#dino institute

[theartofzan]

ArtVember Day 5: Seeker

Heeeello there! Today we have my FAVORITE Disney Parks character and a heckuva paleontologist, Dr. Grant Seeker!

Animal Kingdom's Dinosaur ride is one of my favorites and I'm really gong to miss it, but I think the most painful loss for me is gonna be this preshow. :'(

Ko-Fi

[idreamofthemeparks]

Official Dinoland USA mourning post. Please share things you'll miss about the land. Some of mine:

The Trilo-Bites food stand

The video of Aladar walking around the Dino Institute that plays in the Dinosaur gift shop

Sue the T. rex's cast and getting to tell people that McDonald's was responsible for buying the original skeleton

The little scarf they put on that Corythosaurus statue on the dinosaur sculpture trail

The third Carnotaurus animatronic on Dinosaur, which has possibly the funniest B-mode ever

The Boneyard, and how cast members never look at you weird for playing in it even if you're an adult

Chip and Dale's dinosaur costumes

The fact that they refer to every other dinosaur on the ride by their scientific name, but the raptor is just "raptor"

Hey did you know that the red, white and yellow pipes are ketchup, mayo and mustard?

The unbeatable thrill of winning a Triceratops Spin plush, because the carnival games require skill and you know you earned it

Rope dropping Dinosaur and walking onto it several times in a row

[fashionlandscapeblog]

Lorena Diem photographed by Marcello Junior Dino for Institution

[mensfactory]

Bernie Ecclestone's collection of historic grand prix and Formula 1

Mr Ecclestone, 94, is now parting ways with many of them—a total of 69 cars—which will be sold via U.K. exotic car specialist Tom Hartley Jr.

Many of them have been locked away for decades, as Ecclestone rarely showed them to the public, if at all.

The crown jewels of Ecclestone’s collection include some of the most iconic machines in racing history:

José Froilán González’s Ferrari 375: The 1951 Italian Grand Prix winner that marked Ferrari’s first F1 victory.

Mike Hawthorn’s 1958 Dino: Driven by the first British Formula 1 World Champion.

Michael Schumacher’s Ferrari F2002: A car that dominated the 2002 season with 15 wins.

Ferrari 312B3: The team’s first true monocoque chassis.

Carlos Reutemann’s 1977 Brazilian GP-winning chassis.

 1993 McLaren MP4/8A F1 race car piloted by Ayrton Senna

The collection also features other historic rarities, including the Thinwall Special, further cementing its status as one of motorsport’s greatest treasure troves.

This isn’t the first time Ecclestone has let go of prized automobiles. The former F1 boss previously sold over 50 cars during RM Sotheby’s infamous auction, but this sale represents a deeper emotional moment. These cars embody not only his love for motorsport but also his unparalleled contribution to Formula 1’s history.

The sale will occur through a private treaty process, meaning the prices of individual cars will not be disclosed. However, with an estimated collective value of $634 million, collectors and institutions worldwide are expected to vie for a piece of Ecclestone’s extraordinary legacy.

[mariacallous]

The social media site X (formerly Twitter) went dark last Saturday in Brazil, where it had an estimated more than 20 million users. The ban followed months of tensions between owner Elon Musk and Brazilian authorities.

Musk, who took over the site in 2022, has been increasingly vocal about Brazil’s domestic politics. His personal account has boosted right-wing politicians, cast doubts on the integrity of Brazil’s 2022 election, promoted posts about an upcoming political demonstration, and told foreign investors to stay away from the country.

Musk objected to court orders to suspend certain content on X, including the accounts of many right-wing activists, and last month, he refused to name a legal representative for the company in Brazil. Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes ruled that if X did not reinstate a representative by Aug. 29, the platform would be shut down.

When the day arrived, in anticipation of the ban, X’s global affairs account posted that Moraes’s moves were “manifestly illegal.” It also pledged to publish confidential Brazilian court filings containing Moraes’s orders. Musk posted that the judge was an “evil dictator.”

“Economic power and the size of one’s bank account do not produce some strange immunity from jurisdiction,” Supreme Court Justice Flávio Dino wrote Monday as part of a five-person panel that unanimously upheld Moraes’s ban. In the days since the shutdown, Brazilians have migrated to other microblogging sites, such as Bluesky and Threads.

The ban has reignited fierce debates over Brazil’s approach to online content moderation, as well as the conduct of its powerful judges. Brazilian federal judges stepped up their role in policing what they deem to be anti-democratic online content after the 2018 election that brought former President Jair Bolsonaro to power. His campaign was dominated by disinformation, and social media platforms often fell short of their own pledges to moderate it.

Brazil is globally unique for the extent to which its judges moderate online content, University of São Paulo law professor Rafael Mafei told the Café da Manhã podcast. That’s because “the institution that should be leading this discussion, Congress, is not willing to do so,” Mafei said.

When Bolsonaro ran for reelection in 2022, a group of federal judges tasked with overseeing elections—led by Moraes—ordered X, then still known as Twitter, to remove accounts that spread unproved claims of election fraud and praised demonstrations objecting to the result of the vote. (A mob vowing to overturn Bolsonaro’s election loss later stormed various government buildings in the capital, Brasília.)

At the time, Moraes’s social media policing was generally applauded by Brazil’s political center and left. But a growing number of Brazilians have also slammed his content policing as opaque and excessive. Many of the court’s takedown orders in 2022 and since were never publicized. To critics, the secret proceedings—and the fact that the banned accounts were from similar political camps—smacked of censorship.

Moraes moved alone in ordering the new ban on X; only days later did he get an endorsement from the Supreme Court panel that included Dino. Moraes also received widespread criticism from across the political spectrum for ordering a ban on the use of virtual private networks (VPN) to access X—and a hefty fine for violating it. The Brazilian Bar Association filed a lawsuit to reverse the VPN fine.

Still, many people, including Brazilian digital rights experts and Brazilian lawmakers, have defended the X shutdown. Musk’s open efforts to sway Brazilian politics raised the stakes for regulators to take a stand, journalist Rubens Valente wrote in Agência Pública. “To find something similar to Musk’s crusade, you need to go back 60 years to the role of the United States in the 1964 coup.”

“While the threat of blocking [a platform] is nothing new and is provided for in our legal system, this case stands out as the first one a large scale in which a company has completely ignored court rulings for days—and sought the spotlight for it,” Brazilian researcher Fernanda Campagnucci told Foreign Policy’s Rishi Iyengar. She added that the measure, “although drastic, was necessary.”

[wawamouse]

Oz Rewatch 3: S6E06: A Day in the Death…

Storylines:

Dino guest narrates

Beecher is back in Oz and angry with Keller; Schillinger offers to befriend Keller now that they’re both at odds with Beecher

Rebadow tries to talk to Stella about cold shouldering her but she wants distance

Idzik is transferred to Em City; Omar is made Idzik’s sponsor

Glynn continues the investigation into Adrian Johnson; Willy Brandt turns up dead;

Robson meets with Sister Pete; Robson joins group therapy

Chico and Miguel talks about Morales and the future of El Norte; Cathy Jo Cutler visits Miguel; Morales’s funeral; McManus offers to set up a meeting between Miguel and Ruiz

Martinez’s autopsy shows he was murdered; Carol Grace is interrogated and arrested

Telemarketing continues to suffer; Burr tries to recruit prisoners; Arif is struggling with finances; Poet and Rawls try to get back into the tits trade; Samuel Gouegeon crime flashback; Burr is sent to destroy the printing press;

Gloria proposes Cyril be executed by electric chair rather than lethal injection; Cyril gets a haircut in preparation of the execution; Jahfree Neema organises a demonstration of solidarity by the Em City inmates during the time of Cyril’s execution; Cyril gets a stay on his execution

Sister: Have we met this guy before? Me: Yeah, that’s Dino. Guy who died in the very first episode? Sister: Uhm….. Me: He was set up like a main character and then he was set on fire at the end of the episode? Sister: I don’t remember that. I only remember um… Jefferson.

Sister: And that’s why he decided to kill someone?

Sister: hey trying to shove a romance in here last second? With the nazi wife?

Sister: I don’t get it. He could just tell and get the insurance anyway, couldn’t he? It’s not like he conspired to burn down the machinery. (Sigh) This is why he’s in prison.

Sister: How did he get everyone to do what he says she he’s been nothing but rude to them?

Sister: They have to wet his head? For conduction? Me: Yeah. Haven’t you seen the Green Mile? Sister: Nope. Me: What? The Green Mile? Yes you have. Pretty sure we watched it together. Sister: Nope. The black guy? Me: With Tom Hanks? Sister: Nope. What's the one where the dude threatens the guards and they get coke? Me: Shawshank Redemption?! Sister: Yeah, I haven't seen that one either. Or Saving Private Ryan. And I'm pretty sure we had Saving Private Ryan at home. Me: We have the Green Mile, too!

Sister: Wawa lied to me… Me: How did I lie? Sister: You made it sound like he died.

Me: Must suck to be Li Chen’s parents sitting there and everyone including the staff is really happy the guy who killed your son won’t be executed. Like, if you believe in the death penalty. Sister: Yeah, they're like screw them, LOL.

Sister’s Predictions for the final two episode/what she would like to happen:

Tobias isn’t getting released unless he gets more family members killed, but he ain’t got that many left.

Cyril will get sent to the mental institute and Ryan will probably mellow out if he’s smart and learns to reflect and be grateful. Or he’ll just keep being a dick. Or maybe O’Reily will stop showing up now that his storyline is done and then we can finally have time to focus on other people’s stories. I mean, what do we have left? Two hours? We got a lot to get done. But I feel like he’s a fan favorite because they do so much crap with him, there’s no way they’re going to just shove him aside. Even if he’s in the background, he’s gonna be, like, standing there. And there’s the stuff with his mom and the other dude. He’s probably going to bless their relationship or whatever and say he understands now.

Redding’s probably going to die because he’s not doing anything else so far. But if the show wants to end with a sense of calm, then Redding’s probably going to survive, or Poet and the other guy will die because they’re already getting messed with.

Miguel will become leader… Or maybe Chico will become leader, if he finds the leadership balls. Someone will come up to him and be like “who’s leader” and he’ll be like “oh, let me go ask Miguel”, which is like HUH? But if he had the leadership balls, he would just be like “Oh, I am!” …There’s only two options with the Latinos. Some random person? I don’t think so.

Keller will die if the show wants to end things on a calm note, but if they want to end things chaotically, he will kill someone and become leader of the white supremacists maybe.

Depending on how much time is allotted to other stories, Idzik will die as a casualty by someone else’s hand and he’ll die as he wanted, and Mr Dinosaur (Omar) won’t get in trouble.

The Muslims need to find a strong leader… The current guy isn’t leadership material so he’ll probably get overthrown.

Lord of the Rings type ending after the ending in the last episode where we do a tour of all the groups and staff with like Mukada and Sister Pete where it seemingly never finishes. The old people (Rebadow and Stella) are probably going to be part of the Lord of the Rings ending. Maybe they’ll do a little wink and wave with the Gays, if they’re really wanting to hit all the groups and give some representation before the show ends. Each group has about…. [some strange Sister math later] 10 minutes and 54 seconds of screen time in the next two episodes.

Next episode will be the action finale and then episode 8 will be a bunch of fall out and resolution so they can give the show a nice ending. Unless they really didn’t know the show would end.

[heybiji]

supe npc (Then and Now) for a MASKS: A New Generation game I'm gonna be running for some friends. TrueStrike, mentor to the protégé character. left was him before he disappeared from the public eye after the intense ridicule brought on from accidentally killing destroying a city institution: the giant, beloved balloon mascot of the city's favorite donut shop (Dino Donut, the D-Rex, of Dino Donut), traumatizing a generation of children who loved it and all the adults who grew up with it. there were a lot of kids screaming, crying, The Day Dino Donut Died. The Dino Donut balloon has since been replaced with a statue of a hipper version of the D-Rex that wears a backwards baseball cap and everyone hates it.

TrueStrike currently lives inside a storage unit, monitoring the city with all his high tech computers as he sinks deeper into paranoia and self-pity, missing his ex-wife and kid, and tries not to spend too much time refreshing the FUCK TRUESTRIKE geocities page. he mostly uses his protégé to get him pizza.

[blueiscoool]

A Carlo Scarpa Vase Found in a Thrift Store Sells For $107,000 at Auction

When Jessica Vincent, who raises polo ponies on a farm outside Richmond, Virginia, was shopping at a Goodwill store in that city, she likely had no idea she might come upon a rare and perfectly intact glass vase by a renowned Italian designer that would fetch six figures at auction—but that’s exactly what happened.

That vase, the so-called “Pennellate” vase or Model 3664, by famed architect and designer Carlo Scarpa (1906–78) hit the block on December 13 at Wright Auction House, tagged with an estimate of $30,000–$50,000. It sold for $107,100.

“It’s an amazing story, that this very sophisticated piece of glass finds its way to Virginia,” said Richard Wright, founder of the auction house, in a phone interview. “It was expensive, not mass-produced, and it falls through the cracks all the way down to the Goodwill. It’s not even chipped.”

He added: “And this very charming woman who raises polo ponies finds it, and she isn’t sure what she’s found but she’s smart enough to do her research. She finds the Italian glass group on Facebook, and is smart enough not to sell it for the first offer she gets, of $10,000.”

Standing about 13½-inches high, the object dates from about 1947 and is made with pieces of applied opaque and transparent glass that mimic brushstrokes across the glass’s surface (pennellate means brushstroke in Italian). Scarpa designed it for the Italian art glass maker Venini, located on the Venetian island of Murano.

Wright Auction House described the vessel as one of the rarest pieces the house has offered in a decade of auctions, and in fact only one other vase with this exact color combination is known to exist, in what the house calls an established private collection. The vase was included in its “Important Italian Glass” sale, which also offered examples by designers including Ercole Barovier, Tomaso Buzzi, and Dino Martins.

The current auction high for a Scarpa vase is also a Venini piece, a Laccati Neri e Rossi from 1940 that fetched about $309,000 at Christie’s Paris in 2012, soaring past its high estimate of about $64,000, according to the Artnet Auction Price Database.

Trained as an architect and designer, Scarpa is known for his architectural renovations, his glass, and his industrial design. He has come in for a renewed round of attention in recent years, for example in an exhibition organized by contemporary sculptor Carol Bove and pairing her own work with his, at the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds, England and at Museion in Bolzano, Italy.

“Venini Glass by Carlo Scarpa: The Venini Company, 1932-1947” appeared at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2013–14. It was while working with Venini, the museum said, that Scarpa “redefined the parameters of glassblowing in terms of aesthetics and technical innovation.” He created two dozen styles of vases, “pioneering techniques, silhouettes and colors that thoroughly modernized the ancient tradition of glassblowing.” In the 1930s and 1940s, their collaborations were on display at venues including the Milan Triennale and the Venice Biennale.

By Brian Boucher.

[notwiselybuttoowell]

The hair that drops in clumps on the floors of some salons in Kiel, a port city in northern Germany, is swept up to be turned into fabrics that filter oil from water. Parents who want to buy their children cloth nappies instead of disposable ones can apply for grants of up to €200 from the local authorities. At the city’s biggest festival last year, the organisers got rid of single-use cutlery and replaced it with a deposit system.

Germany is famed as a world leader in recycling – and Kiel, as I found out during a visit this summer, has some of the most weird and workable plans in the country to deal with its trash. It is the first German city to be declared “zero waste” by the environmental campaign group Zero Waste Europe. The certificate does not mean it has already stopped throwing things away – far from it – but rather that it has a concrete plan for how to do better.

“It’s one step in the right direction,” says Bettina Aust – a Green party politician who was elected president of Kiel city council in June – over a glass of juice made from apples that had been saved from landing in a supermarket bin. “You have to keep thinking further … You cannot stay still.”

Germany has a complicated relationship with waste. Despite its status as a world leader in recycling, Europe’s biggest economy is also one of its dirtiest. In 2021, the average German generated 646kg of waste, while the average EU citizen generated 530kg. Only in four EU countries – Austria, Luxembourg, Denmark and Belgium – did people throw away more.

Dino Klösen, a manager at Kiel’s waste management company ABK, says trends in the country’s consumption can be seen in its bins. Paper recycling bins that would have once been full of newspapers are now bursting with cardboard from delivery packages. “The weight of paper waste has dropped but the volume keeps rising from online shopping,” he says.

Awash with waste, cities like Kiel are exploring ways to throw away less and recycle more of what it does chuck. The city council has announced projects ranging from a ban on single-use items in public institutions, to installing more public drinking fountains, to teaching schoolchildren about waste. It is also encouraging people to make simple changes to their behaviour such as using solid bars of soap instead of buying plastic bottles of the stuff.

Other proposals are more systemic. The city is trialling a “pay as you throw” system where people are charged only for the rubbish they throw in the mixed waste bin. A report from the European Environment Agency last year found only about 30% of Germany is covered by such a scheme, even though areas that were covered saw an average drop in mixed waste of 25%.

“General waste is the most expensive form of rubbish there is,” says Klösen. “We are trying to motivate citizens to throw less waste in the bin by making them pay less for doing so.”

Even though waste-cutting efforts like Kiel’s are fairly novel in Germany, recycling is firmly rooted in the culture. In 2021, Germans collected more than two-thirds of their municipal solid waste to be repurposed – more than any other country in Europe. They burned most of the rest for energy, and dumped just 1% in landfills (the EU average is 16%).

[veritas-rpg]

The following applications have been approved for enrolment at Daehan Institute: 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ ACTOR Seonho Yoo as LUCIEN HYUK IM 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ ARTMS Kim Lip as BRIELLE CHARRON 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ ASTRO Eunwoo as YEJOON HAN 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ ATEEZ San as ARERU PERUN 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ ATEEZ Seonghwa as JASPER 'FOX' HOLDEN 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ ATEEZ Yeosang as YIJUN 'JUNE' CHU 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ BLACKPINK Lisa as ALEXIS KIERA LEE 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ BTS Jungkook as JIWON AHN 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ DREAMCATCHER Siyeon as IANTHE IM 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ ENHYPEN Sunghoon as JOON IM 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ LE SSERAFIM Yunjin as SEULHYUN LEE 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ MONSTA X I.M as NATHANIEL YOO 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ NCT Taeyong as YIHAN 'XANDER' CHU 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ RED VELVET Joy as ANASTASIA BOK 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ RIIZE Wonbin as MIKA MOON 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ SOLOIST B.I as HANJIN LEE 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ SOLOIST Jo Yuri as SOHA MOON 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ SOLOIST Mijoo Lee as EMIKO HIKARI 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ THE BOYZ Sunwoo as JAEWON JUNG 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ TXT Choi Yeonjun as DINO LI

The following faceclaims have been reserved for 48h:

𖥨᩠ׄ݁ SEVENTEEN Mingyu (10/17/23) 𖥨᩠ׄ݁ TXT Beomgyu (10/17/23)

Daehan University, a prestigious century-old private institution, boasts a legacy of producing society's elite. Yet, beneath its polished façade lies a world of uncanny occurrences and enigmatic secrets. Welcome to a 21+ mewe-based, dark academia themed university roleplay, where mature themes and darker genres of literate writing come to life within the mysterious halls of academia. Our official opening is scheduled for Sunday, October 15th at 12 AM KST.

PREMISE / GUIDELINES / MAJORS / LOCATIONS / MASTERLIST / APPLICATION.

[procrastinatorproject]

WIP Folder Game

I wasn't actually tagged, but I saw this on @beautyofsorrow's blog and just... couldn't resist.

Rules: Post the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet or tell them something about it! and then tag as many people as you have WIPs.

The problem, of course, is that my "WIP folder" is in fact four different Scrivener projects with a sum total of over 100k unpublished words, so this is gonna be LONG 😅🙈 But in the past, I have found great inspiration in looking through all my wild ideas and wip's that mostly consist of a couple paragraphs or a screenshhot of a discord conversation with friends. So I'm gonna do this anyway :D

WIPs that are only notes or snippets of conversations with friends where I tell them about My Great Fic Idea

Breathe

Field Medicine

5+1 holos

Moriarty

Bashir & Soji

All in a Day's Work

Kidfic

Merged

Sugar Rush

Circuit (Dark Academia)

S1 Agnes POV

CYOA/Scavenger Hunt

The Train Job

Regency AU

Holo-Admonition

He Never Gets Any Nicer (meta)

WIPs that are mostly notes (sometimes very long, elaborate notes) but do have a bit of actual writing attached

Conference Emails

Calluses

A Day at the Faire

Cosmic Detours (one unpublished chapter)

From the Mouths of Babes

Mittens on a String

Squad

Rescuing Dahj

Podcast

WIPs that are a single paragraph (or sentence) or two with not a lot of notes or context

ricepudding

Nostalgia/Nerdiness

The Quiet Spaces in Between (Raffi & Tuvok)

Kestra (Holoween)

All Aboard

Bed Rest (Seven)

Dino Hunt

Ready Room

Cosmic Detours (one unpublished chapter)

Valkriss Tales

Brainwashing

Choose Your Path

AI Malfunction

WIPs that are quite substantial already but still need a lot more work (or for me to sit down and JUST WRITE THE THREE MISSING SENTENCES ALREADY MY GOODNESS!)

Virus

Check-Up

Raffi Whump

Game Night II (Holoween)

Snapshots

Bed Rest (Rios)

Bed Rest (Picard)

Bed Rest (Agnes)

Homecoming

Dynamic Chaos

Meadow (two unpublished chapters)

Baby on Board

Space Shark

CMO's Log (some notes and a couple unpublished chapters)

Favouritism

Four Cakes

Sleep-Deprived

In the Shallows

In the Palm of his Hand (couple unpublished chapters)

Mittens on a String (5 + 1)

Institutional Knowledge

Kestra & Rios

The Cake Is A Lie (Findings and Conclusion)

And finally: WIP's so big they are their own Scrivener Project and will never be finished because they'd be the length of a novel. Or two. (Though I usually only have a few paragraphs/chapters written, the rest is wild ideas and notes)

Star Trek: La Sirena, Episode 2 (and notes for five or six more episodes)

Star Trek: Second Chances

Post-Rusker [semi-disqualified]

Synth Ban Thriller

Star Trek Holo Novel

And I'm not gonna tag as many people as I have WIPs, because that would require me to count them. And even though I rationally know the number of WIPs is morally neutral, I still have deep shame about Not Finishing Things. I'm working hard to dismantle that and have come a long way, but I'm not there yet 😅

(Also, I may not have enough mutuals for the number of WIPs 🙈😅)

So, if you, too, would like to stroll through your WIP folder and have people ask you about some of the stories that live in your head rent free, take this as permission to go for it! 😁🖖

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Chloe Simon at MMFA:

After a week of right-wing media spreading baseless smears about Haitian migrants abducting and eating pets, conservative activist Christopher Rufo posted a video allegedly showing a cat on a barbecue grill in Dayton, Ohio. Dayton police have issued a statement saying “there is no evidence to even remotely suggest” that any community is eating pets — but some in right-wing media ran with the story, claiming that Rufo’s video falsely “confirmed” the rumors about migrants and animals. 

Last week, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, promoted baseless and racist rumors about Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio, eating pets. During the September 10 presidential debate, Trump claimed, “They’re eating the dogs. They’re eating the cats. They’re eating the pets of the people that live there.” Right-wing media also jumped on the narrative, calling Haitian migrants “locusts,” zombies,” and “weird Third World aliens.” [The Associated Press, 9/11/24; Media Matters, 9/10/24]

On September 14, Rufo posted a video purportedly showing a cat on a barbecue with the caption, “EXCLUSIVE: We have discovered that migrants are, in fact, eating cats in Ohio. We have verified, with multiple witnesses and visual cross-references, that African migrants in Dayton, the next city over from Springfield, barbecued these cats last summer.” Rufo did acknowledge in his Substack that “this single incident does not confirm every particularity of Trump’s statement. The town is Dayton, not Springfield; cats alone were on the grill, not cats and dogs.” However, he continued that the video “does break the general narrative peddled by the establishment media and its ‘fact checkers’” and that “independent journalists are already on the hunt and could reveal more.” Prior to releasing the video, Rufo claimed he would “provide a $5,000 bounty to anyone who can provide my team with hard, verifiable evidence that Haitian migrants are eating cats in Springfield, Ohio.” [Twitter/X, 9/14/24, 9/11/24; Substack, 9/14/24]

Rufo, a senior fellow at conservative think tank the Manhattan Institute, is a conservative activist known for his right-wing crusades against diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives and higher education. Media Matters has described his career as a long attempt to “inject bigotry and incorrect information into mainstream discourses about gay and trans people, drag queens, and the academic discipline known as critical race theory.” [Vox, 9/10/23; Media Matters, 1/6/23, 7/27/23; The Guardian, 2/21/24]

Dayton police have categorically denied that any group has “engaged in eating pets.” In a statement, the department wrote, “We stand by our immigrant community and there is no evidence to even remotely suggest that any group, including our immigrant community, is engaged in eating pets. Seeing politicians or other individuals use outlandish information to appeal to their constituents is disheartening.” Rufo’s video has also received a lot of backlash online, with open-source intelligence analyst Oliver Alexander writing that it was “clearly chicken you weirdo. Dude’s never seen chicken that wasn’t dino-nugget shaped.” In a further attempt to verify the video’s claims, CBS News reached out to veterinary experts who cited the image’s poor quality, while another “noted the legs looked ‘weirdly distended’ and in his opinion, did not look like cat legs.” [Twitter/X, 9/16/24, 9/14/24; The Independent, 9/15/24; CBS News, 9/16/24]

Right-wing disinformation purveyor Christopher Rufo posted a video purporting that cats were cooked on a barbecue grill in Dayton, Ohio. Dayton PD, however, shot down Rufo’s rumor-mongering by stating that there is no evidence of cats being grilled in Dayton.

[minteagalaxea]

the high table | s.v.t

choi seungcheol: s.coups

known for overturning in a single night the entirety of the japanese yakuza for his ward to seize control of the yakuza, s.coups is ruthless and protective of those that under his care, garnering him a thirteen million dollar bounty on his head from those that oppose his charge’s control.

yoon jeonghan

as the manager of the incheon branch of the continental hotel, joenghan serves as the information broker for all of south korea, and potentially beyond (though he keeps his knowledge to himself). despite his penchant for verbal and psychological warfare, he’s also capable of shooting.

hong joshua

hong joshua helps keep the incheon continental working smoothly, operating as the intermediary between his criminal clientele and the many ammenities rendered by the various members in the establishment. he is known for his sweet demeanor, but behind that hides a deadly nature when in danger.

wen junhui: jun

as the heir to the wen crime family, wen junhui is set to take over his family empire with the various bodies he has killed. capitalizing on the rule by fear, he is determined to stretch his dominion beyond just guangzhou, but towards all of china.

kwon soonyoung: hoshi

as a former associate of many various crime families and institutions, kwon soonyoung is currently on the run from those many institutions after killing an esteemed member in the prestigious continental hotel in incheon. with a twenty-two million dollar bounty, his whereabouts are frequently tracked by money-hungry assassins.

jeon wonwoo

known among the criminal underworld to be a free agent, jeon wonwoo is an assassin of absolute precision and brutality in his part of the world. also known to have retired from the world, his sudden return to the underground makes his bounty enticing to many who want to immortalize themselves.

lee jihoon: woozi

the newest proprietor and manager of the osaka continental, woozi’s reputation for taking in strays into his wing makes osaka the premier safe haven for those that wish for refuge from whatever is hunting them. his benevolence, however, does not exempt him from sharp words and knives, indicating his former time as a serviceman. 

lee seokmin: dokyeom

hiding from emissaries of the russian mob because of his brother’s actions, dokyeom currently works as a ballistic armor specialist and tailor for the osaka continental’s guests. his work, while relatively anonymous, is worn among the many locals in the criminal underworld of japan.

kim mingyu

particular about his “dinner reservations”, mingyu works hard to make sure that the bodies are disposed of in every capacity. his services are so impeccable that he is highly sought out through osaka to help handle the aftermath, though he does take some of the valuables for himself. 

xu minahgo: the8

initially a member of the wen family, the8 now works as the sommelier for the osaka continental, not just serving wine, but also firearms for all occasions. taken in as a stray after killing a prominent member of the wen crime syndicate, his location is unknown to the family.

boo seungkwan

initially beginning a clinic to help those that could not receive medical assistance, seungkwan’s increasingly underworld clientele enticed him to seek employment at the incheon continental hotel, where he shows his years of medical experience.

choi hansol: vernon

another stray now within the osaka continental hotel, vernon’s knowledge of blueprints—and where to get them—allows operatives to have their most powerful weapon on hand. a former member of the ruska roma, his bounty is due to an incident that required him to use his ticket, losing his place there.

lee chan: dino

the newest member of the osaka continental, dino is learning the ropes of being a concierge, a shift from his upbringing of violence and brutality. however, he is of utmost loyalty to the hotel, being unafraid to exert violence in the face of danger of not just the establishment, but to the workers inside.

[savasbitti]

Hi! How are you? If you could recommend one book that deeply influenced you, what would it be and why?

hello, thank you, i’m fine, how about you? actually, it’s impossible for me to name just one book that deeply affected me, but I can list the books that have had a significant impact on me as follows:

oğuz atay – the disconnected (tutunamayanlar)

ahmet hamdi tanpınar – a mind at peace (huzur) and the time regulation institute (saatleri ayarlama enstitüsü)

in addition to these, i would also mention dino buzzati's the tartar steppe. these books hold a special place for me because i find their characters very relatable. furthermore, i also love dino buzzati’s short story the dog who saw god.

[archoneddzs15]

Sega Mega Drive - Sonic Spinball

Title: Sonic Spinball / ソニック・スピンボール

Developer: Sega Technical Institute / Polygames

Publisher: Sega

Release date: 10 December 1993

Catalogue No.: G-4112

Genre: Pinball Action

Oh no! Let the Americans get hold of Sonic and what do they do? Fuck it up, that’s what! Sonic doesn’t even look like Sonic in this game!! The music is bloody awful, the graphics are poor, and the scrolling is jerky. One of the worst pinball games I’ve ever played along with Wolf Team's Dino Land. The pinball parts of Sonic 2 are more fun than this.

[fanthropologists]

The Fanthropologists Episode 22: SCP Foundation: An Ethnography of a Fictional Institution

In this episode, Bridgette and Syd dive into the SCP Foundation. They break down what it is, how it works, and the dangers of the institution's philosophy. Enjoy a brief vignette, some analysis, and overall a very silly little project.

Listen Here!

Next Episode: March 1st

Bibliography:

Icephoenix44. “SCP-6480.” SCP Foundation: Secure Contain Protect. 11.26.23

Chaucer345. “SCP-5316”. SCP Foundation: Secure Contain Protect. 11.26.23

Dino--Draws. “SCP-7765”. SCP Foundation: Secure Contain Protect. 11.26.23

ModernMajorGeneral. “SCP-5013”. SCP Foundation: Secure Contain Protect. 11.26.23

Sirpudding. “SCP-2111.” SCP Foundation: Secure Contain Protect. 11.26.23

OptimisticLucio. “Guide for Newcomers”. SCP Foundation: Secure Contain Protect. 11.26.23

Creepy music provided by freestockmusic.com