#draw prediction website
Explore tagged Tumblr posts
Text
new pfp!!
happy (almost) three years to my child Aura <3
i finally brought back their markings under his eyes
i had removed them for years until now
also three years of bandanna Aura lmfao


^ feb 13 2023 (?)
#blizz's art#aura!!!#oc#god my old art is so 😭😭😭😭😭#i was new at digital art in 2021 and the bucket tool on the website i used was so bad#so i had to manually color it and did not know how to use layers lmfao#but its nice seeing how much my artstyle has evolved#i created aura in may 2021 i think#i thought it was 2020 but now that i think about it#also my lines were so wobbly LMFAOOOO i drew on my chromebook on sketchpad app#<- for both those past drawings#also i did do a bandanna wolf in 2022 buttttt it was of my oc blizzard#aura predicted that i was nonbinary lmfaooooo#i created them as nonbinary and a year and a half later i discover im nonbinary#had to edit the last one to not confuse ppl#im sorry for the long ass tags 😭😭😭 but feel free to ask anything about aura <3 like his backstory etc
9 notes
·
View notes
Text
How To Get Roughly 50 Notes On An Original Writing Post And Possibly Net A Single Reader
I had someone ask today how I get people to click through and read my writing, and I'm realizing that I've never actually made a post all in one place of everything I do to get a new piece of short fiction off the ground... so here you go! How to get (some) eyes on your work, even if it is not published anywhere of interest and you don't have a marketing team behind you.
The #1 thing is presentation. You want to get people's attention, and once you have it, convince them to keep paying attention. Fortunately, people tend to be both reasonable and predictable, which means all you have to do is follow The Formula.
(original post link)
Here's the formula from the above post broken down:
[giant horizontal title card, preferably animated to catch the eye] OR [a few tasteful parallels, if you're good at parallel posts]
TITLE (linked to where you can read the piece) / wordcount
a quote that is representative of the tone, themes, prose style, and/or the "promise of the premise"
A longer pitch, featuring the overall subject of the piece (transsexual reality TV drama), any comp titles (Detransition, Baby), the main draw (in this case, watching trans people be awful to clueless cis people), major themes (performance), and any other promises you'd like to make (food romance and tigers). You can see that the quote I chose delivers on the promise of trans people intellectually outperforming cis people-- if I were a reader, I would be more likely to trust that the rest of the pitch was accurate based on that assurance.
If you have any positive reviews on your piece, say so. If it has won any awards or contests, say so. If your work has made people cry, Doja Cat - Say So. Always. Generally speaking, more personal and more detailed is better, but keep it to one or two people-- e.g. "when I gave this to my S/O to read he shot milk out of his nose so far I had to go clean under the couch" or "my favorite review of this piece is the reader who said they read it chapter-by-chapter under their covers because they wanted it all to themself." This should be one sentence.
Depending on where the story is published, what you usually promote, etc., it may be worthwhile saying the story is free. Use your judgment on whether the reader can tell.
I also like putting my links at the bottom so someone seeing this on a friend's dash can easily track me around the 'Net. They make me look more professional (I now include a link to my website) and they visually balance the post, in my opinion. This post also happened to have some additional links for bonus content.
This is not as high stakes as it seems. I'm not 100% happy with the pitch here, and I'm not 100% happy with the graphics I've used in other cases. These are some bones that help to sell the piece even when the details aren't as sharp.
REBLOGGING
When is the last time you read something the first time you saw it on your dash? I schedule reblogs of all important posts at least twice over the next 2-3 days, often three times so I can get the morning/afternoon/evening reblog. If your followers tend to be more active at certain times, go ahead and use those. In the past I've intentionally scheduled posts for times I knew more popular mutuals were active, and it has paid off!
I also schedule a reblog for a week and a month and sometimes even a full calendar year out, because I know there is going to be that person who tags the piece '#to read' and instantly forgets about it, only to get excited when they see it weeks later. I am very often that reader. The goal is to catch people when they're ready to read immediately, and this is a game of chance.
Every so often, I go through my entire #writing or #important writing updates or even just #popular tag(s) and queue two dozen posts before shuffling my queue to redistribute matters. This keeps my older work circulating, ensuring new readers get a chance to see older pieces and giving those older pieces another shot at dashboard space. (More on #popular later.) This sounds like a lot, which is why you have to space everything pretty far apart. Fortunately, this is the world's best site for cool things to reblog. I guarantee you that you can find something new you love to post in the meanwhile.
COPING WITH FAME
The post above is what I, a published author, consider "doing well" for a post about my writing on Tumblr. As of October 10th, 2024, over two years after its initial posting and over five years into my posting doggedly about my original fiction, it has 77 notes. More than half (43) are likes. Around half of the reblogs are me promoting my own work or the same very sweet person dutifully reblogging me every time I do so. Glancing through the reblogs now, I know of four people whom I can confirm have read it. Presumably, there are more who are completely silent and have never interacted with the post whatsoever. Genuinely: wahoo!! I am so grateful and happy for the attention and reception of my work.
This is the number one thing I suggest: focus on what you have, and not what you lack. Imagine your post from the perspective of an outsider: even one reblog means you convinced that one person to spread your art! How cool is that! This is also good advice because moping is simply not helpful; it will not get you more reads. (And no, neither will guilting others. Kill that vent post in your head!)
GETTING FOLLOWERS
I don't have that many followers. Of the followers I do have, people are very unpredictably active. When I hear about other people's follower counts I am consistently surprised, because people with half of mine will have fans and haters the likes of which I could not possibly dream of. I follow 500-follower folk who post "I ate a strawberry today" and get 6 asks ranging from "Wow I respect you so much for eating that strawberry" to "I'm going to come to your address at [REDACTED REDACTED REDACTED] and shove bananas down your throat for hating on my favorite fruit."
I point this out to establish three important things. 1) Be grateful for what you have (in my case, 0 anonymous hate asks about fruitpinions), 2) followers have far less impact on interaction than one might think, and 3) followers don't engage with the things you might like them to.
Think about yourself. Are you more likely to reblog a photo of a cat in a pumpkin (alright, here) or something advertising fifteen minutes' worth of writing, which could be, for all you know, bad? Or, for that matter, by a person you should not like to support? Reblogs on generically interesting things are 'safer' (unfortunately) than reblogs on art, and it makes perfect sense that people are skittish around the latter. People don't often reblog things they haven't read, and nobody can reblog every artpost on their dash. Having someone else put it there, however, is incredibly powerful—someone's vetted this post as Worth a Reblog, after all. Having more followers allows for much more of this.
(Followers don't guarantee any one sort of interaction, but having more of them is rarely bad. Rarely.)
Across my most popular posts, one theme becomes very obvious: people like things that apply to them or their blog. I try to post writing advice/opinions/memes every so often, because I know I have a loyal base of writerfolk who like to see that from me, and it's "easier" to reblog than my writing. This is simply the nature of the universe. I used to pretty frequently go into the #writeblr tag and check out what was recently popular so I could figure out how to serve the same base, and from time to time it worked.
You're welcome to examine the list of #writing posts that made it to 100 notes, because each tends to have a notable reason behind its success: a reblog with an exceptionally good review, a contest win, a wordcount that lends itself to pasting the whole thing in one go.
(Posts about my book's release are a notable exception, in part due to Blaze and in part due to my absolutely relentless flogging of their reblog buttons during the ~year of promotion. Also in large part to a dedicated circle of friends who passed the post around nonstop! Thank you so much!!)
A lot of people will tell you to attempt covert reciprocal promotion. You know—reblog a lot of stuff, in the hopes that people will reblog yours. If I could change one thing on Tumblr, it would be this: the culture that quietly encourages disingenously interacting with other people with a secret True Goal in mind. (On the autism website.)
Please, for the love of all that is good and holy, do not do this. If you comment on other people's work, do it because you're happy to do so. When I released Paper Tigress, I went through everybody else who responded to the same prompt and read their work, because I had the day off and I was curious. This has led to Paper Tigress having more comments on Reedsy than one of my contest winners, and even outranking the shortlisted story in the same prompt category. However, this would have been a waste of my time if I did not genuinely enjoy reading the other stories. I read 80+ stories, taking several hours, and gained 30 comments from the venture (half my comments are my responses).
Crucially, I do not promote other writers' work on Tumblr in the hopes of them reading or boosting mine. This is the #1 tip I see thrown around that I viscerally disagree with. While, again, I am grateful for engagement with my work regardless of the context, I do not want people suffering through my work in the hopes that I will promote them. I work a full-time job, and my reading calendar is perpetually overbooked, including with work by my absolute best of friends. Even if it wasn't, I think it would be quite insulting if I were posting works in the hopes that someone would choke it down like medicine. I post what I think is good so that people can read and enjoy it. If you are not enjoying it, I do not want you to feel as though you have to read it. My aim is to give to others what my favorite authors have given me, which is most certainly not A Bad Time Spent Being Dishonest In The Hopes Of Getting Something Back. You have better things to do with your time. Please be honest.
CONCLUSION
Realistically, the readers I have, I gained through being a published author for five years promoting my behind off on Tumblr, the least forgiving social media for promotion. People like it when you have a book they can buy, especially if it has Goodreads reviews that make it look like you have been vetted for them. Many people who follow me have read only Something's Not Right and nothing else. (Many people who follow me have read everything but Something's Not Right.) I have posted dozens of pieces on Tumblr and Wattpad (and AO3). I gained a small number of readers writing and posting fanfiction for the Locked Tomb Tri(?)logy, even though I marketed it absolutely terribly.
Just keep writing. Keep writing, keep posting, and keep making sure everyone who follows you knows you write. And keep writing because you want to. There's no better advice than that.
#writeblr#writeblr advice#writeblr tutorial#writeblr tips#writeblr community#writing advice#writers on tumblr#important writing updates#txt
180 notes
·
View notes
Note
Hi :D, I hope you can help me if you can :c , I would like to read the mangas and 4komas of twisted wonderland, but how can I find them? and this question is strange, but I would like to know who are the manga artists, how can I find out? I fell in love with the drawing style of savanaclaw's manga
Hello hello! Thank you for this question! ❤️🦁🐙 The manga and 4koma are being released on a somewhat erratic schedule in G-Fantasy magazine, available from Amazon, and coming out this week!


The magazine itself releases on the 18th of every month but the manga releases are difficult to predict: Savanaclaw was on a temporary hiatus while the mangaka had COVID, only the 4koma was released in November, only Octavinelle and the 4koma are coming out this month, and we have't seen any new Savanaclaw since July 2024?
But a second hiatus has yet to be formally announced and the manga continues to be published in book format, with Octavinelle starting before Sanavaclaw was complete and possibly on track to end before it is finished?
There are at least five artists at work behind the Heartslabyul/Savanaclaw/Octavinelle/4koma manga (not including Yana herself, who might have a supervisory role)!
Starting with Savanaclaw 🦁 The artist is Oda Suzuka! (Website)
Other work she has illustrated for includes: ・Psychic Detective Yakumo ・Pretty Boy Detective Club ・Danzai no Dragnet ・The Villainess Who Aims to be a Nightingale





Unlike the artists for the Heartslabyul and Octavinelle arcs Oda seems to be working entirely by herself, doing both layout and illustration!



Layout design for the Heartslabyul arc was done by Hazuki Wakana, with illustrations by Kowono Sumire!
Yana explains that Hazuki and Kowono "…are staff members involved in art production for background settings, cards, and more in the Twisted Wonderland app."


There do not seem to be any SNS accounts or other published works associated with the names "Hazuki Wakana" or "Kowono Sumire," so they might be aliases for use in their work with D-6th.
Yana says that they are both also staff members that have been working with her on her manga, Black Butler, for many years.


The two artists will sometimes have messages to fans posted through Yana's Twitter account, like at the conclusion of the Heartslabyul arc and the start of Octavinelle.


Illustrations for the Octavinelle arc are also being done by Kowono Sumire, with layout design mostly by Hazuki Wakana except for chapter 11, which was done by longtime Black Butler assistant artist Nagaoka Chiaki (Twitter).
Yana says that her role is overall collaboration, character design and character creation (she says that in addition to creating the basis for Trey’s parents she also designed Riddle’s mother, including her face, but they ultimately left her in silhouette).
It is difficult to tell what Yana means by “overall collaboration," but she has shared a tweet about drawing the characters out herself for Kowono to base her work on.
(This might not apply to Oda who is not a member of D-6th, and I have not been able to find any tweets from either Oda or Yana about any collaboration that may be going on.)

And the 4koma is by artist "mochi"! (website)
They are also one of 18 artists who participated in the creation of volume 2 of the anthology manga! (The one in the middle with Lucius!)

91 notes
·
View notes
Text
by Christian Toto
Antisemitism keeps rearing its ugly head in the arts.
And, sadly, many Legacy Media outlets can’t be bothered to notice.
Among the Jewish artists who have found their events canceled in recent months include Michael Rapaport, Matisyahu and Brett Gelman.
The media mostly looked the other way each time, with only a few exceptions. Imagine a black artist being canceled due to his skin color or place of origin.
What kind of news coverage might that spark?
Jewish news organizations covered the cancellations extensively, and understandably so.
Yet at a time when sites like IndieWire and The Hollywood Reporter are warning of a Trumpian crackdown on the arts, they’re often silent during actual artistic crackdowns.
THR made an exception for Kosha Dillz. The Israeli-American rapper planned to show rough footage from his upcoming documentary, “Bring the Family Home,” at Facets, a Chicago-based theater. The film follows the rise of antisemitism on college campuses following the Oct. 7 attacks.
Dillz planned to host the screening with a DePaul University student who says he’s endured severe antisemitic harassment at his college.
Facets spiked the screening hours before showtime. THR has more details about the cancellation.
Dillz said he even offered to have the theater show the film without any promotion on the marquee or website to avoid drawing attention to it, but Facets leadership declined.
The club’s reasoning for the cancellation is almost laughably predictable.
“Based on the public posts made by Kosha Dillz and the overall tone surrounding the event, we determined that proceeding would not align with our values or our responsibility to protect the safety and well-being of our community,” Facets said, without elaborating on what they were referring to. “We reject antisemitism in all forms — just as we reject Islamophobia, anti-Palestinian racism, and any form of hate or dehumanization.”
The ownership of Facets later had a change of heart. THR suggests “press coverage” played a role in its decision, but the cancellation drew little media noise.
If entertainment news outlets cared about free speech in the arts they’d give events like this far more coverage.
35 notes
·
View notes
Text


Very sad to hear about the passing of L. J. Smith.
She was the author of The Vampire Diaries, The Secret Circle, Night World, and more... books that were a big part of my teen years. When I was 16, I even won a fan art contest she ran on her website.
In her memory, I decided to redraw one of my old illustrations from that contest—Kaitlyn Fairchild, a character haunted by her ability to predict the (often tragic) future through her drawings, from the book Dark Visions. Her stories were filled with great characters, and I loved getting lost in the worlds she crafted. She’ll be sorely missed.
RIP, L. J. Smith.
#illustration#my art#artists on tumblr#illustrators on tumblr#fanart#dark visions#lj smith#vampire diaries#secret circle#night world#Kaitlyn Fairchild#redraw
37 notes
·
View notes
Note
do you have any Romeo or Delilah critter creature designs. And if so. For all the bedfans out there, especially me, can we get Delilah hanging out with Axl :3? The rest of her adoptive family too lol But!!!! Uncle/Auntie Axl...whoopie...
I do I do I do indeed! They are sheep, as predictable as it may be, but what can I say... Sheep are pretty great...
I have a TON of doodles of them I made in the past (~2023)! Way too many to post here, but my buddy Doc has archived most of the doodles ive done on its website!
Anji and Baiken, are a grey heron and a ��🐲 (dragon but I wanted to show I know the kanji for my own name huhuhu)! You can see Baiken is one of my favourite characters by the fact she is. In fact. A dragon. Everyone ask me to draw more Baiken
#guilty gear#anthro dragon#anthro#clean furry#sfw furry#sfw anthro#baiken#baiken guilty gear#baiken gg#anji mito#delilah guilty gear#Delilah Neumann#bedman guilty gear#Bedman#Romeo f. Neumann#Anthro sheep#Anthro badger#Anthro heron
55 notes
·
View notes
Text
answering more misc asks! below. some of these are weeks old lmao
yes, I saw! tumblr sent me an automated notification about it actually. it's very cool, I've never had my art featured up front on a big website like this before and I was pretty happy about it. the downside is, it's put a target on my back for spambots. not that terrible, but annoying.
I know the first part of this is a joke in regards to the person who sent me nine individual asks with slightly different wording that all started with "so I know you don't like predictions" but I don't know whether the second part is a weird joke the fandom is doing that I missed or just something You came up with and either way I'm afraid to ask for more details on what the hell that means
haha, I wouldn't say I ever left. I just draw what I want or what I find interesting or exciting from day to day and sometimes that's deltarune, but sometimes it isnt. I have an infinite roulette of stuff that's fun to draw spinning in my brain forever.
on dess, I unfortunately can't say I have many concrete ideas. I mostly go by the same popular interpretations as the rest of the fandom- if it ends up being wrong, at least we're all wrong together! and umm, I guess I'd say that I just hope we get to meet her and she gets to do things. I've been reading so much manga from the 70s lately that just the idea of a girl having an active role in a story is exciting to me, lol.
THANK YOU!!! I really really appreciate any love for my OCs and I really want to draw them again soon. there's just never enough goofy girl robots in the world.
technically? for like ten minutes, like ten years ago maybe? I remember starting it and immediately finding it boring and with too many complicated mechanics right at the beginning. but I was a less experienced RPG player then, plus I know it has the same team behind it as octopath, which I love. I go back and forth on whether I want to pursue playing it again or not based on various secondhand information so it's in the realm of "maybe someday".
fuck man that's a really good point. I was getting so many theory asks at once that I kinda skimmed this one but now that I'm reading it I'm like okay you might be onto something there! whether supported further by canon or not, great opportunity for symbolism
ahaha well, that is the thing, I don't have much interest in western RPGs. or yknow, ones that arent purposefully modeled after JRPGs. a lot of it just has to do with the difference in style and presentation- I like pixel art (or early polygons), cute character and monster designs, and turn-based combat. I'm not really interested in a lot of modern JRPGs for the same reason, I just don't like the style as much as how they were 20+ years ago. so.... no, I've never played fallout and I don't have much interest in changing that. if I was going to play one though, I'd choose the first game in the series.
no but I've sure seen gifs of those two dudes gayly becoming one with the cosmos or whatever a whole lot
25 notes
·
View notes
Text
Stay a Little Longer - part 1
Masterlist
Written for @tomtenadia as part of the 2024 Rowaelin Secret Santa!
Happy Yulemas, Nadia!
I know you don’t celebrate Christmas, so I wrote you the regular canonverse(ish) pregnancy fic! It got much longer than I predicted (like 9k so far and a bit more to go), so I’ll be posting it into parts throughout the gift exchange period.
You cannot tell my excitement when I drew your name in that website. Your friendship is one I treasure so much, and I love discussing books and fics with you, crazy time zones be damned. I hope you’re having a wonderful time, and that your 2025 gets to be filled with peacefulness and joy the way you deserve. ❤️
Also, thank you @goddess-aelin for organizing the event!! ✨❤️
Warnings: none
Words: 657
Aelin has never burned a drawing room before.
The intricate carvings in gold that decorated the walls would melt before the velvet draperies and furniture could catch it. She had never willed her fire to kill people, but to burn a room with four royals and Fenrys—Prince Rowan’s pet nobleman, or maybe it was the other way around—was a bold move nonetheless.
Two males from the highest ranks of Doranelle’s military. Even with Aedion alongside her, Aelin was sure her father would’ve vetoed this trip had he known Prince Rowan and Lord Fenrys are here as well.
As a child, Aelin would spend hours staring into open flame, watching its dance as a single spark slowly took over like dominoes cascading in a line; with her, not so much. With Aelin, one second, things were, and in the other they weren’t.
Aelin traveled all the way to Wendlyn in her human form without a worry about needing to use her powers for military purposes, it never occurred to her that her uncle might ask her to light his cigar.
“Are you quite all right, dear?” Uncle Glaston kindly asked, his cigar still hanging from between his fingers.
“Perfect,” Aelin said, smiling as she straightened in her seat. Behind him, Aedion was the one who looked unwell, terrified eyes begging her not to proceed. Rather discouraging, but he meant well. At the Orynth Castle, men didn’t ask her to light up their cigars—and if they did, a healer might check for their mental wellbeing.
The shifting to her demi-Fae form made her wince. It’d been too long since she did, and the heightened senses added to the lava bubbling underneath her skin, begging to be let out—for a moment, it overwhelmed her.
She inhaled deeply, begging the fire to stay put and let the smallest amount of it rise…
A crackling roar and a deep vibration boomed in the drawing room—it was immediately stifled, but followed by the horrifying sight of burn marks on Uncle Glaston’s chaise, along with the lack of sights of the cigar she was supposed to light up—not blow up.
Aelin used all her Fae speed to get to her feet and run her uncle’s way. “Did I hurt you?”
He waved her off. “It’s alright.” Glaston grabbed another cigar and held it up. “If you don’t mind.”
Aelin gave him a tense smile and decided on another route: turning her fingers into matches—lighting herself up was always easier than directing fire elsewhere. Safer. She focused her mind, body and strength on her pointer finger, willing for a single spark to show…
Only to watch her entire arm combust, tall flames dancing with the wind, brightening the room in ways no evening candlelight could.
It was a quick burst. Before Aelin could shovel it inside again, she felt the wind that sparked her flames stifle them—it licked over her arm, slowly sending the flames inside until only the tip of her finger was lit. However, she didn’t feel stifled. It didn’t feel suffocating like every other attempt reign over her abilities did—it felt like an embrace.
A tug in her gut took her breath away, but remaining little flame on her forefinger flickered. It was so vivid, it resembled an invisible string lassoing her from across the room. Frozen in place, Aelin didn’t notice her uncle lightning his cigar.
She felt like a shooting star—ethereal. A blink-and-you'll-miss-it event, yet impossible to miss. On a predetermined path that felt like she was free-falling into the unknown.
Her heart snapped shut like a suitcase’s fasteners did, and suddenly the room didn’t have 360 degrees for her eyes to wander anymore.
Her head whipped to the spot across the room that felt incandescent, like moth to the flame.
Only to find Prince Rowan Whitethorn of Doranelle already staring at her, looking as if he’d seen a ghost.
You can get notified when I update by either turning notifications on for @mariaofdoranelle-fics or joining my (sometimes glitchy) one general tag list!!
TAG LIST
@aelinchocolatelover
@anarchiii
@autumnbabylon
@bookcide
@booksandteaonarainydayislife
@cookiemonsterwholovesbooks
@courtofjurdan
@cynthiesjmxazrielslover
@dreamer-133
@elentiyawhitethorn
@elizarikaallen
@emily-gsh
@empress-ofbloodshed
@fangirlprincess09
@fauna-flora11
@goddess-aelin
@gracie-rosee
@leiawritesstories
@lululululululuop
@mis-lil-red
@nayaniasworld
@renxzs
@rowanaelinn
@s-uppertime
@sarahjswift
@staghorn-mountains
@superspiritfestival
@swankii-art-teacher
@thegreyj
@throneofus7
@violet-mermaid7
@wishfulimaginings
#rowaelin#rowan whitethorn#aelin galathynius#throne of glass#rowaelin fanfiction#rowan x aelin#aelin x rowan#rowaelin fanfic#throne of glass fanfic#canonverse#stay a little longer
49 notes
·
View notes
Text
my predictions for wwwyf:
the whole band does the family guy death pose on the ground for the entire time slot instead of playing music. the crowd immediately gets lost trying to sing along without them and at some point it devolves into people shouting random parts of songs they like (this is especially funny for the songs that are definitively not in the black parade)
the previous thing but an event coordinator peeks on stage, pokes a few people with their shoe, and starts frantically making phone calls in a hushed but distinctly panicky voice
the concert starts like normal, but quickly devolves into a slapstick comedy performance of looney-tunes-esque injuries to reference the many injuries mcr sustained while doing the original black parade tours and music videos
mcr isn't on stage at all and the only thing you can see is vocaloid-style hologram skeletons doing the skeleton dance
i am in a completely different city at goodwill shopping for pieces of my halloween costume right at the time they start playing the breakdown in mama. as this is my favorite part of the whole black parade, i abruptly keel over from a heart attack in the middle of the store because of the transcendent power of band autism. in the decades that follow, no one will ever be able to understand the cause of my death, but let it be known that if you strain your ears to listen in the graveyard at night, the black parade can be heard quietly, almost inaudibly so, echoing from my headstone.
there isn't any comment about mcr5 the entire time. because we are conspiracy theorists, we take this as a tacit confirmation that mcr5 will infact be happening imminently
at certain points throughout the tracklist, random, or rather seemingly random, lyrics are changed by a letter or a word. this is enough to draw people's attention, and as it turns out, if you type all the changes made into a search engine, the singular result aside from people theorizing about it on reddit is an unknown, sketchy website that looks like it would instantly give you 500 malware and die. the website displays only a single picture of realistic human skull. when you inspect it, hidden amongst the code is a very different type of code, a cryptic string of letters and numbers. as it turns out, this text is actually instructions that have been put through WWII-era war encryptions. when translated, this text gives driving directions. if you follow its commands starting from the wwwyf grounds, you'll be taken on a downright frightening drive through some of the most backend streets & drug dealer houses & decrepit graveyards in the entire southwest. once you're thoroughly lost, then and only then will you be able to find the warehouse. this warehouse is a laburinthine mess of ancient relics, long-lost props from music videos, several very authentic looking vampire corpses, a few questionably stained revolvers, killjoy masks, rubble from the world trade centers, vintage marching band uniforms, a shocking variety of weapons, and finally a single edison tin foil cylinder. survivors from the warehouse later state they felt an overwhelming presence and could have sworn they saw a shadow in the corner of their eyes. after several months in the intensive care unit and several more months in both physical and mental therapy, these brave souls will place the cylinder, with shaking, scarred, and weak hands, into the phonograph, from which, after a torturous second of silence, will echo the first sweet notes of mcr5.
they accidentally point the pyrotechnics at the audience. oops!
some gay shit happens idk
#i really shouldnt have been writing weird ass mcr fic i really need to do my homework#i got a little silly though#writing#mcr#mcr5#shitpost#mcr5 is real#mcr tumblr#my chem#my chemical romance#wwwyf#wwwy fest#wwwy fest 2024#the black parade#gerard way
47 notes
·
View notes
Text
Nevermore Characters and their Poe Inspirations
It’s the winter solstice, so how about something special?
I think everyone knows by now that all* the characters in the Nevermore WEBTOON are based on one or more of Edgar Allan Poe’s works, as well as many of the plot points and items that appear in the webcomic too. (You can check out my post comparing “The Pit and the Pendulum” to Nevermore here: )
But if you don’t follow me here or on Bluesky (please do, I’m very lonely ;-;) you might not know that I’m a teacher! And since one of my walls is, let’s say damaged, I thought I’d cover it up while advertising an excellent webcomic and sharing some of that Poe goodness.
(Warning: Spectre Spoilers!)
Behold!

It’s not the first time I’ve had to make an “English Board” without an actual board, but it did take… an embarrassing amount of time to make considering the quality.
Why?
Because instead of using a magic wand tool to separate characters from their backgrounds, I manually scrubbed each image in Procreate. That’s right, I actually have a problem.
(The real reason is that I’m not a big fan of magic wand feathering and they’re fairly fussy about picking up details. Also, black uniforms on dark backgrounds make it harder for the magic wand to get an accurate selection. And Annabel’s hair. Why did I choose to use a shot with a bright background?)
Anyway, all the characters are from Red and Flynn’s Nevermore and all the QR codes take you to the work the corresponding character is inspired by! I used the Poe Museum’s versions of the short stories and poems, despite the fact that they recently redesigned their website and now it looks atrocious. Like my wordpress level of not very well designed, but they’re an actual museum in Virginia, and I’m a single person.
Here by the way if you want to visit :)
And since just giving you a broad look at the wall isn’t that helpful, here are all the actual “graphics”.
They’re all on Letter/A4 paper size dimensions since I had to print them out, so there are weird margins, but if you want something quick to print out, there you go!
I actually wanted to include backgrounds and borders too, but I was so tired after cleaning the character portraits that I just kind of slapped the elements onto the page. There was also a bit of a time crunch because I wanted to get this out before Season 2, and I’m not exactly a graphic designer :/
Actually, I wanted to print them and then cut out their outlines before laminating so that they retained their full silhouettes, but that kind of defeats the purpose of covering up my poor wall.
Still, the whole process has given me a lot more respect to Flynn for drawing Nevermore. It took me hours to get a single character portrait done. The thought of having to draw all those details dozens of times for a single chapter frightens me.
But I’m very excited for Season 2!
I “had to” reread the entirety of Season 1 looking for good portraits, and let me tell you, there really aren’t that many full body anterior shots in Nevermore. Or at least, a lot less than 108 chapters would suggest. Taking screenshots for this was awful too. A couple of these are actually stitched together from multiple photos.
Anything else?
Oh, I used Georgia as the font. I’m fairly certain it’s what’s used in the webcomic, but all those straight serif fonts really blend together… I thought about using two different fonts, one for the character names, and one for the work names, but again tired.
#nevermore webtoon#nevermore#annabel lee nevermore#lenore nevermore#ada nevermore#morella nevermore#pluto nevermore#duke nevermore#eulalie nevermore#berenice nevermore#montresor nevermore#will nevermore#prospero nevermore#qr code#teaching#teacher#Edgar Allan Poe#Decorating#short stories#poems and poetry#rednflynn#season 2 hype!#I make things needlessly difficult#It’s a bad habit#I love using laminators#laminator#seriously#the best tool in the entire school office#Spoilers
48 notes
·
View notes
Text
Trump didn't look thrilled when questioned about the new pope.
"... In a recent February 2025 post, which has gone viral since Prevost’s elevation, he wrote that Vice President J.D. Vance — a Catholic convert in adulthood — was “wrong” about his attempts to find a theological justification for the administration’s treatment of migrants. “Jesus doesn’t ask us to rank our love for others,” Prevost wrote. (He added a second post critical of Vance’s misunderstanding of the doctrine of “ordo amoris.”) In his most recent post before entering Conclave, Prevost criticized Trump and Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele for making light of the deportation and detention of Kilmar Abrego Garcia. Prevost linked to an article from the website Catholic Standard comparing the plights and persecutions experienced by immigrant and refugee communities to the Passion of Jesus Christ. The reaction from the MAGA right — which in recent years has also taken a liking to ultra-conservative Catholicism — was immediate and predictable. “WOKE MARXIST POPE,” wrote Laura Loomer — a far-right 9/11 conspiracy theorist..."
Promising. Though he's inevitably anti-abortion, etc.
"... Right-wing commentator Megyn Kelly, who was initially thrilled over the election of an American Pope, later wondered if it was “too much to hope that some 20-year-old ran the new pope’s X account and he never looked at it?” Through his tweets and retweets, Prevost has waded into several hot-button topics in American politics — from gun control to the death penalty to climate change to the murder of George Floyd. In 2013, he retweeted anti-capitalist political cartoon. It features a drawing of Pope Francis standing beside a poster reading “GREED IS NOT GOOD,” and behind a trio of men in suits with briefcases reading “Wall Street,” “Banks,” and “Big Biz.” The men are pointing back at the pontiff and shouting, “Blasphemy!”
Robert Provost seemingly supports migrants, takes climate change seriously, is anti-racist and for social justice.
11 notes
·
View notes
Text
On February 10, employees at the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) received an email asking them to list every contract at the bureau and note whether or not it was “critical” to the agency, as well as whether it contained any DEI components. This email was signed by Scott Langmack, who identified himself as a senior adviser to the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Langmack, according to his LinkedIn, already has another job: He’s the chief operating officer of Kukun, a property technology company that is, according to its website, “on a long-term mission to aggregate the hardest to find data.”
As is the case with other DOGE operatives—Tom Krause, for example, is performing the duties of the fiscal assistant secretary at the Treasury while holding down a day job as a software CEO at a company with millions in contracts with the Treasury—this could potentially create a conflict of interest, especially given a specific aspect of his role: According to sources and government documents reviewed by WIRED, Langmack has application-level access to some of the most critical and sensitive systems inside HUD, one of which contains records mapping billions of dollars in expenditures.
Another DOGE operative WIRED has identified is Michael Mirski, who works for TCC Management, a Michigan-based company that owns and operates mobile home parks across the US, and graduated from the Wharton School in 2014. (In a story he wrote for the school’s website, he asserted that the most important thing he learned there was to “Develop the infrastructure to collect data.”) According to the documents, he has write privileges on—meaning he can input overall changes to—a system that controls who has access to HUD systems.
Between them, records reviewed by WIRED show, the DOGE operatives have access to five different HUD systems. According to a HUD source with direct knowledge, this gives the DOGE operatives access to vast troves of data. These range from the individual identities of every single federal public housing voucher holder in the US, along with their financial information, to information on the hospitals, nursing homes, multifamily housing, and senior living facilities that HUD helps finance, as well as data on everything from homelessness rates to environmental and health hazards to federally insured mortgages.
Put together, experts and HUD sources say, all of this could give someone with access unique insight into the US real estate market.
Kukun did not respond to requests for comment about whether Langmack is drawing a salary while working at HUD or how long he will be with the department. A woman who answered the phone at TCC Management headquarters in Michigan but did not identify herself said Mirksi was "on leave until July." In response to a request for comment about Langmack’s access to systems, HUD spokesperson Kasey Lovett said, “DOGE and HUD are working as a team; to insinuate anything else is false. To further illustrate this unified mission, the secretary established a HUD DOGE taskforce.” In response to specific questions about Mirski’s access to systems and background and qualifications, she said, “We have not—and will not—comment on individual personnel. We are focused on serving the American people and working as one team.”
The property technology, or proptech, market covers a wide range of companies offering products and services meant to, for example, automate tenant-landlord interactions, or expedite the home purchasing process. Kukun focuses on helping homeowners and real estate investors assess the return on investment they’d get from renovating their properties and on predictive analytics that model where property values will rise in the future.
Doing this kind of estimation requires the use of what’s called an automated valuation model (AVM), a machine-learning model that predicts the prices or rents of certain properties. In April 2024, Kukun was one of eight companies selected to receive support from REACH, an accelerator run by the venture capital arm of the National Association of Realtors (NAR). Last year NAR agreed to a settlement with Missouri homebuyers, who alleged that realtor fees and certain listing requirements were anticompetitive.
“If you can better predict than others how a certain neighborhood will develop, you can invest in that market,” says Fabian Braesemann, a researcher at the Oxford Internet Institute. Doing so requires data, access to which can make any machine-learning model more accurate and more monetizable. This is the crux of the potential conflict of interest: While it is unclear how Langmack and Mirski are using or interpreting it in their roles at HUD, what is clear is that they have access to a wide range of sensitive data.
According to employees at HUD who spoke to WIRED on the condition of anonymity, there is currently a six-person DOGE team operating within the department. Four members are HUD employees whose tenures predate the current administration and have been assigned to the group; the others are Mirski and Langmack. The records reviewed by WIRED show that Mirski has been given read and write access to three different HUD systems, as well as read-only access to two more, while Langmack has been given read and write access to two of HUD’s core systems.
A positive, from one source’s perspective, is the fact that the DOGE operatives have been given application-level access to the systems, rather than direct access to the databases themselves. In theory, this means that they can only interact with the data through user interfaces, rather than having direct access to the server, which could allow them to execute queries directly on the database or make unrestricted or irreparable changes. However, this source still sees dangers inherent in granting this level of access.
“There are probably a dozen-plus ways that [application-level] read/write access to WASS or LOCCS could be translated into the entire databases being exfiltrated,” they said. There is no specific reason to think that DOGE operatives have inappropriately moved data—but even the possibility cuts against standard security protocols that HUD sources say are typically in place.
LOCCS, or Line of Credit Control System, is the first system to which both DOGE operatives within HUD, according to the records reviewed by WIRED, have both read and write access. Essentially HUD’s banking system, LOCCS “handles disbursement and cash management for the majority of HUD grant programs,” according to a user guide. Billions of dollars flow through the system every year, funding everything from public housing to disaster relief—such as rebuilding from the recent LA wildfires—to food security programs and rent payments.
The current balance in the LOCCS system, according to a record reviewed by WIRED, is over $100 billion—money Congress has approved for HUD projects but which has yet to be drawn down. Much of this money has been earmarked to cover disaster assistance and community development work, a source at the agency says.
Normally, those who have access to LOCCS require additional processing and approvals to access the system, and most only have “read” access, department employees say.
“Read/write is used for executing contracts and grants on the LOCCS side,” says one person. “It normally has strict banking procedures around doing anything with funds. For instance, you usually need at least two people to approve any decisions—same as you would with bank tellers in a physical bank.”
The second system to which documents indicate both DOGE operatives at HUD have both read and write access is the HUD Central Accounting and Program System (HUDCAPS), an “integrated management system for Section 8 programs under the jurisdiction of the Office of Public and Indian Housing,” according to HUD. (Section 8 is a federal program administered through local housing agencies that provides rental assistance, in the form of vouchers, to millions of lower-income families.) This system was a precursor to LOCCS and is currently being phased out, but it is still being used to process the payment of housing vouchers and contains huge amounts of personal information.
There are currently 2.3 million families in receipt of housing vouchers in the US, according to HUD’s own data, but the HUDCAPS database contains information on significantly more individuals because historical data is retained, says a source familiar with the system. People applying for HUD programs like housing vouchers have to submit sensitive personal information, including medical records and personal narratives.
“People entrust these stories to HUD,” the source says. “It’s not data in these systems, it’s operational trust.”
WASS, or the Web Access Security Subsystem, is the third system to which DOGE has both read and write access, though only Mirski has access to this system according to documents reviewed by WIRED. It’s used to grant permissions to other HUD systems. “Most of the functionality in WASS consists of looking up information stored in various tables to tell the security subsystem who you are, where you can go, and what you can do when you get there,” a user manual says.
“WASS is an application for provisioning rights to most if not all other HUD systems,” says a HUD source familiar with the systems who is shocked by Mirski’s level of access, because normally HUD employees don’t have read access, let alone write access. “WASS is the system for setting permissions for all of the other systems.”
In addition to these three systems, documents show that Mirski has read-only access to two others. One, the Integrated Disbursement and Information System (IDIS), is a nationwide database that tracks all HUD programs underway across the country. (“IDIS has confidential data about hidden locations of domestic violence shelters,” a HUD source says, “so even read access in there is horrible.”) The other is the Financial Assessment of Public Housing (FASS-PH), a database designed to “measure the financial condition of public housing agencies and assess their ability to provide safe and decent housing,” according to HUD’s website.
All of this is significant because, in addition to the potential for privacy violations, knowing what is in the records, or even having access to them, presents a serious potential conflict of interest.
“There are often bids to contract any development projects,” says Erin McElroy, an assistant professor at the University of Washington. “I can imagine having insider information definitely benefiting the private market, or those who will move back into the private market,” she alleges.
HUD has an oversight role in the mobile home space, the area on which TCC Management, which appears to have recently wiped its website, focuses. "It’s been a growing area of HUD’s work and focus over the past few decades," says one source there; this includes setting building standards, inspecting factories, and taking in complaints. This presents another potential conflict of interest.
Braesemann says it’s not just the insider access to information and data that could be a potential problem, but that people coming from the private sector may not understand the point of HUD programs. Something like Section 8 housing, he notes, could be perceived as not working in alignment with market forces—“Because there might be higher real estate value, these people should be displaced and go somewhere else”—even though its purpose is specifically to buffer against the market.
Like other government agencies, HUD is facing mass purges of its workforce. NPR has reported that 84 percent of the staff of the Office of Community Planning and Development, which supports homeless people, faces termination, while the president of a union representing HUD workers has estimated that up to half the workforce could be cut The chapter on housing policy in Project 2025—the right-wing playbook to remake the federal government that the Trump administration appears to be following—outlines plans to massively scale back HUD programs like public housing, housing assistance vouchers, and first-time home buyer assistance.
16 notes
·
View notes
Text
Uranus is preparing for a significant transition as it shifts into the sidereal sign of Taurus on March 18, 2025. This planet, known for its transformative influence, typically remains in a sign for approximately seven years, taking about 80 years to complete its journey through the entire zodiac. At the onset of this new transit, Uranus will reside in the Nakshatra (Birth Star) of Krittika, which is governed by the dazzling Pleiades star cluster, with Alcyone, the brightest star in the cluster, standing out as its focal point.
Uranus is the harbinger of change; it embraces sudden, unexpected events and embodies a sense of unpredictability. Its energy encompasses innovation, the future, awakenings, and a connection to electricity and lightning, making it a potent force of vibration and transformation. Often referred to as the “great awakener,” Uranus can create unsettling energy when interacting with other celestial bodies.
Though Uranus will officially change signs on March 18, 2025, it has already made a brief foray into Taurus during the summer before retrograding back into sidereal Aries. This prior ingress coincided with significant political turmoil, notably the near-assassination of former US President Donald Trump. The Birth Star Krittika, symbolized by a knife, is ruled by the Hindu deity Agni, representing the element of fire. It embodies the essence of cutting through impurities, making way for renewal. This dynamic process can be likened to a wildfire that, although destructive, ultimately paves the way for fresh plant growth and revitalization.
The term "Krittika" translates to "critical" in English, highlighting its propensity to identify and rectify mistakes or flaws. Its energy prunes away unnecessary growth or outdated elements, facilitating personal and collective evolution. - Eventually, Uranus will transit other Nakshatras in this sign and they will have their own unique effects on the world. When the time comes, I will make posts about those individual transits before they happen - Uranus will inhabit sidereal Taurus until July 7, 2031.
The star that governs Krittika, Alcyone, located in the shoulder of the bull, is believed to enhance our perception, helping us notice what has previously eluded our attention. It is said to stir winds of change, revealing secrets and unearthing hidden truths. However, tradition warns that when Uranus transits over the Pleiades, it can lead to a period fraught with accidents, unforeseen troubles, and, at times, significant loss—often through fire or confrontations with adversaries.
In her insightful book, "World Predictions 2024 To 2042," Joni Patry draws parallels between past events and Uranus's previous stays in Taurus. She notes that its last transit through this sign, particularly at the same degree it is approaching now, was marked by the bombing of Pearl Harbor. This tumultuous period unfolded further with the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and, under Saturn’s influence at a similar degree, the devastating terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The cyclical energies of Uranus in Taurus remind us of the powerful and sometimes unsettling waves of change that can reshape our world.
Anyone who has the Krittika in their birth charts can be effected by this transit more then others, especially if their natal moon or ascendant is here. Each year, from May 11 to May 24, the Sun traverses the domain of Krittika. Individuals born with their natal sun here are encouraged to exercise heightened awareness and caution, as they may encounter unexpected transformative shifts in their personal lives. These days may herald moments of change that challenge the status quo, urging those born under Krittika's influence to navigate life’s complexities with resilience and insight.
MY INSTAGRAM
An official website is coming soon
#astrology#vedic astrology#vedic astro observations#vedic chart#nakshatra#sidereal astrology#sidereal zodiac#sidereal chart#jyotish#astrologer#astrology readings#horoscope#zodiac signs
16 notes
·
View notes
Text
Also preserved on our archive
Frustrating how a Disneyland fanatic website is doing better covid reporting than the CDC
by Alessia Dunn
If you are heading to Walt Disney World, while there are many things to think about, and making sure you have some vitamin C packed is seemingly now one of them.
Since the pandemic shut down the theme parks, the thought of getting sick at Disney World has tremendously increased. For months, guests were required to wear a face mask, at times, even while walking outside without others around to protect themselves and others from COVID-19.
While park operations have gone back to normal, there are still guests who travel to the most magical place on earth with a face covering — and they may be onto something.
As the world has largely returned to a state of normalcy after the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the virus continues to linger and has begun to resurge.
The United States is currently experiencing a concerning rise in COVID-19 cases, with a steady increase reported over the past few weeks, according to Fox News. This uptick has coincided with the arrival of summer, suggesting a potential return of the virus’s seasonal pattern.
However, experts are warning the public not to become complacent as new variants continue to emerge, making the pandemic’s course difficult to predict.
Since the end of the national emergency declaration over a year ago, the public health landscape has shifted, with a reduction in comprehensive case tracking. Instead, authorities now rely on representative sampling to assess disease severity. Despite this change in tracking methods, available data indicates that COVID-19 cases are likely increasing in at least 38 states.
Wastewater surveillance, which analyzes sewage samples for traces of the virus, further supports this trend. While the current levels remain lower than previous peaks, the data shows increasing viral activity, particularly in the West and South. These regions may be seeing higher COVID-19 levels due to warm, humid conditions that support viral persistence.
The recurrence of a summer surge in COVID-19 cases has raised questions about the virus’s potential seasonality. Public health experts, however, caution against drawing definitive conclusions, noting that while immunity may blunt the peaks of new waves, the virus’s future behavior remains uncertain.
With new variants spreading, large public spaces like Disney World are likely to see increased transmission. Despite being known as one of the cleanest theme parks, Disney World is still a place where germs can spread easily.
High-touch areas, such as lap bars on attractions like Pirates of the Caribbean and Haunted Mansion, are touched by thousands of visitors each day, making it difficult to avoid germ transmission at the “most magical place on earth.
Over the past few years, many have complained about visiting the theme parks and getting sick.
While this is certainly something that was likely happening before the pandemic, as Disney World guests can possibly interact with over 100,000 others in a single day, making the passing of bacteria very simple, now, it is becoming a more realized thought.
These realizations have brought guests to the internet to see if others are finding it much more common to get sick when visiting Disney World. The discussion began on the now-popular Reddit post:
“I used to visit fairly often and was usually fine. Of course still some sick days but it was rare and avoidable as long as you just wash your hands and all that. Then I stopped going for a few years and just recently started again. Been here 4 times in the past couple of years now. And every single time… basically immediately… I get the worst illness you can imagine. This recent trip, it was the second day of the trip, and I already felt it coming on. Then the third day came and I was done. Completely sick with whatever it even is. And that was it for the whole rest of the week. Pretty much wasted all but 1 ticket. I got a solid 1.5 days worth of being able to go to the parks. Like I said, this has happened every visit in the past couple of years. It probably seems insane that I even keep trying but, I don’t know, I just keep hoping It’ll be different because I really want to go. At least the other 3 times I was here for 2 weeks so I was able to recover and go back again, but this time I was only here for a week so it was just entirely ruined. And it’s really no surprise that this happens. Everywhere you turn there’s somebody coughing in your face. Standing in lines there a family coughing in your face in front of you, and a family coughing in your face behind you. Not an exaggeration, it’s comical how much that is really true. But anyway I just wanted to see what other people’s experience is. It truly seems that 95% of people in the parks are sick at any given moment lately. I’m not trying to complain about it but I’m really trying to figure out how I can come back in the future and be able to enjoy a healthy vacation. Edited to say that I also drive there. So no flights to blame.”
One Disney guest, as well as a local to the theme park stated that this has always been an issue, as we previously hinted, “Florida Resident here, been to Disney uncountable times since the mid 80s, and always come home with SOMETHING no matter how careful I am. There are people there from all over the country and all over the world. International buffet of germs!”
Others also brought up the difficulty that comes with having to cancel or reschedule a vacation, which can feel nearly impossible for some who have paid in full, taken time off of work, and are not able to get refunded. In that case, many guests with the common cold or worse likely opt to head to Disney and overcome the sickness next to Mickey Mouse instead of their own bed.
Others brought up the importance of using sanitizer, Clorox wipes, and washing their hands when they get the chance to in order to limit the germs that they touch, especially when gearing up to eat a Mickey pretzel.
Regardless of how well you prepare, however, there is always the chance that you can get sick after your Disney vacation. As a local to Orlando, I can definitely say I have caught the cold from Disney World in the past, but for the most part, I do not get sick when I visit.
There have also been many illnesses reported at the Disney parks by guests, which you can read more on here.
#mask up#covid#pandemic#covid 19#wear a mask#public health#coronavirus#sars cov 2#still coviding#wear a respirator#disney#disney world#disney parks
30 notes
·
View notes
Text
BERLIN (AP) — Norwegian chess grandmaster Magnus Carlsen was forced into a draw Monday by more than 143,000 people worldwide playing against him in a single, record-setting game.
Billed as “Magnus Carlsen vs. The World,” the online match began April 4 on Chess.com, the world’s largest chess website, and was the first-ever online freestyle game to feature a world champion.
The mega-match ended after Team World checked Carlsen’s king a third time, a stunning outcome after Chess.com had predicted Carlsen would win by a wide margin.
Members of Team World — anyone around the globe could sign up — voted on each move and each side had 24 hours to make their play. Carlsen played the white pieces.
The world forced the draw on move 32 after checking Carlsen’s king three times in the corner of the board where it could not escape. The rule is called “threefold repetition,” meaning all of the pieces on the board are in the exact same position three times to prompt a draw.
‘Very, very sound chess’
Carlsen, 34, became the world’s top-ranked player in 2010 at 19 and has won five World Championships. He achieved the highest-ever chess rating of 2882 in 2014 and has remained the undisputed world No. 1 for more than a decade.
“Overall, ‘the world’ has played very, very sound chess from the start. Maybe not going for most enterprising options, but kind of keeping it more in vein with normal chess — which isn’t always the best strategy, but it worked out well this time,” Carlsen said in a statement Friday as Monday’s draw seemed imminent.
In a freestyle match, the bishops, knights, rooks, queen and king are randomly placed around the board at the start while the pawns are in their usual spots. Freestyle chess is popular because it allows players to be more creative and avoid memorization.
‘We made history’
This was the third “vs. The World” record-setting online game. In 1999, Russian grandmaster Garry Kasparov played against more than 50,000 people on the Microsoft Network and won after four months.
Last year, Indian grandmaster Viswanathan Anand won his “vs. The World” match against nearly 70,000 players on Chess.com.
In the Chess.com virtual chat this week, players appeared split on whether to force the draw — and claim the glory — or to keep playing against Carlsen, even if it ultimately meant a loss.
“Don’t Draw! Let’s keep playing Magnus,” one user wrote. “This is an opportunity that won’t come along again. I’d rather play the Master all the way to the end and see if we can battle it out another 20 or 30 moves! Let’s have some FUN!!!”
Another added: “Thanks Magnus for such a great game. We made history.”
7 notes
·
View notes
Text
{Creepypasta} Remember Euclydia
Growing up, Gravity Falls was truly something special. Released back in 2012 and concluding after two seasons on February 15, 2016, the Disney Channel series revolved around Dipper and Mabel Pines, a set of fraternal twins, who were sent to spend their summer vacation in the fictional town of Gravity Falls, Oregon, with their great uncle, or rather “Grunkle” Stanley Pines. Together, they work at Grunkle Stan’s tourist trap “The Mystery Shack” alongside Soos and Wendy Corduroy. It is there that Dipper would discover a journal cataloging all the mysterious anomalies that plague the town.
Of course, the show was best remembered because of its use of cryptograms such as the Caesar cipher among other varieties of encrypted puzzles. In fact, shortly after the series finale was aired, a real-life Cipher hunt was orchestrated by series creator Alex Hirsch himself which spanned countries beginning in Saint Petersburg, Russia, and, appropriately ending in Reedsport, Oregon. And it is there, somewhere in the woods that the victors who decoded the mystery were met with a statue of an... old friend.
Fans of the show are more than familiar with the sinister Dream Demon Bill Cipher, but for those who slept on the show, Bill Cipher was the main antagonist of the series, a triangular fiend from the Second Dimension who was originally meant to be a one-off character before he was promoted. To keep the spoilers to a minimum, Bill wanted to merge his decaying dimension, the Nightmare Realm, with the Earth succeeding at his goal in “Dipper and Mabel vs. The Future” when he deceived a despondent Mabel. He rained weirdness on the entirety of Gravity Falls in an apocalyptic event dubbed Weirdmageddon driving people to the brink of insanity with his Bubbles of Pure Madness and transforming others into stone statues and creating a Throne of Frozen Human Agony from them.
However, despite his near victory, Bill is predictably defeated, leaving his physical form behind to get an equation which prevented him from spreading his weirdness to the rest of the world. While the show ended on a great note with the day saved, it left a plethora of questions, the most damning one being on the demonic triangle himself. Was Bill truly dead, or could there be a chance he could return to wreak havoc on the Pines family?
This question lingered for years and was only further muddled with the subsequent releases of books to expand the universe of Gravity Falls. The most alarming one was written from the perspective of the Dream Demon himself, which begged the question: if Bill was dead, how could he be writing the book? Was he in some weird afterlife, preferably Hell for all the atrocities he committed throughout the trillions of years he was alive? Or was he hiding in the deepest regions of Grunkle Stan’s mind? The Book of Bill promised to reveal Bill’s origins and ultimately clear up where he had been for all those years since the show finished production.
Naturally, the book is classic Bill with its morbid, dark humor, and, to its credit, it did reveal Bill’s backstory... or at least bits of it that put together. Even in the original cartoon it was common knowledge that Bill was a native of the Second Dimension where, as he put it, was a realm containing nothing but flat dreams, flat minds, and a flat world. It was then that Bill “liberated” his dimension, and he did such an exceedingly excellent job at it that... the dimension no longer exists. Everyone was dead, even his parents.
While the book could be summed up as being just nonsense that Bill wrote to ensnare a hapless victim to possess and start Weirdmageddon anew, what made this an even more interesting turning point is the creation of a tie-in website “thisisnotawebsitedotcom.com.” The site could be best described as being additional pages of The Book of Bill that were left on the drawing board detailing more lore to the series and giving some funny responses. Just try typing in “Ted Cruz” and you would be introduced to a popup that informs you that you violated standards and practices and therefore you must have your mouth washed out. Or if you typed in “Skibidi” you are met with the lovely message that your life privileges are revoked. Then there were the... not-so-funny responses like what happens if you type in “Stanley” one-too-many times.
After hearing about the website, I decided to visit the website. I was met with several interesting visuals like a human skull with a gold tooth; an eye in a jar; a copy of The Book of Bill with a dagger stabbed into it. Best of all, the low beat of the show’s theme song complimented the mysterious aura that took me back to when I first watched the cartoon. I soaked in the atmosphere for a few more seconds before I remembered the reason I logged onto the website.
I started off with the codes I already was familiar with ranging from the names of the main characters and was met with amusing results. I then thought of ones off the top of my head to see if they also worked. If you were to type Season 1 into the computer, you’d get “Anti-Gravity Falls” for one, or Season 1 if you plugged in Season 2. As I further experimented with the outcomes, my mind directed me towards Cipher again. However, I had already used “Bill,” “triangle,” and “Bill Cipher” so I needed to think of something else... maybe on some of his classifications. Given the terminology that he was a Dream Demon, the most sense was to type “dream.”
So... I did. I wrote out “dream” and pressed enter. Red flashed from the computer denoting that the word was not one of the codes. I was disappointed, but I remembered how there were tricks to some of the words, so I pressed the enter key again. But like before, no slice. However, I was not one to just give up after the first two goes. I pressed enter again and again in rapid succession only for the same blaring to ring out.
It was the very definition of insanity I admit, but if it provided me with answers to Bill’s nature, I would have felt obligated. Eventually, the pyramid placeholder on the computer glitched as a new message popped up:
PA'Z UVA TF MHBSA PA'Z UVA TF MHBSA PA'Z UVA TF MHBSA TF LFL... P JHU ZAPSS ZLL AOL IBYUPUN IVKPLZ... PA OBYAZ PA OBYAZ... WSLHZL ZVTLVUL AHRL HDHF AOL WHPU!!!
I could practically hear Bill railing against me the further I typed the word into the password interface. The screen glitched and flashed in vibrant colors undoubtedly representing a color code. Clearly whatever was going on indicated that whatever was happening was working to my favor. It must have taken me thirty times, but the website appeared to relent. Another message fizzled up asking me if I really wanted to know the deep dark secret this time offering me a yes or no option. I chose the former, and after it stalled for a few seconds, it sent me a link to a video with the simple title of “Remember Euclydia.”
From my research on the wiki for Gravity Falls, I came to the realization that Euclydia was the name of Bill’s realm and that I would be sitting front and center and witness the destruction of the world. True to what he had alluded to, Eucyldia existed on a flat plane, as if it were just a piece of paper. In this dimension, there were no stars or cosmic bodies to speak of, with all the inhabitants of that realm bumping into each other at random and talk of any other dimensions was strictly forbidden. Everyone had two-dimensional forms befitting their environment, but I could also tell that the realm did have a sense of leadership.
Two triangles, one red, the other blue, directed the citizens with authoritative stride. Among the gathered assemblies were rhombuses and ellipses. Squares and diamonds. All the shapes you were taught in preschool were in attendance as they waited for some grand experience. What I found the most peculiar about the two triangles, however, were their two sets of eyes. If they were supposed to be Bill’s parents, then that only further indicated that Bill was born with a mutation. Just as I came to that conclusion, more cryptograms, this time representing the Caesar cipher, filled the screen.
Decoding it, the symbols formed a sentence: “In aspiration of making his people see all, the killer’s mental state took a great fall.”
My eyes were directed to a yellow triangle with a single peeper rise above the others. It floated over to the farthest end of its reality when I heard the rumblings of a song. I carefully pressed the plushy cushions of my headphones to better hear what tune it was playing. It possessed a soft, motherly tone making me speculate it was Bill’s mother Scalene. I would be lying if I did not say that the lullaby lulled me into a false sense of security.
“Rock-A-Bye Billy
Please don’t you cry
It’s not your fault you have that strange eye
Stay safe with Mommy you’ll never fall
And we’ll always love you sharp angles and all.”
The song’s instrumentals continued to play in the background as more Cipher cryptograms glimmered. I was admittedly not too adept at decoding the cryptograms from the show, so I wrote them down and opened another tab to a website that could decode what the hidden message said. I jotted down the letters that accompanied each symbol and returned to the video. From what I could gather, it went like this.
FOR TRILLIONS OF YEARS, I WAS AFFLICTED. THEY CALLED ME CRAZY FOR SAYING THAT I SAW BILLIONS OF TRILLIONS OF UNIVERSES ALL EONS AHEAD FROM THIS FLAT HELL OF AN EXISTENCE. EVEN MY OWN MISERABLE PARENTS TRIED STUNTING MY TALENTS WITH THAT HICK OF AN EYE DOCTOR. MY EYE THROBS EVERY TIME I LOOK INTO OTHER WORLDS. I CAN’T SUPPRESS MY GIFT ANY LONGER.
I watched the yellow triangle representing Bill further push through the shapes as they went sideways and down, but never up. It pushed against the limitations of its world and stretched its hands until the palms clanged on a hollow surface. A ripple of waves wobbled on the invisible forcefield like gelatin. However, the triangle was far from done.
The vocals of the audio returned a second time, but I sensed there was something amiss about. The shape intensified its blow at the same time the song grew more pronounced. Again and again, the barrier jiggled as it became stable. The video zoomed in on the triangle’s singular eye with the slit of its pupil expanding. Galaxies sparkled being so close, yet still so far.
I WILL SHOW EVERYONE THE STARS.
A deafening smash rang through my headphones the moment Bill broke through his reality. The fabrics of reality shattered like shards of glass exposing the once concealed dimension to third dimensional space. Scalene's lullaby reached its crescendo before falling silent.
LOOK, EVERYONE! I WAS RIGHT ALL ALONG! MOM, DAD, I -
The text stopped midsentence when the video began to buffer despite playing normally. I decided to refresh the video, and it functioned properly until, yet again, it buffered on the scene. Curious, I did the same trick a few more times getting the same result, but after the sixth time, the video resumed playing a corrupted version of Scalene's lullaby. “Rock-A-Bye Billy
Please don’t you cry...
It’s not your fault you have that strange eye
Stay safe with Mommy, you’ll never fall
And we’ll always love you, sharp angles and AAALLLLLLLLLLLLL-”
The scene slammed to show Bill’s pupil shrink as... something... descended through the crack in his reality but since the camera focused in on his face, all I heard was the sound of roaring and gnashing mandibles of a large creature. My only theory was that it was some anomaly that breached the Nightmare Realm and was now wreaking chaos on Euclydia. The once peaceful lullaby that Bill’s mother sang to him was replaced with a melody of horrified screams and the natives getting gorily ripped to shreds by the monster.
NO... NO... NO THIS WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN! OH GODS... HOW COULD THIS GO SO WRONG!!!?
Blood was everywhere as the monster ruthlessly attacked each inhabitant with no one being spared from its rage. Because of the primitive design flaw of Euclydia, it made it all the easier for their slaughter to happen en masse. Blue flames rained down from the monstrosity’s maw and engulfed buildings incinerating them to their last atom. Any that fought against the intruder did so, saving the other two-dimensional beings a few seconds at best, but their weapons were of no use. Rather, it made the monster more infuriated at their insolence.
Bill hovered over the ruined husk of his world his confidence being replaced with an expression of dread. His eye throbbed again this time out of bewilderment as he floated there petrified. Crimson blood splattered across his face knocking him slightly out of his catatonic state. His stomach churned with his eye burning hot with the urge to vomit (the show had confirmed that his eye doubled as his mouth). He clutched his chest with his fist as his voice staggered in disbelief. He struggled to speak, but the scent of seared flesh filled his nostrils. He could only wheeze a dry “It... it wasn’t me.”
He continued to speak into the void when the video transitioned slain Euclideans dragged their broken bodies along and linked their limbs together in huge swarms. They directed their collective gaze towards Bill... I could practically feel the venom in their words.
Why did you do it? Why did you do it?
Bill gripped the sides of his head in desperation of drowning the accusations out and continued doing so even when his fingernails clawed into him. The video began playing at a fast pace with Bill shaking fervently. The harsh critique drilled tiny holes in his body with his blood and tears coming together in a mixture. Cipher slowly lowered his hands.
Tears streaked down his eye as Bill laughed hysterically, his mental state snapping and burning away alongside the rest of his world and continued growing more erratic and pained the more Bill allowed himself to slip away. The blue flames licked his body symbolizing the punishment that he would receive for all his crimes. His mother’s lullaby reached its final note before the video abruptly ended.
The next day, I booted up my computer and decided to visit thisisnotawebsitedotcom.com to see if I could get that outcome again. I typed in “dream” as I did yesterday only to be met by the blare of the monitor as the code was rejected. No matter how many times I tried that password, I was never able to activate the link for the video. The rest of the website worked as normal.
26 notes
·
View notes