#public dollars belong in public schools

[scottguy]

A strong public education system is at the heart of a strong economy.

Education isn't charity. It's society making sure we have enough engineers, doctors, researchers, and scientists to help us and to discover and invent things that keep America strong.

Poor education = poverty. Poverty is expensive to taxpayers. Education is cheap in comparison.

The rich want a two class system of "haves" versus "have-nots." But soon that will backfire when there aren't enough educated Americans to fill ALL the crucial jobs.

The wealthy 1% of Americans can't possibly be enough to fill 100% of the highly skilled jobs.

(The rich are so short sighted.)

[hopeastrz]

AQUARIUS THROUGH THE HOUSES: where you’re rebellious, the most outstanding and peerless individual.⋆🫐⋆𐙚₊˚⊹🪼♡

CHECK OUT SEPTEMBER SALE: fixed price on any and all of my readings 17 DOLLARS only.

Aquarius is the sign of sudden changes, the sign of unpredictably and where we may feel like we don’t belong or have no desire of following the crowd, that’s why we end up getting repelled by that thing, and find ourselves breaking the rules to make our own path.

NOTE: enjoy this post and don’t forget to reblog, thank you for your support, lots of love xoxo!! ₊˚⊹౨ৎ🩵.

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 1ST HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° ON THE AC.

You may have felt the need to constantly change yourself, always have something unique going on, either a new hairstyle, haircut and maybe even naturally you have a unique face, you don’t follow the current fashion style, you have a distinctive sense of style and may prefer to wear vintage things from the past like, wear 90s makeup, or you have a keen eye with you spot trends before they even become a thing. you’re also the type to break traditional beauty standards and public image rules, that may be because you’ve been told and maybe even forced from a young age to act a certain way, project a certain persona of yourself or to possess certain mannerisms, that’s why you hate being picture perfect or just ordinary, you seek uniqueness and rebel in being yourself!, (having pluto on 11th or 10th house may cause that)

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 2ND HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 2ND HOUSE.

Very unique way of handling money, you may have grown fed up with your parents perspective of money for example like: ‘you need to hard work for you money,’ or ‘money is so hard to get that’s why we’re financially unstable’, which stirred this untamed desire within you to challenge it and come up with new ideas to get money, you may work a unique source of money and you may love to keep old antiques!.

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 3RD HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 3RD HOUSE.

You have always felt that you don’t belong in your community, your school (you’ve been unlike your peers, you didn’t follow them, which may have resulted in you being bullied or becoming a loner), or the place you grew up in aka your community and your place on the social pyramid, that’s why you took the matters in your own hands and sooner or later you’ll have this urge to change everything, you may feel this need to climb up your social status which could result in you moving to a rich neighborhood for example, change your environment entirely. You may also be the most unique sibling, they may be your step siblings or you just don’t look like them!.

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 4TH HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 4TH HOUSE.

You didn’t want to follow your family’s path for you it seemed, you didn’t want to be like them or you just wanted to be very unique, your mother may have had some expectations for you but you didn’t want to even meet them. This placement may be prominent in the charts of new money wealth makers, you may change your family status drastically, and you may not want to be dependent on them or their resources.

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 5TH HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 5TH HOUSE.

Very distinctive talents, you date the most unique people and maybe even have a very distinctive taste, you go to many underrated artists concerts, visit unique or unknown places during your vacations and also have some real different interests.

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 6TH HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 6TH HOUSE.

You have a unique routine or a specific lifestyle, your parents may have been chaotic, which made you seek discipline in your life, or very strict which made you seek freedom, either way you have a very unique routine in the gym and in your daily life!, also you may have some unique pets and work ethic!, you may be known as the most creative one between your coworkers.

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 7TH HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 7TH HOUSE.

You are uniquely independent, the most distinctive partner, someone who came to break marriages stereotypes of your family or this generation!, you may hate the idea of codependency,having a traditional partner or relationship, which may result in you preferring not to marry at all!, there’s just something about marriages that you see worthless or just unnecessary, and you may prefer to be on your own, your freedom is your one and only love, since you may be traumatized by your own parents marriage. (Scorpio on the 4th house!.)

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 8TH HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 8TH HOUSE.

Well well, the usual, you may have some unique kinks or sources of income, in other words your job may pay you some money but it won’t be your main source of income, you may know some unique taboo stuff or are interested in some real dark and underrated practices!, you also may be a very unique partner in bed!.

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 9TH HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 9TH HOUSE.

You may feel like you don’t belong to your country, the era you are born in or you may feel very close to another culture than your own. Another thing is that you have been living in another country than the one your parents or you were born in!, I’ve seen this placement occur daily with natives who chose to immigrate and save their families or their own future. Also you may studied a very unique, specific major or went to a unique and underrated university.

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 10TH HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 10TH HOUSE.

Your job is unique, and also your reputation, you may have a very weird and almost taboo public image, which may have nothing to do with the real you!, people say the most flabbergasting things about you, and the rumors you may hear about you make you question everything thing seriously from how bizarre they are lmao, also you may have a unique job of career!.

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 11TH HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 11TH HOUSE.

You’re the most unique one in your friend group, or you just don’t befriend people who look like you, in my head i pictured a group of friends full of rockstars and then there’s you all sunshine and rainbows lmao. You also may have some very rebellious dreams you chase, things that people may feel like they’re impossible for you to achieve!, like to be a millionaire or billionaire!.

AQUARIUS OR URANUS IN THE 12TH HOUSE | AQUARIUS DEGREES 11°, 23° 12TH HOUSE.

You are the most unique when it comes to being spiritual, like these people are the best when it comes to spiritual advice or guidance, your parents may have been so religious or quite the opposite so you had to become spiritual on your own and make your own path, also you guys sleep.. weirdly????, pls stop tossing and turning😭!!.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Uncle Sam paid to develop a cancer drug and now one guy will get to charge whatever he wants for it

Today (Oct 19), I'm in Charleston, WV to give the 41st annual McCreight Lecture in the Humanities. Tomorrow (Oct 20), I'm at Charleston's Taylor Books from 12h-14h.

The argument for pharma patents: making new medicines is expensive, and medicines are how we save ourselves from cancer and other diseases. Therefore, we will award government-backed monopolies – patents – to pharma companies so they will have an incentive to invest their shareholders' capital in research.

There's plenty wrong with this argument. For one thing, pharma companies use their monopoly winnings to sell drugs, not invent drugs. For every dollar pharma spends on research, it spends three dollars on marketing:

https://www.bu.edu/sph/files/2015/05/Pharmaceutical-Marketing-and-Research-Spending-APHA-21-Oct-01.pdf

And that "R&D" isn't what you're thinking of, either. Most R&D spending goes to "evergreening" – coming up with minor variations on existing drugs in a bid to extend those patents for years or decades:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3680578/

Evergreening got a lot of attention recently when John Green rained down righteous fire upon Johnson & Johnson for their sneaky tricks to prevent poor people from accessing affordable TB meds, prompting this excellent explainer from the Arm and A Leg Podcast:

https://armandalegshow.com/episode/john-green-part-1/

Another thing those monopoly profits are useful for: "pay for delay," where pharma companies bribe generic manufacturers not to make cheap versions of drugs whose patents have expired. Sure, it's illegal, but that doesn't stop 'em:

https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/topics/competition-enforcement/pay-delay

But it's their money, right? If they want to spend it on bribes or evergreening or marketing, at least some of that money is going into drugs that'll keep you and the people you love from enduring unimaginable pain or dying slowly and hard. Surely that warrants a patent.

Let's say it does. But what about when a pharma company gets a patent on a life-saving drug that the public paid to develop, test and refine? Publicly funded work is presumptively in the public domain, from NASA R&D to the photos that park rangers shoot of our national parks. The public pays to produce this work, so it should belong to the public, right?

That was the deal – until Congress passed the Bayh-Dole Act in 1980. Under Bayh-Dole, government-funded inventions are given away – to for-profit corporations, who get to charge us whatever they want to access the things we paid to make. The basis for this is a racist hoax called "The Tragedy Of the Commons," written by the eugenicist white supremacist Garrett Hardin and published by Science in 1968:

https://memex.craphound.com/2019/10/01/the-tragedy-of-the-commons-how-ecofascism-was-smuggled-into-mainstream-thought/

Hardin invented an imaginary history in which "commons" – things owned and shared by a community – are inevitably overrun by selfish assholes, a fact that prompts nice people to also overrun these commons, so as to get some value out of them before they are gobbled up by people who read Garrett Hardin essays.

Hardin asserted this as a historical fact, but he cited no instances in which it happened. But when the Nobel-winning Elinor Ostrom actually went and looked at how commons are managed, she found that they are robust and stable over long time periods, and are a supremely efficient way of managing resources:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/04/analytical-democratic-theory/#epistocratic-delusions

The reason Hardin invented an imaginary history of tragic commons was to justify enclosure: moving things that the public owned and used freely into private ownership. Or, to put it more bluntly, Hardin invented a pseudoscientific justification for giving away parks, roads and schools to rich people and letting them charge us to use them.

To arrive at this fantasy, Hardin deployed one of the most important analytical tools of modern economics: introspection. As Ely Devons put it: "If economists wished to study the horse, they wouldn’t go and look at horses. They’d sit in their studies and say to themselves, ‘What would I do if I were a horse?’"

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/27/economism/#what-would-i-do-if-i-were-a-horse

Hardin's hoax swept from the fringes to the center and became received wisdom – so much so that by 1980, Senators Birch Bayh and Bob Dole were able to pass a law that gave away publicly funded medicine to private firms, because otherwise these inventions would be "overgrazed" by greedy people, denying the public access to livesaving drugs.

On September 21, the NIH quietly published an announcement of one of these pharmaceutical transfers, buried in a list of 31 patent assignments in the Federal Register:

https://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2023-20487.pdf

The transfer in question is a patent for using T-cell receptors (TCRs) to treat solid tumors from HPV, one of the only patents for treating solid tumors with TCRs. The beneficiary of this transfer is Scarlet TCR, a Delaware company with no website or SEC filings and ownership shrouded in mystery:

https://www.bizapedia.com/de/scarlet-tcr-inc.html

One person who pays attention to this sort of thing is James Love, co-founder of Knowledge Ecology International, a nonprofit that has worked for decades for access to medicines. Love sleuthed out at least one person behind Scarlet TCR: Christian Hinrichs, a researcher at Rutgers who used to work at the NIH's National Cancer Institute:

https://www.nih.gov/research-training/lasker-clinical-research-scholars/tenured-former-scholars

Love presumes Hinrichs is the owner of Scarlet TCR, but neither the NIH nor Scarlet TCR nor Hinrichs will confirm it. Hinrichs was one of the publicly-funded researchers who worked on the new TCR therapy, for which he received a salary.

This new drug was paid for out of the public purse. The basic R&D – salaries for Hinrichs and his collaborators, as well as funding for their facilities – came out of NIH grants. So did the funding for the initial Phase I trial, and the ongoing large Phase II trial.

As David Dayen writes in The American Prospect, the proposed patent transfer will make Hinrichs a very wealthy man (Love calls it "generational wealth"):

https://prospect.org/health/2023-10-18-nih-how-to-become-billionaire-program/

This wealth will come by charging us – the public – to access a drug that we paid to produce. The public took all the risks to develop this drug, and Hinrichs stands to become a billionaire by reaping the rewards – rewards that will come by extracting fortunes from terrified people who don't want to die from tumors that are eating them alive.

The transfer of this patent is indefensible. The government isn't even waiting until the Phase II trials are complete to hand over our commonly owned science.

But there's still time. The NIH is about to get a new director, Monica Bertagnolli – Hinrichs's former boss – who will need to go before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee for confirmation. Love is hoping that the confirmation hearing will present an opportunity to question Bertagnolli about the transfer – specifically, why the drug isn't being nonexclusively licensed to lots of drug companies who will have to compete to sell the cheapest possible version.

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

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/19/solid-tumors/#t-cell-receptors

My next novel is The Lost Cause, a hopeful novel of the climate emergency. Amazon won't sell the audiobook, so I made my own and I'm pre-selling it on Kickstarter!

[juleswrites223]

Midnight Rain 𓍲⋆˙⟡ᡣ𐭩

Carlos Sainz x Reader

Context: Your father does not think Carlos is good enough for you and you slowly realise you don't belong in his glamorous world of F1 and fame.

a/n: uff been in an angst mood lately. Yes I did the iconic fleabag scene. This was rushed af but enjoy.

Carlos never experienced love with such intensity. He was pretty sure he was going to marry you, have cute kids with you and eventually die by your side.

So when you wanted to break up, it hit him like a truck. Yeah you guys had your ups and downs but you truly loved each, even the media could see how much your relationship with Carlos was different than all his other relationships. Carlos showed you affection in public hell he even hard launched your relationship and constantly showed you off on his social media.

“Amor I just don’t get it. Please tell me why.” Carlos begged, clearly on the verge of crying.

The desperation in his voice was evident, his heart hurt so badly. He knew that this couldn’t be your decision and he had already suspected you father may be behind this. When he first met your parents, your father outright showed his distaste towards your boyfriend while your mother still tried to be subtle but you knew they didn’t think he was good enough for you (after all they heard stuff about Carlos being a cheater.)

Being born into a wealthy and famous family, you were used to the constant spotlight on you since you were young. Your mother, a really famous actress and your father, a businessman with a net worth of over a billion dollars meant that you were under constant scrutiny of the media whether it was for being a “spoiled brat” simply for not wanting the paparazzi to take pictures of you as you left your school or for having it “easy” and dating an F1 driver.

“Carlos please we have to break up. I’m so sorry.” You said as tears fell out of your eyes like pearls.

You hated yourself in this moment, looking at Carlos’ face made it worse. You had only seen Carlos cry twice the entire time we were in a relationship with him and now was the third in which you were the one who caused him pain.

"I love you." He croaked.

"It'll pass." You whispered.

You always felt out of place in Carlos’ world. You were used to the media and paparazzi but dating an F1 driver was a different kind of media frenzy. You love Carlos but you’re not so sure you belong in his world. The world seems to think you’re a distraction for Carlos from his career. You don’t want to believe these people but you start to see it.

As much as it pained you (& him) to breakup, you know you had to. Carlos needs to focus on his career first, its his childhood dream while you are just a girlfriend. It killed you to break up with him, it killed you when your father set you up with some rich bachelor and it completely shattered your heart when you attended one final race only to support Carlos and he was P1, putting on fake smiles yet his eyes showed sadness.

His eyes catch yours in the crowd and so many words are spoken, just between you and him. He was sunshine while you were the midnight rain.

[cynicalclassicist]

Why do we think that the GOP hates education?

[tiredlittlewriter]

High & Low 🧡🧡Sannoh Rengokai Headcanons🧡🧡 for the main 6 + Naomi some happy, some sad

Remember: These are my own hcs and you don't need to agree with me! Just don't be rude or I'll make fun of you♡ I love my Sannoh Boys

Cobra🧡

- Constantly tired, but a happy tired now that the whole Kuryu thing is over

- Can do a handstand for 30 seconds

- Hates carrots unless Naomi mixes them really really well into whatever he's eating

- Speaking of food :[ has trouble eating anything he doesn't make himself or made by Naomi and even then... Yamato has to make sure he eats or sometimes he won't

- Passed out from that more times than he would like to admit

- Definitely undiagnosed depression. He doesn't think anything is wrong with wanting to self-sacrifice himself all the time. Noboru checks up on him anyway

- Cried when Smoky died (not in public though, someone needed to be strong)

- A great singer but only sings when he's drunk at karaoke

- Member of the alphabet mafia, which letter? Don't worry about it

◇◇

Yamato🧡

- A big baby, cries at movies

- Would clap at the end of a flight

- Empathy king!! Whenever someone is going through something he knows how to comfort them or give pretty bad (or good) advice

- Everyone in Sannoh respects women ofc but Yamato walks the girls of the Sannoh area home if need be. His big frame comes in handy

- Bumps his head on things

- Massively protective over Noboru and Chiharu. He sees them as one in the same sometimes, loves them a lot

- Despite all of the Mugen/Amamiya beef being squashed, he and Hiroto spar every now and then

- Doesn't drink a lot (only a social drinker) because he's afraid of being addicted to something the way his mom is pachinko

- Absolutely no way he didn't have a crush on Cobra for at least a little bit. I mean. Come on

- Alphabet mafia amen

◇◇

Noboru🧡

- Most normal Sannoh member (this does not mean much)

- Would probably try to go back to law school, he'd want to learn how to protect S.W.O.R.D on a different front

- Has nightmares about the day he found his gf. He's moved on from the event but the way he saw her stuck with him

- A ball of anxiety

- Sucks at cooking

- Knits when he's stressed (has a lot of scarves would you like one please take one he has too many)

- Semi-speaks English

- Works at a nearby library

- Forced Chiharu to get his GED

◇◇

Dan🧡

- mmm I don't have very many but

- A pretty solid painter, painted the sign for his shop

- Joined Sannoh because he felt like he felt that he finally had a place to belong

- Doesn't have that much family

- 2nd best cook of the Sannoh boys (Cobra is first best but not by much)

- Owner of at plenty Noboru Anxiety Scarves and puts the ones he doesn't want up for sale in his shop

- Plays the lottery and won 100 dollars once (spent it on Sannoh and never told them)

◇◇

Tetsu🧡

- Adhd all the way babey

- Oya High alumni (tell no one)

- Has at least 2k followers on insta

- Keeps airing Sannoh's business on socmed 😭😭

- Jailbroke an iPhone once before forgetting how to do it

- Is religious (not one of Those Types) and prayed for S.W.O.R.D whenever they had major fights

- Goes to Nameless City to help rebuild and bring food incognito (Rude Boys just pretend they don't see him)

- He's cringe so he probably has had a crush on the same girl since middle school

- Likes to scrapbook

- Stays watching horror movies

- PDA King if ur in Sannoh you've hugged him at least 10 times within the month

- Lowkey bumps to the Mighty Warriors music on Spotify

◇◇

Chiharu🧡

- After officially squashing the beef with Furuya, they got along as well as you can when it is Big Loud Angry Guy and Please Don't Guy

- Can and will eat you out of house and home

- Works part time at Yamato's shop

- Giving him the highest honour I can bestow (Trans)

- Told Sannoh and cried and then Yamato cried cause Chiharu was crying and Tetsu decided that was the best time for a selfie with everyone's ugly ass cries

- Kizzy probably knows

- Although not the sharpest tool in the shed he's really good at puzzles and riddles

- He's never really forgiven himself for betraying S.W.O.R.D

- Lightest of the boys, Cobra has thrown him before

- Considers them his family, since his own kinda gave up on him after dropping him at Oya

♡♡

Naomi🧡🩷

- "I am not a nurse" she says as giving stitches to her boys

- She's a certified women kisser idc argue with the waaaaallll

- Really loves her boys no matter how mean she is to them

- She's a Sannoh girl, of course she knows how to fight a bit

- She knew she couldn't go up against the White Rascals but if someone tried to rob Itokan all they'd be leaving with is an ass whooping

- Keeps trying new styles with her hair, did a side shave

- Probably has an infinity tattoo for her brother

- Has a custom made motorbike

- Forget Sannoh being protective of Naomi, Naomi is protective of her hoodlums and will in fact talk mad shit to anyone who disrespected them

- Has a running tab for each gang that happens to eat there, White Rascals has the lowest one because Rocky always pays + a nice tip and Oya has the highest because they have 5 dollars between the entire school

[cherryspikes]

You know you love me

‧₊˚ 📸 ✩ ₊˚ Multiple ships - EAH Gossip Girl AU

⭒ desc: After a rat infestation shuts down the school, students from Nottingham High get transferred to different schools all over New York. Sparrow and his friends ended up being part of the unlucky few who were sent to Ever After Prep. Being thrust into the world of the disgustingly rich felt like diving in head first into a pile of rocks. Tensions between the students were high enough, but after an anonymous blog starts spreading gossip it all rises to another level. Secret relationships, millions of dollars, and nosey teenagers were already a recipe for disaster. But it seems someone is trying to make every student's life a living hell.

⭒ content: this is a story with a full plotline!! you do not have to have seen Gossip Girl to understand but there are some references that are funnier if you have. mentions of drugs and alcohol. - THIS IS NOT A FULL RECREATION OF GOSSIP GIRL - its eah characters in a gg inspired universe with reimaginings of iconic gg plotlines.

⭒ wordcount: 3,171

cross-posted on ao3 !!

⭒ note: i'm currently working on cross-posting all the works I'm working on to this blog and i'm working on the second chapter of this so stay tuned!!

Chapter 2

Chapter 1: The Devil Wears Pointe Shoes

Once upon a time, in the far away land of Manhattan, New York. There was Ever After Prep, a school for the ultra rich kids of the highest of high society. Founded by Wilhem and Jacob Grimm in the 1700’s, the school is just as pretentious as you'd imagine it to be. 

The building has a castle-like structure, making it stand out against all the modern office buildings. A testament to its insistence on upholding traditional values and promoting what they believe is the best of the best. Which usually included relatives of the school's alumni, making it hard for anyone else to enter. 

The school's website is a showcase of pure gloating with pop ups of all their achievements everywhere. Sports trophies, sold out plays, they had a team for every single niche hobby. It was pretty much guaranteed that if there was a competition for it, they’d win it. 

The students are even more self-absorbed and cocky – not to mention, judgmental as hell. Manhattan’s elite love to boast about how great EAP is. Those who didn’t attend were very much looked down upon, no matter how much money you had. So it’s no surprise that parents and students rallied up when they found out their exclusive school would be hosting students from Nottingham High School for their second semester. 

Nottingham High has been EAP’s rival ever since it was created. A public school with great extracurriculars and professors that received basically the same education as the ones in EAP, started to sound a lot better to most parents in the city. So when some Nottingham students were transferred to EAP for the rest of the semester, students took it as a call to arms. 

Ever After students made their opinions on Nottingham very clear. They weren't like them, so they didn't belong. They branded them as outcasts and excluded them from student events. But even in a castle flooded with snobby, rich teens and only a couple exchange students from Nottingham, the small group stuck together and made the best out of their situation.

Sparrow Hood quickly made a name for himself. 

A punk guitarist with a loud personality easily challenged EAP’s atmosphere. He focused on having fun and broke a lot of rules. He was open about how he hated the megarich students and they hated him back because his band would crash events to get more exposure.

His main enemy? Apple White.

Apple basically ruled the school. Most if not everyone at the school saw her as an angel. She was at the top of her class, participated in several extracurriculars and had at least 1,000 hours of community service. But Sparrow didn’t fall for any of that crap. He saw through her act and knew that in reality she was just like everyone else. Immature, kind of selfish and without a clue of what they’re doing. The only reason she was seen as an angel was because she’s Snow White's daughter.

If people from Nottingham hated the rich, they hated Snow White even more. She was probably the worst governor New York ever had. All her rules made her rich friends richer while everyone else got their leftovers.

Sparrow hated them. He hated them and their Dior suits. He hated their fine china. He hated their long ass limos. But after the rumors that they were involved with their school's infestation spread, he hated them even more. He hated the hypocrisy of it all. They spoke about helping those in need while judging them for seeking refuge in their part of town. 

Apple represented all of that hypocrisy to him. She swore they didn’t have any problems. They didn’t hate each other, they just disagreed from time to time. But Sparrow knew that deep down she saw him as a threat. She represented everything the rich stood for and he was beginning to take her down. 

But she tried her best to ignore him. Deciding she had other things to worry about. 

“You guys wanna go to Beanstalk later?” Sparrow asked, while dumping his books on the table. 

Lunch time at EAP was insanely different. It was better that's for sure, but it was more expensive. Even with financial aid, paying nearly $20 for lunch everyday was insane. 

“Can’t, I got practice.” Hunter replied. “Already missed two this month, and Daring’s already looking at me weirdly.” 

“Please, I’ve literally never seen Hopper even pick up a bow.” Sparrow rolled his eyes. “If anyone needs to be kicked out it's him.” 

“Yeah, but Hopper’s daddy funds the Athletics program. It’d be a grave mistake to lose him.” Hunter said, mocking what he had overheard the coach saying once after practice.

As annoying as it was to have Daring and his lackey controlling their every move, Sparrow didn’t want Hunter to lose. He knew how passionate Hunter was about his sports and he didn’t want to ruin his chances of being in a good team. Even if that meant having to overcompensate while the rest did the bare minimum. 

“I can’t either.” Ramona chimed in. 

“Oh my god, are you serious?” 

“I’m sorry! I have to pick up Cerise, the train comes in at 4.” She defended herself. 

“Okay, I’ll just go with you and we can go to Beanstalk after!” Ramona immediately rejected the offer. “Are you crazy? I’m not taking Cerise to a bar.” 

Sparrow pouted. He knew better than to argue with Ramona. She always got the final word. Especially when it came to her sister. He laid his head on the table, bored out of his mind. He dreaded the rest of the day. He only had Music and English left, which were his favorite classes.  But none of his friends made it to his section yet, of course, Apple and her friends did. This day was going to be awful. He tried to take a nap in order to kill time and distract himself. But as if God wanted to personally punish him, there she was. 

He audibly groaned when he saw her blonde curls bounce into the room. She waited in line, typing something on her phone while her friends talked. They all wore the signature EAP uniform. Black skirt, white button up, red and yellow tie. They all accessorized their outfits to fit their style, but it seemed like every girl wanted to be Apple so they all just wore different variations of the same shoes and bags. Sparrow hated the uniform. The gold was too shiny and the red was too deep. His white button ups always ended up with food stains by the end of the day and the black blazer made him feel restricted. At least they could customize them. He already gave up some of his music, giving up his fashion was a different type of sacrifice. 

When they all first arrived, they got weird looks because of their style. Sparrow especially. He decorated his blazer with a ton of pins and wore his tie unknotted. He wore baggy jeans that caught your attention because of their green tint and whenever you saw him in class he was doodling on his combat boots.

Suddenly, everyones phone in the room started ringing. Sparrow’s face scrunched up in confusion. His phone didn’t ring. He turned to Ramona and read the message she got. 

  TO: Ramona Badwolf Hood

         (ramonabwh@nhs.edu)

  FROM: Apple White

            (applewhite@gmail.com)

  Subject: Welcome Party!

    Dearest EAP and Nottingham students, 

These past couple of weeks have been hectic, to say the least. But in order to relieve some of the stress and get to know each other a little more, I’ve decided to host a dinner party to kick off and welcome all new students joining us this semester. 

There will be free food, live music and tons of chatting! Let’s take this opportunity to relieve some stress and get to know each other! Hope to see you all there!

Friday, January 25th 7:00PM - 11:00PM 

Spellbound Ave. 

79th street PL87

7th Floor Room 705

When at the gate just say your name and the room number. 

        With Love, 

        Apple White <3. 

“Wow, okay. So she says there's no problem between us but she doesn’t invite me?” He straightened himself up.

“Well, it’s not like you even want to go so…” Hunter asked. “Yeah, but still!” 

Laughter interrupted their conversation. The sound, unsurprisingly, came from Daring and Apple’s group. Daring was standing on their table, acting out a scene till he fell. Causing their laughter. 

Hunter glared at him. “You know, I heard Kitty telling Maddie she thinks he caused the infestation.” 

“Who? Daring?” Hunter nodded. Ramona laughed. “I don’t believe that. He’s too dumb.” 

“I mean, causing a rat infestation at your rival school is a dumb thing to do.”

“Fair point.” She acknowledged. 

The bell rang. Sparrow groaned loudly. “God! I can’t handle the rest of the semester at this fucking school. I’m actually going to drop dead in the middle of chem.” 

Ramona awed at him while petting his back. “Chill out. It’ll be July before you know it. We can crash that dinner party if you want.”

Sparrow’s hopes got up and he responded a little too loudly. Loud enough for Daring and Apple to hear him and his friends laughing as everyone else left the cafeteria. Sparrow and Daring made brief eye contact as he glanced up. Sparrow winked at him and he rolled back his eyes. He walked away, Apple following him shortly.  ________________________________________

Ramona wandered the halls looking for the nearest bathroom. Even after 2 weeks of being in the school, its size still managed to confuse her. All the doors looked the same and the halls seemed to get more narrow every day. Having finally found it, she pushed the white door open. She put the hall pass down on top of the sink and stared at her hair in the mirror. She didn’t really have to go to the bathroom, she just needed an excuse to not listen to the teachers loud ass microphone anymore. 

She was deciding whether or not she should put her hair up when she noticed it. She noticed smoke coming from the disabled bathroom stall. It wasn’t fire smoke so she didn’t worry, but then she noticed the smell. Someone's smoking weed. 

She was going to leave the bathroom and let whoever was in there be, till she realized it was one of the rich kids. She could see her perfectly polished heeled mary janes from under the stall so now she was intrigued. She turned on the sink and pretended to wash her hands. She then walked to the door and opened it, but let it close without walking back. Then the stall opened. 

What a fucking surprise. Ramona had only been at the school for 2 weeks but never in a million years would she have guessed that Justine Dancer skipped class to get high. The ballerina didn’t notice her until she walked towards the sink. 

“Oh you have to be kidding me.” Her hands went to cover her face. A flush of embarrassment and worry rushed through her. This cannot be the way she gets caught. 

“How’s it going, Dancer?” Ramona stepped closer. She felt confident – cocky even. She finally knew how Daring felt whenever he caught Sparrow smoking near the bleachers. “Where’s your hall pass?” 

Justine turns towards her. Looking up to stare at her blankly. “What?” 

“Oh, yeah. Well there's this rule that you can’t walk around during classes without a hall pass. I thought you knew.” Ramona’s condescending words annoyed her. She was starting to get angry.

“Yeah, I know what the fucking rules are okay? Unlike you, some of us actually care about our future.” Ramona wasn’t having fun anymore. She struck a nerve, but unluckily for Justine, she doesn't back down very easily. 

“Well, you don’t really have to worry about that. Your mom’s just going to end up doing it all for you anyways.” 

“Well at least my parents actually amounted to something!” She immediately regretted her words. 

“What the fuck did you just say?” 

“I’m sorry… I didn’t…” Justine hesitated. She realized what she had said and she hated herself for it. She didn’t mean any of it but she didn’t know how to apologize. She knew that having a bad day wasn’t an excuse but the Ramonas words paired with her failed audition that morning really made her want to explode. 

“Justine and Ramona! What is all this ruckus?” 

They both turned to see Madame Baba Yaga next to the door. Justine froze while Ramona stood her ground. 

“I caught her playing around with illegal substances.” Justine looked at the tall girl, mouth agape. 

“Ms. Dancer! Is this true?” 

Justine blinked and quickly looked down at her feet. She sheepishly nodded, not daring to look at her teacher. 

“Well, the very least I can say is that I’m disappointed in you. Headmaster Grimm and your parents will be hearing about this. You have detention after school. Both of you.”

“Both? What for?” Ramona complained. 

“For disrupting other classes and missing part of your own. Now get back to class!”

Madame Yaga stood near the door with her arms crossed till they both left the room. Once they did, they glared at each other before returning to their classes. 

“Fucking asshole.” Ramona muttered to herself. ________________________________________

The train station was loud and crowded like always. It didn’t really bother Sparrow though. He was used to it by now. Years of living in the city and going to punk shows made it so he barely noticed loud noises. If a bomb exploded in the city, he probably wouldn’t know until it hit him. He looked around the station, trying to find something he hadn’t seen before. Everything looked the same. Same green ceiling, same yellow lights and the same old ass clock in the center. Till he saw it.

A head of white and black hair that most, if not all teenagers, in New York could recognize. 

Duchess Swan was back in the city.

Duchess was known for being a total bitch. Even those who knew nothing about the Upper East Side had heard about her. She was seen as an out of control party girl that lived life like there was no tomorrow. There were countless rumors of her doing drugs, sleeping with celebrities, stealing from designer stores, etc. Yet somehow, no story was crazy enough to take her down. She came from a long line of old money so her professional opportunities never ceased. Even though people thought of her as a disaster waiting to happen, she still had tons of friends, she had a captivating aura. Her charismatic personality was comforting and her glamor was desirable. No one truly knew if the stories about her were true and the mystery made you want to know more. Her character in general was alluring and you could easily be charmed by her. 

Sparrow knew this from personal experience. He had fallen down the rabbit hole back in his sophomore year and after the spell wore off, his interest in the ultra rich lifestyle wore off too. However, it might’ve been coming back. Even though he was tired of his life revolving around the upper east siders, he wanted to know why she disappeared for almost a year. What made her comeback? He wouldn’t have been at the station if it weren’t for Ramonas surprise detention, what if this was a sign? He wanted to talk to her. Actually, nevermind. Why bother? She probably didn’t remember him. What if she did?  

He moved his arms around a bit, trying to calm himself from the million thoughts running through his head. He knew it was dangerous to deal with the devil, but life was getting a little bit boring. Maybe it was time to spice things up a bit. 

“Sparrow?” A voice asked behind him. He turned to see a familiar head of black hair covered up with a red hoodie. 

“Hello, little red riding hood!”  

“Shut up. I need to touch up my roots.” The girl rolled her eyes, holding the hood in place. Sparrow used to tease Cerise a lot when they would visit each other during the holidays, but now that they were going to live together it was going to be a lot worse. She was not looking forward to it. 

“So, where’s Ramona?” He tried to help her grab some of her bags, but he failed. The weight of the bags surprised him. He had forgotten how fit she was. She was all grown up. 

“Oh, I thought she told you. She got detention so she won't be out of school till 5:00.” 

Ramona's sister hummed, slightly disappointed. “Hey, wanna get a banana split from Hatter’s?” Sparrow comforted her and she excitedly replied with a yes. 

They caught up with each other while walking out of the station. Sparrow spoke about how unbearable it is to attend Ever After and Cerise told him about her recent competitions. As they laughed about how Ramona managed to get herself detention only 2 weeks into the semester, the bags Sparrow carried bumped into someone. 

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry.” The girl said. Sparrow looked up and he gulped as soon as he realized who he was talking to. White and black hair, lavender streaks. 

“No, don’t worry – I was the one who bumped into you.” He helped her get the things she dropped and she just kept apologizing. Was this really Duchess or did she have a twin he didn’t know about? After the awkward exchange was over, he turned towards Cerise. A wide grin occupied her face. 

“What?” 

“Nothing…” she shook her head, still smiling.

“What?”

“I said nothing!” She laughed.  ________________________________________

e-blast #1: Welcome home!

2/8/07 - 5:30PM

Evening upper east siders, Gossip Girl here. Your one and only source to the scandalous lives of Manhattan's elite. A lot of rumors have been spreading after the whole Nottingrat disaster and I was getting tired of having to explain the same things over and over again to those who don’t pay enough attention. So I thought, why not make something to document it all? However, as my name suggests, gossip about everything and everyone in the UES will be discussed here. So you all better start watching yourselves because if you think you’re safe, you aren’t! Don’t believe me? Well I have the biggest news ever. Spotted at Grand Central, bags in hand (kind of): Duchess Swan. That’s right, the queen is back! But who is this? Unfortunate Nottingham student, Sparrow Hood, seen head over combat boots over New York’s signature it girl. Poor Lonely Boy, longing for what he can’t have. If only she knew who he was. 

[ click to view foto ] 

Believe me now? Welcome home D! Hope you enjoyed your trip, can’t wait to hear all about it. 

                                                                                                                                            - XOXO, Gossip Girl

[confessions-official]

So in 8th grade (22-23 school year) I applied to this local private high school that was very neurodivergent-, disability- and queer-friendly. I got in and I got almost a full ride scholarship, we would have to pay a couple thousand dollars but my dad was getting a pay increase and my grandma has some money so it all worked out!

And then the school fuckin closed.

Deadass they were just like “yeah we lost an investor there’s nothing you can do we know it’s too late to apply to other private schools you’re on your own sorry.” I now attend a public high school where I hear the r slur repeated regularly and only once have I heard someone push back against its use (shoutout to my algebra teacher).

I go to the wikipedia page for my county, city and neighborhood somewhat often. I ended up going to the “education in [city]” part of the city’s page. And it still listed the school as a private high school, right next to other active private high schools.

I had a totally normal response to this, and like a non-spiteful, non-hating bitch created a wholeass wikipedia account to add a comment regarding the school’s closure to the talk about the page. I had never done this before and it took some work but by god I fucking did it.

I’m still really pissed about the school shutting down and I’m probably always going to be pissed about it. Because it was this place that said “we’ll accept you, we want you to succeed” and meant it genuinely, and you could fucking SEE it in the school environment because the kids there were nice. Probably because they had also been treated awfully by students at previous schools for some part of their identity and they didn’t want other people to have the same experience. And then suddenly the school was like “actually, never mind” and really didn’t help at all. Just kinda threw us to the wolves. That’s not going to be able to go on the actual wikipedia page and I know that the school shutting down wasn’t on purpose to make me feel bad about myself but I do kind of feel like that. Not because “ugh I have to go to school with the regular low born common folk” or whatever but I hear the r slur used constantly. Nobody says anything. It’s never brought up. The school will talk about being discrimination free and everybody belongs there, but you know what? I’ve heard people being incredibly racist towards Black people and nobody does shit about that either. So I guess it’s just fuck you no matter what kind of minority group you belong to.

Anyway. People irl don’t seem to understand me but I figure on Tumblr someone will. I’m just very tired.

 

[partisan-by-default]

Public Dollars Belong in Public Schools (facebook):

Things that didn’t kill kids today: *Books *Drag Queens *Pronouns

[scottguy]

Yeah.. what could be LESS important to Americans and America's future than ... EDUCATION? 🙄🙄🙄

Jesus!

DeVos wants an US versus THEM education system in America.

Rich children get private school. Poor and the middle class kids get just enough training to be employed by the rich.

She's just an oligarch pig who HATES working-class people who she feels superior to just because she owns a lot of money.

Can someone inform the millionaires and billionaires...that more money does not make you a better person. In fact, it's often the exact opposite.

Public dollars belong in public schools.

[happyinjection]

HC Novel ♦️7 Never No Dollars “Pre flop ~Prologue~”

People sometimes ask me about the appeal of collecting antiques. Personally, I believe it is merely a hobby, but at the same time it’s also my life’s work that I can’t stop doing.

It is difficult to put it into words, but the greatest value of an item lies in the spirit, or perhaps we can also call it the energy, of said item’s creator or successive owners which resides in it. In a way, it contained condensed history. The concept is not plausible by those with lower education or class.

Antique collectors are countless in number. Most of them are those who are considered to be rich.

On the surface, I’m the headmaster of Rummy College, a prestigious private boarding school for boys in Fourland Kingdom. However, in the end, I work under the board of directors. So I don’t get paid that much.

Antiques are made to be unique. If you miss the chance to acquire an item once, the next opportunity will only come when the wealthy owner dies and their family sorts out their belongings, or when they lose their mind and give it away for charity, or when they go bankrupt. When such an opportunity comes, usually the price has soared high.

Therefore, in order to compete with other antique collectors from around the world, it is necessary for me to form a few underworld connections. Even so, I’m first and foremost a teacher, hence I won’t take part in their terrible deeds. That said, I have no control over the happenings without my knowledge. I simply use money or some other convenience in exchange for antiques I want to get my hands on.

I’m talking about “the cards”.

At a glance, they seem to be no more than trump cards of somewhat good quality. However, the truth is there is no antique more valuable than these cards in the entire Fourland Kingdom. Their rarity, lore, and even purpose—they are all surpassed by none. I paid a fair price for the risk, thankfully the broker was an idiot and agreed to seal the deal.

In this Kingdom of Fourland, we have a folklore—or perhaps a myth is a better word. Every citizen must have heard of it from their parents or grandparents in their bed when they were children, and listening to it they would fall asleep peacefully.

In other words, everyone knows about the cards, yet only a few are aware that they actually exist. Isn’t that romantic?

—Fourland Kingdom as we know it is a nation made up of four states. In the past, when this place had not yet earned its name but was instead called Trapla Island, the four states were separate countries and were repeatedly in conflict with each other. Combined with the invasion of foreign enemies, the four states were at the edge of destruction.

During such a time, a figure stood to prominence, a boy who would eventually become the first king of Fourland and his 52 knights.

The boy alongside the 52 knights fought with all their might to unite the four nations. Unfortunately, the knights lost their lives in the midst of their battle.

It was then Lala Waldenklein[*] demonstrated her powers. Lala is a mage who accompanied and led the boy to become the first king. She magically transformed the souls of the fallen knights into cards and gave them to the boy who survived. With the cards and supernatural powers at his disposal, he splendidly defeated his enemies.

—Such is the folklore in essence. It gave rise to the publication of a lot of thick fantasy novels, but not many were interested in reading them.

The number of cards is equal to the number of knights, as there is one for each. Since the number of cards matches, those cards are said to be the origin of trump card games in the Fourland Kingdom.

Although they appear to be nothing more than ordinary trump cards, the cards grant supernatural abilities to those whom they have chosen to be their holders, rumors say.

It seems that some people have started calling these cards the “X-Playing Cards”.

The existence of X-Playing Cards would confirm the existence of the supernatural powers they hold. If possible I want to see it with my own eyes.

Long story short—I’ve managed to acquire two cards.

Still, to prove whether or not they are the real deal is easier said than done. The day after I got my hands on them, I put the two cards on the large table in the headmaster’s office, and while leaning back into my leather chair I stared at them in utmost admiration.

The cards would never get damaged. I’ve tried to fold them and set them on fire, but in the end they continue to reflect the light like a mirror.

I left the windows open. The grids of anti-intruder bars were decorated with a pattern of lions which can also be found on the grassy fields of Rummy College. After I was appointed to be the headmaster, I had started displaying my collections here, so the bars were only recently installed. Through the gaps, a cool breeze was blowing.

Someone knocked on the door. It’s true that I had scheduled a meeting with the vice headmaster. 

“Come in,” I responded, and the door flew open.

I felt a particularly strong gust of wind. Had the cards not been right in front of me, I wouldn’t have minded the wind at all, because nothing would get blown away.

—Before I knew it, there was only one card remaining on the table, while the other had vanished without a trace.

For a split second, when he caught my distraught expression, the incompetent vice headmaster whose only talent was to lick my shoes appeared to be very afraid for his life.

I burst out laughing. But it wasn’t because I saw the hilarious reaction of the vice headmaster.

The cards were created from the souls of the 52 fallen knights. They were made using the mage Lala’s supernatural abilities. So if the cards can also magically disappear, isn’t that just one wonder among many others?

I still had one card in my possession, so there was nothing to be down about. 

The cards are by no doubt real. That knowledge alone had brought me immeasurable happiness.

♠️♥️♦️♣️

TL notes: I’m not a professional translator so feel free to tell me if you spot any errors! Please do not repost this translation anywhere. In the case of any problem occuring in the future, I may take down this post. Also bear in mind that I’ll be updating at a suuuper slow pace. [*] I might not spell her surname right, will fix it once the official comes out.

[sophieswundergarten]

Sophie's really bad and also currently incomplete "Summary" of The Sofa Book

@nobody33333333 Here you go

I'm putting this under the cut because Moth said he might want to read it at some point. Everyone else is welcome to my insanity.

Also, fair warning, because I'm really bad at summarizing things so there's going to be a lot of touch and go with how detailed this is

I found this book in a bargain book bin several years ago in a local grocery store and my mother bought it for me because I thought it looked interesting.

I was right.

But it is also so many other things.

And it has an unprecedented number of references to other media, namely The Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and A Wrinkle in Time, by my count

So, there's these three kids: River, Freak, and Fiona. River's parents died in a car crash, when he was little, and that also gave him a limp. River arrives at the bus stop one day to find a sofa just. Sitting there. (It is worth noting that the sofa is coloured similarly to Mr. Benedict's green suit. And that there is a possible bloodstain on one of the cushions)

River's friend Freak is sitting on the sofa, and soon their other friend Fiona shows up. Fiona is the only one of the trio to have a phone, but she also refuses to be seen with the boys in public because "girls mature faster than boys and [she] really [needs] to be with people [her] own age" and she tells the boys not to take it personally, it's just that emotionally the boys are both six.

Fiona's a lot of fun.

She also constantly wears very strange outfits with extremely clashing colours. No one mentions this to her.

So, the kids deduce that the couch probably belonged to "old man Underhill" since it's technically outside his driveway. Fiona suggests looking for loose change in-between the cushions. They find a peanut shell, a gum wrapper, a plaid sock, a weird coin that has two different people's heads and words in an unknown alphabet, a green crayon labeled "ZUCCHINI", and a fishhook that River discovers because he jams his hand into the couch and gets stabbed.

They save all of these things "for posterity", which is a good thing because Fiona then finds out that there are collectors out there who will pay a lot of money for it so she sets up an online auction.

Background information that is important: The town they live in (Cheshire) backs up to a coal-seam fire wasteland called Hellsboro, which has been burning for twelve years and was caused by some kind of accident at the Rodmore Chemical plant, the abandoned building at the center of Hellsboro. The three kids are the only people who live in the houses near Hellsboro, and the rest of the city is several miles away.

Also, phones and other technology are sold by the company Disin Tel, and basically every food is made by Agra Nation. And there are huge town-wide flash mobs that happen every so often, which the participants deny ever happening. This is a common argument with the kids as Fiona takes part in the flash mobs and the boys are annoyed she keeps pretending it never happened.

The crayon auction has now jumped to over seven thousand dollars, and the kids are freaking out. The bidding war is between GORLAB and Alecto, but River points out that technically they don't own the crayon, and should check with Mr. Underhill first.

They end up speaking to him through a speaker in the front gate of the Underhill house, at which point we discover that this man is, in fact, not Mr. Underhill. Mr. Underhill died at age 97 in a tobogganing accident. This guy is named Alf.

They mention that they found the crayon in the sofa, to which Alf replies "Oh, that sofa. I was wondering where it had gotten to. I didn't realize if was missing until yesterday even when I tried to sit down. Imagine my surprise."

Alf also references the fact that his pneumatic mail slot apparently ate the mailman's hand, but that's not relevant.

Alf suggests they meet after the kids get out of school to discuss the mattter (Dropping a few very specific details about the kids' lives that he has no way of knowing), and the kids agree.

River gets back to the gate early, and takes a nap on the sofa. He has a very strange dream involving his irritated and pedantic English teacher wearing a suit made out of the sofa upholstery. This is not, in fact, his English teacher, but rather "the sofa's spokesperson".

There is then a very confusing explanation about a place called "Indorsia" that is described as being like a landscape "on the inside surface of a giant, hollow sphere", which is where the sofa's from.

The sofa is a piece of "smart furniture", which means it "keeps itself clean; it digests stains; it can change its color to match the drapes" and also it grows from small, sugar-cube-like objects. This "makes it easier to pack if you're being pursued by storm troopers".

It takes a year for the sofa to grow to full size, and this sofa in particular has nanotech factories in both armrests, which can copy small objects once given a sample. (Such as replicating spare change)

Also, (And here you are, Bods) the sofa is the only entity in either their world or Indorsia to have the ability to tesser

This means it can teleport, with a maximum range of two miles and the need to recharge, but nonetheless quite impressive as it figured out how to do this on its own.

And it powers itself to do all these things by eating dust bunnies

AND WE'RE STOPPING HERE FOR TONIGHT BECAUSE I NEED TO GO EAT. I WILL TRY AND FINISH LATER, IF ANYONE'S INTERESTED :)

[mariacallous]

Earlier this week, WIRED published a story about the AI-powered search startup Perplexity, which Forbes has accused of plagiarism. In it, my colleague Dhruv Mehrotra and I reported that the company was surreptitiously scraping, using crawlers to visit and download parts of websites from which developers had tried to block it, in violation of its own publicly stated policy of honoring the Robots Exclusion Protocol.

Our findings, as well as those of the developer Robb Knight, identified a specific IP address almost certainly linked to Perplexity and not listed in its public IP range, which we observed scraping test sites in apparent response to prompts given to the company’s public-facing chatbot. According to server logs, that same IP visited properties belonging to Condé Nast, the media company that owns WIRED, at least 822 times in the past three months—likely a significant undercount, because the company retains only a small portion of its records.

We also reported that the chatbot was bullshitting, in the technical sense. In one experiment, it generated text about a girl following a trail of mushrooms when asked to summarize the content of a website that its agent did not, according to server logs, attempt to access.

Perplexity and its CEO, Aravind Srinivas, did not substantively dispute the specifics of WIRED’s reporting. “The questions from WIRED reflect a deep and fundamental misunderstanding of how Perplexity and the Internet work,” Srinivas said in a statement. Backed by Jeff Bezos’ family office and by Nvidia, among others, Perplexity has said it is worth a billion dollars based on its most recent fundraising round, and The Information reported last month that it was in talks for a new round that would value it at $3 billion. (Bezos did not reply to an email; Nvidia declined to comment.)

After we published the story, I prompted three leading chatbots to tell me about the story. OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude generated text offering hypotheses about the story’s subject but noted that they had no access to the article. The Perplexity chatbot produced a six-paragraph, 287-word text closely summarizing the conclusions of the story and the evidence used to reach them. (According to WIRED's server logs, the same bot observed in our and Knight’s findings, which is almost certainly linked to Perplexity but is not in its publicly listed IP range, attempted to access the article the day it was published, but was met with a 404 response. The company doesn't retain all its traffic logs, so this is not necessarily a complete picture of the bot's activity, or that of other Perplexity agents.) The original story is linked at the top of the generated text, and a small gray circle links out to the original following each of the last five paragraphs. The last third of the fifth paragraph exactly reproduces a sentence from the original: “Instead, it invented a story about a young girl named Amelia who follows a trail of glowing mushrooms in a magical forest called Whisper Woods.”

This struck me and my colleagues as plagiarism. It certainly appears to satisfy the criteria set out by Poynter Institute—including, perhaps most stringently, the seven-to-10 word test, which proposes that it’s “hard to incidentally replicate seven consecutive words that appear in another author’s work.” (Kelly McBride, a Poynter SVP who has described this test as being useful in identifying plagiarism, did not reply to an email.)

“If one of my students turned in a story like this, I would take them before the academic dishonesty committee for plagiarism,” said John Schwartz, professor of practice at the University of Texas at Austin’s journalism school, after reading the original story and the summary. “I find this just too close. When I was reading the Perplexity version, I just thought, there’s an echo in here.”

Perplexity and Srinivas, the company’s CEO, did not respond to a detailed request for comment in which they were presented with the criticisms experts made of the company for this story.

Bill Grueskin, professor of professional practice at Columbia Journalism School, wrote in an email that the summary looked to be “pretty much ok” for a chatbot identified as such, but that it was hard to say because he hadn’t had time to read the original WIRED story. “Quoting a sentence verbatim without quote marks is bad, of course,” he wrote. “I'd be pretty mortified if a news org ran an AI summary like this without disclosing the source—or worse, pretending it came from a human.” (Perplexity, of course, isn’t claiming this material came from a human.)

Perhaps luckily for Perplexity and its backers, this is a literal academic debate. Plagiarism is a concept pertaining to professional ethics, important in contexts like journalism and academia where being able to identify the source of information is of fundamental importance but of no legal significance in itself. If a rival studio releases a film containing a reasonable chunk of footage from Inside Out 2, Disney would sue not for plagiarism but for copyright infringement; similarly, a letter Forbes reportedly sent Perplexity threatening legal action is said to mention “willful infringement” of Forbes’ copyrights. Here, legal experts say, Perplexity is on somewhat safer ground—probably.

“In terms of the copyright, this is a tough call,” says James Grimmelmann, professor of digital and information law at Cornell University. On one hand, he argues, the summary is reporting facts, which cannot be copyrighted; but on the other, it does partially duplicate the original and summarize the details found in it. “It’s not a slam dunk copyright case, but it’s not trivial, either. It’s not frivolous.”

Grimmelmann sees a host of potential issues for Perplexity, among them consumer protection, unfair advertising, or deceptive trade practices claims he believes could be made against a company that says it respects the Robots Exclusion Protocol but doesn’t follow it. (The standard is voluntary but widely adhered to.) He also thinks it could be vulnerable to a claim of misappropriation of hot news, in which a publisher argues that a competitor summarizing its material before it’s had a chance to commercially benefit from it, or in a way that undermines its value to paying subscribers, is infringing on its copyright. Perplexity’s evident ability to circumvent paywalls “is a bad fact for them,” he says, as is the fact that its system is automated.

Grimmelmann also says that Perplexity may be forfeiting the protection of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. This is the law that, among other things, protects search engines like Google from liability for defamation when they link to defamatory content because they are services passing on information from other content providers; as he sees it, Perplexity is similarly shielded as long as it accurately summarizes material. (Whether AI-generated material enjoys 230 protection at all is a matter of debate.)

“They’d only get in trouble if they summarized the story incorrectly and made it defamatory when it wasn’t before. That’s something that they actually would be at legal risk for, especially if they don’t credit the original source clearly enough and people can’t easily go to that source to check,” he says. “If Perplexity’s edits are what make the story defamatory, 230 doesn’t cover that, under a bunch of case law interpreting it.”

In one case WIRED observed, Perplexity’s chatbot did falsely claim, albeit while prominently linking to the original source, that WIRED had reported that a specific police officer in California had committed a crime. (“We have been very upfront that answers will not be accurate 100% of the time and may hallucinate,” Srinivas said in response to questions for the story we ran earlier this week, “but a core aspect of our mission is to continue improving on accuracy and the user experience.”)

“If you want to be formal,” says Grimmelmann, “I think this is a set of claims that would get past a motion to dismiss on a bunch of theories. Not saying it will win in the end, but if the facts bear out what Forbes and WIRED, the police officer—a bunch of possible plaintiffs—allege, they are the kinds of things that, if proven and other facts were bad for Perplexity, could lead to liability.”

Not all experts agree with Grimmelmann. Pam Samuelson, professor of law and information at UC Berkeley, writes in an email that copyright infringement is “about use of another’s expression in a way that undercuts the author’s ability to get appropriate remuneration for the value of the unauthorized use. One sentence verbatim is probably not infringement.”

Bhamati Viswanathan, a faculty fellow at New England Law, says she’s skeptical the summary passes a threshold of substantial similarity usually necessary for a successful infringement claim, though she doesn’t think that’s the end of the matter. “It certainly should not pass the sniff test,” she wrote in an email. “I would argue that it should be enough to get your case past the motion to dismiss threshold—particularly given all the signs you had of actual stuff being copied.”

In all, though, she argues that focusing on the narrow technical merits of such claims may not be the right way to think about things, as tech companies can adjust their practices to honor the letter of dated copyright laws while still grossly violating their purpose. She believes an entirely new legal framework may be necessary to correct for market distortions and promote the underlying aims of US intellectual property law, among them to allow people to financially benefit from original creative work like journalism so that they’ll be incentivized to produce it—with, in theory, benefits to society.

“There are, in my opinion, strong arguments to support the intuition that generative AI is predicated upon large scale copyright infringement,” she writes. “The opening ante question is, where do we go from there? And the greater question in the long run is, how do we ensure that creators and creative economies survive? Ironically, AI is teaching us that creativity is more valuable and in demand than ever. But even as we recognize this, we see the potential for undermining, and ultimately eviscerating, the ecosystems that enable creators to make a living from their work. That’s the conundrum we need to solve—not eventually, but now.”

[galerymod]

Imagine you are so extremely rich that you can afford anything!

How stupid do you have to be to put your personal reputation on the line to profit from what exactly?

Power over people or is it really just pathological greed for the save of money?

British billionaire clan on trial for exploitation

They belong to one of the richest families in the UK. But they apparently only had a tip to spare for their domestic workers. Four members of the Hinduja clan are now on trial in Switzerland for exploitation and human trafficking.

The public prosecutor's office accuses them of possibly not always treating their servants appropriately.

The Hinduja family, whose fortune is estimated at around 47 billion dollars, owns a villa in the wealthy town of Cologny in the canton of Geneva.

They apparently recruit their domestic staff mainly in India. According to the public prosecutor's office,

It is said that Prakash and Kamal Hinduja, along with their son Ajay and his wife Namrata, compensated the victims with a mere $8 each for 18-hour days.

Wow 8 ÷ 18 = 0,4444444444

In a nutshell: Minimum wage in SwitzerlandIs there a statutory minimum wage in Switzerland?

No, there is no statutory minimum wage in Switzerland. However, as trade unions have repeatedly called for a Swiss minimum wage, there is now a minimum wage in five cantons: Neuchâtel, Jura, Geneva, Basel-Stadt and Ticino.

How high is the minimum wage in the different cantons?

In Neuchâtel, at least CHF 20.08 must be paid per hour of work. In Jura, the minimum wage is CHF 20 per hour, while in Ticino it has been CHF 19 since 1 January 2021. In Geneva, the hourly pay must be at least 23 francs; 21 francs must be paid as a minimum in Basel-Stadt (expected from 1 July 2022).

Why is there no statutory minimum wage in Switzerland?

There is no question that there are a number of reasons for and against minimum wages. As many Swiss people voted against the introduction of a minimum wage in a referendum, it was ultimately decided not to do so.

Again, in plain language, referendums are not always for the good of all. So it was legally compliant to pay fucking low wages,

it was just morally and ethically reprehensible. Evil world of good people with their morals and ethics, smile.

It is also alleged that they confiscated their passports and restricted their freedom to leave the house.

The family's lawyers partially admitted the allegations, but at the same time tried to relativise them by referring to the free board and lodging.

As far as the financial exploitation is concerned, an agreement has already been reached, reports the BBC.

However, the accusation of human trafficking remains. The confiscation of passports and the strict curfew could possibly be categorised as human trafficking. In Switzerland, human trafficking is considered a serious criminal offence.

To be really evil now! British society likes to bet what would you bet that this can all be settled with a paltry financial penalty?

mod

Being rich means taking responsibility for society at all levels and not exploiting it at all levels.

This only comes from these ***** elite schools and universities where profit maximisation is put before ethics and moral responsibility.

We can't eat as much as we want to vomit!

Incidentally, this is just one example of so many, it is sad how our elites and our academic cultural elites hand in hand hardly represent moral values if not for self-expression.

[knickynoo]

Back to the Future: The Animated Series, s01ep13 “Clara's Folks” Review and Commentary

Previous episodes linked HERE

In this episode: Clara and the boys are at risk of being wiped from existence because Marty doesn't know how to say no to a nine-year-old.

And just like that, here we are at the last episode of season 1.

Doc begins his broadcast by carrying in a box and explaining that Clara has been urging him to do some serious cleaning and get rid of all the junk he's gathered over the years. One particular item catches his eye, and he pulls it out to show us, explaining that it was his entry into the 1932 Hilly Valley Junior Science Fair (which would have put him at 10 years old according to his birth year in the animated series).

Doc: "A videotape recorder with full 14-day programming capability. It worked perfectly! Too bad there weren't any TV sets around."

So, yeah. That's something Doc did, evidently.

The next thing he finds is one of my favorite parts of these live-action segments. Doc retrieves a videotape from the box and tells us that he was tight on money a few years back and had to resort to selling some of his inventions on the home shopping network. He pops the tape into the VCR, and we get to see a clip of one of his infomercials featuring the new and improved mind-reading helmet he's perfected. It's wonderfully silly.

Now I want to know about these financial issues Doc was having? What's the story there? Did he not have any ethical qualms about selling a functioning mind-reading device to the general public? How is such powerful technology being sold for only TWENTY DOLLARS?

The Back to the Future universe it truly a strange place.

Doc also shows us a net, which he says belonged to Clara's father, Daniel. Doc speaks very highly of the man and says the two met back in 1850, five years prior to Clara's birth. This little story then brings us into the cartoon to hear the full story.

While Doc is doing some work on a giant robot, Jules and Verne enter, having just arrived home from school. Jules tells his father he "discovered two new elements in chemistry class," to which Doc replies, "Everyone's entitled to a slow day now and then." Verne, however, had a horrible day and is majorly bummed out about something.

Meanwhile, Marty—who is also at the Brown residence—is playing his guitar that always makes me annoyed to look at because it has these two pathetic little strings on the body and then zero strings going up the neck.

It just. It makes no sense. How is he playing this thing? It makes appearances in multiple episodes, and it never has strings on it. Is this supposed to be some kind of ultra-futuristic guitar that Doc bought him? If so, couldn't they have at least mentioned that in passing so that my mind could be at peace? (It's like they weren't even considering me in this decision at all. Rude.) Is it that terribly difficult to draw a few strings on a cartoon guitar?

Verne storms into the room and tells Marty why his day was so bad. Turns out a classmate, Roland Culver, was bragging about his grandfather's accomplishments, which upset Verne since he never had a chance to know his grandparents or any of the cool things they might have done in life. Marty points out that Verne does know some stories about Clara's parents and directs him to a frame on the wall. It contains a piece of buckboard from Martha and Daniel's wagon, on which their wedding announcement was burned into the wood.

Verne goes on to recite some of the story he's heard a hundred times, informing us that Martha and Daniel met on the Oregon Trail and married that same day.

Wanting to get solid proof of his grandparents' love story, Verne announces that he's going to travel back in time to meet them. I'm glad to say that Marty, who is typically a major enabler of the boys' shenanigans, does warn Verne about the dangers of going back in time and meeting relatives. Verne doesn't see the big deal.

"Don't get your shorts in a wad," he tells Marty. "I'm just gonna take a stinkin' picture." Verne is such a little smart-mouth, and I love the dynamic he has with Marty.

Unfortunately, even the plethora of bad things Marty experienced as a result of messing with the past isn't enough to motivate him to put a stop to Verne's plan. He ends up tagging along with them to 1850.

One neat detail in this episode is that we actually get some of the BTTF part III music in the 1850 scenes. In the one pictured above, we hear a few seconds of the music that plays as Marty walks through the town after leaving Seamus' house. And a few seconds later, as the boys are all running from a buffalo stampede, we hear the music that plays when Doc and Marty are attempting to get the horses to pull the DeLorean up to 88mph. It's very cool.

Marty, Jules, and Verne are saved from the stampede by none other than Clara's mother, Martha, who falls in love with Marty the moment she sees him. Marty is not thrilled by this development.

I mean, I don't know, McFly. Maybe you should simply stop being so ruggedly handsome and irresistible to every woman you come across. Have you considered that?

A whole line of wagons show up then, with Clara's father being the last one to arrive. He causes a collision because he's too busy reading a book to pay attention to where he's going, and we're obviously supposed to get the impression that he's a nerd.

"That's Grandpa? I hope Roland Culver never hears about this," Verne comments, ashamed of his bowtie-wearing, bookworm of a grandfather.

Poor Daniel Clayton.

The group plus Marty and the boys continue along the trail, and Jules laments that he now has to repair the damage done to the DeLorean during the stampede, along with figuring out how to undo the damage to their family tree. The future isn't looking too good for Clara's side of the family. Martha has tied Marty up and is insisting that they get married.

She literally tells him that she won't set him free until he agrees to walk down the aisle with her. And you know what? Clara is a lovely person, but her mother? Not liking her so far.

Marty manages to escape and ends up in Daniel's wagon, where Daniel confesses that he's got a crush on Martha, who doesn't even know he exists. Marty tells Daniel he's going to help him win Martha's affection.

Also, Daniel is a bug enthusiast. His wagon is just filled with jars of bugs. I like him a lot.

As part of his plan to make Daniel more appealing to Martha, Marty helps to give him a makeover of sorts—exchanging his formal clothing for cowboy attire.

Daniel: "Will this really make the lovely Miss O'Brien notice me?"

Verne: "Yeah, and she'll say, 'Who's the stinkin' geek?'"

VERNE. Verne, you are not helping.

That evening at dinner, Marty urges Daniel to go and talk to Martha, but he's interrupted by none other than "Wild Bill" Tannen, who also has eyes for Martha. He ends up kidnapping her after she witnesses him stealing from their gold.

We then take a scene jump to the present day, where something alarming is happening to Clara. She's beginning to become transparent. Which is, um, not a good sign.

She's oblivious to her current state and very upset that someone has "sanded" the wedding announcement off of the buckboard. Doc assures her that he'll take care of things and instructs her not to look in any mirrors.

After taking the time train to 1850, Doc sets out with Marty, Daniel, and Jules to find Martha (and Verne, who has gone to rescue her on his own). They have trouble trying to track them down, but it's okay because Martha and Verne manage to escape on their own after Wild Bill blinds himself with the flash from Verne's camera. They don't get too much time to relax, though, seeing as a giant bear finds them a moment later.

From over on a nearby cliff, Jules spots his brother and grandmother, who appear seconds away from becoming bear-chow. After taking some time to survey the land, Doc spots a nearby geyser and recognizes that the area they're in will eventually become Yellowstone National Park. Doc yells down for Verne to lay some buffalo hide over the opening of the geyser and sit on it with Martha. When the geyser soon erupts, they're lifted up into the air and out of harm's way. Doc and Daniel then use the covering for a wagon to construct a paraglider and swoop in to catch Marth and Verne once the geyser stops.

This heroic rescue wins Martha over, and she falls in love with Daniel, setting the timeline right. During their ceremony, Daniel (the bug enthusiast, remember?) catches a butterfly, which he says is a new species. He names it after Martha.

We return to the present day, where Verne is showing the picture of the butterfly to his class as part of his show-and-tell. Roland Culver tells Verne that he has a cool grandfather. End of cartoon.

Back in the garage, we find Doc in a state we don't often see him in: angry.

Except, surprise. The big goofball was just pretending. In fact, he was doing "geyser talk," which brings us into a little lesson on how geysers work, along with an experiment to create one using boiling water and a funnel.

After the experiment portion with Bill Nye, we go back to Doc, who is wearing glasses. I'm not sure why. But he looks nice in them. They compliment his face well.

Anyway, that's the end of the episode.

This was a fun one, and I really liked getting to see Clara's parents. You can see where she got the various aspects of her personality from. Strong-headed and tough like her mother, yet sensitive and intelligent like her father. Revisiting season 1 has been nice, and I'm excited to begin season 2, which I've never seen before.

Join me next week for the first episode of season 2, in which Marty lies to Jennifer, then sneaks off with Verne to 1697 so that Verne can get an earring in the Caribbean. ??? Really, Marty??

(I use the Futurepedia summaries to write the "join me next week" parts, btw. Very intrigued by. Whatever is going on in the next episode.)