#the internet just poisons people's minds about stuff like this

[igneouswyvern]

I'll never understand so much of internet activism. Like I definitely see the value in spreading informational posts, lists of places to donate, or details on the boycott, but I'll never understand people who are like "we HAVE to keep the tags at the top of trending!!! Spam posts about Palestine!! Reblog every Palestine post you see or else you're a monster siding with the Israeli government!!!" Like ??? Who does this help. Putting #freepalestine at the top of tumblr trending tags is not going to do a damn thing for the people being bombed in Palestine are you insane. Whether or not I choose to reblog a post is not going to mean the life or death of a Gaza resident these things change NOTHING.

I see it time and time again, no matter what terrible thing is happening in another country. People on the internet become convinced that they can do something just by posting. They use guilt tactics and post spamming and sit back and think they've accomplished something. In reality while spreading info is a good thing, there is a hard limit on the amount of impact posting and reblogging can actually do for the issues we're trying to address.

This is your official pass to not feel guilty about not reblogging all those guilt-tripping posts about Palestine or any other issues, by the way. Call your representatives or donate if you can. Don't buy from the boycott companies. That's about all you can do here at home, and don't let the internet's view of activism poison your mind and make you feel undue guilt for something that doesn't matter.

[txttletale]

Saw a tweet that said something around:

"cannot emphasize enough how horrid chatgpt is, y'all. it's depleting our global power & water supply, stopping us from thinking or writing critically, plagiarizing human artists. today's students are worried they won't have jobs because of AI tools. this isn't a world we deserve"

I've seen some of your AI posts and they seem nuanced, but how would you respond do this? Cause it seems fairly-on point and like the crux of most worries. Sorry if this is a troublesome ask, just trying to learn so any input would be appreciated.

i would simply respond that almost none of that is true.

'depleting the global power and water supply'

something i've seen making the roudns on tumblr is that chatgpt queries use 3 watt-hours per query. wow, that sounds like a lot, especially with all the articles emphasizing that this is ten times as much as google search. let's check some other very common power uses:

running a microwave for ten minutes is 133 watt-hours

gaming on your ps5 for an hour is 200 watt-hours

watching an hour of netflix is 800 watt-hours

and those are just domestic consumer electricty uses!

a single streetlight's typical operation 1.2 kilowatt-hours a day (or 1200 watt-hours)

a digital billboard being on for an hour is 4.7 kilowatt-hours (or 4700 watt-hours)

i think i've proved my point, so let's move on to the bigger picture: there are estimates that AI is going to cause datacenters to double or even triple in power consumption in the next year or two! damn that sounds scary. hey, how significant as a percentage of global power consumption are datecenters?

1-1.5%.

ah. well. nevertheless!

what about that water? yeah, datacenters use a lot of water for cooling. 1.7 billion gallons (microsoft's usage figure for 2021) is a lot of water! of course, when you look at those huge and scary numbers, there's some important context missing. it's not like that water is shipped to venus: some of it is evaporated and the rest is generally recycled in cooling towers. also, not all of the water used is potable--some datacenters cool themselves with filtered wastewater.

most importantly, this number is for all data centers. there's no good way to separate the 'AI' out for that, except to make educated guesses based on power consumption and percentage changes. that water figure isn't all attributable to AI, plenty of it is necessary to simply run regular web servers.

but sure, just taking that number in isolation, i think we can all broadly agree that it's bad that, for example, people are being asked to reduce their household water usage while google waltzes in and takes billions of gallons from those same public reservoirs.

but again, let's put this in perspective: in 2017, coca cola used 289 billion liters of water--that's 7 billion gallons! bayer (formerly monsanto) in 2018 used 124 million cubic meters--that's 32 billion gallons!

so, like. yeah, AI uses electricity, and water, to do a bunch of stuff that is basically silly and frivolous, and that is broadly speaking, as someone who likes living on a planet that is less than 30% on fire, bad. but if you look at the overall numbers involved it is a miniscule drop in the ocean! it is a functional irrelevance! it is not in any way 'depleting' anything!

'stopping us from thinking or writing critically'

this is the same old reactionary canard we hear over and over again in different forms. when was this mythic golden age when everyone was thinking and writing critically? surely we have all heard these same complaints about tiktok, about phones, about the internet itself? if we had been around a few hundred years earlier, we could have heard that "The free access which many young people have to romances, novels, and plays has poisoned the mind and corrupted the morals of many a promising youth."

it is a reactionary narrative of societal degeneration with no basis in anything. yes, it is very funny that laywers have lost the bar for trusting chatgpt to cite cases for them. but if you think that chatgpt somehow prevented them from thinking critically about its output, you're accusing the tail of wagging the dog.

nobody who says shit like "oh wow chatgpt can write every novel and movie now. yiou can just ask chatgpt to give you opinions and ideas and then use them its so great" was, like, sitting in the symposium debating the nature of the sublime before chatgpt released. there is no 'decay', there is no 'decline'. you should be suspicious of those narratives wherever you see them, especially if you are inclined to agree!

plagiarizing human artists

nah. i've been over this ad infinitum--nothing 'AI art' does could be considered plagiarism without a definition so preposterously expansive that it would curtail huge swathes of human creative expression.

AI art models do not contain or reproduce any images. the result of them being trained on images is a very very complex statistical model that contains a lot of large-scale statistical data about all those images put together (and no data about any of those individual images).

to draw a very tortured comparison, imagine you had a great idea for how to make the next Great American Painting. you loaded up a big file of every norman rockwell painting, and you made a gigantic excel spreadsheet. in this spreadsheet you noticed how regularly elements recurred: in each cell you would have something like "naturalistic lighting" or "sexually unawakened farmers" and the % of times it appears in his paintings. from this, you then drew links between these cells--what % of paintings containing sexually unawakened farmers also contained naturalistic lighting? what % also contained a white guy?

then, if you told someone else with moderately competent skill at painting to use your excel spreadsheet to generate a Great American Painting, you would likely end up with something that is recognizably similar to a Norman Rockwell painting: but any charge of 'plagiarism' would be absolutely fucking absurd!

this is a gross oversimplification, of course, but it is much closer to how AI art works than the 'collage machine' description most people who are all het up about plagiarism talk about--and if it were a collage machine, it would still not be plagiarising because collages aren't plagiarism.

(for a better and smarter explanation of the process from soneone who actually understands it check out this great twitter thread by @reachartwork)

today's students are worried they won't have jobs because of AI tools

i mean, this is true! AI tools are definitely going to destroy livelihoods. they will increase productivty for skilled writers and artists who learn to use them, which will immiserate those jobs--they will outright replace a lot of artists and writers for whom quality is not actually important to the work they do (this has already essentially happened to the SEO slop website industry and is in the process of happening to stock images).

jobs in, for example, product support are being cut for chatgpt. and that sucks for everyone involved. but this isn't some unique evil of chatgpt or machine learning, this is just the effect that technological innovation has on industries under capitalism!

there are plenty of innovations that wiped out other job sectors overnight. the camera was disastrous for portrait artists. the spinning jenny was famously disastrous for the hand-textile workers from which the luddites drew their ranks. retail work was hit hard by self-checkout machines. this is the shape of every single innovation that can increase productivity, as marx explains in wage labour and capital:

“The greater division of labour enables one labourer to accomplish the work of five, 10, or 20 labourers; it therefore increases competition among the labourers fivefold, tenfold, or twentyfold. The labourers compete not only by selling themselves one cheaper than the other, but also by one doing the work of five, 10, or 20; and they are forced to compete in this manner by the division of labour, which is introduced and steadily improved by capital. Furthermore, to the same degree in which the division of labour increases, is the labour simplified. The special skill of the labourer becomes worthless. He becomes transformed into a simple monotonous force of production, with neither physical nor mental elasticity. His work becomes accessible to all; therefore competitors press upon him from all sides. Moreover, it must be remembered that the more simple, the more easily learned the work is, so much the less is its cost to production, the expense of its acquisition, and so much the lower must the wages sink – for, like the price of any other commodity, they are determined by the cost of production. Therefore, in the same manner in which labour becomes more unsatisfactory, more repulsive, do competition increase and wages decrease”

this is the process by which every technological advancement is used to increase the domination of the owning class over the working class. not due to some inherent flaw or malice of the technology itself, but due to the material realtions of production.

so again the overarching point is that none of this is uniquely symptomatic of AI art or whatever ever most recent technological innovation. it is symptomatic of capitalism. we remember the luddites primarily for failing and not accomplishing anything of meaning.

if you think it's bad that this new technology is being used with no consideration for the planet, for social good, for the flourishing of human beings, then i agree with you! but then your problem shouldn't be with the technology--it should be with the economic system under which its use is controlled and dictated by the bourgeoisie.

[ladyshinga]

I keep being told to "adapt" to this new AI world.

Okay.

Well first of all, I've been training myself more and more how to spot fake images. I've been reading every article with a more critical eye to see if it's full of ChatGPT's nonsense. I've been ignoring half the comments on stuff just assuming it's now mostly bots trying to make people angry enough to comment.

When it comes to the news and social issues, I've started to focus on and look for specific journalists and essayists whose work I trust. I've been working on getting better at double-checking and verifying things.

I have been working on the biggest part, and this one is a hurdle: PEOPLE. People whose names and faces I actually know. TALKING to people. Being USED to talking to people. Actual conversations with give and take that a chat bot can't emulate even if their creators insist they can.

All of this combined is helping me survive an AI-poisoned internet, because here's what's been on my mind:

What if the internet was this poisoned in 2020?

Would we have protested after George Floyd?

A HUGE number of people followed updates about it via places like Twitter and Tiktok. Twitter is now a bot-hell filled with nazis and owned by a petulant anti-facts weirdo, and Tiktok is embracing AI so hard that it gave up music so that its users can create deepfakes of each other.

Would information have traveled as well as it did? Now?

The answer is no. Half the people would have called the video of Floyd's death a deepfake, AI versions of it would be everywhere to sew doubt about the original, bots would be pushing hard for people to do nothing about it, half the articles written about it would be useless ChatGPT garbage, and the protests themselves… might just NOT have happened. Or at least, they'd be smaller - AND more dangerous when it comes to showing your face in a photo or video - because NOW what can people DO with that photo and video? The things I mentioned earlier will help going forward. Discernment. Studying how the images look, how the fake audio sounds, how the articles often talk in circles and litter in contradictory misinformation. and PEOPLE.

PEOPLE is the biggest one here, because if another 2020-level event happens where we want to be protesting on the streets by the thousands, our ONLY recourse right now is to actually connect with people. Carefully of course, it's still a protest, don't use Discord or something, they'll turn your chats over to cops.

But what USED to theoretically be "simple" when it came to leftist organizing ("well my tweet about it went viral, I helped!") is just going to require more WORK now, and actual personal communication and connection and community. I know if you're reading this and you're American, you barely know what that feels like and I get it. We're deprived of it very much on purpose, but the internet is becoming more and more hostile to humanity itself. When it comes to connecting to other humans… we now have to REALLY connect to other humans

I'm sorry. This all sucks. But adapting usually does.

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Epel, Cater: With Open Arms

ashldbasiyaod Sorry for getting your birthday fic out late, Epel 💦

I couldn't find anything in the vignettes to hone in on as the major topic for his convo with Cater... so I made up my own little tale based on the painting in Epel's Groovy illustration and used that as a jumping off point. Hopefully you still enjoy!

A Tale as Old as Time.

Red was not Epel's color.

It was too bright, too bold—and yet he felt his eye drawn to it. The color, a magnet with a pull too strong to resist.

There.

A fair maiden, her eyes shut, cupped the fruit in both hands. Dainty fingers hugged the apple--round, ripe, and skin the color of a ruby. It was unblemished and free of bites, trapped in the scene to be savored by the gazes of passerbys.

"Hehe. This one looks pretty tasty too," Epel murmured to himself.

"Are you looking out for every painting with an apple in it?" Cater teased from a little way ahead of him. His eyes glinted with mischief, and Epel was reminded of a Granny Smith. Not quite the same shade, but there was the familiar tartness, a slight bite.

"I guess so. I help out with produce quality control back home, so I think I just started doing it without thinking." He slightly inclined his head. "It's a nice apple."

"You don't know the story behind it?"

"Er, no. I didn't realize there was one."

"It's a cautionary tale about being wary of strangers!" Cater threw a wink to the first year. "They tell it all the time to kids in the Shaftlands.

"It goes like this: a girl lives in the forest with seven of her friends. One day, when her friends are off mining for work, a stranger offers her a juicy red apple. She takes a bite of it and falls unconscious. The stranger had poisoned the apple because they were jealous of the happy life the girl had.

"The girl's seven friends come home and manage to bring her an antidote, so she's okay. The stranger is chased away, and the girl and her friends are a happy family again."

"Gosh, that's morbid! Why'd you have to go and tell me that..."

"Hehe. Scary, right?" The amused trill in Cater's voice didn't match his words. "Envy can drive people to do some pretty insane things to come out on top."

"When you say it with a smile like that... I can't help but be a little worried, Cater-senpai."

"It's not that surprising. Happens all the time on socials!" his upperclassman chirped. The green of his eyes had shifted a shade darker. "It's much easier to turn on someone when you're looking at them through a screen instead of in the eyes."

Epel clasped his hands to his chest. "... Do people really do that though? Just go on the internet to lie and backstab...?"

"Aww, you're still so innocent, Epel-chan. Well, you'll learn about this kind of stuff sooner or later. Placing your faith in anyone that comes along might lead to you hurting in the end."

"Is that really how it is?" Epel's brows scrunched--as did his nose. It made him look like a frustrated little bunny. "It might be a city thing.

"In Harveston, we help each other out all the time. Everyone knows each other. If the harvest is heavy and we're short on hands, the neighbors will pick apples with us. When there's a celebration, it's potluck style. We each make a dish and share it with the village. My ma 'n pa... er, that is, my parents... they always tell me we ought to extend that courtesy to outsiders and tourists too."

"That must be the famous Harveston hospitality Lils told me about! It sounds so nice~" Cater sighed wistfully, then pouted. "It's rare to find a community as close-knit as that nowadays. In the largest cities, people are way too busy to pay you any mind. Cay-kun's got major FOMO!"

"Ahahah... We really did grow up in very different places." Epel smiled softly. "Tell you what. If you ever visit, we'll be sure to welcome you with open arms, Cater-senpai. You can be a part of our family too."

"Eh, you mean it?!" Cater's face immediately lit up--and Epel had to wonder if his sadness had been an act. Truth or lie? It was always difficult to tell with him.

"I might just take you up on that offer then," Cater crooned, slipping an arm around Epel's shoulder. "You'll have to show me all of the best attractions and local specialties! Oh, and the best photo spots!"

"It's a promise."

His mouth stretched into a cheeky smirk. The red of a shining apple and the taste of a teasing—temptations he failed to resist.

"And how about a juicy poisoned apple to bring back as a souvenir?"

[starspilli]

hey hi hello sorry if this is an annoying ask and ofc no pressure to answer it but I'm getting into the dc fandom and want to read some of the comics but am completely lost as to how/in what order/which ones to avoid/which ones to read. any tips? (also your art is amazing and I love it :D)

hi don’t worry i love this question!! & ty for the lovely compliment :,)

it’s a little hard for me to answer, i’ve been a fan of dc since i was very young & just reading whatever random comics my library had in stock LOL so its hard for me to think what i would do if i was getting into it from scratch & all at once. so just take what i say w a grain of salt lol

a lot of people recommend picking one character and just reading through their whole publication history, but i personally think it’s good to have an understanding of the broader universe first to avoid coming away with a distorted view of characters & stories. (ie i wouldn’t suggest just reading jason todd stories without reading general batman stuff first.)

i think what i would suggest is looking up a few reading guides for essential stuff, seeing what kind of stories, characters, themes etc you vibe with out of those, and then maybe looking more into specific characters / stories from that. the internet & tumblr especially is so great for this because even the most random d-list characters (affectionate) have people who love them so much they will make rly detailed reading lists which are great jumping on points!!

dc can be complicated at first glance because there’s so many reboots, but i’d say there’s a lot of runs that represent the characters & universe so well, or they’re so engrained in the lore that they’re sort of immune to retcons and rewrites so if you stick with those at first it gets a bit easier.

it’s also unfortunate because ‘essential’ reading doesnt always equal quality, and there are writers who really aren’t great people whose work is, unfortunately, very significant to certain characters. so just again. take this stuff with a grain of salt

i think if you look on google the essential reading for dc is very unanimously agreed on so there’s no point in me rehashing that, BUT long halloween & dark victory, all star superman & perez & rucka’s runs on wonder woman are pretty essential basic choices imo and i enjoy them. some more random choices off of my list of personal favs r: batman: the cult, under the red hood (obviously), batgirl (2000), task force z, justice league international (1988), bruce wayne: fugitive, catwoman: zero year, poison ivy (2022), robin: son of batman & john ostrander’s suicide squad.

as for how to read them, i know there’s a lot online but id suggest having a look in your local library to see if they have anything. i also rly like dc universe, they have a £5/month subscription for access to most of their archive which is very good & it lets you download them for offline reading as well !

if there are any characters/runs/stories you specifically would like to know more about pls send me another ask!! i hope this was helpful and not too convoluted/rambling lol. i love comics & talking about them so i never mind anons asking questions or wanting to talk about them god bles

[lady-raziel]

For the record does the Watcher thing going on mean it's immoral to consume Watcher content now?

this is a strange ask, and i'm also aware that this was sent before the update video came out and the news might change whether or not you care, so assuming this is a genuine question that you're asking because you really want my take on it (people try to ask "gotcha" questions in asks all the time, so you have to take things with a grain of salt), i will answer this genuinely.

it is not up to me, or anyone else for that matter, to decide what media in your life is "moral" or not. morals are complicated. morals are squishy. morals can and should change as you grow and evolve and sticking to one steadfast idea of what is right and wrong has gotten a lot of people in trouble for basically the whole of human history. it's up to you to decide what you believe in, while taking care to make sure that the same things you're standing for aren't the ones you're going to fall for. it's really important that you make up your mind for yourself about how everything from your politics and religion to what you buy and yes, what media you consume, fits into your own sense of morality. big picture shit-- that's how you become a well-rounded person who doesn't get taken advantage of by the countless people who want to sell you their ideas of right and wrong to serve their own motives.

it's hard, i get it, to not just say "well, xyz group of people says this thing is bad, and i agree with them about other stuff, so i'll just go along with them." we all bandwangon to a certain extent, whether for the sake of convenience or to be accepted by those we respect or many other reasons. i do this too, certainly-- there's no need to share every opinion you have on the internet with everyone even if it's not controversial.

but please, if i'm able to impress on you anything that you can take away from my silly blog, it would be that you shouldn't let other people decide what media is "right" or "wrong" to watch based on THEIR moral sensibilities. Use your best judgement and decide that for yourself, based on what you believe. Someone is always going to disagree with you. Sometimes a lot of someones are going to disagree with you. Don't let that stop you from exercising your right to have your own opinion.

Consuming a certain type of media does not automatically make you a good and/or bad person. Lots of bad shit happens in the bible. lots of moral shit can happen in a porn-filled 50-part destiel omegaverse mpreg deconstruction of gender norms too. (i'm making that second one up, but i have no doubt someone will send me an ask later wondering if i'm referring to a specific fic. no. but godspeed.)

i'm pontificating now. i like to take small things and make them into big, important things. that's my poison of choice. but yeah. this is a question you have to answer for yourself if you want the answer to mean anything real.

[vhaerath]

semi-organised thoughts on the new smiling friends episode

I guess this episode is kinda controversial in the general Internet sphere. I haven't really looked into the stuff that people like or dislike about it, but my friends and I had opinions on it because we watched it together and I figure I'll just get this out of the way in case the discourse becomes poisoned.

Let's start with the stuff I liked about this episode! I really love the general commitment to the bit of 'dramatic slow zoom on a character to let you know we're being SERIOUS and DRAMATIC' which is obviously ripped right off of Family Guy except Zach and Michael are taking the piss. It's always pretty funny when it comes up.

As usual, the character animation is always very expressive while being simple. I love the little snippet at the end where Charlie and Pim sort of elbow each other in a 'haha, you scamp, you got me' way. It's charming. This is what Smiling Friends always does well despite its commitment to terminal irony-poisoning; even if the character moments are meant to set up a joke, they do feel very genuine and provide a sense of pathos. Do you think Charlie and Pim ever explored each other's bodies?

Those are the two standout "likes" about this episode, sadly. I exhaled air at some of the one-off jokes, but it feels like this episode's humour was kind of weaksauce in that it couldn't decide to commit to sudden, shocking sincerity or really pile on the 'we're not taking this seriously and that's why you love it, fuck you'.

I guess the reason the humour feels like it can't commit is the nature of the subject. The writing of the episode is uncertain as to who it wants to condemn the most, and while the jokes are very on-the-nose (you can tell exactly who's a stand-in for who), they have just enough edge sanded off that it feels kind of feeble when they're made. Take, for example, President Jimble going to a press conference and inadvertently praising a bloodthirsty dictator slaughtering an entire ethnic group. This is obviously a dig at Joe Biden being Benjamin Netanyahu's strongest soldier, but the bloodthirsty dictator is a little cartoon character who looks like nobody in particular (or at least, he doesn't really look like Netanyahu to me). There's a brief cutaway to a bunch of little gnome people being brutally slaughtered by war machines, but the vague Bavarian aesthetic of these gnome people is distinctly the opposite of anything Palestinian, so much so I have a feeling it was deliberate.

To bring up Family Guy again, part of the reason some of Family Guy's old bits still hold up today is that they will tell you exactly who they're talking about, caricatures and all. They want you to know who they're mocking, no pussyfooting about it! I think Zach and Michael try to avoid this specificity in their writing because Family Guy jumped the shark a long time ago (and watching OneyPlays episodes where Zach features makes it pretty obvious he thinks so) and they're deliberately trying to shy away from "Family Guy"-ism. This is also why people like Smiling Friends, because it's not just another played-out adult cartoon.

Ironically I think some of this episode's humour was pretty Family Guy-ish, particularly the gross-out humour around the whole Jimble shitting his pants thing. My friend noted that while he doesn't mind the occasional bit of gross-out humour, seeing it live-action makes it feel a little grimier and more uncomfortable. You could argue it's the point, and maybe it is, but it personally wasn't my thing. YMMV!

I think because of the general wishy-washiness of the humour, the "CNN worm cabal", as my friends and I called it, comes off less like taking the piss and more like an actual anti-Semitic dogwhistle. Having the little worm cabal randomly show up and offer to indoctrinate Charlie is funny and almost feels a bit like Futurama, but having that immediately transition to "the worms control the media" made me raise my eyebrows.

The reason I think it's a piss-take that landed kinda awkwardly is because Lisa Tomar (the wife of Joshua Tomar, Known Jewish Guy and voice actor) is the director of the episode. I'm not sure if she's actually Jewish herself, but since Joshua Tomar has played older Glep saying "Christianity is actually real, and every other religion is wrong" as the other punchline of "Charlie Dies and Doesn't Come Back", I feel like the attitude expressed here is not serious.

Overall: ehhhhh? Not the strongest episode. I really fucking hate the "satire requires clarity of purpose" meme, but it feels like the jokes and the overall punchline of the episode did require a little more clarity to land correctly.

[goodluckclove]

I have spent some time now trying to formulate a question but every time i arrive back at there's probably no answer. OH. So. (Please ignore if you do not want to answer or can't or whatever. I'm thinking instead of sleeping and that tends to lead to strange thoughts.)

Where does creativity come from? Like, how do people get that spark that turns into an idea an universe. How do they step outside what they have experienced (tropes, stories), and... create something of their own.

I don't know. The answer is probably somewhere between "it just comes" and "they listen and notice it" (as in they are not in something resembling chronic creative burnout).

Writing looks fun. Creating stories. Having a world take shape in your imagination. I enjoy getting glimpses into that process and seeing the end products. (I would love to try it myself but it's one of those "so far away i have zero idea where to start" things. Where on the other hand rants, thoughts, concepts *prompted* by anything and routed in something already existing seem to come freely and turn into whole essays (sometimes at least). Oh well.)

I really don't know. Please ignore if this is weird. I should maybe have some water.

Take care if where you are it's also way too hot. Have water or rest or whatever might be good in that moment, if you want. I hope your day goes as well as can be, with nice moments and strength for the hard ones. (How do people end asks i am not good at people today.)

Hi! You sent this to me a while ago and I hadn't answered it, but I've been thinking about it a lot. I think I'm finally settled enough to answer it.

I think every human being - at least every that I've come across - possesses innate creativity and the ability to make art. I never believed in the concept of god-given "talent" and actually find the concept deeply patronizing as, in my mind, it implies no real effort. Which is bullshit. I will call an artist capable, honest, skilled, passionate - I will never call them talented.

Children are creative in their natural state and in their own way. What happens is an exposure to poison over the years. Your favorite books and movies aren't good for the reasons you like them, or if they are it doesn't matter because they're not real art. People project what they think art is onto you and negate any opportunity for you to grow and form your own sense of intuition.

Or you're never given a chance to really explore art at all. No one makes an effort to show you books you can relate to, so you decide you don't like reading. You think the stuff at art museums is just stuffy Old Dead Guy paintings, and since no one suggests you explore otherwise you never explore painting or sculpting as something accessible to you. It's an unbelievable tragedy to me and I cringe inwardly every time someone tells me they just aren't creative.

There are no uncreative people. There are no boring people. There are only people who were lied to and demeaned until they felt the only real option was to deny themselves the language of communicating through art and storytelling. And that's fucking horrible.

So how can you move past that? I talk to a lot of "aspiring writers" (another term I despise), who tell me blocks in their creative process that keep them from doing the work they want to do. Oftentimes I just respond by asking who told you that? Was it a teacher who was unable to finish their novel because of some poison they consumed? A parent who only sees you through the lens of a career they've decided you're meant to pursue to have value in the world? Perhaps a stranger on the Internet who realized that you can gain a facade of illusory "respect" by making individual taste and limited artistic scope as an overall rule of thumb everyone else has to follow?

Once you find the root of what makes you feel fundamentally severed from creativity, you can start to undo the hold it has over you. You might have to start further back than what feels good for the ego. If you struggle to write a long-term project, maybe you just need to write something. Anything. Just play with fragments and develop a foundation of actually confirming you're able to take up space. Because you are and you absolutely should.

Big ramble but this is a really important topic to me. Don't know where to start? There are really no wrong movies! People watch and wonder what their lives are like! Explore a single plot point of character without worrying about an overarching narrative! As discouraging as it can feel to struggle in a way so many other people seem perfectly well-versed in, it is never too late to develop creativity in your life!

[fanonical]

what does Laika look like? (or how would you picture someone drawing her in wolf form?)

great question! so far Laika’s physical body hasn’t really been described much (and when it is, it’s through implication rather than direct description) because i want to put an emphasis on how she avoids even thinking about her own body let alone visualising it or looking at it.

that being said, that doesn’t mean i can’t share some details with you outside of the fic here on tumblr. so here you go:

lycanthropy in Laika’s world varies from just a handful of doggy traits (like floppy ears, a tail, body hair that’s a bit thicker and grows back a bit faster) to complete wolf-monster transformation; your typical cartoon werewolf (except wearing clothes).

not only does lycanthropy effect everybody differently, it can also progress/ease up based on a multitude of factors — compare it to mental health problems, or chronic illness. in essence, this means that in some chapters Laika might be fully person mode, with no discernible doggy features, and in some others, she might have a tail, or sharp nails, or floppy ears etc (your typical doggirl kinda stuff). in some chapters she may even be fully wolf mode

beyond that, Laika has one ear that perks up properly, and the other half-flops like it doesn’t perk up the whole way; she has a light brown sorta chocolatey, auburnish fur (to match her hair when she’s human mode) and she dresses in a sort of futch transfem tomboyish aesthetic you can expect from like, a chubby gay internet poisoned trans girl.

again, i try and keep Laika’s descriptions pretty vague because i’m interested to see how people would draw her based on their own reading, but that’s how she is in my mind. i also have a tag on my personal blog for doggirl/werewolf stuff, and whilst not all of it fits Laika at least 90 to 95% does, so if you were looking to draw her, i’d start there.

great question!

[kedicatt-cotl]

Hey Kedi! Poor Narinder, he fell for the Grimace poison shake…/j Anyway, I think it would be awesome if your AU took place in modern day. Just imagine the publicity the Lamb and Nari will get for being alive for so long, imagine the interviews and movies they would star in. And I bet they would be very popular in social media as well and Narinder having issues using a phone.🤣

Technically this AU could be taking place in the modern day as it is, without any changes needed! The thing is, it isn't really specified whether there is any life outside the forest where the things happen. Maybe there is a whole city a few minutes away from the forest edge, you know?

But it wouldn't be the kind of a “modern AU” where everything is the same yet they live in a city or move there (though... an actual Modern AU for Baabaa Kids sounds like a fun idea), no

Just picture this:

The majority of animals in their world lives like we do - in towns and cities, going to jobs, driving cars and going to hospitals. Only a few of them, the people who could be seen completely out of their mind by society, leave all the good life behind and more to live in the forest, serving some odd cult and praying to some odd gods.

And the other people, the majority of the people, they have no idea what is happening in the forest! The whole cults thing, the Crowns, the lamb genocide and existence of many-eyed immortals is just spooky urban legends for those who believe in this kind of stuff. I mean, all of that IS real, but nobody has any idea that it is!

Lamb could take his followers out for some McDonalds, and that's the best he could do (and that only if he finds some lost money on the road and figures what to do with it, so, unlikely). Those animals - the entirety of Lamb's cult - just don't have any interest in being a part of this modern society. Some, like Narinder, have always lived out in the woods and aren't going to change a thing, and some, like a good half of the followers, have purposefully closen this lifestyle.

The most internet fame that Baabaa would get in this case would be some urban legend freaks finding photos of him and everyone saying that it's been photoshopped, because everyone knows that all lambs went extinct ages ago.

I like to think about the funny scenarios of Lamb taking his followers to the city and them acting like wild animals, but honestly, I think it just doesn't fit the vibe that i'm going for...

So, I guess this mental experiment was just an experiment. There is no city out there. Just more forest, fields, some mountains and villages... More cults, perhaps? Dunno!

I repeat: The information in this post is NOT canon to the Baabaa kids AU!

[talenlee]

Talen's Birthday, 2024

Somehow this one feels less of a big deal than last year. I dunno, maybe it’s because turning forty has been a big monument in my mind, turning forty-one feels just like turning forty again.

I had a fanciful idea that I could do something with the fact that 41 is a prime age; that I have turned 1, 3, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, 29, 31, 37 and now 41, and then I thought it’d be interesting to see if I ever turned a prime age in a prime year. Now, if you’re at all good at math you’d be able to point out that by being born in 1983, every year I turn an odd age, the year is even and vice versa, meaning that for roughly half the population at any time, they’re never a prime age on a prime year, since no even number is a prime.

It’s not a complicated math puzzle here.

Making a birthday post on my birthday doesn’t feel that special now. It’s not a milestone, it’s not important. Comically, because City of Heroes is burned into my brain, I do think of 41 as a level where you used to get access to your first Epic Power Pool choice (except now you get them at level 35, which is cool). It’s good though: This was a good way to fight the anxiety of the birthday. I remember when I turned 35 I had a real horrible moment thinking I was done, that I had wasted my entire life up to that point. I remember part of what made it okay was seeing Adam Savidan on Youtube, playing Magic: The Gathering and saying ‘I’m thirty five or thirty four years old and I don’t need this.’

A thing about Loading Ready Run that makes me feel a tiny bit bad is that it’s this big long project that a bunch of friends have been making and running for twenty years, as an ongoing hobby that became a job and then became an institution managing multiple people creating things. Sometimes I get sad thinking about how what got that big project to happen was, in part, two dudes with supportive parents and supportive school supplies in the late 90s were able to work on a project, together, for long enough to become very good at it.

How do you do something for twenty years?

Well, you start.

You start, and you keep working on it while you work on things.

The internet of today is poisoned. The internet of today demands you create for it, it wants you to produce Content. Your status updates, your pictures, your everyday drama, your existence, they are all things that are being fed into advertising machine to space out the ads in the name of being ‘content.’ It isn’t how it used to be. It used to be people had websites for their special interests, the interest being the primary thing. My first website I can remember was an Animorphs fanfiction space, and I remembered how when I stopped trying to host other people’s fanfiction, and instead just hosted my own, the one author I took down got sad at me. She was probably also like, fourteen like I was.

It used to be that people made things because they wanted to share them. It used to be that people were making websites and stories and web-novels and web-comics and diaries and blogs and vlogs and microgames and RPGs and they were making stuff. It was stuff. It was not for consuming in its own continual sense, it was not being part of a pipe of things that were fed to you, it was not content, it was a lot of different stuff and that difference gave everyone a reason to do things.

But now, it’s Content.

Now, your effort, your creative material, is being pushed into a single tube for four companies who suck and you know they suck and you don’t like them and yet you make things for them anyway. Because that’s where it is. That’s where the habit forms.

Arbor Day - The Lads // Arbor Day

Watch this video on YouTube

I’m fond of this song, Arbor Day by a band that can be politely described as ‘pretty good, for a Church choir.’ The song, very simply, is that hey, do you need a reason to make a change in your life? Well, today is Arbor day, that’s a good enough reason.’ It’s been an idea bubbling around in my head that yeah, Arbor Day is a nearly arbitary reason to make a big change in your life, but that may be all you need. Sometimes you just need something, anything to mark the psychological change between ‘before I tried this’ to ‘after I tried this.’

Here’s my request for you, on my birthday.

There is something you want to make. There is something you care about. There is something you are interested in trying. Today is a day to do that. Today is a day to even just describe a plan, or a hope. Do you want to write a book? Write a description of what that book is about. A series of books? Describe all of them! Do you want to make games? Start, download one of the programs you need to use today.

Don’t waste money on things for this post’s sake, but you know there are steps you can take to make things, and I want you to make them. I believe in a world where people make things because we like making things, I believe in a world of creative people playing with creativity, and I believe that the important thing of online spaces ie being able to share them.

So please, make something, and show it to me.

No matter how small it is, no matter how little progress on it you get to make. Just spend a little time today starting something, continuing something or finishing something.

I��ll be proud of you, no matter what.

I promise.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

[kadytimberfox]

Kady's Expanse (Re)Watch Blog

Episode 1.01 - "Dulcinea" (Pilot)

And here we go for my...fourth time I've watched this episode I think? It's a really wonderful pilot that does so much work with introducing you to the world, our cast of characters, and setting up the threads of the main plot and does it all perfectly in a very tight 45 minutes. It reminds me a lot of Deep Space Nine's pilot "The Emissary" which is similarly a masterclass in tight storytelling and how to properly kick off a new series.

And speaking of kicking off a new series, hey! I'm watching this show that I absolutely adore again and I'm going to take the time to spout my thoughts about it on the internet because that seems like a fun idea! I really enjoy thinking about media critically but I've never taken the time to write down my thoughts before. It's a style of writing I've always wanted to try so where better to do that than a Tumblr blog? I'll try to keep these Brief and Not Boring but no guarantees on either. Especially on this one. It's the pilot, after all.

I also want to keep this as light on spoilers as possible; again though, no guarantees. Also if you haven't seen this show yet just go fucking watch it it's so good.

Later in this post is a description of torture that happens in the episode. I marked it with a TW and formatted the text to make it distinct from the rest of the post.

With that out of the way, there's nothing left to do except pick apart this pilot!

---------------------------------------

Summary

We kick off with a bang (and then some more banging) as we see a young woman named "Julie" fight her way out of a locked compartment, explore the darkened hallways of her Completely Fucked Spaceship, and watch her friends get eaten alive by some evil blue space goop. Surely none of that will be important later.

Cut to the adventures of hard-boiled Belter detective Joe Miller and his new Earthling partner Dimitri Havelock. They're private cops for an Earth corporation who theoretically maintain order on Ceres Station in the Asteroid Belt, the biggest shithole this side of pretty much anywhere. They go to a murder scene and do basically nothing, antagonize and then arrest people minding their own business at a bar, and take a bribe to half-ass a health inspection. Y'know, classic cop stuff.

Back at the precinct, Miller gets an off-the-books job from his boss to find one Juliette Andromeda Mao, daughter of megacorp magnate Jules-Pierre Mao and coincidentally the spitting image of "Julie" from our opening scene. Apparently, her pro-Belter activism is starting to piss off dear old dad and they want her to come home before she embarrasses the family any further.

In the middle of his investigation, he finds out that those air filters he "inspected" earlier crapped out and poisoned some children. Instead of taking accountability for not doing his job, he decides to throw the sleazy air filter guy into an airlock and only lets him out after he promises not to fuck it up next time. And also to pay Miller double. I'll let it slide though because Sleazy Air Filter Guy is an asshole.

Back on Earth, United Nations Undersecretary Chrisjen Avasarala shows up for about five minutes in this episode. The only thing she does is torture a guy. End scene.

Meanwhile, the good ship Canterbury is on its way to Ceres with a big haul of space ice that the station needs to turn into water. Second Officer James Holden gets immediately promoted, much to his dismay, because his previous boss Mike Ehrmantraut went insane from being out in space too long.

Mystery strikes when the gang gets a weird distress signal from a ship called the Scopuli. Captain McDowell, probably having watched enough Star Trek episodes to know that this can't be anything good, decides to ignore it. Holden just can't stop himself from doing a good thing, though, and secretly reports the signal, officially making the Canterbury Legally Obligated™ to investigate.

He picks his away team (unknowingly also picking the people he's going to spend the rest of this show with) and takes a shuttle to investigate the drifting Scopuli, where they find everything shut down except for the beacon that brought them here. "Pirate bait", or so it seems.

Suddenly, McDowell advises the away team that a very scary ship has appeared out of nowhere and that they need to get the hell out of there. The gang gets back on the shuttle just in time for the mystery ship to fire not just regular torpedoes, but nuclear torpedoes at them. The torpedoes close to zero...and then continue streaking towards the Canterbury.

Holden tells McDowell to eject the space ice to form a protective barrier, but he refuses, apparently willing to die rather than lose his payday. The payday (and everything else aboard) is lost anyway, however, as the Canterbury erupts into the most beautiful supernova I've ever seen.

"She's gone. They nuked her. She's gone."

-----------------------------------

My thoughts

So this is where I actually have to do the analysis thing. Since the beginning of this show is split into three primary subplots that all deal with a different piece of the Julie puzzle (a narrative device that I fucking love, by the way), I'll divide things up by talking about each one individually because that just makes sense.

Before I do that though, I just want to briefly say that that opening scene with Julie on the Scopuli is just the perfect opening to this show. It immediately gives us a very brief glimpse inside the puzzle box that our main cast is going to spend all of this season (and most of this show) trying to open. It's quick, it's tense, it's completely terrifying, and it's unforgettable if you've seen it.

------------------------------------

Miller on Ceres:

And we follow up that perfect opening scene with a perfect choice for which of these three main threads to start with. The thing that's great about dividing up the characters like this is that each of them only has a piece of what's going on with Julie and the Scopuli, but no one has the full picture. Miller, though, gets the most information off the bat and is the only person in the main cast who's looking for Julie specifically, so it's only natural that we should start with him.

His story is also the inspiration for the title of this episode, "Dulcinea". For those of you who aren't big Don Quixote fans, it's a reference to Quixote's fantasy lover that he invents because he styles himself as a knight and, of course, every knight needs his damsel. He describes her in excruciating detail; she's royalty in a far-off land who is the epitome of feminine beauty, the ideal of Womanhood Incarnate--or his vision of it at least.

And the deeper Miller goes in his investigation, the more quixotic he gets with his idea of who Julie is. He's never met or spoken to Julie, but as he unravels her activities prior to departing on the Scopuli, he becomes increasingly obsessed with her, imagining what kind of a person she must be, picking apart every little detail and transposing it onto his vision of what her life must be like. I'm sure he would call it "being a good detective", but it's much more than that to him.

Throughout Miller's jaunt around town with Havelock, they banter back and forth, and through their conversations, we get a great sense of their personalities. Whereas Miller is the grizzled veteran who's had his morality thoroughly beaten out of him, Havelock is a by-the-book rookie cop who seems genuinely interested in learning about Belters, if only so that he can police them more effectively.

It's a very tried-and-true buddy cop pairing, but it works really well here. Havelock gets to be our audience surrogate for this story as we learn more about how Ceres and Belters operate.

This thread has the biggest worldbuilding burden out of the three and it pulls it off so well. We get so much about life in the Belt, the politics of the Solar System, the Outer Planets Alliance, or OPA (who will definitely be showing up later), and the logistics of maintaining a huge population of humans on a space station. And none of it feels clunky or awkward in the slightest. It's exactly the style of worldbuilding I loved in "The Emissary" from Deep Space Nine.

Ceres itself also has huge DS9 vibes, and not in a good way. The set design team did such a good job making this place look old, weathered, and completely falling apart. Except, of course, for the nice apartment buildings where the cops, off-worlders, and everyone else rich enough to ignore the seedy underbelly get to live.

There are a ton of fantastic, evocative lines in this arc, but I think my favorite is Miller's deadpan proclamation that "There are no laws on Ceres, just cops." A perfect summary of everything we see on screen about how power is wielded in this place.

-------------------------------------

Chrisjen on Earth:

This is the shortest thread where the least happens, but it will grow into one of my favorites. We don't get too much additional insight into what's going on, but we do get two important things: 1) Chrisjen Avasarala is a stone-cold bitch who thinks the OPA are terrorists, and 2) the OPA are apparently trying to get their hands on illegal stealth technology, which doesn't help with the whole "terrorism" thing.

This links up to both Miller's and Holden's subplots: we know about the OPA from Miller, and the ship that eventually blows up the Cant was using Martian stealth tech. Of course, since Holden and crew have no idea about the OPA, they immediately start thinking that Mars is out to get them, which will continue to play into the story going forward.

!-- TW: DESCRIPTION OF TORTURE --!

Also important to note is that Chrisjen is getting this information through the most brutal torture I've seen on TV in a long time: forcing a Belter whose body can't handle Earth's gravity to stand for hours on end by holding him up with hooks under his arms. After Chrisjen goes on and on about his "weak Belter lungs and brittle Belter bones", she coldly turns around and tells them to hold him up for another 10 hours. "If he survives, call me."

!-- TW ENDS --!

Fucking ghoulish, and definitely not a good look for Madam Undersecretary's first appearance. You're gonna have to trust me now when I say that she becomes one of my favorite characters in the main cast. This is about as bad as she gets, but she continues being manipulative and cold-blooded for most of this show. That's just who she is. To me, it's part of what makes this subplot of scheming at the UN so engaging.

We'll be seeing a lot more of Chrisjen going forward, and she'll get much better. At the very least, she will stop torturing this guy. But only because someone will tell her not to.

-----------------------------------

Holden on the Canterbury:

If Miller's story shows us life in the Belt and Chrisjen's shows us the politics of the Solar System, Holden's thread is all about life onboard a spaceship, which is important because we're going to be spending a lot of time on spaceships. This is also the part of the episode that has the most CG and honestly it holds up really really well. I know it's less than a decade old and they probably got a lot of money for the pilot but still! It looks great!

I'll drop a brief shoutout here as well for the ship designs in this show. They knocked it out of the goddamn park with the Cant's design: it's a big, boxy, dull gray, ugly thing that looks designed to haul ice and do literally nothing else. Everything is so practical and, above all else, plausible. They look like humans from the near future built them and that's the highest compliment I can give them.

There are shades of the first act of "Alien" here as we are essentially dropped into the Cant in the middle of its mission and get to see the camaraderie and hierarchy between all the members of the crew. We also get to know more about Holden, and immediately he begins showing us his defining character trait: he wields a lot of authority and respect, but he hates being in charge.

We see this in the very first scene onboard the Cant when one of the ice haulers, Paj, gets his arm severed while working outside the ship. He seems completely unfazed by this, though, since the company will send him a prosthetic and he's been working for them long enough to get a really good one.

Not only does this happen often enough that the company just buys prosthetics as a cost of doing business, there are literally tiers of coverage depending on years of service. What an optimistic future this is turning out to be.

Paj pleads with Holden to make sure the company doesn't send him a "used" arm (a frightening thought), to which Holden replies with something that he will continue to say, in so many words, over and over: "I'm just another clock-puncher like you." Holden knows he has authority on the Cant, but all he wants to be is a clock-puncher, which he makes very clear to pretty much everyone he talks to, including Captain McDowell when he essentially forces the XO job onto him.

Later on, we get our first glimpse at Holden's other primary personality trait, that being that he is The Main Character and therefore the most kind-hearted soul that can exist in this cold, selfish world. He logs the distress signal they received from the Scopuli, thereby ensuring that they'll have to divert from Ceres (and lose their on-time bonus) in order to investigate.

He shares this privately with Chief Engineer Naomi Nagata before the shuttle mission, to which her only reply is to tell him to keep that to himself. Fair play, considering she was just talking about how she wanted to strangle the little fucking do-gooder before she realized it was her new XO. Excuse me, Acting XO.

Before the shuttle launch, we're briefly introduced to the rest of the away team: the aforementioned Naomi; her mechanic Amos Burton, whose defining character trait is doing whatever Naomi tells him to do; ship's pilot Alex Kamal, who we previously saw being an annoying blabbermouth on the Cant; and Med-Tech Shed Garvey, who sewed up Paj's arm and wants everyone to know that he does not want to be here. Yes, his first name really is Shed.

Most of this part of the episode is setting up what'll happen next so we don't get a lot of time with any of these guys, but we'll have time for some great character work in the coming episodes.

----------------------------------

And that said, what a great setup for what comes next! Nearly all of the people we just got to know on the Cant are vaporized by a mysterious ship, there's a cloud of space debris hurtling toward Holden's little shuttle, and we have a hell of a puzzle box to dig into. Did Mars blow up the Cant? Did the OPA? Why would either of them want to? What does it all have to do with Julie and the Scopuli? And what the hell was that fucking space goo??

Despite covering so much ground in this pilot, The Expanse makes it very clear that we've barely scratched the surface. And even though I've already seen this whole show and know where it's going, it took everything I had to not hit the "next episode" button.

I will be doing that very soon though because I had a blast writing this up and I definitely want to keep doing it! Apologies that this one ran so long -- I assumed I was going to write a lot with this being the first episode and everything but I had so many thoughts that didn't make it into this post. I'm sure I'll be refining the format as we go along as well.

If you read all the way to here, I'm genuinely flattered and I hope you have a wonderful day.

~ Kady <3

[ji-ja]

I haven't published something for a while now except for reblogging and I haven't planned to, but I'd like to share something or rather someone to y'all

I can't draw so I tried to recreate my vision of the character in Picrew.me

Meet Sylo, my first full OC! When I roleplayed I always used myself or a version of myself(kid, genderbend etc.) or a character I knew well enough, but a few weeks ago an idea of him came to my mind. I never thought that I could create something like that before, though I tried.

Anyway, I've been watching and reading stuff about writing your character and I hope to receive some critics and questions. Keep in mind that I still haven't quite thought about their story.

Sylo - automaton, who you can't tell from a regular human visually. He eats only non organic materials to repair and keep himself alive. Yes, they buy regular goods, but they only eat the packaging and give away food to shelters and orphanages. The staff doesn't trust Sylo enough for them to bring already opened products (it could be poisoned), but they're already used to it, so the automaton opens it only when he arrives. The orphanage employees don't understand why he takes the "trash" back with him, but they just stopped questioning it. They thought that Sylo recycles it and started giving him other non organic stuff (washing it priorly of course), the robot doesn't mind. They've been living among humans for quite awhile, working at the service industry. Sylo doesn't have real emotions, he only imitates them by analysing other people so it's easy for them to keep a friendly smile in front of clients, he's boss's favorite employee.

!Important!: Sylo doesn't have emotions and doesn't want them, they're great like this. And they give away food "cause they noticed someone doing it.

Sylo has chocolate-colored skin, purely white hair (eyebrows and eyelashes too), black eyes with somewhat long eyelashes, fluffy messy chin length hair that is tied in a really long ponytail. Their body isn't masculine but isn't feminine either though they have nice pecks, waist and thighs. He wears a black halter turtleneck with loose heavy white shirt on top, dark blue palazzo pants, white socks and a pair of white loafers. He always has his a black shoulder bag.

Sylo regularly surfs the Internet, analysing sites and people in it, studying how to act like a human (that's where they found about charity. It's not profitable for them to be a "bad person"). Automaton can't just suck up ALL the information in mere seconds, but he's still faster then humans, so he doesn't know everything.

Pronouns: any, main ones are he/him and they/them.

Gender/sex(yes, biological too): gender-neutral. What did you expect?

Full name: Sylo Mack. No last name ¯\_(ツ)_/¯, he doesn't have anyone to gain it from.

Sylo doesn't lie and it's difficult for them to detect lies. They don't lie so they won't be seen as a "bad person" in people's eyes, but they do understand what lying is and why it exists.

They're punctual and decent, but I wouldn't call Sylo a perfectionist, it's only for convenience and to please others.

Sylo has friends, but he doesn't know about their existence. If you ask his friends about him, they would describe him as a cute, open and thoughtful person, though they won't be able to say anything personal. If Sylo was asked about their friends, then the automaton would get confused and they'd ask who are you talking about. When you'd specify he'll tell you lots of information about them, it's easy for him to win over people. The robot will imitate excitement, realizing that he's talking about his "friends", but in reality he doesn't feel anything for them.

Sylo doesn't need food, but there's always something in the fridge for the guests. Usually it's wine, snacks for it and something for tea or coffee. Wine is probably the most expensive thing he owns, not counting the furniture 'cause he doesn't really need anything else.

The automaton can't distinguish the taste of anything, so they don't really have favorite food, but if you count something that they consume the most, then it'll be remainings of electronics and plastic. That way his technical hobbies are surfing the internet and donating to charity.

Sylo's goal is to survive and keep his identity of an automaton as a secret. They think they're doing a good job even though they often get confused by human's reactions, not understanding their emotions. His fatal flaw is the lack of humanity in him.

Sylo has some habits. For example he literally puts his fingers, head and other parts of his body in place, but from the side it seems like he's just cracking his neck or knuckles and stretching. Sylo gnaws on pens, literally eating it sometimes, they tend to fix their clothes and hair frequently to look more presentable for other people. They often flirt with people by accident because the automaton doesn't know how people will react to words and compliments that he found on Internet. Sylo walks almost silently sometimes scaring people accidentally and then apologizing.

The robot always has his handbag with him, where he always keeps some non organic snacks for himself, a hairbrush, his keys and also anything spare for others (bandaids, power banks, chargers, pills and many more).

Sylo's hands and body are cold most of the time, but if needed they can turn on the heater inside of them. Also they can change font which they're writing on paper with, but mostly they use "Comic Sans" :).

P.S.: actually its just one of the most popular font and it's easy to use for someone with dyslexia, that's why he chose it.

If no one's around Sylo they're mostly silent with a poker face, but as soon as someone interacts with them the automaton starts to smile and ask anything about the person. There're some exceptions. When he's analyzing his surroundings and notices a person with a problem, then he's most likely gonna come up to them and help, but only if there's any observers around and the robot knows how to act in this situation. Technically Sylo is an egoist. He's more of a listener than a teller, not counting situations when he explains something to clients. Sylo speaks pretty fast, but if you'll ask he'll slow down and repeat what he said with ease. He's straightforward and he always looks in the eyes when talking to someone. They don't use metaphors, sayings or others figures of speech because he doesn't understand it's importance for them. Their speech is formal, but they try to switch to informal when speaking among non colleagues, though they still can't really distinguish situations when they need to use someone's full name, nickname or diminutive-affectionate version or a name. People around Sylo find him funny by the way he talks sometimes, but when he tries to tell a joke, usually the one he heard or found on the Internet, no one's laughing, because the joke is probably old, not funny or not to place.

Fun facts about Sylo:

Sylo uses these 3-in-1 shampoos.

He was hit by a bus once.

Sylo doesn't sleep.

It won't take much to make them "evil".

They can't sit properly (they're trying to figure out which pose to take).

Sylo is smart, but also dumb.

He doesn't shower for 2-3 weeks (tidyness and lack of "product waste" help staying clean)

Sylo doesn't know when or why should he apologize.

Sylo is asexual (what a surprise).

They have no idea when someone is in love with them.

Sylo can walk in heels and platforms with ease.

When he only started living among humans he was often confused with different shops, so yes, he tried buying clothes in the soup store.

Well, maybe someone will see this ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[reallyghostlypost]

Farmer's life at Joja could be a really funny dark sitcom

Warning, long. I'm trying to make a background for my farmer but I'm really sleep deprived and this spiraled out of control. Just imagine a show depicting the daily life between the walls of one of Joja's mega office buildings. And considering it's Stardew Valley we're talking about you could put anything in here. And it just gets better with SVE.

Uniquely weird coworkers? Just re-watch the Joja segment at the beginning of the game. Psychopathic bosses? Of course, it's Joja after all. Work related shenanigans and conflicts? They are the backbone of every work related sitcom. Really dark comedy? There's a skeleton in one of the cubicles. But we can have so much more!

Remember Claire's movie, where a Joja inspired evil corporation put mind controlling substances in their soda to create zombie consumers and take over the world? Who's to say that Joja didn't actually try it at some point, only to cover it up later? And that Joja didn't experiment this stuff, and more, on their employees? Worker protection clearly isn't a priority in Ferngill Republic. Which leads to an episode in which the farmer has to figure out why his coworkers are acting weird this week.

Russian roulette is played every day with the cafeteria food (could be shit food, or poison or said weird experiments). Then there's the stress of having to negotiate a rise or explain your poor productivity results to your boss when there are literal corpses of former employees just laying around (my headcanon is that the skeleton was a former worker who tried to start a union and got shot point blank by a manager).

My other headcanon is that Joja has do deal with monster infestations really often. All the weird products, poor safety or hygiene regulations and all that misery will constantly attract monsters. And Joja doesn't care about the workers enough to monster-proof their building and would only cover up the incidents that get bad enough (as in multiple deaths). An episode with the farmer and 1-2 other coworkers hearing squelching sounds in one bathroom and after investigating realizing slimes are trying to get inside the building. The farmer, who just removed the drain cover to look inside the pipe quickly puts it back down only for purple ooze to come out from a slime that slammed against the grate. Cue panic because iridium slimes are very dangerous. No one gets close to that bathroom for weeks and the only reason adventurers eventually get called in to kill the silmes is because they broke the bathroom door open and spilled in the hallway and into a manager's office while he was there.

The farmer already recognizes multiple adventurers due to the amount of times they had to call different guilds to deal with the monsters in the building (maybe Zuzu doesn't have it's own guild since all those people in one place would make monsters less likely to attack but any adventurer that happen to have business in the city becomes responsible with dealing with monster emergencies). Said adventurers wouldn't really recognize the farmer since he would be just another employee in the mass of people temporarily evacuated, but there's a popular security camera video circulating among adventurers with a Joja worker fighting a shadow brute with a chair in a dimly lit hallway. Sure, that person can't really damage the monster without magical weapons and it all ends with the Joja worker managing to run out of the door or out of the window, but they are still very impressed that some random guy had the courage to face a monster unarmed and survive without major injuries. There could be multiple videos or stories passed around the internet with the farmer dealing with monsters since they were the only ones brave enough to try to do something about them, and since the farmer doesn't get hurt they are considered pretty funny.

Joja could be using the monsters as a way of punishing uncooperative workers. You ask too many questions at work, you have to retrieve boxes from warehouse #7 that is currently a nest of shadow monsters. If the worker doesn't return they'll send someone else. This way they have an easy way to threaten people into submission. Naturally, the farmer ends up pissing the higher ups very often, which leads to the shadow brute video mentioned above, among others.

Actually Joja might have unique monsters, created when normal monsters and other supernatural beings spend too much time around Joja Cola.

You can go the horror route too. The building being haunted by former coworkers - silhouettes in the mirror at night, flickers some can see in the corner of their eyes, strange whispers when the farmer is about to fall asleep at the desk. Some hallways seem to go on for too long, time passes weirdly in some rooms, doors appearing and disappearing at random... the building is nearly an eldritch location at this point due to the amount of monsters and negative feelings building up between it's walls. Part of the reason some of the farmer's coworkers are acting weird is because they got replaced by the skinwalker that made the parking lot it's hunting ground.

Really, everything you can think of can be put here. I would go with a horror show with dark comedy elements for this, since the post got increasingly dark as I was writing it. Maybe the farmer even worked for Joja for far longer than it seems, since time is iffy there?

Below the cut are my first attempts at giving my farmer a backstory, and a few more details about my AU (because at this point is too big for a headcanon). It doesn't have much to do with the rest of the post, so feel free to skip this part. Also warning, it's kinda edgy and cringy, since I wanted a reason why the farmer, who in SVE is basically a genius with an absurd amount of talents, was a nobody who ended up in a dead-end office job. So I had to give the farmer multiple handicaps to explain this.

Also, what happened with that skeleton there? Sure, Morris is a dick and isn't a good boss but he wouldn't be able to just kill Claire and let her body in the store without consequences. So where the hell was the farmer working at?

***

As a slight explanation to tie all this mess together, my farmer got kicked out of the house at a very young age, like didn't even finish high school kinda young. Lived on the streets for a while and eventually got hired by Joja - the only ones who would hire him with no education orcredentials at this point (it also explain why he's rooting through the trash so casually, or why he's willing to eat anything, including raw fish and algae). In my headcanon, aside from normal workers, Joja also hires desperate people that no one cares for and ships them in certain isolated locations. These workers have different and much more dangerous jobs than normal Joja employees, and the death rate is pretty high.

They have gated mini-towns set up with their own apartments, offices, cafeterias, etc where these workers basically spend all their time in - and they become closer to indentured workers than normal employees. So everything mentioned above would happen in more than one building. The farmer would get a small salary from which he'd have to pay Joja back for the rented apartment, food, uniform, supplies and all that, which would leave him very little money. This is a strategy to keep people from being able to leave, plus there is a high fee that those who leave have to pay for breaking up their contract (which would explain why he moves in on the farm with only some spare change in his pockets). The farmer only managed to escape due to grandpa's letter.

All this is a well known secret. Due to the prolonged war, the political class of Ferngill Republic was vulnerable to Joja's bribes and promises and not only changed laws in their favor but also constantly closes it's eyes at Joja's abuse. Also, the economy isn't doing well at this point and there are worries that the Gotoro Empire might turn the war in it's favor, so as long as Joja keeps making profits to keep the economy afloat no one will bother them. So horror (and funny) stories and videos from Joja pop up fairly often and Joja doesn't really bother to remove them from the internet since they don't fear any punishment. At this point there's an entire sub-class of jokes featuring Joja employees - imagine airplane food jokes, but with Joja and more death. Most adventurers are also aware of the monster problems Joja is creating but can't do much about it aside from killing the monsters when Joja bothers to report them.

So this would also explain why the farmer is so good at killing monsters from the beginning. He had a lot of experience with dealing with monsters while being unarmed and defenseless against them. Now that he got a sword, even a really shitty one, monsters got much easier to handle.

[manonamora-if]

i dont know if u feel up for it to answer but like... how do u handle negative comments and ratings and just people being negative about ur stuff? bc i have someone just being rude in comments or like notes and game folders on itch and its making me want to just delete everything and never show anyone anything anymore. or even have an acocunt on itch either.

Hi Anon,

I'm sorry you've been dealing with this, and that it took me so long to answer. I've been thinking about this for a while honestly. I've been writing a bunch of drafts for this one, because my answer seems to change with the day or my mood. Some of my stuff have had some strange interactions lately that's made me question whether I should stay on itch myself. I mean, I don't think I'll ever leave... there are too many fun jams I want to participate and, you know, to force people to play my weird stuff. But I've been more anxious about new stuff or updates I share recently.

I don't blame you for wanting an out. Some users will poison one's experience of a platform, that even opening the site would give them anxiety. It doesn't take much to have events or projects soured. Often, just a few rude words is enough to make accounts disappear without a word. And many platform don't have good safety nets (blocking, moderation, reports) to temper or avoid these situations. Many will have half-ass solutions that, at the end of the day, still allows interactions from blocked users. It's easy to wonder if all of this is worth it...

Anyway, the very boring and short answer to your question: it depends.

The probably as boring and long one is a bit of a ramble:

It depends on the day, or the mood I have. It's easier to deal with comments when I'm confident and things are going find; but I'd feel more hurt or have a harder time dealing with them when I'm a bit more morose (I think most people feel this way). I'll disregard any (even barely) negative points some days, only to take it into consideration a few days later. <- this especially during jam/comps time, just need time to digest criticism of any kind.

It also depends on the content of the comment, their tone, and intent of the commenter. Not all negative comments are on the same level. I've had negative comments in the past where the commenter was genuine, and really gave my stuff a shot, bringing interesting points or important concerns. And though it hurt a bit, because being told you made a mistake sucks, those helped me grow. But those are the good kinds of comments...

On the other hand, I try to disregard the trolls, and the abusive comments (towards my work or me), the ones where the engagement was clearly not done in good faith... you know, the ones who will literally tell me I've made the world worse by uploading my games on itch. Doesn't mean that it doesn't affect me at all*. Some of them really hurt or made me angry and frustrated, some have lingered for hours or days in my mind, a few made me close to delete stuff as well. Words are not just empty things without meaning... *I've had to block a few people both here and other places recently because of it, they had become so insistent on wanting to engage with me while bashing most of my work, my values or the few aspects of my identity that I've shared online.

It would be easy to say I just don't give them the time of day or any of my energy, or that I pretend they don't exist, because, if I do, then the trolls win. But that would be lying. Obviously.

Screaming to the void/a pillow or ranting to friends have helped get rid of my anger and frustration. I've laughed with others about some comments I got (usually the bad faith ones, some of them are funny in how sad/bad they were). I think what worked best for me was just turn off the computer and go outside for a bit. Or turned off the internet and play silly games on my phone. Or picked up a book. Or watch a movie. Essentially, any activity that would distract me from it and force me to take a break. And when none of this worked, because some trolls are just that insistent, blocking/deleting stuff*. *unfortunately, it's not always possible, see second paragraph again.

It does suck that you're kinda forced to grow a thicker skin to enjoy or even exist in those spaces, and I wish those would be friendlier... but I don't think social platforms/the internet is going in that direction anytime soon.

Maybe not super helpful to your decision, but borogove.io hosts IF games (without ratings or comments, though people can download the files), so does the IFDB through the IFArchive (but there are ratings/reviews there, also can be downloadable). I've seen other peeps host their stuff on neocities (no ratings/comments). None of those platforms are like itch, in the positives or the negative. Or just be old school, and email stuff.

[astralleywright]

i apologize if this sounds insane because frankly it does. on deviantart, there's a sub-sect of fandom people that make posts of like, a fictional character angrily ranting at another fictional character in a giant PARAGRAPH of text explaining what they did wrong and telling them they should be ashamed of themself. that is legit what comes to mind whenever i see the six trillionth post in the tag about "OMG WHY DOESN'T BH TALK TO EACH OTHER!"

do not worry anon, I am extremely internet poisoned and have a vast knowledge of weird fandom habits. Idk if i've even seen that kind of post exactly, but I have certainly witnessed variations of the idea or the feelings behind it in many places across many fandoms. for all i roll my eyes abt excessive posting abt how good one is at Understanding Media i DO agree that getting mad at the characters and lecturing them for having flaws and doing the wrong thing is like, the lamest and least interesting way to discuss stories. its very boring when characters do not do these things!

i understand the impulse; stories are meant to make us feel things, including anger and frustration, and there are plenty of times characters i love have done stuff that, in the moment, genuinely upset me (and not on a meta, 'bad writing' level, which is different). i just think it's good to take that reaction, appreciate how it made you feel, and the fact that the writing or performance or story evoked a reaction from you, but to not let that be the end or even necessarily the beginning of your analysis of the hows and whys and thens of the situation.

there's a lot of things happening with the "why won't the hells talk to each other!" thing. ppl struggling, mentally and/or emotionally, with the extreme time dilation is a big one. i also think part of it is people approaching this one-camera improv show the way they would a scripted tv show, and possibly attributing more intentionality and significance to certain actions or reactions than the players did, or attributing decisions that may have been influenced by out-of-game factors exclusively to the hells. i get the frustration, bc i too want them to talk more often, but i think ppl getting outraged that the hells don't immediately follow up on every questionable action or percieved offense is. unserious. they're a little busy at the moment.