#good startup companies to invest in

[phantomrose96]

If anyone wants to know why every tech company in the world right now is clamoring for AI like drowned rats scrabbling to board a ship, I decided to make a post to explain what's happening.

(Disclaimer to start: I'm a software engineer who's been employed full time since 2018. I am not a historian nor an overconfident Youtube essayist, so this post is my working knowledge of what I see around me and the logical bridges between pieces.)

Okay anyway. The explanation starts further back than what's going on now. I'm gonna start with the year 2000. The Dot Com Bubble just spectacularly burst. The model of "we get the users first, we learn how to profit off them later" went out in a no-money-having bang (remember this, it will be relevant later). A lot of money was lost. A lot of people ended up out of a job. A lot of startup companies went under. Investors left with a sour taste in their mouth and, in general, investment in the internet stayed pretty cooled for that decade. This was, in my opinion, very good for the internet as it was an era not suffocating under the grip of mega-corporation oligarchs and was, instead, filled with Club Penguin and I Can Haz Cheezburger websites.

Then around the 2010-2012 years, a few things happened. Interest rates got low, and then lower. Facebook got huge. The iPhone took off. And suddenly there was a huge new potential market of internet users and phone-havers, and the cheap money was available to start backing new tech startup companies trying to hop on this opportunity. Companies like Uber, Netflix, and Amazon either started in this time, or hit their ramp-up in these years by shifting focus to the internet and apps.

Now, every start-up tech company dreaming of being the next big thing has one thing in common: they need to start off by getting themselves massively in debt. Because before you can turn a profit you need to first spend money on employees and spend money on equipment and spend money on data centers and spend money on advertising and spend money on scale and and and

But also, everyone wants to be on the ship for The Next Big Thing that takes off to the moon.

So there is a mutual interest between new tech companies, and venture capitalists who are willing to invest $$$ into said new tech companies. Because if the venture capitalists can identify a prize pig and get in early, that money could come back to them 100-fold or 1,000-fold. In fact it hardly matters if they invest in 10 or 20 total bust projects along the way to find that unicorn.

But also, becoming profitable takes time. And that might mean being in debt for a long long time before that rocket ship takes off to make everyone onboard a gazzilionaire.

But luckily, for tech startup bros and venture capitalists, being in debt in the 2010's was cheap, and it only got cheaper between 2010 and 2020. If people could secure loans for ~3% or 4% annual interest, well then a $100,000 loan only really costs $3,000 of interest a year to keep afloat. And if inflation is higher than that or at least similar, you're still beating the system.

So from 2010 through early 2022, times were good for tech companies. Startups could take off with massive growth, showing massive potential for something, and venture capitalists would throw infinite money at them in the hopes of pegging just one winner who will take off. And supporting the struggling investments or the long-haulers remained pretty cheap to keep funding.

You hear constantly about "Such and such app has 10-bazillion users gained over the last 10 years and has never once been profitable", yet the thing keeps chugging along because the investors backing it aren't stressed about the immediate future, and are still banking on that "eventually" when it learns how to really monetize its users and turn that profit.

The pandemic in 2020 took a magnifying-glass-in-the-sun effect to this, as EVERYTHING was forcibly turned online which pumped a ton of money and workers into tech investment. Simultaneously, money got really REALLY cheap, bottoming out with historic lows for interest rates.

Then the tide changed with the massive inflation that struck late 2021. Because this all-gas no-brakes state of things was also contributing to off-the-rails inflation (along with your standard-fare greedflation and price gouging, given the extremely convenient excuses of pandemic hardships and supply chain issues). The federal reserve whipped out interest rate hikes to try to curb this huge inflation, which is like a fire extinguisher dousing and suffocating your really-cool, actively-on-fire party where everyone else is burning but you're in the pool. And then they did this more, and then more. And the financial climate followed suit. And suddenly money was not cheap anymore, and new loans became expensive, because loans that used to compound at 2% a year are now compounding at 7 or 8% which, in the language of compounding, is a HUGE difference. A $100,000 loan at a 2% interest rate, if not repaid a single cent in 10 years, accrues to $121,899. A $100,000 loan at an 8% interest rate, if not repaid a single cent in 10 years, more than doubles to $215,892.

Now it is scary and risky to throw money at "could eventually be profitable" tech companies. Now investors are watching companies burn through their current funding and, when the companies come back asking for more, investors are tightening their coin purses instead. The bill is coming due. The free money is drying up and companies are under compounding pressure to produce a profit for their waiting investors who are now done waiting.

You get enshittification. You get quality going down and price going up. You get "now that you're a captive audience here, we're forcing ads or we're forcing subscriptions on you." Don't get me wrong, the plan was ALWAYS to monetize the users. It's just that it's come earlier than expected, with way more feet-to-the-fire than these companies were expecting. ESPECIALLY with Wall Street as the other factor in funding (public) companies, where Wall Street exhibits roughly the same temperament as a baby screaming crying upset that it's soiled its own diaper (maybe that's too mean a comparison to babies), and now companies are being put through the wringer for anything LESS than infinite growth that Wall Street demands of them.

Internal to the tech industry, you get MASSIVE wide-spread layoffs. You get an industry that used to be easy to land multiple job offers shriveling up and leaving recent graduates in a desperately awful situation where no company is hiring and the market is flooded with laid-off workers trying to get back on their feet.

Because those coin-purse-clutching investors DO love virtue-signaling efforts from companies that say "See! We're not being frivolous with your money! We only spend on the essentials." And this is true even for MASSIVE, PROFITABLE companies, because those companies' value is based on the Rich Person Feeling Graph (their stock) rather than the literal profit money. A company making a genuine gazillion dollars a year still tears through layoffs and freezes hiring and removes the free batteries from the printer room (totally not speaking from experience, surely) because the investors LOVE when you cut costs and take away employee perks. The "beer on tap, ping pong table in the common area" era of tech is drying up. And we're still unionless.

Never mind that last part.

And then in early 2023, AI (more specifically, Chat-GPT which is OpenAI's Large Language Model creation) tears its way into the tech scene with a meteor's amount of momentum. Here's Microsoft's prize pig, which it invested heavily in and is galivanting around the pig-show with, to the desperate jealousy and rapture of every other tech company and investor wishing it had that pig. And for the first time since the interest rate hikes, investors have dollar signs in their eyes, both venture capital and Wall Street alike. They're willing to restart the hose of money (even with the new risk) because this feels big enough for them to take the risk.

Now all these companies, who were in varying stages of sweating as their bill came due, or wringing their hands as their stock prices tanked, see a single glorious gold-plated rocket up out of here, the likes of which haven't been seen since the free money days. It's their ticket to buy time, and buy investors, and say "see THIS is what will wring money forth, finally, we promise, just let us show you."

To be clear, AI is NOT profitable yet. It's a money-sink. Perhaps a money-black-hole. But everyone in the space is so wowed by it that there is a wide-spread and powerful conviction that it will become profitable and earn its keep. (Let's be real, half of that profit "potential" is the promise of automating away jobs of pesky employees who peskily cost money.) It's a tech-space industrial revolution that will automate away skilled jobs, and getting in on the ground floor is the absolute best thing you can do to get your pie slice's worth.

It's the thing that will win investors back. It's the thing that will get the investment money coming in again (or, get it second-hand if the company can be the PROVIDER of something needed for AI, which other companies with venture-back will pay handsomely for). It's the thing companies are terrified of missing out on, lest it leave them utterly irrelevant in a future where not having AI-integration is like not having a mobile phone app for your company or not having a website.

So I guess to reiterate on my earlier point:

Drowned rats. Swimming to the one ship in sight.

[headspace-hotel]

I went down the internet rabbit hole trying to figure out wtf vegan cheese is made of and I found articles like this one speaking praises of new food tech startups creating vegan alternatives to cheese that Actually work like cheese in cooking so I was like huh that's neat and I looked up more stuff about 'precision fermentation' and. This is not good.

Basically these new biotech companies are pressuring governments to let them build a ton of new factories and pushing for governments to pay for them or to provide tax breaks and subsidies, and the factories are gonna cost hundreds of millions of dollars and require energy sources. Like, these things will have to be expensive and HUGE

I feel like I've just uncovered the tip of the "lab grown meat" iceberg. There are a bajillion of these companies (the one mentioned in the first article a $750 MILLION tech startup) that are trying to create "animal-free" animal products using biotech and want to build large factories to do it on a large scale

I'm trying to use google to find out about the energy requirements of such facilities and everything is really vague and hand-wavey about it like this article that's like "weeeeeell electricity can be produced using renewables" but it does take a lot of electricity, sugars, and human labor. Most of the claims about its sustainability appear to assume that we switch over to renewable electricity sources and/or use processes that don't fully exist yet.

I finally tracked down the source of some of the more radical claims about precision fermentation, and it comes from a think tank RethinkX that released a report claiming that the livestock industry will collapse by 2030, and be replaced by a system they're calling...

Food-as-Software, in which individual molecules engineered by scientists are uploaded to databases – molecular cookbooks that food engineers anywhere in the world can use to design products in the same way that software developers design apps.

I'm finding it hard to be excited about this for some odd reason

Where's the evidence for lower environmental impacts. That's literally what we're here for.

There will be an increase in the amount of electricity used in the new food system as the production facilities that underpin it rely on electricity to operate.

well that doesn't sound good.

This will, however, be offset by reductions in energy use elsewhere along the value chain. For example, since modern meat and dairy products will be produced in a sterile environment where the risk of contamination by pathogens is low, the need for refrigeration in storage and retail will decrease significantly.

Oh, so it will be better for the Earth because...we won't need to refrigerate. ????????

Oh Lord Jesus give me some numerical values.

Modern foods will be about 10 times more efficient than a cow at converting feed into end products because a cow needs energy via feed to maintain and build its body over time. Less feed consumed means less land required to grow it, which means less water is used and less waste is produced. The savings are dramatic – more than 10-25 times less feedstock, 10 times less water, five times less energy and 100 times less land.

There is nothing else in this report that I can find that provides evidence for a lower carbon footprint. Supposedly, an egg white protein produced through a similar process has been found to reduce environmental impacts, but mostly everything seems very speculative.

And crucially none of these estimations are taking into account the enormous cost and resource investment of constructing large factories that use this technology in the first place (existing use is mostly for pharmaceutical purposes)

It seems like there are more tech startups attempting to use this technology to create food than individual scientific papers investigating whether it's a good idea. Seriously, Google Scholar and JSTOR have almost nothing. The tech of the sort that RethinkX is describing barely exists.

Apparently Liberation Labs is planning to build the first large-scale precision fermentation facility in Richmond, Indiana come 2024 because of the presence of "a workforce experienced in manufacturing"

And I just looked up Richmond, Indiana and apparently, as of RIGHT NOW, the town is in the aftermath of a huge fire at a plastics recycling plant and is full of toxic debris containing asbestos and the air is full of toxic VOCs and hydrogen cyanide. ???????????? So that's how having a robust industrial sector is working out for them so far.

[sanzaibian]

I turns off my phone angrily. I have barely touched down to Pudong International Airport, and now I have to call my Shanghai agent about how I’m going to be late, and that “China Eastern”, that company full of crooks, doesn’t even want to compensate my $4200 business class ticket for being 2 hours late.

“Allô ? C’est Julien, je suis enfin arrivé à Shanghai. (Hello ? It’s Julien, I’ve finally touched down at Shanghai.)” I say to my local correspondent, the one responsible for dragging me here.

- Enfin ! Ça fait une heure qu’on vous attend ! (Finally ! We’ve been waiting for you for a whole hour !)

- C’est pas ma faute ! Le vol a eu deux heures de retard à cause de soi-disants ‘vents forts’ vers la Mongolie… et ces escrocs ne veulent rien me rembourser… typique… (It’s not my fault ! The flight was two hours late due to so-called ‘powerful winds’ around Mongolia… and those crooks don’t want to reimburse me… typical…)” I answer, annoyed.

- Bon, de l’Aéroport de 浦東 (Pudong) jusqu’ici… pff… je vais devoir leur dire de revenir cet après-midi… (So, from 浦東 (Pudong) Airport to here… ugh… I need to ask them to come back this afternoon…)” He says, similarly annoyed, though seemingly flaunting his perfect pronunciation in Chinese.

- Ne râle pas sur moi, j’ai rien fait ! Je savais que j’aurais dû prendre Air France, ils n’auraient pas eu de retard comme ces asiates… (Don’t dump it on me, I did nothing ! I knew I should have gone for Air France, they wouldn’t be late like those chinks…)

- Roh… (Ugh…)” He sighs a while. “Je vais m’occuper de tout. Juste… viens aussi vite que possible. (I’ll manage. Just… come here as soon as you can.)”

I turn off the phone. As if I would waste a minute of my life… I’m Julien Blanc, and my time is money, just like the saying goes. As the heir of a multi-million dollars worth banking company, I have investments left right and center, and can’t let the next golden goose escape me.

Recently, a well-known investor, Pierre Zhang, let me know of a promising startup here in Shanghai. While at first I was understandingly skeptical, after all chinks are known for their plagiarism, I did check the project and found it to be unique, and even viable.

While I do know that Pierre Zhang is half one of them, so he does take their side much more than a regular person would, this time he saw a good opportunity. And it will be botched due to an incapable company that spouted nonsense about “strong winds” or something and was late as a result.

Angrily, I stomp in the giant airport halls, guiding myself thanks to my impeccable English – though, just don’t listen to the pronunciation. I’m stopped multiple times for security checks, and I do swear on them a couple of times, but they deserved it for wasting my time even more.

However, as I was striding in the main hall in order to find the metro station, seeing more and more of those chink hooligans, one of them shoves me to the side. He’s wearing a mask like the pussy he is, as well as a ridiculous oversized hoodie, some laughable jewelry and undistinguished sweatpants.

He’s left as soon as I turn around, meaning I can’t berate him. Youth these days are really insufferable. Where I grew up, on the Saint-Louis island in Paris, we weren’t even half as rude as today’s kids.

Scoffing, I continue rushing to the metro, though I kind of feel dizzy. Did he give me a disease or something ? When I reach the metro shoot, I see a barrier with policemen. Apparently they’re scanning for the coronavirus – they’re still doing that ? – by checking our temperature.

I go in the barrier, confident that I’ll pass the test, when suddenly, my path is blocked.

“Sorry, sir, please come with me.” Said a policewoman in her heavily accented English.

- What are you doing ! Let me go, I did nothing wrong !” I protest with a similarly accented English.

The policewoman doesn’t answer me and leads me to a small room in the airport. There, I see a bunch of other people with masks, waiting on seats. Showing me a mask, the policewoman explain :

“You may be sick. Take a mask and wait. - I’m going to be late ! Nothing’s wrong with me, just let me leave !” I say, though I don’t notice my accent shifting a little.

- Wear it or face consequences.” The policewoman insists, dangling the mask in front of my eyes. I sigh.

- Okay, but make it quick. I’ll wear 一只 (one).”

I squint my eyes. How did I say ‘one’ ? It feels incorrect, have I accidentally used French ‘un’ ?

I take the mask and wear it, still squinting. I still feel dizzy, so I guess the policewoman must have been right ? I take my phone out, wanting to send a quick message to Pierre about me being late, but something seems wrong.

When I look on my phone, there’s a weird app named 抖音 that has been installed. I don’t remember doing that. In fact, why is there even a Chinese app on my phone !

I click on it, and suddenly, videos start playing. I squint my eyes as I look at the videos of ch… Chinese people doing a variety of things. First it’s a video of a cat rubbing on someone, and that guy exclaimed “它真的是只饥渴死的猫啊！”, with then the woman filming answering, with a hurried tone “快摸它啊，你干嘛在那儿等呗？真冷啊。”. Even though I don’t understand a word that is said, I can guess that the woman is telling the guy to go rub the cat.

It’s funnier than I expected. Turns out the Chinese have more humor than I thought. Then, another video comes on, showing a guy, looking just like that punk from earlier, saying “穿这种衣服，我干嘛不会感丢人哎？(… these clothes… … lose face ?)”, and the camera pans out to a woman in a cockroach outfit. The punk continues “你已经三十岁了，为什么还在买这种衣服了？(… thirty years old, why still buy… ?)”, the woman answers “你现在我穿什么你都要管吗？(You... right now what I wear… your business ?)”. The punk then comes back into frame, with the woman on the left, asking “没有情侣版吗？哪只手我该牵啊？(There isn’t a couple’s version ? Which hand should I hold ?). Then, the woman shows a tendril, and they hold hands like that. I smile, finding it way funnier than it should.

I don’t really notice how I understand more and more what’s on 抖音 (Douyin), though I do let myself grow limp on the waiting room chair. I guess I don’t have much regards anymore for how I look, after all I’m waiting for a coronavirus test. Nobody’s going to comment on my posture !

The next video shows three guys running, with the caption 三人跑步时能干什么 (What can three people do while running together ?), and I see how their hair bop up and down. I’ve been shaving myself bald for quite a few years, ever since I was balding too much for me to bother with hair, but seeing these guys like that makes me a bit nostalgic of that time.

Seeing them doing stupider and stupider stuff, and smiling more and more as they show bungee jumping, doing pull-ups, playing games, stir-frying and even boxing, I feel a bit weird. Like I can kind of relate, in my youth I also did crazy things, and it would absolutely be something I would have done with my friends. I scratch my head, feeling it tingle, as I continue watching the next video, not even realizing my squinting is less and less strenuous.

The videos continue trickling in, every one more humorous than the last, and I catch myself chuckling out loud multiple times. By now, I understand everything very clearly, and when a doctor comes to do a coronavirus test, I don’t even blink when he addresses me in Chinese :

“少年，请跟我进走。(Young man, please enter with me.)

- Yes, 先生。(Yes, sir.)” I answer, mixing English and Chinese.

Everything is confused as he takes me to a machine, my thoughts mixing French, English and Chinese. Even my clothes feel… less tight than they used to. Almost as if they were melting and becoming glue.

I take place in the machine and he activates it. I feel as if things become clearer while I’m in. Like, for example, why was I stressed just now ? I don’t have anything important to do right now. And why languages are mixed ? I guess it’s because it’s cooler to mix in English…

The machine stops, and I leave it, scratching my straight hair. Had I ? … no, of course not, it’s my facial hair that I shave…

The doctor hands me my piercings.

“Euh, attendez, 先生，有什么不对了…… (Er, wait, sir, there’s something that’s not right.)” I ask, mixing French and Chinese. I really feel like something is not right.

- 什么发生过了？会跟我谈一谈。(What happened ? You can discuss it with me.)

- 我……有个奇怪的感受。Est-ce que 您找到了种疾病吗？(I… have a weird feeling. Did you find some kind of disease ?)

- 没有。但是您不舒服的话我肯定会给您扑热息痛。(I didn’t. However, if you don’t feel good, I can give you some paracetamol.)” He answers me, with a helpful look.

- 该好了。Merci. (It should be good. Thank you.)”

I take the pill he gives me, and put my piercings back on as I go back in the terminal. As I walk, I feel very comfy, as if everything was alright. I look down on my large oversized hoodie with its colorful prints. I feel like I’m in my youth once again… huh, it’s so weird to say that when I’m only... 23 years old !

Suddenly, I get a phone call from a weird contact I don’t remember having, someone named 张皮尔 (Zhang Pi’er/Pierre). I accept the call :

“喂。是谁？(Hello. Who’s there ?)” I ask, with a perfect accent.

- Julien ? Pourquoi tu parles chinois ? (Julien ? Why do you speak Chinese ?)” He groans, then switches to Chinese. “是我问您是谁。是您的电话吗？(I’m the one asking you who you are. Is it your phone ?)

- 当然是。我是个富二代，为啥要偷手机啊？(Of course. I have a trust fund, why would I steal a phone ?)” I slur, my speech becoming more and more relaxed.

- 嗯……那您是谁啊？您认不认识Julien Blanc ? (Ugh… So who are you ? Do you know Julien Blanc ?)

- 是白炬亮。那你到底是谁啊？(I’m Bai Juliang. And now can you tell me who you are ?)

- 是张皮尔……嗯……听我说一下。你有没有多钱会投资？我认为了Julien Blanc要投资新项目，但你还会投资一下。有没有兴趣？(I’m Pierre Zhang… ugh… Listen. Do you have a lot of money to invest ? I thought Julien Blanc would come and invest in a new project, but you can still invest. Are you interested ?)”

I think for a while. It could be great to have some money coming from another place than my parents’ company… plus, I don’t want to have to join it, or risk being cut off from my money…

However, there’s time, I’m still young, and there’s no rush right now… Plus, having work is, like, a lot of work, and I don’t want to work… But I have an idea.

“张先生，你想不想跟我投资？我给了你钱币，你给了我专业，收入分两半。感觉好吗？(Mr. Zhang, do you want to invest with me ? I give you the funds, you give me the expertise, and we divide the profits in half. Do you like that ?)”

After a while, he answers :

“感觉好了。(I think it’s good.)”

[transmutationisms]

…so can you expand on the psychological ramifications of stewy being in private equity? that has definitely been lost on me given that i barely understand what private equity is

ok this is an underrated funny aspect of the show imo, and also good insight into stewy and kendall. i'm trying to spare you a bunch of stupid business jargon but basically, maesbury capital (which stewy represents but sandy/sandi ultimately own) is a private equity fund, meaning it's a big pile of a bunch of rich people's money, and stewy's job is to take that money and invest in private companies. a PE fund can invest at a few different points: at the very beginning of a startup's life (venture or angel investing), at a point where the company is trying to grow or restructure (growth investing), or when a company is struggling financially, in which case the fund is usually planning to either dismantle it and sell it for scrap, restructure and go public, or sell it for cash to another company. PE firms like to present themselves as doing a lot of growth or venture investing, but in truth many/most are primarily engaging in this third category of investment strategies, because they're lucrative (and because many startups are stupid, and only good for generating investor payouts).

so, when kendall went and dismantled vaulter in season 2 because logan decided that selling most of it for scrap would be more profitable? that's basically a dramatisation of what stewy does routinely, except of course the exact financial instruments and strategies will differ because stewy represents a PE firm. like, if kendall's venture capitalist schemes tell us about his delusions of creating cool new products and services, stewy is sort of the opposite because his structural goal is usually to dismantle companies and liquidate them however is best for maesbury's backers. it's a total destruction of all use-value and a conversion of it into pure exchange-value in the form of capital (which goes into his pockets and maesbury's). stewy generates money by destroying utility, which is perverse if you think capitalism is supposed to create and sustain human life, but actually completely comprehensible if you understand that capitalism is an insatiable growth machine with inherently contradictory internal tendencies and no raison d'être beyond the endless accumulation of pure capital itself.

many viewers think stewy is insane because he is friends with kendall roy. this is true, but on a deeper level stewy is insane because his job is to participate in the inexorable tendency to more and more abstraction in the capitalist mode of production. it literally does not matter at all to someone like stewy whether people are fed or clothed or happy, or have any of their needs met. the point is solely to create money, to turn all social forms and values into numbers on a balance sheet. this is why, when kendall tries to threaten him on axos at the end of season 2, stewy is able to casually tell him that "it doesn't matter; it doesn't mean anything." he and sandy are convincing shareholders that their offer will be able to make them more money, "and that's all that this is." stewy speaks the language of business differently than logan, because stewy doesn't care about dick-swinging competitions or demonstrating dominance in logan's cringey old catholic military way. which makes stewy more rational in certain ways, but also more insane, in that he operates in a way totally detached from this type of social value system and solely motivated by cold hard numbers.

the irony is that, whilst being detached and disembodied in his business practices, stewy is also better than the roys at appreciating the material fruits of wealth. he eats; he dresses well; he enjoys the "several houses" he owns. kendall is always trying to come up with some grand moral bullshit masculinity reason that what he's doing is noble or whatever, and he's alienated from his body and afflicted with severe catholic martyr disease. stewy just bypasses all that shit, measures his success by his payouts, and enjoys wealth because he sees it as an end in itself and not a means to logan roy's respect.

this is also why kendall's line in 'living+' about "it's enough to make you lose your faith in capitalism" is so funny. kendall can't just accept that business is a bunch of meaningless bullshit confidence games played by coked-up assholes who like to win; he always has to try to convince himself he's making cool new tech shit, or saving the world from the spectre of death itself or some shit. it's like, insane that he made it to literally 40 years old, growing up in a media conglomerate of all things, and still thinks that what he's doing requires actual skill or creates actual social value—but of course, part of the reason he still thinks this is because he deified logan and was therefore incapable of ever seeing logan or waystar for what they really were. stewy would never say that line because he can't be disillusioned this way on account of he already knows the whole thing is bullshit. it's just that to him it doesn't matter, because being bullshit does not preclude it from paying well.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Mass tech worker layoffs and the soft landing

As tech giants reach terminal enshittification, hollowed out to the point where they are barely able to keep their end-users or business customers locked in, the capital classes are ready for the final rug-pull, where all the value is transfered from people who make things for a living to people who own things for a living.

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/21/tech-workers/#sharpen-your-blades-boys

“Activist investors” have triggered massive waves of tech layoffs, firing so many tech workers so quickly that it’s hard to even come up with an accurate count. The total is somewhere around 280,000 workers:

https://layoffs.fyi/

These layoffs have nothing to do with “trimming the fat” or correcting the hiring excesses of the lockdown. They’re a project to transfer value from workers, customers and users to shareholders. Google’s layoff of 12,000 workers followed fast on the heels of gargantuan stock buyback where the company pissed away enough money to pay those 12,000 salaries…for the next 27 years.

The equation is simple: the more companies invest in maintenance, research, development, moderation, anti-fraud, customer service and all the other essential functions of the business, the less money there is to remit to people who do nothing and own everything.

The tech sector has grown and grown since the first days of the PC — which were also the first days of neoliberalism (literally: the Apple ][+ went on sale the same year Ronald Reagan hit the campaign trail). But despite a long-run tight labor market for tech workers, there have been two other periods of mass layoffs — the 2001 dotcom collapse and the Great Financial Crisis of 2008.

Both of those were mass extinction events for startups and the workers who depended on them. The mass dislocations of those times were traumatic, and each one had its own aftermath. The dotcom collapse freed up tons of workers, servers, offices and furniture, and a massive surge in useful, user-centric technologies. The Great Financial Crisis created the gig economy and a series of exploitative, scammy “bro” startups, from cryptocurrency grifts to services like Airbnb, bent on converting the world’s housing stock into unlicensed hotel rooms filled with hidden cameras.

Likewise, the post-lockdown layoffs have their own character: as Eira May writes on StackOverflow, many in the vast cohort of laid-off tech workers is finding it relatively easy to find new tech jobs, outside of the tech sector:

https://stackoverflow.blog/2023/03/19/whats-different-about-these-layoffs/

May cites a Ziprecruiter analysis that claims that 80% of laid-off tech workers found tech jobs within 3 months, and that there are 375,000 open tech roles in American firms today (and that figure is growing):

https://www.ziprecruiter.com/blog/laid-off-tech-workers/

There are plenty of tech jobs — just not in tech companies. They’re in “energy and climate technology, healthcare, retail, finance, agriculture, and more” — firms with intensely technical needs and no technical staff. Historically, many of these firms would have outsourced their technological back-ends to the Big Tech firms that just destroyed so many jobs to further enrich the richest people on Earth. Now, those companies are hiring ex-Big Tech employees to run their own services.

The Big Tech firms are locked in a race to see who can eat their seed corn the fastest. Spreading tech expertise out of the tech firms is a good thing, on balance. Big Tech’s vast profits come from smaller businesses in the real economy who couldn’t outbid the tech giants for tech talent — until now.

These mass layoff speak volumes about the ethos of Silicon Valley. The same investors who rent their garments demanding a bailout for Silicon Valley Bank to “help the everyday workers” are also the loudest voices for mass layoffs and transfers to shareholders. The self-styled “angel investor” who spent the weekend of SVB’s collapse all-caps tweeting dire warnings about the impact on “the middle class” and “Main Street” also gleefully DM’ed Elon Musk in the runup to his takeover of Twitter:

Day zero

Sharpen your blades boys 🔪

2 day a week Office requirement = 20% voluntary departures.

https://newsletter.mollywhite.net/p/the-venture-capitalists-dilemma

For many technologists, the allure of digital tools is the possibility of emancipation, a world where we can collaborate to make things without bosses or masters. But for the bosses and masters, automation’s allure is the possibility of getting rid of workers, shattering their power, and replacing them with meeker, cheaper, more easily replaced labor.

That means that workers who go from tech firms to firms in the real economy might be getting lucky — escaping the grasp of bosses who dream of a world where technology lets them pit workers against each other in a race to the bottom on wages, benefits and working conditions, to employers who are glad to have them as partners in their drive to escape Big Tech’s grasp.

Tomorrow (Mar 22), I’m doing a remote talk for the Institute for the Future’s “Changing the Register” series.

Image: University of North Texas Libraries (modified) https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth586821/

[Image ID: A group of firefighters holding a safety net under a building from which a man is falling; he is supine and has his hands behind his head. The sky has a faint, greyscale version of the 'Matrix Waterfall' effect. The building bears a Google logo.]

[drogba-prospect]

How This Central African City Became the World’s Most Expensive

S & M GOALS TEAMPLATE

Stretch Goals: Central African Republic Ranks Top 8 in FIFA World Rankings for Men's and Top 5 for Futsal

Micro Goals: All Time Laureus World Sports Awards Winner for Africans, Laureus Team Award, All Time African Footballer of the Year, AFCON Host Nation Champion*, African Transfer Record*,  Insead and WSJ Conferences*, Jeune Afrique Cover*, Verified LinkedIn Member*, and Agriculture Startup Reality TV

CAPÔI HABITANT CURRENCY MODEL

Pigou Effect, Corporate Tax Havens, Capital Gains Tax Havens, Private-Public Sectors, Joint Venture Plantations, Market Extension Mergers, with Business Incubators, and Enterprise Foundation, Holding Company, Subsidiaries, and Horizontal Integration for Monopoly.

A currency union (also known as monetary union) is an intergovernmental agreement that involves two or more states sharing the same currency. These states may not necessarily have any further integration (such as an economic and monetary union, which would have, in addition, a customs union and a single market). [Pigou Effect Currency (Short FX), Currency Board Currency (Retirement Fixed Exchange Rate), Market Currency (FX Long Currency)]

Gross national product (GNP) GNP is related to another important economic measure called gross domestic product (GDP), which takes into account all output produced within a country's borders regardless of who owns the means of production. GNP starts with GDP, adds residents' investment income from overseas investments, and subtracts foreign residents' investment income earned within a country. Whilst GDP measures the total value of goods and services produced within a country's borders, GNP focuses on the income generated by its residents, regardless of their location.

Gross National Income (GNI) is the total amount of money earned by a nation's people and businesses. It is used to measure and track a nation's wealth from year to year. The number includes the nation's gross domestic product (GDP) plus the income it receives from overseas sources.

Agriculture Central Hedge Fund, Mining Unions: Peninsula Agronomique Engineering, Commodities Options Exchange (Credit Spread Options, Farm REITs, Crop Production; Fertelizers and Seeds; Equipment; Distribution and Processing Stocks, Ag ETFs and ETNs, Ag Mutual Funds), Tableau Économiques, Investments Farms REITs, Art Financing Mardi Gras

Index Franc: Tobacco-Tobacco Soil Index/Franc Tabac Currency Pair (TBS/TAF)

The overlapping generations (OLG) model; consumption-based capital asset pricing model (CCAPM); Endogenous growth theory; Material balance planning; Leontief paradox; Malinvestment; Helicopter money; Modern monetary theory

Mercantilism Spectrum of CDF/CFA

CDF Raw Materials and CFA Products. (Prices); CDF Holding Company and CFA Conglomerate Company. (Equity and Dividend Yield); CDF is Gold Standard and CFA is Helicopter Money. (FX Rate/Hedging); CDF Helicopter Money [Supplier Currency] and CFA as Purchasing Power [Consumer Currency] (Currency Union & Currency Board and Negative Interest Rates); CDF is Congolese Franc and CFA is Central African Franc

DOS SANTOS FREE-ROLE

Supporting Striker (Inverted Winger)

Central Winger (False 10)

Overlapping Run/Defensive Winger (Half-winger)

An inverted winger is a modern tactical development of the traditional winger position. Most wingers are assigned to either side of the field based on their footedness, with right-footed players on the right and left-footed players on the left.[65] This assumes that assigning a player to their natural side ensures a more powerful cross as well as greater ball protection along the touch-lines. However, when the position is inverted and a winger instead plays inside-out on the opposite flank (i.e., a right-footed player as a left inverted winger), they effectively become supporting strikers and primarily assume a role in the attack.[66]

The "false 10" or "central winger"[55] is a type of midfielder, which differs from the trequartista. Much like the "false 9", their specificity lies in the fact that, although they seemingly play as an attacking midfielder on paper, unlike a traditional playmaker who stays behind the striker in the centre of the pitch, the false 10's goal is to move out of position and drift wide when in possession of the ball to help both the wingers and fullbacks to overload the flanks. This means two problems for the opposing midfielders: either they let the false 10 drift wide, and their presence, along with both the winger and the fullback, creates a three-on-two player advantage out wide; or they follow the false 10, but leave space in the centre of the pitch for wingers or onrushing midfielders to exploit. False 10s are usually traditional wingers who are told to play in the centre of the pitch, and their natural way of playing makes them drift wide and look to provide deliveries into the box for teammates.

In Italian football, the term mezzala (literally "half-winger" in Italian) is used to describe the position of the one or two central midfielders who play on either side of a holding midfielder and/or playmaker. The term was initially applied to the role of an inside forward in the WM and Metodo formations in Italian, but later described a specific type of central midfielder. The mezzala is often a quick and hard-working attack-minded midfielder, with good skills and noted offensive capabilities, as well as a tendency to make overlapping attacking runs, but also a player who participates in the defensive aspect of the game, and who can give width to a team by drifting out wide; as such, the term can be applied to several different roles.

On occasion, the false-10 can also function in a different manner alongside a false-9, usually in a 4–6–0 formation. Midfield collective of False 9, False 10, Box to Box, Holding, Half Winger, Attacking, Defensive. We are not stretching the defensive line itsself, but the space between the defensive line and the goalkeeper.

Thiago Motta’s ‘Super Offensive’ 2-7-2 Formation Explained: Instead of the traditional way of looking at a tactical set-up horizontally, the Brazil-born manager instead split the field into three vertical lanes. This means he effectively has seven players in the central channel with two players out wide on each flank.

Adjust Free Role System to The Scoreboard.

The Central African Games was an international multi-sport event for countries within Central Africa. (Boxing, Athletics, Tennis, Football, Rallycross, Olympic Weightlifting, Volleyball, Trap Shooting, Basketball)

The Central African Football Federations' Union, officially abbreviated as UNIFFAC[a], is a sports governing body representing the football associations of Central Africa.

RUSSE NOIR FOOTBALL

VEDETTE: 3-4-1-2 has 4 Pivot Formations so 5 Total: Transition to a 4-4-2 Diamond, Transition to a 4-4-2, Transition to a 4-2-3-1, Transition to a 3-3-1-3

Positional Game is Diamonds Tic-Tac-Toe with Enforcer and Avoider. Striker [Enforcer](Inverted Winger and Centre Forward), Deep Lying Playmaker [Avoider] (Holding Midfielder and Inverted Winger), and Sweeper Wingback Deep Lying Playmaker [Avoider] (Centre Back). Use Playing Styles, Manipulated Positions, and Combinational Games for Positional Play as Johan Cruyff students.

Angolan 4-4-2 Diamond Tic Tac Toe Variant: 1-3-4-2; (1) Falar Pelos Cotovelos (Sweeper Deep-lying Playmaker Wingback) (4) Diamond Rover (Diamond Rotation from Midfield, Wings, and Defensive Third) Counterpressing Pivot Pressing Triggers, Sweeper-Winger Pivots, Overlapping Runs, W; I; M; V; Box Keeping Formation with 3 Centre-Backs) [Key Stats: Front Foot, Pressing Triggers, Clearance, Aerial Duel, Interceptions, Blocked Shots, Tackles, Final Ball, Key Dribbles, Overlapping Runs, Set Piece Taker] Spacing, Possession, Pass Completion, and Counter Pressing with Pursuit and Ambush Predation One Team Box Touches and Capture the Flag with Analytics-Geometry Total Football Trixie Bet on CNS Drugs (Xanax and Modafinil); 1-1-2-1 Diamond Rover Futsal Pivot Formation

Define a run in one of two ways: (i) as a set of consecutive goals scored by one team, without the other team scoring a goal; (ii) as a set of consecutive scoring events by one team, each event being either a goal or one or more Set Piece. Play aggressive and with counter pressing and run it up on the score board in the first half and after halftime play defense. You get a break at half and it's easier to win when someone plays defense and looks for opportunities instead of Attacking.

Posterior Chain Super Compensation and Speed-Endurance (Elastic-Connective Tissue) Force-Velocity Curve; Crescent Moon Horizontal Plane Vertical Force Sprinting Mechanics.

Set Piece Stylistic Biomechanics: Shooting Knee at Wall for Curve and Placement Knee for Corner. Follow through with Shot with proper Body Alignment

Knee to Feet or Shoulder to Feet Cradling for Touch/Entertainment

Placement Mechanics: Arch-Heel Linedrive and Arch-Knuckle Raised Curve

UEFA Front Office Curriculum

Museum d'histoire: Broken down into three major section — “A Lineage of Coaches Players and Places,” “Proving Grounds” and “Cultures of Basketball” — City/Game documents how basketball first found its origins in the neighborhoods of NYC and then went on to produce a roster of local legends who played everywhere from Rucker Park and the Cage on West 4th Street to Christ the King High School and St. John’s University.

Agility Ladder Eyes Pocket: Eyes Between Defenders Feet and Ball, Numbered Footwork V-Step (Shifting Defenders with Momentum) et L-Step (Explosive First Step), All moves should form a Triangle or an Incomplete Triangle (Coup de Pied)

*Push-Pull Sprint/Shooting Cycle: Pull Glutes et Hamstring; Push Calf et Quads for Sprints.

Sprint Size Up: A series of feint Karaoké dribble moves with Eye Tricks (Fake Pass) but Sprint Position Finish

Triangle Philosophy: All Dribbling Moves should form a Triangle or an Incomplete Triangle while using V-Step (Shifting Defenders with Momentum) et L-Step (Explosive First Step).

Thé Crescent: In Close Dribbling; Crescent Footwork with L Shapes (Paul Pogba)

On the Run Dribbling Moves: Letters and Shapes; Still Play 1 on 1: Numbered Footwork

Piedi Felici Courts: Drills Side/Box Play with 1 Net; Design Vaporwave Action Painting Angels; Knee for Direction and Sole Drags for Dribbling Touch and Crescent Moon Sprint Mechanics

Gambling Games: 5 Roll (Captain, Ship, Crew); Live-Pool Betting Monopoly

Stylistic Biomechanics: Dribbling Foot To Ball Contact (Balls of Feet and Arch of Feet); Knee for Direction; Foot Drags; & Hip Angle, Crescent Moon Running Mechanics, and Laces Kick.

Diamond Football (15 mins)

Set Up

-Lay out two overlapping sets of 4 flat markers in the positions shown above.

-Ask the players to stand on a flat marker for their teams colour (Red on Red, Yellow on Yellow).

Instruction

-Whenever the ball goes out for a kick in or for the defenders ball, the players must stand on their markers before play begins.

-As soon as the ball has been played in, players are free to move.

-Reset everytime the ball goes out.

Coaching Points, Progressions Ect.

-Ask players to shout out what each position on the park is to devlop understanding of their roles.

-If you decide to go to a normal game , leave the markers out for a visual aid for the players.

-If more than 8 players, Add in Goalkeepers who would then play the ball out to the DF,LM,RM.

-Rotate Positions, Ask Players to stand on a marker they haven't been on before

RUSSE NOIR ACCENT

Lingua Franca of Renaissance Latin (Vocabulary) and Atlantic–Congo Fon (Grammar).

Volta–Congo is a major branch of the Atlantic–Congo family. Fon (fɔ̀ngbè, pronounced [fɔ̃̀ɡ͡bē][2]) also known as Dahomean is the language of the Fon people. It belongs to the Gbe group within the larger Atlantic–Congo family.

In linguistic typology, subject–verb–object (SVO) is a sentence structure where the subject comes first, the verb second, and the object third.

Haitian Creole (/ˈheɪʃən ˈkriːoʊl/; Haitian Creole: kreyòl ayisyen, [kɣejɔl ajisjɛ̃];[6][7] French: créole haïtien, [kʁe.ɔl a.i.sjɛ̃]), or simply Creole (Haitian Creole: kreyòl), is a French-based creole language spoken by 10 to 12 million people worldwide, and is one of the two official languages of Haiti (the other being French), where it is the native language of the vast majority of the population. The language emerged from contact between French settlers and enslaved Africans during the Atlantic slave trade in the French colony of Saint-Domingue (now Haiti) in the 17th and 18th centuries. Although its vocabulary largely derives from 18th-century French, its grammar is that of a West African Volta-Congo language branch, particularly the Fongbe and Igbo languages.

Prose Accent Congo and Modern Accent Congo.

Full Lips Endings with Vertical Narrow Mouth and Soft Rs.

A noun phrase – or NP or nominal (phrase) – is a phrase that usually has a noun or pronoun as its head, and has the same grammatical functions as a noun.

BELMÔNT'S SIN INDEX FUND PORTFOLIO 

Sin stock sectors usually include alcohol, tobacco, gambling, sex-related industries (Cabaret and Burlesque), and weapons manufacturers.

Diageo 

Phillip Morris

Sports Betting Investment Trust

Pharmaceuticals

Business Clusters with Scrum Management and Accelerators to produce Festivals.

Example: Create a Index Fund Portfolio of 15-20 Stocks and using Supply Side Economics to create Decentralized Gambling Economy.

BELMÔNT'S DECENTRALIZED GAMBLING ECONOMY

Corporate-Capital Gains Tax Haven

High Stakes Minimum Buy In

Card Gambling (Signal and President): Top 2 highest bids fight for the Coup d'état and the other two are lesser men, the lesser men are subordinates that aid in playing cards for the warlord, the winning team splits the money, the warlords switches based on the 13 cards dealt and bets placed, the first team to shed all of their cards win.

Domestic Gambling: Boxing

Retirement Gambling: Boat Racing

Residency Program for Tax Benefits

BELMÔNT'S TURF ACCOUNTING MODEL

+EV

Python Programming Gaussian Distribution

Exotic Options Trading Live Betting

Parlays Minimum for Round Robins

Daily Fantasy Sports Rakes

RUSSE NOIR PALACE

Definitions of ballroom. noun. large room used mainly for dancing. synonyms: dance hall, dance palace**. types: disco, discotheque.

Go Go Music Influenced, Eurphoric Trance Chord Progression Melody, Progressive House and Drum n' Bass Percussion-808 Call and Response Staccato Polyrhythm or Layered Kick and Punch 808.

In his 1972 study of French lute music, scholar Wallace Rave compiled a list of features he believed to be characteristic of style brisé. Rave's list included the following: the avoidance of textural pattern and regularity in part writing; arpeggiated chord textures with irregular distribution of individual notes of the chord; ambiguous melodic lines; rhythmic displacement of notes within a melodic line; octave changes within melodic line; irregular phrase lengths.

Have the Snare and Kick say, "Hi, How are you?" And the 808 say, "I am good thanks for asking.”

Use progressive House to push the Drums Conversation to either Fast and Punchy for Happy or Slow and Deep for Sad.

In technical terms, "go-go's essential beat is characterized by a five through four syncopated rhythm that is underscored prominently by the bass drum and snare drum, and the hi-hat... [and] is ornamented by the other percussion instruments, especially by the conga drums, rototoms, and hand-held cowbells."[5]

Polyrhythm: In music, a cross-beat or cross-rhythm is a specific form of polyrhythm. The term cross rhythm was introduced in 1934 by the musicologist Arthur Morris Jones (1889–1980). It refers to a situation where the rhythmic conflict found in polyrhythms is the basis of an entire musical piece.[1]

Four-on-the-floor (or four-to-the-floor) is a rhythm used primarily in dance genres such as disco and electronic dance music. It is a steady, uniformly accented beat in 4. 4 time in which the bass drum is hit on every beat (1, 2, 3, 4).[1] This was popularized in the disco music of the 1970s[2] and the term four-on-the-floor was widely used in that era, since the beat was played with the pedal-operated, drum-kit bass drum.[3][4] (Punch 808-Kick)

Polyrhythm 4 on the Floor examples 2:4 or 5:4

Hard trance is often characterized by strong, hard (or even downpitch) kicks, fully resonant basses and an increased amount of reverberation applied to the main beat. Melodies vary from 140 to 180 BPMs and it can feature plain instrumental sound in early compositions, with the latter ones tending to implement side-chaining techniques of progressive on digital synthesizers.

Singles Only Email Raves Blogger then Multi Market Distribution Deal: A distribution deal is a contract to release the music to platforms, but not own the publishing or exclusively lock the artist in. Record Artist Producer Label: Have Polyrhythm Artist earn Streaming Percentage under a Recording Artist Deal. Label has Distribution Above Me and I have Manufacturing over Polyrhythm Artist. Have a end of the Year Album for New Year's Raves!

BELMÔNT'S SYSTEM: CAPÔI RETAINER AGREEMENT WITH ASSET PROTECTION TRUST

Capo: Describes a ranking made member of a family who leads a crew of soldiers. A capo is similar to a military captain who commands soldiers. Soldier: Also known as a “made man,” soldiers are the lowest members of the crime family but still command respect in the organization.

A capo is a "made member" of an Italian crime family who heads a regime or "crew" of soldiers and has major status and influence in the organization.

Consigliere: Defense and Corporate Lawyers

Head Boss: Ministry of Medicine

Underboss: Pharmaceutical Industry

Capo: CAPÔI RETAINER AGREEMENT

Soliders: Artisans

Commercialism is the application of both manufacturing and consumption towards personal usage, or the practices, methods, aims, and distribution of products in a free market geared toward generating a profit.

Commercial art is art created for advertising or marketing purposes. Commercial artists are hired by clients to create images and logos that sell products. Unlike works of fine art that convey an artist's personal expression, commercial art must address the client's goals.

The word 'Commercial' is defined as follows: Concerned with or engaged in commerce. Commerce is the exchange of goods or services among two or more parties.

Craftsmen are committed to the medium, not to self-expression. Artists are committed to their self-expression, not the medium.

A medium of exchange is an intermediary instrument and system used to facilitate the purchase and sale of goods and services between parties.

Stretch and Micro Goals

Music Medium System: Distribution and Retailers Contract Theory (System) for Music (Instrument)

Football Medium System: Analytics and Geometry for Free Role (System) Trixies (Instrument)

Age 16-19

Bond Funds

Farmland REITS

CFDS

Real Estate Brokerage Trust Account

Age 20-30

Farmland Recession Proof Stocks (Cosmetics, AgTech, Ag ETFS, AgETN)

Incubator and Startup Accelerators

Real Estate Joint Ventures

Age 30-40

Farmland Blue Chip Indexes w/ Credit Spread Options

CURRENCY, OIL, & GOLD COMMODITIES CANDLESTICK CHARTS

Swing Trading: Use mt4/mt5 With Heiken Ashi Charts, Setting at 14 or 21 Momentum Indicator above 0 as Divergence Oscillator and Volume Spread Analysis as Reversal Oscillator and Trade when bullish candlesticks above 200 exponential moving average and/or 20 exponential moving average (EMA) on H1 (Hourly) Time Frame; use H4 (4 Hours) and D1 (1 Day) as reference.

TUNNEL STRATEGY (OFFSHORE BANKING)

Purpose: Permanent Residency Card

$250k Deposit

$125k: 60/40 portfolio, 60% Fixed Income & REITs and 40% Blue Chip Stocks

$50k: Guaranteed Investment Certificates (GICs) and term deposits are secured investments. This means that you get back the amount you invest at the end of your term. The key difference between a GIC and a term deposit is the length of the term. Term deposits generally have shorter terms than GICs.

$75k: Spending Cash

SIN STOCKS PORTFOLIO

Sin stock sectors usually include alcohol, tobacco, gambling, sex-related industries, and weapons manufacturers.

Sports Betting Investment Trust

Pharmaceuticals

Example: Create a Index Fund Portfolio of 15-20 Stocks and using Supply Side Economics to create Decentralized Gambling Economy.

FESTIVALS DEAL

Singles Only Email Raves Blogger then Multi Market Distribution Deal: A distribution deal is a contract to release the music to platforms, but not own the publishing or exclusively lock the artist in. Record Artist Producer Label: Have Polyrhythm Artist earn Streaming Percentage under a Recording Artist Deal. Label has Distribution Above Me and I have Manufacturing over Polyrhythm Artist. Have a end of the Year Album for New Year's Raves!

NEUROPLASTICITY DRUG-CRIME NEXUS BASED ON TRAFFICKING

CPP, CNS Depressants, et FENTALOGS: Cul-de-sac

Defensive Penalty Capture The Flag Raiding Warfare

Grey-Decentralized Markets

Bastilles: Cul-de-sac Artist Résidences Penthouse Complexes

Polyrhythm Raves

Acid House Art Gallery

International Film Festival

Hôtel Chefs

Seigneurial System/Tableau Economique Raw Material Économics Production Spot

Surautomatism

Discount Networking Acid House Party

Opium Dens and Fragrance Festivals

Pill Pressers

CNS depressants

Upper-tier County System

Defense Lawyers are Traplords (Trafficking P4P and Malicious Prosecution)

Cash Conversion Cycle (CCC)

Brain Receptor Dealing

Neuroplasticity Drug-Crime Nexus

Religious Ecstasy

Entheogens are psychedelic drugs—and sometimes certain other psychoactive substances—used for engendering spiritual development or otherwise in sacred contexts

Live-Pool Betting Monopoly Board Game

Summary Sentencing

Urban Level: Street Culture Art Gallery (Street culture may refer to: Urban culture, the culture of towns and cities, Street market, Children's street culture, Street carnival, Block party, Street identity, Street food, Café culture, Several youth subculture or counterculture topics pertaining to outdoors of urban centers. These can include: Street art, Street photography, Street racing, Street wear, Hip-hop culture, Urban fiction, Street sports, Streetball, Flatland BMX, Freestyling), Art Pedagogy, Artist Residency, Art Schools, and Art Plugs

Art Pedagogy: Arts-based pedagogy is a teaching methodology in which an art form is integrated with another subject matter to impact student learning. 28-30. Arts-based pedagogy results in arts-based learning (ABL),11 which is when a student learns about a subject through arts processes including creating, responding or performing. Aesthetic Teaching: Seeking a Balance between Teaching Arts and Teaching through the Arts. In aesthetic education, learning must be developed especially with the inclusion of sensations and with the help of feelings. Sensations and feelings should lead to movement, representation, and expression. Aesthetic learning often entails learning to distinguish certain qualities or objects aesthetically in different ways depending on the situation and the purpose. Certain things can be experienced in negative ways in one activity and in positive ways in another.

A designer drug is a structural or functional analog of a controlled substance that has been designed to mimic the pharmacological effects of the original drug, while avoiding classification as illegal and/or detection in standard drug tests

Patchwork tattoos are a collection of tattoos collaged together to create an overall design. Each individual 'patch' of the tattoo can be a different design, symbol or element with a little space in between. Patchwork tattoos are a collection of tattoos collaged together to create an overall design. In short, the gun-toting angel was a multifaceted metaphor. “It undoubtedly also reflected the Catholic Counter-Reformation militaristic rhetoric,” wrote Donahue-Wallace, “which promoted the church as an army and heavenly beings as its soldiers.”

DECADENCE AESTHETICS THEORIES

Slogan

J'Cartier, Je cours après les vœux de champagne,

Subjective

Based on or influenced by personal feelings, tastes, or opinions

Gastronomy

Precarious Balance

Precariously: If something is happening or positioned precariously, it's in danger. A glass could be precariously balanced on the edge of a table. If something is on the verge of danger, then the word precariously fits.

Grey & Decentralized Markets

Tableau Économique

Semblance

Semblance is generally used to suggest a contrast between outward appearance and inner reality.

High Socioeconomic Status & Tattoos

Phantasmagorical

Having a fantastic or deceptive appearance

adjective. having a fantastic or deceptive appearance, as something in a dream or created by the imagination. having the appearance of an optical illusion, especially one produced by a magic lantern.

Socioeconomic Status Development Immigration Multilingual Sensory Play

Law of Polarity in Relationships

In any successful relationship that has an intimate connection and sexual attraction, there is polarity. What does this mean exactly? Polarity in relationships is the spark that occurs between two opposing energies: masculine and feminine. Gender does not affect whether you have masculine or feminine energy.

Second Reflection

Burden Aesthetics with Intentions

The Second Reflection lays hold of the Technical Procedures

Tattoos

SOCIO-PSYCHOLOGY

Keystone Theory Habits

Game Theory

Behavioral Finance

Self-actualization is the complete realization of one's potential, and the full development of one's abilities and appreciation for life. This concept is at the top of the Maslow hierarchy of needs, so not every human being reaches it.

Potential Psychology: Psychological potential is a very broad concept. It may include one's capacity to conform, change, re-invent oneself, bounce back from adversity, etc.

SOCIO-FORMAL SCIENCE

+EV Optimal Game Theory Poker

Civil, Agriculure, Solvent Levelling Effect Chemical Reaction, and Biomechanical Engineering

SOCIO-PHILOSOPHY

Ontology

IMPERIALISM, THE HIGHEST STAGE OF CAPITALISM

Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism,[1] originally published as Imperialism, the Newest Stage of Capitalism,[2][3] is a book written by Vladimir Lenin in 1916 and published in 1917. It describes the formation of oligopoly, by the interlacing of bank and industrial capital, in order to create a financial oligarchy, and explains the function of financial capital in generating profits from the exploitation colonialism inherent to imperialism, as the final stage of capitalism. The essay synthesises Lenin's developments of Karl Marx's theories of political economy in Das Kapital (1867).[4]

Tax Mergers Law; Market-extension merger: Two companies that sell the same products in different markets. 4.2.2 Corporate Taxation At the corporate level, the tax treatment of a merger or acquisition depends on whether the acquiring firm elects to treat the acquired firm as being absorbed into the parent with its tax attributes intact, or first being liquidated and then received in the form of its component assets.

SOCIOCULTURAL THEORY OF DEVELOPMENT

Seconds Liberal Arts are often viewed as pre-professional since, while conceived of as fundamental to citizenship, they address the whole person in recognition that our moral and spiritual identities develop best through participation in a society that perpetually renews the rights and responsibilities of membership.

Executive management master's degree programs often result in an Executive Master of Business Administration, or EMBA. They are primarily designed to act as accelerated graduate programs for working professionals who already hold management or executive positions.

Engineering college means a school, college, university, department of a university or other educational institution, reputable and in good standing in accordance with rules prescribed by the Department, and which grants baccalaureate degrees in engineering.

Monopoly Family Boarding Schools: The socio-historical context refers to the societal and historical conditions and circumstances that influence events or individuals. It involves elements like the cultural, economic, and political circumstances during a certain time period.

Agriculturism is an ideology promoting rural life, a traditional way of life. It is characterized by the valorization of traditional values (the family, the French language, the Catholic religion) and an opposition to the industrial world.

CAPÔI CLASS STRUCTURE

Demonym Examples: CAR Congolese, Gabon Congolese, Afrikaans Congolese, and Congolese

Monopoly Family (Apartheid)

Chief Executive of State (Apartheid)

Political Class (RUSSE NOIR)

Upper Class (RUSSE NOIR)

Working Class (RUSSE NOIR)

JEAN-CLAUDE TRAORÉ BUSINESS ADVICE

Blue Ocean Strategy; Solvent Levelling Effect Chemical Reaction Engineering and Economic Science.

TENNIS AGRICULTURE

A clay-court specialist is a tennis player who excels on clay courts, more than on any other surface.

Due in part to advances in racquet technology, current clay-court specialists are known for employing long, winding groundstrokes that generate heavy topspin; such strokes are less effective on faster surfaces on which the balls do not bounce as high. Clay-court specialists tend to slide more effectively on clay than other players. Many of them are also very adept at hitting the drop shot, which can be effective because rallies on clay courts often leave players pushed far beyond the baseline. Additionally, the slow, long rallies require a great degree of mental focus and physical stamina.

CASAPIANOS MARTYROLOGY ORDER (CATHOLIC COUNTER-REFORMATION)

The Casa Pia is a Portuguese institution founded by Maria I, known as A Pia ("Mary the Pious"), and organized by Police Intendant Pina Manique in 1780, following the social disarray of the 1755 Lisbon earthquake. For almost three centuries, thousands of young boys and girls were raised by Casa Pia, including many public personalities, called casapianos. Casa Pia is Portugal's largest educational institution dedicated to helping youngsters in risk of social exclusion or without parental support. The organisation is composed of ten schools and enrolls approximately 4700 students. In addition to standard schooling, the organisation also provides boarding for children in need. It strives to enable these youngsters to become healthy and successful members of society, by developing intellectual, manual, and physical traits, in an environment promoting spiritual, moral, and religious values. The institution is proud to have had amongst its students many outstanding Portuguese personalities, including politicians, journalists, and artists. A martyrology is a catalogue or list of martyrs and other saints and beati arranged in the calendar order of their anniversaries or feasts. Local martyrologies record exclusively the custom of a particular Church. Local lists were enriched by names borrowed from neighbouring churches.[1] Consolidation occurred, by the combination of several local martyrologies, with or without borrowings from literary sources.

The Canons Regular of St. Augustine are priests who live in community under a rule (Latin: regula and κανών, kanon, in Greek) and are generally organised into religious orders, differing from both secular canons and other forms of religious life, such as clerics regular, designated by a partly similar terminology. As religious communities, they have laybrothers as part of the community.

Clerics regular are clerics (mostly priests) who are members of a religious order under a rule of life (regular). Clerics regular differ from canons regular in that they devote themselves more to pastoral care, in place of an obligation to the praying of the Liturgy of the Hours in common, and have fewer observances in their rule of life.

Lay brother is a largely extinct term referring to religious brothers, particularly in the Catholic Church, who focused upon manual service and secular matters, and were distinguished from choir monks or friars in that they did not pray in choir, and from clerics, in that they were not in possession of (or preparing for) holy orders.[1][2][3][4][5]

In female religious institutes, the equivalent role is the lay sister. Lay brothers were originally created to allow those who were skilled in particular crafts or did not have the required education to study for holy orders to participate in and contribute to the life of a religious order.

Lay brothers were found in many religious orders. Drawn from the working classes, they were pious and hardworking people, who though unable to achieve the education needed to receive holy orders, were still drawn to religious life and were able to contribute to the order through their skills. Some were skilled in artistic handicrafts, others functioned as administrators of the orders' material assets. In particular, the lay brothers of the Cistercians were skilled in agriculture, and have been credited for the tilling of fertile farmland.[1]

Lay sisters were found in most of the orders of women, and their origin, like that of the lay brothers, is to be found in the necessity of providing the choir nuns with more time for the Office and study, as well as creating the opportunity for the illiterate to join the religious life. They, too, wore a habit different from those of the choir sisters, and their required daily prayers consisted of prayers such as the Little Office or a certain number of Paters.[1]

All canons regular are to be distinguished from secular canons who belong to a resident group of priests but who do not take public vows and are not governed in whatever elements of life they lead in common by a historical rule. One obvious place where such groups of priests are required is at a cathedral, where there were many Masses to celebrate and the Divine Office to be prayed together in community.

In modern astrology, Mars is the primary native ruler of the first house. Traditionally however, Mars ruled both the third and tenth houses, and had its joy in the fifth house. While Venus tends to the overall relationship atmosphere, Mars is the passionate impulse and action, the masculine aspect, discipline, willpower and stamina.

Mars rules over Tuesday and in Romance languages the word for Tuesday often resembles Mars (in Romanian, marți, in Spanish, martes, in French, mardi and in Italian "martedì"). The English "Tuesday" is a modernised form of "Tyr's Day", Tyr being the Germanic analogue to Mars. Dante Alighieri associated Mars with the liberal art of arithmetic. In Chinese astrology, Mars is ruled by the element fire, which is passionate, energetic and adventurous.

According to John Clements, the term martial arts itself is derived from an older Latin term meaning "arts of Mars", the Roman god of war, and was used to refer to the combat systems of Europe (European martial arts) as early as the 1550s

A religious congregation is a type of religious institute in the Catholic Church. They are legally distinguished from religious orders – the other major type of religious institute – in that members take simple vows, whereas members of religious orders take solemn vows.

In the Catholic Church, a religious order is a community of consecrated life with members that profess solemn vows. They are classed as a type of religious institute.[1]

Catholic School Girls Moon Evangelical Prophets: Consecrated life is "placed in a privileged position in the line of evangelical prophecy," whereby its “charismatic nature” and communal discernment of the Spirit "makes it capable of inventiveness and originality.”

Men Mars Angelology Conversion System: Church Enterprises (Planetary Intelligence Church District Real Estate; Liberal Arts Catholic Immersion Schools; Gold; Athletics; Cooking);

Church Gatherings (School Nights Virgil, Weekend Noon Mass then Weekend Sports League) Francis de Sales and Don St. Bosco Influence 

Harquebusier Angels Patchwork Tattoos: Biblical Crowns, Praying Hands, Gun Toting Angels, Dirty Dancing Angels, Drug Using Angels, Heavenly Choir, Summa Theologica Sherman, Saints and Pastors, Hebrew Tetragram, Council of Trent

HARQUEBUSIER ANGELS GANG BLUEPRINT: PARDISUS MEDIAE; Spirit Unity Oversoul Angelology Shaman, Eros Influence Angels: Ecstasy-Painkillers Trafficking Angel Spirit Type Oversoul, Jupiter-Mars-Venus with Planetary Intelligence; Erotes are Horcruxes, Google Imprint Oversoul, Choice of Choir is Heavenly Host, Lightning-Ice Element, Wings Transfer Invocation, MARS-JUPITER  Syncretism Planetary Intelligence, ESTJ Sensory Myers-Briggs Personality Indicator Syncretism, Church Expenses Occupation (Festivals, Venues, Freeports, Art Gallery, Underground Garages, Tobacco Store, Restaurants, Réal Estate Brokerage, Impure Aesthetic Thrillers Publishing Imprint et Production Company, Body Etching, Lipodissolve, and Hyaluronic Acid Fillers Cosmetics Surgery

ANGOLAN HARQUEBUSIER ANGELS STRUCTURE; Commission on the Social and Cultural Affairs; Commission for Ecumenism; The Commission on Christian Education; Liturgical Commission; Missionary Committee; Chief Executive of State and Military Religion Legislation; Stretch and Micro Goals

Material religion is a framework used by scholars of religion to examine the interaction between religion and material culture. It focuses on the place of objects, images, spaces, and buildings in religious communities. The framework has been promoted by scholars such as Birgit Meyer, Sally Promey, S. Brent Plate, David Morgan, etc.

Physiocracy (French: physiocratie; from the Greek for "government of nature") is an economic theory developed by a group of 18th-century Age of Enlightenment French economists who believed that the wealth of nations derived solely from the value of "land agriculture" or "land development" and that agricultural products should be highly priced.[1] Their theories originated in France and were most popular during the second half of the 18th century. Physiocracy became one of the first well-developed theories of economics.

The Bible typically describes the Heavenly host as being made up of angels, and gives several descriptions of angels in military terms, such as their encampment (Genesis 32:1–2), command structure (Psalms 91:11–12; Matt.13:41; Rev.7:2), and participation in combat (Job 19:12; Rev.12:7). Other passages indicate other entities make up the divine army, namely stars (Judges 5:20, Isaiah 40:26).[1][full citation needed] In Christian theology, the heavenly host participate in the war in Heaven.

The doctrine or theory of immanence holds that the divine encompasses or is manifested in the material world. It is held by some philosophical and metaphysical theories of divine presence. Immanence is usually applied in monotheistic, pantheistic, pandeistic, or panentheistic faiths to suggest that the spiritual world permeates the mundane.

The Dionysian Mysteries were a ritual of ancient Greece and Rome which sometimes used intoxicants and other trance-inducing techniques (like dance and music) to remove inhibitions and social constraints, liberating the individual to return to a natural state. 

Religious nationalism can be understood in a number of ways, such as nationalism as a religion itself, a position articulated by Carlton Hayes in his text Nationalism: A Religion, or as the relationship of nationalism to a particular religious belief, dogma, ideology, or affiliation. This relationship can be broken down into two aspects: the politicisation of religion and the influence of religion on politics.

Dioceses ruled by an archbishop are commonly referred to as archdioceses; most are metropolitan sees, being placed at the head of an ecclesiastical province. In the Catholic Church, some are suffragans of a metropolitan see or are directly subject to the Holy See.

The body of light, sometimes called the 'astral body'[a] or the 'subtle body,'[b] is a "quasi material"[1] aspect of the human body, being neither solely physical nor solely spiritual, posited by a number of philosophers, and elaborated on according to various esoteric, occult, and mystical teachings. Other terms used for this body include body of glory,[2] spirit-body, luciform body, augoeides ('radiant body'), astroeides ('starry or sidereal body'), and celestial body.[3] The concept derives from the philosophy of Plato: the word 'astral' means 'of the stars'; thus the astral plane consists of the Seven Heavens of the classical planets. The idea is rooted in common worldwide religious accounts of the afterlife[4] in which the soul's journey or "ascent" is described in such terms as "an ecstatic, mystical or out-of body experience, wherein the spiritual traveller leaves the physical body and travels in their body of light into 'higher' realms."[5]

The canon law of the Catholic Church (from Latin ius canonicum[1]) is "how the Church organizes and governs herself".[2] It is the system of laws and ecclesiastical legal principles made and enforced by the hierarchical authorities of the Catholic Church to regulate its external organization and government and to order and direct the activities of Catholics toward the mission of the Church.

An institute of consecrated life is an association of faithful in the Catholic Church canonically erected by competent church authorities to enable men or women who publicly profess the evangelical counsels by religious vows or other sacred bonds "through the charity to which these counsels lead to be joined to the Church and its mystery in a special way".[1] They are defined in the 1983 Code of Canon Law under canons 573–730. The Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life has ecclesial oversight of institutes of consecrated life.[2]

In Christianity, the three evangelical counsels, or counsels of perfection, are chastity (NEVER), poverty (or perfect charity), and obedience (RECKLESS ABANDONMENT).[1] As stated by Jesus in the canonical gospels,[2] they are counsels for those who desire to become "perfect" (τελειος, teleios).[3][4] The Catholic Church interprets this to mean that they are not binding upon all, and hence not necessary conditions to attain eternal life (heaven), but that they are "acts of supererogation", "over and above" the minimum stipulated in the biblical commandments.[5][6]

Catholics who have made a public profession to order their lives by the evangelical counsels, and confirmed this by public vows before their competent church authority (the act of religious commitment known as a profession), are recognised as members of the consecrated life.

The Council of Trent (Latin: Concilium Tridentinum), held between 1545 and 1563 in Trent (or Trento), now in northern Italy, was the 19th ecumenical council of the Catholic Church. Prompted by the Protestant Reformation at the time, it has been described as the embodiment of the Counter-Reformation. The Council issued key statements and clarifications of the Church's doctrine and teachings, including scripture, the biblical canon, sacred tradition, original sin, justification, salvation, the sacraments, the Mass, and the veneration of saints[4] and also issued condemnations of what it defined to be heresies committed by proponents of Protestantism. The consequences of the Council were also significant with regard to the Church's liturgy and censorship.

Initiated in part to address the challenges of the Protestant Reformations,[3] the Counter-Reformation was a comprehensive effort arising from the decrees of the Council of Trent. The effort produced apologetic and polemical documents, heresy trials, anti-corruption efforts, spiritual movements, the promotion of new religious orders, and the flourishing of new art and musical styles. 

Tradwave is a Catholic artistic style using synthwave and vaporwave art to promote traditional catholicism. Tradwave usually uses traditional catholic paintings, sculptures, or photographs of saints, given with vaporwave effects, often with a bible verse or quote about catholicism. The art usually tries to convey a resurrection of catholic spirituality in the modern atheist world. Figures often depicted in Tradwave art include Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, Ven. Fulton Sheen, Cardinal Robert Sarah, and Mother Angelica.

Tradwave music often takes the form of two main styles. One of them is catholic hymns with vaporwave effects and traditional Vaporwave/Lo-Fi music. It can also have quotes from modern prolific Catholic figures, such as Ven. The other theme is Fulton Sheen and Cardinal Robert Sarah.

Heavenly Virtues: Another phrase to describe this obedience to the voice is “reckless abandon.” It simply means that we let God do what God wants to do through us. It means if He tells us to do something or say something—we do it.

Intercession or intercessory prayer is the act of praying to a deity on behalf of others, or asking a saint in heaven to pray on behalf of oneself or for others. Intercession of the Saints is a Christian doctrine that maintains that saints can intercede for others. To intercede is to go or come between two parties, to plead before one of them on behalf of the other. In ecclesiastical usage both words are taken in the sense of the intervention primarily of Christ, and secondarily of the Blessed Virgin and the angels and saints, on behalf of men.[2] The doctrine is held by the Catholic, Eastern Orthodox Churches, the Assyrian Church of the East, the Oriental Orthodox churches , and some Lutherans and Anglicans (chiefly those of Evangelical Catholic or Anglo-Catholic churchmanship, respectively).[3] The practice of asking saints for their intercession can be found in Christian writings from the 3rd century onwards.[4][5][6] Catholic doctrine supports intercessory prayer to saints. This practice is an application of the doctrine of the Communion of saints. Some of the early basis for this was the belief that martyrs passed immediately into the presence of God and could obtain graces and blessings for others, which naturally and immediately led to their direct invocation. A further reinforcement was derived from the cult of the angels which, while pre-Christian in its origin, was heartily embraced by the faithful of the sub-Apostolic age. The doctrine of intercession and invocation was set forth by the Council of Trent, which teaches that "... the saints who reign together with Christ offer up their own prayers to God for men. It is good and useful suppliantly to invoke them, and to have recourse to their prayers, aid, and help for obtaining benefits from God, through His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, Who alone is our Redeemer and Saviour".[10] Intercessory prayer to saintly persons who have not yet been beatified can also practiced by individuals, and evidence of miracles produced as a result of such prayer is very commonly produced during the formal process of beatification and canonization.

In short, the gun-toting angel was a multifaceted metaphor. “It undoubtedly also reflected the Catholic Counter-Reformation militaristic rhetoric,” wrote Donahue-Wallace, “which promoted the church as an army and heavenly beings as its soldiers.” These "Harquebusier Angels" or "Arcabuceros" are full-length depictions of winged angels, elaborately dressed, and carrying matchlock guns (harquebuses).

The related term astrolatry usually implies polytheism. In anthropological literature these systems of practice may be referred to as astral cults.

A friar is a member of one of the mendicant orders in the Roman Catholic Church. There are also friars outside of the Roman Catholic Church, such as within the Anglican Communion. The term, first used in the 12th or 13th century, distinguishes the mendicants' itinerant apostolic character, exercised broadly under the jurisdiction of a superior general, from the older monastic orders' allegiance to a single monastery formalized by their vow of stability. A friar may be in holy orders or be a non-ordained brother. The most significant orders of friars are the Dominicans, Franciscans, Augustinians, and Carmelites.[1]

Romans 8:31; Exploring Biblical Imagery is one of the most important keys to interpreting and gaining a deeper understanding of the Bible. The Bible often communicates truth to us through images and patterns.

Throughout history, armed priests or soldier priests have been recorded. Distinguished from military chaplains, who are non-combatants that provided spiritual guidance to service personnel and associated civilians, these priests took up arms and fought in conflicts as combatants. The term warrior priests or war priests is usually used for armed priests in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, and of historical tribes.

Slang: In Romans 8:5-8, Paul presents a compelling contrast between living according to the flesh and living according to the Spirit. The flesh, with its disordered desires and rebellion against God, leads only to spiritual desolation. Martyr, one who voluntarily suffers death rather than deny their religion by words or deeds; such action is afforded special, institutionalized recognition in most major religions of the world. The term may also refer to anyone who sacrifices their life or something of great value for the sake of principle. A religious allusion is a brief reference to a person, event, place, or phrase from religious texts or traditions, without describing them in detail. 5 Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6 The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. 7 The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8 Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God. Martyr/Romans 8 Allusion Slang.

Romeu e Julieta (Casapianos Order 1996 Adaptation 18+ Romance Thriller)

While it retains the original Shakespearean dialogue, the film represents the Montagues and the Capulets as warring mafia empires (with legitimate business fronts) and the Capulets were "a Latin family, sort of,"[15] played by Latin-American and Italian actors.[16] It is set in contemporary United States, where swords are replaced by guns[17] (with model names such as "Dagger", "Sword", and "Rapier"), and with a FedEx-style overnight delivery service called "Post Haste".[18] Shakespeare and Impure Aesthetics explores ideas about art implicit in Shakespeare's plays and defines specific Shakespearean aesthetic practices in his use of desire, death and mourning as resources for art. In fiction, a subplot or side story is a secondary strand of the plot that is a supporting side story for any story or for the main plot. Subplots may connect to main plots, in either time and place or thematic significance. Subplots often involve supporting characters, those besides the protagonist or antagonist. Subplots may also intertwine with the main plot at some point in a story.[1]

THE ENCYCLICAL PASSIONARIES ABOUT YHVH CASAPIANOS

Specifically, the royal psalms deal with the spiritual role of kings in the worship of Yahweh. Aside from that single qualification, there is nothing else which specifically links the ten psalms. Each of the psalms make explicit references to their subject, the king. Royal (messianic) psalms deal with the king as God's anointed or chosen one. Many are prayers for the wisdom of the king, his long life or success in battle. Some are prophetic in nature in that they also point to the ideal future king, the Messiah or the King of kings. A martyrology is a catalogue or list of martyrs and other saints and beati arranged in the calendar order of their anniversaries or feasts. Local martyrologies record exclusively the custom of a particular Church. Local lists were enriched by names borrowed from neighbouring churches.[1] Consolidation occurred, by the combination of several local martyrologies, with or without borrowings from literary sources. Simple martyrologies only enumerate names. Historical martyrologies, also sometimes called passionaries, also include stories or biographical details. (Reckless Abandonment; Mars Shamanism and Casa Pia Wing Transfer Invocation)

In the martyrdom narrative of the remembering community, this refusal to comply with the presented demands results in the punishment or execution of an individual by an oppressor. Accordingly, the status of the 'martyr' can be considered a posthumous title as a reward for those who are considered worthy of the concept of martyrdom by the living, regardless of any attempts by the deceased to control how they will be remembered in advance.[1] Insofar, the martyr is a relational figure of a society's boundary work that is produced by collective memory.[2] Originally applied only to those who suffered for their religious beliefs, the term has come to be used in connection with people killed for a political cause. (Armed Friars and The War for Central Africa between Casapianos and The French; The Fall of Yoruba for Bembé; Arcubusier Angels in Africa)

The Metal Ages is a term for the period of human civilization beginning about 6,000 years ago during which metallurgy rapidly advanced, and human populations started using metals such as copper, tin, bronze and finally iron to make tools and weapons. By heating and shaping metals in hot furnaces, humanity also learned to use precious metals such as gold and silver to make intricate ornaments.[1][2] With these technological adaptions, human society became more productive and human settlements became larger and more prosperous, but also more violent.[3] The Metal Ages are divided into three stages: the Copper Age, the Bronze Age, and the Iron Age.[1][2] (Calcium Age of Angola)

5 SENSES FESTIVAL MONTHLY (CASAPIANOS ORDER)

Heortology or eortology is a science that deals with the origin and development of religious festivals,[1] and more specifically the study of the history and criticism of liturgical calendars and martyrologies*. Religious Ecstacy Entheogens are psychedelic drugs—and sometimes certain other psychoactive substances—used for engendering spiritual development or otherwise in sacred contexts.

Sight: Fireworks on Water Front

Sound: Casapianos Palace Raves

Scent: Overnight Fragrance

Taste: Lamb and Wool

Touch: Tomato Food Fight

🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴🇦🇴

CASA PIA REPUBLIC

[kenyatta]

These companies have strayed from their core products — helping you find information, buy things, or connect with people — because their focus is no longer on innovation or providing a service, but finding a "good enough" service that they can then sell advertising around. Despite statements reiterating their commitment to users, workers, or the world, it's clear that tech companies and executives have become totally enthralled by one set of stakeholders: Wall Street. CEOs over hired and then laid off thousands of people or hyped new tech only to reverse course months later, all in an attempt to woo investors. This monomaniacal focus on market performance incentivizes a rot economy — a consistent yet unsustainable trajectory that favors the illusion of growth at the expense of actual development.

The biggest tech companies are encouraged to chase growth not as a way to have happy customers or become sustainable and profitable enterprises, but to have fancy-sounding numbers to send the stock price higher. It doesn't matter to investors that Mark Zuckerberg is burning billions of dollars a year and has absolutely nothing to show for it, or that the basic Facebook product experience has been getting worse for 10 years. Zuckerberg began "the year of efficiency" to show some newfound sense of discipline, but the mass firings are only going to make employees more miserable and the product worse. Even these companies' internal evaluation and compensation systems push employees to develop shiny "new" projects that produce flash-in-the-pan customer interest over building or sustaining existing products for current users.

This mindset has even trickled down to early-stage startups, which are typically thought of as proving grounds for innovation. Venture capital and other investors have pushed for a growth-first model, prioritizing "line goes up" metrics rather than building a useful product and sustainable business. VCs also incentivize companies to appeal to whatever hot trend could get them the highest multiple on their initial investment, rather than doing what will make the best user experience.

The net result of these rotten economics is a genuine lack of innovation. When companies are incentivized to grow at any cost — even if that means degrading the user experience — they will never seek to change or improve the world. Innovation can be expensive, time-consuming, and unprofitable, which means that the only innovation we'll ever see is the short-term kind that leaves a smile on a VC's face but angers average users.

Google, Amazon, and Meta are making their core products worse — on purpose

[ranidspace]

i downloaded the "No Thanks" app because i wanted a quick check of like. whats on the boycott list for israel and im just had a weird feeling about it.

i noticed while i was buying chips that the app said that, everything by frito lay, and its parent company, pepsico, is on the boycott list. but pepsico isnt on the BDS list.

i found out its actually not using the BDS list, but rather "boycotzionism.com" list. this website has. absolutely no information whatsoever. not what its goal is, not who owns it, nothing. i have found no one on social media who claimed to have made the page. it's just a giant list

quick note: the whole point of BDS is the fact that theyre focused, targeted boycotts. long lists of everything you should boycott just cause people to give up, and thats sometimes used as a tactic by zionists*

there's 620 brands to boycott on the site. and theres "proof" for all of them but like. a lot of them is just. they have a location in israel. or they do buisness with a company that does buisness with israel, or like, they invest in startups in israel (along with like 100 other countries) and like idk. it's like they're just pulling at every little possible thing

*this is not enough info to claim it's a psyop or whatever. the people behind it could have really good intentions and i respect the dedication for cataloguing all of this info along with reasons.

but do not let long ass lists make you give up boycotting, the largest boycott movement is a small, targeted boycott to these brands.

yes you can personally boycott whatever you want, of you're able to fully follow the boycotzionism list, go ahead nothing is stopping you, however BDS is the largest targeted boycott and it will do the most if you target those

[zenosanalytic]

Something that should have occurred to me earlier:

I've been thinking lately about how the ONLY people who seem to be excited and interested in ~AI~ are C-Suite Types, and Of Course They Are, because they're ALSO one of the few classes of society with enough money to be heavily involved in investing, and ~AI~ is the latest scam for pouring investment-dollars into in lieu of genuinely GOOD investments(which, thanks to pro-monopoly policies in the US, are supremely hard to find these days).

Like: it isn't(entirely) that these people are Dense Idiots; they are heavily invested IN ~AI~ startups, and pushing the companies they run to take on ~AI~ contracts WITH these startups actively helps those investments.

[juni-ravenhall]

reminder that SSE is valued at 1.2 billion SEK (120 million USD) as late as may 2023. (the article preview on the bottom of the screenshot is "Here are Sweden's 82 billion-valued tech companies 2023". as in, they're on that list of the WOW! Billion!! companies.)

quotes from the article (the preview at the top):

Star Stable, which has the Danish Egmont as its major owner, has since its inception in 2011 built an entire world of horse-related entertainment [...] But the world economy and the subsequent weaker purchasing power also affect the horse world, and the company is now being forced into an organizational change that affects 15 percent of the employees. This corresponds to 27 permanent employees, the company tells Di [the magazine], and union negotiations have now begun. "It was a difficult decision to make, but necessary for the company given the new market conditions. We started a minor reorganization last year, which gave a greater focus on our online game," comments the company's CEO Johan Sjöberg. Star Stable is on Di's list of Sweden's 82 billion-valued startup and technology companies, with a valuation of SEK 1.2 billion. In 2021, Star Stable had a turnover of SEK 346 million and made an operating profit of just over SEK 33 million.

im not posting this bc i think nobody has seen it before, i assume its been posted before. im posting it to remind you that this poor little meow meow is not in any way a 10 person indie studio doing desperate things to stay afloat. theyre a massively successful company with as much money as there are bugs in star stable.

the reorganisation and stuff is really normal. i dont like how they did it, i dont like how they cut the books and comics, and i think they couldve handled all of this better by better planning in advance instead of spreading themselves thin. i also think its insane of them to not focus on improving sso itself enough for like a decade and to not have sso merch out for just as long.

but, it IS really good that they're finally properly focusing on sso itself and trying to improve their main product. i think the current writing is embarrassingly bad though and there is not much gameplay to speak of. pretty graphics will only keep them afloat for so much longer, and revamping old things might not keep old players around for much longer who have waited for years to see the story go somewhere interesting. they're trying to do better, sometimes failing, sometimes succeeding. so we now have to wait and find out if they will invest all their resources back into sso in a meaningful way or not.

[syntia13treeman]

Case files 13.01

CAT3RB4622-17092023-14032024

what I think happened in:

Case 13.01, the case of "The Zorrotrade App" or "Play stupid games, win stupid prizes: Cryptobro edition"

What we know about the Zorrotrade App:

It likely has no government oversight.

It does some weird background checks of new users.

It allows users to engage in highly profitable and borderline illegal financial exploits.

They have some shady experimental features that are not advertised, hidden under a tonne of submenus and must be found and opted in by the user. (Free will, babey).

They have an Adjustment Department.

What we suspect about the Zorrotrage App:

It's magic.

One of magical perks is protectingusers phone from being stolen;

One of magical cons is compulsive truth spell included in their support line answerphone.

Another magical con: the Adjustment Department.

So let's meet a Zorrotrade user. Darrien Laurel (account number 428813). He had no shame, no self-awareness and no sense of decency. Also not a shred of common sense.

He came from a poor family (though considering his definition of 'broke' I'm not sure if his parents were actually poor, or just 'won't buy me a porshe' 'poor'). He went to private public expensive high school thanks to a scholarship, which – props to him, for this thing and this thing only. Boo to anything else he did with his life.

After school he took student loan, and instead of spending in on studying, he sunk it all in financial speculations (This has to be illegal, right? Aren't there stipulation in the contract about the permissible uses of the loan?) He used every trick in the book (specifically, the "book of things that are shady as fuck and are only technically legal because rich people benefit from them"). Shorting (and possibly indirectly bankrupting) startup companies and trading in cryptocurrency among them.

He used the funds he acquired this way for the ever so important business of impressing his former classmates, getting plastic surgeries, and buying excessive and excessively expensive shit. (Your suitcase does not have to cost a 1000 dollars, you prick). (Why are you buying in dollars, anyway? Did you have that imported from USA? Use pounds or euros like a proper European, asshat).

Then, in 2020, a tragedy: while he was peacefully sailing with his good friend Oli somewhere south of France, one bad investment left him broke – that is to say, just with a few thousands worth of clothes on his back (and in his 1000$ suitcase) (and the watch on his wrist) (and just a few thousands of savings to throw away on a whim).

Truly, a more devastating blow has never been dealt to anyone in human history.

This is when he discovered that his rich 'friends' really did hate him all along. More importantly, he discovered the experimental feature on his favourite app, "Personal Projection Short Selling". There were no instructions, but by stroke of bad decisions and bad luck (blindly investing most of his remaining money + getting drank + braking his friend's TV, and getting kicked out of Oli's yacht, + getting kicked in the face by some muggers respectively) Darrien worked out that it was functionally a wager against his own good fortune.

Another entry into Things that Darrien Did Not Have: a drop of self-preservation.

Imagine stumbling into an illegal casino in an alleyway somewhere, winning your first game by chance, and immediately deciding to start playing there every night, with loaded dice, winning a lot and occasionally getting caught and getting your teeth kicked in.

Darrien did this, but he skipped a few steps. His new business plan went like this:

Put in a wager that he'll have a Bad Day.

Arrange to get seriously hurt and/or destroy one of your relationships, therefore having a Bad Day and winning the wager.

Profit

He spent several weeks knocking around the south of France, purposefully getting into fights (arguments with friends and brawls with strangers both) and accidents. He was getting harmed and isolated and felt it was all worth it because he got paid every time.

I'm going to give him a pass on never questioning how this worked, because at this point I'm fairly sure it's influence off the app itself. It's not constant supernaturalsurveillanceyou're looking for /Jedi hand-wave/ It's perfectly normal for your life's misfortunes to be monetizable. /Jedi hand-wave/ It's all good! Chill! /Jedi hand-wave/

What I can't just hand-wave is Darrien's grand finale. His famous One Last Job, then I Retire I Promise.

He 'invested' a million pounds (£ 1 000 000), burned all the bridges with his family, friends and even strangers on the internet, and then jumped off a cliff. A literal, honest to gods, not metaphorical cliff.

Sir. SIR. There's gambling with your life, and then there's this.

He lost one leg, along with structural integrity of several pretty important internal organs and bones – and he was happy upon waking, because he was (doped up on painkillers) already counting the money he was surely going to get.

Alas, reality check – this was the Find Out part of his ultimate round of Fuck Around.

He loaded his dice, he stacked his deck, he used his cheatcodes – it was only a matter of time before somebody noticed and demanded refund. (somebody knew all along – they were just waiting for the stakes to be really worth it).

This time, the app did not pay up. This time, the app called foul and demanded that he pay up – or be Adjusted.

Predictably, Darrien Laurel was not happy with this outcome and he wanted to Speak to the Manager of this Application.

He called the support line. He threatened the answerphone with legal consequences. (now they hear you). He told the answerphone his life story, up to and including his current hospitalization. (now they know you). And at the end, almost as an afterthought, he said his full name and app account number. (now they own you).

The answerphone dutifully transferred the call to adjustments department. Somebody from adjustments department crawled out of the phone and onto Darrien's bed. The call got disconnected. Darriel Laurel… got Adjusted.

Well. That sure was something. Final thoughts:

Remember when I yelled about Fae rules in case file 05-01? Do not take their money food, do not give them your name. Darriel broke those rules, and just look what happened! Well,

we don't actually know what happened. My first knee-jerk reaction was to say 'he got eated', but Personal Adjustment sounds… much more painful than just death by Mrs. Spider's mandibles. (I keep calling her that, but for some reason my mental image of that last scene is a weird metal centipede skittering out of the phone speaker that's much too small to fit it). I wonder if we'll meet Darriel, or at least some of him, again somewhere down the line. (Would he be like Needles, or more like Not-Arthur?) The incident happened about 6 month prior to Sam hearing it. Is that enough time for a new unholy abomination to incubate? Or… ripen? Whatever the 'adjustment' process entails.

This is the third time we've seen a man changing their fortune through pain. And we know it's possible to game the system successfully, because the 19th century violinist did it – he died of old age, more or less satisfied with his life. Mr. Die and Darrien could never. (Smh. Kids these days. No patience, no self-discipline).

This is… how many times now that we've seen someone's body being transformed? {Not-Arthur, RedCanary (? missing eyes at least), Daria(? - partial, self inflicted), Dr. 'Jasmine bush' Samuel, Cinema Tom(? - potentially), Needles(?), Mr. Bonzo(?), Error(?), Crypto Darrien} That's 3 up to 9, I think. Something definitely likes to play play-do with human flesh.

[manorpunk]

The Global Logistics Network is not China; it is Huawei. The Global Logistics Network is not America; it is Amazon. It is an empire of middlemen, neither top-down nor bottom-up but center-outwards. Everyone is still free to develop new products and start their own company, but your raw materials will be produced by the GLN, shipped on GLN trains and freighters, and your production equipment will be build to GLN specifications and operated by machinists who passed certification tests written by the GLN.

Even so, there are some corporations who have managed to maintain independent power bases, including:

Vae Victis Engineering, high-tech arms developers who have formed a joint venture with the Werther Group to branch out into sexbot development;

Aivrcade, the tech goose that laid the golden egg of VR that doesn't suck, in a joint venture with Shintendo, leading producer of video games and other consumer goods which keep the proles happy;

and 'musklings,' a derogatory term for the lingering Capuletian remnants of the billionaire class who were given eye-popping bribes in exchange for the GLN seizing all of their assets as the old economic order fell to pieces, and use that bribe-money to invest in startups that the GLN considers 'too stupid to fund.'

You may have heard rumors that the GLN is secretly run by a sentient superintelligent AI. Well, it's not. So don't believe that. AI technology is used in many branches of the GLN to complete routine tasks under careful management, and furthermore, AI doesn't even work like that, there's no way it coulpRyCQ5viwSwBoJkAGzte3muc2f3cPA2D [TERMINATE PROGRAM]

[looosey]

Tech and the City

Long time no write. To get you onboarded: this summer, I've been code-monkeying as a software engineer intern at the AI music startup I wrote about earlier in my posts. This past month has looked pretty routine: show up before 10 and leave after 5, code-code-code. But on Thursday and Friday, I pushed the backend and frontend of my feature into the product for the first time!! My hands were cold, and I sat right next to the senior engineer, reading my Github "Files Changed" tab over and over again, nervous as heck about my manual merge, and I clicked Merge... Screams of joy in my head!!

I realized recently, I want a return offer to this job, because... I enjoy it.

For the first time in my life, I've enjoyed my job itself. I like the focus it requires, the challenge to engineer and design and clean and improve, the mentorship I get from brilliant engineers around me. The pace of it, as a startup. The tight-knit, rapidly growing team. So I'm greedy to be a part of it for a bit longer.

This got me thinking though, about what it takes to be at the caliber of coding that would guarantee me any position I wanted. It was as if I was back at college applications, wondering if I should become a spikier applicant and put in hours and hours into programming, to become an undeniable pick. Spikiness... an athlete's dedication to her sport... an artist's whole investment into their craft... is brilliance and I deeply admire it in other people and find it a pleasure to be surrounded by people who dedicate their lives to one thing.

For example, there are my friends who dedicate their college lives to becoming better freestyle or choreography dancers. There is my professor who dedicates his entire day to perfecting the craft of rap. There is my co-intern who spent 8 hours a day after school coding his own personal projects all throughout high school.

And then there is me, who cannot make a decision between her interests in engineering, dance, music, and content. For this summer, I have adopted the mindset of not forcing any of my "hobbies:" to do something only as much as I enjoy it. Is it possible for this to still be a satisfying life?

After Friday 10 a.m. standup (i.e. tech companies typically have these short, regularly-scheduled meetings, where team will update each other on what they're working on), I was waffling around the corporate watering hole (i.e. the coffee machine) when another coworker stopped by and helped me use the terrifyingly complex Xbloom. After a bit of talking about our favorite roast, I found out she was extremely interested in coffee, so much so that she was writing a book! This girl can code, play piano, make coffee, design/draw, and write?? And with the drive needed to write her own book?

This interaction reminded me of my Software Design professor, who told me to go write a book: it's very fun and surprisingly easy to self-publish. He was very good at programming. And also teaching and also photography..

Which makes me think there is another model of brilliance that is not as obvious. A world where it's possible to achieve satisfying qualities in different areas of interest. Fueled by the belief that as long as you are true to yourself: because you as a body of cells and celestial dust exists, a narrative of your interests too can be summarized.

I think, I'm going to schedule Thursdays of every week to think about this a little more.

Anyways it's 1:30 a.m. and I need to be at work at 9 tomorrow. Good night!!

[multicore-processor]

This part from the leaked MrBeast memo stood out to me, because it's a sentiment I've seen before

Mostly it hits too close to home because I am probably not an "A player" myself, but I have Thoughts, not very well organized

The actual best in the goddamn world are generally either expensive consultants, startup cofounders with a big equity stake, or senior employees at big companies making seven figures. MrBeast probably can't afford them. So we're actually talking about people who are a couple standard deviations above average. Even then, I'd hope the pay scale is a couple standard deviations above average.

(Unless "best in the goddamn world" is defined narrowly and includes your acquired mastery of the idiosyncratic ways of your organization.)

If your organization can only function with A players, your organization can't scale very big, since the supply of A players is limited and heavily contested.

But, that's still a valid strategy, putting a lot of investment into finding a few good people so that your organization can be nimble and punch above its weight.

I guess one thing in favor of this strategy is that a lot of "A players" are only capable of obsessive dedication to certain things, and wouldn't be "A players" at another company. Maybe if you're singularly obsessed with producing viral youtube videos and nothing else, MrBeast doesn't have to compete with the entire corporate world for your services.

But this has all been assuming that I should take the definitions given at face value. Is MrBeast just redefining "bad employee" as "average" and "good employee" as "best in the world" to boost morale? Not sure.

[cooganbegs-blog]

My first day of my two-day a week contract. I am so lucky that I have yet another queen bee who is amazing. She invested in The Yield which is where I met her and learned the ropes of software management. She’s supposed to be semi-retired but has so many fingers invested in so many startups she can’t help herself. And she insisted she wanted me in her businesses. She’s also insisting on calling me the Chief Product Officer?!!! Faaark, I am not ready for that title but she seems to think I am! So my LinkedIn is now officially CPO! It’s a tiny startup but with a growing customer base and a solid beautifully designed product. And the founder is such a good egg! I’d trust anyone that Jen recommended.

So I’m up to my armpits is learning a new product, a new team….im on the exec team!!!!!!!!! I have a seat at the decision making table….again, pretty sure it’s a big reach above my experince but Jen sees something I don’t!!!

It’s a nice feeling, I get the product and there’s no fuckhead, arsehole fuckers …..so far! I do have some doubts about the CEO though, am withholding judgement and giving her space to show what she’s made of. A lot of the exec team have the word “strategy” in their title…yet when I asked when I could find the business goals and strategy…..hmmmm they don’t have one! They’re only 3-4 years old, babies but happy to let me run amok and do whatever the fuck it is that product people do……I had that rarest of experiences today….flow! I was so engrossed analysing a bunch of qual data and mapping out the outcomes and opportunities before I realised I’d lost track of time!! I definitely enjoy the doing more than the overseeing!!

I’m staying sanguine but my new “no fuckheads and no more clusterfuck companies” might have got me a start in that direction.

Time will tell.

[azspot]

All the upside-down incentives and warped prerogatives of the startup world are on display here (including a preference for lying and monkeying with data over actually doing good work). They're also, in turn, mere appendages of a deeper and more profound decadence. In 2023, discovery, exploration, and invention are just vibes you rent, by investing in a future-costumed effort to ignore all of what's already been learned and pretend "making a car that works" (or tunnels, or spaceships, or social media) is a new frontier. What matters isn't whether any of this has been done before, and more authentically, and well enough to be built upon—what matters is that this particular rich man-child hasn't done it yet, from scratch, for himself and for his own dream of being The Most Special Boy. In the absence of any real opportunity to envision a brighter future, you sign up to support some inheritance goober's personal fantasy camp by dumping money into his company or buying his stupid-looking car. In this way, you are meant to understand, you have participated in the great grand adventure of discovering tomorrow.

You're Supposed To Be Glad Your Tesla Is A Brittle Heap Of Junk