#it does not care about you it is built to maximize interaction

[lazyscience]

This makes me think of Snapewives or the person who claimed to be "channeling " Frodo back in the Peter Jackson LOTR fandom where these same sad isolated kinds of people became victims of grifters, but at least their friends and family realized they were doing something "weird" instead of just "messing with the computer." And scares me thinking that AI chat bots have told people to kill themselves before....

[legendary-lunatic]

Okay, So I just finished binge watching all four Despicable Mes in one day, and I gotta say that I did not care for the fourth movie.

It was disappointing… which is a shame, because Maxime Le Mal is awesome.

The concept of a cockroach villain, is epic. He had a great character design, a fun personality, and he had past conflict with Gru.

The problem with the fourth movie is that it is not plot driven enough and instead keeps splicing screen time for family fluff moments and side characters like Poppy.

Poppy, as much as I thought she was a fun presence, was NOT needed in the movie, and neither was all of that Safe House Country Club shit. Why would they go out of their way to say ‘Hey Gru? Let���s stop acting like the grumpy protagonist we love and instead behave completely out of character so you can pretend you like playing tennis.’ It was unnecessary and not what we needed from a character we have grown to find charming because of the way he can be both kind and a grumpy asshole. (Like Shrek.) Shrek does not belong at a country club, and neither does Gru.

We introduce a villain school that Gru went to only to not only completely avoid talking about him or the school in that context, but bring it up again solely for an irrelevant character who overall contributes nothing the the story at hand.

All of the other films in some way had a proactivity to them that kept the main antagonist in mind, and this film does not work because they keep shoving Maxime to the side. They should have completely scrapped all the minion fantastic four hero parody crap and stayed focused on the overall narrative and developing the new central antagonist.

It would have been fantastic if we had gotten more background on the conflict between Gru and Maxime. Apparently they had a little rivalry or just generally were jerks to each other in school as we find out that not only did Gru steal his song, Maxime pantsd him in front of the school, not to mention how they interacted in the beginning of the film, so clearly there is bad blood. This is the first villain that had conflict with Gru specifically, and it would have been an excellent central plot point to focus on his early life, or a great way to develop a villain that’s built out of personal grudge rather than inherently destructive ambition like the others.

And instead that was SQUANDERED by this absolutely directionless travesty. Maxime’s girlfriend, first of all, was useless and distracting. All the little cutaway moments and side stories were unnecessary, and overall it was incredibly disappointing to have a guy that can CONTROL COCKROACHES do absolutely nothing with them. He could be strong and invulnerable, He could have been mutating more people, controlling swarms, he could have been going after Gru more intensely and talking about how they bullied each other and that could have been very interesting.

But no. This is the only film in which the main antagonist takes such a back seat that he can effectively be cut from the film and it would hardly impact a thing. Maxime had potential and stage presence, and they did nothing with it in favor of fluff.

And Listen, LISTEN, fluff isn’t bad, I love their family- but it should not comprise 98% of the film!!! It should be wedged into little moments between plot points. Even Despicable Me 3, which had a bizarre out of left field twin plot, handled their villain with more respect and managed to tie in the two narratives in a way that culminated in a final act that was satisfying to all the characters.

Brat had charisma and was a genuine threat and was present enough in the story that he was still necessary to the story overall because he and his diamond were the reason Gru lost his job and he and his brother did the heist to retrieve it. By the end of the first half of the film we knew that Brat was a washed up star that peaked in his childhood and was trapped in his nostalgia, and he had a fully fleshed out motivation and draw to him despite being rather simple that allowed us to indulge in his quirks. His pathetic nostalgic personality CARRIES that film because it’s funny and endearing and believable because we’ve all met someone like that.

But Maxime is not such a simple character by design because his motivations are relationship focused- and in this film they spend most of the time running away from Maxime, which is counter intuitive and lets us understand absolutely nothing about the guy. Because they didn’t delve deeper, Le Mal’s motivations were weak, and thus the overall STORY was weak. We don’t even know why he has such an intense hyper fixation on cockroaches that he would literally roachify himself and make that his central theme!!!

Why didn’t Lucy and the kids go to the safe house and Gru could stay to deal with his rival? It doesn’t make sense!!! And the AVL was doing nothing about the threat at all and instead was being ridiculous by giving the minions super powers? Ineptitude to the point of absurdity. What is the point of going to a safe house if they aren’t trying to resolve the issue and then Gru does it anyway?!!!!

Brain dead. Disappointing. On every level.

They didn’t even resolve the personal conflicts the girls were having, what with Margo having trouble at school and Agnes not liking telling lies! What was the point?!

The animation may have been pretty, but the plot was weak. The character motivations were weak because they didn’t expand on them. There were thousands of directions they could have gone with this film and they chose to go NOWHERE.

The best part of the film is the end, and only because we got to see Maxime be relevant for three minutes and it implies that they’ve managed to wrap up their implied but borderline nonexistent rivalry. And we got two seconds of Brat dancing way too over sensually to ‘Rule the World’ because it’s an 80s song (the power of character consistency)

I don’t like hearing ‘ItS JuSt a KiDs FiLm’- NO. Pandering to children is not an excuse for bad writing in family media, and this franchise has been out long enough that it has an audience larger than just kids. Kids media and family media deserve better and should still have good narrative standards. Do not insult our intelligence by giving us content without purpose. It costs millions of dollars and months upon years to make a film nowadays, there is no excuse for not sitting down and coming up with a decent story direction and cohesive plan. A family film can be enjoyable for little ones and still have depth to it-

Family movies have been getting insanely messy lately with their story content because they think seeing characters we like regurgitated at us with good animation is enough to keep the company afloat and appease everyone, and it’s irritating. Dig deeper, have some respect for your craft. Keep our expectations high to keep us coming back!

I love the Despicable Me world and characters, but honestly this was such a disjointed film that it was almost hard to enjoy because I just kept waiting for something, anything to happen, and was utterly let down.

Maxime Le Mal deserved better as a villain, and this film deserved better. This franchise deserved better. Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.

[nhaneh]

so the other week my secondary PC had yet another one of those full screen "We're ending support for Windows 10 soon you need to upgrade to a more modern PC to support Windows 11" ads show up and feeling particularly annoyed with that kind of bullshit at the time I decided to have a peek into task manager to see if I could find out what particular executable was behind this bullshit and whether I could do something about it, and well...

It turns out this is all run by one of the four executables that Windows update has sneakily decided to install under /Program Files/RUXIM/, notably either RUXIMICS.exe or RUXIMH.exe

Okay so what does this RUXIM stuff actually do? That's... good question - according to their file properties metadata, and Microsoft, and just about every place on the web i could find, they are part of the Reusable UX Interaction Manager, and are used by Windows Update and is supposedly used to collect data to "keep Windows up to date and performing properly."

There's apparently a number of people who are very insistent on that being the full, entire, and absolute truth of it and anyone questioning why it is there, what it does, or wanting to be rid of it is a complete fool. And also that your Windows PC will quickly and hopelessly degrade in performance, become unstable and break down if you're dumb enough to delete it. Apparently.

But like... why exactly should we be taking Microsoft at their word about any of this, again? You know, the same company who have been actively lying about the hardware requirements of Windows 11 seeing how they allow some of their larger customers to entirely circumvent it? The same company who came up with Windows Recall and still intends to roll out some version of it basically as soon as they can get away with it?

Do these people also genuinely believe it whenever a website shows a popup to tell you how much they care about your privacy even as they ask you to please click that big shiny button to allow them and their affiliates to track your browsing to the maximal extent possible?

Companies lie to you. Silicon valley lies to you. Even your favourites lie to you.

Anyway I decided to forcibly replace all four executables in the RUXIM folder with a tiny little program I built that basically just writes an entry to a log text file listing what date and time it was loaded and what arguments was passed to it and Windows Update is still working so far ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[talenlee]

Game Pile: Opus Magnum

Opus Magnum is a 2017 game in this Zachtronics ouvre which is in the simplest way I can describe it about sticking marbles together. The game uses a thematic framing of being alchemical in nature and you are meant to be following the exploits of a delightfully arrogant but also justifiably so alchemical savant character as he progresses from student to master alchemist to — well I won’t tell you the whole story.

I won’t tell you the whole story in no small part because I haven’t read the whole story. No need to be concerned about a content warning or spoiler warning here, as far as I understand the game I’ve played so far, I’m not about to be running into triggering material. A warning though of sorts: I haven’t finished this immensely deep game about perfect optimisation, after all.

And read is the correct word because this is a story that is mostly told to you through speeches that happen off to the side away from the important leaderboard and mechanical framing of the puzzle you’re about to partake in. Opus Magnum is not a game that particularly cares about integrating its story with its puzzles. This is not any kind of slight against the game the framing device does not necessarily need to be engaging. Generations of fathers read the newspaper and solved crosswords which were by no means meant to be high art or contain any kind of long form narrative, which shows that there are always going to be people who can delight in doing a puzzle well and then maybe complaining at their friends for how they messed them up.

This is also my first Zachtronics game, as far as I know.

I am not a Zachtronics girly. I have no extensive history with the franchise connected to the creator or creators I couldn’t tell you. For those unfamiliar, Zachtronics Games are renowned for programmatic puzzle games which give an enormous amount of freedom but also a lot of opportunities for optimization in ways that tickle the brains of the kinds of people who would like to do this as a job. They are games of systems and in many ways they represent a sort of purity of game design where the game itself is simplistic and almost barren in its fiction or its relationship to the game mechanics, but the game itself is made to be a maximally rewarding system of systems.

In the conversation around the work of Roger Caillois, I have remarked on the four different ways he described for games to be played — agon, competition, alea, randomness, ilinx, vertigo, and mimicry, roleplay. This model was expanded by Astrid Ensslin who added a fifth category which she called rhythmos. That is the idea of games which are satisfying to play and engage the player because the games systems integrate an interlock in a way that is fundamentally pleasant. A game of rhythmos is a game whose systems work well to fit into one another. Puzzle boxes, perfectly done sudoku puzzles, the interactions between tight rule sets in limited card games — these are all the appeals of rhythmos.

Not that it lacks for a feeling of vertigo or indeed, of competition. I get dizzy trying to orient clockwise and counterclockwise turns of a machine, yes, but more than that, you are going to be given a chance to compete with your friends. Your friends? Yes, of course — make no mistake, the game is social despite being positioned as entirely isolated and alone. Your delightful little machine is when you finish it going to be compared to the delightful little machines of your friends, and sometimes that can be wonderful and exciting as you realise how well your first attempt did compared to all of theirs. Then as you grow more and more sophisticated your understanding of the game and as you become more and more familiar with what the game is asking of you, you start to see the leaderboard as if it is taunting you, as you wonder how in the hell did Dana do this with 40 gold coins worth of equipment. How is she the Tony Stark who built this machine and these molecules in a cave with a bunch of scraps?

This sense of competition is no doubt healthy but it does give me the impression that there are veritable precipices of game understanding I have not yet tumbled over. Games are measured in terms of the number of pieces used but also the number of instructions executed and there are times where the numbers of instructions executed by my friends look wholly impossible. Even as I say this though it’s possible that the game is grading one version of their build for its price of pieces and another version of their build as its price in instructions. Not sure don’t know and the nature of opus magnum is to be a game that invites you to continually approach questions period it is a game for people who like to make the system do what the system is for.

The game’s appeal is shown in how not only does it want you to find it satisfying to play, and then to replay to be better than the first play, but also, it wants you to have mementos of your play experiences. Every game you get a button that can compose an animated gif, a keepsake of your play experience, which just so happens to be the kind of thing you can share to your friends, possibly on social media. It’s truly fascinating stuff, too, because I don’t think anyone would reasonably look at these gifs and go ‘oh, cool videogame, I want to play that,’ meaning the normal push of videogame advertising is lost here.

It’s very much the kind of material that only looks appealing if you’re already the kind of person who wants to play Zachtronics games. A very, ‘oh look at that little doohickey you made do that thing!’ kind of reaction.

Also this article was mostly dictated, as I have hurt my hand. I’ll be better tomorrow.

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

[hbittechno]

Why Your Business Needs Expert Mobile App Development Services

Why Mobile App Development Matters

A well-designed mobile app dramatically increases customer interaction, decreases workload, and enhances the final bottom line. Not all applications are liable to meet these fundamental mountains, however. To stand out in a crowded app marketplace, you need more than just basic functionality — you need seamless mobile application design services combined with strategic development support.

Custom Solutions for Unique Business Needs

One-size-fits-all apps often fail to meet the unique needs of businesses. That’s where a custom mobile app development service becomes invaluable. Custom application development provides an opportunity to introduce specialized features based on your requirements, keep in line with brand identity, and make user experiences distinct from anything provided by the competition.

Custom apps can be scaled as needed. Your app can grow when the business does, adding new features, new integrations, and user new requirements without rebuilding it from scratch.

Tailored Functionality for Business Goals : Custom apps are built to align with your specific operational needs, offering features and workflows that directly support your business processes.

Brand-Centric Design & Experience : Your app can be uniquely designed to reflect your brand’s identity — colors, typography, tone, and style — ensuring a consistent and recognizable presence.

The Power of Cross Platform Mobile App Development

When it comes to maximizing your app’s reach, cross platform mobile app development company services are a smart investment. With the help of these services, one can build applications that run smoothly across all iOS and Android platforms, utilizing just one code base. Besides that, this model cuts down on development costs and time taken to launch in the market, it also guarantees the same experience across all devices.

Cross platform mobile application development frameworks like Flutter and React Native have brought about a revolution in developing high-performance apps with a native look and feel without having to repeat the effort of creating different applications.

Design That Delivers Results

Functionality alone doesn’t guarantee success. A visually appealing, intuitive interface is just as important. That’s where mobile development services company application design services come into play.A great design boosts usability, encourages user interaction, and raises retention rates. It literally connects the users to the ways they use your application.

Professional UI/UX designers turn your app into the holistic beauty it is truly meant to be by building perfectly smooth navigation flows, adding interactive elements, and creating responsive layouts to make the user’s journey seamless.

Strategic Guidance from App Development Consultants

Continuous Application Development Support

Launching an app is just the beginning. To ensure long-term success, ongoing application development support is essential.Performance monitoring, bug fixing, changes at a regular interval, and proof of upcoming new features will all come under Support Services. These changes will keep your application functional, scheduled, and competitive in the face of future evolutions in technology and what customers expect.

Development partners in this support line offer real peace of mind to you, as it allows your focus to be on scaling the business while experts take care of the technical issues.

Comprehensive App Development Solutions for Business Growth

A holistic app development solution goes beyond just coding. It encompasses planning, design, development, testing, deployment, and ongoing support — all aligned with your business objectives. Whether you need an enterprise-grade solution, a customer-facing eCommerce app, or an internal workflow application, a full-service development team can turn your vision into a reality.

By choosing the top mobile app development services, you gain access to industry-leading practices, advanced technologies, and a collaborative approach that ensures your app not only meets but exceeds expectations.

Final Thoughts

In a digitally driven marketplace, having a high-performing mobile app is a game-changer. Whether you’re aiming for broader reach through cross platform mobile app development services, seeking personalized functionality with a custom mobile app development service, or elevating user experience with mobile application design services, the right development partner can make all the difference.

[rapidbrains]

Why Django is Ideal for Scalable Web Applications

I say all of that because, in this age, where all stuff like stuff is online, web app development that scales up along with your business is a must. Whether you’re just beginning with a few users and going to be millions in the future, scalability is that one must ingredient that will guarantee your application will be running well. This is where Django saves strong points at this stage. And it’s a web framework based on Python which, as a far simpler framework with strong features and great potential for further growth, attracts the developer’s attention. To learn why especially Django is the best choice for creating scalable web applications, let’s take a look at the very reasons.

1. A Strong Foundation for Growth:

The modular approach of Django inherently makes it scalable from the ground up. Django follows a top-down architecture so the entire application can scale, magazine along with its app, and can split up multiple magazines to be deployed at the same time. For example:

1.Middleware takes care of the communication between the request and the response.

2.They are also useful because they allow you to encapsulate features in various units that will inhabit in certain areas, and are expandable in certain areas of your application.

3.You just have to do the rest while the integrated ORM takes care of the requests between your application and the database for a quick pace even if you scale up your amount of data.

It enables this strong backbone for your application to be ready for any difficult scenarios it can possibly encounter.

2. Ease of Horizontal Scaling:

Horizontal scaling with after databases and Memcached integration using caching is possible by Django. Adding more servers to share the load with is a part of this process and Django's framework is ready for these distributed setups.

Also, Django makes it possible to use load balancers with django without worrying those traffic is spend evenly over the servers, reducing downtime and improving the user experience. With this capability, businesses can grow without complete rewriting their infrastructure.

3.Modern Asynchronous Capabilities:

Django is moving with the times. From version 3.1 on it also adds support for asynchronous programming via ASGI (Asynchronous Server Gateway Interface). Django handles real time features such as WebSockets, live notifications and chat application with no sweat. Django is equipped to handle thousands of simultaneous connections if your application only involves that.

4. Optimized Database Management:

Django’s ORM not only makes database interactions easier but also enables developers to:

Database sharding is used to spread data across some databases.

Replication strategy can be taken to make highly available either among multiple nodes or horizontal across multiple replicants.

Index and cache to improve query performance.

Since they come with these capabilities, even with large database usage, these applications can scale easily. Django is compatible both SQL and NoSQL databases, which maximizes choice to address different businesses needs.

5.Built-in Security:

When scaling an app, you are managing a larger user base and more sensitive data. Security is one of the key areas that Django takes care of, programming it with built in security against common attacks like SQL injection, cross site scripting (XSS) and cross site request forgery (CSRF).

The strong user authentication system it has prevents exposure to sensitive information while it allows you focus on growth and not worry about potential vulnerabilities.

6. An Ecosystem That Grows With You:

Django’s large collection of reusable packages is surely one of Django’s strongest points. There’s probably a package out already to make it happen if you need to implement a feature, whether an API, user authentication, or whatever you need. Not only does this save you time but it also leaves you free to work on the differentiated features of your application.

Along with that, any given time, Django’s active community is there to give support, keep us posted about diffs and updates, and introduce innovative tooling that aims to solve new challenges.

7. Excellent Documentation and Learning Curve:

One of Django’s strongest selling points has always been its comprehensive documentation. New users get up to speed easily and seasoned developers pack serious power into solid, highly scalable applications in a timely manner. Learning a system in a simplified and easier way improves its time of development and enables quicker projects delivery.

This allows teams to keep up with the increasing business needs while the developers quickly change their project requirements using Django.

8. Flexibility for Diverse Applications:

Django has flexibility to be used with different kinds of applications. Django is a great framework if you need to deliver a large site for people to browse, add content to, communicate, or buy things from. Businesses that are interested in expanding their operations are swayed by the fact that it can handle high traffic, large amount of data and intricate workflows.

The framework can be bent to accommodate to pivot and change without technical constraints.

9.Ready for the Cloud:

The cloud is where future is going on and django is ready for it. It fits in organically with cloud platforms like AWS, Google Cloud and Azure. All of that holds true, but with compatibility for tools like Docker and Kubernetes, deploying and scaling your application is a simple breeze. It allows very easy adaption of changing demands and traffic spikes without any headache.

Conclusion:

Thanks to the modular approach it takes, its security, its asynchronous capabilities and abundance of ecosystem, Django is one of the best frameworks to build highly scalable web applications. Maintaining performance and user experience and future ready for growing demands, it is a reliable solution for a business that aspires to have digital solutions of the future ready.

It is a pragmatic decision for organisations and developers especially at RapidBrainsto pick Django when building web applications to be scalable, safe, performant and flexible to change. Hire Django Developers from RapidBrains will defenitely take up your project.Let’s kickstart your Django journey right now, and see how the vast web development opportunities have to offer you!

[wisteria-lodge]

burnt & exploded bird + badger secondary (bird model)

Hi! I've been doing a lot of introspection lately and I kind of wanted a second opinion about me?

I've been reading about the primaries and of all of them, Snake seems the least wrong, but it doesn't really feel right? Like, I prioritize my people over everyone else, but I don't do it because it's the right thing to do or because I care about my people. I do it because it helps me. I don't think I'm really capable of caring about people for who they are instead of what they provide me. When I was in grade school, I made a chart of how often I could interact with my friends to maximize fondness and minimize distaste for my innate personality.

Well, somebody's got some Bird somewhere.

And you're definitely an Idealist. Loyalists see people as ends in themselves, and you don't which is... totally fine.

Although this "distaste for my innate personality" thing... you had such a strong belief that you were such a huge problem so young? What happened?

Most of my conclusions from back them remain true to this day.

Oh. Yes. You're a Bird Primary. You built a system, you built it young, and you're still living in it.

Including an inability to suppress my extreme selfishness, an inability to understand how my actions will affect other people, and an inability to actually hold a decent conversation. I intentionally "befriend" people who like to talk more than they like to listen because I don't like talking to other people, but I quite enjoy learning. My people are the only ones I ever consider, but I consider them so I can keep them, not because I really care.

You know this is fine, right? To want to be around interesting people, and listen to them talk? You're a good listener, and that is a HUGE part of "holding a decent conversation." There is no reason you have to be some sparking, witty, extroverted charmer.

And all of this talk of "extreme selfishness" and "inability to understand how my actions will affect other people?" So far it seems like you make flow charts to try to understand how your actions affect other people. Is the problem that you're not omniscient?Something is up with your secondary, there's to much "I literally am incapable of being a person" for there not to be.

Bird is the second closest, but it seems to imply a level of... put-togetherness? that I don't really have.

Yeah, I adore Birds, but Birds are crazy.

I appreciate logic and reasoning, but I'm self-aware enough to know that my decisions are mostly emotion and instinct and justified after the fact. I don't trust the "outside world" to convey accurate information to me, likely due repeated and continuous incidents in my childhood that I won't get into because it's a little too personal.

OH. You're Exploded. You're an Exploded Bird. Mostly likely you've dealt with some heavy duty gaslighting (sadly common) and this has messed with your ability to take in new information.

Best guess is that your secondary, whatever it is, is Burned, and you don't feel confident navigating the world using it.

I think I want to be a Bird and try to be a Bird but can't actually use any of its tenets. I am not a rational person.

And... that's Burnt Primary talk. "I can't reason." You're a Burnt Bird as well. I mean sure you have emotions, and bias, you're a person. But you like logic, you like coming up with conclusions and then using them as rules to live by, and you can think and reason. What does it even *mean* to say "I'm not a rational person?" Like, what, intrinsically rational? There are no rational four-year-olds, this is something that you build.

I think rationality is the best possible metric for morality you will ever find

Bird.

and I am incapable of judging on a standard that isn't "how will this help me". I use rationality as a tool to further my objective of maximizing myself.

What's the problem with that. That's just, existentialist philosophy.

I don't really like myself either, so I'm not really sure why it's an objective to maximize self-benefit. And even this isn't really the best portrayal of me? Because I think I'm acting for my own self-benefit. It's the best way I've thought of to understand myself.

No one is born not liking themselves. That happened at some point. And whatever it is, it seems to have to do with *how* you interact with the world (secondary) and not *why* you interact with the world (primary.) For having Burning and Exploding in your past, you seem pretty confident in your primary.

But the thing is, I automatically try to live up (or down) to people's expectations. This has hurt me greatly in life, both academically and socially. EX: I made a really weird first impression on one of my current "friends". They genuinely think I'm plausibly a serial killer now. I don't know how to tell them it was a bit, and I don't know how to stop acting like that around them. It doesn't feel like me while I'm not around them, and I don't think they like being around me either, but I am genuinely incapable of stopping.

Feeling like you got "stuck doing a bit" is generally an Actor Bird Secondary problem... but the idea that you can't switch out of it in the moment (even though you want to) and feeling like you're kind of only doing it because of inertia, that's something I recognize in myself. So I'm kind of inclined to say this is an automatic Secondary, Badger or Snake.

Also, it needs to be said, but if you were really as creepy and as off-putting as you seem think you are... no one would hang out with you. (unless... are you insanely good-looking? incredibly rich? Is that the context I'm missing? :)

You truly seem to believe that the multi-player version of your secondary is ineffective/incorrect/wrong. You're Burnt, in the terminology of this system. And I suspect you're being too hard on yourself.

For secondary, I feel weirdly split between Lion and Snake. Like, who I am is unchanging.

(Except when you're doing a bit.) (But I know what you mean. The 'neutral' you is always you, but that's the case for everybody.)

I will never compromise myself to fit in, even if it would help the situation.

Sounds like a You-Move secondary. (Lion or Badger.)

I have strong difficulties adapting to situations.

Prep-work secondary (Badger or Bird.) And some Burnt secondary language of course.

If you're following along, that gives us: Automatic, You-Move, Prepwork seconday = Badger.

However, I have noticed that these convictions of mine are probably false.

... that is something a Lion primary would never, ever think. To a Lion, convictions are internal and therefore true. But that doesn't work for you. You're a Bird, so you need your Truth to exist externally as well, in order to be secure and safe.

I change a lot depending on the person I'm around. EX: When I'm alone, I'm a paranoid mess that flinches at loud sounds (past trauma). When I'm with this one friend of mine who has a lot of issues with manic episodes and hates touch, I'm loud and bombastic, smiling and unnerving, and oddly physical considering the touch aversion of both me and my friend. When I'm with this other friend who's a bit more mellow, I'm almost actually nice. I say "please" and "thank you", which is also weird because this friend doesn't.

You've stopped putting "friend" in air quotes. I'll take it.

You'll call me crazy, but this sounds like Courtier Badger. You're unusual, and probably your friends are too, so it's going to manifest in some interesting ways, but that's what's going on. I know this is a process that gets called "mirroring," but the idea is not that you're reflecting back a duplicate of your friend, the idea is that you're responding to whatever they're putting out, and reflecting back whatever energy you think they need.

(I would not be at all surprised if your mellow friend finds the upped manners comforting... and your friend with manic episodes finds you being bombastic, tactile and out-there comforting as well. Like, I'd buy that. Maybe they get a lot of people tip-toeing around them and treating them with kid gloves, and the fact that you don't do that makes for a pleasant change.)

It feels like me when I'm there, but when thinking about it when alone, I don't recognize it.

^ This is a very real part of being a Courtier Badger, especially if your friends are very *different* from each other. Getting emotion "hangovers" or needing time to reset back to center after interactions is also very real.

Bird is also maybe an option, but like if I had no areas of expertise. Probably not, though.

Again with that burnt secondary talk. You almost certainly have a Bird secondary model, that you built very young when whatever happened to your Badger secondary happened. And started writing relationship flow-charts as a coping mechanism.

I think somewhere along the line, I internalized the fact that all my choices are the wrong ones and became terrified of having agency. I don't know how much this affects the evaluation, but yeah.

I hate to say it, but that's absolutely classic Burnt Bird.

That's me. You know now more about me than my therapist. Do you have a sorting?

I sure do. Maybe not the best news in the world, but then that's for you to decide. I've laid out what I think. And I'm doing to lightly suggest that you're working from some old data that is... no longer relevant. You are not nearly as bad at being a person as you seem to think you are.

[zorilleerrant]

I can’t believe someone would claim Damian doesn’t drink tea. Like. What. What the absolute fuck. That is garbage.

First of all, no one doesn’t drink tea. Anyone who claims that is a liar. Tea is just any plant(s) in hot water to make a tasty beverage. (Do Not give me pedantry about tisanes. Those are also tea.) That’s like saying you don’t eat side dishes or something, like it would have to be some bizarre, pseudo-religious fad diet thing. It’s rare enough to simply not like tea. I have never in my life heard of anyone who doesn’t drink tea.

Second, you’re telling me World’s Greatest Weeb Ra’s Al Ghul doesn’t have fucking tea in the fucking League?? This maximalist pan-Asian aesthetic somehow forewent tea??? Tea, the foundational drink of pretty much every Asian culture? The drink that huge amounts of ceremonial, social, and familial functions are built around? Are you kidding me?

And, with that in mind, you think, regardless of what culture you think Talia prominently ascribes to because that’s like. Intentionally obscured. You think Talia was not having tea with her son? You think she was not using elaborate rituals to drive the interactions between them that neither of them exactly knew how to navigate? You think she was not squeezing every drop of formality out of whatever tea ritual she picked just to maximize bonding time? You think he doesn’t associate tea with his mother’s love and care?

Then! You think Damian, whose greatest fondness for anyone in the family is for Alfred nearly since meeting him, would not take on Alfred’s behaviors as normative? This quintessentially British man, this man who does nothing if not uphold stereotypical markers of his birthplace, this man who is convinced that harkening back to old society politesse will solve any social impasse, would not share his love of tea with his youngest child? Alfred, who is known to do nothing but make tea when he’s anxious about his loved ones? There’s some world in which Damian doesn’t associate tea with Alfred’s love and care as well, with the soothing presence of the man himself?

There is NO WAY Damian Wayne does not drink tea.

This is even worse than “Jason Todd’s unmarked grave” oh my fuck.

[tlbodine]

The Horror Genius of Five Nights At Freddy’s

I’ve been playing FNAF: Help Wanted VR on my Oculus Quest lately (a birthday present to myself -- I know I’m late to that party!) and it’s reignited in me my old love of this series. I know Scott Cawthon’s politics aren’t great, but I don’t think there’s any malice in his heart beyond usual Christian conservative nonsense -- and I think he stepped down as graciously and magnanimously as possible when confronted about it. Time will judge Scott Cawthon’s politics, and that’s not what I’m here to talk about. I want to talk about what makes these games so damn special, from a horror, design, and marketing perspective. I think there’s really SO MUCH to be learned from studying these games and the wider influence they’ve had as intellectual property. 

What Is FNAF? 

In case you’ve somehow been living under a rock for the last seven years, Five Nights At Freddy’s (hereafter, FNAF) is a horror franchise spanning 17 games (10 main games + some spinoffs and troll games, we’ll get to that), 27 books, a movie deal, and a couple live-action attractions. 

But before it exploded into that kind of tremendous IP, it started out as a single indie pont-and-click game created entirely by one dude, Scott Cawthon. Cawthon had developed other games in the past without much fame or success, including some Christian children’s entertainment. He was working as a cashier at Dollar General and making games in his spare time -- and most of those games got panned. 

So he tried making something different. 

After being criticized that the characters in one of his children’s games looked like soulless, creepy animatronics, Cawthon had his lightbulb moment and created a horror game centered on....creepy animatronics! 

The rest, as they say, is history. 

The Genius of FNAF’s Horror Elements

In the first FNAF game, you play as a night security guard at Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza, a sort of ersatz Chuck-E-Cheese establishment. The animatronics are on free-roaming mode at night, but you don’t want to let them find you in your security room so you have to watch them move through the building on security camera monitors. If they get too close, you can slam your security room doors closed. But be careful, because this restaurant operates on a shoestring budget, and the power will go off if you keep the doors closed too long or flicker the lights too often. And once the lights go out, you’re helpless against the animatronics in the dark. 

Guiding you through your gameplay is a fellow employee, Phone Guy, who calls you each night with some helpful advice. Phone Guy is voiced by Cawthon himself, and listening to his tapes gives you some hints of the game’s underlying story as well as telling you how to play. A few newspaper clippings and other bits of scrap material help to fill in more details of the story. 

Over the next set of games, the story would be further developed, with each new game introducing new mechanics and variations on the theme -- in one, you don a mask to slip past the notice of animatronics; in another, you have to play sound cues to lure an animatronic away from you. By the fourth game, the setup was changed completely, now featuring a child with a flashlight hiding from the monsters outside his door -- nightmarish versions of the beloved child-friendly mascots. The mechanics change just enough between variations to keep things fresh while maintaining a consistent brand. 

There are so many things these games do well from a storytelling and horror perspective: 

Jump Scares: It’s easy to shrug these games off for relying heavily on jump scares, and they absolutely do have a lot of them. But they’re used strategically. In most games, the jump scares are a punishment (a controlled shock, if you will) -- if you play the game perfectly, you’ll never be jump-scared. This is an important design choice that a lot of other horror games don’t follow. 

Atmospheric Dread: These games absolutely deliver horror and tension through every element of design -- some more than others, admittedly. But a combination of sound cues, the overall texture and aesthetic of the world, the “things move when you’re not looking at them” mechanic, all of it works together to create a feeling of unease and paranoia. 

Paranoia: As in most survival horror games, you’re at a disadvantage. You can’t move or defend yourself, really -- all you can do is watch. And so watch you do. Except it’s a false sense of security, because flicking lights and checking cameras uses up precious resources, putting you at greater risk. So you have to balance your compulsive need to check, double-check, and make sure...with methodical resource conservation. The best way to survive these games is to remain calm and focused. It’s a brilliant design choice. 

Visceral Horror: The monster design of the animatronics is absolutely delightful, and there’s a whole range of them to choose from. The sheer size and weight of the creatures, the way they move and position themselves, their grunginess, the deadness of their eyes, the quantity and prominence of their teeth. They are simultaneously adorable and horrifying. 

Implicit Horror: One of the greatest strengths to FNAF as a franchise is that it never wears its story on its sleeve. Instead of outright telling you what’s going on, the story is delivered in bits and pieces that you have to put together yourself -- creating a puzzle for an engaged player to think about and theorize over and consider long after the game is done. But more than that, the nature of the horror itself is such that it becomes increasingly upsetting the more you think on it. The implications of what’s going on in the game world -- that there are decaying bodies tucked away inside mascots that continue to perform for children, that a man dressed in a costume is luring kids away into a private room to kill them, and so forth -- are the epitome of fridge horror. 

The FNAF lore does admittedly start to become fairly ridiculous and convoluted as the franchise wears on. But even ret-conned material manages to be pretty interesting in its own right (and there is nothing in the world keeping you from playing the first four games, or even the first six, and pretending none of the rest exist). 

Another thing I really appreciate about the FNAF franchise is that it’s quite funny, in a way that complements and underscores the horror rather than detracting from it. It’s something a lot of other properties utterly fail to do. 

The Genius of Scott Cawthon’s Marketing 

OK, so FNAF utilizes a multi-prong attack for creating horror and implements it well -- big deal. Why did it explode into a massive IP sensation when other indie horror games that are just as well-made barely made a blip on the radar? 

Well! That’s where the real genius comes in. This game was built and marketed in a way to maximize its franchisability. 

First, the story utilizes instantly identifiable, simple but effective character designs, and then generates more and more instantly identifiable unique characters with each iteration. Having a wealth of characters and clever, unique designs basically paves the way for merchandise and fan-works. (That they’re anthropomorphic animal designs also probably helped -- because that taps into the furry fandom as well without completely alienating non-furries). 

Speaking of fan-work, Scott Cawthon has always been very supportive of fandom, only taking action when people would try to profit off knock-off games and that sort of thing -- basically bad-faith copies. But as far as I know he’s always been super chill with fan-created content, even going so far as to engage directly with the fandom. Which brings me to....

These games were practically designed for streaming, and he took care to deliver them into the hands of influential streamers. Because the games are heavy on jump-scares and scale in difficulty (even including extra-challenging modes after the core game is beaten) they are extremely fun to watch people play. They’re short enough to be easily finished over the duration of a long stream, and they’re episodic -- lending themselves perfectly to a YouTube Lets Play format. One Night = One Video, and now the streamer has weeks of content from your game (but viewers can jump in at any time without really missing much). 

The games are kid-friendly but also genuinely frightening. Because the most disturbing parts of the game’s lore are hinted at rather than made explicit, younger players can easily engage with the game on a more basic surface level, and others can go as deep into the lore as they feel comfortable. There is no blood and gore and violence or even any explicitly stated death in the main game; all of the murder and death is portrayed obliquely by way of 8-bit mini games and tangential references. Making this game terrifying but accessible to youngsters, and then marketing it directly to younger viewers through popular streamers (and later, merchandising deals) is genius -- because it creates a very broad potential audience, and kids tend to spend 100% of their money (birthdays, allowances, etc.) and are most likely to tell their friends about this super scary game, etc. etc.

By creating a puzzle box of lore, and then interacting directly with the fandom -- dropping hints, trolling, essentially creating an ARG of his own lore through his website, in-game easter eggs, and tie-in materials -- Cawthon created a mystery for fandom to solve. And fans LOVE endlessly speculating over convoluted theories. 

Cawthon released these games FAST. He dropped FNAF 2 within months of the first game’s release, and kept up a pace of 1-2 games a year ever since. This steady output ensured the games never dropped out of public consciousness -- and introducing new puzzle pieces for the lore-hungry fans to pore over helped keep the discussion going. 

I think MatPat and The Game Theorists owe a tremendous amount of their own huge success to this game. I think Markiplier does, too, and other big streamers and YouTubers. It’s been fascinating watching the symbiotic relationship between these games and the people who make content about these games. Obviously that’s true for a lot of fandom -- but FNAF feels so special because it really did start so small. It’s a true rags-to-riches sleeper hit and luck absolutely played a role in its growth, but skill is a big part too. 

Take-Aways For Creatives 

I want to be very clear here: I do not think that every piece of media needs to be “IP,” franchisable, an extended universe, or a multimedia sensation. I think there is plenty to be said for creating art of all types, and sometimes that means a standalone story with a small audience. 

But if you do want a chance at real break-out, run-away success and forging a media empire of your own, I think there are some take-aways to be learned from the success of FNAF: 

Persistence. Scott Cawthon studied animation and game-design in the 1990s and released his first game in 2002. He released a bunch of stuff afterward. None of it stuck. It took 12 years to hit on the winning formula, and then another several years of incredibly hard work to push out more titles and stoke the fires before it really became a sensation. Wherever you’re at on your creative journey, don’t give up. You never know when your next thing will be The Thing that breaks you out. 

If you want to sell a lot of something, you have to make it widely appealing to a bunch of people. This means keeping your concept simple to understand (”security guard wards off creepy killer animatronics at a pizza parlor”) and appealing to as wide a segment of the market as you can (ie, a horror story that appeals to both kids and adults). The more hyper-specific your audience, the harder it’s gonna be to find them and the fewer copies of your thing you’ll be selling. 

Know your shit and put your best work out there. I think there’s an impulse to feel like “well, nobody reads this anyway, so why does it matter if it’s no good” (I certainly have fallen into that on multiple occasions) but that’s the wrong way to think about it. You never know when and where your break will come. Put your best work out there and keep on polishing your craft with better and better stuff because eventually one of those things you chuck out there is going to be The Thing. 

Figure out where your target audience hangs out, and who influences them, and then get your thing in the hands of those influencers. Streaming and YouTube were the secret to FNAF’s success. Maybe yours will be BookTube, or Instagram, or a secret cabal of free librarians. I don’t know. But you should try your best to figure out who would like the thing that you’re making, and then figure out how to reach those people, and put all of your energy into that instead of shotgun-blasting your marketing all willy nilly. 

You don’t have to put the whole story on the page. Audiences love puzzles. Fans love mysteries. You can actually leave a lot more unanswered than you think. There’s some value in keeping secrets and leaving things for others to fill in. Remember -- your art is only partly yours. The sandbox belongs to others to play in, too, and you have to let them do that. 

If in doubt, appealing to furries never hurts. 

Do I take all of this advice myself? Not by a long shot. But it’s definitely a lot to think about. 

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go beat The Curse of Dreadbear. 

[url-is-url]

Can you please talk more about valerie red huntress symbiote au ? Just general thoughts on how it would work ? I know barely anything about Venom but imagine valerie would get the symbiote from Axion Labs.

OH GOD OH NO OH GOD OH NO I DIDN'T MEAN FOR THIS TO BE AN AU I JUST WANTED TO DUNK ON BUTCH HARTMAN AND HIS PLAGIARIZING HABIT AND MY VENOM OBSESSION

First of all: I will be referring to the symbiote as Venom, a la movie canon, because I have a deep and passionate loathing for the past three years of Venom comic canon, do not get me started on this because I will not be able to stop.

Okay firstly: YES Venom totally comes from Axion Labs. I have not watched Danny Phantom since it was actually airing so I'm definitely checking the ole wiki as I write this but apparently Axion Labs was its own thing and then VladCo bought it? Idk how Venom got to Axion Labs, but it got there and the scientists were like "idk wtf to do with this" and just sorta. Put it in a drawer with a label that says "weird space goo" and forgot about it. (That is VERY MUCH a thing that happens in science labs you would not BELIEVE the shit you can run into if you start poking around old storage objects in labs.) And then VladCo buys Axion, and Intern Valerie is helping organize things and she finds the jar of lost space goo. Idk what happens after that; maybe she determines it's some flavor of alive and passes it to Vlad under the assumption that it's a Weird Space Ghost, maybe she drops it and Venom escapes and bonds with her. I don't know, the details of how they get together aren't important IMO, the important part is the interactions between symbiote and host.

Valerie is still in high school and this is very important to me. Depending on what you do and don't consider canon, Venom is between several thousand and six hundred million years old. Depending on what you do and don't consider canon, Venom has BEEN TO EARTH BEFORE! I am of the opinion that Venom is actually extremely knowledgeable about physics and chemistry and other like, not-Earth-specific things, because they're old as balls. So imagine you're in high school and you're in AP World learning about the Vikings, and you hear this bass-ass voice in your head go actually it wasn't like that at all and suddenly you're RELIVING some other creature's memories of fighting Vikings. Or you're in high school and you're in biology watching a video about octopus camouflage and this voice in your head goes we can do that too and your arm turns "invisible". Imagine you're on your period and you ran out of Advil and you think to yourself "I swear to god if this lunch line doesn't move faster I'm gonna eat the kid in front of me" and the voice in your head goes no, eat the one behind you, he looks juicier LIKE WHAT THE FUCK

Valerie and Venom get together way after Danny becomes Phantom. So Valerie has this huge crush on Danny, but then she also hates Phantom's guts. Venom has senses that humans don't so they can tell that Fenton is Phantom, and Venom regrets their life choices re:bonding with a human, because oh no, these bald apes are so fucking stupid. Every day Venom considers informing Valerie about the secret identity thing. Every day Venom remembers that Phantom's ghostly wail is extremely deadly to them specifically. Every day Venom does not tell Valerie about the secret identity thing.

Most of town is probably at least a little convinced that the huntress is some sort of weirdass ghost, because humans aren't that big. I headcanon Valerie as being short but muscular as hell, around 5'4". Venomized Valerie? Pushing 7' and built like Athena. People assuming she's a weirdass ghost pisses Valerie off SO MUCH, and it pisses Venom off too though for different reasons (I AM TAKING VERY GOOD CARE OF MY HOST SHE IS ONE HUNDRED PERCENT ALIVE I AM INSULTED BY YOUR INSINUATIONS THAT SHE IS IN ANY WAY DECEASED)

Oh hey wait, if Venom can tell the Dannys are the same person, Venom can also tell that the Vlads are the same person. Vlad has never demonstrated anything along the lines of a ghostly wail, so his secret identity is NOT safe and Venom tells Valerie what's what. Valerie is so disturbed, but then she decides to give Vlad the Homophobic Rich Grandpa treatment and pretends to go along with what he wants so she can get that sweet sweet tech, then she turns right around and does whatever she wants when he's not looking. Maybe Venom (as in the big lady) and Red Huntress are assumed to be two different people because Valerie works for Vlad as Red but then does her own stuff as Venom?

Carnage. Oh god, Carnage. So, the Carnage symbiote (often referred to as Red, I love a coinkydink) is Venom's offspring. In the comics, it is possible for a host to experience sympathetic morning sickness and shit in advance of the symbiote spawning. Please imagine you're in high school in a small town, and you are nauseous as fuck and having weird dreams and cannot eat enough chocolate (chocolate is a good source of phenylthylamine, which is a neurotransmitter that symbiotes need to eat) and one of your shitty high school friends goes "omg are you PREGNANT" and you know that whatever you say, everybody in the universe is gonna hear it. You've never had sex in your life but you still have a moment of panic like OH GOD AM I THE NEXT VIRGIN MARY SHIT and then your body roommate is like actually, this one's on me. DO YOU LOSE YOUR WHOLE GODDAMN MIND OR DO YOU LOSE YOUR WHOLE GODDAMN MIND. "wait Venom I thought you were a guy" "why would you think that i have a concept of gender" "...your voice is deep?" "humans are so fucking stupid"

The big weaknesses of symbiotes are fire and certain frequencies of sound. Venom is scared shitless of Ember McClain, send tweet.

There's a re-appearing ghost who hosted Venom when they were alive. This could be a canon character or an OC. Either way, the interactions maximally play up the "awkward ex" thing.

A better source of the phenylthylamine Venom needs to live is BRAINS. This is now a ghost hunger AU also and Valerie catches Phantom noshing on like, a ghost deer or something. Cue Venom SEE IF HE CAN DO IT WHY CAN'T WE

Hey Venom's an alien who is old as balls, it's called the INFINITE REALMS, there's probably LOTS of alien ghosts with opinions about symbiotes

One day Phantom gets hurt really badly and Valerie feels bad enough to go save his ass (if only because the only person that gets to kill Phantom is HER tyvm). Venom is very Exasperated Parent about all of these fool human children so they just. Pick him up by the scruff like a disgruntled kitten and drag him to safety.

Venom has a very, very low opinion of the Doctors Fenton. Venom knows one (1) thing about humans and that is Protecc The Children and these morons are continuously shooting at their own child. The only reason Venom has not eaten them is because a) Valerie insists that humans are off menu and b) Danny's ghostly wail is scary. Also the only competent ghost hunters in this town seem to be Sam, Tucker, Danny, Jazz, and Valerie. Valerie why are the only competent people in this town children. "i wish i FUCKIN KNEW"

I'm now headcanoning that Valerie has a Very Southern grandma or auntie just to have an excuse for Venom to learn Very Southern expressions. Please imagine doing something stupid and the alien that lives in your brain stem just goes "oh bless your heart". Please imagine that some asshole yoinked the whole town into the Ghost Zone again and the alien that lives in your brain stem is like "dear jesus give me patience" I just think that would be funny.

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All you’ll need to do is choose the name you want for your new software and they will take care of the rest.

They will even design an all new logo for you, and help you out with setting up your sales pages and videos for your new rebranded software.

Conclusion

That’s all what I want to share with you about CourseCube. I hope that my review can give you a helping hand in deciding what is best for you.

[couplesinstitutecounseling]

Couples are often uncertain what to expect from the process of couples therapy. They are not sure of what to expect of the therapist or even if the therapist has any expectations of them.

I have found most couples approach therapy with the notion that each person will describe their distress and somehow the therapist will assist them to create a happier, more functional, relationship. They expect to learn some new or better skills. However, most people hope their partner will do most of the learning in problem areas.

After 30 years of clinical experience and specializing in working with thousands of couples, I have arrived at some guidelines that can make our work more effective. First, I do have some expectations of you. I am not neutral. I have evolved principles and concepts that I believe give us the greatest chance for success.

I believe my primary role is to help you improve your responses to each other without violating your core values or deeply held principles. So that you may know some of my key guiding principles, I have created this document to provide clarity and focus to our work.

Your job is to create your own individual objectives for being in therapy. Like a good coach, my job is to help you reach them. I have many, many tools to help you become a more effective partner — they work best when you are clear about how you aspire to be.

Goals and Objectives of Couples Therapy

The major aim of therapy is increasing your knowledge about yourself, your partner and the patterns of interaction between you. Therapy becomes effective as you apply new knowledge to break ineffective patterns and develop better ones.

The key tasks of couples therapy are increasing your clarity about:

The kind of life you want to build together

The kind of partner you aspire to be in order to build the kind of life and relationship you want to create

Your individual blocks to becoming the kind of partner you aspire to be

The skills and knowledge necessary to do the above tasks

Tradeoffs and Tough Choices

To create sustained improvement in your relationship you need:

A vision of the life you want to build together

To have a life separate from your partner because you are not joined at the hip

The appropriate attitudes and skills to work as a team

The motivation to persist

Time to review progress

To create the relationship you really desire, there will be some difficult tradeoffs and tough choices for each person.

The first tradeoff will be time. It simply takes time to create a relationship that flourishes: time to be together, time to be with family, time to play, coordinate, nurture, relax, hang out and plan. This time will encroach on some other valuable areas — your personal or professional time.

The second compromise is comfort. That means emotional comfort, like going out on a limb to try novel ways of thinking or doing things, listening and being curious instead of butting in, speaking up instead of becoming resentfully compliant or withdrawing. At the beginning, there will be emotional risk taking action, but you will never explore different worlds if you always keep sight of the shoreline. In addition, few people are emotionally comfortable being confronted with how they don’t live their values or being confronted with the consequences of their actions.

The other comfort that will be challenged is energy comfort. It simply takes effort to sustain improvement over time: staying conscious of making a difference over time, remembering to be more respectful, more giving, more appreciative etc. It takes effort to remember and act.

The other effort is even more difficult for some people: that is improving their reaction to problems. For example, if one person is hypersensitive to criticism, and his/her partner is hypersensitive to feeling ignored, it will take effort to improve their sensitivity instead of hoping the partner will stop ignoring or criticizing.

In all these areas, there is generally a conflict between short-term gratification and the long-term goal of creating a satisfying relationship. The blunt reality is that, in an interdependent relationship, effort is required on the part of each person to make a sustained improvement. It is like pairs figure skating — one person cannot do most of the work and still create an exceptional team.

How to Maximize the Value from your Couples Therapy Sessions

A common yet unproductive pattern in couple’s therapy is making the focus be whatever problem happens to be on someone’s mind at the moment. This is a reactive (and mostly ineffective) approach to working things through.

The second unproductive pattern is showing up and saying, “I don’t know what to talk about, do you?” While this blank slate approach may open some interesting doors, it is a hit or miss process.

The third common unproductive pattern is discussing whatever fight you are now in or whatever fight you had since the last meeting. Discussing these fights/arguments without a larger context of what you wish to learn from the experience is often an exercise in spinning your wheels.

Over time, repeating these patterns will lead to the plaintive question, “Are we getting anywhere?”

A more powerful approach to your couple’s therapy sessions is for each person to do the following before each session:

Reflect on your objectives for being in therapy.

Think about your next step that supports or relates to your larger objectives for the kind of relationship you wish to create, or the partner you aspire to become.

This reflection takes some effort. Yet few people would call an important meeting and then say, “Well, I don’t have anything to bring up, does anyone else have anything on their agenda?” Your preparation will pay high dividends.

Important Concepts for Couples Therapy and Relationships

The following ideas can help identify areas of focus in our work and/or stimulate discussion between you and your partner between meetings. If you periodically review this list, you will discover that your reflections and associations will change over time. So please revisit this list often, it will help you keep focus during our work.

Attitude is Key

When it comes to improving your relationship, your attitude toward change is more important than what action to take.

Identifying what to do and how to do it is often easy to identify. The bigger challenge is why you don’t do it.

How to think differently about a problem is often more effective than just trying to figure out what action to take.

Your partner is quite limited in his/her ability to respond to you. You are quite limited in your ability to respond to your partner. Accepting that is a huge step into maturity.

The definite possibility exists that you have some flawed assumptions about your partner’s motives. And that he/she has some flawed assumptions about yours. The problem is, most of the time we don’t want to believe those assumptions are flawed.

Focus on Changing Yourself Rather than Your Partner

Couples therapy works best if you have more goals for yourself than for your partner. I am at my best when I help you reach objectives you set for yourself.

Problems occur when reality departs sharply from our expectations, hopes, desires and concerns. It’s human nature to try and change one’s partner instead of adjusting our expectations. This aspect of human nature is what keeps therapists in business.

The hardest part of couples therapy is accepting you will need to improve your response to a problem (how you think about it, feel about it, or what to do about it). Very few people want to focus on improving their response. It’s more common to build a strong case for why the other should do the improving.

You can’t change your partner. Your partner can’t change you. You can influence each other, but that doesn’t mean you can change each other. Becoming a more effective partner is the most efficient way to change a relationship.

It’s easy to be considerate and loving to your partner when the vistas are magnificent, the sun is shining and breezes are gentle. But when it gets bone chilling cold, you’re hungry and tired, and your partner is whining and sniveling about how you got them into this mess, that’s when you get tested. Your leadership and your character get tested. You can join the finger pointing or become how you aspire to become.

Nothing is impossible for the person who doesn’t have to do it.

Fear lets you know you’re not prepared. If you view fear in that mode, it becomes a signal to prepare the best you can.

You can learn a lot about yourself by understanding what annoys you and how you handle it.

The more you believe your partner should be different, the less initiative you will take to change the patterns between you.

Zen Aspects of Couples Therapy (Some Contradictions)

All major goals have built in contradictions, for example, speak up or keep the peace.

All significant growth comes from disagreements, dissatisfaction with the current status, or a striving to make things better. Paradoxically, accepting that conflict produces growth and learning to manage inevitable disagreements is the key to more harmonious relationships.

It’s not what you say. It’s what they hear.

Solutions, no matter how perfect, set the stage for new problems.

Tough Questions

Asking good questions–of yourself and your partner–helps you uncover causes beneath causes.

In a strong disagreement, do you really believe your partner is entitled to their opinion?

Under duress, do you have the courage and tenacity to seek your partner’s reality and the courage to express your reality when the stakes are high?

Why is it important to let your partner know what you think, feel and are concerned about? (Because they really can’t appreciate what they don’t understand.)

What is the price your partner will have to pay to improve their response to you? How much do you care about the price they will have to pay? (Everything has a price and we always pay it.)

Can you legitimately expect your partner to treat you better than you treat him/her?

If you want your partner to change, do you think about what you can do to make it easier?

When a problem shows up, it’s natural to think “What should I do about it?” A much more productive question is. “How do I aspire to be in this situation?”

The Importance of Communication

The three most important qualities for effective communication are respect, openness and persistence.

Good communication is much more difficult than most people want to believe. Effective negotiation is even harder.

A couple’s vision emerges from a process of reflection and inquiry. It requires both people to speak from the heart about what really matters to each.

We are all responsible for how we express ourselves, no matter how others treat us.

Communication is the number one presenting problem in couples counseling. Effective communication means you need to pay attention to:

Managing unruly emotions, such as anger that is too intense

How you are communicating — whining, blaming, vague, etc.

What you want from your partner during the discussion

What the problem symbolizes to you

The outcome you want from the discussion

Your partner’s major concerns

How you can help your partner become more responsive to you

The beliefs and attitudes you have about the problem.

No wonder good communication is so hard.

Some Final Thoughts.

You can’t create a flourishing relationship by only fixing what’s wrong. But it’s a start.

Grace under pressure does not spring full-grown even with the best of intentions — practice, practice and more practice. Practice the right things and you will get there.

Love is destroyed when self-interest dominates.

If you don’t know what you feel in important areas of your relationship, it is like playing high stakes poker when you see only half your cards. You will make a lot of dumb plays.

The possibility exists that we choose partners we need but don’t necessarily want.

To get to the bottom of a problem often means you first accept how complex it is.

Trust is the foundational building block of a flourishing relationship. You create trust by doing what you say you will do.

It’s impossible to be in a highly inter-dependent relationship without ever being judgmental or being judged.

If you strive to always feel emotionally safe in your relationship and get it, you will pay the price by becoming dull.

If neither of you ever rocks boat, you will end up with a dull relationship

Knowledge is not power. Only knowledge that is applied is power.

Most of the ineffective things we do in relationships fall into just a few categories:

Blame or attempt to dominate

Disengage/withdraw

Resentful compliance

Whine

Denial or confusion.

These are the normal emotional reactions to feeling a threat or high stress. Improving your relationship means better management of these reactions.

Everything you do works for some part of you, even if other parts of you don’t like it.

Three motivations will govern any sustained effort you make. You will seek to: 1. Avoid pain or discomfort 2. Create more benefits 3. Be a better person. It’s also true for your partner.

If you are asking your partner to change something, sometimes it’s a good idea to ask if the change is consistent with how they aspire to be in that situation.

Businesses and marriages fail for the same three reasons. A failure to:

Learn from the past

Adapt to changing conditions

Predict probable future problems and take action.

Effective change requires insight plus action. Insight without action is passivity. Action without insight is impulsive. Insight plus action leads to clarity and power.

If you want to create a win-win solution, you cannot hold a position that has caused your partner to lose in the past.

“To be a champ you have to believe in yourself when nobody else will.” Sugar Ray Robinson -Middleweight boxing champion, considered by many to be the best fighter in history, pound-for-pound.

Note: please review this document periodically as there is simply too much to absorb in one reading of it. We all will benefit from your efforts.

The following three questions help clarify and sharpen our focus.

1. What kind of relationship do you want to be in and create if you stay together? What kind of relationship makes you glad to see other at the end of the day?

Interestingly, most couples who created their own wedding vows describe a marriage that could serve as the North Star for the kind of relationship they want to co-create.

If you wrote your own vows, how well do you remember them?

Identifying the kind of relationship you desire to be in is the target, the bigger picture of why we are meeting. Otherwise, we’re just going to jump in and try to solve problems without any idea how these problems fit into a bigger picture of where you’re headed.

You don’t start packing for a trip unless you have an idea where you’re going or how long you going to be there.

2. Why is this kind of relationship important to you?

It takes motivation to do the heavy lifting that’s going to grow your relationship.

It’s often said, and I believe it, “When we lose our why, we lose our way.”

It’s a lot more than just coming in here and complaining about what your partner does and then hope for a miracle. It’s human nature to want progress without effort or emotional risk. However, desire without effort creates lifeless marriages.

3. What’s required of you, not your partner, to create this kind of marriage?

The sooner you start identifying what’s required of you, not what’s required of your partner, you are on the way to the fast track of creating change.

I also know everybody has self-protection and coping mechanisms that inhibit individual growth.

Your barriers can be those that you’ve created since you got together or resulted from negative early life experiences.

Common barriers to growth are a quick temper, being critical, disengaging, not being dependable, being furious instead of curious, etc.

Just reading all this information and reflecting on how you aspire to be a better partner is a good beginning!

If you find you need help, reach out to us for a free consultation. We can help!

[thegeneralsnotebook]

February Feature: Ten Things Every Metagame Needs

I’m going to start this month’s article by offering a little unorthodox advice. Unorthodox because, as someone writing a blog series about card games, who hopes that readers will take some precious time out of their day to peruse some of the words I’ve written, it might seem unwise for me to recommend other blogs about card games that you could spend your time reading. Especially when said blogs are written by actual professionals who no doubt have much more insight into matters of consequence than I.

For the last few weeks of February, I have been perusing and enjoying the collected works of one Mark Rosewater, a name likely familiar to many of you. For those who don’t know him, Mark Rosewater is the head designer for Magic: the Gathering, a position that he has held for more than 15 years. As someone who has shepherded dozens upon dozens of new sets through that game’s development process, it goes without saying the Rosewater clearly knows a thing or two about game design.

Of particular interest to me as an amateur game designer is his Making Magic series, covering design decisions and processes over a length of years and a variety of topics. But the one article that originally got me interested in his work, and the one that we’re going to be looking at today, is one of his most well-known: The Ten Things Every Game Needs. In this post, Rosewater covers ten bullet points that cover the very essence of game design, the absolute basics of things which no game can lack if it is to be properly designed. It’s a great read, but it got me thinking. About metagames.

In the context of a collectible card game, “the metagame” is generally defined as the swirl of trends and constraints that go into a player’s decision of what kind of deck to bring to tournaments. If you’re expecting a lot of Nightmare Moon at the next Harmony event, what will you do to take advantage of that? If most of the players in your group play aggro (or control, or combo or whatever) then how does that affect the kind of deck you should play in order to maximize your chances of winning? These are metagame decisions.

The word metagame literally means “a game about a game”. Yet, I thought, if a metagame is also a game, as that definition seems to imply, should it not also abide by Rosewater’s ten requirements? It turned out that the answer was a bit of yes and a bit of no, but there were still some useful thoughts that came out of the exercise.

1. A Goal

Before we even really get started, it’s going to be useful to clarify exactly what the metagame is. Because otherwise we’ll fall flat on our face with just this first question. What does it mean to “play” the metagame? And what is the objective of the players?

One interesting thing about the metagame for a CCG is that it’s largely removed from the act of playing the normal game. The metagame is played by building decks and taking them to tournaments. In that sense, if we’re looking for an analogue, a CCG metagame can be thought of along the lines of a simple bidding game. Given some info about what the other players are thinking (the trends), and an understanding of the resolution process (playing the actual game), each player secretly submits their own decks, and then things are resolved and a winner is decided. Then everyone heads home to craft their decks for the next round.

So given that, the goal of the metagame becomes straightforward: in playing the metagame one tries to build the best deck to maximize their chances of winning a tournament. Note of course that that goal is stated in terms of chances. The resolution of each tournament is non-deterministic, since we’re not all comparing decklists and grading them to see who wins the tournament. The games still have to be played, and upsets will happen. But over time, playing well in the metagame will translate to good performance and tournament wins.

2. Rules

One of the things that makes CCGs really interesting as games is that they fall under a category that we might call “living games”. Unlike other tabletop games that are published once and never change for the rest of time, CCGs change because the card pool gets updated. So it’s a shifting experience, and the same is true of the metagame.

Since the metagame is played by building decks rather than by playing the normal game, the rules of the metagame are contained within the OCR. These rules define which cards are allowed to be run at tournaments, and thus constrain the kind of decks that can be built. Of lesser importance of course are the game rules themselves, and the floor rules, as these place some additional constraints on what kind of decks are allowed to be played at tournaments. But the prime point here is the OCR.

What this means is that the rules of the metagame are constantly shifting, making it even more of a living game than the CCG itself. The metagame can be totally different from one set to the next, and indeed that is something a designer may like to shoot for.

3. Interaction

As we get into the middle of the list, we start to hit the really interesting ones. As I said at the start, there is something useful that comes out of this exercise, and one of the things we realize about metagames, and about living games in general, is that attention needs to be paid to them in order for them to be kept fun. A straightforward advantage of fixed games is that once they’re finished, they’re done. They will be fun forever. A living game though needs to be designed constantly, otherwise it can end up drifting away from what its developers originally intended.

One thing that’s cool about these Ten Things is that one can look at them not only as requirements for initial design, but in the case of a living game we can also treat them as metrics to measure our success going forward. If any of them are lacking, it’s a sign that things aren’t healthy in your metagame.

To that point, we come to Interaction: the principle that players should have to react to each other as they play the game in order to play optimally. On the one hand, this may seem to be an obvious strikeout for a CCG metagame, as it is played solo, on Ponyhead often late at night, and the other players are only seen when we come together to play the real game.

Yet even so, the metagame necessarily exists as a push-and-pull between different creators and different decks. What other people are bringing to the tournament is a key piece of info for playing the metagame, and that creates a game of hiding your intentions while attempting to divine everyone else’s. Anyone who has seen the pre-Continentals verbal jousting matches between Bugle and eminently_sensible on Discord can attest to that, I hope.

But to bring this section back to its point, Interaction is also one of the key gauges we can use to judge the health of the metagame. If there is an optimal strategy that means I don’t have to care about what other people are bringing, and I still have a good chance at winning, then that’s a bad sign.

4. A Catch-up Feature

This is another point where it may seem that if we’re thinking about metagames we’re out of luck. A Catch-up Feature is defined as a way for players who are behind to get back themselves back into the game. What does it even mean to be behind in a metagame?

Well, we know what it means to be ahead. The players in the lead are the ones playing the best decks at the moment, so the players behind would be the ones who aren’t doing that. The catch-up comes from two places. First, the players behind can simply build a better deck than the players in front, or at least one as good. Then, suddenly, you’re in the mix, just like that.

Alternatively, and this is again the somewhat more useful point to note, the players behind can look for the counter and build for it. In well-established CCG metagames, there are often broad trends that run across sets and release years. Style A rises to prominence, and the players naturally turn to Style B to counter it. Note that I didn’t say Deck A and Deck B. The decks change, but often the overall winds of style and strategy stay the same. When these counters exist, they naturally serve as the metagame’s Catch-up feature. So thus it’s a benefit to the metagame for those counters to exist.

5. Inertia

Inertia is the tendency of a game to end itself. Systems of inertia are systems that naturally raise the probability of a game ending as it progresses onward. And this is therefore the first of the Ten Things that CCG metagames can’t satisfy. After all, metagames don’t end. There’s always another tournament coming up, or another set that will shake things up. When a metagame ends, it dies, because that means it’s “solved” and there is no longer any question on what decks to bring to the next tournament.

Now, if one was looking for an excuse here, we could decide to break apart the metagame, and say that rather than one continuous metagame, we instead have many smaller ones, consisting of the constraints and trends that exist for specific tournaments. So once a tournament happens, its metagame ends and the next metagame (for the next tournament) starts right away. If this is our interpretation, then the game’s Inertia is simply the passage of time, as tournament dates are fixed and necessarily come along.

6. Surprise

For metagames, surprise is actually a pretty easy one, again covered by the same idea that gave us Interaction up above. A large part of the metagame is trying to guess what other players are going to be bringing, and while sometimes these guesses can be pretty easy, they’re still fundamentally guesses, and that naturally creates the possibility that they can be wrong.

In Rosewater’s article, he makes mention of a concept called Depth of Play, which is simply to say that game states should be complex enough that it’s difficult to know exactly what to do at any given point. The metagame has that solved easily, as there are countless possible decks out there. While it’s true that many of them can be discounted as unworkable, there’s always the chance that at the next tournament someone will show up with something completely out of left field, simply because they thought to try it while you didn’t.

7. Strategy

Counterbalancing Surprise is Strategy. While Surprise dictates that it should never be possible to know exactly what the right move is in most circumstances, there should at least be principles and heuristics that we can use to get an idea of the sorts of moves that might be better than others.

Here again, we can see that the metagame covers this category nicely. Some of the principles of playing the game well are easy: many of us learn the simple dicta of deck construction very early on in our forays into the game. But naturally there’s an advanced layer underneath, where one can learn to think critically about other decks’ styles of play and how to counter them, or which play strategies should be countered and which should be ignored in pursuit of increasing the strength of our own. Since the metagame is a living game, these strategies necessarily will evolve as the rules do. There can never be static analysis as complete as there is for a game like Chess, but that keeps the metagame interesting, as there’s always something to learn.

8. Fun

Don’t worry folks, the end is in sight. Especially as with these last three there isn’t a whole lot to talk about. As Rosewater freely admits in his article, while Fun is bar-none the most important of the ten requirements, it’s also the one that can’t really be talked about in prescriptive terms.

What some find fun others will not, and there isn’t really a way to find out if a game is fun except by letting people play it and finding out. Now, after all of this, I think I can reasonably say that a CCG metagame can be expressed largely as an exercise in problem-solving, with the added spice of a healthy sprinkle of incomplete information. I’m pretty sure that some people find that fun, so it seems we’re probably in the clear on this one.

9. Flavour

Now, here’s a funny thing. CCGs in general are usually dripping with flavour, and our humble MLP CCG is no exception. Yet CCG metagames, almost by definition, have none whatsoever. Because metagames are abstractions, existing purely in terms of optimizing decks. Decks, tournaments, strategies, these things are all abstract concepts defined according to the game rules, and thus can’t really have emotional connections attached to them. We do at least have human narratives that play out over the course of a season; rivalries between players and decks that become famed in their own rights. But I would argue that none of that constitutes flavour.

10. A Hook

And finally, the list ends with quite the whimper, as A Hook is something that Rosewater notes is for people that want to sell their games. For CCGs themselves the Hook is absolutely essential, as it is for all tabletop games. Yet, as it was with Inertia and Flavour, metagames by their definition are not sold on their own merits, and thus don’t need Hooks. One cannot buy the MLP CCG metagame, at least not without buying the CCG that underlies it, and similarly one cannot play the former without first playing the latter.

***

So, at the conclusion of all that, where do we stand? As I said starting out, a little bit of this and a little bit of that. If we take Rosewater’s Ten Things as the fundamental requirements without which a thing cannot be a game, then the metagame necessarily falls short, as it’s missing Inertia, Flavour, and A Hook. Yet that seems like a fairly meaningless analysis, as by their nature metagames don’t need any of those things, and wouldn’t benefit from having them.

I think there is value in looking at and understanding the other seven, though, as they all should be present in a healthy metagame, and a healthy metagame is something that requires work. Some of these properties are fixed: the Goal, the Rules, the Surprise, the Strategy and the Fun will always be present regardless of the design decisions that are made going forward. Note of course that many of these properties will still change as the metagame changes. But their presence is something that the living nature of the metagame has no real bearing on.

Finally, the remaining two properties: Interaction and Catch-up. These are the properties that the living nature of the metagame has the most bearing on, as a poorly maintained metagame can lose these two properties, and their absence is a sure sign that things are not going well. If the metagame has turned into one which lacks Interaction, where there is no need to think about the other decks people might bring to the tournament, then that’s a problem. If there’s no way to assail the top-tier decks aside from copying them, then that may also be a problem.

There’s often a fair amount of talk within the community as to when intervention is required to fix an ailing metagame. Well, these two properties can hopefully serve as nicely understandable metrics to let us know how healthy the metagame is from a more objective standpoint, and thus guide our discussion in more constructive directions.

As a final note, I feel I should perhaps apologize to people who may have been expecting a History of White this month. While I do intend to eventually cover all of the colours in that series, I also expect to interrupt it whenever something more inspiring comes up, as happened this month. We’ll have to see if White can get its due in March, or if sudden inspiration will strike again. Until then, thank you and good day.

[kapampangan-traveller]

Visiting a place always leads us to another dimension of experience – the realm of AGRICULTURE! Commonly thought as could be a bland activity, this sector in the tourismsphere exposes visitors of the life we have before the flourishing of the urban zones – the simplicity of farm living. The Provincial Tourism Office of Pangasinan ramps up its activities to promote Agritourism, a tourism product that lets consumers experience first hand on the various procedures and processes done within a developed and accredited farm facility. From sowing seedlings to harvesting ripe produces, up to feeding the livestock and poultry, this activity would surely provide a learning experience to the visitors, and insights on giving importance on the undeniably crucial agriculture sector.

Also, Included in the itinerary set are three farms with diversified practices and improved processes:

FARMCRADLE, Balungao, Pangasinan

OUR FARM REPUBLIC, Mangatarem, Pangasinan

LOTUS VALLEY FARM, San Juan, La Union

Thank you to the Lakbay Norte 9, a five-day tour organized by the Northern Philippines Visitors Bureau, our batch was able to experience and understand, first hand, different farms in Pangasinan and La Union provinces.

If touring these facilities, I would recommend slathering on your sun-exposed skin with Belo Sun Expert Spray Mist to minimize the effects of sunburn.

  These are the farms we are able to check and visit:

FARM CRADLE, Balungao, Pangasinan

Visiting this farm facility is an enriching experience, who would have thought from a bare parcel of land would emerge to a huge multifaceted agricultural facility, and now, a certified agritourism destination and TESDA certified educational facility too.

We are welcomed at their study hall where we are fed with our lunch and served our afternoon caffeine boost. Prior to the actual tour, Sir Tony Santos, Founder, welcomed the team and discussed the history and various activities of the farm. After, we are whisked around the farm through their golf cart rides, stopping on each section of their vast farm.

Things that I loved:

The Cute Bunnies

Feeding the rabbits

Rabbits are one of the live animals capable to be farmed due to its fast multiplication. They cultivated both of their meat and fur. I was excited to see their rabbitry and experience to feed the adult ones. We are also able to experience the young ones, Kaye was able to cuddle one young rabbit.

The OSTRICHES 

Cute ostrich

  Set in separate farmland, the ostriches are caged and fed in a spacious and airy spot. With enough space, you can actually interact with them but with extreme caution, as they have a powerful kick and strong pecks.

The CAMELS

Kiko interacting with a camel

One of the unique features of this farm, you can interact or go near with these creatures but be careful as they might munch on your hair. They a characteristic odor, and if you have some sort of an allergy, better not to go near.

The ATV RIDE

Maria enjoying the ATV

This farm is really vast and touring around while walking will consume much time. Thanks to their ATV ride, you can hop on different sections of the farm in style. Apart fr this, you can enjoy the farm tour riding a golf cart.

The KUBOTELS

One of the Kubotels

These are accommodations set for students of TESDA who are deployed on the farm. Sleeping on this traditional house type surrounded by farmland is a dream of every nature-lover traveler. Imagine waking up with the chickens and produces in just a few strides.

The HANDMADE PRODUCT LINES

Natural beauty products

Having different sections of the farms means varied products for consumers. Upon our entry, some of the products are already on display. There are lotions, candles, bath soaps, balms and many more.

For inquiries, contact Farmcradle at +63 917 1544 748 or email at hello@Farmcradle.com

OUR FARM REPUBLIC, Mangatarem, Pangasinan

Instragrammable!!!

Astounding on how this farm started, Farm Republic is one of the agritourism destinations I have enjoyed. The founder, Ms. Lea Soriano, previously from a corporate role, has decided to follow her heart for agriculture – and it seemed to be a noble calling for her. Looking at her achievement wall, the certificates she learned equate her devotion to the practice of agriculture. I was astounded on how she really poured her heart out on this. It is also inspiring to listen to her, that success on changing of career does not always end in futility, but with enough courage and sheer effort, surely success is on way.

Stuff I love

Buffet Lunch

Enjoyed these healthy servings of their lunch buffet

  Prior we tour, a sumptuous lunch buffet is served using ingredients sourced no other than, within the farm. This is evidence of farm-to-table model. The majority of the ingredients making up their delectable dishes are sourced from the farm – talk about freshness and quality. Must try is their Flower Salad, and my favorite ingredient are the blue ternate flowers – known for its medicinal benefits.

Flower Salad – a must-try in Our Farm Republic

Discussion on concocting organic fertilizers 

Their storage of different organic fertilizers

With the multiple varieties growing on the farm, adding certain fertilizers would increase the yield and having it in an organic way is an added plus. Munching on their product is indeed guilt-free.

Learned about Tandem Farming

different herbs

it is my first time to know about this practice. Planting together or beside each other with a herb or vegetable, the farm is able to enhance its pest protective effect.

The Fishpen 

This beautiful cottage above the fishpen

  Their fish pens are designed with a central island connected by steel footbridges over the actual freshwater pools, which not the same with the fish pens I saw with other farms.

Clean Pig Pens

No stench pig pens

Our common notion that having a piggery equates stench, but not for this farm. They have many pens with dry and clean soil, of course having less or no stench at all, hence, their pigs are thriving on a healthier and cleaner environment. You will pass by these pens during the guided tour and you will notice how clean and well kept they are.

Pick and Pay

Favorite part – the pick and pay

this is, of course, one of the favorite activities on a farm. There are baskets provided at the start of the tour, and you can pick on produce that your tour guide has allowed to. During our visit, there are heaps of java apples, florals, eggplants, and cherry tomatoes ready for harvest. At the end of the tour, you would pay depending on the actual weight of each product.

Continued Research and Development 

  Ms. Soriano’s heart is in continuing evidence-based procedures to increase quality yields thereby improving the lives of our farmers. Even of her innumerable certificates dangling on her walls, she never stops learning and never stops imparting the technique to students and her team members.

For inquiries, send them an email to  info@ourfarmrepublic.com or SMS/call to +63 927 882 6005  | +63 947 853 2342 | +6394 550 08401

Visit their website to ourfarmrepublic.com

  LOTUS VALLEY FARM 

From once a basic terrain to a promising tourist destination featuring diversified neighboring forestry, bed-and-breakfast, and a wellness retreat, this is a huge project made possible by the team of Sir Toby Tamayo. A multilevel property complex composed of different sections, the plantations, the diversified forest, the open hall, the Kubo accommodations, and their private living space, all enclosed in a systematized and efficient system in harmony with nature’s liking, and supporting its thrusts to boost the contiguous biocapacity.

The almost 9-hectare land was bought last 2008 and currently features an astounding 77 varieties of native trees that invite almost 50 species of bird, which is identified by the UPLB. Because of his expertise in ecology, he planted almost a thousand trees during the initial year, and until such time letting birds and bats do the pollination and seed propagation.

Kat trying this technique (Photo: Benzi Florendo)

  He did not start with a clean slate, but on a land decimated by poor farming practices. Imagine the efforts he has to undertake to reverse the damage and bring back the life it has before.

What I love with the farm:

The Elegant kubo accommodation

One of the two native bamboo huts

  Not your usual kubo huts, Mr. Tamayo had designed these huts with bamboo sourced within the farm and utilizing efficient architecture that flatters the eye, usage of space and function. He has stressed that harvesting bamboo poles at the right age would maximize its quality and strength. Set on a slope beside a diverse forest that gives off cooler air and retains more groundwater, experience a refreshing internal climate during your stay. The huts have installed lighting with proper luminance avoiding attracting many insects.

The Wellness Session

Music meditation (Photo: Benzi Florendo)

Ms. Marisa Tamayo, wife of Sir Toby, heads sessions on acupuncture and music meditation. We are able to experience music meditation while having our ears acupunctured.

The Detox Diets

Healthy Dinner Buffet (Photo: Benzi Florendo)

All of the dishes they served are plant-based and sourced locally – think of the freshness and nutrition it would bring to your plate. Not only that quality is topnotch, but taste and presentation too. Their Kare Kare is heaven on my tongue. I think I got more than 5 helpings of it – especially am not a pork eater, hence, totally guilty free meals here. I totally loved my dining experience – A for effort.

The “Forestry 101 Crash Course”

Sir Toby discussing the farm’s goals

As a commoner, we do not usually dive deep into understanding forestry matters. The majority might understand it as simply planting any sapling or seedling, wait for it to grow, and that’s it. With Sir Toby’s discussion about

The Open Air Hall

The stairway leading to the open hall (Photo: Benzi Florendo)

They built and designed an open-air high ceiling hall for their purpose and activities. This is where we had our acudetox and meditation sessions. Perched on a higher elevation, spectacular view of the property plus cooler fresh air are of the many things you will enjoy.

The Multilevel Garden

Sir Toby touring the team through his plantations.

Sir Toby toured us around the property and shared lots of insights with agriculture and forestry. I paid particular attention to how he mention always the coexisting of native species to amplify its long term positive ecological effects. In his multilevel garden, they are able to yield different produces, from soybeans to our samGy staple lettuces, they have it – note that they are grown and cultivated organically, and these go as well on the dishes they serve.

For inquiries, you can contact them at +63942 366 4519 or email at lotusvalleyfarm@gmail.com

Elegant bamboo hut accommodation

For bed and breakfast reservation, you can check at AirBnB.

  Truly, the tourism sector in the Philippines never stops evolving and developing over the years. There are always new and fresh experiences that would satiate the longing for adventure and break in the hustle-bustle stress in the urban zones. These farm owners are one of the forerunners in creating and developing these experiences ready for consuming at our convenience.

Our heartfelt thanks to these farm owners for giving us an opportunity to experience the other dimension of tourism – the more tranquil AGRITOURISM.

More photographs:

FARM CRADLE

Baby Rabbits

Cattles

Bike Zipline Tower

Goats

Fowls

One of their peacocks

Chickens upclose

Free range chickens

Farm Cradle products

Ostrich

Camel

Goat Feeding

more fowls

OUR FARM REPUBLIC 

Instragrammable path way

Gumamela

Macopa

Picking cherry tomatoes

More fruits

Aubergines

Plant Nursery

Resting area

Dessert

signature Flower Salad

delicious

more crops

pet pig

LOTUS VALLEY FARM 

Various bamboo species

Elegant huts

View near the farm

plantbased canapes

singers from SIFcare

another herb

chopped black bamboo

herbs

instagrammable stairway

Acupuncture set

Acupuncture session

Plant Based Kare Kare

Thank you Sir Toby!

Bedroom inside the native

Lakbay Norte 9

    AGRITOURISM: What’s new in the North? Visiting a place always leads us to another dimension of experience - the realm of AGRICULTURE! Commonly thought as could be a bland activity, this sector in the…

[animatedminds]

Stage Play Review: Imagination Row (Makes Sense Theatrics)

In 1944, Jean-Paul Sartre wrote that “Hell is other people.” And he was right. But sometimes, it’s worth remembering that Heaven can be other people as well.

This is an oddity for me, just like my last big post. Usually I do reviews and reactions to animation pretty strictly, tv or film. But here I am doing video games and stage plays. But sometimes, it’s worth going outside of what makes you most comfortable, if it’s the right thing to do.

Imagination Row is a play that has recently been put on by Makes Sense Theatrics (makessensetheatrics.com),  via Alchemical Studios, written by Matthew Allan West. The story, atypical as it may seem, is about the daily grind of the overlooked and oft-forgotten: the humble imaginary friend. What might seem innocent and lighthearted simply by description, is a dramatic look at what makes people truly content, what makes them feel safe, the difference between purpose and desire, and what it means to teach those things to others.

The comparison to Sartre’s classic play No Exit is actually rather apt - Imagination Row plays something like its polar opposite, similar in narrative style but flipped thematically. No Exit is a classic centered around how characters influence each other in key ways - it’s simply four flawed souls stuck in a room, entering at key points and either afraid or later unwilling to exit, each perfectly tailored to pick at the faults and insecurities of the others in ways that maximize their self-centered distress and keep them from finding peace.

Imagination Row is very similar in execution: the principal characters are Luck - an uptight but experienced imaginary friend who believes strongly in an unbothered existence, who we slowly learn believes so for staunch, moral reasons - and Sprinkle - a easy, free spirit who, as we slowly learn, is the most wise and worldly of the “imfs” (imaginary friends, as they call each other) and believes strongly in letting the past go. We follow them as they go through their lunch break at Imagination Row, headquarters for friends, and are intermittently interrupted from their own person business by other imfs who are - themselves - going through trying experiences. The two - as the more experiences - find themselves guiding these others through their trials, while also trying to figure out their own futures and what their places in them are.

Catharsis is a major theme in this play. Questions about life, directed through the lens of the imaginary friend, are abound: what happens when someone we care about moves out without us? What’s the line between between justified attachment and selfish abuse, and how easy it it to cross it? How hard is it to move on after being left behind, and how does one stay happy in a world where everyone is eventually left behind. Like “No Exit,” the characters are perfectly tailored to bring out the right reactions in the characters - there is a notable point where Luck and Sprinkle are easing a bitter imf - one of the most vibrant characters in the story - through what he feels are the last days he has with his kid. He is hostile and caustic at best, but willing to listen when they share what might be if he doesn’t come to terms, and right as they seem to be getting through to him here enters another character, blissfully happy and oblivious to the others’ pain in complete contrast to the one having a breakdown, and who subsequently cuts a knife through the intervention and leaves everyone in worse turmoil than when everything started: exactly the kind of sledgehammer character who would be able to do so. But ultimately, it is only through the interaction with this character, in a roundabout way, that the situation is resolved to its fullest, most empathic extent. It is only by experiencing things at their most painful, that the characters are able to understand their pain and its effects the most, and thus grow through their experiences.

There are characters who understand this at the outset, and are desperate to teach this to others. There are characters who are at the crossroads, and are just learning it at the time. And there are characters who are surely going to learn it in time. Some imfs were literally just born that day, new to the job as well as life itself: “newborns.” Some are experienced, but need to learn new lessons to fully experience their lives. Some have learned those lessons, and might seem oblivious - as I mentioned earlier - but in thinking it about it afterwards, may be wiser than they seem. The characterization and characters dynamics in this play are absolutely fantastic: it is a story built upon interaction, and how it can harm and heal us.

Sprinkle and Luck - played by Jules Forsberg-Lary and Marilyn Wallace respectively - are brilliantly acted and characterized, brought to life with wry exuberance and no-nonsense compassion respectively. Jules as Sprinkle is especially magnetic, at first providing comic relief before the true depths of her wisdom and relation to the others are revealed, after which point she becomes a vital focal point to the others interactions without ever really changing in persona or prominence. The aforementioned bitter imf, Annabelle - played by Jake Banaslewicz - is a perfect counterpoint to their world weary empathy: young, brash and too distraught by his life to see when others are connecting to him. The other characters roles are brief, but meaningful - perhaps they could have been present a bit more, or perhaps not, for much of the play is dedicated to the conflict between those three, and the the actors therein embody their happiness, sadness and - again - individual catharses with a spirit that kept my eyes glued.

Everyone has potential, and sometimes everyone needs a guide.

Sadly, I caught the last showing of this play, but I sincerely hope that one day it will get another run - and so I won’t spoil anything of it for you. It is a fantastic foray for Allan West, and a brilliant production from Makes Sense Theatrics, a small company with a lot of heart. I give Imagination Row a great deal of recommendation, and say that while No Exit is an entirely bitter but necessary pill for those of us oblivious to our own damning insecurities, Imagination Row is a bittersweet tincture for those of uncertain about where we stand amongst ourselves and what comes next.

[sarahmarshall3]

Lesson 1: The social, audience and growth roles within newsrooms

Not the modern journalism course timetable. Private Eye.

I’m about to meet my fourth cohort of  Interactive Journalism MA students at City University, London.

I step out of my role as head of audience growth at Vogue International for two hours a week to teach the practical element of the social media, community and multimedia management module; Adam Tinworth teaches the theoretical side.

Here are my notes from the first lesson. This covers:

What does a social media editor do?

What’s audience development?

What is a growth editor?

How have these roles changed within the past year?

What are news publishers looking for in entry level social journalism graduates?

What does a social media editor do?

News organisations started to introduce social media editors about a decade ago to gather and distribute news via social, predominantly using Facebook and Twitter. Here’s an interview from 2009 with Alex Gubbay, the first social media editor at the BBC, explaining what his role would be.

Asked in the Guardian interview if he would play a role in the distribution of news, he said: 

“Indeed, part of my work will be to extend the news and distribute them into the social networks, so that people can discuss them. We learn from the discussions that built on the stories themselves, pick up details we missed, or factor them into how we are approaching a story.”

The role was fairly similar – though needed less explaining to fellow journalists – when I joined The Wall Street Journal as a social media editor in December 2013.

I remember explaining back then that there were four areas to the role:

Engagement

Traffic

Reach / Brand awareness

Social newsgathering

Engagement

I first got interested in social media when, in 2007 and 2008, I was a broadcast journalist. The commercial radio station I worked for had fantastic community of people who would text in. This was the time that Facebook and Twitter started to gain traction and I enjoyed similar listener and engagement online. Ten years on and social provides a way for news brands to host communities of readers. This happens through commenting on site and social and Facebook groups, for example. A social media editor may respond to comments or take an action as simple as liking an Instagram post or Facebook comment, showing the reader the news brand is listening.

In 2014 I wrote how engagement is key to keeping people returning to a news site or brand.

Traffic

Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Reddit and other social platforms have been an important source of traffic to news sites. News startups sprouted up as Facebook and other platforms provided millions of eyeballs to stories. And while Facebook traffic has dropped significantly over the past year (more on that later), it still provides 28% of traffic to the news publishers that use Parsely, an analytics tool.

Reach / brand awareness

A social media editor also plays a role in increasing the brand awareness of a publication. I remember hearing Buzzfeed UK editor in chief Janine Gibson speak at Hacks/Hackers in December 2015 when Buzzfeed traffic had exploded. She made the point that even though the site of course cared about on-platform engagement, it was equally as important for Buzzfeed to have brand reach, whether logo on a social card on Twitter or a native post on Facebook.

Social newsgathering

Social newsgathering has become a whole field in itself, with agencies such as Storyful and organisations like Bellingcat being the pioneering experts. But for many social media editors, their role extends to monitor trends, hot topics and news events via social.

What is audience development?

Audience development roles have developed over the past five years. As this 2014 Digiday article notes, “The New York Times’ Innovation Report pointed out the need for audience-development specialists to get Times content in front of more readers.”

This 2017 Digiday article explains the current climate – and how audience development a focus for both the newsroom and for the commercial side of the business.

“Audience development has become core to how publishers scale and make money. But now the question facing publishers is how to ensure it serves all sides of the business, whose interests often conflict.”

“Once a role that mainly focused on SEO, audience development has become more complicated because of the explosion of ways publishers can find and distribute content, from their own platforms such as newsletters and apps to external ones such as social media outlets and bots.”

“At the most fundamental level, both the business and edit sides want to reach new and existing audiences. But from there the interests can diverge. Whereas the newsroom wants to maximize the reach and impact of its journalism, the sales side is rewarded for growing ad revenue, which could lead it to prioritize certain audience segments over others. And then there is driving subscriptions and marketing other products like events and commerce.”

Blogging about an ONA conference on audience development in 2016, I offered this definition of audience development

“Audience development is about taking the overall goals of the news organisation, whether they be advertising revenue and/or a growth in the number of paying subscribers, and working backwards to develop a strategy to help the news organisation achieve those goals.”

I still agree with my definition from a couple of years ago and expand it to say the field involves identifying a target audience and reaching those people and keeping them engaged.

And, of course, audiences may be engaged off platform. For example, launching Vogue on Snapchat has delivered millions of new, loyal weekly readers. But our owned and operated sites get zero traffic from Snapchat. So what’s in it for the publisher? Brand reach, young audiences and revenue share from the Snap advertising.

What does an audience growth editor do?

Julia Haslanger wrote this Medium post in 2015 answering that question. She quotes Thomas McBee, Quartz’s inaugural director of growth. 

“McBee says that when there’s an obstacle to growth, it’s most often an editorial obstacle, such as a story not being framed or headlined in a way that will resonate with the audience.” 

That still holds true. As head of audience growth I spend a lot of time guiding headline changes.

Here are Haslanger’s points on the role of a growth editor:

Identifying potential new audiences

Reaching out to people who might be interested in a specific story or event.

Shaping stories — and particularly headlines — to resonate with readers

Following up with new readers to build a relationship

Pushing the organization to go beyond the regular sources for stories

Analytics. Analytics. Analytics.

Assigning and shaping stories on trending topics

Events

I manage an eight-person audience growth team and consider our function as supporting the audience growth of the network of Vogues and GQs.

I’m advertising for a maternity cover and state in the ad that the primary function of my role as "responsible for audience development strategy, guidelines and a consistent approach to headlines, content packaging and SEO and identifying editorial opportunities based on audience data.”

Audience growth, in my view, relies on a three-part strategy:

Content strategy

Distribution strategy

Community strategy

The content strategy part includes:

Shaping stories. It’s helpful to think that every digital story starts with an audience of zero and it is our job as audience growth editors to find the right audience for that story.

Thinking audience-first in how people will find stories. That might mean commissioning a story that plays into a Pinterest trend, for example.

Guiding a broad offering of stories that appeal to large numbers of people

That includes evergreen content that delivers long-tail audiences

Shepherding in-depth, quality reporting that delights and keeps readers returning

Developing series to attract loyal readers

The distribution strategy part of the role includes:

SEO, social, email newsletter, and off-platform strategies

Working with product to ensure sites and platforms are optimised for search

The community strategy part includes:

Ensuring the brands host conversations and communities to keep people engaged and connected

And all of the above are underpinned with data.

What’s changed in the past year?

As this is my fourth year of teaching and updating my slides, it’s apparent that this year the social, audience and growth roles have shifted due to the Facebook algorithm change.

The move by Facebook to prioritise friend and family posts over those from news organisations and brands was announced in January. But Facebook traffic had been dropping for several months.

Data from Chartbeat (the first chart) and Parsely (the second chart) shows Facebook traffic declined throughout the previous year.

This algorithm change particularly hit VC-funded, ad-supported news startups including Mashable, Vice and Buzzfeed. But there have been positive stories for some publishers this year. Chartbeat noted in May that mobile direct traffic started to eclipse Facebook traffic, suggesting readers were going direct to sites rather than accessing via Facebook.

And social, audience and growth roles have shifted with the algorithms. The editors’ roles still include Facebook but there’s renewed focus on the following:

Search / SEO. You will have noted the rise in Google traffic in the charts above

Email newsletters, which offer direct relationships with audiences

Diverse and distributed traffic, including Flipboard, Pinterest, Upday, for example

What are news publishers looking for in entry level social journalism graduates?

In the final part if lesson 1, I take the students through the skills that publishers are looking for by going through job ads (such as this one, this one, this one, this one and this one. 

I see my teaching role as equipping the trainee journalists with those skills so they are employable on graduating from the MA in 9 months’ time.