#there's so many freaking similarities in not just the painting itself but its conception

[thepythakorean]

parallels between the boy and the heron and this painting, plus general analysis

Arnold Bocklin, Island of the Dead. 1880

i want to preface this by saying i am by no means an art history nerd, i just happen to know some stuff about the background of this painting in particular.

as soon as mahito is sucked into the tower floor he is standing at the shore of an island surrounded by an endless ocean. he is dwarfed by a large set of golden gates that say something like "those who seek my knowledge shall perish" and an even taller forest of cypress trees. these features all frame a white dolmen (primitive tomb usually made of giant rocks stacked like below) that beckons to him.

this scene immediately struck me since it has so many of the visual elements of the painting. mahito is even framed in the foreground to be so very small approaching these giant, daunting structures just like the boat heading for the island in the painting. besides the tombs, the cypress trees are also traditionally associated with mourning and death at least in europe/the mediterranean. other ghibli movies have lavish european aesthetics tied to characters (howl, yubaba, etc.) but it feels particularly intimate here given that mahito's great granduncle, the creator and ruler of this world, is apparently european and can only pass on his role to a direct descendant. (btw not saying the gaudy european decor signature of howl and yubaba aren't important to their characterization, it def is! i'm just saying it stood out to me in this movie especially.) the cliffs full of stone entrance passageways are prominent later in the movie as himi takes mahito through the parakeet's domain, and interestingly, in the delivery room where natsuko is, there is another dolmen behind her (can't find pics since the movie hasn't been uploaded yet urgh).

the backstory to the painting continues to parallel to the events of the story! so there's 5 versions of this painting. the first three versions were painted in a cemetery close to bocklin's residence which was also full of white headstones and sculptures, and cypress trees. one of his infant children, one of many children he lost, was buried there. the one i posted above is the first/second-- while bocklin was working on the first, a the soon-to-be wife of a politician visited his studio, saw the wip, and commissioned her own version with the added white figure and coffin to commemorate her first husband who had just died of diphtheria. already somewhat similar to how mahito's mother died in the hospital fire (well. she died from the fire but presumably she was there because she was sick) and when his father shortly remarried. these were also added to the initial wip and stuck in later versions of the painting. bocklin later wrote to her, "you will be able to dream yourself into the world of dark shadows". the movie is also very dreamlike-- it's a fantasy world filled with strange creatures, alternate versions of people he knows, and passages that seem to alter the fabric of time and space. people also seem to forget about it as soon as they leave even after spending long periods of time in it like a dream. the painting is also very dreamlike, but why? the warm lighting, maybe not in the version i posted but in a couple others, may explain it, but the island itself resembles the curtains and stage of a theater (referencing the audio clip below the description). even if it doesn't look EXACTLY like that to you, it's definitely a too-perfect little scene in a nebulous expanse of space. this theatrical quality is also shown in the movie by the parakeet uprising side plot as well as the scene when himi and mahito collapse in front of the delivery room-- the curtain falls directly in front of the viewer over them as though a stageplay just ended. oh and a friend mentioned to me how this is a classic hero's journey plot and mirrors orpheus in the underworld. island of the dead has also directly inspired NUMEROUS other works of art, including other paintings, stage productions, and symphonic poems. apparently the painting was so popular many people in berlin hung prints of it in their homes (i do too)! as i stated above though, a lot of the visual elements in the painting were already traditional symbols relating to death so i don't want to 100% conclude that miyazaki was directly inspired by this painting, he may have just also resonated with those symbols independent of bocklin which i still think is awesome.

the first time we see himi also reminded me of the painting. she's wearing a white dress and standing at the bow of a small wooden boat, and though her intentions are to save the warawara from the pelicans, she inevitably kills some of them too. visually and thematically she's like the white figure at the front of the rowboat in the painting. she acts as a guide for mahito (analogous to the rower? he traveled to this world of his own volition but needed a guide) for a good part of the movie and is a collage of life and death. she is a younger but kind of omniscient version of his dead mother; she's known all along she is mahito's mother but is about to be born into the world by the end of the movie and accepts her fate happily. she can control fire which envelops her like how she died in the real world, but is harmless to the touch unless she directs it as a weapon, and as we see with the warawara and pelicans it helps creation but also destroys much like fire's role in the natural world. natsuko, though a separate person from himi, is still connected as a sibling, and we see her wandering into the forest at the beginning of the movie while wearing white like himi, back turned to mahito, and that is what prompts him to first enter the tower. the strange nature of her character that doesn't adhere to a proper time or space parallels the way the white figure completely stands out in the painting, at least the ones with darker lighting. another crazy parallel surrounding fire and wwii between the painting and the movie is that the fourth version of this painting was destroyed during wwii due to bombing, again like how mahito's mother's hospital was presumably set on fire by bombing during the war.

the looming effects of war alluded to throughout the movie eventually tie into its resolution, when mahito accepts his new family that he initially rejected, his own imperfect being, and the fact that one must seek out love to be happy in this bitch of a world. his great granduncle is confused as to why mahito wouldn't want to recreate his own world like him. why would you want to return to the world that killed your mother and rejects you as a person? the world that forces your people to die in war and will eventually drop the deadliest weapon mankind has ever seen even a century from now onto your home? you can make everything perfect here! he's created something of a "paradise" himself, full of lush tropical plants, parakeets, and strange insects (some of them looked like the bugs from nausicaa, another fantastical world of lush nature which is also threatened by war. interesting), almost like a garden of eden, and it so happens to be at the very top of the tower. funnily enough, bocklin also painted this several years later:

Arnold Bocklin, Island of Life. 1888

i don't know much about this one so idk if it's an explicit companion piece to the island of the dead but it certainly looks like it. the similarities are now less apparent to the movie if there are any, it's much less lush but there are exotic plants and uh birds and stuff. this is definitely more likely a case of shared inspiration from the symbols themselves rather than movie directly looking at the painting. anyway clearly the promise of a perfect paradise isn't real, as this is interrupted by a war of his own unwitting creation, the uprising of the parakeets he wanted to breed in a paradise that literally bring about the end of the world. no world will ever be perfect when left long enough to its own devices. life finds a way! plus, this world was created through so much death (the construction workers in hazardous conditions, the way the tower keeps spiriting people away. btw in the english sub mahito's dad calls the whole ordeal a "disappearance" but he says "kamikakushi" in japanese which means "hidden by god" in reference to people who mysteriously disappeared as if from supernatural circumstances and yes that's the word they used in the japanese title of spirited away!!!) and is on the verge of collapsing from reality every three days just because of some building blocks?? the real world may be on fire but it'll go out/burn less badly someday, and at least it won't completely disappear in a snap, not in an easily imagined timescale for a human anyway. it's up to you to make the best of it, and this is what mahito decides. there are also visual allusions to other ghibli movies about the constantly present threat or consequences of war. the only other landmark aside from the island mahito lands on is a line of ships which kiriko later tells him are all fake. it immediately reminded me of the stream of planes in porco rosso which were the souls of dead fighter pilots moving on. the shadow people in the swamp were also reminiscent of those in the train in spirited away, which are never explained to my knowledge but the given that spirited away's characters are largely spirits and the way souls are so similarly designed in this movie makes me feel that they were also souls of people in spirited away.

through this imagined otherworld, there is also the blurring of lines between life and death, reality and imagination. himi plus her dyad with natsuko (they're sisters AND they look exactly the same AND both are mother figures to mahito) are great examples of this. mahito's mother is gone, he knew this and set foot into the world anyway. he rejected natsuko as his new mother but in going through the struggles of the tower he comes to accept familial love for her and even keeps confusing "natsuko" and "mom" while reaching out to her in the delivery room. a family is made up of different people but inevitably you will see each other in each person. in the delivery room scene we see the paper hanging from the ceiling lash out to attack and stick to mahito like tape, it even leaves red marks on him. this is one of the best scenes in the movie to me because of its visual contrast to him rushing to save his mother in the fire. in the fire scene, the real world around him is blurred and distorted and at times so is mahito and especially his mother. the fire doesn't seem to burn him or his clothes (i could be remembering that wrong tho) and the scene cuts off before it shows him possibly going in further. in the delivery room, everything is drawn with clean lineart, no stylization. there is no mistaking the reality of this situation even though this world is conjured, the dawning realization upon mahito that this person is his mother is so visceral that he actively fights through the paper literally snapping its jaws and natsuko spitting her hatred towards him. when mahito is ready to leave the tower, himi leaves through a separate door to be born as his mother sometime in the past though she is not a warawara and knows what has happened/will happen, an exception that further demonstrates the nonlinear nature of time and space in the movie.

after coming out of the tower, the heron tells mahito he should forget everything that happened in there. even his grandmother seemed to have forgotten the whole year she spent in there (it seems like tower time reflects irl time judging by the events of the movie). anything that comes out doesn't just disappear, it transforms into a real-life counterpart as we saw with the pelicans leaving as they were (presumably minus the ability to speak) and the parakeets going from big bloodthirsty things to regular parakeets. so mahito can't just forget, especially because he comes out changed from his experiences in there, not just himself personally but also his changed relationships with natsuko and the heron, and also his little souvenirs. then the movie abruptly ends with mahito narrating that they left for tokyo again shortly after the war ended. i like to think that this was a hopeful ending where mahito maintained that character development and was able to welcome natsuko and his new sibling into his family while being able to seek more friends and family in the future. i've seen other analyses talking about how this movie was semi-autobiographical for miyazaki and i can see it, how events early in his life shaped his personality and how he had to fight to find beauty in a world that otherwise treated him poorly, so i'm glad he ended the movie on that note, although in less words. pretty similar to how spirited away ended, although there was arguably more loss involved, but still hopeful, and that's what i find so powerful about this movie. and like this movie, spirited away involves a dyad between yubaba and zeniba as a device for the hardships and beauty of life, how they're not so discreet at times. as a last kindasorta tie-in to bocklin's work, i'll point again to the island of life which was created after the island of the dead, plus a composition directly inspired by the island of the dead, a symphonic poem with the same title written by sergei rachmaninoff. the last time i listened to this was in high school and it's like. 20 minutes long so i'm too impatient to give it a relisten now but from my vague recollection plus some quick searches it's a very somber piece that escalates into emotional climaxes yet still contains warmer tones, and goes back to the same "rowing" motif at the end. it weaves together evocations of life and death in one piece, also illustrating how the two really are so closely connected.

tl;dr, this was me the entire movie because miyazaki SEEMS to be heavily inspired by this one symbolist painting i happen to like a lot:

also also here's a self portrait of bocklin:

yes, all of his paintings are that cool.

[aion-rsa]

How Black Mirror Embraced Its Horror Potential with Playtest

https://ift.tt/31rDHKg

Monster specialist Grant Walker of award-winning VFX studio Framestore was excited when he received an offer to work on an episode of sci-fi anthology Black Mirror’s third season. But the nature of the job, for an episode called “Playtest”, proved to be an unexpected one.

“I thought: ‘they want to make monsters for Black Mirror? I don’t get it,’” Walker says.

Through two seasons and six episodes on Channel 4, the monsters of Black Mirror were largely metaphorical and unseen, signals and dispatches from mobile devices in a dubiously fictional world. Then the show was picked up by Netflix, which quickly commissioned a six-episode third season. Among those six episodes was “Playtest,” an hour starring Wyatt Russell (Lodge 49), Wunmi Mosaku (Lovecraft Country), and Hannah John-Kamen (Ant-Man and the Wasp). When that episode premiered on Oct. 21, 2016 it looked quite different from any other Black Mirror installment before it.  

In “Playtest,” the monsters of Black Mirror became literal with a grotesque human-spider hybrid and a shrieking flayed-faced zombie terrorizing Russell’s character Cooper Redfield as he playests the latest virtual reality videogame from a legendary game studio SaitoGemu. Though it all may be happening in Cooper’s head, the monsters created by Framestore are no less real to the viewer. That makes “Playtest” something truly unique in the Black Mirror canon. This is the one installment of the show’s 22’s entries that is undeniably, unapologetically horror. And four years to the day after its premiere, it still stands tall in the Black Mirror canon among the creative individuals who crafted it.

“I wasn’t expecting to do it. Then it just kind of just snuck in there, and it ended up being the highlight of my year,” Walker says of his BAFTA-nominated work on the episode.

“Playtest” director Dan Trachtenberg came to the project directly after the release of his film debut, thriller 10 Cloverfield Lane. Like Walker, he was pleasantly surprised that Black Mirror was set to expand its genre influences. 

“I remember that was the big draw for Charlie (Brooker). He was really excited about making essentially Evil Dead 2. And I was excited to continue to do that kind of work and I felt like I was sharpening a tool that I hadn’t yet fully sharpened,” Trachtenberg says. 

Trachtenberg and creator Charlie Brooker bonded over a shared love of both horror and videogames and quickly got to work fine-tuning Brooker’s concept into a lean horror machine. 

“What evolved the most was probably Wyatt Russell’s character,” Trachtenberg says. “Initially, the character was much more of an ugly American. There’s still that quality to him, but there’s a lovability and a naivete to Wyatt’s performance that informs the gravity of some of the things that he’s dealing with. In initial drafts, it was more like one of the horror movie terms of the unlikable person who is put through a gauntlet to learn to have values.”

The first third of “Playtest” serves to set up the improbable circumstances that would lead a young American man to a creepy manor in the British countryside to playtest a VR horror videogame from a Japanese gaming giant. It all starts with Cooper out on a sprawling world tour, traveling to India, Dubai, Spain, and more before arriving in London at the tail end of his journey. When it’s time to finally return home, Cooper discovers that his bank account has been hacked and he’s unable to buy a return plane ticket. Thankfully SaitoGemu is in London working on its latest horror game and it’s willing to pay for some willing playtesters. That’s how Cooper makes his way to the opulent and spooky Harlech House where lead designer Shou (Ken Yamamura) and the team are hard at work creating the next great VR horror adventure.

If this seems like a lot of exposition before Cooper engages with the horrors of the haunted mansion, there’s a method to Black Mirror’s madness. Much of what Cooper experiences prior to entering Harlech House informs the horrors that he sees. One prominent example includes Cooper watching a movie on his flight about a monstrous spider and then encountering a terrifying spider of his own later on. There’s also a poster for Red Sonja, which foreshadows the moment that a specter of Cooper’s sex buddy Sonja (Hannah John-Kamen) enters the simulation and has her face torn off, revealing the crimson skull beneath. 

“When (Cooper) kills that evil Sonja and slams her head onto the knife and through his shoulder that is (the position that) they woke up that morning. It’s kind of like in dreams, the way things are affecting you while you’re sleeping and then they show up later inside what you’re imagining,” Trachtenberg says.

The rest of “Playtest’s” dream sequences are positively bursting with similar dream imagery and Easter eggs that fans have done an excellent job of documenting over the years. Trachtenberg is fond of some of the subtler ones.  

“There’s a typical, classic creepy girl in the painting in a creepy house, and the girl in the painting is the girl that he’s sitting next to in the airplane in the beginning. Everything you see in act one populates in act two and three,” the director says.

Once the horrors of “Playtest” get going, however, there is nothing subtle about them. And that’s where Framestore’s work comes in. Walker and his team were charged not only with creating a small, realistic spider that sets off the hallucination, but also a monstrous version with the human visage of his childhood bully Josh Peters.

“I played around with quite a lot of different iterations of where to put the face, and how to change the anatomy of the spider and the body,” Walker says. “The mandible things, they were coming out of his mouth at one point, and then they returned into part of his mouth opened up in the way that it does. I don’t know if people notice it or not, but those legs are hands with long nails. They’re like fingers. It’s got a belly button underneath it and other weird stuff that you might not ever get to see.”

The undead version of Sonja was a combination of practical and visual effects, with Walker’s team serving to make the terrifying red skull “gooier” for the most part. 

“That was a tricky one. It was one of those ones when you spend a lot of time actually just massaging the integration so it feels tangible as opposed to kind of making this standalone thing and investing time in an amazing asset. She wasn’t quite so shiny, so we built our own CG version, and some shots were CG and layered on the top.”

The effects for Spider-Peters and Red Sonja had to be particularly on point as they are a product of Cooper’s brain and not merely SaitoGemu’s VR technology. As attentive viewers of Black Mirror know, “Playtest” actually “ends” roughly 20 minutes in when Cooper receives a phone call from his mom in the secure playtest area. The signal from his phone, which was supposed to be off and secured in a suitcase, fries the “mushroom’s” connection to Cooper’s brain and kills him almost instantly. Everything that follows is the product of his dying brain and not the work of SaitoGemu’s machine. This information, of course, isn’t revealed until episode’s end and as such Brooker maintains that it’s one of the most misunderstood endings in Black Mirror history. 

“If there’s misunderstandings of it, I’m probably to blame, which may be why Charlie is cleaning it up,” Trachtenberg jokes. “But frankly, every reaction video that I’ve watched I feel like people usually do get it. There’s even a clip where someone put what actually happened, where they cut out the entire second that they just show that scene as if that’s all that happened, which is fun to watch.”

Read more

TV

Black Mirror: Ranking Every Episode

By Alec Bojalad

The best episodes of Black Mirror are never about how technology will torment humanity. They’re about how humanity will use new technology to continue to torment ourselves. And nowhere is that more apparent than in “Playtest.” The episode sets up a scenario in which a VR experience will go haywire, but then in reality it is Cooper’s brain that betrays him, not the machine. It’s Cooper’s conscience that takes him on this terrifying freak show of monsters and murderers and then dies before the game even begins. It’s the proverbial “flashes before your eyes” moment in which that flash is a literal horror movie.

“I do find it interesting how devastating that notion is for so many – that it could all happen in a split second,” Trachtenberg says. “We definitely went back and forth so much on the ending. And I certainly don’t love too many twists as well, I just felt the initial twist was the expected one and I wanted there to be something more. I really wanted to drive home that it’s his fault in the end and tie in the fear of inheriting what his father had.”

Though the monsters of “Playtest” offer up the biggest scares, it’s approach to horror is deeper, more existential. Cooper’s real biggest fear is forgetting who he is, just like his father did before his end. And the mechanism that ultimately kills him isn’t any malevolent entity within the game or SaitoGemu, it’s simply his inability to connect with his mother during a difficult time in their lives. 

Cooper is quite the keen observer of his surroundings in Harlech House, despite being dead.  During one moment in particular, Cooper opens up a cupboard door to find a bottle of (non-alcoholic) wine and before he closes the cabinet he says aloud to his handler Katie (Mosaku) “He’s going to be right behind this door when I close it, isn’t he?” referring to the shade of Josh Peters. And of course, Cooper is right – just a little delayed, as the spider version of Peters that launches itself across the kitchen shortly after he closes the cabinet.

Characters in horror movies being self-aware about the “rules” of horror is nothing new in our highly metatextual pop culture landscape. But identifying the “cupboard” rule is still quite impressive. According to Trachtenberg, acknowledging the legacy and tactics of horror is an important part of any horror enterprise.

“There’s a scene in I Know What You Did Last Summer with these two characters talking in a car. The frame they’re on is the extreme side, and the entire other two-thirds of the frame of negative space is the window; and you just know that someone or something is going to jump inside that part of the frame. It’s about riding the wave of tension then releasing it. (With the cupboard scare) the audience has the sensation of, ��Uh-oh, it’s going to happen here?’ Then Cooper calls it out and the audience thinks, “Oh there. That’s what it is.’ Now that they’re not expecting it, we can actually still surprise.”

“Playtest” could have been a lot more meta than just as a mere horror critique. At one point, Brooker planned to have a “Nightmare Mode” version of the episode available on Netflix’s streams, in which viewers could revisit it and get a new horror experience. If that sounds like the choose-your-own adventure nature of the eventual special Black Mirror: Bandersnatch, it’s because it is … right down to the focus on videogames. 

Trachtenberg says Netflix wasn’t ready to take on the technological burden of such a concept in 2016. 

“Charlie is a huge gamer, as am I. We talked a lot about, ‘wouldn’t it be awesome if we could pull off alternate endings or an alternate beat, or could there be connections to other episodes that you only see if you clicked on this button or whatever. I think he really tried with Netflix at that moment and there just was no technology for it.”

Being on the bleeding edge was something of a trend for “Playtest.” Many Black Mirror episodes are known for their uncanny predictive abilities (right down to the truly insane real life rumor of a British Prime Minister allegedly sexually defiling a pig). “Playtest,” meanwhile, preceded a run of truly excellent horror games (including one literally called “P.T.” for “Playtest”) and a modest increase in the popularity of VR technology. But four years on from the episode, Trachtenberg doesn’t feel as though culture is fully embracing the tech’s potential.

“VR was around when we were shooting. And it’s gotten much better since but I think we all felt like AR was definitely going to take over. I still feel that eventually. You just have to try it to know how amazing it is. But still … I would have thought that would have taken over sooner.”

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

Perhaps that’s the real legacy of “Playtest.” It’s the one episode of Black Mirror that wasn’t cynical enough about our reliance on technology…despite killing its lead character with a phone 20 minutes in. 

The post How Black Mirror Embraced Its Horror Potential with Playtest appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3jiM2pI

[machetelanding]

For more than a decade, despite the increase in domestic population, the number of movie admissions sold has stalled. For some time that fact was papered over. Premium pricing through gimmicks such as 3D and IMAX were at least able to increase annual box office revenues (a bit). Nevertheless, the movie business is no longer a growth business, and 2017 is beginning to look like the year when the industry will have to finally come to terms with that.

Globalism was supposed to save Hollywood. The exact opposite ended up being the case. The worldwide audience became the tiger held by the tail; for the global village is one that demands shockingly expensive spectacle, which means huge investments, all-in gambles, that cannot begin to see a profit until $600 to $700 million in tickets are sold.

Worse still, leftwing filmmakers were counting on these oh-so sophisticated internationales to make political diatribes profitable, to appreciate their cinematic calls for multiculturalism, moral equivalence, anti-Americanism, and statism. Whoops! Turns out the rest of the world is even more addicted to mindless escapism than us rubes.

And so, over the last ten years Hollywood slowly painted itself into a corner, where at the expense of everything else, only $250 million franchises, low-budget horror, animated films, and raunchy R-rated comedies can make any money. But today about half those franchises are flaming out and R-rated comedies are in a coma.

Oh, there will always be movies. But let's face it, other than the pretentious, wankfest indies America's foo foo critics pretend to like and the thrilling exceptions that used to be the rule — Dunkirk, Baby Driver — going to the movies anymore is like going to Six Flags; an expensive ride on the latest CGI rollercoaster, something that is no longer about affirming the soul or a relaxing good time. Instead of coming together to explore our shared human condition, we buckle in to overload the senses.

Anyway, let's look at all the suicidal mistakes made by the film industry…

1. The Death of the Movie Star

The men who made Hollywood — the Selznicks, Warners, Mayers, Cohns, Goldwyns, Thalbergs, Zanucks, Schencks, Zukors, Laskys and Laemmles — quickly figured out that the movie star was the key to the world. Not just to box office success, but the key to shaping our culture, fashion, politics, Americanism, and even our humanity.

And so it was until the 1990s. Believe it or not, we used to go and see Eddie Murphy movies, Sylvester Stallone movies, and Goldie Hawn movies. We liked Harrison Ford and trusted his choices. We loved Chevy Chase and trusted his choices. This reality was good for everyone because you didn’t need $250 million in computer effects to put butts in seats. All you needed was Bruce Willis or Steven Seagal or Sigourney Weaver. All you needed was John Candy trying to get it right or Kathleen Turner merely showing up.

Fearing their $20 million salaries and growing power, Hollywood killed the movie star. But without the face on the poster selling tickets, all that's left to sell is the narcotic of CONCEPT, which must get bigger and bigger and more expensive in order to feed the fix.

2. Partisan Politics

Movies have always been political, have always had something to say. But it used to be that for every leftwing High Noon you had a response in the form of Rio Bravo. And look at what this healthy competition created — two masterpieces, both of which are political as opposed to partisan or divisive.

Today, movies and actors go out of their way to create ill-will through insulting and divisive commentary that attacks more than half the country. Sure, in their time, John Garfield, Humphrey Bogart, Charlie Chaplin, Katherine Hepburn and many others were leftwingers who advocated for their respective causes. But they had class. They never insulted or demeaned those who disagreed with them. Creative giants, leftists such as John Huston, Orson Welles and Elia Kazan, managed to have their say without throwing poop.

And that is all the difference in the world.

Insulting your own customers is not only bad business, it cannot begin to make up for a deficit of talent.

3. The Death of Censorship

Just because I believe that certain things should be legal — porn, getting drunk, loveless sex, homosexuality — that does not mean I believe those things are healthy for our society. Quite the contrary. I side with freedom because the messy and oftentimes tragic results of freedom are almost always preferable to the result of government control (see: Obamacare).

The same goes for censorship. I'm not for any form of movie censorship, but that doesn't mean I'm unaware of how lifting censorship, removing all barriers, has greatly diminished the art form of the motion picture.

There are exceptions (DePalma, Scorsese) where excess can be in and of itself art, but for the most part the depth, creative energy and artistic breakthroughs required to find another way through subtext are almost always preferable to text.

Had Alfred Hitchcock been allowed to get his full freak on, does anyone believe Psycho, Rear Window, North by Northwest, Vertigo, Strangers On a Train, Notorious, Rebecca, or Rope — all violent films stewing in sexual, and sometimes homosexual subtext, would be anywhere near the classics they are today?

Almost always, limits benefit art. There are no limits today and creative laziness is the result. For this reason, movies are not even sexy anymore.

4. The Leftwing Sycophants Who Cover the Movie Business

Whether it is Deadline, The Hollywood Reporter or Variety, whether it is pretty much every critic you read at Rotten Tomatoes, the people whose job it is to cover the movie business are almost all leftwing Social Justice Warriors, all sycophants who refuse to challenge the status quo or speak truth to power.

Yes, there are people on the political right like myself who sometimes cover these things, but we are all on the outside looking in. The publications within the bubble, however, are all bubbled themselves, and all about protecting the bubble. The only time they raise a fuss is when Hollywood is not leftwing enough — We need more homosexual movies! We need more trans movies! We need more women and minorities! We need more Stephen Colberts! Trump is icky!

A perfect example was published over the weekend when two new movies released on more than 3,000 screens tanked. The franchise wannabe Dark Tower failed to clear $20 million; the oh-so topical and critically-lauded Detroit lit itself on fire with $7 million.

But how did Deadline spin these dual duds…

For the second weekend in a row, Sony figured out a way to work around the Rotten Tomatoes system to get a lackluster title to open. Last weekend, it was the Emoji Movie, which posted an OK $24.5M in second. This weekend, it’s their Media Rights Capital co-production The Dark Tower, which is taking No. 1 with a modest take estimated at $19.5M. …

Call it what you will, but it’s distribution’s job to open a movie. In the case of Sony, they held back reviews as late as they could for Dark Tower and Emoji Movie and got them started so they could last the rest of the month. Again, not a wondrous result with Dark Tower, but here it sits in first place.

It gets worse…

Kathryn Bigelow’s Detroit from Annapurna, despite having the best reviews and audiences scores out of this weekend’s wide entries – respectively with an 88% certified fresh and A- CinemaScore – didn’t find that love spill over into its opening weekend, which looks to settle at $7.25M. Not a fantastic start for a movie which cost between $35M-$40M. …

Once moviegoers leave Detroit, they’re amazed. The trick for Annapurna is to keep word-of-mouth alive[.] … We hear the original 20 runs of Detroit held quite well.

For the sake of context, let's look at this very same Deadline writer's analysis of a movie that opened in January of 2016. Both Detroit and 13 Hours are topical, controversial, and political. Both are modestly-budgeted ($40 million for Detroit; $50 million for 13 Hours), but that is where the similarities end.

13 Hours, Michael Bay's Benghazi story, is aimed at conservative Middle America. Detroit is aimed at the Black Lives Matter crowd.

13 Hours opened cold in only 2,389 theaters. After a limited run to boost publicity and word of mouth, Detroit opened in a whopping 3,007 theaters.

Over at Rotten Tomatoes, critics buried 13 Hours with a miserable 50% rating. Critics lauded Detroit with a 88% fresh rating. Nevertheless…

13 Hours opened to much, much better $16.5 million 3-day when compared to Detroit's miserable $7.3 million 3-day opening.

And yet…

This weekend Paramount launched Michael Bay’s 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi, drawing more noise from the CIA, Republicans and Democrats than moviegoers with a middling 4-day opening of $19M.

But despite audiences embracing the Michael Bay film with an A CinemaScore, bureaucrats have had a heyday kicking 13 Hours around like a political football. And it’s never good when partisan factions get their hands around a movie. Such squabbling is one of the chief factors seen in 13 Hours coming in under its $20M-$23M four-day projection.

This sort of partisan spin and wishcasting from those who should be telling cold truths is part of what's destroying a cowardly and out of touch film business desperate for any kind of affirmation that encourages them to never change.

5. The Death of the Women's Movie

After the studio system gasped its last in the mid-60s, the leftists of New Hollywood took over, and while they had an incredibly creative 10-year run, these oh-so progressive leftists also killed the women's picture.

In the hands of leftist Hollywood, in the hands of a Hollywood where more women and feminists are in charge than ever before, how freakin' pathetic is it that a Wonder Woman is a revelation, a cultural epoch, a record scratch in Hollywood history.

Sorry, but no it's not.

When patriotic right-wingers ran Hollywood, when those stodgy, old and backwards "sexist" conservatives were in charge, up on that big screen, women enjoyed real equality. They were goddesses — tough and beautiful, independent and accessible, whip-smart and classy, in charge and selfless, sexy and decent.

The list is endless… Garbo, Davis, Crawford, Grable, Stanwyck, Simmons, Kerr, Hayworth, Lamar, Hepburn, Rogers, Colbert, Bergman, Bacall, de Havilland, Fontaine, Hayward, Taylor, Dietrich, Loren, Lombard, Garland, Loy, O'Hara, Pickford, Harlow, Day, Monroe, Kelly, Gardner, Leigh, Swanson, Holliday, Grahame, Reynolds, Neal, Saint, Caron, Wyman, Wood, Tierney, Darnell, Goddard, Grier and Arthur.

What do we have today? An aging and increasingly unappealing Meryl Streep and a whole host of cookie cutter babes (many of whom look like 14-year-old boys) all-too eager to degrade themselves, to act like sexist men. Hollywood uses these girls for nothing less than chum, and every year wonders why they can't find even five decent choices to fill the Best Actress category.

Oh, yeah, you've really come a long way, baby.

6. A Bubble That Has Lost Touch With the Audience and Now Makes Crap

The movie industry has lost complete touch with its audience. Gone are the talent scouts looking to build a farm club by spreading out across the country in search of The Next Big Thing. Instead it is an incestuous bubble that only reproduces within the family, within the rarified zip codes of Manhattan and Los Angeles.

7. The Death of Comedy

What in the world happened to the family comedy? The romantic comedy? The high school comedy? The ethnic comedy? The guy comedy? The snobs vs. slobs comedy? The stick-it-to-the-man comedy?

I'm no prude. I love The Hangover and American Pie. But every comedy today is man-boys and their body fluids, gross-out and heartless.

I don’t want to walk out of a theater feeling like I need a shower. And judging by the endless string of R-rated flops, we are all tired of this soul-killing garbage.

8. The New Production Code Is Much More Stifling Than The Old One

The old Production Code that guided the movie business throughout much of the golden era was more about how content like sex, violence and human sexuality was presented. In other words, these topics were not placed off limits. Hitchcock was allowed to make clear that Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint did it, he just couldn’t show them doing it; Hitchcock could make clear Martin Landau and James Mason were homosexual lovers, he just couldn’t show it.

Today's Production Code is an unspoken one. Nevertheless, it is much more fascist and creatively stifling than its predecessor because you cannot work around political correctness, you cannot turn text into subtext when certain subjects are placed completely off limits. For instance, unless you are black, you are no longer allowed to tell certain stories. A movie that told the truth about transsexuals being mentally ill could not be made today. Certain special interest groups cannot be satirized today. Conservatism cannot be portrayed as having any good ideas today. Every Western must apologize to the Indians. The list is endless and grows by the day. Just look at this stupid controversy surrounding HBO's Confederacy.

You can argue that anyone can make any movie they want. Sure. And that was true back in the studio era. But within the system, within the mainstream, you risk the same thing you did in 1955 — being blacklisted, shunned, and personally destroyed.

9. An Expensive Bad Time

With insanely high ticket and concession prices, movies are no longer accessible to millions of Americans. Like major league baseball, the theater experience is not only expensive but becoming more and more elitist, with high-priced luxury theaters becoming their own form of skyboxes.

For those of us who do gamble a hard-earned $80 for family night, we are forced to deal with the stress of theaters that do not police the talkers and texters; we are forced to gamble all that cash on an industry with a 15% success rate when it comes to producing a satisfying product.

Pathetic.

[daemon-not-a-demon]

Hello, Sophia and Elijah! Yesterday Cass (my dæmon) and I decided to reread The Magician’s Nephew—the first book in The Chronicles of Narnia (as I’m sure you know are by C.S. Lewis).

   We’d gotten to about page 23 when we saw the following:

“

“The Atlantean box contained something that has been brought from another world when our world was only beginning.”

“What?” asked Digory, who was now interested in spite of himself.

“Only dust,” said Uncle Andrew.

“

   Cass and I pretty much freaked out. Other worlds? Dust? Dust from other worlds?

   Of course, it wasn’t capitalized, but it might as well have been. We continued reading, this time with considerable more excitement:

“

“Fine, dry dust. Nothing much to look at.

“

—this part was somewhat unhappier; Dust is described as beautiful, after all, and being invisible to the naked eye (but of course maybe The Magician’s Nephew is set in a different universe than one presented in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and the people from there can actually see Dust, but see it differently?)—

“

Not much for a lifetime of toil, you might say. Ah, but when I looked at that dust (I took jolly good care not to touch it) and thought that every grain had once been in another world—I don’t mean another planet, you know; they’re part of our world and you could get to them if you went far enough—but a really Other World—another Nature—another universe—somewhere you would never reach even if you traveled through the space of this universe forever and ever—a world that can only be reached by Magic—well!”

“

   By now we were absolutely reeling. Doesn’t that sound familiar?

   In fact, it’s the exact same base for the ‘Other Worlds’ theory in His Dark Materials. We can’t seem to recall when or where or who explained it initially, but it’s there, in one of the books, certainly.

   Funnily enough, there’s also a sort of place between the worlds—almost like Cittagazzè—in The Magician’s Nephew. Polly Plummer dubs it The Wood between the Worlds, and “It’s not the sort of place where things happen. The trees go on growing, that’s all.” 

    In a sort of way, Cittagazzè is the same—after all, nothing really happens, per say, kids are just kids and adults try to avoid the specters. There’s nothing going on.

    In the Wood, there are many different pools. These pools act in a manner similar to windows, except they’re just There—they can’t be made, as far as I know—and you can’t just go in and out as you please.

    For one, you need a ring to get to the Wood. It’s described by Uncle Andrew as the ‘outward’ ring, and in the books is colored yellow. It was “stuff that wanted to get back to its own place, the in-between place”. You can use it at any time, any place, in any given world apart from the Wood itself.

   To get out of the Wood, you need to actually go into a pool, and you must have your green ring on, described as the ‘homeward’ ring (and incorrectly, too). The “stuff in the green ring is stuff that is trying to get out of its own place”, and it therefor gets you out. If you don’t, you’re stuck in the Wood.

   In later books, Cass reminded me, they don’t actually use Rings to get to Narnia. Most famously, the four Pevensies use a wardrobe in the second book, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe; in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Lucy, Edmund, and their cousin Eustace get in through a painting, and in The Silver Chair, Eustace and Jill enter through a door, unless we’re greatly mistaken.

    It can be noted how all three of these items could easily hide a window.

   The painting—of a sea—led them to a sea, on board a boat, also in a painting—the Dawn Treader. The wardrobe actually gave way to forest, disguised somewhat by the coats (also a nice nod to the beginning of The Golden Compass. Let’s just be glad Lyra didn’t get to Narnia), and an unopened door could hide all sorts of mysteries behind it. So who’s to say that none of these were actually just windows in disguise?

   The first book in The Chronicles of Narnia was finished in 1949; His Dark Materials were written in 1995. In other words, considering that they take place in relatively the same time period in which they were written (John Parry’s journal excerpts in The Subtle Knife were from1985; the book was published in 1997, which makes sense, seeing as Will is thirteen when the books take place), then by the time of The Last Battle, there are still open windows. However, they would’ve become closed by The Amber Spyglass (therefor making it impossible to get to Narnia).

    I’ve actually forgotten what our original point was. I reckon we just wanted to show it, I dunno.

    But it is interesting to think that, maybe, the subtle knife wasn’t the only way to get to another world. What if there were still rings? That meant anyone who got their hands on them could be perfectly able to get into another world. Wouldn’t that be an interesting concept? Just imagine!

    Have a great day/night, thanks for humoring us!

daemon-not-a-demon comment: DUUDDEEE!!!! This is legitametly (legitamately? legitimately? legit.) cool! I’ve always thought of Narnia and His Dark Materials as kind of being...enemies? Almost? Like one was made sort of in opposition of the other xD

BUT, these are some noticeable parallels and they’re really interesting! I’m not really sure what I’d say about it lmao but, followers, got anything?

[markxforother]

20 YEARS OF BUFFY, 10 FEMINIST LESSONS

Buffy The Vampire Slayer turns 20 years of age and as a massive fan who has been watching it since I was 10 years old, here are my top ten feminist lessons and moments from the show.

1. Self Reliance and the Strength Within.

One thing that Buffy as a show tackled well was the importance and downfall of being a self-reliant, independent woman in today’s world. What aided her in her defeat of her abusive vamp ex was also what isolated her from her friends and family. Buffy showed that whilst as a woman it is important to have friends and family but it is vital to draw from the strength within whilst also not being afraid to ask for help. 

Angelus: Now that's everything, huh? No weapons... No friends...No hope. Take all that away... and what's left? Buffy: Me.

2. Joyce - single mother extraordinaire

Joyce Summer’s was the single mother to Buffy and also Dawn (it’s a whole thing)

She was kind, caring and to a point, pretty understanding. She freaked out about Buffy losing her virginity and being a vampire slayer but throughout it all she was always there for her daughter. She squared off power hungry principals, vampires and even a killer slayer, she defended her child and she did it alone. She vowed to protect and love Dawn especially after finding out she wasn’t really her biological daughter and taught Buffy compassion and responsibility in a way she had never faced, despite saving the world numerous times. 

Her death contributed to one of the most heartbreaking tv episodes ever seen (and there’s a lot!) it was real, raw and not like anything television at that time had seen. It was a testament to her character and what she meant to Buffy, her friends and also to the show and its fans.

Joyce: You get the hell away from my daughter!

3. Women and Sexuality 

Buffy the Vampire Slayer pushed boundaries in many ways but one of the most important boundaries was that of the first lesbian sex scene on network television in America. Whilst some aren’t fans of using magic as a subtext of their relationship, Tara and Willow’s relationship grew in one of the most well rounded, healthy and honest relationships on the entire show. Willow’s gradual exploration and realisation of her sexuality is also important. Everyone regardless of how they define their sexuality comes to realise it and navigate it in different ways. 

The show also tackled straight female sexuality, from Buffy’s loss of virginity to who she thought was the right guy but turned nasty, to Kendra’s shy engagement with boys to Faith’s open and care free attitude, there was always a strong message that sex and sexuality was important and different for each female character in the show  and can mean different things at different times in your life. The main message for young women is, as long as your choices are healthy and make you happy, who really cares?!

Willow: ...and I think I’m kinda gay?

4. What it feels like to be just a girl. 

Buffy isn’t a natural superhero, from the film and the flashbacks she was a cheerleading prom loving girl who was Chosen and had her destiny forced upon her.

From the episode Prophecy Girl where Buffy finds out she’s going to die, to explaining what being a slayer is to her mother and lamenting on wanting to just paint her nails, Buffy struggles with what it means to have so much responsibility, face all the darkness in the world whilst just wanting to be a normal girl.

Whether its discrimination in the workplace, our right to abortions, sexual assault, maternity rights and all the problems women face, it can feel like the weight of the world is on our shoulders and that we are fighting daily battles and making sacrifices just to get by. 

But we’re all just girls, we all have dreams, hopes and aspirations. We all have silly things we do to make ourselves feel better and we all want to be loved and respected.

We all want equality for everyone and right now, to do that, we’ve got to keep slaying.

Kid: But you're... you're just a girl. Buffy: ....That's what I keep saying.

5. Male allies

The men in Buffy are definitely second fiddle but are vital. I’m going to start by admitting that re-watching the first couple of season of Buffy, Xander is a bit dick! Right got that out of my system, but just like the women in the show he grew and learnt and became the heart of the group. From his unwavering support of Buffy, his iconic pep talk with Dawn which makes me cry every time, to saving the world by reminding Willow of her humanity. Xander became the best friend you wish you had.

Giles became Buffy’s father figure quite early on in the series and accepted her for all her faults and never judged her for it. He jeopardised his job by standing up to the patriarchal system that made him her Watcher and pretty much tortured her, he was willing to die and kill for her and took all of her friends under his wing as well. 

It’s important to remind ourselves that Feminism is about equality so if you’re lucky enough to have male allies around you, appreciate their value and support.Yes, they are doing as they should but whilst they may benefit from it more that us, they are also victims of the Patriachy as well.  If they’re fighting to good fight and not intimated by your strength, I say hats off to you sirs!

Buffy: But this is all my fault.

Rupert Giles: No. I don't believe it is. Do you want me to wag my finger at you and tell you that you acted rashly? You did. And I can. I know that you loved him. And he has proven more than once that he loved you. You couldn't have known what would happen. The coming months are gonna be hard. I suspect on all of us, but if it's guilt you're looking for, Buffy, I'm not your man. 

All you will get from me  is my support. And my respect.

7. The Slayer, The Mother, The Geek, The Prom Queen, The Killer, The Demon, The Witch, The Key 

Labels are placed on women all the time and can feel suffocated by the expectations around that, where its mother, career women, whore, virgin, girly or tomboy, society rarely allows to be all these things or none. We have to fall into one group or another and if we try and mix them around we get called up on being contrary or worse - attempting to ‘have it all.’

You can label each one of the main women that make up the Buffyverse but each one defies its stereotype growing into complex and realised people, just like everyday women. 

Buffy was a peppy pretty girl with a secret and evolved to a maternal yet isolated warrior who had grown tired of the weight of being a Slayer, to finally embracing her role as a leader a teacher. Willow was a geek and also an all powerful witch, Faith was a killer but was also vulnerable, Anya was a demon who also was a doting girlfriend. 

Their stereotypes are fantasy extremes but each character was one thing at the start and something different by the end, they are real, three-dimensional women growing, learning, falling and rising up again.

Buffy: I'm cookie dough. I'm not done baking. I'm not finished becoming who ever the hell it is I'm gonna turn out to be. I make it through this, and the next thing, and the next thing, and maybe one day, I turn around and realize I'm ready. I'm cookies.

8. Misogyny can kill even the strongest of women

In one of the weaker seasons of Buffy, season 6 did however thrive in tackling the subject of misogyny.  After Buffy comes back from the dead, she is left feeling lost, alone and seeking sexual solace in Spike, a vampire. When she realises that their relationship isn’t healthy and that she’s been sleeping with him for all the wrong reasons, he doesn’t take it well. He in fact, tries to rape her. This is something that women all over the world face and this theme is furthered by her human nemesis Warren who is particularly sexist and when she asserts her physical strength over him/‘emasculating’ him, he responds by coming into her home, shooting her and killing Tara in the process.

Violence and sexual assault against women is a very real problem in society and no matter how much we tell girls to dress a certain way, to not ‘tease men’ and to ‘cater to their ego’ even the Slayer herself can be victim to a system that perpetuates an idea that women are at fault and men are left blameless. We need to stop this because also we don’t have Willow to turn evil and become a vengeful super witch. 

Willow: You never felt you had the power with her, not until you killed her. 

Warren: Women. You know, you're just like the rest of them. Mind games.

9. Diversity and Intersectionality are key

One of the downfalls of Buffy is its lack of diversity. Show runners have admitted it and done their best to learn from it with future shows paving the way for awesome characters like Zoe Washburne from Firefly and Melinda May from Agents of Shield who are both similar in characteristics to Buffy but also women of colour.  

But one way that the show tackled their shortcomings of diversity with previous characters was when we met The First Slayer. 

The First Slayer was an African woman kidnap and imbued her with demonic powers by 3 men who became The Watcher’s Council. 

Now she’s far from perfect and how the whole concept and how its portrayed is problematic as hell, one might even go as far to say that its pretty racist. 

But they could have easily made The First Slayer white, they could’ve made her ethnically ambiguous etc but by making her black they not only recognized the importance of race and Africa in The Slayer’s origins story but also the in human race itself. 

Here presence itself lead to the origins of other Slayers and Potential Slayers to be slightly more diverse and we see it full effect in the seventh and final season of Buffy The Vampire Slayer from dodging accents, varying sexualities, ethnicities, sub-cultures and general characteristics. The Potentials may also be terrible stereotypes but to some people (me in this case) when it comes to early forms of representing intersectional feminism, I’ll take what I can get.

Either way, Buffy as a character and the‘Wheddonverse’ in general are indebted to the First Slayer.

First Slayer via Tara: You think you know what's to come, what you are. You haven't even begun.

10. The Sisterhood

One thing I’ve always loved about Buffy the Vampire Slayer was the sisterhood. They may not all love each other and be best friends but when it came down to it, they had each others back. From Cordelia stepping up to fight the demons and even offering a vulnerable Buffy a ride home to Willow saving Anya’s life even when she had reverted to being a demon to even Faith proudly being by Buffy’s side in the final fight. Buffy’s friendships and female allies taught us that its important to have different types of women from different backgrounds and opinions and that each add value to your life. Female friendships can be challenging and complex in a world when were are constantly pitted against each other but more than ever its important to celebrate and covet what unites us. 

In the final episode Buffy decides to give up her title by having Willow make every potential slayer an actual Slayer, it’s final message of the show was using that sisterhood to pass on the power and strength to a new generation may it be potential slayers or our daughters and students because whilst we may have made progress, we still having many demons to fight.

Buffy: From now on, every girl in the world who might be a Slayer, will be a Slayer. Every girl who could have the power, will have the power. Can stand up, will stand up. Slayers, every one of us. Make your choice. Are you ready to be strong?

[whaq]

How Do You Write Like You're Running Out of Time: Hamilton and Me

I. Just You Wait

Hamilton was alright. Not the best opener is it? I’m not referring to the show, I meant the opener to this verbose verbal vomit. The musical was typical fare, all things considered. Lin Manuel Miranda is the farthest thing from a good singer. I believe anyone singing his praises should take a listen to his rendition of Jesus Christ Superstar’s Gethsamane. Talk about taking your shot… to the gut.

It still kinda baffles me how a show so unexpectedly and unremarkably unprovocative found such a huge cult following; the likes of which the musical world has yet to match since. Overlooking the novelty of a Founding Father finessing like the Fresh Prince, the musical fits the mold of presenting the concepts of rap and immigrants for the first time to the aristocratic white people (y’know the ones, they probably called it “hippity-hop” and are currently collecting their stimulus check amid the pandemic) who could actually afford it.

There’s a lot to be said when it comes to meta-textual analysis. Contrary to the marketing’s emphasis on “The Room Where It Happened” seemingly depicting a story meant to peek behind the curtain of politics, the eponymous song actually does present a better alternative to House of Bars (alternative jokes include: The West Side, Bars & Recreation, and The Fire).

II. The Room Where It Happens

There’s an element of mysticism that surrounds the number ‘The Room Where It Happens” thanks to the inconsistently charismatic narrator of the show: Aaron Burr (Sir--). With only the three gentlemen involved with that day’s events being in that room, much of the going-on’s details are shrouded in mystery. No servers, no stenographers, spies, nor sluts, to witness history in the making. It’s any wonder how history gets recorded at all! Question of the hour...

Hamilton’s downfall in the play, all leading up to his descent into the proverbial ‘Hurricane,’ would not be as impactful if not for his most precious desire. We’ve seen it first-hand, all politicians need to do during a scandal is to “talk less, smile more.” Although... $130,000 in hush money excluded from your tax returns should do the trick-- [President Obama complete remarks at 2015 White House Correspondents' Dinner (C-SPAN) 16:48 - 16:59] No, not if you want to protect your legacy.

III. Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story?

There are many perspectives on the subject of how one lives on well past their time on Earth, and Hamilton has its fair share. Aaron Burr references a fallen colleague of his being given a street named after him and how it makes his “legacy secure.” Making idols, commemorations, names on a parchment, the epitome of memorability. You may be gone, but your name remains physically engraved on plaques and local parks.

At first, it seemed like Alexander also subscribed to a similar outlook. By imprinting himself on literature, legislature, and ladies, he found a way to almost literally leave his mark on everything he’s had his hands on. Hell, the show left out the relevant factoid that his 2nd freaking son was his junior. He’d rather die than let the Hamilton name Burr away, and that’s exactly what he did.

That being said, it doesn’t take a keen eye to realize that the self-destructive behavior these men exhibit isn’t exemplary by any means. The play depicts the consequences of the paths these men take. Burr ends up being painted as an apolitical squirrel, Alexander a self-indulgent tomcat. While their legacies remain, they’re tarnished by shame. If these great men still strived and struggled to cement their legacies, then what chance do we have?

Many of us, if not most, will barely be but a footnote in history. We can’t all be president, the same book can’t be written twice, there is no solitary thought that has yet to be thought of. However, even with all this in mind, it never stops us from trying, does it?

We still attempt to paint like Gogh, write like Tolkien, or waste human space like 6ix9ine (this was written in July of 2020 and it was dated then too), for life has little meaning or value without purpose; that’s exactly what’s been on my mind: Who will tell my story if I have nothing to leave behind?

IV. Palaces Out of Paragraphs

How do others do it? How do they just snap their fingers and… well-- do? Do what, you ask? Nothing in particular, it is the act of doing that I refer to. With hustle culture being the trend, many people like me have found that making the most out of their existence is a more daunting task than it’s cracked up to be. When others are so good at doing, are you doing nothing in comparison?

I’m not one to judge others so I’ll only be doing so for myself: I believe I have not been doing anything productive with the time I’ve been given. Every waking moment of mine has been spent either attempting to maximize my time and energy to do something worthwhile or bereaving on the lack of my drive to execute. This, however, is obviously an uphill battle for me.

When everything , your mind, your body, and even yourself, are against you, the last tool in the arsenal of human perseverance is the ability to do what one wills. The phrase shouldn’t be “if there’s a will there’s a way,” for many of us have found ourselves in no-win scenarios. Instead the phrase should be “if there’s a will, there’s a way out.” And there is a way out of the rut that is dissatisfaction.

Most conflict within one’s self is the disconnect between our ideal self, who we want to be, and our actual self, who we currently are. One may find themselves longing to become a strong-willed scribbler of scripts like Hamilton, it takes no more than a glance at your reflection to see that, when the rose tint decays, you’re a sniveling Burr. This is where the pain stems from, my pain.

Ambition and reality will always be at odds with one another. When one desires to leap over skyscrapers, actuality reminds you that you can barely skip over an anthill. That’s kind of what has been bothering me. For years I’ve seen those capable of what I could only dream of doing, and that has always bothered me. Not my pride, but my sense of who I really am.

I desire to leave a legacy that depicts me as larger than my life, what I leave behind being greater than what I have done; a kingdom left prospering after my reign. My lofty aspirations extend to being renowned, and contract to being remembered fondly. But the sad reality for I, and many others like me, presents itself: we can’t all make leaps and bounds that impress, most people aren’t so easily enamored.

Not having this in mind has resulted in my complete inability to create and finalize. For a person with each of their toes dipped into a different pool of expertise, I can barely muster up the strength to continue to submerge, much less immerse, myself into any of them. Looking into the dark Mariana Trench of inadequacy one sees as their skillset will induce aquaphobia in many.

Beyond all pretension and rhetoric, my issue is this: I can’t make anything because I fear I will make nothing worth making. This is already the 5th rewrite of this maligned monotribe, that in and of itself exemplifies how I’m not quite past that hurdle. That being said, I’m looking forward to and deciding on taking steps to amend that.

V. Taking Back The Narrative

This text marks the beginning of another attempt at reinvention. With limit tests spanning over the course of two years, involving stressing the definitions of human minimums and maximums, I am content with commencing continued coercion with my consciousness (translation: I’m letting the process of improving continue despite my fear of the absence of such). I took back to writing once more because I needed something to stare at that convinced me I’m capable of the things I want to do, but also that there’s no rushing or forcing things.

It is honestly kinda silly how someone like me, who has made it their life goal to show that passion and wit is enough to get someone through the typical things in life like work, school, and relationships, had to be reminded of that very mission.

I’m not blessed with any genius in particular, and I’m not nerdy Casey Neistat who runs at the speed they can create meaningful and worthwhile content. Holding myself to higher standards was supposed to be a healthy way of preventing stagnation, not a destructive process to kill my motivation.

After going through the Hurricane of my own inner turmoil, realizing that being ‘Lucky to be Alive Right Now’ doesn’t have to come with survivor’s guilt, and that there is no such thing as ‘Running Out of Time,’ for all time cannot be wasted, I’m once again going back into the swing of things. Just like my last relaunches, all beginning with varying degrees of premature declarations, I’ll be doing the same right now.

I have made something

for all intents and purposes

I wrote my way out

[nahoo883]

It’s time to pay serious attention to TikTok

If you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you haven’t been paying attention. The short-form video app hailing from Beijing’s ByteDance just had its biggest month ever with the addition of 75 million new users in December — a 275 percent increase from the 20 million it added in December 2017, according a recent report from Sensor Tower.

Despite its rapid rise, there are still plenty of people — often, older people — who aren’t quite sure what TikTok is.

TikTok is often referred to as a “lip-syncing” app, which makes it sound like it’s some online karaoke experience. But a closer comparison would be Vine, Twitter’s still sorely missed short-form video app whose content lives on as YouTube compilations.

While it’s true that TikTok is home to some standard lip-syncing, it’s actually better known for its act-out memes backed by music and other sound clips, which get endlessly reproduced and remixed among its young users.

Its tunes are varied — pop, rap, R&B, electro and DJ tracks serve as backing for its 15-second video clips. But the sounds may also be snagged from YouTube music videos (see: I Baked You A Pie above), SoundCloud or from pop culture — like weird soundbites from Peppa Pig or Riverdale — or just original creations.

These memes-as-videos reference things familiar to Gen Z, like gaming culture (see below). They come in the form of standalone videos, reactions, duets, mirrors/clones and more.

The app has been growing steadily since it acquired its U.S.-based rival Musical.ly in November 2017 for north of $800 million, then merged the two apps’ user bases last August.

This gave TikTok the means to grow in Western markets, where it has attracted the interest of U.S. celebrities like Jimmy Fallon and Tony Hawk, for example, along with YouTubers on the hunt for the next new thing.

But unlike Vine (RIP), YouTube or Instagram, TikTok doesn’t yet feel dominated by micro-celebs, though they certainly exist.

Instead, its main feed often surfaces everyday users — aka, amateurs — doing something cute, funny or clever, with a tacit acknowledgement that “yes, this is an internet joke” underlying much of the content.

Okay, okay.

Sometimes these videos are described as “cringey.” 

But that’s because those of us trying to talk about TikTok are old(er) people who grew up on the big ol’ mean internet.

Cringey, frankly, is an unfair label, as it dismisses TikTok’s success in setting a tone for its community. Here, users will often post and share unapologetically wholesome content, and receive less mocking than elsewhere on the web — largely because everyone else on TikTok posts similar “cringey” content, too.

You might not know this, however, if your only exposure to TikTok comes from YouTube’s TikTok Cringe Compilations. But spend a day in the (oddly addictive) TikTok feed, and you’ll find a whole world of video that doesn’t exist anywhere else on the web — including on YouTube. Videos that are weird, sure — but also fun to watch.

It’s a stark comparison to the existing social media platforms.

Users today are engaged in the culture wars on Twitter (ban the Nazis! protect free speech!), while YouTubers are gaming the algorithm with hateful, exploitive, dangerous and otherwise questionable content that freaks out advertisers. And Facebook is, well, contributing to war crimes and the toppling of democracy.

Meanwhile, TikTok presents an alternative version of online sharing. Simple, goofy, irreverent — and frankly, it’s a much needed reset.

For example, some of the popular TikTok memes have included videos of kids proclaiming what a great mom they have, as they drag her into frame, or they remind people to pick up litter and conserve water. They might give themselves silly, but self-affirming makeovers where, afterwards, they cite themselves not as “cute” but rather “drop. dead. gorgeous.”

They might spend hours setting up gummy bears as Adele concert-goers, learning how to do a shuffle dance up a set of stairs or in a dance battle their dad. Or they may showcase some special talent — drawing, painting, gymnastics, dance or skateboarding, perhaps. They do science experiments, make jokes or use special effects for a little video magic.

They shout out “hit or miss!” in public places and wait to see who answers. (Look it up.)

Sometimes it’s dumb, Sometimes it’s clever. But it’s addictive.

Of course, it is still the internet. And TikTok isn’t perfect.

The app has also been the subject of troubling reports about its “dark” side, which is reportedly filled with child predators and teens bullying and harassing one another. It’s not clear, however, that TikTok’s affliction with these matters is any worse than any other large, social, public-by-default app of its size.

And unlike some apps, concerned parents — or the users themselves — can set a TikTok account to private, turn off commenting, hide the account from search, disable downloads, disallow reactions and duets and restrict an account from receiving messages.

It is concerning, however, that under-13 kids are setting up social media accounts without parental consent. (But, uh, have you seen Fortnite and Roblox? This is what kids do. At least the TikTok main feed isn’t worrisome, we’ve found.)

The bigger issue, though — and one that could ultimately prove damaging to TikTok — is whether it will be able to keep up with content filtering and takedown requests, or handle its security and privacy protection issues as it scales up.

Content and community aren’t the only things contributing to TikTok’s growth.

While Vine may have introduced the concept of short-form video, TikTok made video editing incredibly simple. You don’t need to be a video expert to put together clips with a range of effects. It’s the Instagram for the mobile video age — in a way that Instagram itself won’t be able to reproduce, having already aligned its community with influencers and advertisers.

TikTok’s sizable user base, meanwhile, is due not only to its growth in Western markets, but because of its traction in emerging markets like China and India.

This allowed TikTok to rank No. 4 worldwide across iOS and Android, combined, according to App Annie’s data on the most-downloaded apps of 2018. On iOS, TikTok was the No. 1 most-downloaded app of the year, mainly thanks to China.

At times last year, TikTok even ranked higher than Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube.

Both App Annie and Sensor Tower agree that TikTok scored the No. 3 position for most installs among all apps worldwide in 2018.

Now, TikTok is growing in India, says Sensor Tower.

The country accounted for 27 percent of new installs between December 2017 and December 2018, and last month was the source for 32.3 million of TikTok’s 75 million total new downloads — a 25x increase from last year.

Some of this growth comes from ad spend, according to a report from Apptopia, which examined the app’s widened use of ad networks. (It’s also driving people bonkers with its YouTube ads).

The revenue is starting to arrive, as well.

Worldwide, users spent $6 million tipping their favorite live streamers, a 253 percent year-over-year jump from December 2017’s total of $1.7 million, Sensor Tower estimates. But live streaming is not the default activity on TikTok — it added the feature after shutting down Musical.ly’s live streaming app, Live.ly.

Above: full-screen ad in TikTok when app is first launched; spotted today

Think this is the first real ad campaign I’ve seen on @tiktok_us. @kerrymflynn pic.twitter.com/zt3JcSYCz0

— chris harihar (@chrisharihar) January 26, 2019

Above: an ad appearing earlier this month

TikTok is also starting to test in-app advertising, and is being eyed by agencies as a result. When you launch TikTok, you may see a full-page splash screen ad of some kind — though the company has not officially launched ad products.

But the brands are starting to take notice. This week, for example, TikTok collaborated with SportsManias, an officially licensed NFL Players Association partner, for the introduction of NFL-themed AR animated stickers in time for the Super Bowl. The move feels like a test for how well branded content will perform within the TikTok universe, but the company says it’s “not an ad deal.”

The company also declined to say how many are today using TikTok.

However, parent company ByteDance had publicly stated last year that it had 500 million monthly active users when it announced the app’s rebranding post-merger. It has yet to release new numbers for its global user base.

That said, ByteDance just shared updated stats for China only, on all versions of the TikTok app (including the non-Google Play Android version). It says that TikTok now has 500 million monthly active users in China alone.

Sensor Tower today estimates TikTok has grown to nearly 800 million lifetime installs, not counting Android in China.

Factoring in those Android in China installs, it’s fair to say this app has topped 1 billion downloads.

Here comes the new new internet, folks. It’s big, dominated by emerging markets, mobile, video, meme-ified, and goes viral both online and off.

So if you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you may want to get started.

from TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2CTfM9f via IFTTT from Blogger http://bit.ly/2DJNNKZ via IFTTT

[readersforum]

It’s time to pay serious attention to TikTok

New Post has been published on http://www.readersforum.tk/its-time-to-pay-serious-attention-to-tiktok-2/

It’s time to pay serious attention to TikTok

If you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you haven’t been paying attention. The short-form video app hailing from Beijing’s ByteDance just had its biggest month ever with the addition of 75 million new users in December — a 275 percent increase from the 20 million it added in December 2017, according a recent report from Sensor Tower.

Despite its rapid rise, there are still plenty of people — often, older people — who aren’t quite sure what TikTok is.

TikTok is often referred to as a “lip-syncing” app, which makes it sound like it’s some online karaoke experience. But a closer comparison would be Vine, Twitter’s still sorely missed short-form video app whose content lives on as YouTube compilations.

While it’s true that TikTok is home to some standard lip-syncing, it’s actually better known for its act-out memes backed by music and other sound clips, which get endlessly reproduced and remixed among its young users.

Its tunes are varied — pop, rap, R&B, electro and DJ tracks serve as backing for its 15-second video clips. But the sounds may also be snagged from YouTube music videos (see: I Baked You A Pie above), SoundCloud or from pop culture — like weird soundbites from Peppa Pig or Riverdale — or just original creations.

These memes-as-videos reference things familiar to Gen Z, like gaming culture (see below). They come in the form of standalone videos, reactions, duets, mirrors/clones and more.

The app has been growing steadily since it acquired its U.S.-based rival Musical.ly in November 2017 for north of $800 million, then merged the two apps’ user bases last August.

This gave TikTok the means to grow in Western markets, where it has attracted the interest of U.S. celebrities like Jimmy Fallon and Tony Hawk, for example, along with YouTubers on the hunt for the next new thing.

But unlike Vine (RIP), YouTube or Instagram, TikTok doesn’t yet feel dominated by micro-celebs, though they certainly exist.

Instead, its main feed often surfaces everyday users — aka, amateurs — doing something cute, funny or clever, with a tacit acknowledgement that “yes, this is an internet joke” underlying much of the content.

Okay, okay.

Sometimes these videos are described as “cringey.” 

But that’s because those of us trying to talk about TikTok are old(er) people who grew up on the big ol’ mean internet.

Cringey, frankly, is an unfair label, as it dismisses TikTok’s success in setting a tone for its community. Here, users will often post and share unapologetically wholesome content, and receive less mocking than elsewhere on the web — largely because everyone else on TikTok posts similar “cringey” content, too.

You might not know this, however, if your only exposure to TikTok comes from YouTube’s TikTok Cringe Compilations. But spend a day in the (oddly addictive) TikTok feed, and you’ll find a whole world of video that doesn’t exist anywhere else on the web — including on YouTube. Videos that are weird, sure — but also fun to watch.

It’s a stark comparison to the existing social media platforms.

Users today are engaged in the culture wars on Twitter (ban the Nazis! protect free speech!), while YouTubers are gaming the algorithm with hateful, exploitive, dangerous and otherwise questionable content that freaks out advertisers. And Facebook is, well, contributing to war crimes and the toppling of democracy.

Meanwhile, TikTok presents an alternative version of online sharing. Simple, goofy, irreverent — and frankly, it’s a much needed reset.

For example, some of the popular TikTok memes have included videos of kids proclaiming what a great mom they have, as they drag her into frame, or they remind people to pick up litter and conserve water. They might give themselves silly, but self-affirming makeovers where, afterwards, they cite themselves not as “cute” but rather “drop. dead. gorgeous.”

They might spend hours setting up gummy bears as Adele concert-goers, learning how to do a shuffle dance up a set of stairs or in a dance battle their dad. Or they may showcase some special talent — drawing, painting, gymnastics, dance or skateboarding, perhaps. They do science experiments, make jokes or use special effects for a little video magic.

They shout out “hit or miss!” in public places and wait to see who answers. (Look it up.)

Sometimes it’s dumb, Sometimes it’s clever. But it’s addictive.

Of course, it is still the internet. And TikTok isn’t perfect.

The app has also been the subject of troubling reports about its “dark” side, which is reportedly filled with child predators and teens bullying and harassing one another. It’s not clear, however, that TikTok’s affliction with these matters is any worse than any other large, social, public-by-default app of its size.

And unlike some apps, concerned parents — or the users themselves — can set a TikTok account to private, turn off commenting, hide the account from search, disable downloads, disallow reactions and duets and restrict an account from receiving messages.

It is concerning, however, that under-13 kids are setting up social media accounts without parental consent. (But, uh, have you seen Fortnite and Roblox? This is what kids do. At least the TikTok main feed isn’t worrisome, we’ve found.)

The bigger issue, though — and one that could ultimately prove damaging to TikTok — is whether it will be able to keep up with content filtering and takedown requests, or handle its security and privacy protection issues as it scales up.

Content and community aren’t the only things contributing to TikTok’s growth.

While Vine may have introduced the concept of short-form video, TikTok made video editing incredibly simple. You don’t need to be a video expert to put together clips with a range of effects. It’s the Instagram for the mobile video age — in a way that Instagram itself won’t be able to reproduce, having already aligned its community with influencers and advertisers.

TikTok’s sizable user base, meanwhile, is due not only to its growth in Western markets, but because of its traction in emerging markets like China and India.

This allowed TikTok to rank No. 4 worldwide across iOS and Android, combined, according to App Annie’s data on the most-downloaded apps of 2018. On iOS, TikTok was the No. 1 most-downloaded app of the year, mainly thanks to China.

At times last year, TikTok even ranked higher than Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube.

Both App Annie and Sensor Tower agree that TikTok scored the No. 3 position for most installs among all apps worldwide in 2018.

Now, TikTok is growing in India, says Sensor Tower.

The country accounted for 27 percent of new installs between December 2017 and December 2018, and last month was the source for 32.3 million of TikTok’s 75 million total new downloads — a 25x increase from last year.

Some of this growth comes from ad spend, according to a report from Apptopia, which examined the app’s widened use of ad networks. (It’s also driving people bonkers with its YouTube ads).

The revenue is starting to arrive, as well.

Worldwide, users spent $6 million tipping their favorite live streamers, a 253 percent year-over-year jump from December 2017’s total of $1.7 million, Sensor Tower estimates. But live streaming is not the default activity on TikTok — it added the feature after shutting down Musical.ly’s live streaming app, Live.ly.

Above: full-screen ad in TikTok when app is first launched; spotted today

Think this is the first real ad campaign I’ve seen on @tiktok_us. @kerrymflynn pic.twitter.com/zt3JcSYCz0

— chris harihar (@chrisharihar) January 26, 2019

Above: an ad appearing earlier this month

TikTok is also starting to test in-app advertising, and is being eyed by agencies as a result. When you launch TikTok, you may see a full-page splash screen ad of some kind — though the company has not officially launched ad products.

But the brands are starting to take notice. This week, for example, TikTok collaborated with SportsManias, an officially licensed NFL Players Association partner, for the introduction of NFL-themed AR animated stickers in time for the Super Bowl. The move feels like a test for how well branded content will perform within the TikTok universe, but the company says it’s “not an ad deal.”

The company also declined to say how many are today using TikTok.

However, parent company ByteDance had publicly stated last year that it had 500 million monthly active users when it announced the app’s rebranding post-merger. It has yet to release new numbers for its global user base.

That said, ByteDance just shared updated stats for China only, on all versions of the TikTok app (including the non-Google Play Android version). It says that TikTok now has 500 million monthly active users in China alone.

Sensor Tower today estimates TikTok has grown to nearly 800 million lifetime installs, not counting Android in China.

Factoring in those Android in China installs, it’s fair to say this app has topped 1 billion downloads.

Here comes the new new internet, folks. It’s big, dominated by emerging markets, mobile, video, meme-ified, and goes viral both online and off.

So if you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you may want to get started.

[technicalsolutions88]

If you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you haven’t been paying attention. The short-form video app hailing from Beijing’s ByteDance just had its biggest month ever with the addition of 75 million new users in December — a 275 percent increase from the 20 million it added in December 2017, according a recent report from Sensor Tower.

Despite its rapid rise, there are still plenty of people — often, older people — who aren’t quite sure what TikTok is.

TikTok is often referred to as a “lip-syncing” app, which makes it sound like it’s some online karaoke experience. But a closer comparison would be Vine, Twitter’s still sorely missed short-form video app whose content lives on as YouTube compilations.

While it’s true that TikTok is home to some standard lip-syncing, it’s actually better known for its act-out memes backed by music and other sound clips, which get endlessly reproduced and remixed among its young users.

Its tunes are varied — pop, rap, R&B, electro and DJ tracks serve as backing for its 15-second video clips. But the sounds may also be snagged from YouTube music videos (see: I Baked You A Pie above), SoundCloud or from pop culture — like weird soundbites from Peppa Pig or Riverdale — or just original creations.

These memes-as-videos reference things familiar to Gen Z, like gaming culture (see below). They come in the form of standalone videos, reactions, duets, mirrors/clones and more.

The app has been growing steadily since it acquired its U.S.-based rival Musical.ly in November 2017 for north of $800 million, then merged the two apps’ user bases last August.

This gave TikTok the means to grow in Western markets, where it has attracted the interest of U.S. celebrities like Jimmy Fallon and Tony Hawk, for example, along with YouTubers on the hunt for the next new thing.

But unlike Vine (RIP), YouTube or Instagram, TikTok doesn’t yet feel dominated by micro-celebs, though they certainly exist.

Instead, its main feed often surfaces everyday users — aka, amateurs — doing something cute, funny or clever, with a tacit acknowledgement that “yes, this is an internet joke” underlying much of the content.

Okay, okay.

Sometimes these videos are described as “cringey.” 

But that’s because those of us trying to talk about TikTok are old(er) people who grew up on the big ol’ mean internet.

Cringey, frankly, is an unfair label, as it dismisses TikTok’s success in setting a tone for its community. Here, users are able to post and share unapologetically wholesome content, and receive far less mocking than elsewhere on the web — largely because everyone else on TikTok posts similar “cringey” content, too.

You might not know this, however, if your only exposure to TikTok comes from YouTube’s TikTok Cringe Compilations. But spend a day in the (oddly addictive) TikTok feed, and you’ll find a whole world of video that doesn’t exist anywhere else on the web — including on YouTube. Videos that are weird, sure — but also fun to watch.

It’s a stark comparison to the existing social media platforms.

Users today are engaged in the culture wars on Twitter (ban the Nazis! protect free speech!), while YouTubers are gaming the algorithm with hateful, exploitive, dangerous and otherwise questionable content that freaks out advertisers. And Facebook is, well, contributing to war crimes and the toppling of democracy.

Meanwhile, TikTok presents an alternative version of online sharing. Simple, goofy, irreverent — and frankly, it’s a much needed reset.

For example, some of the popular TikTok memes have included videos of kids proclaiming what a great mom they have, as they drag her into frame, or they remind people to pick up litter and conserve water. They might give themselves silly, but self-affirming makeovers where, afterwards, they cite themselves not as “cute” but rather “drop. dead. gorgeous.”

They might spend hours setting up gummy bears as Adele concert-goers, learning how to do a shuffle dance up a set of stairs or in a dance battle their dad. Or they may showcase some special talent — drawing, painting, gymnastics, dance or skateboarding, perhaps. They do science experiments, make jokes or use special effects for a little video magic.

They shout out “hit or miss!” in public places and wait to see who answers. (Look it up.)

Of course, it is still the internet. And TikTok isn’t perfect.

The app has also been the subject of troubling reports about its “dark” side, which is reportedly filled with child predators and teens bullying and harassing one another. It’s not clear, however, that TikTok’s affliction with these matters is any worse than any other large, social, public-by-default app of its size.

And unlike some apps, concerned parents — or the users themselves — can set a TikTok account to private, turn off commenting, hide the account from search, disable downloads, disallow reactions and duets and restrict an account from receiving messages.

It is concerning, however, that under-13 kids are setting up social media accounts without parental consent. (But, uh, have you seen Fortnite and Roblox? This is what kids do. At least the TikTok main feed isn’t worrisome, we’ve found.)

The bigger issue, though — and one that could ultimately prove damaging to TikTok — is whether it will be able to keep up with content filtering and takedown requests, or handle its security and privacy protection issues as it scales up.

Content and community aren’t the only things contributing to TikTok’s growth.

While Vine may have introduced the concept of short-form video, TikTok made video editing incredibly simple. You don’t need to be a video expert to put together clips with a range of effects. It’s the Instagram for the mobile video age — in a way that Instagram itself won’t be able to reproduce, having already aligned its community with influencers and advertisers.

TikTok’s sizable user base, meanwhile, is due not only to its growth in Western markets, but because of its traction in emerging markets like China and India.

This allowed TikTok to rank No. 4 worldwide across iOS and Android, combined, according to App Annie’s data on the most-downloaded apps of 2018. On iOS, TikTok was the No. 1 most-downloaded app of the year, mainly thanks to China.

At times last year, TikTok even ranked higher than Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube.

Both App Annie and Sensor Tower agree that TikTok scored the No. 3 position for most installs among all apps worldwide in 2018.

Now, TikTok is growing in India, says Sensor Tower.

The country accounted for 27 percent of new installs between December 2017 and December 2018, and last month was the source for 32.3 million of TikTok’s 75 million total new downloads — a 25x increase from last year.

Some of this growth comes from ad spend, according to a report from Apptopia, which examined the app’s widened use of ad networks. (It’s also driving people bonkers with its YouTube ads).

The revenue is starting to arrive, as well.

Worldwide, users spent $6 million tipping their favorite live streamers, a 253 percent year-over-year jump from December 2017’s total of $1.7 million, Sensor Tower estimates. But live streaming is not the default activity on TikTok — it added the feature after shutting down Musical.ly’s live streaming app, Live.ly.

Above: full-screen ad in TikTok when app is first launched; spotted today

Think this is the first real ad campaign I’ve seen on @tiktok_us. @kerrymflynn pic.twitter.com/zt3JcSYCz0

— chris harihar (@chrisharihar) January 26, 2019

Above: an ad appearing earlier this month

TikTok is also starting to test in-app advertising, and is being eyed by agencies as a result. When you launch TikTok, you may see a full-page splash screen ad of some kind — though the company has not officially launched ad products.

But the brands are starting to take notice. This week, for example, TikTok collaborated with SportsManias, an officially licensed NFL Players Association partner, for the introduction of NFL-themed AR animated stickers in time for the Super Bowl. The move feels like a test for how well branded content will perform within the TikTok universe, but the company says it’s “not an ad deal.”

The company also declined to say how many are today using TikTok.

However, parent company ByteDance had publicly stated last year that it had 500 million monthly active users when it announced the app’s rebranding post-merger. It has yet to release new numbers for its global user base.

That said, ByteDance just shared updated stats for China only, on all versions of the TikTok app (including the non-Google Play Android version). It says that TikTok now has 500 million monthly active users in China alone.

Sensor Tower today estimates TikTok has grown to nearly 800 million lifetime installs, not counting Android in China.

Factoring in those Android in China installs, it’s fair to say this app has topped 1 billion downloads.

Here comes the new new internet, folks. It’s big, dominated by emerging markets, mobile, video, meme-ified, and goes viral both online and off.

So if you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you may want to get started.

from Social – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2CTfM9f Original Content From: https://techcrunch.com

[sheminecrafts]

It’s time to pay serious attention to TikTok

If you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you haven’t been paying attention. The short-form video app hailing from Beijing’s ByteDance just had its biggest month ever with the addition of 75 million new users in December — a 275 percent increase from the 20 million it added in December 2017, according a recent report from Sensor Tower.

Despite its rapid rise, there are still plenty of people — often, older people — who aren’t quite sure what TikTok is.

TikTok is often referred to as a “lip-syncing” app, which makes it sound like it’s some online karaoke experience. But a closer comparison would be Vine, Twitter’s still sorely missed short-form video app whose content lives on as YouTube compilations.

While it’s true that TikTok is home to some standard lip-syncing, it’s actually better known for its act-out memes backed by music and other sound clips, which get endlessly reproduced and remixed among its young users.

Its tunes are varied — pop, rap, R&B, electro and DJ tracks serve as backing for its 15-second video clips. But the sounds may also be snagged from YouTube music videos (see: I Baked You A Pie above), SoundCloud or from pop culture — like weird soundbites from Peppa Pig or Riverdale — or just original creations.

These memes-as-videos reference things familiar to Gen Z, like gaming culture (see below). They come in the form of standalone videos, reactions, duets, mirrors/clones and more.

The app has been growing steadily since it acquired its U.S.-based rival Musical.ly in November 2017 for north of $800 million, then merged the two apps’ user bases last August.

This gave TikTok the means to grow in Western markets, where it has attracted the interest of U.S. celebrities like Jimmy Fallon and Tony Hawk, for example, along with YouTubers on the hunt for the next new thing.

But unlike Vine (RIP), YouTube or Instagram, TikTok doesn’t yet feel dominated by micro-celebs, though they certainly exist.

Instead, its main feed often surfaces everyday users — aka, amateurs — doing something cute, funny or clever, with a tacit acknowledgement that “yes, this is an internet joke” underlying much of the content.

Okay, okay.

Sometimes these videos are described as “cringey.” 

But that’s because those of us trying to talk about TikTok are old(er) people who grew up on the big ol’ mean internet.

Cringey, frankly, is an unfair label, as it dismisses TikTok’s success in setting a tone for its community. Here, users are able to post and share unapologetically wholesome content, and receive far less mocking than elsewhere on the web — largely because everyone else on TikTok posts similar “cringey” content, too.

You might not know this, however, if your only exposure to TikTok comes from YouTube’s TikTok Cringe Compilations. But spend a day in the (oddly addictive) TikTok feed, and you’ll find a whole world of video that doesn’t exist anywhere else on the web — including on YouTube. Videos that are weird, sure — but also fun to watch.

It’s a stark comparison to the existing social media platforms.

Users today are engaged in the culture wars on Twitter (ban the Nazis! protect free speech!), while YouTubers are gaming the algorithm with hateful, exploitive, dangerous and otherwise questionable content that freaks out advertisers. And Facebook is, well, contributing to war crimes and the toppling of democracy.

Meanwhile, TikTok presents an alternative version of online sharing. Simple, goofy, irreverent — and frankly, it’s a much needed reset.

For example, some of the popular TikTok memes have included videos of kids proclaiming what a great mom they have, as they drag her into frame, or they remind people to pick up litter and conserve water. They might give themselves silly, but self-affirming makeovers where, afterwards, they cite themselves not as “cute” but rather “drop. dead. gorgeous.”

They might spend hours setting up gummy bears as Adele concert-goers, learning how to do a shuffle dance up a set of stairs or in a dance battle their dad. Or they may showcase some special talent — drawing, painting, gymnastics, dance or skateboarding, perhaps. They do science experiments, make jokes or use special effects for a little video magic.

They shout out “hit or miss!” in public places and wait to see who answers. (Look it up.)

Of course, it is still the internet. And TikTok isn’t perfect.

The app has also been the subject of troubling reports about its “dark” side, which is reportedly filled with child predators and teens bullying and harassing one another. It’s not clear, however, that TikTok’s affliction with these matters is any worse than any other large, social, public-by-default app of its size.

And unlike some apps, concerned parents — or the users themselves — can set a TikTok account to private, turn off commenting, hide the account from search, disable downloads, disallow reactions and duets and restrict an account from receiving messages.

It is concerning, however, that under-13 kids are setting up social media accounts without parental consent. (But, uh, have you seen Fortnite and Roblox? This is what kids do. At least the TikTok main feed isn’t worrisome, we’ve found.)

The bigger issue, though — and one that could ultimately prove damaging to TikTok — is whether it will be able to keep up with content filtering and takedown requests, or handle its security and privacy protection issues as it scales up.

Content and community aren’t the only things contributing to TikTok’s growth.

While Vine may have introduced the concept of short-form video, TikTok made video editing incredibly simple. You don’t need to be a video expert to put together clips with a range of effects. It’s the Instagram for the mobile video age — in a way that Instagram itself won’t be able to reproduce, having already aligned its community with influencers and advertisers.

TikTok’s sizable user base, meanwhile, is due not only to its growth in Western markets, but because of its traction in emerging markets like China and India.

This allowed TikTok to rank No. 4 worldwide across iOS and Android, combined, according to App Annie’s data on the most-downloaded apps of 2018. On iOS, TikTok was the No. 1 most-downloaded app of the year, mainly thanks to China.

At times last year, TikTok even ranked higher than Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube.

Both App Annie and Sensor Tower agree that TikTok scored the No. 3 position for most installs among all apps worldwide in 2018.

Now, TikTok is growing in India, says Sensor Tower.

The country accounted for 27 percent of new installs between December 2017 and December 2018, and last month was the source for 32.3 million of TikTok’s 75 million total new downloads — a 25x increase from last year.

The revenue is starting to arrive, as well.

Worldwide, users spent $6 million tipping their favorite live streamers, a 253 percent year-over-year jump from December 2017’s total of $1.7 million, Sensor Tower estimates. But live streaming is not the default activity on TikTok — it added the feature after shutting down Musical.ly’s live streaming app, Live.ly.

Above: full-screen ad in TikTok when app is first launched

TikTok is also starting to test in-app advertising, and is being eyed by agencies as a result. When you launch TikTok, you may see a full-page splash screen ad of some kind — though the company has not officially launched ad products.

But the brands are starting to take notice. This week, for example, TikTok collaborated with SportsManias, an officially licensed NFL Players Association partner, for the introduction of NFL-themed AR animated stickers in time for the Super Bowl. The move feels like a test for how well branded content will perform within the TikTok universe, but the company says it’s “not an ad deal.”

The company also declined to say how many are today using TikTok.

However, parent company ByteDance had publicly stated last year that it had 500 million monthly active users when it announced the app’s rebranding post-merger. It has yet to release new numbers for its global user base.

That said, ByteDance just shared updated stats for China only, on all versions of the TikTok app (including the non-Google Play Android version). It says that TikTok now has 500 million monthly active users in China alone.

Sensor Tower today estimates TikTok has grown to nearly 800 million lifetime installs, not counting Android in China.

Factoring in those Android in China installs, it’s fair to say this app has topped 1 billion downloads.

Here comes the new new internet, folks. It’s big, dominated by emerging markets, mobile, video, meme-ified, and goes viral both online and off.

So if you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you may want to get started.

from iraidajzsmmwtv https://tcrn.ch/2CTfM9f via IFTTT

[toomanysinks]

It’s time to pay serious attention to TikTok

If you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you haven’t been paying attention. The short-form video app hailing from Beijing’s ByteDance just had its biggest month ever with the addition of 75 million new users in December — a 275 percent increase from the 20 million it added in December 2017, according a recent report from Sensor Tower.

Despite its rapid rise, there are still plenty of people — often, older people — who aren’t quite sure what TikTok is.

TikTok is often referred to as a “lip-syncing” app, which makes it sound like it’s some online karaoke experience. But a closer comparison would be Vine, Twitter’s still sorely missed short-form video app whose content lives on as YouTube compilations.

While it’s true that TikTok is home to some standard lip-syncing, it’s actually better known for its act-out memes backed by music and other sound clips, which get endlessly reproduced and remixed among its young users.

Its tunes are varied — pop, rap, R&B, electro and DJ tracks serve as backing for its 15-second video clips. But the sounds may also be snagged from YouTube music videos (see: I Baked You A Pie above), SoundCloud or from pop culture — like weird soundbites from Peppa Pig or Riverdale — or just original creations.

These memes-as-videos reference things familiar to Gen Z, like gaming culture (see below). They come in the form of standalone videos, reactions, duets, mirrors/clones and more.

The app has been growing steadily since it acquired its U.S.-based rival Musical.ly in November 2017 for north of $800 million, then merged the two apps’ user bases last August.

This gave TikTok the means to grow in Western markets, where it has attracted the interest of U.S. celebrities like Jimmy Fallon and Tony Hawk, for example, along with YouTubers on the hunt for the next new thing.

But unlike Vine (RIP), YouTube or Instagram, TikTok doesn’t yet feel dominated by micro-celebs, though they certainly exist.

Instead, its main feed often surfaces everyday users — aka, amateurs — doing something cute, funny or clever, with a tacit acknowledgement that “yes, this is an internet joke” underlying much of the content.

Okay, okay.

Sometimes these videos are described as “cringey.” 

But that’s because those of us trying to talk about TikTok are old(er) people who grew up on the big ol’ mean internet.

Cringey, frankly, is an unfair label, as it dismisses TikTok’s success in setting a tone for its community. Here, users are able to post and share unapologetically wholesome content, and receive far less mocking than elsewhere on the web — largely because everyone else on TikTok posts similar “cringey” content, too.

You might not know this, however, if your only exposure to TikTok comes from YouTube’s TikTok Cringe Compilations. But spend a day in the (oddly addictive) TikTok feed, and you’ll find a whole world of video that doesn’t exist anywhere else on the web — including on YouTube. Videos that are weird, sure — but also fun to watch.

It’s a stark comparison to the existing social media platforms.

Users today are engaged in the culture wars on Twitter (ban the Nazis! protect free speech!), while YouTubers are gaming the algorithm with hateful, exploitive, dangerous and otherwise questionable content that freaks out advertisers. And Facebook is, well, contributing to war crimes and the toppling of democracy.

Meanwhile, TikTok presents an alternative version of online sharing. Simple, goofy, irreverent — and frankly, it’s a much needed reset.

For example, some of the popular TikTok memes have included videos of kids proclaiming what a great mom they have, as they drag her into frame, or they remind people to pick up litter and conserve water. They might give themselves silly, but self-affirming makeovers where, afterwards, they cite themselves not as “cute” but rather “drop. dead. gorgeous.”

They might spend hours setting up gummy bears as Adele concert-goers, learning how to do a shuffle dance up a set of stairs or in a dance battle their dad. Or they may showcase some special talent — drawing, painting, gymnastics, dance or skateboarding, perhaps. They do science experiments, make jokes or use special effects for a little video magic.

They shout out “hit or miss!” in public places and wait to see who answers. (Look it up.)

Of course, it is still the internet. And TikTok isn’t perfect.

The app has also been the subject of troubling reports about its “dark” side, which is reportedly filled with child predators and teens bullying and harassing one another. It’s not clear, however, that TikTok’s affliction with these matters is any worse than any other large, social, public-by-default app of its size.

And unlike some apps, concerned parents — or the users themselves — can set a TikTok account to private, turn off commenting, hide the account from search, disable downloads, disallow reactions and duets and restrict an account from receiving messages.

It is concerning, however, that under-13 kids are setting up social media accounts without parental consent. (But, uh, have you seen Fortnite and Roblox? This is what kids do. At least the TikTok main feed isn’t worrisome, we’ve found.)

The bigger issue, though — and one that could ultimately prove damaging to TikTok — is whether it will be able to keep up with content filtering and takedown requests, or handle its security and privacy protection issues as it scales up.

Content and community aren’t the only things contributing to TikTok’s growth.

While Vine may have introduced the concept of short-form video, TikTok made video editing incredibly simple. You don’t need to be a video expert to put together clips with a range of effects. It’s the Instagram for the mobile video age — in a way that Instagram itself won’t be able to reproduce, having already aligned its community with influencers and advertisers.

TikTok’s sizable user base, meanwhile, is due not only to its growth in Western markets, but because of its traction in emerging markets like China and India.

This allowed TikTok to rank No. 4 worldwide across iOS and Android, combined, according to App Annie’s data on the most-downloaded apps of 2018. On iOS, TikTok was the No. 1 most-downloaded app of the year, mainly thanks to China.

At times last year, TikTok even ranked higher than Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube.

Both App Annie and Sensor Tower agree that TikTok scored the No. 3 position for most installs among all apps worldwide in 2018.

Now, TikTok is growing in India, says Sensor Tower.

The country accounted for 27 percent of new installs between December 2017 and December 2018, and last month was the source for 32.3 million of TikTok’s 75 million total new downloads — a 25x increase from last year.

Some of this growth comes from ad spend, according to a report from Apptopia, which examined the app’s widened use of ad networks. (It’s also driving people bonkers with its YouTube ads).

The revenue is starting to arrive, as well.

Worldwide, users spent $6 million tipping their favorite live streamers, a 253 percent year-over-year jump from December 2017’s total of $1.7 million, Sensor Tower estimates. But live streaming is not the default activity on TikTok — it added the feature after shutting down Musical.ly’s live streaming app, Live.ly.

Above: full-screen ad in TikTok when app is first launched

TikTok is also starting to test in-app advertising, and is being eyed by agencies as a result. When you launch TikTok, you may see a full-page splash screen ad of some kind — though the company has not officially launched ad products.

But the brands are starting to take notice. This week, for example, TikTok collaborated with SportsManias, an officially licensed NFL Players Association partner, for the introduction of NFL-themed AR animated stickers in time for the Super Bowl. The move feels like a test for how well branded content will perform within the TikTok universe, but the company says it’s “not an ad deal.”

The company also declined to say how many are today using TikTok.

However, parent company ByteDance had publicly stated last year that it had 500 million monthly active users when it announced the app’s rebranding post-merger. It has yet to release new numbers for its global user base.

That said, ByteDance just shared updated stats for China only, on all versions of the TikTok app (including the non-Google Play Android version). It says that TikTok now has 500 million monthly active users in China alone.

Sensor Tower today estimates TikTok has grown to nearly 800 million lifetime installs, not counting Android in China.

Factoring in those Android in China installs, it’s fair to say this app has topped 1 billion downloads.

Here comes the new new internet, folks. It’s big, dominated by emerging markets, mobile, video, meme-ified, and goes viral both online and off.

So if you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you may want to get started.

source https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/29/its-time-to-pay-serious-attention-to-tiktok/

[fmservers]

It’s time to pay serious attention to TikTok

If you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you haven’t been paying attention. The short-form video app hailing from Beijing’s ByteDance just had its biggest month ever with the addition of 75 million new users in December — a 275 percent increase from the 20 million it added in December 2017, according a recent report from Sensor Tower.

Despite its rapid rise, there are still plenty of people — often, older people — who aren’t quite sure what TikTok is.

TikTok is often referred to as a “lip-syncing” app, which makes it sound like it’s some online karaoke experience. But a closer comparison would be Vine, Twitter’s still sorely missed short-form video app whose content lives on as YouTube compilations.

While it’s true that TikTok is home to some standard lip-syncing, it’s actually better known for its act-out memes backed by music and other sound clips, which get endlessly reproduced and remixed among its young users.

Its tunes are varied — pop, rap, R&B, electro and DJ tracks serve as backing for its 15-second video clips. But the sounds may also be snagged from YouTube music videos (see: I Baked You A Pie above), SoundCloud or from pop culture — like weird soundbites from Peppa Pig or Riverdale — or just original creations.

These memes-as-videos reference things familiar to Gen Z, like gaming culture (see below). They come in the form of standalone videos, reactions, duets, mirrors/clones and more.

The app has been growing steadily since it acquired its U.S.-based rival Musical.ly in November 2017 for north of $800 million, then merged the two apps’ user bases last August.

This gave TikTok the means to grow in Western markets, where it has attracted the interest of U.S. celebrities like Jimmy Fallon and Tony Hawk, for example, along with YouTubers on the hunt for the next new thing.

But unlike Vine (RIP), YouTube or Instagram, TikTok doesn’t yet feel dominated by micro-celebs, though they certainly exist.

Instead, its main feed often surfaces everyday users — aka, amateurs — doing something cute, funny or clever, with a tacit acknowledgement that “yes, this is an internet joke” underlying much of the content.

Okay, okay.

Sometimes these videos are described as “cringey.” 

But that’s because those of us trying to talk about TikTok are old(er) people who grew up on the big ol’ mean internet.

Cringey, frankly, is an unfair label, as it dismisses TikTok’s success in setting a tone for its community. Here, users are able to post and share unapologetically wholesome content, and receive far less mocking than elsewhere on the web — largely because everyone else on TikTok posts similar “cringey” content, too.

You might not know this, however, if your only exposure to TikTok comes from YouTube’s TikTok Cringe Compilations. But spend a day in the (oddly addictive) TikTok feed, and you’ll find a whole world of video that doesn’t exist anywhere else on the web — including on YouTube. Videos that are weird, sure — but also fun to watch.

It’s a stark comparison to the existing social media platforms.

Users today are engaged in the culture wars on Twitter (ban the Nazis! protect free speech!), while YouTubers are gaming the algorithm with hateful, exploitive, dangerous and otherwise questionable content that freaks out advertisers. And Facebook is, well, contributing to war crimes and the toppling of democracy.

Meanwhile, TikTok presents an alternative version of online sharing. Simple, goofy, irreverent — and frankly, it’s a much needed reset.

For example, some of the popular TikTok memes have included videos of kids proclaiming what a great mom they have, as they drag her into frame, or they remind people to pick up litter and conserve water. They might give themselves silly, but self-affirming makeovers where, afterwards, they cite themselves not as “cute” but rather “drop. dead. gorgeous.”

They might spend hours setting up gummy bears as Adele concert-goers, learning how to do a shuffle dance up a set of stairs or in a dance battle their dad. Or they may showcase some special talent — drawing, painting, gymnastics, dance or skateboarding, perhaps. They do science experiments, make jokes or use special effects for a little video magic.

They shout out “hit or miss!” in public places and wait to see who answers. (Look it up.)

Of course, it is still the internet. And TikTok isn’t perfect.

The app has also been the subject of troubling reports about its “dark” side, which is reportedly filled with child predators and teens bullying and harassing one another. It’s not clear, however, that TikTok’s affliction with these matters is any worse than any other large, social, public-by-default app of its size.

And unlike some apps, concerned parents — or the users themselves — can set a TikTok account to private, turn off commenting, hide the account from search, disable downloads, disallow reactions and duets and restrict an account from receiving messages.

It is concerning, however, that under-13 kids are setting up social media accounts without parental consent. (But, uh, have you seen Fortnite and Roblox? This is what kids do. At least the TikTok main feed isn’t worrisome, we’ve found.)

The bigger issue, though — and one that could ultimately prove damaging to TikTok — is whether it will be able to keep up with content filtering and takedown requests, or handle its security and privacy protection issues as it scales up.

Content and community aren’t the only things contributing to TikTok’s growth.

While Vine may have introduced the concept of short-form video, TikTok made video editing incredibly simple. You don’t need to be a video expert to put together clips with a range of effects. It’s the Instagram for the mobile video age — in a way that Instagram itself won’t be able to reproduce, having already aligned its community with influencers and advertisers.

TikTok’s sizable user base, meanwhile, is due not only to its growth in Western markets, but because of its traction in emerging markets like China and India.

This allowed TikTok to rank No. 4 worldwide across iOS and Android, combined, according to App Annie’s data on the most-downloaded apps of 2018. On iOS, TikTok was the No. 1 most-downloaded app of the year, mainly thanks to China.

At times last year, TikTok even ranked higher than Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube.

Both App Annie and Sensor Tower agree that TikTok scored the No. 3 position for most installs among all apps worldwide in 2018.

Now, TikTok is growing in India, says Sensor Tower.

The country accounted for 27 percent of new installs between December 2017 and December 2018, and last month was the source for 32.3 million of TikTok’s 75 million total new downloads — a 25x increase from last year.

The revenue is starting to arrive, as well.

Worldwide, users spent $6 million tipping their favorite live streamers, a 253 percent year-over-year jump from December 2017’s total of $1.7 million, Sensor Tower estimates. But live streaming is not the default activity on TikTok — it added the feature after shutting down Musical.ly’s live streaming app, Live.ly.

Above: full-screen ad in TikTok when app is first launched

TikTok is also starting to test in-app advertising, and is being eyed by agencies as a result. When you launch TikTok, you may see a full-page splash screen ad of some kind — though the company has not officially launched ad products.

But the brands are starting to take notice. This week, for example, TikTok collaborated with SportsManias, an officially licensed NFL Players Association partner, for the introduction of NFL-themed AR animated stickers in time for the Super Bowl. The move feels like a test for how well branded content will perform within the TikTok universe, but the company says it’s “not an ad deal.”

The company also declined to say how many are today using TikTok.

However, parent company ByteDance had publicly stated last year that it had 500 million monthly active users when it announced the app’s rebranding post-merger. It has yet to release new numbers for its global user base.

That said, ByteDance just shared updated stats for China only, on all versions of the TikTok app (including the non-Google Play Android version). It says that TikTok now has 500 million monthly active users in China alone.

Sensor Tower today estimates TikTok has grown to nearly 800 million lifetime installs, not counting Android in China.

Factoring in those Android in China installs, it’s fair to say this app has topped 1 billion downloads.

Here comes the new new internet, folks. It’s big, dominated by emerging markets, mobile, video, meme-ified, and goes viral both online and off.

So if you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you may want to get started.

Via Sarah Perez https://techcrunch.com

[universeinform-blog]

Hijab in Sports: How Muslim Women Athletes Are Fighting for Acceptance

New Post has been published on https://universeinform.com/2017/03/27/hijab-in-sports-how-muslim-women-athletes-are-fighting-for-acceptance/

Hijab in Sports: How Muslim Women Athletes Are Fighting for Acceptance

In 2016, Ibtihaj Muhammad became the first Muslim girl athlete competing for The united states to wear the hijab during the Rio Olympics. As one of the maximum-pointed out Olympians in a set that blanketed names like Michael Phelps and Simone Biles, she did her satisfactory to deflect the hyper-focus on her faith or what she wears at the same time as nonetheless competing on a world-elegance degree. Instead,

Muhammad used her platform and voice to train as she confirmed grace and humility on the most important athletic stage inside the global, making records along the way by means of becoming the primary Muslim-American to stand on a podium on the Olympics, prevailing a bronze.

Even though she’d take home a medal, her fortitude to stay real her to herself has led to a defining possibility – to help normalize what being Muslim seems like. Much less than a yr after competing in Rio, some view Muhammad as a catalyst for Muslim girls athletes, that the eye the media paid to her all through the Olympics (now not to say a market estimated to be really worth $5 trillion in underneath five years) is a big purpose why Nike these days announced plans to debut a “Pro-Hijab” for Muslim women who compete. Muhammad, who has her personal modest fashion line, Louella, isn’t involved in the Nike campaign, but her impact is simple.

Muhammad started out competing in fencing when she becomes 13 years antique, whilst her dad and mom found it to be a suitable game because of the ability to wear the hijab throughout a competition. She did no longer realize other athletes who competed in the hijab, and for that reason, she knows the significance of getting someone who represents you. “It is usually tough while you do not see someone excelling in something that you may have desires or aspirations to take part in or excel at. It’s tough to look yourself in that area,” she says

Hajar Abulfazl, who captained the Countrywide ladies’ Soccer team in Afghanistan, and who wears the hijab says Muhammad’s impact “made an international effect competing and winning in Olympics for The USA,” adding, “She represents a sturdy and smart athlete who has the commitment to her religion and way of life. Her phrases and pics educate people around the arena who accept as true with the vintage stereotype approximately the hijab and that Muslim girls are weak.”

Sports Injuries: Sometimes, the Most Difficult Thing To Do Is Stop Moving

There are some individuals who lead incredibly sedentary existence. They’re less lively by using nature. This doesn’t imply They are bad, however, as even a sedentary person can get in a few form of exercise (and those operate at distinctive energy levels).CBS sports march madness

Then again, there are the ones people who are energetic by nature. They exercise session, spend time exterior, or in any other case do something physically active daily. Additionally, they push themselves to assignment their physical limits. Unavoidably, this effects in some shape of exhaustion, stress, or even injury. The hardest element? Letting themselves heal.

Healing Requires Relaxation

Now, we’ve all been there. I can’t inform you how in many instances I have been injured in education or opposition, and it is very hard to just take it easy after the fact (unless it hurts an excessive amount of to move, besides). I have heard countless memories of, “I suppose I commenced running on my sprained ankle too soon” or, “I understand I have a pulled muscle, however, I just had to go online last weekend.”

With a purpose to heal properly, you need to Relaxation, however, This doesn’t imply 0 physical pastimes. Move for a stroll rather than a run. Elevate lighter weights or keep on with frame weight physical activities. Perform a little mild to mild stretching, or yoga. There are tremendous many things you may do without straining a damage.

Recuperation is Electricity

Whilst we p push ourselves to our bodily limits, or maybe do moves we are not used to doing, we harm our muscular tissues. Now, don’t freak out. Your frame does not smash so without problems. That harm is what activates our body to come to be more potent.

Muscle cells respond to harm through basically developing new muscle cells, but now not exactly similar to earlier than. For the reason that muscle cells were not robust enough to deal with the pastime or motion without damage before, they repair stronger, with more muscle cells (or extra powerful contraction of muscle cells).

You realize that point you have been sore after a weightlifting consultation? That soreness is a sign of straining muscle groups, and with a few exceptions, a sign of these muscle groups getting more potent. After some Rest, what do you notice after your subsequent exercising? You feel more potent, don’t you? Your stamina may additionally even be better. Giving your body time to restore will make you more potent ultimately.

Are you Harm or Injured

An easy query pulled from a football movie… In fact, this can appear a silly query, but there’s a pretty massive difference. Constructing back up after pain or slight stress isn’t the same as coming returned after an outright injury. In case you’re sore, you can usually take it smooth for an afternoon or two, or simply tone down the interest. In case you’re injured, it’s going to take a lot greater within the way of Relaxation to get you back to combating shape (without re-injuring yourself).

As with most (if not all) of my different discussions, I would like to factor out that your frame is designed to heal itself, whether or not from contamination or damage. While a specific movement hurts, it is your body’s way of telling you now not to do this, at least for some time. Our trouble is spotting what our body is trying to inform us. Every so often, we simply need a touch assist.

Women’s Beauty Is An Indescribable Subject

How do you measure a ladies’ splendor? By her man or woman, Through her career, By using her desires or By using her looks? Each has its significance and each element is taken into consideration. It is the case with men too. They’re judged or witnessed Through their breeding, paintings and their person. beauty is something that comes from inside your body. Its miles related with the soul that God has formed inner us Some enhancers from outdoor can enlarge them however the actual thing remains interior and simplest a special soul can ooze that out and spread it in the international.

A few radiate happiness of their smiles. Their smile is so stunning that eases the upset person and feels elated and cozy. Their air of secrecy is so extraordinary and soothing that it calms the burning soul and sends peace within. We make such friends for the lifetime and in our fields, those operating angels assist in our difficulties. We have our dad and mom, our delivery givers whose air of mystery portrays eternal peace and love.

women love from their hearts. I’m stressing at the feminine thing here because They may be frequently underrated. They wish you the pleasant of the whole lot. In case you need a sworn statement, observe your mother, your spouse, your daughter, or your girlfriend. Whenever you cry, they sit beside you, offer silent prayers, and shed tears to provide solace. “the whole thing will be all proper. I will lay my existence for you my expensive. You do no longer need to fear.”After these, who might now not assume that he has nevertheless something left inner? Finest of the terrific warriors were on their knees while a female brave heart got here to their resource.

Type hearts provide the Greatest friendship.

They will by no means go away their different-half on the needy times and could now not hesitate to destroy the unwell will. A lot has been written on this issue that we are getting quick of phrases we just want to recognize dating with any man or women should stand at the pillars of hope, sacrifice, religion and love.

It isn’t always incorrect to bitch about distances. We’re however a silly mortal and we need our cherished ones to be close. We need to look them, sense their presence, and feel cherished By their moves. It isn’t and in no way is an awful factor. Whoever It’s miles, must always give a while to the individual looking forward to him or her on the other side of the continent. A person can never be that busy that he cannot spare an unmarried minute to assist you to understand approximately his situation.

Why Muslim Clothes for Women Offend Westerners

The costumes Muslim girls put on in public is an affront to many Western ladies who have the liberty to dress as they want rather than as faith dictates. The concept that girls have to cool their heads and our bodies to prevent them being raped is outrageous to those who have lived largely without worry of one of this factor. With the merging of cultures now taking place and the arrival of women who get dressed in a head and face coverings, they threaten that freedom.Muslim beliefs vs Christian beliefs

Segregation of the sexes is any other affront as that is not a part of the democratic society of the west. While it appears to boil down to adult males not able to manipulate sexual urges and there in all likelihood gang rape of women there’s a well-known worry brewing a few of the women of western international locations.

Many look upon the Muslim head headscarf as a form of terrorism and persecution of ladies. In hot united states of America like Australia,

Our sympathy is going out to the young ladies who are pressured to put on this type of factor that makes them stand out and may be a supply of ridicule and misunderstanding.

The indoctrination and traditions carried with those people whilst they come to a unfastened united states of America does not help. They may be stood over through guys each of their circle of relatives and the prolonged ones as brothers, fathers, uncles or even mothers turn on them in the event that they rebellion against it. While they now live in a cute democratic society They’re in no way a part of it and that puts them at odds with other women.2015 womens world cup groups

[readersforum]

It’s time to pay serious attention to TikTok

New Post has been published on http://www.readersforum.tk/its-time-to-pay-serious-attention-to-tiktok/

It’s time to pay serious attention to TikTok

If you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you haven’t been paying attention. The short-form video app hailing from Beijing’s ByteDance just had its biggest month ever with the addition of 75 million new users in December — a 275 percent increase from the 20 million it added in December 2017, according a recent report from Sensor Tower.

Despite its rapid rise, there are still plenty of people — often, older people — who aren’t quite sure what TikTok is.

TikTok is often referred to as a “lip-syncing” app, which makes it sound like it’s some online karaoke experience. But a closer comparison would be Vine, Twitter’s still sorely missed short-form video app whose content lives on as YouTube compilations.

While it’s true that TikTok is home to some standard lip-syncing, it’s actually better known for its act-out memes backed by music and other sound clips, which get endlessly reproduced and remixed among its young users.

Its tunes are varied — pop, rap, R&B, electro and DJ tracks serve as backing for its 15-second video clips. But the sounds may also be snagged from YouTube music videos (see: I Baked You A Pie above), SoundCloud or from pop culture — like weird soundbites from Peppa Pig or Riverdale — or just original creations.

These memes-as-videos reference things familiar to Gen Z, like gaming culture (see below). They come in the form of standalone videos, reactions, duets, mirrors/clones and more.

The app has been growing steadily since it acquired its U.S.-based rival Musical.ly in November 2017 for north of $800 million, then merged the two apps’ user bases last August.

This gave TikTok the means to grow in Western markets, where it has attracted the interest of U.S. celebrities like Jimmy Fallon and Tony Hawk, for example, along with YouTubers on the hunt for the next new thing.

But unlike Vine (RIP), YouTube or Instagram, TikTok doesn’t yet feel dominated by micro-celebs, though they certainly exist.

Instead, its main feed often surfaces everyday users — aka, amateurs — doing something cute, funny or clever, with a tacit acknowledgement that “yes, this is an internet joke” underlying much of the content.

Okay, okay.

Sometimes these videos are described as “cringey.” 

But that’s because those of us trying to talk about TikTok are old(er) people who grew up on the big ol’ mean internet.

Cringey, frankly, is an unfair label, as it dismisses TikTok’s success in setting a tone for its community. Here, users will often post and share unapologetically wholesome content, and receive less mocking than elsewhere on the web — largely because everyone else on TikTok posts similar “cringey” content, too.

You might not know this, however, if your only exposure to TikTok comes from YouTube’s TikTok Cringe Compilations. But spend a day in the (oddly addictive) TikTok feed, and you’ll find a whole world of video that doesn’t exist anywhere else on the web — including on YouTube. Videos that are weird, sure — but also fun to watch.

It’s a stark comparison to the existing social media platforms.

Users today are engaged in the culture wars on Twitter (ban the Nazis! protect free speech!), while YouTubers are gaming the algorithm with hateful, exploitive, dangerous and otherwise questionable content that freaks out advertisers. And Facebook is, well, contributing to war crimes and the toppling of democracy.

Meanwhile, TikTok presents an alternative version of online sharing. Simple, goofy, irreverent — and frankly, it’s a much needed reset.

For example, some of the popular TikTok memes have included videos of kids proclaiming what a great mom they have, as they drag her into frame, or they remind people to pick up litter and conserve water. They might give themselves silly, but self-affirming makeovers where, afterwards, they cite themselves not as “cute” but rather “drop. dead. gorgeous.”

They might spend hours setting up gummy bears as Adele concert-goers, learning how to do a shuffle dance up a set of stairs or in a dance battle their dad. Or they may showcase some special talent — drawing, painting, gymnastics, dance or skateboarding, perhaps. They do science experiments, make jokes or use special effects for a little video magic.

They shout out “hit or miss!” in public places and wait to see who answers. (Look it up.)

Sometimes it’s dumb, Sometimes it’s clever. But it’s addictive.

Of course, it is still the internet. And TikTok isn’t perfect.

The app has also been the subject of troubling reports about its “dark” side, which is reportedly filled with child predators and teens bullying and harassing one another. It’s not clear, however, that TikTok’s affliction with these matters is any worse than any other large, social, public-by-default app of its size.

And unlike some apps, concerned parents — or the users themselves — can set a TikTok account to private, turn off commenting, hide the account from search, disable downloads, disallow reactions and duets and restrict an account from receiving messages.

It is concerning, however, that under-13 kids are setting up social media accounts without parental consent. (But, uh, have you seen Fortnite and Roblox? This is what kids do. At least the TikTok main feed isn’t worrisome, we’ve found.)

The bigger issue, though — and one that could ultimately prove damaging to TikTok — is whether it will be able to keep up with content filtering and takedown requests, or handle its security and privacy protection issues as it scales up.

Content and community aren’t the only things contributing to TikTok’s growth.

While Vine may have introduced the concept of short-form video, TikTok made video editing incredibly simple. You don’t need to be a video expert to put together clips with a range of effects. It’s the Instagram for the mobile video age — in a way that Instagram itself won’t be able to reproduce, having already aligned its community with influencers and advertisers.

TikTok’s sizable user base, meanwhile, is due not only to its growth in Western markets, but because of its traction in emerging markets like China and India.

This allowed TikTok to rank No. 4 worldwide across iOS and Android, combined, according to App Annie’s data on the most-downloaded apps of 2018. On iOS, TikTok was the No. 1 most-downloaded app of the year, mainly thanks to China.

At times last year, TikTok even ranked higher than Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube.

Both App Annie and Sensor Tower agree that TikTok scored the No. 3 position for most installs among all apps worldwide in 2018.

Now, TikTok is growing in India, says Sensor Tower.

The country accounted for 27 percent of new installs between December 2017 and December 2018, and last month was the source for 32.3 million of TikTok’s 75 million total new downloads — a 25x increase from last year.

Some of this growth comes from ad spend, according to a report from Apptopia, which examined the app’s widened use of ad networks. (It’s also driving people bonkers with its YouTube ads).

The revenue is starting to arrive, as well.

Worldwide, users spent $6 million tipping their favorite live streamers, a 253 percent year-over-year jump from December 2017’s total of $1.7 million, Sensor Tower estimates. But live streaming is not the default activity on TikTok — it added the feature after shutting down Musical.ly’s live streaming app, Live.ly.

Above: full-screen ad in TikTok when app is first launched; spotted today

Think this is the first real ad campaign I’ve seen on @tiktok_us. @kerrymflynn pic.twitter.com/zt3JcSYCz0

— chris harihar (@chrisharihar) January 26, 2019

Above: an ad appearing earlier this month

TikTok is also starting to test in-app advertising, and is being eyed by agencies as a result. When you launch TikTok, you may see a full-page splash screen ad of some kind — though the company has not officially launched ad products.

But the brands are starting to take notice. This week, for example, TikTok collaborated with SportsManias, an officially licensed NFL Players Association partner, for the introduction of NFL-themed AR animated stickers in time for the Super Bowl. The move feels like a test for how well branded content will perform within the TikTok universe, but the company says it’s “not an ad deal.”

The company also declined to say how many are today using TikTok.

However, parent company ByteDance had publicly stated last year that it had 500 million monthly active users when it announced the app’s rebranding post-merger. It has yet to release new numbers for its global user base.

That said, ByteDance just shared updated stats for China only, on all versions of the TikTok app (including the non-Google Play Android version). It says that TikTok now has 500 million monthly active users in China alone.

Sensor Tower today estimates TikTok has grown to nearly 800 million lifetime installs, not counting Android in China.

Factoring in those Android in China installs, it’s fair to say this app has topped 1 billion downloads.

Here comes the new new internet, folks. It’s big, dominated by emerging markets, mobile, video, meme-ified, and goes viral both online and off.

So if you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you may want to get started.

[technicalsolutions88]

If you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you haven’t been paying attention. The short-form video app hailing from Beijing’s ByteDance just had its biggest month ever with the addition of 75 million new users in December — a 275 percent increase from the 20 million it added in December 2017, according a recent report from Sensor Tower.

Despite its rapid rise, there are still plenty of people — often, older people — who aren’t quite sure what TikTok is.

TikTok is often referred to as a “lip-syncing” app, which makes it sound like it’s some online karaoke experience. But a closer comparison would be Vine, Twitter’s still sorely missed short-form video app whose content lives on as YouTube compilations.

While it’s true that TikTok is home to some standard lip-syncing, it’s actually better known for its act-out memes backed by music and other sound clips, which get endlessly reproduced and remixed among its young users.

Its tunes are varied — pop, rap, R&B, electro and DJ tracks serve as backing for its 15-second video clips. But the sounds may also be snagged from YouTube music videos (see: I Baked You A Pie above), SoundCloud or from pop culture — like weird soundbites from Peppa Pig or Riverdale — or just original creations.

These memes-as-videos reference things familiar to Gen Z, like gaming culture (see below). They come in the form of standalone videos, reactions, duets, mirrors/clones and more.

The app has been growing steadily since it acquired its U.S.-based rival Musical.ly in November 2017 for north of $800 million, then merged the two apps’ user bases last August.

This gave TikTok the means to grow in Western markets, where it has attracted the interest of U.S. celebrities like Jimmy Fallon and Tony Hawk, for example, along with YouTubers on the hunt for the next new thing.

But unlike Vine (RIP), YouTube or Instagram, TikTok doesn’t yet feel dominated by micro-celebs, though they certainly exist.

Instead, its main feed often surfaces everyday users — aka, amateurs — doing something cute, funny or clever, with a tacit acknowledgement that “yes, this is an internet joke” underlying much of the content.

Okay, okay.

Sometimes these videos are described as “cringey.” 

But that’s because those of us trying to talk about TikTok are old(er) people who grew up on the big ol’ mean internet.

Cringey, frankly, is an unfair label, as it dismisses TikTok’s success in setting a tone for its community. Here, users are able to post and share unapologetically wholesome content, and receive far less mocking than elsewhere on the web — largely because everyone else on TikTok posts similar “cringey” content, too.

You might not know this, however, if your only exposure to TikTok comes from YouTube’s TikTok Cringe Compilations. But spend a day in the (oddly addictive) TikTok feed, and you’ll find a whole world of video that doesn’t exist anywhere else on the web — including on YouTube. Videos that are weird, sure — but also fun to watch.

It’s a stark comparison to the existing social media platforms.

Users today are engaged in the culture wars on Twitter (ban the Nazis! protect free speech!), while YouTubers are gaming the algorithm with hateful, exploitive, dangerous and otherwise questionable content that freaks out advertisers. And Facebook is, well, contributing to war crimes and the toppling of democracy.

Meanwhile, TikTok presents an alternative version of online sharing. Simple, goofy, irreverent — and frankly, it’s a much needed reset.

For example, some of the popular TikTok memes have included videos of kids proclaiming what a great mom they have, as they drag her into frame, or they remind people to pick up litter and conserve water. They might give themselves silly, but self-affirming makeovers where, afterwards, they cite themselves not as “cute” but rather “drop. dead. gorgeous.”

They might spend hours setting up gummy bears as Adele concert-goers, learning how to do a shuffle dance up a set of stairs or in a dance battle their dad. Or they may showcase some special talent — drawing, painting, gymnastics, dance or skateboarding, perhaps. They do science experiments, make jokes or use special effects for a little video magic.

They shout out “hit or miss!” in public places and wait to see who answers. (Look it up.)

Of course, it is still the internet. And TikTok isn’t perfect.

The app has also been the subject of troubling reports about its “dark” side, which is reportedly filled with child predators and teens bullying and harassing one another. It’s not clear, however, that TikTok’s affliction with these matters is any worse than any other large, social, public-by-default app of its size.

And unlike some apps, concerned parents — or the users themselves — can set a TikTok account to private, turn off commenting, hide the account from search, disable downloads, disallow reactions and duets and restrict an account from receiving messages.

It is concerning, however, that under-13 kids are setting up social media accounts without parental consent. (But, uh, have you seen Fortnite and Roblox? This is what kids do. At least the TikTok main feed isn’t worrisome, we’ve found.)

The bigger issue, though — and one that could ultimately prove damaging to TikTok — is whether it will be able to keep up with content filtering and takedown requests, or handle its security and privacy protection issues as it scales up.

Content and community aren’t the only things contributing to TikTok’s growth.

While Vine may have introduced the concept of short-form video, TikTok made video editing incredibly simple. You don’t need to be a video expert to put together clips with a range of effects. It’s the Instagram for the mobile video age — in a way that Instagram itself won’t be able to reproduce, having already aligned its community with influencers and advertisers.

TikTok’s sizable user base, meanwhile, is due not only to its growth in Western markets, but because of its traction in emerging markets like China and India.

This allowed TikTok to rank No. 4 worldwide across iOS and Android, combined, according to App Annie’s data on the most-downloaded apps of 2018. On iOS, TikTok was the No. 1 most-downloaded app of the year, mainly thanks to China.

At times last year, TikTok even ranked higher than Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube.

Both App Annie and Sensor Tower agree that TikTok scored the No. 3 position for most installs among all apps worldwide in 2018.

Now, TikTok is growing in India, says Sensor Tower.

The country accounted for 27 percent of new installs between December 2017 and December 2018, and last month was the source for 32.3 million of TikTok’s 75 million total new downloads — a 25x increase from last year.

The revenue is starting to arrive, as well.

Worldwide, users spent $6 million tipping their favorite live streamers, a 253 percent year-over-year jump from December 2017’s total of $1.7 million, Sensor Tower estimates. But live streaming is not the default activity on TikTok — it added the feature after shutting down Musical.ly’s live streaming app, Live.ly.

Above: full-screen ad in TikTok when app is first launched

TikTok is also starting to test in-app advertising, and is being eyed by agencies as a result. When you launch TikTok, you may see a full-page splash screen ad of some kind — though the company has not officially launched ad products.

But the brands are starting to take notice. This week, for example, TikTok collaborated with SportsManias, an officially licensed NFL Players Association partner, for the introduction of NFL-themed AR animated stickers in time for the Super Bowl. The move feels like a test for how well branded content will perform within the TikTok universe, but the company says it’s “not an ad deal.”

The company also declined to say how many are today using TikTok.

However, parent company ByteDance had publicly stated last year that it had 500 million monthly active users when it announced the app’s rebranding post-merger. It has yet to release new numbers for its global user base.

That said, ByteDance just shared updated stats for China only, on all versions of the TikTok app (including the non-Google Play Android version). It says that TikTok now has 500 million monthly active users in China alone.

Sensor Tower today estimates TikTok has grown to nearly 800 million lifetime installs, not counting Android in China.

Factoring in those Android in China installs, it’s fair to say this app has topped 1 billion downloads.

Here comes the new new internet, folks. It’s big, dominated by emerging markets, mobile, video, meme-ified, and goes viral both online and off.

So if you haven’t been paying attention to TikTok, you may want to get started.

from Mobile – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2CTfM9f ORIGINAL CONTENT FROM: https://techcrunch.com/