#or the equivalent in a format you'd like

[ctl-yuejie]

love this system that is like "oh you work for 2 years while we barely pay you - it's not called a wage for a reason, duh - have you come to class and write an exam every week but in class - just for funsies - we won't actually teach you what you need to know for the exams but a lot of practical stuff which doesn't apply for your work because that is way more specialized"

glad i can skip the classes since i moved outside of town for this part. while i have to teach everything to myself, everyone in class is non the wiser and at least i don't lose the hours.

[fiabex]

FIAB: Sign-ups open!

Sign-ups are now open for Fic In A Box, a 10k fandom gift exchange, and it's time to officially join the event!

What Is FIAB?

A gift exchange is an fandom event where participants create fanworks to gift to each other. Fic In A Box is a fanwork exchange with a large minimum gifting requirement and several unique features. Participants have 6 weeks to create their gifts, and gifts can include fic, art, audio, video— and much much more— aiming for a minimum of 10k of fic or equivalent to give to their assigned recipient.

This sounds enticing but you have questions? More under the cut!

Signups? What's that?

To officially join the event and be matched— so that you are assigned someone to make a gift for, and someone is assigned to you— you have to sign up on Ao3. It is the "sign up" button in the sidebar on the left-hand side of the Ao3 page. You have until signups close on September 7th (10pm EST), to get your signup filled out. You can edit your signup after you submit it, so feel free to get a minimum signup done and then tinker with it during signups.

To sign up you fill out your Requests (what you are saying you'd be okay for people to give you as a gift), and your Offers (what you are saying you'd be able to make to give someone else as a gift), and submit it. You use tags from a special event tag set to fill out your offers and requests, and you'll only be able to use the tags in the tag set for the event. The tag set contains fandoms, ships, characters, worldbuilding tags, and gift types ("mediums"), all of which you use to refine your requests and offers to make sure you are signing up with exactly the type of gift you want to get or make in mind (with a bit of mystery still, part of the fun of the exchange is the challenge and surprise of it all).

Tag set?

Hopefully you heard about FIAB early enough that you were part of the nomination process where we built the tag set, where anyone could nominate their ships or worldbuilding ideas or fandoms. But maybe you just heard about it and you didn't nominate any tags— can you still participate? Yes! There are two options! First one: check out the tag set here, and if there are any ships that you like, smack those into a signup and you're good to go!

Second option: FIAB accepts late nominations if they are tags that you imminently intend to use in your signup. You need to format them in such a way that we can batch load them into the tag set, and you need to submit them through a comment on the designated Dreamwidth Blog Post— check out this post for more information and an example in the comments of what a submission would look like. You do not need a dreamwidth account to comment on the post, you can comment anonymously! Late nominations closes 6 days before signups close.

What if I only like one ship in the tag set, or at all? What if I like several ships, but only one fandom?

If you only like one tag in the tag set you still have a minimum viable signup, and you can sign up with just the one fandom, one ship! However, there are two points of order for that.

The first point is about your offers. You must be matchable to at least one person to get an assignment and stay in the exchange. If we can't give you an assignment, we'll contact you to ask about adding more offers, and if it ends up we cannot match you to anyone, your sign up will be deleted. So you need to be offering something that at least one person is requesting when the exchange closes and locks. You can look at all current signups here to see if there's anyone you can add an offer to, to make yourself matchable! It's best practice to offer at least three different fandoms to make yourself matchable— but if you have only one fandom you main you can still sign up, as long as you're matchable! (And pro tip, even if it comes down to the last few hours and you're not matchable, don't delete your signup! There's always a flurry of signups in the last few hours of the exchange, and someone from your fandom might still sign up.)

The second point is about your requests. If your original gifter drops out (life happens! People's lives blow up, computers break, people leave fandoms, etc.), the mods will put your assignment up for a Pinch Hit on the blog. That way people who want to take on an extra assignment can claim it and still write you a gift! If you have three or more unique fandoms in your requests, the mods will hold the entire exchange until someone has turned in a gift for you— nobody gets their gift until everybody gets a gift. However, if you have less than three requests you are still welcome to sign up, and you will still be posted as a pinch hit if something happens to your original gifter, but the mods won't hold the exchange for you if you only have one or two fandoms, so you might not get a gift. There is a dedicated group of pinch hitters who will do their best to make sure that everyone gets a gift, but you do run the risk of no gift if you sign up with a restricted list of offers.

I can't write 10k of fic, but I could do 10k's worth of art— what do I do?

The standard assumption is that everyone gets 10k of fic by default, and everyone signs up to make 10k of fic by default. But this is a special unique exchange, and we love to have people participating who are not fic writers. How does that work? You do not specify that you are a non-fic-writer in your signup, because that would break Ao3's matching. The mods match you manually— as long as they know that they have to do that. So you have to let them know that you want to give a non-fic gift.

If you want to work in a medium that is not fic, contact the mods by email (ficinaboxmod@gmail.com), and tell them

The username you are signing up with.

A list of usernames of participants who are requesting something you can make, and what relationship/character/WB: tag and medium tag(s) you are aiming for.

It will look something like:

Hi mods, My username is RanbooLive, and I'm a podficcer who just signed up. I would like to be matched to either CarthagoDelendaEst (for the tags Chara & Flowey & Toriel (Undertale), and Medium Opt-In: Audio - Podfic of any of my fics that match this request's fandom/relationships), or Clif_Bar (for the tags Padme Amidala & Royal Handmaidens (SWPT) or WB: Prequels-Era Jedi Culture (SWPT) and Medium Opt-In: Audio - Podfic), or ThingsForgotten (for the tags Billy Brennan/Alan Grant (Jurassic Park OT) or WB: Effect of Dinosaur Reveal on Careers of Academics (Jurassic Park OT), and Medium Opt-In: Audio - Podfic). Thanks, let me know if there are any issues!

We need the info about relationship-field tags and medium tags not because you will be obligated to create that exact thing, but because we will double check during matching that the recipient we’re matching you to hasn’t, for example, removed the medium you said you can create from their request. We do not want to give you an assignment you cannot actually complete.

You do not need to have multiple options on the list you send the mods— as long as there's one person you're matchable to, you're matchable and we can assign you! It is a somewhat safer idea to have multiple options so you know you're still matchable even if someone changes their signup at the last minute, but technically one option is all you need.

And how do you get the information to put in the letter about who you're matchable to? That would be searching through the automagic app, which is a searchable database of everyone who's signed up, which lets you sort by medium tags and fandoms! Check there to find people requesting podfic/poetry/art/spreadsheets/fibercraft/cocktail instructions/video/whatever your art form is!

Honestly I'm still baffled/I'm staring at this Ao3 box and it is swimming in front of my eyes/What on Earth is a medium tag and how many do I need:

The system for signing up is pretty complex, especially if you haven't done it before. That's why we set up a discord server with a bunch of experienced people who are happy to answer questions! If you join the server, look for the #event-questions channel and we would be happy to explain anything you need, from "how do I sign up for an Ao3 account" to "why is my signup yelling at me when I save it" to "what's the difference between these two medium tags and do I need them both"? We are all standing ready to answer questions, hit us up!

If you do not want to talk to people, there is extensive documentation on the dreamwidth blog, and there might be an answer to your question there!

Or if all else fails— shoot us an ask here or email the mods!

Note: FIAB is not an all-ages exchange. You must be 18 or older to join FIAB.

Links

Email: ficinaboxmod@gmail.com

Ao3 Collection

Automatic Ao3 App (contains the signups for everyone who's signed up so far, sortable by fandom or by tag, allowing you to see who you're matchable to)

Tag Set

Dreamwidth Blog

Discord (includes question channel)

[yanderes-galore]

I also have one more request in regards of Cult of the Lamb.

Do you think it's possible to do a (platonic/romantic) concept of naridener(toww)

Towards a cult leader lamb reader?

Ooo! This is another interesting dynamic I think will be fun to explore :)

Yandere! Narinder with Lamb! Darling

Pairing: Platonic/Romantic

Possible Trigger Warnings: Gender-Neutral Darling, Obsession, Religion, Cults, Manipulation, Possessive behavior, Worship, Ownership, Corruption, Indoctrination, Sacrifice, Violence, Dubious companionship/relationship.

Narinder is the being that gave you another chance.

You were brutally slaughtered by his siblings and the last of your kind.

He's the being who decided you deserved a second chance at life.

A useful pawn... forever in his debt.

A common start of yanderes is usually if the obsession sees them in a light no one else does.

Not in this case... well, not until much later I guess.

Narinder likes the control he has over you as TOWW.

You are his chosen vessel and he originally just sees you as such.

This is different from the typical format as, for most of the obsession, you're worshiping him.

You make a cult in his name because there's no other choice you have.

Narinder is a powerful force in your life, lending you his power to carry out his message.

Just where would you be if you didn't have him?

Narinder, as TOWW, primarily sees you as a pet or just a pawn.

Although... The Bishop does enjoy seeing you conduct sermons and pray in his name.

He praises you for your work and duties.

You grow your cult, sacrifice in his name, brainwash those stupid little followers to work tasks.

In a way... Narinder is proud.

He likes what you do in his name, you'd only do it in his name.

Narinder would feel you're already his, no matter what.

You're forever tied to him in your deal.

After all... You need him to use the Red Crown.

You'd be nothing but prey if he didn't step in.

Narinder feels prideful about this as he feels confident to be in control.

It's hard to pinpoint where the obsession starts.

I feel the moment he realizes you'll be the perfect vessel, he feels he claims you.

You can't do anything against him, can you?

He does everything for you.

Resurrection, upgrades, influence, power...

You need him and he enjoys that fact.

You're so small when you visit him in his realm.

He often summons you to praise you.

He may be in chains, but his grin says everything.

Narinder would have a field day with you.

Even more so when his obsession starts.

This isn't your traditional yandere, of course.

It's the equivalent of a God falling for a mortal.

He is a big presence in your existence.

He will not let any harm bring you down.

You are his strong disciple, loyal to him.

As he watches you take down his siblings, part of him is pained.

But for the most part... He is happy to have developed such a strong lamb.

He listens to your every prayer.

Every sermon meets his ears.

Every sacrifice he takes greedily.

You get power... and he gets you.

His cute little lamb.

This dynamic can work platonically or romantically.

This is primarily just Narinder enjoying your worship.

In a way, the deity is possessive of his lamb.

Part of him wants to thank his siblings for giving him such a... gift.

Them giving you to him was their own downfall.

All revenge for not only imprisoning him... but sacrificing you.

Doesn't it feel good?

You get to feel this good... this powerful... all due to him.

This would be the first half of the obsession, perhaps even most of the obsession.

You worship him and he enjoys every minute of it.

He loves knowing you're his.

Even when you show attention to your followers, he doesn't care.

They're fodder.

Your devotion truly belongs to him.

Your Bishop.

The roles would only reverse when he demands his crown back... when he can finally have his revival, you just need to give yourself to him.

Only for you to refuse.

The nature of his obsession changes once you beat him in combat.

He's made you too strong... he fully expects to die by your hands...

Then you spare him... and he wonders if your feelings are mutual.

Are you still his? Even now?

Narinder's obsession with his lamb changes when you make him a follower.

He's still upset you managed to beat him... but you're still his in his eyes.

After all, you have to like him somewhat if you spare him.

You could've slaughtered him, removed his oppressive presence from your life entirely.

But you didn't.

Now he's in your debt, just like you were with him.

Narinder hates to admit it, yet you mean a lot to him as his lamb.

Now he's forced to listen to your every whim as you're his new leader.

As TOWW, Narinder is sadistic along with being possessive of his lamb.

He has you tied to him due to your deal, you're his to control.

What he says goes.

Now, as your follower, Narinder becomes a possessive worship yandere.

He used to not mind your followers before.

Now he can't stand them around you.

In a way he's happy this new form allows him to interact with you in ways he couldn't before.

Yet he misses his power, that ability to make you listen to his every word....

Now, Narinder dedicates himself to you as much as he can.

He tries to outperform every follower, he sticks right by your side.

While he appears moody... Narinder doesn't want to be away from your side.

He misses when he didn't have competition.

Now he has to try and force it.

Imagine if Narinder had to frame other followers you had to get rid of them.

He does everything to be your favorite.

He needs you... just like you need him.

Narinder wants to be yours, in return, he expects you to be his lamb.

In terms of which version is my favorite, I'm biased towards TOWW.

There's just something more intimidating about a God of Death falling for a follower of his.

You couldn't get rid of him and he'd always be there to summon you back to him.

So, hopefully, during your final confrontation...

Maybe you'll just roll over and give yourself to him...

Then you'll be forever his, his little lamb.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The CHIPS Act treats the symptoms, but not the causes

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

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/07/farewell-mr-chips/#we-used-to-make-things

There's this great throwaway line in 1992's Sneakers, where Dan Aykroyd, playing a conspiracy-addled hacker/con-man, is feverishly telling Sydney Poitier (playing an ex-CIA spook) about a 1958 meeting Eisenhower had with aliens where Ike said, "hey, look, give us your technology, and we'll give you all the cow lips you want."

Poitier dismisses Aykroyd ("Don't listen to this man. He's certifiable"). We're meant to be on Poitier's side here, but I've always harbored some sympathy for Aykroyd in this scene.

That's because I often hear echoes of Aykroyd's theory in my own explanations of the esoteric bargains and plots that produced the world we're living in today. Of course, in my world, it's not presidents bargaining for alien technology in exchange for cow-lips – it's the world's wealthy nations bargaining to drop trade restrictions on the Global South in exchange for IP laws.

These bargains – which started as a series of bilateral and then multilateral agreements like NAFTA, and culminated in the WTO agreement of 1999 – were the most important step in the reordering of the world's economy around rent-extraction, cheap labor exploitation, and a brittle supply chain that is increasingly endangered by the polycrisis of climate and its handmaidens, like zoonotic plagues, water wars, and mass refugee migration.

Prior to the advent of "free trade," the world's rich countries fashioned debt into a whip-hand over poor, post-colonial nations. These countries had been bankrupted by their previous colonial owners, and the price of their freedom was punishing debts to the IMF and other rich-world institutions in exchange for loans to help these countries "develop."

Like all poor debtors, these countries were said to have gotten into their predicament through moral failure – they'd "lived beyond their means."

(When rich people get into debt, bankruptcy steps in to give them space to "restructure" according to their own plans. When poor people get into debt, bankruptcy strips them of nearly everything that might help them recover, brands them with a permanent scarlet letter, and subjects them to humiliating micro-management whose explicit message is that they are not competent to manage their own affairs):

https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/07/hr-4193/#shoppers-choice

So the poor debtor nations were ordered to "deregulate." They had to sell off their state assets, run their central banks according to the dictates of rich-world finance authorities, and reorient their production around supplying raw materials to rich countries, who would process these materials into finished goods for export back to the poor world.

Naturally, poor countries were not allowed to erect "trade barriers" that might erode the capacity of this North-South transfer of high-margin goods, but this was not the era of free trade. It wasn't the free trade era because, while the North-South transfer was largely unrestricted, the South-North transfer was subject to tight regulation in the rich world.

In other words, poor countries were expected to export, say, raw ore to the USA and reimport high-tech goods, with low tariffs in both directions. But if a poor country processed that ore domestically and made its own finished goods, the US would block those goods at the border, slapping them with high tariffs that made them more expensive than Made-in-the-USA equivalents.

The argument for this unidirectional trade was that the US – and other rich countries – had a strategic need to maintain their manufacturing industries as a hedge against future geopolitical events (war, but also pandemics, extreme weather) that might leave the rich world unable to provide for itself. This rationale had a key advantage: it was true.

A country that manages its own central bank can create as much of its own currency as it wants, and use that money to buy anything for sale in its own currency.

This may not be crucial while global markets are operating to the country's advantage (say, while the rest of the world is "willingly" pricing its raw materials in your country's currency), but when things go wrong – war, plague, weather – a country that can't make things is at the rest of the world's mercy.

If you had to choose between being a poor post-colonial nation that couldn't supply its own technological needs except by exporting raw materials to rich countries, and being a rich country that had both domestic manufacturing capacity and a steady supply of other countries' raw materials, you would choose the second, every time.

What's not to like?

Here's what.

The problem – from the perspective of America's ultra-wealthy – was that this arrangement gave the US workforce a lot of power. As US workers unionized, they were able to extract direct concessions from their employers through collective bargaining, and they could effectively lobby for universal worker protections, including a robust welfare state – in both state and federal legislatures. The US was better off as a whole, but the richest ten percent were much poorer than they could be if only they could smash worker power.

That's where free trade comes in. Notwithstanding racist nonsense about "primitive" countries, there's no intrinsic defect that stops the global south from doing high-tech manufacturing. If the rich world's corporate leaders were given free rein to sideline America's national security in favor of their own profits, they could certainly engineer the circumstances whereby poor countries would build sophisticated factories to replace the manufacturing facilities that sat behind the north's high tariff walls.

These poor-country factories could produce goods ever bit as valuable as the rich world's shops, but without the labor, environmental and financial regulations that constrained their owners' profits. They slavered for a business environment that let them kill workers; poison the air, land and water; and cheat the tax authorities with impunity.

For this plan to work, the wealthy needed to engineer changes in both the rich world and the poor world. Obviously, they would have to get rid of the rich world's tariff walls, which made it impossible to competitively import goods made in the global south, no matter how cheaply they were made.

But free trade wasn't just about deregulation in the north – it also required a whole slew of new, extremely onerous regulations in the global south. Corporations that relocated their manufacturing to poor – but nominally sovereign – countries needed to be sure that those countries wouldn't try to replicate the American plan of becoming actually sovereign, by exerting control over the means of production within their borders.

Recall that the American Revolution was inspired in large part by fury over the requirement to ship raw materials back to Mother England and then buy them back at huge markups after they'd been processed by English workers, to the enrichment of English aristocrats. Post-colonial America created new regulations (tariffs on goods from England), and – crucially – they also deregulated.

Specifically, post-revolutionary America abolished copyrights and patents for English persons and firms. That way, American manufacturers could produce sophisticated finished goods without paying rent to England's wealthy making those goods cheaper for American buyers, and American publishers could subsidize their editions of American authors' books by publishing English authors on the cheap, without the obligation to share profits with English publishers or English writers.

The surplus produced by ignoring the patents and copyrights of the English was divided (unequally) among American capitalists, workers, and shoppers. Wealthy Americans got richer, even as they paid their workers more and charged less for their products. This incubated a made-in-the-USA edition of the industrial revolution. It was so successful that the rest of the world – especially England – began importing American goods and literature, and then American publishers and manufacturers started to lean on their government to "respect" English claims, in order to secure bilateral protections for their inventions and books in English markets.

This was good for America, but it was terrible for English manufacturers. The US – a primitive, agricultural society – "stole" their inventions until they gained so much manufacturing capacity that the English public started to prefer American goods to English ones.

This was the thing that rich-world industrialists feared about free trade. Once you build your high-tech factories in the global south, what's to stop those people from simply copying your plans – or worse, seizing your factories! – and competing with you on a global scale? Some of these countries had nominally socialist governments that claimed to explicitly elevate the public good over the interests of the wealthy. And all of these countries had the same sprinkling of sociopaths who'd gladly see a million children maimed or the land poisoned for a buck – and these "entrepreneurs" had unbeatable advantages with their countries' political classes.

For globalization to work, it wasn't enough to deregulate the rich world – capitalists also had to regulate the poor world. Specifically, they had to get the poor world to adopt "IP" laws that would force them to willingly pay rent on things they could get for free: patents and other IP, even though it was in the short-term, medium-term, and long-term interests of both the nation and its politicians and its businesspeople.

Thus, the bargain that makes me sympathetic to Dan Aykroyd: not cow lips for alien tech; but free trade for IP law. When the WTO was steaming towards passage in the late 1990s, there was (rightly) a lot of emphasis on its deregulatory provisions: weakening of labor, environmental and financial laws in the poor world, and of tariffs in the rich world.

But in hindsight, we all kind of missed the main event: the TRIPS (Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights). This actually started before the WTO treaty (it was part of the GATT, a predecessor to the WTO), but the WTO spread it to countries all over the world. Under the TRIPS, poor countries are required to honor the IP claims of rich countries, on pain of global sanction.

That was the plan: instead of paying American workers to make Apple computers, say, Apple could export the "IP" for Macs and iPhones to countries like China, and these countries would produce Apple products that were "designed in California, assembled in China." China would allow Apple to treat Chinese workers so badly that they routinely committed suicide, and would lock up or kill workers who tried to unionize. China would accept vast shipments of immortal, toxic e-waste. And China wouldn't let its entrepreneurs copy Apple's designs, be they software, schematics or trademarks.

Apple isn't the only company that pursued this strategy, but no company has executed it as successfully. It's not for nothing that Steve Jobs's hand-picked successor was Tim Cook, who oversaw the transfer of even the most exacting elements of Apple manufacturing to Chinese facilities, striking bargains with contractors like Foxconn that guaranteed that workers would be heavily – lethally! – surveilled and controlled to prevent the twin horrors of unionization and leaks.

For the first two decades of the WTO era, the most obvious problems with this arrangement was wage erosion (for American workers) and leakage (for the rich). China's "socialist" government was only too happy to help Foxconn imprison workers who demanded better wages and working conditions, but they were far more relaxed about knockoffs, be they fake iPods sold in market stalls or US trade secrets working their way into Huawei products.

These were problems for the American aristocracy, whose investments depended on China disciplining both Chinese workers and Chinese businesses. For the American people, leakage was a nothingburger. Apple's profits weren't shared with its workforce beyond the relatively small number of tech workers at its headquarters. The vast majority of Apple employees, who flogged iPhones and scrubbed the tilework in gleaming white stores across the nation, would get the same minimal (or even minimum) wage no matter how profitable Apple grew.

It wasn't until the pandemic that the other shoe dropped for the American public. The WTO arrangement – cow lips for alien technology – had produced a global system brittle supply chains composed entirely of weakest links. A pandemic, a war, a ship stuck in the Suez Canal or Houthi paramilitaries can cripple the entire system, perhaps indefinitely.

For two decades, we fought over globalization's effect on wages. We let our corporate masters trick us into thinking that China's "cheating" on IP was a problem for the average person. But the implications of globalization for American sovereignty and security were banished to the xenophobic right fringe, where they were mixed into the froth of Cold War 2.0 nonsense. The pandemic changed that, creating a coalition that is motivated by a complex and contradictory stew of racism, environmentalism, xenophobia, labor advocacy, patriotism, pragmatism, fear and hope.

Out of that stew emerged a new American political tendency, mostly associated with Bidenomics, but also claimed in various guises by the American right, through its America First wing. That tendency's most visible artifact is the CHIPS Act, through which the US government proposes to use policy and subsidies to bring high-tech manufacturing back to America's shores.

This week, the American Economic Liberties Project published "Reshoring and Restoring: CHIPS Implementation for a Competitive Semiconductor Industry," a fascinating, beautifully researched and detailed analysis of the CHIPS Act and the global high-tech manufacturing market, written by Todd Achilles, Erik Peinert and Daniel Rangel:

https://www.economicliberties.us/our-work/reshoring-and-restoring-chips-implementation-for-a-competitive-semiconductor-industry/#

Crucially, the report lays out the role that the weakening of antitrust, the dismantling of tariffs and the strengthening of IP played in the history of the current moment. The failure to enforce antitrust law allowed for monopolization at every stage of the semiconductor industry's supply-chain. The strengthening of IP and the weakening of tariffs encouraged the resulting monopolies to chase cheap labor overseas, confident that the US government would punish host countries that allowed their domestic entrepreneurs to use American designs without permission.

The result is a financialized, "capital light" semiconductor industry that has put all its eggs in one basket. For the most advanced chips ("leading-edge logic"), production works like this: American firms design a chip and send the design to Taiwan where TSMC foundry turns it into a chip. The chip is then shipped to one of a small number of companies in the poor world where they are assembled, packaged and tested (AMP) and sent to China to be integrated into a product.

Obsolete foundries get a second life in the commodity chip ("mature-node chips") market – these are the cheap chips that are shoveled into our cars and appliances and industrial systems.

Both of these systems are fundamentally broken. The advanced, "leading-edge" chips rely on geopolitically uncertain, heavily concentrated foundries. These foundries can be fully captured by their customers – as when Apple prepurchases the entire production capacity of the most advanced chips, denying both domestic and offshore competitors access to the newest computation.

Meanwhile, the less powerful, "mature node" chips command minuscule margins, and are often dumped into the market below cost, thanks to subsidies from countries hoping to protect their corner of the high-tech sector. This makes investment in low-power chips uncertain, leading to wild swings in cost, quality and availability of these workhorse chips.

The leading-edge chipmakers – Nvidia, Broadcom, Qualcomm, AMD, etc – have fully captured their markets. They like the status quo, and the CHIPS Act won't convince them to invest in onshore production. Why would they?

2022 was Broadcom's best year ever, not in spite of its supply-chain problems, but because of them. Those problems let Broadcom raise prices for a captive audience of customers, who the company strong-armed into exclusivity deals that ensured they had nowhere to turn. Qualcomm also profited handsomely from shortages, because its customers end up paying Qualcomm no matter where they buy, thanks to Qualcomm ensuring that its patents are integrated into global 4G and 5G standards.

That means that all standards-conforming products generate royalties for Qualcomm, and it also means that Qualcomm can decide which companies are allowed to compete with it, and which ones will be denied licenses to its patents. Both companies are under orders from the FTC to cut this out, and both companies ignore the FTC.

The brittleness of mature-node and leading-edge chips is not inevitable. Advanced memory chips (DRAM) roughly comparable in complexity to leading-edge chips, while analog-to-digital chips are as easily commodified as mature-node chips, and yet each has a robust and competitive supply chain, with both onshore and offshore producers. In contrast with leading-edge manufacturers (who have been visibly indifferent to the CHIPS incentives), memory chip manufacturers responded to the CHIPS Act by committing hundreds of billions of dollars to new on-shore production facilities.

Intel is a curious case: in a world of fabless leading-edge manufacturers, Intel stands out for making its own chips. But Intel is in a lot of trouble. Its advanced manufacturing plans keep foundering on cost overruns and delays. The company keeps losing money. But until recently, its management kept handing its shareholders billions in dividends and buybacks – a sign that Intel bosses assume that the US public will bail out its "national champion." It's not clear whether the CHIPS Act can save Intel, or whether financialization will continue to hollow out a once-dominant pioneer.

The CHIPS Act won't undo the concentration – and financialization – of the semiconductor industry. The industry has been awash in cheap money since the 2008 bailouts, and in just the past five years, US semiconductor monopolists have paid out $239b to shareholders in buybacks and dividends, enough to fund the CHIPS Act five times over. If you include Apple in that figure, the amount US corporations spent on shareholder returns instead of investing in capacity rises to $698b. Apple doesn't want a competitive market for chips. If Apple builds its own foundry, that just frees up capacity at TSMC that its competitors can use to improve their products.

The report has an enormous amount of accessible, well-organized detail on these markets, and it makes a set of key recommendations for improving the CHIPS Act and passing related legislation to ensure that the US can once again make its own microchips. These run a gamut from funding four new onshore foundries to requiring companies receiving CHIPS Act money to "dual-source" their foundries. They call for NIST and the CPO to ensure open licensing of key patents, and for aggressive policing of anti-dumping rules for cheap chips. They also seek a new law creating an "American Semiconductor Supply Chain Resiliency Fee" – a tariff on chips made offshore.

Fundamentally, these recommendations seek to end the outsourcing made possible by restrictive IP regimes, to undercut Wall Street's power to demand savings from offshoring, and to smash the market power of companies like Apple that make the brittleness of chip manufacturing into a feature, rather than a bug. This would include a return to previous antitrust rules, which limited companies' ability to leverage patents into standards, and to previous IP rules, which limited exclusive rights chip topography and design ("mask rights").

All of this will is likely to remove the constraints that stop poor countries from doing to America the same things that postcolonial America did to England – that is, it will usher in an era in which lots of countries make their own chips and other high-tech goods without paying rent to American companies. This is good! It's good for poor countries, who will have more autonomy to control their own technical destiny. It's also good for the world, creating resiliency in the high-tech manufacturing sector that we'll need as the polycrisis overwhelms various places with fire and flood and disease and war. Electrifying, solarizing and adapting the world for climate resilience is fundamentally incompatible with a brittle, highly concentrated tech sector.

Pluralizing high-tech production will make America less vulnerable to the gamesmanship of other countries – and it will also make the rest of the world less vulnerable to American bullying. As Henry Farrell and Abraham Newman describe so beautifully in their 2023 book Underground Empire, the American political establishment is keenly aware of how its chokepoints over global finance and manufacturing can be leveraged to advantage the US at the rest of the world's expense:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/10/weaponized-interdependence/#the-other-swifties

Look, I know that Eisenhower didn't trade cow-lips for alien technology – but our political and commercial elites really did trade national resiliency away for IP laws, and it's a bargain that screwed everyone, except the one percenters whose power and wealth have metastasized into a deadly cancer that threatens the country and the planet.

Image: Mickael Courtiade (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/197739384@N07/52703936652/

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

[mrsrookhunt]

Not me forgetting its Mermay until the last day of May. Anyway, idk if it really counts but now I don't have time for plot planning so have an Azul X Reader.

I really love the idea of present day chubby Azul. Maybe he gained weight over stress, I'm not sure. But you still think he's more than adorable when you see him again a year later.

Leave Me Be

Chubby!Azul Ashengrotto x Reader

Warnings: Angst, Self-shaming, Depression, reader is probably also chubby but maybe I'm just projecting

Traveling to the deepest depths of the Coral Sea was less than easy. Honestly, the amount of potions and formulas you had to drink from weaker mages made you feel like shit. Azul could've done far better for you, but upon your accidental return to Night Raven College through some portal you'd found in a puddle, you'd found that he'd left the school and decided to take a year for himself at home.

You were shocked, but there wasn't much you could do; he wasn't returning your messages. You waited a couple of weeks for school to let out, and had Jade and Floyd take you to his home.

You quickly found out that Azul had moved out of his family's home, into the outskirts of town, apparently, according to the rumors, depressed and ashamed of himself.

Alone, with Jade and Floyd already gone to their own destination, you swam unguided to where you hoped was at least the general direction of his new home.

The other Mers had said his home wasn't easy to miss, but for someone as unsuited to water as you, particularly in these dark depths, a serious worry that you would get lost ruminated in the back of your mind.

Around 30 minutes of aimless swimming later, you saw a dim light in the gloom.

It seemed to glow a dim purple, somewhere off in a hole in the side of a massive rock formation.

Bracing yourself to swim upwards quite the distance, you realized just how massive this wall of rock and sediment was.

It was just a guess.

No one had mentioned Azul's home as being on the human equivalent of a mountainside. But then again, it didn't seem like many people had visited him. They spoke strongly of his gloomy, irritated demeanor, and unwillingness to use his magic anymore. It seemed that shortly after he moved, he began rejecting visitors all together.

You pulled yourself along the rough rock wall with your hands, following the light, which became clearer and brighter the closer you swam.

It was just a guess, but you were certain if there was any place the Azul you knew would hide, it would be far away from others, holed up in a spot where he'd be safe and unbothered.

The relatively small opening to the cavern you were less than a few feet from fit the definition to a tee.

Maybe 12 feet across both directions, the mouth of the cavern felt tucked away.

You took in a deep breath when you reached the edge, seeing the gauzy purple light brighten from within, relishing the strange feeling of water filling your lungs instead of air.

"Azul?" You called out, unsteady and feeling small in the vast ocean around you, hands still tightly gripped on the rough rocky surface.

A small flurry of bubbles, and the light turned off with a tick.

"I'm not accepting visitors at the moment." A voice called from within, annoyance pricking every syllable.

You sighed and valted yourself into the entrance of the cave with relief, not going any farther.

"Did you not hear me? Step out of my home, I have not invited you here!" His tone was sharp and outright angry.

You couldn't see a thing in the dark now, but you could feel the soft swish in the water of Azul's swift movements nearby.

"Zullie, it's me." You called into the dark, feeling unsettled.

A silence seemed to fall over the small space.

"...Yuu?"

His voice shook, a little weaker than he had clearly intended it to come out.

"I've missed you." You said tentively, hoping he would turn the light on already.

"Why are you here?"

His voice was composed and sharp again.

"W-well," it was your turn to stutter. He seemed almost angry that you were here. "I found a portal back to school and.. I found out that you had left, and I just..." Though you tried to keep yourself together, tears began to flow freely into the ocean. "I couldn't leave you alone. The first person I went looking for when I came back, was you."

You could hear the heavy breathing from what you could now identify as across the room.

That swish of movement again, and--

"Leave me be."

"What-?"

"You heard me." He sounded solemn. "Go, Yuu. Go back to school, or go back home." His voice was softened and shaky; you could hear small sniffles.

"Azul, please, I've missed you so much!" He must have heard the panic, the hurt in your voice, but he only sank deeper into the depths of his cave.

"I don't want you here." He mumbled. "I don't want you here, and I'm not coming back to school either. Don't wait for me."

"Zullie, please! What happened? What's made you like this?"

"You have," He grumbled into the waves.

Your voice dropped to a whisper. "Me? What did I do?" You sat at the edge of the cave.

He didn't respond.

"I'll sit here until you tell me," you warned, in a voice softer than you thought you could manage.

The silence answered you.

"Azul.. I'll go. Just, listen for a moment. I'm sorry if I hurt you... I.. I really missed you. I'm so, so sorry, I'm--" You were crying into your hands at this point.

A single tentacle wrapped around your arm and gently tugged it away from your face.

"It's not your fault.. I shouldn't have hidden it from you. Yuu.. there was something I neglected to tell you before you left. I.. love you. And I didn't tell you. And I've regretted that every day since. I didn't think I would ever get the chance to tell you again."

The tentacle tightened around your arm.

You wiped your tears away, a wry laugh escaping from your mouth amongst the remnants of sobs.

"That's.. what I regretted too. I didn't tell you either.. I love you too, Azul."

You crawled closer to embrace him.

The tentacle rapidly whished away, and you heard him scoot back. You stopped in your tracks.

"..Azul?"

"Yuu.." You could hear the pain in his voice. "It would still be better if you left."

"Absolutely not! You can't j-just confess and expect to escape it now!" You protested. "I've missed you for far too long. Please, I don't want to leave you right now."

You grasped in the dark, coming into contact with a tentacle you gently pulled toward you, sensing Azul moving closer with it.

"You.. you won't like me anymore." His voice is breathy and he sounds pitiful.

"Who said that?"

"You don't understand... I'm not.. what you remember."

"What does that mean?"

"I look different."

"Your mer form, you mean? I've seen it before."

"No.. I looked different in.. other ways."

"...What do you mean?"

The air that hung between you was dampened by the cold, lonely feeling of sadness.

"I used to be fit, and beautiful, for a time... but I couldn't keep that up after you left. Now I'm just a disgusting remnant of who I was when you knew me. I've done nothing but indulge myself in treats, forgotten all about ideal caloric intake, I've not exercised or--" His voice was tangibly anxious, fast and unstable. You could guarantee his eyes were glazed over with tears.

You squeezed the tentacle you were holding tighter, watching him quiet as he wrapped it around your hand, shaking and softly crying.

"Azul, are you trying to tell me that you've gained weight?"

"I look disgusting."

You cast your eyes downward with solemn understanding. "I doubt that, Zullie. I can't imagine you could ever look anything other than perfect in my eyes." Your voice was whisper quiet, but his breath still caught at the sentiment, whimpers lessening as you gently ran a finger back and forth over his suckers to calm him.

"Don't hate me." He muttered, suddenly pulling away from you and shuffling to the other side of the cavern again.

Click

The light revealed your beautiful octo-mer, still as wonderfully entrancing and gorgeous as you'd remembered.

He took your breath away. You could hardly even see any imperfections, even now. His stomach was rounder, his arms were less toned, his jawline was softer and his tentacles looked more full than before. But he was still the most beautiful man you'd ever lain eyes on.

His icy blue eyes were filled with tears you couldn't overlook, and before he could say another word, you launched yourself upon him in a tearful embrace, soothing him with soft whispers while your tears intermingled with his into the open ocean.

His tentacles wrapped against you, words of love and passion falling from both your lips.

You put your hands on each side of his face, guiding him to look into your eyes.

"Azul, I don't see any difference. You're still you. And I love you because of the Azul up here--" you pushed a finger at his forehead. "Not because your body has changed. I love you, Azul. And I won't leave you again."

He buried his head against your neck.

"I love you, I love you so much, Yuu..."

"Zullie.. I'm here to stay. Do you hear me? I'm never leaving you again."

He pulled you tighter to him, sobbing once again.

"Thank you... thank you for coming back, Angelfish."

°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°•°

May 31st, 2023

Yeah, this was healing, I know I'm not fat but damn I feel horrible about my body :(

-Kaori

[merakiui]

Mera... can I ask you for some Cater thoughts pretty please? 🤲

Any thoughts, I love all the ideas you come up with! >< Be it sk, fwb, a band au, just obsessed.... all good!

:D of course!!! I will happily share Cater thoughts.

✧ there's a yan fic idea I have for Cater that's told entirely in blog post format. Sort of like those smau fics, only instead of through texts/tweets you'd see something like,,,, the twst equivalent for tumblr or myspace and it's Cay-Cay's little private blog where he shares all of his innermost thoughts. The posts start innocent enough and then in classic yan fashion it derails terribly as Cater falls deeper into obsession with you.

✧ I like to think that when Cater's really stressed or self-loathing he just,,, uses Split Card to kill off his clones in whatever way matches the emotion(s) he's feeling in that moment. But then he probably also isolates himself when he's in bad moods. Definitely tries to distract himself with even more social media.....

✧ a pink bitch club au. Cater as Minako, Kalim as Gyaruko, and Lilia as Charlotte!!!! I feel like the role of VYT-24 fits Ortho because,,, android.

✧ omegaverse fwb......... whether he's an alpha, omega, or beta!!!! all is good!!! orz orz orz Cater helping you through your heats/ruts. Cater who gets too attached.

✧ serial killers Cater and Trey who work together. Aaaa but then serial killers Cater and Riddle.......... Riddle the lawful doctor who can easily find ways to cover things up or provide Cater with certain tools!!!

✧ serial killer Cater who livestreams all of his murders,,, live snuff. >_<

✧ the trope of popular guy is secretly deranged or a gross degenerate. You admire Cater's Magicam presence, but in real life he's actually horribly obsessed and gross. >:D

✧ there's some sort of Secret Alliance au to be had with Reader in the role of Eun Sian, Lilia as Chae Yul/Yuri, and Cater as Hyun Yujin.

✧ idol Cater....... all of his songs seem so strangely personal, as if they're about a specific person. Little do they know that same mystery person is locked up in his home. :)

✧ assisted non-con...... Cater and Trey teaching Ace and Deuce how to please you. Or maybe it's the two of them teaching Riddle because Queen knows he has no idea what he's doing. Leave it to the socially skilled upperclassmen to teach him what to do!!!

✧ I forget Cater is canonically talented at skateboarding...... there's a brain rot in there somewhere...

[shalomniscient]

I downloaded Path to Nowhere because of you, and Sinful Lanterns, and rolled for Shalom, since you seemed to like her

I lost the 50/50 20 rolls in to Oak Casket

But 20 pulls later and I got Shalom!

I think you give me good luck!

Er, for future reference, I would like to know how she works?

I just started the game last night, so I'm unsure how the combat mechanics are and the descriptions are... confusing?

I'm sure I'll get used to them eventually, but it usually takes me around a week to get used to the UI and equate everything in the newest-played gacha game to something in my frame of reference.

Any help would be appreciated! Sorry this isn't an ask or a thirst or anything, when I get into the story and understand the characters, I'll see if I can send you something :>

DAMN aisno should be paying me and angey promo fees LMAO anyway, glad you've gotten into the game !! the gameplay takes some getting used to but if you can power through it the story is absolutely worth it, as i'm sure you've heard. i'll try and give a quick rundown of shalom's mechanics: -> her normal atk bounces around between enemies making her good for clearing a lot of enemies at once (known in the meta as waveclear. another character good at waveclear is NOX, but her waveclear is limited to her ult. still an overall excellent character, though.) -> her ult breaks 2 cores (the little diamonds on enemies). -> her ECB (exclusive crimebrand) allows her to put down a special diamond that allows her normal atk to bounce a few more times. useful in single target fights against bosses. however, her ECB is only unlocked when you reach past lvl70, so you don't really have to worry about it right now.

some tips for general mechanics: -> crimebrands are ptn's version of genshin's artifacts. crimebrands can be S, A or B. crimebrand main stats and substats are fixed. the gacha element comes from actually getting the crimebrand you want (usually, tuning zero). -> exclusive crimebrands are kind of like ascension talents from genshin. for some characters it adds some changes to their playstyles, like enfer getting corebreak, but for others it may just be a huge dmg buff. -> cores are the diamond symbols that appear on enemies. breaking cores puts the enemy in a state where they take increased damage, but it's only temporary. after a few seconds the boss will recover and you'll have to wait for them to regain their cores. some bosses spawn in with cores, others you have to wait for a while before they gain cores. -> characters who can corebreak have red in their icon in the character menu. -> tendencies are like honkai star rail's paths system. fury is equivalent to destruction (high dmg, high health); endura is equivalent to preservation (shielding, dmg mitigation, blocking more than 1 enemy); umbra is equivalent to hunt (high dmg, high mobility, low hp); catalyst is equivalent to harmony + abundance + nihility (buffs allied units, heals, debuffs enemies). the remaining tendencies don't really have an equivalent i can think of, but arcane characters deal magic dmg exclusively and have high ult dmg but low hp, while reticle characters deal continuous dmg over long range, but also have low hp. ideally you'd want to put arcane and reticle characters in your backline where they're safer. -> if i'm not mistaken, there's only 2 dmg types in ptn, either physical or magic. this has some importance in endgame content depending on boss resistances, but i think you'd be very familiar with the game by then to figure it out.

off the top of my head this is mainly what confused me when i started out, so i hope this will be helpful. for more help you can head to s1n.gg, which has way more information structure in a way more understandable format lmao. anyway, good luck !!

[eldritch-spouse]

What books do the Icons like to read? I'm sometimes a graphic novel type.

All of them read the amount necessary to execute their function as demonlords, and the "magical arts" of their sin type.

If you assume Cero reads anything but law and politics books, you'd be sorely mistaken. Every once in a blue moon he'll read about history, mostly Hell's history, but also some surface history.

Vesper writes. He prefers to create stories that, aside from innovating smut as a whole, also explore facets of identity and life as a concubus. He's not very preoccupied with reading beyond what he has to in order to create his works of fiction.

Rinx reads the equivalent of what can be called buyer manuals. Texts that inform him of how to properly evaluate what he wants to buy. Anything that has to do with general or advanced economy in Hell and outside of it is also appreciated.

Vorticia doesn't have as much time to read as the others. She prefers something a little more indulgent, like an easily digestible (hah) romance, or anything that has to do with inovating gastronomy.

Zizz has short bursts where he absolutely devours books in an incredibly short span of time. He tends to read about astrology, the subconscious mind and brain activity during rest periods.

Kalymir hardly reads. He likes content in short and concise formats, the least amount of embellishments and subtle depth, the better.

Livius is all over the place. One day he'll read a fantasy novel, the next he's browsing scientific articles, and then he's into parodies- His literature tastes are as defined as his general personality.

[digimonirl]

It's a sad inevitability that all good things come to an end, including our time with our Digimon. But, every ending is just a chance for a new beginning and with Digimon that means the start of a new growth cycle! Today we're going to be touching on the Digimon life cycle, focusing on how to care for a digitama and what to do while you wait for your partner's new life to begin!

First off, for the newer Tamers in the audience, Digimon do not "die" at the end of a growth cycle. Think of it more like a transformation; the Digimon will shed excess data and surround their Digicore in a hard protective shell while reforming their remaining data into a Stage I form. A Digimon is strictly speaking alive for every step of the process and even if we humans find it useful to assign terms like "brith" and "death" to the process, it's important to keep in mind that Digimon cultures tend to think of it more as a period of rest and rejuvenation rather than a strict end or start to one's life.

Next up we have the tamas themselves! Digitamas, or Digieggs if you prefer, are the natal stage of all Digimon with no real exceptions. Despite looking like the kind of eggs you'd find here on Earth, tamas are actually incredibly durable and require no outside heat to incubate. Fragments of tamas donated for research have been shown to withstand puncture wounds and small caliber fire without so much as a scratch! Lastly, Digitama also display a wide variety of colors and patterns. Patterns seem to be unique to the individual as there is no correlation between the colors displayed on the egg and what species it will hatch into. This is consistent between naturally occurring Digitama and ones that were created via a data composition machine, leading researchers to believe that the color of one's tama is analogous to finger prints in us humans!

"But Lady", I hear you asking, "That's all well and good but how do I care for a Digiegg if they just seem to hatch on their own?". Don't worry friend, there's actually a lot you can do for your partner to help them along in the hatching process! To keep things convenient for mobile readers, I'll be formatting this section into bullet points.

1. Prepare a nest or incubator for the tama: It is true that tamas don't need outside heat to incubate, but a safe environment for both the tama and the resulting newborn is always going to be ideal. Incubators are the high end solution to this, most models being the Digimon equivalent of those backpacks you can buy to carry your pets around in. They're temperature controlled and very easily portable, most actually do have straps to make them into backpacks, so it's hard to argue against getting one. That being said, if you can't afford the steep price tag, a nest will do just fine friend. Bunch up some old blankets and pile them onto a sturdy pillow and your new friend will hatch just as well as one kept in a fancy incubator.

2. Wait: The time it takes for tamas to hatch varies between individuals, and can even vary between an individual Digimon's growth cycles. Some artificial Digitama have been observed hatching in as little as ten minutes, while the longest recorded hatch time for a naturally occurring Digitama was a little under a month! Generally speaking though, most tamas take about three to five days to hatch regardless of their point of origin. Don't be stressed if your friend takes a little longer than usual, you can't rush growth.

3. Be prepared for change: While it is true that most Digimon's Stage I and II forms remain fairly consistent, it is still ultimately as random as digivolution. I've already done a resource post on what to do immediately after a tama hatches so I won't go too in depth here, but it is worth repeating that you should be ready to accept change as it comes and be prepared to help your partner with basic tasks for the few days to weeks it'll take them to reach Stage III again.

4. Last but not least, care for yourself: Even if we know our partners aren't gone forever, waiting for them to hatch can take its toll on us Tamers. It's important to keep yourself busy during this time and to use it to enrich your life away from your partner. I always take time between growth cycles to tidy up around the house and give myself a spa day. I think that having a clean home and a refreshed attitude helps both you and your partner come into this new experience with a better foot forward but you can do whatever will make you happiest! There's no right or wrong way to care for yourself, as long as you put in the effort it'll pay off.

That's all we have for now friends! As always, make sure to send us any questions y'all have on today's post and we'll try to answer them as they come. Good luck, and we hope that y'all's partners hatch soon!

[subhumanselflover]

Hello, can you do smut to fluff with Baiken getting impregnated by the reader and then how she would be as a mom? Thanks

note: okay. i'm not gonna lie this is a scary request for me because this is NOT subject matter i'm used to, and i still need to figure out how to write baiken.. especially in this particular scenario. however, i am an encourager of playing with canon like dolls, and don't wanna leave ya waiting any longer, anon. anyways, i'm formatting it as a few scenarios. if you want more and something more specific, my ko-fi is linked in my pinned :3 also no offense anon but i chuckled a little at this being the third request i got. lightheartedly, i feel like i've been hit with the writer's equivalent of "now draw her pregnant". okay, anyways, enough mar yapping, hope you enjoy

Baiken x Reader NSFW, Dearest

Hands wandering over her, you worked to please the samurai under you. Thrusting into Baiken's warm wetness, she let out a quiet, growling moan, reaching for your head to pull lightly at your hair. "I'm getting close, Baiken," You warned her, trying to be polite, which she usually appreciated. "Mm, I can tell," She said with a smirk, clearly a bit softer than usual. "Cum inside this time," She demanded, leaving little room for argument, or anything of the sort. And so, without wanting to displease her, you did.

Something about that was.. strange. Baiken seemed to have no interest in motherhood before. Sure, she had practically adopted Delilah, and done a damn good job taking care of her, but she had never willingly talked of being a mother. But due to the fact that she fell asleep right after sex, snoring rather loudly next to you, you couldn't talk to her about it until the morning. For now, you curled up with her in your arms, and decided you'd make it the topic of conversation over breakfast.

And when the morning came, you brought it up to her. However, Baiken being Baiken, simply stated that she decided she'd like to be a mother. She wanted to give someone a life that had been better than hers, at least as much as she could control. Understanding, you began to prepare together to become parents.

Baiken's pregnancy was not easy. The emotions were.. difficult to deal with, and you swore you were going to get your head cut off one of these days. All in all, you did your best to take care of her, but she took it the wrong way on a fair amount of days. "You think I can't take care of myself?" She'd growl, and you tried not to make a big deal of defending yourself, as that would only likely make it worse. You both did your best.

(I am not writing anything about childbirth. If you wanted that, I remind you that my ko-fi is in my pinned post.)

In the early days of having a newborn, Baiken got up many nights to deal with your child crying. She'd grumble as she left your shared bed, but if you went in to check on her, you'd find her lovingly holding the child in her arms, trying as she could to soothe the little one. As she held the child, she gave you a dirty look, as if you hadn't seen her act soft before. You laugh to yourself a little. When you left the room, she kissed the newborn on the head, and put them down into the crib once they stopped crying. As you had went back to bed, you notice in the morning that Baiken didn't rejoin you-- no, you found her the next morning sitting on the chair adjacent to the crib in the child's nursery. She had stayed all night, just in case she was needed again.

[homebrew-a-la-traumaverse]

Subclasseptember Day 29: Wild

The Deadeye Conclave - Homebrew Ranger Subclass

For something that's treated as Ranger's equivalent of Divine Smite, Hunter's Mark really doesn't get treated like Ranger's Divine Smite. There's Banishing Smite, Searing Smite, Blinding Smite... Why no Hunter's Mark variants?

We'll have to put that project on the shelf for now. Until then, here's this.

We're almost done with Subclasseptember. Let's finish strong!

Playing around with image formatting around text. You'd think there'd be a better way than manually adjusting every single line, but I haven't heard of it.

... Hey, what happened to Aloy's arrow? Are arrows usually headless?

[acradelius]

Please can you do a junkerqueen X Male Reader maybe reader is a overwatch agent trying to recruit her and ends up getting into a fight with her that goes like this

"So, About That Recruiting Process, Eh?"

Fandom: Overwatch / Overwatch 2

Pairing: Junker Queen ("Odessa 'Dez' Stone") x Male! Reader

Rating: Lime [🟢] - (Equivalent to PG-13)

Warnings/Mention Ofs: Reforming Overwatch Era, Recruiter! Reader, Male Pronouns Used For Reader, Mentions Of Various Other Characters, Reader Almost Gets Beheaded, Reader Gets Stepped On- Literally, Humor- Probably A Bit Dry, Reader Blatantly Tries To Flirt, Open Ending (?).

Word Count: 1,529 Words

If you'd like to be tagged for all posts, certain fandom posts, or certain character posts then feel free to message me!

(Y/N) had to continuously keep pinching the flesh upon his arms to make sure that this indeed was now his reality, and not just some bizarre lucid dream that he was currently experiencing. It had begun with him assisting the legendary Reinhardt and some of his companions in destroying the command ship that was wreaking havoc to the city of Gothenburg. Now here he was as one of the handful of recruits for the secondary formation of Overwatch, being given a tour of the newest headquarters located within Malevento, Italy. It was an amazing experience so far! Getting to meet various former heroes such as Cassidy and Sojourn, and then newer members such as Lucio and D.Va. (Y/N) couldn’t wait to begin the trainings and then be able to go on missions, to begin coming up with concepts of his own costume, to be able to- 

‘Uh, (Y/N)?’ 

Oh, yeah. 

Turns out that it wasn’t all how (Y/N) had believed how things were going to go. 

‘You doing alright down there, luv? You’ve been quiet for these last couple of minutes?’ 

While it was quite obvious to him that he wasn’t going to be instantly thrown in missions that were dangerous or would end up in extreme circumstances, this was definitely not what (Y/N) was thinking when he was recruited for Overwatch. Instead of being sent on basic covert missions to help address future locations that the Null Sector would attempt to strike at next, it turns out that the former members of the Overwatch crew had decided that the perfect position for (Y/N) would be to venture out and go recruit other members of interest to increase their numbers. 

Yeah, you heard that right. 

(Y/N) (L/N), newest recruiter for Overwatch.

‘Uh, yeah.. Doin’ fine, Le- I, uh, mean.. Tracer.. Yeah, just finally getting around to the last person that’s on the list for this area that some of the others are interested in recruiting. 

“Let’s see, where we’re at on this damn thing..”

Mako Rutledge.. “Roadhog”.. 

Jamison Fawkes.. “Junkrat”.. 

Ah, there we are! Odessa “Dez” Stone.. Junker Queen..

‘Wait, Tracer? This.. wasteland.. Actually has a Queen? Like they have literal lines of royalty out in this dump?’ (Y/N) questions the woman over his comms, eyebrows furrowing slightly as he proceeds to reread the name and the context following a couple of times just to make sure that what he was seeing was actually correct. There’s absolutely no way that a place as.. chaotic and savage.. would have any sort of royalty, let alone the capacity to really understand how royalty and their systems work. At least there couldn’t be, right? 

‘It’s not what you would think when thinking of the term ‘royalty’, such how royalty is within other places. For example, the United Kingdom, where I’m from. Within Junkertown, the term royalty follows more- Well, it’s a bit complicated to explain. Let’s get this process done quickly so we can get you out of there before the locals start getting riled up with an outsider being in their presence.’ 

Tracer was definitely right, and (Y/N) couldn’t agree with her anymore than he already did. The faster that he could get this recruitment process done and over with, that’s if this “Junker Queen” agreed to be recruited, then the better that this whole situation would be. He could only hope that it wouldn’t be as hectic as dealing with that “Roadhog” and “Junkrat” duo. 

It’s not like there was a possibility that this trip could become even weirder than it already has been.

..Right? 

“Hold on,” Apparently there was a bodyguard that (Y/N) had to address his intentions to, and apparently be deemed worthy by the bodyguard, before being able to approach the Junker Queen. “So, you’re telling me that you’re the Queen’s bodyguard?” 

A hamster. 

A hamster that’s in a mechanical ball. 

A hamster that’s in a mechanical ball, that speaks apparently, is the Queen’s bodyguard. 

“Affirmative.” 

It’s then that there’s a somewhat awkward moment of silence, moreso from (Y/N)’s side than the hamster that has informed the man to address him as “Hammond”, as they stand there and just stare at each other. (Y/N) then proceeds to hold out the list of individuals for recruitment. “Uh, so I’m (Y/N), one of the newer members and now the recruiter for Overwatch, or at least this reformation of it, and your.. Queen.. happens to be upon the list.. So, would I be able to meet her? To discuss the possibility that she might be interested in joining?” He could only think about what Tracer’s thoughts might possibly be as she was also watching through the cameras that were located within the hall that Winston had managed to infiltrate, and ultimately (Y/N) wouldn’t be surprised if she was to tell him that his next task was to attempt to recruit the damn hamster as well. 

“Right this way.” 

There’s something similar to an eerie silence that begins to overcome the environment as (Y/N) proceeds to follow Hammond down the hallway to where apparently the Queen’s throne was located, or at least what (Y/N) would hope to be the Queen’s throne and not some crazy death trap. Just a quick turn around to look behind him to ease the slight paranoia that had begun to work its way within the depths of his mind, but (Y/N) turns back around to find out that he’s apparently lost sight of Hammond. ..Somehow.. But at this point it doesn’t necessarily matter. Back to the original purpose of being here, recruiting the Queen. 

“Uh, hello?” He calls out into the open, the sound of his voice echoing off the metal walls, but not being met with any response whatsoever. Just the creaking and groaning of machinery within the background. “Hello?” (Y/N) calls out once again for safe measure, for maybe he wasn’t heard in the first place- “What the hell?!” A slight shriek leaves past his lips as there’s a sudden blur that whips past his face, the breeze from the encounter causing his hair to become disheveled. He doesn’t necessarily get even a moment to process and figure out what the thing was that had flown past him and imbedded itself into the wall behind him - object, person, whatever it happens to be, before he’s having to quickly throw himself back to avoid having his face sliced off from the ax that has seemed to materialize out of thin air and just inches away from his face. “H-Holy shit!” 

‘(Y/N)! Look out!-’ 

Tracer’s voice, a panicked tone, could be heard through the comms not even a moment later, but it was already too late at that point to give a proper reaction, as (Y/N) could only focus on the brief pain that surged from what seemed to be the thick heel of a boot colliding with his chest, and then pain surging through him once again as his back collides harshly with the floor beneath him. 

Was this the end for him? 

How his life long dreams were now going to be short lived memories?

Yet, what he wasn’t expecting was to feel an immense pressure upon his face and practically be tasting a mixture of dirt and rubber. Moving his face proves to be fruitless as the pressure on his face increases. 

‘(Y/N)?! (Y/N)?! Are you okay?!’ 

“Oh, doing fine!-”

There wasn’t any doubt that she was definitely something of a taller woman. While she didn’t necessarily need those couple inches of wedge upon her boots to give her that extra height, it was definitely a mixture of not only intimidating but also attractive as well. (Y/N) couldn’t necessarily care about height, but that was more his personal preference. The various variants of blue within her hair, despite that he could see the brown color peeking out within her roots, yet it’s quite an eye-catcher as while typically the colors would contrast within the red of her eyes, yet, it just made her all that more beautiful. Don’t get (Y/N) started on the articles of her appearance either. From the metal studs that were embedded into the fabric of her clothing to the faded makeup to her eyes. It just enhanced it all. Tied everything together like it was a bow on a present. 

God, she was just absolutely beautiful. 

‘Are you sure that “doing fine” is the correct choice of words? You’re literally being crushed by the Junker Queen, (Y/N)!’

There’s some soft, muffled chuckle that makes way past (Y/N)’s lips at Tracer’s words, watching as Odessa proceeds to lean down to get a better glance of the man beneath her foot while a slight sneer begins to make its way to her own lips. “Well, Tracer, she’s kinda fine, if you happen to get what I mean~” He goes to lift his arm which briefly catches Odessa’s attention, slightly waving the clipboard that he somehow, miraculously still held onto. 

“So, gorgeous~ How about we get started on discussing you joining Overwatch?~”

[yuri-is-online]

Hi! I know it's a bit weird of me to put another thing in your periphery so soon after my last check-in. But I'm currently caught up in Princess Peach: Showtime! brainrot and I thought you'd like to hear it!

So in one of your earlier posts you came up with the idea of Yuu having a modern Alice in Wonderland-esque overblot with Grim as their phantom. But, having spent the better part of a week trying to hundred percent this game (why am I like this?) gave me another worm. And it goes something like this:

What if Grim isn't the only one gaining something from those blot crystals?

Because in the game, Peach changes "form" so to speak, after taking in a bunch of Sparkle. So who's to say Yuu isn't unknowingly absorbing runoff blot from those crystals? Then who's to say that Yuu doesn't have similar "forms" to the Overblot boys? Snapshots immortalized in ink and imbeded in a human who is slowly but surely losing it. And, going along with your idea of a Yuu overblot, what would it be like for the boys to have to effectively face themselves should that happen? Now it's not just Grim they have to face but a reflection of them at their lowest and the one victim who has been dragged to it every single time. The pain, the fear, the regret! Ah! I didn't know I could think of something so angsty! (And that's not even talking about Peach's last form and the Yuu equivalent!)

Anyway, make of that what you will. I just wanted to get that out there. Hope you're doing well and staying healthy! Looking forward to the next thing you make!

Sincerely,

The anon who loves Riddle & Azul

I really do love the way you format your asks dear friend, it is rather like receiving a letter. It is splendid to hear from you again so soon.

I had a brain rot myself a bit a while ago thinking about how it would be interesting for Yuu and Grim to channel the overblot forms similar to Eden's Promise: Eternity in FFXIV:

In my mind I was thinking how I would design a boss fight where Grim has three forms and Yuu has three forms, and then they merge to channel the Thorn Fairy since she's too powerful for just the one of them... but meh that's neither here nor there. The idea of Yuu with forms that reflect the various phantoms and physical attacks that reflect the overblot boys is so delicious, but realistically I think the concept you are describing where the boys are being forced to face themselves is the point of the various chapters we are going through in Book 7 right now. Grim and Yuu twisted into an overblotted abomination... you could argue that facing them would be the equivalent of what is happening with the ob boys right now in his book. It would be easy for him to blame the other dorm leaders and act like if they didn't overblot then he wouldn't be forced to hurt his first friend... but then that would be a disservice to you. He very much had his part to play, the largest one perhaps. In you now is a twisted reflection of everything he hated about himself: his power and his inability to save those he loved with it. You don't need any form other than your own to taunt him with that.

I do think you are onto something about the crystals not just affecting Grim. If we think about the relationship between Grim and Yuu, I think it makes the most sense to say that what Yuu gains from the blot crystals is their premonitions of overblot? Memories sealed in crystal are a fairly common trope... so if the memories of the respective phantom is trapped inside of that crystal then Yuu's visions could be the crystals calling out to them. I am less solid on the "why" but when I think about it this way, something about Grim and Yuu's connection allows Yuu to "hear" the crystals forming, which is why we don't get visions of every bad thing that happens (Rollo and Fellow for example) because there is no "Flower of Evil" about to bloom. Perhaps the Great 7's crystals "belong" to Grim/the Chimera in some way so that's why they are calling to Yuu? I need to think a bit more, but oh I am so glad you sent this ask. It gave me so much to think about...

[corvidiss]

Greetings, Dirk Gently fandom; I bring you great news! A saviour has been born!

Introducing: a searchable DGHDA scene index!

-

What is it?

It's a way to categorise and search for every single scene in the show.

You can sort by character, tone, season, activity level, etc, and the spreadsheet will automatically give you all the scenes that match your search with a link to their start and end times on YouTube!

Why?

The original intention of this was for fic writers – as the writing equivalent of a folder of reference images. But it has as many applications as you can think of for it!

How?

Four days of me hyperfocusing on spreadsheet formulae. Worth it.

-

But!!! There's a Problem!

See, I've set the whole thing up, with formatting and formulae and so on – but, at present, there isn't actually anything in it.

There's something like 900 scenes in the whole show.

So: I'm asking for your help!

I've got a document linked below explaining everything involved, but in short: if we produce a community effort and divide the episodes between us, the whole thing will be filled out and functional much more quickly!

There's no pressure to do anything you don't feel up for, so don't feel like you have to input loads to take part! And if you don't take part at all for any reason, that's also completely fine. Your presence in the fandom is always enough <3

If you do feel up for anything, your help will be greatly appreciated!!

Interested? Read the document and get in touch!!

The Guide Document:

The Spreadsheet:

(The sheet is view-only at the moment for safety. Read the document and get in touch with me if you'd like to help out!)

-

P.S. We've got an active DGHDA discord server if you'd like to hang out and discuss anything DGHDA related! The guys there have been vital to this spreadsheet's production so far, and are wonderful to be around; come join us if you want to! Here's the link - DM me somewhere if it's expired!

[theminecraftbee]

oh yeah anyway my further deckbuilding advice for hctcg (and other tcgs) but this time less 'actual talk about ratios' and more 'philosophical advice i guess':

netdeck (copy other people) all you'd like. yes i KNOW people will be rude when you netdeck a popular deck but like... actually who cares, deckbuilding is a skill, it's hard, and netdecking gives you a framework you can be pretty sure is decent to start playing with so you can learn mechanically without losing all the time. later, you can adjust it to use stuff you like more, or adjust it based on what you see other people playing. (this is basically entirely how i build magic decks for mtg:a standard, i find a version of what i want to play that someone else made and then adjust it as i play it to be more what i want to play.)

similarly people will complain a LOT about people who play the meta and just... ignore those guys? if you enjoy playing meta play the meta. learning the meta and, more importantly, why certain strategies are meta will make you better at running off-meta when you want to too. literally any competitive game will have a meta, devs will use banlists/limited lists/errata to try to rebalance and change the meta as needed, players will try to break the meta. that's how it goes. you're not a bad person if you like winning. winning is fun. play meta all you want.

if you like a certain effect just build your deck around that thing you'll have fun with it i promise. yes even if it's bad. yes "is this thing really an optimal choice" is how i do a lot of thinking (hence my deck being so many three-ofs part of my process is "if i'm playing this, is it worth playing at less than three"), but that's not everyone's thing. "does this spark joy" is also important!

(glances back at mtg:a again there's a REASON i refused to play mono-black for like the past three sets and that's because i just don't like it, even if playing a deck that could actually play sheoldred probably would have been better,)

remember that single game format kinda sucks a little bit and there's a reason most tournaments play with a sideboard (set of 8-15 cards that you can swap in between games after seeing what your opponent plays). actually DO recommend sideboarding with friends. sideboarding is fun.

you're allowed to tell your friends you're playing with like, your own invented banlist, that's a thing you can do, have fun with it.

uh. basic items are boring but you need to play a lot of them unless you're playing really low-curve and even then my mono-redstone is the equivalent of 'really low curve' and i still hesitate to cut more items,

did you know i got FTKed by stress the other day? because i'm like this and think people should be allowed to play broken stuff i'll tell you how they did it, it was with a combination of rare stress, opponent flipping going second, and opponent drawing into a efficiency book turn one it was SO FUNNY. i love FTKs. winning before the opponent gets to play is very funny.

that's probably unreliable though and WILL make your friends mad at you if you do it so you know. mileage may vary

i still think "cheap and aggro" is probably the best deck atm; like, doc was complaining that pearl needs to be nerfed but i'm REALLY not convinced. maybe it's because i play the deck with all the status effects though.

idk i'm thinking about all of this. rotating it. because i'm a nerd.

[allthe-everything]

to all my babes out there trying to get a job, got some tips for y'all. i'm updating my resume and realised that what i do might help some people, and not everyone knows about ATS parsing. gonna be long, will add a tldr at the end

so, first things, instead of MS office, i use libreOffice as my document creator/word processor. stop giving microsoft your money - libreOffice is free and open source, and it's amazing. go get it. saves you money too and god knows we need that. but, i'm sure you can do this in publisher too, i just don't know all the buttons

onto techniques: instead of creating my resume in libreOffice's equivalent of word, i use the equivalent of microsoft's publisher - the thing meant for you to make cards and flyers and whatnot. essentially you just pick a size document, and get to throw things (pictures, text boxes, charts, whatever) onto the page where you want them. since it's geared more towards artsy things, it's a lot more flexible with formatting than word (moving images in word? just don't).

essentially, every snippet of information i put on my resume is one text box. each job with its description, each project i've worked on, etc gets its own text box. this is great in a couple ways: it means that if you want to change the formatting of your resume, you can just move around text boxes instead of fucking around with copy/paste all day. the second thing is that when a machine tries to read your resume, internally it'll read that pdf and see blocks of related information that's more precise than giant paragraphs you'd get in word. make your section titles their own text boxes (like experience, education, skills, etc) so they don't get lumped in with the real info.

i'm not gonna talk about "resume words" or "clean formatting" bc tbh i'm bad at that and i think recruiters are dumb sometimes for wanting "no templates, but only format it this one particular way". but get all your info there, arrange it how you see fit, and THEN. then we get sneaky.

in libreOffice, you can name and add descriptions to text boxes. "what!" i hear you say. "that's so weird why would anyone do that!". and i say "well, if a human is reading your resume, it doesn't matter what the text box thinks it is. but it's a machine reading your resume! you want to speak the machine's language." the name is less important than the description, in my opinion, but you can name the boxes too. what you're gonna do is select a text box, click on "format" at the top bar, then "description". and you're gonna add in the alt text box what this text box is. if it's a list of skills, write "skills". if it's education, write "education". this info won't show up visually to a human reading the doc, but it helps machines categorise the data, just a little bit better. in the description part of this, you can also try adding the key words from the job description so the machine sees them but a human really can't find it unless they really look. this isn't something i've been able to test thoroughly, though, so take it with a grain of salt.

i'm still working out all the kinks myself, and picking apart what the ATS does in terms of parsing your resume, but when i started doing this my resume was better parsed whenever i applied to jobs. which, bonus, less retyping your resume into the bullshit job app.

tldr; fuck microsoft, use libre office instead. use libre office's drawings app or ms office's publisher app for ease of use. in libre office, click text box, go to format -> description and add a description of what the text box contains. test and retest your resume in an ATS parser online to make sure the machine reads your resume correctly.

i wish this wasn't how things are, but since we're here might as well figure out hacks. if anyone else has info to add, please please do. it's rough out here.