#did i just write a clickbait title

[emizsc]

timeskip!kozume kenma x fem!reader

notes: smau + written, fluff + crack, specific to streamer!kenma, established relationship, shōyō + kuroo + lev mentioned, lowercase intended, can be read as a stand-alone but pls if you have the time check out the first part!

link to part one and three of my short kenma series!

kenma’s a little shit head that LOVES to fuck with his fanbase and drop these thumbnails just for the clickbait … even now when the two of you are married, he still messes around.

the comments from other haikyuu chars as follows: (too lazy to make up kewl usernames… i apologize ˙Ⱉ˙)

shōyō: OHEMGEE! Miss you two 😊!

-> y/n: how could you forget my baby 🥀

-> shōyō: I MISS YOU THREE!! I’LL BRING HER CAT FOOD NEXT TIME I COME OVER!!!

kuroo: STOP WITH THE THUMBNAILS IM RIPPIN’ OUT MY HAIR

-> kodzukenzsc: fyi our souls r actually stitched together so it’s impossible to happen

-> kuroo: i hope y/n wakes up, realizes how insane you are, and actually breaks up with you

-> y/n: yet you begged me to talk to him in middle school cos you were sick of him talking about me :P

y/n: i love you ken

-> kodzukenzsc: hi i have a crush on you please date me i want to kiss you i love you so much let’s get married

-> lev: I THOUGHT YOU TWO WERE ALREADY DATING???

lev: YOU BROKE UP??? WHAT???

his most popular video on his youtube channel is titled, “accidentally queued into a RANKED VALO GAME with EX GIRLFRIEND.” the video was actually you playing on his valorant account which dropped him from from immortal 2 to ascendent 3… he still couldn’t be mad at you!

a/n: HELLO I’M SO THANKFUL FOR THE LOVE ON THE FIRST PART?! genuinely i’m so shocked, i’m very new to the writing community (this is litch my 5th post) i did NOT expect people to love it so much!! cooking(heh) up a part three, which will be posted pretty soon!!!

[sodaneko]

𝐒𝐎𝐅𝐓 𝐋𝐀𝐔𝐍𝐂𝐇 (𝐎𝐬𝐚𝐦𝐮 𝐱 𝐟!𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫) ❦ 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟏𝟕: 𝐜𝐚𝐠𝐞 𝐟𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐬

♫ Middle Kids - Dramamine

I used to be the kid who never wanted to be seen Let people jump all over me, the human trampoline but I got the feeling, I'm stronger on the other side, hey Does that sound okay to you? Sometimes I wanna say to you You are the only reason I believe in anything

✰ 𝐜𝐰: alcohol mention, hints at suggestive topics in pretty much all conversations (this is what you get for freak x freak romance)

⭅ back to m.list

•┈••✦ 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞𝐬

Y/N has been hosting the night market fundraiser for the third year in a row and she's getting more and more confident but will still hide when the local press wants to interview her in person

all self-discipline faltered the moment Y/N laid eyes on Osamu and they both flirted shamelessly in front of all visitors (no food safety rules were broken until they got home)

another tiny maneater mention! turns out Suna is just as obsessed as i am

no cage fight in this chapter, i'm so sorry. the chapter title was just clickbait. i would have loved to see it happen too though

there's still a few chapters left so who knows. Osamu, Oikawa and Omi might end up in one. there is still hope

Osamu: (exists) Oikawa & Omi: i need this man to perish

Iwaizumi tried changing the Seijoh 5 group chat many times but gave up eventually and accepted his fate of being the group's dreamboat

if Y/N hadn't met Osamu, Iwaizumi was thinking about becoming matchmaker for her because he did NOT approve of any of her partners in the past lmao

Soft Launch has always been about bonds to me, so this chapter was dedicated to all the beautiful friendships that exist along with what Osamu & Y/N have <3

✰ 𝐓𝐀𝐆𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓:

@brithedemonspawn @giasssslife @yuminako @notverymarley @krissiekris

@wyrcan @kentocalls @maybespiderman @uncovered-mad-man @honey-deku

@yukichan67 @dailyakira @morgan-lowell @angee444 @mo072806

@ellouisa17 @toges-cough-syrup @mahalsuya @itsdragonius @bakingcuriosity

@nekomasmngr @spacekedi @nymphsdomain @thatprettybunny @joseimukeaddict

@writing-for-the-hell-of-it @honeytwo @estreya05 @jisookdays @blueballslock

@lonelycrystal-star @weezerbby @iluv-ace @s777athv @kameyyy

@localgaytrainwreck @mirkaaaluv @elliesndg @mollysmovingcastle @weirdgirlbrina

@nobodybutnnoorr @blueflamebimbo @softpia @pet-plasma-bubble @meekydeeks

@realswimshaddy @manhattanstrawberry @sunahyejin @arattaaki @anniewings

taglist open! fill out this form to be added (or removed, no hard feelings ♡)! minors DNI!

[dana-chan-the-control-brain]

Not a day goes by I don't think of Nexus.

And I don't think I will ever get the point or his purpose in the story.

I know the point. Some times people change for the worse and there is nothing you can really do about it and it wouldn't have as much of an impact if it was another character besides the main character.

But going from main character to side content villian is like....

I thought it was character assassination then, I still think it is now.

It doesn't help that since of the improv nature of the show, details about him are swiftly abandoned and forgotten. To the point where Moon's bad behavior is put on Nexus.

The problem is that the devil is in the details. But no one remembers the details.

Like how Nexus started forcefully entering people's minds and breaking them because Monty did the same to him when he was in containment when he was a 100 percent innocent man. Yet this is never brought up or talked in length about. Nexus was treated that way, and he was giving back. Yes, an awful choice but he was given no tools and the resentment for his family came from an understanding place. Until it didn't. Until they kept upping the stakes to remind you "No, Nexus is not relatable he's a bad evil guy doing bad evil things and will literally kill everyone without stopping and he won't make different choices."

He's often regarded as a tool that served his purpose and I'm pretty sure the actors really didn't care or think about what a villain arc would mean for the title character Moon of the sun and moon show. What someone grieving that heavily and deeply and someone caring so much and changing the narrative to say it was about ego the whole time. Or it transformed into ego.

The consequences of doubling down.

I've seen this with Bloodmoon to a lesser extent as well. (Even Sun sometimes to a degree ) If they don't care about a specific character, you as a fan are not supposed to, because you're stupid if you think these characters are supposed to have any redeeming qualities or depth to them or find them relatable in anyway, right?

Nexus himself becomes a buttmonkey. The butt of the joke and just an edge lord full of spite with no emotion or anything else and just a husk where the character no longer remains. He's a tool. He's a joke. He's clickbait. He's Sun's mistakes. He's the inability to let go, ironically.

To be clear, I don't condone harassment of any of the VAs for how they write THEIR story with their characters. That'd be absolutely stupid and ridiculous.

I'm just coming to terms that, I don't get Nexus. Meta wise, writing wise and from a story perspective. And probably never will.

[ultfreakme]

Zuko's character arc is not lost it's clickbait

*Tired sigh* EarlyGame released an article saying "Zuko's character arc is lost!" in the live action and have said that Zuko's character motivation has shifted from chasing Aang to restore his honor to now chasing Aang to help the FN win the war. They use the short promo clip of Dallas Liu's Zuko writing a letter/journal about the Avatar to say that, especially when he says the line "it is my duty to capture the Avatar".

First of all, I read the article, because I got concerned too. Honor is a large pat of his motivation, we also got a trailer clip of Zuko telling Aang "You are the enemy of the Fire Nation!". We know Zuko didn't hunt Aang for the war.

Except.

New audiences do not know that Zuko's chasing Aang for his honor. The first premise we as an audience knew when we watched the cartoon was this;

Fire Nation is taking over the world

Aang is the only one who can stop them

The Fire Prince is chasing Aang and getting in his way

When we are introduced to Zuko, Sokka talks about invaders and spies from the Fire Nation. Zuko then attacks the village and destroys Sokka's wall with his ship and fights him. From all of this, we get the impression that Zuko's here with animosity towards SWT along with the goal to capture the avatar for the FN.

We, the OG viewers, did NOT know Zuko was doing this as a necessity due to his banishment until The Storm, halfway through the series. We thought he's just in competition with Zhao and being an asshole FN Prince. It was a huge twist and a spoiler that contributed heavily to us sympathizing with Zuko when we learned the real reason.

The Live Action isn't just for the original fans, it's for everyone. What is blatantly obvious to us is not for those who are going to watch it with brand new eyes. Zuko doing this due to his banishment is a surprise and they're 100% trying to maintain it for the live action too.

Zuko's arc of honor is also impossible to be removed btw, because we SEE clips of Ozai attacking Zuko, Zhao is still his competition. These characters and incidents are the bedrock of establishing the 'honor' motivation so no it's not gone.

In addition, it makes sense for Zuko to at least tell other people that he's trying to capture Aang for the Fire Nation. In the og series he didn't give a shit about the war, which makes sense, but Zuko is a Prince, an heir to the throne. He would've been deep in the propaganda. It's like;

Father wants to win the war -> Father has banished me-> The Avatar is a huge obstacle in the way of the war -> He has assigned me the task of capturing the Avatar -> I AM important to the war! -> So war= avatar's capture= me being vital -> The war and capturing the avatar, an honor mission, become one and the same.

If Zuko frames his mission as serving the Fire Nation, despite his banishment, he can think himself as still being a part of the royal family.

Nothing has drastically changed, I honestly think it's a good addition to include Zuko's thoughts on the war itself because of course the PRINCE of the FIRE NATION would have an opinion on the war. It is impossible for him to not think the Fire Nation is deserving of their victories.

Literally every single time I've seen people freak out over things, it's over a clickbait title, the article writers badly misinterpreting things, or people going into this convinced that the Live Action is bad. A conclusion has been made, and people are desperately searching for evidence even if it's false.

[jung-koook]

I think it’s funny when people (media.) are like “will they actually come back together.” “BTS future uncertain” (I don’t actually read bts news, unless bts announces it themselves. But I’ve seen clickbait titles like that. I don’t trust anyone but bts to share bts news. And I most definitely don’t trust media)

When they’ve all said they want to. And they talk about it on their lives. Those men are a family.

I just kind of hope they push it to the second half of 2026 soonest. At least tour wise. So they have proper time to rest and adjust. Not just be physically ready, but mentally too. I can’t stop how many albums they want to drop or wrote already or will write. But tours are so taxing on the body, mentally, emotionally and physically. So I really do want them to at least consider not doing it all fast. I STILL think Jin went back to work too quickly (but it’s what he wanted so I can’t fight him about it just have to support). It’s totally okay for them to rest first. I (we/us) will still be here supporting them.

I agree with you but sometimes unfortunately, we need to know about some news in other places, like for example about jin. there are armys who don't even know that he released a liquor last month because bighit will not post about it and jin hasn't posted about it yet. we found out about igin unfortunately through the media and he's already even doing pop-up store events for his drink.

but for most of the news we just have to trust bangtan and no one else.

korean media is being miserable, wanting to exclude yoongi, but that's not going to happen. the level at which they're still treating yoongi accident i so absurd! there are literally CRIMINALS making a name for themselves in their country and they don't care.

I'll always be excited about what they release and share with us, but I'm also not comfortable with the rush of having to release some work as soon as they come back. I am totally against this mentality that you have to live for your work and that makes me very uncomfortable. as soon as yoongi did his tour, rumors started that hobi would also do a tour when he returned home. I imagine if that really happens, how exhausting it will be for him to do two tours in such a short time. I really hope that even the album comes out in 2026. for me they could start working only in 2026 as a group. I miss new bangtan music and etc so much but I have always prioritized their health and well-being first.

[kaylinalexanderbooks]

‼️Clickbait Description Tag Game 😱😱👇👇 ‼️

Thanks to @mysticstarlightduck here, @the-golden-comet here, and @willtheweaver here!

Rules: describe your WIP(s) like a click bait YouTube video!

Alright let's see how this goes. Bringing out more WIPs than I'm actively working on.

The Secret Portal:

TWEENS FIND WHAT???? IN THEIR SCHOOL'S WALL ⁉️⁉️⁉️⁉️

School of the Legends:

✨ INSPIRING:✨ Rural Irish teen thought he couldn't do anything... Until this #wholesome

It Was All Just a Dream:

TEEN COMPLETELY CHANGES OVERNIGHT! You'll never believe her story...

The Emerald of Secrets:

OZONE LAYER GONE??? | Conspiracy

I bet it's frustrating that TEOS is not green but I already gave that to TSP and it's a temp title anyway.

Anyway hope I did this right lol

Tagging @aalinaaaaaa @mk-writes-stuff @elsie-writes @winterandwords @imsoveryveryconfusedatlife

+ ANYONE ELSE

TSP intro

TSP tag list (ask to be +/-): @thepeculiarbird @illarian-rambling @televisionjester @finchwrites

@nebula--nix @literarynecromancy @honeybewrites @the-golden-comet

SOTL intro

SOTL tag list (ask to be +/-): @illarian-rambling @katwritesshit @wyked-ao3

Lovelies on either taglist, consider yourself tagged for this game too, if you so desire :)

[mariacallous]

Several of the most prominent alt-weekly newspapers in the United States are running search-engine-optimized listicles about porn performers, which appear to be AI-generated, alongside their editorial content.

If you pull up the homepage for the Village Voice on your phone, for example, you’ll see reporting from freelancers—longtime columnist Michael Musto still files occasionally—as well as archival work from big-name former writers such as Greg Tate, the Pulitzer Prize–winning music critic. You’ll also see a tab on its drop-down menu labeled “OnlyFans.” Clicking on it pulls up a catalog of listicles ranking different types of pornographic performers by demographic, from “Turkish” to “incest” to “granny.” These blog posts link out to hundreds of different OnlyFans accounts and are presented as editorial work, without labels indicating they are advertisements or sponsored.

Similar content appears on the websites of LA Weekly, which is owned by Street Media, the same parent company as the Village Voice, as well as the St. Louis–based alt-weekly the Riverfront Times. Although there is a chance some of these posts could be written by human freelancers, the writing bears markers of AI slop.

According to AI detection startup Reality Defender, which scanned a sampling of these posts, the content in the articles registers as having a “high probability” of containing AI-generated text. One scanned example, a Riverfront Times story titled “19 Best Free Asian OnlyFans Featuring OnlyFans Asian Free in 2024,” concludes with the following sentence, exemplary in its generic horny platitudes: “You explore, savor, and discover your next favorite addiction, and we’ll be back with more insane talent in the future!”

“We’re seeing an ever-increasing part of old media be reborn as AI-generated new media,” says Reality Defender cofounder and CTO Ali Shahriyari. “Unfortunately, this means way less informational and newsworthy content and more SEO-focused ‘slop’ that really just wastes people’s time and attention. Tracking these kinds of publications isn’t even part of our day to day, yet we’re seeing them pop up more and more.”

LA Weekly laid off or offered buyouts to the majority of its staff in March 2024, while the Riverfront Times laid off its entire staff in May 2024 after it was sold by parent company Big Lou Media to an unnamed buyer.

The Village Voice’s sole remaining editorial staffer, R.C. Baker, says he is not involved with the OnlyFans posts, although it appears on the site as editorial content. “I handle only news and cultural reporting out of New York City. I have nothing to do with OnlyFans. That content is handled by a separate team that is based, I believe, in LA,” he told WIRED.

Likewise, former LA Weekly editor in chief Darrick Rainey says he, too, had nothing to do with the OnlyFans listicles when he worked there. Neither did his colleagues in editorial. “We weren’t happy about it at all, and we were absolutely not involved in putting it up,” he says.

Former employees are disturbed to see their archival work comingling with SEO porn slop. “It’s wrenching in so many ways,” says former Riverfront Times writer Danny Wicentowski. “Like watching a loved home get devoured by vines, or left to rot.”

This is a new twist in the grim growing world of AI slop. WIRED has reported on a variety of defunct news and media outlets that have been resurrected by new owners and stuffed with AI-generated clickbait, from a small-town Iowa newspaper to the beloved feminist blog the Hairpin. In the case of the alt-weeklies and OnlyFans listicles, the clickbait is appearing alongside actual editorial content, both archival and new.

It is unclear how this effort has been coordinated between the sites, or whether there are several parallel efforts ongoing to produce OnlyFans-centric listicles. LA Weekly and the Village Voice are both owned by the same parent company, Street Media, and some of their OnlyFans content is identical. Meanwhile, the Riverfront Times publishes its OnlyFans blogs under the byline “RFT staff.”

Street Media owner Brian Calle did not respond to WIRED’s requests for comment. Chris Keating, the Riverfront Times’ former owner, says he is bound by a confidentiality agreement and cannot name the new buyer, but that he “does not believe” Calle is part of the purchasing company controlling the new Riverfront Times.

Daniela LaFave, an Austin-based SEO expert who is bylined on the majority of the Village Voice OnlyFans blog posts as well as some of the LA Weekly posts, confirmed to WIRED that she is the same person named as the author. She declined to answer whether she used AI tools to create the posts.

Another frequent byline on the Village Voice and LA Weekly posts, “Jasmine Ramer,” has published 910 articles primarily for these two outlets in the past year, according to the public relations platform Muck Rack. (Sample headlines: “Top OnlyFans Sluts 2024” and “Top 10 Finnish OnlyFans & Hottest Finnish OnlyFans 2023.”) There is a profile on LinkedIn listed as a senior staff writer at LA Weekly for an Austria-based woman named Jasmine Ramer, but there is little other digital footprint for the writer. When Reality Defender analyzed the profile photo on Ramer’s LinkedIn account, it found it was likely AI-generated. There is also at least one other account using the same photo claiming to be a digital marketing executive in the UK. (WIRED did not receive a response when it asked Ramer for comment via LinkedIn.)

OnlyFans is an online porn behemoth, one which has spawned numerous cottage industries, like professional proxy chatters who impersonate the platform’s stars. There are marketing agencies devoted to promoting OnlyFans creators, and many social platforms from Reddit to X are swarmed with bots trying to entice potential customers. These efforts are known as “OnlyFans funnels.”

Risqué sex ads have played a major role in the rise and fall of some alt-weeklies. The founders of Village Voice Media, which once owned the Village Voice, LA Weekly, and the Riverfront Times as well as other US-based alt-weeklies, created the classified website Backpage.com in 2004 to compete with Craigslist. It created a lucrative revenue stream, buoying many titles for years, but ginned up major controversy for hosting sex ads.

Vice President Kamala Harris, serving as California attorney general at the time, dubbed the company “the world’s top online brothel” in 2016 and arrested its founders and CEO for facilitating prostitution. With this recent history in mind, the decision to lean into sexual advertorial is especially brash.

It may be that these alt-weeklies are creating these blog posts in an effort to drum up web traffic to their sites, which could in turn help boost digital ad sales. They may also be accepting money from the accounts or from representatives of the accounts promoted, which would mean the posts were unlabeled advertorial. “Online ads, print ads, they all dried up,” Rainey says. “But this OnlyFans stuff is there.”

“OnlyFans has no financial arrangement with these outlets,” an OnlyFans spokesperson who identified herself only as “Brixie” told WIRED via email.

“I think the creators are paying,” says Luka Sek, SEO manager for an OnlyFans promotion company called SocialRise. “An agency that handles multiple models, or someone doing the marketing for such agencies.”

Whatever the reason, it marks a grim new pit stop for declining media publications, one in which blatant SEO bait sits side by side with culturally valuable archival journalistic work and, in the case of the Village Voice, ongoing contemporary reportage.

Tricia Romano, a former Village Voice writer who recently published an oral history of the newspaper, The Freaks Came Out to Write, sees the arrival of AI slop as keeping with the recent deterioration of alt-weeklies. “This is the logical dystopian conclusion,” she says. “But who’s reading it?”

[earlgreytea68]

I was Googling to check a lyric and for whatever reason (BAD AI ALGORITHMS), one of the first results was a YouTube video titled something like "How Fall Out Boy writes lyrics: Are they sellouts?" Which, like, clearly that title is just clickbait and I'm not linking to the video because it immediately annoyed me and I don't want to encourage this clickbaityness. I watched long enough for the songs to be called "simplistic" and "full of lazy rhymes" and also "mostly about romantic love" and I'm just like, .......Did you even listen to or think about for two seconds any of these songs????? and the answer is no, his methodology was to cut and paste the lyrics into a bunch of programs that then spit out how many syllables the words were and if any lines were repeated and then he deduced based on that and, like, doing data like that is not going to actually capture the dense wordplay in a Pete Wentz lyric and YOU CANNOT REDUCE POETRY TO A SPREADSHEET and also basically any time anyone implies Pete Wentz doesn't write good lyrics an angel loses its wings and then I have to write up a Tumblr post like this to try to rectify the situation.

[queer-ragnelle]

Writing asks! ✍️ 🖋️ 📖 ❤️ and ⁉️ please and thank you!

✍️ When did you get started writing?

Answered here!

🖋️ What inspired you to write your WIPs?

Every retelling I enjoyed was good, but there would always be at least one thing about it nagging me. Like one character portrayal that was just wretched and soured the whole thing. I wanted to read queer Arthuriana from the perspective of "side" characters, ie, never from Arthur, Merlin, or Lancelot's povs. I wanted to circumvent expectation enough that certain characters could become more three dimensional and complex than their medieval counterparts (like Lamorak and Elaine, for example) while still letting Camelot fall. The series is titled Elegy of an Empire because it is still a tragedy, even if it begins on a high note, I'm writing with the knowledge it will all crumble anyway. It's sort of in the way Hadestown gives the viewers hope that maybe Orpheus won't look back this time. Maybe he and his beloved Eurydice will escape and live happily ever after. But then he looks back. Arthurian Legend is cyclical; it's the perfect place to explore the cycle of violence and the self-fulfilling prophecy of Mordred's, and Camelot's, eventual fate. So even though Agravaine and Laurel raise Mordred to the absolute best of their ability, and even though Ragnelle and Gawain loved Gingalain beyond reason, they all lose their "children" and then each other and the kingdom disintegrates anyway. I'm a sicko who likes "none of it mattered" endings with an obscene amount of foreshadowing. I "told" you it would end badly, why are you crying?

📖 What has surprised you about your WIPs?

I suppose it's a bit late in the game to say the wordcount as I was surprised about that like 4 years ago. But I'd also say I'm surprised my writing has resonated with people. So often writers are coached to cater to "the market" and that "self-indulgent" writing is reserved for people that've already found success. Famous authors can sell their name on any novel regardless of contents; I have to write something that interests as many people as possible. Something generic. Yet I found that the more I sanded off the edges of what I wrote, the less I liked it, and the more mediocre it became. I don't want to cast a wide net. I'd rather have a smaller audience of people who really, really dig it than a bunch of people who skim the whole thing and throw it into the pile for their "I Read 150 Books in 2 Months!!!" clickbait video. That surprised me because our society says we should measure our value as a person by our commercial success. But I don't subscribe to that idea anymore.

❤️ What are your favorite scenes from your WIPs?

I like the scenes that are both emotionally charged but a little funny. Like Ragnelle and Gawain unbelievably horny for each other which is goofy but deeply romantic. So they're fucking and sucking in broad daylight, in public, haven't even locked the door, only for her grandpa to walk in on them and they're grown ass adults but they have to leap apart like teenagers because they lost their heads. Or that time Percival is hiding in a tree with Morien from Twrch Trwyth and they accidentally witness a particularly intimate exchange between Lamorak and Agravaine only for Agravaine to notice them, have three silent mental breakdowns in a row, then decide to pretend it didn't happen and walk away before Lamorak works out what he missed. Then again, I particularly enjoy my horror scenes. Ragnelle coming to terms with her cursed reflection; Lamorak encountering the Questing Beast for the first time; Elaine continuously gaslit by Lancelot's memory loss about their son's existence; Orkney bros mental illnesses and physical disabilities resulting in flashbacks and memory loss and pain. Many such cases! All horror subgenres accounted for!

⁉️ What do you do when stuck on a scene?

Read! Read! Read!!!!! Reading something in the same genre or even just the same vibes as the scene I'm stuck on helps a lot.

[serendertothesquad]

"Wordsville" and the Problem with Cash-Cow Copies

[note original day of creation was February 15, 2024. just...just for reference. trust me bro.]

Hello.

Tonight I am in a silly mood fueled by sleep deprivation.

That means you all get an introspective blog that I will complete within a week and then ask "why'd I write that?"

So here's what's on Seren's lovely table of discussion tonight...

Put...put away the glasses. You don't need your glasses. This is the highest-quality thing I can get.

But et voila. A little project in the works called Wordsville.

Now, at this point you might be asking why I'm referencing "cash-cow copies" in the title. And whoo-hoo...oooooh...well, I don't want to make this some kind of clickbait blog, so I might as well perfect the atomic bomb in five minutes and land it on you folks.

What if I were to tell you that this is a blatant, shameless, slap-a-digital-coat-on-it-and-call-it-a-day copy of Odd Squad?

Ahhh, see, now I have you intrigued. Hopefully. If you are, then peep down below and let me discuss things a little more in-depth for you non-believing hacks asking me if I'm borderline insane.

So to put things in perspective, allow me to explain what Wordsville is, starting with my own personal summary.

Wordsville is an up-and-coming episodic (not to be confused with serialized, that's a whole 'nother ballgame) TV series that is produced (and will later be distributed) by Sinking Ship Entertainment and is made with assistance from WNET, a PBS station located in New Jersey, and TVO Kids, PBS Kids's girlfriend from Canada that's definitely real.

It was announced back in October of last year with a press release from Kidscreen, which didn't give much info aside from the following blurb:

Wordsville stars two child detectives on the hunt for missing words that are causing chaos in their town.

Sounds a little familiar, don'tcha think? Two kid detectives, finding something missing...and that "something missing" is causing chaos where they live?

Oh, but if you think the similarities end there, then no. No the absolute fuck they do not. I've got my bathing suit on and God damn it if I'm not gonna jump all the way in the pool instead of dippin' my little toes in there.

Doing a little bit of digging reveals more tidbits from a casting call for the series. It's rather wordy (ayyyyyy I did a funy), so let's take it piece by piece and discuss accordingly.

Wordsville is a town populated entirely by kids

A town that is populated entirely by children? Now c'mon, surely that doesn't ring a be-

...Ah. Whaddya know. Yes it does.

And with the adults as useless and idiotic as they are, it might as well be a town full of solely children. Next question.

and it’s a place where words matter. A lot. Every kid citizen has a special connection to words. And that means that if something happens to a word, there are far-reaching consequences.

A special connection to words? Like how there are children who have a special connection to normalcy? Stopping, oh, I dunno, hypothetically speaking...

...oddness?

Okay okay, I'm reaching just a wee bit here, but you can't read this and not tell me it echoes the funny kids math show to some degree or another. If an odd thing happens to a person, the whole town suffers. You've seen it. I've seen it. It's been the basis for many an A and B-plot. Must I elaborate? Good, because I don't plan on it. Continuing.

If the Main Street Baker bakes delicious donuts and they all mysteriously disappear, nothing else in Wordsville can taste good until they are returned.

Town Baker walked so Main Street Baker can sprint while blowing their lungs out.

If the Town Doctor’s soothing medication gets swiped, the whole town gets uncontrollably itchy until the medicine-napper is uncovered.

Ignoring the incredibly dark implications of this as well as the implications of this shoddy knockoff town having only one single doctor...

Dr. O walked so the Town Doctor can sprint while blowing their lungs out...over their massive paycheck.

(I technically could have also put New Dr. O too, but I'd like to spring for iconic OG's here. New Dr. O is neither iconic nor an OG.)

And let me remind you that "Torontonians get uncontrollably itchy due to something odd" would, by technicality, classify as an odd problem. Because...I mean, y'know...the cause is something odd happening. Doing shit with words is odd. This needs absolutely no explaining.

If the Local Scientist does an experiment with electricity and all the lights in town go out, they won’t come back on until the experiment wrecker is revealed.

Yep, I've taken shots of every IPA I can. We nearly hit the main character quadfecta, if you discount Dr. "bro thinks she's part of the team" O. All they needed was a bit about a high governing body and we'd round out the quad squad in proper with Oprah!

There's also a sneaky lil' crumb in the form of that blurb relating to Oona, who did, indeed, experiment with electricity in one episode and wound up proving why she can never take up Crossfit.

Hmmmnnnnext!

In each crime, the episodic word disappears and can’t return until the mystery is solved. The impact of the missing word is felt all over town.

This is another one of those things that I gotta wrench a hammy for in terms of comparisons, because about the only thing I can reasonably compare Odd Squad to is the second sentence.

See, here's the thing. You get oddness that happens to a person. Oftentimes, that oddness spreads to other people, whether directly (in the form of diseases and disorders) or indirectly (like the Town Baker's cakes being split in half, which wouldn't please Torontonians poppin' in for a whole cake and eyeing the display to get a feel for one). In a sense, normalcy disappears and, well, it can't return until [insert partner pair here] solve the case. It's kinda the entire schtick of Odd Squad as a franchise. It's formulaic, just like how Wordsville's "words disappear and nothing can be normal until the word returns" schtick is formulaic.

Is it a stretch? Perhaps. Mileage may vary. I think it's a bit of a stretch, personally. But hey, I'm a grown adult critiquing a ripoff of a kids STEM show. I shouldn't be talking. But I didn't start this fandom nearly 10 years ago just to let Sinking Ship's piss-poor attempt at really capitalizing on one of their biggest franchises sliiiiiide right by me on a floor smooth enough where I'm falling on my ass every 10 seconds.

Luckily, best friends and partners Sage and Chase are on the case and run the only detective agency in town. These tech-savvy sleuths solve mysteries entirely virtually because their reading, listening and digital literacy skills are their greatest strengths. Sage and Chase always catch their culprit and make sure everything is right with the word.

Now where in the McFuck do I start with this one? The PAW Patrol catchphrase thrown in complete with shared name? The fact that there is only one detective agency in the entire town? The fact that Sage and Chase are best friends as well as work partners? Or the pun that made me actively cringe in a way I haven't felt since Whitney told James she wanted to go on the lake?

I mean...this is about Odd Squad, so...I guess the second one sounds most plausible.

But that doesn't need explaining either. There is only one detective agency in town. There is one Odd Squad precinct per city or per state.

No, neither does the third bit. I already referenced Olive and Otto above. You should know what's up.

(I've also read that blurb five times now and...well...we'll get to the digital stuff in a bit. That just needs a whole side-set of word vomit.)

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

In my digging of this series -- which, well, wasn't all that much -- I managed to find a few blurbs on our two main characters. The casting call for them, funny enough, called for, and I will quote this exactly, "talent to look 9."

As in, they want the actors to physically look 9 years old.

Which puts that qualifier in the same ballpark as Odd Squad UK's "talent must be Canadian but live in the UK". But at least that prerequisite actually had a legitimate earnest reason behind it, which is that the production needed to be Canadian in a lot more than just the "Canadian prodco works on a British series" sense. Hiring kids who have to physically look 9 years old and will probably be yoted onto the street the second puberty hits them like a truck is a practice not even the most egregious bosses of family-owned-and-operated businesses could pull off.

But enough about the qualifiers. Let's get started on our character comparisons and civil cidiscussion! (Oh the irony...)

And remember this: the casting call was handled by Larissa Mair Casting, who previously did casting for Odd Squad. So that means there will be tinny lil' crumbs of bonus material for me to dissect and discuss! Huzzah! Aw God why can't this happen for Odd Squad UK...man, I'm gonna have to go into my sobbing corner...

First up, we have Sly Sleuth, originally referred to as "Sage" here. I'll also be referring to him as "Sage" in this blog.

Sage is a great detective; thoughtful, extremely logical, and talented at getting information out of people.

Thoughtful of others. Logical. And can wrench information out of suspects like a badass.

Yep, we got an Olive that got hit with an Olando-fied beam. (And because half of you don't know who Olando is: Sage is meant to be a male Olive. I hope that clears things up for you.)

What else?

Nothing related to vocabulary or literacy gets by this investigator. Suspects can underestimate Sage but that is always a mistake. Sage doesn’t scare easily and won’t take no for an answer, traits that make an excellent detective.

You could tell me this was how Olive was meant to be written in "My Better Half", word for word, and I would honestly believe you. Right down to asking, "Her name was Sage in pre-production?"

About the only place I can draw the line here is at Olive not scaring easily. We don't know Sage's backstory -- and once again, this is an episodic series, so don't expect much in the way of plot, backstory included -- but Olive, at least, has a legitimate reason for all the times she covers her ears at loud noises or sharply reacts to something startling.

The former is because of The Censor-Friendly Bullet Massacre of '15.

The latter is because Dalila Bela marched straight out of a viewing of Who Framed Roger Rabbit and never looked back.

I...can't really say either applies to Sage. At least not yet. We'll have to see if Sinking Ship decides to bring Wordsville into its lil' multiverse that Odd Squad and Dino Dana and Endlings and Playdate already share.

Sage is also wise, which is why the name “Sage” is completely appropriate.

Sooooo does that mean his name is Sly because he's cunning like a fox?

Well then in other news, Olive is named such because she was inspired by the famous Law and Order character Olivia Benson. I have fifteen folders that back me right the hell up. Also I contacted Sinking Ship the other day, they explicitly told me.

No, no, but in all seriousness. Olive, too, is very wise. Historian buff, knows her shit about Odd Squad, doo-dah, doo-dah.

Anyway, next up we have Chase, who was renamed to "Gabby Gumshoe". (I'll be referring to her as Chase in this blog, as well.) Let's see what's on the chopping block for her in terms of our favorite food-loving, hella tall, crazy silly blorbo.

Chase is a fantastic detective, but is also goofy[,] funny, visually oriented, and, like the name suggests, loves the “chase”.

Now there's a man who got hit with a yassified beam, right there.

I'll leave it up to you folks whether you consider Otto to be "visually oriented". But in terms of "loving the chase"...yeah, I'd say that fits.

To lay it down: Otto is a rookie agent. Common sense would lead anyone to assume that he has an absolute blast solving odd cases and absorbing every bit of knowledge about Odd Squad that he possibly can. He finds out a villain's on the loose? He's right there, by Olive's side, workin' to catch 'em. He finds out oddness has run rampant throughout the town? He's right on that shit.

Chase, on the other hand, is someone I wouldn't call a rookie. It's made quite evident that she is, for all intents and purposes, seasoned. Seasoned enough that she manages to keep the detective agency she works for afloat and get approval from the others in Wordsville, Sage included. This, perhaps, is because she's not really meant to be an audience surrogate in the same way Otto is. Otto, at least for the first few episodes, serves as a way to ease the audience into Odd Squad and show them what the organization is and what they do without yoting them into it and leaving them asking "Where am I?" more times than a drunkard. Chase doesn't fill that role, because it could be argued that such a show like Wordsville doesn't really need an audience surrogate. Whether that's true, though, remains to be seen.

People tend to underestimate this investigator, but Chase often notices things like a chocolate stain when someone said they didn’t like chocolate or a squiggle of icing that turns out to be the antonym of the word they’re tracking.

Y' take Otto's...Otto's love of food...and y' put it in a gorl...and BAM you got a character.

...

That isn't a joke. It's dead-on serious. Even the casting call script pins Chase as a kid with a sweet tooth! It's just Otto but with a less diverse palate! Otto eats everything! This kid eats sweets! God sakes, give her some juice, make her Oprah, I don't give a shit, fucking hell I'm driving 50 minutes to Burger Ki-

Chase is also great with computers and incredibly artistic. A graphic note taker[,] Chase loves to draw, has a great eye for details, is a big fan of the “zoom in” function, and really enjoys creating animated re-enactments of Word Mysteries.

All right, we finally have somewhere we can draw the line.

No, not at being tech-literate. With being artistic.

Otto's artistic talent kind of varies throughout the franchise. In drawing on paper, he's pretty solid for an I-just-recently-turned-10-please-praise-me-year-old. In making paper airplanes, he's solid enough to take down a grown-ass man and rock his sunglasses when he's done for.

In computer drawing...well...if you can believe it, concepts like Ibispaint and Photoshop don't exist in the world of Odd Squad. (Okay, maaaaybe Photoshop does. I don't think it does. But it could be a good in-universe justification for it.)

We don't know Otto's digital artist merit because we never see him make any digital art. All of his art is solely non-digital. On Chase's side of things, she lives in an era where digital drawing is, like in real life, the norm. It's a contrast that might be one of the more glaring ones when it comes to comparing these two shows.

Now, as for the "creating animated re-enactments" schtick...if that isn't an excuse for Sinking Ship to work their animation magic after the Sandy Cheeks movie, then I honestly don't know what is. If you wanted to make the show animated, you could have made it animated. Would've been cheaper, too!

(And "Word Mysteries"...it's not as grating as Wild Kratts's "Wow Fact", but it's edging pretty close. I blame WNET. That's solely a PBS thing right there. TVO Kids would never.)

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

So we've gotten the discussion about the two main characters out of the way. Now we can dive into the heartier meat. The kind where's it's purple on the inside but you still digest it anyway.

I'm talking, of course, about the sample scripts- script. Singular. There is one script. Uno.

Now, lemme give you a bit of a rundown: casting calls for Odd Squad -- really, most shows, but this is a blog about Odd Squad -- often come with sample scripts. This is so talents can read their parts aloud for the camera and have the tape submitted to the casting agency for consideration. Odd Squad in particular has had quite an interesting ride with sample scripts, from entire episode plots being adapted into final products (with a bit of tweaking) to characters having names different than what they're named in the final product (which is the case with both Sly and Gabby). They're nothing on the scale of ABC Me dropping episodes earlier than PBS or shorts getting dropped as an alleged April Fools prank, but they're pretty damn good crumbs to chew on.

The sample script starts out with Sage and Chase on, of course, a video call. (Sinking Ship made a Zoom reference once. Pray they do not make another by the name of a friendly drug called "Speed" or that term for peeing known as a "Whiz".) Chase explains that she just gave her office chair's wheels a tune-up, which, of course, makes her hungry. Hungry enough that she declares a "cookie break" and immediately takes out a ginormous cookie from hammerspace that just made the European bakery down the street from me start sobbing. (Look, they make good cookies. Giant cookies. Cookies I need two hands just to hold properly. Trust me, it's- it's massive.)

However, when she bites into the cookie, she finds that it tastes absolutely gross -- "not sweet, not even sour". While she ponders if her body has forcefully rejected one of the best sweet treats known to humankind, Sage begins to grow suspicious and asks if it's a Word Mystery they need to solve.

Which is, coincidentally enough, when the Main Street Baker calls in a fit of hysteria, explaining that their "delicious donuts" are gone. And because we can't take enough from Odd Squad, we get a bit of "literal humor" in the form of the donuts both being delicious (probably) and them spelling the word "delicious" prior to their disappearance. After Sage explains what "delicious" means as well as what synonyms are, it's shown that the culprit also struck other pastries, up to and including gingerbread people, which Sage absolutely takes personally because he's a kid of pure culture who gives a big "fuck you" to holiday-specific treats being enjoyed only during said holidays.

Chase, in true Otto fashion, decides to take more bites of her cookie and instantly regrets it. Sage, in true...well...Clint Eastwood fashion (I shit you not, that's literally what it says in the script), declares that they need to find the word "delicious" and fix the pastries.

And...yeah, that's about it. Like I said, there's really not much to go on with casting call sample scripts. Especially not ones from Larissa Mair.

My conclusive thoughts on it, you ask? Well...they can try to hide it, but all it's doing is enforcing my point. From the Main Street Baker having donuts missing similar to how the Town Baker had bagels missing in "Soundcheck", to Chase being an idiot who is obsessed with food the same way Otto is (right down to his willingness to drink Odd Todd's pickle juice when it tasted gross in "Bad Lemonade"!), even down to the "literal metaphor" kind of humor as it applies to singular words. Am I stretching? Perhaps. But these supposedly insignificant pieces are just part of the bigger picture, the larger issue at hand in this long-winded piece.

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

The digital aspect of Wordsville is one of the ways they decided to put a twist on the precedent that Odd Squad set. And it's so blatant and in-your-face that it's on par with shoving a red flag in someone's eyes to blind them.

But here's the thing. The digital aspect been done. Amusingly enough, by the same company.

Lockdown is a show that fits right in with the others at the Shows-Made-During-the-COVID-Pandemic-About-the-COVID-Pandemic club. It was a way to capitalize on something in society that probably will never be relevant again until around 2050. Maybe even earlier than that, at the rate we're going.

I haven't seen it, so I can't speak much about it, but from my side of things it looks a lot like Unfriended if it took place during the pandemic and wasn't a horror movie and involved teens and not young adults/adults/I haven't seen the movie in many years bite me.

But the main difference between Lockdown and Wordsville, relevant to this editorial, is that Lockdown has a legitimate reason to be shot entirely on electronic devices. It's part of the plot. It works, I'm sure. For Wordsville, it makes no sense for the outline and isn't just limiting, but is downright insulting for something "rooted in the 21st century". It's good to be unique when making a show, but there's such a thing as trying too hard to be unique to the point where it's detrimental to your show's quality. Making the show be a digital-only angle isn't a smart move, especially for a detective procedural.

And if it's trying to differentiate itself from Odd Squad...well, do I got some bad news for you.

The show already did an entire Zoom parody in the span of an 11-minute episode.

And I still hate it with all the vitriol of an old woman who hates kids playing with beach balls in the yard pool. It sucks ass. It's entirely unneeded when you have three children sitting around the same table. I could vomit on you all day about it. But at least it's far more justified than Wordsville having its entire formula based on it. You can rip off a show without being limiting.

(don't. seriously. don't.)

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

Before we get to the conclusion, I need to dive deep into Odd Squad's own popularity and explain it a little more beyond just little "trust me bro" tidbits.

If you've been following it for as long as I have, then it's no secret that Odd Squad is one of Sinking Ship's cash-cow franchises. You've got the main series, six different spinoffs, a live show, a book...and I didn't even provide a whole damn list! Point being, it's huge. It doesn't have many roots in pop culture, but from a certain angle, it is an absolutely massive franchise that continues to grow, even in spite of its controversies.

Unlike works such as SpongeBob or Bluey, Odd Squad isn't popular enough to get bonafide ripoffs. The formula is relatively easy to copy, and if anything there are shows that have a similar premise but aren't even close to ripoff territory (K.C. Undercover, for example). It's just that, for all the ripoffs people have done of shows and movies over the years, the motivation for industry bigwigs in taking Odd Squad and running with it just...isn't there. I can connect it to Disney or Dreamworks or Viacom all I want, but at best they have a vague awareness of it that only goes as far as "oh, that's a thing, I guess". At worst, they see it as a pile of shit that would never turn a decent profit.

It could be argued that Sinking Ship wasn't all too well-known in the entertainment sphere up until Odd Squad came around. Looking at their resume doesn't show all too much in the way of what's popular. This is Daniel Cook, Roll Play, Playdate...they don't stick in your head, right? Yeah, none of them stick in my head either. Odd Squad was their first big hit for them, something that really helped them gain ground as a company. It's the one that's pretty much linked with Sinking Ship in news articles. Like husband and wife, but for the TV industry.

But to Hollywood bigwigs, that means about as much as finding a stick on the ground. I guaran-goddamn-tee Bob Iger is not going to put his grubby little hands on the funny kids math franchise and twist the hell out of it. The only way that's happening is if you run "Odd Squad, but make it Disney" through an AI generator. (Which, for the record, I have not done. You can't really replicate Odd Squad characters in animation without making them look like they walked out of yet another Law and Order spinoff that's far more kid-friendly.)

However, even with Odd Squad's varying popularity, there are shows that go just a little beyond having a similar premise to it but don't dive into ripoff territory. Sort of like a next step up.

A long time ago, a few friends and I in an Odd Squad Discord server were discussing the show Numberjacks. You know, that show that Jacknjellify may or may not have used as inspiration for Four's design? Yeah, that's the bitch.

The show has a few similarities to Odd Squad. You've got the focus on math, a system for exiting the couch headquarters that's similar to the tube system, and even the existence of kid agents and incredibly odd villains, one of which, need I remind you, Twitter tried to make into a sexyman for all of two days to varying degrees of success.

I will admit, I haven't seen Numberjacks in several years. In fact, the last time I saw it was when it was brought up as an Odd Squad ripoff. If I recall correctly, the episode that I picked to watch on a whim was "Seaside Adventure", wherein a few numbers take a vacation and trouble occurs. Or something like that. I really can't remember many details.

One thing I do remember, though, is distinctly thinking that I could see the Odd Squad similarities, but...it's not a ripoff. The series premiered in 2006. By that point, Tim McKeon and Adam Peltzman were off on their own ventures as they wrote for cartoons and other things. Thus, Odd Squad hadn't been birthed yet. If anything, Odd Squad took cues from Numberjacks, not the other way around -- but even with the existence of Odd Squad UK, we don't know that for sure. I don't even know how popular Numberjacks was in the UK. I'm a dumb lil' American, not a Daphne-Moon-esque English woman.

Since then, I haven't found anything that has come close to what Wordsville aims to accomplish. Granted, though, I have not looked very hard. I'm moreso keeping an eye on PBS to see if they're going to try and rip off Odd Squad rather than keeping an eye on any random B-lister studio. (And no, I'm not talking about WNET. They are a PBS station, but I'm referring to PBS as a whole entire network, not a sole affiliate.)

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

So the question remains: is Wordsville an Odd Squad ripoff?

Yes. On multiple counts. Right down to the name inspo. Guilty as charged. Right to jail.

From it being for the 4-7 demo not unlike Odd Squad's own 4-8 demo, to Sage and Chase being referred to as "Word Detectives" in lieu of "agents", to it being a detective procedural not unlike Odd Squad and its spinoffs, to the synopsis of the show being described as having "a case rooted in a vocabulary lesson" similar to Odd Squad having episodes rooted in STEM lessons, to it actively encouraging the audience to solve mysteries along with Sage and Chase...to Sage and Chase having alliterative theme naming...

Yeah, safe to say, we've got ourselves a ripoff.

There's no denying that Odd Squad is a fantastic franchise. Even through all of its issues, including financial controversies, heavy criticism, and mistreatment from PBS, it has remained strong for nearly 10 years, and will stay strong for many more. Maybe one of these days, it will plant roots deeper into pop culture and become one hell of a phenomenon. We'll have to see.

But the fact that Sinking Ship Entertainment has to resort to borrowing a concept that is unique in its nature, a concept that has already been done, a concept that has been given life and creativity by the people who birthed it, and then try to pass it off as its own original IP is not a good look on them. It's been done similarly before with their other big franchise, Dino Dan -- key word being "similarly" because it's one show and three spinoffs focusing on different characters. That isn't the case with Wordsville, though.

Put it this way: it's a company ripping off not someone else's IP, like many other companies have done and continue to do. It's a company ripping off their own IP.

And really, it doesn't matter how it's done. Stealing is stealing. At the end of the day, all it shows is a complete lack of creativity and a complete craving for the almighty dollar. More so if it's a company stealing from themselves and passing it along as okay.

In spite of this, however, I am perfectly willing to give Wordsville a shot when it comes out. Not so much to see if it's good (though my curiosity is piqued), and definitely not to hate-watch (which has the opposite intended effect on a show or movie), but to see just how far Sinking Ship is willing to push the envelope in affirming viewers and industry buddies alike that this is not, by any and all accounts, a copy of Odd Squad. I want to spot similarities. I want to take whiskey shots until I can do a zoom-zoom to a hospital and then ask if they've got a bottle on board the rig. I want to give a full, I-watched-this-show-now-here-are-my-overall-final-thoughts addendum on the entire issue.

As of now, Wordsville has no narrow timeframe. All I know is that it's releasing this year, likely on TVO Kids in Canada. Whether PBS as a whole will adopt it into its roster -- and if anything, it'll be WNET-exclusive, otherwise we would've heard something about it at the TCA Winter Press Tour a few days back -- for American audiences remains yet to be seen. Rest assured, though, that I'll be keeping an eye on it and rushing to it as soon as the first episode drops. After that, I'll give a proper addendum so I can finally put this issue to bed. Along with myself. Revenge bedtime procrastination is a bitch.

Thanks for reading. This honestly started out as something silly, but then I became analytical. So you got a mix of both in this one. This may or may not be the norm. Day-by-day, y'know?

Seren out.

[askbensolo]

Journal Entry #48: Local Dude Already Hates the Job He Was So Excited to Get

Yeah. What the title says. It's been only a few weeks and I already hate my job. I don't know what I was expecting, really.

But...hey. The pay is higher than at my old position!

...That's my little mantra, anyway. I close my eyes, take a couple of deep breaths, and say, "the pay is better, the pay is better, the pay is better..."

Man...I don't know where to start. So...I guess I'll just start with the fact that upon starting this position, I was given my own text generation droid. And that already tells you a lot, right off the bat, doesn’t it?

I know I joked about that at my last job. But now it's not a joke—it's real.

Text generation droids are fairly new. Which is super weird, since protocol droids (and other droids capable of mimicking natural language) have been around forever. But, while natural-language droids use their speech abilities to communicate with us (and are so good at it they almost feel like other sentients)…they're not necessarily designed with the purpose of generating complex, or worse, creative, text samples. Threepio, for example, has no idea what to do when I ask him to freestyle rap.

And I have asked. More than once. Anyway—

My text generation droid at work is one of the Scribblr models. It's an SC-2 unit, so, I, uh...call her...Essie.

She also doubles as a personal assistant. And resembles a cute little humanoid lady, which I'm sure is sooo not sexist at all.

Only…about the size of a bottle of wine. She’s meant to fit on top of your desk, and she doesn’t move, which is weird for a droid. You have to pick her up and carry her if you want to move her around. But, mostly I just leave her in her charging dock on my desk. She communicates wirelessly with my work computer, and I can view her text generation outputs on the screen.

At first, I refused to use Essie's text generation function, because I, uh, you know, kinda wanted to WRITE, since that's what I thought I was hired to do—but my manager soon made it very clear to me that I could not possibly succeed in churning out the sheer quantity of content expected of me, without using Essie. Sooo...Essie and I are a team now. Unfortunately.

No—it sucks. It really, really sucks. What I am currently doing at my job cannot be described as writing. It's content generation, it's clickbait, it's mind-rotting sensationalist drivel for the masses, it's advertising and sponsored links and a never-ending battle to capture as much holonet traffic as possible—it's everything I hate as an artist.

But...hey. The pay is better!

Thepayisbetterthepayisbetterthepayisbetter—

Sigh. My hands are kinda tied. It's not gonna look good on my resume if I quit so soon. And I am not interested in starting a whole new job hunt, or crawling back to my old department in tears. So...guess I'm just...stuck here for a while. Me and Essie. Good ol' Essie...

The interesting thing about Essie is that I am 100% sure she is stealing my data at all times, recording my speech patterns when I talk to myself, tracking whatever little writing is actually being produced by me—because there is no other explanation as to why, instead of saying "Good morning, Ben Solo" like she used to, she is now saying "Yooo, 'sup buddy!" and "What's shakin’, my dude?"

She even said something was "wizard" the other day and...hooh, that made my heart flutter. Everyone else keeps telling me to stop trying to make "wizard" happen. But no. Not Essie.

I should probably be wiping her memory more often...but, honestly, I am way too amused by this. Today after lunch she said to me, "By the way bro, you have a stupid freaking meeting at three o'clock," and, ha—let me tell ya—it made my day. Fannie's lucky I still don't think droids are sentient, because, heh—well—if I did—wait, wait, no, actually I’m not gonna finish that sentence.

Ohhh, Essie! My bright light in a dark world.

...But I’m not becoming a droid guy. I’m not! Beebee-Ate and Threepio still drive me insane at home. And get this! You remember Sweeper? From my old office? Well, it turns out that every single department at the ChommSec Daily has also not updated their cleaning droids since before the Battle of Yavin, so it’s not the same Sweeper that’s on my new floor, but there’s definitely a Sweeper here, who I call Sweeper 2, and he is just as annoying as Sweeper 1. ARGH

[ladyofthepen]

A Monochrome world; ch.01

Grace scrolled through the various articles online. She had been up since seven that morning and had been puking her guts out after her morning coffee. Now, her nausea had subsided, and she could happily catch up with some friends on Facebook and scroll through some celebrity news. 

She didn’t read much of what showbiz had to offer, most of it was gossip anyway. But, Grace figured she could scour the internet for some news on one of her favorite celebrities: Henry Cavill. 

She had binge-watched the whole first season of The Witcher when it aired on Netflix. Drooling and daydreaming during the infamous bath scene. She enjoyed Geralt’s relationship with Jaskier. She even enjoyed the world around Geralt of Rivia. In other words, Grace didn’t just binge-watch the first season. She devoured it. She watched it at least once a week. Whenever she got bored with watching the same old shows on her cable TV, she turned to Geralt and his horse. She laughed with Jaskier, rooted and cheered for Yennefer. Only to be mildly confused at the whole Ciri storyline. Which hurled her down a rabbit hole of looking into the show, the books and the lore. 

Eventually, she too, fell victim to fan fiction. Grace stayed up when she couldn’t sleep, reading one fan fiction after the other. From whump fan fictions to fix-it stories. From alternate universes to a Stoic Geralt running a coffee shop while taking care of his adoptive daughter Ciri. 

Grace used to love fan fiction back in secondary school. Her teenage years had been defined by fan fiction on the first ever websites like Quotev and Quizilla. She moved on to Fan Fiction dot net. Where she tried her hand at writing some stories herself, but they never really reached the 100 views mark. So, after a few years of trying, Grace closed her account and moved on with her life. 

Now, sick and spending most of her days at home or at the hospital, she was back on the fan fiction bandwagon. Reading countless stories and finding some online friends as well. It was here, with her online friends, that Grace found solace and peace. She found a way to escape her diagnosis and chat with friends. Although none of her friends knew how sick she truly was, they did know her immune system wasn’t the best.  But that didn’t matter now. Grace got pulled back to reality by a headline on a gossip blog. She had absentmindedly closed the browser on her phone and opened Tumblr. There, at the top of her ‘for you’ page was a blog post titled:

'HENRY CAVILL QUITS ACTING?!'

Grace couldn’t believe what she was seeing. There was no way that Henry Cavill decided to quit acting. She tapped the ‘read more’ sign and as her eyes read every sentence, a sense of relief washed over her. The title had been clickbait, but the post spoke about Henry’s recent departure from The Witcher and how he had openly spoken about his dislike for the creators’ take on the source material. How much they had strayed from it and how he felt he disappointed the fans. How he had disappointed his fans. 

Grace pressed the heart button and commented: 

“Henry Cavill is the best actor I have seen so far! There’s no one else who could have brought Geralt to life other than him. I have seen the in-game Geralt and Henry’s portrayal, and I’m honestly surprised to see how close these two Geralt’s look alike. He never disappointed us, and he simply can’t give up!” 

Others had commented words of support and cheered Henry on. But Grace felt like she had to directly tell Henry about her feelings. She had to try and get her words to him. She opened her browser on her phone again and looked for the fan mail address for Henry Cavill.

Once she had found it, she told herself that maybe he wouldn’t respond, but if he read it. If he just read the letter, it would be enough. 

So, Grace went to writing. Once finished, she dragged herself off the couch. She put on her thick gray coat and her red knitted scarf and walked out in the autumn weather. She pulled her scarf close and coughed, holding the letter in her free hand. When she reached the post office, she followed the process of sending her letter and watched as it disappeared among thousands of other letters waiting to be sent out to their destinations. 

She didn’t expect a response, in fact she didn’t think Henry or his manager would even bother writing back. She returned home, exhausted and fell asleep on the couch. Wearing her red scarf and her coat.

[themonotonysyndrome]

Your thoughts on the newest audio from Desmond ?

sndfjksndf I was just thinking of posting my thoughts on Prince Renae today; you have great timing, Anon! I was lowkey worried that I might spoil those who haven't listened to it yet.

What I ❤️❤️❤️ about it:

-Tigress's new origin story is hella interesting! I actually like that she's not a captain in this one because a captain would be too busy to try and infiltrate the Imperial royal circle. Tigress is playing the long game and I'm here for it!

-Little Prince Renae was the one who gave Tigress her nickname! Awww! Even after all these years, he still remembers her.

-The SFX!? SNDJSKDNAS I can clearly visual in my head during that scene where Prince Renae and Tigress were dancing. The footwork, the background music, and the soft conversation around them? IMMACULATE.

-Tigress is still a badass and a badass that Desmond clearly 'shows' instead of having the characters just say, "Oh wow, Tigress. You're really strong." Once again, to all the creatives out there, the golden rule is: Show, not tell!

-Prince Renae's admiration for those 'Southern Warriors' and how he only admits it in a drunken haze because it might come across as treasonous is adorable. I imagine that he has heard of Castin by now, and I would love to write a fic where the Baroness and Castin are attending an Imperial Royal Ball, and the Prince is trying really, really hard not to fanboy while Castin is so confused at this Tsundere 😂

-Also, I love how everyone in the tavern couldn't care less that Tigress killed the owner sdnfjdkfsdf though, Tigress, that was very stupid of you. YOU'RE TRYING TO STAY LOW PROFILE! NOW WE HAVE WITNESSES!

-The dramas and intrigues came in swinging like a wrecking ball! Who framed Tigress' dad!? I'm so sus about the Captain, don't trust him Tigress! I don't know if Tigress can continue pretending to be a merchant girl for long because the Empress and Prince Renae are upset about her face and the ending, too!? Tigress is fully back in Imperial high society and mingling with royalty - there's so much potential here for where the story can go, AND I CAN'T FUCKING WAIT! Oh, the fallout is gonna be so angsty!

-Last, I hope Desmond will release the official names and their spellings somewhere soon.

What I 🤨🤨🤨 about it:

-Once more, Desmond, why? Why with the clickbait thumbnail and title? Tigress only took a bath in her new room in the Imperial Palace, and Prince Renae walked in. There was no brothel bathhouse or whatever 😭 I was disappointed in that.

-Speaking of which, the title - now, we know that Tigress and Prince Renae were childhood friends, and at the very least, he has a crush on her and now MAYBE believes himself to be in love with an idea of Tigress instead of ya know, her actual self. But calling them exes is not really... right?

-The name change from Prince Desmond to Prince Renae. I remember in the old lore that Prince Desmond was given that name to honour Gang Leader!Desmond, the first King of the Coastal Empire. I don't know if I remember that wrong, please correct me if I'm wrong, but yeah, I always did like that bit of lore. But hey, I can fuck with Prince Renae eventually.

And... yeah! That's pretty much it!

[caffeineandink]

Tag Game: Clickbait Descriptions

Rules: explain the plot/premise of your wip/s as if it were a clickbait (or just a regular one if you don't want to do clickbait) youtube video.

Thank you for the tag @tildeathiwillwrite !

The Foundations of Despair:

APOCALYPSE IN OKLAHOMA? Demon sighting in El Reno! 😱 Find out more here: (insert sketchy link)

The Thriving Village of Nyr:

Did the Nyrik gods lose their powers, or are they just hiding? Click here to find out more

School of Monsters (working title, I haven't talked about this one yet...but I have no title for it):

WHY ARE STUDENTS TAUGHT TO DIE: an opinion piece

I have more WIPS, but these three are the most promising ones, so I'm including them here

I'm tagging @the-ellia-west @write-on-world @abbyzwrites + open tag!

[kaddyssammlung]

"Angel Vessel"

I did a stupid video for my YT.

7 signs that you are an angel. I don't like titles like that. They seem clickbaite-ish. They name their seven signs and I was just sitting there watching this and my reaction was “well...that's just spiritual awakening”. That's all. I don't care. So according to them I'm an angel then. Great. To me it's just spirituality that's all.

But...I have Vessel to my right.

It's his posture. Idk...he looks like he is spreading his wings. Right?! Right?!

Angel Vessel is what I have stuck in my head ever since.

Now I want to write about Vessel and angels but I would have to quote "the forbidden stuff" or however you want to call it XD.

Here is my video btw. if you want to watch that. It's whatever...On the verge of not recording anything anymore anyway. Not in that style at least.

[tayfabe75]

Hi. Hope all is well. Was wondering what your thoughts are on TTPD double album as well as the video of the lead single. I see so many references to Matty in the video. The black dog. The black and white aesthetic. The lying down like Peanut on the patch of grass. The wedding dress imagery. The rain like when she played Question that night of the rain show. The leather jacket and silver ring Post Malone has in the last scenes. The faces like twins as well as the twin flames imagery. The writing to each other via typewriter standing in for the phones they used. The album itself is gut wrenching. And of course the past relationship of 2014 comes to light and I saw someone say that she used to party with the back then and they did date but her parents broke it up because of his drug use and no one was allowed to talk about but that it was well know by everyone around them. 31 songs is a lot to take in especially when many of them have similarities to 1975 songs so I am still processing it but was wondering what you thought. Thx

Hello again! All is well, just… my head hasn't stopped spinning for a week so I haven't posted much as I process it all! lol

I can't believe we got a double album after all that clowning. It definitely felt like a "be careful what you wish for" sort of moment, because I have been in a constant state of shock and overwhelm trying to make sense of these 31 songs!

You're right! TTPD is bursting at its seams with references to Matty and The 1975, their sound and aesthetic, etc. I'm going to be posting all of the parallels that have been found in the coming days. I'm not ready to definitively list which songs are or aren't about Matty, but there are a few smoking guns, to say the least - TTPD being one of them. The fact that this track shares a title with the album, hints that it's mostly telling a cohesive story (as I believe ALL of Taylor's albums do!)

There are a lot of people coming out of the woodwork lately claiming they know insider information about Taylor and Matty back in the day. I'm personally not impressed with any of that, not in the age of clickbait and instant gratification for lying, especially while they're a hot topic of conversation right now.

But the good news is… you don't need anything other than their discographies to piece together their story, and TTPD seems like it was about a much earlier time in their history, especially given she was working on this album prior to May 2023. Not to mention, I don't for one minute believe Matty had ANY type of relapse while on tour, either (I am incredibly, INCREDIBLY disheartened by "fans" who assumed otherwise based on his stage performance). Lastly, the fact the album exists at all, with SO many blatant references to Matty alongside references to his drug use - makes me feel pretty confident that Taylor would not release any of this without his blessing. Thanks for the ask! 🤍