#because of how reviewers are treated and how many bot-generated reviews are out there just to sell a product

[awkward-teabag]

It may not even be that they're cynical or anything, just that they're overworked, underpaid, and expected to keep a certain output no matter how many co-workers get fired. That or there's a "content pivot" which means much of what they review are things they have little to no interest in and may actively dislike.

It's particularly bad with professional video game reviews given all the firings, the sheer breadth of video games in terms of content and gameplay, and how it can take a dozen or more hours to form the framework for a proper review.

It's hard to do that if you're the only one doing reviews now and expected to put 1-2 reviews out a week... of brand new games so you don't even have a backlog to pull from.

(There's also a massive issue where publishers will blacklist a company if a review isn't glowing enough and fans who can get vitriolic and violent if a game gets a 7/10 or lower.)

It's hard to not get jaded when you're pressured to do things you don't enjoy and doing the work of several people while also having to deal with the fallout if you phrase things "wrong" or don't outright lie to keep your sanity, safety, or because you were told to do so.

But it applies to reviews in other industries, too. What may be a negative for one person may be fine (or a positive) to someone else. They're not wrong for pointing it out, though, and just because something is a review doesn't mean you can turn off your critical thinking.

And please read multiple reviews to get a better understanding of something rather than reading one review and taking it as gospel. One person complaining about something may just be it wasn't for them or they were having a bad day, if multiple people complain about the same thing, it may be a sign of a larger issue.

And by the gods, a stranger pointing out a negative or under-developed part of something you like in a review is not a personal attack against you.

Sometimes you encounter negative critique that you disagree with where you have to recognize that nothing the critic said was technically wrong, but they just have a far more cynical and low-patience lens through which they are reviewing the work that highlights all flaws and prevents them from experiencing the more lighthearted joy in the little things about a piece of media that do work really well.

Unfortunately, professional reviewers are particularly prone to this as they are forced to mechanically grind through every new major release in their medium to get paid, regardless of whether it's their type of thing or if they have any patience for its genre expectations or particular approach, and are often primed to have a bad time with anything that can't push past that hump by being an unexpectedly moving piece of art. Which arguably makes them some of the worst people to qualitatively review the experience of engaging with a piece of media for entertainment, but there you are. The system might be flawed somewhat.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Dirty words are politically potent

On OCTOBER 23 at 7PM, I'll be in DECATUR, presenting my novel THE BEZZLE at EAGLE EYE BOOKS.

Making up words is a perfectly cromulent passtime, and while most of the words we coin disappear as soon as they fall from our lips, every now and again, you find a word that fits so nice and kentucky in the public discourse that it acquires a life of its own:

http://meaningofliff.free.fr/definition.php3?word=Kentucky

I've been trying to increase the salience of digital human rights in the public imagination for a quarter of a century, starting with the campaign to get people to appreciate that the internet matters, and that tech policy isn't just the delusion that the governance of spaces where sad nerds argue about Star Trek is somehow relevant to human thriving:

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/10/04/small-change-malcolm-gladwell

Now, eventually people figured out that a) the internet mattered and, b) it was going dreadfully wrong. So my job changed again, from "how the internet is governed matters" to "you can't fix the internet with wishful thinking," for example, when people said we could solve its problems by banning general purpose computers:

https://memex.craphound.com/2012/01/10/lockdown-the-coming-war-on-general-purpose-computing/

Or by banning working cryptography:

https://memex.craphound.com/2018/09/04/oh-for-fucks-sake-not-this-fucking-bullshit-again-cryptography-edition/

Or by redesigning web browsers to treat their owners as threats:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/09/open-letter-w3c-director-ceo-team-and-membership

Or by using bots to filter every public utterance to ensure that they don't infringe copyright:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/09/today-europe-lost-internet-now-we-fight-back

Or by forcing platforms to surveil and police their users' speech (aka "getting rid of Section 230"):

https://www.techdirt.com/2020/06/23/hello-youve-been-referred-here-because-youre-wrong-about-section-230-communications-decency-act/

Along the way, many of us have coined words in a bid to encapsulate the abstract, technical ideas at the core of these arguments. This isn't a vanity project! Creating a common vocabulary is a necessary precondition for having the substantive, vital debates we'll need to tackle the real, thorny issues raised by digital systems. So there's "free software," "open source," "filternet," "chat control," "back doors," and my own contributions, like "adversarial interoperability":

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interoperability

Or "Competitive Compatibility" ("comcom"), a less-intimidatingly technical term for the same thing:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/12/competitive-compatibility-year-review

These have all found their own niches, but nearly all of them are just that: niche. Some don't even rise to "niche": they're shibboleths, insider terms that confuse and intimidate normies and distract from the real fights with semantic ones, like whether it's "FOSS" or "FLOSS" or something else entirely:

https://opensource.stackexchange.com/questions/262/what-is-the-difference-between-foss-and-floss

But every now and again, you get a word that just kills. That brings me to "enshittification," a word I coined in 2022:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/28/enshittification/#relentless-payola

"Enshittification" took root in my hindbrain, rolling around and around, agglomerating lots of different thoughts and critiques I'd been making for years, crystallizing them into a coherent thesis:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/potemkin-ai/#hey-guys

This kind of spontaneous crystallization is the dividend of doing lots of work in public, trying to take every half-formed thought and pin it down in public writing, something I've been doing for decades:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/09/the-memex-method/

After those first couple articles, "enshittification" raced around the internet. There's two reasons for this: first, "enshittification" is a naughty word that's fun to say. Journalists love getting to put "shit" in their copy:

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/15/crosswords/linguistics-word-of-the-year.html

Radio journalists love to tweak the FCC with cheekily bleeped syllables in slightly dirty compound words:

https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/projects/enshitification

And nothing enlivens an academic's day like getting to use a word like "enshittification" in a journal article (doubtless this also amuses the editors, peer-reviewers, copyeditors, typesetters, etc):

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=enshittification&btnG=&oq=ensh

That was where I started, too! The first time I used "enshittification" was in a throwaway bad-tempered rant about the decay of Tripadvisor into utter uselessness, which drew a small chorus of appreciative chuckles about the word:

https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1550457808222552065

The word rattled around my mind for five months before attaching itself to my detailed theory of platform decay. But it was that detailed critique, coupled with a minor license to swear, that gave "enshittification" a life of its own. How do I know that the theory was as important as the swearing? Because the small wave of amusement that followed my first use of "enshittification" petered out in less than a day. It was only when I added the theory that the word took hold.

Likewise: how do I know that the theory needed to be blended with swearing to break out of the esoteric realm of tech policy debates (which the public had roundly ignored for more than two decades)? Well, because I spent two decades writing about this stuff without making anything like the dents that appeared once I added an Anglo-Saxon monosyllable to that critique.

Adding "enshittification" to the critique got me more column inches, a longer hearing, a more vibrant debate, than anything else I'd tried. First, Wired availed itself of the Creative Commons license on my second long-form article on the subject and reprinted it as a 4,200-word feature. I've been writing for Wired for more than thirty years and this is by far the longest thing I've published with them – a big, roomy, discursive piece that was run verbatim, with every one of my cherished darlings unmurdered.

That gave the word – and the whole critique, with all its spiky corners – a global airing, leading to more pickup and discussion. Eventually, the American Dialect Society named it their "Word of the Year" (and their "Tech Word of the Year"):

https://americandialect.org/2023-word-of-the-year-is-enshittification/

"Enshittification" turns out to be catnip for language nerds:

https://becauselanguage.com/90-enpoopification/#transcript-60

I've been dragged into (good natured) fights over the German, Spanish, French and Italian translations for the term. When I taped an NPR show before a live audience with ASL interpretation, I got to watch a Deaf fan politely inform the interpreter that she didn't need to finger-spell "enshittification," because it had already been given an ASL sign by the US Deaf community:

https://maximumfun.org/episodes/go-fact-yourself/ep-158-aida-rodriguez-cory-doctorow/

I gave a speech about enshittification in Berlin and published the transcript:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/30/go-nuts-meine-kerle/#ich-bin-ein-bratapfel

Which prompted the rock-ribbed Financial Times to get in touch with me and publish the speech – again, nearly verbatim – as a whopping 6,400 word feature in their weekend magazine:

https://www.ft.com/content/6fb1602d-a08b-4a8c-bac0-047b7d64aba5

Though they could have had it for free (just as Wired had), they insisted on paying me (very well, as it happens!), as did De Zeit:

https://www.zeit.de/digital/internet/2024-03/plattformen-facebook-google-internet-cory-doctorow

This was the start of the rise of enshittification. The word is spreading farther than ever, in ways that I have nothing to do with, along with the critique I hung on it. In other words, the bit of string that tech policy wonks have been pushing on for a quarter of a century is actually starting to move, and it's actually accelerating.

Despite this (or more likely because of it), there's a growing chorus of "concerned" people who say they like the critique but fret that it is being held back because you can't use it "at church or when talking to K-12 students" (my favorite variant: "I couldn't say this at a NATO conference"). I leave it up to you whether you use the word with your K-12 students, NATO generals, or fellow parishoners (though I assure you that all three groups are conversant with the dirty little word at the root of my coinage). If you don't want to use "enshittification," you can coin your own word – or just use one of the dozens of words that failed to gain public attention over the past 25 years (might I suggest "platform decay?").

What's so funny about all this pearl-clutching is that it comes from people who universally profess to have the intestinal fortitude to hear the word "enshittification" without experiencing psychological trauma, but worry that other people might not be so strong-minded. They continue to say this even as the most conservative officials in the most staid of exalted forums use the word without a hint of embarrassment, much less apology:

https://www.independent.ie/business/technology/chairman-of-irish-social-media-regulator-says-europe-should-not-be-seduced-by-mario-draghis-claims/a526530600.html

I mean, I'm giving a speech on enshittification next month at a conference where I'm opening for the Secretary General of the United Nations:

https://icanewdelhi2024.coop/welcome/pages/Programme

After spending half my life trying to get stuff like this into the discourse, I've developed some hard-won, informed views on how ideas succeed:

First: the minor obscenity is a feature, not a bug. The marriage of something long and serious to something short and funny is a happy one that makes both the word and the ideas better off than they'd be on their own. As Lenny Bruce wrote in his canonical work in the subject, the aptly named How to Talk Dirty and Influence People:

I want to help you if you have a dirty-word problem. There are none, and I'll spell it out logically to you.

Here is a toilet. Specifically-that's all we're concerned with, specifics-if I can tell you a dirty toilet joke, we must have a dirty toilet. That's what we're all talking about, a toilet. If we take this toilet and boil it and it's clean, I can never tell you specifically a dirty toilet joke about this toilet. I can tell you a dirty toilet joke in the Milner Hotel, or something like that, but this toilet is a clean toilet now. Obscenity is a human manifestation. This toilet has no central nervous system, no level of consciousness. It is not aware; it is a dumb toilet; it cannot be obscene; it's impossible. If it could be obscene, it could be cranky, it could be a Communist toilet, a traitorous toilet. It can do none of these things. This is a dirty toilet here.

Nobody can offend you by telling a dirty toilet story. They can offend you because it's trite; you've heard it many, many times.

https://www.dacapopress.com/titles/lenny-bruce/how-to-talk-dirty-and-influence-people/9780306825309/

Second: the fact that a neologism is sometimes decoupled from its theoretical underpinnings and is used colloquially is a feature, not a bug. Many people apply the term "enshittification" very loosely indeed, to mean "something that is bad," without bothering to learn – or apply – the theoretical framework. This is good. This is what it means for a term to enter the lexicon: it takes on a life of its own. If 10,000,000 people use "enshittification" loosely and inspire 10% of their number to look up the longer, more theoretical work I've done on it, that is one million normies who have been sucked into a discourse that used to live exclusively in the world of the most wonkish and obscure practitioners. The only way to maintain a precise, theoretically grounded use of a term is to confine its usage to a small group of largely irrelevant insiders. Policing the use of "enshittification" is worse than a self-limiting move – it would be a self-inflicted wound. As I said in that Berlin speech:

Enshittification names the problem and proposes a solution. It's not just a way to say 'things are getting worse' (though of course, it's fine with me if you want to use it that way. It's an English word. We don't have der Rat für englische Rechtschreibung. English is a free for all. Go nuts, meine Kerle).

Finally: "coinage" is both more – and less – than thinking of the word. After the American Dialect Society gave honors to "enshittification," a few people slid into my mentions with citations to "enshittification" that preceded my usage. I find this completely unsurprising, because English is such a slippery and playful tongue, because English speakers love to swear, and because infixing is such a fun way to swear (e.g. "unfuckingbelievable"). But of course, I hadn't encountered any of those other usages before I came up with the word independently, nor had any of those other usages spread appreciably beyond the speaker (it appears that each of the handful of predecessors to my usage represents an act of independent coinage).

If "coinage" was just a matter of thinking up the word, you could write a small python script that infixed the word "shit" into every syllable of every word in the OED, publish the resulting text file, and declare priority over all subsequent inventive swearers.

On the one hand, coinage takes place when the coiner a) independently invents a word; and b) creates the context for that word that causes it to escape from the coiner's immediate milieu and into the wider world.

But on the other hand – and far more importantly – the fact that a successful coinage requires popular uptake by people unknown to the coiner means that the coiner only ever plays a small role in the coinage. Yes, there would be no popularization without the coinage – but there would also be no coinage without the popularization. Words belong to groups of speakers, not individuals. Language is a cultural phenomenon, not an individual one.

Which is rather the point, isn't it? After a quarter of a century of being part of a community that fought tirelessly to get a serious and widespread consideration of tech policy underway, we're closer than ever, thanks, in part, to "enshittification." If someone else independently used that word before me, if some people use the word loosely, if the word makes some people uncomfortable, that's fine, provided that the word is doing what I want it to do, what I've devoted my life to doing.

The point of coining words isn't the pilkunnussija's obsession with precise usage, nor the petty glory of being known as a coiner, nor ensuring that NATO generals' virgin ears are protected from the word "shit" – a word that, incidentally, is also the root of "science":

https://www.arrantpedantry.com/2019/01/24/science-and-shit/

Isn't language fun?

Tor Books as just published two new, free LITTLE BROTHER stories: VIGILANT, about creepy surveillance in distance education; and SPILL, about oil pipelines and indigenous landback.

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/2024/10/14/pearl-clutching/#this-toilet-has-no-central-nervous-system

[terramythos]

TerraMythos' 2020 Reading Challenge - Books 15-18 of 26

Titles: The Murderbot Diaries -- All Systems Red (#1), Artificial Condition (#2), Rogue Protocol (#3), and Exit Strategy (#4) (2017-2018)

Author: Martha Wells 

Genre/Tags: Science Fiction, Cyberpunk (ish), Novella, Agender/Nonbinary Protagonist, Asexual Protagonist, First Person 

Rating: 9/10 (note: this is an average-- see under the cut for individual ratings) 

Date Began: 6/15/2020

Date Finished: 6/23/2020 

Murderbot is a SecUnit -- a humanoid security construct created to protect contracted clients in a corporate, spacefaring future. Following mysterious/murderous events in its past, Murderbot hacked the governor module controlling its actions. Now it prefers to watch media serials and half-ass the whole “protecting human clients” thing. 

This changes when it discovers someone is sabotaging its clients’ planetary mission, putting the team in grave danger. Even worse, these new clients start to treat it like a person, much to Murderbot’s discomfort. In the resulting fallout, Murderbot finds itself answering questions it’s avoided thus far -- who it is, and what it really wants. 

I’m doing something a little different and combining these four novellas into one review; they are too short and interconnected to review individually in my regular format. Under the cut, I’ll start with my overall impressions of the series, then a look at/rating of each individual story. 

Who knew being a heartless killing machine would present so many moral dilemmas. 

(Yes, that was sarcasm.) 

Overall Thoughts 

I really enjoyed this series! The strong point is without a doubt Wells’ excellent characterization of a distinctly non-human viewpoint character. Murderbot is a very interesting protagonist, and its constant snark and parenthetical asides are a joy to read. Much to its dismay, there’s also a lot of emotional punch entwined in Murderbot’s character arc and interactions. Murderbot may not be a human, but it’s definitely a person. 

It seems obvious to me that Murderbot is intended to be autism spectrum/ADHD coded. I’ve never encountered an unambiguously heroic protagonist that displays similar behaviors to my own, and it’s affirming to read. Difficulty with processing emotion? Hyperfixating on media to comfort itself? Issues with direct eye contact and touch? Truly a bot after my own heart. Honestly, I dreaded the point in the story where these are presented as weaknesses for Murderbot to overcome... and was overjoyed that it never happens. In fact, characters accommodate these aspects of Murderbot’s behavior/personality and respect its boundaries. This totally surprised and impressed me. 

Finally, I do really appreciate Wells’ approach to nonbinary characters. While it’s nice that we’re getting more representation, it can be very grating/telling if all nonbinary characters in popular media are nonhuman. Wells asks “why not both” and introduces a nonbinary human that uses neopronouns in Artificial Condition! I don’t use neopronouns myself, but I know plenty of people who do, and this is the first “mainstream” thing I’ve ever seen use them. 

I found this first arc in The Murderbot Diaries relatable, entertaining, approachable, and easy to read. I’m super excited to see where the series goes from here. 

All Systems Red (#1) -- 8/10 

It’s wrong to think of a construct as half bot, half human. It makes it sound like the halves are discrete, like the bot half should want to obey orders and do its job and the human half should want to protect itself and get the hell out of here. As opposed to the reality, which was that I was one whole confused entity, with no idea what I wanted to do. What I should do. What I needed to do. 

This is a good introduction to the premise. Murderbot's interactions with the human characters are a highlight throughout the series, but I think it’s especially true in this part. Wells does an excellent job, as many others have said, making a distinctly nonhuman perspective character sympathetic, interesting, and relatable. I like that the human characters treat Murderbot like a person/member of the team by default and generally respect its personal limits-- AND we didn't get some trite cliche about it-- AND that this throws Murderbot into an emotional crisis because it hasn't experienced this before.

If I have criticism here, it’s that the plot feels incidental; more a vehicle for certain character interactions than an involving story in and of itself. While the conflict and central antagonist do return in Exit Strategy, in this one they don’t feel especially relevant. The narrative thrust is more about Murderbot's personal development and denial/coming to terms with its attachment to the human characters, especially Dr. Mensah.

To be fair, it is weird to give this a numeric score because it feels like rating the first fourth of a full novel. So take this with a grain of salt. 

Artificial Condition (#2) -- 9/10

But there weren’t any depictions of SecUnits in books, either. I guess you can’t tell a story from the point of view of something that you don’t think has a point of view.  

Artificial Condition introduces another nonhuman character who is distinctly different from Murderbot, yet still fun and compelling: ART the research ship! Who’s moonlighting as a cargo transport. It's the ship on the cover, which I didn’t know going in, and this blew my mind for some reason. Anyway, the friendship between ART and Murderbot was really fun and genuine. I know ART shows up later, so I’m very excited for that; it adds a lot to the narrative. While I didn’t find the human cast as interesting as in All Systems Red, I do appreciate that there’s an actual nonbinary human character. 

The plot of Artificial Condition is still pretty secondary, but it does connect to Murderbot’s past, so I found it more engaging. In general, Murderbot gets a lot of interesting character development, and over time gains a lot of nuance. I think this is great, considering how complex and well-written it is from the start. There’s an excellent moment of delayed emotional payoff near the end when Murderbot helps a character after learning something earlier in the story. It’s hard to describe without spoilers, but I thought this was really cool. 

Rogue Protocol (#3) -- 9/10

Or Miki was a bot who had never been abused or lied to or treated with anything but indulgent kindness. It really thought its humans were its friends, because that’s how they treated it. 

I signaled Miki I would be withdrawing for one minute. I needed to have an emotion in private. 

Like Murderbot, I find myself missing ART, but we do get an alternate nonhuman character in Miki. Overall, Murderbot's character arc feels way more connected to the conflict and action in this story than the previous installments, which is nice. While this is presumably a throwaway cast based in the ending, I thought Miki and Don Abene's friendship was an interesting foil to what I assume is going to happen with Murderbot and Dr. Mensah.

While this trait has been present throughout, this installment makes it very clear that despite its protests, Murderbot genuinely does want to help and protect people of its own free will, even when doing so is not the quickest or most self-preserving choice. There are multiple points in this story (and the previous ones) where Murderbot could choose to save itself or abandon people in need. But it doesn’t; it just sighs and complains about having to protect stupid humans. I love Murderbot. 

Also, this is one of those works where the meaning of the title doesn't really hit until you finish it, and oof.

Exit Strategy (#4) -- 10/10

So the plan wasn’t a clusterfuck, it was just circling the clusterfuck target zone, getting ready to come in for a landing. 

This one just slaps from start to finish. We get the full post-development emotional payoff re: Murderbot’s complicated feelings about the humans from All Systems Red. The characterization, plot, humor, and action are all on-point and the best in the series.  

I don’t really have anything else to say except this is an awesome conclusion to the first arc, and definitely my favorite of the 4 stories. I’m excited to see where things go from here. 

[danzinora-switch]

IMDb Day

Hey guys, so I got off a 10 hour shift happily checking to see if we made a difference in the IMDb rating and was confounded to see that it was still at a 5.2.

So I did some digging.

And, well, we certainly showed up and did a head count! But upon some more digging, I think this U-shape is actually what’s hurting us. 5.2/10 is IMDB’s Weighted Average Rating. What is that? Well according to them:

“Various filters are applied to the raw data in order to eliminate and reduce attempts at vote stuffing by people more interested in changing the current rating of a movie”

They probably deal with this kind of stuff all the time. Fandoms are powerful, as we know.

So, even though they do not list what kind of filters/algorithms they use, I got to thinking: if I were an internet movie database trying to ward off this kind of behavior, what would I look for? And, conversely, what could we do differently because of it?

The following are just my sheer thoughts and speculations:

1. Don’t just pick 10 stars

As much as it may pain us, we need more 9′s, 8′s, and 7′s, heck, maybe even a handful of 6′s and 5′s thrown in. That U-shaped curve is probably giving the impression that “oh, either people love or hate this show, so for YOU, new user, it’s a 50/50 shot. 5.2″ IMDB says they’re looking for honesty, and while 10 stars may be honest, 1000 10 stars starts to look suspect. An air of general positivity will probably go further.

2. Timeline

Were I an algorithm or filter guarding against vote stuffing and spam, I’d probably look out for a sudden spike of ratings and reviews. This will need to be the opposite of what we do on Twitter: this is something that needs to simmer. Space out the ratings. A few here, a few there, 10′s through 7′s all mixed in, and those are much more likely to be counted as real, honest, thoughts instead of a coordinated strike.

Instead of a day, maybe a week of 9 star ratings? Last names A-M? Then next week, 8 star ratings? Last names N-Z? Or some other form of rotation?

3. New User Activity

I made an IMDB account only a month or two ago, and yes, it was to give Rise 10 stars. But that’s all I’ve done with it. How many of us have also just created accounts to review this show? A filter might think we’re bots at best. If you have an account, be active. Rate and review other shows and movies. Prove you are not a robot, nor a lip-service protester who just made an account to contribute to changing one rating and then moved on with life. I’m not 100% sure if algorithms will treat some ratings/reviews as more ‘real’ than others, but this certainly couldn’t hurt.

4. Going Forward

I’m sure other review sites have similar guards. If we try something similar with Rotten Tomatoes, for example, we’ll probably have to be just as careful.

I’m not sure what changing current ratings will do in regards to affecting that weighted average, and I wouldn’t put it past a smart enough algorithm to note the changes and suspect that we’re on to its tricks with more tricks, thus discounting the ratings even more (wow, this feels Machiavellian). Or we could simply create new accounts (again, following the considerations above).

Idk if any of this is on point or not, but it makes sense to me and might explain why that pesky 5.2 still remains.

[mobius-prime]

159. Sonic Super Special #15

Welcome to the final Sonic Super Special ever! Here's my opinion on it. Past Super Specials have ranged from okay to amazing, depending on the writer and the subject matter, and their long length has usually, if you ask me, worked in their favor, as it meant more time and space to tell a compelling story. This is not true of this one. Unfortunately, the last super special of the comic is utterly awful, with two stories that do absolutely nothing to grip my attention, one of which ends in a status quo with a net gain of absolutely nothing, and the other of which is cringeworthy and isn't even very clear on when, where or how it takes place. Let's just get this over with, shall we?

Naugus Games

Writer: Ken Penders Pencils: Many Hands Colors: Josh and Aimeee Ray

This first story is far, far longer than it has any right to be - it really feels like they were trying to find ways to pad it out it to take up the full 48 pages of the special. Furthermore, you might notice some oddities about the credits above. First of all, Aimee's name is misspelled with three E's for both stories for some reason, indicating some lazy copy-and-pasting as well as a lack of care from the editors. Even more frustratingly, no one is actually credited directly for the pencils (or inks), with the art instead just being credited to "many hands." Remember how I said the comic was getting annoyingly bad about properly crediting people? Now, in case you're confused, there's not just some artist out there literally named Many Hands; instead, that's the comic's way of sidestepping actually bothering to credit any individuals for their work. It just means "eh, a lot of people worked on this I guess, but we don't care enough to actually tell you who." Unfortunately, unlike a few issues ago where the art style was immediately recognizable as Steven Butler's, the art style for this story is foreign to me, suggesting they got some people who weren't their usual artists to work on this one, so I can't even take an educated guess here. All I know is that both the art style in general and the quality of the inks are very poor, and as we'll see, the art gets unforgivably lazy at times. Perhaps best of all, this story was later retconned into a much more interesting and concise version of itself at a later date, with better storytelling and artwork to boot. The only reason, then, that I'm covering it at all, is honestly as a demonstration of just how lazy the comic could get at times, as well as due to the fact that this is the first appearance of "Many Hands," who later pencilled one other issue for the comic that was of equally poor quality.

So this story takes place at an unspecified time in the recent past. It seems to be sometime after Eggman's return, judging by some of the lines of dialogue within the story, but the actual timeframe is pretty vague. Sonic has returned to the Southern Tundra to pay his respects to Eddy, recalling how Eddy sacrificed himself when he, Tails, and Nate all fought Naugus here some time ago. He's brought a single rose to lay on the site of the wreckage, but the ground isn't quite stable…

And here we have the first instance of a truly terrible art decision. Sonic falls into a pitch black cave system, but instead of representing this with maybe one page max of blackness or darker lighting, we're treated to nearly four pages straight of nothing but this:

He blindly stumbles around for a while, informing us of this fact through dialogue bubbles because everyone knows that telling is better than showing in fiction, right? He finally hits a wall and sees a glow through a crack in it, so he tunnels his way into the next room only to find it full of glowing rings - apparently, either he, Tails and Naugus somehow didn't use up all the rings when they fought, or these one have just auto-generated themselves somehow down here. Sonic recalls memories of the previous battle when Nate sealed Naugus away with a wish from a ring, and then decides to try to use one to get out of the cave system.

Wonderful! Apparently, a "wish" as defined by the magic of the rings just means that you think of someone's name while touching a ring, and so with a flash, Naugus is back from his imprisonment in the zone that Nate sealed him into! But how is this possible?

That explanation makes… basically no sense, dude. Naugus was definitely sealed away in another zone, he didn't just get turned into a pile of telepathic rings. But whatever. He and Sonic start battling it out, and somehow make it outside, where Naugus conjures up a snowstorm that consistently stays centered on Sonic no matter where he runs. Time for the second awful art choice of the issue - now instead of four pages of pure blackness, we get six whole pages of this:

I think the best thing about this is that the blizzard backgrounds are clearly not even hand drawn like the rest of the comic is - there's only two types of snowflakes up there, and they're consistently just copied and pasted in that same repetitive swirl pattern on every single page. I get that drawing for a big story in a super special like this can be long and tedious work, but this is why you don't try to find a way to artificially elongate a story like this which could easily be told in the span of a normal issue length. It just ends up making the audience feel like their time is being wasted. Anyway, the blizzard finally ends when Sonic pulls out a ring from his jacket and wishes for Naugus to be sealed away in his previous zone once more, and thus, Naugus is out of our hair again, with absolutely nothing to show for it. Man, if it's this easy to defeat people in this universe, why hasn't anyone tried this on Eggman yet?

Sonic then leaves back for home, thinking one last time of Eddy, who is shown looking down on him from the heavens above. And thank god that story is over.

Sonic Spin City

Writer/Pencils: Michael Gallagher Colors: Josh and Aimeee Ray

Michael Gallagher, over the course of the comics, has gone from one of the series' main writers to basically a guest writer who's brought on every once in a while for special occasions. In this case, he even makes his return as a penciller! Unfortunately, his goofy writing style has begun to clash with the much more serious plots of these later issues, and this story is no exception. It's entirely unclear about whether we're supposed to take this story as actual canon, as a story from an alternate zone, or as just a silly joke story that doesn’t mean anything - and while I tend to try to avoid looking at non-canon materials in this review series (I've already skipped a few stories and issues for exactly this reason), the ambiguity of this one forces me to cover it. In addition, I don't even know why Josh and "Aimeee" were credited as colorists for this story, considering the entire thing is black and white with no color to be found.

Much like the first story of StH#52, this story has the flair of an old detective serial. Sonic is wandering the streets on a rainy night when two swatbots ambush him. Of course, two swatbots are no match.

What does a swatbot need matches for? Eh, whatever. Sonic races over to Rusty's, a hangout for abandoned badniks, and orders himself a "chili dog float," which in addition to sounding absolutely disgusting doesn't even seem like something a bar for robots would serve in the first place. As he takes his seat, the lights go out, and… this abomination emerges onto the stage.

Yes. The badniks are going wild for a swatbot with tits dancing seductively on a stage for them. What is she gonna do, plug them into a wall outlet? They even start screaming out for "the stretch," and appear to get even hornier as she massively elongates her legs for them. I mean, just, what? I swear, Michael, if we get one more weird borderline-sex thing like this from you in this comic, my eyes are gonna pop out of my head like Natsuki. A bot grabs the dancer's ankle, and she's thrown off balance and crashes down, with the head popping off to reveal that underneath, it's Bunnie in disguise.

You know, after her claim all those issues back that she's a "sax cymbal," I'm not even gonna contest the idea that she'd do a sexy dance during infiltration for a mission. Hell, I get the impression she'd do one anyway just for fun back in Knothole if she got the chance. You might also notice her arm is the arm from her old design, and that coupled with Sonic's own design seems to indicate that if this took place at all in actual canon, it was before Eggman's return, though I'm immensely skeptical that this is supposed to be canon at all. Sonic and Bunnie take out the rest of Rusty's customer base, and then evacuate before the last swatbot activates its self-destruct chip, blowing the place sky high. Congratulations, nothing important was accomplished in this issue and nobody cares!

It's kinda sad that the final Sonic Super Special turned out to be so low-quality, honestly. However, this marks a bit of a turning point in the comic. For the first time in its entire run, from now on, there are no more special issues, no sister series, no miniseries, nothing. From the next issue, all the way to almost the 200th, with one exception in the form of a Free Comic Book Day issue, there are absolutely no interruptions from issue to issue. While this may not seem too notable at first, since we've just been reading everything in mostly-chronological order anyway, keep in mind that as far as the comic is concerned we're still in the year 2000, with a mere seven years having passed from the beginning of the comic all the way to now over the course of 159 issues. Over the course of the next 106 issues, we're going to blaze through nine years of comic history, meaning that the story is going to flow a lot faster, with more plot points being covered in a shorter amount of time. While this does make the order of issues a lot easier to follow, since there's no questions about which issue fits in where or anything, I am sad to see all the special issues go, as I quite enjoyed how they served to break up the flow of the comic as a whole with special stories and side content. Though we're still in the middle of our current plot era, we're entering into a new era of the comic as a whole, where we've got a straight shot through the next hundred issues. So I say - let's do it to it!

[scriptlgbt]

This ask is about porn. What kind of porn do LGBT like, especially since a lot of mainstream porn tend to be fetishing gays, lesbians, and transgender, and so on...Also,what would you say are the most offensive or homophobic or even transphobic porn out there?

NSFW topic 

(This will be assumed to be a writing question but please, in future, use wording that clearly indicates that. There was some talk between the mods as to whether or not this ask was okay to answer. We don’t answer questions unrelated to writing as a rule, but it was brought up that this question probably should be answered - and we do get a lot of asks like this which dance around the topic without asking it anyway.) (Just word it to do with writing in the future is all I’m getting at.)

Pretty much everyone out there likes something slightly different, and there are some LGBT+ folks who do lean on mainstream porn for whatever reason. Whether they find a specific actor attractive, like the angles, sounds, whatever. Generally, there are also subtle differences in what porn is popular with who based on who the target audience is. What kinds of sex acts are spent more time on, whose pleasure is focused on and what aspects of that pleasure? How things are communicated and what kinds of settings things take place in? What kinds of titles are used and who they are meant to appeal to?

As a general thing, most folks with super long nails don’t fingerblast people on the regular without some kind of barrier to ensure nobody gets cut. I mean, that’s some delicate skin.

With non-mainsteam porn, I’d say a lot of people also aren’t necessarily in the know about the other options out there, or the accessibility of them. Or they might not be able to safely interact with some kinds of porn in comparison to others due to discriminatory laws (or whatever) where they live. Maybe they are closeted and just want some extra security.

And on top of that, I think far too many people think there’s something bad about paying sex workers for their labour. I’d say what’s offensive is not paying sex workers for their labour, or otherwise using venues where sex workers get to release their content on their own terms. 

I’ll elaborate.

Some sex workers do release teaser clips and various free stuff in advertisement of their regular paid work. (People who are verified on PornHub are people releasing their own content and there is the paperwork to back that up.) Some people use live camming sites like Chaturbate and MyFreeCams so on. There are trans categories on these sites and workers might use derogatory terms to market their work, but that is different from when other people use those terms to refer to people in these groups. 

There are also studios that someone might be signed to depending on where they are based (like if the worker is based in the same city as a specific studio). Four Chambers is one, Crash Pad Studios is another (and if you review their content you can get free content) is another. They might release their content differently based on contracts and when people are paid and whether it’s been agreed upon that the content can be free at some point. 

Copyright is a very big deal with porn, because when someone breaks copyright or watches porn where the worker isn’t paid... it becomes non-consensual. The payment transaction is what consent is reliant on (at minimum) in the sex work industry. It is work, and people not treating it like real work is a human rights issue. 

In virtually all cases that I’ve heard of, people who do cam work online through cam sites need to be able to take photographs with current government-issued photo ID to prove they are of age. There is another element where they have to prove their usernames. An example of this would be writing it down on a paper, taking a picture of that, crumpling the paper and showing the words on the crumpled paper. (Making these selfies is frequently a thing.) Rules and requirements on that vary. Names listed on the sites are almost always pseudonyms.

There are a number of sites out there that automatically record live cammers and then make fake profiles on their websites, and demand that people pay subscription fees to watch the content. This is exploitation.

You can file a DMCA complaint if the site runs through the USA (which most do). That said, these sites (the kinds with the bots who automatically record) are really horrifically difficult at getting to take down content. Some make it out like you are required to give a phone number, legal name, address in order to have your content taken down. That is not true. But the forms on their sites claim this, and sometimes don’t give you an email or anywhere else to make your complaints. I don’t even think DMCA complaints work like they say they do. Sites which steal the works of trans cammers are infamous for this, and usually, are huge perpetrators as labelling trans cammers with slurs as well. 

A significant amount of sex workers have a presence on Twitter and Switter (which is a different site). I think a number have moved to Mastodon and other sites from Tumblr when that hell broke loose.

In general, I would be mindful of these things with porn in general.

As for the specific kinds of sex acts, kinks, etc, (which influence porn tastes) there’s a lot to cover. 

There are literally entire subcultures dedicated to different kinks, and are predominantly filled with LGBT+ folks who were rebelling against the sterilization of our identities during the AIDS crisis. (See: leather pride.) I would also say in general LGBT+ people are way more educated on sex-related topics (including kink) compared to our cis straight counterparts. The notions of what sex is for cis straight folks have been permeated throughout our society as a default, whereas we have had to actively look for our knowledge. It doesn’t mean everyone who is LGBT+ is kinkier - it just means that our knowledge of LGBT+ sex, of any kind, has been something we haven’t been able to find out about in conventional resources. And unconventional resources have more information about other things related to sex that people don’t really talk about in mainstream cisheterosexist sex ed. 

Resources to learn about sex with trans people (specifically but also general resources which are inclusive), in general, I’d recommend:

Fucking Trans Women by Mira Bellwether (HUGE zine)

Girl Sex 101 (I’d say this is between a textbook and a magazine?)

Trans Bodies, Trans Selves (pretty much a textbook - not sex-focused per se but it is an incredible resource for talk about trans bodies, medical stuff, and it’s all trans written as far as I’m aware)

@sapphic-sex-ed (Tumblr blog)

I’ve also heard people recommending Stevie Boebi for lesbian sex ed videos (YouTube) but I honestly haven’t seen her videos (other than in collabs) so I cannot verify to the trans inclusiveness factor

There also used to be a blog called pervocracy which was run by a nurse, who ALSO ran a blog called “can I fuck the thing” - unfortunately Tumblr has since deleted these. (The person who ran these has other work elsewhere but I really don’t know what the main resources are anymore since then. I also feel uncomf wholly endorsing them due to some stuff they said while I followed them back in the day. Obviously I can’t source that to check what it was and tell you, and it’s also been some time. Google them if you want to, and go at their content with an open and critical mind.)

If followers want to add recommendations in the replies feel free to add!

(But please for the love of consent and respect for marginalized peoples, do Not recommend Laci Green or Erica Moen. Google can tell you more about their literal exploits if you need.)

See also 

Chelsea Poe: “I’m a porn star asking the industry to stop using the term ‘sh*m*le’” (The Daily Dot)

[corpus-chorus]

A dev’s insight to tumblr’s updates

Alright guys. I’m sorry to make this long-ass discourse post when I’d really much rather just be doing my art reblogs and basking in my warm community, but I feel this needs to happen, because a lot of you may not be aware of what goes into updates like this.

To be clear - I’m not making any comment about the color change itself. It doesn’t actually bother me, seems kind of silly to flip a lid about when there’s plenty of extensions to fix it if you don’t like it, but I get the annoyance of having something familiar change into something that makes you uncomfortable, especially with no warning.

But then I started to see a bunch of rants on how shitty this update is when there were so many bugs that needed to be fixed instead, and I just need to take a moment to address app development in general, because y’all seem fairly misinformed about the whole thing.

So let’s get one thing straight - bug fixing is not easy.

Yeah, that sounds like a copout, doesn’t it?

But let’s talk about how bug fixing works, alright? Because there’s a couple of things we gotta look at when considering changes like this.

How much code is needed to fix the bug? Yeah, this one’s pretty straight forward, right? How many lines of code do the devs have to write to fix whatever’s broken? Except you’re forgetting the time it takes to find the bug in the first place. And this isn’t about popping into one file and looking through the lines until you see what’s broken. Bugs aren’t just typos. Bugs are NOT easy to find. Generally, if I’m working on a bug, and it takes me 4 days to fix, 3 of those days were probably spent just defining exactly where the bug came from and the places it exists. And that’s with me being super familiar with the codebase. If I didn’t already know that the core value displayed on the groupings page was coming from the hciReplacements inspector (out of 30-some inspectors), which is pulling data from the hagi, which is pulling and calculating data from the clip model, of which I know the exact layout, it probably would have taken me double or triple that time. And now, on top of that, what if the bug is an extreme edge case no one thought about when they built the core code? I might have to rewrite the entire functionality of the thing that pulls all that data, and holy hot hell is that gonna take some time.

How much QA effort is required? Contrary to popular belief, no, developers don’t just make bug fixes and immediately push them out to the app. It’s gotta be tested, usually by some sort of QA/QC team. And, fun fact, QA can take longer than the development did. Because the QA team is looking for EVERY POSSIBLE USE CASE of the exact thing you’re working on. Every single possible way a user might interact with that. That takes a skilled worker to think of all of those possible use cases (and spoiler alert, they’re human, so they still fuck up sometimes), and it takes them time to find them all.

But ON TOP of that, you also have a LOT of unexpected consequences to code changes. Maybe you just needed to update to cores count so that it’s the total cores on a node instead of total cores per processor, but you didn’t realize that another part of the code was assuming that value was cores per processor, and congrats, you’ve screwed the values all through the rest of the app.

And that’s just a data example. You can make critical errors if, say, you rename a value, and miss one of the places that value’s used, so now that value doesn’t exist in that specific scenario, and congratulations, you’ve actually caused your app to crash if the user follows a specific series of actions, and oops, looks like that set of actions wasn’t one QA thought of, so now users get to find it instead. You were just trying to fix a little data bug, and you’ve now broken the entire app. Good job.

How old is the codebase? Why is this important, you ask? Well, if you’re not in the industry, you may have never been introduced to the idea of “legacy code”. Legacy code is, to over-simplify, old code. It’s code that’s been around for a while. It’s code that dozens of people have had their hands in and is therefor a bit of a mess, no matter how hard you try to keep it clean, or how well organized your team is. Because maybe Eric built that one file really well to start with, and Suzy made some great additions to it, and Tom just made a few bug fixes, but he names variables a little differently, so Jason didn’t realize that the function he needed already existed when he went to build it a few months down the line, so now there’s two versions of the same thing, one used in one place, one used in another, and when Meredith goes to fix a bug related to it, she doesn’t realize she has to fix it both places, and wow, that is a bit of a mess, isn’t it?

The codebase I’m working in currently is about a year and a half old now, maybe a little more. When our first version was released, our codebase was 51,714 lines of code long. As of today, it is 357,932 lines long. With new features on the horizon, it will continue to grow, and the web of dependencies tangled through the codebase will get bigger and more complex. This is just a fact.

So keep in mind that that’s an app that’s about 1.5 years old. Tumblr was launched in, what, 2007 or something? That’s 11 years. 11 fucking years of coding, of dozens, if not hundreds, of people contributing to the codebase, in their own coding style, with their own knowledge levels. This is like if a team of 100 writers was working on a fic series for 11 years, and they didn’t all get to work together, and not everyone took notes. You’re gonna have plot holes. You’re gonna have inconsistencies. Shit’s gonna be messy.

And then there’s the pinnacle question. 

How much do the devs care? How much you wanna bet a lot of the devs on this site started out with a genuine passion for it? How many do you think worked long past the hours they were getting paid for just to make sure they were making something they could be proud of? How excited do you think it used to make them to release new features, and get to see it make people’s lives better?

When you care about a project, you think beyond the exact task you were given. You think about the impact every line of code you write is going to have. on the users. Because you want the users to enjoy the app. You want them to be happy with it. You want all the work you put into it to mean something.

When you care, you make less bugs. When you care, you don’t get lazy and just make temporary fixes. When you care, you put your heart and soul into your work.

How much heart and soul do you think the Tumblr devs want to put into this site at this point? When every single update, every single effort they put in, is met with criticism and hatred? When they’re told that nothing they do is ever good enough? How much do you think the devs care about getting everything perfect and on time and working themselves to tears on this site when they know damn well that the second they release an update, it’s going to be met with nothing but hatred and ignorant people treating them as if their hundred of hours of effort were stupid?

If I was a dev for this site, I’d hate my fucking job.

So let’s review. When you ask for bug fixes, I promise, there is someone on that team very concerned about addressing that bug fix. When you complain that tags are borked, or searching is shit, or whatever you get frustrated with that day, I promise, some dev is already working their tits off trying to find exactly what it’s going to take to fix that for you.

But understand that, that ask? That ask that might seem super simple and straight-forward to you from your comfortable couch? But it might take a team of devs working ungodly hours for months to be able to do. It might carry risks as high as accidentally deleting posts or banning blogs or breaking the entire bloody site. So they wanna spend some time and get that shit right so that you’re not stuck with something even worse than the bug they were fixing.

The people working on these bug fixes are human beings. We seem to remember that about everyone else in the goddamn world, but not the people who work tirelessly to give us the very site that we’re having these conversations on right now.

This update? Yeah, it might seem trivial to you. It might seem like they’re “wasting their time” with “stupid bullshit” when they could be fixing bugs.

But let me make it very clear. They’re trying to fix the bugs. They’re trying to stop the porn bots (and oh, fucking boy, I could make an entire post just about how insanely difficult that is, because some of you people seem to think the devs are fucking GODS or something). And maybe this update is stupid to you, but I can tell you right now, having this update right here is not the reason these things are not going to be fixed tomorrow. This is the frontend team making an aesthetic change - I promise it didn’t stop the backend team from their tireless work to fix the tags.

so tl;dr Fixing Tumblr’s bugs is not some simple, do-it-in-a-month, just-get-more-devs fix. And tearing into this release is doing nothing but reminding the probably very tired dev team that their work means absolutely dick to a large portion of ungrateful fucks on this site.

Complain about bugs. Tell Tumblr about their bugs. Make sure they know. And then sit the fuck down and wait - they’re fucking trying.

[writingonjorvik]

Impromptu Can We Discuss: Can We Discuss The Chat Features?

In all honesty, I can’t say I care a whole lot about this issue. I tend to agree with the complaints, that this is a generally bad idea on a large scope, that it makes an arguably elitist game even more elitist, and it’s only going to severely highlight the issues inside the community, or push problematic players to find a different way to continue causing problems. So, what’s the point?

First, I want to spend a good portion of time promoting actual solutions to this issues. I think a lot of people can be angry, but I see very few people suggesting solutions to do this better. Because the issue is real, so if we find the devs’ approach wrong, what would work instead? So here’s a dozen and a half of those in no particular order. 

1. Implement a better reporting system to allow problems be more accurately and quickly report.

2. Have a real moderator team across all servers with a concrete and clear set of rules.

3. Implement a preset chat system, so people can still communicate, but to prevent harassment due to limited dialogue options.

4. Add a Captcha to your account registration to prevent botting or easy account creation.

5. Have harsher punishments for offenses, with third and fourth offenses having a player’s account deleted.

6. Ban IP addresses that are continuing to spam accounts. It doesn’t stop people, but it slows them down.

7. Make a series of videos clarifying correct online behavior so bad behavior is easier to identify and report.

8. Allow for multiple characters per account to track more people who may be making second accounts to get away with bad behavior, but also to prevent boredom and pushing people to this kind of attitude in the first place.

9. Promote creators who promote healthy online behavior, and are being reported to be promoting healthy behavior by the community, to start breaking down the popularity contests inside SSO.

10. Rework the FAQs and the tutorials to actually be clear on the expectations for the players, particularly since the FAQs haven’t been updated since Golden was still level 12, and the help function in game is massively outdated.

11. Implement an official forum/wiki to allow players to resource more easily to find communities and answers to questions.

12. If someone misreports for the first time, inform them why the report wasn’t really breaking a rule to help educate the player base.

13. Create a clearer understanding out of the game besides the Terms & Conditions about what the rules are, somewhere in written form.

14. Ask for more information for all accounts, locking out chat for everyone until everyone files more information.

15. Implement a “Looking For Group/Club” function inside the game to help players working on similar things (racing, questing, exploring, etc.) find each other, which doesn’t require chat interaction, to promote a more helpful community.

16. Don’t incentivize reporting with Star Coins, incentivize it with the idea of improving the community.

17. Have a separate “prison” server for repeat offenders and cheaters where chat is removed instead of punishing the whole community for the behavior of the few.

18. Have a separate server dedicated to beta testers for the game to separate people breaking the rules to find problems in the chat filters or in the world intentionally, and people breaking the rules for the sake of breaking the rules.

But here’s the real problem. Reviewing the company’s comments, they seem to insist that Non-Star Riders are the real source of this issue, prompting this implementations. Based on the PR team’s insistence, I’d like to believe they’re telling the truth, but the fact of the matter is that the devs have lost most of their credibility. And that is likely the heart of the problem. When things like this happen, the community struggles to believe the devs have the players in their best interests because there’s no history of credibility. Instead, there’s a history of the devs actively removing criticism, promoting numbers we’ve never seen evidence of, and struggling to keep promises. And that’s not the environment to promote trust.

If SSO really has an issue with Non-Star Riders, show us the numbers. Have a real conversation with players about the problems. Stop taking soft-ball interviews to pad your reputation. Restore our faith that you’re being sincere and not half assing facts because you know most of your audience won’t recognize the truth of the industry so you can excuse bad business practices. You’d probably be surprised how many people are willing and able to have that conversation. Because if we keep getting treated like dumb kids, guess what the majority behavior will be in the game? Start treating us like adults with smart and capable thought processes, and the standard will increase. Respect is a two-way street.

Whenever the devs are ready for that conversation, I’m ready to push the conversation forward. Hell, I’d write the interview myself if that’s what it took. But if the devs want us to trust them again, then they need to put in the effort to make themselves trustworthy again. I’m all ears. Here’s the community trying to help. Just waiting on the devs to acknowledge our attempts.

[emilywhite1999]

My (respectful) Love Island Contestant Review 💖

So after slagging off Love Island to my family when it came on this year I am now fully into the show and can’t bear to miss a single episode. It took one episode and I was hooked. I’d never watched it before and so didn’t think it was worth my time but there is something about the show that just makes me want to keep watching. It gets to a point where you feel like you know the contestants on a personal level and can tell you as much about them as their best mate probably could. Here is how I currently view each contestant and my opinions based on what I’ve seen of them on the show. 

Megan and Wes

At first I thought Wes was a bit of a bad guy after he got rid of Laura to be with Megan. Now I see though that Wes and Megan make a much better couple and they are much better suited for one another. I do think though that he could have gone about ending things with Laura in a much better way and Megan could have been a bit nicer in the situation as well. Since being with Wes I’ve noticed Megan is much more relaxed and you see her wearing more jumpers in bed rather than sexy lingerie. I prefer seeing this more natural side to Megan and also her vulnerability as well. You can see you is insecure about her past and wants to make a good impression when she meets his family. It just goes to show how much she really does like him. They are always getting ‘caught in the act’ which does make me question if their relationship is just a physical one. From everything I’ve seen from them then I believe there is more to their relationship than just that. I’m not a big fan of them both but I’m glad they are doing well. 

Alex and Alexandra 

I had high hopes at first for these two but once new Laura came into the villa you could clearly see Alex had his head turned and was no longer interested in Alexandra. He did the right thing though and told her that he wanted to get to know the new girl. Once he realised though that Laura was more interested in Jack he started paying Alexandra more attention again. I understand that Alexandra probably felt a bit like the second option in this situation but she didn’t help her case after quickly falling back into old ways with Alex once they had recoupled. Things continued between the two of them but at a slow pace as Alex didn’t want to feel any pressure. The other night he told Alexandra that he didn’t feel things were working out and he was right in doing so as on their last date she seemed very eager for Alex to meet her parents but you could see Alex felt very overwhelmed by the whole prospect. The past few days he has received a lot of negative attention because he dumped Alexandra but at the end of the day I don’t see anything wrong with what he did. I believe he generally wanted to give things another go with Alexandra and gave it enough chance to see if things would work and when they didn’t he was completely honest with her. Of course Alexandra was annoyed at him and upset but it’s not his fault they just weren’t on the same page. Alex never lied to her face or was actually mean to her.    

Paul and Laura 

Laura by far has to be my favourite contestant. She’s be broken hearted by Jack and Wes and lied to by Georgia and Megan who claim to be her mates. She is nothing but nice to everyone and listens to all their drama but others are rarely there for her. Laura gets a lock of backlash but she deserves to have been treated a lot better than what she has been in the villa. She has only ever reacted to her situations in the same way anyone else in her shoes would and always ends up having to be the bigger person. I think her and Paul are well suited and he fact they are more similar in age defiantly helps. I think they have a lot more in common than what Laura had in previous couples and his maturity that comes with age is defo what she needs after the young guys pied her off. I do think Paul could have a little more enthusiasm occasionally as he sometimes seems a bit bored but you can tell he liked Laura from the start and that they both care a lot about one another. I have high hopes for these two. Both seem nice and considerate and the kind of people I could see myself getting along with in person. 

Charlie and Ellie 

These two are my favourite couple from the villa. I know Jack and Dani are set to win it but the fact that Ellie is so mad and Charlie is so laid back just makes for a hilarious duo. Charlie keeps Ellie in check and seems to make her a better person in doing so. Since leaving the villa they seem to be doing very well  and have already moved in together. I find them so cute together and also have big respect for Ellie after she was the only one to stick up for Laura in the villa and confront the lying Georgia.  

Jack and Laura

I really liked Jack at first (and fancied him) but after what happened with old Laura I felt like I really saw his young side and that he still has a lot of learning to do in terms of relationships. When new Laura came in even I thought she was hot so no surprise the newly single Jack went for her. In my opinion they are 100% the best looking couple. I love Laura because she is the only female athlete to have been on the show so I have a lot of respect for her and I think she’s really cool. My only issue though is that when her and Jack went on their date I noticed that Laura didn’t actually ask Jack many questions about himself and talked about herself for pretty much the whole date. This grated on me a bit and made me question if her feelings for Jack were that real. After the lie detector challenge though I believed she was as she began crying lots to Jack about her feelings and how she normally runs away from them. Obviously she couldn’t do this on Love Island though. It made get the feeling that she normally runs aways surfing when things start to get serious so maybe the programme has done her a favour this time round. I don’t know if things will last outside the villa for these two as Laura seems a bit of a free spirit but only time will tell I guess. 

Josh and Kaz

I thought these two were always well suited for one another and although it was upsetting to see how loyal Georgia was to him while he was in the other villa he didn’t actually do anything that wrong. He couldn’t tell Georgia what was going on and so unfortunately she had to find out in the most savage way thanks to the show. I think Josh and Kaz are the only couple that can possibly rival Jack and Dani as they bot get on so well and seem to be very much in love. My only issue is that in the baby challenge Josh was the worst dad there by far. He wanted to be as far away as possible from the plastic baby at all times and even seemed a little scared of it. It was all hilariously summed up at the end when he accidentally pulled the baby’s arm off. I was wetting myself at that point. I also find it funny how Josh kinda looks like Alex the lion from Madagascar.

Jack and Dani 

Set to win this show because they simply are the best couple. Not perfect but have been together since the beginning and had a connection from day one. Jack adores Dani and cares so much about her. This can sometimes cause arguments between the two of them though as Jack cares a lot about what Dani thinks of him and gets defensive if she ever thinks badly of him. Also Dani has a lot of insecurity about being cheated on but at the end of the day I don’t think Jack would ever do that to her. She has really changed him for the better and they are already like an old married couple so I can’t see them finding anyone else outside the villa.   

[cryptocoinguides]

Verasity Keynote Speech at CoinTelegraph

Hi everyone. My name is Robert Keogh and I’m the financial director of Verasity, a successful blockchain project revolutionizing the online ad space. Today I’m going to talk about Verasitys mission, products, and accomplishments. First off I would like to thank the organizers of Hot Trends for inviting me and Verasity to speak here today. Verasitys management and development team, of 25 people, have been working together in the online ad space for over 7 years and we understand in-depth the ecosystem and problems that brands, ad networks, ad exchanges, and content publishers have currently.

As most of you know there is a significant problem with online advertising. Out of some 400 Billion dollars of online ads, as many as 40% or approximately 160 Billion dollars worths is seen by bots and not humans. That’s 160 billion dollars of wasted advertising spend by brands! There are over 2 million content publishers struggling with the problem that brands don’t want to pay much for their ad space because they just don’t believe that humans watch the ads.

Even Google and Facebook have to return substantial amounts of money to brands every quarter, because ad fraud companies that detect fraud, after the event, are used by brands to justify clawing back their ad spend. And of course, that adversely affects the content providers of YouTube and other platforms because they get much less money.

Brands pay 5 to 10 times more if they are convinced that the fraud levels are low. And this is where Verasity comes in. Verasity has – just two days ago – received the US patent to its Proof of View technology that detects and eliminates ad fraud and only records, on the blockchain, genuine human views of ads and content.

Verasity has just been granted a US patent for the technology that helps solve advertising’s 160 billion dollar problem.

In addition to the US grant, we’ve made an international patent application. Verasitys Proof of View is the ONLY Protocol Layer patented ad technology for the blockchain. Verasitys mission is to significantly increase advertising revenues for content publishers, on any video platform, through its rewarded player and ad stack utilizing its patented Proof of View.

The online ad ecosystem is extremely complex and involves many intermediaries, such as ad exchanges, brands, and ad networks, but the problem faced by the industry can be divided into two parts: The first is the detection of fraud and the second is accounting for valid ads. Verasity developed Proof of View to combat these two separate problems. On detection – the current standard is for analysis to happen after the content has been delivered and often towards the end of an advertising campaign. With Verasity, our technology detects ad fraud as it happens.

Utilizing 200 touchpoints and AI, Verasity can determine with very high confidence whether a bot or human is watching an ad or content, in real-time. There’s no more waiting for post-delivery fraud analysis or requesting refunds from publishers – ad fraud is detected and eliminated immediately. The Proof of View system also prevents the multiple methods bad actors may try to manipulate view counts and audience metrics.

Once the view has been verified as genuine we need to solve the second part of the problem which is accounting for valid ads. To provide accountability, and therefore transparency for views, a unique identifier is allocated to all parties involved. When viewers create an account, they are assigned an anonymous and hashed ID that then marks the content views generated by that user. We treat views like transactions that can be recorded on the blockchain. Verasitys technology uses advanced methods to ensure only views verified by Proof of View are counted.

Views that are verified are added to a publicly accessible database containing anonymized data. Verasity will provide open-source tools to provide transparency and accountability of the system. With these tools, viewers and third parties can review the data to ensure its accuracy and credibility. Although view data is anonymous, individual viewer’s unique ID is recorded on the blockchain as valid and accurate and cannot be manipulated. To ensure that the data stored within the publicly accessible Proof of View database is bona fide untampered data, all view data is sent to the Blockchain.

To test the system as a use case, Verasity built an Esports platform called esportsfightclub.com Esports Fight Club has scaled with the launch of large tournaments such as PUBG, Valorant, and Dota2 to test Verasity products in real-time with a reasonably large number of viewers. In the last large tournament, Esports Fight Club had roughly 8.5M viewers which is a great environment for us to test Verasity products as well as earn revenues from the platform itself.

Verasity treats Esports Fight Club as a separate business model so that it grows organically and provides stats that third-party content deo platforms can analyze to see for themselves how the platform significantly improves engagement and monetization. Verasity has built several product modules, beta tested on Esports Fight Club, that can be licensed to third-party video platforms so they themselves can increase engagement and monetization.

These product modules include a content rewarding system, a digital wallet, a proprietary video player, and Proof of View. The video rewarding system rewards Verasitys token VRA via an SDK integration into the publisher’s video player. The integration is available already for YouTube, Twitch, Vimeo, and 90% of all video players when they are used on a publisher’s domain.

The second product module is the digital wallet of Verasity which is called VeraWallet. The VeraWallet is a secure, custodial wallet to store rewarded tokens and is itself a payment system providing both crypto and non-crypto payment options. VeraWallet has over 100,000 users and offers VRA holders a 25% per year staking option.

The third product module is the proprietary video player which contains a unique ad stack built to optimize advertising revenue using our 17 ad partners. The player is now in Beta to be launched in the next few weeks. Proof of View is the fourth product module that, as we’ve discussed, detects and eliminates ad fraud sending only valid views to the blockchain which cannot be manipulated. It is against this ledger that brands will pay content publishers.

Because Proof of View has several use cases and works for different kinds of digital fraud we applied it as well to NFTs. Since Verasity owns an Esports platform and major gaming companies are looking to NFTs as a new method of monetization, Verasity is developing the industry standard for authenticating the chain of ownership and validating it on the blockchain.

Verasity, through Esports Fight Club, has its own source of NFTs and will apply its technology to validate and authenticate them on the blockchain. Verasity is in discussion with third-party NFT auction platforms to integrate Proof of View as an industry standard.

Esports Fight Club NFTs will also be available later this year in the game store at esportsfightclub.com/nfts. By implementing all of Verasitys product and protocol layers on esports fight club, Verasity can demonstrate the success of this use case to significantly improve engagement and ad monetization through rewarded content, its ad stack, and Proof of View.

Verasity makes revenues from its use case esportsfightclub.com with subscriptions, commissions on prize pools, content ad revenues, and transaction fees. And it will roll out its B2B products later in 2021 to major content platforms. content publishers are waiting impatiently for the completed beta of the use case on Esports Fight Club to license the modular products from Verasity for their own platforms.

Verasity has a current market cap of 75 million dollars with 35 million dollars of daily volume on exchanges including KuCoin, Bittrex, Bitmax, MXC, Gate, Uniswap, and Dodo To learn more about Verasity and its roadmap, please go to verasity.io To see Verasity products in action go to veracity.tv Thank you for the opportunity to speak at the Hot Trends event today. Thank you and goodbye.

via Verasity Keynote Speech at CoinTelegraph

[deadcactuswalking]

REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 23/01/2021 (Anne-Marie, Juice WRLD, Young Thug)

The site I use for this show has refused to update – which is fine, it’s probably run by one guy and/or their bots – which means I had to go on the UK Singles Chart page from the Official Charts Company for information, and man, I hate that site. Anyway, despite a big #2 debut and a big remix at #3, “drivers license” by Olivia Rodrigo stays steady at #1 for a second week, which shows us a little sliver of how much longevity this song could have – and it’s good too, so I’m glad. Anyway, time for more apathy. Let’s start REVIEWING THE CHARTS.

Rundown

I feel like, especially recently, debuts don’t really stick at all. We have many songs gradually falling below the chart this week, and they place into either two categories: songs that I wished would go away already, and songs that debuted last week. Out of the debuts from last week still on the chart, we have three notable gains and four of the opposite, making this actually an okay week for debuts, but it still feels like people have not got time for new music right now, which is honestly understandable. Out of those debuts, “Streets” by Doja Cat surges up to #20, “Notorious” by Bugzy Malone and Chip drops to #39, “Best Friend” by Saweetie featuring Doja Cat is down to #42, “Regardless” by RAYE and Rudimental unfortunately is up to #51, alongside an even more unfortunate gain for “Chemtrails Over the Country Club” by Lana Del Rey at #58 (Please, don’t make this a hit). That’s it for gains for our debuts last week, as “Vibez” by ZAYN couldn’t even gain from an album boost down to #62 and “WW2” by Unknown T makes the expected second-week drill dive to #63. Our other gains aren’t much to discuss either, although I’ll admit I actually kind of like “You’re Mines Still” by Yung Bleu and remixed by Drake up to #47 (I do really want to see this as a hit). I don’t like, however, the two deep house pastiches at #15 and #16, “Goosebumps” by HVME and “The Business” by Tiesto. What’s even worse is that “Goosebumps”, a remix of Travis Scott’s song, now has a Travis Scott remix, so that remix remix could land this in the top 10 next week. What might not be is also a remix: “34+35” by Ariana Grande featuring Doja Cat and Megan Thee Stallion up to #3. It was doing okay before the remix so it could stay here but I don’t see the remix as a replacement for the original so it could falter from #3. Of course, we do have other notable fallers, mostly pointless to list and a couple weeks too long on the chart, so I’ll split it into two once again: “Go away, please” and “Go away, but maybe later”. In the first category, we have “Whoopty” by CJ at #9, “Blinding Lights” by The Weeknd at #23, “Head & Heart” by Joel Corry and MNEK at #25, “Mood” by 24kGoldn and iann dior at #28, “positions” by Ariana Grande at #33, “Midnight Sky” by Miley Cyrus at #41, “See Nobody” by Wes Nelson and Hardy Caprio at #48. “Someone You Loved” by Lewis Capaldi at #52, “Lonely” by Justin Bieber and benny blanco at #53, “Watermelon Sugar” by Harry Styles at #54, “Looking for Me” by Paul Woodford, Diplo and Kareen Lomax at #55, “Take You Dancing” by Jason Derulo at #64, “Diamonds” by Sam Smith at #67, “Tick Tock” by Clean Bandit, Mabel and 24kGoldn at #72 and “Lasting Lover” by Sigala and James Arthur at #74. I like a fair few of these songs but I’d like some new blood in the charts, like the second category of songs that seem to have started dropping out prematurely: “Therefore I Am” by Billie Eilish at #22, “Loading” by Central Cee at #25, “What You Know Bout Love” by the late Pop Smoke at #45, “Forever Young” by Becky Hill at #57, “Plugged In” by Fumez the Engineer and A92 at #59, “champagne problems” by Taylor Swift at #65, “Body” by Megan Thee Stallion at #68, “pov” by Ariana Grande at #70, “Love is a Compass” by Griff at #71 and, finally, since I only cover the top 75, “Your New Boyfriend” by Wilbur Soot at #73. We have one return here, and that’s for a song that’s a couple years old but from a new star: Olivia Rodrigo’s “All I Want” returning to #32, from the High School Musical: The Musical: The Series: The Soundtrack which I had assumed was new initially but did peak at #72 prior to this. The song’s fine, but I don’t review returning entries, and honestly it’s even more of a Disney teen-pop ballad that “drivers license” is, so I don’t find much point in making exceptions. Note to self to edit the drop-outs in whenever you know what they are.

Edit: The notable drop-outs are “HOLIDAY” by Lil Nas X, “Princess Cuts” by Headie One featuring Young T & Bugsey, “no body, no crime” by Taylor Swift featuring HAIM, “Ain’t it Different” by Headie One featuring AJ Tracey and Stormzy, “Savage Love (Laxed - Siren Beat)” by Jason Derulo and Jawsh 685, “Show Out” by Kid Cudi, Skepta and the late Pop Smoke, and “Dreams” by Fleetwood Mac.

NEW ARRIVALS

#60 – “Friday (Dopamine Re-Edit)” – Riton and Nightcrawlers featuring Mufasa & Hypeman

Produced by Riton

“Push the Feeling On” is a song by Scottish collective Nightcrawlers that is known much more commonly for its classic deep house remix by American DJ MK, which would be known now for how much it’s been sampled in pop music: You’ve probably heard the synth riff or vocal chop in “Hotel Room Service” by Pitbull, “Dinner Guest” by AJ Tracey and MoStack, “Wiggle It” by French Montana and City Girls, “House Party” by MIST and Fredo, or even “Nightcore in tha Club” by Viper of all people. So, 20 or so years later, here comes English DJ Riton making another official remix alongside dually-credited Musafa & Hypeman, who I guess are social media influencers from articles I see about them. That would explain why this is charting... but yeah, this is lazy. A female vocalist sings “It’s Friday, Saturday, Sunday again” to the melody of the classic vocal loop, and the rest of the song is a worthless and artless “future house” track made for no-one, with Musafa & Hypeman delivering nothing more than obnoxious skits and faint ad-libs. I’ll admit, the second verse where it suddenly drops into her vocals over the haunting vibration of bass is inspired, but it goes nowhere. It uses the same drop as the original MK remix and if it isn’t, it uses a vocaloid drop that sounds way too similar to blackbear’s “hot girl bummer” for my liking. Once you hear it, you may not unhear it – although I doubt you’d come back to this song for any reason other than clicking the wrong song when looking for the original MK remix, which is still great. This, however, is useless.

#50 – “Skengman” – Ghetts featuring Stormzy

Produced by Ten Billion Dreams

This is actually Ghetts’ first ever track to hit this chart as a lead solo act and that shouldn’t come as much of a surprise. Whilst Ghetts is very important to grime and his mixtapes are considered classics, he’s not exactly the peak of commercial success – and is somewhat infamous for said squandering as he released a diss track against MTV for not thinking he was that great of an MC – which wasn’t exactly helped by beef with the Boy Better Know collective. It makes a lot of sense for him to ride off the coattails of the new generation of English rappers and make a drill-adjacent track with Stormzy, the track’s namesake. It also makes sense for this to be good: we have some pretty ominous keys and horns that sound great under this cold and minimal trap beat, relying less on percussion than it does the eerie strings. Sure, the chorus is pretty awkward and tired, with Ghetts not selling it nearly as he well as he does the verses, which even then are off-kilter. The second verse – by Stormzy – is where this song really shines, as gorgeous vocal samples combine with the rise of the strings, looming 808s and Stormzy’s deep contrast of a voice before the beat drops and Stormzy lets out his best flows. Honestly, after Stormzy’s verse, not even a beat shift really makes Ghetts’ other two verses worthwhile, as his just seem short and ineffective, even if the beat is going to keep on intensifying with these incredible strings and horns – lest we forget the choir of “Skengmen” behind him on the chorus. I really wish this was a solo Stormzy track, with no disrespect to Ghetts, who just feels out of place if anything. This could have been a lot better.

#49 – “Lumidee” – Chip featuring Young M.A. and Young Adz

Produced by the Fanatix

Most of our new arrivals are hip-hop or hip-hop-related, so of course whenever we see Stormzy, I guess we have to have a Chip song the same day. Is that beef still going on? Regardless, this is a very different song, named after the artist behind the awkward, minimal R&B sample used here. Listen, I like 2000s R&B, but “Never Leave You (Uh Oooh, Uh Oooh)” is just a fatal misunderstanding of what makes Timbaland’s production good. Surely that would make any reworking an improvement, especially with these subtle strings and guitars under a dancehall beat just as awkward as the original. Oh, and I call the strings subtle because it’s not like Young Adz could ever be, or Chip for that matter, as both of them deliver stiff, ugly performances about how the sex is spectacular... but also how they want this woman to treat them kindly after they cheat on her because they buy her nice things. “They” of course being everyone here, as Chip plays the same role as Adz – who only grabs the chorus – and hell, I think Young M.A., who could deliver a narrative here that criticises Chip’s attitude, just expresses the same ideas. I’ll admit that M.A.’s flow and cadence is a lot smoother, less nasally Auto-Tuned and honestly kind of good, but this honestly, much like “Skengman”, reeks of missed potential. A dancehall back-and-forth about love that means nothing but sex and materialism sounds fun on paper but nothing’s really done with it here, which is what I’d expect from these guys in all honesty. It’s weird and kind of cool to see Young M.A. on the UK Singles Chart again (She appeared on an Eminem track around this time last year too), though, so I’ll give it that.

#44 – “Pinging (6 Figures)” – Central Cee

Produced by ItchyDaProducer

Well, we can now add Central Cee to the drill guys that spark a top 50 hit out of nowhere every couple weeks. I actually quite like “Loading” mostly because of the fusion of hard 808s with those slick horn samples. As an aside, the Genius.com page for “Loading” has a comment saying the beat is “disgusting” that has a ton of downvotes, probably because of some sort of disconnect between cultures and audiences. This new track is a lot less interesting, though, relying on a really cheap guitar loop, but otherwise I do think the drill percussion works here, especially with the sliding 808s and Central Cee’s pretty constant delivery. I can’t really say he’s saying anything of interest other than the fact he supposedly turned down a six-figure record deal to stay independent, which of course is the chorus, so it’s not like this is great, or even good, but it makes the best out of a bad loop, and I can respect that, especially with piano touches, although this apparently sounds like another beat Itchy’s made so I’m not sure if that deserves much praise either. You know, I really thought Central Cee could have been on to something with the jazzier touches, but once again, this is missed potential.

#37 – “Wellerman” – The Longest Johns

Produced by ???

There aren’t any producer credits for this one, though I’m not sure to how much extent you can “produce” a sea shanty. It’s not often for this show that I can say a song that debuted is from the 1800s, but this song dates back to around 1833, where the Weller Brothers and their “Wellerman” ships became the most important merchant traders in New Zealand, operating mostly through their base in Otago. Naturally, sea shanties are sang at sea but it’s seldom seen that said songs surge up as singles on Spotify. Thanks to TikTok, however, this 2018 cover by the Longest Johns, a folk group from Bristol, debuted in the top 40. There’s no instrumentation, so this is just an a-capella cover, with some genuinely great vocal harmonisation, even if these guys aren’t great singers – not that you have to be to sing sea shanties. The end product is a pretty fun track about wishing for a supply ship to come whilst whaling, and that they hope to come home soon – or something like that. Look, I hope this doesn’t stick around even though I have the feeling it will. It’s not a bad song at all and the guys are talented, but come on, guys, it’s a sea shanty from TikTok. As that damn app still runs a lot of the charts, though, I suppose I should embrace this, because it is harmless, and that’s really all there is to it.

#31 – “Bad Boy” – Juice WRLD and Young Thug

Produced by Pi’erre Bourne

Now, I’m usually cynical about posthumous releases from Jarad, and I was initially for this, but it has been in circulation as a leak and it was also completely finished with a music video produced before his death by Cole Bennett of Lyrical Lemonade, who directed a lot of Juice’s earlier videos (including “Lucid Dreams”). It has Young Thug on the second verse and Pi’erre Bourne on production so I can’t be mad at this at all. As long as these posthumous projects from now on don’t have tacked-on features and are surrounded by collaborations from only his genuine friends who cared for him, I have no issue with them going on – even if I’d prefer for all of his demos to be released with proceeds going to charity (which should be done with most if not all artists after their passing unless they have an album on the way). It helps that this song isn’t just respectful, but it’s incredible. The hard trap beat from Pi’erre has this great squealing guitar and noisy synth blend that kicks ass whenever it comes in, especially when at odds with the more casual bleeping in the verses. Juice’s chorus is infectious and fast-paced, exactly how he should be on his “banger” tracks, but his verses are really a genius blend between his melodic and technical skills that I wish I heard more from Juice when he was alive. Oh, and Young Thug has what might be verse of the year, with smooth flow switches as always, unique inflections as always as well as playing with the beat perfectly as he drops the nasal screech of his “skrrt!” ad-libs amidst a more simple, intense flow by the end – with the addition of that squealing guitar. Is the content unique? Maybe not, as this is mostly flexing over an explosive trap beat, but there are enough quotable rhymes and vocal deliveries that make this more than honestly the sum of its parts, as out of context I don’t think this beat, this feature or Juice’s hook could work nearly as well as they do. As is, however, this is one of Juice’s best songs, hell, even one of Thugger’s best – and he has a strong discography – so, yeah, for the part of me that appreciates ignorant, stupid-hard trap-rap, this clicked. I hope it’s a hit and even if it isn’t, this is one of the best send-offs they could have chosen for Juice, and I’m just glad it’s finally met an official release.

#2 – “Don’t Play” – Anne-Marie, KSI and Digital Farm Animals

Produced by Mojam and Digital Farm Animals

“Bad Boy” seems like it should be the big story here, as it’s a massive lead and/or final posthumous single from one of the biggest rappers in history featuring another A-list that is getting a lot of praise and YouTube views... but alas, this is the UK, so here’s KSI and Anne-Marie. Is this KSI-Digital Farm Animals collaboration going anywhere? He had a similar one last year with “Really Love” featuring Craig David and that was kind of big – still is – and I think also debuted at #2 behind a really strong #1. They also had awkward, ugly cartoon cover arts, so maybe this is a collaborative project between KSI and the EDM producers? Well, “producer”, because Digital Farm Animals is actually just one guy. I think I honestly wouldn’t mind that considering how better KSI pulls off rapping over EDM than hip-hop. Anne-Marie is filling Craig David’s role, although this time with a verse and lead billing, so it could be from an upcoming album that may or may not exist. Honestly, who cares? Is the song good? No, the chorus is lazy, the UK garage-adjacent beat is cheap and KSI gets outshined in his verse both performance and mixing-wise by orchestra hits. Is the content interesting? Well, KSI’s lyrics are supposedly subliminal disses towards other YouTubers, which annotators on Genius have “marked as a stretch”, only to be met with downvotes from fans because of course, they would. Is it catchy? I guess so, that is the purpose. Hence, we have an inoffensive pop song from three artists who have made better but mostly through freak accident. Top 10 material? Probably not, but the charts are weak and it’s the UK so you can’t really expect much more. Also, why does this have an extended version?

Conclusion

Whilst I’m writing this conclusion, the site I use still has yet to update, so I’ll actually have to do a Kanye in 2016 and edit this post-release for the top 10 and drop-outs. For now, though, I can pretty solidly give Best of the Week to “Bad Boy” by the late Juice WRLD and Young Thug, with an Honourable Mention to I guess “Wellerman” by the Longest Johns for at least being different, although most of these debuts reek of missed potential. “Wellerman” could have been a lot more jaunty with actual instrumentation, “Don’t Play” could have replaced Anne-Marie with an actual personality, Ghetts could have gone in harder on “Skengman” and the beat in “Pinging (Six Figures)” could have actually existed. Therefore, the songs with the least potential are the victims here, as Dishonourable Mention goes to Chip, Young Adz and Young M.A. for “Lumidee” and Worst of the Week goes to “Friday (Dopamine Re-Edit)” by like, four complete nobodies, honestly, I do not see the purpose in that song existing at all. Well, here’s the top 10 for this week – or at least it will be here in a couple hours:

I can’t make any solid predictions for next week other than Billie Eilish and ROSALIA, maybe Lil Skies? You can follow me @cactusinthebank if you’re vaguely interested in doing so, thank you for reading, and I’ll see you next week.

[mst3kproject]

207: Wild Rebels

I guess if it's time to tackle the movies I've been trying to avoid, my next review should be a biker flick.  I don't really like the biker episodes, but then, I don't really like biker movies in general, and the fact that MST3K naturally chose bad biker movies doesn't help me enjoy something I didn't enjoy much to begin with.  Now, bad monster movies, on the other hand...

The hero, I guess, of Wild Rebels is racecar driver Rod Tillman.  Other than owning a magical disappearing, reappearing guitar, he is not at all an interesting person.  After wrecking his car, he decides to get out of racing and goes to a bar where he meets a biker gang consisting of leader Jeeter, ultra-violent Banjo, Designated Chick Linda, and mute Fats.  They need a getaway driver for their next robbery, and I guess none of them can drive a stick shift.  Rod wants nothing to do with them, probably because of the Nazi flag in their hideout, but then the police ask him to help them gather evidence against the gang.  With Rod in tow, the bikers rob a gun shop, then a bank – not because they really want the money, but just for kicks!

I hadn't seen this episode for a while, and I'd forgotten Joel's joke about the Nazi-themed bikers having Trump's Art of the Deal on their shelves.  Everything old is new again.

This is one of those movies that it's kind of hard to say anything about.  It's bleak and dull, and in the closing sketch Joel and the bots already went through its low points quite thoroughly.  “The villains were so cliché, they were laughable,” “so the hero was supposed to be unattractive and spineless,” and so forth.  That basically covers Wild Rebels.  It's a series of tropes and symbols standing in for a story, with a 'hero' we're never given any reason to be interested in.

The very first thing we see Rod do in the movie is give up.  He's wrecked his car, so he decides to give up on racing entirely.  He meets a girl in a bar, but when the gang tells her to get lost so they can talk to him, he gives up on her with only a token protest.  This is actually pretty realistic, given that he barely knows her and the bikers are fairly intimidating, but in the context of his abandoning racing, it just seems to cement 'quitter' as his core character trait.

That needn't ruin the movie, of course – maybe Rod's character arc is learning to see things through, or to stand up for himself!  But character arcs just aren't something this movie does, and Rod never seems to change.  His return to racing was a setup to get the gang's attention, not Rod actually trying again.  When Banjo jealously attacks him, it looks like Rod's starting to grow a spine as he successfully defends himself, but it's a false alarm.  At the climax of the film he just cowers at the top of the lighthouse stairs waiting to be shot, rather than doing anything that might be considered heroic.

The gang members are stereotyped thugs, who seem to do what they do just Because It's Evil.  Linda even says as much: they aren't interested in money or cars or high living, they just want the adrenaline rush.  They have no backstories, no explanation of why they are the way they are.  They surround themselves with Nazi symbols, like the swastikas on their jackets or the flag in their hideout, but they don't seem to have any actual ideology.  The fascist imagery serves only to reinforce that they are bad people, which has already been amply estalished by their behaviour.  It's a lazy substitute for proper characterization.

I don't know how old any of these characters are supposed to be. The actors appear to have been in their late twenties to early thirties.  In the serenade scene Linda looks like she's around forty. The slang they use never rings true.  It's like your parents trying to use emojis.

The romance between Rod and Linda is as unmotivated as anything else.  He knows she's one of the murderous thugs he's trying to bring to justice, and while he might pretend to be interested in her as part of his act, he has no reason to develop real feelings for her. She, meanwhile, repeatedly calls him a square and knows that he's an untrustworthy outsider.  She might pretend to be interested in him in order to keep an eye on him, but again, there's no reason for her to actually fall for him.  They have no chemistry and nothing in common.  Why does Linda kill Jeeter to save Rod?  Does shooting a friend who trusted her really give her the kicks she craves?  Or could the writers not think of any other way to end the movie?

The entire dramatis personae feel like they exist only as players in this particular story.  We don't really know what they were doing before the movie began, and we have no idea what Rod is likely to do next.  It doesn't seem like his story is over, because it never really began.  He had no personal stake in any of this – he just drifted into contact with the gang, and seems to decide to become a police informant merely because he doesn't have any better idea what to do with himself.  T-Bird Gang was not a good movie, but Frank had his father's death to avenge and was determined to do it with or without police support.  That's a character motivation.  Rod doesn't have that.

Because the characters have no real personality or motivation, the story cannot really be about anything.  T-Bird Gang was about a quest for justice, and feels unsatisfying because it does not end in the way that theme would seem to demand.  Wild Rebels feels bleak and hollow because it doesn't even have a theme.  Movies like The Violent Years and I Accuse my Parents tried to be about why people turn to crime.  Village of the Giants tried to be about the idea of rebellion.  Wild Rebels isn't trying to be about anything at all.

If the film-makers had a goal beyond 'get the movie in the can and earn a few bucks', I think it was simply to make us feel as bad as possible.  The beginning, in which Rod gives up on racing despite the encouragement of his friends, is depressing.  The bar scene contains cringeworthy bad dancing, almost on a par with The Creeping Terror.  The bikers murder a couple of barflies for no good reason.  The gang's hideout is a ramshackle place full of paraphernalia associated with the most despicable parts of history. There are multiple musical numbers and they're all terrible.  Joel describes the experience of watching Wild Rebels as like 'being dragged through a dark tarry abyss' and that's as accurate as anything else in the ending sketch.  There's nothing fun or exciting in the whole movie.

There are a couple of places where the movie is mildly entertaining, but never in the way it wants to be.  The bit with the syringe in the bank is laughably impractical.  The movie's signage would blend right into Killer Klowns from Outer Space – there's the Swinger's Club sign that looks like it was drawn with Crayola markers, and the Citrusville First National Bank that Tom Servo describes as “printed with electrician's tape on ceiling tile”.  Tires squeal on grass.  The movie ends in the world's artsiest railing kill.  'Citrusville' is where the Man-Thing's swamp is in Marvel comics.  Each of these is a nugget of amusement, but they don't add up to enough to make the movie worth watching even on that level.

Now that I've run out of things to say about the movie, I'm going to do something I don't usually do at any length, and talk about the episode.  The riffing is mostly pretty good, with some golden lines like blessed are the grease monkeys, for they will lube and Ronald McDonald, shaking his McBooty, and the joke about the ventriloquist's dummy trapped in Rod's suitcase.  The host sketches, with Wild Rebels Cereal and Dr. Forrester trying to figure out what ee-yuh-ka-ee! means, are instant classics.  But it's also got some very uncomfortable moments in it, as Joel and the bots make fun of a character's mental handicap.

We are told that Fats suffered a head injury that left him unable to speak.  He seems to otherwise have his wits about him – he can read, as demonstrated by his drawing the others' attention to the newspaper, he can certainly drive his motorcycle competently and he seems to know what's going on.  But when he's on screen, we get lines like blue light special on chromosomes – extra ones! or riffs delivered in 'stupid' voices.  There aren't that many of these, but they're very uncomfortable to hear.  The swastika-wearing characters in the movie actually treat Fats with more respect than the peanut gallery does!

On the other hand, this was also the episode that began some proper characterization for Gypsy. Wild Rebels was when we found out that most of her processing power is occupied with running the Satellite of Love, leaving little room for anything else but occasional thoughts of Richard Basehart.  Later episodes would develop Gypsy further, and she went on to become a rare example of a comedy character who is an outspoken feminist without being a bra-burning, man-hating joke.  Although I have to wonder... if she runs the 'higher functions of the ship', what kept the satellite going before Joel started building robots?  Did he simply take the ship's existing control computer and give her a way to express herself?  Or did Dr. Forrester and Dr. Erhardt send him up to a satellite with no functional life support, so that he had to build some before he ran out of air?

Eh, it's just a show.  I should really just relax.

[gamedadmatt]

The Chappie Rant

So some time ago I had a big old rant on Twitter about Chappie. I saw it fairly recently for the first time. Reason being is that I’ve been on something of an Artificial Intelligence and Robotics in film/novels/TV series kick. There’s been some really good things I’ve seen (I quite enjoyed Westworld), but Chappie easily takes the cake as one of the worst things I’ve seen.

If you don’t know what Chappie is, it’s a movie directed by Neil Blomkamp, the guy who also did District 9. District 9 is a good movie. It had plot holes, but it was generally enjoyable. Anyway. Chappie is a movie about a robot that gains sentience. "Robots? Philosophical questions about what sentience is? That sounds right up my alley right now!" I think to myself.

But it's misleading. Chappie is actually a movie that asks the question: "what if we made an entire movie based upon those few minutes in Short Circuit 2 where Johnny 5 becomes a gangster and cluelessly steals car radios."

Spoilers ahead, in case you actually want to watch this garbage. Because I'm basically going to lay the plot out for you. The whole plot. Because it’s worth doing to review how and why the movie is so bad.

Chappie starts by following the programmer (henceforth called Programmer Guy) of these robots that were designed to supplement the South African police force. They seem pretty damn effective, really. The company he works for is doing well and the robots look and move fantastically. It's a really promising start to the film.

One of the robots gets damaged and is marked to be dismantled because it's battery has fused to its chassis, making the entire chassis need replacement. Programmer Guy goes back home and continues a little hobby side project.

You know, just... Programming robotic sentience. NBD.

"Wow, okay. That's... a hell of a hobby side project" I think to myself, while squinting at Programmer Guy's dirty apartment, CRT screens and DOS-like interface. I squint even more as he starts slamming red bull. "Hm. This feels a little like the director may not quite understand programming and just be writing based on programmer tropes here."

Yes, past Matt. That is exactly what it is.

So of course Programmer guy successfully codes robotic sentience. We know he's successful because the DOS interface says so, and he gets very excited that the thing he programmed tells him he's made stable sentience... Okay.

So Programmer Guy rushes back to the company, and tries to sell his boss on giving the robots this sentience. "They'll be able to write poetry and paint!" He explains, excitedly.

"Dude, they're police robots. She's never going to buy that." I say. "Dude, they're police robots. No you can't make them write poetry." Boss lady says.

But of course, Programmer Guy is determined to see this god complex of his through to the very finish. He steals the damaged robot, the USB security key required to access the robots (seems a little bit insecure, but okay), and rushes off to go and install sentience onto it.

And then he gets attacked and taken hostage by gangsters.

Said gangsters are... actually kind of the real opener of the movie, but you won't care about them. They're running drugs or something for some other big important gangster (you can tell he's important because his gun is gold plated), but the cop robots fucked up their plans and Gold Plated Gun Gangster is pissed and wants money. So they decide to take Programmer Guy hostage and force him to make the cop robots work for them so they can do a heist.

I think. It’s all a little convoluted.

Anyway, Programmer Guy can't reprogram all the robots because it's not possible to do (even though somebody else does it later, but that’s just one of many plotholes). But he can reprogram this one bot to be sentient and it'll do what the gangsters say.

"Okay." Say the gangsters. "It only has 5 days to live though." Says Programmer Guy. "Cool." Says the gangsters.

Worst gangsters ever.

So the sentience is installed and Chappie is born. It freaks out in its first moments, cowering away from the humans.

"Does it understand English?" Asks one of the Gangsters. "Well of course it understands En--" "No, it doesn't understand English. Not yet. We’ll need to teach it." Programmer Guy says, interrupting my perfectly reasonable chain of thought.

This was my first big problem with the film. The basic police units are clearly able to understand and speak English. Probably other languages, too. But apparently to create sentience, this gets left out. It's an excuse to spend some cute moments connecting with Chappie as it learns to say important words like "chicken" and "shoe" and "this fuck mother talks ghetto huh?" Yes, that’s a quote from the film.

It also skips over the fact that the English language is complex, but Chappie picks up on some words and concepts without being taught them, and others... well, we'll get to that.

Anyway, Programmer Guy gets bulled by The Gangsters and runs off screaming about "his creation" and how they are all terrible people and how he'll be back. For a guy that created sentience, you'd think he'd show Chappie a bit more respect, but he really does spend a lot of the movie still treating Chappie like a 'thing'. Specifically, HIS ‘thing’.

Chappie starts getting trained in Gangster, but (without much prior learning or influence) decides it doesn't want to use guns. Programmer Guy returns and teaches Chappie to paint, but we don't really get to see the robot flex its apparent built in creativity as it just paints what it sees like a big robotic printer. Chappie also promises Programmer Guy that it will “not do any crimes”.

But Programmer Guy gets chased off by The Gangsters again, tucking tail and screaming once more about how they are awful people and how Chappie should embrace its creativity while he runs off.

The Gangsters are pissed that Chappie learned something other than Gangster, and so they dump their sentient robot out in the world to teach it a lesson about how the world is shit and it should be scared of humans (I guess?). In the process, it gets captured by Religious Australian Douchebag who also works at the company where Chappie was made. He saws Chappie's arm off (because he’s the bad guy) and takes the USB drive security key that Programmer Guy left plugged in to Chappie.

Chappie gets back to the Gangster’s hideout, beaten up by humans and with its arm missing. The Gangster's are really sorry, plug in a replacement arm, and get back to training Chappie in Gangster. It doesn't want to use guns, so instead the Gangsters train it in using throwing stars and knives because "they put people to sleep" and "it feels nice", lying to convince the Robot that it's not killing anybody. We'll get back to this, too.

Remember how I said that the robots looked and moved real nice? Well, forget that. Because now Chappie has been trained to move like it’s straight out of a gangster trope. One metal hand always towards its nonexistent junk. Another metal hand constantly wiping a nonexistent nose. Chappie is anything but endearing at this stage.

Programmer Guy meanwhile is getting pushed around by Religious Australian Douchebag at work. Religious Australian Douchebag has a rival project that he's trying to get the police force to buy - a giant war machine that has rockets and anti tank rounds and a chainsaw and anti air and... it’s overkill. The movie has characters point it out, too. Anyway, he's trying to get the police to buy it instead of the robots. But he's also terrified of robotic sentience.

It’s not explained why (because religious?) but it isn't really important until the end, anyway.

Chappie is out stealing cars from people with The Gangsters because they have convinced it that this is not a crime, they stole those cars from The Gangsters first! With all their ill-gotten gains, The Gangsters get C4 for their heist (which Chappie adamantly refuses to do because "it's a crimes[sic]") as well as a stack of PS4's (buy Sony products). Chappie also learns about death (which it clearly already has a concept of, because it refuses to use guns) and its own short 5-day lifespan in a really ham-fisted scene that could have been so much better. I imagine a better version of Chappie where it learns about death early in the film, only to learn about its own short lifespan later. Instead of being all in the course of a conversation about a dead dog. Anyway.

They return, and Chappie runs into Programmer Guy again. But Chappie is pissed with Programmer Guy because Programmer Guy put Chappie in a body with a limited lifespan. "I didn't know you'd become you!" Programmer Guy argues. Who knew that the robot he made sentient would become sentient?

Meanwhile, Religious Australian Douchebag turns off all the police bots by injecting them all with code at the same time, thus making moot the earlier point about how Programmer Guy couldn’t reprogram all the robots. All the crime that they'd stopped in South Africa comes back in like, 5 minutes. But this shutdown also effects Chappie, so Programmer Guy rescues it from The Gangsters and takes it back to the facility Chappie was made, so that he can fix it.

Programmer Guy fixes Chappie and gets it back up and running. They go to leave the facility and Chappie notices a test robot rig, just like its body.

"We can use this to save me! Transfer me into this body!" "No." Says Programmer Guy. "Why not?" Says Chappie (and myself). "Because your sentience is more than just your battery or hard drive! We don't know what it is!"

...

So Programmer Guy - who literally programmed Chappie's sentience - now seems to be claiming that it (Chappie) isn't just driven by code. It sounds like an argument for something more. That by programming Chappies sentience and letting it grow, Chappie has developed a soul.

There's so many issues with this statement. But it's okay. Because it's about to get worse.

So on the way out, Chappie notices one of the helmets that people use to pilot Religious Australian Douchebag's giant war mech. Programmer Guy briefly explains that it reads peoples brainwaves to pilot the gigantic mech.

"I can use this to transfer myself into another body!" Chappie says, stealing the helmet.

...

"Now hold up, Chappie." I say, rubbing my face. "Firstly, that's a helmet that reads human brainwaves. It can't read robot brainwaves because, well, you have not got a brain. And secondly, human brainwaves aren't sentience. They're just--"

Chappie has gone and downloaded all the information from the Internet about what Sentience is. Now Chappie is plugging a whole bunch of PS4's (buy Sony products) together and is plugging them into a Sony branded VAIO (buy Sony products) laptop and running some DOS looking software while wearing the helmet. The software keeps failing - it cannot find any sentience.

"Chappie. Chappie, stop. This scene isn't going to end well. It cannot read your mind and it's going to make the audience feel sad and sorry for you because--"

Oh. Look at that. The helmet made to scan human brains has managed to scan Chappie and display a visual representation of Chappies sentience...

... 

Remember earlier how I had said that Chappie picked up on some things but not others really quickly without much teaching involved? This is like, case and point right here. Chappie is taught nothing about what sentience is outside of a few throwaway lines by The Gangster’s trying to explain it in a pseudo-philosophical manner. And yet here, this 4-day old robot, goes and just downloads a bunch of information about sentience from the internet and immediately understands what it has to do to extract it. 

This very same robot that hasn’t figured out yet that sharp things hurt when you stab people with them.

Anyway... Moving on from this god-forsaken scene and--oh. Here comes one of The Gangsters (the nice one that Chappie calls 'mommy', because that's a thing). Chappie goes and slaps the helmet on her and it shows a visual representation of her sentience, too.

So apparently Chappie’s code-driven running-off-a-hard-drive sentience is just like human chemical-driven running-off-a-fleshy-meat-sack sentience. It’s another nudge the movie makes that, hey, this helmet is actually reading a soul and that’s the thing that humans have in common with Chappie. Or maybe it’s just dumb. The worst part is that this is actually important later.

So Chappie goes with The Gangsters on their heist, convinced that by doing it there’ll be enough money that it can buy itself a new body to transfer to. The whole act gets caught on video by a news helicopter, that reports that one of the police robots appears to have gone rogue and is helping criminals now. This catches the attention of Religious Australian Douchebag, who uses the information to convince his boss to let him go out in the war machine and destroy Chappie. She agrees.

Oh, and Chappie figures out here too that The Gangsters were lying to it about how it feels good to be stabbed after it stabs a police officer. Who knew?

Religious Australian Douchebag straps in to his war machine and goes after Chappie. So too does Golden Plated Gun Gangster, who wants his money and Chappie too, now. Programmer Guy also has grabbed a gun and grenades and rushed to Chappie to equip him for the coming three-way battle. 

Of course, Chappie refuses to take the gun because it doesn’t want to hurt anyone. But then the three-way battle between The Gangsters, Religious Australian Douchebag and Golden Plated Gun Gangster’s Gang kicks off. So we are treated to a slow-motion shot of Chappie clearly considering the gun and grenades in the back of Programmer Guy’s van as bullets ricochet and explosions ring out. Chappie starts taping a grenade to a knife. 

A character dies. The war robot is apparently not overkill enough since carpet bombing gangsters isn’t enough to kill them all. Then Chappie leaps out from inside of the nearby building (having apparently gone inside after taking the gun and grenades, so that it could make an entrance?). It throws the grenade knife and it sticks to the war robot (apparently it’s made out of polystyrene) and then starts shooting it up with some kind of heavy shotgun, which blows parts of the war robot off (definitely polystyrene).

Of course it’s not enough. Chappie gets shot up, and so does Programmer Guy. Programmer Guy is dying. Chappie loses the detonator for the knife grenade. Chappie rushes off to grab the brainwave helmet so that it can save Programmer Guy, but the helmet gets destroyed. One of The Gangster’s realises the error of his ways and tries to sacrifice himself so that everyone else can escape the flying war robot. It looks like everyone but the one Gangster is getting out. But before he can sacrifice himself, “mommy” Gangster rushes back and steals his thunder by getting shot up instead. Which leads to Chappie finding the detonator and blowing up the War Robot. 

It’s a mess of a scene, filled with “this almost happens, BUT THEN” over and over again. It’s deeply unsatisfying. 

Chappie and Programmer Guy rush off to the facility where Chappie was built. Chappie fucks Religious Australian Douchebag’s shit up. Like, no joke here. It looks like both his arms and both of his legs are broken, twisted at weird angles after being thrown through walls and into the ceiling. But he’s alive, and Chappie spits an “I forgive you.” At him. So much for not wanting to hurt anybody.

Programmer Guy’s body is tossed into the War Machine pilot chair. He’s only suffered a single stomach wound, so I don’t know why he’s not being taken to the hospital instead. Chappie puts the brainwave scanner helmet on Programmer Guy, and gets ready to transfer his mind into the test robot.

“Okay. This could actually kinda be redeemed. Chappie sacrificing its life. The creator becoming the very thing he created. That’s a pretty neat idea.” I think to myself.

Programmer Guy goes limp and gets transferred into the robot test rig. Disregarding questions and suspending my disbelief for a moment about how police robots have enough storage space to fit a human mind (we’ll even get to that later), it’s interesting. But the scene misses an opportunity for Programmer Guy really struggling with being in a robot that he created, or looking at his own corpse.

“Now get out, and spend the last few hours of Chappie’s life doing something meaningful. Redeem this horrible film.” I say. “Let’s upload Chappie’s mind wirelessly into one of the disabled Police Robots outside.” The film says. “Please no--”

So they slap the helmet on Chappie, and upload its mind into a nearby robot outside. 

Sigh.

So Programmer Robot Guy escapes, finds Chappie as it’s just picking itself up from the trash. They escape back to The Gangster lair, where “daddy” Gangster (also a thing) is currently mourning “mommy” Gangster. He’s going through a box of her things, burning old photos and such, when he finds a little USB drive.

“Does that say… no… no, please, god, no.” I think to myself.

Sure enough, it says something to the extent of ‘Mommy Brain Scan Backup’ on the side of the USB drive. Apparently, in the brief moments that Chappie had put the brainwave reading helmet on her in the earlier scene, it was enough to create a full backup of her mind.

And so our closing moments of the film cover how police robots have been taken off the streets, replaced once more by human officers. Chappie hacks into the robot manufacturer and uploads schematics for a new kind of robot, that it then wirelessly uploads “mommy” Gangster’s mind into. The final shot of the movie is of a robot with a woman’s face opening its eyes, and then we immediately cut to credits with a god-awful rap song to see out this god-awful movie.

Seriously. I have never felt the need to type out a rant about a film before now, it’s terrible. The movie struggles to figure out what exactly it wants to be, and what it’s concepts are. It never really succeeds at explaining to you how things work in this universe.

At one moment, we are made to believe that sentience is something truly unique and cannot be replicated or copied. The film seems to struggle with what concept of sentience it is rolling with. Sentience can be programmed. But Sentience is also the soul. Or maybe it’s brain scans. It’s never really answered what sentience is, but we’re apparently able to move it around easily - despite what we’re told half-way through the film.

Similarly, for a movie about sentient machines, it understands very little about how they work. I would have maybe bought the explanation, if the film explained how machines are unique in this world. But it never really does.

Here we have a Programmer that creates sentience – which can apparently be tested for. But then later on, we’re told to believe that the Programmer doesn’t quite know or understand what he’s created, and that here’s a degree of ‘magic’ involved in his code and in sentience itself. But then how did we confirm right at the start that he created sentience? 

And then we have the characters. There’s nobody likeable in this film. Nobody that you can connect with. Chappie is made to speak and act “gangster”, missing out on an opportunity to have a really cool, likeable robot. Programmer Guy is a coward. The Gangster’s are assholes and the one ‘nice’ Gangster (“mommy” Gangster) is made to be entirely paternal for no good reason. There’s hints that “mommy” and “daddy” Gangster may have had a child (or maybe I am reading too much into the art in scenes), and this feels like a missed opportunity to talk about Chappie’s importance to them if they did.

I also get slightly racist undertones from Blomkamp’s continued representations of South Africa. It’s always represented as a place on the brink of tearing itself apart, governed by useless and lazy bureaucracy, made up of slums and repurposed abandoned buildings. It always feels like a hopeless place, that is never changed for the better despite the actions of the characters. 

The movie fails to tell a good plot with what is an interesting concept, and it boggles my mind how blatantly obvious (to me, at least) it feels some of the solutions in there are, that they didn’t make it to the film. There was an opportunity for a sad but hopeful ending, but it was sacrificed in favour of an empty but “happy” ending.

Chappie is just... really, really bad.

[earnvbucks187428-blog]

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Well, Fortnite's success isn't based just on the fact that it is free, but instead, it is because of how so their free-to-play asset interlocks with the premise and features of the game itself. To shows that the fact that Fortnite is open in the second is a solid heart to seriously supports the other part we will be discussing. Good the ballots are in and the idea been officially confirmed - Fortnite is the best Battle Royale game off there.

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All the Fortnite Battle Royale tips you need, plus Fortnite Android info, free V Bucks, and Fortnite Server status updates. Fortnite is the best battle royale video competition of 2018. PUBG is a similar game, but its feature is a lot lower than Fortnite's. The essential subject is whether the dances used in Fortnite emotes are copyrightable material kept under US law. If not, then Epic Games' utilization of the dancing is not copyright infringement, and in-game deal of the individual parties could last unfettered.

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More easily: Playing "Fortnite" is free, but progressing through the game's loot-unlock system is not. While people follow here for the base Fortnite game free v-bucks no individual verification you will be presented rotating missions from the daily Quest machine. Once you have finished each one, you'll move your own loose V-bucks and you will be able to use them at points for the conflict Royale mode.

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The news on V-Bucks getting used to wash currency is not surprising, given that crooks are operating Fortnite to make money in a mind-boggling various methods. Similar to Snow in Season 7, Discovery awards any player who completes all seven weekly challenges with a secret loading screen producing a confrontation star or hidden banner. Doing all this is a lot of control, but for the most dedicated Fortnite players, that essential.

So that's everything you need to know or getting placed into Fortnite and Fortnite Battle Royale. We'll guarantee you inside channels. In reply , Epic party member darkveil” said, Yes!” The plan is in place but it is officially a bit difficult,” according to the comment. Epic wants to give mini-BR” match with Creative where users can configure the Tornado, use the bus drop feature, and other factors from the main Fortnite battle royale island.

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According to some information websites, Fortnite is already known to these kind of hacks And they are treating them like a major crime and acquiring legal actions and also can exclude the explanations who are trying to hack or cheat in the system. Because of its frequent occurrences of gentle violence, Fortnite is time 12+ by PEGI, Pan American Game Information But just like many sports of this type, plenty of children younger than 12 are participating, so this imperative that mothers are mindful of the safety fears to cover occurred raised, also just how to help their own kids play safely.

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That looks like Xbox have a current promotion for Fortnite Battle Royale where players can purchase 3 months of Xbox Live Gold and 1,000 V-Bucks used for a discounted rate of $9.99. Remember that once you have the V-Bucks, they will be offered on any program if this linked with your Epic account. Creative mode lets "Fortnite" players team up to build, not drive.

It is doubtful how much profit criminals were able to sort out of money laundering, though Sixgill achieve to Fortnite items received more than $250,000 on eBay in a 60 day time recently. A small form of Fortnite: Battle Royale will hopefully be around to participants soon via Creative Mode. Get V Bucks Free No People Verify 2019 Hack Working Free V Bucks This Fortnite cheats can help in taking free v-bucks easily.

[say-im-your-homie-blog]

“My life as a writer began when an English teacher decided to take my sappy teenage work seriously. Writing is a journey of constant improvement.“

My writing began in a similar way, at age 11, with a terrible self-insert type story that an English teacher was honest about. She told me it showed promise and was good for my age. I had teachers that encouraged me throughout the time I was writing in junior high and high school. I also got comments online, both negative and positive, but confiding in teachers and real life friends was a stabilizing point for me.

I don’t think that minors should be looking to the internet for support or stability of any kind. Teaching an 11 year old that the internet is their source of support and legitimacy is far more dangerous than squashing a young writer’s productivity. Frankly it is not the job of people on the internet to know if someone is an 11 year old writing their first story or a 25 year old looking for real feedback on their work to see if they can become a professional. 

I’m not saying that a first work shouldn’t be taken seriously or treated well, but someone who is clearly older than 18 writing something, should be treated like an adult. And you’re really making a very hurtful assumption by saying otherwise and I have to make a statement about it.

Posting your first work is scary and if you look at someone’s account before you comment on their fic and see that they are younger/can tell from the writing etc. that’s one thing. An adult shouldn’t shit all over the work of a minor, and it is your job as a reviewer to determine, roughly the age and maturity level of the writer you are dealing with. 

However, for a lot of writers, myself included, constructive criticism is the most important sort of feedback we can receive. I want to write professionally, but I will never be able to do so if I’m not pushed increasingly toward perfection. The internet is an invaluable resource for someone who is seeking to hear how well they’ve mimicked a show’s tone, dialogue, and plots. Online fanfiction is basically crowdsourced tutoring for franchise writing-- and it is one of the only tools available for someone who wants to learn how to write in a franchise to teach themselves to do so.

Furthermore, to say that someone can never say anything negative is really demoralizing to people who put a lot of effort into their reviews. There are people who evaluate a work as a whole because they were invested in the story and want to give meaningful feedback and engage with the story. And for many writers, those are the readers we want most. 

I’ve gotten more out of constructive criticism than I can express. Even if I disagreed with it, it tended to spur thoughts and logistics as to why I thought what I did that I could trace back to canon. If I couldn’t trace those logistically lines, I realized I had made a mistake and needed to fix it. Not everyone can learn from silence, especially in a smaller fandom,  or one where sometimes silence is only a result of your work not being well publicized or promoted properly.

Now, there is never any excuse for harassing someone. Or for piling on negativity for a young writer when they are trying to test their skills for the first time. If you see your negative comment has already been given, maybe hold back. Someone doesn’t need to hear the same criticism a dozen times. Though, I would argue that I learned my first rules of good writing from seeing how negatively Self-Insert type stories were perceived and that is a valuable lesson. 

However, to tell reviewers to be totally positive all the time is basically telling them they have to be praise machines and conformity monsters. “I only want your opinion when it agrees with mine” is a dangerous attitude that hurts far more than it helps. I know you are trying to spare the feelings of young writers, but the price of doing so is silencing the opinions of others and reducing them into bots that just shit out generic positivity.  Every fanfiction author asks for comments and says they are the lifeblood of a fandom, which I agree with. But to tell them they have to comment in a certain way is pretty insulting to them. I would never ask reviewers to curtail their opinions in hopes of sparing my feelings. That makes me feel like some sort of tyrannical god, demanding only praise or I will withhold my gifts from them. That’s terrible. I just want to know someone is reading. That means a lot to me, and if they think I’ve done something wrong then I want to hear what it is because theirs is an informed opinion I respect and that I can learn from. 

Now I think that you shouldn’t just comment negatively. Say something positive and something negative. If you bothered to read a whole story and comment, then you cared enough to say something, but if all you have to say is negative then you are doing that from a place of anger or hatred. That is the way of the Sith, and you just shouldn’t do it. The world doesn’t need more toxicity. Unless, of course, the author asked for constructive criticism, then go ahead. That was what they wanted. But to have some negative in a comment that is mostly positive is totally fine and shouldn’t be discouraged. Saying “Never be negative!” is just rude and demoralizing to reviewers and unhelpful to writers. 

If you want to give real advice that helps young/beginning writers, try talking to them directly. Tell them to talk to their teachers and parents, to find individual friends who share their interests and opinions to help them remain stable against the wider world. What you’re suggesting is a Plesantville-level online dystopia of lies and conformity that I simply cannot support and have to say something about.   A writer should know themselves well enough to know if they only want positive comments (and learn better from silence) or if they want normal open comments or if they want only constructive criticism. But only wanting positive comments is, to me, as weird as only wanting negative ones, and if you want that, then you should at least to know ask for it. 

When I say “writers don’t want your unsolicited criticism” and “leaving unsolicited criticism on fanfiction hurts writers” THIS is what I mean.

This isn’t even all of them, this is just from a FEW posts on the subject. Read through these, and then look me in the eyes and say you’re ~helping writers~ by leaving that criticizing comment on someone’s fic when they didn’t ask you to.

You’re hurting or, at best, annoying us. You’re hurting fandom.

You’re not helping us.

[setshape]

Are Mortgage Brokers Going Extinct? 9 Industry Experts on How to Futureproof Your Mortgage Business

A couple of years ago, Forrester analyst, Andy Hoar famously declared, "we believe one million [sales] jobs will be net displaced by 2020."

Yikes. With AI, blockchain and automation in the game, there's plenty to think about when it comes to the road ahead for lenders. And it doesn't exactly help that interest rates are on the rise and business behemoths like Amazon are now making mortgage plays.

No doubt about it, it's rough out there for originators. But amid all the buzz and hard-hitting headlines, what's real and what's hype?

And more importantly, where does the mortgage broker stand?

We consulted a panel of top industry experts to get their candid insights on how to stay relevant, no matter what the future holds.

Outsmart AI

You know Frank Garay, right?

The mortgage industry influencer and co-founder of the National Real Estate Post is known for his no-holds-barred opinions on industry shifts.

For Frank, the biggest threat to lenders is that AI is currently being used by massive tech companies to originate loans from virtually any web/mobile-based platform.

Yep, a loan at your fingertips, zero lender required.

Still, Frank's not fazed.

“Use technology that helps you physically engage with referral partners (Realtors) by giving you a real reason to speak with them on a consistent basis asking them for the business. Not technology designed to ensure you don’t need to engage with them physically. As street level originators we need to move away from 'automated' engagement platforms and embrace platforms that trigger us to physically engage with referral partners so we can ask for the referral," he advises.

If you don't already have one, make sure you set up a simple referral partner touch campaign in your CRM to help you stay connected to the real, human people who send the best leads your way.

Stop treating each deal as transactional

Alex Jimenez is Branch Manager at Benchmark Home Loans.

He's also incredibly tuned into the changes taking place in the mortgage industry.

"Lenders need to stop treating each deal as transactional. They need to build a solid foundation with their client and understand their needs. They need to go above and beyond to provide their client top notch service from the inception of the relationship to beyond the closing. Consistent communication, touches and follow up are all important factors of this. You have to stay in front of your clients, or someone else will," Alex warns.

He's not wrong.

In fact, research shows that 79% of leads never convert into sales, usually due to a lack of lead nurturing. But that doesn't mean you need to run in every direction to stay in front of your clients and prospects.

"Lenders tend to create their own threats. They get focused on what other people are doing and get out of their lane. Lenders need to focus on themselves and what provides them consistent business. What creates that is dependent on the market place, the types of loans they are doing and what impact they have had locally," explains Alex.

Resist the urge to spread yourself thin. Instead, set up a smart CRM to concentrate your efforts on optimizing and converting your best leads.

Embrace technology ASAP

Shashank Shekhar is a #1 Best Selling Author, CEO of Inc 500 Company Arcus Lending, and a regular contributor here on the Shape blog.

According to him, technology is a mandatory part of every successful mortgage business.

"Automation through digitization is the #1 biggest change every lender needs to prepare for. More than half of the work currently done by humans will be replaced by algorithms, tech tools, and bots in the next 24 months. To thrive, lenders need to embrace technology ASAP and also provide better than average education to borrowers via online and offline mediums," Shashank predicts.

In fact, approximately 83% of Top Producers said digital mortgage technology is the key to their company's future growth. But if you don't count yourself within that majority, you should know that there are some benefits of being late to the party.

For example, choosing a CRM from within a more mature marketplace enables you to select a tool capable of running all your business tasks within one central system, rather than creating a bulky patchwork of platforms.

Work less

Sounds counterintuitive, right?

Stick with us.

When we asked Eric Mitchell, Executive Vice President of National Retail for his thoughts on the future outlook for brokers, he had this to say:

"The biggest challenge facing Mortgage Lenders is getting their Loan Officers to adopt technology. Technology will not replace Loan Officers, and Loan Officers that adopt technology will replace those that don’t! The days of a Loan Officer making a good living closing 1 or 2 loans per month are over. And the only way Loan Officers can close higher volume without working 70+ hours per week, is to adopt technology at a faster pace."

More business from less work? It's true.

With the right use of the right tech, you can achieve the seemingly impossible. But you'll need to pay extra close attention to ensure your daily tasks (fewer though they may be) actually move the needle on revenue. And you need to inspire your team to do the same. Here's Eric:

"There are tremendous efficiencies that can be achieved that allow Loan Officers to be more valuable to their clients and also generate more business with less time. The companies that will survive this next market correction, will be those that inspire their Loan Officers to make the needed changes to their daily activities. The size of our paychecks are directly correlated to the level of value we bring to our clients. Stop complaining about the market and start learning how to be more valuable!"

You heard it here first, people.

If you want to make the most of the inevitable changes in the market, it's time to start thinking bigger about the value you bring to the table.

Prove your value

Change is never easy.

Most of the time you know what you need to do, you just need practical steps for how to do it.

We brought in Rajin Ramdeholl, Vice President Private Client Division at Meadowbrook Financial Mortgage Bankers Corp. for help on that one.

According to Rajin:

"The biggest change would be interest rates increasing and affordability decreasing. That coupled with a recession on the loom will be a tremendous challenge for those in the mortgage industry. During a recession people are scared to spend or can’t afford to buy a home. They can prove their value through social media videos or testimonials from prior clients. Or through online reviews," he advises.

We know it's getting tough out there. But for savvy lenders, there's always a way to help lead your prospects and customers cut through the hype and fear, so they can find the right deal for them.

And nothing builds that level of trust like a little social proof. In fact, research shows that product reviews are 12X more trusted than product descriptions and sales copy.

If you don't already have an automated system for collecting testimonials and reviews, make sure you get that set up in your CRM. Simply give your customer a heads-up that they'll be asked for feedback and you'll be amazed by how many will jump at the chance to share their experience.

Empower your team

Alright, by now you've probably realized you have some work to do to bring your business systems and strategies forward.

But what about your team? We asked Christine Beckwith for help on this one.

Why? Well, because as a professional sales and life success coach, award-winning mortgage finance veteran and best selling author, she knows a thing or two about nailing the next level.

Here's what she had to say:

“Lenders need to arm their employees with the tools to compete. Great service and competitive rates are the bare minimum needed. How do they help their Mortgage Loan Originators become experts in the many niche programs available and then position themselves to capture market share? Second, they need to advance technology wise as the movement on that front is beginning to take on a more rapid evolution. If they focus on those two things while servicing the consumer at the highest possible level they will stay alive,“ she predicts.

To recap, if you want to stick around in this crazy game of mortgage lending, you'll need to have:

A team of influential experts

A tech-positive approach to running your business

Think of creative (and of course, tech-friendly) ways to elevate your team and don't be afraid to experiment to find what works.

Refuse to become a commodity

John Thomas is the Branch Manager of Primary Residential Mortgage, Inc. and he also happens to be one of the The Most Connected Mortgage Professionals of 2018 according to National Mortgage Professional Magazine.

According to him, the competition is becoming fiercer than ever.

"I see the biggest challenge for lenders is big companies like Zillow and Amazon getting into mortgages and making it seem to the consumer that a mortgage is just like any other commodity like coffee," he warns.

We know, scary. But when we asked John plainly whether the mortgage broker would one day become extinct, he basically said 'no chance.'

"I would say that is not going to happen. People may start search online but most people want to make to talk to someone about the right loan product especially first time home buyers. There are even more loan options in the market now as we see Non-QM loans come into the market which certainly don't fit into an online application," says John.

Today, 66% of consumers say they'll happily switch brands if they feel like a number, not an individual. And no matter how many mammoth-sized competitors enter the market, with the right tools, your team can offer a truly warm and personal experience customers just can't get anywhere else.

Don't forget how important this is

While we're on the topic of personalization, it's worth remembering that taking out a mortgage is a truly momentous occasion in your customer's life—which makes your role downright crucial.

Here's Tom Smith, Branch Manager at First Centennial Mortgage Corporation on taking a minute to walk in your customer's shoes:

"As companies such as Zillow, Realtor.com and Amazon are attempting to change the market as we know it for mortgage and real estate, the loan officer needs to show what an asset they are with the education and resources that they can provide face to face. Technology is great, but do you really want to put your information in the hands of a person that you can't see or touch and works only 8-5 for the biggest investment of your life?"

Probably not. Find ways to show your customers you understand how important this decision is and are ready to be the one to help them find their way through it.

Communicate to compete

By now, it's clear.

Though tech is evolving at lightning speed, customers are demanding a more human and personal experience with providers.

Anthony VanDyke knows the story well. The President of ALV Mortgage is a master originator and a total pro at using visual elements like video and screen captures to connect on a more meaningful level with customers.

"The lending landscape is changing again. Big companies with big data are making it easier and improving the customers mortgage experience. We need to be aware of the customers experience and work towards making the mortgage process easier for the customer," says Anthony.

When we asked him, 'What's the best way lenders can make the experience easier for the customer?' He had just one word for us: Communication.

Let's face it. For most people, navigating the mortgage application process is no walk in the park. What can you do to make it as simple and seamless as possible? Start by asking your customers about their experiences working with you to identify the friction points and come up with better ways to walk them through it.

Don't give in to the pressure

John Stevens is a true mortgage industry leader

The immediate past president for The National Association of Mortgage Brokers has been in the game for decades. And suffice to say, he's heard his fair share of buzzwords.

To him, the biggest challenge facing lenders is the "pressure to be less personable and more digital."

"In today’s ever-changing environment the successful lender is the one who has trained their staff with a superior customer service experience. This should not be just a buzzword that lenders have in their company recruiting brochures, it should be a way of life. People want to work with people. And people will remember, and refer, the ones who treated them with respect and kindness," explains John.

Sometimes the best thing to do is simply go back to basics. Because while the tools and technology will always change, but the human being still wants what it wants. Use smart systems to fuel that connection, and you'll have a long and healthy future ahead of you.

Article Source:- https://setshape.com/blog/are-mortgage-brokers-going-extinct-how-to-futureproof-your-mortgage-business