#but it's ok... we all have to move on eventually

[pastryfication]

hi! 🤗 maybe something cute for kimi about how he loves most things zombie apocalypse related, and he decides on a movie one night except it’s kinda gorey and scary! we try to be good and stick it out for kimi since he loves this kind of stuff, but eventually we can’t handle it anymore and just have to snuggle closer to him subtly (hoping he doesn’t notice how freaked out we are)

strayed a bit from your request but i hope it’s ok xx

It was hard to deny Kimi anything. In general you just wanted him to be happy all the time, but it was especially hard when he looked at you so pleadingly, eyes wide with hope that made it impossible to utter a word even close to no.

He was good at that. At getting his way when you disagreed over the small things. The things that were so mundane. So matterless that it didn’t make sense to argue.

He knew he just had to flash you the pouty look he had perfected and you would be goo, melting into his arms and agreeing to anything and everything. He didn’t use it for his advantage often - no, he would argue that he only used it when you were being stubborn, when you were denying yourself something he could easily give you - but this time, he had to admit that it was selfish of him.

He was tired. Exhausted from being on the road for three weeks in a row, the constant stress and pressure hanging over his head, making it impossible to relax. The hundreds of kilometres between you had made it impossible to be with you except for a few sparse moments over facetime where you tried to give him your entire focus. But it was difficult. There was always a distraction around the corner, wanting to steal you from him and he’d had enough.

He wanted to spend real time with you. Just enjoy the feeling of you in his arms as his shoulders lowered all the way for the first time in 20 days.

But he also wanted to watch a new movie he’d been looking forward to since the cast announcement had first appeared on his feed.

That was the reason for the puppy eyes he flashed you as you stood in front of him, arms crossed defiantly in front of your chest as you stared down at his open arms.

“Please, tesoro. Don’t you want me to relax?” His lip was jutted comically out, his fingers making grabby hands towards you like he was a small child wanting comfort.

“Kimi… that isn’t a relaxing movie.” You tried to hold your own, arguing hesitantly, but it was a lost cause and you knew it. It was impossible to disagree with him when he looked at you like that. When you hadn’t seen him for far too long and your hands ached to caress his hair and face and hold him as close as possible.

“For me it is.” He insisted, a smile finally breaking onto his face when you sunk down next to him, hands immediately finding his.

He pulled you closer, practically manhandling you into his lap before he was satisfied, placing a lingering kiss into your hair. Your hair that smelled so intensely of softness, comfort and home. The smell of you.

You let out a sigh, half exasperation, half contentment. You didn’t mind giving in to his wishes; not when he smiled so widely at you, like you’d gifted him something big and expensive and not just agreed to watch a gooey science fiction flick.

As the starting credits filled the screen in front of you, Kimi tightened his grip just slightly, as if making sure you wouldn’t move, wouldn’t leave his side even for second. Almost in reply, almost to assure him that you really were there, you melted further into his strong arms, leaning against his chest with silent contentment, even as the movie continued, scenes making you flinch and look away.

You didn’t pay much attention to the plot - in fact, you probably saw more of your boyfriends chest than of the actual action, but you didn’t mind. When it came to the brunette boy who had snaked his way so permanently into your heart, you’d do just about anything if it meant making him smile that carefree smile he only bore when he was completely relaxed. A smile you saw more than others. A smile that was worth enduring even the grossest zombie apocalypse film for.

-

You fell asleep before the end credits rolled around, your body curled entirely into his.

He hasn’t noticed, not until you let out a particularly loud breath, almost a mumble of something and buried yourself deeper into him.

His body stilled for a second, unsure what to do next, but the relaxing weight of your limps on top of his got to him. You were breathing almost in sync, as if even in your sleep, even in your most vulnerable form, you wanted to remind him that you loved him. That you trusted him.

And he loved you right back. The love and trust and safety you had become synonymous with filled his entire body as he inched himself into a more comfortable position, careful to keep you close.

The movie had been good. Exactly the nice distraction he had needed. It was the kind of movie he knew you wouldn’t like and therefore wouldn’t put your attention to. The kind of movie where he could get your full attention. And laying there with you, all warmth and love, he felt truly relaxed. He closed his eyes - just to rest them for a moment - and breathed in the peacefulness, trying to bottle it up in his mind so he could stay there forever.

[whateverisbeautiful]

Hey there! Do you ever ponder how Rick and Michonne would fit into eachothers worlds if the zombie apocalypse wouldn't have happened? I envison Michonne as this highly educated, trendy, city girl with a career as a successful and high powered attorney who wears expensive designer clothes, has nice artsy things, and lives in a high rise condo in a bustling city. Rick on the other hand, seems to be a traditional small town country boy who maybe struggled some to take care of his wife and son on one income. I often daydream about how Richonne's world would intersect pre apocalypse and how they would fit in eachother's worlds. Do you think Rick would move to the city with Michonne or vice versa? I cant picture pre apocalypse Mich living in a small town nor can i see Rick living in a high rise in the middle of a busy city lol! Rick seemed to be more traditional, do you think he'd be ok with Michonne being the bread winner and not going along with traditional roles? I know their love is kismet in any world, it'd just be so dang interesting to watch how their love and life together play out sans apocalypse!

Hey! 😊 I really like the way you put it. When I was watching TWD in real time I hadn’t thought much about how Rick and Michonne’s dynamic would play out without the apocalypse. But I have thought about it more in recent years. I definitely envision Michonne the way you described and Rick too.

I was thinking about how one of the many great things about Rick’s TOWL dreams is we got to see Michonne through his mind’s eye and what he thinks she’d be like in a non-apocalypse world. And he clearly knew too that she’d be an incredibly beautiful, successful, stylish professional all while maintaining an infectious personality, femininity, smile, and warmth.

Rick and Michonne’s professions would probably be the most likely way their paths could cross. And I think they’d surprise themselves with their connection because their worlds are so different. I feel like the apocalypse introduced both Rick and Michonne to the truest version of themselves which then allowed them to find their truest soulmate in each other. But because Richonne is truly inevitable I think they could absolutely still find their way to each other in a non-ZA world and eventually fall in love, even if a real world scenario came with a bit more delays and complications.

Regarding the traditional roles thing, Rick and Michonne both have a commendable humility. And so I think Rick would totally be supportive of Michonne’s professional success and Michonne would totally embrace being a supportive wife to him, because neither would view the other as “less than” for doing so.

Something so special about Rick & Michonne is they are truly home to each other. So while a bustling city life isn’t Rick’s scene and a rural small town life isn’t Michonne’s scene, I think they’re the rare type of soulmates who could successfully adapt and make it work anywhere they laid roots. Because as long as they were together, they’d feel more at home than ever.

[la-principessa-nuova]

Mine was also a joke I made, but just to myself.

I made a kind of boring comic about it before, but basically, I was sitting at my desk in my college dorm, and I came across an article about how some female protagonist in an upcoming title was really important because she would give young girls someone to connect with and see themselves in and teach them that they can do whatever it was the protagonist does too.

And I was basically like, “Yay that’s great! …but actually, hang on… is it even true that people connect more to characters of their own gender?” And it just struck me as weird because I connected way more to female characters than male ones, and I loved reading books that went deep into a female protagonist’s thoughts, and I felt more connected to women I played as in games than men.

And I wondered if maybe everyone just felt like that, and maybe either women were just easier to connect with, or books meant to appeal to women just went deeper into thoughts and less into action and maybe that’s why? Or maybe stereotypes around women lead people to write women that way?

And so I decided that maybe it’s not actually true that people connect more with/see themselves more in characters of their own gender, and it’s just that people who realize it’s not true don’t want to say that because it would make it harder to push for equal representation in media and so it’s just a white lie we keep up that’s easy to sell?

And I basically thought, “Yeah, that’s gotta be it. Because it’s the only way it makes any sense that I connect more with female characters.”

And then as a joke to myself in my head, I added on, “unless I was trans!”

And I laughed, “ha ha ha ha… ha????”

and then I realized that was actually legitimately a possibility I had never considered and I immediately set out to figure out if that could be true, and I completely failed to disprove it, and in fact just found immediately that the only reason I didn’t feel like the label “woman” applied to me was because I felt excluded from it, like I wasn’t allowed to have it apply to me.

And funnily enough I immediately compared myself to my siblings and was immediately like “well if any of us are trans it’s <oldest sibling>”, who only ended up realizing she was trans 6 years later.

But I ended that being 100% sure I was not a man and undecided whether I was a woman or nonbinary (whatever that was), mainly because I didn’t feel like the label woman could apply to be and I thought I would have realized sooner and felt gender dysphoria harder, so I just assumed maybe that means I’m nonbinary and i must be ok with my (now dead) name and he/him pronouns.

And I briefly tried experimenting with transitioning socially online at the time but I got scared out of it and intentionally avoided the trans community online bc i felt like i needed to be able to prove to my parents that this came from inside me and I wasn’t indoctrinated or anything, so I missed out on a lot of the info that would have helped me figure things out and on acceptance or anything like that, and once I moved back into my parents’ house and started commuting, I didn’t have that time and freedom to think about things like that, so I just stopped trying and it became this thing I knew but just figured must be fine to ignore.

And then like 7 years later I finally moved out of my parents’ house, and it finally gave me the time to think, and I started spending more time like I did in my dorm thinking about what my gender really was. And I started watching things like Drawfee and Dropout that were really openly supportive of trans people, and it made me feel more OK engaging more with it, and I started watching some YouTube videos about trans people and eventually by actual trans people, and started understanding it a bit more.

And then one day I decided to look up what gender dysphoria really meant to trans people, rather than a medical definition, and I ended up on genderdysphoria.fyi, and then I stayed up all night reading that and realizing how many aspects of gender dysphoria I had been ignoring and how many other feelings were just gender dysphoria or the direct effects of ignoring it, and how much I needed to transition in order to start living my life.

And fast forward 3 years and here we are, lol.

If I cracked your egg, you have to tell me.

Or tell me what did it. Mine was the reddit story of the girl that tried her gf's wig.

[biancasaidstfu]

Update.

My colleague watched some of the YouTube documentary, she wouldn't watch all of it, not that interested to watch all. She took my advice and did not get too deep into things, she thinks the fandom is toxic but her general opinion is all fandoms are toxic and she doesn't care to join one. She prefers to be casual just looking at movies or shows she likes and she's not one to follow celebrities all the time. If she sees something she will skim it but then move on.

Context as well, she does not believe things from Deuxmoi and the others. Her opinion of all entertainment sites and magazines is that they all lie and if they interview a celebrity they still have some lie or omit in some way because we only get what they want us to know. She thinks Luke and Nicola are not together now, it does not mean they would never be but they do have something between them. She says we will never know because they don't want us to know and it is actually better that we do not see the intimate side they have because if it is public it gets ruined when people track them down too much. She told me examples of other couples who had potential but the pressure of the public was too much and added to their problems which made their relationship hard (one was Miley and Liam). Whatever we see written about them will never confirm their true relationship with or without each other. The only thing we will get to hold on to is they are friends as that is what was confirmed by them.

I shared some theories with her. She does not think Netflix or Shondaland has anything to do with their stuff and hasn't seen anything from them that would want their employers to get involved (I explained the drama with Antonia, Jake, pap walks, all of it).

She agrees on the outside it looks messy but they will do what they want when they want. Her opinion of their relationships is that they are having fun with their unconfirmed bf/gf but they will eventually move on from them and that is normal part of life and celebrity relationships.

Her conclusion is she understands why fans ship Luke and Nicola, they really make it hard not to ship them. She thinks they are cute and if they ever get together she hopes they keep private and secret like some other couples are able to.

I like her take on things but it still doesn't change my mind. I'm shipping them. Good news as well is she won't get sucked in so we are safe with this one!

I am introducing her to Tumblr but she has no interest in joining. In her mind all social media is bad and she's ok with the one she has. I saw her lurking on Nicola's page 🤭

Good luck to her 🙏🏼 she gonna need it

[ehh-is-the-name]

II 18 AM I RIGHT FOLKS????

OH MY FCJING GODD, I didn't visit this site for like 4 days just to not get spoiled and that was THE CORRECT DECISION!!!

WE STAY WINNING!!!! TAKE MY VIDEO AND GIFS!!!!

First of all, let's just all take a minute to appreciate the best part <3

There was the pg line later, and I really don't blame them. I mean... come on now this felt graphic. It's literally like if someones guts was splayed across the ground after an explosion. I love it but holy shit. Anyway my favourite gif on my PC:

Him getting his comeuppance is what I needed. I can die peacefully now <3

At the same time, I really can't get over this-

I mean, just look at the way he's staring- He definitely wants a bite.

= - - =

Now that I got that out of my system let me start from the top.

I can't be the only one to think that he might've been thinking about... Ya know. Let's just say season 1 finale-ing it again once he realised that Cobs wasn't holding him. Though that might be projection, he was probably just looking at everything truly being gone.

THIS SCENE ACTUALLY GAVE ME CHILLS. MePhone was so silent for every part up to this, hearing him sound absolutely petrified to the cut to the stabbing is ACTUALLY terrifying. God, it was like the suitcase being torn in half scene except real-

The abusive alcoholic father memes were right.

^ Quite literally my reaction to the first half of the ep today. Literally guess he's really good at hitting. Cobs can't swing a sword (thank god) but apparently, he can hit hard enough to fucking shatter glass in one hit.

This one too... Bro's cared about them so much and I can't with this shit man- I FUCKING CAN'T!!! LITERALLY MAKING SURE NOBODY COULD DIE OVER THIS SHIT AGAIN-

I actually can't y'all. I finished this ep like 4 hours ago and I still can't unhear or unsee these scenes.

"I made you so I can unmake you"??? "I desurve this"????? "You wanted my approval but I didn't care if you lived or died"!!! HOLY FUCKIN SHIT-

Sure, I could pull a book outta Cobs' and be like "lol he's dead who cares about a dead man" but DAWGS I can't stop thinking about the layers of trauma literally everyone's going to deal with specifically mephone because I'm a mephone head, sorry not sorry at all. In the span of a day, he watched everyone he cared about die, come back to life, his brother die, his abuser die, and move on from the reminder of his abuser (inanimate insanity). Like that's a lot to happen in a day guys. That's A FUCKTON to happen in a day. BOX IS ALIVE TOO- LIKE C'MON THiS IS CUFKCING CRASZY.

I don't even know what to say about this scene, I just really like it. Maybe it's 'cause he pulled out his kernels. Moving on.

This scene fuckin' gets me- His fuckin' "THEY'RE STILL ALIVE????" Will always get me. Maybe it's 'cause of all the talk of them being dead it just gets me that he got to know that they weren't, and that they didn't die <3

Top 10 scenes that make me glad Cobs exploded. I can't believe he fucking died for our sins (I'm still coping).

THE WAY HE WAS WITH MEPAD BEFORE HE WOKE UP </3 I can't believe they fucking killed him after showing this in the beginning.

That transition from early s2 to late s2 style was phenomenal, but just look at the scene- MePhone essentially talking to a brick wall about the show is killing me. MePhone probably felt more close to MePad than MePad did about him. I say that but I'm not saying MePad didn't care about him on some level. But y'all know. Also not overlooking the "Enhancing Obedience Emulation" installation either. I guess that's what makes him dying for our sins more meaningful. I can't believe he's fucking dead,.

Close to lastly 'cause I'm runing out of imgs in this post and I want to look through the tag now, I'M SO HAPPY TOILET'S ALIVE!!! ANd apparently not made by Mephone? Like MePad was talking about toilet when he showed up and idk- maybe I gotta watch that scene over again- Idon't know y'all. I'm feeling so many things this series finale.

OH OH AND THE SCENE WITH BOT'S LEGS AND FAN GOING "This is gonna be a whole thing, isn't it" WITH BOW IN THE FOREGROUND. IT FUCKING BETTER BE!!!! I NEED THEM TO TALK!!! PLEASE!

Oh and actual last thing, I actually SCREAMED when 3gs came on screen here.

Everything about this scene. There were many objects being mirrored, like Box and Suitcase, but 3gs and Mephone being face to face with breaks made the title click. They've always been mirrors of each other and I didn't even realise it. They're both free and it's genuinely beautiful. I hope the demolish Meeple as an act of freeing everyone there. I want the metags free, I want mecintosh free, everyone. Very glad 4s still exists inside of Mephone, it was so nice to see him, but I really want everyone to be free. Can't believe Mepad fuckin' died for our sins.... Everyone grew in someway or another, I think.

All in all, I'm just glad the corn man's dead <3

I didn't make popcorn but he did burn!!

Happy inanimate insanity y'all! We've made it to the end of an era <3

[twnxfiresigns]

just realized (one of) the reason(s) why i’m so attached to odysseus and athena’s relationship in epic…they remind me of me and my (ex) bestie

[skyscrapergods]

Every time you drop new lore I get a new idea that I can't figure out how/have the motivation to craft a full story out of lmao

Been thinking about those people asking if Cellie or Luna would notice if somepony lands on them, and I couldn't help but thinking about a pony escaping some sort of abusive situation and flying to the one place they couldn't imagine anypony following them- a goddess.

Would the goddess care? I imagine Luna most definitely would, but Celestia? Maybe, on a sort of vague level, in that she cares about the well being of all creatures. Or maybe she would on a much deeper level than anticipated, seeing as she knows all too well what comes from that sort of thing.

Just wanted to stop by to say thank you for the brain food, I just adore how your universe is coming along! Your worldbuilding is exquisite.

Celestia would not notice you for a while. She may get a vague sense of someone seeking sanctuary, so she would feel protective. If you stay more than a few sunsets she would realize your significance and check you out. She won't ask you about your day or anything, and caring about your story is a little difficult for her. But if your abuser shows up, well... They shouldn't have been so close to a goddess' feet.

The others would care much more, and want to know your whole story and give you comfort. Luna would protect your dreams, Cadance would protect you physically, and Twilight would connect you to a support network to help you get your life back and stay safe.

[ask-nikolaorsinov]

{{reread the strange music transcript and help. help. im so foolish. i thought nikolas been ringmaster a WHILE but the photo with nikolai denikin titles the ringmaster as gregor, and the photo was from 1948??? THATS SO RECENT {{ the wiki says the timeline for breekon & hope leaving is weird because they left After the gorilla skin was stolen which supposedly happened sometime After 2006 (when daniel was anglerfished) but they supposedly took over breekon & hope company after they left which they took the company in 1993.

{{ the timeline for nikola killing gregor and becoming ringmaster is then most likely somewhere between 1948-1993 Minimum. slightly insane to me what do u mean she hasnt even been ringmaster for a century. what do u mean its possible she hasnt even been ringmaster for 50 years. what. huh. i think she deserves the 50 year mark at least. im saying she struck sometime soon after that photo. maybe later the same year or even just 1949 or 1950 idk.

{{ nikolai denikin died in 2004 and had spent the prior two years being looked after by his granddaughter. so he left the circus in 2002 at Minimum. potentially either result of gorilla skin or if the skin was taken After his leave then it could be that he either made a personal decision OR he had some sort of issue with nikola becoming ringmaster (maybe fond of gregor or thought her unfit or just. generally something or another.

[seaofreverie]

Sparkstember Day 25: Hippopotamus (What The Hell Is It This Time?)

My Hippopotamus rant is here. I love Hippo and I think this was one of the best examples of how putting something off for later can be a very good idea sometimes. So I didn't hear most of it until this summer, and hearing the whole album then was one of the biggest highlights of that time. Thank you modern era Sparks for always bringing us the awesomest music ever.

[thatonecrookedsmile]

More progress being made. I finished re-reading The Illusion of Living this past Friday. It's a nice book. 👍 This was the last of the Bendy books in this "marathon" that I'm doing which I had already read previously and now I'm rereading, meaning that I'm kind of up to date when it comes to rereading all the books that were released until December 2021. But the race is not over yet. Soon I'll start Fade To Black, and (technically) I'll finally be up to date.

Just to continue my chain of posting about the books I finished (at least, the main ones that I really wanted to read) here it is…something I did at the beginning of March, on the night when shit went down. (I hope you know what I'm talking about). I saw the tweets first hand, I was there! Right at the damn moment. And it was..something reading those tweets alright. If the image above doesn't show it, my mood that night and the next 1-2 days wasn't so… great. You might read this and think I'm exaggerating, but that night especially I, uuhhh, I didn't feel good! And this image (and maybe 2 more posts I made that night) are the results of that. (And to think that a week before this happened, I had finished rereading DCTL after a long time. Talk about better/worse timing than this)

At least, if you want the bright side of this, it's that even after that day, I decided to continue with my book marathon, and I don't regret it. I was down that day, but I wasn't out yet damn it!! and I'm still not. (I don't know if this sentence makes a lot of sense, but you get my point)

As a bonus, here's something I did the night I got to the part where Henry is first mentioned in the book (you can consider this as a representation of my reaction when he's first mentioned, both for when I read TIOL for the first time in 2021, as now in this rereading)

Feat. canon Henry design and my fanon design for him (I wanted to include him here + I still read this book with my fan-designs in mind)

[anishenanigans]

i haven't drawn serious fanart for anything in so long good lord. i do miss drawing fandom related stuff but im balls deep in OC lore so that's mostly what I like drawing right now + it's very rare that I have ideas and motivation to make any fanart other than basic headshots of characters I like </3

I do still love everything I used to make art for! and I don't plan to distance myself from any of those communities! but I'm at a point where I'm happier just Enjoying fanworks instead of making them myself.

I like using my time & creative energy to focus primarily on my characters, because if I don't create things for them nobody will. and I want to eventually take all these loose parts and make something Tangible (which isn't to say fanworks aren't just as cool and valid, because they are, and I really admire the people who make fanart/fics).

There is some LMK stuff I want to draw for sure but idk when I'll get around to Doing That. The Interest tm is still going strong as ever, but the soul crushingly long and silent hiatus is KILLING ME and the most fulfilling/sustainable/etc source of entertainment I've found to enjoy in the meantime is working on my own stuff

What's become most appealing to me is creating something that exists entirely on my own terms and is inseparably personal to me in a way I won't get from drawing any amount of fanart. so ummm just dont expect a ton of fanart from me in the future. ok rant over i just wanted to get that out there

[letters-to-a-faraway-lullaby]

idk man maybe im just built different but for the brief span of time i had expendable money?? yea i made dumb impulse purchases but i also was sending hundreds of dollars to my good friends who werent doing so well financially. like hundreds. id order food delivered to their work weekly if not daily and pay for rent/groceries

meanwhile im over here scraping the bottom of the barrel for Months--actually now YEARS in between work, and all my better off friends are all oh:)) going to vegas! and ireland!! and getting new pets!! and this and that and this and im like......ok......cooooool......

[fakevariety]

told my parents multiple times how harmful ai is for the environment and my mom’s argument is “well ai is gonna take over our lives eventually so might as well get used to it now”

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Amazon annihilates Alexa privacy settings, turns on continuous, nonconsensual audio uploading

I'm on a 20+ city book tour for my new novel PICKS AND SHOVELS. Catch me in SAN DIEGO at MYSTERIOUS GALAXY on Mar 24, and in CHICAGO with PETER SAGAL on Apr 2. More tour dates here.

Even by Amazon standards, this is extraordinarily sleazy: starting March 28, each Amazon Echo device will cease processing audio on-device and instead upload all the audio it captures to Amazon's cloud for processing, even if you have previously opted out of cloud-based processing:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/03/everything-you-say-to-your-echo-will-be-sent-to-amazon-starting-on-march-28/

It's easy to flap your hands at this bit of thievery and say, "surveillance capitalists gonna surveillance capitalism," which would confine this fuckery to the realm of ideology (that is, "Amazon is ripping you off because they have bad ideas"). But that would be wrong. What's going on here is a material phenomenon, grounded in specific policy choices and by unpacking the material basis for this absolutely unforgivable move, we can understand how we got here – and where we should go next.

Start with Amazon's excuse for destroying your privacy: they want to do AI processing on the audio Alexa captures, and that is too computationally intensive for on-device processing. But that only raises another question: why does Amazon want to do this AI processing, even for customers who are happy with their Echo as-is, at the risk of infuriating and alienating millions of customers?

For Big Tech companies, AI is part of a "growth story" – a narrative about how these companies that have already saturated their markets will still continue to grow. It's hard to overstate how dominant Amazon is: they are the leading cloud provider, the most important retailer, and the majority of US households already subscribe to Prime. This may sound like a good place to be, but for Amazon, it's actually very dangerous.

Amazon has a sky-high price/earnings ratio – about triple the ratio of other retailers, like Target. That scorching P/E ratio reflects a belief by investors that Amazon will continue growing. Companies with very high p/e ratios have an unbeatable advantage relative to mature competitors – they can buy things with their stock, rather than paying cash for them. If Amazon wants to hire a key person, or acquire a key company, it can pad its offer with its extremely high-value, growing stock. Being able to buy things with stock instead of money is a powerful advantage, because money is scarce and exogenous (Amazon must acquire money from someone else, like a customer), while new Amazon stock can be conjured into existence by typing zeroes into a spreadsheet:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/03/06/privacy-last/#exceptionally-american

But the downside here is that every growth stock eventually stops growing. For Amazon to double its US Prime subscriber base, it will have to establish a breeding program to produce tens of millions of new Americans, raising them to maturity, getting them gainful employment, and then getting them to sign up for Prime. Almost by definition, a dominant firm ceases to be a growing firm, and lives with the constant threat of a stock revaluation as investors belief in future growth crumbles and they punch the "sell" button, hoping to liquidate their now-overvalued stock ahead of everyone else.

For Big Tech companies, a growth story isn't an ideological commitment to cancer-like continuous expansion. It's a practical, material phenomenon, driven by the need to maintain investor confidence that there are still worlds for the company to conquer.

That's where "AI" comes in. The hype around AI serves an important material need for tech companies. By lumping an incoherent set of poorly understood technologies together into a hot buzzword, tech companies can bamboozle investors into thinking that there's plenty of growth in their future.

OK, so that's the material need that this asshole tactic satisfies. Next, let's look at the technical dimension of this rug-pull.

How is it possible for Amazon to modify your Echo after you bought it? After all, you own your Echo. It is your property. Every first year law student learns this 18th century definition of property, from Sir William Blackstone:

That sole and despotic dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in total exclusion of the right of any other individual in the universe.

If the Echo is your property, how come Amazon gets to break it? Because we passed a law that lets them. Section 1201 of 1998's Digital Millennium Copyright Act makes it a felony to "bypass an access control" for a copyrighted work:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/24/record-scratch/#autoenshittification

That means that once Amazon reaches over the air to stir up the guts of your Echo, no one is allowed to give you a tool that will let you get inside your Echo and change the software back. Sure, it's your property, but exercising sole and despotic dominion over it requires breaking the digital lock that controls access to the firmware, and that's a felony punishable by a five-year prison sentence and a $500,000 fine for a first offense.

The Echo is an internet-connected device that treats its owner as an adversary and is designed to facilitate over-the-air updates by the manufacturer that are adverse to the interests of the owner. Giving a manufacturer the power to downgrade a device after you've bought it, in a way you can't roll back or defend against is an invitation to run the playbook of the Darth Vader MBA, in which the manufacturer replies to your outraged squawks with "I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it any further":

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/26/hit-with-a-brick/#graceful-failure

The ability to remotely, unilaterally alter how a device or service works is called "twiddling" and it is a key factor in enshittification. By "twiddling" the knobs and dials that control the prices, costs, search rankings, recommendations, and core features of products and services, tech firms can play a high-speed shell-game that shifts value away from customers and suppliers and toward the firm and its executives:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/19/twiddler/

But how can this be legal? You bought an Echo and explicitly went into its settings to disable remote monitoring of the sounds in your home, and now Amazon – without your permission, against your express wishes – is going to start sending recordings from inside your house to its offices. Isn't that against the law?

Well, you'd think so, but US consumer privacy law is unbelievably backwards. Congress hasn't passed a consumer privacy law since 1988, when the Video Privacy Protection Act banned video store clerks from disclosing which VHS cassettes you brought home. That is the last technological privacy threat that Congress has given any consideration to:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/06/privacy-first/#but-not-just-privacy

This privacy vacuum has been filled up with surveillance on an unimaginable scale. Scumbag data-brokers you've never heard of openly boast about having dossiers on 91% of adult internet users, detailing who we are, what we watch, what we read, who we live with, who we follow on social media, what we buy online and offline, where we buy, when we buy, and why we buy:

https://gizmodo.com/data-broker-brags-about-having-highly-detailed-personal-information-on-nearly-all-internet-users-2000575762

To a first approximation, every kind of privacy violation is legal, because the concentrated commercial surveillance industry spends millions lobbying against privacy laws, and those millions are a bargain, because they make billions off the data they harvest with impunity.

Regulatory capture is a function of monopoly. Highly concentrated sectors don't need to engage in "wasteful competition," which leaves them with gigantic profits to spend on lobbying, which is extraordinarily effective, because a sector that is dominated by a handful of firms can easily arrive at a common negotiating position and speak with one voice to the government:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/06/05/regulatory-capture/

Starting with the Carter administration, and accelerating through every subsequent administration except Biden's, America has adopted an explicitly pro-monopoly policy, called the "consumer welfare" antitrust theory. 40 years later, our economy is riddled with monopolies:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/17/monopolies-produce-billionaires/#inequality-corruption-climate-poverty-sweatshops

Every part of this Echo privacy massacre is downstream of that policy choice: "growth stock" narratives about AI, twiddling, DMCA 1201, the Darth Vader MBA, the end of legal privacy protections. These are material things, not ideological ones. They exist to make a very, very small number of people very, very rich.

Your Echo is your property, you paid for it. You paid for the product and you are still the product:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/14/luxury-surveillance/#liar-liar

Now, Amazon says that the recordings your Echo will send to its data-centers will be deleted as soon as it's been processed by the AI servers. Amazon's made these claims before, and they were lies. Amazon eventually had to admit that its employees and a menagerie of overseas contractors were secretly given millions of recordings to listen to and make notes on:

https://archive.is/TD90k

And sometimes, Amazon just sent these recordings to random people on the internet:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/12/20/amazon-alexa-user-receives-audio-recordings-stranger-through-human-error/

Fool me once, etc. I will bet you a testicle* that Amazon will eventually have to admit that the recordings it harvests to feed its AI are also being retained and listened to by employees, contractors, and, possibly, randos on the internet.

*Not one of mine

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/2025/03/15/altering-the-deal/#telescreen

Image: Stock Catalog/https://www.quotecatalog.com (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Alexa_%2840770465691%29.jpg

Sam Howzit (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:SWC_6_-_Darth_Vader_Costume_(7865106344).jpg

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

[catmask]

meowdy! looks like our move to a new apartment is not going to be so peaceful after all - our old apartment is currently leaking sewage water and we have to evacuate four people and two cats! donations are appreciated, but im opening an emergency sale + commissions too! (more under the cut)

KO-FI SHOP SALE + EMERGENCY COMMISSIONS ARE OPEN!

DISCOUNT CODE IS 'LEAK' IN ALL CAPS

so for this section, i'm going to break down everything thats happening + when things will come off hiatus! i'm hoping that everything will be set up in the new place by JUNE 1st, so that is the hard deadline i'm setting to start all functions up again as usual.

WHAT'S HAPPENING?

two years ago, my fiance and i were offered emergency housing when we (very suddenly and tragically) became the parents to his orphaned little sister. both of us are only 26 and had to move 8 hours from where we had been living at the time, so the housing we had was the best 2 people with few connections and no established jobs could find within a single weeks notice.

since then, we have been saving up and working to finally have a proper place to live. and we did so! at the beginning of this month we found an apartment where all of us can move to. we have a friend staying with us who is helping with the move as well.

i really wanted this move to be seamless - basically, you wouldn't have had to know it was happening. we were going to pay double rent for two months while i would stream and work from the old place, and begin sleeping at the new one. its expensive, but i didn't want my real life to trouble anyone here.

unfortunately this is no longer possible. the old building we were staying at had a pipe begin to leak, then eventually flood our entire apartment. this has been a reoccurring problem the landlord hasn't seemed to find a solution for, and it's led to a biohazard where we were planning on slowly moving from - leading to an immediate and emergency evacuation for the safety of everyone in our family.

SO... STREAMING?

will be back online as soon as possible! we moved out our tech as soon as we could due to fear of water damage, and it seems like everything is A-OK. we just need to rebuild my desk and sound proof the new room, so this will probaaabbly be back online within a week? im just going to take the week off to make sure everything is set up and there are no bugs. (digital. digital bugs.)

LAIKA'S COMET?

for the sake of not losing my buffer crazystyle, i'm pausing laika's until JUNE 1st. but i'm going to post one more page right now to leave you guys on a cliffhanger because i think it's funny. (the ko-fi will still update as regular as i finish pages! tbh, in between moving i am going to be drawing.... a LOT... it's like my only self soothing activity i have access to right now </3)

SHOP STUFF?

you basically won't notice a difference. orders go out every 2 weeks anyway, and literally the day before this happened we completely caught up to date. that + all of the goods we had were already moved over because (similar to the tech) we were worried about water damage, so nothing will be yucky... (i dont know if i can say the same about our furniture or clothes ; _ ; )

FINAL NOTES

while we did manage to get out with emergency bags and a weeks worth of outfits + things to sleep on + cook with, we have no real means of knowing the extent of damage until we bring things out of the apartment and clean them here. thankfully *most* things appear undamaged, its largely the flooring and the smell that are unliveable... walking through puddles of sewage water and having to wear a mask to breathe is not really liveable conditions.

however, considering this move is sped up way faster than planned, and i wont be able to work during it - any sales or donations are hugely appreciated. ; w ;

i'm sorry to ask for help like this, and its only if you are comfortable to do so!!! i can work hard, so i don't mind doing a little extra art to make money, this is just if you feel okay to help out and would like to.

if you read this far, thank you so much - hopefully next time i will return with good news - and maybe a new apartment tour...?

[gh0stsp1d3r]

I would love to see nerd face more how it transition there sex life and dating

Like how he would react to y/n ridding him for the first time and wants to grab her boobs so he just fist the covers and she’s like you can grab them 🫣 and he reacts just like how she gave him a blow job

nerd!rafe and reader transitioning into their sex life | MDNI

A/N: OK OK… I adore this

NERD!RAFE MASTERLIST

˚｡⋆୨୧˚ SO. We all know how shy he is. At first, he’s scared to even ask for sex. Because he’s scared of making you uncomfortable or think he only is lustful over you when he gen is in love with you.

˚｡⋆୨୧˚ and because of this, you’d be the one having to iniate everything. And even then, he was always asking before he does anything… like the man was scared to touch you

˚｡⋆୨୧˚ eventually, after many many times, he starts getting to know more about what you like and what you don’t like. He learns your body so quick, it’s kinda crazy.

˚｡⋆୨୧˚ okay, okay, so when you first ride him, he’s nervous as hell. He’s never had a girl wanna ride him, like ever. And he struggles not to bust a nut as soon as he sees you on top of him and you start straddling him.

˚｡⋆୨୧˚ and he is GRIPPING those sheets at first. You’re sinking down on his cock, and he is just pulling and tugging at them, unsure of what to do with his hands. And he couldn’t just, grab your hips or something, because in his mind, he was overstepping.

˚｡⋆୨୧˚ you find it kinda cute 😭 because it IS. That man just doesn’t wanna make you uncomfy and he’s really sweet abt it. But, you come up with an idea in your head that you think he’s gonna adore.

˚｡⋆୨୧˚ you stop moving and grinding your hips on him for a moment, and you grab his hands, pulling them off the sheets. “Here.” You tell him with a sweet smile as you guided his hands towards your breasts, letting them rest there for a moment.

he looked at you in pure awe. you know he’s a boob guy, and so, why not?

˚｡⋆୨୧˚ so, you start to ride him again, and his hands are frozen still your boobs now, when you put your hands over his, and nod softly, already reading his mind.

˚｡⋆୨୧˚ he gives you a smile, looking like a kid in a freaking candy store when he starts to grope you, his hands gripping your chest and watching them bounce up and down in his hands as you ride him.

˚｡⋆୨୧˚ he busts in that moment btw.. that’s literally all he needed. And you can tell by the way his cheeks grew rosy and his soft lips parted.