#sponsored by tumblr crashing and not even saving a draft. (which made me so annoyed that i have not opened the inbox for the next week)

[yvtro]

struggling to phrase this concisely but do u have any thoughts on how stephanie and cassandra would relate or struggle to relate to jason given that his death was held over both of their heads and the timing of his return to gotham being RIGHT after steph’s death in war games… i just think it’s such an underutilized dynamic and there’s a lot of interesting stuff there bc i think cass would find jason infuriating whereas steph would find him unnervingly relatable and similar to her… add in the context of jason’s relationships to dick babs and tim (or lack thereof) and i just think there’s a lot of much more interesting storylines and conflicts than the half redeemed uncommitted to anything jason we have now where most of the batfam is like simultaneously disdainful of and indifferent to jason’s presence/choices

disclaimer: i'm moving blogs. still here to go through my askbox, but you will find me at @boyfridged from now on.

i’m sorry but I think this might be a mad disappointing answer… (which is why i’m very curious how you see it! maybe there’s some interesting angle that i am missing – please do tell!)

i think it all depends on what moment in the timeline we are thinking about for jason. utrh doesn't offer much space for anyone other than bruce and jay to interact, and i believe this (and lost days) is the only time when he is truly committed to any particular moral 'code' or a specific cause (like 'controlling crime'). even in comics in which jay is portrayed as a villain, he doesn't really... do anything other than displaying severe mental illness symptoms? no more crime empire, no more fixed agenda, just dogmatic murder and wandering around in some maladaptive state. but since you mentioned that in most scenarios he is “half-redeemed”, i will go with what i think is going on with jay post-utrh: he's not truly committed, but he's also not rehabilitated; nowhere near to it, even. 

now, the question that i always ask myself in terms of what dynamics can arise for characters is what both of them can get out of this relationship (on a meta level). 

which kinda leads me to perhaps a very underwhelming assumption that jay is just such a mess in that period that it's difficult to imagine scenarios where characters like steph or cass actually gain anything from sharing the narrative with him. it's a bit ironic in a sense that jay could get plenty out of it in terms of his storyline: cass' very presence poses a threat to his already very wobbly philosophy, and it would probably unnerve him because of how her personality reflects his own innate compassion. steph, on the other hand, is like a still frame of his worst time as robin, right before his death. (and by *the worst* I mean his emotional turmoil and issues in relationship with bruce rather than an assessment of his skills or even morals), which i think would also terrify him. as such, i reckon he would actually avoid both of them. in terms of cass, I don’t think she would necessarily want to interact with him either, mostly because while *ordinarily* she would fight anyone of his views, and she for sure wouldn't have much sympathy for him, she would be able to see that his philosophy is a result of immense trauma. we could conceive circumstances in which they are forced to work together, and as i once mentioned, if we put them in a box and shook hard enough, a conflict would definitely arise. but at the end of the day, does cass get anything out of it in terms of her own development? at this point she is (for the better part) way past the internal conflicts that jay experiences; she is simply more mature. 

as for steph, i could see steph seeking him out if the comparison to the ‘failed robin’ was fresh in her mind. but I think, to an extent, she would be disappointed – because while they do share a lot of characteristics and background, he is reckless only as much as he is suicidal. it’s definitely not his typical trait and as a child, he never had the same issues with bruce until the very end (starlin’s run). i'm not saying there's no room to still bond over certain things – but jay's self-isolating tendencies definitely would not help here at all. and i think if steph realised how big of a mistmatch there is between all of stories she was fed and his past + current attitude, she would maybe pity him.

so tldr it’s very difficult for me to imagine any particular dynamics nor stories for them within that timeframe. i don't think it's the case for *all* characters btw – i think people who knew him before (dick, donna, perhaps leslie or dana if we want to go in the direction of civilians), people who don't even know who he is and don't really care (kyle), or parental figures/older gen (talia or even some jl members) generally have a better set up to get involved with jay in meaningful ways (for both sides involved.)

but when it comes to characters around his age who only heard of him in a context of his death, it's simply... sad, especially that he *is* still a walking tragedy at this point.

now, on the other hand… the lost days? here, there is some grand potential for cass & jay or even jay & steph content. but that’s a topic for a whole another post.

[fleurdeneuf]

How to X-Kit

I made a general How to Tumblr post a while ago, and while I did mention the importance of x-kit there, I did not go into much detail.  I drafted this x-kit tutorial for a new to tumblr friend more recently, and it’s just been sitting in my documents ever since.  I’ve decided to dust it off and clean it up for posting, in case it can help anyone else out there.  

So, here are the x-kit extensions that I find most useful, grouped by “essential” or “nice to have.”  Of course, everyone uses tumblr differently, so these are my personal preferences, and ymmv. 

Essential:

One-click reply: Lets you reply to people who have replied to your posts (you can also reply if someone has reblogged or liked a post).  A little arrow shows up when you hover over a note in your dash or on your activity page.  Click on the arrow, and it’ll draft a reply post for you.  You can select multiple notes by holding down Alt when clicking on arrows.  The default reply posts look like this, which will tag you, but not @ you, so they are easy to miss.  If you add the options to add the person’s avatar and @ them for good measure, they look like this.

Tweaks: 1) Wrap tags for easier reading (In the past, you had to scroll all the way across to see people’s tags, which was terrible.  Tumblr has added those  “see all” links now, which wraps tags, but only to a certain point, and then you have to click to see the rest.  I hope that xkit will one day fix that so the wrapped tags are all in one block again, which is why I still have this extension and will never get rid of it.)  2) Add a separator line for Tag section on editor. (In an update a while back, tumblr made it impossible to see between the tags box and the text box of a post, and this redefines the boundaries.)  3) I am fond of the “move to top” button on the queue page.  4) & 5) Hide the explore button on trending posts and Hide the explore link at the top of the page and in the side bar (because we don’t need that garbage).  6) & 7) I like Always show the scroll to top arrow, and Make small text in reblogs the same size as small text in my own posts.  8) & 9) Hide the tumblr radar and Hide recommended blogs, because we don’t need that garbage either.  10) Show Mass post editor and blog settings buttons (another old thing that I don’t remember exactly what it does, because I no longer remember what tumblr looks like without it).

Blacklist: You probably know how this one works, but I do recommend a few of the options, like: Don’t block my own posts, Use improved checking, and definitely definitely Show tags on blocked posts (so you can see people’s tag rambles even if you don’t see the post itself). (Note: tumblr did just roll out that new blacklist of its own, but you can’t see people’s tags that way, which is why I still use x-kit’s blacklist.)

Go-to-dash: View a post on someone’s blog in dash mode so you can view without someone’s theme and access more options than are usually on someone’s blog.  Click the eye symbol at the top of a post on someone’s blog (you have to be following the person for this to work).

Mute!: Lets you not see someone’s posts for as long as you like, without having to unfollow them.  You can choose which type of post to not see: OPs, reblogs, text posts, photo posts, etc.

No Recommended: Get rid of recommended likes and blogs.

Open in tabs: Opens links and blogs in new tabs, rather than in the sidebar thing.  Note: this does not always work, depending on the blog settings of the person you’re trying to visit, but it does work on most.

Outbox: Saves sent messages to an outbox!  Only works on the computer you have this x-kit installed on, though.  (At work, you’ll only see messages you sent at work; at home at home)

PostBlock: Block posts you don’t like.  (I do this when pron or anti- stuff shows up in tags I track.)

Read more now: Lets you click on a read more and the post will expand in your dash, rather than making you go to the person’s blog to see it.

Reblog as text: Honestly, I don’t know if this is still a problem, but tumblr used to reblog long posts as if they were links (so all that you would see on your dash was a link, not the actual post), and it was hella annoying.  If tumblr is still doing this stupid thing, then get this extension.

Reblog yourself: Lets you reblog a post from yourself.

Reply viewer: A little speech bubble button appears at the bottom of posts and if you click on it, you can view all of the replies to that post - good for looking at post history.

Retags: Shows you people’s tags in your notes so don’t need to check each person who reblogged from you to see what their tags were.

Tag replacer: Lets you replace or remove tags on your posts.  For example, when I realized that tags with dashes in them do not work, I changed all of my tags that had dashes in them to tags with spaces between words instead.  Also handy if your friends change their URLs or if you realize you have five different tags that say something like “I love CE” but you only want one.

Tag tracking+: At the very least, you should track your URL (with no dash, if your URL has a dash in it, because dashes don’t track) to see when people tag you in things.  Any fandom things you’re into are also worth tracking, once you find their “official”/most popular tags.  Boxes to check: Show a [new] indicator, Redirect the followed tags to tagged instead of search, and Show tags on sidebar (which adds a sidebar menu so you can see all of the tags you’re tracking).

Tag viewer: Similar to reply viewer, but shows you all of the tags of people who have reblogged a post.  If it’s an old or popular post, lots of great things to be found!

Old sidebar: Gives you back a sidebar menu so you can find things easier.

Nice to have extensions below the cut:

Xinbox: Has some nice options in it, like “tag published asks with their usernames”, which is very helpful (so people will see your reply in their tag).

Activity+: Group notes by post, filter notes by type, show timestamps on notes (TIMESTAMPS ARE THE BEST).

Anti-Capitalism: Remove sponsored posts, Terminate...sidebar ads, Remove framed ads, Hide the asktime banner, Hide sidebar ads.

Blog tracker: Lists someone of your choice’s blog in your sidebar as if they were a tag you were tracking, so you never miss their posts.  Helpful if you don’t scroll through your entire dash, but you want to make sure you never miss something that a friend posts, for example.

Drafts+: Another old thing that I don’t remember exactly what it does, because I no longer remember what tumblr looks like without it.

Enhanced Queue: Lets you shuffle queue posts to mix them up, and a few other things.

Header options: Makes the header look like what it used to before tumblr “improved” it.

Mass deleter: Unlike likes/delete drafts en masse.

Mass+:  Another old thing that I don’t remember exactly what it does, because I no longer remember what tumblr looks like without it.

NotificationBlock: If a post of yours goes out of control and you don’t want to see the notes anymore, it’ll block them.

Notification+: Highlights notes from people you follow.  (It also used to show number of notes when you hover over a notification, but the newest tumblr update broke that.)

Post crushes: I LOVE this.  It lets me make these posts. 

Scroll to bottom: Lets you get to the bottom of your likes or drafts, though crashes tumblr if you try to use it and you have too many posts (like me).

Search likes: This would be amazing if I ever remembered to use it!

Separator: Puts a horizontal line through your dash where you left off before, though it does not always work.

Timestamps: I LOVE TIMESTAMPS.

User Menus+: another old thing that I don’t remember exactly what it does, because I no longer remember what tumblr looks like without it.

View on dash: View blogs in dash mode rather than going to the blogs and dealing with their theme.