#because of the links

[adobe-outdesign]

recently I discovered that Kawayoo, one of my all-time favorite Pokemon TCG artists, has some art of Loudred floating around and it's the best thing I've ever seen

[captainkirkk]

At least once a month I remember that Ozai ruled for ~3 years. That's shorter than one presidential term. That's nothing. In comparison Zuko - who suffered so much cruelty and was made to feel worthless under Ozai - ruled for ALMOST 70 YEARS. That's more than 22 times the length of Ozai's rule - and he will go down in history as one of the most influential and well loved Fire Lords of all time

[thedailydescent]

Please reblog for further reach!

If you liked this uquiz, please check this out.

[effemimaniac]

don't bother me I'm atop my tower pondering the Fractal Orbs of Pleasure. ascending the accursed spire, so to speak. wizard business, you know how it is.

[proxycrit]

Linktober day 11: rollin’ inn

After a day fighting a volcano, the heroic group stumble back to the inn to take a Long Rest. Unfortunately for Link, his sleep is interrupted by mournful ghosts partying it up in his brain.

(Mineru and rauru were the last of their kind ever since the already small insular zonai kingdom was decimated by a strange, flesh bending plague. A lone miner found the two children, and decided to take them in despite concerns of the curse.

He raised them. When they asked him to help fight the source of their blood family’s extinction, who was he to say no?)

More about this totk au! (It all started when zelda did not get teleported into the past, and then spiraled from there)

Patreon!

[octarineblues]

supporting communities & people impacted by the Southport attack and the far-right riots in the UK

here is a list of community fundraisers I found, starting with those aiming to support the Southport community after the appalling attack at a children dance party, to the fundraisers helping those affected by the subsequent racist and Islamophobic far-right/nazi riots

Edited on 5 August to include Middlesbrough fundraisers. Edited on 6 August to correct the link on the Books for Spellow Lane fundraiser, to adjust the name change for the Belfast fundraiser, and to adjust the wording in the second last paragraph.

Southport:

Southport Strong Together Appeal - organised by the community foundation for Merseyside, for those affected by the Southport knife attack

United for Southport families - the funds will be distributed among the nine families of the children who were at the party

Swifties for Southport - a fundraiser for the Alder Hey Children's charity, which supports the victims and the affected families, as well as first responders and clinicians. Extra funds will also support the wider Southport community

Fundraiser for the Southport Mosque - a fundraiser to aid rebuilding or possibly re-locating the Southport Mosque after the damages it suffered during the riots

Rebuilding Windsor Mini Mart - fundraiser to rebuild the locally-owned grocery store that was targeted during the attacks, broken into, and looted

Liverpool:

Fundraiser for the Spellow Hub - the Spellow Hub was broken into, looted and set on fire at night during the riots. The Spellow Hub is a newly created one-of-a-kind (in the UK) institution, which consists of a library as well as a community centre with a mission to help people get education and pathways to work

Books for Spellow Lane - another fundraiser for the library in the Spellow Hub, to replace the books and rebuild the library there edit: included the correct link

Hartlepool:

Fundraiser for the Nasir Mosque - the Nasir Mosque was attacked following Southport riots; this fundraiser is organised by Hartlepool citizens to help the mosque deal with the damages as well as to show appreciation for the role of the mosque in the community. edit: the funds will be also distributed to the local community!

Rebuilding the Farm Shop - the shop was targeted during the riots, and when the owner and his son tried to protect it, they were also violently attacked. The fundraiser is to help fix the damages to the store.

Sunderland:

help rebuild Citizens Advice Sunderland offices after arson - two of the Citizens Advice Sunderland offices were set on fire during the riots, and one of them is completely destroyed.

Hull:

Hull Help for Refugees - a local fundraiser to support the Hull Help for Refugees charity, the donated money will be re-distributed to community members affected by the riots

Fundraiser for Hull Help for Refugees and Welcome House in Hull - collected money will be donated to the two charities

Belfast:

help fix racially motivated damages - originally the fundraiser for the Sahara Shisha Cafe which was targeted by the far right in Belfast during the riots, now a fundraiser for all affected businesses in the area. edited to reflect the change of the name of the fundraiser to avoid any confusion

Middlesbrough:

Supporting residents after the riots - Middlesbrough has suffered so much during the riots, lots of businesses as well as just regular family homes were vandalised, had their windows smashed or even were broken into. This fundraiser wants to distribute the funds between affected people to help them fix the damages, and to generally support the local community. the newest fundraiser, imo potentially the most urgent one

Fundraiser for a Care worker's car which was set on fire - a car belonging to an employee of a care agency was set on fire during the riots while he was on shift at a care home.

If you want to donate locally but there is no fundraiser to support where you live, consider donating to your local charities oriented towards Muslim or PoC communities, or towards anti-racist and refugee organizations! And go support your local Muslim/Arab/Black/Asian/Refugee owned businesses!

If you have any information about other local fundraisers, feel free to add to the post or don't hesitate to let me know and I will add them here! We have seen so much hate in the past few days, we have to stay strong and keep supporting each other!

Stay safe everyone 💛

[cestacruz]

i started playing skyward sword and i am in love with their love

[oof-i-did-it-agaaiiin]

Beautiful from Ordinary Days

[greyias]

Oh look, it seems everyone has been opted into the unfortunate "experiment" now. For everyone who has been blissfully using the old UI up until now, welcome to hell :)

Do you not like hell? Do you want to leave and crawl back up into the sunlight of the old UI? Well, have I got a link for you! A beautiful tumblr user (who is not me) has gone and fixed things beautifully for you already: https://github.com/enchanted-sword/dashboard-unfucker

You will need to have Tampermonkey installed on your browser of choice, and once that's done, just go to the github link above, and peruse the readme to install. And voila! You have your old dash back!

The authors of XKit Rewritten said during the experiments that at the time, since this was an "experiment" they weren't going to implement anything to revert to the old UI (although who knows if they'll do it now). And the dashboard unfucker has worked beautifully enough for me to where I genuinely couldn't tell if they had ended the experiment or not.

[genericpuff]

Tbh at this point you should just make your own webcomic app/website because it would probably be 100 times better than whatever going on with webtoon right now.

hahaha it wouldn't tho, sorry 💀

Here's the fundamental issue with webcomic platforms that a lot of people just don't realize (and why they're so difficult to run successfully):

Storage costs are incredibly expensive, it's why so many sites have limitations on file sizes / page sizes / etc. because all of those images and site info have to be stored somewhere, which costs $$$.

Maintenance costs are expensive and get more so as you grow, you need people who are capable of fixing bugs ASAP and managing the servers and site itself

Financially speaking, webcomics are in a state of high supply, low demand. Loads of artists are willing to create their passion projects, but getting people to read them and pay for them is a whole other issue. Demand is high in the general sense that once people get attached to a webtoon they'll demand more, but many people aren't actually willing to go looking for new stuff to read and depend more on what sites feed them (and what they already like). There are a lot of comics to go around and thus a lot of competition with a limited audience of people willing to actually pay for them.

Trying to build a new platform from the ground up is incredibly difficult and a majority of sites fail within their first year. Not only do you have to convince artists to take a chance on your platform, you have to convince readers to come. Readers won't come if there isn't work on the platform to read, but artists won't come if they don't think the site will be worth it due to low traffic numbers. This is why the artists with large followings who are willing to take chances on the smaller sites are crucial, but that's only if you can convince them to use the site in favor of (or alongside) whatever platform they're using already where the majority of their audience lies. For many creators it's just not worth the time, energy, or risk.

Even if you find short-term success, in the long-term there are always going to be profit margins to maintain. The more users you pull in, the more storage is used by incoming artists, the more you have to spend on storage and server maintenance costs, and that means either taking the risk at crowdfunding (ex. ComicFury) or having to resort to outsider investments (ex. Tapas). Look at SmackJeeves, it used to be a titan in the independent webcomic hosting community, until it folded over to a buyout by NHN and then was pretty much immediately shuttered due to NHN basically turning it into a manwha scanlation site and driving away its entire userbase. And if you don't get bought out and try your hand at crowdfunding, you may just wind up living on a lifeline that could cut out at any moment, like what happened to Inkblazers (fun fact, the death of Inkblazers was what kicked off the cultural shift in Tapas around 2015-16 when all of IB's users migrated over and brought their work with them which was more aimed towards the BL and romancee drama community, rather than the comedy / gag-a-day culture that Tapas had made itself known for... now you deadass can't tell Tapas apart from a lot of scanlation sites because it got bought out by Kakao and kept putting all of its eggs into the isekai/romance drama basket.)

Right now the mindset in which artists and readers are operating is that they're trying way, way too hard to find a "one size fits all" site. Readers want a place where they can find all their favorite webtoons without much effort, artists wants a place where they can post to an audience of thousands, and both sides want a community that will feel tight-knit. But the reality is that you can't really have all three of those things, not on one site. Something always winds up having to be sacrificed - if a site grows big enough, it'll have to start seeking more funding while also cutting costs which will result in features becoming paywall'd, intrusive ads, creators losing their freedom, and/or outsider support which often results in the platform losing its core identity and alienating its tight-knit community.

If I had to describe what I'm talking about in a "pick one" graphic, it would look something like this:

(*note: this is mostly based on my own observations from using all of these sites at some point or another, they're not necessarily entirely accurate to the statistical performance of each site, I can only glean so much from experience and traffic trackers LMAO that said I did ask some comic pals for input and they were very helpful in helping me adjust it with their own takes <3).

The homogenization of the Internet has really whipped people into submission for the "big sites" that offer "everything", but that's never been the Internet, it relies on being multi-faceted and offering different spaces for different purposes. And we're seeing that ideology falter through the enshittification of sites like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc. where users are at odds with the platforms because the platforms are gutting features in an attempt to satisfy shareholders whom without the platforms would not exist. Like, most of us aren't paying money to use social media sites / comic platform sites, so where else are they gonna make the necessary funds to keep these sites running? Selling ad space and locking features behind paywalls.

And this is especially true for a lot of budding sites that don't have the audience to support them via crowdfunding but also don't have the leverage to ask for investments - so unless they get really REALLY lucky in EITHER of those departments, they're gonna be operating at a loss, and even once they do achieve either of those things there are gonna be issues in the site's longevity, whether it be dying from lack of growing crowdfunding support or dying from shareholder meddling.

So what can we do?

We can learn how to take our independence back. We don't have to stop using these big platforms altogether as they do have things to offer in their own way, particularly their large audience sizes and dipping into other demographics that might not be reachable from certain sites - but we gotta learn that no single site is going to satisfy every wish we have and we have to be willing to learn the skills necessary to running our own spaces again. Pick up HTML/CSS, get to know other people who know HTML/CSS if you can't grasp it (it's me, I can't grasp it LOL), be willing to take a chance on those "smaller sites" and don't write them off entirely as spaces that can be beneficial to you just because they don't have large numbers or because they don't offer rewards programs. And if you have a really polished piece of work in your hands, look into agencies and publishing houses that specialize in indie comics / graphic novels, don't settle for the first Originals contract that gets sent your way.

For the last decade corporations have been convincing us that our worth is tied to the eyes we can bring to them. Instead of serving ourselves, we've begun serving the big guys, insisting that it has to be worth something eventually and that it'll "payoff" simply by the virtue of gambler's fallacy. Ask yourself what site is right for you and your work rather than asking yourself if your work is good enough for them. Most of us are broke trying to make it work on these sites anyways, may as well be broke and fulfilled by posting in places that actually suit us and our work if we can. Don't define your success by what sites like Webtoons are enforcing - that definition only benefits them, not you.

[hyolks]

ohhh early 2000s protagonists save me

[captain-lovelace]

weird that we treat autism and ADHD as intrinsically linked due to high rates of comorbidity but no one talks that way about autism and schizophrenia or autism and OCD or autism and bipolar disorder etc etc even though those are also often comorbid. gee I wonder why

[pitflight]

list of palestinian fundraisers from people who have reached out to me- each has a name, tumblr @, amount raised/goal, gofundme link, verification, and any additional info. please donate if you can and share these families’ fundraisers. additionally, visit their blogs and gofundmes and read their stories in their own words. all of them have persevered through so much, and as many of them have said, it’s not easy to ask for help- take some time to listen to them. this post will be edited regularly with updated information and additional fundraisers. please check the original post and reblogs for updates and share the latest version.

version date: 10/20/24

30 FUNDRAISERS (1-30) BELOW THE CUT ⬇️, 18 AND 26 MORE IN ADDITIONAL REBLOGS- PLEASE SHARE FULL LIST OF 74

1. dina @dinamahammed99 and @dina-my-family $15,566/$50,000 gofundme pinned post verification

2. karam al nabih @karamrafeek £1,063/£7,000 gofundme pinned post post with verification new gofundme (previous had problems, stopped at €13,880)

3. mohammed salem @save-salem-family2 €7,302/€10,000 gofundme pinned post with verification

4. fidaa @fidaa-family2 $61,418/$75,000 gofundme pinned post with verification

5. bilal @shadowyavenuetaco £9,167/£50,000 gofundme main post verification nephew of @/yasermohammad, current short term goal of £9,500

6. mahmoud ayyad @mahmoudayyad €7,395/€55,000 gofundme pinned post verification

7. asmaa ayyad @asmaayyad €25,670/€45,000 gofundme pinned post with verification

8. muhammad imad abdel latif sharab @d-mohammed and @adham89s €4,868/€100,000 gofundme main post verified by 90-ghost on prior blogs that are now inactive

9. motaz @motaz225 kr96,457 SEK/kr250,000 gofundme pinned post verification

10. ahmed jehad @ahmad-syam-blog $6,518 CAD/$40,000 gofundme post with verification (links are dead but gofundme is still up)

11. sara hussein @sara-97a €1,615/€50,000 gofundme post with verification

12. asmaa @asmaamajed2 $10,920/$50,000 gofundme pinned post verification (90-ghost reblog)

13. mohammad @yasermohammad €26,870/€35,000 gofundme pinned post verification bilal @/shadowyavenuetaco’s uncle and family, current short term goal of €27,000

14. salam @save-salam-family €24,937/€40,000 gofundme pinned post verification (90-ghost reblog)

15. marah baalousha @freepaleatine95 $32,861/$50,000 gofundme pinned post verification

16. falestine @falestine-yousef $31,548/$40,000 gofundme post with verification and her family's other gofundmes, including doaa and tahrir (below)

17. ola @olagaza $58,396/$85,000 gofundme pinned post with verification (vetted list links match)

18. ahmad @ahmad-gaza $11,612/$35,000 gofundme post with verification

19. khaled smeer @khaledgazacity $1,688 AUD/$60,000 gofundme main post no verification yet but gofundme is donation protected and very new and reverse image search is clear (links are dead but gofundme is still up)

20. amal @amalgheelan and @amalgaza99 $8,249/$50,000 gofundme pinned post verification

21. doaa @dodoomar12345 @free-gaza2 and @dodoomar12 kr271,530 SEK/kr500,000 and $7,186/$12,000 gofundme 1 gofundme 2 pinned post 1 with verification pinned post 2

22. hanaa @hanaa-yousef and @hanaa987 £30,570/£50,000 gofundme pinned post with verification

23. aseel @aseelo680 $59,608/$100,000 gofundme pinned post verification and art raffle

24. tahrir @tahreer-199 and @tahreer-1990 $12,445/$65,000 gofundme pinned post verification

25. nabila @nabila58 and @nabelamohamed $6,355/$10,000 gofundme main post verification

26. safaa asaad @safaa18mero $24,408/$75,000 gofundme pinned post verification (pinned and blog link dead but verification and gofundme still up)

27. hashem @hashemsh12 and @hashemsh92 €13,026/€45,000 gofundme pinned post verification

28. ahmed @ahmeddahlancampaign €340/€35,000 gofundme main post verified by @/gazavetters #130 (links match)

29. youssef @yousefjehad3 $9,673/$15,000 gofundme pinned post with verification

30. anas al-sharfa @anasalshrafa €12,981/€50,000 gofundme recent post no verification yet but likely legit

[wreniriis]

One year of Tears of the Kingdom 🐉☁️

[wickedcriminal]

Oh that's where he went

[mochiobonio]

the great fairies in totk realized they wanted more rupees...