#resp post in source!

[quillheel]

well he doesnt count in that generalization obviously. his sexuality is none of your business but if it WAS your business he'd be straight. mhm. least fruity man to ever exist he might as well have been named after plywood mhm yep

[woodsfae]

B5 S04E01 The Hour of the Wolf  previous episode - table of contents 

It's good to be back - I wanted to watch, but whenever I typed it hurt. Feeling much better now! 

I quickly browsed my last post to make sure I remembered what was going on and remembered something I wanted to say to John Sheridan. 

John. :| I like you, I do. But recall, you had to earn that affection and you kinda rode on Susan Ivanova's shoulders for awhile. As far as I was concerned. So yeah, I like you. But - and this is critical - I like Delenn a lot more than I like you. So no more shaking Delenn by the shoulders, m'kay? /speaking directly to the characters 2000's fanfic author-style

press play

G'Kar continues his trend of being the narrator. Sheridan - lost on Z'ha'dum. Garibaldi - captured by the Shadows. Ivanova - traumatized. Mollari - wished on the monkey's paw and it came true. Delenn - religious fasting and prayer. But of G'Kar himself, he says nothing. He only muses about Sheridan and Garibaldi's fates. 

Oooooh, new opening! Hearing from all the humans and also Delenn but no other aliens. It's punchier and faster than the previous openings, or at least it feels like it - I didn't check.

Aww Susan does not look like she's having a good time listening to the computer recite her incredibly busy schedule. 

Things are tense. The various species who signed the Babylon 5 are pulling their ships - or at least, most of them. They don't want to press the attack like Ivanova is trying to persuade them to do. They believe that if you go to Z'ha'dum, you die. If they go, they die. Sheridan went, and Sheridan's dead. 

It does look like, at this point, that Dr Franklin won't be involved in circumventing the prophecy that if Sheridan goes, he dies. So I am left to wonder how it will be fulfilled and then sidestepped! Knowing Sheridan's wiles, it'll either be incredibly petty levels of pedantry, overwhelming force, or overwhelming force from an unexpected direction and source. 

Centauri Prime looks...glossy. 

The Emperor is Cartagia. I will try to remember this. Londo has met him twice: one when he was a drooling infant, and once when he was "15 and trying to look up the skirts of the court ladies,." delightful. He is incredibly pretentious. 

He actually puts his fucking finger in one of the ladies' mouths while talking about walking among the common people in his short crest. So, so cringe. She seems to be into it. 

I hate Centauri court already. :| Luckily, Londo also hates it, so we can be comrades in arms in this terrible place. His suffering makes him more tolerable for sure. 

Vir has been collecting information from Londo's Shadows contacts while he's gone! And they're coordinated enough to report what happened in the last episode with a high degree of accuracy. The chasm he jumped into is two miles deep. That's only a little short of falling the height of Mt Fuji. And Susan has a sad about her friend. :/  Little does she know, he's gonna be resurrected.

Fucking Morden is here to make Londo's day a little better. And oh my god, he got fucked up. But the Shadows claim he'll "be better soon." Better be dead soon! >.> Emperor Cartagia knows about Morden, so he claims. And he's made a deal with the Shadows - the Shadows are putting ships around Centauri Prime.

New prophecy prediction: Londo's going to murder Emperor Cartagia. Still not sure if he'll be the direct successor, though. Logic says yes, but drama says maybe-no.

Delenn wishes to speak with not-Kosh, but Lyta says no. not-Kosh doesn't speak. Hasn't come to any council meetings, won't return Delenn's calls. Until he does speak! He knows what's up, but won't do anything. He calls Sheridan irrelevant. And says that Sheridan's actions opened an unexpected door. So although there was a prophecy that Sheridan would go to, and die on, Z'ha'dum, he carried it out in an unexpected way? That's cool. Vorlon-stymying machine, that one!

But with how he's dealing with Delenn, he's sure destroying some of her respect for the Vorlons as an elder species and demigods of the universe. 

 So funny that Zack Allen notices someone's in Garibaldi's quarters by seeing the door half open. Since when to the doors ever do anything but open and then close again immediately. lol. 

G'Kar is searching his quarters and they have a friendly chat. Ahh and here's the famous scene about Daffy Duck being described to G'Kar as a god of frustration! That's pretty good. 

Is...is G'Kar saying that he owes Garibaldi, and his new mindset he got from being in prison...in a good way? yikes. Anyway, he's off to find Garibaldi. It would be pretty funny if, as serenely as he describes his new quest, he also carries it out thus. Then serenely punches Garibaldi after he rescues him. haha. But that won't happen, I'm sure - they've seemed to be on good terms, and the show really doesn't seem to understand what horrific injustices they are putting the Narns, and G'Kar, through without any thematic wins. 

Emperor Cartagia is not only allowing Shadows to post ships around the planet, but also a palace to stay in. 

He's a megalomaniac with literal delusions of impending godhood. "I've known all my life that it's what I was born for." WHAT. 

"When I become a god, I will forgive you your rudeness, Mollari. [...] For now, I will simply try to forget it." lololol

ah! not-Kosh is sucking Lyta! And not in the fun way! She does not look well. She's 'carrying him with her', and not in the same way she 'carried Kosh'. Hm. Mysterious telepathy and mysterious Vorlon shit. Oh - and I didn't notice till she put on her environment mask, but not-Kosh was making her freaking stand in the wrong atmosphere for her while he used her strength! Seriously messed up. Is not-Kosh about to be the first Vorlon of the second war of the shadows to defect?? Or just an example of "With friends like that, who needs enemies,"?

I. Don't believe that Vir sleeps with his crest up. Or that it stays up in anyone sleep. It's just hair! Like, even a mohawk but up with elmer's glue gets crushed if you squish it in your sleep, no? There's just no way. That's too silly and literally in a show of silliness, broke my suspension of disbelief, hah. 

Susan Ivanova claims she hasn't slept in seven days???? GIRL. Susan-Lyta bonding time going on. Rather, Susan is describing an existential crisis, but in the most melodramatic way possible. And says when her dad was going through it he would drink vodka before bed to keep the wolf away. Hm. Alcoholism runs in that family, judging by the glass also in Susan's hand. She's feeling rough! 

Lyta has a mission in mind. She says Kosh was sensitive to both Lyta and Sheridan, so if she gets near Z'ha'dum she might be able to sense if he's alive or not. Susan says, hmmm don't think telepathy works like that. Authorized. And Delenn and I are coming too. 

Lyta is confidently exhibiting Psi confidence I would not attribute to The Gathering Lyta. I think she's grown to well above Psi 5.

This is genuinely quite tense. Lyta's eyes went all black. Delenn is trying to reach out with or through Lyta, which is also something I was pretty sure telepaths couldn't do. 

And now Susan is joining in on being eerie. 

The Shadows have sensed them. They are looking. ANd Susan says she has been here before. Instead of running, Susan ordered the ship to descend. And then! They jump away!

Lennier was s m a r t. He programmed the ship to jump back to B5 if he didn't hit a button every two minutes. So while they all got long distance hypnotized or some shit, past!Lennier saved present!everyone. Go Lennier! 

So the Shadows are not only weak to telepaths, but they also have some sort of telepathic ability. Not the way the lower species' telepathy works, but more like an individual nightmare that draws each one in separately. Spooky as fuck.

But from the lack of response from Sheridan, they've concluded he's dead. Or Susan has, at least, I don't know if Delenn will give up hope or not. I kinda think Lennier won't. I think Lennier will always choose hope. 

Probably Sheridan staggering through a tunnel on Z'ha'dum. What did he drop, tho. I don't recognize the metallic, squarish, long and thin object. end teaser interlude.

"Vir, when you are mad you say these things the way you or I would talk about the weather!" -Londo, filling Vir in on the situation that Londo created with his string of disastrous decisions

Ugh, Londo speaks in quotations. So quotably. He says that Vir is his friend in a flowery way. And asks for help. And Vir's like "dude...when have I ever not helped you." and Londo's like "fantastic, we need to plan a regicide." Poor Vir. Always getting dragged into terrible situations. By Londo. 

Susan Ivanova's personal log: I need to plan war things. And I need help. I know where to get help. And I need to stop being sad that o Captain my captain! is dead.  honey. :(

New alien ! On Z'ha'dum. Sheridan has memory issues. But was still able to find fuel for a fire and start one. His fire-sharing companion gazes deeply at him, stroking one ear. 

yesss that's the way to build tension right at the end of an episode. The ole gaze-staring ear stroke. ._. 

Lol. It was a good episode! It'll be fun to see how the new season's arcs get set up and what I can figure out!

next!

[itsquakey]

Say it with me.

Did Opal-Owl-Flight groom minors? NO

Did Blue-Jester groom minors? NO

Did they go too far up by making a lot of very questionable sex jokes and showing imagery that is suggestive to minors? YES

Are you kidding me??? I was aware that the words “Groomer” and “Pedo” are thrown around just like that on the internet. But…holy shit. So what are these two being accused of? Well. Grooming. Because they were saying some very out of pocket risky jokes and had art that is risky (According to sources of both sides no actual porn was posted, just risky content in which you could argue teeters on NSFW because remember, not all NSFW is blatant porn. It’s a spectrum.) Okay so let’s look at the definition of grooming here. According to Oxford Dictionary grooming is the attempt to form a relationship with someone for them with the sole intention of sex or being in a sexual relationship with them.

From interviewing both sides as well as looking into the two hundred paged doc (which we will get there soon my friends), there was no instance of grooming here, they didn’t try to get closer to these kids to try and use them for sex, the closest thing you could tie that to is the pinup drawings, which I don’t even think Opal or Blue knew what they were doing when they posted that. Oh. And one more thing.

Hey owl. I know we’re mutuals and all. And I saw you already fixed this but I feel the need to say it. You are an adult. I am an adult. We should not be throwing the word groomer around especially when you are in contact with the doc maker and likely already read it all. I understand grooming is a very serious thing however we should remain mostly neutral if not stand our ground a little bit but be open while we listen to all sides of the story before jumping to conclusions.

So what about the doc? Hey where did it go? Yea it got deleted or just taken off public view from what I’ve seen. If I were to take a guess…it may or may not have to do with the lack of censorship when it came to the minors in this situation! Yes, they did not censor a large amount of the minors interactions in this doc opening them up to harassment. I know one of these minors and went to them in hopes of them telling me more. But guess what? They did what most kids would do in such a situation and freaked out, which was my fault for trying to do such a thing without thinking. These kids are basically open to a rain of gunfire now because of no censorship. I thought we were trying to protect them? What’s up with that? I don’t consider it doxxing as doxxing is the reveal of personal information on the internet/ to the public. The info of those minors were public in a way. But it’s still VERY scummy whether or not the doc makers knew that. And to add onto this, according to a few people some or all of these screenshots were taken out of context. I was not given any further proof so take it with a grain or salt. If the doc maker is reading this. I’d recommend actually taking time in making that doc better because all it does is make you look aggressive even if you may have a point in some things. Or just… go to those involved and try to fix it in private so unneeded drama like this doesn’t happen.

Opal, Blue, any other adult who happened to be heavily involved. I understand sex jokes = funny. I understand we can go too far. Hell. This situation made me realize I did a similar thing a while back and how it was not at all cool of me to do. I know that sex humor is a staple in minors and at the end of the day we can laugh about “magic condoms” or how much of a slut Mago is. Here’s the thing. I do think you guys went too far. A sex joke or two is funny and not out of the ordinary (again, I have I think a couple of those on my account if you look hard enough) and I know it’s easy to go take a couple steps too far from the path. What I want you lads to do is be aware that a lot of the more raunchier jokes and images wasn’t okay around minors and you need to take responsibility for it. No defensive words. Just say “Yeah I messed up, but guess what. I can fix this” and I’m not just expecting this just out of you, I’m expecting this out of the other side and those who jumped on these claims without looking into them. Here is an idea for you, what can possibly fix your issue with regards to content within your server. Make a 18+ channel or a series of them, having them locked and people only allowed in by mods who give it a green light when the person wanting in is 18 or older. That way you can post content and make jokes to your hearts content without worrying about these folks calling you groomers. Worst case scenario you get called a degenerate but I mean…come on. If you’re a degenerate then I am 100x more of one judging by the jokes and content I’ve made in the shadows. The adult channels is something I’ve seen in multiple Kirby servers and if you plan on keeping your current server or moving to a new one to protect minor identity keep that idea of mine in mind please. This is kinda like the maturity option on tumblr posts, which if you haven’t used yet for spicier content I highly recommend!

And this is just for Opal. Hey, I wanna say this so you don’t catch flack for it later but author doesn’t equal character is not an excuse in this situation. I understand the thought process of this, but keep in mind you are the one speaking through Magolor. You are the one who wrote him to have this character and you should be very aware that if you use that excuse on anyone who isn’t as open as I am they will likely just completely believe you are trying to save your own ass.

FYI If later on in the timeline it does come out someone here no matter what side they’re on is actually grooming minors with undeniable proof, they’re going to have to deal with my ass and the cops.

I don’t think I will be involved in drama again, unless it’s of this magnitude in which I’d highly recommend saying your prayers because I will not be nearly as nice as I was in this post.

TLDR: Opal and Blue aren’t groomers, stop throwing that word around. Everyone in this situation is at some sort of fault and should just take responsibility like a fucking adult instead of excusing and worming their way around it.

Please do not contact me unless you are involved in this drama or are a close mutual of mine. I’m afraid I may blow up on you because my fuse has been eaten up by the flame of this situation. Goodnight Tri-State area.

Edit: Please read comments and tags as they share different opinions and may cover things I didn’t cover or may have gotten wrong. Thanks.

[ominouspositivity-or-else]

“Seeing exceptions will never cause these people to rethink the rules they make up.“ But my sister in Christ, do not these “rules” apply to the Catholic Church to an extent? The Church has certain ideals of male and female behavior, there is a “complementary”masculine/feminine complementarity” and “natural law” and “traditional gender roles” are held as the ideal. I can provide evidence of this from magisterial Church documents. I admire the Church it’s just that I have a lot of confusion regarding certain topics, gender roles being one of the biggest. I’m aware the Church is not so shallow as to say “women cannot be intelligent/men cannot be emotional” and has always educated both sexes, it doesn’t think “women are actually sinning if they aren’t doing x job exactly” but it still upholds the general trends that differentiate men and women, which logically leads to the idea “men are x and women are y by nature”. Which is true, men and women are, in general, different, both physically and psychologically . This has been an endless source of confusion for me. This is also why I wonder about how many Catholics on this site seem to reject gender roles altogether which seems antithetical to Christian history (and indeed all history, all cultures have gendered divisions of labor and gender roles). For the record I’m not a particularly “masculine” man either.. so it does affect me..

My brother in Christ, of course there are differences between men and women. Spiritual, psychological, physical. I don't? Believe? I've ever said otherwise?

But what I usually say is that your masculinity and femininity is deeper than toys, books, and clothes. It's deeper than colors, than emotions, than personality types. You're inherently male because you are a man. Congratulations. If you are wholly being truly yourself, you will be a masculine person, simply because that's what you are. Likewise, if I am truly being myself, I will be a feminine person, because that is what I am. We are both created in the image and likeness of God, meant to do different things in this world, but like.

The way you cut your hair doesn't factor into your masculinity of femininity. Whether or not you wear pink doesn't factor in.

You're a man by the virtue of being one.

And none of this is to say you don't have a role that's specific to your masculinity. Of course you do! You're made to fight and to protect and to love! You're made to be a father just as I am made to be a mother.

But what I think you may be seeing a lot of on my account is not the degradation of roles that belong to the sexes properly, because I don't believe I've ever reblogged a post about how "the wife should be in charge on the home" or how "a man should obey his wife", but rather that society's ideas of masculinity and femininity are so screwed up that we reduce our ideas of what it means to be male and what it means to be female to a simple stereotype.

Because you know what? Boys can like pink and play with dolls. Girls can like trucks and monsters. None of those things make them any less of what they were created to be.

When I was a little girl(to this day, ngl to you) I always fell more in line with my male peers versus my female peers. I've got a personality that has more stereotypically masculine standings, I've got a brutal honesty to me that some women have a hard time with. I never liked dolls in the way that my female friends did, but then again I never played with them like my brother did. I have a more masculine style of dress but I like my hair long. I don't like make-up or fashion or shopping or stuff. None of that stuff makes me less feminine. Nor does liking that stuff make someone MORE of a female.

That's all I try to say.

As far as legitimate roles for each sex to play, there is definite places for that, and it specifically in my opinion exists in the construct of the family. It's not "women sit down and bite your tongue in work meetings", it's "wives, listen to and respect your husband's for they are the symbol of Christ to you and your kids."

The gender roles exist naturally and for good reason. Makes your relationships healthier if your wife is on the same page as you and is willing to let you take the lead. Likewise it's a more healthy relationship if your husband is willing to take the lead and your advice as well, to lead the family where all of you need to go.

But that dichotomy seems to exist outside all the surface level stuff.

Your wife could cut her hair into a buzz cut and wear combat boots and a military jacket. She's still your wife, and she ought to listen to you.

Your husband could paint his nails, grow his hair out long, like pink. He's still you husband, and he should love you like Christ loves the church.

Men and women are different creatures, but I think a lot of what you're seeing, anon, is our unwillingness as a group to fall in line with the idea that there are surface level boxes on what make men men and women women.

There isn't a check list. There are things you are called to do depending on your sex, but that's deeper than how you style your hair or how often you cry. I think that's what you might be seeing.

My advice is to try to separate gender stereotypes and gender roles! Ik it can be difficult but like. Don't let society tell you what to do and who you are. Let the Lord do that!

Lmk if I didn't answer this enough, or I was too broad. Praying for you, anon! God bless!

[flyonthewallmedstudent]

Chlamydia Trachomatis

Can't blog about gonorrhoea without at least a brief mention about Chlamydia.

Risk groups: Sexually active and under 30 Concerningly, it's usually asymptomatic (90% are asymptomatic), but can have severe/significant complications if undetected and untreated (i.e. infertility, pelvic inflammatory disease etc.)

Prevention: Active screening of anyone under <30, pregnant patients in clinic etc. Related to Chlamydophila Pneumoniae (atypical 'walking' pneumonia) and Psittaci (bird infection, causes resp illness psittacosis) Is an atypical bacteria, no cell wall, so penicillins have no effect. It has a lipid rich membrane. Gram stains negative (Pink), much like gono. Clinical presentation: Source: QHealth

ANyone with a human body can also get laryngeal chlamydia (so painful throat) from oral sex, and conjunctivitis (similarly, oral sex)

IMage source:

Pregnant women are routinely screened and treated, as it can also result in neonatal conjunctivitis during vaginal delivery, usually presenting 2 weeks post partum.

by the way, koalas also get chlamydia..

Investigations: - gold standard testing is PCR swab or NAAT (Nucleic acid amplification test) Also test for: - concurrent gonorrhoea (treated with ceftriaxone)

Complications if left untreated: Pregnancy: low birth weight infants, pre term delivery, as above, neonatal conjunctivitis Pelvic inflammatory disease --> which can lead to abscess and infertility via tubal damage from inflammation

Epididymo-orchitis --> painful, swollen testicles, can feel like a testicular torsion presentation is a differential for this

Rarely, but can happen: reactive arthritis. painful, red, hot swollen joints from immune complexes, sterile on testing fluid MCS from joint. usually resolving post infection, even more rarely can lead to long term inflammatory arthritis needing long term immunosuppression as guided by rheumatology. Treatment: 1 g of azithromycin as a stat dose, PO (blissfully simple) alternative is doxycyline 100 mg BD for a week, but I rarely see this prescribed. Given it is an atypical that won't respond to pencillins or cephalosporins. For adherence it's better to just go with the stat dose unless there's contraindications to azith (prolonged QTc etc). As it often co-occurs with gono, they're often tested together and treated together. With gono it's IM cef, 500 mg

Contact tracing is always incredibly important in STIs - need to trace back partners up to 6 mos Sexual contact - none for 7 days post therapy, and not with partners from the last 6 months until they've been screened and treated if positive. there's no immunity post infection, and re-infection is common. interestingly re testing at 3 months is recommended.

REsource: JAMA

CDC guidelines/free Free - Australian STI guidelines

Summary from JAMA on X:

[violets-funhouse]

Fun Fact!

the hindi alphabet is in fact organized by where in the mouth you pronounce it!

So first of all, vowels and consonants are arranged separate.

The latin??? alphabets go a b c d e f and so on, with consonants and vowels all mixed willy nilly (is that how you say that).

In hindi, they are separated into two sequences. All vowels have an alphabet, all consonants have an alphabet.

Disregard the vowels for now

there are 33 consonants, arranged in 5 groups of 5, and then 2 groups of 4

each row of 5 is basically all the sound you can make from a particular part of your mouth, and the row of 4 is how an open sound is made in those parts in that order (I'm explaining more below, dw)

eg. the first row is

क for the c sound in cow,

ख for a much harsher, throatier c sound, like the kh in khan

ग for g soung like garden

घ for the gh sound of ghost

ङ is that one sound you make if you try to say the n sound but at the same space you say the prev four sounds, like ng in sing

Basically the velar region in the image by @allthingslinguistic

this pattern stays for the first five rows, the 2nd row covering ch as in chew, its throatier version, j as in jug, its throatier version, and the weird 'if you pronounce n in that area" (palatal region)

and so on

3rd -> t as in tinkling + throatier, d as in down + throatier, weird n -> alveolar region

4th ->th as in think + throatier, d as in hindi + throatier, n as in no -> interdental region

(5th -> p + throatier(which is basically f), b + throatier and ma) -> bilabial

now the next row is basically mouth sound from 4 places in that order which is y, r, L and v (how much pressure of the tongue is required to the roof of the mouth to pronounce them, etc)

(palatal, post alveolar, alveolar, and labio dental resp)

and after that there are two different sh sounds (the one in should and the one in asia), the s sound like snake, and the h as in half

i find it really cool

if anyone wants to talk about the tamil alphabet and the fucking weird ways they are pronounced, i would be an inferior source, but i can try.

(to anyone who knows hindi, im ignoring ksha tra gnya shra because they're all just joined compound letters there's not need like ksha = क्+ष्+�� and so on for the entire last row so suck it up buttercup)

The International Phonetic Alphabet consonants found in English, with keywords and relevant parts of the mouth highlighted and colour-coded. (Source.) 

[tungledotedu]

for your blocklist:

warning for ableist slur, genocide denial (and cringe in general)

[ID: a tumblr reply by narukorankofan on 5 may. it says: 'It's not genocide, it's a war the Hamas started on October 7th. They now get another lesson hammered into their skulls how attacking the Yahud is bad for your health.' end ID.]

(source)

[ID: two replies on tumblr by narukorankofan, dated 13 february. the first reply says, 'Bibi is no dictator, ya fucking retard.' the second reply says 'Cry about it, commie'. end ID.]

(source)

[ID: a tumblr post titled 'random thoughts' by narukorankofan. it says:

'Unapologetic Zionist Jew

IL UA TW (flag codes for israel, ukraine, and taiwan)

Bij bolszewika!

Путин хуйло!

DNI lists are bullshit, and this user will ignore them (resp. not look up the profile before replying or reblogging)

No disclaimers, trigger warnings or tone indicators around here

People who care about “shipping” too much need to touch grass.

end ID.]

another generic edgelord who likes to throw around slurs. what even is this waste of oxygen doing on tumblr.

[jcmarchi]

Alexandr Yarats, Head of Search at Perplexity – Interview Series

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/alexandr-yarats-head-of-search-at-perplexity-interview-series/

Alexandr Yarats, Head of Search at Perplexity – Interview Series

Alexandr Yarats is the Head of Search at Perplexity AI. He began his career at Yandex in 2017, concurrently studying at the Yandex School of Data Analysis. The initial years were intense yet rewarding, propelling his growth to become an Engineering Team Lead. Driven by his aspiration to work with a tech giant, he joined Google in 2022 as a Senior Software Engineer, focusing on the Google Assistant team (later Google Bard). He then moved to Perplexity as the Head of Search.

Perplexity AI is an AI-chatbot-powered research and conversational search engine that answers queries using natural language predictive text. Launched in 2022, Perplexity generates answers using the sources from the web and cites links within the text response.

What initially got you interested in machine learning?

My interest in machine learning (ML) was a gradual process. During my school years, I spent a lot of time studying math, probability theory, and statistics, and got an opportunity to play with classical machine learning algorithms such as linear regression and KNN. It was fascinating to see how you can build a predictive function directly from the data and then use it to predict unseen data. This interest led me to the Yandex School of Data Analysis, a highly competitive machine learning master’s degree program in Russia (only 200 people are accepted each year). There, I learned a lot about more advanced machine learning algorithms and built my intuition. The most crucial point during this process was when I learned about neural networks and deep learning. It became very clear to me that this was something I wanted to pursue over the next couple of decades.

You previously worked at Google as a Senior Software Engineer for a year, what were some of your key takeaways from this experience?

Before joining Google, I spent over four years at Yandex, right after graduating from the Yandex School of Data Analysis. There, I led a team that developed various machine learning methods for Yandex Taxi (an analog to Uber in Russia). I joined this group at its inception and had the chance to work in a close-knit and fast-paced team that rapidly grew over four years, both in headcount (from 30 to 500 people) and market cap (it became the largest taxi service provider in Russia, surpassing Uber and others).

Throughout this time, I had the privilege to build many things from scratch and launch several projects from zero to one. One of the final projects I worked on there was building chatbots for service support. There, I got a first glimpse of the power of large language models and was fascinated by how important they could be in the future. This realization led me to Google, where I joined the Google Assistant team, which was later renamed Google Bard (one of the competitors of Perplexity).

At Google, I had the opportunity to learn what world-class infrastructure looks like, how Search and LLMs work, and how they interact with each other to provide factual and accurate answers. This was a great learning experience, but over time I grew frustrated with the slow pace at Google and the feeling that nothing ever got done. I wanted to find a company that worked on search and LLMs and moved as fast, or even faster, than when I was at Yandex. Fortunately, this happened organically.

Internally at Google, I started seeing screenshots of Perplexity and tasks that required comparing Google Assistant against Perplexity. This piqued my interest in the company, and after several weeks of research, I was convinced that I wanted to work there, so I reached out to the team and offered my services.

Can you define your current role and responsibilities at Perplexity?

I’m currently serving as the head of the search team and am responsible for building our internal retrieval system that powers Perplexity. Our search team works on building a web crawling system, retrieval engine, and ranking algorithms. These challenges allow me to take advantage of the experience I gained at Google (working on Search and LLMs) as well as at Yandex. On the other hand, Perplexity’s product poses unique opportunities to redesign and reengineer how a retrieval system should look in a world that has very powerful LLMs. For instance, it is no longer important to optimize ranking algorithms to increase the probability of a click; instead, we are focusing on improving the helpfulness and factuality of our answers. This is a fundamental distinction between an answer engine and a search engine. My team and I are trying to build something that will go beyond the traditional 10 blue links, and I can’t think of anything more exciting to work on currently.

Can you elaborate on the transition at Perplexity from developing a text-to-SQL tool to pivoting towards creating AI-powered search?

We initially worked on building a text-to-SQL engine that provides a specialized answer engine in situations where you need to get a quick answer based on your structured data (e.g., a spreadsheet or table). Working on a text-to-SQL project allowed us to gain a much deeper understanding of LLMs and RAG, and led us to a key realization: this technology is much more powerful and general than we originally thought. We quickly realized that we could go well beyond well-structured data sources and tackle unstructured data as well.

What were the key challenges and insights during this shift?

The key challenges during this transition were shifting our company from being B2B to B2C and rebuilding our infrastructure stack to support unstructured search. Very quickly during this migration process, we realized that it is much more enjoyable to work on a customer-facing product as you start to receive a constant stream of feedback and engagement, something that we didn’t see much of when we were building a text-to-SQL engine and focusing on enterprise solutions.

Retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) seems to be a cornerstone of Perplexity’s search capabilities. Could you explain how Perplexity utilizes RAG differently compared to other platforms, and how this impacts search result accuracy?

RAG is a general concept for providing external knowledge to an LLM. While the idea might seem simple at first glance, building such a system that serves tens of millions of users efficiently and accurately is a significant challenge. We had to engineer this system in-house from scratch and build many custom components that proved critical for achieving the last bits of accuracy and performance. We engineered our system where tens of LLMs (ranging from big to small) work in parallel to handle one user request quickly and cost-efficiently. We also built a training and inference infrastructure that allows us to train LLMs together with search end-to-end, so they are tightly integrated. This significantly reduces hallucinations and improves the helpfulness of our answers.

With the limitations compared to Google’s resources, how does Perplexity manage its web crawling and indexing strategies to stay competitive and ensure up-to-date information?

Building an index as extensive as Google’s requires considerable time and resources. Instead, we are focusing on topics that our users frequently inquire about on Perplexity. It turns out that the majority of our users utilize Perplexity as a work/research assistant, and many queries seek high-quality, trusted, and helpful parts of the web. This is a power law distribution, where you can achieve significant results with an 80/20 approach. Based on these insights, we were able to build a much more compact index optimized for quality and truthfulness. Currently, we spend less time chasing the tail, but as we scale our infrastructure, we will also pursue the tail.

How do large language models (LLMs) enhance Perplexity’s search capabilities, and what makes them particularly effective in parsing and presenting information from the web?

We use LLMs everywhere, both for real-time and offline processing. LLMs allow us to focus on the most important and relevant parts of web pages. They go beyond anything before in maximizing the signal-to-noise ratio, which makes it much easier to tackle many things that were not tractable before by a small team. In general, this is perhaps the most important aspect of LLMs: they enable you to do sophisticated things with a very small team.

Looking ahead, what are the main technological or market challenges Perplexity anticipates?

As we look ahead, the most important technological challenges for us will be centered around continuing to improve the helpfulness and accuracy of our answers. We aim to increase the scope and complexity of the types of queries and questions we can answer reliably. Along with this, we care a lot about the speed and serving efficiency of our system and will be focusing heavily on driving serving costs down as much as possible without compromising the quality of our product.

In your opinion, why is Perplexity’s approach to search superior to Google’s approach of ranking websites according to backlinks, and other proven search engine ranking metrics?

We are optimizing a completely different ranking metric than classical search engines. Our ranking objective is designed to natively combine the retrieval system and LLMs. This approach is quite different from that of classical search engines, which optimize the probability of a click or ad impression.

Thank you for the great interview, readers who wish to learn more should visit Perplexity AI.

[criticaldesign-turbo]

Fashion and Fame

“DNA, The Kardashians & The Konsequences” by Marie Clare Jones

Marie Clare Jones explores the popularity of ancestry kits and the commercialization of DNA testing. It imagines how Kylie Jenner could introduce K-DNA kits through her brand, Kylie Cosmetics, and explore the implications of widespread DNA testing through a timeline linking DNA, the Kardashians, and its consequences. The project raises important questions about DNA ownership, commercialization, and ethical implications for the future, culminating in the creation of two spoof articles where children sue their parents for irresponsible use of K-DNA Kits. Overall, it offers and questions insights into the potential uses and ethical concerns surrounding DNA in a commercial context.

2) “How the Shein influencer trip marked a turning point in the brand-sponsored vacation trend” by Jenna Benchetrit

Shein, an online store that specializes in selling clothes and shoes, is one of the largest retailers with $100 billion in sales in 2022. Known for its extremely low prices, the online shop sources directly from China. Like other fast fashion companies, Shein has faced criticism for poor working conditions, high levels of toxins in its clothes (with no commitment to using standards), and extremely high CO2 emissions (source: https://time.com/6247732/shein-climate-change-labor-fashion/).

The article discusses Shein's attempt to "greenwash" these criticisms by sponsoring and paying influencers to visit a "fake" manufacturing facility, in the hopes that they would promote Shein as "not as bad as everyone thinks." However, this move sparked a huge backlash and controversy for the influencers. This situation is critical as it highlights how such companies try to improve their image without making substantive changes.

3) “Dirty Laundry” by  Carole Frances Lung, Aditi Mayer, Minga Opazo, Alicia Piller, and Sommer Roman

The San Luis Obispo Museum of Art held an exhibition called "Dirty Laundry" focusing on the problems of fast fashion. Fast fashion makes lots of cheap clothes quickly to keep up with trends. This leads to waste and harm to people and the environment. The works in "Dirty Laundry" highlight critical design aspects by making people think about the problems of fast fashion. They use creativity to show how this industry harms the environment and people. By raising awareness the exhibition encourages viewers to think differently about the clothes they buy and the impact of their choices.

4) Smog Free Project by Daan Roosegaarde

Led by Daan Roosegaarde, the SMOG FREE PROJECT is an urban innovation project that showcases the aesthetic value of clean air. Roosegaarde crafts SMOG FREE RINGS from compressed smog particles gathered from the SMOG FREE TOWER (world's first smog vacuum cleaner which creates clean air parks). You can donate the city 1000 m3 of clean air by sharing the SMOG FREE RING.

It is currently included in the permanent collections of the National Museum of Zurich, Utah Museum of Fine Arts USA, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, and The Biosphere Environment Museum in Montreal.

5) Solar-Powered Jacket by Vollebak:

The Solar Charged Jacket is made of a highly adaptable material that can be quickly charged and made to glow in the dark by any kind of light you can find. For example, a phone flashlight can be used to draw on it. You can use sunlight to charge it. If it is fully charged it glows completely. The piece deals with fashion's functionality and sustainability while presenting creative responses to environmental issues.

[college-girl199328]

The federal budget, set for Tuesday, will include a grocery rebate measure aimed at lower-income Canadians to help address the affordability crisis, particularly to mitigate the rising cost of food, CBC News has learned.

A senior government official familiar with the budget being rolled out told CBC News that the overall cost of the measure is "north of $2 billion" and will benefit 11 million households. It will be facilitated through the GST credit, aimed at lower-income families.

"It's being called a grocery rebate," said the source, but noted the rebate amount will not be based on a person's grocery expenditures, nor will the government require that the one-time payment be spent on groceries.

The source explained that a single person with no children could get a one-time payment of up to $234, while a couple with two children could receive up to $467 and a senior citizen about $225. The timing of these payments will depend on how quickly the government can get the legislation to implement the budget passed.

Tuesday's budget will have other affordability measures as well. CBC News confirms that the government plans to crack down on so-called junk for consumers, first reported by Canadian Press. Junk fees are hidden or unexpected consumer charges that are tacked on to the initial price of a product or service, ultimately inflating the total cost.

Ottawa regulatory agencies and the provinces and territories to eliminate junk fees. Sectors that might be affected by the crackdown include phone and internet providers and large event ticket sellers.

The federal budget will also increase the limit on what students can withdraw from their registered education savings plans (RESPs) for their first semester of post-secondary education.

During the first 13 weeks of schooling, students can't withdraw more than $5,000 of the education assistance payment (EAP) portion of the RESP, which is the investment earnings and government grants. The federal government plans to increase that limit to $8,000 to reflect the rising cost of college and university.

There is no limit on post-secondary education (PSE) withdrawals, which are the contributions made by the subscriber. Other affordability measures are also expected in the budget to pay for recent healthcare deals made with the provinces and territories.

A key plank of the budget will also be investments in the clean industrial economy, spurred by the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which will pump hundreds of billions of dollars into clean energy in that country.

CBC News can also confirm a Reuters report that the budget will include a tax credit for clean tech manufacturing worth 30 percent of capital investment costs in manufacturing equipment.

The government source used the critical mineral sector as an example of where the government wants to accelerate production. The tax credit would provide an incentive to mine and process critical recognition that there is a growing demand for them in the U.S., particularly for the electric vehicle market.

The source said that the new tax credit is one of the measures that will be part of a comprehensive package the Liberal government will bring in what the U.S. is doing with its Inflation Reduction Act.

The budget will also provide greater detail about two tax credits in last November's fall economic statement. The Clean Hydrogen Tax Credit and the Clean Tech Investment Tax Credit will take shape in this budget to invest in those areas and do so in a way that boosts pay for workers will benefit the most, said the source.

"There are similar positive incentives for unionized workers in the U.S.'s IRA. We mirror that in some ways," said the source, adding that the government has been consulting organized labor over the last two months to ensure budget measures are not "designed in isolation."

In fact, the new tax credits will be worth more to employers if their workers are paid more, said the source. The source would not specify whether there's a projection for a balanced budget.

The fall economic statement projected a balanced budget by 2028 — the first time the Liberal government had a budget since it was first elected in 2015.

But economic growth is significantly weaker now. "Expect to see the fiscal picture adjusted, not because of expenditures, but because nominal GDP growth is hugely different from a year ago," said the source.

The slow growth might also impact the debt-to-GDP ratio, an anchor for the government that has relied on a downward trajectory of Canadians that deficit spending is not out of control.

[basic-retro-programming]

SchoolFreeware, QBasic Tutorial 10/64, Do-Loop ...

My source code of tutorial 10, Part 1 ...

The output of my source code ...

My source code of tutorial 10, Part 2 ...

Post #153: SchoolFreeware, QBasic Tutorial 10/64, The Do-Loop resp. Do-While-Loop & Do-Until-Loop, 2023.

[creatiview]

[ad_1] The Bangash Dodson & Horrell team delivered two back to back swift and smooth goals by Ignacio Negri but UAE Polo kept a 2 goal lead by halftime. The game levelled during the penultimate chukker with both teams having 6 goals each as each player demonstrated a skilled play. The last chukker saw Haider Bangash scoring for the team, but not long after the UAE Polo players took quick strides and finished the game with 10 to 7 score, which earned the UAE Polo team its well-deserved spot at the IFZA Silver Cup 2023 final. Match Progression: UAE Polo vs. Bangash Dodson & Horrell Polo3 – 1 | 5 – 1 | 6 – 4 | 6 – 6 | 10 – 8 Top Scorer: Lucas Monteverde Jr., 4 goals The Dubai Wolves by Cafu took the advantage in the first chukker as Carlos Ulloa opened the afternoon match with 3 consecutive goals. The next chukker didn’t see much of the Dubai Wolves by Cafu as Bautista Bayugar scored two goals followed by one from Juan Jauretche which levelled the game. Both the teams picked up the pace in the succeeding chukkers, but it was IFZA Habtoor Polo team leading the game with, 8 to 7 score. It was a fight for the win at the last chukker, with the Wolves giving it their all. However, the back to back goals by the patron of IFZA Habtoor Polo – Mohammed Al Habtoor – ensured the team’s victory at 11 to 9 score. Match Progression: IFZA Habtoor Polo vs. Dubai Wolves by Cafu1 – 3 | 4 – 4 | 7 – 6 | 8 – 7 | 11 – 9 Top scorer: Bautista Bayugar & Carlos Ulloa, 5 goals each Get tickets to watch the IFZA Silver Cup 2023 final in person or catch live on livestream. Final Day Agenda: 12:00 Gates Open 13:30     IFZA Habtoor Polo vs. Dubai Wolves by CAFU 13:15     Sax at the IFZA Lounge 15:00     Cheerleader Show 15:05     Acrobat Balance Show at the IFZA Lounge 15:15     Dubai Mounted Police Horse Show 15:35     Miabella Fashion Show at the IFZA Lounge (15 mins) 15:55    UAE National Anthem & Team Introduction 16:00    UAE Polo vs. AM Polo 16:40    Find the Gold Coins 17:15    Acrobat – Diamond Show at the IFZA Lounge              Awarding Ceremony 17:45     Singer at the IFZA Lounge 18:00     LED Show 18:30     After Party at the Silver Lounge !function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s) if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function() n.callMethod? n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments) ; if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0'; n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0; t.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)(window,document,'script', 'https://connect.facebook.net/en_US/fbevents.js'); fbq('init', '860081330738247'); fbq('track', 'PageView'); fbq('track', 'ViewContent'); jQuery(function ($) (function(d, s, id) var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.async = true; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&appId=1892660097624150&version=v2.0"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); (document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); $( document ).ready(function() $.ajax( url: '/ajax/nextarticleajax', type: 'POST', data: cat: 3459, id: 347936, count: 2, ajax: true, error: function(xhr,tStatus,e) if(!xhr) console.log(' We have an error '+tStatus+' '+e.message); else console.log('else: '+e.message); , success: function(resp) $('.ajax_article').html(JSON.parse(resp).main); ); ); ); [ad_2] Source link

[al-n-cartoons]

I never did finish my rambling for the rest of the episode, did I? I had a lot to say but can’t remember most of it.

I was worried that Verosica would he scapegoated as a comparative Bad Exe so as to make Stolas look good by comparison. The hate party is also really weird and made me think that Blitz was going to be revealed to be an in-universe lolcow that people parasocially hate. This worry was made in large part per certain characters, like that Dillan guy, being invited in spite just being someone Blitz made out with and the immediately rejected.

In hindsight, a lot of the characters at the party probably just showed up for a friend or because it was a party hosted by a famous person (Verosica). Or a lot of these characters could be from one of the fires Blitz set (to his childhood circus and then that amusement park)? The more you think of it, the weirder it is. I think the scene was going off of the mentality of how powerful it would be to see all the people one wronged in a singular setting actively demonstrating their animosity, which is cool, but strange.

Returning to Verosica, her scenes were really good. The narrative and animators were all really respectful of her and treated her like an actual human being. She's angry and hurt but handling her issues and is trying to help others in her community, and Blitz's apology to her is probably the single most deserved in the series (alongside Fiz's).

An interesting application of the apology tour could have been apologizing to Blitz's coworkers, given that Blitz has a habit of invading their privacy. I think this issue has already been resolved somewhat in the episode with the truth serum, but it could have been returned to here? I don't know, I'm spitballing. An apology to Mean Mamma or Octavia could have been interesting. Mean Mamma might not be deserved an apology, but… neither is Stolas and yet here we are sometimes people apologize to those who are undeserving and it leads to steep consequences. It happens.

Blitz's sudden interest in reconnecting with Stolas is undeserved. Stolas has always been a burden to Blitz and the most I can configure that is in line with what we have actually seen is that the loss of the relationship is a scary change. Change = Danger, Danger = Loss of Success, therefore he's rebounding?

I recieved a comment on the first of these posts, but Tumblr is being mean and not letting me see the rest of it.

This is as good as I can see of it, may you please reblog with a screenshot or copy-and-paste of what you wanted to say? I read the episode's description, and it doesn’t say anything that would counter my claims that Stolas has hurtful habits (which I assume is what you were responding to). It says “Stolas [is] still not quite being self aware enough at times”, which is an excuse that real people with the real tendencies I was referring to use all the time.

On an unrelated note, I heard someone excuse Stolas' lack of self awareness to his autism, and I don’t think he's autistic? He was emotionally neglected and socially isolated from peers growing up while being a person of privilege and power over everyone around him (except for Mean Mamma). These things don’t excuse his behaviors and even if he were a fellow autistic, it's not an excuse. I'm autistic and I would still hold myself accountable for harming another sentient being.

What I will say is that Stolas was raised with a certain sense of entitlement, which does lend towards a lack of self awareness. He felt entitled to Blitz's body and later his feelings, felt entitled to make the rules and conditions of their relationship. He's trying to do better but hasn’t quite figured out the source of his issues, in no small part because no one is calling him out on it. Everyone else is someone he has power over, and he never leaves his home, so how could they?

I think Osmodius or Fizz should be the ones to say something. That or one of the sins (as they seem to all have healthy, mutually respectful relationships).

My work break's over, adios!

I'm watching the new Helluvaboss episode, and thus far it's worrying (though unsurprising) that all the blame is being put on Blitz. The writers have gotten better at handling interpersonal conflict, but they're still off base.

While it was kind of Stolas to gift Blitz a new way to Earth, he did ambush Blitz into making a decision. The agreement was for Blitz to come over for rowdy sex, therefore of course he would assume that to be what was happening.

That said, I think it's interesting (and very twisted) that Stolas has turned around to be angry at Blitz. Remember, Stolas' motivations behind the gift was (1) an expectation of immediate unconditional love, (2) explicitly stated desire for distraction from his divorce via pursuit of his fantasy romance, and (3) evidence that he is not the “Kind of monster” who coerces people into sex.

For Stolas to be angry is him blaming Blitz for failing to live up to the fantasy as well as acting as a handy scapegoat for who was the “monster” of their arrangement.

Do I think Blitz was in the wrong for yelling? Uhm…. Maybe a little? Not a lot? He acted outraged in an outrageous situation, and to put the owness on him to male amends is rather callous. He should apologize for the projective accusations, but the conflict was primarily Stolas' fault.

I think the writing decision to not capitalize on this is because the series has a weird habit of trying to woobify powerful people and demonize (ha ha) the ones who explicitly have a problem with the status quo. Osmodious and Stolas are supposed to be benevolent massively powerful people whereas Greed Clown and Mean Mamma are the characters set as obvious antgonists— but both of our ostensively good power heads are rather cruel to those under them. Stolas with his imp butler (who gets tossed around and has his work repeatedly destroyed) and Osmodious with the whole of his staff (threatening physical violence against them all and yelling at them for being in public spaces while he's doing ✨secret stuff✨). I mention these because the narrative takes no issue with either individuals as compared to literally anyone under them.

If the clown contest episode had followed Mammon as the protagonist, the narrative would have vilified Fix as the bad guy being a Big Meant for ruining Mammon's suuuper important show, that is ALL I am saying.

Back to the current episode, Stolas faults Blitz for knowing someone was trying to assassinate him, even though Stolas has previously hired Blitz to protect him against assassination. The more I think about it, the more Stolas comes across as an emotionally abusive gaslighter.

Which the show won’t capitalize on because it's would ruin the fun easy going mood of the show. Mean Mamma being obviously abusive is fine because it's dramatic and flashy, but reflecting on Stolas' own abusive behaviors would get in the way of people,s ability to enjoy him, so instead it's melodrama time.

[audreydoeskaren]

Saw this post on Xiaohongshu a while back and it’s a really good example of 18th century erasure, so I think I’ll share this here (not calling out anybody or anything just sharing). OP posted a series of scanned images from a Republican era source (of unclear provenance) showing what people *thought* were historical fashions at the time, and the outfit for what they described as the “end of the Ming” is actually from the 18th century, the Qianlong era in the Qing Dynasty. The other images of the Qing all show stereotypical 19th century fashions. What’s fascinating about this is that it shows that 18th century erasure is by no means a recent phenomenon, it had existed since at least the 1920s/30s, when I assume this was made. Great for illustrating that people in the Republican era knew fuck all about Chinese fashion history (even something as recent as 120 years ago) and by extension a lot of other Chinese history.

Textbook mid 18th century women’s fashion from the 燕寝怡情 painting series. (Ironically, the person who uploaded this image to Pinterest labeled it Ming Dynasty lol)

I always think that 18th century erasure is harmful to both Ming and Qing fashion because as is the case with this source, actual Ming Dynasty fashion makes no appearance and Qing Dynasty fashion is appropriated. What this is doing is more than just creating fashion history misconceptions though, it basically reconfigures the whole discourse on what is and isn’t Qing, and more importantly for that time period, what it means to be Chinese, what to embrace and what to reject. 18th century erasure discourse has immense power in stretching the limits of mental gymnastics, as it can make people mentally push the starting date of the Qing Dynasty to around 1800, one and a half century later than the 1644 of reality, and decide that things they do like about the Qing belong to the Ming instead. This is dishonest and annoying at best, and at worst I can make a case about how The Qing™️ in 18th century erasure discourse isn’t referring to the actual dynasty anymore, but functions more as an umbrella term for “everything we deem degenerate and don’t like”. Honestly why would anyone try to nudge 18th century fashion in the direction of the Ming if they didn’t think the Qing was bad in the first place.

The Qing has become a sort of all use hate object since the proliferation of Western colonialism in China, and it’s evident that this sentiment lingers on in the present day. If you scroll through the comments under this post you can find multiple people bashing the Qing for its apparent inferior taste and lamenting the loss of Chinese beauty, based on the incorrectly dated historical fashions. What they don’t know is that some of the supposed “pre-Qing” things they praise for their beauty and Chinese essence are, in fact, also from the Qing. I’m not even going to unpack how the whole thing about the Qing “degenerating” Chinese cultural evolution has close ties to eugenics and racial science popular around the time. Anyway, I’d just like to remind everyone that when you bash what you think to be Qing and contrarily praise what you think to be pre-Qing, both things could in actuality be from the Qing and you are creating a binary opposition out of nothing.

*On a side note, I think it’s fascinating that OP added a Chinese flag emoji to the image, probably because of a growing nationalist paranoia where people imagine they’re defending Chinese artworks from being “stolen” by Koreans. I’ve seen more Chinese people paranoid about supposed Korean stealings than actual Korean people using Chinese images inappropriately. Korean people as a hate object are also very much en vogue right now, for whatever reason. It’s almost established as a racist cliche in recent years that “Koreans like to steal”, and it’s so normalized people don’t even perceive it as offensive. Not saying that OP is intentionally being racist, but this emoji under this context triggers my fight or flight response.

[fuckingrealityshifting]

Post Masterlist

FAQ

Shiftblr Intro

My Subliminals Masterlist

Make Subliminal Requests

Space To Express Negative Experiences

Where I Get My Info From

INFORMATIONAL POSTS

Shifting Terms

Before You Try Shifting

List of Shifting Methods

Evidence Shifting Isn’t Lucid Dreaming

Quick Resp*wning PSA

Disbelief About Shifting

Mental Health and Shifting

I’m Doubting Shifting: A Guide

How to Hide You’re a Shifter

Evidence for shifting, spirituality, astral projecting etc. with sources

Indications a Shifting Story May be Fake

Subject

Subject

Subject

Subject

USEFUL ASK/COMMENT RESPONSES

Scripting romances

Tips on scripting

Tips on shared DRs

The lifa app

Setting intentions

Reblog response about resp*wning

Why isn’t “clone” accurate?

Specific accounts to check out for info

Guided meditations list

Interacting with a friend’s alternate self

Are there methods that don’t include visualization?/What do you do with aphantasia?

Some shifting vs lucid dreaming info

More stuff about shifting and lucid dreaming

Do you visualize in first or third person?

Can you use the bathroom in your DR/stop time in your DR when you’re in your CR?

Scripting to a fanfiction

Recreating hearing voices when shifting

Why the shifting community is largely involved w Harry Potter

If your DR has reality-hopping, do you still script?

Can you shift into a character that already exists?

Alternate self scripting affirmation tips

Have you successfully shifted?/Have you shifted before?

If you shift to an anime world, will the characters be 2D or 3D?

Can you shift to a DR that isn’t fully established/written yet?

Incorporating other media in fictional DR

Navigating a fictional school

Can you shift into your WR between DRs?

What guided meditation do you use?

How does it feel to shift overnight?

Weed and shifting/spirituality

Quick meditation tips

Can you have sex in your DR?

Can you forget certain things you’ve scripted?

What is energy? (To be answered)

The consciousness of you and your DR self/Are you replacing your DR self?

Is it easier to shift to a close by reality?

Nonsleep methods link

Why am I getting signs not to shift?

Are there methods that don’t require you to be still?

CONTINUATION OF USEFUL RESPONSES HERE

[sereia1313]

The Sweetest Sounds 51-60

I decided to start posting these here in lots of 10 instead of one at a time (follow me on Ao3, Dokuga, or FFnet to get daily updates).

Summary: Sesshoumaru is driven by many things, but the reason behind joining his brother’s pack is the pure and unadulterated need to quench his curiosity about the miko.

Read the whole story on Ao3, Dokuga, and FFnet.

Flippant

"Look, even if you are some sort of prince, you have to give people space."

"The females in my court prefer it when they are showered with attention."

The miko snorted. "And I bet they're great conversationalists too."

A smirk graced Sesshoumaru's lips. "Ind—yes. They wish to be seen and not heard. To be draped in jewels and silks."

Blue eyes rolled, piquing his curiosity again.

"You would not?"

"Not really. I like being treated like a real person. Someone with feelings and a brain." She looked down at the iris, brushing the delicate petals with her thumb. "You can't be a partner if you're up on a pedestal."

Talisman

"You are an odd creature."

Her smile was genuine, yet melancholy tainted her aura. "Would you rather have a doormat as a wife? Someone more concerned with how she looks than what's going on in the kingdom? How the people are being treated?"

Unfamiliar emotions once again stirred within him.

The miko was a source of immeasurable strength—the limit of power coursing through her veins had yet to be seen.

It was her passion that set her apart. She had always been more efficient with social politics than him. Sesshoumaru provided the basics for the Western Stronghold.

Protection. Sustenance. Shelter.

What would the miko provide if given the chance?

Abrasive

"Somethin's up."

Shippou grinned as Rin lifted her head, gazing at the sky.

"I don't see anything."

Inuyasha opened his mouth to retort, but Sango smacked the back of his head.

Shippou inhaled deeply, focusing on all the lingering scents around their camp like Sesshoumaru had taught him. Nothing smelled out of place.

"You're being paranoid again, Baka-yasha."

"Shut your face, runt! This is grown-up stuff."

"Since when are you a grown-up?"

It took Inuyasha three swings before he landed a punch—one more than last time.

Small fangs flashed as the kitsune grinned again.

Hunting with Sesshoumaru had its benefits.

Venerate

"Whatcha making, Rin?"

The little girl smiled softly but continued with her task. "I'm making Lord Sesshoumaru a flower crown."

Inuyasha snorted, then leaped up with a string of curses as the grass next to him caught fire.

Shippou held out the next bloom for Rin, watching her fingers work as she finished the crown.

"Can you teach me how to do that?"

Rin's face lit up, and she eagerly passed him her leftover flowers.

"For Kagome?" she questioned.

Shippou shook his head as she showed him the first steps. "I want to thank Lord Sesshoumaru for teaching me how to hunt."

Rationale

"So, what's the real reason you followed me?"

Sesshoumaru frowned again, eyes sliding to the horizon.

Why had he followed her?

"I seek to understand. There is someone I am—" He struggled for the right word. "Someone that has piqued my curiosity."

"You mean someone you're interested in? Why are you following me if you like someone else?!"

He rolled his shoulders, the back of his neck feeling warm even in the fading sunlight. "You are similar. I thought—"

"You thought you'd practice with me instead?"

Sesshoumaru braced himself for the miko's next tirade, jerking in surprise when she grabbed his hand, her face alight with excitement.

"Why didn't you say so!"

Congenial

"So, what are they like? Do they like you back? Do your parents disapprove of them? Have you had to hide the affair because they're from a different station?"

The miko's rapid-fire questions made his head spin, but he couldn't stop the way the corners of his mouth twitched.

Happiness made her glow.

"Well? Tell me about them so I can help you win them over!"

"She is…different. Never in my life have I met someone like her. She commands respect from those around her. Even if she did not, her gentle heart charms anyone who crosses her. Even those who would cause her harm."

Huckster

"You must really like her."

A dark eyebrow raised.

"That's the most I've heard you talk at once."

Sesshoumaru tried to think of anyone else he would be so willing to part so many words with but came up empty.

Rin accepted his silence or single-word replies. Jaken heard more of his boot against his skull than anything else—the tea swindler had received more of a response.

The memory of the miko's tantrum about his responses came to mind.

"You just thought of her, didn't you?"

"Do you read minds now?"

"Not a chance," she laughed, sapphire eyes sparkling.

"The reasoning behind your assessment then?"

"You smiled."

Exasperate

Rin watched as Inuyasha paced the camp, his agitation written clearly on his face.

"Why are you always so upset when we stop?"

Inuyasha let out a low growl as Sango and Miroku chuckled to themselves.

"None of your business brat."

Ah-Un's fiery snort mixed with Kirara's, sending the hanyou into a string of curses. The beasts had become much more protective of the children during the trip, but it was abundantly clear when Kagome and Sesshoumaru were missing.

"Baka-Yasha likes it better when everyone is here."

Rin's head cocked to the side before breaking into a smile. "So he misses Sesshoumaru!"

The rest of the pack burst into laughter as Inuyasha's face hit the dirt.

Benign

"When are you planning on telling her?"

"Telling her what?"

The miko rolled her eyes. "About how you feel! Does she know who you are?"

An unusual calmness settled around Sesshoumaru's heart. "She makes me want to live up to her expectations."

"That's a start."

"You are such a confusing creature."

She crossed her arms. "What have I done now?"

"I have admitted to following you without your permission, yet you do not seem angry about it anymore. And are now giving me advice."

A hand waved dismissively. "I try not to hold grudges. Besides, even if you did mean me harm, and got the drop on me, I've got others who would come to my rescue."

Paucity

"Your friend from before?"

The miko nodded. "He might not be the first to arrive, but he's the one you have to look out for the most."

A lie. He wouldn't have let her out of his sight in the first place.

Not that she would require his aid in the first place—there were few instances that she couldn't handle by herself. The miko had proven herself capable against a multitude of foes.

She'd claimed him ill-suited for 'rescuing damsels', but could that be due to his human façade?

To their lack of connection?

If she'd known his true identity, would she have accepted his help?