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ashethehedgehog · 7 years ago

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OKAY U GUYS LMAO TY FOR THE ASKS <33333 I’ll do ygo for all the letters here! It’s long so I’ll put it under a read more! So dive on in for some talk about my writing and puzzleshipping fics! (Also some snippets I posted below so wink wink)

B: Any of your stories inspired by personal experience?

Not like directly, but I definitely put some of my influences into them. Like Yugi wanting to be a knight in The Beast Within was 100% because I used to want to be a knight lmao.

F: Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

Ohhh off the top of my head? Gosh mmmm. Okay so off the top of my head there’s this one scene in an AU I’m probably going to abandon actually, so it’s kinda ehhh to show it now and tease u all like this lmao, but I did really enjoy writing the interactions between Yugi and Atem in them, so I’m going to put one of those for this! I just like the way they butted heads and Atem refused to relent, but then so did Yugi so they just tip toed around each other looking for the weak spot while referring to ‘the pharaoh’ as if it’s someone else and not Atem lmao. For context, it’s from an AU where everyone is an anthro animal, felines are considered the high ranking ones, spotted cats (Yugi’s species) is endangered and highly revered, Atem is a lion.

“You’re under the protection of the pharaoh, and as such are to remain in the palace where said effect can be carried out.” Atem answered as dully as he could manage. It seemed to work, as Yugi’s expression dropped.

“That order can be extended and revoked by the pharaoh himself should he wish. Do you think the pharaoh realises that? I wonder…” Yugi clicked his tongue, a thoughtful hand tapping his chin.

“I believe the pharaoh wishes for the spotted cat to remain within the palace walls, where he would be safest. I wonder if he realises that he could have servants fetch anything he needed from the city.”

“He wants to go look at what the city has to offer. With his own eyes, not those of servants not belonging to him.”

“You have your own staff I have assigned to you.”

“They’re not loyal to me.”

Atem paused, finally giving his full attention to Yugi. So that’s the kind of game Yugi was playing today. It seemed he had slipped up, however, and Atem wasn’t beneath taking advantage of this blunder.

“You question the good intentions of the pharaoh, who has given you his place as residence while asking nothing of you?” Atem tsked, turning back to his scroll, attention slipping from Yugi. He knew that would irritate the little cat, and sure enough, Yugi gave a soft growl in warning.

“I do not question the pharaoh, only wonder if he remembers whether or not he will honour his agreement.”

“What agreement?” Atem rolled his eyes.

Yugi pushed off the desk, slamming a hand down on the table, tail lashing angrily behind him. “You cannot keep me locked up here, pharaoh. Protective rules or not, if I leave, you cannot stop me.”

“No, I can’t,” Atem responded calmly, adjusting the scroll in his paws. “But you lose my protection if you venture into the city. You go alone.”

"I will be going into the city, pharaoh. And you will provide me with the necessary guards."

G: Do you write your story from start to finish, or do you write the scenes out of order?

I tend to write random scenes around as I get inspiration for them, but mostly I write it chapter by chapter to keep it consistent! But if I’m in a slump, I write scenes that I had the motivation to work on, even if it’s for like three chapters ahead. I did this a little with my Big Bang fic because I had a deadline and needed to be working on it lmao. Fun fact tho, The Living Daylights I started off with the opening scene from chapter nine! Yeah nine chapters in right crazy ahaha, but that was what inspired the AU! xD

H: How would you describe your style?

I dunno? Semi-decent descriptions enough to understand locations and a fuckton of travelling montage work and fighting scenes. I couldn’t tell u dude I dunno my own style lmao.

M: Got any premises on the back burner that you’d care to share?

Sure, why not! So my list of fics I’m currently writing are:

Prince and King on AO3

Dragontaur AU/ Opportunities in Unexpected Places on AO3

The Demon Prince Yugi and Knight Atem AU, which will be my next multi chap fic after PaK is done.

A naga!Yugi and vampire!Yugi AU that I’m writing, buuuuut they’re both for my smut blog, where I post them exclusively, and I’m not going to move them to AO3 either soz (anyone is welcome to IM me for the link to the blog, but it’s on private so access is message only lmao).

Magic AU, which u can find some snippets of here! I don’t plan to take this further than a longshot, even with the potential for more there, I just don’t have the time for another fantasy AU world to build rn lmao. But I hope to have something of this to share soon!

Lion Atem, which I gave the snippet of above, where they’re all anthros. I never wrote much for this, and although I liked the concept, I don’t think I’ll work on it anymore. Maybe I’ll post the 6K I wrote just as a ‘read if u want but don’t expect more pls’ kind of thing. But yeah, at this stage this one is p much discontinued because I don’t have the time to work on it.

And that leaves Elf King Yugi, something that has definitely been on the back burner for MONTHS now (ever since Trial and Error, so u do the maths lmao) which I have written a fair amount for, but need to do some serious plot work before I consider doing more. Since there is a chance I’ll continue to work on this one tho, I’ll post a snippet here!

"You know the council isn't going to like this Yugi. You're in for a long and dangerous fight with this one."

"I know Anzu- you don't need to treat me like a kid." Yugi scolded her with a quick frown.

"I'm just warning you. Be prepared to argue into the night."

"I am- believe me." Yugi groaned, a hand rubbing his forehead as if to still a headache.

Yami tittered at the edge of the room near the door, unsure if he should interrupt what looked like a conversation (or argument) between friends.

Luck wasn't (or was) on his side though it seemed, as Yugi took that moment to crane his neck to where Yami was standing, his eyes lighting up. Yami suppressed a groan as he waved him over. Yami stepped lightly, his steps hesitant as he approached the two.

"Oh wow Yugi is this him? Your narcissism is showing with this one." The girl’s eyes gleamed with something predatory, like she was sizing up how long Yami would last in... Something.

"Would you please stop saying 'this one?' It implies I do this frequently- which I don't." Yugi said, shooting Yami an apologetic look. "This is Anzu- she works at the castle here-"

"You forgot to mention I'm your best friend." Anzu said in a sing song voice. Yugi shot her a look this time.

"Yes, and you're my annoying best friend." He turned back to Yami. "She's going to give you your tour, alright?"

Yami nodded. "Where are you going?"

"I have to go to court today. We'll see each other later, my dear Yami." Yugi smiled at him, reaching out to pat his shoulder as he passed him, disappearing out of the room.

Yami turned back around to immediately jump in surprise.

Standing way too close for comfort in front of him was Anzu. She had a wild grin on her face, like she knew a secret Yami didn't.

"Well well Yami. Looks like it’s just the two of us for the rest of the day." She practically purred.

"Uh... Okay... Should I be worried?" Yami frowned, not liking the glint in her eyes. It's like a maze of demons here, Yami observed. You turn away from one only to find another.

"Not at all," Anzu hummed, patting Yami's shoulder. "We're all friends here I assure you. Yugi wants me to take extra good care with you. And I must say- I can see why. You're a keeper."

"A keeper?" Yami's frown deepened, and he suppressed a sigh of exhaustion. Just what have I gotten myself into here? He was beginning to seriously regret his decision to break the elves' border seal now.

"Never mind." Anzu waved him off, trotting over to the door only to swing back around, her hand on the handle. "You coming? Yugi wants you to see the castle."

"Oh, right, of course." Yami muttered, following Anzu as she made her way out into the hallway.

"Alright, first things first- unless Yugi gives you public permission to travel around, don't go anywhere without an escort, okay?"

"Why? I'm not a kid." Yami scoffed.

"Mmm, technically you are to a lot of these folk. Most of the population in the kingdom are elves, and they tend to be a lot older than they appear."

N: Is there a fic you wish someone else would write (or finish) for you?

LMAO YEAH REALLY WISH I DIDN’T HAVE TO WRITE THE REST OF PRINCE AND KING BUT WELP IT’S MY FIC AND I’VE COME THIS FAR SO I GOTTA FINISH IT RIP. I just reaaaaaally crave the day I can slap a COMPLETED on it :’’’’D

O: How do you begin a story–with the plot, or the characters?

The plot! Mainly because fanfic so the chars already exist lmao. I usually start with one thing that catches my interest, and work out from there. Sometimes my AUs start from dreams, like Demon Prince started because I had a dream Yugi was a demon in jail trying to seduce Atem to come work for him so lmao there u go.

P: Are you what George R. R. Martin would call an “architect” or a “gardener”? (How much do you plan in advance, versus letting the story unfold as you go?)

I’m much more of an architect, because without a decent plot written out in front of my, in like a chapter by chapter format, I will easily lose motivation and focus because I won’t have a ‘oh yeah that’s what’s happening next!’ sort of thing. It helps with building up foreshadowing and stuff too for me. The stories I try to ‘gardener’ for I guess are the ones that often don’t see tumblr or AO3 lmao. AKA u will never hear of them because I have a few lmao.

Q: How do you feel about collaborations?

Interesting question! I suppose it depends what kind! I like collaboration ideas, in fact my first multi chapter fic The Living Daylights was a collaboration in ideas between me and my pal Ren! But I still wrote the entire thing lmao. I guess I like to have control over the writing for style consistency, but I think tackling the entire concept with another writer would be fun! I’ve never tried to write something with someone else so I dunno how that would go!

T: Any fandom tropes you can’t stand?

[kinda nsfw] INNOCENT PURE YUGI MUTOU WHO MUST ALWAYS BOTTOM FOR ATEM BECAUSE ATEM IS SEX GOD AND YUGI IS VIRGIN WHO KNOWS NOTHING ABOUT SEX. Listen nothing rustles my JIMMIES more than that that troupe which is EVERYWHERE in puzzleshipping. I don’t understand why it’s so popular??? Like, this isn’t to say Yugi 100% CANNOT bottom because he totes can! But of ALL the puzzleshipping I’ve ever read that involved smut, especially in multi chapter fics, Yugi topped like... once, maybe??? ???? That’s SO MANY fics where Atem almost NEEDED to top. It kind of feels like people were too scared to write it at times? Like some stories I could totally see it either way, but it was ALWAYS with Atem topping, always. I don’t really understand why people are so against Yugi topping in puzzle but auuuugh I just wish there was more of it u know? Like if I want top Atem material shit man I got hundreds of fics for that, but top Yugi? Man, I can list them on my fingers...

Long story short ppl shouldn’t be afraid to let Yugi top pls. I’m not saying he ALWAYS HAS TO TOP, but more of that than Atem always topping would be real nice? A nice mix instead of everything seemingly so bias would be cool? Sometimes I want top!Atem, and sometimes I want top!Yugi, isn’t that the same for everyone lmao. Like they’d totes switch it up all the time so why is there so little for top!Yugi? The mystery of my life lmao. Let Yugi Top 2k17.

X: A character you enjoy making suffer.

Probably Atem, sorry to the kid but he’s the one who ends up suffering the most in my fics opps. I think there’s like ONE fic where Yugi suffers more maybe? The rest is all like nope lmao soz bro but ur the punching bag ahaha.

W: Do you like more general prompts, or more specific ones?

(this is the one I picked myself lmao) I like really specific ones! I like to know exactly what I’m writing, and unless I get a burning idea in my head I’d rather do (not often) I’d prefer prompts that give me more to work with, or at least more detail than like a one line simple prompt lmao.

#ashes ramblings #yugioh #puzzleshipping #i guess since all my fics mentioned r puzzle lmao #also feel free to bug me about the fics mentioned and shit #I may invest more into them if ppl like them #i am still on the border about Lion Atem AU //strokes chin

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holytheoristtastemaker · 5 years ago

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A (mild) defense of Zoom Inc.'s troubles Let me start by quoting Citizenlab's report: For those using Zoom to keep in touch with friends, hold social events, or organize courses or lectures that they might otherwise hold in a public or semi-public venue, our findings should not necessarily be concerning. For those who have no choice but to use Zoom, including in contexts where secrets may be shared, we speculate that the browser plugin may have some marginally better security properties, as data transmission occurs over TLS. Unfortunately a few hours later, on the same day, the web client was put under maintenance and thus disabled for the time being, hopefully not for long. update: the web client has been restored, multiple sources confirmed. Please enable join from your browser as a default setting. Zoom probably didn't anticipate going from 0 to 100 (actually + 1126% of increased usage according to some estimates) in the span of a few weeks and the fact that their network hasn't melted down and rendered all calls impossible to make is a testament to the quality of the underlying technology. As we all can imagine there are challenges in scaling that big that fast, but most of the problems that have been identified up until now don't really have much to do with scalability or reliability per se, but with questionable software design choices and bad privacy or marketing decisions made by the company. To be fair, sometimes shortcuts seem a great idea when you're in the heat of the moment and have a booming product, but the more people use it, the higher the likelihood that these shortcuts will come back to haunt it. Also, Zoom devs are humans and like all humans, sometimes they just make bad decisions without malice. What worries me is how the company management, also entirely human AFAIK 😃, decided to handle the response, more on that later. Last but not least: the media piled up on them quite extensively and some security flaws (except maybe "zoombombing") aren't an inherent problem for those meetings that would otherwise be held in public if we weren't quarantined even though the extent of the problem with user generated content is that its severity differs case by case and here there would be millions of cases (each Zoom call) to analyze. Zoom is used by everyone: individuals, institutions, therapists, teachers, doctors, religious and secular organizations, goverment officials and even heads of state. Zoom, as of April 1st 2020, halted all feature development and vowed to fix privacy and security issues over the following 90 days. What went wrong is also a cautionary tale about the importance of implementing secure practices and caring about users privacy from day one because at the scale they are now it's quite understandable they are trying to put out fires left and right. What is or was wrong it with TLDR; Zoom has numerous known security holes. Some of those have since been fixed, some haven't. The company also made (and in some cases, still makes) questionable decisions related to privacy. (I'm going to use the past tense where I reasonably verified the issue has been fixed) Zoom has a security issue in its "waiting room" feature. The issue is currently unknown as the security researchers correctly disclosed it only to Zoom Inc. granting them time to get it fixed lest it gets in the hands of malicious actors. Security researchers are advising people to use passwords and not the waiting room feature. Recordings are easily findable on the web: Zoom saves recordings with a guessable name pattern, thus it's quite trivial to find them if they are uploaded to the open web. Search engines are literally built to find public data on the web. Again, "security through obscurity" is not a good practice if the content is sensible, and it was: the Washington Post was able to watch other people's therapy sessions and elementary school online classes by scanning the web (!!!!!). The ID of a meeting room is numeric, which means that people can guess it (manually or with scripts) and thus, being openness the default, people can hijack meetings, thus "zoombombing". The meeting ID has 9 to 11 digits, not even "obscured". Security researchers did actually find meetings and with scripts had up to 14% of a success rate guessing correct meetings URLs. Recurring Zoom meetings links can be found: they also contain info of the meeting organizer and whatever info the organizers disclosed as topic or description. Security researchers found meetings of large banks, government contractors and other companies. Screensharing by any participant is on by default, which means that people can stream whatever they want without oversight. Very handy for private and regulated meetings, not great if meetings rooms are open by default. File transfer is on by default: don't think this needs explaining in an app where a meeting is public. You can literally send to dozens or hundreds of people malware hoping at least one of them will click on it. The app has too many settings: I went through the configuration panel on both the app and the web version (before it was disabled) and I didn't understand half of the options and got bored after a few minutes (minutes!!!). As we all know as creators of sofware the default matters (most users don't even look at apps settings), and by default you should respect the user's privacy and be secure, otherwise hell can break loose when enough people come knocking with the receipts. The company lied about being end to end encrypted, that's it. They said they use end to end encryption (e2e) but they don't. They also own decryption keys for what is encrypted on the wire, which is definitely not *end to end encryption. *FYI: true end to end encryption means that only the participants in a communication exchange can actually see the data in the clear. Not the company providing the service, not any goverment, not anyone except who's invited. Zoom uses weakish encryption: even though the service is not e2e encrypted, calls don't travel in the clear on the transport network. They are encrypted using a central encrypting server which holds the keys. The issue is that they use a single AES 128 bit key in ECB mode which is definitely deprecated and has security holes. Security researchers were able to decrypt video and audio frames from "encrypted" calls. Zoom encryption and security protocols are not independently audited, which means that they most certainly contain flaws. We all know how hard is to pull off encryption done correctly, I can't imagine how hard it is to do it with video, audio, text and generic media. "Roll your own encryption" is 99.99% of the time a bad idea, it's monumentally bad in this instance. As Bruce Scheiner wrote: I'm okay with AES-128, but using ECB (electronic codebook) mode indicates that there is no one at the company who knows anything about cryptography. Zoom encryption keys are occasionally on servers under the jurisdiction of the Chinese goverment: under Chinese law the goverment of China can require companies to disclose their encryption keys and tools for oversight. This has happened also if all participants were outside the country. Likely a data routing problem (Zoom tries to keep calls local to the participants) but not reassuring nonetheless. Also makes me thing of sci fi scenario in which governments or attackers decrypt all of these calls and use facial recognition to create mass surveillance tools. 👀 The company sent data to Facebook unbeknownst to users: this is probably quite common in apps that embed the Facebook SDK without tweaking it (and it only applied to the iOS app which might mean it was truly unintentional), but it's not great anyway. Facebook already knows a lot about users (both those using it and those who don't). It has been fixed since discovery. Zoom's privacy policy was all encompassing. Basically it stated that all personal data (including recordings, chats and uploaded files) could be shared with third parties. It has been since amended. Zoom allowed hosts to monitor participant's attention. This is 1984-the-book kind of stuff 😱. It was removed since discovery, on April 1st. The app bypassed the usual installation process. This was probably done to be friendler to the user in the very common scenario in which a user gets a link, doesn't have the app on their computer and wants to be in the videocall as fast as possible. It's exactly what malware does. It has been fixed since the discovery. Zoom shares your contact info to everyone within certain email domains. What happened was that thousands of users whose emails belonged to a Dutch email provider where pooled together and their personal info shared with each other. The app let Windows users click on anything resembling a link. Basically you could automatically open a file on a shared drive sending your network credentials to an attacker. It has been fixed. Zoom sent your contact data to Linkedin. In some situations, if they could match you to a Linkedin Profile somehow, they did, without telling you and sharing your Linkedin data to other people. This feature has since been removed on April 1st. 0 day vulnerabilities leading to hardware take over were discovered. The likelihood of those happening was very low (the vulnerability window span the length of the installation process and just that). Fixed as well on April 1st. Records of private messages with the host are available in the export. This is not a huge problem in theory as the export doesn't contain private messages between other participants than those with the host. Zoom tracks lots of data about its users and has many third party trackers on its website. This to me feels like a very intentional choice. Part of those were amended when the new privacy policy was published the other day. What has happened in the "aftermath" So far: Privacy and advocacy groups started to notice Class actions are starting to mount The US government and the FBI have started to notice 👀 NASA, SpaceX and other companies moved away from Zoom New York City has banned Zoom from its schools Conclusions I'm sure you've noticed how this article doesn't talk at all about alternatives. The question of alternatives really depends on what the users requirements are and if the entire globe is your users, then it's hard to evaluate on the spot. It also takes a lot of time to evaluate all options and I think it'll take a few days before deeply researched articles about pros and cons of the alternatives start to appear. You also need a group of people distributed all over the world for thorough testing of each app. Let's also not forget that we mostly felt okay with Zoom until tens of millions of people started using it overnight and it got on experts's radars. Alternatives might be just as flawed, simply less popular right now. Trust in the company is important so I do understand why regular people are rushing to find alternatives. I'm also not a tech columnist nor a security expert, so I can't claim "X is better than Zoom for everything and for everyone". I'll see if I can find a reasonably well done comparison of alternatives in the next few days with what I think should be generic requirements: great video and audio call performance, secure by default with indipendently reviewed encryption and protocols, and absolutely no adtech on all of this sensible data (which wouldn't be possible anyway if they had e2e, though technically you can still sell metadata about users...). Echoing other people's sentiments I read online: Apple is sitting on a gold mine if they open Facetime, get it audited and make sure their e2e encryption has no "backdoors". I'm leaving last a long list of links, with some excerpts, which is what I've read to write this summary. Media (and other sources) coverage (in chronological order) Although there are past issues (like the "open web server" debacle from 2019), I've focused only on recent media coverage from March-April 2020. 20200317 - (Techcrunch) - Beware of ‘ZoomBombing’: screensharing filth to video calls 20200326 - (Motherboard, Vice) - Zoom iOS App Sends Data to Facebook Even if You Don’t Have a Facebook Account 20200330 - (Doc Searls, digital privacy expert) - Zoom’s new privacy policy: There will be no need for Zoom to disambiguate services and websites if neither is involved with adtech at all. And Zoom will be in a much better position to trumpet their commitment to privacy. That said, this privacy policy rewrite is a big help. So thank you, Zoom, for listening. 20200331 - (Motherboard, Vice) - Zoom Faces Class Action Lawsuit for Sharing Data with Facebook 20200401 - (Motherboard, Vice) - Zoom is Leaking Peoples' Email Addresses and Photos to Strangers: "I was shocked by this! I subscribed (with an alias, fortunately) and I saw 995 people unknown to me with their names, images and mail addresses." "I just had a look at the free for private use version of Zoom and registered with my private email. I now got 1000 names, email addresses and even pictures of people in the company Directory. Is this intentional?" 20200401 - (webrtcH4cKS, WebRTC technologists) - Does your video call have End-to-End Encryption? Probably not...: So yes, Zoom does not have end-to-end encryption. Quite often, WebRTC doesn’t either – not yet at least. If you are using a WebRTC service check their terms of service and privacy policy and make sure that you understand what they are saying about this. Hopefully we will see this change soon as WebRTC Insertable Streams matures. 20200402 - (Fight for the future, digital rights group) - New campaign calls for Zoom to (actually) implement end to end encryption to keep people safe: Digital rights group Fight for the Future, known for organizing massive online protests for net neutrality and Internet privacy, has launched a new campaign calling for video conferencing service Zoom to implement default end-to-end encryption on all video, audio, and chat content. 20200402 - (Steven Bellovin, security researcher and professor) - Zoom Security: The Good, the Bad, and the Business Model: There is, though, a class of problems that worries me: security shortcuts in the name of convenience or usability. Consider the first widely known flaw in Zoom: a design decision that allowed “any website to forcibly join a user to a Zoom call, with their video camera activated, without the user's permission.” Why did it work that way? It was intended as a feature I'm optimistic that things are heading in the right direction. Still, it's the shortcuts that worry me the most. Those aren't just problems that they can fix, they make me fear for the attitudes of the development team towards security. I'm not convinced that they get it—and that's bad. Fixing that is going to require a CISO office with real power, as well as enough education to make sure that the CISO doesn't have to exercise that power very often. They also need a privacy officer, again with real power; many of their older design decisions seriously impact privacy. 20200402 - (Krebs on Security, security expert) - ‘War Dialing’ Tool Exposes Zoom’s Password Problems: according to data gathered by a new automated Zoom meeting discovery tool dubbed “zWarDial,” a crazy number of meetings at major corporations are not being protected by a password. Lo said zWarDial evades Zoom’s attempts to block automated meeting scans by routing the searches through multiple proxies in Tor, a free and open-source software that lets users browse the Web anonymously. “Having a password enabled on the meeting is the only thing that defeats it,” he said. Lo shared the output of one day’s worth of zWarDial scanning, which revealed information about nearly 2,400 upcoming or recurring Zoom meetings. That information included the link needed to join each meeting; the date and time of the meeting; the name of the meeting organizer; and any information supplied by the meeting organizer about the topic of the meeting. 20200402 - (Reuters) - Elon Musk's SpaceX bans Zoom over privacy concerns -memo: In an email dated March 28, SpaceX told employees that all access to Zoom had been disabled with immediate effect. 20200403 - (NYTimes) - ‘Zoombombing’ Becomes a Dangerous Organized Effort: Zoom raiders often employ shocking imagery, racial epithets and profanity to derail video conferences. Harassers have begun to leverage every feature of Zoom’s platform for abuse. They have used the app’s custom background feature to project a GIF of a person drinking to participants in an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, and its annotation feature to write racist messages in a meeting of the American Jewish Committee in Paris. The frequency and reach of the incidents on Zoom prompted the F.B.I. to issue a warning on Tuesday, singling out the app 20200403 - (TidBITS) - Every Zoom Security and Privacy Flaw So Far, and What You Can Do to Protect Yourself: As detailed as this article is, I fear that this list of problems and choices will be far from the last we hear about Zoom’s security and privacy troubles. In fact, while writing and editing this article over the last 48 hours, we had to add six additional exploits, design-choice errors, and privacy concerns. Zoom has gone into what’s known as “technical debt.” The company’s developers made a lot of poor decisions in the past, which are likely difficult and costly to fix. The longer it takes Zoom to address the core problems, the harder and more costly future fixes will be, as additional code is built upon that weak foundation. 20200403 - (Washington Post) - Thousands of Zoom video calls left exposed on open Web: Videos viewed by The Washington Post included one-on-one therapy sessions; a training orientation for workers doing telehealth calls that included people’s names and phone numbers; small-business meetings that included private company financial statements; and elementary school classes, in which children’s faces, voices and personal details were exposed. 20200403 - (Citizenlab) - Move Fast & Roll Your Own Crypto: A Quick Look at the Confidentiality of Zoom Meetings: Until a few weeks ago, it would have been uncommon for high stakes business negotiations, high level diplomacy, political strategy conferences, and cabinet meetings to be conducted over platforms whose security properties are unknown. Zoom has not publicly disclosed information such as statistics of requests for data by governments, and what Zoom has done in response to these requests. Zoom’s policies concerning notifications to users over breaches or the handing-over of data to governments are also unknown During our analysis, we also identified a security issue with Zoom’s Waiting Room feature. Assessing that the issue presented a risk to users, we have initiated a responsible vulnerability disclosure process with Zoom. We are not currently providing public information about the issue to prevent it from being abused. As a result of these troubling security issues, we discourage the use of Zoom at this time for use cases that require strong privacy and confidentiality For those who have no choice but to use Zoom, including in contexts where secrets may be shared, we speculate that the browser plugin may have some marginally better security properties, as data transmission occurs over TLS. In the meantime, we advise Zoom users who desire confidentiality to not use Zoom Waiting Rooms. Instead, we encourage users to use Zoom’s password feature, which appears to offer a higher level of confidentiality than waiting rooms 20200403 - (Politico) - Multiple state AGs looking into Zoom’s privacy practices 20200403 - (Bruce Scheiner, legendary security researcher) - Security and Privacy Implications of Zoom: Privacy first: Zoom spies on its users for personal profit. It seems to have cleaned this up somewhat since everyone started paying attention, but it still does it. I'm sure lots more of these bad security decisions, sloppy coding mistakes, and random software vulnerabilities are coming. But it gets worse. Zoom's encryption is awful. First, the company claims that it offers end-to-end encryption, but it doesn't. It only provides link encryption, which means everything is unencrypted on the company's servers. 20200404 - (Steven Bellovin, security researcher and professor) - Zoom Cryptography and Authentication Problems: When companies roll their own crypto, I expect it to have flaws. I don't expect those flaws to be errors I'd find unacceptable in an introductory undergraduate class, but that's what happened here. 20200404 - (Chalkbeat, organization related to American schools) - NYC forbids schools from using Zoom for remote learning due to privacy and security concerns: Instead, the guidance says, schools should switch to Microsoft Teams “as soon as possible,” which the education department suggests has similar functionality and is more secure. 20200404 - (Techcrunch) - Zoom admits some calls were routed through China by mistake: Zoom said in February that “rapidly added capacity” to its Chinese regions to handle demand was also put on an international whitelist of backup data centers, which meant non-Chinese users were in some cases connected to Chinese servers when data centers in other regions were unavailable

http://damianfallon.blogspot.com/2020/04/a-semi-technical-explainer-of-all-known.html

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zibizuba · 5 years ago

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An inventory of a few of the most memorable methods staff have ever stop their jobs. Have you ever ever spent a nasty day at work fantasizing of all of the intelligent, confrontational, and basic methods to say “take this job and shove it?” Have you ever ever daydreamed in regards to the look in your boss’s face if solely you would ship the quitting speech of your desires? Nicely get able to reside vicariously by a gaggle of oldsters who really did what most disgruntled employees solely dream of. Whether or not they spelled it out in an incendiary public announcement or employed a full band to accompany their speech, every of those staff reached their breaking level and embraced it. We’ve acquired resignation letters written on muffins, farewells constructed into video games, and even musical performances by people who stated farewell with aptitude. Not each ex-employee you’ll see right here was so well mannered nevertheless, so beware the occasional F-bomb or bare goodbye as you wade by these outstanding examples of bridge-burning.

Residing as much as Inconsistency

Although their identify’s been redacted, this nameless worker lives on as a hero to disgruntled staff in all places. After receiving what they felt was unfair suggestions, this particular person determined to offer their boss just a little suggestions of their very own.

The postscript is particularly priceless, as the remainder of the letter’s subtext lastly simply turns into textual content.

When is a BRB Signal Not a BRB Signal?

As you may see from the signal they left behind, this was not the day to mess with this worker. Sadly, the corners their boss tried to chop don’t seem to have been value it. Let this be a lesson to frugal enterprise homeowners in all places.

This Tech Man Confirmed His Bosses the Error of Their Methods

Although unidentified, the tech man who created this error message will likely go down in historical past for his epic resignation. After lastly determined he’d had sufficient, the witty internet designer put his abilities to good use, even giving his employers a tongue in cheek second likelihood with a “renegotiate” button.

Actually the Sweetest Resignation Letter Ever

Chris Holmes could have written the tastiest resignation letter of all time when he stop his job as a border agent at Stansted Airport to pursue his dream job of proudly owning a bakery. The aspiring baker delivered the tasteful and attractive deal with to administration, who then fairly probably turned the one bosses on the earth to answer a resignation letter by consuming it.

Behold! Karma at Its Best

Generally a boss who abuses their energy really will get what’s coming to them. The three staff who wrote this had sufficient and determined to offer karma just a little shove in the precise course, apparently closing up store in the course of the day.

Declaring Independence from Taco Bell

Former Taco Bell Shift Chief Adam was upset to study that, regardless of working for 22 days straight, his request for break day on the 4th of July had been denied. Decided to have a good time America’s independence with some fireworks of his personal, nevertheless, he channeled his frustration into this public declaration worthy of historical past.

Punctuality: Not Simply For Staff Anymore

As you may see from the word displayed on the shop’s entrance door, Joe had merely had sufficient of following guidelines that the boss didn’t suppose went each methods. The “Assist Needed” signal provides some good context.

Better of all, Joe’s rapidly written word was the reward that stored on giving: the later the boss was, the extra individuals discovered precisely why the doorways had been locked.

The Chipotle Revolt

In September of 2014, the employees of a Pennsylvania Chipotle was pushed to the purpose of revolt by what they known as a “borderline sweatshop” surroundings. The staff later cited circumstances that included 11-hour shifts with no breaks or alternatives to eat lunch or dinner.

Chipotle responded by sending a company supervisor to speak to the vexed crew about precisely what had gone flawed on the location.

The Icing on the Cake

If it’s going to be profane, it would as properly be scrumptious. It appears this disgruntled Baskin-Robbins worker had iced their final cake. Whereas the execution could not have been tactful, it’s a must to admit, it’s uncommon to see an expletive-laden resignation that can be a tasty dessert.

You Can Change Your Personal Indicators From Now On

Just like the Taco Bell resignation, however even a bit extra indignant, this employee felt the necessity to not solely declare their bitterness by the enterprise’s light-up signal, but additionally caught the shock just a little bit additional by telling his boss to put in writing his personal rattling indicators.

A Prehistoric Goodbye

Generally the easiest way to stop a job you hate is by giving your former employers a parting reward alongside together with your resignation letter. This worker determined his farewell reward could be a drawing of a dinosaur, which additionally acted as his two weeks discover.

A Playable Resignation Letter

When developer Jarrad Farbs determined to stop his job at a serious Australian online game firm to pursue impartial growth full time, he discovered an lovely solution to break the information to his co-workers. Fairly than a chilly resignation letter, he developed a brief Mario Brothers Flash sport which broke the information alongside Mario’s journey.

At its conclusion, the sport learn, “You gave me a paycheck, an unbelievable venture, and a world-class crew to study from. However my princess is in one other citadel.”

A Goldman Sachs Government Stop with the World’s Most Public Resignation Letter

In March of 2012, Goldman Sachs Worker Greg Smith not solely knowledgeable his bosses he’d be resigning, he shared the information with the world. In a New York Times Op-Ed, Smith revealed his disgust with the corporate for creating an surroundings that put revenue above individuals, even their very own prospects. Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein and COO Gary Cohn responded with an internal memo which was eventually printed in WSJ‘s “Deal Journal.”

An Ode to Borders Books

You understand all these offended stuff you suppose at work however by no means say? Nicely, when the workers of 1 Borders location discovered that the shop would quickly be closing, they figured they could as properly earn their unemployment. They concocted and posted “Ode to a E-book Retailer Loss of life,” an indignant record of complaints about prospects that just about instantly turned a want success basic for pissed off retail staff the world over.

To the Excessive Seas!

This resignation email is fairly commonplace to start with, that’s, till it takes a fast left flip when the worker broadcasts he’s determined to satisfy his desires of being a excessive seas pirate, and that he can be accepting purposes for his First Mate quickly. Confused? A bit bit. However nonetheless very a lot impressed.

A Poetic Twitter Farewell

Jonathan Schwartz, the previous CEO of Solar Microsystems, determined to announce his departure from the company in a really public and poetic method, by not solely resigning on Twitter, but additionally by doing it with a haiku. Nothing flawed with including a contact of sarcastic class once in a while.

Learn My Cheez Whiz

Fed up together with his place as a clerk at a Seattle grocery retailer, an unnamed worker reportedly confirmed up on the scene someday to drunkenly announce his resignation. Apparently he was in no state to really kind up his resignation letter, so he proceeded to do the subsequent smartest thing and write out “I stop” on a retailer window utilizing Cheez Whiz.

Greatest Driveway Chalk Ever

This message left scrawled on someone’s driveway was written by a landscaper who had grown just a little bored with cleansing up their weeds.

The Rooster King Takes What’s His

When this Florida Burger King worker stop his job, he took extra than simply his closing paycheck. The person, who’s Twitter deal with is @zealot, additionally took every last chicken nugget the fast food joint had within the freezer. He tweeted an image of his loot with the caption, “TODAY WAS MY LAST DAY WORKING AT BURGER KING SO I TOOK ALL OF THEIR NUGGETS, F*** IT.” Followers dubbed him the Rooster King, and helped the tweet go viral (it has since been eliminated). Right here’s hoping he acquired to maintain these nuggets.

Using a Rainbow Vaccum Outta There

Tom “T-Bone” Amellino left his job in essentially the most optimistic method potential – by using out on a rainbow taking pictures vacuum. Scent ‘ya later dead-end job, I’ll see you on the finish of the rainbow!

Concerning the creator: Viral Luck

Inform us one thing about your self.

Associated

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duaneodavila · 6 years ago

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Kopf: Footnote 239

As I told SHG sometime back, there is nothing sadder than an old judge trying desperately to remain relevant.

I come out of retirement, briefly, not endeavoring to remain relevant, but rather to complain about the use and characterization of one my past posts by the NACDL in its breathless report entitled, The Trial Penalty: The Sixth Amendment Right To Trial on the Verge of Extinction and How To Save It (Summer 2018).[i] I have no earthly understanding of why the NACDL ended with a footnote to one of my posts from Hercules and the umpire.

As I have written before on Simple Justice, I am not much concerned with the “vanishing federal criminal jury.” See Richard G. Kopf, Kopf: A Contrarian’s View of the Vanishing Federal Criminal Jury Trial (December 27, 2017). Indeed, I sometimes joke that jury trials are unconstitutional because no sane person would randomly select from the great unwashed 12 stiffs to make a decision that can significantly impact both the public and the defendant. Besides, criminal jury trials are almost always a waste of time. With few exceptions, federal criminal jury trials are the equivalent one long guilty plea where the defendant has rightly calculated that he or she has nothing to lose and is hoping to win the lottery.

In a closely related vein, I am also not much concerned with the obsession of the NACDL about the so-called “trial penalty.” As a normative matter, it makes perfect sense that people who fail to acknowledge their guilt should be treated more harshly than people who admit guilt. The question, of course, is how much harsher? The NACDL thinks “trial penalties” are too harsh and that they are applied unequally. OK, fine, the NACDL is entitled to its point of view. I’m OK with the status quo ‘cause most federal judges I know and respect are sensitive to the issues raised by the NACDL. Frankly, I am too bored with the subject to engage with the report writ large. I’ve heard and thought about that stuff before. It is old news.[ii]

But I want to bitch. That’s what old men do.

The last footnote in the report, footnote 239, cites to something I wrote.[iii] I will first provide you with the context and then the footnote.

The Trial Penalty ends with what one expects from the closing argument of a certain segment of the criminal defense bar–that is, a rather badly reasoned appeal to emotion that does not meaningfully grapple with bad facts. Our subject this time is poor Christian Allmendinger. (My last name sucks too!)

Chris (I trust I am not being too familiar) and his partner Brent Oncale bilked people out of more than $50 million. Oncale cooperated and testified, and got 10 years later, reduced to 5 for cooperation. Allmendinger rolled the dice. He got hit with 45 years in prison.[iv]

And so, the NACDL writes, using Chris’s sad story very much as a conclusion, “locating a sentence ‘sufficient, but not greater than necessary’ can easily turn into an arbitrary task.239 In many cases, the excessive pull of the Guidelines prevents judges from meaningfully exercising their discretion under 3553(a).” The Trial Penalty, at p. 56.

Here is how footnote 239 is written:

It is possible[v] that judges find the 3553(a) factors complicated or even contradictory and so they opt to rely on the Guidelines range that has been calculated according to a defined and familiar formula. See “It’s Time To Rethink Or Junk Entirely 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a),” HERCULES AND THE UMPIRE, Blog by Judge Richard George Kopf, District of Nebraska (entry posted July 27, 2014) (expressing frustration that the 3553(a) factors “provide no meaningful guidance to the sentencing judge”), available at https://herculesandtheumpire.com/2014/07/.[vi]

Id. at 78.

Why my Herc post is cited is beyond me. It does not support the conclusion for which it is cited. It is almost as if the writer needed a filler and threw a dart at the internet to find one. Let me be more specific.

Yes, sentencing can “easily turn into an arbitrary task,” but it has little to do with “trial penalties” or the “excessive pull of the Guidelines.” I do not find the 3553(a) “factors too complicated.” I am certainly dull, but I am not quite a moron.

Let me be plain: Section 3553(a) is even more nuts than the results of a Rorschach test interpreted by a chiropractor with meth mouth. It compiles all the various goals of sentencing that scholars have worked so hard to develop as separate and distinct principle-based theories, throws them into a statute, and tells us to act like Goldilocks, “Ahhh, this porridge is just right.”[vii] The task is not “too complicated,” it is impossible.[viii] The NACDL blames the Guidelines when it is the statute that Congress passed that is the villain. The NACDL blames judges for failing to use their discretion while forgetting that one can only exercise informed discretion when the sought-after result of the exercise is evident to the decision maker.

If Congress wants me to engage in common-law judging, fine, then junk section 3553(a) completely. Yet, like Dr. David Banner, the NACDL wouldn’t like me when I’m angry.

If Congress wants retribution, merely tell me and, Sweet Baby Jesus, I will wield the guillotine.

If Congress wants me to concentrate on the offender’s life story, the probation officer and I can pretend to be social workers and do so with happy face emojis. (Although, to be frank [rather than jane], it is true that we would probably never really care.)

If Congress wants rehabilitation, then tell me and I will order RDAP and all the educational opportunities and vocational training that our massive federal deficit spending can supply.

If Congress wants incapacitation, tell me and life sentences will reign down upon those who are unspeakably vile even though the cause for their behavior is found in their genetics, the poverty in which they have been raised, the mental illnesses they suffer, or the sociopathic nature that propels them to prey upon the weak.[ix]

Rejecting the taunt hurled by José and his wife[x], I am not afraid to judge. I just want to know what the hell I am supposed to be judging. Applying section 3553(a) and the vaunted discretion of federal district judges, tell me, for example, how to sentence a very good man who has done a very bad thing? I dare you!

Now it is true that I rely upon the Guidelines and fairly heavily so. This is not because they are “calculated according to a defined and familiar formula”—the NACDL’s polite way of suggesting that judges like me lack a Yale education or are just plain lazy or cowardly. No, I rely upon the Guidelines for precisely the same reasons that the NACDL worries about “trial penalties” being unequally applied.

I rely upon the Guidelines because they slightly help to diminish, but certainly not entirely avoid, unwarranted sentencing disparity both between people in the same case and otherwise. Setting to one side the need to avoid sentencing disparity, the remainder of the section 3553(a) factors–because they are mixed together like the lunch ladies’ cafeteria offerings–amount to little more than free-floating anti-anxiety nostrums to be applied by woke judges as needed.

So, in summary, I have one piece of advice for the smart person who wrote and inserted footnote 239 into The Trial Penalty. In the future, fucking focus.

Richard G. Kopf Senior United States District Judge (Nebraska)

[i] The Trial Penalty mixes apples and oranges. It writes about both federal and state law. The two are obviously not interchangeable, but the report confusingly conflates the two.

[ii] In fact, I agree with some, but certainly not all, of the recommendations set forth in The Trial Penalty (at pp. 59-60). For example, I would not impose an obstruction enhancement merely because a defendant testified but was found guilty.

[iii] SHG tipped me off to the report and the footnote. Coincidentally, Jeff Kay, a now retired AUSA who served as Chief of the Economic Crimes Unit in SDFL, sent me a link to the report on the same day. Great minds and all. Since I was napping, I probably would have missed it.

[iv] Not noted in the NACDL report was the opinion by Chief Judge Traxler that affirmed the sentence and found the differences in sentences as between Allmendinger, Oncale and one other to be warranted. United States v. Alemendinger, 706 F. 3d 330 (4th Cir. 2013). In that opinion, the Court addressed the difference between Allmendinger and others:

Counsel maintained that Allmendinger and Oncale were similarly situated and should receive similar sentences, and counsel reiterated his argument that the loss found by the court was much larger than Allmendinger could reasonably have foreseen.

In response, the government argued that Allmendinger and Oncale actually were not similarly situated, contrasting Oncale’s prompt cooperation after he was approached by investigators with Allmendinger’s continued evasion and attempts to hide and spend his money, and his possible intention to flee. The government stressed that Allmendinger’s crimes had far-reaching impact, had “destroyed countless lives,” and thus warranted a very severe sentence in order to deter those who would consider committing similar crimes. J.A. 2403. The government also noted that Mackert, who was not an architect of the fraud and who ended up with only $250,000 from his participation in the scheme, was sentenced to almost 16 years.

. . .

Here, the district court heard extensive argument from Allmendinger and the government concerning the extent to which Allmendinger was similarly situated to his co-conspirator Oncale. The district court’s lengthy explanation for the sentence imposed left no doubt regarding the court’s reasons for selecting the particular sentence that it did. Indeed, the court specifically noted that it was considering unwarranted disparities both among defendants in general and among co-defendants within the case. We therefore conclude that the district court’s explanation satisfied the requisite standard.

Also not noted in the NACDL report, perhaps because the opinion may have come out after the report was released, Allmendinger’s section 2255 motion was successful. Appellate counsel on the direct appeal was found to be ineffective for failing to raise a “merger” argument that was nearly certain to result in reversal of the defendant’s money laundering convictions. United States v. Allmendinger, No. 17-6447, 2018 WL 3117199, at *7 (4th Cir. June 26, 2018). So, Chris is almost certain to have his sentence reduced.

[v] It is also possible that monkeys will fly out of my butt when I summon them.

[vi] The more precise link is this one.

[vii] This is the “not more than necessary” pabulum found in section 3553(a) that is so laughably meaningless.

[viii] It is not only that some of the goals may be contradictory, but far more importantly, it is that the goals when mixed together become completely unmoored from their intellectual foundations.

[ix] See, e.g., United States v. Johnson, 69 F.3d 1092 (8th Cir. 1999) (affirming my imposition of a life sentence on the “gentle drug dealer” who, among other depraved activities, had his brother sodomize a young girl with motor oil to collect a drug debt.)

[x] This is an “inside baseball” reference for which I refuse to provide a citation.

Kopf: Footnote 239 republished via Simple Justice

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jessestoddard · 7 years ago

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Welcome to Chapter 12 of my blog-to-book project: Life After High School: Secrets To A Successful Life By Those Who Have Had Twenty Years To Think About It (or) What They Didn’t Teach Us Gen Xers In High School. This chapter is called Stupid Tax. If you missed the last post, click here, otherwise, you can start at the beginning here.

It was cool while it lasted

Before I left Pure Fitness I got caught up in the amazing returns people were getting on real estate during the false boom of 2005. I invested in a plot of land in a new development in Northport, Florida, and had my aunt checking on it in my stead. I thought I knew about real estate, as I had carefully purchased a condo in Belltown while working at University Fitness. The price on that had nearly doubled, so I thought I could handle a little long distance investing.

I had a house built on the land and was ready to sell. I would have profited around $50,000 when it sold. My aunt was interested in living there, so I made the very unfortunate decision to hold on to it and rent it to her. She lost her job and then the economy tanked in 2007. It was all over the news that this particular area in Florida was not only dropping rapidly, it was one of the worst places in the entire country. Only some areas in Nevada and California had bigger drops in value. I went down to Florida and realized that every two out of three houses in the area were in foreclosure. Every single house had a for sale sign.

I gritted my teeth, found a tenant, who ironically was a foreclosure attorney (and later took advantage of his knowledge of the system to avoid paying rent), and tried to ride it out suffering through the loss. I bought the house at around $200,000 (all leveraged with a stupid low-down payment ARM), it was going to sell a little over $260,000, and since I didn’t sell, it was now worth $57,000 and I had a ton of debt that would eventually adjust to higher interest and kill me financially.

Also in 2005, being married and trying to settle down to give my wife some much-needed security, I decided it was the perfect time for me to become a high-risk entrepreneur.

It was an idea I had always believed I was destined for, even though my career had centered on the arts. In my mind, there is a strange parallel between the arts and entrepreneurship that most people miss. There is a creative genius that both require, but not everyone taps into.

I felt I had what it took, and since I had been kicking the idea around for around seven years, I dedicated focused time on carefully planning a new strategy to own my own gym. It was, after all, something I knew a lot about as an employee and independent contractor, and it seemed to go with my fascination with the physical.

Owning a gym is the perfect business for someone who wants to get in horrendous shape and go broke. Pushing pencils do wonders for the waistline, and any business that has huge fixed costs at the peak of the bubble with fickle customers paying $29 per month or less, is bound to have money slipping through your hands like a bucket shot full of holes by a 12-gauge shotgun.

I went back to my old boss, Rick Clark, and I appealed to his desire to expand his health club into new territory. I knew from years of conversations that he wanted more.

Actually, all Rick ever wanted to do was go golfing. He didn’t want to be there, but it had been a good gig and I saw that as an opportunity to be of service while helping myself make my own way simultaneously. I saw the debacle at the 5th Avenue Theater as a sign it was time to move on with my life and become a high roller.

I would say I wanted to be like Donald Trump since I had read his book among many other business books at the time before anyone knew who he was. Of course, this was long before anyone dreamed that he might become president. I just respected some of his real estate accomplishments, and the stories were inspiring to show how America still has opportunities. That was it. He was barely getting into reality TV, and people only knew him as a shrewd and rather wise business man.

Be honest, before the presidential election, did you even know anything about him other than he was a business celebrity on TV? Did you read books about him or by him? Well, I did, which might just give me a slightly different perspective than the average Joe. So just relax for a minute before you go nuts on me and throw Molotov Cocktails at my front door.

At that time, if you said “Trump for president,” you would be probably looked on as a radical intellectual with interesting views of the world and a unique viewpoint that others would wonder at.

Of course, at the time of this writing, if I were to say anything remotely positive about him, I am afraid a lynch mob would be waiting outside my house ready to take me out for devil worship. Living in Washington State has such a rich and tolerant culture! So I will NOT say anything either for or against. I leave that to Facebook, the source of all of our news and opinions. Facebook will tell us how to think. Oh great Facebook, only you know the truth. Please enlighten us with your out-of-context video clips and serial rants. Show us the way.

OK, worship time is over. Back to the story…

While I was still working at the 5th Ave, I met a guy named Mark who worked with Gary at WAMU Capital Corporation. He was a finance guy of sorts, but his dream was just to brew beer. He was at some of our poker parties at Gary’s. For some reason, I called him up at the bank and said: “You still want to get out of there?” He was ecstatic. We decided to open a gym.

I mean, of course, a gym made perfect sense, right?

We drove all over for months looking for spaces and writing business plans and then playing Halo on the X-Box to blow off steam. Eventually, a commercial broker introduced us to a space in Mountlake Terrace. It was 6,400 square feet next to a QFC and seemed to be prime retail. Mark and I gathered other partners (Mark’s friend Nathan, and my friends Gary and Luke) to raise cash, and then Rick provided the credit and his reputation. We called our new venture Retrofit, using a Seattle firm to create the branding elements.

At that time, my wife and I moved into the Snohomish house she grew up in, leaving Seattle behind in favor of rural commuting to the gym every day instead. She still worked at the UW, helping run a lab, and then came home to help me at the gym. She was and is an amazing woman, who stuck by me through some very bleak times. We are stronger for it.

The house was nearly condemned and in sore need of a major overhaul. My mom and dad came and stayed in hotels while helping remodel our house while Mae and I worked. I would come home after a very long day at the gym and crawl under the house to help with plumbing. We rebuilt the entire house from the inside out and ended up having to take a second mortgage to do it. We knew that everything would be fine since even though we had a lot of debt, real estate would most certainly keep going up and we would be making tons of money on our gyms after we opened three to five of them in the next couple of years as was our plan. We had run the numbers and were determined we would become wealthy.

This was a very tough time in my life that I am going to skirt over very quickly so as not to make myself rant excessively. We bought in at the top of the market on everything. We even went to the big IHRSA convention in Los Vegas to buy equipment. We did our research and studied our demographics and we were sure we could do it.

I signed up 635 new clients (setting a few records), in the worst time of the year to open a gym (summer), as fast as I could and things looked pretty good, but behind the scenes, we were falling apart. Let’s just say none of us could get along and there was some power plays that drove us further apart. The stock was internally devalued and somehow through some very tricky legal handiwork, I no longer had any control or value in the company and my equity had been reduced to nothing. I learned a huge lesson that day and for many days after that.

Luckily, while I was there, a guy named Wayne came in and had me try AdvoCare. I was very skeptical, but the stuff worked. In three weeks, without changing diet or exercise, the products helped me lose two notches on my belt, gain a pound of muscle, and feel more energy than I did in high school, and that was exactly what I needed at the time. Later, Mae would use the products to go from a size 12 to a 6 after kids and looks and feels amazing. We have maintained those results for over eleven years and love every aspect of the company and products. The customers were starting to love it too, but we didn’t have much time in the gym left to introduce it there.

Shortly after, the locks were changed and I was ousted of my own creation.

I was crushed and the company was in trouble. I could no longer sell memberships to keep it going and yet I still had all of the responsibilities and debts. The gym cost us $500,000 worth of equipment, and it was $13,000 a month in rent, not including the equipment leases.

The gym kept puttering along for a few years, and finally, they declared bankruptcy. Rick Clark lost his other gym and his house and retirement and moved to Arizona to get a job and start over in his sixty’s. Everybody lost, and a trainer who worked for us got pregnant (not by me).

My personal guarantee was on everything. My stock was worth nothing. It was a nightmare.

Right before we closed, another gym owner con man befriended me with an evil manipulation. I was weak and he saw it. He convinced me to give him $15,000, which was my last line of credit to my name to go invest in a new company so I could go work with him. He took it and ran. People from all over were trying to put him in jail for years. Like they say, an idiot is born every day, and I was being a glutton for punishment apparently.

Now there are different kinds of debt… At least there are different reasons you might choose to get into debt. You can just be a normal American and rack up the consumer kind using credit cards and payday loans and rent your furniture and get a couch repossessed, or you can get into debt as a small business owner and live the real American Dream.

“Our bank supports hard-working entrepreneurs like you. This country was built on the backs of small businesses and if you want to do something of patriotic significance you’ll need to take out a loan with us.”

“But I thought 99% of all traditional businesses fail, so why—”

“Well, yeah, but that could take years and you will be paying a lot of taxes in the meantime to support your local community… And don’t worry about us, we’ll just take your home when you fail.”

You know what’s stupid about business debt in particular? At least with normal consumer debt you get to have all the fun and trinkets that give you temporary material pleasures! Most regular Americans just rack up the credit cards and have a blast and then file bankruptcy… And later they might enjoy a bailout paid for by the taxpayers. With small business debt, however, you get an entire decade of lost hopes and dreams.

“So let’s see, would you like to take a cruise around the world for a year, buy a Lamborghini, and have a wild shopping spree to Best Buy every day for a month…

‘Or would your prefer to have all the same debt and just sit in a cold unfinished foreclosed house filling out endless paperwork for the IRS?”

“Hmmmm…. That paperwork in a cold empty house sounds pretty nice. Do I get extra airline miles with that?”

There was one time I was in court and remember representing myself in front of the judge. Even the judge admitted that he thought I really got screwed. The landlord took pity on me and released me from my obligations to him, although that was only a part of what I owed. He was still trying to collect over fifty-thousand in back rent. He tried to get the partners to come back together to make it work, but it wasn’t happening.

Lessons From The Loss Of Retrofit

Always Go Low Overhead (my dad warned me, but I had to learn the hard way)

Pick the right partners, because breaking up is hard to do

Handle conflict with care. It’s like a seriously inflamed hemorrhoid

The only way out of the business that continues to profit is to go from true business owner to investor (or a “B” to an “I”, as Robert Kiyosaki suggests in Rich Dad, Poor Dad). Become the financier and get a replacement who has skin in the game with ownership. Otherwise, just cut your losses since that ship is eventually going to go down like the Titanic!

I fell into a deep depression in 2007 and 2008. I would lie around in my bathroom all day and Mae would understandably be upset and worried. I would pour through emails and paper trails looking for a way to fight everyone. I was angry and sad and had never seen such loss.

I eventually drug my sorry tail out of the house and started over working at a little gym in Snohomish as a personal trainer. I felt like a nobody. I later took a second job crawling under houses for an insulation company, do estimates while lying in rat feces. I had spiders crawling all over me every day, lived out of their trucks, and had insulation in my hair and on my skin that never seemed to wash out—always itching.

I hated myself. I found myself in the crawl spaces, talking to myself and feeling sorry and mumbling: “I used to be on the 5th Avenue stage! We got a standing ovation at the end of A Chorus Line after our perfect show and I started balling!” Then, I was too angry to cry so I just went emotionally numb for a time.

(Ironically, this same company became a consulting client almost a decade later and hired me on full-time to transform their marketing strategy, but that is another story).

After the loss, it took me ten years to forgive everyone, and I am almost ready to forgive myself too. It has taken a lot of work since I live with the repercussions still to this day. The good news is that I never declared bankruptcy since I don’t really believe in it. I have lived modestly and worked hard and followed the Debt Buster plan that AdvoCare, the nutrition company we are distributors for, provided me. I highly recommend everyone at least check out their debt reduction program, and the people are wonderful.

Using that system and by selling things off and earning additional plan-B income, we have gone from 2.2 million dollars of debt down to under two-hundred-thousand. Our dream is to one day be debt free, and we see that as possible now. Granted, I lost my condo in downtown Seattle, had to short-sell the Florida property and sell most of my personal belongings, while working the new business on the side of multiple jobs. It is not easy, but I believe it will build character and be worth it in the long run.

I eventually started a boot camp business, called Snohomish Boot Camps that grew to four cities and had eight trainers working for me. We had hundreds of clients and helped people shed thousands of pounds. We did huge fundraisers and donated to charity. It was a rocking few years again from 2009 to 2012. We were also rocking and rolling in AdvoCare earning a substantial residual income. We had a month where we made a little over $7,000 just from that alone and decided Mae could leave her job in science to follow her dream, which was to be a mom to our two kids, Phinneas and Keira. At that time, it appeared it would all work out just fine.

Of course, we had another rude awakening. Perhaps I got a little ahead of myself again and tried to grow the fitness business too rapidly. I had a big vision to change the world with my boot camp system and franchise.

One of my trainers had a different idea of how it would be and she took the biggest camp I had and “moved” (a euphemism for “stole”) all the clients in a pretty well-executed coup d’état. Now, I am to blame for several poor leadership blunders, but it doesn’t justify that extreme of action. Maybe I do deserve it anyway, I don’t know. Well, she wanted more money, and she thought I was rolling in the dough and just holding out and didn’t believe me when I said I wasn’t really making any money.

The truth is that I was living on under approximately $24,000 per year, and much of our income was coming from other sources, not from the boot camps. The reason she couldn’t believe it is that our gross revenue was very high. What she didn’t understand, because she was not and probably never will be a business owner, is that there is a huge difference between revenue and net income. I had huge expenses and was using the majority on the payroll (including her) and financing the launch of other camps so that someday if I worked really hard, I would eventually make good money on it personally.

I decided to sell what was left of the company but the new owners and I had some serious differences, so I was no longer involved at all. I found myself “retired,” but at least we were doing well enough in AdvoCare to make ends meet, which was the entire purpose of the plan-B income, to begin with.

After that, I have gone back to training and launched a boot camp with a new system I developed. I enjoy it and I help other people start their own fitness boot camp businesses as well. This has also lead me to small-business consulting and a new opportunity that is exciting and life-changing.

It is all good honest work now and I have zero partners, other than my wife. I am a believer now that most of the time the only ship sure to sink is a partnership (never say never?), and all of these learning lessons and never-ending debt payments were my way of having to pay a stupid tax for my lack of wisdom.

Lessons From The Loss Of Snohomish Boot Camps

There always is a way to exit and get to make lemonade out of lemons (E.g. I created a consulting practice and wrote a book).

Businesses without high overhead and debt are easy to change or get out of.

“Strictly Business” is a misnomer, and “It’s not personal” is a lie. It’s always personal, so you have to be prepared to handle it.

Leadership is influence, and it requires service and a servant’s heart. The business is not there to serve you, as much as you wish it were the other way around. If you treat it that way, you end up killing the Golden Goose and choking on the feathers. If it hurts you too much to see the world as it really is, you can always go back to being a lazy consumer and working for someone else and losing your influence. Then someone can tell you what to do all day and you can choose bondage. Freedom isn’t free.

Doing it “for the money” is a trap and a weird paradox. We must follow our dreams and passions to bring light to the world, and the light is what people pay for. Yet we feel we need money to follow our dreams, which entices us to choose careers and projects based on the lure of money, rather than the dream. We wait for the money so we can invest in the dream, but by then it’s too late… We are caught in a Catch 22.

Ok, this one is going to be challenging not to sound sexist (although I assure you that it isn’t), but here it goes… If you are a man:

Working with women is more complicated than working with men.

As a man, having women work for you is going to make you man up.

Having a bunch of women running your business is either going to be the best idea in the world or a recipe for drama and disaster…

And you can’t blame anyone but yourself (Just like the Jimmy Buffet song says).

Whew! Glad I’m getting through that lesson relatively unscathed until the hate mail comes in.)

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In the next post, I will continue with more interesting interviews.

Are you from Generation X? I want to hear what you think! Please comment below and participate in the conversation about What They Didn’t Teach Us Gen Xers In High School. What do you wish someone told you when you were eighteen?

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Life After High School: Chapter 12 Stupid Tax Welcome to Chapter 12 of my blog-to-book project: Life After High School: Secrets To A Successful Life By Those Who Have Had Twenty Years To Think About It

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