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[forexservices]

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[todayisafridaynight]

SO! I've wanted to talk about The Clip all day but felt like I should wait until the tumblr "premiere" (even though I think you were literally one of the first people to see it on Twitter lol). Thank you for defending my honor btw even if I am just Someone <3

But. Yes. Yeah. Yokoyama's absolute certainty in saying that??? Without anything to even buffer it? No maybe. No "don't expect too much." Just point-blank in front of a huge fan (whom I believe he's now going to be working with), a staff member, and a massive audience. As if that part isn't the matter of contention. I WILL be injecting those words directly into my veins for some time.

I was on the verge of choking and/or spewing blood and/or crying before posting it though lol, so I really appreciate the vote of confidence regarding the translation and I love your redraw! The reception as a whole has been really nice, although I wish people would keep it to themselves if they'd rather have Nishiki or Ryuji back or whatever. Not like it's a race, but even if it was, Mine's been in last place for ages lol.

And while I enjoy Y3's writing more than most, Mine's death wasn't some Grand Meaningful Statement, it was the decision of a fledgling studio that never knew if it would be able to keep making these games trying to tell a self-contained story. It did have far-reaching consequences for the series, but those consequences are also... not really relevant anymore?

Like, I can and have argued that Mine's death caused the fall of the Tojo Clan, but the clan has already fallen. So I don't see why some people are acting like revisiting his character would be A Spit In The Face to the saga somehow, but I guess I've never really been against characters being brought back...? A quote from the staff that's always stuck with me from the staff is that RGG is always going for RGG-ism, not realism.

Ranting aside... I honestly don't know if I should be saying this, but there's this new guy working the counter at Survive in some LaD8 behind the scenes footage. Now, upfront, I'm 99.8% sure it's not Mine (I happen to have a 100% accuracy rate so far identifying major RGG characters from extremely blurry images and silhouettes lmao), and I have no idea who it is, whether it's a new character or an old one heavily redesigned or Just Some Guy.

But he's not Kashiwagi. And he happens to have slicked-back dark brown hair with what appears to be an ahoge in some angles. And, unless the materials are temporary, he also dresses A Lot Like the celebrity Mine's design was based on. And his features... line up closely enough to piss me off, even though they don't fully match in the end, which is why I don't think it's him.

I'm in argumentative essay mode 100% of the time which is why I'm saying this in a "convincing" tone despite literally not believing it myself, but like... wouldn't that be something? To just have Mine part-timing at Survive or whatever and no one makes a big deal of it because they don't know any better? If nothing else, I really do think he should get The Bartender Treatment.

I dunno, I might post about it with a comparison tomorrow because it's been on my mind lately, especially with The News, but I really don't want people to get the wrong idea either. Or embarrass myself if it was too tenuous of a link to look that deeply into from the start lol

I remember seeing it two minutes after you posted it, so I can imagine I was one of the first to the scene of the crime (so my friends put it LMAO). AND OF COURSE I- and a lot of us- can't be any more grateful for all the work you do than we already are. I'd go insane trying to document and manage everything you do! especially when you have insane people like me ready to pounce on the smallest thing like I know I'd cry FJLKAJ The least I can do is give a proper title/credit to you when I can o7

If Yokoyama had any remaining hesitance about Mine being alive, then he REALLY would have fumbled by sounding so certain. Like in his old tweet, he certainly sounded more ambiguous, but this time he really had no extra notes and sounded more sure of himself. I won't expect RGG to do anything with Mine, but the concept is still very much exciting and the idea that Yokoyama almost seems earnest about the idea of bringing Mine back for whatever reason is very nice to know :] And thank you about enjoying the art I did! I can't lie in the slightest, since the last ask where you alluded to posting the clip, I had that drawing saved in the back of my head ready to make once you had that posted LMAO

But oohh not to touch drama since I generally try to Not touch it, but yeah I can't act like I haven't seen some people be. ""Interesting"" about the idea of Mine being alive. I won't dive too deep into it, but I think my major issue with the few grievances I've seen is that RGG hasn't done anything with Mine's alive status. As of right now, it's just a thing Yokoyama said, so I don't understand the need to be so angry about it (it's especially weird to say Ryuji hasn't been back when he not only got to be a playable protagonist in Dead Souls, but he was also the protagonist of RGGO- though I suppose I can understand wanting him in the mainline series again. Still, it's weird to act as though Mine's back any more than he is and being upset about it just because Yokoyama said he was alive)...

Moving on though, I'm really curious as to this 'mystery figure' you mean. I've been missing out on LaD8 production material, so I haven't seen this bit myself but I'd love to take a stab at it and analyze myself too. I agree though: if Mine does come back- whether he's working at Survive or anywhere else- I would greatly prefer if he had The Bartender status and was just never really called attention to and only existed in the background

[definitelyjunehomestuck]

my heart goes out to any artist whos main platform is twitter, but ngl i think musk bein forced to buy twitter is the best thing ever just cuz of how utterly FUCKED he is financially now

[roseband]

...

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Red Lobster was killed by private equity, not Endless Shrimp

For the rest of May, my bestselling solarpunk utopian novel THE LOST CAUSE (2023) is available as a $2.99, DRM-free ebook!

A decade ago, a hedge fund had an improbable viral comedy hit: a 294-page slide deck explaining why Olive Garden was going out of business, blaming the failure on too many breadsticks and insufficiently salted pasta-water:

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/940944/000092189514002031/ex991dfan14a06297125_091114.pdf

Everyone loved this story. As David Dayen wrote for Salon, it let readers "mock that silly chain restaurant they remember from their childhoods in the suburbs" and laugh at "the silly hedge fund that took the time to write the world’s worst review":

https://www.salon.com/2014/09/17/the_real_olive_garden_scandal_why_greedy_hedge_funders_suddenly_care_so_much_about_breadsticks/

But – as Dayen wrote at the time, the hedge fund that produced that slide deck, Starboard Value, was not motivated by dissatisfaction with bread-sticks. They were "activist investors" (finspeak for "rapacious assholes") with a giant stake in Darden Restaurants, Olive Garden's parent company. They wanted Darden to liquidate all of Olive Garden's real-estate holdings and declare a one-off dividend that would net investors a billion dollars, while literally yanking the floor out from beneath Olive Garden, converting it from owner to tenant, subject to rent-shocks and other nasty surprises.

They wanted to asset-strip the company, in other words ("asset strip" is what they call it in hedge-fund land; the mafia calls it a "bust-out," famous to anyone who watched the twenty-third episode of The Sopranos):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bust_Out

Starboard didn't have enough money to force the sale, but they had recently engineered the CEO's ouster. The giant slide-deck making fun of Olive Garden's food was just a PR campaign to help it sell the bust-out by creating a narrative that they were being activists* to save this badly managed disaster of a restaurant chain.

*assholes

Starboard was bent on eviscerating Darden like a couple of entrail-maddened dogs in an elk carcass:

https://web.archive.org/web/20051220005944/http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~solan/dogsinelk/

They had forced Darden to sell off another of its holdings, Red Lobster, to a hedge-fund called Golden Gate Capital. Golden Gate flogged all of Red Lobster's real estate holdings for $2.1 billion the same day, then pissed it all away on dividends to its shareholders, including Starboard. The new landlords, a Real Estate Investment Trust, proceeded to charge so much for rent on those buildings Red Lobster just flogged that the company's net earnings immediately dropped by half.

Dayen ends his piece with these prophetic words:

Olive Garden and Red Lobster may not be destinations for hipster Internet journalists, and they have seen revenue declines amid stagnant middle-class wages and increased competition. But they are still profitable businesses. Thousands of Americans work there. Why should they be bled dry by predatory investors in the name of “shareholder value”? What of the value of worker productivity instead of the financial engineers?

Flash forward a decade. Today, Dayen is editor-in-chief of The American Prospect, one of the best sources of news about private equity looting in the world. Writing for the Prospect, Luke Goldstein picks up Dayen's story, ten years on:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-05-22-raiding-red-lobster/

It's not pretty. Ten years of being bled out on rents and flipped from one hedge fund to another has killed Red Lobster. It just shuttered 50 restaurants and declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Ten years hasn't changed much; the same kind of snark that was deployed at the news of Olive Garden's imminent demise is now being hurled at Red Lobster.

Instead of dunking on free bread-sticks, Red Lobster's grave-dancers are jeering at "Endless Shrimp," a promotional deal that works exactly how it sounds like it would work. Endless Shrimp cost the chain $11m.

Which raises a question: why did Red Lobster make this money-losing offer? Are they just good-hearted slobs? Can't they do math?

Or, you know, was it another hedge-fund, bust-out scam?

Here's a hint. The supplier who provided Red Lobster with all that shrimp is Thai Union. Thai Union also owns Red Lobster. They bought the chain from Golden Gate Capital, last seen in 2014, holding a flash-sale on all of Red Lobster's buildings, pocketing billions, and cutting Red Lobster's earnings in half.

Red Lobster rose to success – 700 restaurants nationwide at its peak – by combining no-frills dining with powerful buying power, which it used to force discounts from seafood suppliers. In response, the seafood industry consolidated through a wave of mergers, turning into a cozy cartel that could resist the buyer power of Red Lobster and other major customers.

This was facilitated by conservation efforts that limited the total volume of biomass that fishers were allowed to extract, and allocated quotas to existing companies and individual fishermen. The costs of complying with this "catch management" system were high, punishingly so for small independents, bearably so for large conglomerates.

Competition from overseas fisheries drove consolidation further, as countries in the global south were blocked from implementing their own conservation efforts. US fisheries merged further, seeking economies of scale that would let them compete, largely by shafting fishermen and other suppliers. Today's Alaskan crab fishery is dominated by a four-company cartel; in the Pacific Northwest, most fish goes through a single intermediary, Pacific Seafood.

These dominant actors entered into illegal collusive arrangements with one another to rig their markets and further immiserate their suppliers, who filed antitrust suits accusing the companies of operating a monopsony (a market with a powerful buyer, akin to a monopoly, which is a market with a powerful seller):

https://www.classaction.org/news/pacific-seafood-under-fire-for-allegedly-fixing-prices-paid-to-dungeness-crabbers-in-pacific-northwest

Golden Gate bought Red Lobster in the midst of these fish wars, promising to right its ship. As Goldstein points out, that's the same promise they made when they bought Payless shoes, just before they destroyed the company and flogged it off to Alden Capital, the hedge fund that bought and destroyed dozens of America's most beloved newspapers:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/10/16/sociopathic-monsters/#all-the-news-thats-fit-to-print

Under Golden Gate's management, Red Lobster saw its staffing levels slashed, so diners endured longer wait times to be seated and served. Then, in 2020, they sold the company to Thai Union, the company's largest supplier (a transaction Goldstein likens to a Walmart buyout of Procter and Gamble).

Thai Union continued to bleed Red Lobster, imposing more cuts and loading it up with more debts financed by yet another private equity giant, Fortress Investment Group. That brings us to today, with Thai Union having moved a gigantic amount of its own product through a failing, debt-loaded subsidiary, even as it lobbies for deregulation of American fisheries, which would let it and its lobbying partners drain American waters of the last of its depleted fish stocks.

Dayen's 2020 must-read book Monopolized describes the way that monopolies proliferate, using the US health care industry as a case-study:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/01/29/fractal-bullshit/#dayenu

After deregulation allowed the pharma sector to consolidate, it acquired pricing power of hospitals, who found themselves gouged to the edge of bankruptcy on drug prices. Hospitals then merged into regional monopolies, which allowed them to resist pharma pricing power – and gouge health insurance companies, who saw the price of routine care explode. So the insurance companies gobbled each other up, too, leaving most of us with two or fewer choices for health insurance – even as insurance prices skyrocketed, and our benefits shrank.

Today, Americans pay more for worse healthcare, which is delivered by health workers who get paid less and work under worse conditions. That's because, lacking a regulator to consolidate patients' interests, and strong unions to consolidate workers' interests, patients and workers are easy pickings for those consolidated links in the health supply-chain.

That's a pretty good model for understanding what's happened to Red Lobster: monopoly power and monopsony power begat more monopolies and monoposonies in the supply chain. Everything that hasn't consolidated is defenseless: diners, restaurant workers, fishermen, and the environment. We're all fucked.

Decent, no-frills family restaurant are good. Great, even. I'm not the world's greatest fan of chain restaurants, but I'm also comfortably middle-class and not struggling to afford to give my family a nice night out at a place with good food, friendly staff and reasonable prices. These places are easy pickings for looters because the people who patronize them have little power in our society – and because those of us with more power are easily tricked into sneering at these places' failures as a kind of comeuppance that's all that's due to tacky joints that serve the working class.

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

https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/23/spineless/#invertebrates

[authne]

Global Stocks Fall as Investors Stress Over Recession

cThe S&P 500 file in the US fell 1.1%, the Stoxx Europe 600 list fell 1.2%, and the MSCI Asia Pacific Record fell 1.3%. The auction was set off by various elements, including: Worries about the conflict in Ukraine and its effect on the global economy. Rising expansion and the possibility of additional loan cost climbs from national banks. A stoppage in monetary development in China and other…

[jaisaxenaa]

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[harrysonlylover]

You Can Be The Boss*

Summary: Harry can’t stay away from his fiancée and neither can his body.

Trope: CEO!H

Warnings: Slight exhibitionism, breed!ng kink, cockwarming.

WC: 3.2k

A/n: an oldieee!

Masterlist

Being a CEO is never easy.

Harry could certainly witness to that. He’s had meetings atop meetings for the past few months with security, insurance, construction, and interior design companies along with several other businessmen. The opening of the new branch in Italy turned out to be harder than Pleasing’s debut.

It is one thing to rise from nothing and gain fame, and another thing to maintain it while focusing on having a family. Harry is unbelievably proud of his achievements, he was featured in Forbes under 30 merely a few months after his first Pleasing launch, sold over 2 million products in the first year, and heard stories of couples who met thanks to his company.

What he did is something that every young man dreams of, he knows that and has heard it in interviews about him. But how can he explain to the money-greedy people that his empire is nothing when it comes to his fiancée?

He could only sleep when she was near, wake up with her body around his, eat when she was with him, or if she reminded him to. Every time he visits a certain store he is adamant about buying something, whether it be a chocolate bar or a Cartier necklace, Harry will spoil her.

He never really cared all about social events and didn’t make a habit of attending until she became his. Sometimes he would take her with him, her arm joined with him, as he showed her off to everyone there with a proud smile on his face that said:” This is my girl, look at how pretty she is”.

However, there were times when she’d barely put on her dress and heels before he had her against the wall as he fucked himself deep inside her whispering in her ear. “No, you’re mine. For my eyes only.”

It’s safe to say that he discovered a whole new level of infatuation with Y/n. But she certainly couldn’t believe it when the pressure of Pleasing made him drift away from home that he suggested selling it.

“Harry, are you mad? You worked so hard!” She shouted in anger at her frustrated fiancée.

“Don’t you get it? It’s you. it’s always you.” He brought his lips to her temple pressing a long kiss as he inched her body closer to his.

She managed to knock some sense into his mind and lay out a work plan, as she organized his week while he pouted and demanded that she come into his office at least twice. She couldn’t deny him, not when she missed him so much all day considering she was jobless.

Before she met him, she worked in finance and dreaded her job. It took him a while to convince her to quit, not because he wanted to be one of those men who flaunt providing for their wives. In fact, he wrote half of the company’s assets in her name, all he ever wanted was for her to feel safe financially whether it be from a job or by just existing. He doesn’t like the terms ‘mine’ and ‘yours’, simply anything he owns is immediately Y/n’a as well.

He is aware that some men hold it against their partners and bring out the finances card in arguments but Harry assured her many times that the day he does that, she’s free to slap him and sue him.

Eventually, she agreed to quit two months ago and since then she has busied herself with new hobbies, workshops, and fitness classes. She’s also certain that it made Harry feel happier.

Upon what they agreed on earlier this week, she headed to visit Harry in his office, she arrived early with two lunch bags in her hand as the whole building stared at the elegant woman dressed in luxurious clothing from head to toe, with the huge emerald stone on her ring finger.

They were accustomed to her frequent visits but that didn’t stop anyone from staring as she walked in knowing that their boss’s mood would shift completely.

She can hear Harry’s voice fill the hall as you step out of the elevator, it wasn’t something common to witness. Harry is known for being a kind boss but the faces of the employees around her suggest otherwise.

His secretary Mila jogged behind her trying to catch up as she stood in front of her with her face clouded with apprehension. “Mrs. Styles I don’t think you should go in there.”

She stared back at her for a few moments then glanced at all the other employees whose eyes were wide from Harry’s loud shouting. She patted her shoulder and gently moved her out of her way before heading towards his office.

She turned the doorknob to his office and walked in casually only to see him leaning against his desk with his palms supporting him as he scolded the employee in front of him, the veins along his neck were protruding and fury was radiating off him.

The moment he set his eyes on her, he straightened his posture and sighed as his whole body relaxed. He ordered the man in front of him to leave, which the latter did quite quickly. She placed the lunch bags on a small table and took off her jacket as Harry sat back in his chair and admired her.

“What happened? You never shout at your employees.” She spoke as she walked towards him and sat in his lap.

“He messed up something and now I have to stay for extra hours to fix it. It’s more time away from you.” He held on to her body as he hid his face in her chest.

“Harry. You always do this, you should let them learn from their mistakes, he’s the one who should do it.” Harry had a thing for being an overly nice boss but also a perfectionist. He liked doing things by himself so whenever someone messed up, he’d just tell them to email it to him.

“I guess you’re right.” He gave her lips a peck as she swiped her hand through his hair.

“You looked so hot while shouting though. You’re such a boss.” She turned the peck quickly into a heated kiss as she grinded against his suit.

“Yeah? You always love it when I’m in power don’t you?” Harry smiled into the kiss and tightened his grip on her waist.

The thought of having everyone do what he wants with one order made her unbelievably turned on. He is a man with authority and it shows all the time. But most importantly she loved it when he manhandled her in bed, lifting her with one arm like she weighed nothing.

“Let me help the boss destress.” Harry moaned into her mouth as she rubbed at his visible bulge with her hand.

“Such a good girl, pleasing me like it’s your job.” He unbuttoned his pants and slightly pulled them down as she stared back at his thick bulge. She’s not sure how he was able to get hard this fast but it looked painful.

Despite having sex this morning, he acted as if it’s been weeks and that he’s starved. His hand roamed her body while his tongue clashed with hers. He grinned when his fingers swiped through her folds under her skirt and realized that she had no panties on as instructed and was very wet.

“My baby is walking around my building with no panties on, so eager to fuck her fiancée. What would the employees say?” He tsked as if he was disappointed and teased her by sucking on her neck with his hand gently massaging her labia.

“I want to warm you up.” She caught him off guard as he expected her to want to fuck him, but he’d do anything she wanted.

“C’mon then, help me relax.” He laid back and crossed his arms behind his head, as he raked his eyes over her body and eager eyes that were set on his twitching cock.

He watched her next movements intently knowing that the sight in front of him was any man’s wet dream. She happily stroked his cock, swiping her thumb against the tip and collecting his precum on her finger before pushing it inside her pussy and smiling because ‘his cum shouldn’t go to waste.’

Harry bit his bottom lip feeling his cock about to burst while she looked down and spat at it before stroking it again and using his arousal to finger herself.

“Sweetheart, why don’t you put my cock where it belongs?” He caressed her jaw with his knuckles as she nodded eagerly and positioned his cock at her entrance before sinking on him with one swift motion.

Harry rolled his eyes backward the moment her pussy wrapped around his cock. So warm, tight, and velvety. She sucked him inside so perfectly and made his body heat up quickly.

“Best fucking pussy. Can’t wait to continue breeding it.” She was reminded of the fact that she was only cockwarming him but now that he mentioned getting his cum, she regretted not fucking him.

Sinking on him quickly made her feel like she was being split into two halves, he was thick and even more swollen when hard as if he knew that he had to give her his load. The stretch only made her wetter as she squirmed and tried to adjust on his lap while he guided her head to his neck.

Her continuous clenching around him almost made Harry cum—something he wasn’t pleased about. The tightness of her cunt was unbearable, and his thighs were drenched with her wetness because she can’t seem to control herself.

“Behave brat.” He slapped her ass harshly with his ring-clad hand making her spasm around him even harder.

Holding her to his body, he gently moved his chair closer to his desk and grabbed a granola bar from the drawer unwrapping it and feeding her while your head stayed laid against his chest. After two bites, she guided his hand to his mouth to which he smiled and happily accepted a bite.

“My darling always taking care of me. But you’re the one who should eat more for our baby. Need to feed you the best food ever.” His hand sneakily made its way to her tummy and rubbed on it.

She was pretty sure she got knocked out by now. The signs were all there but they both ignored them as the whole breeding fantasy thing was pleasing and Harry continued to cum deep inside of her.

No matter what, nothing compared to her fiancée filling her up or taking her out while his cum runs down her thighs. He couldn’t help marking her, it was a necessity.

After a few more bites, she almost fell asleep and forgot that she was sitting on his cock. All she felt was the heat between her legs and a warm snug feeling that felt good. Harry stroked her hair and kissed the top of her head now and then.

He shifted his position slightly making his cock push deeper inside of her, she could’ve sworn that precum leaked into her pussy, but it doesn’t matter because there is no way she’d be able to ignore the ache in her pussy.

She lifted her head off his chest and found him reading an email on his phone while he gently rubbed her back. She began leaving wet kisses along his skin where his chemise was unbuttoned.

“Harry—” She almost moaned his name, but it was obvious that she needed him and changed her mind.

He immediately set his phone down and adjusted his position (on purpose) as he gave her all his attention. He looked into her eyes and knew that she needed a good fuck, she always did. He could not possibly deny that for both of them— not when his cock is about to burst.

“What does my love wa—“Harry’s question was cut off by an employee coming inside.

“Mr. Styles I—“He stopped in his tracks and awkwardly looked around as he stuttered. The sight in front of him wasn’t completely graphic, Y/n still had her skirt on after all, but it was obvious to anyone that she and Harry weren’t all love-dovey.

“Can’t you see that I’m busy?” Harry gritted his teeth while his breathing picked up. Despite loving exhibitionism, he isn’t always in the right mindset to show her off. He wants her all for himself and although his employee probably can’t see anything, Harry was reminded of how vulnerable she felt during intimate moments and saw red.

“Sorry sir I ju—“

“Get out!” Harry pointed to the door with warning eyes as the man immediately scrambled away from his office dropping a paper behind him in the process— not daring to come back for it.

Harry checked on Y/n by raising her chin to his level and smiled when he saw her looking alright and as pretty as ever. “You’re mine only okay?”

She would never replace him in a million years but seeing his possessive side come out was always so hot to witness. Anything he did made her drop on her knees and that didn’t help her current situation.

She slowly began rolling her hips, as her swollen cunt turned unbearably achy and puffy. Harry’s cock seems to only harden inside of her and if he doesn’t fuck her brains out, she could cry.

“Dirty girl. Can barely last on my cock for ten minutes and you’re jumping on me again. What a needy slut.” His degrading words made her even hornier as she clutched onto his shirt with a tight grip letting out whines.

“Please fuck me. I want you deep inside.” She barely let out a few coherent words before feeling the pleasure and need for Harry to take over her.

He loved watching her beg for him when she could not take it anymore. The way she withered and felt like crying only fueled his ego further. The fact that she would only be relieved if his cock fucked her repeatedly made him twitch inside her pussy.

“Say that you want me to knock you up. You filthy girl, you want me to be your baby daddy hmm?” He began rolling his hips slowly to edge her even further.

“Wanna be pregnant with your child.” She whimpered against his lips as tears began to well in her eyes from the amount of wetness.

That was all she had to say before Harry lifted her with one arm and threw everything off the desk as they landed on the ground with a thud. He laid her gently and got rid of her blouse so he could have access to her hardened nipples.

His cock was still tucked inside her cunt so when he inched his face closer to hers, he pushed himself deeper making her moan loudly as he hit her g-spot unexpectedly. He laced his fingers with hers leaving love bites all over her chest while admiring her tits proudly.

“The greediest pussy ever. So insatiable even when I fuck you day and night. You just love your fiancée’s cock so much.” He rolled his hips into hers as he closed the gap between their two bodies.

“Oh—“ It wasn’t in her ability to form coherent words. The veins on Harry’s cock massaged her walls perfectly, scratching an itch she never knew she had. The sound of skin slapping filled the room as he fucked her raw without holding back.

His muscles flexed with every thrust, as he looked down to her relaxed figure watching his cock go in and out from her drenched pussy that is dripping right on his desk. Her cunt was so sensitive and swollen, and her clitoris was bulging asking for attention which Harry generously gave by pinching it.

“Gonna have to show off your swollen belly to everyone. Let them know I gave you my seed day and night to get you pregnant.” He whispered in her ear as she rolled her eyes backward imagining how he would proudly rub at her bump in public.

She locked her legs around him, as her heels dug at his back prompting him to go deeper. Their bodies were sweaty and filled with need for one another. The feeling of her pussy so snug around his cock, sucking him inside made him see stars.

“I’m sure you’re knocked out by now, but your greedy pussy just keeps sucking my cum inside.” God knows how much precum has leaked inside of her when she cockwarmed him and Harry would like to think that her pussy reacts to the presence of his cum in her cunt.

“Yes— I feel so sensitive, and I want you all the time.” She wrapped her arms around his neck thinking about how much he’s filled her up by now.

“And you have me baby, my mind, body, and soul are yours.” He slowed down but deepened his cock, allowing himself to rest for a few moments before plunging harder as he rubbed at her swollen clitoris.

Harry rested his forehead against hers, catching her lips in a wet sloppy kiss as heat radiated off their bodies. The sex was dirty and passionate, exactly what fits for them.

“Fuck, look at these gorgeous tits. They’re gonna be swollen and full of milk. You won’t need any bras, gonna make you walk naked.” He cupped each of her breasts, greedily sucking at her nipples as he squeezed them.

“I’m cumming—” His compliments on her tits tipped her over the edge as her orgasm washed over her. All she could see were white spots and stars as her moaning echoed through the room. Her cunt was pulsating rapidly around Harry’s cock whose orgasm got triggered by hers.

Harry rutted his hips against hers as if he wishes to converge their bodies and make them one person as he spilled his seed deep inside of her cunt.

“Draining me from my seed all day, aren’t you?” Take all of it my love and give me a baby.” He stilled his hips as he released a big load with his lips hovering over hers and chests flush against each other.

The euphoric feeling she got every time he came inside of her was irreplaceable. Her skin sweaty and naked as he hugged her to his chest and mumbled words of praise and love in her ear.

“My best girl. I’m so lucky to have you.”

“I’m gonna take care of you till we’re old and gray.”

“I love every bit of you that it physically pains me.”

She held on to Harry for a while as he kept his body wrapped around hers in a tight grip. There was no denying the happiness Harry offered her or all the new feelings she got to explore thanks to him, so she closed her eyes and let out a sigh of contentment.

In this world, it’s just her, Harry, and the baby growing in her belly.

Kindly reblog if you liked it!

Taglist: @babegoals @hotnhardrrry @mattieshattuck1 @harrrrystylesslut @virgopr1ncess

[bitchesgetriches]

Everything You Need to Know about How to Increase Your Income

Make more money at the job you have

One of the simplest ways to increase your income is to just make your current employer pay you more. But while it may be simple, it ain’t always easy.

Santa Isn’t Coming and Neither Is Your Promotion: How To Get Promoted

How I Chessmastered Myself Into a Promotion at Work

The First Time I Asked for a Raise

You Need To Ask for a Fucking Raise

Ask the Bitches: “Can I Quit With Unvested Funds? Or Am I Walking Away From Too Much Money?” 

The Ultimate Guide to Growing Your Salary

Make more money at your next job

All that said, you’re statistically more likely to increase your income faster by job hopping! So if your current employer doesn’t want to pay you more, leave that sinking ship behind in pursuit of a higher salary.

Job Hopping vs. Career Loyalty by the Numbers

The Fascinating Results of Our Job Hopping vs. Career Loyalty Poll

How NOT to Determine Your Salary

When It Comes to Salary Negotiations, Are You Asking for Enough?

What To Do When You’re Asked About Your Salary Requirements in a Job Interview

If Your Employer Refuses To Negotiate Salary, Try These 11 Creative Counteroffers

Season 4, Episode 9: “I’m on the Wrong Career Path. How Do I Convince a New Industry To Take a Chance on Me?” 

Invest your way to more money

Of course there are some who say the true path to wealth is passive income: when you stop working for your money and instead let your money work for you. And they’re not wrong! Here’s how we recommend you increase your income passively.

When Money in the Bank Is a Bad Thing: Understanding Inflation and Depreciation

Investing Deathmatch: Investing in the Stock Market vs. Just… Not 

What’s the REAL Rate of Return on the Stock Market?

Dafuq Is a Retirement Plan and Why Do You Need One? 

Procrastinating on Opening a Retirement Account? Here’s 3 Ways That’ll Fuck You Over.

Season 4, Episode 1: “Index Funds Include Unethical Companies. Can I Still Invest in Them, or Does That Make Me a Monster?” 

Small Business Investing: A Kinder, Gentler Alternative to the Stock Market 

The Dark Magic of Financial Horcruxes: How and Why to Diversify Your Assets 

Make more money through side hustles

When it comes to side hustles, we have traditionally advocated caution. The last thing you want to do is burn out in pursuit of a second income stream. But with enough wits and fortitude, a side hustle could help you increase your income by leaps and bounds.

Romanticizing the Side Hustle: When 1 Job Isn’t Enough

Season 2, Episode 9: “I Use My Free Time to Volunteer. Should I Focus on Making Money Instead?”

Stop Undervaluing Your Freelance Work, You Darling Fool

Freelancer, Protect Thyself… With a Fair Contract 

Season 4, Episode 10: “I’m a Freelance Artist. How Do I Price My Work Fairly Without Losing Clients?”

Ask the Bitches: My Boss Won’t Give Me a Contract and I’m Freaking Out 

“Independent Contractor” My Ass: How to Stop Wage Theft Through Worker Misclassification 

Becoming a Millennial Entrepreneur (In the Midst of a Pandemic) With Katelyn Magnuson 

11 Awful Mistakes I Made as a Self-employed Freelancer, and How You Can Avoid Them

The Magic of Unclaimed Property: How I Made $1,900 in 10 Minutes by Being a Disorganized Mess

I Am a Craigslist Samurai and so Can You: How to Sell Used Stuff Online

What to do when you make more money

Once you increase your income, you might find yourself… not quite bored, but finding you have a little more bandwidth to handle the stuff that matters. It can be a jarring transition! Here are our thoughts on the matter.

Season 3, Episode 7: “I’m Finished With the Basic Shit. What Are the Advanced Financial Steps That Only Rich People Know?” 

Season 3, Episode 4: “The More Money I Save, the More I’m Scared To Lose It. Can I Break the Cycle of Financial Anxiety?” 

How to Avoid Lifestyle Inflation … and When to Embrace It

Ask the Bitches: I Know How to Struggle and Fight, but I Don’t Know How to Succeed

Update: I Know How to Struggle and Fight, but I Don’t Know How to Succeed 

The FIRE Movement, Explained 

I Was Happy to Marry a Poor Man. Then Things Changed.

I Have Become the Rich Relative I Always Wanted 

Believing in Miracles: A Conversation with Chris Dane Owens on Money, Creativity, and Self-Funding Art 

I Now Make More Money Than My Husband, and It’s Great for Our Marriage 

Season 2, Episode 1: “I’m Financially Stable, but My Friends Aren’t. The Guilt Is Crushing!”

The Resignation Checklist: 25 Sneaky Ways To Bleed Your Employer Dry Before Quitting

Advocate for systemic change

We don’t endorse an attitude of “I got mine.” So once you increase your income, there are lots of ways to use your newfound financial breathing room for good! Lift as you climb, my friend. Here are a few ways to do so:

Wallet Activism: Using Your Money for Good with Author Tanja Hester 

Woke at Work: How to Inject Your Values into Your Boring, Lame-Ass Job 

Raising the Minimum Wage Would Make All Our Lives Better

Post a Salary Range in the Job Description, You Fucking Cowards

1 Easy Way All Allies Can Help Close the Gender and Racial Pay Gap

The Truth About Unions: What Has Organized Labor Done for You? 

How To Support a Labor Strike with 3 Simple Steps

Everything in moderation

One last thing, my lambs: don’t crush your spirit while chasing the goal of a higher income. Working hard is hard work. If you find these tactics are leaving you exhausted and demoralized, you might be on the road to burnout. And that road leads nowhere good!

That’s why we just released our glorious new Burnout Workshop. Click the button below to take a peek!

Get the Burnout Workshop Here!

[cosmicpuzzle]

Mercury in Houses

Mercury in 1st House

You are an intellectual person and have a lot of questions. You are curious and restless. You may have difficulty slowing down your mind. You are quick witted and mercurial (especially in signs Gemini, Virgo, Aries). You learn a lot from experiences than textbooks. You can be proud intellectually or don't appreciate others viewpoints.

Mercury in 2nd House

Your mind is often focused on financial matters and wealth. You often think about increasing your income. You have a good mind for selling and commerce and may succeed in business. You can micromanage your finances. You may be a good speaker too.

Mercury in 3rd House

You have an active mind, and you are good at writing and communication. You are a quick learner and may be employed in customer care, IT and education sector. You love short travels on cycles, bikes, trains and cars. You can have a lot of contacts.

Mercury in 4th House

You can be bit introverted, and your feelings are strong. You are interested in psychology and the past. You are interested in human behavior. You are nostalgic and remember things from the past. You can change residences often.

Mercury in 5th House

You are interested in love and romance. You are communicative and flirty in love. Your thoughts are on romance and fun often. You can be a creative person and do well with storytelling. You like to read romantic novels and may publish storybooks for children. You can be good at stockmarket.

Mercury in 6th House

You can be nervous and interested in health, diet and hygiene. You are a hard worker and do well in fields related to numbers, accounting and documents. You are good in solving day to day problems practically and efficiently.

Mercury in 7th House

You are attracted to people who are intelligent, witty and communicative and seek these attributes in a partner. Intellectual rapport with others is important to you. You need to feel that you can discuss any aspect of your relationship with your partner. You are suited to public relations work, as you enjoy meeting people and dealing with the public in general.

Mercury in 8th House

You have a deep interest in occult and metaphysics. You can be uncommunicative and reserved. You are good at research and investigation. You may be good at managing other's assets and in corporate finance.

Mercury in 9th House

You are interested in higher knowledge, philosophy and spiritual matters. You are motivated to broaden your horizons. You can travel abroad for education and may be good at learning foreign languages.

Mercury in 10th House

Your mind is focused on professional achievement. You are suited to business, academic work, writing, journalism, politics and the communication industries. You have organizational skills, leadership capabilities and the ability to make executive decisions. You enjoy variety in your profession and may hold down more than one job or seek a career that constantly tests your skills.

Mercury in 11th House

Spending time with your friends is important to you. You belong to common interest groups or societies. A natural networker, you are able to bring people together for a purpose or cause.

Mercury in 12th House

You need to create a space in your life where you can retreat into your own private thoughts. You are quite happy in your own company and tend to prefer to work alone or behind-the-scenes. You may forget things easily.

For Readings DM

[theambitiouswoman]

Wealth Building: Money Topics You Should Learn About If You Want To Make More Money

Budgeting: This means keeping track of how much money you have and how you spend it. It helps you save money and plan for your needs.

Investing: This is like putting your money to work so it can grow over time. It's like planting seeds to grow a money tree.

Saving: Saving is when you put some money aside for later. It's like keeping some of your treats for another day.

Debt Management: This is about handling money you owe to others, like loans or credit cards. You want to pay it back without owing too much.

Credit Scores: Think of this like a report card for your money habits. It helps others decide if they can trust you with money.

Taxation: Taxes are like a fee you pay to the government. You need to understand how they work and how to pay them correctly.

Retirement Planning: This is making sure you have enough money to live comfortably when you're older and no longer working.

Estate Planning: This is like making a plan for your stuff and money after you're no longer here.

Insurance: It's like paying for protection. You give some money to an insurance company, and they help you if something bad happens.

Investment Options: These are different ways to make your money grow, like buying parts of companies or putting money in a savings account.

Financial Markets: These are places where people buy and sell things like stocks and bonds. It can affect your investments.

Risk Management: This is about being careful with your money and making smart choices to avoid losing it.

Passive Income: This is money you get without having to work for it, like rent from a property you own.

Entrepreneurship: It's like starting your own business. You create something and try to make money from it.

Behavioral Finance: This is about understanding how your feelings and thoughts can affect how you use money. You want to make good choices even when you feel worried or excited.

Financial Goals: These are like wishes for your money. You need a plan to make them come true.

Financial Tools and Apps: These are like helpers on your phone or computer that can make it easier to manage your money.

Real Estate: This is about buying and owning property, like a house or land, to make money.

Asset Protection: It's about keeping your money safe from problems or people who want to take it.

Philanthropy: This means giving money to help others, like donating to charities or causes you care about.

Compounding Interest: This is like a money snowball. When you save or invest your money, it can grow over time. As it grows, you earn even more money on the money you already earned.

Credit Cards: When you borrow money or use a credit card to buy things, you need to show you can pay it back on time. This helps you build a good reputation with money. The better your reputation, the easier it is to borrow more money when you need it.

Alternate Currencies: These are like different kinds of money that aren't like the coins and bills you're used to like Crypto. It's digital money that's not controlled by a government. Some people use it for online shopping, and others think of it as a way to invest, like buying special tokens for a game.

[astrobydalia]

Astro knowledge

A short more educational post for y'all!

work by astrobydalia

Pisces/Neptune rules marketing while Gemini/Mercury is more about sales. They’re both deeply related but difference is Gemini is the salesman that appeals to your reason and resorts to mind games (Mercury) in a one-on-one to convince you why you should buy into something. Marketing on the other hand is ruled by Pisces because it appeals to the collective unconscious (Neptune). It’s all about crafting subliminal messages that make you see that product/idea as more appealing even when you know what you're seeing is not realistic. Very related to propaganda as well. This is also a field that requires a lot of creativity, they're constantly using metaphors, hyperboles or even making up little fictional stories to sell a product...

I've already said this but for anyone new, the planet that rules real love is moon not Venus. See the full explanation here

Where Sagittarius is in your chart will bring luck and happiness, but Taurus does give off expansive (or dare I say expensive) energy too. Where Taurus sits in your chart is an area of your life that will be more grandiose in nature cause Taurus rules over indulgence and pleasure. You could experience some sort of privilege when it comes to this house, the themes of this house come to you in abundance with little to no effort. Some examples:

Taurus 1st house: have a striking and bold appearance, gives off luxury and attractive vibes regardless of their looks. These people could come across as a "high value woman/man" without trying

Taurus 7th house: very active and abundant love life, lots of suitors and business partners landing on your lab, they want to provide for you and/or give you lucrative opportunities

Taurus 9th house: having access to high quality education or elevated knowledge. Probably attended a very exclusive or expensive collage, payed vacations vibes, easy and frequent relocations

Taurus 10th house: almost untouchable reputation, very respected and liked by others, is always seen as innocent or harmless, lots of success with their ventures

The 2nd house also talks about your roots and upbringing but in a more objective and material sense. This house and the position of its ruler can be very telling of how your actual social and economic context shaped your basic values. It can also talk about your house as the 2nd house rules over real state, lands, properties, etc. The 4th house is more about your home, how you were raised within that reality and how it impacted you emotionally at your core

Example: Libra risings could come from an environment that shaped their values around survival and money gains due to Scorpio 2nd house (I've seen very commonly they come from marginalized groups or humble beginnings or very financially competitive environments). So they have a family that is very demanding and expected them to work or be a boss from a young age (Capricorn 4th house)

Speaking of, 2nd house does not ONLY rule money!!! It rules RESOURCES and anything that you own that is highly valuable and you can put a price on!!!! And yes of course since these things are valuable they can be easily monetized, traded, used to make you money. This can be your skills, assets, real state, etc. The 2nd house is your piggy bank basically

There's a lot of talk about how 11th house is how you make money in your career while 2nd house is how you spend it. Well this is technically true but I'd like to add more explanation to this. In derivative astrology 11th house is 2nd (money) from the 10th (career) so it does show how you actually make money from your career. 2nd house is where you get money but 11th house is how you make money. Your 11th house is the multiplier (credits to @cosmicpuzzle for that fact) while 2nd house is where your financial stability lies on. In other words 11th house is indicative of how you generate more but 2nd house is all about what you already have, its about what you can make with what you OWN already, it deals with money that is already available through your resources' value (again, you piggy bank). This does 'make' you money in a way like if you lose your job and are lacking money your 2nd house where you turn to for example if you own a house you can rent it, you can buy a rare item that costs a lot, selling your art or any other natural skill, etc. The concept of value is important in this house bc it can increase or decrease (while 11th house increases and multiplies). The more valuable your resources are the more potential money you have available which means more financial stability and wealth. Anyways hope all that makes sense

We often refer to water signs when talking spirituality but truth is fire signs are very spiritual in nature as well. Fire symbolizes the spark of life itself, nothing could exist or be created without it. Aries deals with the basic ontological conception of 'I am, I exist', Leo is about how the self manifests and create itself and Sagittarius is about the purpose of the self. Living beings need heat to thrive/live and just like fire radiates heat your spirit radiates energy, creativity, passion, action, inspiration, purpose... and that's what fire signs represent. I'd say fire represents the fundamentality of spirit while water is more about the complexity of inner world.

Just like Aries is the "natural" ASC for a birth chart, Libra is the natural ASC for a composite chart cause a birth chart represents the chart of an individual (Aries) while composite represents the mutual relationship between two people (Libra)

When you develop the themes of a certain house in a healthy manner, you naturally start attracting the themes of the opposite house. This goes to show you that things in astrology aren't as compartmentalized as they seem, everything works together in certain way SPECIALLY axis'. Examples:

You need to focus on yourself first (1st house) to find the right partner (7th house)

You need to investigate and learn (3rd house) in order to find higher answers (9th house)

When you invest successfully (8th house) you earn more available resources (2nd house).

When you develop your hobbies and individuality (5th house) you find keen people (11th house)

When you heal spiritually (12th house) you find healthier habits (6th house)

There's this misconception that you have to disregard your South Node in order to develop you NN, but the thing is the SN is the starting point that can lead you towards developing your NN. This can happen as a harsh and painful lesson tho if you liger too much on your SN. For example NN in Libra need to learn to compromise in this life, there's a lot of focus on the self and independence, but eventually this placement teaches them that if you really wanna develop yourself in full potential (Aries) eventually you'll need others (Libra). If they linger too much on Aries SN they could experience a harsh lesson that forces them to count on others

work by astrobydalia

[zvaigzdelasas]

Hui, who founded Evergrande in 1996, was detained by Chinese police last month on “suspicion of illegal crimes” related to the debt-laden company’s financial woes.[...]

Founder Hui was once Asia’s second-richest person, having built up a personal fortune of $42 billion by 2017. However, according to Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index, which tracks the real-time wealth of the world’s wealthiest people, Hui’s net worth has now tumbled to $979 million. That means he has lost 98% of his wealth over the past six years.[...]

Since the Chinese government insisted that Hui use his own wealth to pay off some of Evergrande’s debts, the firm’s embattled founder and chairman has been selling off assets including a $227 million London mansion and a $112 million villa in Hong Kong.

Lol, and I can't stress this enough: lmao [25 Oct 23]

[mikasasrippedtoenail]

Why Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend

Women and their jewellery have a very intricate relationship. The tale of the nagging wife troubling her husband for new jewellery is as old as time. It is a reflection on a woman's vanity. Folk tales mock her ignorance of worldly ways and her frivolous obsession with being adorned. She is redundant to a mere crow that admires shiny things. However, this begs the question, is a woman's desire to collect jewellery as absurd as men paint it to be?

The world has forgotten that until very recently, women were forbidden from owning any form of capital. Be it property, money or even small inanimate objects, they belonged first to her father then her husband. The roof above her could be taken away on a whim with a clock's tick. In these trying times, jewellery emerged as a beacon of financial security for most women of the globe.

Mother of pearls, diamond earrings, gold necklaces etc. were-- although not in print-- under a woman's reign of control. They had an impressive resale value and could last several generations under proper care. More so, they could be secretly sold usually without paperwork to acquire a woman some monetary freedom. If her husband gambled all their assets away, atleast she'll have enough money to put some food on the table for her children.

Jewellery has often times saved people from calamities. Unlike land, jewellery is easier to sell. In case of an emergency, a large sum of money could be obtained without much trouble. Jewellery are an excellent heirloom. The wisdom of grandmothers is passed down to granddaughters to come, allowing them some command over their own life.

Jewellery is a form of investment just like land and shares. Its value is diminished solely due to its association with women. It is not a woman's vice but a survival tactic against the suffocating patriarchy. Jewellery is something she can have under her own name--no matter how small or how futile-- it is her sole capital, her best friend.

[mitchipedia]

Reddit is speedrunning enshittification.

Hypothesis: The owners of the company are no longer interested in keeping the business going, and are just trying to maximize financial return by selling off every possible asset.

In Reddit’s case, the upcoming IPO isn’t the beginning of a new chapter in the business. It’s the end of the business.

The most financially valuable part of Reddit is its fat corpus of content, built by volunteers over many years, suddenly made valuable for training AI. Now, Reddit’s corporate owners want to sell access to that corpus. That is Reddit’s new business. It’s not a long-term business, because the corpus will decay in value over time. But it’s enough for the owners to cash out.

I’m inspired in this thinking by yesterday’s edition of Rusty Foster’s “Today in Tabs.”. I don’t think he’s making this exact point, but he’s putting all the dots down, without necessarily connecting them.

John Gruber at Daring Fireball notes that OpenAI already scooped up Reddit’s corpus of data when the APIs were free. The data has no value anymore.

Reddit already gave all its data to large companies for free. Huffman is trying to charge now for horses that were let out of the barn years ago. And he obviously doesn’t care about Apollo or other third-party Reddit clients, or what these moves do to Reddit’s reputation as a platform vendor. He’s just trapped in a fantasy where investors are going to somehow see Reddit as a player in the current moment of AI hype.

Also, on Ryan Broderick’s Garbage Day: “Platforms Don’t Really Make Sense Anymore”:

We tolerated large platforms, that were never all that good to begin with, because they were convenient and useful and part of a larger interconnected network of tools and apps and systems that made the digital world safer and more dynamic. So you’d think, if they were actively deciding to stop being part of that larger system and no longer interested in making the internet, as a whole, function better, they would, at the very least, try and be more convenient! But instead we’ve ended up in a situation where all the local stores are gone, Main Street is deserted, and the large Walmarts on the edge of town are being set on fire and left to rot.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Yanis Varoufakis’s “Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism?”

Monday (October 2), I'll be in Boise to host an event with VE Schwab. On October 7–8, I'm in Milan to keynote Wired Nextfest.

Socialists have been hotly anticipating the end of capitalism since at least 1848, when Marx and Engels published The Communist Manifesto - but the Manifesto also reminds us that capitalism is only too happy to reinvent itself during its crises, coming back in new forms, over and over again:

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/31/books/review/a-spectre-haunting-china-mieville.html

Now, in Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism, Yanis Varoufakis - the "libertarian Marxist" former finance minister of Greece - makes an excellent case that capitalism died a decade ago, turning into a new form of feudalism: technofeudalism:

https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/451795/technofeudalism-by-varoufakis-yanis/9781847927279

To understand where Varoufakis is coming from, you need to go beyond the colloquial meanings of "capitalism" and "feudalism." Capitalism isn't just "a system where we buy and sell things." It's a system where capital rules the roost: the richest, most powerful people are those who coerce workers into using their capital (factories, tools, vehicles, etc) to create income in the form of profits.

By contrast, a feudal society is one organized around people who own things, charging others to use them to produce goods and services. In a feudal society, the most important form of income isn't profit, it's rent. To quote Varoufakis: "rent flows from privileged access to things in fixed supply" (land, fossil fuels, etc). Profit comes from "entrepreneurial people who have invested in things that wouldn't have otherwise existed."

This distinction is subtle, but important: "Profit is vulnerable to market competition, rent is not." If you have a coffee shop, then every other coffee shop that opens on your block is a competitive threat that could erode your margins. But if you own the building the coffee shop owner rents, then every other coffee shop that opens on the block raises the property values and the amount of rent you can charge.

The capitalist revolution - extolled and condemned in the Manifesto - was led by people who valorized profits as the heroic returns for making something new in this world, and who condemned rents as a parasitic drain on the true producers whose entrepreneurial spirits would enrich us all. The "free markets" extolled by Adam Smith weren't free from regulation - they were free from rents:

https://locusmag.com/2021/03/cory-doctorow-free-markets/

But rents, Varoufakis writes, "survived only parasitically on, and in the shadows of, profit." That is, rentiers (people whose wealth comes from rents) were a small rump of the economy, slightly suspect and on the periphery of any consideration of how to organize our society. But all that changed in 2008, when the world's central banks addressed the Great Financial Crisis by bailing out not just the banks, but the bankers, funneling trillions to the people whose reckless behavior brought the world to the brink of economic ruin.

Suddenly, these wealthy people, and their banks, experienced enormous wealth-gains without profits. Their businesses lost billions in profits (the cost of offering the business's products and services vastly exceeded the money people spent on those products and services). But the business still had billions more at the end of the year than they'd had at the start: billions in public money, funneled to them by central banks.

This kicked off the "everything rally" in which every kind of asset - real estate, art, stocks, bonds, even monkey JPEGs - ballooned in value. That's exactly what you'd expect from an economy where rents dominate over profits. Feudal rentiers don't need to invest to keep making money - remember, their wealth comes from owning things that other people invest in to make money.

Rents are not vulnerable to competition, so rentiers don't need to plow their rents into new technology to keep the money coming in. The capitalist that leases the oil field needs to invest in new pumps and refining to stay competitive with other oil companies. But the rentier of the oil field doesn't have to do anything: either the capitalist tenant will invest in more capital and make the field more valuable, or they will lose out to another capitalist who'll replace them. Either way, the rentier gets more rent.

So when capitalists get richer, they spend some of that money on new capital, but when rentiers get richer, them spend money on more assets they can rent to capitalists. The "everything rally" made all kinds of capital more valuable, and companies that were transitioning to a feudal footing turned around and handed that money to their investors in stock buybacks and dividends, rather than spending the money on R&D, or new plants, or new technology.

The tech companies, though, were the exception. They invested in "cloud capital" - the servers, lines, and services that everyone else would have to pay rent on in order to practice capitalism.

Think of Amazon: Varoufakis likens shopping on Amazon to visiting a bustling city center filled with shops run by independent capitalists. However, all of those capitalists are subservient to a feudal lord: Jeff Bezos, who takes 51 cents out of every dollar they bring in, and furthermore gets to decide which products they can sell and how those products must be displayed:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/28/enshittification/#relentless-payola

The postcapitalist, technofeudal world isn't a world without capitalism, then. It's a world where capitalists are subservient to feudalists ("cloudalists" in Varoufakis's thesis), as are the rest of us the cloud peons, from the social media users and performers who fill the technofuedalists' siloes with "content" to the regular users whose media diet is dictated by the cloudalists' recommendation systems:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/potemkin-ai/#hey-guys

A defining feature of cloudalism is the ability of the rentier lord to destroy any capitalist vassal's business with the click of a mouse. If Google kicks your business out of the search index, or if Facebook blocks your publication, or if Twitter shadowbans mentions of your product, or if Apple pulls your app from the store, you're toast.

Capitalists "still have the power to command labor from the majority who are reliant on wages," but they are still mere vassals to the cloudalists. Even the most energetic capitalist can't escape paying rent, thanks in large part to "IP," which I claim is best understood as "laws that let a company reach beyond its walls to dictate the conduct of competitors, critics and customers":

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

Varoufakis points to ways that the cloudalists can cement their gains: for example, "green" energy doesn't rely on land-leases (like fossil fuels), but it does rely on networked grids and data-protocols that can be loaded up with IP, either or both of which can be turned into chokepoints for feudal rent-extraction. To make things worse, Varoufakis argues that cloudalists won't be able to muster the degree of coordination and patience needed to actually resolve the climate emergency - they'll not only extract rent from every source of renewables, but they'll also silo them in ways that make them incapable of doing the things we need them to do.

Energy is just one of the technofeudal implications that Varoufakis explores in this book: there are also lengthy and fascinating sections on geopolitics, monetary policy, and the New Cold War. Technofeudalism - and the struggle to produce a dominant fiefdom - is a very useful lens for understanding US/Chinese tech wars.

Though Varoufakis is laying out a technical and even esoteric argument here, he takes great pains to make it accessible. The book is structured as a long open letter to his father, a chemical engineer and leftist who was a political prisoner during the fascist takeover of Greece. The framing device works very well, especially if you've read Talking To My Daughter About the Economy, Varoufakis's 2018 radical economics primer in the form of a letter to his young daughter:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374538491/talkingtomydaughterabouttheeconomy

At the very end of the book, Varoufakis calls for "a cloud rebellion to overthrow technofeudalism." This section is very short - and short on details. That's not a knock against the book: there are plenty of very good books that consist primarily or entirely of analysis of the problems with a system, without having to lay out a detailed program for solving those problems.

But for what it's worth, I think there is a way to plan and execute a "cloud rebellion" - a way to use laws, technology, reverse-engineering and human rights frameworks to shatter the platforms and seize the means of computation. I lay out that program in The Internet Con: How the Seize the Means of Computation, a book I published with Verso Books a couple weeks ago:

https://www.versobooks.com/products/3035-the-internet-con

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/2023/09/28/cloudalists/#cloud-capital