#specifically one working in the service industry

[luneariann]

Follow up question how do you get a boy to like you

Nvm i might be bi actually

[bearsbadblog]

I'm on my 4th retail job and it's still crazy to me how terribly-run my 2nd one was. Making food with no ticket system. No order numbers. Vestigial buttons dotting the POS touch screen and a sticky note denoting how to ring in each seasonal drink. This was a nationwide chain. Not even a franchise, either. How & why did they survive this long

[andrewminyardslawyer]

PSA for those writing coffee shop AUs, bakery AUs, etc.

I have worked in the food service industry for 20 years and I just wanted to make an informational list of common mistakes or misconceptions I see in writing about said industry. Not trying to be a jerk, just thought I would try to make a helpful list! I will add more if I think of any and please feel free to ask any questions you may have!

- it's cookie dough, not cookie batter. Doughs are for thicker stuff, typically something you can pick up in your hand (cookies, bread). Batters are more liquid and pourable (cakes, brownies, muffins)

- one person cannot make all the products from scratch and bake everything themselves unless they are a very slow business. Most of the time someone has a specific thing they do weather it's focused on specific products or split up like one person does the batters/doughs, one person preps and bakes, one person decorates. Sometimes one person does multiple things but generally not every single thing every day by themselves

- Front of House = people interacting with customers like barista, waiter, person at the register. Back of House = people making the food (line cook, baker, etc), dish washer (the worst job in the world, I salute all dishwashers everywhere)

- if they're doing stuff like bagels, doughnuts, breakfast pastries, cinnamon rolls, bread, etc they are there EARLY. Depending on the product some people start working at 2 in the morning. I saw a published book that had someone making dozens and dozens of cinnamon rolls from scratch in like one hour. Not possible even though I wish it was

- frosting, icing, and glaze are all different things. Frosting is the thicker stuff you see on cakes and cupcakes. Icing is typically for cookies, especially the decorated cut out sugar cookies. Glaze is thin, like what you get on doughnuts

- 99% of people who work in the food service industry will immediately go home and shower. I've seen lots stories where the character gets done at work and goes out. You are covered in various substances with powdered sugar in places you didn't know it could get, a shower before Literally Anything is a must

[thosetwofirefighters]

.

[zooophagous]

So why do you hate the advertising industry?

Hokay so.

Let me preface this with some personal history. It's not relevant to the sins of the advertising industry perse but it illustrates how I started to grow to hate it.

I wanted to be a veterinarian growing up, but to be a vet you basically have to be good enough to get into medical school. I do not have the math chops or discipline to make it in medical school. I went into art instead, and in a desperate attempt to find some commercial viability that didn't involve moving to California, I went into graphic design.

I've been a graphic designer for about seven or eight years now and I've worn a lot of hats. One of them was working in a print shop. Now, the print shop had a lot of corporate customers who had various ad campaigns. One of them was Gate City Bank, which had a bigass stack of postcards ordered every couple months to mail to their customers.

Now, paper comes from Dakota Paper, and they make their paper the usual way. Somewhere far, far from our treeless plain there is a forest of tall trees. These trees are cut down and put on big fossil fuel burning trucks and hauled to a paper mill that turns them into pulp while spewing the most fowl odors imaginable over the neighboring town and loads the pulp up with bleach to give it a nice white color.

Then the paper is put on yet another big truck and hauled off to the local paper depot, then put on another big truck and delivered to my print shop, where I turned the paper into postcards telling people to go even deeper into debt to buy a boat because it's almost summer. The inks used are a type of nasty heat sensitive plastic that is melted to the surface of the paper with heat. Then the postcards are put on yet ANOTHER truck and sent to the bank, which puts them on ANOTHER truck and finally into the hands of their customers, who open their mail and take one look at the post card and immediately discard it.

Heaps and heaps and literal hundreds of pounds of literal garbage created at the whim of the marketing team several times a year. And thats just one bank in one city.

I came to realize very quickly that graphic design was the delicate art of turning trees into junk mail.

And wouldn't you know it there are a TON of companies that basically only do junk mail. Many of them operate under the guise of a "charity," sending you pictures of suffering children or animals and begging for handouts and when they get those handouts the executives take a nice fat cut, give some small token amount to whatever cause they pay lip service to, and then put the rest of the cash right back into making more mailers. "Direct mail marketing" they call it.

Oh but maybe it's not so bad, you can advertise online after all. Now that there's decent ad blocker out there and better anti-virus ads usually don't destroy your computer anymore just by existing.

Except now when I search for the exact business I want on Google it's buried under three or four different "promoted search items" tricking me into clicking on them only to shoot themselves in the foot because I searched for the specific result I wanted for a reason and couldn't use those other websites even if I felt like it.

And now we have advertising on YouTube and on every streaming service, forcing more and more eyes onto the ad for the brand new Buick Envision that parks itself because you're too stupid to do it on your own.

Oh thats ok maybe I'll get Spotify premium and go ad free and listen to some podcasts- SIKE we have the hosts of your show doing the song and dance now. Are you depressed and paranoid from listening to my true crime podcast about murdered and mutilated teenagers? That's ok, my sponsor Better Help can keep you sane enough to stay alive and spend more money.

It's gotten so terrible that now you have content farms, huge hubs of shell companies that crank out video after video to get more and more precious clicks. Which if the videos were innocuous maybe that wouldn't be so awful except now you have cooking hacks that can actually burn your house down and craft hacks that can electrocute you being flung into your eyes at the speed of mach fuck so some slimy internet clickbait jockey doesn't need to get a real job.

It of course goes without saying that animals are also relentlessly exploited by clickbait companies that will put them in compromising situations on purpose to create a fake fishing hack video or even just straight up killing them for sport by feeding small animals to a pufferfish that rips them apart for the camera.

And all of this, ALL of this doesn't even touch how adveritising is the death of art in general. Queer topics, any kind of interesting art, any kind of sex or substance use topics are scrubbed clean and hidden at the behest of advertisers.

Sex education, a nude statue, topics such as racism or sexism or bigotry in general have tags purged or hidden from search, even life saving information about SDTs or drug use, because if someone saw that and complained then Verizon might sell fewer tablets and we can't fucking have that.

Conservative talking heads often bitch and moan that they're being censored on social media. The stupid part is, they're right! They are being censored! But it's not by a woke mob, it's by ATT and Coca Cola not wanting their adspace sharing screen time with their stupid fucking opinions.

However, they won't ever figure that out, because the talking heads they get their marching orders from like Tucker and Jones ALSO rely on the sweet milk flowing from the sponsorship teat and they aren't about to turn on their meal ticket so they have to come up with even stupider shit to say for the train to continue rolling.

I managed to rant this far without even getting into the ads I see for the beauty industry. The other day a botox ad described wrinkles as "moderate to severe crows feet" as if wrinkles are a symptom of a fucking serious disease! Like having a flaw in your skin is a medical problem that you need thousands of dollars of literal botulism toxin to fix! I was incandescent with anger.

Advertising is a polluting, censoring, anti educational and anti art industry at it's very core. It destroys human connections, suppresses human thought and makes us hate our own bodies. It ads no value, actively detracts from value, and serves no real purpose and I believe it should be almost if not entirely banned.

[honga2]

web development company in Bangladesh

[just-my-latest-hyperfixation]

🧠🪱 Wiggly Wednesday 🧠 🪱

I was tagged by @runninriot - thx love ❤️

Today I'm thinking of ...

...Eddie, stupidly high and with a mad case of the late-night munchies, stumbling his way up to the fast food counter. The guy behind it has his back turned, talking and laughing at the freckled girl in the kitchen, but when he hears Eddie approach, he turns. 

“Hi,” Eddie mutters. “Can I have a- fuck!” 

“I'm afraid we're not that kind of business,” says the apparition behind the counter. 

“... huh?” says Eddie. 

The apparition laughs, a sound like bells. “Never mind, what can I do for you?” 

“Are you an angel?” Eddie blurts, and scowls when he gets another laugh in reply. He thinks it's a fair question. Regular humans don't have eyes with golden flecks of toffee and hair like spun honey and sun-kissed, caramel skin that looks good enough to lick, and fuck he is so hungry!

“No, man,” says the guy, gesturing at his name tag. “I'm Steve. I work here.” 

“Steeeve,” Eddie slurs. Even the name tastes sweet. “Hi, Steve, I'm Eddie, it's a pleasure to- … Wait, is God, like, in trouble or somethin’? Forcing his angels to work in the service industry? I've never been much for organized religion, but-” 

The girl in the kitchen doubles over laughing, sending a large, silver tray rattling to the ground. It goes boioioing. 

“Okay, listen,” says Steve. His voice is so gentle and slow, Eddie could listen to it for hours. “How about you just let me take your order?” 

Right, food. He needs food. Like a whole truck full of it. 

“Stevie,” he declares, letting the v sound linger on his tongue, soft and velvety. “I'd be forever grateful to you if you could fast forward me one of your finest Whoppers. No, you know what? Make it a Double Whopper.” 

“Oh,” says Steve. Those pretty eyes go serious, and oh no, Eddie has disappointed him! “I'm afraid I can't.” 

“What?” Eddie croaks, blinking tears from his eyes. “Wha- … Why not?” 

“Because, Eddie,” Steve smiles, and taps his name tag again. Or the logo on it, more specifically. “This is a McDonald's.”

He gets Eddie a Big Mac. Eddie returns a few nights later, more sober, to discover that Steve is still just as angelic. Him ordering a Whopper becomes their little running gag. Their first date is at a Burger King.

🍔🍟🍔🍟🍔🍟🍔🍟🍔🍟🍔🍟🍔🍟🍔🍟🍔🍟

Tagging: @rozzieroos @stervrucht @arelliann @dartlekey @eyesofshinigami

[fatehbaz]

Today, as you read this [...], there are almost 2 million people locked away in one of the more than 5,000 prisons or jails that dot the American landscape. While they are behind bars, these incarcerated people can be found standing in line at their prison’s commissary waiting to buy some extra food or cleaning supplies that are often marked up to prices higher than what one would pay outside of those prison walls. [...] If they want to call a friend or family member, they need to pay for that as well. And almost everyone who works at a job while incarcerated, often for less than a dollar an hour, will find that the prison has taken a portion of their salary to pay for their cost of incarceration. [...] These policymakers and government officials also know that this captive population has no choice but to foot the bill [...] and that if they can’t be made to pay, their families can. In fact, a 2015 report led by the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, Forward Together, and Research Action Design found that in 63 percent of cases, family members on the outside were primarily responsible for court-related costs [...].

Rutgers sociology professor Brittany Friedman has written extensively on what is called “pay-to-stay” fees in American correctional institutions. In her 2020 article titled, “Unveiling the Necrocapitalist Dimensions of the Shadow Carceral State: On Pay-to-Stay to Recoup the Cost of Incarceration,” Friedman divides these fees into two categories: (1) room and board and (2) service-specific costs. Fees for room and board -- yes, literally for a thin mattress or even a plastic “boat” bed in a hallway, a toilet that may not flush, and scant, awful tasting food -- are typically charged at a “per diem rate for the length of incarceration.” It is not uncommon for these fees to reach $20 to $80 a day for the entire period of incarceration. The second category, what Friedman refers to as “service-specific costs,” includes fees for basic charges such as copays or other costs for seeing a doctor or nurse, programming fees, email and telephone calls, and commissary items. 

In 2014, the Brennan Center for Justice documented that at least 43 states authorize charging incarcerated people for the cost of their own imprisonment, and at least 35 states authorize charging them for some medical expenses. More recent research from the Prison Policy Institute found that 40 states and the federal prison system charge incarcerated people medical copays. 

It’s also critical to understand how little incarcerated people are paid for their labor in addition to the significant cut of their paltry hourly wages that corrections agencies take from their earnings. Nearly two-thirds (65 percent) of incarcerated people work behind bars. According to the Prison Policy Initiative, those who work regular jobs in prisons such as maintaining the grounds, working in the kitchen, and painting the walls of the facilities earn on average between $0.14 and $0.63 an hour. [...] Arkansas and Texas don’t pay incarcerated workers at all, while Alabama only pays incarcerated workers employed by the state’s correctional industry. [...]

For example, if someone sends an incarcerated person in Florida $20 online, they will end up paying $24.95. [...]

Dallas County charges incarcerated people a $10 medical care fee for each medical request they submit. In Texas prisons, those behind bars pay $13.55 per medical visit, despite the fact that Texas doesn’t pay incarcerated workers anything. Texas is one of a handful of states that doesn’t pay incarcerated people for their labor. 

In Kentucky’s McCracken County Jail in Paducah, it costs $0.40 a minute for a video call; this translates into $8.00 for each 20-minute video call. [...] For those who need to use email, JPay charges $2.35 for five emails for people in the Texas prison system ($0.47 an email). [...]

People in Florida prisons pay $1.70 for a packet of four extra-strength Tylenol and $4.02 for four tampons. And with inflation, commissary items are priced higher than ever. For example, according to the Kentucky Center for Investigative Reporting, incarcerated people in Kentucky experienced a 7.2 percent rise in already-high commissary prices in July 2022. Researchers noted that a 4.6-ounce tube of Crest toothpaste, which costs $1.38 at the local Walmart, is $3.77 at the prison commissary. [...]

In Gaston County, North Carolina, incarcerated individuals who participate in state work release may make more than the state’s $0.38 an hour maximum pay, but they pay the jail a daily rate based on their yearly income of at least $18 per day and up to $36 per day. In fact, Brennan Center research indicates that almost every state takes a portion of the salary that incarcerated workers earn to compensate the corrections agency [...].

These room and board fees are found throughout the nation’s jails and prisons. Michigan laws allow any county to seek reimbursement for expenses incurred in relation to a charge for which a person was sentenced to county jail time -- up to $60 a day. Winnebago County, Wisconsin, charges $26 a day to those staying in its county jail.

---

Text by: Lauren-Brooke Eisen. “America’s Dystopian Incarceration System of Pay to Stay Behind Bars.” Brennan Center for Justice. 19 April 2023. [Bold emphasis and some paragraph breaks/contractions added by me.]

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The specific process by which Google enshittified its search

I'm touring my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me SATURDAY (Apr 27) in MARIN COUNTY, then Winnipeg (May 2), Calgary (May 3), Vancouver (May 4), and beyond!

All digital businesses have the technical capacity to enshittify: the ability to change the underlying functions of the business from moment to moment and user to user, allowing for the rapid transfer of value between business customers, end users and shareholders:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/19/twiddler/

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

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/24/naming-names/#prabhakar-raghavan

Which raises an important question: why do companies enshittify at a specific moment, after refraining from enshittifying before? After all, a company always has the potential to benefit by treating its business customers and end users worse, by giving them a worse deal. If you charge more for your product and pay your suppliers less, that leaves more money on the table for your investors.

Of course, it's not that simple. While cheating, price-gouging, and degrading your product can produce gains, these tactics also threaten losses. You might lose customers to a rival, or get punished by a regulator, or face mass resignations from your employees who really believe in your product.

Companies choose not to enshittify their products…until they choose to do so. One theory to explain this is that companies are engaged in a process of continuous assessment, gathering data about their competitive risks, their regulators' mettle, their employees' boldness. When these assessments indicate that the conditions are favorable to enshittification, the CEO walks over to the big "enshittification" lever on the wall and yanks it all the way to MAX.

Some companies have certainly done this – and paid the price. Think of Myspace or Yahoo: companies that made themselves worse by reducing quality and gouging on price (be it measured in dollars or attention – that is, ads) before sinking into obscure senescence. These companies made a bet that they could get richer while getting worse, and they were wrong, and they lost out.

But this model doesn't explain the Great Enshittening, in which all the tech companies are enshittifying at the same time. Maybe all these companies are subscribing to the same business newsletter (or, more likely, buying advice from the same management consultancy) (cough McKinsey cough) that is a kind of industry-wide starter pistol for enshittification.

I think it's something else. I think the main job of a CEO is to show up for work every morning and yank on the enshittification lever as hard as you can, in hopes that you can eke out some incremental gains in your company's cost-basis and/or income by shifting value away from your suppliers and customers to yourself.

We get good digital services when the enshittification lever doesn't budge – when it is constrained: by competition, by regulation, by interoperable mods and hacks that undo enshittification (like alternative clients and ad-blockers) and by workers who have bargaining power thanks to a tight labor market or a powerful union:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/09/lead-me-not-into-temptation/#chamberlain

When Google ordered its staff to build a secret Chinese search engine that would censor search results and rat out dissidents to the Chinese secret police, googlers revolted and refused, and the project died:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragonfly_(search_engine)

When Google tried to win a US government contract to build AI for drones used to target and murder civilians far from the battlefield, googlers revolted and refused, and the project died:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/01/technology/google-pentagon-project-maven.html

What's happened since – what's behind all the tech companies enshittifying all at once – is that tech worker power has been smashed, especially at Google, where 12,000 workers were fired just months after a $80b stock buyback that would have paid their wages for the next 27 years. Likewise, competition has receded from tech bosses' worries, thanks to lax antitrust enforcement that saw most credible competitors merged into behemoths, or neutralized with predatory pricing schemes. Lax enforcement of other policies – privacy, labor and consumer protection – loosened up the enshittification lever even more. And the expansion of IP rights, which criminalize most kinds of reverse engineering and aftermarket modification, means that interoperability no longer applies friction to the enshittification lever.

Now that every tech boss has an enshittification lever that moves very freely, they can show up for work, yank the enshittification lever, and it goes all the way to MAX. When googlers protested the company's complicity in the genocide in Gaza, Google didn't kill the project – it mass-fired the workers:

https://medium.com/@notechforapartheid/statement-from-google-workers-with-the-no-tech-for-apartheid-campaign-on-googles-indiscriminate-28ba4c9b7ce8

Enshittification is a macroeconomic phenomenon, determined by the regulatory environment for competition, privacy, labor, consumer protection and IP. But enshittification is also a microeconomic phenomenon, the result of innumerable boardroom and product-planning fights within companies in which would-be enshittifiers try to do things that make the company's products and services shittier wrestle with rivals who want to keep things as they are, or make them better, whether out of principle or fear of the consequences.

Those microeconomic wrestling-matches are where we find enshittification's heroes and villains – the people who fight for the user or stand up for a fair deal, versus the people who want to cheat and wreck to make things better for the company and win bonuses and promotions for themselves:

https://locusmag.com/2023/11/commentary-by-cory-doctorow-dont-be-evil/

These microeconomic struggles are usually obscure, because companies are secretive institutions and our glimpses into their deliberations are normally limited to the odd leaked memo, whistleblower tell-all, or spectacular worker revolt. But when a company gets dragged into court, a new window opens into the company's internal operations. That's especially true when the plaintiff is the US government.

Which brings me back to Google, the poster-child for enshittification, a company that revolutionized the internet a quarter of a century ago with a search-engine that was so good that it felt like magic, which has decayed so badly and so rapidly that whole sections of the internet are disappearing from view for the 90% of users who rely on the search engine as their gateway to the internet.

Google is being sued by the DOJ's Antitrust Division, and that means we are getting a very deep look into the company, as its internal emails and memos come to light:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/03/not-feeling-lucky/#fundamental-laws-of-economics

Google is a tech company, and tech companies have literary cultures – they run on email and other forms of written communication, even for casual speech, which is more likely to take place in a chat program than at a water-cooler. This means that tech companies have giant databases full of confessions to every crime they've ever committed:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/03/big-tech-cant-stop-telling-on-itself/

Large pieces of Google's database-of-crimes are now on display – so much, in fact, that it's hard for anyone to parse through it all and understand what it means. But some people are trying, and coming up with gold. One of those successful prospectors is Ed Zitron, who has produced a staggering account of the precise moment at which Google search tipped over into enshittification, which names the executives at the very heart of the rot:

https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-men-who-killed-google/

Zitron tells the story of a boardroom struggle over search quality, in which Ben Gomes – a long-tenured googler who helped define the company during its best years – lost a fight with Prabhakar Raghavan, a computer scientist turned manager whose tactic for increasing the number of search queries (and thus the number of ads the company could show to searchers) was to decrease the quality of search. That way, searchers would have to spend more time on Google before they found what they were looking for.

Zitron contrasts the background of these two figures. Gomes, the hero, worked at Google for 19 years, solving fantastically hard technical scaling problems and eventually becoming the company's "search czar." Raghavan, the villain, "failed upwards" through his career, including a stint as Yahoo's head of search from 2005-12, a presiding over the collapse of Yahoo's search business. Under Raghavan's leadership, Yahoo's search market-share fell from 30.4% to 14%, and in the end, Yahoo jettisoned its search altogether and replaced it with Bing.

For Zitron, the memos show how Raghavan engineered the ouster of Gomes, with help from the company CEO, the ex-McKinseyite Sundar Pichai. It was a triumph for enshittification, a deliberate decision to make the product worse in order to make it more profitable, under the (correct) belief that the company's exclusivity deals to provide search everywhere from Iphones and Samsungs to Mozilla would mean that the business would face no consequences for doing so.

It a picture of a company that isn't just too big to fail – it's (as FTC Chair Lina Khan put it on The Daily Show) too big to care:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oaDTiWaYfcM

Zitron's done excellent sleuthing through the court exhibits here, and his writeup is incandescently brilliant. But there's one point I quibble with him on. Zitron writes that "It’s because the people running the tech industry are no longer those that built it."

I think that gets it backwards. I think that there were always enshittifiers in the C-suites of these companies. When Page and Brin brought in the war criminal Eric Schmidt to run the company, he surely started every day with a ritual, ferocious tug at that enshittification lever. The difference wasn't who was in the C-suite – the difference was how freely the lever moved.

On Saturday, I wrote:

The platforms used to treat us well and now treat us badly. That's not because they were setting a patient trap, luring us in with good treatment in the expectation of locking us in and turning on us. Tech bosses do not have the executive function to lie in wait for years and years.

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/22/kargo-kult-kaptialism/#dont-buy-it

Someone on Hacker News called that "silly," adding that "tech bosses do in fact have the executive function to lie in wait for years and years. That's literally the business model of most startups":

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40114339

That's not quite right, though. The business-model of the startup is to yank on the enshittification lever every day. Tech bosses don't lie in wait for the perfect moment to claw away all the value from their employees, users, business customers, and suppliers – they're always trying to get that value. It's only when they become too big to care that they succeed. That's the definition of being too big to care.

In antitrust circles, they sometimes say that "the process is the punishment." No matter what happens to the DOJ's case against Google, its internal workers have been made visible to the public. The secrecy surrounding the Google trial when it was underway meant that a lot of this stuff flew under the radar when it first appeared. But as Zitron's work shows, there is plenty of treasure to be found in that trove of documents that is now permanently in the public domain.

When future scholars study the enshittocene, they will look to accounts like Zitron's to mark the turning points from the old, good internet to the enshitternet. Let's hope those future scholars have a new, good internet on which to publish their findings.

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/2024/04/24/naming-names/#prabhakar-raghavan

[apas-95]

Do you have a concept of what the "stateless, classless society" of communism would possibly look like? Personally I find it hard to imagine a functional society devoid of a state apparatus, I was discussing politics with a friend recently and they said they don't bother differentiating. Tween socialism and communism because communism isn't possible and I kind of wanted to reinforce the proper definitions of the two but since I'm also not convinced about statelessness I wasn't sure if I technically disagree with their point.

Well, principally - no, I don't have any concrete conceptions of what communism would look like, because we are not at the historical stage of building communism yet. However, here I think there's a misconception that is leading to confusion: the conflation of the state specifically and of government in general.

The state is the means by which one class subjugates another. The state's principal feature is bodies of armed men - police and armed forces. Ultimately, every piece of state apparatus and state power is dependent on the ultimate enforcement by these bodies; by the ability to escalate cases of disobedience to cases of force.

In class society, all things have a class character - all things are branded with the mark of one class or another, and serve the interests of one class or another. The dictatorships of one class over another, manifested through that class's state, envelop all aspects of governance and take them under the control of the dominant class, in service of that class's interests. However, governance itself need not be a class affair - in a classless society, the existence of organised committes and agencies for carrying out the tasks of public works have absolutely no relation to the domination of one class by another.

The assumption that 'stateless society' means a society without organisation or government, or even hierarchy as dictated by industrial production, is a misconception. Statelessness is simply the logical result of classlessness - that being, that with the withering away of classes, so too would the need for an apparatus of class rule wither away. The communist movement seeks to abolish, in the ultimate sense, the rule of one social class over another - not to abolish all differences between individual people, or between industries, or between sections of a given factory. It's entirely possible that the communist stage of society would, through advances in the means of production, do away with these forms of organisation, but that is not a goal of the communists, nor is it, again, something that can be speculated on at the present stage of history.

[mistakenot4892]

Disclaimer that this is a post mostly motivated by frustration at a cultural trend, not at any individual people/posters. Vagueing to avoid it seeming like a callout but I know how Tumblr is so we'll see I guess. Putting it after a read-more because I think it's going to spiral out of control.

Recent discourse around obnoxious Linux shills chiming in on posts about how difficult it can be to pick up computer literacy these days has made me feel old and tired. I get that people just want computers to Work and they don't want to have to put any extra effort into getting it to Do The Thing, that's not unreasonable, I want the same!

(I also want obnoxious Linux shills to not chip in on my posts (unless I am posting because my Linux has exploded and I need help) so I sympathise with that angle too, 'just use Linux' is not the catch-all solution you think it is my friend.)

But I keep seeing this broad sense of learned helplessness around having to learn about what the computer is actually doing without having your hand held by a massive faceless corporation, and I just feel like it isn't a healthy relationship to have with your tech.

The industry is getting worse and worse in their lack of respect to the consumer every quarter. Microsoft is comfortable pivoting their entire business to push AI on every part of their infrastructure and in every service, in part because their customers aren't going anywhere and won't push back in the numbers that might make a difference. Windows 11 has hidden even more functionality behind layers of streamlining and obfuscation and integrated even more spyware and telemetry that won't tell you shit about what it's doing and that you can't turn off without violating the EULA. They're going to keep pursuing this kind of shit in more and more obvious ways because that's all they can do in the quest for endless year on year growth.

Unfortunately, switching to Linux will force you to learn how to use it. That sucks when it's being pushed as an immediate solution to a specific problem you're having! Not going to deny that. FOSS folks need to realise that 'just pivot your entire day to day workflow to a new suite of tools designed by hobby engineers with really specific chips on their shoulders' does not work as a method of evangelism. But if you approach it more like learning to understand and control your tech, I think maybe it could be a bit more palatable? It's more like a set of techniques and strategies than learning a specific workflow. Once you pick up the basic patterns, you can apply them to the novel problems that inevitably crop up. It's still painful, particularly if you're messing around with audio or graphics drivers, but importantly, you are always the one in control. You might not know how to drive, and the engine might be on fire, but you're not locked in a burning Tesla.

Now that I write this it sounds more like a set of coping mechanisms, but to be honest I do not have a healthy relationship with xorg.conf and probably should seek therapy.

It's a bit of a stretch but I almost feel like a bit of friction with tech is necessary to develop a good relationship with it? Growing up on MS-DOS and earlier versions of Windows has given me a healthy suspicion of any time my computer does something without me telling it to, and if I can't then see what it did, something's very off. If I can't get at the setting and properties panel for something, my immediate inclination is to uninstall it and do without.

And like yeah as a final note, I too find it frustrating when Linux decides to shit itself and the latest relevant thread I can find on the matter is from 2006 and every participant has been Raptured since, but at least threads exist. At least they're not Microsoft Community hellscapes where every second response is a sales rep telling them to open a support ticket. At least there's some transparency and openness around how the operating system is made and how it works. At least you have alternatives if one doesn't do the job for you.

This is long and meandering and probably misses the point of the discourse I'm dragging but I felt obligated to make it. Ubuntu Noble Numbat is pretty good and I haven't had any issues with it out of the box (compared to EndeavourOS becoming a hellscape whenever I wanted my computer to make a sound or render a graphic) so I recommend it. Yay FOSS.

[ratatouillewastakendammit]

HAIII :3 I absolutely loveddd the love quirk fic you wrote for Hawks and I was wondering if you could make part two but it's Hawks that gets hit this time🗣️

Enjoy 🫡

I’d never mind

Pairing: Hawks x Reader

Warnings: Language, slight smut/suggestive, Hawks gets supperrrr clingy

Word Count: 3.5k

Click click click

The keyboard chirped as your fingers glided over its surface, lowering themselves just slightly every so often on a specific key. Almost like magic, the letters appeared on the screen, each one following the other in tandem as they melded together and formed the sentences you desired. 

Click click click

You paused, eyes grazing over the screen in contemplation, your thumb slowly finding its way to your pointer finger to fidget in the short spout of reprieve.

Writing emails had never been very interesting, especially since most of them consisted of you attempting to come up with the most creatively professional ways of conveying ‘screw off.’

Although not unusual, the shady paparazzi sending in emails for a much too personal interview always left your boss annoyed. He had actually given you the go ahead to tell them to mind their own business, an opportunity that had unfortunately bothered your well-mannered temperament far too much, so you were left to do the proper tweaking. 

After years of schooling, you would have been perfectly content to avoid writing anything longer than a paragraph all together. Regardless, the unusually high pay tethered to the application for the number two’s secretary was much too alluring to pass up.

Working for Hawks had been surprisingly enjoyable, although you did have to get used to the smell of fried chicken wafting through the lobby every afternoon. 

And the quiet attraction you held for him gnawing at your conscience.

Without mentioning his level of physical appeal, which was most definitely high, he had been quite friendly and kind to you, a far cry from what you had to endure from previous employers.

Seeing as you had found yourself working predominantly in the customer service industry, though, maybe that wasn’t so impressive. 

Each flirtatious remark he shot your way left you craving more, although you were determined not to let it get to your head, especially with all the tabloids going on and on about his playboy lifestyle. 

It wasn’t like it made you important.

With a sigh, you pressed the ‘period’ key, sitting back to inspect your work with a thoughtful eye.

After taking a moment, you found yourself fairly satisfied with the contents, clicking send and slouching into your chair with another breath. 

A peaceful silence echoed through the agencies entryway, wrapping its arms around your mind and weighing down your eyelids with a gentle pull. 

It was nice, tranquil.

The doors burst open. 

You stood, fully expecting blood or a broken bone to come along with the gaggle of yelling. There had been a few times where an upcoming pro had entered through the door with battle injuries, and if this was one of those instances, you were sure it wouldn’t be the last.

Today, though, everyone seemed fine.

Hawks, along with the small group of heroes behind him, appeared to be absolutely unharmed.

Hands in his pockets, he walked backwards, words geared towards the long, white eared woman yelling from behind him. ��-worries too much.”

“Uh,” you cleared your throat. “Is everything okay?”

Mirko scoffed. “Yep. I just work with an idiot.”

It hadn’t taken long to adjust to the woman’s straightforward attitude, especially since most insults weren’t directed at you. Surprisingly, the hero seemed to have taken a liking to you, something strikingly close to what you may have defined as friendship, so you were content to sit back and watch her quarrel with Hawks instead.

The man in question threw his coworker a vulgar gesture before turning around to face you, freezing as his eyes met yours.

You shuffled your feet, becoming self conscious as his full attention seemed to pierce through you.

“Are you oka-”

Pushing off the balls of his feet, Hawks shot forward, clearing the large expanse of the lobby within seconds.

The action barely registered in your mind before he reached you, hands sliding underneath your back and knees as he pulled your body into his, lifting the two of you in the air.

Instinctively, your arms wrapped around his neck, tightening as your stomach dropped.

It wasn’t until your shoes touched the marble that you loosened your grasp. The one Hawks held on you didn’t seem to waver, however, his biceps pressing you into his chest.

He pulled back enough to face you, sporting an exceedingly charming grin that had your heart thumping. “Fine, just missed you is all.”

You paused.

“Huh?”

Somewhere in the background, Mirko let out a sigh, the sound fuming with a mix of relief and pride. “I fucking called it.”

“I’m sorry?” You called, attempting to withdrawal out of Hawks’ hold, your strength doing barely anything against his.

“Nothing.” The pro lifted a hand to her mouth, concealing what you could’ve sworn was a laugh. “He got hit with a love quirk.”

“He what?”

“I’m fine.” Hawks waved her off, golden irises still locked on you.

“He was helping some civilian out of a car accident and go hit with it,” Mirko replied, itching the back of her elongated ear. “They said he should be fine by tomorrow, and since it hadn’t taken effect yet, we figured it be fine if he brought him here.”

She bent at the waist, inspecting the way you were still attempting to wriggle from his clutches before continuing. “Maybe not.”

“So… what am I supposed to do with him?”

She sighed. “Not sure. Good luck, though, I have to go write some reports.”

And with a small wave from Mirko, you were left alone, regardless of the pleas that followed her down the hall.

Surprisingly, it had taken a mere polite request from you to get Hawks to detach himself. He definitely wasn’t as compliant when you pulled a spare chair next to yours before attempting to finish your work for the day.

He watched you, face contorted in thought for a few moments before a grin fell over his features.

You hadn’t noticed what he was doing until his arms snaked under yours, lifting you up as he slid into your spot and plopped down. Next, he grabbed your waist, pulling you forward into a sitting position, thighs straddling his.

Warmth blossomed in your face as you tried to slide off, the hands pressed firmly on your hips easily denying you the escape.

“Oh, come on, sweetheart. You don’t have to be shy,” he chided, nuzzling his face into your shoulder.

“It’s just, uh…” you craned your neck to the side, trying to take a look at the front door. “Anyone could walk in, ya know?”

“So?” He cocked an eyebrow. “Whoever doesn’t know you’re mine yet is an idiot.”

You remained silent, heart jumping at his words, but continued to wait for any moment that his grip would loosen, giving you a chance to slip away.

Still, you had no doubt he would be quick enough to catch you again.

Not that you would particularly mind.

At some point you gave up, shuffling the chair around and starting your work once more, pretending to ignore the way your body fit into his, or the soft, affectionate way he was playing with a strand of your hair.

The two of you fell into a quiet lull, the sound of your fingers against the keyboard the only noise. Thankfully, the back of your chair was short enough for you to see your computer, making for a surprisingly straightforward setup.

“Do you like someone else?”

His works made you pause, hands hovering above your desk. “What?”

“I’ve liked you for months and you barely give me any attention,” Hawks huffed. “Is it that dumbass pro from the next town over?”

“No, that’s because I-” The words made you pause, words faltering as your mental gears began to turn.

Months.

That doesn’t make any sense.

The quirk made him like you, sure, but was it messing with his memories as well?

You glanced down at him, ignoring the small laugh bubbling up your stomach at how dejected he looked, a far cry from the usually cocky attitude you had come to know and enjoy.

Still, the statement led to far too many things not adding up, the dissonance boggling your train of thought until the rest of your productive workday became impossible.

“I need to go talk to Mirko." You pushed the chair away from your desk, pleasantly surprised when Hawks agreed to let you go.

Regardless, it didn’t take long for him to lace your fingers through yours, guiding the both of you to the first floor elevator.

You entertained him for the ride up, the skin of your palm tingling against his.

It was when you arrived to the doorway of Mirko’s office, however, that you had a problem.

Bringing your pointer and middle finger to your temple, you massaged the skin in exasperation. Hawks had become quite adamant on not leaving your side, despite your exasperating protests. “Can you just wait out here for a few minutes? Please?”

It took a few moments but the look of distress slowly morphed into one of wicked glee, a smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. “Alright, fine. But you have to give me something first.”

Your eyebrows furrowed. “Okay… and what would that be.”

“I think you can guess.” His eyes flicked down to your lips.

Oh shit

You swallowed, almost fearful if you opened your mouth to speak, he would hear your heart beating up through your throat.

It’s just a kiss, right? No harm done?

The words seemed useless amidst the power of your nerves, the best course of action fighting its way to the forefront of your mind.

No way no way no way no way

Lifting up your heels, you took a sharp breath, pressing your lips against his for a mere moment before pulling away, scurrying past the doors to Mirko’s office and shutting them with a slam.

The woman looked up from a stack of paperwork, eyes shining in excitement at the distraction, and probable drama you were bringing. “What can I do for ya?”

There were a few seconds of silence, those in which you used to collect yourself, before you answered. "I was wondering if the civilian, the one with the love-quirk, I mean, told you anything else about it? Besides how Hawks will be better tomorrow and stuff."

She cocked an eyebrow. "Such as?"

"Well," you hesitated, taking a moment to remind yourself that it was alright to tell her, a woman who had become dangerously close to your friend, despite the warnings that came along with close relationships with heroes. "He said that he's liked me for months and that just doesn't make sense, especially if the quirk only really affected him a few hours ago, right?"

“I was just…” you sighed, taking a moment to compose your words before continuing. “Did you ask the quirk user if his memories would be influenced at all? Like would they be different than what’s really true?”

“Nope.” The lack of knowledge left your chest heavy, pulling your face downwards to focus on your wringing hands. “They did say that Hawks would only be affected if he looked at someone he had feelings for, though.”

Your eyes shot up. “Huh?”

Miraculously unbothered, she was now inspecting her nails, currently painted a soft gray and shaped into points that you couldn't imagine would be practical. "Uh-huh."

“And you didn’t think to say anything?”

“I figured it would be best to let him tell you himself, even though I only really had a half guess that he liked you,” she replied in amusement. “And since he technically did tell you, I’m off the hook. Figured I’d let you two weirdos work it out.”

She propped her left foot on the edge of her desk, using the momentum to push her chair backward before standing. With a wave of swagger, she made her way over to you, placing a hand on each of your shoulders before spinning your body around and prompting you towards the exit.

Squirming away didn't seem to make a difference, especially considering that her left bicep seemed to be about the size of a tree trunk.

"Wait-"

"Have fun!"

Opening the door, she pushed you out before locking her office, leaving you to glare at the foggy glass.

Are all heroes this manhandle-y?

An arm snaked around your waist, the sudden contact making you jump. "How'd it go? Figure out what you needed?"

Taking a moment to slow your heart, you turned around to face Hawks. "I, uh... yeah, I did."

Looking up at him now was an oddity you weren't sure you were ready for. You were almost sure he didn't reciprocate your feelings, the actual possibility being something you had pushed away in fear of rejection, the concept becoming foreign to you.

Now, it was hard to believe you weren't dreaming, almost as if the soft smile and longing glance he was giving you would slip through your fingers if you didn't hold on tight enough.

The thoughts infiltrating your mind had you distracted, a soft sting of embarrassment hitting you when you realized you both were dangerously close to one another in the middle of the main office floor.

Regardless, when you glanced around, you were met with a quiet destitution, a stark difference to the usual business the agency saw on a Friday afternoon.

"Um, where is everyone?"

He cocked his head to the side, a small chuckle erupting from his lips as he took your chin between two fingers and pushing it slightly toward the left. At first, you weren't sure why, but the clock sporting a 7:27 fell into your line of sight. "Only the workaholics stay this late and we don't have many of those here."

Guess I was going through emails for longer than I thought "Oh. I suppose I should be going home too, then."

"Can I come?"

You almost laughed at his question, the thought of someone of his social standing, and economic one, asking to come to the small apartment on the edge of the city you called home. "You definitely wouldn't want to."

"Then why don't you come back to my place?"

The request made you pause, drawing a feeling of unease into your system despite the lightheartedness it was delivered with. At this point, you knew he liked you, but the idea of going to his house left you anxious.

As far as you were aware, he was an individual of solitude, not even Mirko, whom you perceived to be a fairly close friend, had been to his abode.

For some odd reason, the idea made you feel icky. You sure as hell wouldn’t want to wake up surprised to someone sleeping next to you in your home, someone who you had unknowingly let in while under the effects of a quirk no less.

Seemingly able to notice your hesitation, Hawks offered you his hand. "Follow me."

He didn't exactly wait for a response, lacing your fingers through his and tugging you towards the elevator with a gentleness you wouldn't have believed to be possible with him.

With each button lit, a floor fell beneath your feet, every ding bringing you closer to what you were sure was his office.

It was quite large, the metal doors opening directly into the fully windowed room. White and gold furniture lay atop the marbled floor, polished to a shine.

The birch desk and swivel chair took of most of the space, but he had some other things laying about, such as the mini-fridge and air fryer to your right.

You were almost positive what went on there.

An ivory couch, just about the same width as a twin sized bed lay along the left wall, its creamy pillows and a lusciously looking soft blanket thrown on the side.

A moment passed before you understood what was happening. "Are you… are you sure that's even big enough for both of us?"

"Don't worry about it, songbird." He shrugged his jacket over his shoulders, grasping your arm and pulling you towards the sofa. With exhausted grace, he fell over it, tugging you with him until your body lay over his.

Fuck

With the outer layer off, the fabric of his shirt was just thin enough to feel the ripple of his muscles between your fingers. The soft heat radiating off his skin was nothing short of addictive, the warmth something you were tempted to bask in forever.

And the thing was, you were sure he would let you, if he asked.

The thought was sweet, but it didn’t take long for your mind to wander, to imagine what else he would do for you; would do to you.

"Are you turned on?"

That sure broke the peaceful daze. "What?"

He sat up, golden irises burning in excitement. "If you wanted to do something, you could've just asked."

"I'm not." The words came out exceedingly more nervous than you anticipated.

"Liar." A wicked grin laced his features. "I can tell, ya know, when you're in the mood."

Heart dropping to your stomach, you blinked up at him. "You... you what?"

"Mhm." Hawks placed a hand on your chest, fingers toying with the top of your shirt. "Your heart speeds up just so. I can hear it.”

“You’re bullshitting me.” Somehow, you suspected he wasn’t. The details of his quirk were unknown to you, but you had heard of the heightened senses tethered to those feathers he possessed.

“Ouch, so vulgar,” he waved off the assumption, using his left hand to draw gentle circles on the skin of your stomach. “But keep telling yourself that. I can be patient.”

Your brain filled in the blanks.

I'll wait until you’re begging for it

You tried desperately to ignore the thought, to quiet your frenzied mind and think of something, anything else. Curiosity, it seemed, was your saving grace, another question blossoming in your mind. "So, if you knew about... ya know, why didn't you say something.”

"Liking someone and being horny for them are two different things, gorgeous." He flashed you another grin, identical to the ones on the tabloid covers that inspired thirst tweets and tumblr stories. "Besides, I’ve heard it isn’t very hard to want me in bed, figured my sweet little receptionist wouldn’t be any different."

You snorted. "You're an idiot."

"But you don't mind, right?"

The question came across as playful, but there were wisps of insecure longing strewn amidst his tone.

"No, I definitely don't."

Your affirmation seemed to meet his standards, the man burying his face in your shoulder and pulling you back down onto the couch. Golden locks tickled your cheek, the soft hum of the air conditioner lulling your eyes to a close.

Minutes passed before the two of you fell asleep, surprising seeing that you were usually quite the night owl. Regardless, the way his wings enfolded around the both of you, blocking out the remnants of the evening sunset and any other distractions made you feel disturbingly safe. You would have been content to die here, his arms wrapped around your torso, shielded from the rest of the world within the scarlet plumage.

Chests moving in tandem, each breath undisturbed and hushed as the hours ticked by.

Upon waking, the first thought that entered your mind was how cold it was. That plush blanket you had been eyeing earlier was wrapped snugly around your form, but the fabric seemed to pale in comparison to what you had enjoyed last night.

Your eyes flickered open, straining under the sun streaking past the windowed walls. It took a moment for them to adjust under the harsh lighting, but you jumped when you glanced around to see two golden irises staring back at you.

Hawk's head was propped up on his arms, each balancing on the side of the couch, a few centimeters away from you. A smirk twitched at the corner of his lip at your reaction. "Good morning."

"What the hell are you doing?" You groaned.

An unbothered shrug tugged his shoulders upward. "You look pretty when you're sleeping."

Sitting up, you rolled your joints, stretching the rest of the tiredness away. "Hasn't anyone ever told you watching people while they sleep is creepy?"

"I've never found anyone else as good looking to feel the need to do so." He tilted his head to the side, flashing a boyish grin. "Besides, I thought you ladies liked that sort of thing. Isn't there a movie about that or something?"

You rolled your eyes, sitting up with a yawn. “So… uh, I’m guessing you’re back to normal then?”

"Yup," he replied, popping the 'p' at the end. “Why? Miss me hanging off your shoulder twenty-four seven?"

Yes.

“Shut up.”

He grinned, seemingly unaffected by your fatigued harshness. “So, are you gonna let me take you out today or what?”

“You still want to?”

“Well obviously,” Amusement laced his tone, a quiet ardor brewing among his features. “Unless you’d just like to skip all that and fuck.”

The thought had heat blooming in your cheeks, “You’re so vulgar.”

“And you love it.”

“Maybe.”

You did.

[drdemonprince]

is there a reason a lot of transmascs and trans men gravitate towards puppy play/pup related kink? it’s something i’ve noticed on the online trans community

It's not a transmasc specific thing at all. Pup play's stock is up in a massive way across a variety of communities for several reasons.

Pup play's popularity began with the gay male community, where it largely originated. Most of the major manufacturers of pup play gear are still gay men's fetishwear companies, and the kink has been enjoyed in that scene for decades because it evokes a kind of soft masculine playfulness and a gentle power dynamic, with potential elements of deindividuation and primalness that speak to a variety of people.

(It also gives men an opportunity to be tender with one another in a way that doesn't evoke gendered baggage of casting any partner as "the woman," or as less of a "man," and that also I think lent it massive appeal. )

The gay male kink community tends to have a lot more money and access to more clubs and venues than other queer communities do, and so we see a lot of experimentation and trendy-ness in its kink scene. Lots of guys have the expendable income to buy up new gear, and dungeons to play with them in. Because of this, sexual trends move quickly in the gay male world -- piss similarly had a deluge of popularity in recent years, and hypno as well. Chastity too, and now latex. Anything new and exciting that you can buy, wear, and play with will have its moment in the scene, and sprout a whole new cottage industry around it. Once the gay male dollars are flowing in, a whole kink economy forms.

As pup play was becoming a more widespread gay male kink activity, furries caught onto it as an alternative to the more expensive and cumbersome fursuiting. This has been VERY noticeable as someone who has been attending Midwest Furfest continuously since 2017. The first few years that I was going, I never saw any pup hoods (and friends who have been in the scene far longer than me have echoed this as well). There just wasn't an overlap between pups and furs much at all.

Now at furry events, there is a MASSIVE contingent of pups, and many events centered on pups and pup play. Everywhere you go at the conventions you will see hoards of pups roving around with their owners, and vendors of pup gear peddling tails, collars, muzzles, hoods, hand mitts, leashes, and more.

Compared to fursits, pup hoods are cheaper, easier to clean, easier to find, less prone to damage, more comfortable to wear, lighter weight, and can be snapped onto a belt loop or fanny pack and carried around all day. Yet it still provides an animalistic appearance and anonymity, and the ability to play with an inhuman headspace. Furries flocked to pup hoods because it had a low barrier to entry -- just $50 or so for a headpiece, many of the models customizable in a variety of colors. You can even use your pup hood color to flag what you are into!

After pup play exploded across the furry scene, it got exposed naturally to a larger contingent of trans people. Lots of furries are trans people, and vice versa, and so pup hoods spread from the Rockets and Mittens to the Aidans and Cassandras of the world with ease. Even people who aren't furries or especially kinky now find pup play adorable, for it taps into a lot of existing kinks that are also really popular right now.

We're in a zeigest that emphasizes softness and comfort, and the longing for escape from the capitalist grind and the world's horrors -- people are listening to womblike music in softly lit rooms with the curtains drawn and fantasizing about becoming stay-at-home girlfriends and cottagecore boywifes and shit.

Becoming an adored puppy who sexually services their owner in return for pets and snacks and never has to work a day in their life is highly appealing to a TON of people. Some of them, indeed, are trans guys. But if you explore the fetish and porn worlds widely (as I do), you'll see that pup play has also become massively popular among cishet people too!

Puppy girl Jenna is a massive Tiktok and OnlyFans phenomenon! Even the most basic of ahegaoing chicks on redgifs are wearing muzzles and tail butt plugs! Everybody is into puppy play right now because it is an accessible, nonthreatening, cutesy kink that allows people to envision themselves existing safely within a comforting power dynamic where they can be adored and all their problems are gone. Lots of headspacey, cuddly, escapist kinks like Bimbo have become popular for these reasons too.

And there you have it! From the early days in the leather bars to today's era of cage tours on Tiktok, pup play is very much IN with just about every sexually adventurous crowd. This has been the devon price kink stock report.

[avnnetwork]

Connecting the World: Telecommunications Satellites Enhance Global Communication Networks

In an increasingly interconnected world, the role of telecommunications has never been more critical. The rapid growth of digital communication technologies has significantly transformed the way we live, work, and interact with one another. At the heart of this transformation lies a technology that orbits high above us – telecommunications satellites. These sophisticated machines play a pivotal role in bridging gaps across continents, bringing people closer, and enabling the seamless exchange of information on a global scale.

Telecommunications satellites are the backbone of modern communication networks. These satellites are designed to transmit signals across vast distances, overcoming the limitations of terrestrial infrastructure. By relaying signals from one point on the Earth's surface to another, they enable instant communication, regardless of geographical barriers. This capability has revolutionized various sectors, from media broadcasting to internet services, emergency communications, and more.

The Evolution of Telecommunications Satellites

The journey of telecommunications satellites began in the mid-20th century. Early experiments with satellite communication laid the groundwork for what would become a global network. The launch of the first artificial satellite, Sputnik, in 1957 marked the dawn of the space age. However, it wasn't until the launch of the first geostationary satellite in 1965 that the true potential of satellite communication was realized. This satellite, positioned in a fixed location relative to the Earth's surface, could provide continuous coverage to a specific region, paving the way for real-time communication across the globe.

Since then, telecommunications satellites have evolved dramatically. Advances in technology have led to the development of more sophisticated satellites with greater capacity, reliability, and efficiency. Modern satellites are equipped with high-powered transponders, enabling them to handle large volumes of data transmission. These advancements have expanded the capabilities of satellite communication, making it an indispensable part of the global communication network.

How Telecommunications Satellites Work

The operation of telecommunications satellites is based on the principles of radio frequency transmission. These satellites receive signals from ground-based stations, amplify them, and retransmit them back to other ground stations. The process involves several key components:

Uplink: The transmission of signals from a ground station to the satellite. This is typically done using high-frequency radio waves.

Transponder: The component within the satellite that receives the uplink signal, amplifies it, and changes its frequency for retransmission.

Downlink: The transmission of signals from the satellite back to a ground station. This completes the communication loop, allowing the original signal to reach its intended destination.

Satellites are positioned in different orbits depending on their specific functions. Geostationary satellites, which orbit at approximately 35,786 kilometers above the equator, provide continuous coverage to specific regions. Low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites, positioned much closer to the Earth's surface, offer lower latency and are often used for services requiring real-time data transmission, such as internet connectivity.

Impact on Global Communication Networks

The impact of telecommunications satellites on global communication networks is profound. They have enabled a level of connectivity that was previously unimaginable, facilitating the seamless exchange of information across vast distances. Here are some key areas where their impact is most evident:

Media and Broadcasting

Telecommunications satellites have revolutionized the media and broadcasting industry. They enable the transmission of television and radio signals to remote and underserved areas, ensuring that people worldwide have access to information and entertainment. Live broadcasts of major events, such as sports competitions and political speeches, are made possible through satellite technology, allowing audiences to experience these moments in real time.

Internet Connectivity

In many parts of the world, terrestrial internet infrastructure is either insufficient or nonexistent. Telecommunications satellites provide a vital solution to this problem by offering internet connectivity to remote and rural areas. Satellite internet services have become increasingly popular, providing reliable and high-speed internet access to communities that were previously disconnected.

Emergency Communications

During natural disasters and emergencies, terrestrial communication networks are often disrupted. Telecommunications satellites play a crucial role in providing emergency communication services, ensuring that rescue and relief operations can be coordinated effectively. Satellite phones and portable satellite communication devices are essential tools for first responders and humanitarian organizations, enabling them to maintain communication in even the most challenging conditions.

Global Navigation Systems

Telecommunications satellites are also integral to global navigation systems. They provide the precise timing and positioning data required for navigation and location-based services. These systems are essential for various applications, including aviation, maritime, and land transportation, as well as for personal navigation devices used by millions of people worldwide.

Future Trends and Developments

The field of telecommunications satellites is continually evolving, driven by advancements in technology and increasing demand for connectivity. Several trends and developments are shaping the future of this industry:

High Throughput Satellites (HTS)

High throughput satellites represent a significant advancement in satellite technology. These satellites offer substantially increased data transmission capacity, enabling faster and more reliable communication services. HTS technology is particularly beneficial for providing broadband internet access to remote and underserved areas, helping to bridge the digital divide.

Constellations of LEO Satellites

One of the most exciting developments in satellite communication is the deployment of constellations of low Earth orbit satellites. These constellations consist of hundreds or even thousands of small satellites working together to provide global coverage. LEO constellations offer lower latency and higher data transfer rates compared to traditional geostationary satellites, making them ideal for applications such as internet of things (IoT) connectivity and real-time data services.

Advances in Satellite Manufacturing

Advances in satellite manufacturing are making it possible to produce smaller, more cost-effective satellites. These miniaturized satellites, often referred to as smallsats or cubesats, can be launched in large numbers, providing flexible and scalable communication solutions. The reduced cost of manufacturing and launching these satellites is driving innovation and enabling new players to enter the market.

Integration with Terrestrial Networks

The integration of satellite communication with terrestrial networks is another key trend. Hybrid networks that combine satellite and terrestrial technologies can offer seamless connectivity, ensuring that users have access to reliable communication services regardless of their location. This integration is particularly important for providing consistent internet coverage in areas with challenging terrain or sparse infrastructure.

Challenges and Considerations

While telecommunications satellites offer numerous benefits, there are also challenges and considerations to address. One of the primary challenges is the cost associated with launching and maintaining satellites. The development, launch, and operation of satellites require significant investment, which can be a barrier for some organizations.

Additionally, the increasing number of satellites in orbit raises concerns about space debris and collision risks. Ensuring the long-term sustainability of space activities requires careful management of satellite operations and the implementation of measures to mitigate the risk of space debris.

Conclusion

Telecommunications satellites have fundamentally transformed global communication networks, enabling instant connectivity and information exchange across vast distances. From media broadcasting and internet connectivity to emergency communications and global navigation, the impact of these satellites is far-reaching and profound.

As technology continues to advance, the future of telecommunications satellites looks promising. High throughput satellites, LEO constellations, and advancements in satellite manufacturing are set to further enhance the capabilities of satellite communication. By overcoming challenges and embracing innovation, telecommunications satellites will continue to play a crucial role in connecting the world, bridging gaps, and enabling a more connected and informed global community.

In a world where connectivity is essential, telecommunications satellites stand as a testament to human ingenuity and the relentless pursuit of progress. They embody the spirit of exploration and innovation, bringing people closer together and fostering a sense of global unity. As we look to the future, the continued evolution of telecommunications satellites promises to unlock new possibilities and drive the next wave of communication advancements.

[mareastrorum]

These are just initial thoughts, and perhaps I’ll learn something that changes my mind on it, but I’m glad to see Critical Role making the leap to their own subscription service with Beacon.

As a lead in: I’m an attorney that has some background in IP law, though it isn’t what I practice currently. I’ve kept in contact with several active practitioners, particularly those that represent small-time creators either in their own independent practice or via nonprofits. I do not have an extensive Rolodex of IP peers, nor do I spend the money to keep up on IP CLEs. I’m just someone who used to know a ton because I did heavy research and work in that space, and that hasn’t been the case for years.

So here’s my thoughts a bit on the IP angle:

The primary reason I’m happy to see this leap is that CR is taking active steps to keep control over its IP. It’s a boring thing to most people, but when I start paying attention to a specific creator (authors, directors, companies, etc.), I tend to be very attentive to how they use their IP. How freely do they license their marks to partner with other creators to make merch? How often do they allow others to make adaptations or derivatives of their copyrights? What is the quality of those products? What is the supply chain like? Are those third parties objectionable in some way? Were the other parties faithful to the original works or marks? Was this a cash grab or an earnest effort to make something worth the price tag?

Honestly, I like how CR run their business. They have a history of tapping fans and fellow small businesses when making new merch or spinoffs. They embrace the culture of fan-made derivative works, both by featuring fanart/cosplay and by sharing their success. Do you know how rare it is for a company to pay fan artists for their already-made and freely posted work and then sell books of it? Let me be clear: CR bought a limited license from each artist so they could print and sell each work in a physical book, then paid the cost of publishing that book with no guarantee that CR would make that money back, let alone profit. I have a copy of the collector’s edition art books: they’re actually very well made and the packaging definitely cost a pretty penny. That’s not a rainmaker idea, that’s genuinely risking financial loss to sell something people could access for free if they wanted to.

The art books aren’t a one-off either. Darrington Press is CR’s separate LLC for tabletop games. (It’s good business practice to split off companies that handle products in different industries.) CR has also made shows based on those games, and the Candela Obscura series has quite a dedicated audience. Everything about Candela belongs to them: the game itself, the rule book, all the art in the book, the web series based on the game, and merch. It’s so successful that they invested in scheduling a live show for Candela later this month. That’s HUGE.

Contrast that with the distribution of Campaign 1 and the first 19 episodes of Campaign 2. CR cannot host those videos themselves; Geek & Sundry still exists and still holds what I presume to be distribution rights (but I don’t have the contract to review). So G&S gets to host those videos on YouTube and reaps the advertising. I can’t speak to whatever share CR gets from that, but considering that CR is locked out of hosting their own copies of those videos, I doubt it’s much, if any, revenue. (If you’re wondering why CR just didn’t buy those rights back, I ask: what incentive does G&S have to sell something that’s making them money for no cost?)

Knowing that background about G&S, I was wary of CR choosing Amazon to host and distribute The Legend of Vox Machina. Originally, TLOVM was not the plan; CR had a kickstarter for an animated special based on C1. It was only because they blew past the goal that CR was able to make an entire season. The reasonable assumption is that choosing Amazon had to have secured CR additional funding for future seasons of the show, which seems evident from how quickly season 2 was announced, Mighty Nein Animated is also going to be a thing, and that season 3 of TLVOM is scheduled for fall 2024. CR had the option of just doing 1 season and keeping it purely in their control, but going with Amazon meant they could animate more of their works. Animation is expensive. I cannot stress enough how doubtful I am that CR would have been able to afford this many episodes and both campaigns if they had not gone this route. As wary as I was in the start, it paid off, and it’s going well—so far. Hopefully CR doesn’t regret that decision if Amazon tries something sleazy. But, as before, we don’t have the contracts and can’t know how secure CR’s position is if any dispute came up.

CR also partnered with Dark Horse Comics to make Vox Machina comics and Might Nein Origins comics. What’s especially surprising is that each of the cast had a hand in writing the MNO comics for their characters, with Matt listed for multiple. That isn’t very common with comic adaptations. Often times, IP owners let comic companies go ham with minimal oversight. Being listed as one of the authors comes with IP rights that have to be negotiated. That means that Dark Horse had to talk with CR about whether that warrants more or less revenue going to which party in exchange for that—or, alternatively, whether the comic gets made at all. That’s a ballsy move. You think people can just demand to write the comics that a publishing company is going to pay to print? Pffft. CR wanted some creative control, and that is a big ask. However, Dark Horse still has the distribution rights, both digitally and for physical copies. You couldn’t buy the comics from CR until they came out with the library edition, a book bound compilation of 4/8 comics. But the publisher is still Dark Horse; CR is just allowed to sell the book directly from their own site as well.

Contrast that with the novels about CR characters. CR partnered with Penguin Random House to publish novels about Vex and Vax (Kith & Kin), Lucien (The Nine Eyes of Lucien), and Laudna (What Doesn’t Break). Liam and Laura were vocal about having some say in K&K, whereas Madeline Roux said in an interview that she had full control over TNEOL. Both of those novels were narrated with CR voices, but narrating a book doesn’t come with IP rights, it just brings in a paycheck. There’s a lot less IP control in there compared to the comics, but this isn’t abnormal for book publishing. To be blunt, I doubt PRH would have agreed to publish the novels if anyone from CR had been a co-author or had heavy oversight over the author or the editing. I don’t think PRH even considered that as an option. Either an author that has already managed to sell X number of copies or nothing. Creative control over a book a huge ask, asks come with reduced revenue, and switching to books from a web series is already a leap. The fact that Laura and Liam had any say is surprising, really.

That was a long meandering tour of what we’ve seen CR do with its IP. The reason I bring up each of these things is that navigating the way to protect an IP in this space is rife with challenges. Different types of IP warrant different strategies because of the cost involved in creating each medium and the challenges placed by industries that have already sprung up around them. Any time that a third party is tapped to create an IP, it’s usually because they already have the funds and resources to create the work, and CR has to negotiate for revenue, creative control, distribution, and—the big one—who gets to be the owner. These are not easy, quick, or fun conversations, and CR is always going to be the smaller company at the table.

Knowing that, I’m not surprised or worried that CR is creating its own independent subscription service with Beacon. It tells me that they’re being careful with their IP whenever they can. A subscription service means they don’t have to trade away distribution rights or give up ad revenue to a third party. They’re in this for a long term investment, and that requires solid income not tied to third parties that can definitely outspend them in litigation in the event of a dispute. A subscription for bonus content is one of many parts in a diverse revenue stream.

(All that said, this isn’t meant to criticize creators that cant afford to do this type of thing. It took 9 years for CR to get to the point where Beacon is financially feasible and a desirable business decision. They have enough ongoing, popular content to warrant paying for a subscription, and they’ve built sufficient trust with their audience that more will be added. That takes time and an awful lot of money.)

As a final note, I take this step as a sign that CR definitely intends to stick around. This isn’t a move people make when they plan on ending the business after the current campaign. I’m glad to see CR is taking steps to secure their foundation and keep making new content.

I’m sure people will chime in on other issues (cost, content exclusivity, etc.), but I hope my perspective gives an idea of why this sort of thing is good for business generally and why it would be good for CR.

[astrogre]

Money In The Houses 💴

To be precise each house can show you something about money, for an example your 6H can show daily services you subscribe pay for like Netflix or HBO. but there are 4 primary houses that specifically focus on and show us about money these are: The 2nd house, 5th house, 8th house and 11th house. They all show resource accumulation in different ways. 2nd house and 8th house are the main houses to focus on for money astrology, secondary would be 11H and 5H then all the other houses have their own subtler money relevancy.

2nd house, The house of Values and Possessions, it shows:

stored wealth like income, earning potential, salary, savings, assets, possessions (like jewels, cars)

- how you spend

- how you earn

- the kind of assets and possessions that you own

- what you spend on

- how you perceive the value of money

- how you save

- The skills and talents you use to make money for yourself

- the state of your financial stability

- Your attitudes on saving

2nd house is money earned through your own personal efforts, the skills that you have, your blood sweat and tears. Money here is made through you and your efforts alone. It is long lasting assets and the kind that are considered when calculating your net worth.

Look at sign ruling this house and the planet. Do they work well together or contradict each other? E.g a Virgo ruled second house with Uranus inside has two energies that contradict one another, Virgo needing to be picky on purchases VS Uranus being impulsive and purchasing what it wants so when these two energies work in the same building you may even feel bad for purchasing things before doing research on it and get disappointed with your purchase because you just went for it in the moment

Finding where the 2nd house ruler planet is in the chart shows the best topics, best places , best way you can earn money that’s beneficial to you.

Eg. If your 2H was in Virgo, look at 6th house what’s inside of it? And where mercury is in your chart. Mercury (ruled by Virgo) in this case shows you how you can can excel in an industry under the topic of the house it’s in. Whereas the 6th house and The planets that would fall into the 6th house, would indicate industries you’d do well in that are a combination of the planets in there and what kind of work you could do/what planet energies you can emphasise to gain more money on your career based on the 2nd house.

5th house, the house of Gambling and risky investments, it shows:

investments in startup companies ,gambling, investing in penny stocks

- how much you may make from investing, gambling and creative endeavours

- Money made from personal hobbies, creative talents and projects

- how lucky you are at earning money from risky investments

- Your approach to gambling

- How you spend resources on leisure activities and entertainment

- Attitudes on risky spending/gambling

- The outcome of your gambling and risky investments

This would be your trading 212 and creative artist placement. I can imagine people that invested in crypto currency back in 2008 and people that purchased nfts having this house active. 5H placements can make you lucky in the industry you are in, it can give you that boost in industries that require you to need to have luck or attention to make it. This can be entertainment stars, the lottery, entrepreneurship or just being really blessed with income from taking risks for fun. I’ve noticed natives with this house active tend to be successful businesses investors, gamblers, fashion designers, actors and artists, because these industries also require a bit of luck to make it, that’s why it’s also known as thie “star” house for celebrities. If planets here are beneficial native just happens to have the right things happen for them at the right time.

Key figures with 5th house active/stellium: Timothee chalamet, will smith, Vivienne Westwood, Alexander McQueen, Calvin Harris, Mozart, Elon Musk

11th house, the house of tangible material gains:

ready to be spent wealth like, liquid cash, profit, products (clothing, food), promotion from work

- money made from your public image and things your known for (fame)

- Your financial status and social standing

- How you can gain profit and wealth online

- Money made from your ideas, goals and inventions

- How money comes easiest to you

- The type of resources acquired from

- What part of our lives we may live in luxury or can afford to spend more on (E.g 11H sag being luxury travel)

11H is on hand liquid cash, things like stocks , disposable income, the tangible stuff that you can actively spend, it’s pretty unexpected too like 8th house except 8th house income comes from places you didn’t know about but 11H gains come from sources you always knew about but are just suddenly now benefiting you out of nowhere. You know how some people can be famous and still be broke, with a prominent or beneficial 11 house, you automatically get money along with the attention from their public image. This is because 11H is naturally the representative of social connections, networking and communities but also because of derivative astrology

The 10th house represents your career, public image and the 2nd house represents money/finances so you count 2 houses starting from 10 using Derivative Astrology (10 => 11) meaning the 11th house represents money made from our career and public image. This is why this is known as the influencer house.

People tend to use their fame and wealth from this house to start businesses. This house works really well with 8H because it kind of forces other people to acknowledge you. It’s a little different from the 5th house in terms of getting money from your inventions -In the sense that the very concept behind your creations bring you material gain whereas 5th house are blessed for expressing themselves and in risky situations (not strictly exclusive to creative arts, but the art industry is naturally a hit or miss industry). This house is very similar to 2nd house however I’d say 2nd house is more long term but 11H is quick and easy, makes you appear wealthy like rappers and celebrities living a lavish lifestyle but don’t have something to fall on if it runs out. 2nd house is longevity and allows a native to live off their assets if necessary.

8th house, The house of inheritance, joint resources and investments, it shows:

inheritance, debt, taxes,investors, gifts, joint resources,insurance, the money people owe you

- how much resources you receive from other people

- How much assets, money and resources you may share with others and inherit

- The individuals you may inherit from,have joint bank accounts, shared resources with that financially bless you

- where your resources from other people come from

- the kind of people and industries that may invest/donate/give to you

- How you handle and manage your debt and loans

- your ability to adapt to financial challenges and a complete change of class or income, essentially how you handle financial transformations

- How much you may leave for others when you pass away

- Your ability to repay financial obligations like debt and taxes

- The financial downfalls or sudden financial gains that come from unexpected sources or a source you didn’t know about (8th house is a house of secrets and in the dark so you don’t really see it coming)

- Attitudes towards other peoples resources and the concept of debt/loans

- What kind of resources, assets and things you may receive from other people

Honestly 8th house covers a lot in finances, it’s the kind of money you get for literally no reason, like you can just be sitting there and money falls on to your lap, it can be known as the nepotism house, resources gained not as a result of your day to day efforts (unless making aspects to 6H/Saturn), but a thing you get all at once as a “here you go, well done!”. You really don’t see it coming either, having a blessed 8H is good but you also need to maintain your inheritance otherwise you can end up losing it all that’s why it’s important to have a grounded 2nd house. The kind of people that tend to have this house active and beneficial would be people that are blessed with money in their darkest of times, natives put in the will of their family, people that marry into wealth, being involved with financial contracts that benefit the native more than the other.

E.g Uranus here would want it’s independence, Pluto would feel entitled to others finances and therefore native would excel in taking money from others, Jupiter is lucky here so you would just be blessed with inheritances and financial gains from others even though you didn’t plan for it.

Also look at the ruling planets of this house, say if you had an Aries 8th house, locating which house Mars is in your chart can show you which kind of places you can be given money from most, E.g your Aries is in 11th house and your Mars is in 3rd House you would make great financial gains on the topic/themes of networking, social media E.g. online companies giving you their products in hope of you trying them, being recommended for bonus or accolades because someone you vaguely know mentioned you to their boss, whereas Mars (Aries planetary ruler in 3H) could also indicate who you get your money from like siblings, people you share your ideas with etc.