#why digital marketing matters

[thenexuswave]

Unlocking Success with the Best Digital Marketing Company in Austin

Elevating Your Online Presence with the Best SEO Company in Austin, Texas. In the bustling digital landscape of Austin, Texas, finding the Best Digital Marketing Company in Austin a matter of choice; it's a strategic imperative. With businesses vying for attention in a sea of online competition, partnering with the right SEO experts can make all the difference. Welcome to The Nexus Wave where we redefine digital marketing excellence.

Unparalleled Expertise in SEO

Our journey begins with a steadfast commitment to mastering the art and science of search engine optimization (SEO). At The Nexus Wave, we don't just follow trends; we set them. Our team of seasoned SEO specialist’s boasts years of experience navigating the ever-evolving algorithms of major search engines. From keyword research to on-page optimization and link building, we employ a holistic approach to boosting your online visibility and driving organic traffic to your website.

Web Development Services Tailored to Your Needs

In today's hyper connected world, your website serves as the virtual storefront of your business. As the premier provider of web development services in Austin, TX, we understand the importance of a seamlessly functional and visually captivating online presence. Whether you're looking to revamp your existing website or embark on a new digital venture, our team of developers is equipped with the technical prowess and creative flair to bring your vision to life.

Crafting Compelling Content Strategies

In the realm of digital marketing, content is king. However, not all content is created equal. That's where our content marketing expertise comes into play. From captivating blog posts to engaging social media campaigns, we specialize in crafting content strategies that resonate with your target audience and drive meaningful engagement. With a keen understanding of your brand identity and business objectives, we deliver content that not only educates and entertains but also converts.

Embracing the Power of Data Analytics

In the age of data-driven decision-making, insights reign supreme. At The Nexus Wave, we harness the power of advanced analytics to glean actionable insights into your digital performance. By tracking key metrics and analyzing user behavior, we uncover hidden opportunities for optimization and refinement. From identifying high-converting keywords to fine-tuning your conversion funnels, our data-driven approach ensures that every aspect of your digital strategy is optimized for success.

Why Digital Marketing Matters

In today's digital-centric world, the importance of digital marketing cannot be overstated. Whether you're a small local business or a global enterprise, establishing a strong online presence is essential for survival and growth. From reaching new audiences to nurturing existing customer relationships why digital marketing matters offers unparalleled opportunities for expansion and innovation. By leveraging the latest tools and techniques, businesses can unlock new avenues of growth and stay ahead of the competition.

Partner with the Best for Unrivaled Results

In conclusion, when it comes to digital marketing, the stakes are high, and the competition is fierce. That's why it's crucial to partner with a trusted ally who understands the nuances of the digital landscape and has a proven track record of success. At The Nexus Wave, we are committed to helping businesses of all sizes thrive in the digital age. From SEO to web development to content marketing, we offer a comprehensive suite of services designed to elevate your online presence and drive tangible results.

[aaksconsulting]

Web Accessibility :Why IT Matters and How to Implement IT

In the digital age, websites have become the primary means of accessing information, services, and resources. They have opened up a world of possibilities, making it easier for people to connect, learn, work, and perform everyday tasks online. However, for some individuals, accessing the internet can be a challenging or frustrating experience.

Web accessibility is the key to addressing this issue, ensuring that websites are inclusive and usable for everyone, regardless of their abilities or disabilities. In this comprehensive guide, we will explore the importance of web accessibility and provide practical steps on how to implement it.

1.The Significance of Web Accessibility

Web accessibility refers to the practice of designing and developing websites and web applications that can be used by people with disabilities. Disabilities can be permanent, temporary, or situational and include conditions like visual, auditory, motor, or cognitive impairments. Making websites accessible means removing barriers and providing alternatives that enable people with disabilities to perceive, understand, and interact with web content effectively.

-Inclusivity for All:

The primary reason why web accessibility matters is inclusivity. The internet should be a place where everyone has the opportunity to participate equally, regardless of their physical or cognitive abilities. This inclusivity extends to individuals with various disabilities, including but not limited to:

Visual impairments: Blindness, low vision, color blindness.

Auditory impairments: Deafness, hard of hearing.

Motor impairments: Limited dexterity, tremors.

Cognitive impairments: Dyslexia, attention disorders, memory issues.

 -Legal and Ethical Obligations:

Many countries have recognized the importance of web accessibility and have enacted laws to ensure compliance. In the United States, for instance, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act require federal agencies and contractors to make their digital content accessible. Non-compliance can result in legal consequences. Beyond legal obligations, ethical considerations are equally vital. Building accessible websites is a step toward creating a more inclusive and equitable digital environment.

-Wider Reach and Audience:

Prioritizing web accessibility can expand your website’s reach and audience. An accessible website not only caters to people with disabilities but also benefits older individuals, those with temporary impairments (e.g., a broken arm), and even those in noisy environments. The broader your audience, the greater your impact, whether you’re a business, government entity, educational institution, or individual content creator.

-SEO and Improved Search Rankings:

Search engines like Google consider web accessibility when ranking websites. By optimizing your site for accessibility, you improve its SEO performance, making it more discoverable and easier to find. Search engines reward websites that offer a seamless user experience for all visitors.

2. Implementing Web Accessibility

Steps to Ensure an Accessible Website

Implementing web accessibility involves a combination of design, development, and content considerations. The goal is to make your website perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust for all users. Here are the key steps to achieving web accessibility:

-Use Semantic HTML:

Semantic HTML elements: Use appropriate HTML tags (e.g., headings, lists, tables) to structure your content. This helps screen readers and assistive technologies understand the content’s hierarchy and context.

-Provide Alternative Text for Images:

Alt attributes: Always include descriptive alt attributes for images. These descriptions help users with visual impairments understand the content and context of the images.

– Ensure Keyboard Accessibility:

Keyboard navigation: Make sure all interactive elements, links, and forms are accessible and operable via a keyboard. Avoid reliance on mouse-specific actions.

– Use ARIA Roles and Attributes:

ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) attributes: Employ ARIA roles and attributes to enhance the accessibility of dynamic web content, such as single-page applications and web applications.

-Captions and Transcripts for Multimedia:

Multimedia content: Provide captions for videos and audio content. Additionally, offer text transcripts for audio content, which aids both users with disabilities and those in noise-sensitive environments.

-Ensure Proper Heading Structure:

Headings hierarchy: Use a clear and consistent heading structure throughout your web pages. Heading tags (H1, H2, H3, etc.) provide a logical order for screen reader users to navigate.

– Color and Contrast:

Color choices: Ensure sufficient color contrast between text and background to improve readability for users with low vision or color blindness.

– Form Accessibility:

Label forms: Label all form fields with clear and concise labels. Provide error messages that are clear and informative.

– Focus Management:

Focus indicators: Clearly define focus states for interactive elements to make them easily identifiable when using a keyboard or assistive technology.

-Test with Assistive Technologies:

Screen readers and other assistive devices: Regularly test your website with screen readers, speech recognition software, and other assistive technologies to identify and address accessibility issues.

-Regular Accessibility Audits:

Ongoing evaluation: Conduct regular accessibility audits to identify and rectify issues as your website evolves. Automated tools, user testing, and expert audits can be valuable resources.

3: Web Accessibility Beyond Compliance

Striving for Inclusive Excellence

While achieving compliance with accessibility standards is essential, web accessibility should not be viewed as a mere checkbox item. Strive for inclusive excellence by going beyond the minimum requirements. Here are some additional considerations:

User-Centered Design:

User personas: Understand the needs, preferences, and challenges of different user groups, including those with disabilities.

User Testing:

User feedback: Regularly gather feedback from users with disabilities to improve your website’s accessibility.

Education and Awareness:

Training: Educate your team about web accessibility best practices and foster a culture of accessibility awareness within your organization.

 Third-Party Content:

External content: Encourage third-party content providers to create accessible content when sharing materials on your website.

Continuous Improvement:

Evolution: Recognize that web accessibility is an ongoing journey. Stay informed about new technologies and best practices to continuously improve your website’s accessibility.

4: Resources for Web Accessibility

Tools and References

For those looking to delve deeper into web accessibility, the following resources can be valuable:

 Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG):

WCAG: The WCAG guidelines are the globally accepted standards for web accessibility. They provide detailed recommendations and techniques for creating accessible web content.

 Accessibility Evaluation Tools:

Automated tools: Various automated tools can help identify accessibility issues on your website. Some popular options include WAVE, axe, and the Accessibility Insights suite.

 Assistive Technologies:

Screen readers: Familiarize yourself with popular screen readers like JAWS, NVDA, and Voice Over to understand how users with visual impairments access websites.

 Online Courses and Training:

Online courses: Platforms like Coursera, edX, and Udacity offer courses on web accessibility, including those from experts in the field.

 Accessibility Communities and Forums:

Online communities: Join online forums, mailing lists, or social media groups dedicated to web accessibility to stay up-to-date with the latest developments and best practices.

 Conclusion

Web accessibility is not merely a legal requirement; it is a moral and practical imperative. Creating an inclusive digital space benefits everyone, making the internet a more accessible and enjoyable place for all users.

By understanding the significance of web accessibility and taking the necessary steps to implement it, you contribute to a more inclusive online world, ensuring that no one is left behind in the digital age. As web accessibility continues to evolve, staying committed to inclusive design is a commitment to a better, more equitable future for all internet users.

[inkskinned]

the thing is there's like, a point of oversaturation for everything, and it's why so many things get dropped after a few minutes. and we act like millennials or gen z kids "have short attention spans" but... that's not quite it. it's more like - we did like it. you just ruined it.

capitalism sees product A having moderate success, and then everything has to come out with their "own version" of product A (which is often exactly the same). and they dump extreme amounts of money and environmental waste into each horrible simulacrum they trot out each season.

now it's not just tiktokkers making videos; it's that instagram and even fucking tumblr both think you want live feeds and video-first programming. and it helps them, because videos are easier to sneak native ads into. the books coming out all have to have 78 buzzwords in them for SEO, or otherwise they don't get published. they are making a live-action remake of moana. i haven't googled it, but there's probably another marvel or starwars something coming out, no matter when you're reading this post.

and we are like "hi, this clone of project A completely misses the point of the original. it is soulless and colorless and miserable." and the company nods and says "yes totally. here is a different clone, but special." and we look at clone 2 and we say "nope, this one is still flat and bad, y'all" and they're like "no, totally, we hear you," and then they make another clone but this time it's, like, a joyless prequel. and by the time they've successfully rolled out "clone 89", the market is incredibly oversaturated, and the consumer is blamed because the company isn't turning a profit.

and like - take even something digital like the tumblr "live streaming" function i just mentioned. that has to take up server space and some amount of carbon footprint; just so this brokenass blue hellsite can roll out a feature that literally none of its userbase actually wants. the thing that's the kicker here: even something that doesn't have a physical production plant still impacts the environment.

and it all just feels like it's rolling out of control because like, you watch companies pour hundreds of thousands of dollars into a remake of a remake of something nobody wants anymore and you're like, not able to afford eggs anymore. and you tell the company that really what you want is a good story about survival and they say "okay so you mean a YA white protagonist has some kind of 'spicy' love triangle" and you're like - hey man i think you're misunderstanding the point of storytelling but they've already printed 76 versions of "city of blood and magic" and "queen of diamond rule" and spent literally millions of dollars on the movie "Candy Crush Killer: Coming to Eat You".

it's like being stuck in a room with a clown that keeps telling the same joke over and over but it's worse every time. and that would be fine but he keeps fucking charging you 6.99. and you keep being like "no, i know it made me laugh the first time, but that's because it was different and new" and the clown is just aggressively sitting there saying "well! plenty of people like my jokes! the reason you're bored of this is because maybe there's something wrong with you!"

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Kickstarting the audiobook of The Lost Cause, my novel of environmental hope

Tonight (October 2), I'm in Boise to host an event with VE Schwab. On October 7–8, I'm in Milan to keynote Wired Nextfest.

The Lost Cause is my next novel. It's about the climate emergency. It's hopeful. Library Journal called it "a message hope in a near-future that looks increasingly bleak." As with every other one of my books Amazon refuses to sell the audiobook, so I made my own, and I'm pre-selling it on Kickstarter:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doctorow/the-lost-cause-a-novel-of-climate-and-hope

That's a lot to unpack, I know. So many questions! Including this one: "How is it that I have another book out in 2023?" Because this is my third book this year. Short answer: I write when I'm anxious, so I came out of lockdown with nine books. Nine!

Hope and writing are closely related activities. Hope (the belief that you can make things better) is nothing so cheap and fatalistic as optimism (the belief that things will improve no matter what you do). The Lost Cause is full of people who are full of hope.

The action begins a full generation after the Hail Mary passage of the Green New Deal, and the people who grew up fighting the climate emergency (rather than sitting hopelessly by while the powers that be insisted that nothing could or should be done) have a name for themselves: they call themselves "the first generation in a century that doesn't fear the future."

I fear the future. Unchecked corporate power has us barreling over a cliff's edge and all the one-percent has to say is, "Well, it's too late to swerve now, what if the bus rolls and someone breaks a leg? Don't worry, we'll just keep speeding up and leap the gorge":

https://locusmag.com/2022/07/cory-doctorow-the-swerve/

That unchecked corporate power has no better avatar than Amazon, one of the tech monopolies that has converted the old, good internet into "five giant websites, each filled with screenshots of the other four":

https://twitter.com/tveastman/status/1069674780826071040

Amazon maintains a near-total grip over print and ebooks, but when it comes to audiobooks, that control is total. The company's Audible division has captured more than 90% of the market, and it abuses that dominance to cram Digital Rights Management onto every book it sells, even if the author doesn't want it:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/07/25/can-you-hear-me-now/#acx-ripoff

I wrote a whole-ass book about this and it came out less than a month ago; it's called The Internet Con and it lays out an audacious plan to halt the internet's enshittification and throw it into reverse:

http://www.seizethemeansofcomputation.org/

The tldr is this: when an audiobook is wrapped in Amazon's DRM, only Amazon can legally remove it. That means that every book I sell you on Audible is a book you have to throw away if you ever break up with Amazon, and Amazon can use the fact that it's hold you hostage to screw me – and every other author – over.

As I said last time this came up:

Fuck that sideways.

With a brick.

My books are sold without DRM, so you can play them in any app and do anything copyright permits, and that means Amazon won't carry them, and that means my publishers don't want to pay to produce them, and that means I produce them myself, and then I make the (significant) costs back by selling them on Kickstarter.

And you know what? It works. Readers don't want DRM. I mean, duh. No one woke up this morning and said, "Dammit, why won't someone sell me a product that lets me do less with my books?" I sell boatloads" of books through these crowdfunding campaigns. I sold so many copies of my last book, *The Internet Con, that they sold out the initial print run in two weeks (don't worry, they held back stock for my upcoming events).

But beyond that, I think there's another reason my readers keep coming back, even though I wrote a genuinely stupid number of books while working through lockdown anxiety while the wildfires raged and ashes sifted down out of the sky and settled on my laptop as I lay in my backyard hammock, pounding my keyboard.

(I went through two keyboards during lockdown. Thankfully, I bought a user-serviceable laptop from Framework and fixed it myself both times, in a matter of minutes. No, no one pays me to mention this, but hot damn is it cool.)

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/13/graceful-failure/#frame

The reason readers come back to my books is that they're full of hope. In the same way that writing lets me feel like I'm not a passenger in life, but rather, someone with a say in my destination, the books that I write are full of practical ways and dramatic scenes in which other people seize the means of computation, the reins of power or their own destinies.

The protagonist of The Lost Cause is Brooks Palazzo, a high-school senior in Burbank whose parents were part of the original cohort of volunteers who kicked off the global transformation, and left him an orphan when they succumbed to one of the zoonotic plagues that arise every time another habitat is destroyed.

Brooks grew up knowing what his life would be: the work of repair and care, which millions of young people are doing. Relocating entire cities off endangered coastlines and floodplains, or out of fire-zones. Fighting floods and fires. Caring for tens of millions of refugees for whom the change came too late.

But with every revolution comes a counter-revolution. The losers of a just war don't dig holes, climb inside and pull the dirt down on top of themselves. Two groups of reactionaries – seagoing anarcho-capitalist billionaire wreckers and seething white nationalist militias – have formed an alliance.

They've already gotten their champion into the White House. Next up: dismantling every cause for hope Brooks and his friends have, and bringing back the fear.

That's the setup for a novel about solidarity, care, library socialism, and snatching victory from defeat's jaws. Writing it help keep me sane during the lockdown, and when it came time to record the audiobook, I spent a lot of time thinking about who could read it. I've had some great narrators: Wil Wheaton, @neil-gaiman, Amber Benson, Bronson Pinchot, and more.

I record my audiobooks with Skyboat Media, a brilliant studio near my place in LA. Back in August, I spent a week in their recording booth – "The Tardis" – doing something I'd never tried before: I recorded a whole audiobook, with directorial supervision: The Internet Con:

https://transactions.sendowl.com/products/78992826/DEA0CE12/purchase

When it was done, the director – audiobook legend Gabrielle de Cuir – sat me down and said, "Look, I've never said this to an author before, but I think you should read The Lost Cause. I don't direct anyone anymore except for Wil Wheaton and LeVar Burton, but I would direct you on this one."

I was immensely flattered – and very nervous. Reading The Internet Con was one thing – the book is built around the speeches I've been giving for 20 years and I knew I could sell those lines – but The Lost Cause is a novel, with a whole cast of characters. Could I do it?

Reader, I did it. I just listened to the proofs last week and:

It.

Came.

Out.

Great.

The Lost Cause goes on sale on November 14th, and I'll be selling this audiobook I made everywhere audiobooks are sold – except for the stores that require DRM, nonconsensually shackling readers and writers to their platforms. So you'll be able to get it on Libro.fm, downpour.com, even Google Play – but not Audible, Apple Books, or Audiobooks.com.

But in addition to those worthy retailers, I will be sending out thousands – and thousands! – of audiobook to my Kickstarter backers on the on-sale date, either as a folder of DRM-free MP3s, or as a download code for Libro.fm, to make things easy for people who don't want to have to figure out how to sideload an audiobook into a standalone app.

And, of course, the mobile duopoly have made this kind of sideloading exponentially harder over the past decade, though far be it from me to connect this with their policy of charging 30% commissions on everything sold through an app, a commission they don't receive if you get your files on the web and load 'em yourself:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doctorow/red-team-blues-another-audiobook-that-amazon-wont-sell/posts/3788112

As with my previous Kickstarters, I'm also selling ebooks and hardcovers – signed or unsigned, and this time I've found a great partner to fulfill EU orders from within the EU, so backers won't have to pay VAT and customs charges. The wonderful Otherland – who have hosted me on my last two trips to Berlin – are going to manage that shipping for me:

https://www.otherland-berlin.de/en/home.html

Kim Stanley Robinson read the book and said, "Along with the rush of adrenaline I felt a solid surge of hope. May it go like this." That's just about the perfect quote, because the book is a ride. It's not just a kumbaya tale of a better world that is possible: it's a post-cyberpunk novel of high-tech guerrilla and meme warfare, climate tech and bad climate tech, wildcat prefab urban infill, and far-right militamen who adapt to a ban on assault-rifles by switching to super-soakers full of hydrochloric acid.

It's a book about struggle, hope in the darkness, and a way through this rotten moment. It's a book that dares to imagine that things might get worse but also better. This is a curious emotional melange, but it's one that I'm increasingly feeling these days.

Like, Amazon, that giant bully, whose blockade on DRM-free audiobooks cost me enough money to pay off my mortgage and put my kid through university (according to my agent)? The incredible Lina Khan brought a long-overdue antitrust case against Amazon while her rockstar DoJ counterpart, Jonathan Kanter, is dragging Google through the courts.

The EU is taking on Apple, and French cops are kicking down Nvidia's doors and grabbing their files, looking to build another antitrust case for monopolizing GPUs. The writers won their strike and Joe Biden walked the picket-line with the UAW, the first president in history to join striking workers:

https://doctorow.medium.com/joe-biden-is-headed-to-a-uaw-picket-line-in-detroit-f80bd0b372ab?sk=f3abdfd3f26d2f615ad9d2f1839bcc07

Solar is now our cheapest energy source, which is wild, because if we could only capture 0.4% of the solar energy that makes it through the atmosphere, we could give everyone alive the same energy budget as Canadians (who have American lifestyles but higher heating bills). As Deb Chachra writes in her forthcoming How Infrastructure Works (my review pending): we get a fresh supply of energy every time the sun rises and we only get new materials when a comet survives atmospheric entry, but we treat energy as scarce and throw away our materials after a single use:

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/612711/how-infrastructure-works-by-deb-chachra/

Anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop. We have shot past many of our planetary boundaries and there are waves of climate crises in our future, but they don't have to be climate disasters. That's up to us – it'll depend on whether we come together to save ourselves and each other, or tear ourselves apart.

The Lost Cause dares to imagine what it might be like if we do the former. We don't live in a post-enshittification world yet, but we could. With these indie audiobooks, I've found a way to treat the terminal enshittification of the Amazon monopoly as damage and route around it. I hope you'll back the Kickstarter, fight enshittification, inject some hope into your reading, and enjoy a kickass adventure novel in the process:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doctorow/the-lost-cause-a-novel-of-climate-and-hope

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

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/02/the-lost-cause/#the-first-generation-that-doesnt-fear-the-future

[asthedeathoflight]

Im here as a certified Blade Runner expert to inform all of you that Armand would prefer the theatrical release with the happy ending because deep down hes a scared little kid and he wants to believe that everything is going to be alright for Deckard and Rachael forever and Daniel prefers the director's cut which is obviously objectively the better version and so he would be very caught off guard by Armand preferring the theatrical release, even tho he really shouldnt because he and Armand saw the theatrical version together in theaters and the directors cut didn't come out until after they broke up so of course thats the version Armand has been rewatching all these years.

However because they're both so damn stubborn this would result in their first ever couple fight post-turning which inevitably becomes extremely personal extremely quickly (should Rachael get to live forever with Deckard? Is her life beautiful BECAUSE its short? Does Deckard's love for her mean more if he's turning his back on his long-lived brethren to embrace the ephemerality of her existence?) and results in several pieces of furniture being destroyed. After this Armand has a blu ray of the final cut overnighted bc neither of them have ever seen it (even tho its available digitally) and they have a seven hour long conversation about whether Deckard is a replicant and what it would mean if he was which at some point turns into makeup sex but never stops also being a philosophical discussion of the themes of timeless Ridley Scott classic Blade Runner.

And in late 2018 Armand kept mentioning that there's this science fiction movie set next year to Louis like he expected him to be excited but Louis was too busy manipulating the stock market or whatever and he just didn't really get why it mattered- all scifi movies are set in the future Armand, and we're immortal so we're going to live to see all of those futures, you weren't like this in 1984 Armand - and Armand doesn't quite regret what he did but the loneliness cuts sharper than usual on New Year's 2019.

[tangibletechnomancy]

The reason I took interest in AI as an art medium is that I've always been interested in experimenting with novel and unconventional art media - I started incorporating power tools into a lot of my physical processes younger than most people were even allowed to breathe near them, and I took to digital art like a duck to water when it was the big, relatively new, controversial thing too, so really this just seems like the logical next step. More than that, it's exciting - it's not every day that we just invent an entirely new never-before-seen art medium! I have always been one to go fucking wild for that shit.

Which is, ironically, a huge part of why I almost reflexively recoil at how it's used in the corporate world: because the world of business, particularly the entertainment industry, has what often seems like less than zero interest in appreciating it as a novel medium.

And I often wonder how much less that would be the case - and, by extension, how much less vitriolic the discussion around it would be, and how many fewer well-meaning people would be falling for reactionary mythologies about where exactly the problems lie - if it hadn't reached the point of...at least an illusion of commercial viability, at exactly the moment it did.

See, the groundwork was laid in 2020, back during covid lockdowns, when we saw a massive spike in people relying on TV, games, books, movies, etc. to compensate for the lack of outdoor, physical, social entertainment. This was, seemingly, wonderful for the whole industry - but under late-stage capitalism, it was as much of a curse as it was a gift. When industries are run by people whose sole brain process is "line-go-up", tiny factors like "we're not going to be in lockdown forever" don't matter. CEOs got dollar signs in their eyes. Shareholders demanded not only perpetual growth, but perpetual growth at this rate or better. Even though everyone with an ounce of common sense was screaming "this is an aberration, this is not sustainable" - it didn't matter. The business bros refused to believe it. This was their new normal, they were determined to prove -

And they, predictably, failed to prove it.

So now the business bros are in a pickle. They're beholden to the shareholders to do everything within their power to maintain the infinite growth they promised, in a world with finite resources. In fact, by precedent, they're beholden to this by law. Fiduciary duty has been interpreted in court to mean that, given the choice between offering a better product and ensuring maximum returns for shareholders, the latter MUST be a higher priority; reinvesting too much in the business instead of trying to make the share value increase as much as possible, as fast as possible, can result in a lawsuit - that a board member or CEO can lose, and have lost before - because it's not acting in the best interest of shareholders. If that unsustainable explosive growth was promised forever, all the more so.

And now, 2-3-4 years on, that impossibility hangs like a sword of Damocles over the heads of these media company CEOs. The market is fully saturated; the number of new potential customers left to onboard is negligible. Some companies began trying to "solve" this "problem" by violating consumer privacy and charging per household member, which (also predictably) backfired because those of us who live in reality and not statsland were not exactly thrilled about the concept of being told we couldn't watch TV with our own families. Shareholders are getting antsy, because their (however predictably impossible) infinite lockdown-level profits...aren't coming, and someone's gotta make up for that, right? So they had already started enshittifying, making excuses for layoffs, for cutting employee pay, for duty creep, for increasing crunch, for lean-staffing, for tightening turnarounds-

And that was when we got the first iterations of AI image generation that were actually somewhat useful for things like rapid first drafts, moodboards, and conceptualizing.

Lo! A savior! It might as well have been the digital messiah to the business bros, and their eyes turned back into dollar signs. More than that, they were being promised that this...both was, and wasn't art at the same time. It was good enough for their final product, or if not it would be within a year or two, but it required no skill whatsoever to make! Soon, you could fire ALL your creatives and just have Susan from accounting write your scripts and make your concept art with all the effort that it takes to get lunch from a Star Trek replicator!

This is every bit as much bullshit as the promise of infinite lockdown-level growth, of course, but with shareholders clamoring for the money they were recklessly promised, executives are looking for anything, even the slightest glimmer of a new possibility, that just might work as a life raft from this sinking ship.

So where are we now? Well, we're exiting the "fucking around" phase and entering "finding out". According to anecdotes I've read, companies are, allegedly, already hiring prompt engineers (or "prompters" - can't give them a job title that implies there's skill or thought involved, now can we, that just might imply they deserve enough money to survive!)...and most of them not only lack the skill to manually post-process their works, but don't even know how (or perhaps aren't given access) to fully use the software they specialize in, being blissfully unaware of (or perhaps not able/allowed to use) features such as inpainting or img2img. It has been observed many times that LLMs are being used to flood once-reputable information outlets with hallucinated garbage. I can verify - as can nearly everyone who was online in the aftermath of the Glasgow Willy Wonka Dashcon Experience - that the results are often outright comically bad.

To anyone who was paying attention to anything other than please-line-go-up-faster-please-line-go-please (or buying so heavily into reactionary mythologies about why AI can be dangerous in industry that they bought the tech companies' false promises too and just thought it was a bad thing), this was entirely predictable. Unfortunately for everyone in the blast radius, common sense has never been an executive's strong suit when so much money is on the line.

Much like CGI before it, what we have here is a whole new medium that is seldom being treated as a new medium with its own unique strengths, but more often being used as a replacement for more expensive labor, no matter how bad the result may be - nor, for that matter, how unjust it may be that the labor is so much cheaper.

And it's all because of timing. It's all because it came about in the perfect moment to look like a life raft in a moment of late-stage capitalist panic. Any port in a storm, after all - even if that port is a non-Euclidean labyrinth of soggy, rotten botshit garbage.

Any port in a storm, right? ...right?

All images generated using Simple Stable, under the Code of Ethics of Are We Art Yet?

[paper-mario-wiki]

Genuine question: Why do you believe Glitch Productions is overworking and underpaying their employees? Is there a source for this? I don't see where the animosity is coming from.

It's not a matter of overworking and underpaying.

It's that the potential for this series is straight up being held hostage by a studio who does not care about anything other than finding a golden goose.

I've been in digital media for pretty much my entire career, and I can tell you with great confidence that that much advertising and hype doesn't out of nowhere, and it doesn't happen with no budget. That much merch wasn't just available by chance day 1. And the fact that they're gauging the potential of the project solely on merch sales and not by audience engagement and response is extraordinarily telling.

The Amazing Digital Circus is a GI-Joe commercial to sell action figures, and I'm really sick of people talking about it like it's just a cute little indie project with a lot of heart. Because that's part of the marketing.

[brostateexam]

One of the recent trends on TikTok is an aesthetic called “night luxe.” It embodies the kind of performative opulence one usually encounters at New Year’s Eve parties: champagne, disco balls, bedazzled accessories, and golden sparkles.

“Night luxe” doesn’t actually mean anything. It isn’t a reaction to wellness culture, nor is it proof that partying is “in” again (has partying ever been “out”?). It’s just one of many aesthetic designations for which the internet has contrived a buzzy, meaningless portmanteau. Rest assured that night luxe will likely have faded into irrelevance by the time this article is published, only for another meme-ified aesthetic (i.e., coastal grandmother) to be crowned the next viral “trend.”

The tendency to register and categorize things, whether it be one’s identity, body type, or aesthetic preferences, is a natural part of online life. People have a penchant for naming elusive digital phenomena, but TikTok has only accelerated the use of cutesy aesthetic nomenclature. Anything that’s vaguely popular online must be defined or decoded — and ultimately, reduced to a bundle of marketable vibes with a kitschy label.

Last month, Harper’s Bazaar fashion news director Rachel Tashjian declared that “we’re living through a mass psychosis expressing itself through trend reporting.” There is, I would argue, as much reporting as there is trend manufacturing. No one is sure exactly what a trend is anymore or if it’s just an unfounded observation gone viral. The distinction doesn’t seem to matter, since TikTok — and the consumer market — demands novelty. It creates ripe conditions for a garbage-filled hellscape where everything and anything has the potential to be a trend.

TikTok plucks niche digital aesthetics out of obscurity and serves them up to an audience that might not have known or cared in the first place. While aesthetic components were once integral to the formation of traditional subcultures, they’ve lost all meaning in this algorithmically driven visual landscape. Instead, subcultural images and attitudes become grouped under a ubiquitous, indefinable label of a “viral trend” — something that can be demystified, mimicked, sold, and bought.

[yaut-jaknowit]

So somehow Gawtin or her human lover get ahold of a strap on :3

False Control

Pairing: Gawtin (female Yautja) x AFAB!Reader

Warnings: Strap on, wlw, lesbian sex, cunnilingus.

Word Count: 3926

Summary: Gawtin comes to you with a silicone dildo. She wants you to use it on her. The first time you are able to fuck her the way she deserve. Despite her allowing you to top her, she's always in control.

Author Note: I know I say this every time but I love our girl Gawtin. Sexy motherfucker who could twist off my head and I'll thank her. Also, I didn't know who was suppose to use it so I took the chance to write about our goddess getting dicked down.

P.s. I'm sorry but I'm gonna have to close asks. I didn't expect nearly thirty to be sitting in my inbox right now. Plus, I'm falling behind in my writing right now. Work has been rough with summer coming and people fucking calling out. So fun.

Masterlist

Ao3

In your hand, the silicone was heavy and thick. A concerned look passed over your features when you glanced up at Gawtin. “This is the average size for a male?” you exclaimed, eyes darting between the fake phallus and those gorgeous purple eyes of hers. Gawtin had given you this after visiting the market today. The two of you have been talk about getting an item like that.

One of her upper mandibles lifted with a smirk. “Yes.” She bent at the waist to pinch your chin between her thick digits. “And that does not even include the knot.” Your eyes widened. You had forgotten that small detail. Males had a knot… part of their breeding and such.

Your bottom lip was caught between dull teeth, eyes raking down her form you knew so well but loved just the same. “I wish I could knot you,” you uttered softly into the air, dazed by checking your green Yautja out.

The grasp on your chin tightened and tugged you towards her. Her warm breath fanning over your face. “Is that so?” All you could do was just nod with your eyes softening. Her long, skinny tongue darted out and teased your lips for a second. “You will not be able to but you have a chance for something else,” she purred with a hint to why she bought that.

It’s the classic Qui-oki visiting his aunty again for the night. Bziut-ty knows the drill by now. Every time you left her dwelling after dropping Oki off, a heavy blush burned your cheeks. Yet, the sister to Gawtin was nonchalant about it. She happily took Qui-oki for the night with no complaints.

You attempted to wrap your fingers around the base of the shaft but came up short. “Are you sure this isn’t going to hurt you?” you couldn’t help but question. This thing would tear you into two without any preparation. For her, it seems like she could take it with little foreplay into the mix. No matter what, you would still do at least some foreplay. If not for her sake, for yours to make you feel more at ease before shoving this massive thing inside of her.

Gawtin chuckled and pressed a kiss to your forehead. “I am more than sure, artful one. I want you to watch as it splits me open and I take it fully in. I cannot wait to see that look of surprise on your face.” She grinned and released her hold on your chin with a last kiss.

“Well… if you’re sure,” you trailed off and glanced down the hardwood floors of the house. Gawtin patted your head.

“Do you want to test it now?” Your head snapped to look up at her towering form.

“Like, right now?” It was stupid to question her like that but you couldn’t believe she was wanting to do that now. She just bought it. Well, that’s true. She did just buy it. Who doesn’t want to try a new toy the day you received it.

The forest green Yautja snorted and stepped further into your personal space. A space always welcomed for her. One of her hands splayed across a large portion of your back and pushed you to her. “Yes, this very second.”

Both of you were into your shared bedroom in less than a second. A giddy smile gracing your feature to hide your nerves. Despite her attempt to cool your anxiety, but the fact this thing was massive in your hands… you thought it was going to hurt her. Though, she does a little pain, biting and scratching are always welcomed.

The yellow toy was set on the bed. You stood before her, still fully clothed. Something Gawtin was going to fix. She hooked a claw on the strap of your tank top and pulled on it. Though, she could easily tear it off of you and replace it just the same, she gave you the option to remove it yourself. You raised a brow, eye flickering down to her own clothing.

“Honey, I think it’s you that needs to strip,” you pointed out, nearly demanding your mate to strip before you. Every time, you loved the sight of her muscles and even slightly pronounced breasts from breastfeeding Qui-oki.

Gawtin had to teach you a lesson. The massive female grabbed a handful of the clothe and ripped it straight off of your torso. You didn’t expect less from her and gave the green Yautja a deadpanned look. She ignored it by lowering herself onto her knees and cupping one of your freed breasts now. “I prefer to see you bare and at my will,” she purred and bowed her head to lick at your pebbled nipple. A low groan sounds from the back of your throat.

Your jaw drops at the feeling. “Gawtin, please. Be nice and strip for your mate,” you pleaded with the stubborn female. You saw the fire in her eyes flicker to life. Her tongue trailed up, followed by her lower mandibles up to the vulnerable column of your throat. They carved a path till your jawline before slipping off. You shuttered, body covered in goosebumps.

“Hearing you beg is Paya’s grounds,” she whispered against your ear, tongue ghosting over the shell of you ear. “Be good and ask properly.”

Now, you were beginning to pant, even with the light, little touches she gave to you. With your brows furrowed and lip pushed out, you up at her. “Gawtin, I want to see your body. I’ll be good. I promise. I want to fuck you. You’re so pretty. I want to see you take this dildo. Will you let me?” you rambled and your beautiful mate a look you knew she couldn’t resist.

“That is a good little ooman,” she praised and tapped your cheekbone with a claw. “All you need to do is ask sweetly, just like that.” Gawtin stood back up and stripped her body of any clothing.

Dumbly, all you could do was stand watch each piece of clothing fall away. It was like the first day you saw her naked. Adoration sparkled in your eyes even after the last article was placed to the side. “God, you’re my pretty woman,” you muttered and reached out to squeeze her hips. Your head only reaching her midriff, shoulders level with her hips.

She snorts and motions her head over to the bed. “Get the harness on, artful one. I’ll help adjust,” she ordered with a soft tone but you knew to listen to her. You padded over to the end fo the bed and found the item she told you about.

A black, simple harness that’s been modified for someone of your smaller stature and to fit the tank of a dildo she wants. It was simple enough to pull it up and secure it to your hips. Gawtin’s warm hands helped to tighten the harness so it wouldn’t fall off nor was it too tight. The toy itself was secured as well to the designated spot.

Your hand wraps what you can around the base and gave the firm silicon a few strokes. Your lover lies down on the bed and spreads her legs. You follow after her and kneel between her legs, eyes softly gazing at her. “Can I warm you up, my pretty warrior?” you asked with a hopeful gaze.

The Yautja raised a brow at you, letting the tension build up between you two. Then, her massive head dipped down in permission. You silently cheered and bent down, face to her exposed cunt. Though this wasn’t your first time, you still took in the sight.

Alien, but in a good way. Three clits, though longer than usual. You’ve learned they can grow up to two inches long when aroused. The folds themselves are ribbed and even inside are too. Definitely alien. And you loved it.

Softly, you wrapped your lips around the top clit, the biggest of the three. One of your thumbs runs a path along what would be considered the labia. The pad ghosting over the nubs that lined her entrance. Gawtin’s thighs tensed but refused to clamp down on your head, taking your fragile self into consideration. You lightly suckled on the sensitive nub you pulled into your mouth and ran your tongue over the flushed skin.

Her breath hitched while watching you, resting on her elbows. “Keep going, little one. Do not stop,” she commanded, voice in between soft and firm. Gawtin rolled her hips slightly against your face, your thumbpad teasing her nubs harder. You took it as a sign to press against the little sensitive bumps harder. She responded the way you expected her. A short growl escaped her throat. “That’s it.”

From the top clit, you moved to the one on the bottom left. That drew a soft sound from your mate. Her thighs flexed at your sides, barely moving any closer to you. You dipped a thumb just past her entrance to dampen the fingertip. The moist digit glides across the bumps easier, gaining a pace you she enjoyed.

The clit was released once it was flush with blood. For the first time, you tongued at her entrance and tasted her again. Your muscle scooping up what was possible and drinking in her taste. Such deliciousness that couldn’t be contested. You hummed, eyes hooding over, and returned to finishing the last clit. Her sweetness makes it hard to focus on one thing at a time. You just wanted to dive back in and consume the taste she created.

As you sucked, you slipped two fingers, just the size of one her own, into her. Her strong muscles rippled around your digit, trying to suck it in more. You stopped at the knuckle and kept your hand vertical. With those two fingers, you find a well defined ribbed area and push.

Gawtin growled lowly in her throat, muscles throbbing around your fingers. God, you loved that sound and the feeling. You continued to rub a small circle around the area and returned to loving on the first bud. It slightly twitched in your mouth, at it’s full length at this point.

“You know me so well, little one. Know all my spots. Such a good little artist,” she cooed, head rolling back and neck fully exposed. You hummed around her clit and sent vibrations up the length of her spine. Her thighs pressed against the sides of your head before pulling back. “Paya, you are playing a dangerous game, teasing me like that.” You smirked silently to your self and started to pump your fingers. Another finger added to the ring.

It barely did anything to stretch her out. Your hand being too small for the job. That didn’t bother more than did it worry you instead. The last thing you wanted to do was hurt her in a bad way. You added your last finger inside of her and kept pumping away.

Her arousal began to leak down the swell of her cheeks as you drew it out from her. You abandoned her throbbing buds to dip down and lick up what spilled. Your hand was withdrew from her and was replaced with your mouth. The taste of her returning to your tastebuds. A hum sounding from your pleased state.

In such a state, you didn’t even realize your hips were rutting against the mattress until you felt her hand on your hip. They stilled under her touch; breath caught in your throat. Your own slick was starting to drip down the inside of your thighs. The scent mingling with hers.

The hand slips more from your hip and towards your entrance. You mewled with her fingertips ghosted over your dripping folds and swiped up some of your arousal up. Gawtin brough it up to her mouth and licked off the sticky substance staining them. You shuttered and doubled down on her, tongue scooping what you could at the source.

Your mouth returns to her sensitive clits, hand diving back to rub at the spot deep inside of her. Gawtin’s walls started to pulse around your hand. Her noises gaining pitch, hips thrust harsher against your face. You severely focused on her, letting every other thought fall away besides just hurt.

With your other hand, you wrapped it around one of her thighs and pulled yourself snug with her. When her muscles clamped down on your fingers, you felt the bones creak under the strain but refused to pull back. You continued to suckle and lick at her buds, drawing out her orgasm the best you could. Your name was thrown in the mix with a magnificent whine you rarely got to hear.

Gawtin’s chest heaved with breaths as she gathered herself. You drew yourself onto your knees and placed the heavy cock on her mound. Deep down, you were excited to see this thing spilt her open, better than your fingers ever could.

When the dazed look started to fade from her eyes, you rubbed your hand over her stomach then dragged your nails down. They might be dull but she arched her back to press against them harder.

“There’s my wonderful mate. How was that?” you teased your very dominate mate. She growled that ended into a purr and exposed her throat to you. “Are you okay to continue? We-“

One of her hands lashed out and grabbed your throat. A soft yet firm grasp to keep you from pulling away. Gawtin pushed up to rest on her hand instead of her elbow to lean closer to your face. “If you do not put that thing into me now…” she trailed off, leaving open the threat. You couldn’t help but snort, knowing where she was coming from. All the times she’s teased you before coming to mind.

“If you let go of my neck, I can see what I’m doing.” There was just a hint of a snark in your words. One that Gawtin let slip past for the moment. She let go at your words. A smile was giving to her. You gazed down and lined up the pointed head of the yellow dildo at her entrance.

The fire in her eyes could rival the sun’s heat itself. Her desire heavy and thick in the air. You timidly pushed the head past her folds, watching as she consumed it. Gawtin’s cunt starting to stretch to accommodate the toy. Fuck, this was a sight you never knew you needed to see.

Each inch pushed deeper into her, you met no resistance, even when you hilted inside of her. A tiny part of you wished to feel what it would be like to have her wrapped around a real cock. “You look so beautiful stretched around my cock, Gawtin. You don’t understand what this does to me,” you admitted, raptured by the sight before you. You never thought this day would ever come.

She was back on her elbows and kept that sense of dominate aura around her. A soft look passed over her features. “Oh, I do know what you mean, little one. Every time I use my fin-ah,” she gasped when you pulled out and thrusted fully back in. “You sneaky little brat.” Her voice hardened. You smirked.

“You were saying?” With this tiny lick of dominance, you were acting like you had the whole universe in the palm of your hand. Her hand flicked out and wrapped around your throat all over again. Your thrusting stopped, eyes widening at the show of dominance over you. Again, she’s in charge.

Gawtin pulls you closer to her face. “When I stretch you with my fingers alone, you are a squirming, pleading mess underneath me,” she finished what she was originally going to say. You shuttered, your empty pussy clenching around nothing. “So, you better fuck me good, little one.” Her wish is your command. You rapidly nodded your head to get her to release your throat.

Thankfully, she did. Your hands grasp at her hips and pull back your own. A mix of her arousal and your saliva coating the toy. You shoved the entire length back into her, watching as it disappeared. You groaned lowly in the back of your throat and started up a pace. One of your thumbs moved to run tight circles around her top clit, still wet from your mouth earlier. Her walls tightened around the dildo.

“Paya’s grace, you know what you are doing,” she moaned and watched as you fucked her, eyes glued to the yellow toy moving in and out of her. “Tilt… tilt your hips down, little one.” Every little sound and word she made you soaked in. Instantly, you listened to her and angled your hips down to drive the head towards the ground.

Her abs flexed when you hit something your fingers could never reach. “That is it. Right-right there.” In the heat of moment, you accidentally sped up your thrusts, the praise making you lightheaded. “Slow. Slow down.” You whined an apology and returned to your former speed.

An array of sounds echoed back at you in the privacy of her room. The slapping of skin on skin; her keens; your pants. You bite your bottom lip to keep some of your control in check. Your finger continuously rubbing at her sensitive nerve endings.

Sweat pooled on your forehead. Though you felt your energy depleting, you were driven by determination to get her come. You wanted to leave a good impression on her so she’ll let you do this more often. You bowed down, keeps still angled down to rub against the sweet spot inside of her. “Shit, Gawtin. You don’t understand… how much I love you,” you rambled and gave her the sweetest eyes you could pull.

In her orbs, you saw something shift. But you had no time to prepare for when the scenery changed. You gasped after finding yourself on your back and staring up at Gawtin. The giant straddled your hips easily and positioned herself over the toy. Her body slammed down and engulfed the dildo back inside of her. She moaned, head bowed and began to ride the strap on still attached to your hips. Gawtin easily trapped both of your hands in hers and pinned them to bed. Her entire frame leaned over you as she took her pleasure from you.

“Gawtin?!” you shrieked afterwards, unable to move but not in any pain. She was taking what she wants from you. She dismissed your squeak, not stopping.

Gawtin leaned down and practically shoved her tongue past your lips. Her muscle dominated yours without much of effort. You were too stunned to fight back. You moaned though, back arched off of the bed. Her free hand found its back to your exposed chest and tweaked a nipple. Gawtin pulled back and stared deeply into your eyes.

“Ah, shit!” you squeaked and keened under her touch. “This is supposed t-to be about you!” With her riding you, it still was mainly focused on her pleasure, but you wanted to be strictly zeroed in on her.

All she did was growl, the fire in her eyes bright. Your bottom lip caught between dull teeth as you attempted to reel in your noises. You didn’t dare drown out what little sounds she made. Gawtin pulled harshly on your perked nipple with a huff. A knowing look passed over her features. You kept any other words to yourself if it wasn’t praise.

Fangs dug into the skin of your throat, on the verge of spilling blood. You pulled on your hands but the Yautja refused to let go.

The teeth moved to your shoulder, holding on tight. “Good girl, Gawtin,” you cooed and tried to thrust up to meet her hips. Yet, each time she slammed down practically bounced your body back up into hers. “You gonna come? Come all over my cock inside of you?”

A pitiful whine pierced the air. Her hips slammed once more with yours before stilling. All of her muscles flexed and twitched. Pain radiating from your shoulder, her teeth lodged into your skin. Another mark to add to the pile. Your eyes rolled into the back of your head.

Hands cupped your chin. Gawtin released her hold on you and looked at you. A smile broke across your face. “How was that, pretty girl?” you asked the goddess in a soft tone. Her face relaxed after making sure you were okay. Gawtin began to purr and rested her forehead to yours. “I think you liked that more than me.” At least you hoped so.

One of her hands left your face to touch at the bite mark on your shoulder. You couldn’t help but hiss at the pain. It wasn’t bad but definitely noticeable. “I would apologize but it will scar nicely,” she stated.

You couldn’t help the snort that left you. “I think everyone in the village knows I belong to you. Possibly the planet,” you teased her. Marking you is a favorite thing of hers. Anything to get you marked and smelling like her was her favorite. None of the males ever come up to you, especially when Gawtin is around. Expect those two times… those two males really learned a hard lesson.

Gawtin huffed before leaning up to stand on her knees. The dildo slips out of her and flops onto your stomach, covered in her essence. Before you had a chance to even think about cleaning anything, you were lifted up and off the bed. You yelped and scrambled to latch onto Gawtin. “What did I say about warning me?” She didn’t response and began to walk towards the bathroom. “Hey, I’m supposed to be one taking care of you.”

“It is my duty to care for you, little mate,” she stated. You groaned and leaned back in her hold, trusting her to keep you safe. “Complain all you want but I love caring for you.” You softened at her words and looked at her beautiful eyes.

“You’re such a big softy,” you jestered then leaned up, arms hooked around her neck to hoist you up. “You’re my big softy.” Then, you kissed her top two mandibles each. Blood still stained her inner fangs.

A purr started in her chest. The Yautja starts to run a bath for both of your sake and sets you down. You were able to strip yourself of the toy and tossed it into the sink for cleaning later.  “You never answered my question,” you brought up after the tub was filled with hot water.

She perked a brow at you. “I rode you like… like a horse into the sunset,” she responded with a smirk on her alien face. You pressed your lips together and looked away. “And you figure out your speed quickly. It was perfect. You are perfect, my little ooman.” Heat rose to your cheeks as you looked away from her shyly.

Warm water engulfed you. Gawtin sat you in her lap and wrapped her arms around. “You’ll let me go that, right?” you pleaded with a pouty look on your features. “Since I did so good.”

One of her hands stroked down your back, sending tingles along your skin. “Yes, you did earn the chance to do it in the future.”

Dominate as she is, she’ll let you have your moments of false control. You were swift to eat up each second she allotted to you.

[sinkovia]

Black Market: II

Hitman Simon Riley x Doctor Fem!Reader

In desperate need of money to clear a million-dollar debt, you accept Simon's offer to become his personal doctor, earning twenty percent of each contract he completes. But as you plunge back into the black market, ghosts from your past emerge, threatening to unravel everything you've worked so hard to run away from.

Masterlist - Black Market Masterlist

Your eyes shot open, and you quickly sat up, scanning the unfamiliar room around you. The soft bed beneath you and the clean, modern surroundings were unexpected, given the circumstances. It felt more like being in a newly furnished home than the aftermath of a kidnapping.

Checking your clothes, you realized you were still in your pajamas, and nothing seemed out of place. A sigh of relief escaped your lips as you confirmed that you were unharmed.

Getting off the bed cautiously, you scanned the room for any potential weapons. Your eyes landed on a trash bag on the floor next to the bed, prompting you to approach it carefully and untie it.

As you sifted through the contents, your brows furrowed as you found your clothes inside. You pushed aside your confusion and moved to the nightstand, you searched for anything usable, but it was empty. With a plan forming in your mind, you unplugged the bedside lamp and approached the door with caution, slowly turning the knob and stepping out.

You hear noise coming from the next room over, prompting you to press against the wall and cautiously peek over. Your eyes widen as you spot a man with his back turned, busying himself with making coffee.

Moving stealthily, you approach him, intending to use the lamp as a weapon. But just as you lift it, he turns around, catching the lamp before it can hit him.

"Good morning to you too, love," he remarks casually, holding the lamp securely.

Your wide-eyed gaze meets his, and you attempt to retrieve the lamp, but it remains firmly in his grasp. A rush of disbelief floods through you as you recognize him from the courthouse.

Why the hell would he-?

You let go of the lamp and took a step back shaking your head “No. absolutely not. I already fucking told you I don’t want to be your doctor.” You turned around and immediately started walking back to the room you came from and grabbed the trash bag full of your belongings. 

You walked to the front of the door and when you reached out to unlock you were met with a digital passcode. You dropped your bag and turned towards him, “Open the door.”

“You are in need of money and I’m in need of a doctor. What more could you ask for?”

“I’ll find another way to make up the money.”

Simon stood against the counter with his arms crossed and a smug smile playing on his lips. He knew you needed this job, knew you needed the money no matter how much you didn't want to work for him. 

"Why are you smiling? This isn't funny," you cursed at him, frustration evident in your voice. "Unlock the door so I can leave."

He leaned back, his smile widening. "You'll get forty thousand dollars for a single contract I complete," he said casually, watching your reaction.

Your brows furrowed at the offer. "Forty thousand?" you quietly repeated.

He nodded. "You'd be paying off your million-dollar debt for the rest of your life with a regular paying job. And even then, you might not pay it off before you die of old age."

You sighed, running a hand over your hair. He was right, as much as you hated to admit it. You needed the money. 

"You need the money," he continued, his tone matter-of-fact. "And I'm not letting you go. So you better start getting comfortable sweetheart."

"Fuck you," you seethe, grabbing your bag full of clothes and storming back to the room, cursing under your breath.

"There's coffee hot in the pot," Simon calls after you, but you cut him off, slamming the door shut behind you with a loud bang. Simon's smug smile remains as he walks over to his basement, unfazed by your outburst.

Who the hell does he think he is?

You drop the bag on the floor and look around the room, finding only an empty closet behind a set of double doors and a small bathroom behind another. No windows in either, no means of escape.

Sitting heavily on the bed, you bury your head in your hands. It's only a few months, right? You'll be able to pay off your debt, and then you'll be back home again, far away from him.

Suddenly, you're on your feet, determined to confront him. You swing open the door and stalk around the house, slamming open doors in search of him.

Finally, you come to one that's locked, another with a digital code. You sigh in frustration and knock. After a few moments, the door unlocks, revealing Simon towering over you with that infuriating smug smile.

"Come to your senses, love?"  Simon's voice broke the silence, drawing your attention.

"We need to talk rules," you assert, and Simon quirked his brow, gesturing for you to follow him down the stairs into the basement. You hesitate for a moment before reluctantly obeying, your curiosity piqued.

As you descend, your eyes widen at the sight that greets you. Rows upon rows of different guns and weapons are mounted on the walls, the basement stretching out before you, vast and intimidating.

"Okay, John Wick," you remark dryly, Simon's lips twitch into a slight smile. He walks over to his desk and picks up his coffee mug.

Leaning against a nearby counter, you face him. "What's your name?" 

"Simon. You?" 

"Y/n," you reply shortly, cutting straight to the point. Your gaze sweeps the room, taking note of the absence of any medical supplies.

"First of all, you have no medical supplies: no blood bags, no needles, no medication, no defibrillator. How the hell do you expect me to be your doctor with nothing to work with?"

"Give me a list of everything you need, I'll buy it," his tone firm as he stared at you expectantly.

You released a breath, looking away from him. "I'll patch you up here, I'm not joining you on missions,"

Simon furrowed his brows, scoffing. "How in the bloody hell are you going to be any help to me if you're here?"

You shake your head, meeting his gaze squarely. "Even if you get gutted like a fish, if you make it back to me, I'll save you,"

Simon shook his head, striding over to you and standing directly in front of you, his imposing figure towering over you. "You're coming with me,"

You glare up at him, your resolve unyielding, "You can grab a gun off the fucking wall and shoot me. I'm not coming with you." Within a second, Simon grabs the pistol behind your head and holds it against your forehead. You slightly lean forward, pressing the barrel even harder against you. 

Simon had underestimated everything about you, but would he gamble underestimating your medical abilities?

"Why do you refuse to come?" His voice was stern and deep as he held your gaze.

You gaze was unwavering as you held eye contact, not an inch of fear coming from you. "I have my reasons, but if you want me to be your doctor, then I stay here."

Simon released a breath through his nose, dropping the pistol and returning it to the shelf. He walked over to his desk, retrieving a notepad and pen. "Write down everything you need and give it back to me," 

You took the notepad and sat down on the leather chair near his desk, jotting down the list of medical supplies you required. Simon took a seat at his desk, reviewing a contract he was considering.

It took you thirty minutes to write down everything you needed, meticulously listing all the medications, surgical tools, and large equipment required for your medical setup.

Simon would occasionally glance at you from time to time, unable to read your demeanor, which only added to his frustration. He couldn't understand why you refused to join him on missions or why you remained so composed after being kidnapped. Did you have ties to the black market? His mind buzzed with questions, but you offered no answers.

You set the notepad down on his desk and crossed your arms, awaiting his response.

“Where will all this stuff go?” Simon motioned to the opposite side of the basement, where sleek cabinets lined the walls. You glanced over, pleased with the ample space for your medical equipment.

He examined the list and began searching for the items you needed on the black market. “Should come in a few days,” 

You nodded and started walking back to the stairs leading up to the main floor of the house.

“The kitchen is yours to cook whatever you want. If we run low, just write it on the notepad on the fridge,” 

You nodded in acknowledgment and continued on, finding solace in the confines of your room. As you settled in, you couldn't help but wish he had just shot you back there; it would have freed you from the debt, the black market, and the haunting memories of your past.

By the end of the week, you had organized everything neatly in the cabinets of your designated space. As you finished sorting through the medications, you hoisted yourself up onto the counter and let out a tired sigh.

Meanwhile, Simon was gearing up, packing his black duffel bag with all the essentials for his upcoming contract. You observed silently as he selected guns, securing one to his belt and concealing several knives over his body. 

With a sniper case in hand, he made his way up the steps, his back turned to you. Without so much as a backward glance, he muttered, “Be back in a few hours.”

“Wait, how am I going to get in and out? What's the code for the basement?” you called after him. 

“Twelve twenty-five,” he replied before disappearing through the door. As it closed behind him, he added, “And no, the guns aren't loaded.”

You rolled your eyes at his parting remark. Killing him wouldn't solve your problems. You'd still be trapped behind the locked front door, food would eventually finish, and you’d be dead with time.

You prepared yourself some lunch before settling in the living room, turning on the TV to pass the time. After a few hours, the sound of the front door opening alerted you, and you glanced up to see Simon entering, clutching his side with traces of blood on his hand.

Moving swiftly, you rose and opened the basement door, beating him to the bottom of the stairs to wash your hands and don gloves. Simon followed, dropping his duffle bag on the floor before approaching you.

“Take off your shirt,” you instructed, your tone brisk and no-nonsense.

“Take me to dinner first,” Simon grinned as he shrugged off his shirt and reclined in the chair. You rolled your eyes, focusing on the task at hand.

“Bullet graze?” you asked, assessing the wound on his lower torso.

“He was expecting me. Fucker had twenty bodyguards,” Simon replied, closing his eyes as you gathered the necessary supplies.

Seating yourself on the rolling chair, you elevated to his level, swiftly tending to the wound. Your hands worked with precision, staunching the bleeding, disinfecting the area, and stitching him up in a matter of minutes. Simon kept his eyes closed, not even wincing as you stitched him up.

"All done,"

Simon's eyes flew open, surprise evident in his furrowed brows as he glanced down at his now-bandaged wound.

“How’s the pain?” Simon marveled at the swiftness of your work, feeling as though mere seconds had passed since he closed his eyes.

“Barely hurts. Scotch will help,”

You responded with a nonchalant hum, proceeding to disinfect your workspace. Meanwhile, Simon fetched a clean shirt from the cabinet near his desk, swiftly pulling it on before making his way back to where you were.

"What made you want to become a doctor?" his curiosity evident in his tone. Memories stirred within you, but you maintained a neutral expression as you responded, "I just want to save people."

"People are shite, why would you want to help them?" Simon probed further, attempting to understand you more.

"Not everyone is," you replied cryptically, your mind drifting to past experiences.

"They're not until they are,"

As Simon's words hung in the air, you remained silent, your attention focused on meticulously disinfecting every surface for a second time. His probing didn't faze you; you were determined to keep him at arm's length, unwilling to share any details about yourself or your past. If he wanted to uncover the truth, he'd have to delve into the darkest corners of the web to find any semblance of who you truly were.

Tag list: @shinchanboi @talooolaaloolla @lieutenantlashfaz @neothewitch @birdienotting @jupiternighties @samiiii333 @elowynnlane @silverianni

[things-about-cars-in-posts]

what do you like about cars?

I think you knew, upon asking this, that I could only ever have answered with either an ironic one-liner or a dozen-part novel. And unfortunately, this is already the second line, so novel it is. So then, without any further ado than the literal half year that’s gone by since this was asked, let's go.

1. Engineering matters

At the end of last year (aka when I started writing this, yikes) my dear old iPhone 6S moved on to a new home because it simply wasn't keeping up with me anymore. (And again, I was using an iPhone 6S in 2023. If I say a phone is too slow, it's too slow.) I had plenty of criteria for the replacement: a smallish screen not overboard on resolution, ideally a physical media control button and/or vibration toggle, repairability, a FUCKING AUX JACK... Something like the Sony Xperia 10, whose only real issue is marketing so trash you've only just now learned Sony never stopped making phones.

And yet...

This fancy wallpapers-sporting foldable is a Motorola RAZR 5G, a phone whose too-big screen already broke (though at the edge due to adhesive issues) and those who dared try warn repairing it will be as hard as phone repairs get. Why the fuck did I buy this? Well, because it has something more important than the aux jack, proper sizing, and good cameras: it made me go “That’s so cool!”, and when’s the last time a phone made you say that? It's the cusp of a new technology, and whether it becomes the future of phones, a future of phones, or just a weird footnote, it is an island of interesting in a sea of boring. And sadly, even this island is rapidly sinking. The drive for new form factors has already boiled down to the same two phones and their evolution is sinking into the usual millimetric proportion tweaking, camera rearranging, touchscreen expanding, case material switching, fingerprint sensor moving, and spec improvements not even manufacturers can come up with use cases for. I mean, seriously, how does the iPhone 15 differ from a software-updated iPhone X (which is apparently not pronounced "x", so I guess the iPhone Twitter)? Nothing is new. Nothing is tackled differently. The user experience does not differ. And why should it, when iPhone users will get a new one out of habit anyway and many are so tech illiterate moving a button could hospitalize them? Five generation newer and 150% faster are numbers you basically have to trust, because they don't make a difference that matters.

But in cars? 150% faster will matter alright. Even just looking at it. Cars are a visceral experience to even witness, let alone ride in or drive, and the frantic engineering pursuits for performance and overall capability actually have impactful real world implications beyond "some pockets will bulge 1mm less". And their engineering involves so many fields that there’s always a breakthrough going on somewhere - which leads to another reason their engineering is so interesting: there’s simply so much of it that anyone interested in engineering will find something for them, no matter their level or sector of expertise! Interested in mechanics? Well, obviously you’ll have a field day! Aerodynamics? Don't even get me started! Electronics? You're getting more goods by the year! It spread from engine management to safety assists to infotainment to ergonomic adjustments to even suspension and aerodynamics! Sound design? Even just working on the way engines sound is a profession of its own, let alone making these barrels of metal and glass propelling themselves at triple digit speeds through hundreds of explosions a second things you can comfortably have a conversation in - and that's not even mentioning horns and chimes! Hi-Fi? We’ve spent most of a century trying to get concert hall sound from a tiny tin can where everyone sits off-center and everything bumps and shakes around and you have maybe room for two components* a third the normal size and speakers can only be in a handful of places you wouldn’t want them which may well be the next room over**!

And this is just engineering.

*Like everything in the car world, there are exceptions to that

**For those unfamiliar, subwoofers, the speakers dedicated to, indeed, sub-bass, due to their frequent humongousness are often installed in the trunk.

[aaksconsulting]

Web Accessibility : Why IT Matters and How to Implement IT

In the digital age, websites have become the primary means of accessing information, services, and resources. They have opened up a world of possibilities, making it easier for people to connect, learn, work, and perform everyday tasks online. However, for some individuals, accessing the internet can be a challenging or frustrating experience.

Web accessibility is the key to addressing this issue, ensuring that websites are inclusive and usable for everyone, regardless of their abilities or disabilities. In this comprehensive guide, we will explore the importance of web accessibility and provide practical steps on how to implement it.

1.The Significance of Web Accessibility

Web accessibility refers to the practice of designing and developing websites and web applications that can be used by people with disabilities. Disabilities can be permanent, temporary, or situational and include conditions like visual, auditory, motor, or cognitive impairments. Making websites accessible means removing barriers and providing alternatives that enable people with disabilities to perceive, understand, and interact with web content effectively.

-Inclusivity for All:

The primary reason why web accessibility matters is inclusivity. The internet should be a place where everyone has the opportunity to participate equally, regardless of their physical or cognitive abilities. This inclusivity extends to individuals with various disabilities, including but not limited to:

Visual impairments: Blindness, low vision, color blindness.

Auditory impairments: Deafness, hard of hearing.

Motor impairments: Limited dexterity, tremors.

Cognitive impairments: Dyslexia, attention disorders, memory issues.

 -Legal and Ethical Obligations:

Many countries have recognized the importance of web accessibility and have enacted laws to ensure compliance. In the United States, for instance, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act require federal agencies and contractors to make their digital content accessible. Non-compliance can result in legal consequences. Beyond legal obligations, ethical considerations are equally vital. Building accessible websites is a step toward creating a more inclusive and equitable digital environment.

-Wider Reach and Audience:

Prioritizing web accessibility can expand your website’s reach and audience. An accessible website not only caters to people with disabilities but also benefits older individuals, those with temporary impairments (e.g., a broken arm), and even those in noisy environments. The broader your audience, the greater your impact, whether you’re a business, government entity, educational institution, or individual content creator.

-SEO and Improved Search Rankings:

Search engines like Google consider web accessibility when ranking websites. By optimizing your site for accessibility, you improve its SEO performance, making it more discoverable and easier to find. Search engines reward websites that offer a seamless user experience for all visitors.

2. Implementing Web Accessibility

Steps to Ensure an Accessible Website

Implementing web accessibility involves a combination of design, development, and content considerations. The goal is to make your website perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust for all users. Here are the key steps to achieving web accessibility:

-Use Semantic HTML:

Semantic HTML elements: Use appropriate HTML tags (e.g., headings, lists, tables) to structure your content. This helps screen readers and assistive technologies understand the content’s hierarchy and context.

-Provide Alternative Text for Images:

Alt attributes: Always include descriptive alt attributes for images. These descriptions help users with visual impairments understand the content and context of the images.

– Ensure Keyboard Accessibility:

Keyboard navigation: Make sure all interactive elements, links, and forms are accessible and operable via a keyboard. Avoid reliance on mouse-specific actions.

– Use ARIA Roles and Attributes:

ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) attributes: Employ ARIA roles and attributes to enhance the accessibility of dynamic web content, such as single-page applications and web applications.

-Captions and Transcripts for Multimedia:

Multimedia content: Provide captions for videos and audio content. Additionally, offer text transcripts for audio content, which aids both users with disabilities and those in noise-sensitive environments.

-Ensure Proper Heading Structure:

Headings hierarchy: Use a clear and consistent heading structure throughout your web pages. Heading tags (H1, H2, H3, etc.) provide a logical order for screen reader users to navigate.

– Color and Contrast:

Color choices: Ensure sufficient color contrast between text and background to improve readability for users with low vision or color blindness.

– Form Accessibility:

Label forms: Label all form fields with clear and concise labels. Provide error messages that are clear and informative.

– Focus Management:

Focus indicators: Clearly define focus states for interactive elements to make them easily identifiable when using a keyboard or assistive technology.

-Test with Assistive Technologies:

Screen readers and other assistive devices: Regularly test your website with screen readers, speech recognition software, and other assistive technologies to identify and address accessibility issues.

-Regular Accessibility Audits:

Ongoing evaluation: Conduct regular accessibility audits to identify and rectify issues as your website evolves. Automated tools, user testing, and expert audits can be valuable resources.

3: Web Accessibility Beyond Compliance

Striving for Inclusive Excellence

While achieving compliance with accessibility standards is essential, web accessibility should not be viewed as a mere checkbox item. Strive for inclusive excellence by going beyond the minimum requirements. Here are some additional considerations:

User-Centered Design:

User personas: Understand the needs, preferences, and challenges of different user groups, including those with disabilities.

User Testing:

User feedback: Regularly gather feedback from users with disabilities to improve your website’s accessibility.

Education and Awareness:

Training: Educate your team about web accessibility best practices and foster a culture of accessibility awareness within your organization.

 Third-Party Content:

External content: Encourage third-party content providers to create accessible content when sharing materials on your website.

Continuous Improvement:

Evolution: Recognize that web accessibility is an ongoing journey. Stay informed about new technologies and best practices to continuously improve your website’s accessibility.

4: Resources for Web Accessibility

Tools and References

For those looking to delve deeper into web accessibility, the following resources can be valuable:

 Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG):

WCAG: The WCAG guidelines are the globally accepted standards for web accessibility. They provide detailed recommendations and techniques for creating accessible web content.

 Accessibility Evaluation Tools:

Automated tools: Various automated tools can help identify accessibility issues on your website. Some popular options include WAVE, axe, and the Accessibility Insights suite.

 Assistive Technologies:

Screen readers: Familiarize yourself with popular screen readers like JAWS, NVDA, and Voice Over to understand how users with visual impairments access websites.

 Online Courses and Training:

Online courses: Platforms like Coursera, edX, and Udacity offer courses on web accessibility, including those from experts in the field.

 Accessibility Communities and Forums:

Online communities: Join online forums, mailing lists, or social media groups dedicated to web accessibility to stay up-to-date with the latest developments and best practices.

 Conclusion

Web accessibility is not merely a legal requirement; it is a moral and practical imperative. Creating an inclusive digital space benefits everyone, making the internet a more accessible and enjoyable place for all users.

By understanding the significance of web accessibility and taking the necessary steps to implement it, you contribute to a more inclusive online world, ensuring that no one is left behind in the digital age. As web accessibility continues to evolve, staying committed to inclusive design is a commitment to a better, more equitable future for all internet users.

[cheetour]

The Void Within's dialogue is sloppy to the point of not being fully literate*.

It's been noticed that the rough sketches and the final artwork don't match up in quality, and seem to be declining as the plot goes on. The same is happening to the writing.

This is, I am sorry, a post about the latest major Neopets update. Not only that, it's about the GRAMMAR in the dialogue for that update. Riveting.

I SWEAR I AM NOT JUST A PEDANTIC ASSHOLE, I GENUINELY WANT USERS TO KNOW THERE'S AN ISSUE!

Most people who complain about "incorrect" grammar in games and comics are wrong. Homestuck, Night in the Woods, We Know the Devil, and Captain Underpants all have fine grammar, just stylized.

I really, really, really like The Void Within. I think it's a fantastic idea, and I am determined to enjoy it as much as possible.

I am a professional editor. Noticing this stuff is my job.

Now, PLEASE bear that in mind when I say:

tl;dr: Neopets is asking you to pay money to a product that does not meet the quality standards of a primary school English test for ages 10+.

*I don't mean to use "not literate" as a stand-in for "stupid and bad at writing." Literacy is very complicated, illiteracy is more common than you think, and there is no shame in being illiterate - you can be very intelligent and also have no written or digital literacy. I mean the literal "not able to use written language to its fullest extent".

It's clear whoever wrote the dialogue didn't have a perfect grasp of English punctuation. AND THAT'S FINE. Good writers don't always have good grammar, and you DON'T need fluent English to write good stories in English.

That's why writing, proofreading, and editing are all separate professions, and why a well-run creative project delegates those roles to separate people. They still matter.

People are more likely to notice grammar mistakes the more they read books. Correctly formatted English is how older, less online, and disabled people with visual or linguistic processing difficulties read. Text-to-speech doesn't work correctly on writing without correct punctuation. These are serious professional standards, and they exist for a reason. They're not worthless just because you don't understand them.

A good-quality publisher of books, comics, or video games wouldn't release dialogue like this to a paying audience. They would consider this standard unacceptable. They'd either use correct grammar, or stylized grammar. (Inconsistent grammar, with no logical or narrative rules, isn't a style. They're not choices if you don't know you're making them. They're mistakes.)

To an extent this is nitpicking, and most people wouldn't notice this stuff.

But Neopets is MAKING MONEY. They are SELLING PRODUCTS for this. They have MULTIPLE PHASES of NC Market sales for this plot.

As an educator, there is no way I could show this (perfectly kid-friendly) comic to a classroom of children - it would have no educational value. It's not written correctly or with any obvious care. If they paid attention to it too much, they'd get the wrong idea about the English language!

I think it's fair to say that if you're publishing an official Neopets story, and you want Neopets to be a kid-friendly, fan-driven, story-based brand with a target audience wider than "people who don't really care about whether stories are professionally written", the script should've been proofread.

To give you an idea of how many typos Chapter 3 has, here's one of the dialogue pages with the missing punctuation added; I also took 5 minutes to rewrite each line for coherency.

And THIS is a website showing you at what points in primary eduation we teach children to use commas correcty:

Art is hard. Programming is hard. Hell, good writing is hard. It's HARD coming up with dialogue and a plot that people actually want to experience.

Grammar is boring and sometimes pointless. It's not difficult. It requires only basic literacy. Children learn how to use commas at ages seven and up.

If you don't care about the story you're telling enough to check that it would get a good grade on a child's school test, how can you possibly expect anyone to pay for it? You need specialist skills to code a website or create a high-quality digital graphic, but the only thing you need to get this right is... one literate adult who cares enough to try.

So where are they?

**There is no shame in being illiterate, but there is CERTAINLY shame in selling illiterate writing.

tl;dr: Neopets is asking you to pay money to a product that does not meet the quality standards of a primary school English test for ages 10+.

Finally, here are some browser petsites/RPGs who have never prompted me to write an 800 word critique:

Fallen London

Pixel Cat's End

Lioden

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Zuck’s gravity-defying metaverse money-pit

Tomorrow (Oct 31) at 10hPT, the Internet Archive is livestreaming my presentation on my recent book, The Internet Con.

Think of everything that makes you miserable as being caught between two opposing, irresistible, irrefutable truths:

"Anything that can't go on forever eventually stops" (Stein's Law)

"Markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent" (Keynes)

Both of these are true, even though they seemingly contradict one another, and no one embodies that contradiction more perfectly than Mark Zuckerberg.

Take the metaverse.

Zuck's "pivot" to a virtual world he ripped off from a quarter-century old cyberpunk novel (reminder: cyberpunk is a warning, not a suggestion) was born of desperation.

Zuck fancies himself an avatar of the Emperor Augustus (that's why he has that haircut) (no, really). The emperors of antiquity are infamous for getting all weepy when they run out of lands to conquer.

But the lachrymosity of emperors has little causal relationship to the anxieties of tech monopolists! Alexander weeps because he just loves a good conquest and when he finishes conquering the world, he's terminally bored. That's not Zuck's problem at all. When Zuck attains monopoly status, his company develops an autoimmune disorder, as his vicious princelings run out of enemies to destroy and begin to knife one another.

Any monopoly faces these destructive microincentives, but tech is exceptional here because tech has the realtime flexibility and speed that brick-and-mortar businesses can never match:

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

Sociopaths with tech monopolies are worse for the same reason that road-rage would be worse in a flying car: adding new capacity to indiscriminate self-destructive urges turns ordinary car crashes into low-level airburst warfare:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/28/microincentives-and-enshittification/

The flexibility of digital gives tech platforms so much latitude to break things in tiny increments. A tech platform is like a Jenga tower composed of infinitely divisible blocks. The Jenga players are the product managers and executives who have run out of the ability to grow by attracting new business thanks to their monopoly dominance. Now they compete with one another to increase the yield from their respective divisions by visiting pain upon the business customers and end users their platform connects. By tiny increments, they increase the product's cost, lower its reliability, and strip it of its utility and then charge rent to restore its functionality:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/24/cursed-bigness/#incentives-matter

This is the terminal stage of enshittification, the unstoppable autocannibalism of platforms as they seek to harvest all the value created by business customers and end users, leaving the absolute minimum of residual value needed to keep both stuck to the platform. This is a brittle equilibrium, because the difference between "I hate this service but I just can't stop using it," and "Get me the fuck out of here" is razor-thin.

All it takes is one tiny push – a whistleblower, a livestreamed mass-shooting, a Cambridge Analytica – and people bolt for the doors. This triggers the final stage: the "pivot," which is a tech euphemism for "panic."

For Zuck, the pivot got real after a disappointing earnings call triggered a mass sell-off of Facebook stock, history's worst one-day value incineration, which lopped a quarter of a trillion dollars off the company's market cap:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-19/dramatic-stock-moves-of-2022-led-by-meta-dive-nordic-flash-crash

This was when the metaverse became the company's top priority.

Now, in my theory of enshittification, the step that follows the pivot is death: "Finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die":

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/potemkin-ai/#hey-guys

Many people have asked me about the conspicuous non-death of Facebook! That's where I have to fall back on Stein's Law: "Anything that can't go on forever eventually stops." Facebook can't continue to annihilate value, alienate its workers, harm the public, hemorrhage money in support of a mediocrity's cherished folly forever. Can it?

Admittedly, it sure seems like it can. Facebook's metaverse pivot has thus far cost the company $46,500,000,000. That is: $46.5 billion. That's even more money than Uber torched, seeking to maintain the illusion that they will be able to create monopolies on both transport and the labor market for driving and recoup the billions the Saudi royal family let them use for the con:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/11/bezzlers-gonna-bezzle/#gryft

Don't worry: the Saudi royals are fine! They cashed out at the IPO, collecting a tidy profit at the expense of retail investors who assumed that a pile of shit as big as Uber must have a pony under it, somewhere:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/19/fake-it-till-you-make-it/#millennial-lifestyle-subsidy

Uber has doubled the cost of rides and halved drivers' wages, using illegal gimmicks like "algorithmic wage discrimination" to squeeze a little more juice out of the nearly exhausted husks of its workforce:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

But Stein's Law hasn't been repealed. Drivers can't drive for sub-subsistence wages. Do that long enough and they'll literally starve: that's what "subsistence" means. We lost a decade of transit investment thanks to the Uber con, at the same time as traditional taxi drivers were forced out of the industry. Uber can't be profitable and still pay a living wage, and the fantasy of self-driving cars as a means of zeroing out the wage-bill altogether remains stubbornly, lethally unworkable:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/09/herbies-revenge/#100-billion-here-100-billion-there-pretty-soon-youre-talking-real-money

Which means we're at the point where you can get off a commuter train at a main station and find yourself stranded: no taxis at the taxi-queue, no busses due for an hour, and no Uber cars available unless you're willing to pay $95 for a ten-minute ride in a luxury SUV (why yes, this did happen to me recently, thanks for asking).

As more and more of us are exposed to these micro-crises, the political will to do something will increase. This can't go on forever. "Don't use commuter rail" isn't a viable option. "Walk three miles each way to the commuter rail station" isn't viable either. Neither is "Pay $95 for an Uber to get to the station." Something's gotta give…eventually.

"Eventually" is the key word here. Remember the corollary of Stein's Law: Keynes's maxim that "markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent." Sure, anything that can't go on forever eventually stops, but that is no guarantee of a soft landing. You can't smoke two packs a day forever – but in the absence of smoking cessation, the eventual terminus of that habit is stage-four lung cancer. Keep hammering butts into your face and your last smoke will come out a crematorium chimney.

Zuckerberg hasn't merely blown a whole-ass Twitter on the metaverse with nothing to show for it – he's gotten richer while doing it! In the past year, his net worth increased by 130%, to $59 billion, thanks to an increase in Facebook's share-price, driven by investors who stubbornly remain irrational, keeping the Boy Emperor solvent long past any reasonable assessment of his performance.

What are these investors betting on? One possibility is that the rise and rise of Facebook's share-price represents a bet on technofeudalism. Since the Communist Manifesto, Marxists have been predicting the end of capitalism. That end seems to have come, but what followed capitalism wasn't socialism, it was the return of feudalism, an economic system where elites derive their wealth from rents, not profits:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/28/cloudalists/#cloud-capital

Profit is the income you get from investing in capital – machinery, systems, plant – and then harvesting the surplus value created by workers who mobilize this capital. Capitalism produces massive returns for its winners – in the Manifesto's first chapter, Marx and Engels just geek out about how productive and dynamic this system is.

But capitalism is also a Red Queen's Race, where the winners have to run faster and faster to stay in the same place. Capitalism drives competition, as other would-be winners pile into the sector, replicating the systems that the current winners are using and then improving on them. This is why the prophets of capitalist end-times like the FBI informant Peter Thiel say that "competition is for losers."

Capitalism's "profits" stand in contrast to the feudalist's "rents." Rents are income you get from owning something that other people need to produce things. The capitalist owns the coffee-shop, but the feudalist owns the building. When a rival capitalist opens a superior coffee-shop and drives the old shop out of business, the capitalist loses, but the rentier wins. Now they can rent out an empty storefront in the neighborhood everyone's coming to because of that hot new cafe.

Feudal and manorial lords also made their fortunes by extracting surplus value from workers, but these rentiers don't care about owning the means of production. The peasant in the field pays for their own agricultural equipment and livestock – control over the means of production is necessary for worker liberation, but it's not sufficient. The worker's co-op that owns its factory can still find the value it produces bled off by the landlord who owns the land the factory sits on.

The jury's still out on whether American workers really see themselves as "temporarily embarrassed millionaires," but America's capitalists have a palpable, undeniable loathing for capitalism. The dream of an American "entrepreneur" is *PassiveIncome: money you get from owning something capitalists and/or workers use to create value. Digital technology creates exciting new possibilities for rent-extraction: a taxi-operator had to buy and maintain a car that someone else drove. Uber can offload this hassle onto its drivers and rent out access to the chokepoint it created between drivers and riders, charging all the traffic can bear. This is feudalism in the cloud – or as Yannis Varoufakis calls it, cloudalism.

In Varoufakis's Technofeudalism, he describes Amazon as a feudal venture. From a distance, Amazon seems like a bustling marketplace of manic capitalism, with sellers avidly competing to offer more variety and lower costs in a million independently operated storefronts. But closer inspection reveals that Amazon is a planned economy, not a market.

Every one of those storefronts pays rent to the same landlord – Amazon – which determines which goods can be offered for sale. Amazon sets pricing for those goods, and extracts 45-51% of every dollar those sellers make. Amazon even controls which goods are shelved at eye-height when you enter the store, and which ones are banished to a dusty storeroom in a distant sub-basement you'll never find:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/14/flywheel-shyster-and-flywheel/#unfulfilled-by-amazon

Zuck's metaverse is pure-play technofeudalism, Amazon taken to the logical extreme. It's easy to get distracted by the part of Zuck's vision that will convert us all into legless, sexless, heavily surveilled low-resolution cartoon characters. But the real action isn't this digitization of our fleshy wants and needs. Zuck didn't spend $46.5B to torment us.

The cruelty isn't the point of the metaverse.

The point of the metaverse is to rent us out to capitalists.

Zuck doesn't know why we would use the metaverse, but he believes that if he can convince capitalists that we all want to live there, that they'll invest the capital to figure out how to serve us there, and then he can extract rent from those capitalists and start earning "passive income." It's an Uber for Cyberpunk Dystopias play.

Zuck's done this before. Remember the "pivot to video?" Zuckerberg wanted to compete with Youtube, but he didn't want to invest in paying for video production. Videos are really expensive to produce and the median video gets zero views. So Zuck used his captive audience to trick publishers into financing his move into video. He fraudulently told publishers that videos were blowing up on Facebook, outperforming boring old text by vast margins.

Publishers borrowed billions and raised billions more in the capital markets, financing the total conversion of newsrooms from text to video and precipitating a mass extinction event for print journalists. Zuck kept the con alive by giving away (fewer) billions to some of those publishers, falsely claiming that their videos were generating fortunes in advertising revenue. These lucky, credulous publishers became judas goats for their industry, luring others into the con, the same way that the "lucky" guy a carny lets win a giant teddy-bear at the start of the day lures others into putting down $5 to see if they can sink three balls in a rigged peach-basket.

But when we stubbornly refused to watch videos on Facebook, Zuck stopped spreading around these convincer payouts, and precipitated a second mass-extinction event in news media, as the new generation of video journalists joined their predecessors in Facebook-driven unemployment. Given this history, it's surreal to see publishers continue to insist that Facebook is stealing their content, when it is so clearly stealing their money:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2023/04/saving-news-big-tech

Metaverse is the new Pivot to Video. Zuckerberg is building a new world, which he will own, and he wants rent it to capitalists, who will compete with one another in just the way that Amazon's sellers compete. No matter who wins that competition, Zuckerberg will win. The prize for winning will be a rent increase, as Zuckerberg leverages the fact that your "successful" business relies on Facebook's metaverse to drain off all the value your workers have produced:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/18/metaverse-means-pivot-to-video/

This can't last forever, but how long until Zuck's reality distortion field runs out of battery? That's the $46.5B question.

The market can certainly remain irrational for a hell of a long time. But the market isn't the only force that regulates corporate outcomes. Regulators also regulate. Europe's GDPR is now seven years old, and it plainly outlaws Facebook's surveillance.

For nearly a decade, Facebook has pretended that this wasn't true, and they got away with it. Mostly, that's thanks to the fact that Ireland is a corporate crime-haven with a worse-than-useless Data Protection Commission:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/15/finnegans-snooze/#dirty-old-town

But anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop. Facebook has finally been dragged into EU federal jurisdiction, where it will face exterminatory fines if it continues to spy on Europeans:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/07/luck-of-the-irish/#schrems-revenge

In response, Facebook has rolled out a subscription version of its main service and its anticompetitive acquisition, Instagram:

https://about.fb.com/news/2023/10/facebook-and-instagram-to-offer-subscription-for-no-ads-in-europe/

For €10/month, Facebook will give you an ad-free experience across its service offerings (it's €13/month if you pay through an app, as Facebook recoups the 30% #AdTax rents that the feudal Google/Apple mobile duopoly extracts).

But this doesn't come close to satisfying Facebook's legal obligations under the GDPR. The GDPR doesn't ban ads, it bans spying. Facebook spies on every single internet user, all the time. The apps we use are built with "free" Facebook toolkits that extract rent from the capitalists who make them by harvesting our data as we use their apps. The web-pages we visit have embedded Facebook libraries that do the same thing for web publishers. Facebook buys our data from brokers. Facebook has so many ways of spying on us that there's almost certainly no way for Facebook to stop spying on you, without radically transforming it operation.

To comply with the GDPR, Facebook must halt surveillance advertising altogether. There's no way to square "spying on users" with "you can't surveil without explicit consent, and you can't punish people for refusing."

And of course, "not spying" isn't the same as "not advertising." "Contextual advertising" – where ads are placed based on the thing you're looking at, not who you are and what you do – is hundreds of years old. Context ads underperform surveillance ads by a slim margin – about 5% – but they're vastly more profitable for publishers. That's because surveillance ads are feudal, controlled by rentiers like Facebook, who own vast troves of the surveillance data needed to run these ads. Traditional ad intermediaries (agencies, brokers) took 10-15% out of the total advertising market. Ad-tech companies – the Google/Facebook duopoly – take 51% out of every ad dollar spent.

Eliminate surveillance ads and you torch their feudal estates. Facebook will always know more about someone reading a news article than the publisher – but the publisher will always know more about the article than Facebook does:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2023/05/save-news-we-must-ban-surveillance-advertising

There are rents under capitalism, just as there are profits under feudalism. The defining characteristic of a system is what happens when rents and profits come into conflict. If profits win – for example, if productive companies beat patent trolls, or if news publishers escape Facebook's rent-extraction – then the system is capitalist. If rents win – if investors continue to bet large on the metaverse as its losses pass $50 billion and head for the $100 billion mark – then the system is feudal.

Anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop. The question isn't whether the platforms will eventually become so enshittified that they die – the question is whether they will go down in an all-consuming fireball, or whether they'll go down in a controlled demolition that lets us evacuate the people they've trapped inside them first:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/09/let-the-platforms-burn/

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

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/30/markets-remaining-irrational/#steins-law

Image: Diego Delso (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Puente_de_las_cataratas_Victoria,_Zambia-Zimbabue,_2018-07-27,_DD_10.jpg

CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

[lu-lus-dicks]

Idk what to call this so you make up the title

@huskers-bar x @nunalastor

Tags: enemies to lovers, angst?, eventual fluff, yearning?, soft huskers-bar, both mods are separate people, no beta we die like i do in this fic (not yet though), minor character death, ooc, au: hellaverse (hazbin hotel), nunalastor is head of the marketing department of the hazbin hotel (lucifer grabbed them randomly), jealousy?, huskers-bar is an employee at voxtek, lulu and angie as villains, lulu is a dog

chapter: 1/? Word count: 1,431

Featuring: babygirl anon and (eventually) @xxx-angie . I may add more along the way depending on who wants to be added. I can probably shoe-horn-in a few more characters

For the sake of not tagging people a million times, I will call nunalastor as a single entity nunalastor, traumatized mod dickmaster and cursed mod nun. and huskers-bar just husk. babygirl anon will be babygirl anon. i will be shortened to lulu but I don't appear in this fic yet. Angie doesn't appear yet, but he will be angie.

A/N: anyway this is 100% going to be a huskers-bar harem fic because i can write whatever i want. This first chapter kinda boring but it gets better (source: trust me bro). Lemme know if you'd like to see any changes. Anyway, goodbye for now. I have uni to get to so less frequent posting (sorry dickmaster, you'll have to live without any of my horrid art for a little while)

"Did you know that Alastor made a happy deer squeak during this scene?"

Ah, yes, the words that twist people's dreams into nightmares. Innocent innitially, and maybe even amusing for a good while, but the longer one lingered, the more their skin would crawl with irritation and burn their insides. Especially when one knew the context surrounding this particular phrase. And boy, did Nunalastor know the context.

~

"Another day, another inbox to slay, another heavenly lord to betray" Dickmaster accessed their and Nun's shared blog, unsurprisingly to hundreds if not thousands of asks invading their inbox, all of which were echoes of different variations of *thumps* and *squeaks*. If Nunalastor hadn't already grown accustomed to such deviancy, they would be horrified. Still, the depraved ideas these people came up with never failed to send shivers down their spine, and not the pleasant kind.

And why do they subject themselves to this? you may ask. It was simple. In exchange for free housing, food and supplies, Lucifer Morningstar, the devil himself and father of Charlie Morningstar had requested their help. You see, originally their blog was not this unfortunate cesspool of deranged demons who wanted to see the devil, overlords and sinners squirm under immense sexual pleasure. It used to be a simple marketing tool for the Hazbin hotel, but as all things in hell, it never goes smoothly. It wasn't like they had a choice in the matter anyway, refusing the king of hell's requests was not an option! His commands were absolute.

Dickmaster took one deep breath, running both hands through their hair and clearing their mind, preparing for probably several hours of torture that was going to be their asks. They poured themselves a drink, setting down in front of their screen. Taking a few moments to relish the silence, they closed their eyes and listened to the soft hum of their beaten up 1950's style computer, courtesy of Alastor's ban on Voxtek products at the hotel. Clicking on their inbox tab, they mentally braced themselves. even if they knew, they could never truly predict the horrors hell had to offer.

"time for #housekeeping" They declared, stretching their fingers, getting their reaction images on the ready and sifting through their own version of digital hell. It would only get worse from here.

~

As Nunalastor started to clean their digital home, erasing one cursed ask after another, responding to one alastor circus theory after another, One ask in particular caught their attention. It was definitely a surprise, and a welcome one at that. It stood out like a sore thumb, simple yet elegant, divine and a blessing among heaps of cursed messages that would have asmodeus and satan themselves shaking in fear.

"hi dickmaster" - anon

Nunalastor couldn't explain it. They don't know what came over them, but they felt a strange sense of attraction to this one particular anon. They were sweet, they gave them a place of solace from the dread that was piss kink headcanons and cursed deer facts, equivelent of the clogged up plumming disasters alastor had to fix with his bare hands at the Hazbin hotel. It was the piece of gold nugget hidden in a swamp full of moss and dog urine.

Dickmaster stared at the message for a good few seconds, really taking in the plainness and beauty of the two words before their eyes, appriciating all that message was as a small smile made its way up their face. This called for a special occasion. Dickmaster gripped their keyboard, nearly smashing it with the force. Their fingers danced along the keys and crafted a response like no other, one worthy of this random anon that managed to make their day a bit brighter.

"Hi babygirl" - Nunalastor

~

On the other side of the pentagram, a kind, sweet and not at all deranged huskers was scrolling through hells version of tumblr. Voxtek devices had proven to be quite useful in the underworld. It served as the main source of entertainment and escape for the lonely, not only for husk, but other sinners alike. Besides, being an employee meant he had extra privileges with Voxtek. Regardless, it introduced husk to the nunalastor blog, which was the best moment of their life (or lack thereof, considering they're dead).

They'd quickly grown accustomed to the undeserved hate thrown their way upon their first ever interractioin. Though they didn't understand, they could play along. They found strange comfort in the twisted logic that any form of attention was better than none. After all, being singled out meant they were special in the eyes of Nunalastor, right? that's how husk comforted themselves anyway. And they haven't seen Nunalastor actually reply to anyone with actual love before.

That is... until it happened. Someone who would later reveal themselves as babygirl anon, husks worst adversary and the unfortunate victim of lulu's slander showed up on their feed.

"hi dickmaster" - anon

"Hi babygirl" - Nunalastor

Husk stared at the screen in shock, their eyes widening and heart growing heavy. Countless questions and conflicting emotions swirled within them, each clutching their hold for attention. 'Is nunalastor serious? Do I not want them to be serious? Why can't I be treated the same? What did I do?' And amidst the chaos, one thought rose to the surface, crystal clear in Husk's mind.

'I want to be loved like that'

The frustration of being at the end of every one of Nunalastors verbal spears finally caught up to husk. Every small jab they'd written off as jokes suddenly felt like small pin needles scraping their skin. Unable to deal with the whirlwind of emotions and the confusion of it all, Husk sought solace in the one place they could always trust, the bottom of a bottle.

So they took a swig. And another. And another. Intil there wasn't a shred of emotion left to feel. Not a single thread of frustration left in them, not a nerve of anguish, not a line of confusing verbal spewage...

And not even a speck of self-restraint

~

"THEY JUST KEEP COMING" Dickmaster exclaimed, more like yelled as their inbox was flooded with more cursed asks at a rate faster than they could answer. At this pace, they'll be there all day, answering these asks like a poor overworked minimum wage employee at a call center.

"They'll run out of ideas eventually" Nun responded, nonchalantly, leaning against a nearby wall, sipping on a drink of their own. Nun watched as dickmaster struggled to find another reaction image fast enough so they could call it quits and leave the rest of the struggles for future Nunalastor to handle, or more accurately when it would be nun's turn to answer all the unhinged people in their inbox.

The hurried clicking of the keys on a keyboard could be heard throughout the entire room, bouncing off the walls, reflecting exactly how much infestation was actually happening in nunalastors inbox by the minute. "it would be great if you could answer a few you know, my fingers are dyin-"

And then it suddenly went quiet. The clicking died down and the unbelievably loud buzzing of their computer, along with the hitched breathing of Dickmaster was the only sound bouncing around the room. Nun of course raised a brow at this. "what's the holdup? we can't afford to take a break you know" they said, as if they were the one answering all of the asks in the first place.

nun walked over, curious as to what exactly had stopped dickmaster in his endless pursuit of emptying their inbox, considering they were always the more enthusiastic one of the two. "are you okay?" nun asked, half sarcastically. Their eyes landed over the current ask in their inbox.

"I wish you'd love me" huskers-bar

and suddenly the silence made sense. the pause had been a justified one.

dickmaster inhaled, followed by a deep and saddened exhale. they didn't want to take their eyes off of those five words. they could stare in awe and amazement at them for hours. it wasn't even the fact that it was just another ask that wasn't cursed, but because it was huskers-bar that sent-

a hand on dickmasters shoulder snaps them out of their daze, being brought back to reality, the pitiful reality. they were in hell for a reason, they reminded themselves.

"you remember our deal, don't you, dickmaster?" nuns voice cut through the buzzing, sounding deep, gruff, threatening and slightly saddened.

"yes of course" dickmaster turned back to the monitor, giving one last look at the ask before typing out what nunalastor has agreed would be the appropriate response.

"you'll get over it. #we are a huskers-bar hate blog"

[iww-gnv]

The number of striking U.S. workers more than doubled in 2023. Forget the "summer of strikes," 2023 was a full year of walkouts: The number of workers who walked off the job surged by 141% last year from 2022, per a report out Thursday morning. Why it matters: The strong labor market of the past few years fueled a rise in support for unions and worker organizing, emboldening organizers to take a harder line — pushing folks to the picket lines. The results were great for these workers — especially in the four biggest walkouts of the year, where they scored big double-digit raises, bonuses, better benefits, and other assorted goodies.