-Domain.jpeg

CC BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.en

[reportwire]

Out of Thousands, A Sephora Beauty Director Labels These 11 Finds "Need to Try"

Raise your hand if you could spend an entire afternoon in Sephora and still not even make a dent in their product inventory. I know I could—I could happily browse the shelves for hours at a time and probably only make my way through a few different brands. As we all know, the retailer is basically every beauty lover’s dream—every product you could possibly want is at your fingertips. Since it’s…

[absolutecreaturevibes]

Hey you beautiful Creature Lovers!!! Here’s a roundup of week 3/ batch 3 of Absolute Creature Angels for UltraAngelTober hosted by @ultrainfinitepit to tantalize your eyeballs!!!

“Manticore might be my favorite one yet but it’s hard to choose just one amirite?

[fanaticsnail]

WIP Roundup

While working on commissions alongside my regular fics, this is what I hope to bring out in the next month before the year is out.

Dreaming of You: Red Hair Pirates

Doflamingo: cowboy au, bronko rider.

Heat: birthday series fic.

Wire: a fic I began with the likelihood of it turning into a series.

Hey Doc: Heart Pirate interaction, babying the commanders as per the norm.

The Kissing Booth: series is closed, but the asks are now all accounted for! There's over 30 kisses that need my attention.

Fishman: I just want to write for them. As someone with a Fishfolk OC, I just love thinking about them.

Pollen: there's one in my arsenal that I can't wait to mess with.

Requests: are closed, but there are a few I would love to work with.

Trades: Prior organised trades between me and creators on here and discord are on the list, and coming soon!

Bepo: birthday series fic.

I am also very selfishly enjoying a lot of thoughts about Tobiuo, and Chains & Gallows. The three of them take up a lot of my mind, and I would love to write for them one day.

Thank you for sticking by me, and I hope you all have a beautiful day. 🖤🐌

[felassan]

Some further review titles for Dragon Age: The Veilguard. [prev post]

[source, two, three, four, five, six, seven] <- source links may contain spoilers

Text version of titles:

"Dragon Age: The Veilguard Review – BioWare’s Back Dragon Age: The Veilguard Review - A Beautiful And Engaging Journey Dragon Age: The Veilguard review roundup: 'A fantasy role-playing game of astonishing spectacle' Dragon Age: The Veilguard review: a very safe return to form for BioWare Dragon Age: The Veilguard is the friend group simulator we’ve been waiting for Dragon Age The Veilguard Review: The BEST Bioware Has EVER Been! Dragon Age: The Veilguard Is Full of Pansexual Chaos and Great Character Writing"