#fuck. we don't even need an algorithm like other social media apps we create the damn 'piss people of to have them stay engaged' thing

[chushanye]

tumblr is like

*sees the dumbest most repeatative fandom discourse that has escalated so much that neither side is actually engaging with each other and they're all taking the absolute worst interpretation of what the other is saying creating a cycle of bad-faith arguments* jesus fucking lord. let me log o-

*sees the most beutiful delicious wonderful soul reviving in character piece of fanart ever drawn* ☺️

[chaoticvictorianspirit]

[okay strap in cause I'm ranting tonight]

@staff @wip @humans @support

stop this algorithm driven hell, stop the capitalist madness, stop this tiktokification

borrowing concepts from "popular social media apps" is pretty much the worst business decision you could make. this is not a social media platform targeted to everyone and their mother, this is a blogging site with a very finely working ecosystem. like it or not tumblr will never appeal to the broad public. and you don't want it to, trust me!! the twitter/instagram/tiktok people don't want to use your website and never will, no matter how much you try to roll out Generic Offbrand Tiktok App n.385. they don't need it. to them tumblr is dead and irrelevant and full of incomprehensible weirdos. you know who *will* use your app and generate site traffic and revenue? the fucking core user base that's been here since the dawn of time. the people who affectionately nicknamed tumblr the Hellsite yet spend their lives glued to their dashboard babbling about blorbos and wizards and ballpits and ea-nasir's bitch ass copper. the people who flock to tumblr exactly and solely because it is not the damn profit driven attention span reducing minor sexualising social bubbles creating algorithmic pit of despair these other apps are. all you're achieving with these decisions is alienating the only demographic you have and ever will appeal to. have you ever read anything on here? if there's one thing an average tumblr user hates it's capitalistic money grabs. replacing the blog tab with the marketplace tab is a clear signal as to what you think is more important and even though the reading comprehension on this site has never been strong, we know how to read between the lines. and we're pissed. but mostly we're disappointed and fucking sad because we already see how this will cause the downfall of tumblr, the last place of refuge for many a internet dweller.

what I'm trying to say is please stop trying to appeal to the tiktok girlies. they don't care. they don't need you. instead focus on keeping your current users cause they'll stick with you through thick and thin as long as you don't turn this into glitchy instagram in a wig.

we won't leave.

we don't want to leave.

we don't have anywhere else to go, you're not losing us to competition.

this is OUR carefully cultivated space with zero working features and a gazillion problems and we will die protecting it.

but if you chase us out with a broom that's on you.

[izzieislandheart]

Multi-part reply it is! (So, if you actually want to have better functionality...perhaps start there, rather than with an algorithm.) Dear @staff: First, read all the reblogs on this post you made. All of them. Second, go over to @mostlysignssomeportents and read Let the Platforms Burn then The Enshittification of TikTok. Once you've read those, go to @atomicrobotlive and read Reddit is speedrunning enshittification. Read all of the contents of the links in all of those articles. Because of the passage of time and such, I can state with some confidence that you likely have members on your staff who were born in or near the year I first ventured into web forums, the "brand new" way to communicate online that wasn't Usenet or AOLs early iterations of what would explode into a range of chat apps, flooding almost-adult me with demands for a/s/l. (I ended up in ICQ for a long time, but that's another story for another day.) "Social media" professes to be ABOUT PEOPLE and FOR PEOPLE, yet almost every instance of it today is tied to MONEY and CORPORATIONS. And, regardless of what Congress or the Supreme Court might think, CORPORATIONS ARE NOT PEOPLE. We have to stop treating them like they are. An algorithm, a slick GUI with one-click interfaces, an endless scroll dashboard, or any other gimmick to try to lure and trap new users is not focused on the people. The fact that you have to even think about things like "user growth," "converting non-users into engaged logged-in users," or "posts per session," shows you're viewing people as objects - things to manipulate and use to meet a goal. Do you understand why one of the most frequently demands is to fully reinstate porn on this site? I'll give you a hint: it has an ancestral connection to "the world's oldest profession" (mythology regarding that aside), wherein people understood that they had value themselves, their very existence had value, and that they were desirable to others. That core trait went all kinds of fucked up directions since the earliest days of humankind, but it's key to understanding that WE WANT TO INTERACT WITH PEOPLE. We don't want art spit out by some machine that deconstructs and reconstructs images through code. We don't want a language learning program to search the Internet and regurgitate the most likely palatable response to a question. Those things have appeal to abusers who only care about multiplying money. Even the well-intentioned claims behind them - to make research faster, to help artists construct concept art faster, to bring down the cost of time for those tasks - boils down to turning people into products. Why do we need to do those things faster and why do they need to be cheaper? To put out more product to make more money at an even higher margin. Those Amazon Kindle book covers don't make themselves...but now someone can make one in about 30 seconds with Midjourney. To Hell with the artist who would have otherwise had at least a few hour if not several day turnaround and charged accordingly; it's not worth it, because the book was written by ChatGPT anyway. Amazon doesn't care how their percentage of the profit is created. (To be continued...)

Tumblr’s Core Product Strategy

Here at Tumblr, we’ve been working hard on reorganizing how we work in a bid to gain more users. A larger user base means a more sustainable company, and means we get to stick around and do this thing with you all a bit longer. What follows is the strategy we're using to accomplish the goal of user growth. The @labs group has published a bit already, but this is bigger. We’re publishing it publicly for the first time, in an effort to work more transparently with all of you in the Tumblr community. This strategy provides guidance amid limited resources, allowing our teams to focus on specific key areas to ensure Tumblr’s future.

The Diagnosis

In order for Tumblr to grow, we need to fix the core experience that makes Tumblr a useful place for users. The underlying problem is that Tumblr is not easy to use. Historically, we have expected users to curate their feeds and lean into curating their experience. But this expectation introduces friction to the user experience and only serves a small portion of our audience. 

Tumblr’s competitive advantage lies in its unique content and vibrant communities. As the forerunner of internet culture, Tumblr encompasses a wide range of interests, such as entertainment, art, gaming, fandom, fashion, and music. People come to Tumblr to immerse themselves in this culture, making it essential for us to ensure a seamless connection between people and content. 

To guarantee Tumblr’s continued success, we’ve got to prioritize fostering that seamless connection between people and content. This involves attracting and retaining new users and creators, nurturing their growth, and encouraging frequent engagement with the platform.

Our Guiding Principles

To enhance Tumblr’s usability, we must address these core guiding principles.

Expand the ways new users can discover and sign up for Tumblr.

Provide high-quality content with every app launch.

Facilitate easier user participation in conversations.

Retain and grow our creator base.

Create patterns that encourage users to keep returning to Tumblr.

Improve the platform’s performance, stability, and quality.

Below is a deep dive into each of these principles.

Principle 1: Expand the ways new users can discover and sign up for Tumblr.

Tumblr has a “top of the funnel” issue in converting non-users into engaged logged-in users. We also have not invested in industry standard SEO practices to ensure a robust top of the funnel. The referral traffic that we do get from external sources is dispersed across different pages with inconsistent user experiences, which results in a missed opportunity to convert these users into regular Tumblr users. For example, users from search engines often land on pages within the blog network and blog view—where there isn’t much of a reason to sign up. 

We need to experiment with logged-out tumblr.com to ensure we are capturing the highest potential conversion rate for visitors into sign-ups and log-ins. We might want to explore showing the potential future user the full breadth of content that Tumblr has to offer on our logged-out pages. We want people to be able to easily understand the potential behind Tumblr without having to navigate multiple tabs and pages to figure it out. Our current logged-out explore page does very little to help users understand “what is Tumblr.” which is a missed opportunity to get people excited about joining the site.

Actions & Next Steps

Improving Tumblr’s search engine optimization (SEO) practices to be in line with industry standards.

Experiment with logged out tumblr.com to achieve the highest conversion rate for sign-ups and log-ins, explore ways for visitors to “get” Tumblr and entice them to sign up.

Principle 2: Provide high-quality content with every app launch.

We need to ensure the highest quality user experience by presenting fresh and relevant content tailored to the user’s diverse interests during each session. If the user has a bad content experience, the fault lies with the product.

The default position should always be that the user does not know how to navigate the application. Additionally, we need to ensure that when people search for content related to their interests, it is easily accessible without any confusing limitations or unexpected roadblocks in their journey.

Being a 15-year-old brand is tough because the brand carries the baggage of a person’s preconceived impressions of Tumblr. On average, a user only sees 25 posts per session, so the first 25 posts have to convey the value of Tumblr: it is a vibrant community with lots of untapped potential. We never want to leave the user believing that Tumblr is a place that is stale and not relevant. 

Actions & Next Steps

Deliver great content each time the app is opened.

Make it easier for users to understand where the vibrant communities on Tumblr are. 

Improve our algorithmic ranking capabilities across all feeds. 

Principle 3: Facilitate easier user participation in conversations.

Part of Tumblr’s charm lies in its capacity to showcase the evolution of conversations and the clever remarks found within reblog chains and replies. Engaging in these discussions should be enjoyable and effortless.

Unfortunately, the current way that conversations work on Tumblr across replies and reblogs is confusing for new users. The limitations around engaging with individual reblogs, replies only applying to the original post, and the inability to easily follow threaded conversations make it difficult for users to join the conversation.

Actions & Next Steps

Address the confusion within replies and reblogs.

Improve the conversational posting features around replies and reblogs. 

Allow engagements on individual replies and reblogs.

Make it easier for users to follow the various conversation paths within a reblog thread. 

Remove clutter in the conversation by collapsing reblog threads. 

Explore the feasibility of removing duplicate reblogs within a user’s Following feed. 

Principle 4: Retain and grow our creator base.

Creators are essential to the Tumblr community. However, we haven’t always had a consistent and coordinated effort around retaining, nurturing, and growing our creator base.  

Being a new creator on Tumblr can be intimidating, with a high likelihood of leaving or disappointment upon sharing creations without receiving engagement or feedback. We need to ensure that we have the expected creator tools and foster the rewarding feedback loops that keep creators around and enable them to thrive.

The lack of feedback stems from the outdated decision to only show content from followed blogs on the main dashboard feed (“Following”), perpetuating a cycle where popular blogs continue to gain more visibility at the expense of helping new creators. To address this, we need to prioritize supporting and nurturing the growth of new creators on the platform.

It is also imperative that creators, like everyone on Tumblr, feel safe and in control of their experience. Whether it be an ask from the community or engagement on a post, being successful on Tumblr should never feel like a punishing experience.

Actions & Next Steps

Get creators’ new content in front of people who are interested in it. 

Improve the feedback loop for creators, incentivizing them to continue posting.

Build mechanisms to protect creators from being spammed by notifications when they go viral.

Expand ways to co-create content, such as by adding the capability to embed Tumblr links in posts.

Principle 5: Create patterns that encourage users to keep returning to Tumblr.

Push notifications and emails are essential tools to increase user engagement, improve user retention, and facilitate content discovery. Our strategy of reaching out to you, the user, should be well-coordinated across product, commercial, and marketing teams.

Our messaging strategy needs to be personalized and adapt to a user’s shifting interests. Our messages should keep users in the know on the latest activity in their community, as well as keeping Tumblr top of mind as the place to go for witty takes and remixes of the latest shows and real-life events.  

Most importantly, our messages should be thoughtful and should never come across as spammy.  

Actions & Next Steps

Conduct an audit of our messaging strategy.

Address the issue of notifications getting too noisy; throttle, collapse or mute notifications where necessary.  

Identify opportunities for personalization within our email messages. 

Test what the right daily push notification limit is. 

Send emails when a user has push notifications switched off.

Principle 6: Performance, stability and quality.

The stability and performance of our mobile apps have declined. There is a large backlog of production issues, with more bugs created than resolved over the last 300 days. If this continues, roughly one new unresolved production issue will be created every two days. Apps and backend systems that work well and don't crash are the foundation of a great Tumblr experience. Improving performance, stability, and quality will help us achieve sustainable operations for Tumblr.

Improve performance and stability: deliver crash-free, responsive, and fast-loading apps on Android, iOS, and web.

Improve quality: deliver the highest quality Tumblr experience to our users. 

Move faster: provide APIs and services to unblock core product initiatives and launch new features coming out of Labs.

Conclusion

Our mission has always been to empower the world’s creators. We are wholly committed to ensuring Tumblr evolves in a way that supports our current users while improving areas that attract new creators, artists, and users. You deserve a digital home that works for you. You deserve the best tools and features to connect with your communities on a platform that prioritizes the easy discoverability of high-quality content. This is an invigorating time for Tumblr, and we couldn’t be more excited about our current strategy.

[guzsdaily]

Anxiety with jobs

Day 29 - Dec 4th, 12.023

As I said in past posts, I'm in the look of finding a job. And this week's project is researching, create and learn things to do so, but let's just say that researching didn't help with my anxiety at all. Knowing that I need one somewhat soon if I want to be financially stable and have a home or apartment in some years, it is not good to enter a new social media and see how fucked you are, even YouTube videos didn't help that much to be honest, because none seems to actually talk about this "middle ground" that I'm in.

Why be anxious?

Lack of [real] experience,

If you aren't in tech, let's just say that in this market it's really hard to prove that you can do a good job, because a good programmer is something subjective most of the time. And the big problem also is that your recruiter won't actually see things like source code and the "behind the scenes" of your work, it will probably just see your experience in other past jobs, like any other profession. Which is kinda hard to get when to get a job to have experience, you need experience, I think everyone here already knows this paradox. I don't have experiences, so maybe I can prove saying the things I know? Like, saying the things I learned?

Lack of [real] education,

Well, no. I'm self-taught, so I don't have a degree or prove that I learned something these past 2 years. Yes, I made some courses here and there, but most of them I left and started to learn based on YouTube videos and mostly creating my own projects and learning by trying. Thankfully in this industry, something like a degree is not mandatory for getting a job, but it probably helps a lot. Well, maybe I can then show someone my skills and what I learned? Possibly someone whose work in a company that is recruiting?

Lack of networking,

Again, no, and this is the one that gives me more anxiety. I mostly have relationships online now days, because of my social anxiety which I developed during my young teenager years, and let's just say that this anxiety also applies to social interactions on the internet. There's pretty much no one that I know that could network with to get a job, I actually just started to have people who work in tech to talk with some weeks ago, by accident in some sense. Yes, there are Discord servers and communities that I could talk in, but again, social anxiety still attacks. But in this industry, it seems that it is more possible to get a job if someone recommends you than if you apply directly, even more after the layoffs that happened after the pandemic. There are a lot of people applying, lack of jobs it seems, but also lack of quality in the people who apply, so a lot of companies seems to be making intern hires and position shifts instead of getting someone new who probably doesn't have experience to work.

LinkedIn This anxiety worse a lot after I created a LinkedIn account, because of their emphasis in connections, which is similar to the "mutual" concept in other social medias, but worse. I don't have people to connect, to improve my account algorithm or whatever. This social media in general seems so bad, and worse than just applying to random companies in job finding sites even. And it is somewhat funny that a platform which has a lot of tech people in it, has a 5 to 10 seconds loading stage in each page.

But a lot of projects

As you seen in some past entry, I have a lot of projects ideas related to code, around 20 notes just in my Obsidian, and some more in my phone's note-taking app. And to be honest, that's what I'm good at, actually coding. Yes, I need and kinda want to have more connections with people in this industry, but we all are in this because we are/want to be good at something: programming. I want to create software and things that help people, so that's what I will do every day to be someone who's desired to be hired. Thankfully I didn't fall in tutorial hell, didn't stop some framework or one tool (without even know basic programming logic to begin with), so you know what? I will fucking show it by creating things that "someone else" couldn't create. FUCK. OFF. ok, sorry, but I really needed to emphasize this for me even. I created Lored and Capytal for a reason, to show that I can create quality code and products, and maybe even be able to don't need a traditional job in the future.

Talking more serious now

Ok, but now talking in a more serious note. I feel like I cannot really plan well how I can get a job in this industry, in a lot of sense luck has a factor in it, but you also need to create your own luck. Something that I'm trying a lot now is to be more persistent, continue even if I fail, and it is what I need now when finding a job. It makes take months or even more, one year until I get one, but I need to try something to improve the things I lack now days. So I created a small plan to do so:

Create projects

This is what I like and am good at, but would also help me a lot in showing my skills. Out counting the idea that my projects are open-source, built in public and people can judge clearly if the code and process are good, having a good list of projects in your portfolio or resume can really show that you actually want to learn, improve, and code y'know?

Contributing to open-source

This will be challenging to me, but I need to start to contribute more back to open-source projects. Wanting a job or not, contributing is one of the best ways to connect with people and say like "hey! I exist and know how to code!", and just giving back to this community and tools that I use seems fair, I want to help, and a lot of people needs help. Soooo why I don't have an "open-source weekend"? Contribute to a project every week, while also creating my own projects, seems reasonable and won't pressure my social anxiety that much every single day.

Applying to jobs

I will mostly be rejected because of the reasons above, period. But if I at least get to the interview part of the recruiting process, I can learn how they work and how to communicate and don't be anxious during the live coding section, which will really come in handy when I start to apply to jobs that I actually want and/or have a change to be hired. And there's a change in these random applications, that I actually get hired to work, so why not try one every week also?

Connect in social media

This is the part that, I'm going to be honest, I plan to be lazy with. I really don't care that much in opening Twitter or LinkedIn in general, even Mastodon to be honest, I just got tired of them, but I can't deny the value that them have in showing your work to an audience, even more if you play the algorithm and post consistently every day. But you know what I can use to do this part? Automation! (And even AI, possibly!). I will probably create something, with my own website, to get notes in my note-taking app here where I write my daily journal entries, to post them in social media, and maybe have a section to weekly tweets related to blog posts that I posted, so hopefully I never actually open these platforms. And yes, I'm seeing the possibility to use AI to create tweets related to posts automatically, but I don't want to use OpenAI's ChatGPT for reasons, a lot of them, and would like to use some open-source alternative and/or create/run my own model even. But I will probably just batch write a bunch of them to be posted daily automatically.

---

I think that's it, today's was a little different, but I'm trying new formats to these daily journals. Nonetheless, it is my daily journal, so I will write how I like them. ;')

---

Today's artists & creative things

Video & Song: Glimpse of Us - by Joji Joji never was really my style of music, and it still isn't, but recently I remembered about him and had the curiosity to listen again. And this music, and mostly the video clip, make me shocked. I actually thought that this video was actually found footage, that those people were real, and the history talked in it was real (which to be clear is not, here is the behind the scenes). The visual direction of it is simply superb and of course the music just makes it even more excellent, seeing these people in such destructive life, and even them realizing that life shouldn't be this, the chaos increasing together with the music, this is fucking art. I didn't follow Filthy Frank, but knowing about he and what Joji is now, how his persona changed, just gives even more weight to it and his music to be honest. I don't know if this video somehow reflects how was his life in the past when he was doing Filthy Frank and all his past videos, I probably don't, but I like somehow to interpret some connection to be honest. In general, just love the music and art he created and the artist that he became.

---

Copyright (c) 2023-present Gustavo "Guz" L. de Mello <contact.guz013@gmail.com>

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License

[bogunicorn]

Here is my one and only thing to say about this whole... AO3 algorithm thing. Ready? Here it is, super controversial:

Most of the complaints about the structure of AO3 - as in, the search function, the bookmarking, that sort of stuff, not the arguments about what's in the content that's posted - can be boiled down to people basically saying, "I wasn't curious enough to look up a solution to the issue I'm having, or wasn't self-directed enough to figure out a system that works for me, and it's less embarrassing to complain as if my refusal to do so is someone else's problem."

Now, yes, are there actual structural complaints to be made about AO3? Of course! I'd love to have things like be able to block specific authors or tags by default just built into the account, or even just floating comment boxes (rather than needing a browser extension for those things, which does exist). I'd love to see IP banning become available to make anon harassment more difficult.

But this current little spat of complaints is an update of some older, consistent complaints that can be solved either by: the complainer learning how to use the site, or AO3 becoming social media. And the second one isn't going to happen. I'm not, like, harshing a buzz here, it's literally not social media. There are no private messages, no feeds, the inbox is only for comments and replies to your comments. There is deliberately no feed for, like, things the people you're subscribed to have bookmarked or something. They made it that way on purpose and they're not going to try to change it just because a handful of people with their brains still solidifying are getting crabby about it. There is a reason that you have to subscribe to people instead of "friending" them, there's a reason there's no, like, blogging feature or messaging system or even the ability to set up a feed for anything in browser.

AO3 wants you to be social about fic somewhere else. They expect you to go to tumblr or twitter or discord or, I don't know, fucking carrier pigeons to keep track of stuff they don't have built in. Because once it's inching toward a true social media platform, once we start doing things like automatic feeds, recommendations, algorithms, an app, whatever, then there are community considerations to be made regarding content. Those are the cracks that gives censorship leverage.

Plus, like, you don't want an algorithm anyway. You know what algorithms are for? Selling you shit. Turning you into a sellable product. Driving engagement, which inevitably means rage farming. Every social media algorithm present on the big sites is there to feed you things you'll interact with, and the algorithm doesn't know the difference between joy and drama.

There's already a harassment issue on AO3. You want more harassment on AO3? An algorithm is how you get more harassment on AO3, because it's going to funnel people toward fics that people are already mad about, just like it does on tumblr and twitter and insta and tiktok and facebook and whatever other algorithm-powered shit there is. People in fandom already dogpile each other on other sites over what's on their AO3, the OTW isn't going to help you do it.

But none of that matters because it's just... it's not going to happen. Even if AO3 wanted an algorithm (which it does not, very emphatically and by design), managing one is expensive, hiring the people to create it is expensive, everything about it is expensive and time consuming. So, like, don't worry about it. And if you wanted one, idk, that sucks for you but I'm sure you'll recover.

AO3 expects to give you tools and let you do the work. Curating your own experience is your job, not theirs. Yes, you may have to manually trawl through your friends' bookmarks, oh no. Some large fandoms or super popular pairings even have tumblrs run by bots that post every single thing that shows up in that pairing tag, if that's your thing. Hell, just straight up ask people who wrote your favorite fics what their favorite fics are with the same pairing, and they'll probably go look them up for you!

Oh, also, if you're going to complain about AO3 as if it's doing something to spite you... at least make sure it's about a feature that takes someone more than 5 seconds to go look up and screenshot for you. Or at least go through your settings first and make sure you don't have shit like not asking for confirmation on explicit works turned on or something, since people just love getting sooooo pressed about "not being able to avoid smut" or whatever.

[weirdthingsphanniessay]

Some thoughts on Dystopia Daily aka Dan's Last Attempt At YouTube.

"[Dystopia Daily] may not be daily" - Weird but ok.

"I am finally just gonna give the people and the algorithm what they ask for"; "I am here to create some fucking content (...) my way" - So which one is it, their way or your way?

"I would like to open each episode of "Dystopia Daily" with a monologue about the times that we live in. Something topical, personal, controversial, sexual maybe, I dunno, whatever." - So which one is it, rambling about the world or rambling about yourself?

"I dunno what I wanna do with my life because I don't know what I want." - You're a rich 31-year-old man, not a helpless teenager. Get off the internet, get intensive therapy, and get yourself together. Find hobbies and a job that actually fulfil you.

"More attention? God, please no." - Why are you still a public internet personality then?

"Money? Yeah, I've been ruined by stupid leftist YouTubers and Twitter accounts. And now I'm some bloody, low-key socialist that can't live without the guilt." - Get off the internet, leave your bubble, and use that money you feel guilty about to do good in the world.

"Is it just sex?" - Your sex jokes stopped being funny 5 years ago. Stop.

"after having my dreams disintegrated by an uncaring corporate cog in the machine, and thusly relearning how to be cripplingly depressed for a while after I literally wrote the book about looking after your mental health..." - You had to face rejection. Welcome to life. You're also a hypocrite, cool.

"The problem with everything I aspire to do with my life off social media is it has to be on someone else's terms, and their timeline" - Again, welcome to life you privileged dumbass. Do you think you're the first and only person ever who faces challenges and has to make compromises with other people and still gets disappointed every now and then? Who do you think you are?

"Every day, I am tempted to just go live in the woods, but you keep asking me to come back, trapping me in this liminal hell where I can neither fully follow my dreams or just frolic in the forest and finally be free." - Don't shift the responsibility. Go live in the woods if you want to, no one's trapping you. Stop acting like a martyr. Your fans will be fine.

"What I wanna know is what happens after [burning out]?" You either (1) quit for good, (2) reinvent yourself and your act, or (3) continue to spiral while the world is watching. I can think of several Youtuber examples for each option, and right now it looks like you're on the way to #3.

"I have developed a total phobia of social media, which as someone who is reliant on two apps to live is a bit of a fuckin' problem."; "I feel like I cannot tweet without…"; "On Instagram, my problem is…"; "I really dunno where to go from here" - Get help for your social media addiction and get off the internet.

"I am afraid to upload anything unless it's a fuckin' feature film"; "I have somehow pushed myself into a corner where I can't create a clip unless I got some kind of bomb to drop or trauma to mine for content."; "I care way too much about what people think and what it all means." - It means you need to grow thicker skin or get off the internet and get a job where you aren't exposing yourself to millions of people.

"have I just let various paranoias mutate unchecked and trap me in a prison of my own toxic thoughts?" - Probably.

"I am in terminally online rehabilitation, just trying to learn to shitpost again and find some serotonin somewhere. So this show here is a immersion therapy." - No, you should definitely try to find serotonin elsewhere. Offline. Actual therapy, and hobbies and work that have nothing to do with the internet.

"They say the best way to face your fears is head on. So I am here and I'm queer and I am just gonna force myself through the tears."; "I just wanna show the world and show you that even when every part of you is screaming not to do something, sometimes, you should just go for it" - Sometimes, the fear you feel is there for a reason and you should listen to it because it's trying to protect you. Again, stop being a martyr.

"[We're All Doomed]'s a show I made to just give me something to head towards to save my own life" - If this isn't a cry for help, I don't know what is.