#i feel like it's a collective experience we all have been through as a userbase

[mistressemmedi]

Every time I see someone post one of those Gaza Gofundmes I have to question their intelligence. You truly think a middle aged dad who's currently being bombed is going onto a dying website filled with the unemployed and clicking on your gay sports RPF blog, navigating past Vettel/Webber smut and asking you to help them? I know it comes from a good place I really do but I wish people would think things through a little more.

I can't shit on people for trying in their own way to help someone else.

I mean, sure there's moments that make me go 🤨 but I can't fault someone for posting a cry for help hoping that it's a real one and it will reach the (unlikely) right audience. But I do agree with your assessment.

Also, there is a much younger userbase on here nowadays, many of these people were not around for the 2015 (?) and onwards Russian bots pandemic and it shows.

[chipped-chimera]

I always felt the live push was kind of weird, and that explains it (goddamn corpos).

Maybe an unpopular opinion (please do not boo me off stage) but I think Live could have a place if done correctly and - and this is the important one - regulated. I think the primary problem with live - aside from feeling like it is constantly being shoved down our throats - was it felt more like it was trying to capitalize on the TikTok adjacent, influencer farming, algorithmic content bs that frankly so many of us are fatigued from being exposed to. The amount of control a Tumblr user has over the content they choose to engage with by comparison is phenomenal. And Live was the direct INVERSE of this principle.

Live could work well as a feature, but as long as it integrates with the rest of the existing experience. The current problem is it feels like Tumblr and then this weird thing tacked onto the side of it. Again people are here on Tumblr to get AWAY from being pushed content from people they're not following and have no interest in.

To really get this to work I feel you need to restore the user control here. For example - an artist you really like is going to stream? Cool! Maybe you can get a reminder when they go live (again, only if you choose to get the notification from them - either because they have a promotional post and you can click it to 'set reminder for this stream' or something) and you could pop the stream out like the videos do and keep it on the side of your dash with a chat box underneath while you scroll through your dashboard (at least for the desktop experience). Or you can open a tab of 'who is live now' from people you actually follow. Now if people actually want to go through a discovery section that's more algorithmically managed, that should be contained in it's own thing.

Honestly I feel this is the underlying theme of why a lot of us long-haulers cling to Tumblr - we want the user experience to be prioritized. We don't want to be 'told' what we like constantly and feel like we're merely being grifted for money all the time. Algorithms can be good, I don't mind poking around in the 'For You' tab on occasion to find new people to follow, but that's merely to add to my existing curated dashboard feed. Not to replace it.

In summary, the closing points of my Live related TED talk:

Live could work, but it has to fit with what core Tumblr actually IS if you want it to work.

Content curation is extremely important to Tumblr users and is the whole appeal in an internet that is just constantly using machine learning to squeeze as much money out of us as possible. It's against the grain. It's our hellsite.

Don't shove Live in peoples faces unless they choose for it to be there. And if they choose to look in the algorithmic section, for the love of god please have categories, filters, tagging etc. and whatever it takes to keep the pornbots off it please. (aka another reason why forcing live = bad because now you've got the full monty on your dash and you can't control it)

Emphasize user privacy and choice. I've been seeing shit about the intense level of data Tumblr Live apparently collects, which I am presuming is within the terms of that contract. Tumblr users, again like control. Of both what they choose to engage with and what is done with our data. We pass around enough firefox/adblock/anti-data-scrape posts as it is, it should be obvious.

USER. CHOICE. That's it. No really think about it, the whole internet is turning into a wriggling pit of algorithmic bs that's engulfing everything. It's going to get stale, really quick (I mean with the way I keep seeing articles about social media 'dying' - it already is. And they're all sites that have either been heavily focused on or pivoted towards algorithm). Freedom of choice is the whole appeal here.

Treat your userbase well, they'll treat you back. It's a longhaul strat but it's more guaranteed than alienating your entire userbase to make a quick buck (see the website formally known as Twitter for this one). This is an extremely out of left field example but - Final Fantasy XIV, I feel has treated its community excellently over the years. That game initially was a train-wreck. It's now considered one of the best (and possibly biggest) MMOs, all because they stuck to their core userbase who stuck by them, and listened. I am willing to let my FFXIV sub roll over, for months, without playing sometimes because it's one of the few subs I will pay for where I feel what I get out of it EXCEEDS the value of what I'm paying. And I'm actually happy to do that, I consider it a donation.

Look up 'Enshittification'. Yeah. Don't do any of that basically.

Uh thanks for coming to my TED talk idk where else to stick this so sorry it's being tacked on here 💀 Signed, person who has been on tumblr way too long (since 2010) and seen like 2-3 social medias die in my lifetime.

Since the other ask didn't seem to cover it, Why is Live being kept as a feature? It's almost universally hated, there's a post that circulates every week reminding us to turn it off so we don't forget to do so, the only feature live has is porn users which appeals to small portions of the user base but otherwise isn't worth the hassle. Why is this feature still Around? I'm genuinely wondering, this isn't meant as an attack, I just do not understand how a feature so detested could possibly be beneficial to the site.

We have a contractual obligation to try to make Live as successful as possible through the end of the year, and we'll do our best there. By January, aligned with the new more focused approached of Tumblr teams, we'll re-assess whether it should be part of the Tumblr app anymore. That's all I can really say about it, and I hope that answers your question and gives you something to look forward to in 2024.

[dramarising-replacement]

as someone in lightning who has never participated directly in dom nor been on any of the lightning discord servers but has kept a loose orbit of the dramasphere and periodically skims the dom threads to check the schedule and see if anything's being voted on, the fact that consistently for the last 4 or more years every time i see someone in public say anything that even slightly sounds like it could be questioning the leadership on any level get slammed with the same guilt-trippy sounding "in LIGHTNING we're a GOOD dom flight and our leadership is WONDERFUL because you can TAKE THIS ISSUE UP WITH OUR DOM LEADERS DIRECTLY ANDTHEY'LL LISTEN BECAUSE THEY ARE GOOD rather than COMPLAINING ABOUT IT which you would know if you were COMPLAINING IN GOOD FAITH because otherwise you'd have gone through the PROPER channels to contact our LEADERS rather than WHINING IN PUBLIC and i'm going to heavily imply that the issues you raised don't exist and/or are stupid and wrong and based on a fundamentally idiotically wrong understanding of how our flight works" wall of text puts me right the hell off lightning dom as a whole real hard.

even if i had been the sort of person to have an interest in dom battles, that whole thing combined with a lot of other subtle things and the fact that almost everything is on a discord server out of the public eye at this point gives me uncomfortable vibes, and the fact that these copypasta response posts always seem to have this weird unspoken emphasis on the real problem being that it's visible in public gives me, as someone trapped in an abusive family of exactly that type, who's mother has told me this phrase exactly word for word, MASSIVE "there's some things we don't talk about outside this family." vibes.

the fact that literally nothing is really particularly known or spoken about lightning as a flight outside of people being like "uhh spreadsheets" makes me even more nervous of my own flight, because in my experience dramasphere silence like that only means that they're just very good at hiding where the drama is happening. no news is not the same thing as neutral news. no news means the news isn't getting out. there was also that major dom leader guy with a game of thrones name a year or two back who if i remember correctly did something along the lines of enter himself on his own ticket spreadsheet for a dom raffle he was running so that he could draw himself to win prizes, then when someone asked about that he exploded on them about how they're an entitled brat and ranted on about how as dom leaders they work so hard and are entitled to a cut of the prizes of their work? then fucked off to plague where he proceeded to do some other questionable things i don't remember? that was a thing, and that didn't exactly make me feel less weird something not right here vibes from what little contact i had with the lightning dom situation. i just get a huge feeling of guilt tripping from all of the few interactions i've ever seen of the dom scene interacting with anyone who asks questions and i also get the impression of this heavy unspoken frowning upon anyone speaking about anything going on in-flight outside it.

unfortunately if it turns out there is weird shit going on, or if this spirals into  drama topic whether or not there is, given the fact that up until this point there has been literally nothing on lightning in the collective consciousness of fr up until this point beyond "idk spreadsheet probably" and the fact that right now the popular attitude of 90% of the userbase seems to be that all plague users are problematic rude edgelords and entitled whiny babies because they complain about getting shafted on their aesthetic (and the fact that the site artists are very blatantly going out of their way to exclude the damn color RED) and because the very act of being into such a non-wholesome aesthetic in the first place is apparently enough to make one inherently suspect, this will most likely result in lightning members as a whole coming to be viewed in popular consciousness as inherently problematic, corrupt, suspect, drama-causers, and untrustworthy. after all, there won't be any other preconceived notions on us there for people's brains to gravitate to automatically when they think of us. if my bad vibes feelings turn out to be not unfounded after all i'm going to be completely fucked by association because people on flight rising, even if they won't admit it, are horrifyingly steeped in category-based prejudices towards eachother and ESPECIALLY towards anyone who happens to have anything to do on any level with a flight that's been deemed a "drama" one. just cause they won't say it to your face on-site doesn't mean they don't think it and pass judgements based on it. and lightning if it does turn out to be corrupt will be especially fucked because we have nothing else going for us in the case that we end up being deemed one of the shitty drama flights where all the stupid entitled whiny baby untrustworthy asshole bad people are and everyone there is an problematic whiny scambitch they all suck and their flight sucks too and is probably conceptually problematic or offensive against a real life group or something inherently as a concept too and therefore everyone in it is cosigning causing people epileptic seizures because thrage was a dick about that and blah blah blah because i know damn well how these toxic-ass circles of tumblr that scream 24/7 about what a sweet welcoming wholesome community not like those horrible toxic communities outside they are run.

this whole situation is a mess of uncomfortable ambiguity, guilt tripping, and certain bad times ahead if anyone's suspicions turn out to be even slightly shy of totally unfounded, which i'm not inclined to find likely because insert that phrase about how if something presents itself as too good to be true here. flight rising as a community is already dreadfully susceptible to the worst kinds of aggressive isolationist cult mentality, and the guilt tripping every time i see someone ask questions in public thing has been setting off my warning bells for years. people already almost universally dislike lightning in general just for it's aesthetic and lore, and the kind of tumblr people fr is populated by are very much the type to jump on any chance to rationalize and justify their personal distaste of a fictional thing as a morality thing that allows them to condemn people morally over association with it and thus eradicate the disliked thing's presence and stop people being allowed to like the thing they don't like.

idk this is rambling. some things i've seen and the things i haven't seen make me nervous and everything about the potential outcomes sucks.

[meandmyechoes]

i think a lot of frustration i have with the mandalorian (watching it real-time the first time) is unfairly redirected from my timidness to interact with "mainstream" star wars fandom. I'm jealous of the attention it's getting.

our local fandom is already small, and traditional in its making-up of middle-aged men. I joined a few facebook groups in observation, both local and global. Outside of tumblr, the original fandom activity is centered on either swordfighting or toy collecting. While I appreciate the talent shown in customization and diaoramas, it's not as satisfactory for my experience as it would about creative work and literary criticism.

I also feel kinda prejudiced to catch all fans as "mindless fanboys" but that has been consistent with my observations so far but as always i've been biased and looked down on everyone— Even though I'm interacting with the Ordinary Male™ and they are always less intelligent than I am— Either way it doesn't sit well with me

On the forum, where I have more anonymity, I'm braver to voice out even if the userbase says really sexist things sometimes, (fortunately not overlap with star wars posts). It's okay becuase it's grassroot humour. It's also not okay because at my least observant, I'd still be reminded to "why so serious". I'm definitely exaggerating here because last times I post several long metas the reponse has been wholly positive — I can't place the origin but I just feel very out of place with the local community :(

The weird thing is the attention there isn't even something I need? I have a very satisfactory fandom life here (that's why I come to the uniqueness of this platform in the first place) but I'm instead dwelling on a first-world problem

Like, of course I'm happy more people are liking Star Wars and now curious about my era, I'm slightly gatekeeping?

No that wasn't the issue. There was this party-pooper right-wing man in the group that is the worst. His repeated, insensitive word choice, craving attention. I think there are valid criticisms regarding Disney's treatment of the sequel trilogy and their hypocrisy at diversity versus telling good stories but this guy's wording and attitude comes off so hostile it feels like even if we have common ground, I'd still be labelled as a brainless leftist Karen. But it's really just that one guy and it's not like he's even that influential I think? All the same it makes me feel very uncomfortable talking about certain issues without disclaimers every time. But I'm definitely over-thinking in this respect because it's not out of necessity we interact even if we share the same platform. And he's just one outlier case.

I think the root of the anxiety is coming fron as an Animation fan, and we've been receving the short end for years. As a universal trend Children-oriented media has always been despised and receives blame for being "too kiddy". But what they don't realize it's that there are very important messages to be sent through these shows and making them palatable for children and adults alike is no easy task, and those shows that succeed should be praised and taught with. What's important is that the violence and trauma depicted is enough to springboard children into their own research, raise their awareness and tell them there's a big world out there.

It's so infuriating how in the Kamen Rider fandom, those complaints come not only from man-childs, but actual 14-year-olds who think they're too cool for school. I mean if you don't like the direction of the show, you can just, drop it?

The most common excuse I've heard about people missing out on the shows is they just don't have time, which is reasonable, and relatable, for a 133-episode show. There are more dismissal towards Rebels but always accompanied by comments in its defense. So I think those who are passionate enough about Star Wars to join the local online community, are not entire jerks to animated canons but instead are too busy or not their favourite era to focus on, which is totally valid! The thing is I've heard mostly positive comments on Clone Wars (albeit horny ones from time to time, luckily I'm 18+ now), but I'm still very cautious about revealing myself as a female fan, and that of the animated shows, and that who knows little of the OT or swordfighting. I think I'll be more comfortable if I could dm someone and get a concrete sample of the audience before I feel more confident to put myself out there. It's definitely not like they're bad people, but there's a discrepancy in our fundamental paths of enjoying Star Wars and that may lead to a rocky start. It's like having different majors :/

Another point is involving myself there could be my most sexist experience yet. Yes, even more than a woman in STEM. I'm mature enough to handle even more tinted lenses thrown on me I just won't be very used to it. The other close encounter I had was visiting a warehouse sale a few months ago. The owner was obviously surprised to see a girl visit such a niche event and gestured me the Leia toys. He was friendly in every way but I immediately sniffed the stereotypical assumption. 1) Nobody loves the Prequels and 2) Girls only like girl characters. It was a brief conversation as I rushed to Maul's side and started checking out the clone troopers. Though no hard feelings, the incident adds to how I've been consistently right about my generalization of the (male) fandom.

And it comes back to a vicious cycle about how such anxiety hinders representation, and the lack of familiar voices fuels that anxiety. It's easier here because this is my personal blog and not everything is meant to induce a response. I feel more comfortable speaking things aren't designed to be understood or to communicate here. But out there with a bunch of elders instead of peers (whom I respect even if they haven't seen/don't like Clone Wars, because I hold them to the same expertise in their era as I do with mine), it's tricky to navigate between condescension and firmness, humility and shamelessness. I do feel compelled to "prove" myself if I'm even to share a post in the group. You know? The feeling of working extra hard just to be judged without prejudice?

P.S. Since I mentioned the Right-wing Guy I should also mention the only active female member I saw in the group. She definitely sounds like an older adult and obviously a Disney fan, and just, very stereotypically a "Hong Kong Gal" (-ve intonation), in her obsession with Disneyland and Pandoa bracelets. And I'm unnecessarily disappointed by that because I too look down on capitalism and corporate monopoly.

**********

On a tangent, let's take the opportunity to briefly talk about sexualization of The Clone Wars.

A baffling phenomenon I noticed coming back is the explosion of reader fics, nsfw reader fics. Now I'm not a fanfic person first and foremost so I'm even more baffled by the necessity of the existence of such fics. I am utilitarian on this matter. While I personally do not enjoy them, there's nothing morally corrupt about the bloom and it honestly stays just beyond my alert of annoyance.

I attribute the bloom to first, how like me, the first generation of tumblr users (and thus its majority) are now adults and would like to explore the indulgence. But I just take a step back and imagine the tight, tight frown on my 16-year-old self had she seen the clone wars tag flooded with nsfw fics. She'd flee the site and bleach her eyes so bad.

But that definitely isn't a problem. Although it caught me off guard, the insert writers I've come across are passionate people who abide by tag etiquette, so it's all good, and safe.

On the other hand…

Sexualized Ahsoka isn't my first rodeo. Actually, it probably was my first rodeo with many more in the decade that came. 2009 was the time when even official art sexualized her horribly, let alone the power of Google Images. To this day, it's still easy to find ani//soka fanart (pregnant fanart, in the 2011 deviantart flat colour) outside here (on top of the usual hellship *sigh*). But if you don't go look them up, it's mostly okay.

but yeah, winding back to the "mainstream" entry problem I've been ranting about, I keep seeing fetish threads/comments regarding Ahsoka and it's just very uncomfortable to have my exposure in that accumulate. It's a little bit better here than mainland which I've shunned away totally becuase they just, takes nothing seriously. Of course I do agree Ahsoka has grown into a beautiful young woman and her badassary is off the charts but maybe, one can keep inappropriate thoughts to themselves?

Joking about physical attraction towards a fictional character is… so trivial I ain't even gonna bother (and the age issue really don't need to be repeated) — the joke got old. But seeing men comment on female figures like that, with no mindfulness that they are on a very public forum is just pathetic. It really shows you how deep men can sink.

(and those horny but appreciative comments is only tip of the iceberg from that too explicit one i wish to delete from my mind. I really hope that doesn't become a recurring issue when Ahsoka is live-actionized ﾟ･｡(´Д⊂ヽ)

It's totally gonna become an issue.

[beforethebridge]

Book Review: Chuck Klosterman – But What If We’re Wrong?

Chuck Klosterman – But What If We’re Wrong?

5/20/2019

“It’s impossible to understand the world of today until today has become tomorrow.” – Chuck Klosterman

One of my final mental inhibitors to getting a tattoo in an exposed area of my body is reaching a comfortable place about how I’ll explain its meaning to the different types of people in my life. The not-too-personal two sentence explanation for co-workers, the way-too-personal description for my best friends, and the messy, always evolving reality behind the decision that I’ll mostly keep to myself. In explaining my new forearm tattoo to a co-worker, I landed on a quick catalog of associations: philosophical skepticism, Anthony Bourdain, and suspending judgment (“epoché”). My standard quick description, added to the borrowed line “all I know is that I know nothing, and I’m not even sure about that,” struck a chord – he lent me his Chuck Klosterman book about questioning everything, the nature of history, and what the view of today will look like from tomorrow.

I burned through Chuck Klosterman’s But What if We’re Wrong? on a beach vacation (wrecking it with ocean water, sand, and blood somehow?), enjoying his commentary on how a range of core scientific principles and pop culture mainstays will be viewed in later decades and centuries. He prefers to think about big questions on the nature of history through the practical lens of personal conversation. Indeed, reading the book at times felt like a somewhat suffocating bar conversation with someone determined to prove themselves. But some sharp editing and self-restraint by the author seems to have distilled this book down to the most absorbing parts.

Klosterman’s strength is writing about how academic understanding of the collective, subjective societal significance attributed to pop culture evolves over time. Klosterman writes:

“Our sense of subjective reality is simultaneously based on an acceptance of abstract fallibility (“Who is to say what constitutes good art?”) and a casual certitude that we’re right about exclusive assertions that feel like facts (“The Wire represents the apex of television”).”

I found this tone in his analysis of subjective realities particularly attractive, jiving well with my recent embrace of the “epoché” lifestyle. Essentially, Klosterman argues that while the public tends to recognize that movies, television, music, and other forms of art and entertainment can subsist and thrive within their distinct audiences without having to take on some wider cultural relevance, critics and commentators often resort to superlatives to stimulate interest, conversation, and clicks. This contributes to an individual and societal pressure to conform to absorbing the entertainment highlighted by empowered voices (celebrities of various statures, Twitter trends and their curators, and critics published on influential publications and sites), or otherwise risk the cultural moment leaving you behind. Content is published at an alarming and overwhelming rate in 2019, incentivizing entertainment customers to distil their choices through their trusted filters. But how does this translate to future-historical understanding of what culture matters to us right now?

Klosterman wonders what entertainment will be presented by college lecturers centuries from now as emblematic of our current time period. For example, he settles on Chuck Berry (for “rock & roll” music) and Rosanne (for television sitcoms) as two emblems of 20th century culture, failing of course to predict or consider our current reexamination of Berry’s place in history in light of his documented abuse of underage girls and Rosanne Barr’s racist rantings (both fitting developments to follow a book conscious of the fallibility of predicting the future).

 For what it’s worth, a Google search for “rock and roll music” on 5/20/2019 results in a YouTube video of Chuck Berry performing “Rock & Roll Music,” along with a suggested search for The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, and Queen. A search for “television sitcoms” currently yields a list of shows like Modern Family, Parks and Recreation, How I Met Your Mother, and, indeed, Roseanne, among a few dozen others. Klosterman asserts his choices because someone must, he argues, and because it makes for fun bar conversation (he seems self-aware about how parts of his book might remind some readers of their more eye-rolling dates). He’s not wrong, but maybe there’s an alternative to individual persuasion in rolling-up culture for future dissection. 

Luckily for those lecturers and their students, the Internet has enabled an industry of entertainment opinion amalgamation through ratings aggregator websites across popular artforms. I imagine archived versions of these websites might simplify the process of determining what entertainment is revered in its time, with necessary demographic bracketing of user populations per each site. For example, in music, users on RateYourMusic.com currently hold Radiohead’s OK Computer as the top-rated album of all time, while SputnikMusic.com users lend that honor to Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here (I don’t know much about the comparative userbases of these sites, but I would suspect them both to skew young, white, and male.) Earlier this year, I found Reddit posts where users sorted through ratings websites like these to form amalgamated rankings of 2018’s best music releases, and I’m sure this has been done across all different brackets of time, genre, and format, as well as across all other popular forms of entertainment (including ratings of those ratings websites themselves, in a sort of fivethirtyeight.com meta-analysis).

Letterboxd.com is an example site for movies, or rather for film watchers who find their identity in film viewing (and in calling it “film”) enough to rate and track their views, where Twin Peaks: The Return (2017), Planet Earth II (2016), and The Godfather (1972) currently hold the top ratings spots. This perhaps highlights the utility of nuanced categorization when considering these questions (what constitutes a feature film, a short film, a television show, a documentary, etc., and how should they be compared?). Critical opinions are widely aggregated as well, often compared alongside user ratings, as with sites like MetaCritic.com.

Do these opinion aggregators represent the best resources for those seeking to understand what entertainment connected with or represented most thoroughly our society in our time? Whose opinions are being aggregated, and whose are being left out of these ratings sites and their aggregators? Do these sites undervalue certain demographics (elderly, poor, those otherwise not “extremely online”) in ways that would create blind spots for our future assessors? Do these ratings reveal more about society than sheer viewership volume numbers, like Nielson ratings, Billboard charts, and other audience measurements? I don’t have the cultural awareness or critical experience to dive too deeply into these questions, but Klosterman’s But What if We’re Wrong? suggests ways of thinking that might help sort through the overwhelming entertainment of the present. I wouldn’t suggest to sociologists how to pursue their research, but if there are academics out there thinking and writing about opinion aggregators, I’d love to read up.

“The world happens as it happens, but we construct what we remember and what we forget. And people will eventually do that for us, too.” 

[no-the-other-thaddeus]

On the new guidelines

I rarely ever make my own original posts on this blog. Perhaps because I’ve little faith that they’ll get much traction, or feel they simply won’t have much impact buried beneath endless reblogs that often better articulate the points I’d want to make, or are at least more widely visible. 

But this, this I feel the need to weigh in on in my own words. This affects nearly everyone using this site, from personal friends to complete strangers. This is an attack on a huge chunk of this sites userbase, and yet another slap in the face to NSFW content creators from a major social media platform. I’m tired of it, and I refuse to be silent anymore. 

Normally I’d probably put something this prone to ending up long under a read more, but that just makes it all too easy to ignore. I know that much from experience. So we’re gonna get into this, and if the post ends up taking a while to scroll past? You’ll just have to deal with those few seconds of inconvenience I guess. 

To begin with, I will say that this has at least one silver lining. It still sucks that it’s coming about because of the complete destruction of tumblr’s NSFW community, but it might at least be a comforting thought:

Unless they fuck this up spectacularly, this will be a huge blow to all the pedophile scumbags who embedded themselves into this site like ticks. Gone, by and large will be the contingent of ‘MAPs’ trying to normalize pedophilia like the fucking filth they are from this corner of the internet. 

It fucking sucks that it has to come with the deletion of all other NSFW content on the site as well, but it’s something at least. Fuck those people. No exceptions.

Moving on, however, this is the most extreme measure they could have possibly taken to resolve this problem, to the point I’m still kind of stunned it’s what they’re going with. It is effectively suicide; they skipped straight from shooting themselves in the foot to shooting themselves in the head. It’s not that there aren’t people who use the site mostly for SFW content, but at the same time, even amongst those people, there’s a good chance any given one of them has a side-blog for collecting porn. It’s a huge part of this site’s identity. To attempt to remove that is to lobotomize it. 

This is especially true given that it’s already becoming apparent that whatever algorithm they’re using to flag posts now is wildly inaccurate. If your image has something even vaguely resembling a dick in it, whoops, flagged. And I do mean vaguely resembling.At the rate things are going you could get flagged for posting a picture of Squidward purely because of his nose. That happening here and there would be one thing, but the real issue this is causing is a bleedover that could kill another huge section of tumblrs userbase: Roleplayers

For a few hours after the announcement got spread around, the rp community reasoned they were safe, given that NSFW text is still allowed. So long as they abstained from posting lewd art or using suggestive icons, theoretically they’d be fine. 

Nope. Just an hour or so ago, one I follow had a completely innocuous post flagged for no discernible reason. They appealed it of course, that is something you can do. There’s even a button linking to a page giving you more info on the appeal process on the notification your appeal’s gone through!

That leads to a blank page. 

So, more than likely, it’s going to become infeasible to use tumblr for roleplay without it being a game of Russian roulette. Now we’re up to two groups tumblr is effectively killing or at least wounding. But wait there’s more! From what I hear, Furry blogs, even if they are SFW, are being flagged indiscriminately. It’d be one thing if they were just a casualty of the NSFW purge, but that even ones that are clearly harmless are getting blasted sends a pretty clear message, so now we’re up to three.

But oh, we’re not done. Oh no. I saved the worst for last: tumblr has been known, long before any of this started going down, to frequently label completely benign LGBQT+ content as adult, and with the horrendously inaccurate new algorithm, I can only imagine that’s going to get worse. So that’s four and this last one is just straight up discrimination against an actual marginalized group! Wow! I hate it!

This is not acceptable. Period. This is a ridiculous, extremist solution to a problem that admittedly, yes, was legitimately serious. Child porn should not be hand-waved, and it’s presence on this site was disgustingly prolific, but this is the equivalent of getting past a locked door by nuking the entire house it’s in. It’s destroying an entire community for the actions of one subset of it’s population, and then doing it so poorly you destroy other communities in the process!

Verizon’s stock had a sharp drop after the NSFW purge was announced, and for good reason: anyone with a shred of common sense realizes this is a bad move. It’s going to kill this site. Even if they back down from it, which I highly, highly doubt will happen, the damage will already be done to such a degree that it will likely only result in a slower death. The staff of tumblr, whether you want to blame them directly, or people in Yahoo above them, have proven that they are not worthy of your trust or continued support. 

They would rather neuter this website than actually attempt to moderate it’s content in a reasonable fashion. Hell, they could’ve even done something closer to a compromise and created a separate version of tumblr purely for NSFW content! Anything would be better than this so long as the pedophilic content still got removed in the process!

And so, I appeal to you, denizens of tumblr: once December 17th rolls around, delete your blogs. Show Yahoo and Verizon and whoever the fuck else had a hand in this that this was not okay. That they fucked themselves and cannot regain our trust. Even just leaving your blog to rot from then on will send a message if you don’t want to delete it entirely. You’ll still be depriving them of ad revenue and userbase numbers by no longer patronizing the site.

Back up what you wanna keep, find content creators from here you still want to follow on other sites, whatever you need to do, but leave tumblr behind. They clearly don’ care about us; why should we care about them? 

In closing: Fuck tumblr. This has been a long time coming, the only thing surprising is how ridiculously extreme the straw that broke the camel’s back is. 

[rsharma6431]

How to Speed Up Firefox

Your web browser of choice is truly the gateway into accessing the global Internet. The web has been growing exponentially, and we have seen tremendous changes to browsing software as well. Mozilla has been keeping up well considering the recent release of Firefox 10 which has seen mostly positive review. But as we all know, your web browser tends to slow down over time with repeated use. Firefox is not immune to this, but there are some tweaks you can use to optimize the browsing experience. The key values we’re looking for include startup speed, reduced load times, and accessible web pages. Check out some of my tips in the guide below if you’re looking to enhance the Firefox experience!

Quick Shortcut Commands

A good place to start is with a few handy keyboard shortcuts. These can be difficult to memorize at first, but over repeated use you’ll begin to adopt the routine. And I feel there’s no better way to speed up your web browsing experience than mastering a few shortcut keys. Only a couple examples may seem relevant to your needs. We don’t all require the same knowledge and so one command may be totally pointless to somebody else. If you check through Google you’ll likely find very helpful articles for the more common shortcuts.

1. Clear Private Data

Security is of the utmost importance to consider whenever you’re surfing the web. Even by today’s standards things are a lot less risky than 5 or 10 years ago. But you should understand how private browsing data is stored and what you can do to clear your info.

This short menu which pops up is a condensed version of the settings panel. You can choose how far back in time to clear out along with specific types of data such as cookies, cached pages, active login sessions, etc. I recommend that you clear everything within the list every time you close down the browser window. This is only my personal preference to keep my data secure – but of course you should adopt some form of routine cleanup which works best for you. Shortcut – Ctrl + Shift + Delete

2. Add-Ons Toolbar

The Firefox add-ons menu is a small toolbar which appears at the bottom of your Firefox window. From here you can access add-on commands and menus which are normally reserved from within the regular plug-ins area. This may be one of the lesser-known shortcuts but does come in handy frequently. If you like to keep your browser slim with reduced add-ons then this may pose as a bit uninteresting. And I have to agree that fewer 3rd-party extensions means much quicker browser performance. Just keep this in mind as you’re testing out new add-ons from time to time. Shortcut – Ctrl + /

3. Open Downloads Window

There have been numerous instances using Firefox where I’ve been downloading files and accidentally clicked out of the downloads window. It’s a harmless gesture, though it can be a pain to find your menu again. This command brings up not just your active downloads but also recent history of previous files – very handy when you forget which folder you saved into! Shortcut – Ctrl+J Note: For Mac users, replace Ctrl with Command.

Increase Local Cache Storage

When Firefox saves a cached version of website content it reduces any future requests needed for re-downloading code. By default you can only max out to 1GB of saved cache from the web. But this is likely such a small amount compared to your overall disk space, it’s well worth the effort to update your cache sizes. I recall Firefox 8.0 had local cache storage at 256MB by default. Honestly this is a fair amount of room, especially if you’re clearing out private data at the end of each session. Yet if you browse for hours at a time each repeat website visit will accumulate possibly 10-15 minutes of saved load screens.

In the top menu open Tools -> Options or Firefox -> Preferences... on Mac and click on the Advanced Tab. Somewhere in the middle of this menu you’ll see “Limit cache to” along with a number input. I’ve chosen 1024MB which happens to be the maximum allowed. Simply hit OK and restart the browser for this to take effect.

Popular yet Minimalist Add-Ons

It’s a good idea to keep wary of installing too many extensions into Firefox. The browser will begin to lag fairly quickly if you neglect to disable unused add-ons, but luckily it’s also an easy process to remove them. Below are a couple of the most popular user-voted add-ons which won’t interfere with your speed or page performance.

1. Download Status Bar

In particular this is a very helpful addon I’ve come to love since first installing. The download statusbar is not obtrusive or even displayed in any way until you download a file. Instead of having a new window appear you get a neat toolbar at the very bottom of your browser window.

From this you can check the total file size and amount remaining, along with an estimate of time remaining for the download to complete. You can single-click on a file to pause and even remove items from the queue. My process of downloading files has become more streamlined than ever now that I’m not dealing with a new window for my items list. If you haven’t tried this out yet I highly recommend giving it a shot!

2. WOT – Check Trustworthy Websites

The funky plug-in with a weird name actually has taken me by surprise! As the title says: WOT – Know Which Websites to Trust provides a rating for every website you visit. These are backed by users of the software who have given rankings to sites all over the Internet.

Many users feel this has little-to-no purpose since you can gauge the legitimacy of a website within the first few seconds of landing. Definitely true, but I do frequently cycle through random websites found in social network communities like StumbleUpon. In this scenario I feel WOT hasn’t provided any first step security, but it does help me build credibility and trust for domains I run into through differing sources.

3. Element Hiding Helper for ABP

Most Firefox users are familiar with Adblock Plus which has proven time and again as a sure-fire ads remover. From this core a developer Wladimir Palantfrom ABP released an extension called Element Hiding Helper. Now you can target any specific page element and choose to block it regardless of the internal content. This is perfect for when you don’t want to block all advertisements on a website but you need to remove 1 or 2 of them for whatever reason. Often times video websites will have loud audio ads start playing out of nowhere – and this plug-in is the perfect remedy. You can choose to remove things other than advertisements, such as annoying JavaScript apps or specific HTML blocks within the page layout.

4. Speed Dial

This feature has become standard to users of the Opera browser and more recently has been picked up by Google Chrome. Yet the speed dial home page setup was never implemented into Firefox in any majorly functional way.

This plug-in gives you total control over which links appear where in the 9-box grid system. You have easy access to manipulate settings as well, such as default thumbnail height/width and a few keyboard shortcuts. Overall the software has a lot of support from the Mozilla userbase. If you want to learn more check out the official website for detailed features and release notes.

System Edits in about:config

Firefox users have the ability to edit internal variables within the software from the configuration area. Simply open a new tab, type about:config and hit enter. You’ll come to a warning page mentioning the dangers of blindly changing these settings. But we know what we’re doing, so just hit “I’ll be careful” and you’ll be directed to sorted table of values.

Each of the values in the far left column are associated with a type of variable name. These control instances of how the software runs and performs in the background. I have just a few suggestions for reliable edits.

1. Increase pipelining

In the filter box at the top type in network.http.pipelining.maxrequests. This should limit your field to a single value row set at 4. We can increase this number to 8, which means Firefox can request data through 8 different channels rather than 4 – greatly decreasing your waiting time! Once you edit this value above you’ll need to enable pipelining to see any major effects. Do a search for network.http.pipelining and the first value should be set to false by default. You want to change this to true by double-clicking on the table row.

2. Disable placeholder images

Sometimes when Firefox realizes a page is going to take a while to download it will apply placeholder images. This is to prevent page content from rendering improperly while waiting for the image data. It seems like a good idea in concept, and it does have value but I feel disabling this feature will keep the requested content organized. In the filter box do a search for browser.display.show_image_placeholders which should be set as true. Double-click to change this to false and we should be all set.

3. Disable interface animations

While we’re removing unnecessary features let’s turn our attention to the browser UI. By default Firefox uses a small animation effect whenever you open or switch onto a new tab. It seems small at a glance but once you disable this you’ll be shocked at how much quicker you can move and create tabs. Just do a search for browser.tabs.animate and change the value to false.

4. Increase persistent connections

This variable is similar to pipelining except now we’re looking to open more connections on the server end. This is set much lower at first to keep Firefox downloading at a steady pace. But if you are downloading larger content such as streaming audio or video more persistent connections will mean more data collected at once. In the filter box enter network.http.max-persistent-connections-per-server and you should find only one result. By default the value should be 6, but double-click and change to 8. Then hit okay and restart your browser for these effects to kick in!

Conclusion

With so many options in today’s browser market Firefox appears to be holding a steady place. Their engineers know how to build stable software as it has been a reliable brand for years. With the endless number of plugins and extensions free to download there are solutions for practically any problem. I hope these tips can provide a solid foundation for optimizing your web browsing experience. If you have any other great ideas for speeding up Firefox please let us know in the discussion area. Read the full article

[hellobeautifulcollectionhot-blog]

Transform Sketch Designs Into Mobile Apps Design Map out Medium.

Flinto lets designers quickly make interactive models of their mobile, desktop, or internet applications. This makes it easier to learn, less complicated to make use of, as well as simpler to contribute to or improve when essential. I likewise like the "swipe right" the function on each product for the users to see 'relevant products' without leaving the page. Animations: Motion maintains users based in the UI while including context. Diversify your messaging-- your messages should work together in perfect harmony to produce a great customer experience. If you have any kind of specific images (like a logo design) that should be consisted of with your app style, please submit them to developers with your brief. Whatever the platform, we'll discover just how users obtain from factor A to factor B and you get to income C. That's just how straightforward, good application UI layout should look like. Your playlist appears and you can scroll down to search for more songs if you desire to listen to songs. Consist of mobile application layouts you like, brand information, formats, wireframes, item specifics, designer requirements as well as other specs that would affect your style. Have a look at the UI collections capptivate and also Utilize Your Interface for exceptional user interface examples that incorporate all the gestural, computer animated, and also textual nuances of mobile design. Layout Patterns are actually helpful as you could see in a simple way what solutions already exist and also just how it influences your interface. Display size isn't the only constraint in mobile layout. In spite of the mediocrity, the designers equated their very own creative thinking right into the app matching users' assumptions. Kind while walk, which is an Android as well as iOS application, enables users to type/ review an SMS while strolling, inputting and also relaxing along with showing the streets on the display to stay clear of any kind of collision or mishap. The pictures utilized for showing screens of each apps are great.I will defiantly try few of them. All entries are from actual app screenshots and also they focus on different facets like signals, kind inputs, image galleries, and also tons of various other UI components. Unless you ask for otherwise, your developer could additionally make use of stock images (bought from a third party) in your layout. top video games Obtained the hottest new mobile game? One of things people claim is that a logo is ageless. Have the user signup once they 'like' or 'heart' a thing; enable them to get engaged initially. I'm mostly a hybrid HTML5 designer, so when I create the UI and work through the UX for an application, I'm aiming to be as platform-agnostic as I can. We offer a variety of mobile application style services to accommodate all sort of application requirements - be it for businesses or straight for consumers, be it for assimilation with back-end systems or an energy app for consumer. This is yet another gallery filled with mobile UI/UX inspiration but it covers every little thing from fundamental mobile phone apps to personalized game UIs. This implies you'll have a a lot easier time resembling the UIs in your personal styles however you may likewise really feel a little bit limited with creative thinking. We have actually been very pleased with the design group on these two interactive web application projects. In several ways this weakens the quality since anybody could upload anything they want, and also with such a huge userbase there's a lot of content to experience. I'm regularly seeking mobile app symbols as well as specific pages like sprinkle screens.