elvishmusings

[elvishmusings]

btw a word of caution, because i know this is tempting to some people: DO NOT allow them to send you money under any circumstances, even as a joke/to waste their time. A friend of mine decided to fuck with some of these scammers up to the point where they sent him money, but because the check they sent was fraudulent, HIS account ended up getting locked for about a month. He lost access to *every bank account he owned* and basically had to rely on friends to loan him cash so he could buy food for weeks.

LMAO so, recently someone tried to SCAM me, so i'll show you what happened and the telltales of it being a scam.

This one is quite obvious but i know people who are just starting their artist careers and might not have experiece.

Follow the thread:

🚩#1: They pick your most famous/Popular art as reference. They don't know what you actually sell.

🚩#2: They will pick a random popular character. They're not roleplayers or anything. They're not here for the art in any level

You ask me, what are the odds they really like Goku? Oh, well, you'll see. At this point i check their profile for anythign that might indicate it, but as you'll see you won't have to.

🚩#3: They say they saw my ToS. On it i state i only work with paypal and google forms.

🚩#4: Random issue with payment method. They might have a real problem with it, but see; they'll never ever accept any other payment method, such as Zelle, CashApp, Payoneer, Ko-fi, etc.

I already knew this drill so, let's continue.

🚩#5: I love playing dumb lmao. Anyway, this scam revolves on them either sending you "too much money" and asking it back or something like it. I won't be following through because i know it'll be annoying.

BE ADAMANT WITH YOUR METHODS. Do NOT EVER bend them for randos.

🚩#6: They're so ready with the info on how the payment works it's fucking funny.

The reason I PERSONALLY use PayPal INVOICES (no any other payment within paypal) is that they're safe for both me and my client. My rules are stated clearly.

MAKE A ToS I BEG YOU YOUNG ARTIST

🚩#7: They're not even a good scammer lmao they REFUSE to go on my PROFILE to get a link or read anything.

I use Forms because it collects the client requests and it's easier for me to read it all in one place. It ALSO makes scammers bored.

🚩#8: They're so disinterested on the art they don't care for posing, vibes, colors, nothing. Again, they're NOT here for art. That's hilarious.

🚩#8: Same as above. They don't care for posing or anything.

On my art they link me, i have a vampire almost staking himself in a state of euphoria.

IMAGINE VAMPIRE GOKU STAKING HIMSELF THAT'S SO FUCKIGN FUNNY MY BRO, THINK YOUR SCAM THROUGH MAYBE

🚩#9: They will price your own work for you. And they'll overshot what we, smaller artists, charge for it.

They'll overshot by a lot.

They want you to be impressed and showing "generosity" usually gets people who need monay into risky situations. That's just plain cruel.

🚩#9: Same as above. Over generosity and eagerness to pay.

They're not even with the sketch, this haven't been an hour, they don't have any work form me but OH GOD they're SO READY to pay you NEED TO KNOW they WANTS TO PAY YOU SO BAD

Lmao yeah it's working out ❤��

THIS ONE IS JUST HILARIOUS BRO I CAN'T EVEN.

ANYWAY let's continue

🚩#10: They don't know me. They don't follow me. They broke every rule on my ToS. They're making me go through a payment method i am unfamiliar and don't use.

They don't care for my process. They're not interested on my sketch.

BE. ADAMANT. ABOUT. YOUR. RULES. AND. PROCESS.

Now, for the beautiful closure of this:

Have a ToS. Don't bend the rules for randos.

Use Invoices. Be sure you're safe.

Use forms if you'd like. Requests through DM and Discord ARE COMMON FOR OTHER ARTISTS. I personally don't like it, i have ADHD.

Being an artist on an online space is dangerous. If you need help, poke an artist you know, see how they operate and if it fits you. Most of them would help you.

🚩#11: goku isn't even on their icon 😭

This is the account that tried to scam me.

#art is life ❤️

[elvishmusings]

Last year I had one day a week where I just *planned* to pull an all nighter because it was my only way to get everything done lol

Quick question, I keep seeing tiktoks about college students doing this so I gotta ask

Personally I never pulled an all nighter when I was a student, I honestly thought it was a movie thing and not something students do.

[elvishmusings]

not me putting this off for the past three months only to have fucking tumblr remind me

Every mobility aid user in a cold weather area should get a spiked cleat for each foot of it. Please be proactive and don't wait till you've already slipped on the ice once. You can get very hurt. The rubber feet of canes/walkers/crutches/etc. just slide around on the ice, it will not help you. You can find them for anywhere from $5-$20 in the US. If you don't know what I'm talking about, this is what one looks like, it will help you grip the ice much better the way winter boots do and they can usually be flipped up when you don't need them.

ID: two images of the bottom of medical cane. The metal cleat is attached to the bottom with two screws clamping it in place, spikes at the end to cover the rubber piece. In the second image the spiked part is flipped upwards to be adjacent to the pole of the cane.

(Please reblog to save a disabled person from getting a concussion or worse)

[elvishmusings]

p iracy is BAD!!!!!!!1!

i think piracy is EVIL!!!

ANYONE that pirates ANYTHING should go to JAIL!!

NOBODY should EVER take this base64 string (aHR0cHM6Ly9tZWdhLm56L2ZvbGRlci9NQTB4aElZSSNQX3BqNl82SkxkaFdCcl9odllqSm13) and put it into the converter at https://www.base64decode.org/ to get all the major adobe programs for free! that would be a crime!

ANYONE that pirates adobes 500 dollar programs should be ASHAMED!

that would just be evil!

[elvishmusings]

masks and helmets that hides someone's face in such a way that they become the face themselves my beloved

these are all creatures to me

[elvishmusings]

when you think it must be a one-time-I-dreamt post and then check the url and it's not

My dog was in charge of dinner and he made his legendary peef kibble chilli recipe: one pound dry kibble, 1 qt water, simmer until dissolved into mush; add yogurt as desired. I ate it all, and needless to say It was terrible for me but I couldn’t bare to tell him.

[elvishmusings]

[elvishmusings]

i think it’s funny when someone acts really angry about something you say online. could be whatever. and you check their profile and go. oh wait. you’re literally 14. nevermind. talking about this with you is like 100% useless. and they go “my age has nothing to do with this” like actually your age has everything to do with this. when you are 14 literally everything is influenced by how fucking 14 years old you are.

[elvishmusings]

they should invent a junkyard a few blocks from here that someday burns down so that the rising black smoke can carry me far away & i never come back to this town again in my life

[elvishmusings]

[elvishmusings]

I've never understood why these terms are considered better than just saying "biological sex." In a lot of cases amab/afab is used basically the exact same way, except instead of just admitting that yes, you're talking about somebody's sex characteristics as they would be without medical intervention, it gets cloaked in this pseudo-progressive language to make it sounds like it's not. Plus, when it's used as a sneaky alternative to biological sex it leaves no room for intersex people - you can say that someone's biological sex is neither male nor female, but basically everyone is assigned a gender regardless.

I would never use the term "biological sex" to refer to most trans people because I know it's a term the community is generally uncomfortable with, but personally if what is being discussed is sex and not identity, I'd rather it just be referred to as biological sex. As in, the reason I need to worry about pap smears and not prostate exams is that I'm biologically female, but the reason I was given a feminine name is that I'm afab.

More importantly, these kinds of classifications are rarely if ever necessary (outside of medical settings). Using afab/amab just obfuscates what most of these people are really talking about, making it sound progressive when it's the same sex-based categorization that's always existed.

Oh my god the way non transsexuals have come to use AFAB and AMAB is unfuckingreal. Just witnessed local queer community discourse cuz someone put up a local ad saying they were looking for a “female AFAB performer” and a “male AMAB performer” and you fucking know they thought they were being sooo progressive there. I’ve seen so many non trans kweers and leftists become SO comfortable resorting to blatant sex based segregation and bioessentialist rhetoric under the guise of progressive trans-friendly activist language with AFAB and AMAB being the very obvious new female and male. The rise of “AFAB-only events” “women and AFAB groups” “no AMABs” shit etc, even saw a trans guy recently complaining about a kink event being “AMAB only,” it’s just fucking awfullllllll like… This anti-trans bioessentialism has always been an issue obviously but man am I tired of it being wrapped up in the current progressive language. Once more y’all found a way to boil us down to our natal genitals but this time you’re allies for it. Super cool. We seriously need to return to the CAFAB/CAMAB/“coercive assignment” language that was largely dropped due to it being too “extreme” and making people uncomfortable again lol. And maybe even start exclusively referring to these terms as past tense to keep y’all remembering that this was genital-based categorization thrust upon us (sometimes physically violently so in the case of intersex folk), a literal tangible action, rather than an active, immutable aspect of current identity. Jesus.

[elvishmusings]

The first I read about EA was them talking about how a lot of aid money is misdirected to efforts that don't actually help people that much, which I absolutely agree with.

Then I got to the part where it's all rich people in wealthy countries plugging numbers into spreadsheets and realized that these were the people RESPONSIBLE for that problem.

Reminder that effective altruism is a scam

[elvishmusings]

Some of them are just assholes but I legitimately think a lot of them are as clueless about neurodivergent people as we are about them (to the extent that these things can be represented in binary terms, which they really can't, but for the sake of simplicity two rough groups work).

Just like a lot of neurodivergent people have an easier time with other neurodivergent people, neurotypicals have an easier time with neurotypicals.

If neurotypicals are so good at picking up hints, why do they never seem to notice you leaning away when they try to touch you?

[elvishmusings]

Invasive listeriosis does have a 20-30% mortality rate, and is a significant cause of death, but it's also pretty rare (cdc seems to estimate 1600 cases per year in the US). Listeria can also cause a mild infection indistinguishable from regular food poisoning which is what most people will experience if they have any symptoms at all.

Listeriosis is definitely one of the worse causes of food poisoning, but the phrasing makes listeria sound much deadlier than it is. If you're going to talk about a 20% mortality rate you should also mention that only a tiny fraction of people will develop the illness you're talking about (though, yikes, with the ice cream in that particular outbreak being distributed to nursing homes there could definitely be a higher rate of invasive infection from this particular outbreak).

I keep telling myself to stop making posts about FDA activities...but there are so many products hurting people

[elvishmusings]

I am all for raising awareness about foodborne illness and these are all extremely concerning examples of current problems! Especially fascinated by teh daily harvest/tara flour case and what could possibly be causing that type of liver damage.

That said, 20-30% mortality from listeria is complete nonsense. Listeria IS dangerous to young children, the elderly, pregnant people, and people with compromised immune systems (even more than most food poisoning), but for most people with normal immune systems it is not anywhere near that dangerous.

I keep telling myself to stop making posts about FDA activities...but there are so many products hurting people

[elvishmusings]

crash

[elvishmusings]

URGENT: 🚨🚨EARN IT ACT IS BACK IN THE SENATE 🚨🚨 tumblr's nsfw ban hitting the entire internet this spring 2022

February 1, 2022

I’m so so sorry for the long post but please please please pay attention and spread this

WHAT IS THE EARN IT ACT?

The EARN IT Act has been roundly condemned by nearly every major LGBTQ+ advocacy and human rights organization in the country. This is a bill that will make children less safe, undermine online safety and security, and trample free expression, because it carves out another exception to Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA 230), which the ACLU describes as “foundational to modern online communications.” This has been the law that has let the internet grow into what it is today, we’ve had this law since the 90s. (For context, Trump wanted to get rid of this law because he knew it would lead to mass govt surveillance and censorship of minorities online.)

The EARN IT Act will lead to online censorship. Platforms will be incentivized to scan their users’ communications and censor all sex-related content, including sex education, literally anything lgbt, transgender or non-binary education and support systems, and sex worker communication according to the ACLU. All this in the name of “protecting kids” and “fighting CSEM”, both of which the bill does nothing of the sort. In fact it makes fighting CSEM even harder.

If this bill passes, we're going to see most, if not all, adult content and accounts removed from mainstream platforms, for fear of the liability that could come with ever accidentally hosting CSAM, as well as the erasure of end-to-end encryption on messaging platforms.

This is really not a drill. Anyone who makes or consume anything “adult” online has to be prepared to fight Sen. Blumenthal's EARN IT Act, brought back from the grave by a bipartisan consensus to destroy Section 230.

EARN IT will open the way for politicians to define the category of “pornography" as they — or the lobbies that fund them — please, (Right now, right wing organizers are catgorizing books about racism as ‘porn’ to ban them from schools) which is a cherished goal of organizations that seek to reintroduce obscenity prosecutions for content now protected by Free Speech jurisprudence. This will 1000000% be used to eradicate anything LGBT online.

What this bill says it does on the surface is make platforms liable for their users’ activity if that activity involves sex and minors. However, because of 230, platforms are not liable at all about their users' activity. This has allowed platforms to grow and thrive and many niches online to as well. The bill also creates an unelected commission to create “best practices” to combat online child sexual exploitation. While these recommendations are nominally voluntary (so Americans have no decision on who gets to be on it), platforms that refuse to comply will be liable for criminal prosecutions and lawsuits should the government decide any of their users is engaging in online child sexual exploitation.

This is already a nightmare enough. But the bill also DESTROYS ENCRYPTION, you know, the thing protecting literally anyone or any govt entity from going into your private messages and emails and anything on your devices and spying on you.

This bill is going to finish what FOSTA/SESTA started. And that should terrify you.

Senator Blumenthal (Same guy who said ‘Facebook should ban finsta’) pushed this bill all of 2020, literally every activist (There were more than half a million signatures on this site opposing this act!) pushed hard to stop this bill. Now he brings it back, doesn’t show the text of the bill until hours later, and it’s WORSE. Instead of fixing literally anything in the bill that might actually protect kids online, Bluemnthal is hoping to fast track this and shove it through, hoping to get little media attention other than propaganda of "protecting kids" to support this shitty legislation that will harm kids.

The entire EARN IT act is based on *multiple* misunderstandings of the law and reality. It's a really really really bad policy that will do serious harm. But because Senator Blumenthal wants headlines, he'll pretend that it "helps protect the children." It won't. It'll do real damage. It will make CSEM much much worse.

One of the many reasons this bill is so dangerous: It totally misunderstands how Section 230 works, and in doing so (as with FOSTA) it is likely to make the very real problem of CSAM worse, not better. Section 230 gives companies the flexibility to try different approaches to dealing with various content moderation challenges. It allows for greater and greater experimentation and adjustments as they learn what works -- without fear of liability for any "failure." Removing Section 230 protections does the opposite. It says if you do anything, you may face crippling legal liability. This actually makes companies less willing to do anything that involves trying to seek out, take down, and report CSAM because of the greatly increased liability that comes with admitting that there is CSAM on your platform to search for and deal with. This liability would allow anyone for any reason to sue any platform they want, suing smaller ones out of existence. Look at what is happening right now with book bans across the nation with far right groups. This is going to happen to the internet if this bill passes.

(Remember, the state department released a report in December 2021 recommending that the government crack down on "obscenity" as hard the Reagan Administration did. If this bill passes, it could easily go way beyond shit red states are currently trying. It is a goldmine for the fascist right that is currently in the middle of banning every book that talks about race and sexuality across the US.)

NCOSE, the far right anti-LGBT hate group behind the global anti-sex legislations, is pushing the idea that any form of sexual expression, including talking about HEALTH, leads to sex trafficking. Their goal is to eliminate all sex, anything gay, and everything that goes against their idea of ‘God’ from the internet and hyper disney-fy and sanitize it. This is a highly coordinated attack on multiple fronts.

The reason these bills keep showing up is because there is this false lie spread by organizations like NCOSE that platforms do nothing about CSEM online. However, platforms are already liable for child sexual exploitation under federal law. Tech companies sent more than 45 million+ instances of CSAM to the DOJ in 2019 alone, most of which they declined to investigate. This shows that platforms are actually doing everything in their power already to stop CSEM by following already existing laws. The Earn It Act includes zero resources for proven investigation or prevention programs. If Senator Bluementhal actually cared about protecting youth, why wouldn’t he include anything to actually protect them in his shitty horrible bill?

The Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) along with a coalition of 26 civil society organizations urged the United States Senate to reject the EARN IT Act. Groups on the left and right, including the ACLU, Fight for the Future, EFF, and Hacking // Hustling oppose it. Because it threatens free expression online and will threaten marginalized people’s safety while being totally unnecessary and failing to fix the problem it claims to address. The EARN IT Act empowers states to give law enforcement access to users’ private conversations and force companies to create encryption backdoors for law enforcement. This is totally unnecessary. Platforms are already handing over CSAM to the federal government. It’s actually likely to make prosecuting child molesters more difficult since evidence collected this way likely violates the Fourth Amendment and would be inadmissible in court.

I don't know why so many Senators are eager to cosponsor the "make child pornography worse" bill, but here we are.

WHAT YOU CAN DO:

EARN IT Act was introduced yesterday! And it’s already scheduled to get marked up, which is the first step post-introduction. Most bills never go to markup, so this means they are putting pressure to move this through. IF YOU LIVE IN THESE STATES (IL, VT, CA, RI, MN, DE, CT, HI, NJ, and GA), CONTACT YOUR SENATOR AND HOUSE MEMBERS NOW. THIS IS URGENT. This is who gets first crack, and folks in all have Senators who are on the Judiciary committee.

I'm guessing this month or March is when the bill would be passed if there is no opposition 😭 The bill was re-introduced yesterday, already set for markup this Thursday. This feels like an attempt to fast track it this month. Additionally the current makeup of Congress favors those who want it passed. Back in 2020 it was mostly Senate republicans and democrats who are basically republicans (just like now, check the sponsors) pushing it with Ron Wyden using the filibuster to stop their efforts. The house dems didn't want to give Trump a win and needed to appear as pro-privacy/free speech for the 2020 election. Now the dems have the presidency, both chambers of Congress and if you've noticed have spent a few years repeatedly demanding social media censorship and desperately want to give Biden victories. biden isn't like obama who opposed sopa/pipa to appeal to younger voters. This is similar to how FOSTA passed with the group who made it happen last time back again. Far as I'm aware Wyden hasn't spoken about new earn it yet but even if he does oppose it, it's very possible there will be enough Senate democrats to join the republicans in passing it beating a filibuster. Then pelosi's band of house idiots pass it and we have to choose between breaking the law because they can't stop us from using encryption or being obedient sheep to a group who consider themselves above laws.

It already has a fifth of the Senate cosponsoring it. There is a very very very real chance this bill becomes law. This is an uphill battle that's going to happen fast and quick. PLEASE, FIGHT NOW.

202-224-3121 connects you to the congressional hotline.

This website takes you to your Senator / House members contact info. EMAIL, MESSAGE, SEND LETTERS, CALL CALL CALL CALL CALL. Calling is the BEST way to get a message through. Get your family and friends to send calls too. This is literally the end of free speech online.

More sources to read about this bill:

https://cathyreisenwitz.substack.com/p/the-earn-it-act-is-anti-evidence

Fight for the Future’s Statement

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=678EW8v09z8&t=1s

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20220131/22423648395/senates-new-earn-it-bill-will-make-child-exploitation-problem-worse-not-better-still-attacks-encryption.shtml

EARN IT Act treats Myths as Facts.

https://surviveearnit.com/what-is-the-earn-it-act/ From 2020, but little has changed about the bill.

https://www.protocol.com/bulletins/earn-it-act-back

Center for Democracy and Technology’s Statement

TLDR: The EARN IT Act will lead to online censorship of any and all adult & lgbt content across the entire internet, open the floodgates to mass surveillance the likes which we haven't seen before, lead to much more CSEM being distributed online, and destroy encryption. Call 202-224-3121 to connect to your house and senate representative and tell them to VOTE NO on this bill that does not protect anyone and harms everyone.