#i legit don't know why i'm posting this

[forcebookish]

it's so weird that percy is still being written in books and he's like, a teenager. my nine-year-old cousin is telling me about all these new series with him in it and i'm like no percy is my age why is he trapped in these books

[funkytoesart]

you can always tell the people who give social media advice who are naturally or conventionally attractive even without even having to look at a photo of them cause they're always the ones that recommend showing your face in reels or videos to promote your art and it's like,,, talk about pretty/skinny privilege lol

[vermillioncrown]

by this point, my frustration is justified--if i have:

1) already mentioned in multiple replies that a fic is on hiatus

2) bolded its status and my reasons in the end note

3) added the status and a warning that i will delete comments of the type in my summary

why do i still get asked whether or not i'll ever update again? and that's all they have to say?

becoming increasingly concerned there's a subset of bil readers that don't know how to read or pay attention in a hobby that requires reading comprehension and an attention span

[curio-queries]

Tumblr cultural knowledge

The phrase 'cultural knowledge' is basically an insult and a criticism in my industry. If something isn't written down and shared in a way that's identifiable, accessible, and clear to the applicable individuals, it doesn't exist. Meaning that the correct usage will be lost as time and people change.

Here are a few things I've gleaned in my relatively short time of being an active tumblr user. (NOTE: 95% of my time here is via the mobile app). Please correct me if I've got anything wrong. I'd adore to see any that you've picked up as well.

Continue Reading Button: it's the last one in the tool bar. Looks like a zigzag line between two straight lines. I've added one to this post after this point. Even if you've selected the 'shorten long posts' option on your profile, that won't apply to reblogs. Save everyone's feeds and add it yourself to posts longer than three standard paragraphs.

Gifs: the search utility for gifs legit sucks. There is a logic applied but I can't say I've fully cracked it. What you CAN do if you want to add a specific gif to a post is paste the url of the gif's post into the gif search. Grab this via the three dots menu of any post, there'll be a copy link option. This will only grab the first image of that post though. BUT it will include the proper credit below the gif. Here's an example:

Gif credit: tapping the username below gif will open the source post.

Reblogs: the reason reblogs are so important for tumblr specifically is because the feed doesn't present posts to you outside of your parameters. Those parameters are mainly: 1) blogs you've followed and 2) tags you've followed. You reblogging a post gives it a chance to be seen again within the parameters you influence. So if you don't have any followers, you've got to add tags that ppl may have followed. If you don't use tags on posts, it can only be seen by those who follow you (theoretically, I've chatted with a few moots about the fact that we don't see each other's posts in the feed).

Post Edits: Reblogs don't sync with the original posts. If you edit a post, all of the reblogs will not update with the edits and will exist exactly as the post was when it was reblogged.

Was this helpful? I've got a few more oddities I've encountered but they seem more like workarounds to defects and I've tried to list the pain points I've personally noticed that seem to result from the intended design of tumblr.

[lover-of-mine]

Sometimes I think the 911 fandom can't be that bad, but then I remember I was posting about 911 for less than a day before I got my first "you're just a white bitch fetishizing two straight guys" and it was in reply to a post I didn't even mention Eddie.

[zackmartin]

Z THE CONCEPT OF YOU REBOOTING VALIANT KNIGHT LITERALLY HAS ME FROTHING AT THE MOUTH. it literally never left my head i am always thinking about it at least a little bit. literally recently i came up with a concept for how some of my original characters for my spinoff would fit into valiant knight fnsnskdj and so i technically have like a rewrite/sequel concept that includes zenry and jasper/[redacted] fnsmdnkxnsn which included me rereading the chapters i beta'd for you to remember some details and i was like UGH THIS WAS SO GOOD I MISS IT

LASKDJOSKJVMODKMVLDSKJFSOKJFSLDKFJ HELLO?????????? ARE YOU AWARE THAT I'D LAY DOWN MY LIFE FOR YOU???? CAUSE I SERIOUSLY WOULD LAY DOWN MY LIFE FOR YOU!!!!! BUT AHHHHHHHHHHH

SERIOUSLY THOUGH, THIS IS ONE OF THE HIGHEST COMPLIMENTS I'VE EVER RECEIVED, I'M LEGIT GONNA CRY (affectionate), I'VE BEEN STARING AT THIS ASK FOR LIKE SIX HOURS, LIKE THERE AREN'T ENOUGH WORDS IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TO ARTICULATE HOW MUCH THIS MEANS TO ME

but seriously, like I'm not trying to rag on my writing or anything, but I also know like. I'm not writing anything that's gonna be winning awards anytime soon or anything ground-breaking or anything, but that's never been my goal; and I just say all of that to say that the fact that you're still thinking about something of mine years later and it stuck with you so much that you want to put your own characters into it??????? That's literally so wild to me in the best way, I can't get over it. I'm so serious when I say again that this legit one of the best compliments I've ever received. (Also, if you're willing, I'd very much like to hear about this rewrite/sequel of sorts)

You have me legit thinking about it now. Like I told Pearl in the replies, I feel like my writing is leagues better (i reread stuff from that time period and just cringe now; but to be fair to my past self, she was a novice who was coming back to writing after a 10+ year break so it stands to reason) so I feel like I could do a lot more with it. There's soooo much of that world I want to flesh out that I wasn't skilled enough to do when I first started it. lsakdjf idk man, I might actually do it

[human-blob-nessie]

How to detect scam links in discord

i just learned how people make scam links in discord appear legit (for the untrained eye)

It's very easy to find the way to do it actually (it's slightly modified markdown), but as for how to identify it :

You can make any text clickable with a hyperlink. But a genuine link always has a header (http:// or something similar). Now discord has a security in that aspect : you cannot put a hyperlink on top of an actual link, so the only way for you to make a fraudulous link appear like it links to a genuine url (like the steam gift card example I saw today, which had all the normal steamcommunity.com url you'd expect from a legit link to a Steam page), you have to cut the header off.

Which means your link will look like this : url.somewhere.com

Instead of this : https://url.somewhere.com

(by the way, in the url of pages you're using, Google Chrome usually hides the protocol in the header, rather telling you whether or not the page you're on is secure or not. This is not great, as it is not showing what a complete link looks like, and makes people more likely to not see anything wrong with a url that does not have a header. Firefox always shows it, and anyone should be used to seeing the header in a url.)

So any hyperlink (clickable link) without a header is most likely a scam. Discord automatically detects a url via its header, it cannot link to anything without it, so not seeing it is a red flag. But wait there's more ! When you hover over a hyperlink, it shows you the url it links to. If you hid it with text, it will show you both the text and the url.

If the url at the bottom is any different to the text, the person who posted it is trying to trick you.

Obviously, never click a "free steam gift card $50" link from anyone on a public server, but if you want to better identify any form of fraudulous link that could be shared on discord, this is the best way to tell if it actually links to what is says.

[fitgothgirl]

literally cannot remember the last time cramps knocked me on my ass like this jfc

[icewindandboringhorror]

Recent sky photos 

[bookwyrminspiration]

reaching that point on tumblr where you can no longer figure out why people are following you they just appear with no explanation. like hello but also what does your aesthetic poetry blog have to do with my gay elves

[edenselfships]

[Wistfully] maybe one day I will find someone who also ships with my F/O

[nobodybetterlookatme]

How's it going with your coworker??!!

I'm still so fucking soft and that's really all I've got for today lmao

[kowabungadoodles]

How to spot a (heart wrenching sad cat) Charity Scam

So I've been get a lot of requests for money in my askbox lately, from users I have never seen before! Usually sad cats, sometimes gender affirming medical bills, a queer person being made homeless etc etc... and guess what? None of them are real! It's scammers who have learned how to work tumblr's userbase and prey on our general sense of community and charity.

Here it is, so sad! So tragic! But let's note a few things:

It's generic. They don't know me, I don't know them. it's addressed to 'friend', no use of nicknames or usernames.

Even the cat and the problem are generic 'little kitty' who has 'urgent needs'. This is not how real people talk, this is because this scam is being used over and over with different accounts a different 'cats'.

Praying (uh huh.)

Asking you to reply privately- This is so people don't spot the scam and point it out the mark and because if too many people posted replies to the same message it would beome really obvious that this is a scam. If they're looking for 'boosts' so badly, then why do they need you to reply privately?

Now that I'm suspicious, let's investigate.

Sent me an ask and then followed me! Sounds like they're just hitting up anyone and everyone, but even more likely they have a list they're working from.

(I get so many, I'm probably on a mail-out list a mile long, just being hit up for cash. Likely I fell for one of these once and got my name added to every scam list for miles, but oh well.)

So let's see if they're a bot or a real person!

The blog looks genuine enough, they've got a bio, a fandom etc. And it says they're an artist!

And of course there's that sad cat post, pinned right to the top, so I don't have to look any further through the blog for verification... Looks super legit, pics of the cat, pics of the bill... of course anyone can print out a bill and take a picture of it...

As I do scroll futher, it's full of reblogs making this look like an active user. So how can I tell it's not genuine?

Well, if they're an artist they probably post right? Doodles? Pictures? Let's have a look at their origional posts.

The fastest way to do this is by using an outside tool like Original Post Finder.

just type in the suspicious username and go...

Voila! As suspected, the only post this bot account has ever made is Sad Cat Post.

Confirmed: Scam. Do not give your money to these guys, it looks so real but they're just here to make you feel like a bad person for not handing over everything you can. Charity is wonderful, supporting friends is wonderful, but tbh save it for people you actually know irl/ mutuals you have an actual relationship with. Don't believe any rando who comes knocking!

Love and kisses, stay safe out there.

[jawnwicks]

Some of the most important parts for me:

“Friendships are built of repeated low-stakes interactions and returned bids for attention with slowly increasing intimacy over time.”

"Deeper friendships are formed with people from those kinds of groups when you do things with them outside of the context of the original interaction."

"Smalltalk is a social script of exchanging trivial conversation about non-personal topics in order to pass a brief period of time together.

This sort of conversation is about figuring out whether you want to get to know each other better, so it's kind of a behavioral test. It's assessing "can I have a pleasant, brief conversation with this person?" because people usually want to know if the answer to that question is "yes" before they share more details of their lives."

"If the person speaking responds to your sharing of personal information with a request for more information (asks about your sister) or by sharing some of their somewhat more personal information (roses are blooming) they might be interested in continuing to gradually share more information. If they respond with more smalltalk, they probably aren't interested in becoming closer friends ... [but] maybe at some point they'll share something with you and it'll be your turn to decide if you want to get to know them better."

"Once you've seen someone several times, you will begin to know little things about them. ... If you want to become friends with them, ask them about these things and offer information in return. Start casually and don't pry for more information, and be sure to share about yourself as well. Eventually you will get to the point that you can have a comfortable conversation on topics of shared interest for at least a few minutes."

"If they agree to meeting up for the thing, they are interested in continuing to develop the friendship. If they don't want to meet up then continue at the same level of interaction as before and perhaps later on down they line they'll ask you if you want to plan a meetup."

"Once you have hung out on purpose a few more times you've got two choices: set a regular meetup, or hang out elsewhere. Setting up a regular meetup is the relatively casual option here; it keeps things in the same location and keeps the context of the friendship the same while still increasing interactions and intensifying the relationship. You can have perfectly good, if somewhat casual friends, who you see regularly in one place and rarely outside of that place."

"Hanging out in a new place changes the context of the relationship; suggest a hangout in a place that makes sense for the mutual interests you've learned over the previous months of getting to know the person."

"If you’re talking about the weather as in the first example, but you mention where you grew up and what the weather was like, that can be inspiration for the other person to also talk about where they’re from! But, unlike with a question, if they don’t want to share that information they can usually dodge it without having to make it extremely obvious that that’s what they’re doing."

Wait, so you said that you can learn to trust others by building friendships, but how does one go about doing that? Wouldn't someone I don't know be creeped out or annoyed if I suddenly walked up and started talking to them?

Friendships are built of repeated low-stakes interactions and returned bids for attention with slowly increasing intimacy over time.

It takes a long time to make friends as an adult. People will probably think you're weird if you just walk up and start talking to them as though you are already their friend (people think it's weird when I do this, I try not to do this) but people won't think it's weird if you're someone they've seen a few times who says "hey" and then gradually has more conversations (consisting of more words) with them.

I cheat at forming adult friendships by joining groups where people meet regularly. If you're part of a radio club that meets once a week and you just join up to talk about radios, eventually those will be your radio friends.

If there's a hiking meetup near you and you go regularly, you will eventually have hiking friends.

Deeper friendships are formed with people from those kinds of groups when you do things with them outside of the context of the original interaction; if you go camping with your radio friend, that person is probably more friend than acquaintance. If you go to the movies with a hiking friend who likes the same horror movies as you do, that is deepening the friendship.

In, like 2011 Large Bastard decided he wanted more friends to do stuff with so he started a local radio meetup. These people started as strangers who shared an interest. Now they are people who give each other rides after surgery and help each other move and have started businesses together and have gone on many radio-based camping trips and have worked on each other's cars.

Finding a meetup or starting a meetup is genuinely the cheat-code for making friends.

This is also how making friendships at schools works - you're around a group of people very regularly and eventually you get to know them better and you start figuring out who you get along with and you start spending more time with those people.

If you want to do this in the most fast and dramatic way possible, join a band.

In 2020 I wrote something of a primer on how to turn low-stakes interactions with neighbors and acquaintances into more meaningful relationships; check the notes of this post over the next couple days, I'll dig up the link and share it in a reblog.

[inkskinned]

there are a lot of posts out there that are positive and healthy coping mechanisms for handling the holidays. this is not one of them :)

i think there's like. going to be times in your life you will be stuck in a social situation that you cannot escape from gracefully. i do not know why the internet doesn't believe these times exist. it's not always just that your physical safety is at risk - sometimes it's legit like "i just don't currently have the energy or time to put in the effort of responding to this." sometimes it's a coworker you hate so much. sometimes it's just like, fine, you know? like you know you can handle your aunt when she's cheerily horrible, but if you actually set a boundary around her, it's going to be weeks of fallout with your father.

i don't know why people think the answer is always just "cut them out!" or "don't let them get away with that!" because ... the real world is tricky and complicated. i think kind of a lot of us have an internal "radiation poisoning" meter for certain people. like - i'm talking about the ones who are absolutely giving you gradual ick damage. like, you can handle them, but you'll be exhausted.

and yes. you absolutely should listen to your therapist and the good posts about handling others and set good boundaries and take care of yourself. prioritize peace.

HOWEVER :) ...... since im often in a situation with a Gradual Sense of Ick person i cannot just "cut out" of my life (without losing someone else precious to me) - i have sort of developed the most. maladaptive form of mischief possible. because like, if i'm going to have to listen to this shit again, i like to have a little bit of private fun with it.

now! again, i am physically safe, just mentally drained by this man. you should only do this with people you are not in danger with. which leads me to my suggestions for when your Unfortunate Acquaintance shows up and says oh everyone pay attention to me.

my favorite word is "maybe!" said as brightly and happily as possible. whenever the Horrible Person starts in on a topic you do not want to go further with, particularly if they make a claim that you know to be inaccurate, do not respond to it. you and i have both tried to actually argue with this person, and it hasn't gone well, because this person just wants the drama of an argument. however, "maybe!" gives them literally nothing to go on. it is incredibly disarming. they are used to people having some response. they know they can't prove what they're saying, and maybe! treats them like the child they are. it dismisses them in the politest way possible.

i like to say maybe! and then, in their stunned silence, immediately change the subject. this is because i have adhd and i will have something unrelated to talk about, but if you can't think of topics fast enough, i recommend just pointing to something and saying, "isn't that lovely?" because fuck you let's bring in some positivity.

by the way. that second trick - of pointing to something and stating an opinion about it? - that just works on its own, like, 70% of the time. i picked it up from teaching preschoolers. it's an intentional "redirect". it stops children crying and it also stops grown adults from finishing their explanation on why women belong in kitchens. dual wielding!

keep it silly for yourself. i absolutely do not care if people think i'm fucking stupid (it's more fun if they do) and as a result i will purposefully misunderstand things just to see how long it takes them to realize i've completely removed them from the subject at hand. when they say "women aren't funny" i get to be like. "which women." "all women." "all women in america?" "no in the world." "like the mole people? the people in the world?" "what? no. like, alive." "oh are we not counting the mole people?" "what the fuck are you talking about." "you don't believe in the mole people?"

similarly, i play a personal game called "one up me." my Evil Acquaintance literally knows this game exists (my family & friends caught onto it and now also play it) and it always fucking gets him. i don't know why. you have to be willing to be a little free-spirited on this one, though. the trick is that when they make one of those horrible little bigoted or annoying comments they are always making, you need to go one unit weirder. not more intense, mind you - just more weird. "you don't look good in that dress." "yeah, actually, my other dress was covered in squid ink due to a mishap at the soup store." "you shouldn't wear such revealing clothes." "wait, what? oh shit. sorry, your son tears off strips when no one is looking and eats them. i swear it was longer before we left the building."

the point of "one up me" is to completely upend this person's narrative. we both know this person likes setting up situations where you cannot "win" and then they really like telling other people how badly you handled it. in a usual situation, if you respond "please don't say something that rude", you're a bitch. but if you let it happen, you're letting yourself be debased. they are not usually expecting door number three: unflappably odd. because what are they going to say when they're telling everyone how badly you behaved? "she said my son eats her dresses" ".... okay?"

if you can, form an allyship with someone whomst you can tagteam with. where they can pick up on your weird "soup store" story and run with it.

the following phrase is amazing and can be deployed for any situation: "oh, be nice :) it's the holidays!" i do not know why this works as often as it does. i'll say it for the most random shit. i think this is bc most of the time these people know they're being impolite, they just like to fight.

godbless. when in doubt, remember that you could always start stealing their pens.

the whole point of this is - if you can't escape. maybe see how long you can just be. like. a horrible little menace.

[bitterkarella]

Midnight Pals: No tweets

[at JK Rowling's Scottish castle] JK Rowling: Ha ha! Look at me! I'm possting on the internet! Rowling: "esstrogen turns normal men into rampaging ape beastss!" agent: joanne! stop! agent: you're posting too close to the sun! Rowling: "Gamer ssockss are AGP!"

Rowling: ha ha no one can ssstop me! Rowling: I'm JK fuckin' Rowling! Rowling: I'm a beautiful animal!! Rowling: watch this, i'm gonna poke imane khelif with thisss ssstick agent: joanne! no! Rowling: don't worry, itss a really long ssstick Rowling: i'll be fine!

Rowling: [poking imane khelif with stick] ha ha you like that, you liminal creature? you congenital eunuch? ha ha what are you gonna do about it? Khelif: that's it! Khelif: you've woke the dragon, now prepare to feel her breath!

Rowling: ha ha what're you gonna do? hit me with your massssive tessstosterone fissstss? Khelif: you and me, rowling! three rounds! sudden death match in the arena... Rowling: haha Khelif: the arena of the legal system! Rowling: Rowling: uh oh

Khelif: i'm taking you to court Rowling: Rowling: Rowling: [sweats] wayon jennings narrative voice: now ol' joanne's got herself in a heap o' trouble. how's that dang ol' snake gonna slither her way outta this mess?

JK Rowling: [shoving documents into a shredder] quick! ssshred it all!! shred fucking everything! Julie Bindel: but dark lord what should we tell your followers?! Bindel: they'll be expecting some patented jk rowling hot takes! Rowling: i don't know, jusst sstall them!!!

[mysterious circle of robed figures] Bindel: i've called this meeting to come up w a reason why the dark lord isn't tweeting Kathleen Stock: maybe we can say she's getting her castle fumigated? Bindel: no we used that when she posted the 'no toilets in hogwarts' tweet

Jesse Singal: oo! oo! i've got one! Singal: what if we say that 'having achieved all of her goals and ambitions, she has decided to retire forever' Bindel: no no that won't work Stock: could we just say that she's brumating?

Kathleen Stock: wait! what if we said she's on vacation? Bindel: hmm i like it! Stock: we could even embellish it with plausible details for additional verisimilitude! Bindel: like that she's... eating vodka-infused candy floss! Stock: exactly! that's very believable!

[midnight society] Barker: interesting, joanne hasn't tweeted in like 2 weeks Barker: seems kind of unusual King: oh i'm sure it's nothing Barker: looks like she's actually deleting tweets King: oh King: huh King: i wonder what that's all about?

Julie Bindel: [rising from bushes] ACTUALLY Jk rowling is actually on a jolly vacation right now so that's why she's not tweeting Bindel: it has nothing to do with any lawsuit! it's totally legit! King: where's she vacationing? Bindel: she's visiting her girlfriend in canada

Bindel: see, i have this postcard right here that she sent saying that she's having a great time on her vacation in vacationia and she's too busy to tweet! Barker: hey can i see that postcard? Bindel: um Bindel: no

Bindel: joanne says that she's having too much fun eating vodka-infused candy floss to be transphobic right now King: wow! i don't think i've ever seen her have THAT much fun before! King: this vodka-infused candy floss must be lit!

Barker: so you're telling me Barker: that jk rowling is right now drunk on vodka-infused candy floss Barker: a product which i am definitely sure exists and is real Barker: and being drunk has made her less vocally transphobic? Bindel: Bindel: [sweats] yes