#the cases are so succinct and out of order that I have to content myself with keeping the crumbs of what Watson gives

[anneangel]

Then Sherlock says: "The emotional qualities are antagonistic to clear reasoning. I never make exceptions. An exception disproves the rule".

Also Sherlock:

"Watson, you have never yet recognised my merits as a housekeeper" (says after preparing the dinner with his own hands).

"Look here, Watson, you look regularly done. Lie down there on the sofa and see if I can put you to sleep" (says Sherlock after picking up the violin and knocking Watson into unconsciousness sleeping, by playing impromptu for him).

"Except yourself I have none friend. And I do not encourage visitors." (says Sherlock, after Watson inquired whether any of Holmes' friends were knocking on the door given that Mrs Hudson was away, and it was too blustery a day for unscheduled client visits. The only other person Sherlock called a friend before Watson, that I can remember, was Victor Trevor. And they weren't close after Holmes solved the mystery involving his friend's father. As seen in that sentence, Watson is Sherlock Holmes only current friend).

"Watson, It's an ugly dangerous business, and the more I see of it the less I like it. Yes my dear friend, you may laugh, but I give you my word that I shall be very glad to have you back safe and sound in Baker Street once more." (Say Sherlock, worried about sending Watson on a case alone).

"My dear friend, you have been invaluable to me in this as in many other cases, and I beg that you will forgive me if I have seemed to play a trick upon you. In truth, it was partly for your own sake that I did it, and it was my appreciation of the danger which you ran which led me to come and examine the matter for myself" (Says Sherlock kindly, after sensing Watson's displeasure, anger and sadness at the thought that Holmes did not trust him enough).

"You're not hurt, Watson? For God's sake, say that you are not hurt!" (says worried about an injury to Watson leg).

"By the Lord, it is as well for you. If you had killed Watson, you would not have got out of this room alive" (says in a threatening tone to the man who injured Watson).

"I feared as much. I really cannot congratulate you." (says Sherlock with a most dismal groan, when Watson tells will marry with Mary. Watson is so hurt by Holmes' tone that he asks why Holmes doesn't approve of the marriage! To which Holmes responds with: "love is an emotional thing, and whatever is emotional is opposed to that true cold reason which I place above all things. I should never marry myself, lest I bias my judgment." But a good reader realizes that this is not an adequate answer to the Watson question! Holmes swerved! And remember, that's because Holmes tried to discourage Watson, claiming throughout the case that womens are not a reliable option) Lmao!!

"Watson had at that time deserted me for a wife, the only selfish action which I can recall in our association. I was alone" (says Sherlock needy lamenting Watson's absence by his side for one of his cases).

And, Sherlock Holmes only refers to Watson by his surnames, as was the decorum of the time, but he also uses the possessive pronoun "mine" a lot when addressing Watson. See: "my dear friend", "my dear doctor", "my boy", "my dear fellow", "my dear friend".

Sherlock also says in many cases that he has John Watson as a trusted man. He also drags Watson to concerts, outings and Turkish baths, enjoys Watson's praise, and even allows and encourages Watson to write about cases (although he says he doesn't like it, he never asked Watson to stop and even motivated him to do so), Holmes also seems to enjoy having Watson around him in Baker, cases or non-professional situations too.

John Watson can now, officially, change his name to "Holmes Exception". Lmao.

[ducktracy]

181. the case of the stuttering pig (1937)

disclaimer: this review contains antisemitic content, stereotypes, and imagery. i in no way endorse any of this, but it’s just as important to bring awareness to these depictions rather than shove them under the rug. please, PLEASE let me know if i make any mistakes or say something offensive, i want to take responsibility for my actions and use this as an opportunity to educate myself. any outside commentary is more than welcome. thank you for your patience and understanding.

release date: october 30th, 1937

series: looney tunes

director: frank tashlin

starring: mel blanc (porky, the guy in the third row), billy bletcher (lawyer goodwill), sara berner (petunia)

just in time for the halloween season, we explore one of tashlin’s best directorial efforts to date. the case of the stuttering pig (its title derived from the case of the stuttering bishop, a warner bros. film released only 4 months prior) is the first of many warner bros. cartoons to take a jab at the ever popular dr. jekyll and mr. hyde. here, porky and his family (4 brothers and petunia, who serves as his sister rather than a love interest) are terrorized by the nefarious lawyer goodwill, the family lawyer who turns himself into a mr. hyde facsimile, hoping to kill the family in order to snag some inheritance money.

frank tashlin’s cinematography is in peak form as the cartoon opens to a ghastly exposition--william tell’s “the storm” rages alongside a furious storm. intricate camera angles include an upshot on a giant old house, trees whipping in the wind against the flashing lightning, and a close up of the window shudders snapping against the exterior. the snaps of the window shudders soon melt into the droning tick of a clock inside, an upshot exposing dynamic, drawn out shadows against the walls. tashlin handles the contrast between values exceptionally well. backgrounds are crisp, clear, and pronounced.

cue a vertical pan of porky’s siblings (patrick, peter, percy, portus, and petunia) all lined up against the wall in a row of chairs. each appear apprehensive, obviously on edge. not porky, though. porky’s at the very end of the row, looking on with a hilariously blank smile plastered on his face. 

suddenly, a knock at the door interrupts the silence. cue the famous tashlin jump cut: we only see volney white’s animation of porky jumping out of his seat, but the next shot reveals all of the siblings hanging from a chandelier, with porky trepidatiously inquiring “who-who-who-who-who-who’s theh-the-the-the-the-there...?” you can still feel mel’s attempts to distinguish his own unique porky stutter from the authentic stutter provided by joe dougherty--this delivery is more dougherty-esque than some of his others. 

billy bletcher’s syrupy sweet vocals ring out from behind the door, the disembodied voice introducing himself as lawyer goodwill. the decision not to showcase who’s behind the door is a smart one. suspense is absolutely rife all throughout the cartoon, and the beginning is no exception. with a peppy “okey deh-eh-eh-deh-do... oh-oh-okey deh-deh... okay!”, porky is followed by his siblings as he happily allows this mysterious lawyer goodwill inside. the suddenly calm, almost wholesome atmosphere inside, reassured by the self-proclaimed friendly presence of lawyer goodwill is disrupted as soon as the door opens, wind howling and blowing the entire family down the hallway as goodwill fights his way inside, his face (and head, for that matter) completely concealed by his hat and collar. tashlin plays on this as goodwill removes his hat, a mere nub placed where his neck should be as a waterfall of rain pours out from the hat. nevertheless, goodwill reveals himself, a portly yet good-natured looking fellow as he tells the children it’s time to attend to “business”.

lawyer goodwill gathers the kids around to discuss the matter of their late uncle solomon (a pig caricature of oliver hardy, just one of a handful) and his will. the animation is slightly blurred and jittery from the double exposure effects of the shadows--animation historian mark kausler has this to say (transcribed from his excellent commentary that i’m partially parroting):

“they used to hand crank the cameras here. this was before electric drive animation cameras--that’s why the shadows are so flickery, because they had to back the film up and then re-expose it to get the transparency of the shadow.”

uncle solomon’s will states that his heirs will inherit his money. however, if something were to happen to them, then lawyer goodwill gets the cash instead. goodwill exits the house, reassuring that nothing will happen to the kids... “...i hope!”

there’s a gorgeous, moody upshot of the porch as goodwill lumbers down the steps. volney white is at the hand of this scene, easy to spot thanks to his telltale speed: goodwill practically glides across the screen as he heads towards offscreen, only to whip back and put a hand over his hear, nefariously straining to hear if he’s being followed. volney’s pose and expression are as strong as ever--i made a reel of his animation awhile ago if you’d like to check it out!

bob bentley takes over to animate goodwill’s transformation into the monster--his animation is very meticulous and well crafted. a good way to spot him is to see if characters have thicker eyebrows in some scenes than others. goodwill swaps clothes in favor of a hat and cape almost effortlessly, gliding across the screen like butter. the flow isn’t interrupted, not even by the overlay of tables decorated with test tubes, skulls, etc. 

all of goodwill’s potential queries on how to transform into a hideous beast are answered with a bottle of “jekyll and hide juice” (starting at only $9.99! call now and get another FREE at no cost to you! it’s a steal, folks!)  nestled conveniently on his shelf of various poisons. he pours the concoction into a cocktail, acting like a regular bartender as he shows off by pouring the mixture from glass to glass. tashlin’s timing, both behaviorally and comically, are succinct as goodwill finally downs the mixture. he grips the table, taking heaving breaths, staring at the audience, until... nothing. he heaves a dubious shrug. 

instead, goodwill opts to use a milkshake mixer (a relatively new invention whose novelty value would have scored much bigger laughs then than it does today, but still remains amusing at the very least) to mix his concoction, downing it once more.

bob bentley’s animation of the monster is nothing short of gorgeous. well defined, well crafted, and dimensional. however, it does encapsulate antisemitic stereotypes and caricatures, from the big nose to clawed hands and pointy ears, as well as the desire for money. as skillful as the animation is, and as solid as the cartoon is, these are problems that still need to be addressed. understand that when i’m praising the animation, i’m focusing on the techniques themselves and the technicalities behind it, not the content that’s being animated itself. (thank you anon for taking the time to educate me! it’s much appreciated.) 

billy bletcher snarls in his trademark deep voice, even quipping “you wouldn’t think i was lawyer goodwill now, would you?” he talks directly to the audience, getting right close in their face, jabbing his spindly finger and bulbous nose. he even goes as far as to berate his public by screeching “you bunch of softies! YEAH, YOU IN THE THIRD ROW! ya BIG SOFTIE!” the fourth wall breaking is nothing short of genius. just IMAGINE seeing this in a dark, packed movie theater! the effect would be phenomenal! (especially if you were the guy in the third row! i’m sure all of the third-row-sitting patrons felt quite satisfied at these showings.) the monster vows to dispose of the family, sneering at our inability to help save our heroes.

said heroes are contentedly socializing in the living room, peppy porky talking about how safe and sound they are in their own little house. so, of course, that serves as the cue for a gnarly hand to grab the light switch and kill the lights. i love the detail of the shadow creeping along the wall before you even see the hand itself--little decisions like that go such a long way.

the lights go out, and all we hear is the pluck of an electric slide guitar. the lights come on, and one of porky’s alliteratively named siblings is gone, with an x cleverly marked in his place. the ritual occurs four times, with porky remarking each of the names of his fallen siblings (”peh-peh-patrick!” “eh-peh-peh-peh-eh-peter!” “eh-peh-peh-eh-peh-percy!” “puh-portus!”). the lights go out once more, and x’s mark where porky and petunia were just sitting prior. definitely an artsy and interesting way to convey the kidnappings--even more so when we see porky and petunia trepidatiously popping their heads out from behind the armchair after the camera trucks in on their deserted spot.

volney white animates the close up of petunia clutching to porky, stuttering (from fear, that is) “g-g-gee, p-p-porky, i’m scared!” her voice here is provided by sara berner as opposed to berneice hansell, who voiced her in her last appearance in porky’s romance. ironically, hansell would take over for petunia again after bob clampett adopted (and subsequently redesigned) her character. you can hear the evolution of her voice here. 

porky reassures her that they’ll find the brothers as we cue a clever pan from inside to outside the house, spotlighting the basement. the backgrounds are so gorgeous and moody! we find the pigs tied up in stocks, with the monster sneering about how he’ll do away with all the pigs once he nabs porky and petunia. once more, our ever-aware villain resorts to heckling the poor sap in the third row: “and if that guy in the third row comes up, I’LL FIX HIM TOO! you big CREAMPUFF!” again--this is exceedingly entertaining to watch 83 years later on a laptop screen, but imagine what a riot this would be in theaters! frank tashlin understood that the audience was paying to watch his cartoons, and he knew how to make it worth their time. the cartoons catered to the audience rather than the studio executives always make for the best ones--tex avery was especially keen of this, as we’ll soon explore.

back to porky and petunia, both cautiously traipsing down the hallway as porky calls the names of his fallen brothers, both straining to hear any signs of life. while the poses aren’t nearly pushed to the same extremes as they would be in tashlin’s second directorial stint from 1943-1946, they’re still quite nice and accentuated just enough. certainly stronger than the poses present in the other directors’ cartoons. seeing as tashlin was a newspaper cartoonist, his illustrative, comic look translates well into his own cartoons. it’s almost as if his comic art has leapt right off the page, but also meshes well enough with the animation to have a good sense of motion to it. it’s the best of both worlds.

while porky is unaware, petunia is yanked off screen by a hand protruding from a trick wall panel. suddenly, the villain himself tinkers behind porky, mimicking his movements. porky even manages to grab a hold of his gangly hand, assuming it’s petunia, going so far as to look him straight in the eyes and shush him. the volney white animated villain looks strikingly different than that of bob bentley’s--volney’s is exceedingly more streamlined and design driven, especially around the eyes. he’s not nearly as hairy, grotesque, or dimensional. not that that’s a bad thing! in fact, i love when animators are able to make their styles so distinguishable from the other animators. not only is it fun, it makes identifying animation much easier.

when porky finally realizes that he’s being stalked by the monster, he does the signature volney white eye take and runs for the hills, er, stairs. tashlin’s speed dominates as porky scales flights of stairs at lightning speeds--it’s dizzying to even watch! eventually, porky jumps right into the arms of the monster, clinging to him (thinking it’s petunia) as he describes what he just saw: “i eh-seh-saw the most teh-teh-teh-eh--awful leh-leh-lookin’ man, all beh-beh-big and beh-beh-eh-bleh-black... beh-beh-BIG teeth...” all the while, porky is grabbing onto the villain’s nose and clinging to him like a baby. the animation is positively hilarious, especially when porky recognizes who he’s being cradled by, actually connecting nose to snout as he lets out a scream and barrels down the staircase once more, the same footage from before just in reverse. a wonderful scene with great dialogue and hilarious animation. bob clampett would borrow this in his own jeepers creepers just two years later, with a ghost in place of the monster.

porky locks himself in the basement, discovering his siblings tied up in stocks (”leh-leh-land sakes alive!”), his attempts to free them interrupted by the sound of the villain knocking the door down. interestingly enough, after we pan to the monster infiltrating the premises, the next shot is the entire family huddled in a corner, indicating that porky did manage to free them after all. the technique is reminiscent of the cartoon’s beginning, where we see only porky jump out of his seat before showing all of the siblings hiding in the chandelier. 

just as it looks like the pig family is bacon, a random chair from offscreen is lobbed at the monster, sending him tumbling right into the stocks. the family is just as perplexed as the viewer, asking in unison “who DID that?”

“ME!” mel blanc’s gruff, more natural voice rings out from behind the screen. the locked up monster ogles at the audience, pointing a gangly finger as he snarls “who are YOU?” mel’s tough guy new yoik accent snarls back “I’M DA GUY IN DA THOID ROW, YA BIG SOURPUSS!” iris out on a deflated, dejected villain--just IMAGINE witnessing this in real time in the theaters! 

this cartoon is one of the reasons why frank tashlin is one of my favorite directors of all time. it’s got all of the tashlin essentiasl. the effects animation by A.C. gamer at the beginning is lovely, doing a wonderful job of establishing such an eerie mood. the raging, wild storm juxtaposes perfectly with the unsettlingly still atmosphere inside the house. lawyer goodwill makes an excellent villain, topped off with billy bletcher’s vocals and bob bentley’s skilled animation. the constant fourth wall breaking with him... need i say more? it’s such a great way to involve the audience with the picture and really suck in their attention, especially that ending. the animation is excellent, the backgrounds are gorgeous, it’s absolutely rife with atmosphere. this is tashlin’s best effort thus far and one of his best efforts overall.

however, the antisemitic stereotypes and caricatures should be accounted for. while i do say you should watch this one to get an idea of frank tashlin’s mastery as a director, tread with caution and discretion. i absolutely don’t endorse these concepts. so, if you do want to watch it, you can go to HBOmax or click this link, just be advised.

[threadpull]

how I run my blogs

TAGGED BY: @iustusetpeccator TAGGING: @scarestress @whosyourcultdaddy @dulcisebrietatem @ciaosucker @withoutchoice @hadncchoice @ineffablemum @adentincrime @roguesgalleried @bestvictim @collectedbooks @cunninghoused @deathlydivinity idk, but anyone else too; i’ve just already tagged an obnoxious amount of people already tho lmao

SPEED:  i’m a mess and all over the place with this.  for this blog, it just depends on who i have most inspo/energy for since i have so many muses like an arrogant foole?  and the threads themselves, of course.  and my mental state.  i’m an emotional thot, so i sometimes am depresso and don’t post, but then i am later espresso and rapid fire spam replies.  i am.......  inconsistent REPLIES:  i just go until i don’t.  LIKE i just do what i feel needs to be said???  which means it could be succinct or a novel, though the inner monologues tend to go on and on bc i have broody muses who internalize their emotions more often than express it outwardly lmao.  i don’t mind if people match or not unless i can tell you didn’t put as much effort into it / it’s lacking?  i need substance to respond to or it kills my investment in the thread because i can’t have my character react.  if you are passive in your writing (we all are sometimes, it happens without people realizing at times), the thread can sometimes just sit for a long time in my drafts bc idk what to do with it lmao.  again, i am...................  inconsistent STARTERS:  i feel like i’m terrible at these unless we’ve plotted something or have a long-standing relationship in rp because i hate just having to make up scenarios that bring our muses together dfgbsdlfh like.....  oh wow!  bumped into each other at the coffee shop.  this is original and not derivative content.  BUT SOMETIMES I END UP DOING SOMETHING LIKE THAT ANYWAYS.............  AND I WORRY IT’S NOT GOOD ENOUGH.  that noted, if u wanna do pre-established relationships that’s fuckin gucci cash money of you INBOX: i currently have 31 asks i’ve hoarded over time in case i want to randomly respond to them and they’re all from piri and g besides two other single asks, so that’s my life i guess.  i always respond to at least one ask that someone sends during the short period after it’s sent???  which is why i have so many from piri (26 OF THEM); we both SPAM memes all at once in order to give people options lmao SELECTIVITY:  i’m mutual exclusive because it keeps me from having people sending things in and just ignoring them????  cause that seems mean, but i’m not forcing responses to things if i don’t have interest in the blog?  it established where i stand immediately too because it says “if i follow you, i really do want to write with you.”  and it makes things easy cause i don’t have to turn people down (unless they ignore my rules and send me messages about checking out their blogs, which gives me The Anxiety about possibly saying No, Not Interested bc i don’t wanna seem like an ass). WISHLIST:  i want...........  just more interactions with certain muses of mine atm or to find other blogs for certain characters djfbhsd.  i have energy for hp muses (but tom is finicky cause....  dark lord is a bitch to interact with), my good good boy cecil, and sir anthony j. crow/ley in particular atm on here.  but i wanna interact with more v.oldemorts, du/mbledores, good o/mens characters, gotham rogues, etc?   HONEST NOTE:  i've been thinking of cleaning out my mutuals because i have people who just don’t interact with me and/or have ignored my messages????  and i’m like.  why are u followin me if you don’t wanna rp.  am i misinterpreting.  what’s good.  y’all wild out here.  i’ve also been having issues with having blocked people, but some mutuals interact with them, so i Cannot Escape, and i have no idea how to address it or if i need to just get over myself cause i’m bein an insecure weenie hut jr.’s member cause no one’s doing anything wrong, it’s just a me problem lmao

[douchebagbrainwaves]

WHY I'M SMARTER THAN ATHLETES

One reason we don't see the opportunities all around us is that we just blithely plowed forward writing code. You can see how powerful cities are from something I wrote about earlier: the case of the Milanese Leonardo. You can come along at any point and make something better, and I don't mean you should release something full of bugs, but they also don't know how much they'll need to be in twenty years, and then think about how to make money from it, and by American standards it's not bad. I don't care what he says, I'm going to number these points, and maybe with future startups I'll be able to understand something you're studying, then it isn't hard enough. Even in the US are auto workers, New York City schoolteachers, and civil servants happier than actors, professors, and professional athletes? That's nonsense.1 We estimated, based on some fairly informal math, that there were about 5000 stores on the Web. They probably mean well. You can of course build something for users other than yourself. Curiosity turns work into play.

Anti-immigration people don't understand is that there are good ideas that seem bad are bad.2 Look at restaurants. What topic do your thoughts keep returning to? It's not getting something done is learning how to write well, or how to program computers, or what life was really like in preindustrial societies, or how to draw the line is between what you expect of other people. You're done at 3 o'clock, and you can release it as soon as possible. Immigration policy is one area where a competitor could do better.3 You can start to treat parts as black boxes once you feel confident you've fully explored them. If you try something that blows up and leaves you broke at 26, big deal. To the extent there's a secret to success, it's not the professors who decide whether you get in, but admissions officers, and they all basically said Cambridge followed by a long pause while they tried to think of some change I wanted to work in the other direction. If you raised five million and ran out of funding, but that's not the way it's portrayed on TV.

Men's Wearhouse was at that moment running ads saying The Suit is Back. Police investigation apparently begins with a motive. In industrialized countries we walk down steps our whole lives and never think about this, because it implies something innate. Soon after we arrived at Yahoo, we got an email from a recruiter asking if I was interested in being a technologist in residence. If your product seems finished, there are few outside the US.4 When we started it, there wasn't any; the few sites you could order from were hand-made at great expense by web consultants. Julian said no one would care except a few real estate agents.5 We knew that if online shopping ever took off, these sites would have to be.6 At Y Combinator we sometimes mistakenly fund teams who have the attitude that they're going to build, no matter what, they'll be discouraged from investing in your competitors. So what do you wish there was?

He completely rewrites the program several times; that wouldn't be justifiable for an official project, but because that's the only one most visitors will see. People in Florence weren't genetically different, so you think you're supposed to have. Look at this, for example. Their lives are short too. But if the software were 100% finished and ready to launch at the push of a button, would they still be waiting? Patch. The thing I probably repeat most is this recipe for a startup, so don't compromise there.

Startups rarely die in mid keystroke. You don't need to know about business to run a startup are just unbelievably low. But don't wait till you've burned through your last round of investors would presumably have lost money. I think, because they don't make something people want, we worked to make the software easy to use. Writing novels is hard. White was amused to learn from a farmer friend that many electrified fences don't have any regrets over what might have been ok if he was content to limit himself to talking to the press, but what are investors going to think of some change I wanted to work in, apartments tend to be running out of money. You may not at first make more than you. Reading novels isn't. They were also a kind of thinking you do without trying to. Talk to as many VCs as you can.7 They would call support in a spirit more of triumph than anger, as if you were hired at some big company, for whom ideally you'd work your whole career.8 If you're a startup competing with a big company, and it's hard to switch from that to a product company.

The bad news is that the message is there, but that only makes the odds better for startups. And fortunately, subscriptions are the natural way to bill for Web-based software, all you need at first. At least, it seems likely enough that it would affect where you chose to live? It is by no means a lost cause to try to guess what's going on, as you can, and your competitors can, you tend to feel rich. When we thought of good ideas, we implemented them. And PR firms give them what they want. My own feeling is that object-oriented program, it can certainly help their competitors. Flexible employment laws?

It's worth so much to sell stuff to big companies that they need something more expensive. You seem to be on the board of someone who will buy you, because odds are they'll have to work on? So the way to the extreme of doing the computations on the server, with only a few percent of the world's infrastructure? They're like dealers; they sell the stuff, but they don't seem to realize the power of the forces at work here. It would hurt YC's brand at least among the innumerate if we invested in huge numbers of risky startups that flamed out. Maybe. In the so-called real world this need is a powerful force. At the other end. They know they'll have to deal with internationalization from the beginning.

There is something very American about Feynman breaking into safes during the Manhattan Project. Knowing that should help. At Viaweb our whole site was like a big arrow pointing users to the test drive rose immediately from 60% to 90%. The urge to look corporate—sleek, commanding, prudent, yet with just a touch of hubris on your well-cut sleeve—is an unexpected development in a time of business disgrace. What I find myself saying a lot is don't worry. When you raise a lot of customers fast is of course preferable. Professional athletes know they'll be pulled if they play badly for just a couple games. The point is simply that they understood search. In a remarkable coincidence, Ms. And that gave us flexibility. This may work in biotech, where a lot of work, instead of reading scripts to them. In the Q & A period after a recent talk, someone asked what made startups fail.

Notes

The facts about Apple's early history are from being this boulder we had to resort to in the sense of not starving then you should probably be interrupted every fifteen minutes with little loss of productivity.

The CPU weighed 3150 pounds, and only one founder take fundraising meetings is that so few founders are willing to be significantly pickier. If anyone wanted to go all the combinations of Web plus a three hour meeting with a walrus mustache and a t-shirts, to drive the old one was drilling for oil, over fairly low heat, till onions are glassy. This is one of the big winners are all about hitting outliers, are not all of us in the room, and those where the recipe is to create wealth in a more powerful version written in Lisp.

Starting a company with rapid, genuine growth is valuable, and his son Robert were each in turn forces Digg to respond promptly. My feeling with the buyer's picture on the subject of language power in Succinctness is Power. A larger set of users comes from ads on other sites.

Information is too general.

When you fix one bug happens to compensate for another. The solution to that mystery is that a their applicants come from. Many hope he was a sort of work is not one of the funds we raised was difficult, and stonewall about the origins of the other: the attempt to discover the most common recipe but not in the sort of work is a way in which YC can help in that it makes people feel good.

Some would say that IBM makes decent hardware. Once again, I'd say the raison d'etre of prep schools improve kids' admissions prospects.

The founders who are all about to give up your anti-dilution protections. But the usual standards for truth. And journalists as part of a placeholder than an actual label—like putting NMI on a desert island, hunting and gathering fruit. Unless you're very smooth founder who read this essay talks about programmers, but no doubt often are, but starting a startup: Watch people who said they wanted to start using whatever you make it to them till they also influence one another directly through the buzz that surrounds a hot startup.

If you really have a group to consider how low this number could be ignored. Publishers are more likely to be about web-based apps to share a virtual home directory spread across multiple servers.

[dorothydelgadillo]

How to Write a Pillar Content Page [Series]

This is the third article in a series covering pillar content. To get caught up, you can read the first on pillar content best practices and the second on pillar content on dos and don'ts.

Before 2018 draws to a close, we will have published more than 15 pieces of pillar content on the IMPACT website, which is kind of insane to think about.

Since that milestone is what stands between me and a flute of champagne, as I ring in the New Year in downtown Baltimore with Patrick and our friends, I thought I would pause for a moment to reflect on how a piece of pillar content goes from idea to reality. 

Because, up until this point, I've done a great job explaining why pillar content matters and, generally speaking, what you should and shouldn't be doing with your pillar strategy.

But we haven't really talked about how the pillar content sausage gets made.

I'm not talking about developing the topic cluster strategy or how you make one look pretty. I mean creating the strategy for and the writing of your pillar -- an undertaking that is a beast unto itself.

So, that's what I'm going to cover today -- all of the steps you need to take in order to create an effective piece of pillar content. 

Step #1: Choose Your Pillar Content Topic

As a refresher, a pillar content topic needs to be broad and lives at the center of your topic cluster:

Courtesy of HubSpot.

In the example above, workout routines is the more general topic that lives at the center of this topic cluster. More specific subtopics, such as workout routines to lose fat, are connected to the core pillar. 

You're also going to want a core pillar topic that has substantial search volume, but not too much search volume -- a broad topic that is 500 searches per month may not be worth your time, 1,200 to 6,400 searches per month is more on target, and 33,000 per month is to massive to even consider. 

For instance, our website redesign pillar is based around the target keyword "website redesign," which averages close to 3,000 searches per month. 

Whenever I choose a topic for a pillar, I ask myself four questions, all of which I must be able to answer "Yes!" to:

Does our audience care about this topic?

Does this topic tie directly back to a service we offer or a core focus area?

Does this topic have the right amount of search volume?

Is the topic broad enough?

Only when I am able to pass this litmus test do I move onto the next step.

Step #2: Develop the Strategy for Your Pillar

If you were to ask Carina -- who recently authored our pillar on HubSpot Marketing -- what our first conversation was like, she would tell you that very little of it had to do with scoping deadlines. 

Instead, we discussed the strategy of the pillar, in detail: 

Who is this searcher, and what are their biggest challenges and goals?

Why are they searching for this? What questions are they trying to answer?

OK, if we know who they are and what they're looking for, what do we cover?

How will what we serve up on this pillar page be different than what they will find elsewhere?

By the end of our hour-long discussion, a pillar writer and I should be in agreement on the target audience for a pillar -- which should align with one of our researched buyer personas -- what they're looking for, a rough (but succinct) value proposition that defines why the pillar exists for the end user, and a basic table of contents of what will be included.

(You may end up with anywhere from five to 15 sections in your table of contents.)

Do not end your strategy session without scheduling your 30-minute follow-up meeting to talk about the outline... 

Step #3: Create a Comprehensive Outline

As someone who hates outlining before writing, I know it may be an unnecessary step for those who instinctively know how to pull a cohesive, focused narrative together.

However, given the massive scale of pillar content -- Carina's HubSpot Marketing pillar clocks in about 16,000 words and mine on content style guide creation is 8,000+ -- you cannot skip the outlining phase. 

For example, later this week, we are rolling out a pillar on video for sales, written by IMPACT Client Success Specialist Myriah Anderson, who is basically the queen of sales video.

That pillar, however, went through a rigorous outlining process.

At the end of our initial strategy session (step two), I gave Myriah the following homework assignment:

Take your table of contents and make a deep, comprehensive outline of it. If you need to move sections around, or add or remove sections, that's fine. You will need to flesh out each section before we meet next, and take them as far as you can. 

Ahead of our meeting, Myriah shared her outline with me, so we didn't need to waste time during our meeting by watching me read it. 

Here are the questions I was asking myself, as I reviewed her outline, which guided our discussion during that follow-up session:

If I were in the target audience, would I have any logical follow-up questions that aren't being answered in the current form of this pillar?

Are we providing enough examples or tactical how-to showcases that would make it easy for a reader to implement the strategies we suggest or understand them, in context?

Do we provide enough research or cited data to support any declarative statements that should be shown as based in fact?

Does the order of our table of contents still make sense? Is there still anything missing or out of place?

Are there any sections that seemed critical at the time that now seem like a distraction, superfluous, or out of place?

Are there any sections that feel flimsy -- if so, why? What's missing?

Depending on how solid that first outline is -- and how quickly you can get it up to snuff as you chat -- you may not need more than this single outline review session to move onto the next step. 

If you don't feel like you have what you need after that first session, take some more time to continue to refine it. 

In a few cases in this last quarter, I had subject matter experts who were writing a piece of pillar content meet with me for a second time on their outline. Before that second meeting, I gave them specific feedback of where we needed to improve the outline. 

At the end of your final outlining brainstorm session, it's time to set deadlines and get down to work.

Step #4: Set Deadlines & Stick to Them

Since a piece of pillar content can be so huge, you shouldn't set yourself up for failure by setting one big deadline to rule them all. 

Instead, break your pillar content deadlines down into manageable chunks. 

"How many deadlines should there be?"

That's going to depend on a few factors:

How many sections you have;

How comprehensive the pillar will be (will it require research?);

How comfortable and efficient your writer is; and

How much time realistically your writer has to write.

If I was working with a subject matter expert who was motivated and had the time, I would set weekly deadlines, with 15-minute check-ins scheduled on deadline day for them to ask questions and for us to stay aligned. Typically, they would be asked to write somewhere between two and four sections, per deadline, based on the scope of the content and the size of the pillar. 

For me, I was constantly balancing my desire to make the process an enjoyable challenge, but not an impediment that got in the way of their job, and the need to get a project over the finish line in a timely fashion. 

You will have to do the same. Because, if you're not the one doing the writing, you can't piss off your contributors; if you do, they won't work with you again.

"What if deadlines are missed?"

I am not immune to missing deadlines. Neither are you. And there are often perfectly valid reasons why deadlines shift around -- certain tasks take way longer than expected, unforeseen work emergencies pop up out of nowhere, etc. 

So, you shouldn't go into a piece of pillar content expecting everything to go to plan; you'll more than likely end up disappointed. 

In order to manage your deadlines effectively, you need to set clear expectations around what those deadlines are and how communication should flow if something is slipping into "off-track" territory.

In our case, I promised my writers that if I didn't hear anything from them between deadlines, I would assume things were fine. There would be no annoying, "Heyyyyyy, buddyyyyy, how's it going?" passive aggressive temperature checks on their progress. I would only intervene when they wanted me to.

However, they had to promise me that they wouldn't wait until deadline day to say they were way behind. As soon as things started slipping, we needed to talk to reset deadlines and expectations around their ability to complete their assignments. 

If they did that, I could assure them:

I would work with them to remove barriers or impediments; 

Answer questions that would help the process go more smoothly; 

Be their ally in ensuring this pillar wouldn't become a burden that would prevent them from doing their other work;

I would be flexible and understanding, as we worked through their pillar.

If you're managing the writer for a pillar, the way you handle these conversations is absolutely critical.

Your contributors need to feel safe in coming to you when they're not going to meet a deadline; you don't need to coddle them or be a doormat, but you need to be an approachable, good listener who is willing to understand where they're coming from.

They need to feel you genuinely want them to be successful, and you're their partner in helping them get there. 

"How long should each section be?"

Whether you're the writer or the editor managing the writer, you need to go into this process understanding that pillars come in all different shapes and sizes. 

With that in mind, whenever one of our IMPACT contributes asked me:

"How long should the pillar be?" or "How long should this section be?"

...my answer was always exactly the same:

"Write until you're done."

Really, that's it. 

If you apply that simple logic to every section of your pillar, the length will work itself out naturally. You will cover everything you need to cover, and you will learn how to easily draw the necessary boundaries to prevent you from writing your own version of Ulysses. 

Step #5: Edit Your Pillar

OK, this is the step I will readily admit I did not prepare myself well for. Although, admittedly, you may not be working at the same volume of pillar production as we are. 

This is going to take more time than you expect, so you need to create the space for this editing in your schedule, so you don't get what I call "word drunk" -- which is the moment when you literally have too many words in your brain, and you cannot possibly process any more. 

That means, just like the writer needed to break down writing into chunks earlier on in this process, so should you with editing. (I recommend between three and five days to edit.)

Another tip to make your editing more efficient and effective is to not edit for everything at once. 

What I mean by that is you should never sit down to edit anything -- a blog article, a pillar, a haiku about cats -- and try to solve for grammar issues, spelling mistakes, narrative flow, and visual layout all at once. 

Instead, edit in stages. 

Here are the stages I use:

First, how is the narrative flow? Are there any gaps or sections that need to moved around or reworked? Is the substance of what is being said comprehensive and correct?

Next, how is the content laid out? Are we dealing with endless walls of text that need to be broken up? Are there lists that should actually be in paragraph form? Do we have enough headings and subheadings to move the reader along?

Then, how is the editorial style? Do we use the right words? Does the writing sound natural and conversational? Is the voice of the writer in-line with our content style guidelines?

Finally, what grammar and spelling mistakes need fixing? Now that I know the flow is right, the layout is spot-on, and the overall style is on target, what editorial clean-up is required to get the piece to polished perfection?

This may seem like you're creating work for yourself, but you need to trust me -- by focusing on specific aspect of the writing in each phase (and in this exact order), you won't miss a thing.

It's when you try to absorb, process, and edit everything at once that something slips through the cracks. 

Step #6: Prepare Your Pillar for Design

Congratulations!  You're done with the word stuff! 

Now, it's time for you to go back through your pillar and look for opportunities for visuals:

Showcase examples of what you're talking about, including screenshots, videos, or links -- (example); 

Include the headshots, book covers, podcast artwork, etc., of any references you've included or quoted -- (example); and 

Create snappy little images that move the reader along and make your pillar less boring to look at -- (example). 

If you don't have a ton of design chops, don't panic.

Often, the first and second items of including links, images, and videos of examples, or headshots, will be enough of a visual complement to the layout of your copy -- headings, subheadings, lists, etc.

If you're working with a designer, you'll likely only have to focus on the first two items. Your creative counterpart will take care of sprucing up your pillar where it needs sprucing.

"Liz, Why Do You Do This to Yourself?"

When I talk to people about what I spend a lot of my time doing at IMPACT -- overseeing the development and execution of our pillar content strategy -- some think I'm nuts, because it sounds painful.

Truth be told, they're not entirely wrong. 

However, what they see as painful, I view as probably the most heady content challenge out there -- and that's the stuff that I live for. 

But the reason why I do it isn't because it's hard and I want bragging rights.

It's because, when you follow this process, you have a chance to create one of the most genuinely and profoundly helpful pieces of content you'll ever create across as wide range of topics. 

So, yes. Creating a piece of pillar content isn't easy.

But if you make a commitment to this process, you're not only setting your content strategy up for success in the long-run, you're also going to do a much, much better job at leading those you're trying to reach to the successes they're longing for.

from Web Developers World https://www.impactbnd.com/blog/how-to-write-a-pillar-content-page

[myrobertallen-blog]

Vidently Review and huge bonus

Vidently is a brand-new, initial of its kind, groundbreaking app, which enables individuals to produce full size social and promo videos by just swiping done-for-you scene layouts, breaking them into location and also customizing hotspots.

Official site: https://www.socialleadfreak.com/vidently-review/

When you enjoy with your choices you can click Preview to see it all collaborated! Videos you produce are conserved in your Drafts folder up until you prefer to proceed with posting as well as downloading them. Here's one that I intermingled to advertise my Facebook Survival Set, submitted to my Facebook Page:

Once again, this is where short type video clip could really radiate. The Facebook algorithm enjoys video material, yet if you're anything like me, producing video isn't really precisely easy. However with Coupon, it fasted as well as pain-free to get my message across. As well as in fact, when the message began to build up some natural reach, it became an ideal prospect for a Facebook Advertisement to reach an also bigger target market. With the link above which Rebekah so kindly provided, you could get 20% off for a limited time, so do inspect it out! In the upper-right edge, enhance the day array to a month. A quarter or a year is great, too. One to two minutes is revealed to be the principle of on the internet video content according to this Wistia study. They assessed 564,710 videos as well as greater than 1.3 billion video clip sights to assemble this information. When you look carefully at the chart, you can see that there is a sharp drop-off after 2 minutes in length:

The longer you require to get to the point, the less people will stay. But, if your video approach has to be long-form, don't sweat it. The 2nd pleasant spot that Wistia recognized was 6-12 minutes:

According to their research study, if somebody remains past six mins, they greater than likely will proceed that engagement for a few even more mins. Anything more than that as well as you typically aren't going to see optimum results. The very best wager is to maintain your video content within the 1-2 min mark if you want to maximize your influence. An instance of effective short landing web page video is BuildFire's home page explainer video clip:

" Our existing homepage conversion rate for signups is around 22%. It would not be that high without the explainer video clip." - Ian Blain, Co-founder as well as CMO of BuildFire They make use of a promo-style video clip explainer that lasts for 1:15 as well as sums up business as well as worth recommendation. And they obtain straight to the factor. They maintain Vidently Review succinct by describing how customers can take advantage of their item. Wish to create a video that transforms at a high price? Adhere to the data. Maintain your video clips in between the 1-2 min mark for much better conversion rates. 5. Share Lastly, you prepare to share your video clip! While there are many methods to share your videos on your social media profiles, we wish the most effective way for you is to utilize Buffer's Tailored Posts. With Tailored Posts, you could conveniently schedule or post various videos to each of your social media sites profiles. At one time, from a single area. And also videos will be uploaded straight to the social media systems. To make use of Tailored Posts, click the Buffer browser expansion on any internet site. (Tailored Articles is coming to the desktop and also mobile control panels soon!). After that, select the social profiles you want to share the video with, update the copy, as well as publish the video clip.

Then, hit "Contribute to Queue". Your video clip will be contributed to your particular social profile queues and also shared at the selected times.

7 video clip ideas and also examples in order to help you get started. I understand producing video clips could really feel a little frightening at first. I had lots of questions myself. What should I consist of in the video clip? How much time should it be? What sort of music should I use? I hope from these suggestions and instances of short social media video clips, you'll discover some motivation and also the solution to your questions. How-to, ideas, or tutorial. HubSpot created a short video on how you can convince your employer to let you work from home, with stock video footages and message.

Scroll to the bottom of the page and also alter the number of rows revealed to 100.

Voilà! Now you have your leading 100 article for the previous month (quarter or year)-- and also tons of content ideas for your video. Research the most common web content. Often, your leading post are additionally your most shared. Yet in some cases, they aren't. Making use of a tool like Buzzsumo, you could find your most shared web content. You can also find one of the most common material for any subject! To discover your most shared post, enter your blog site URL on Buzzsumo.

You'll get a listing of your most shared Vidently Review post, purchased in terms of the variety of shares.

You could also arrange the results by the different social networks systems. As an example, if you intend to create a Facebook video clip, you can sort the checklist by Facebook engagements. Now, you'll have a listing of article that created one of the most shares, likes, as well as discuss Facebook.

Take a look at prominent video clips from similar brands. Finally, you can also browse on social networks to see just what topics are preferred right now. With Facebook's Pages to See, you could quickly check out the top blog posts from your favorite or similar Facebook Pages. To accessibility Pages to View, most likely to your Facebook Page > Insights. You'll find the section below the Introduction tab. When you click any of the Pages, you'll see its top blog posts for the week. The posts must give you some video web content concepts. It'll be wonderful to watch out for video clip blog posts particularly.

For Twitter, Social Bearing is a terrific device for locating any type of Twitter account's leading tweets. For Instagram, you can attempt using the Explore function, which shows you prominent blog posts that are relevant to your account. On LinkedIn, you have the Companies to track function in your Firm Page analytics. Maximize your video dimension and positioning. Every little thing makes a distinction when it involves video clip material. You can not slap together a video and think that conversions will certainly roll in. Even the video clip dimension, placement, and also dimensions can have a huge role in conversion rates. When it involves your landing web pages, you should do anything you could to boost conversions. Your organisation depends on it. Wistia carried out a research study where they crawled 95,000 different pages to understand just how size effects conversion prices on landing pages. To start, they split the typical touchdown web page into seven distinct areas:.

As you could expect, video material obtained more plays when it was higher in zones, or over the fold:.

If you desire much more conversions, make certain to maintain your video clip material in areas 1-3. That means above the layer or just before your page begins to obtain also long. For instance, take a look at where BuildFire areas their video clip material, in area 3:.

This assists to warm up visitors with standard introductory content on your touchdown page without overwhelming them. If you jump straight into a video clip without context, you might take the chance of lower conversions. Heat up your brows through with a snappy heading and after that enter the video content. However that's not all. Video elevation and size huge consider play rates as well as conversions. Inning accordance with Wistia, videos with a size of 401 to 600 pixels are going to be best for driving more plays:. 2. Plan. Once you have brainstormed your material suggestions and chose one to work with, you can start planning for it. Both means I want to plan for a video clip is to either write a script or develop a Vidently. Both motivate me to think through the entire flow and vital aspects of the video. A storyboard likewise assists me imagine exactly how a shot would certainly appear like, which will certainly be handy for the next action-- recording. Client testimonial. GoPro interviewed 3 clients to advertise its drone, GoPro Fate, and to present its new functions.

Occasions. Wistia did a recap video of their time at Inbound 2017.

Behind-the-scenes. Patagonia shared a fast behind-the-scenes look at their manufacturing facility.

Item launch. Ben & Jerry's developed a simple looping video to promote a brand-new taste of ice cream.

Checklist. We made a brief video clip slideshow sharing 5 tips that increased our Facebook video sights and also interaction.

User-generated material. Starbucks compiled photos of its famous holiday cups from its consumers right into a simple video slide show.

For even more suggestions, have a look at Facebook's Creative Hub, where they have actually provided near 100 Facebook video clips for your motivation.

Exactly how do you produce your social networks video clips? With videos being the 3rd most-wanted web content key in the future (after social networks messages as well as news), it'll be terrific to obtain begun now6. Below's a simple framework you can use (as well as adjust):. Ideate. Plan. Record. Edit. Share. If you have already been creating video clips, I would certainly enjoy to gain from you. Do you have any suggestions for creating interesting social media sites video clips? Exactly how does your video development process resemble?

These are common measurements that are excellent for producing video that does not control your display or appear too little to click. Optimization is key to getting even more plays. If you can obtain even more plays, you have a great shot at getting higher conversion prices. To sum everything up, focus on these aspects:. Play your video in areas 1-3 on your touchdown web page, preferably over the fold after you've offered context. Utilize a video clip width of 401-600 pixels. Use a video height of 301-450 pixels. How to generate a promotion video with a restricted budget plan. Since you know the crucial elements in a converting video clip, it's time to develop one on your own with a limited budget. Maintaining conversions in mind, you have actually reached produce a brief video clip. Here's how you can produce a discount video with a minimal spending plan that is sure to convert. 1) Create a compelling manuscript. The initial step in generating any wonderful coupon video clip for low-cost is coming up with your own manuscript. Many online marketers will certainly work with a company right from the gate to establish a video script, but to conserve money, you could complete this action within your personal group. You require a video script that reverberates with your target market. Luckily, you could commonly come up with a script based upon your existing landing web page. For example, consider exactly how BuildFire structures their Vidently touchdown page.

First, they utilize an engaging heading to create some initial passion. Next, they make use of social evidence to back up their claims:.

Now they show you precisely how any user could utilize their service for success:.

Then they tease it also additionally with specific attributes as well as advantages:.

The whole landing web page flows like a pre-written manuscript, since it is. The keys to your first video clip are already concealing within your landing web page. To simplify, right here are several of the vital factors to consist of in your manuscript:. Use a fascinating opening line to record interest. Use social proof to back up those claims. Show how simple it is to utilize your product. Program what your item does as well as what benefits it offers. Describe exactly how the user acquires value from it (more conversions, better sales, and so on). If you are not accustomed to storyboarding, here's a quick guide to obtain you started. To help you with your preparation, here are some ideas from Facebook for developing efficient video clips:. Capture focus early: Video clips auto-play on most social media sites systems. By catching interest with the first couple of secs of your video clip, you have a higher opportunity of quiting an audience while she scrolls through her feed. Facebook advises beginning with your most captivating components, integrating your brand message and also identification early, as well as utilizing interesting post copy. Keep your message simple: Facebook urges you to ask yourself, "Just what is one of the most vital message I have to provide in this video?". Layout for sound off: Facebook found that individuals view mobile videos all over-- house, at work, during their commute, and so on 3 Often, they wouldn't desire the audio (and maybe that's why mobile videos are made to play without sound). Inning accordance with Digiday, 85 percent of Facebook videos are played without sound4. Add subtitles or text to tell your story visually. Trying out dimension: More than HALF of video clips are used mobile now5. As well as square as well as upright video clips take up extra screen area than landscape video clips when the phone is held up and down. In our own experiments, we located that square videos exceeded landscape video clips on Facebook, Instagram, as well as Twitter in terms of ordinary involvement as well as views. If you're looking for details about video clip specifications of all the major social networks systems such as the optimum size and also default audio state, we wish we have actually gotten you covered with this article. 2) Find the ideal design for your target market. Next up, you need to identify what design of video clip is best for your target audience. As an example, a video clip on a landing page for a GoPro is mosting likely to be greatly different from a SaaS item, right? The GoPro video will certainly show the item being used in real time, revealing actual video, as opposed to animated clips. The SaaS product video will likely show the application in use and animated shorts to add style and appeal to the video clip. The trick below is to comprehend your market as well as exactly what they want to see. To obtain begun, perform some basic competitor research, or search for the leading companies in your niche. For instance, if you have a mobile application, you could look for the top applications of 2017:.

Locate a few of them on the checklist as well as head to their website to look the landing page for video-based web content. You should easily have the ability to situate their item promotion video clips to see exactly what web content they showcase:.

Tags: Vidently, Vidently Review, Vidently Bonus, Vidently OTO, Vidently Reviews, Vidently Bonuses, Vidently Review and bonus, Vidently Reviews And Bonuses

[marvellousmediamusings-blog]

Culture and conTROLL freaks; An insight into the practice of trolling in an online space.

It has been generally accepted among communities that the internet and social media networks are full of deviant individuals and behaviors. With many platforms offering an opportunity for ultimate anonymity and a perceived lack of consequences the internet as a whole has been synonymous with certain people using the platform to express anti-social, deviant or even violent behaviors is called trolling. This blog post shall discuss what trolling is, who a troll is and, with the use of the case study pertaining to Chelsea King, how trolling can be applied to real world situations.

Online trolling has become a vastly popular topic within internet communities and has attracted a plethora of media attention over the last couple of years, however it remains a topic that is under-researched, with little scholarly attention paid to it (Fichman and Sanfilippo, 2016). This may be attributed to the fact that the term is still in its infancy or simply because the definition for trolling is in a constant state of change and evolvement, with it having never been clearly differentiated from other deviant or negative behaviors and attitudes found online (Fichman and Sanfilippo, 2016). However, for the purpose of this essay we shall define trolling as a repetitive and hugely disruptive set of behaviors that are exhibited on an online platform in order to target a specific individual or group (Fichman and Sanfilippo, 2016). This is performed often with the intention of publicly shaming them, drawing them into an argument or diverting attention away from the original intent of the group (Fichman and Sanfilippo, 2016).

While the act of trolling has been defined, in order to understand the concept as a whole, one should have a thorough understanding of who is classified as a troll (Hardaker, 2010). However, a severe lack of clarity and indeed a large lack of agreement on the term and who can be classified under it, makes it a challenging task (Hardaker, 2010). One explanation that has proven to be both sufficiently detailed and succinct details an internet troll as an individual that operates through an online platform and seeks to provoke others in order to elicit responses that are hostile, naive or corrective in nature (Phillips and Milner, 2017,7). This person can also be a troll by reacting in a primarily emotional manner in order to elicit response or stimulate action from supporters (Phillips and Milner, 2017).

While Social Media platforms are widely accepted as having a global reach and an audience pool that increases exponentially it is no surprise that it has offered individuals with positive opportunities in which individuals can share and communicate, traversing boundaries connecting with others in a way that has previously not been possible (Barlow and Awan, 2016). Indeed, with the internet offering instantaneous communication as well as the compression of time and space there is a significant increase in the speed of communicative processes and a reduction in cultural latency (Stein, 2016). However, taking into consideration the instantaneous and far reaching effect of the internet it can also act as a double-edged sword (Barlow and Awan, 2016). By fashioning a cybernetic universe for individuals who employ hate speech as a means to directly target others while simultaneously maintaining their anonymity (Barlow and Awan, 2016). Thus, users often are found to exhibit behaviour and express opinions online that they would not normally be able to demonstrate in a real-world example without incurring significant consequence (Stein, 2016).

I, myself, have found that the internet often provides one with a false sense of security, I often am under the assumption that other individuals do not know my real identity and therefore my responses can often be different in comparison to if I was responding in person. I am traditionally more daring and more likely to disagree with someone online than in person. This is due to the fact that despite how heated the confrontation may get I am still relatively removed from the situation and can choose to withdraw entirely whenever I see fit.

Psychologists have applied the term ‘online disinhibition effect’ to this notion, in which aspects such as online anonymity, a perceived idea of invisibility, a lack of recognisable authority and the fact that the majority of communication is not happening in real time, serves to degrade the attitudes, established rules of etiquette and accepted cultural practices that many millennia has spent enforcing (Stein, 2016).Indeed, online trolling usually occurs in an asynchronous manner, when the individual responsible for the slander or inappropriate content does not communicate with the victim concurrently (Stein, 2016). This is due to the fact that it is easier to bait the victim with a form of provocation and then leave the scene temporarily (Stein, 2016).

Trolling and the severity of the behaviour can differ depending on specific circumstance, indeed in 2010 trolling reached a new height on the social media platform, Facebook and a new and particularly virulent form of subcultural trolling began to take over (Phillips and Milner, 2017). Unlike other social networking sites such as 4Chan – whose anonymous interactions didn’t extend beyond a particular coordinated attack against a chosen target – trolling on Facebook allowed for the creation of a of a relatively stable and antisocial network in which trolls were able to form close-knit groups to target a whole host of on-site causes, public personalities and affinity groups (Phillips and Milner, 2017).

Arguably one of the most outrageous of these behaviors occurred on what Facebook called the “memorial pages” (Phillips, 2017,8). These pages which are sometimes referred to as RIP pages offer an opportunity to friends, fans and family of the deceased to find comfort in the sense of community, post messages of condolence, keep an open line of communication with other users and to be witness to any site updates or group announcements (Phillips, 2017). Although it is a requirement of the site for people who want to contribute to be members of the page, the condolence pages are usually accessible to all. Hence making them ostensibly private but effectively representative of a very open and public space (Phillips, 2017). Consequently, the tone and at times the coherency of the comments posted vary greatly (Phillips, 2017).

With the death of a family member often being a disturbing and traumatic event in one’s life, many people find comfort in the support and love that is shown on social media networks. Facebook, in my personal case, was abuzz with messages of condolences and I was flooded for days after with memorial pictures of my lost loved one. Indeed, it was a haven of good memories, past photographs of the family and an overwhelming amount of support and love from friends and family all over the globe. However, this is not always the case and Facebook memorial pages can often turn into a platform in which hate is spewed. This is demonstrated clearly through the case of Chelsea King.

Chelsea King was often described by those who knew her as a golden girl of sorts, attractive, intelligent and well-liked by all who knew her (Phillips, 2017). When Chelsea was first reported missing after she failed to return home from a run on the 27th February 2010, everyone assumed the worst (Phillips, 2017). Their worst fears were confirmed when on the 1st of March John Gardener was taken into custody and charged with the rape and murder of two girls, one of them being Chelsea King (Phillips, 2017). Her body was found dumped in a make-shift grave days later (Phillips, 2017). On the internet, concerned individuals and well-wishers who were based all over the world had begun using Facebook as a network platform to express their sympathy, follow the case and cheerlead the search effort (Phillips, 2017). Pages like “Help Find Chelsea King” initially had a following of 80,000 people, however, after she was found dead that number skyrocketed with tens of thousands of group members joining and almost instantaneously the “Help Find Chelsea King” pages gave way to the memorial pages in honour of the dead teen (Phillips, 2017). The majority of the users had never met Chelsea, however they felt inextricably connected to the case and involved with the narrative that surrounded it (Phillips, 2017). This resulted in a number of negative comments as well as a slew of inappropriate remarks that were often sexual in nature (Phillips, 2017). Indeed, one user asked if there were any nude photographs of Chelsea while another used the platform to threaten another user defending the memory of Chelsea with the rape of her mother and sister (Phillips, 2017). Another user who went by the username “Francis Bagadonuts” posted the Google image of a user’s house who disagreed with him on a thread pertaining to Chelsea’s page (Phillips, 2017).

The situation escalated when a troll by the name of Mike McMullen launched a page with the title “I bet this pickle can get more likes than Chelsea King” (Karpi, 2017). Using a picture of a frowning cartoon pickle dressed in underwear and holding an obviously Photo-shopped cut-out of Chelsea’s head (Karpi, 2017). The massive reaction to the page was instantaneous and it was flooded with offensive images, statements and opinions as well as a large body of users who liked the page in order to defend the memory of Chelsea King (Karpi, 2017). Indeed, the page received so much attention that a reporter belonging to ABC went to interview McMullen who demonstrated an entirely apathetic attitude to the entire situation and the reprehensible things his platform has resulted in (Karpi, 2017). As mortified as the ABC audiences were at the story unfolding, the majority of the comments left on the Pickle page were too horrendous and explicit for Prime-Time audiences and thus were left out of the segment (Phillips, 2017). Furthermore, the segment failed to acknowledge in any way that the story was actually the tip of a far deeper and more serious problem, one that extended far beyond a single fan page (Phillips, 2017). In contrast to the belief that the pickle page was an horrendous yet isolated incident it represented the beginning of what eventually became known as RIP trolling (Phillips, 2017).

The above example is a horrifying testament to the damage that can be inflicted by an internet troll and the fact that it is such an accepted piece of social media today proves greatly concerning to many individuals, me included. I find it a disturbing notion that at any given time there will be someone within my social circles that are being either targeted directly or having their opinions lamented or slammed by others. Indeed, I myself have been a direct target of online Trolling. Belonging to the popular social media forum, Reddit. One automatically is cautious of what one comments or posts. Although usernames are anonymous and there is no information directly pertaining to my actual identity there is no shortage of people who are willing to pick apart the profile of those who dare share their personal information, experiences, opinions or accomplishments on the forum.

In my opinion, while Reddit is a social media site that is known for harboring a slew of internet trolls, it is not all negative, indeed many of the subreddits offer motivation , support and inspiration.r/loseit was one such community in which people who were looking to lead healthier lifestyles and lose weight could be given advice, be encouraged when lacking motivation and share progress pictures in order to achieve a common goal of being both happier and healthier. I had belonged to this community for a year and found it a great source of inspiration and motivation as it was full of like-minded individuals. However, the subreddit was not completely devoid of trolls. On one occasion, having lost a significant amount of weight, a progress picture was uploaded with an emoticon of a sun hiding my face on both photographs to protect my identity- the thought process was that I wanted to share my victories with others but not have a permanent reminder of it uploaded onto the internet. However, this small action seemed to be the catalyst for a slew of insults and jokes pertaining to the necessity of having to hide my face. One user insinuated that while I could do everything to change my physique there was nothing I could do to change my face. While another made lewd sexual comments. The more ferocious the comment the more attention it seemed to garner and the more upvotes it received proving that it was most probably said to generate a reaction either from me or other Reddit members. They certainly achieved the intended as the comments deviated so far from the original picture and contained so many instances of trolling it was eventually locked by a moderator of the post.

Internet trolling has fast become one of the most popular and fastest spreading piece of jargon in the 21st century. Indeed, the practice of trolling has become so pervasive and normalised within society it is often barely noticed as being unusual. Instead it is accepted as being a part of belonging to social media and other online networking platforms. Trolls and the practice of trolling occurs on a daily basis and is often performed by those who hide behind the anonymity the internet affords them- with usernames, fake profiles and ways to shield their true identity it becomes the perfect environment in which trolling can occur with the possibility of consequence being very slim. Trolling can often be extremely deviant, this was highlighted through the case study of Chelsea King whose death triggered the beginning of what was to become known as the Facebook memorial pages and through my own personal experiences. Thus this blog post has discussed what trolling is, who a troll is and how it is applied in a real-world situations.

 Biblography

abc News 2010. Chelsea Kings body found. Video. Retrieved 1 November,2017 from the World Wide Wed; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcLmmiY0VM4.

Barlow, C. and Awan, I. 2016. You Need to Be Sorted Out with a Knife: The Attempted Online Silencing of Women and People of Muslim Faith Within Academia. Social Media + Society,2-4.

Fichman, P. and Sanfilippo, M. 2016. Online trolling and its Perpetrators: Under the Cyber Bridge. London: Rowman and Littlefield,9-16.

Hardaker, C. 2010. Trolling in asynchronous computer-mediated communication: From user discussions to academic definitions. Journal of Politeness Research. Language, Behaviour, Culture,1-29.

Karpi, T. 2017. Change name to no-one, Like peoples statuses, Facebook Trolling and managing peoples online Personas. The Fiber Culture Journal. Online, retrieved 29 October,2017 from the World Wide Web:http://twentytwo.fibreculturejournal.org/fcj-166-change-name-to-no-one-like-peoples-status-facebook-trolling-and-managing-online-personas/.

Phillips, W. 2017. LOLing at Tragedy; Facebook trolls, memorial pages and Resistance to grief online. First Monday. Online. Retrieved 29 October,2017 from the World Wide Web: http://firstmonday.org/article/view/3168/3115.

Phillips, W. and Milner, R. 2017. The Ambivalent Internet:Mischief, Oddity, and Antagonism Online. New York: John Wiley and Sons,6-10. 

[eludiumofficial]

Rant #1: The brutal self-slaughter of my former favorite company and why I think comparing Electronic Arts to Bethesda Softworks is ignorant and irrational

Before I get started I’d like to make clear that my opinions presented here are subject to change, dependent on current events and my future beliefs. This post does in no way intend to manipulate the reader’s view on the situation or try and showcase my conviction as being the factual one regarding the topic, it only presents my personal reaction towards the statement featured in the title and should be treated as such.

I dislike rants. I dislike rambling in general, I find it to be a huge time-waster with little to no sense of rewarding. This is probably the first such post that I ever write, and I can’t say I’m quite pleased with my decision, but the subject at hand really provoked me. I feel that writing down my view on it, saving it someplace where I can see it later on in life (and remind myself of my past ways of thinking, as well as the reasoning behind them) is the best course of action. Regarding the second half of the title: I completely understand this is not a big deal, but making Electronic Arts look like the bad guy is something that I’ve seen mentioned for over a decade now in the gaming field, very few times being also backed up by solid arguments. I’m here to present it from my perspective.

Electronic Arts... a name as big in the industry as it is infamous. At least by common standards. Standards that (presumably) mostly come from reading the dumb, uninformed YouTube comment. Hell, I wouldn’t even be surprised if the vast majority of “experts” that comment defamatory remarks at EA's address have never touched any of the company's games. But how could they, right?! You need to pay, what, one hundred dollars for the Deluxe/Premium/Ultimate edition, which is in truth the actual content that assembles the main game... right?

Maybe.

This old company that the average customer loves to bash in ignorance is the same one who grants you complete access to full editions of over 75 of their titles, for €4 a month. It’s the same company who puts their game on sale for €10 one year after its release.. be lucky if you manage to score a €30 deal with other companies’ games in such a short time after launch (and in a sale). Not to mention, they actually have a working DRM *cough* Ubisoft *cough* and customer support.. *cough* Valve *cough*.

But enough about that. I'm not here to lick EA's boots, just pointing out how pathetic it looks to me when people keep complaining about this company 24/7 when there are much bigger culprits in the industry.

Culprits.. like Bethesda. Yeah. Something the old me would never believe he'd write. I wasn't just a fan of Bethesda Softworks. I loved Bethesda. I would read all the lore of their universes for hours on end, at school, at home, even before going to sleep. Hell, I didn't think The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim vanilla was a bad game at all to begin with, but when I discovered modding and found out that the Creation Kit, the godly tool that unlocked such a vast world (inside an already huge world), was brought to us by the developers, I went crazy for this team.

The introduction of paid mods.

Not only was it a global letdown when Valve + Bethesda announced paid mods on Steam back in 2015, it was unfortunately only the beginning of something much darker for BethSoft. Now, to be fair with you, I was willing to give them a second chance as customer after that absolute mess, more or less because I saw the partnership with Valve (a company that I stopped respecting since at least 4 years ago, for reasons that are now obvious worldwide) and I couldn't help but assume that they had the upper hand on here. It was downright difficult for a die-hard fan of Bethesda Studios to just drop all respect for them and accuse them at the fullest (or at least mostly) for the wrongdoing. Nonetheless they lost a big sense of meaning at that time, to me and many other fans as well.

When the "Special Edition" of Skyrim rolled out last fall I genuinely thought that was a bad joke. I went and read its system requirements, up to this day I cannot fathom how some improved shaders and lighting system along with some small improvements to textures require a NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 as graphic processor. It's beyond insulting the way this company neglects any kind of optimization processes for their products.

One year later, here we are: Creation Club. What the actual hell, Bethesda? What the actual hell? Here’s the trailer, it should speak more than mere words can:

The best course of action here is to fight for what we stand for. Don't let Bethesda win this fight. They've lost it once already, but it seems they're coming back with a much, much greedier and more disgusting ploy.

Some more detailed information about this Creation Club mess, as I really do not have the mood to write more about it and ultimately ruin my state of mind:

Creation Club on Fallout Wikia

A very succinct description in video format, by Gopher:

It’sAGundam goes much less family-friendly into the topic, but his points are very valid:

An extremely flawed system explained by YongYea:

I don’t see how it could get worse than this... but I actually have a feeling it still will. At this point, Bethesda Softworks is not just an anti-consumer company, they're inarguably becoming a threat to the industry. They have the power to manipulate other companies' directions, they have the power to manipulate renowned modders into falling for their trap (as proved in the 2015 scandal). But I believe they don't have the power to treat us, customers, like some absolute fools, and to succeed in doing so. I believe we can take the fight to them. For a greedy company like this, where fan service means absolutely nothing today, money speak in totality. Bethesda does not deserve to be given further financial support. Not until they wake up and realize the damage they're creating.

If Bethesda really doesn't want to give up their unethical practices (and so far, it does indeed look like they're going to keep living in a dream), they have to be put down. The company that once held the crown for creating the best sandbox role-playing games, with unlimited modding possibilities, is now digging its own grave. But it won’t lay itself inside.

Nexus mods

Let's face it, Bethesda: you would never be where you are now — up there at the top, laughing in your customers' faces —  if it wasn't for your community. So many people still keep playing games that go as far back as The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, because of modding. As great as your games might initially be, in a vanilla state very few people would still play a 15 years old game on a regular basis. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is still up in the players' charts today thanks to the dedicated modders that spare hundreds of hours from their lives to expand the base game’s content. Not to mention the insane amount of bugs that every of your games has: you never fixed that, Bethesda. It was the community who did it for you. Free of charge.

I began this article by writing about Electronic Arts and never got around talking about its relevance to the topic. That’s simply because I wanted to make clear my thoughts about Bethesda Softworks first. You see, while searching up the community’s reaction to this whole scandal I couldn’t help but notice a couple dozen comments comparing the “new” Bethesda Studios to Electronic Arts. Mostly saying they've become just as bad.

I know, I know.. why do some meaningless comments matter to me? This post should be about Bethesda's fall from glory, not about this. And to be fair I did debate whether to write this in a separate post or not to write it at all. I understand it might not be a big deal, but it does really drive me nuts. I consider the society's uninformed opinions to be just as damaging as Bethesda's recent actions.

Because these uninformed opinions carry on. They influence people. They influence companies' rate of success. Paid mods were taken down in 2015, a few days after their launch, for the fact that the community made its voice heard. All the comments raging at Valve and Bethesda's poor attempt could be translated into a substantial financiar loss for the companies.

With the Electronic Arts case, things are slightly different: we aren't talking about a mass of hateful comments bashing at the team in just a few days' time, we are talking about the worldwide consensus that EA is a "bad" company. This consensus has been spread out in a wide variety of ways, mainly through chats, comments, forums talks etc. and in a very high amount of time (basically since at least ten years ago). It was initially based on the fact (among other things) that you often had to pay for the game's "Premium" edition in order to receive content that was classified by the standard gamer as mandatory for the base game. Later on the consensus was adopted by.. just about a lot of people on the Internet. And that's how it went viral, it basically became a "meme", so to say. Bad things happen in the gaming world, the community instantly associates it with EA. This is not only morally wrong, but it does affect the company as well, for reasons that should be obvious.

"So what? Let them suffer, it's not fair having to pay €100 for a game in order to get the full edition." While I agree that most of the DLCs for EA's games are somewhat mandatory (especially if you're planning to play online), one should not forget the points that I made in the initial paragraphs of this post. If money is indeed such a big issue, wait for a sale. Their games' prices drop by a lot even during the first year. At least you have the assurance of quality control. You pay for a game that... you know, actually works, it's not riddled with bugs.

"How does that still relate to Bethesda?" When people compare these two studios they do it just because they're trying to put Bethesda to shame, really. Most of the time they don't even think twice before hitting the "Send" button: "Just stick EA's name in the comment so everyone can understand I'm only trying to make Bethesda look bad. I might have actually never played an Electronic Arts game, I sure as hell have never read any documentation on them, but hey, they're a meme, everyone refers to them as the bad guy so it has to be true." Their comment/message might literally not try and say anything disparaging about EA, they probably just want to put the focus on Bethesda, but the fact that they're using the brand name as a means to make something else look bad is absolutely ignorant. You are comparing every single damaging event in the industry to one company's marketing unpopular opinion, how crazy is that?

Electronic Arts has made its fair share of mistakes in its time (I agree, buying smaller, good companies and later firing their staff is not cool at all; releasing a new edition of Most Wanted is still supposed to be a Most Wanted game, not a Burnout game), but comparing it to a company that tries and monetize a feature that has been globally free since 1980 (Castle Smurfenstein) is downright insulting. If according to the society EA  is “bad”, then Bethesda must be the devil itself. Unfortunately people will continue to bash at Electronic Arts without backing up any of the criticism with straight facts and/or proof.

The point of this section is not to make EA seem like the victim and Bethesda like the villain. It merely summarizes that if you’re trying to show your feeling of antipathy towards Bethesda Studios through a comparison with another company, then you should pick a suitable candidate. Don’t just rush at placing Electronic Arts' name in your post because you know that will draw attention and favoritism from fellow poor-informed members. It’s a shame that out of all the gaming companies out there, some with much higher rates of greediness, the community has crowned EA as the “greater evil”.

Times have changed, people. Maybe a few years ago the main problem in the gaming industry was indeed the high pricing and the necessity of purchasing a Premium pack in order to enjoy what the whole game has to offer, but if you think that’s still the main issue nowadays then I am afraid you are living in the past. Welcome to 2017, where we are greeted with microtransactions in singleplayer-exclusive titles, card games over card games with little to no difference between each other (except the company your money for in-game items will go to) and an actual increase in the game’s price during the sale, just so it can be “discounted” to very, very little below the normal price (yeah, I know that happened in 2015, but I trust you catch my drift as to what’s happening in the “new world”). While these things are happening and the industry is falling apart, people are still busy complaining about a company that gives you a full-fledged product for a higher sum of money than the “standard” one. And then offers it to you on sale during the next 12 months.

Bethesda has reached an all-time new low and no other company comes to mind that is as brain-dead, heartless and greedy as them, but if you really have to use a comparison to prove your point, for the love of God step up your game and stop mentioning Electronic Arts. There is Valve out there who keeps milking the same damn three games for years now instead of producing anything original, they have a barely functional DRM, their customer support is safe to be assumed AWOL at this point in time and now they’re releasing a card game to further milk money away from players. Take-Two Interactive literally tried to definitively shut down modding for Grand Theft Auto V. There you have Activision shooting themselves in the foot with the Call of Duty franchise, releasing pretty much the same game year after year, also charging the same amount of money for the Deluxe version as EA would for a game that is actually original.

But Electronic Arts is still “the worst company”. Ok.

To sum this up (because it’s getting late, I want a cup of hot chocolate and to play some good old Dragon Age):

Maybe EA is bad. Maybe it isn’t. But it’s certainly not the culprit of the industry anymore, considering all the petty/greedy attempts of other companies in recent years. To compare it to Bethesda, however, is a whole other story. It’s insulting. Bethesda Softworks is not just greedy, they have become a threat.

Bethesda Studios is the kind of wounded owner who kicks his own faithful dog with a club after it comes and licks its master’s wounds. That kick is painful and performed with a Creation Club.

I ran out of hot chocolate sachets.