#unit 9 performance in context

[mdzsxperience]

Lan Sect's known rules !

▷MDZS Home Page

We are all aware of the famous wall of rules at the Gusu Lan Sect, which Wei Wuxian has a hard time following.

Well, according to the MDZS novel, there were 3,000 rules when they were students, and 4,000 rules 13 years later after Wei Wuxian was resurrected.

I managed to compile 180 rules and divided them into categories.

Sources:

The official printed novel The drama (Youtube) The anime/donghua (Youtube)

Interpretation:

There might be translation mishaps from Chinese to English. One thing could be interpreted in various ways depending on context. (note: neither Chinese nor English are not my native languages.)

THE RULES:

▷ Rules on appropriate behavior: (39 rules)

Lan clan disciples must follow the principles of the Lan

Do not work after 9 pm

Do not rise after 5 am / Do not wake up at 8 am

Do not go out at night

Those who come at night should not be allowed in until 7 AM

Do not be late

Do not enter Cloud Recesses without permission

No one is permitted to attend the lectures without an invitation

Do not enter the back hills without permission

Do not fight without permission (alternate: fighting without permission is prohibited)

Do not create damages

Do not take life within Cloud Recesses (alternate: do not kill within the premises)

Do not stand incorrectly (have a proper posture)

Do not sit improperly (sitting improperly is prohibited)

Do not make noise (causing noise is prohibited)

Do not hurry rashly (do not act impulsively; running is prohibited)

Do not move arbitrarily

Do not smile for no reason (do not smile foolishly, do not laugh for no reason)

Sneering for no reason is prohibited

Do not drink alcohol (alcohol is prohibited)

Do not consume meat

Killing livestock within the area is prohibited

Do not be difficult with food (do not be picky about food)

Do not eat more than three bowls

Do not talk during mealtimes

Pets are not permitted

Change clothes after a shower

Wear a headband to discipline yourself

Do not touch others’ headbands without permission

A headband is not to be used for any other purpose

Only a spouse or child may touch the headband

Do not bribe a law enforcer

Do not use a concealed weapon

Do not hide an edged tool

Do not wear any jangling objects like beads

Do not wear more than three accessories around your waist

Do not alter clothes secretly

Never hurt insects or plants

Do not borrow money

▷ Rules related to personal virtues: (63 rules)

Love and respect yourself

Behave yourself

Be respectful (be courteous)

Be modest Arrogance is prohibited

Hide your wisdom

Do not show off your skills

Be humble

Do not be supercilious

Be amicable and united

Be strict with yourself

Have a strong will and anything can be achieved

Diligence is the root

Morality is the priority

Harmony is the value

Be ethical

Uphold the value of justice

Be just

Shoulder the weight of morality

Perform acts of chivalry

Have courage and knowledge

Have courtesy and integrity

Do not be ill-mannered

Have affection and gratefulness

Be compassionate

Be generous

Frugality is a moral

Give more, take less

Do not expect rewards after giving

Do not be miserly

Do not regret offering

Accumulate virtue and merits

Make sure to act virtuously

Be grateful

Be grateful when praised

Stop bad habits

Destroy the five poisons (desire, anger, ignorance, pride, & jealousy)

Do not indulge in pleasure

Do not be promiscuous

Do not indulge in debauchery

Do not wallow in luxury and pleasure (do not live extravagantly/in luxury)

Be peaceful when insulted

Do not succumb to rage

Speak meagrely, for too many words only bring harm

Do not be haughty and complacent

Do not be of two minds

Do not exult in excess (do not be excessively/too happy)

Do not grieve in excess (do not be excessively/too sad)

Do not covet the property of others

Do not steal

Do not be greedy

Be careful with your words

Do not use coarse language

Do not tell lies

Do not take your own words lightly

Do not sow discord

Do not use flowery writing (do not write about love and sex; do not use frivolous language; or do not spread empty lines)

Do not say one thing and mean another (do not break promises; do not go back on your word)

Do not boast about your own strengths

Believe sincerely

Do not be suspicious

Do not be wasteful

Do not break faith and abandon the right

Do not be unreasonable

▷ Rules for training, studying, and learning: (8 rules)

Learning comes first

Train your body and your mind

Maintain your own discipline

Organise work properly

Do not neglect your studies

Do not give up on learning

Do not lose your life goal

Nurture aspirations

▷ Rules for interacting with others: (48 rules)

Love all beings

Embrace the entirety of the world

Honor good people

Appreciate the good people

Good people will be esteemed, blessed by nature, and followed by good fortune

Respect the filial ones

Be fair, and they will follow you

Be trustworthy, and they will believe you

Be mighty, and they will die for you

Be loyal

Earn trust

Win friendships with kindness

See friends as neighbors

Steer away from bad men

Correct others by correcting yourself

Do not fear the strong

Do not ignore others and be undisciplined 

Help the lonely

Take pity on the desolate

Do not despise poverty

Do not bully the weak (bullying is prohibited)

Do not mix public and private interests

Help the underprivileged

Care for the weak

Lend a hand to those in need

Rescue those in danger

Do not take advantage of your position or connections to oppress others

Do not build wealth by using others, for this wealth won’t last

Do not curry favor (flatter)

Do not go tuft-hunting

Do not be a social climber

Do not form a clique and exclude others

Do not insult people

Do not use bad words to hurt others

Do not tease others

Do not praise yourself and slander others

Do not jump to an unfounded conclusion (do not make assumptions about others; do not judge others quickly)

Do not judge people behind their backs (do not speak ill of others; speaking behind other people’s backs is prohibited)

Speak not about other people’s weaknesses

Be easy on others

Be sad for other people’s sufferings

Rejoice in other people’s blessings

Regard other people’s gains and losses as your own

Do not hold grudges

Have wins and losses

If others win over you, do not envy

If others lose to you, do not look down

Do not take apprentices excessively, nor pass ordinary people

▷ Rules for respecting those in authority: (11 rules)

Respect the elderly

Do not disrespect the elder

Do not disregard the younger

Do not forget the grace of the forefathers

Be loyal, filial, friendly, and dutiful

Be a filial child

Do not argue with your family, for it doesn’t matter who wins

Honor the teachers and respect the elders

If your senior is standing, you may not sit until they have done so

Teachers have extensive knowledge and are examples of moral integrity

Disturbing female cultivators is prohibited

▷ Rules on cultivation, good and evil: (11 rules)

Concentrate on cultivating

To suppress and eliminate ghosts and monsters, liberate them

Stay on the righteous path

Take the straight path (follow the righteous way)

Reject the crooked road (do not take the crooked ways)

Eliminate evil and establish a just law

Do not associate with evil

Do not befriend the evil

Do not fall to evil

Resist evil

Promote good

▷ Bonus rule:

Wei Wuxian isn't allowed. (Do not get near Wei Ying)

▷MDZS Home Page

[completed ; 10/07/2024]

★ ⁺. ໒꒰ྀི｡- ˕ -｡꒱ྀི১ ૮꒰˶ᵔ ᗜ ᵔ˶꒱ა ˖⁺‧₊˚

[villain-crown]

needle | @jegulus-microfic | words: 786

critical care, part 2 | (part 1, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9)

a Jegulus nurse!AU

��Prongs!”

Sirius strolled onto the medical-surgical intensive care unit with a coffee in one hand and an exasperated Remus Lupin in the other. James had to hand it to them—ever since his friends started sucking faces and Remus had flatly refused to let Sirius sabotage his 15 minutes early arrival policy, Sirius was never late to work anymore.

“Hey, mate,” James replied over his shoulder, examining the patient assignments that he’d just outlined.

“Are we in charge?” Sirius demanded into his Starbucks when he’d come close enough to read the board.

“Yeah, I'm charge nurse for the medical patients, you can have the surgical ones. Looks like your brother’s floating up here today.”

Sirius hurried to gulp down the sip he’d already taken. “Reggie? Yesss! Put him on my team! I want to boss him around.”

“How is that different from any other day of the week?” Remus asked.

It was on the tip of James’s tongue to ask—why would Marlene warn me not to stare at your brother?—when the two-toned wail of the code blue alarm blared through the hallway, automatically pulling their focus towards the far side of the ICU.

Sirius sucked up the last of his coffee, attempting to simultaneously shrug off his jacket and stagger towards the action. “Fucking hell, okay, OKAY!”

James was already taking long strides towards the other end of his unit, his eyes flicking to the blue light over room twelve’s door and the controlled chaos unfolding within it. Three people were already present: his two Gryffindor nurses, Lily and Mary, along with a very slender man in dark green Slytherin scrubs performing chest compressions.

“We started compressions about fifteen seconds ago,” Mary supplied from her position performing rescue breaths via bag mask at the head of the patient’s bed.

“Do you need a step stool?” James asked without thinking.

Stranger.

Slytherin scrubs.

This must be Regulus!

As the petite nurse looked up to spare him a glare while continuing to stand on his toes to maintain his rhythm, James realized exactly why he’d been warned not to stare.

He’d seen it all in the course of his career: severed fingers, gaping wounds, and infested flesh. When Marlene had warned him to keep his eyes to himself, he’d figured it was because there was something physically off about Sirius’s little brother; a scar or imperfection of some kind.

He was wrong.

Regulus Black wasn’t some deformed hobbit.

He was fucking gorgeous.

Truly, James couldn’t imagine anything he’d like to do more than stare into those stunning silver eyes set in that lovely face. His eyes had barely swept down to register the man’s slender body and neat little waist when fingers clicked sharply in his face.

“Watch your fucking eyes, Potter!” Sirius snapped, having finally caught up, pushing roughly past him to join his brother at the patient’s side. “Hold compressions, Reggie.”

Regulus paused his movements, backing off slightly to come down off his toes as everyone in the room observed the meaningless squiggles on the cardiac monitor fade from the reading. A wavy, trembling line replaced the previously jerky chaos.

“V. Fib,” Regulus concluded, correctly identifying the lethal heart rhythm.

He was much smaller than James, which was exactly what James liked. It would make pinning him up against a wall by the hips as they fucked a lot easier.

“Yeah. Take over compressions, Lily. Reggie, can you give a round of epinephrine? Where’s Dr. McGonagall?”

“In a budget meeting, according to the intern answering her phone,” Regulus answered, drawing up the medication with a needle.

Fuck, even his voice was just incredibly lovely. James imagined how it might sound in a much dirtier context than they were in now.

“Ah. Pour one out for McGonagall,” Sirius instructed Remus, who obediently emptied a syringe of sterile saline into the garbage.

Regulus paused his own movements, watched this action incredulously. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“It’s good luck. What, you guys don’t do that in Slytherin?”

“We don’t need luck in Slytherin.”

James rolled his eyes. “See, this is why people hate you guys. Okay, one milligram of epi is in.”

“Hello, everyone!”

James looked up and scowled upon seeing Barty Crouch Jr., one of the resident physicians on loan to them from Slytherin, swanning into the room like it was a lovely day. He seemed distinctly unconcerned by his late arrival and more interested in sidling over to Regulus and throwing an arm around his shoulder, making James frown.

“Hey Reg! Wow, they’ve really got you slumming it with these surgical idiots, huh?”

“Are you here to help or hit on my baby brother?” Sirius snapped over his shoulder from where he was recording the code events with a dry erase marker on one of the windows.

Crouch frowned. “Where’s McGonagall?”

“Budget meeting,” came from three different directions.

“Oh. Hey, Lupin, pour one out for—“

“We already did that! Now fucking give us orders, you cretin!”

“Oh. Alright, pause compressions, let’s check a pulse…”

[rimeiii]

I return to WHB Tumblr to see how the game us doing and I see the fandom in shambles, damn. And after scrolling through the tag for a bit, I have...questions.

Yo how big is WHB now even? I stopped playing shortly after they introduced the paywalled Gabriel and that's one of the things I've seen several people complain about...

Like I understand the rest of the complaints - it's mostly the same complaints I've been having about the game prior to me quitting. Multiple decisions that seem to reinforce the idea that this game is heading down the P2W path, very anti-F2P practices in general, outrageous prices for the paid Nightmare Pass, no pity system on launch, the disaster that was the implementation of the Solomon's Seals gacha, the many bugs on launch especially, the small amount of farmable premium currency, and the list goes on...the pancake shop rework not only seems to be in line with the trajectory PB seems to be taking in terms of game decisions, but is also the straw that broke the camel's back for a lot of players.

But, uh, storage? Wasn't it like 2 GB tops on launch? That was reasonable I think, because Arknights was around that size on launch and back then, there was so little additional content. Only JP dubbing, no L2D E2 art or skins (the only L2D we had back then was Closure, the SHOPKEEP), 5 story chapters (which translated to 92 stages, in which around half have a Challenge Mode variant and with a large majority being unique maps), and no additional game modes.

For additional context, currently Arknights is ~6-7 GB on a fresh account with all language dubbing, and it gets bloated if you don't delete unused event data (it's ~9.7 GB for me and I have Arknights on my current phone ever since Near Light first hit Global, so just over 2 years now). Keep in mind Arknights is close to 4.5 years old in Global, and CN just celebrated their 5th anniversary a few months back.

Talking about storage, I don't think comparing WHB to older games and non-tower defense is fair either, since:

Older games in general are much easier on your device in terms of storage to content ratio and performance, mostly due to device limitations of the past requiring less sophisticated game mechanics and the devs sticking to these simpler mechanics even as time passes and technology gets more advanced. Gentle reminder that FGO is ~7 years old in NA, ~9 years old in JP, and ALSO doesn't download everything initially - afaik there's an option for that in the settings menu which bumps the total size up significantly (the wiki lists it as around 9-10 GB total).

Different genres and graphics mean different storage requirements. Anything 3D or open world will almost always have higher storage requirements compared to anything else. Path to Nowhere is around the same size as Arknights despite being younger due to the former using 3D models for their battle sprites, compared to the 2D chibis Arknights uses. Love and Deepspace, a ~5 months game, is huge because of how they do the cutscenes AND the stage-based action gameplay, but Wuthering Waves is closing the gap on size quickly despite being only ~1.5 months because it's an open world action RPG.

What I will say, though, is that WHB is not optimized well. Now I may be very unfair by comparing WHB to Punishing: Gray Raven, a game by the optimization gods known as Kurogames (people ran the PC PGR client on 2GB RAM laptops and my 4GB RAM laptop can run WuWa despite it using UE4 - an engine notorious for chugging on low end devices - albeit with lag spikes in the open world map), but when a 2D tower defense game fails to run as smoothly as a 3D action game with stylish and fast-paced combat, then we have a problem. For context, my 4GB RAM phone only has minor lag when I use a skill that has a lot of visual effects like Lee Hyperreal's Hypermatrix, but back when I played WHB I still experienced lag spikes when deploying units.

Again this all boils down to PB just not being used to the game format. Which is all well and good, Arknights was a huge departure from Girls Frontline too - a good portion of Arknights' devs worked on Girls Frontline before splitting off to work on Arknights. But what made Arknights succeed is how accessible and F2P friendly the game was, with smooth and solid gameplay as well as an engaging plot that discusses themes such as racism, discrimination, and the fragility of hope.

Of course you can argue that Arknights is a tower defense first, visual novel second. Unlike WHB, which is an otome game first, tower defense second. And I would agree, but only to a certain extent. Once you step into the realm of having Actual Combat Gameplay Elements then I believe it's your duty to make progression as reasonable as possible. Including a power gate is fine, but nothing too excessive - and certainly do not hold any significantly strong unit behind a paywall.

Because fun fact - in Arknights' entire runtime, there were only a handful of completely paywalled content:

Player icons from promotional packs for large events, particularly the Ambience Synesthesia concerts

Character skins from promotional packs, like the Exusiai and Guard Ch'en skins during the anime release

Purestream, a B4 Therapist Medic who was released as a WWF collab, where all sales from her $1 pack were donated to the WWF. Even then, she eventually became available for everyone, as she was later added to the Recruitment pool (use a resource obtained from Dailies for a chance to get units, some unique to the pool like Purestream). She was a decent healer, and her Module made her a good budget medic. Even then you're more likely using the Medics you've already built by then - for B4 budget options, Perfumer is usually better for multi-target healing and a party HP regen passive, while Sussurro is your go-to for strong single-target healing.

And guess what? None of these had any direct impact on gameplay during their paywalled period. Purestream wasn't even a B5 or B6 unit, yo. There are many better options for healers. I STILL USE THE B3 ANSEL AND HIBISCUS IN INTEGRATED STRATEGIES.

I'm just...PB's choices baffle me, and I do wish they can improve not just on the game performance standpoint, but in how they treat their playerbase in terms of in-game purchases. I hope I made that abundantly clear...

[dweemeister]

2024 Movie Odyssey Awards

So here is the penultimate post for the 2024 Movie Odyssey. This awards ceremony, which used to be (insanely) done on New Year's Eve or New Year's Day, all but puts the bow on last year's movie-watching for me.

The Movie Odyssey Awards honor the best in films that I saw for the first time last calendar year for me. Rewatches are ineligible. Other eligibility rules (such as whether or not a “TV movie” versus a “streaming movie” can count can be found here).

All of these films that were nominated or won (even Worst Picture, to some extent) are worth your time and are worth seeking. Even some of the most incredibly flawed films I saw this year may have gotten a nomination or two elsewhere (ten nominees per category certainly helps). As always, my Best Picture winners and my Personal Favorite Film nominees? Can't recommend them enough (although I think some of the Best Picture winners might need additional contexts for those who aren't well-versed in older films).

Best Pictures

Adam’s Rib (1949)

Awaara (1951, India)

The Big Heat (1953)

Detour (1945)

Dinner at Eight (1933)

Flow (2024, Latvia/Belgium/France)

One Way Passage (1932)

Son of the White Mare (1981, Hungary)

A Special Day (1977, Italy)

20 Days in Mariupol (2023, Ukraine)

See this post for more details! As is tradition, I do not name (or rank) my ten Best Pictures of the year. They are presented here in alphabetical order. However, I will note that Awaara, The Big Heat, and A Special Day received 10/10s; Detour received 9.5/10; all the others received 9/10.

Best Comedy

Adam’s Rib

The Bells of St. Mary’s (1945)

The Caddy (1953)

Desk Set (1957)

Dinner at Eight

Funny Money (2013, Vietnam)

The Life of the Party (1920)

Room for One More (1952)

Tammy and the Bachelor (1957)

Theater Camp (2023)

Again, this boils down to which of these comedies amused me the most – not necessarily which comedy I thought was the best-made. And it just so happened it was Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn's legal battle of the sexes that made me laugh the most this year (there were two Tracy-Hepburn team-ups here with Desk Set as well). Just behind it? The Caddy and Theater Camp.

Best Musical

Awaara

The Bells of St. Mary’s

Broadway Melody of 1936 (1935)

The Caddy

Daddy Long Legs (1955)

Girl Happy (1965)

Theater Camp

Tom Sawyer (1973)

Week-End in Havana (1941)

Wicked: Part I (2024)

Awaara is the best film among these ten. But that’s not what wins this category. I largely decide this category by some strange combination of how much I enjoyed the music, the performances, and how well the film presents itself as a musical. In 2024, that was Wicked: Part I, an adaptation of the hit Broadway musical of the same name (which I have very much an emotional connection to and am quite biased towards). Now, I actually have serious issues with Wicked: Part I in terms of how director Jon M. Chu approached the material (like how he shoots and edits some of the numbers, as well as the desaturated color palette). But the other musicals I considered here for alternative winners – Broadway Melody of 1936 (1930s musicals really did not care for plot) and Daddy Long Legs (not enough notable songs) – had other issues in terms of structure I couldn’t overlook.

Best Animated Feature

Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget (2023)

Dounia and the Princess of Aleppo (2022, Canada/France)

Flow

Inside Out 2 (2024)

Mars Express (2023, France)

Memoir of a Snail (2024)

Robot Dreams (2023, Spain/France)

Son of the White Mare

The Triplets of Belleville (2003, France/Belgium/Canada/United Kingdom)

The Wild Robot (2024)

Quite simply the finest lineup for Animated Feature since the 2017 Movie Odyssey Awards and maybe second-best overall since the 2014 edition. This is one of my favorite categories for this entire 2024 ceremony – an extremely worthy Inside Out 2 would be 9th here; with even the weakest film here, Dounia and the Princess of Aleppo (quite possibly the first animated feature taking place during the Syrian Civil War?), might have easily been more safely in another year. In the end, Marcell Jankovics’ gorgeous tribute to the ancient nomadic peoples of the Eurasian steppe wins out, ekeing out against Flow, Memoir of a Snail, and The Triplets Belleville (the latter two were also under consideration for Best Picture).

Best Documentary

Antonia: A Portrait of the Woman (1974)

The Empathizer (2024)

Ennio (2021, Italy)

Festival! (1967)

The Last Repair Shop (2023 short)

Nai Nai & Wài Pó (2023 short)

New Wave (2024)

Nuremberg: Its Lesson for Today (1948)

Taking Root: Southeast Asian Stories of Resettlement in Philadelphia (2023)

20 Days in Mariupol

I don’t really do New Year’s Resolutions (and this isn’t to undermine our excellent winner)… but I need to watch more documentaries outside of Viet Film Fest contexts. Seriously. Curiously, five of our nominees here (Antonia, Ennio, Festival!, The Last Repair Shop, New Wave) had music or musicians front and center – a rare female classical music conductor from the mid-20th century, one of the best film scores composers ever, the Newport Folk Festival, LAUSD’s instrument repair shop employees, and Vietnamese New Wave music as the soundtrack to a director’s life story.

Best Non-English Language Film

Awaara, India

Casque d’Or (1952), France

Devi (1960), India

The Gold of Naples (1954), Italy

Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell (2023), Vietnam

Son of the White Mare

A Special Day, Italy

The Taste of Things (2023), France

The Triplets of Belleville, France/Belgium/Canada/United Kingdom

20 Days in Mariupol, Ukraine

I’m going to shame myself again here. I didn’t see a single African or Latin American film this year. That’s really regrettable and needs to be fixed in 2025. Among the films in this category I haven’t mentioned yet, I wanted to spotlight the delectable The Taste of Things. Trần Anh Hùng’s latest depicts a love forged through cooking. And boy, was it damn close to getting a Best Picture nod from me.

Best Silent Film

The Ace of Hearts (1921)

Annie Laurie (1927)

Cleopatra (1912)

The Conquering Power (1921)

The Enchanted Cottage (1924)

The Johnstown Flood (1926)

The Lady of the Dugout (1918)

The Life of the Party

Love (1927)

Once again, this is not going to cut it. I only saw nine silent films all year, and too is unacceptable. I didn’t even fill this category! In any case, The Johnstown Flood is a remarkable recreation of the 1889 disaster of the same name. A solid, though not spectacular, set of performances and storytelling to go along with the wonderful special effects, too. Runners-up included Lon Chaney in The Ace of Hearts and John Gilbert and Greta Garbo in Love (this is an adaptation of Anna Karenina and was originally entitled Heat… but then someone realized that the tagline “Greta Garbo in Heat” was a bit racy).

Personal Favorite Film (TIE)

Adam’s Rib

Detour

Dìdi (2024)

Dragonwyck (1946)

El Dorado (1966)

Ennio

Flow

The Last Repair Shop

Robot Dreams

Wicked: Part I

First, your winners. Both are about music. Ennio is a biographical documentary on Italian film composer Ennio Morricone (who consented to interviews in his residence before passing a year before the film was released). The film traces his entire life from childhood, his early musical studies, his first film score successes, his ‘60s Italian pop music arrangements, his atonal phase in the ‘70s, and his maturation in the ‘80s and onward. Though I wish it talked more about process, I can’t complain. At 156 minutes, I wish it talked a little more about process and what he thinks about modern scoring. But to get so much of his musicality and personality? I’ll take it. Then there’s the documentary short The Last Repair Shop. Seek it online because it’ll nourish your soul. It’s about Los Angeles Unified School District’s (LAUSD) instrument repair shop and a few of its inspirational employees. LAUSD is the last major school district in the U.S. to offer free instrument repair to students, and that is something to be celebrated.

Now, let’s talk about those here that weren’t Best Picture winners or haven’t mentioned too thoroughly yet. Sean Wang’s coming-of-age Dìdi transported me back to the days of early high school. And though it is an Asian American film set in California, I didn’t necessarily “see” myself in it (for the record, I’ve never “seen” myself in a film and sorta hope I never do), but I saw elements of others and a time that I remember well.

Elsewhere, Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s Dragonwyck – starring Gene Tierney, Walter Huston, and Vincent Price – proves I’m a sucker for American Gothic dramas. I enjoy the landed gentry scheming, especially if the gentry is played by Vincent Price! And I even learned something totally new to me – that of the manorial rights of Patroons (descendants of the elites of the former New Netherland colony) in New York state.

El Dorado might be written off as a Rio Bravo (1959) redux. But, honestly? Without a weak link in the cast, it’s better than Rio Bravo – an opinion that is certainly unpopular, I’m sure.

Flow and Robot Dreams both exemplified this year the benefits of filmmakers remembering that silence can be golden. Neither film has dialogue, and both use their lack of dialogue to fantastic visual effect – a necessary reminder in perhaps our overly-talkative modern cinema.

Best Director

Sylvain Chomet, The Triplets of Belleville

Adam Elliot, Memoir of a Snail

Marcell Jankovics, Son of the White Mare

Raj Kapoor, Awaara

Fritz Lang, The Big Heat

Satyajit Ray, Devi

Ettore Scola, A Special Day

Douglas Sirk, All That Heaven Allows (1955)

Trần Anh Hùng, The Taste of Things

Edgar G. Ulmer, Detour

I feel like I’m just asking for forgiveness at this point. Because when I locked this category while I was writing this, I just realized, for the first time in the longest time, there are no female directors here. Looking back at the 2024 Movie Odyssey’s full list, I do notice more than a few films directed by women, but I simply didn’t think any were good enough to be nominated here or to win Picture.

That said, for the first time since 2014, the Best Director winner comes from a film that isn’t a winner for Best Picture (1939’s The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums and Kenji Mizoguchi won in 2014). I enjoy Douglas Sirk’s incredible directing of admittedly trashy material in All That Heaven Allows – he turns utter soapy dross into something well worth watching. And for that, alongside his incredible command of color, he beats out all of the other films here that were named as one of the ten Best Picture winners. Runners-up included Chomet, Ray, and Ulmer (Ulmer for getting so much out of a miniscule budget).

Best Acting Ensemble

Adam’s Rib

The Big Heat

The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial (2023)

Conclave (2024)

Devi

Dinner at Eight

El Dorado

On Borrowed Time (1939)

The Teachers’ Lounge (2023, Germany)

The Wedding Banquet (1993)

Ralph Fiennes headlines Conclave, which is about the College of Cardinals attempting to elect a new Pope after the previous Pope’s death – but the election is thrown into turmoil by scandals and secrets that come out into the open. Fiennes is supported by solid performances from Stanley Tucci, John Lithgow, Sergio Castellitto, Isabella Rosellini, Lucian Msamati, and Carlos Diehz.

I also considered The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial (Kiefer Sutherland, Jason Clarke, Jake Lacy, Monica Raymund, Lewis Pullman, Jay Duplass, Tom Riley, and Lance Reddick) and Dinner at Eight (Marie Dressler, John Barrymore, Wallace Beery, Jean Harlow, Lionel Barrymore, Lee Tracy, Edmund Lowe, and Billie Burke) here.

Best Actor

Richard Dreyfuss, The Goodbye Girl (1977)

Ralph Fiennes, Conclave

Glenn Ford, The Big Heat

José Isbert, El Cochecito (1960, Spain)

Raj Kapoor, Awaara

Marcello Mastroianni, A Special Day

William Powell, One Way Passage

Vincent Price, Dragonwyck

Spencer Tracy, Adam’s Rib

Kôji Yakusho, Perfect Days (2023, Japan)

The third time was the charm for Marcello Mastroianni, who was previously nominated here in 2018 and 2019 for two Federico Fellini movies – 8 ½ (1963) and Ginger and Fred (1986). And honestly? It’s the best Mastroianni performance I’ve seen. Opposite Sophia Loren, both actors play unglamorous roles that are against type for both of them. Mastroianni, so often playing the dapper playboys, is allowed to be fully vulnerable here, with an even more rickety façade than usual. Simply great work from him.

Also under consideration here were Glenn Ford (like Mastroianni, he plays against type… in The Big Heat as a decent man who has gotten to the point where he discards his values) and Raj Kapoor.

Best Actress

Kay Francis, One Way Passage

Lillian Gish, Annie Laurie

Gloria Grahame, The Big Heat

Katharine Hepburn, Adam’s Rib

Sophia Loren, A Special Day

Mikey Madison, Anora (2024)

Marlee Matlin, Children of a Lesser God (1986)

Nargis, Awaara

Ann Savage, Detour

Sharmila Tagore, Devi

In 2015, Sharmila Tagore was someone who I had just discovered in Satyajit Ray’s Nayak (1966, India). I definitely took notice of her performance then, but didn’t give her a first Movie Odyssey Award nomination until a year later. Almost a decade since, I now see her as one of the finest big-screen actors – no qualifiers needed. As the young lady thought to be the incarnation of Kali by her father-in-law (Chhabi Biswas), Tagore plays a woman robbed of her agency and humanity while being worshipped as a deity – all in the name of religious zealotry. I imagine contemporary Hindu nationalists would absolutely hate this movie and hate my opinions about her performance and this movie. Honestly? I don’t care.

The distant runners-up included Kay Francis, Gloria Grahame, and Sophia Loren.

Best Supporting Actor

Chhabi Biswas, Devi

Richard Conte, The Big Combo (1955)

Bing Crosby, The Bells of St. Mary’s

Brian Donlevy, The Big Combo

Cedric Hardwicke, On Borrowed Time

Lee Marvin, The Big Heat

Lung Sihung, The Wedding Banquet

Robert Mitchum, El Dorado

Denzel Washington, Gladiator II (2024)

David Wayne, Adam’s Rib

The trickiest of the acting categories. Supporting categories tend to favor antagonists and villains. But this year, the antagonists and villains that could be deemed supporting roles just didn’t stand out to me as winners. So I went with the perpetually sleepy-eyed Robert Mitchum for his role as a recovering alcoholic sheriff in El Dorado (and a sheriff who doesn’t always seem he has a broom up his backside either). I think it’s a role that Mitchum is simply a natural for, and his banter with John Wayne strengthens the performance.

Also under consideration: Lee Marvin as one of the most repulsive gangster sidemen I have ever seen in a movie.

Best Supporting Actress

Jocelyn Brando, The Big Heat

Leela Chitnis, Awaara

Quinn Cummings, The Goodbye Girl

Julia Faye, The Life of the Party

Janet Gaynor, The Johnstown Flood

Gua Ah-leh, The Wedding Banquet

Jean Harlow, Dinner at Eight

Judy Holliday, Adam’s Rib

Eily Malyon, On Borrowed Time

Chantal Thuy, Ru (2023, Canada)

Sometimes, I like to tell folks that there was a subset of pre-Code comedies where many of the jokes stem from the fact that the characters are filthy frigging rich (closest contemporary analog: Crazy Rich Asians). But beneath that, there is usually some pathos and ennui – if we’re so rich, how come we feel like crap? Jean Harlow’s character in Dinner at Eight has none of that ennui. Zinger after zinger. Takedown after takedown. She’d be an awful person to be around in real life, but Harlow’s comedic delivery is pitch perfect, and she does a lot of work to make the movie tick.

Judy Holliday and Chantal Thuy were also considered here.

Best Adapted Screenplay

Sydney Boehm, The Big Heat

William Friedkin, The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial

Hesper Anderson and Mark Medoff, Children of a Lesser God

Peter Straughan, Conclave

Martin Goldsmith, Detour

Frances Marion and Herman J. Mankiewicz, Dinner at Eight

Leight Brackett, El Dorado

Alice D.G. Miller and Frank O’Neill, On Borrowed Time

Pablo Berger, Robot Dreams

Jack Rose and Melville Shavelson, Room for One More

As I said in the Best Picture tidbit on it, there’s no way Dinner at Eight would’ve won this if I had seen it a half-decade or a decade ago. Stellar work from Marion and Herman Mankiewicz – its characterizations, and a structure that keeps the episodic nature from feeling too stop-start.

Those screenplays for Conclave, Detour, and Robot Dreams were also worth honoring too!

Best Original Screenplay

Ruth Gordon and Garson Kanin, Adam’s Rib

Rafael Azcona and Marco Ferreri, El Cochecito

Satyajit Ray, Devi

Neil Simon, The Goodbye Girl

Adam Elliot, Memoir of a Snail

Wilson Mizner and Joseph Jackson, One Way Passage

Trần Anh Hùng, The Taste of Things

Johannes Duncker and İlker Çatak, The Teachers’ Lounge

Sylvain Chomet, The Triplets of Belleville

Ang Lee, Neil Peng, and James Schamus, The Wedding Banquet

In the 1990s, the notion of an LGBTQ+ film – let alone one centered around an Asian American experience – having a happy ending was a laughable notion. The Wedding Banquet, a dramedy, doesn’t have the storybook ending folks might fantasize over, but a sensible, pragmatic, and loving one. And I think it’s all the better for it. Before that ending though… what a heartfelt script, and what care it takes to address so many ideas of Asian and queer identity that blow so many movies from that decade away.

Adam’s Rib, El Cochecito, Memoir of a Snail, and One Way Passage also had original screenplays worth a mention here, too!

Best Cinematography

Tom Hurwitz and Robert M. Young, Alambrista! (1977)

Russell Metty, All That Heaven Allows

John Alton, The Big Combo

Lucien Andriot and Arthur Edeson, The Big Trail (1930)

Subrata Mitra, Devi

Đinh Duy Hưng, Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell

George Schneiderman, The Johnstown Flood

Stanley Kubrick, Killer’s Kiss (1955)

Karl Freund, Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932)

Jonathan Ricquebourg, The Taste of Things

In textbooks that describe film noir, this image from The Big Combo is usually used to illustrate what film noir should look like. There are many moments across The Big Combo that demonstrate Alton’s complete command of black-and-white – the contrasts, the shadows, the mood. The scarcely believable thing is that Alton is most famous for being the co-director of photography on An American in Paris (1951) – a Technicolor extravaganza of a musical that could not be further away from one of the best-looking films noir ever made.

Behind The big Combo were All That Heaven Allows, Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell, and The Taste of Things.

Best Film Editing

Sung Ming, The Big Boss (1971, Hong Kong)

Tanya M. Swerling, The Boys in the Boat (2023)

Marguerite Renoir, Casque d’Or

Nick Emerson, Conclave

Howard Alk, Festival!

Phạm Thiên Ân, Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell

William Goldenberg, News of the World (2020)

John W. Wheeler, The Parallax View (1974)

Jaume Martí and Andrés Gil, Society of the Snow (2023, Spain)

Magda Hap, Son of the White Mare

I don’t watch a lot of political thrillers, but thrillers in general tend to thrive in this category. The Parallax View – borne out of the paranoia-minded Watergate era – is tautly told, and the editing work does all of the heaviest lifting across its runtime.

Best Adaptation or Musical Score

Lester Lee and Bob Russell, Affair in Trinidad (1952)

Frank Skinner, All That Heaven Allows

Shankar Jaikishan, Shailendra, and Hasrat Jaipuri, Awaara

Robert Emmett Dolan, The Bells of St. Mary’s

Nacio Herb Brown, Broadway Melody of 1936

Alfred Newman and Cyril J. Mockridge, Daddy Long Legs

George E. Stoll, Girl Happy

Richard M. Sherman, Robert B. Sherman, and John Williams, Tom Sawyer

Harry Warren and Mack Gordon, Week-End in Havana

John Powell and Stephen Schwartz, Wicked: Part I

This category tends to confuse people. Essentially, Adaption or Musical Score awards a score that would otherwise be an original score but quotes too liberally from preexisting music to be considered in the below category. The category also awards scores that go alongside musical films (musicals are ineligible for the category directly below this). This category also has tended to favor musicals that are wholly original, not adaptations (like Wicked: Part I).

And as such, that’s where Nacio Herb Brown comes away with his score and the songs to Broadway Melody of 1936. Newman and Mockridge might’ve had a better time in this category if they had integrated the melodies of their songs into their score more (while also composing more memorable songs aside from “Something’s Gotta Give”).

Best Original Score

Kris Bowers, The Wild Robot

John Debney, Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1 (2024)

Michael Giacchino, Society of the Snow

Osvaldo Golijov, Megalopolis (2024)

James Newton Howard, News of the World

Ennio Morricone, The Mission

Alfred Newman, The Robe (1953)

Nelson Riddle, El Dorado

Amelia Warner, Young Woman and the Sea (2024)

Franz Waxman, On Borrowed Time

Original Score usually tilts a little older than this, but I do not mind this makeup at all. We have some examples from the best scoring of 2024 (The Wild Robot and Young Woman and the Sea the best here, in my opinion), as well as a nominal presence of Old Hollywood in The Robe and El Dorado.

But it’s the Hollywood outsider, Ennio Morricone, who wins it for what I think (and what the late composer thought) is his best score. Morricone, who might be best known for his work on Sergio Leone’s Dollars trilogy – A Fistful of Dollars; For a Few Dollars More; The Good, the Bad and the Ugly – reportedly disliked his work on “Spaghetti Westerns” as time wore on (source: the 2021 documentary Ennio). To Morricone, his work on The Mission – which is about Spanish Jesuits attempting to convert the Guaraní people of the Paraguayan jungle to Christianity, while defending them from Portuguese and Spanish slavers – was his “revenge” on the Spaghetti Westerns that largely defined his reputation. Morricone wanted to compose something so unabashedly tied to classical music, all while combining musical elements from the Guaraní. And he got it. It’s a top-20 or top-25 all-time score in my books.

I adore all ten of these scores. If I could, I would have you watch all ten of these films, listen to the soundtrack afterwards, and we would talk about the music. But that’s a fantasy. And times marches onward for us all. Kris Bowers and Amelia Warner may just be the Next Big Things in (melodic) film scores, I hope – says this frequent critic of composers like Hans Zimmer Reznor and Ross. Bowers, loves his classical and jazz to equal degrees – trained in composition, he clearly respects the past while forging onward. Warner, a former actress, has shown incredible progress as a composer with each passing film (she composed an all-time sports movie film score in Young Woman and the Sea).

Best Original Score Cue

“The Alumni”, Kris Bowers, The Last Repair Shop

“Beach Celebration”, Amelia Warner, Young Woman and the Sea

“The Boys in the Boat”, Alexandre Desplat, The Boys in the Boat

“The Crucifixion”, Alfred Newman, The Robe

“End Titles”, James Newton Howard, News of the World

“Found”, Michael Giacchino, Society of the Snow

“Gabriel’s Oboe”, Ennio Morricone, The Mission

“Horizon Montage Begins / Closing Survey”, John Debney, Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1

“I Could Use a Boost”, Kris Bowers, The Wild Robot

“New Rome”, Osvaldo Goljiov, Megalopolis

I don’t think you need to hear more wax more about The Mission and Ennio Morricone. I will say that “Beach Celebration” would’ve been one of my go-to cues if I had the editing skills to put a year-end Movie Odyssey montage. “End Titles” is one of the best end credits suites I’ve heard in some time. “New Rome” sounds like something composed from the ‘50s in the best possible way.

Best Original Song

“Aren’t You Glad You’re You?”, music by Jimmy Van Heusen, lyrics by Johnny Burke, The Bells of St. Mary’s

“Awaara Hoon (I'm a Tramp)”, music by Sahnkar Jaikishan, lyrics by Shailendra and Hasrat Jaipuri, Awaara

“Belleville Rendez-vous”, music by Benoît Charest, lyrics by Sylvain Chomet, The Triplets of Belleville

“Giấc Mơ (Dream)”, music and lyrics by Túng, Before Sex (2024, Vietnam)

“Même plus l'amour (Not Even Love)”, music and lyrics by Fred Avril and Philippe Monthaye, Mars Express

“A Million Miles Away”, music and lyrics by Fred Avril and Philippe Monthaye, Mars Express

“On Earth as It Is in Heaven”, music and lyrics by Ennio Morricone, The Mission

“Something’s Gotta Give”, music and lyrics by Johnny Mercer, Daddy Long Legs

“That’s Amore”, music by Harry Warren, lyrics by Jack Brooks, The Caddy

“You Are My Lucky Star”, music Nacio Herb Brown, lyrics by Arthur Freed, Broadway Melody of 1936 (1935)

To all those who participated in MOABOS, thank you!

Best Costume Design

André-ani, Annie Laurie

Adrian, Dinner at Eight

René Hubert, Dragonwyck

Jacqueline West, Dune: Part Two (2024)

Milena Canonero, Megalopolis

Orry-Kelly, One Way Passage

Holly Waddington, Poor Things (2023)

Charles Le Maire and Emile Santiago, The Robe

Gwen Wakeling, Week-End in Havana

Paul Tazewell, Wicked: Part I

Now we get to categories that I have, admittedly the least expertise in. But I thought Wicked: Part I had some excellent costuming work that put its own spin on things, without directly copying the stage musical. Dinner at Eight, Megalopolis, and Poor Things also considered.

Best Makeup and Hairstyling

Yvonne Coppard, Pat Hay, Paula Gillespie, Stephanie Kaye, and Tami Levi, Appointment with Death (1988)

Ben Nye, Dragonwyck

Donald Mowat and Judit Farkas-Arful, and Dune: Part Two

Janty Yates and David Crossman, Gladiator II

Valli O’Reilly and Terrie Velazquez Owen, Megalopolis

Nadia Stacey, Mark Coulier, and Josh Weston, Poor Things

Ana López-Puigcerver, Belén López-Puigcerver, David Martí, and Montse Ribé, Society of the Snow

Frances Hannon, Sarah Nuth, and Laura Blount, Wicked: Part I

How do you get a 150+-pound actor seem like they’ve lost half that much without having the actor starve themselves? That is what the makeup team for Society of the Snow – along with all the grievous bodily injuries seen in this film about the Andes flight disaster and their rescue 72 days after the crash. La sociedad de la nieve won this without much competition at all.

Best Production Design                                                 

Suzie Davies, Conclave

J. Russell Spencer and Lyle R. Wheeler, Dragonwyck

Patrice Vermette and Tom Brown, Dune: Part Two

Gints Zilbalodis, Flow

Martial Le Minoux and Mikael Robert, Mars Express

Beth Mickie and Bradley Rubin, Megalopolis

Shona Heath, James Price, and Zsuzsa Mihalek, Poor Things

Lyle R. Wheeler, Geroge W. Davis, Walter M. Scott, and Paul S. Fox, The Robe

Uncredited, Son of the White Mare

Nathan Crowley, Wicked: Part I

When you pull off a sword-and-sandals epic film off, so much of it depends on your sets and production design. Historical epics like this category, and the fabulously designed Roman/quasi-Biblical epic gets this award.

Achievement in Visual Effects

Alien: Romulus (2024)

Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget

Dune: Part Two

The Fall Guy (2024)

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (2024)

The Johnstown Flood

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes (2024)

Mars Express

Society of the Snow

The Wild Robot

It’s unfair to compare a silent film (The Johnstown Flood) to a 2024 release in terms of visual effects. As is policy, all films listed in this category have won.

Worst Picture

The Corpse Vanishes (1942)

Game of Death (1978, Hong Kong)

Gladiator II

Moana 2 (2024)

Son of Godzilla (1967, Japan)

I gave it a 2/10, but as a fan of Toho’s kaiju films, I must say I greatly enjoyed the experience of watching this alongside other Godzilla fans – many of whom were much more diehard kaiju fans than myself, which only added to the enjoyment.

It feels wrong to single out Game of Death here, as it was unfinished at the time of Bruce Lee’s death. But the official “completed” version is pretty awful. The Corpse Vanishes is the worst non-Son of Godzilla movie of the year, but Moana 2 takes the cake for “Worst Picture nominee I most wish did not exist”.

Honorary Awards:

The Film Noir Foundation, for their tireless efforts to restore films noir and educate viewers about the subgenre

FILMS WITH MULTIPLE NOMINATIONS (excluding Worst Picture... 61)

Nine: Adam’s Rib, Awaara

Eight: The Big Heat

Seven: Devi

Six: Dinner at Eight, Son of the White Mare, Wicked: Part I

Five: The Bells of St. Mary’s, Conclave, Detour, El Dorado, Dragonwyck, Mars Express, Megalopolis, On Borrowed Time, One Way Passage, Society of the Snow, A Special Day, The Triplets of Belleville

Four: Dune: Part Two, Flow, The Johnstown Flood, The Robe, The Taste of Things, The Wedding Banquet, The Wild Robot

Three: All That Heaven Allows, Annie Laurie, The Big Combo, The Caddy, Daddy Long Legs, Gladiator II, The Goodbye Girl, Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell, The Last Repair Shop, The Life of the Party, Memoir of a Snail, The Mission, News of the World, Poor Things, Robot Dreams, 20 Days in Mariupol, Week-End in Havana Two: Affair in Trinidad, The Boys in the Boat, Broadway Melody of 1936, The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial, Casque d’Or, Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget, Children of a Lesser God, Ennio, Festival!Girl Happy, Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1, Room for One More, Tammy and the Bachelor, The Teachers’ Lounge, Theater Camp, Tom Sawyer, Young Woman and the Sea

WINNERS (excluding honorary awards and Worst Picture; 34)

3 wins: Dinner at Eight

2 wins: Adam’s Rib, Awaara, The Johnstown Flood, The Mission, Society of the Snow, Son of the White Mare, A Special Day, 20 Days in Mariupol, Wicked: Part I

1 win: Alien: Romulus, All That Heaven Allows, The Big Combo, The Big Heat, Broadway Melody of 1936, The Caddy, Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget, Conclave, Detour, Devi, El Dorado, Dune: Part Two, Ennio, The Fall Guy, Flow, Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, The Last Repair Shop, Mars Express, One Way Passage, The Parallax View, The Robe, The Wedding Banquet, The Wild Robot

96 films were nominated in 27 categories.

[mitigatedchaos]

General Post for Monday, April 15, 2024

(5,700 words, ~28 mins)

💾 "Don't underestimate computers."

6 - Social Media Notes: Recommendation: To limit distraction, limit notifications in order to make social media into its own specific context, rather than leaking into other contexts.

7 - US War Notes: Since at least the year 2000, despite its technical competence, the United States has been bad at managing the political dimension of its wars. Developments since then suggest it may get worse.

8 - Interpreting Statement A: Why "industrialization enables women's rights" could be viewed as right-wing.

9 - Computing Capital Notes 1: The basic nature of computers as capital. (It's about dimensionality in production.)

10 - Computing Capital Notes 2: How should computing be distributed? From a technical perspective, it's an open question.

11 - Computing Politics Notes: Computing has its own politics, and how computing should be distributed is one of its central questions.

12 - Desktop Internet Notes: The old Internet was implicitly gatekept by the price and complexity of personal computers. With the emergence of smartphones, personal computers are becoming less common again.

-☆☆☆-

6: Social Media Notes

Social media tends to drive people to distraction. It's obvious how negative interactions like arguments can be distracting. Someone could pop up and argue, "owning cats is bourgeois decadence," and it's very tempting to just correct them. With smartphone notifications, such an argument could come up at any time, in any context.

Positive interactions can also be distracting. It's just a lot more fun to work with your friend on writing his homebrew Dungeons & Dragons campaign than to do math homework. (Substitute whatever activity you want.)

This is why I strongly recommend muting the vast majority of social media notifications on your devices. Force social media to be its own specific context, rather than intruding into other contexts.

On Twitter, I've gone so far as to mute notifications from every account except ones that follow me. When I want to continue an argument, I just scroll down in my replies to find it, and if I don't want to, then I leave the Cats-Are-Bourgeois guy's reply unread. Would this approach be bad for Twitter if widely adopted? Sure, but it's necessary to prioritize your own life.

7: US War Notes

For decades, the United States government seems to have done well at the technical challenge of delivering bombs on to targets, but poorly at managing the political dimension of conflicts. Back in 2019, Hanania (yes, the troll one) posted a bunch of excerpts of Afghan War documents, pointing to a government that didn't know what the mission was, could not allocate money effectively, and seems to have failed to understand the needs and desires of the population.

The War in Afghanistan took place during both the Bush and Obama administrations, and neither of them managed to successfully resolve the conflict.

Why? Well, we could say that there's a failure of leadership, and I think that's correct.

More importantly, I think it's likely that the legitimizing basis for both the Bush power coalition and the Obama power coalition contained premises that were in conflict with the national development of a poor, arid, inland, mountainous country, operating under a different religion.

This is still a failure of leadership, because the necessary talent to carry out such a project, or to at least make a better attempt, existed within the American system, and a talented political leader who devoted enough attention to the problem would be able to synthesize new ideology to draw out that talent. The greatest challenge is that this would divide the political leader's attention between foreign politics and domestic politics. Bush or Obama would have needed to tap a trusted lieutenant and imbued them with significant authority, as well as working closely with them to perform the necessary political maneuvering. Could the system have provided the right lieutenant?

The United States remains a formidable opponent due to its immense wealth, technological advantage, and the quality of its institutions. It maintains its position by being well-equipped to knock down legible, modernist states, even as India and China continue to industrialize.

However, the political situation has gotten worse.

For instance...

Statement A: Women's liberation as we currently know it is primarily the result of industrialization reducing the child mortality rate from its historical level of around 50% to rates below 1% in developed countries, in combination with labor-saving home automation (such as laundry machines) dramatically reducing women's work at home, enabling women to work outside the home at much higher rates.

Is the above statement "far right"?

Statement B: The ideology of liberalism has powerful inherent advantages in economic development and trade, as well as epistemic advantages due to relative freedom of speech. (One way to think of this is that it uses peace dividends to pay competing parties for mutual disarmament, both internal to liberal society, and between liberal countries.) However, since the early 20th century, liberalism has likely gained a structural advantage due to the global dominance of the United States (enabled by the country's immense size, geographic diversity, and relative cultural unity, allowing for economic and therefore military power), both making it appear successful and making attacks on liberal countries more costly. In the event of a reduction in US dominance, liberalism may face stiffer competition from more authoritarian and particularist ideologies.

How about this statement? Is this "far right"?

I asked Nous Capybara 34B, a large language model based on 01AI's 34-billion parameter Yi model, to answer this question. Nous Capybara was trained on LessWrong posts, and provided the quite reasonable response that neither quotation is "far right," as neither quote advocates for far right positions (such as discrimination).

There's a famous Tumblr post that reads:

drakensberg: The reading comprehension and overall common sense on this website is piss poor.

poupon: how dare you say we piss on the poor

If you want to know what an awful Tumblr discourse post, Twitter tweet, or clickbait article would say, you can actually just straight-up ask Nous Capybara for an unreasonable opinion. So I did. It said:

An unreasonable interpretation of Statement A could be that it promotes extreme right-wing ideologies by suggesting that women's liberation is solely a result of technological advancements and reduced child mortality rates, rather than acknowledging the significant contributions of feminist movements, activists, and policy changes. This perspective may also argue that the statement undervalues or dismisses the struggles and achievements of women in advocating for their rights and equality. Additionally, an unreasonable interpretation might falsely attribute the statement to a far-right individual or group as a means to discredit or manipulate others' opinions about the issue.

Suppose there is a ruling power coalition whose publicly-expressed ideology is that the concept of merit is a "racial supremacist," colonialist construct, and simultaneously that they're better than you because they got into Harvard and you didn't (and that Harvard Extension School, which includes the same classes, but not the same tough admissions gauntlet, doesn't count).

How would they view the two statements? How would they speak about them?

8: Interpreting Statement A

How could statement A be interpreted as "far right"?

Statement A: Women's liberation as we currently know it is primarily the result of industrialization reducing the child mortality rate from its historical level of around 50% to rates below 1% in developed countries, in combination with labor-saving home automation (such as laundry machines) dramatically reducing women's work at home, enabling women to work outside the home at much higher rates.

Self-identified progressives generally proceed from what could be called a "default abundance" mindset rather than a "default scarcity" mindset. In their view, women's rights are the default that always existed, and would emerge naturally in the absence of oppression. In this view, women's rights could have emerged naturally at any point in history, except that the people of the past chose otherwise. Thus, the contemporary male supporter of women's rights is morally superior to the men of the past, who selfishly chose oppression.

[ women's rights ]

Self-identified progressives might extend causation, but primarily to place "women's rights" as part of a broader network of non-oppression. For instance, they might say that "women's rights" both depends on and reinforces "democracy".

[ women's rights ] ⇄ [ democracy ]

The right wing generally have a "default scarcity" mindset, e.g. "if no one plants the field, then there will be no wheat."

In statement A, women's rights are the result of a particular level of economic development, capable of producing modern medical technology and automating household labor.

[ industrial production ] → [ medical technology ] & [ household labor automation ] → [ women's rights ]

The typical self-identified progressive would not say that medical technology, such as vaccination, is bad. Rather, what makes them upset is what could potentially be attached to the first node, "industrial production."

[ social norms & values ] → [ industrial production ] → [ medical technology ] & [ household labor automation ] → [ women's rights ]

Let's take "punctuality" as an example of what I will call a "production value." We'll use the Smithsonian infographic on "white culture" that was yanked down in 2020 as an example. The authors of the infographic wrote:

‣ Follow rigid time schedules. ‣ Time viewed as a commodity.

For many people, punctuality is viewed in moral terms. Being late is considered immoral, or at least rude. However, punctuality also has mechanical effects - if an assembly line depends on 20 workers all being at their stations, and one worker is 30 minutes late, then the assembly line will not run as long, and will therefore produce fewer items.

If those items are, say, vaccines, then fewer children will receive vaccines. If fewer children receive vaccines, then more children will die of childhood illness. If more children die of childhood illness, women will have to spend more time having and raising children, and will have less time to work and earn money outside the home. If women don't raise more children to make up for the deaths, then that society's population will decline, and that society will, eventually, be replaced.

It might not be vaccines. It might be ball bearings for an industrial equipment maker that manufactures conveyor belts used in plants that make vaccines. It might be tires. It might be helicopter rotor blades. Regardless, if people don't show up, then the product doesn't get made. If the product doesn't get made, then it can't get used. If the product isn't used, then something of value may end up missing from society.

Enforcing punctuality is often inconvenient for people who don't take well to it. It can be viewed as a form of oppression - people will not get paid unless they show up on time, and for some people that's a lot more difficult than it is for others.

This is horrifying for self-identified progressives. "What about sick people? What about mentally ill people? What about people from cultures with looser time norms?"

Someone with a globe emoji (🌐) in their name on Twitter might quip, "All of those people would benefit from a wide availability of cheap, mass-produced vaccines," which reduce the required amount of labor for a particular material standard of living.

It's a trade-off. You set a target level of economic production, and given the available knowledge, capital, materials, and energy available, that takes a particular strictness of production norms to reach.

Note that positive rights, such as "every human being has a right to housing," inherently imply the enforcement of production norms.

A self-identified "reactionary," who dislikes women's rights for his own reasons, can leverage the necessity of stricter social norms for high rates of material production in order to promote stricter social norms for other reasons. This is, roughly, what would cause a self-identified progressive to describe statement A as "far right."

We could also imagine a "dark liberal" who likes women's rights, and therefore wants to impose some minimum limits on social norms in order to keep industrial production within the range necessary to support that. (Such a liberal might be a "conservative," conserving a particular liberal order. US politics tends to attribute too much to both labels, calling Communists "liberals" and monarchists "conservatives.")

Many self-identified progressives, like many political footsoldiers, primarily obtain their political opinions socially, and cannot differentiate between the two.

(How legible is all this? Llama-2 agreed once I suggested something like this reasoning, but didn't notice until I told it to. Expect a difference between progressive-tinged people and hyper-online partisan footsoldiers.)

9: Computing Capital Notes 1

I've said this before, but capital is a low-dimensionality construct, and much of the work of labor is to reduce the context of a production problem until it's simple enough that capital can be applied to it.

As an example, think of this mass production metal-stamping machine - it literally goes up and down. Over and over and over again, the main part of the machine is moving along a single axis, and uniform material is fed into it from a single direction at a steady rate.

The job of labor is to maintain the machine, to configure the machine, to ensure the production area is free of anything that might interfere with the machine (like rain or parts intersecting from other machines), and to supply the right input materials. Once the metal is loaded on to the machine, it goes in a straight line, where it gets pressed into the exact same sequence of dies every time.

A blacksmith could make almost whatever shape you like to order. He could use a variety of metals. That's labor. A machine where the metal can only travel in one direction and can only be made into 10,000 of one particular shape? That's capital.

Software is special.

Suppose we are manufacturing some metal part using a metal stamping machine. Once it comes out of the stamping machine, the parts will be painted either red or blue. Simple enough. We have two conveyor belts. One belt goes to the machine where the parts are painted red. The other goes to the machine where the parts are painted blue. We install a second machine that simply pushes parts onto either the blue or the red conveyor belt. It could be a pusher plate attached to a piston. We'll call it a sorter.

What's the ratio of red to blue parts set by our sorter?

If there's no reconfigurable control system, then it's just whatever ratio it was built for. For instance, the conveyor may have a series of belts, and the sorter may just have some gears that activate the piston for every second part that comes down the conveyor, pushing it on to the blue line. This gives one option:

{ 50% blue }

We could make a more basic control system with just a lever and some more gears. The lever would switch the assembly to different sets of gears with different rhythms. We could have three sets of gears, for three options:

{ 25% blue, 50% blue, 75% blue }

We could install a simple electronic system for triggering the piston, controlled by a knob, with ten increments, with the timing set according to the speed of the conveyor belt. This gives us ten options:

{ 10% blue, 20% blue, 30% blue, 40% blue, 50% blue, 60% blue, 70% blue, 80% blue, 90% blue, 100% blue }

We can consider the [ red-blue color ratio ] as a dimension of the production problem, with some range of possible values. In math, it would be a variable. A customer might call in and say "I want an order of 10,000 parts, and I want 6,000 of them red (and 4,000 blue), with a steel thickness of 4mm." If we were plotting out this order, we would use a 3-dimensional graph, with the variables { quantity, color, thickness }.

If we reduce the range of possible values for one of the variables, we can simplify our machine. We are shrinking or reducing that dimension. If we shrink it down to one value, then we've reduced it to a constant and effectively factored that dimension out. If the only color option is { 50% blue }, then we can omit [ color ] from our graph, and just display { quantity, thickness }.

We already had to do a lot of this to get a working machine to begin with. It would be very difficult for the same machine to manufacture both pillows and steel doors.

Computers are special, because they can increase the dimensionality of the production machine.

Suppose we hook up a computer to the electronic sorting piston. If we know the number of parts in total, and we know the timing of the conveyor, we can select just about whatever number of produced parts we like for painting, in just about whatever pattern we like. If the customer orders 10,000 parts, we can paint any number of them blue from 0 to 10,000. We have 10,000 options:

{ 1, ..., 10,000 }

If the computer doesn't have a particular pattern, we can reprogram it with new software. If the computer is hooked up to a network or terminal, we could potentially even change the color for the remaining share of the order while the order is in progress.

This ability of computers to increase the dimensionality of a production system (which makes it more general) is part of why computers and software are so valuable.

10: Computing Capital Notes 2

A floppy disk contains 1.44 million bytes. That's about 1.44 million characters (letters, numbers, spaces, etc) in an old encoding scheme like ASCII. You could fit about 200,000 words in there, enough for a lengthy book.

Let's suppose that we wanted to store a bunch of names, addresses, and phone numbers. We might allocate...

64 bytes for the first name

64 bytes for the last name

128 bytes for the street address

64 bytes for the city

2 bytes for the state

10 bytes for the phone number

...for a total of 332 bytes per record. Dividing the capacity of our floppy disk by this amount, we get around 4,337 records. We'll round it down to 4,300. (Alternatively, we could omit the city and state for about 5,400 records.)

We could describe the memory usage as "rectangular." It's based on the number of records times the size of each record.

If we just talked about books, it would sound like computers scale linearly. 200,000 words would be a long fiction book - it's about twice the length of The Hobbit - but roughly 5,000 records would be pretty short for a phone book (a printed telephone directory, obsolete as of 2010).

It we wanted to make a telephone directory in this way for say, Manhattan (1.646 million residents), we would need about 546 million bytes (546 megabytes), or about 380 floppy disks, which would just about fill a couple of shoeboxes. This would be a "tall" problem, with lots and lots of small records. (This isn't an important term, here. I'm just using it for the example.)

We could also imagine a "wide" problem, where each record is large. For instance, we could be storing college applications, in which each person submits a PDF of their resume (5 MB), a 10,000 word essay (70 KB), an application form with 96 64-character fields (6.1 KB), 5 photographs (300 KB each), and a 5-minute DVD-quality video (367.5 MB), for a combined total of 374 megabytes per application. If we then get 5,000 student applications for the year, we will need 1.87 terabytes (trillions of bytes) just to store them all.

In the telephone directory problem, we wanted to look at each person in very little detail, so each record is small. In the college application problem, we want to look at each person in a lot more detail, so each record is large. Either way, it adds up.

What should we make of these three simple examples, the book, the phone directory, and the college application storage? How much computer you need, whether that's one floppy disk's worth, 546 megabytes, or 1.87 terabytes, depends on the scale of your problem.

That brings us into the second portion.

Suppose the college hires 15 people to spend 3 workweeks reviewing all 5,000 college applications. Which of the following three options should the college use?

15 desktop computers, each with 2 terabytes of storage, and have a full copy of all applications on each computer

15 desktop computers, each with 2 gigabytes of storage, plus 1 server computer with 2 terabytes of storage, and copy the applications as-needed

15 low-powered "thin client" computers, each with 500 megabytes of storage, plus 1 server computer with 2 terabytes of storage, and have the server do almost all the work

This is a trick question - the information provided isn't enough to give a good answer. It depends on things like the rate of data transfer from the server, the price of the hardware, the budget for the project, and just what the workers will be doing with the applications.

Whether it's more appropriate to use a centralized system or a decentralized system, and when it's better to use a remote system or to handle things locally, is a technical question which varies from project to project, and from time to time.

11: Computing Politics Notes

The question of which computers processing should take place on, and who owns and controls them, as well as their software, is also a political one - though not in the sense that it's formally legislated by congress, or that there is some special identity-based way to use a computer.

A computer is a piece of capital equipment. A decent one might have an upfront cost of $1,500. If it's replaced once every 3 years, then the price is $500 per year - whether you use it or not. The marginal cost of electricity for actually using the computer to crunch numbers or store data is low. This creates a pressure towards centralization - every CPU cycle not used is "wasted," and a centralized system can aggregate work requests across people (and also timezones), averaging out usage.

Likewise, to actually maintain the computer, you have to learn how it works and do research, and things are constantly changing. If you like doing this, you won't perceive this as a cost. Some guys like to work on their own cars. Other guys like to install custom computer operating systems for fun. A lot of other people would literally rather pay someone else to do that (and they have good reasons to do so). This also creates an incentive towards centralization, where a lot of computers can be administered by a few experts.

Both of these trends also lean towards remote systems. With the contemporary Internet, for a lot of uses, it's just easier to have someone else build and administer a giant warehouse of computers, and then pay them to use a few computers as-needed. (This is the basic theory behind Amazon Web Services, which accounted for a majority of Amazon's profit in 2021.)

Here's how this gets political.

You don't own those computers. You can only use them in the ways that the guy who owns the giant warehouse of computers allows, and if he doesn't like you, he might cut off access.

Recently on Tumblr there have been reports of Google removing sexually-charged documents from Google Docs. Are these reports true? I don't know, but given how payment processors behave, it seems likely. If your steamy Doctor Who / X-Files fanfic is on gDocs, and Google's legal department decides that it doesn't want that liability - well, those are Google's computers, not yours.

Poof.

Similar pressures apply to computer programs. An unskilled user could accidentally download ransomware or a trojan that steals their credit card information. Many users don't want to learn how to avoid them (and some users might not be able to). On top of this, they don't want to learn about things like files, folders, file formats, or any of a dozen other aspects of computer literacy. Thus smartphones and tablets computers tend to be the computer as appliance, set up to only download new programs from restricted-access corporate "app stores."

It might not be surprising that, according to Pew Research (2021), many younger Americans only use a smartphone rather than a desktop or notebook computer.

Smartphone dependency: Some 15% of U.S. adults are “smartphone-only” internet users – that is, they have a smartphone, but do not have a home broadband connection. [...] Smartphone dependence is more common among younger rather than older adults: 28% of adults ages 18 to 29 are in this “smartphone-only” category, compared with 12% of those 30 and older.

The typewriter is a production device. The television is a consumption device. The smartphone is both a consumption and production device, but this is asymmetric - due to the device's small size and thumb-based interface, it's much more difficult to write text or edit video than it would be with a desktop computer. Programs ("apps") tend to limit power-user functionality (such as access to the file system) in order to be simpler to use for non-experts, allowing a user to access many of the common uses of a computer but with much less control over how it's done. A smartphone will also be less powerful than a desktop computer of the same price.

The idea of writing a program on a smartphone is absurd - smartphone applications are written on desktop or notebook computers.

12: Desktop Internet Notes

Kontextmaschine once wrote (2019):

And if the Anglophone internet is ::gestures:: like this now maybe it’s cause it’s less of a professional-class preserve? The dividing line maybe being smartphones where “people on the internet” went from “people who specifically spend $X/mo on it as luxury” to “people with telephone service”? That’s a real possibility, that for all the “Global Village” stuff the wondrous effect of the ‘90s internet was to create a cultural space that was MORE gatekept by wealth and education.

That’s… kind of depressing, though. “Haha you thought the world was getting better because you were eliminating elitist barriers but actually it’s cause you were making them higher, which is good because the poor and non-elite are disproportionately idiots with worthless ideas and to the extent they’re on top of things the thing they’re on top of is undermining the basis of a good society, and anyway those times were a phenomenon of a narrow early adopter base and you’ll never ever get them back unless you make the non-elite economically and politically irrelevant.”

Suppose we want to divide up the population of computer users. Remember that bit about capital and dimensionality in section 9? First, "shallow" computing needs have sufficiently simplified/reduced context that they can be easily served by software (users won't need to do things like compile code or access the file system), while "deep" needs do not. Second, the users either "want" or "need" to use the computer.

This gives us a nice 2×2 matrix classification. People love those.

Hobbyists - Hobbyists want a great deal of control over the computer. Maybe they're creating mods for a popular video game like Skyrim. Maybe they're programming Christmas tree lights to Rickroll people. Maybe they're developing desktop window managers for fun. Exactly what it is doesn't matter. What matters is that no one produces an app to do whatever it is they're doing, and if someone does, it doesn't appear on the app store. In fact, if someone did, they might not even care, and continue to do whatever they were doing anyway.

Power Users - The power users need a great deal of control over the computer for their work. Maybe they're compiling software. Maybe they're feeding dozens of spreadsheets of observed wombat behavior into a machine learning program. Maybe they're photoshopping wombat pictures for a National Geographic article. Whatever it is, they probably have to access the file system.

Casual Recreational Users - For gamers who don't want to mod games, but just pop in a disk and play, there game consoles. For social media users who don't feel the need to photoshop their photos, there are smartphones. Tablets can be used to watch movies from streaming services, like Netflix.

Casual Workers - For people doing more casual work, who are fine looking at only one application at a time, it's possible to hook a tablet up to a keyboard and stick it on a stand. For a somewhat more conventional notebook computer experience, casual workers could buy a Chromebook and do all their writing, emailing, and presentation creation in the web browser, using Google Docs and GMail. And if it's just ordering necessities off Amazon? Even a smartphone can do that.

To pick four example computers...

The IBM 7090, first installed in 1959, was priced around $2.9 million in 1960, or $23 million in 2023 terms.

The Apple II home computer, one of the most famous computers in history, was priced at $1,298 (2023: $6,530) to $2,638 (2023: $13,260) when it came out in 1977. It had a clock speed of about 1 Mhz.

1981's IBM Personal Computer cost $1,565 (2023: $5,240) at release. It had a clock speed of 4.77 Mhz.

2004's iMac G5 cost $1,299 (2023: $2,095) to $1,899 ($3,063) at release. It had a base clock speed of 1,600 Mhz.

A "decent" desktop computer, in relative terms, has continued to cost a nominal $1,200 to $1,500 since the Apple II, even as the value of a dollar in real terms declined, and even as processor performance doubled every 1-2 years.

The desktop computer starts out as something only for hobbyists who were willing to spend a lot of money (and who had a lot of money to spend), and for professionals who could justify spending the money. There was a huge market, because even without the Internet, uses like spreadsheets are orders of magnitude faster with a computer than doing them by hand.

During the late 1990s and early 2000s, there was still a broad assumption in many parts of US culture that a lot of bad ideas were due to mere ignorance. For a while, to many people, it looked like everyone would have a desktop or notebook computer, and everyone would learn how to use one. The Internet of the era leaned towards more conventional institutional information, and had less search-engine optimization. It was assumed that, with an entire library at one's desk, searchable with just a few keystrokes, people would become less ignorant, and therefore have better ideas.

But that's not how the world works. People have bad ideas for all sorts of reasons other than unintentional ignorance.

The trend of hardware becoming smaller and more powerful continued. The Internet, which had still been limited largely to wired connections in the 1990s, became available through wi-fi, and then cell phone data connections. Internet-connected smartphones emerged, and then became common, merging phones, cameras, and personal digital assistants into a single device.

And gradually, desktop and notebook computers have once again become the domain of hobbyists and professionals, because casual users don't want to spend $600 for a smartphone and then another $1,200 for either a desktop computer that they can't take with them, or a notebook computer that they have to sit down and open to use (and which is a lot more fragile than a smartphone).

But suppose we wanted to go back...

Well first, Kontextmaschine had already setup camp on Tumblr, one of the websites most like the old Internet. In terms of discourse, he was hanging around the orbit of Rationalist Tumblr (or "rationalist-adjacent" tumblr), which had maintained fairly high discourse norms, much better than whatever was going on over on Twitter, Youtube, or Tiktok (although more casual than their parent site, LessWrong). In terms of mechanics, Tumblr allows for lengthy text posts, delivered based on the order they're posted in, from the specific accounts one follows (rather than recommendation algorithms). As for site culture, many of the more dramatic "anti-shipper" sorts of users left for Twitter (and then presumably BlueSky or Mastodon). While one wonders what he would have said about Tumblr's fascination with The Coffin of Andy and Leyley or Dungeon Meshi, he would likely have been neither surprised nor disappointed by it.

In a sense, Kontextmaschine was already living in that high-barrier world, just with a fujoshi tinge rather than the straight gamer bro vibe of the 00's. Not that he would have had much problem with that, either. In 2021, he wrote:

if the last decade means AO3 replaces the ACLU in the pantheon of worthies fine

Is kind of amusing the extent to which "women are horny and want to fuck" is turning out to be the saving grace of the internet. No Girls indeed.

Second, while it's not possible to match the old Internet, because there's only one "The Internet," and any particular new network now is just a competing social media site, which isn't the same thing, some options are now opening up.

A privately-owned personal computer is a measure of power in the hands of an individual, with fewer constraints from large institutions (like corporations or governments) than a centralized computer system has. It is, in some sense, dangerous, especially in the hands of an unskilled user. And it is, in some sense, work to maintain. But it is, like a car, also a potential source of freedom and autonomy. Data is collected by all sorts of companies and you don't have much control over it, but a PC represents at least a sliver of digital sovereignty.

How would you filter a competing network? The simplest method might be a test of that sovereignty: can the user download and install a program not from an app store?

Access to the new network would then be limited to desktops, notebook computers, and devices owned by someone technically savvy enough to sideload applications outside of the app store.

A test based just on hardware capacity won't work, because smartphone hardware capacity goes up every year, and what you actually want are people with basic device operator skill (and maybe to filter out clickbait journalists from Twitter).

[danieldeepwebs]

Faggot, often shortened to fag, is a derogatory slur used to refer to gay men but expanded to other members of the queer community.[1][2] In American youth culture around the turn of the 21st century, its meaning extended as a broader reaching insult more related to masculinity and group power structure.[3]

The usage of fag and faggot has spread from the United States to varying extents elsewhere in the English-speaking world (especially the UK) through mass culture, including film, music, and the internet.

Etymology

The first recorded use of faggot as a pejorative term for gay men was in the 1914 A Vocabulary of Criminal Slang, while the shortened form fag first appeared in 1923 in The Hobo by Nels Anderson.[4]: 301  Its immediate origin is unclear, but it is based on the word for "bundle of sticks", ultimately derived, via Old French, Italian and Vulgar Latin, from Latin fascis.[5][6] During the European Inquisitions, the term faggot specifically referred to the bundles of sticks used to burn heretics who are people that opposed Catholic teachings. Heretics were often required to gather these sticks themselves. Those who renounced their beliefs to escape execution had to wear a faggot symbol on their sleeve as a mark of shame. The term faggot came to symbolize any burden or stigma, and then evolved into a derogatory term directed at women who are hard to get rid of in a manner similar to the term “ball and chain.” [7]

The term faggot originated in late 16th-century English as an insult directed at women, particularly older women.[6] Its association with homosexuality likely stems from linguistic patterns that use feminizing terms( cf. nancy, sissy, queen) [5][8] to demean homosexual or effeminate men. The application of the term to old women is possibly a shortening of the term "faggot-gatherer", applied in the 19th century to people, especially older widows, who made a meager living by gathering and selling firewood.[8] It may also derive from the sense of "something awkward to be carried" (compare the use of the word baggage as a pejorative term for old people in general).[5]

An alternative possibility is that the word is connected with the practice of fagging in British public schools, in which younger boys performed (potentially sexual) duties for older boys, although the word faggot was never used in this context, only fag. There is a reference to the word faggot being used in 17th-century Britain to refer to a "man hired into military service simply to fill out the ranks at muster", but there is no known connection with the word's modern usage.[5]

The Yiddish word faygele (lit. 'little bird'), itself a pejorative term for a gay man, has been claimed by some to be related to the American usage. Faygele (pronounced [feɪɡələ]) is the nickname for a young girl named Faigie ('bird') after Moses' wife Zipporah (Hebrew for 'bird'). The similarity between the two words makes it possible that it might at least have had a reinforcing effect.[5][8]

There is an urban legend, called an "oft-reprinted assertion" by Douglas R. Harper, creator of the Online Etymology Dictionary, that the modern slang meaning developed from the standard meaning of faggot as "bundle of sticks for burning" with regard to burning at the stake. Homosexuals were burned at the stake during the late Middle Ages as sexual intercourse between same-sex people was considered to be sodom and therefore punished. [9] There is speculation that the term fag derived from the British-English slang for cigarettes, which has been current in British English since at least 1888[10]. The emergence of the slang term in 20th-century American English is unrelated to any historical death penalties for homosexuality; moreover, homosexuality in England and its colonies was never punished by immolation but instead by the accused being hanged and their property taken.[5][11]

Use

Early printed use

The word faggot with regard to homosexuality was used as early as 1914, in Jackson and Hellyer's A Vocabulary of Criminal Slang, with Some Examples of Common Usages which listed the following example under the word "drag": "All the fagots (sissies) will be dressed in drag at the ball tonight."[12]

The word fag is used in 1923 in The Hobo: The Sociology of the Homeless Man by Nels Anderson: "Fairies or Fags are men or boys who exploit sex for profit."[13]

The word was also used together with another homophobic slur, bulldyke, by a character in Claude McKay's 1928 novel Home to Harlem, indicating that it was used during the Harlem Renaissance. Specifically, one character says that he cannot understand: "a bulldyking woman and a faggoty man".[citation needed]

Use in the United Kingdom

Originally confined to the United States,[5] the use of the words fag and faggot as slurs for gay men has spread elsewhere in the English-speaking world, but the extent to which they are used in this sense has varied outside the context of imported US popular culture. In the UK and some other countries, the words queer, homo, and poof are much more common as pejorative terms for gay men. The word faggot in the UK also refers to a kind of meatball. In British English, 'fag' is common slang for a cigarette, sometimes also used to describe a tedious task.[14]

Use of fag and faggot as the term for an effeminate man has become understood as an Americanism in British English, primarily due to entertainment media use in films and television series imported from the United States. When Labour MP Bob Marshall-Andrews was overheard supposedly using the word in a bad-tempered informal exchange with a straight colleague in the House of Commons lobby in November 2005, it was considered to be homophobic abuse.[15][16]

Usage by youth

Faggot, used as a discriminatory term, has expanded beyond gay men. It is often used by the youth in online communities to describe any queer person or someone who differs from the norm. In some cases, the term is completely unrelated to homosexuality and simply used as an insult due to its negative connotation similar to gay.

Through ethnographic research in a high school setting, CJ Pascoe examined how American high school boys used the term fag during the early 2000s. Pascoe's work, culminating in a 2007 book titled Dude, You're a Fag: Masculinity and Sexuality in High School, suggested that these boys used the fag slur as a way to assert their own masculinity, by claiming that another boy is less masculine; this, in their eyes, makes him a fag, and its usage suggests that it is less about sexual orientation and more about gender. One-third of the boys in Pascoe's study claimed that they would not call a homosexual peer a fag, leading Pascoe to argue that fag is used in this setting as a form of gender policing, in which boys ridicule others who fail at masculinity, heterosexual prowess, or strength. Because boys do not want to be labeled a fag, they hurl the insult at another person. Pascoe felt the fag identity does not constitute a static identity attached to the boy receiving the insult. Rather, fag is a fluid identity that boys strive to avoid, often by naming another as the fag. As Pascoe asserts, "[the fag identity] is fluid enough that boys police their behaviors out of fear of having the fag identity permanently adhere and definitive enough so that boys recognize fag behavior and strive to avoid it."[3]

In the late 2010s and early 2020s, the faggot slur lost its original meaning when used by youth. Kids no longer associate the word itself with homosexuality rather it is commonly used as a synonym for the word stupid. [7] In a 2018 study completed by the Anti-Defamation League surveying Generation Z from Grade 6 and up, youth perspectives on the phrase "that's so gay" and homophobic slurs highlight concerns over its use as a synonym for "stupid," which respondents viewed as offensive and insensitive. Some believe it reflects a lack of awareness rather than intent to harm, yet it still evokes frustration and discomfort, pointing to a need for more thoughtful language.

Use in popular culture

Benjamin Phelps, Fred Phelps' grandson and creator of the first "GodHatesFags" webpage, is also from the Westboro Baptist Church, which regularly employs picket signs such as these using fag as slur.[17]

There is a long history of using both fag and faggot in popular culture, usually in reference to gay and bisexual men. Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman's 1995 documentary The Celluloid Closet, based on Vito Russo's book of the same name, notes the use of fag and faggot throughout Hollywood film history.[18] The Think Before You Speak campaign has sought to stop fag and gay being used as generic insults.[19]

Theater

In 1973, a Broadway musical called The Faggot was praised by critics but condemned by gay liberation proponents.[20]

Larry Mitchell and Ned Asta's 1977 cult book The Faggots and Their Friends Between Revolutions inspired a musical by composer Philip Venables and director Ted Huffman reinterprets world history from a queer perspective. [21] The term is used in a sense of reclamation.

Books and magazines

Larry Kramer's 1978 novel Faggots discusses the gay community including the use of the word within and towards the community.[22] A description of Pamela Moore's 1956 novel Chocolates for Breakfast in the Warner Books 1982 culture guide The Catalog of Cool reads: "Her fifteen-year-old heroine first balls a fag actor in H'wood, then makes it with some hermetic, filthy rich, hotel-bound Italian count."[23][24]

In its November 2002 issue, the New Oxford Review, a Catholic magazine, caused controversy by its use and defense of the word in an editorial. During the correspondence between the editors and a gay reader, the editors clarified that they would only use the word to describe a "practicing homosexual". They defended the use of the word, saying that it was important to preserve the social stigma of gays and lesbians.[25]

Music

1960s

Arlo Guthrie uses the slur in his 1967 signature song "Alice's Restaurant", noting it as a potential way to avoid military induction at the time (Guthrie had removed the word from live performances of the song in the 21st century).[26]

Phil Ochs uses the slur in his 1969 song "I Kill Therefore I Am". In the song, which is written from the point of view of a hateful police officer, he uses the slur to describe the student activists who protested the Vietnam War.

1980s

The Dire Straits 1985 song "Money for Nothing" makes notable use of the slur faggot,[27] although the lines containing it are often excised for radio play, and in live performances by singer/songwriter Mark Knopfler. The song was banned from airplay by the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council in 2011 but the ban was reversed later the same year.[28] Ironically, the song in context makes it clear he is actually mocking the jealous and homophobic nature of the antagonist in the song by adopting a third-person point of view to show the irony, bigotry, and ignorance of the character.[29][30]

In 1989, Sebastian Bach, lead singer of the band Skid Row, created a controversy when he wore a T-shirt with the parody slogan "AIDS: Kills Fags Dead".[31]

2000s

The 2001 song "American Triangle" by Elton John and Bernie Taupin uses the phrase, "God hates fags where we come from." The song is about Matthew Shepard, a gay man from Wyoming whose 1998 murder brought national and international attention to hate crime legislation at both the state and federal level.

In December 2007, BBC Radio 1 caused controversy by editing the word faggot from their broadcasts of the Kirsty MacColl and The Pogues song "Fairytale of New York", deeming it potentially homophobic; however, the edit did not extend to other BBC stations, such as BBC Radio 2. Following widespread criticism and pressure from listeners, the decision was reversed and the original unedited version of the song was reinstated, with clarification from Andy Parfitt, the station controller, that in the context of the song the lyrics had no "negative intent".[32][33]

2010s–2020s

Eminem used the word in numerous works, such as "Rap God" (2013), along with an inflammatory lyric containing the term being removed from "Fall".[34][35][36]

A number of rappers have also used the slur in songs supporting the LGBT community. In 2012, Macklemore used the word faggot in the song "Same Love" in reference to the use of the homophobic slur in cyberbullying.[37] Kendrick Lamar's 2022 song "Auntie Diaries" is also supportive of the LGBT community; however, it sparked controversy for its repeated use of the slur, as well as for deadnaming his transgender uncle.[38][39]

Television

In November 2009, the South Park episode "The F Word" dealt with the overuse of the word fag. The boys use the word to insult a group of bikers, saying that their loud motorcycles ruined everyone else's nice time. Officials from the dictionary, including Emmanuel Lewis, visit the town and agree that the meaning of the word should no longer insult homosexuals but instead be used to describe loud motorcycle riders who ruin others' nice times.[40] The episode is a satire on the taboo of using the term, as it goes against political correctness.[41][42]

i feel educated

[myrawjcsmicasereports]

Retinal and choroidal vascular drop out in a case of severe phenotype of Flammer Syndrome. Rescue of the ischemic-preconditioning mimicking action of endogenous Erythropoietin (EPO) by off-label intra vitreal injection of recombinant human EPO (rhEPO) by Claude Boscher in Journal of Clinical Case Reports Medical Images and Health Sciences

Abstract

Background: Erythropoietin (EPO) is a pleiotropic anti-apoptotic, neurotrophic, anti-inflammatory, and pro-angiogenic endogenous agent, in addition to its effect on erythropoiesis. Exogenous EPO is currently used notably in human spinal cord trauma, and pilot studies in ocular diseases have been reported. Its action has been shown in all (neurons, glia, retinal pigment epithelium, and endothelial) retinal cells. Patients affected by the Flammer Syndrome (FS) (secondary to Endothelin (ET)-related endothelial dysfunction) are exposed to ischemic accidents in the microcirculation, notably the retina and optic nerve.

Case Presentation: A 54 years old female patient with a diagnosis of venous occlusion OR since three weeks presented on March 3, 2019. A severe Flammer phenotype and underlying non arteritic ischemic optic neuropathy; retinal and choroidal drop-out were obviated. Investigation and follow-up were performed for 36 months with Retinal Multimodal Imaging (Visual field, SD-OCT, OCT- Angiography, Indo Cyanin Green Cine-Video Angiography). Recombinant human EPO (rhEPO)(EPREX®)(2000 units, 0.05 cc) off-label intravitreal injection was performed twice at one month interval. Visual acuity rapidly improved from 20/200 to 20/63 with disparition of the initial altitudinal scotoma after the first rhEPO injection, to 20/40 after the second injection, and gradually up to 20/32, by month 5 to month 36. Secondary cystoid macular edema developed ten days after the first injection, that was not treated via anti-VEGF therapy, and resolved after the second rhEPO injection. PR1 layer integrity, as well as protective macular gliosis were fully restored. Some level of ischemia persisted in the deep capillary plexus and at the optic disc.

Conclusion: Patients with FS are submitted to chronic ischemia and paroxystic ischemia/reperfusion injury that drive survival physiological adaptations via  the hypoxic-preconditioning mimicking effect of endogenous EPO, that becomes overwhelmed in case of acute hypoxic stress threshold above resilience limits. Intra vitreal exogenous rhEPO injection restores retinal hypoxic-preconditioning adaptation capacity, provided it is timely administrated. Intra vitreal rhEPO might be beneficial in other retinal diseases of ischemic and inflammatory nature.

Key words : Erythropoietin, retinal vein occlusion, anterior ischemic optic neuropathy, Flammer syndrome, Primary Vascular Dysfunction, anti-VEGF therapy, Endothelin, microcirculation, off-label therapy.

Introduction

Retinal Venous Occlusion (RVO) treatment still carries insufficiencies and contradictions (1) due to the incomplete deciphering of the pathophysiology and of its complex multifactorial nature, with overlooking of factors other than VEGF up-regulation, notably the roles of  retinal venous tone and Endothelin-1 (ET) (2-5), and of endothelial caspase-9 activation (6). Flammer Syndrome (FS)( (Primary Vascular Dysfunction) is related to a non atherosclerotic ET-related endothelial dysfunction in a context of frequent hypotension and increased oxidative stress (OS), that alienates organs perfusion, with notably changeable functional altered regulation of blood flow (7-9), but the pathophysiology remains uncompletely  elucidated (8). FS is more frequent in females, and does not seem to be expressed among outdoors workers, implying an influence of sex hormons and light (7)(9). ET is the most potent pro-proliferative, pro-fibrotic, pro-oxidative and pro-inflammatory vasoconstrictor, currently considered involved in many diseases other than cardio-vascular ones, and is notably an inducer of neuronal apoptosis (10). It is produced by endothelial (EC), smooth vascular muscles (SVMC) and kidney medullar cells,  and binds the surface Receptors  ET-A on SVMC and ET-B on EC,  in an autocrine and paracrine fashion. Schematically, binding on SVMC Receptors (i.e. through local diffusion in fenestrated capillaries or dysfunctioning EC) and on EC ones (i.e. by circulating ET) induce respectively arterial and venous vasoconstriction, and vasodilation, the latter via Nitrite oxide (NO) synthesis. ET production is stimulated notably by Angiotensin 2, insulin, cortisol, hypoxia, and antagonized by endothelial gaseous NO, itself induced by flow shear stress. Schematically but not exclusively, vascular tone is maintained by a complex regulation of ET-NO balance (8) (10-11).  Both decrease of NO and increase of ET production are both a cause and consequence of inflammation, OS  and endothelial dysfunction, that accordingly favour vasoconstriction; in addition ET competes for L-arginine substrate with NO synthase, thereby reducing NO bioavailability, a mechanism obviated notably in carotid plaques and amaurosis fugax (reviewed in 11).

Severe FS phenotypes are rare. Within the eye, circulating ET reaches retinal VSMC in case of Blood-Retinal-Barrier (BRB) rupture and diffuses freely via the fenestrated choroidal circulation, notably around the optic nerve (ON) head behind the lamina cribrosa, and may induce all pathologies related to acute ocular blood flow decrease (2-3)(5)(7-9). We previously reported two severe cases with rapid onset of monocular cecity and low vision, of respectively RVO in altitude and non arteritic  ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION) (Boscher et al, Société Francaise d'Ophtalmologie and Retina Society, 2015 annual meetings).

Exogenous Recombinant human EPO (rhEPO) has been shown  effective in humans for spinal cord injury (12), neurodegenerative and chronic kidney diseases (CKD) (reviewed in 13). Endogenous EPO is released physiologically in the circulation by the kidney and liver; it may be secreted in addition by all cells in response to hypoxic stress, and it is the prevailing pathway induced via genes up-regulation by the transcription factor Hypoxia Inducible Factor 1 alpha, among angiogenesis (VEGF pathway), vasomotor regulation (inducible NO synthase), antioxidation, and energy metabolism (14). EPO Receptor signaling induces cell proliferation, survival and differentiation (reviewed in 13), and targets multiple non hematopoietic pathways as well as the long-known effect on erythropoiesis (reviewed in 15). Of particular interest here, are its synergistic anti-inflammatory, neural antiapoptotic (16) pro-survival and  pro-regenerative (17) actions upon hypoxic injury, that were long-suggested to be also indirect, via blockade of ET release by astrocytes, and assimilated to ET-A blockers action (18). Quite interestingly, endogenous EPO’s pleiotropic effects were long-summarized (back to 2002), as “mimicking hypoxic-preconditioning” by Dawson (19), a concept applied to the retina (20). EPO Receptors are present in all retinal cells and their rescue activation targets all retinal cells, i.e. retinal EC, neurons (photoreceptors (PR), ganglion (RGG) and  bipolar cells), retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) osmotic function through restoration of the BRB, and  glial cells (reviewed in 21), and the optic nerve (reviewed in 22).  RhEPO has been tested experimentally in animal models of glaucoma, retinal ischemia-reperfusion (I/R) and light phototoxicity, via multiple routes (systemic, subconjunctival, retrobulbar and intravitreal injection (IVI) (reviewed in 23), and used successfully via IVI in human pilot studies, notably first in diabetic macular edema (24) (reviewed in 25 and 26). It failed to improve neuroprotection in association to corticosteroids in optic neuritis, likely for bias reasons (reviewed in 22). Of specific relation to the current case, it has been reported in NAION (27) (reviewed in 28) and traumatic ON injury (29 Rashad), and in one case of acute severe central RVO (CRVO) (Luscan and Roche, Société Francaise d’Ophtalmologie 2017 annual meeting). In addition EPO RPE gene therapy was recently suggested to prevent retinal degeneration induced by OS in a rodent model of dry Age Macular Degeneration (AMD) (30).

Case Report Presentation

This 54 years female patient was first visited on March 2019 4th, seeking for second opinion for ongoing vision deterioration OR on a daily basis, since around 3 weeks. Sub-central RVO (CRVO) OR had been diagnosed on February 27th; available SD-OCT macular volume was increased with  epiretinal marked hyperreflectivity, one available Fluorescein angiography picture showed a non-filled superior CRVO, and a vast central ischemia involving the macular and paraoptic territories. Of note there was ON edema with a para-papillary hemorrage nasal to the disc on the available colour fundus picture.

At presentation on March 4, Best Corrected Visual Acuity (BCVA) was reduced at 20/100 OR (20/25 OS). The patient described periods of acutely excruciating retro-orbital pain in the OR. Intraocular pressure was normal, at 12 OR and 18 OS (pachymetry was at 490 microns in both eyes). The dilated fundus examination was similar to the previous color picture and  did not disclose peripheral hemorrages recalling extended peripheral retinal ischemia. Humphrey Visual Field disclosed an altitudinal inferior scotoma and a peripheral inferior scotoma OR and was in the normal range OS, i.e. did not recall normal tension glaucoma OS . There were no papillary drusen on the autofluorescence picture, ON volume was increased  (11.77 mm3 OR versus 5.75 OS) on SD-OCT (Heidelberg Engineering®) OR,  Retinal Nerve Fiber (RNFL) and RGC layers thicknesses were normal  Marked epimacular hypereflectivity OR with foveolar depression inversion, moderately increased total volume and central foveolar thickness (CFT) (428 microns versus 328 OS), and a whitish aspect of the supero-temporal internal retinal layers recalling ischemic edema, were present . EDI CFT was incresead at 315 microns (versus 273 microns OS), with focal pachyvessels on the video mapping . OCT-Angiography disclosed focal perfusion defects in both the retinal and chorio-capillaris circulations , and central alterations of the PR1 layer on en-face OCT

Altogether the clinical picture evoked a NAION with venous sub-occlusion, recalling Fraenkel’s et al early hypothesis of an ET interstitial diffusion-related venous vasoconstriction behind the lamina cribrosa (2), as much as a rupture of the BRB was present in the optic nerve area (hemorrage along the optic disc). Choroidal vascular drop-out was suggested by the severity and rapidity of the VF impairment (31). The extremely rapid development of a significant “epiretinal membrane”, that we interpreted as a reactive - and protective, in absence of cystoid macular edema (CME) - ET 2-induced astrocytic proliferation (reviewed in 32), was as an additional  sign of severe ischemia.

The mention of the retro-orbital pain evoking a “ciliary angor”, the absence of any inflammatory syndrome and of the usual metabolic syndrome in the emergency blood test, oriented the etiology towards a FS. And indeed anamnesis collected many features of the FS, i.e. hypotension (“non dipper” profile with one symptomatic nocturnal episode of hypotension on the MAPA), migrains, hypersensitivity to cold, stress, noise, smells, and medicines, history of a spontaneously resolutive hydrops six months earlier, and of paroxystic episods of vertigo (which had driven a prior negative brain RMI investigation for Multiple Sclerosis, a frequent record among FS patients (33) and of paroxystic visual field alterations (7)(9), that were actually recorded several times along the follow-up.

The diagnosis of FS was eventually confirmed in the Ophthalmology Department in Basel University on April 10th, with elevated retinal venous pressure (20 to 25mmHg versus 10-15 OS) (4)(7)(9), reduced perfusion in the central retinal artery and veins on ocular Doppler (respectively 8.3 cm/second OR velocity versus 14.1 mmHg OS, and 3.1/second OR versus 5.9 cm OS), and impaired vasodilation upon flicker light-dependant shear stress on the Dynamic Vessel Analyser testing (7-9). In addition atherosclerotic plaques were absent on carotid Doppler.

On March 4th, the patient was at length informed about the FS, a possible off label rhEPO IVI, and a related written informed consent on the ratio risk-benefits was delivered.

By March 7th, she returned on an emergency basis because of vision worsening OR. VA was unchanged, intraocular pressure was at 13, but Visual Field showed a worsening of the central and inferior scotomas with a decreased foveolar threshold, from 33 to 29 decibels. SD-OCT showed a 10% increase in the CFT volume.

On the very same day, an off label rhEPO IVI OR (EPREX® 2000 units, 0,05 cc in a pre-filled syringe) was performed in the operating theater, i.e. the dose reported  by Modarres et al (27), and twenty times inferior to the usual weekly intravenous dose for treatment of chronic anemia secondary to CKD. Intra venous acetazolamide (500 milligrams) was performed prior to the injection, to prevent any increase in intra-ocular pressure. The patient was discharged with a prescription of chlorydrate betaxolol (Betoptic® 0.5 %) two drops a day, and high dose daily magnesium supplementation (600 mgr).

Incidentally the patient developed bradycardia the day after, after altogether instillation of 4 drops of betaxolol only, that was replaced by acetazolamide drops, i.e. a typical hypersensitivity reaction to medications in the FS (7)(9).

Subjective vision improvement was recorded as early as D1 after injection. By March 18 th, eleven days post rhEPO IVI, BCVA was improved at 20/63, the altitudinal scotoma had resolved (Fig. 5), Posterior Vitreous Detachment had developed with a disturbing marked Weiss ring, optic disc swelling had decreased; vasculogenesis within the retinal plexi and some regression of PR1 alterations  were visible on OCT-en face. Indeed by 11 days post EPO significant functional, neuronal and vascular rescue were observed, while the natural evolution had been seriously vision threatening.

However cystoid ME (CME) had developed . Indo Cyanin Green-Cine Video Angiography (ICG-CVA) OR, performed on March 23, i.e. 16 days after the rhEPO IVI, showed a persistent drop in ocular perfusion: ciliary and central retinal artery perfusion timings were dramatically delayed at respectively 21 and 25 seconds, central retinal vein perfusion initiated by 35 seconds, was pulsatile, and completed by 50 seconds only (video 3). Choroidal pachyveins matching the ones on SD-OCT video mapping were present in the temporal superior and inferior fields, and crossed the macula; capillary exclusion territories were present in the macula and around the optic disc.

By April 1, 23 days after the rhEPO injection, VA was unchanged, but CME and perfusion voids in the superficial deep capillary plexi and choriocapillaris were worsened, and optic disc swelling had recurred back to baseline, in a context of repeated episodes of systemic hypotension; and actually Nifepidin-Ratiopharm® oral drops (34), that had been delivered via a Temporary Use Authorization from the central Pharmacology Department in Assistance Publique Hopitaux de Paris, had had to be stopped because of hypersensitivity.

A second off label rhEPO IVI was performed in the same conditions on April 3, i.e. approximately one month after the first one.

Evolution was favourable as early as the day after EPO injection 2: VA was improved at 20/40, CME was reduced, and perfusion improved in the superficial retinal plexus as well as in the choriocapillaris. By week 4 after EPO injection 2, CME was much decreased, i.e. without anti VEGF injection. On august 19th, by week 18 after EPO 2, perfusion on ICG-CVA was greatly improved , with ciliary timing at 18 seconds, central retinal artery at 20 seconds and venous return from 23 to 36 seconds, still pulsatile. Capillary exclusion territories were visible in the macula and temporal to the macula after the capillary flood time that went on by 20.5 until 22.5 seconds (video 4); they  were no longer persistent at intermediate and late timings.

Last complete follow-up was recorded on January 7, 2021, at 22 months from EPO injection 2. BCVA was at 20/40, ON volume had dropped at 7.46 mm3, a sequaelar superior deficit was present in the RNFL  with some  corresponding residual defects on the inferior para central Visual Field , CFT was at 384 mm3 with an epimacular hyperreflectivity without ME, EDI CFT was dropped at 230 microns. Perfusion on ICG-CVA was not normalized, but even more improved, with ciliary timing at 15 seconds, central retinal artery at 16 seconds and venous return from 22 to 31 seconds, still pulsatile , indicating that VP was still above IOP. OCT-A showed persisting perfusion voids, especially at  the optic disc and within the deep retinal capillary plexus. The latter were present at some degree in the OS as well . Choriocapillaris and PR1 layer were dramatically improved.

Last recorded BCVA was at 20/32 by February 14, 2022, at 34 months from EPO 2. SD-OCT showed stable gliosis hypertrophy and mild alterations of the external layers .

Discussion

What was striking in the initial clinical phenotype of CRVO  was  the contrast between the moderate venous dilation,  and the intensity of ischemia, that were illustrating the pioneer hypothesis of Professor Flammer‘s team regarding the pivotal role of ET in VO (2), recently confirmed (3)(35), i.e. the local venous constriction backwards the lamina cribrosa, induced by diffusion of ET-1 within the vascular interstitium, in reaction to hypoxia. NAION was actually the primary and prevailing alteration, and ocular hypoperfusion was confirmed via ICG-CVA, as well as by the ocular Doppler performed in Basel. ICG-CVA confirmed the choroidal drop-out suggested by the severity of the VF impairment (31) and by OCT-A in the choriocapillaris. Venous pressure measurement, which instrumentation is now available (8), should become part of routine eye examination in case of RVO, as it is key to guide cases analysis and personalized therapeutical options.

Indeed, the endogenous EPO pathway is the dominant one activated by hypoxia and is synergetic with the VEGF pathway, and coherently it is expressed along to VEGF in the vitreous in human RVO (36). Diseases develop when the individual limiting  stress threshold for efficient adaptative reactive capacity gets overwhelmed. In this case by Week 3 after symtoms onset,  neuronal and vascular resilience mechanisms were no longer operative, but the BRB, compromised at the ON, was still maintained in the retina.

As mentioned in the introduction, the scientific rationale for the use of EPO was well demonstrated by that time, as well as the capacities of exogenous EPO to mimic endogenous EPO vasculogenesis, neurogenesis and  synaptogenesis, restoration of  the balance between ET-1 and NO. Improvement of chorioretinal blood flow was actually illustrated by the evolution of the choriocapillaris perfusion on repeated OCT-A and ICG-CVA. The anti-apoptotic effect of EPO (16) seems as much appropriate in case of RVO as the caspase-9 activation is possibly another overlooked co-factor (6).

All the conditions for translation into off label clinical use were present: severe vision loss with daily worsening and  unlikely spontaneous favourable  evolution, absence of toxicity in the human pilot studies, of contradictory comorbidities and co-medications, and of context of intraocular neovascularization that might be exacerbated by EPO (37).

Why didn’t we treat the onset of CME by March 18th, i.e. eleven days after EPO IVI 1, by anti-VEGF therapy, the “standard-of-care” in CME for RVO ?

In addition to the context of functional, neuronal and vascular improvements obviated by rhEPO IVI by that timing in the present case, actually anti VEGF therapy does not address the underlying causative pathology. Coherently, anti-VEGF IVI :  1) may not be efficient in improving vision in RVO, despite its efficiency in resolving/improving CME (usually requiring repeated injections), as shown in the Retain study (56% of eyes with resolved ME continued to loose vision)(quoted in (1) 2) eventually may be followed by serum ET-1 levels increase and VA reduction (in 25% of cases in a series of twenty eyes with BRVO) (38) and by increased areas of non perfusion in OCT-A (39). Rather did we perform a second hrEPO IVI, and actually we consider open the question whether the perfusion improvement, that was progressive, might have been accelerated/improved via repeated rhEPO IVI, on a three to four weeks basis.

The development of CME itself, involving a breakdown of the BRB, i.e. of part of the complex  retinal armentorium resilience to hypoxia, was somewhat paradoxical in the context of improvement after the first EPO injection, as EPO restores the BRB (24), and as much as it was suggested that EPO inhibits glial osmotic swelling, one cause of ME, via VEGF induction (40). Possible explanations were: 1) the vascular hyperpermeability induced by the up-regulation of VEGF gene expression via EPO (41) 2) the ongoing causative disease, of chronic nature, that was obviated by the ICG-CVA and the Basel investigation, responsible for overwhelming the gliosis-dependant capacity of resilience to hypoxia 3) a combination of both. I/R seemed excluded: EPO precisely mimics hypoxic reconditioning as shown in over ten years publications, including in the retina (20), and as EPO therapy is part of the current strategy for stabilization of the endothelial glycocalix against I/R injury (42-43). An additional and not exclusive possible explanation was the potential antagonist action of EPO on GFAP astrocytes proliferation, as mentioned in the introduction (18), that might have counteracted the reactive protective hypertrophic gliosis, still fully operative prior to EPO injection, and that was eventually restored during the follow-up, where epiretinal hyperreflectivity without ME and ongoing chronic ischemia do coincide (Fig. 6 and video 6), as much as it is unlikely that EPO’s effect would exceed one month (cf infra). Inhibition of gliosis by EPO IVI might have been also part of the mechanism of rescue of RGG, compromised by gliosis in hypoxic conditions (44). Whatever the complex balance initially reached, then overwhelmed after EPO IVI 1, the challenge was rapidly overcome by the second EPO IVI without anti-VEGF injection, likely because the former was powerful enough to restore the threshold limit for resilience to hypoxia, that seemed no longer reached again during the relapse-free follow-up. Of note, this “epiretinal membrane “, which association to good vision is a proof of concept of its protective effect, must not be removed surgically, as it would suppress one of the mecanisms of resilience to hypoxia.

To our best knowledge, ICG-CVA was never reported in FS; it allows real time evaluation of the ocular perfusion and illustration of the universal rheological laws that control choroidal blood flow as well. Pachyveins recall a “reverse” veno-arteriolar reflex in the choroidal circulation, that is NO and autonomous nervous system-dependant, and that we suggested to be an adaptative choroidal microcirculation process to hypoxia (45).  Their persistence during follow-up accounts for a persisting state of chronic ischemia.

The optimal timing for reperfusion via rhEPO in a non resolved issue:

in the case reported by Luscan and Roche, rhEPO IVI was performed on the very same day of disease onset, where it induced complete recovery from VA reduced at counting fingers at 1 meter, within 48 hours. This clinical human finding is on line with a recent rodent stroke study that established the timings for non lethal versus lethal ischemia of the neural and vascular lineages, and the optimized ones for beneficial reperfusion: the acute phase - from Day 1 where endothelial and neural cells are still preserved,  to Day 7 where proliferation of pericytes and Progenitor Stem Cells are obtainable - and the chronic stage, up to Day 56, where vasculogenesis, neurogenesis and functional recovery are still possible, but with uncertain efficiency (46). In our particular case, PR rescue after rhEPO IVI 1 indicated that Week 3 was still timely. RhEPO IVI  efficacy was shown to last between one (restoration of the BRB)  and four weeks (antiapoptotic effect) in diabetic rats (24). The relapse after Week 3 post IVI 1 might indicate that it might be  approximately the interval to be followed, should repeated injections be necessary.

The bilateral chronic perfusion defects on OCT-A at last follow-up indicate that both eyes remain in a condition of chronic ischemia and I/R, where endogenous EPO provides efficient ischemic pre-conditioning, but is potentially susceptible to be challenged during episodes of acute hypoxia that overwhelm the resilience threshold.

Conclusion

The present case advocates for individualized medicine with careful recording of the medical history, investigation of the systemic context, and exploiting of the available retinal multimodal imaging for accurate analytical interpretation of retinal diseases and their complex pathophysiology. The Flammer Syndrome is unfortunately overlooked in case of RVO; it should be suspected clinically in case of absence of the usual vascular and metabolic context, and in case  of elevated RVP. RhEPO therapy is able to restore the beneficial endogenous EPO ischemic pre-conditioning in eyes submitted to challenging acute hypoxia episodes in addition to chronic ischemic stress, as in the Flammer Syndrome and fluctuating ocular blood flow, when it becomes compromised by the overwhelming of the hypoxic stress resilience threshold. The latter physiopathological explanation illuminates the cases of RVO where anti-VEGF therapy proved functionally inefficient, and/or worsened retinal ischemia. RhEPO therapy might be applied to other chronic ischemia and I/R conditions, as non neo-vascular Age Macular Degeneration (AMD), and actually EPO was listed in 2020 among the nineteen promising molecules in AMD in a pooling of four thousands (47).

[shrewmingledotcom]

Paradox Live The Animation Ep 1 Thoughts & Reviews

Massive Spoilers for Episode 1 so if you don't want to see spoilers please ignore! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Holy shit this definitely blew my expectations for the Paradox Live anime. I've been a fan for 3 whole years (since 2020) so this is absolutely phenomenal. When I say the 3D Animation of Paradox live is good I mean it's seriously good. The animation is so fluid and dynamic it looks absolutely gorgeous. Both 3D and 2D. Mainly 3D, BAE gets two performances and the quality is amazing, their movements looks so natural and the camera movement is amazing. You also get to see the Phantom lives which is amazing because of how good they look too (Allen's Pheonix especially) 2D animation is also worth praising. In this episode it covers almost all of the Opening Show Drama Tracks mainly from BAE's perspective. However you get to see Shiki meet Nayuta, and Shiki's reaction is a lot more emotional and heart breaking (knowing the context) and the way they animated Shiki's movements, the reaction on his face, the music. Overall, everything in that scene is amazing. There's also a part at the end of the episode that shows Allen's trap reaction. The way it's portrayed is so good, from the way the water drains looking similar to a disc. Allen's reaction, the tone and the setting of the scene itself. It goes from this cheerful performance at CLUB Paradox to a horror movie scene. In terms of the story, I'm not sure if the anime is canon nor how much of the drama tracks it will cover. But just by looking at episode 1. It seems like they already covered most of the Opening Show Drama tracks (except for the actual performances themselves) We also get to see Alter Trigger for the very first time and what their laboratories look like. Mainly we get a new character who has something to do with Chisei. (We don't even know his name and as of the moment he's a mystery guy) So far, I think the episode is great. A good starter and it definitely build up to something in the later episodes. Most of the episode actually follows BAE and there isn't that much of the other units (which is my only problem so far) but other than that it's a good first episode and I would give it a 9/10.

[leonsliga]

Sorry to come into your inbox with this but I was wondering if we could spread some love for our Serge Gnabry?

I used to not mind Tuchel but wow that man is really making me raging mad. I can’t believe that he is insulting players in interviews for injuries that they are not at fault for getting. Serge can not be blamed for breaking his arm against Münster, nor for his muscle tendon injury against Frankfurt.

Serge has been with bayern since 2017, Tuchel only since March 2023 -not even a full year- and has the audacity to pull a “Serge who? Serge who? Ah, Gnabry.” The journalist literally said his name like two seconds before that (while tuchel interrupted him in the middle of the question for “just a quick joke”)

I swear this man is going to ruin the club, bringing the moral down and showing no respect for the players.

Hi anon! We can absolutely give Serge some well-deserved love. I adore our gourmet chef ❤️ Not only is he lethal on the ball, but he’s a genuinely good guy with an impeccable fashion sense to match. It’s hard not to love the guy!

I feel like with every match, I’m getting more and more frustrated with Tuchel; that’s probably no secret 😅 I want team stability after Nagelsmann’s shock sacking as much as anyone, but I don’t think TT’s really steadying this squad, at least not in any noticeable way. In fact, they’ve looked shakier than I’ve seen them in a long time. I’m glad I’m not the only one who feels that way.

9 times out of 10, injuries are out of a player’s control. Footballers want to do what they love most—football—and most of them would do anything to avoid jeopardizing that. That’s definitely the case with Serge. His injuries were not his fault in the slightest.

I can’t know the intentions behind Tuchel’s “joke,” but it did come off a little mean-spirited to me. And who knows? Maybe he didn’t mean for it to. But it’s hard not to feel like it’s just another sign of the times. First we had to stomach Tuchel starting Thomas Müller on the bench nearly every match. Then it was the sloppy performances in recent matches. Then came the costly loss against Leverkusen, which showed so perfectly just how deep the cracks in our beloved club had become. And now we’ve got him joking about Serge’s absence due to injury? It just feels like one thing after another these days. I can’t help but wonder what the hell is going on in that dressing room, if this is how TT already treats the players when they’re not around. Serge deserves so much better. Like you said, he’s been with us since 2017 and has given his all for the club. He didn’t ask to be injured; I’d fact, I’d wager he’s pretty torn up about it, and I’m sure TT joking about it only made him feel worse.

For context, here’s a clip of that moment:

I don’t like to take the easy way out of arguments like this and say “it’s the manager’s fault,” but it’s hard not to feel that way these days. We need a coach who unites the squad, who gives respect to the players and gets it in return. The last thing our team needs in a recovery season like this one is a manager that further divides them, and that’s exactly what we’ve gotten.

Also, you don’t have to apologize at all :) drop by my inbox anytime!

[quynhanhphan]

Week 4: Digital Community and Fandom: Reality TV Case Study

Reality TV

Definition of Reality TV from different angles:

Reality TV, a dominant television format for the past two decades, spans various genres including gamedocs, dating shows, makeover/lifestyle programs, docusoaps, talent contests, court programs, reality sitcoms, and celebrity-based shows (Murray & Ouellette, 2004).

Reality TV has changed over the years:

Reality TV has shifted away from its origins in documentary and social observation, now characterized by camera-ready individuals dramatically performing in emotionally charged scenarios, facilitated by semi-scripted formats, on-set manipulations, and post-production enhancements. Formerly portrayed as 'ordinary people', participants now hover on the brink of celebrity status, lured by the prospect of leveraging the attention garnered from their reality TV dramatic appearances for diverse forms of capital (Kavka, 2018, p. 7).

Authenticity:

Reality TV mirrors contemporary cultural concerns regarding authenticity in the midst of societal fragmentation, accentuating a broader societal desire for authentic connections and meaningful existence in an era marked by increasing uncertainty and individualism. Additionally, it champions the idea of embracing one's innate traits and values, influencing current understandings of self-identity, especially in relation to queer sexualities and gender identities (Lovelock, 2019, pp. 7-8).

Case study: Sisters Who Make Waves (Chị đẹp đạp gió rẽ sóng)

"Sisters Who Make Waves", a reality TV music show that aired on VTV3 on October 28, 2023, is the Vietnamese adaptation of a popular Chinese program aired on Mango TV. The show unites female artists aged 30 and above from diverse entertainment sectors such as music, film, modeling, acting, and business. With courage, participants push past personal boundaries to revive their youthful aspirations and ambitions on the music stage.

Talent show

This show could be characterized as a talent show, which is structured as a competition based on some form of talent (as this term is normatively construed) (Lovelock, 2019, p. 9). Firstly, the participants are represented to be actualizing and affirming an innate (and thus authentic) talent for singing, dancing, composing, playing different instruments, or whatever the show concerns through their involvement in the show. Secondly, the emotional turbulence resulting from the pressurized context of the mediated competition is mined as spectacles of apparent affective authenticity.

Liveness

Broadcasting the show on YouTube according to a specific schedule is an effective method to enhance two-way communication and foster a sense of "liveness". The comment section on YouTube serves as a platform for shared social interaction, allowing individuals from different generations to come together, whether in person or through technology. This enables the audience to watch and engage with the show in real-time, enhancing the sense of immediacy and connection.

Living brands

The show, featuring renowned artists like Diep Lam Anh, Huyen Baby, Trang Phap, My Linh, etc., embodies the concept of 'living brands' in a capitalist setting, where individuals strive for social recognition by transforming into branded products, especially pertinent amidst economic instability and gendered consumption patterns (Ouellette & Hay, 2008). These artists leverage various platforms, from TikTok's Behind The Scene footage to Facebook posts, enhancing their fame while reinforcing the show's positive message: empowering women to defy age stereotypes, pursue passions, and push their limits. This content not only encourages women aged 30 and above to explore new opportunities but also fosters unity and support among them, ultimately advocating for feminism. Through social media, participants extend their moment of fame, generate income, and share unfiltered perspectives on show events, challenging perceptions of reality and authenticity in TV production.

Discussion

Moreover, it is true that Reality TV is a genre that is designed to elicit talk and shared opinions. In the case of this show,  "Divo, Diva Group Vietnam," a Facebook group with over 100,000 members critiques on-screen actions, scrutinizing participants' behaviors and questioning the authenticity of the content. Moreover, discussions on this platform are infused with puns, quips, animated gifs, memes, and sarcastic commentary as audiences vie for likes and shares. Notably, key lines, scenes, and expressions are repurposed as memes, circulating widely and acquiring new meanings beyond their original context (Deller, 2019, pp. 158-159). Such memes have the potential to prolong the relevance of the reality show and its participants.

References

Deller, R., 2019. Chapter Six: Reality Television in an Age of Social Media. In: Reality Television: The TV Phenomenon That Changed the World. s.l.:Emerald Publishing.

Kavka, M., 2018. Reality TV: its contents and discontents. Critical Quarterly, 60(4), pp. 5-18.

Lovelock, M., 2019. Reality TV and Queer Identities: : Sexuality, Authenticity, Celebrity. s.l.:Springer International Publishing AG.

Murray & Ouellette, 2004. Reality TV: Remaking Television Culture. s.l.:NYU Press.

Ouellette & Hay, 2008. Better Living through Reality TV: Television and Post-Welfare Citizenship. s.l.:s.n.

[sleepy-frog-lady]

I’m up late at night, as I often am, and thinking, as I often do, about how astronomically I have been fucked over by my college. I was meant to graduate this spring, but I didn’t because I failed one of my classes. I performed well enough to have a C average on the exams, but because I didn’t do a lot of the homework I still failed the class. I couldn’t do the homework because I was depressed and extremely burned out from simultaneously juggling my college work load, my part time job, my gender transition, and my increasingly severe autism symptoms. I hoped that, upon hearing my explanation, the professor would show some humanity and let me catch up on work or something in order to pass (this is before grades were finalized, for context), but instead she said she wouldn’t because I reached out for help too late. I couldn’t reach out earlier because when I’m experiencing autistic burnout it becomes incredibly difficult for me to do that kind of communication.

When I explain this situation to people, they often say something like “it’s okay, this failure doesn’t define you and shouldn’t decrease your self worth etc etc”. But to be honest I feel like that’s not the problem I’m having at all. Realistically, it was not my lack of knowledge, intellect, or work ethic that ruined my grade in that class, it was circumstance. I was mentally ill, and trying to keep up with all of the work was only making it worse. To be mad at myself for that would be cruel and unreasonable.

I’m not blaming myself for being unable to pass at class when my mental health was close to the worse it has ever been, but I am so, so fucking angry at all of people and institutions who would not just fucking help me when I needed it. I’m mad at my old therapist who told me my problems didn’t seem that notable when I was struggling to get out of bed and feed myself every day. I’m mad at the university’s “student advocacy group” who couldn’t help me in any way that mattered because their main and possibly only priority was maintaining the administrative function of the university. Who told me at the start of the semester that I had to take one more class because I needed 9 more units to graduate (even though the units didn’t have to be in anyway related to my major) even though I was already burnt out and struggling. I’m mad at the professor for not showing me a kindness that I would’ve shown her. I underperformed in the class sure, but I don’t think preventing me from graduating was a proportional or appropriate consequence.

Now I’m in an awful and uncomfortable position. I’m like half moved in to an apartment with my partner, but with the full knowledge that I’ll probably have to be away from her for another 4 months (we’ve already done a year of long distance and I was ready to put that chapter behind me). My parents disagree about whether or not they are willing to pay for my final semester of college, and if they don’t pay then I simply can’t afford to go. By the time I knew I was going to need to take another semester, all of the college’s housing forms and such were already completed, so now I have no idea where I’m going to live (and furthermore I’m cut off from the community I’d fostered and grown comfortable with in my dorm). It is a goddamn mess.

[christianbale121]

What Are the Key Steps in AI Chatbot Development?

In the era of instant digital interaction, AI chatbots have become indispensable tools for businesses seeking to enhance customer experience, streamline operations, and drive engagement. From handling customer queries to automating repetitive tasks, chatbots are revolutionizing how companies communicate. But how exactly is an AI chatbot created? Let’s walk through the key steps in AI chatbot development, from concept to deployment and optimization.

1. Define the Chatbot's Purpose and Goals

Before jumping into development, it's crucial to define what the chatbot is supposed to do. Consider the following questions:

Will it answer customer service queries?

Will it guide users through a purchase journey?

Will it be used for internal tasks like IT support?

Setting a clear purpose allows for focused development and helps determine the required features, platforms, and AI sophistication. This phase also includes identifying the target audience and expected interactions.

2. Choose the Right Chatbot Type

There are mainly two types of chatbots:

Rule-based chatbots: Follow a predefined flow and can handle simple queries.

AI-powered chatbots: Use machine learning (ML) and natural language processing (NLP) to understand context, intent, and user sentiment.

For businesses looking to provide more personalized and adaptive interactions, AI chatbots are the go-to solution.

3. Select Development Tools and Platforms

Once you’ve determined the type, select the appropriate tools and platforms. Popular options include:

Development Frameworks: Microsoft Bot Framework, Google Dialogflow, Rasa, IBM Watson Assistant

Languages: Python, Node.js, Java

Hosting Platforms: AWS, Google Cloud, Azure

You also need to decide where the chatbot will be deployed—web, mobile apps, messaging platforms (like WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger), or all.

4. Design the Conversation Flow

Conversation design is one of the most creative and strategic parts of chatbot development. It includes:

Mapping out various user scenarios

Designing dialog trees for rule-based responses

Creating intents, entities, and responses for AI-based models

Considering fallback responses when the bot doesn’t understand

For AI-powered bots, the design must also factor in context retention and multi-turn conversations.

5. Train the NLP Model

If you're building an AI chatbot, you must train it to understand human language. This includes:

Defining intents (what the user wants)

Setting up entities (important data in user inputs)

Feeding sample utterances for each intent

Training the model with diverse input scenarios

The more varied the training data, the better your chatbot will perform. Using pre-trained language models like GPT or BERT can give you a strong starting point.

6. Integrate with Backend Systems

For the chatbot to be truly useful, it must integrate with databases, CRMs, ERPs, and APIs. For example:

An e-commerce chatbot might connect to inventory and order tracking systems.

A customer service bot may pull user data from a CRM like Salesforce.

An internal HR bot might integrate with employee databases and leave management tools.

This enables real-time, dynamic responses and allows the bot to perform complex tasks.

7. Test Extensively

Before deployment, thorough testing is essential:

Unit Testing: Each component (intent recognition, entity extraction, etc.)

Integration Testing: Interactions with external systems

User Testing: Real users interacting with the bot to check for errors, confusion, and gaps

Testing should focus on usability, accuracy, fallback behavior, and performance under load.

8. Deploy the Chatbot

Once the chatbot passes all tests, it’s ready for deployment. Ensure it’s launched on the desired platforms and integrated with necessary monitoring tools. Set up analytics dashboards to track:

Number of users

Engagement rate

Drop-off points

Intent success rate

Cloud-based services make deployment scalable and manageable.

9. Monitor, Analyze, and Optimize

Post-launch, the real work begins. Continuous improvement is key to chatbot success:

Collect conversation logs and analyze them for improvement areas

Use analytics to track usage trends and performance metrics

Regularly retrain the AI model with new data

Add new intents, flows, or languages based on user feedback

Optimization should be a regular process to keep the chatbot relevant and effective.

10. Ensure Security and Compliance

AI chatbots often handle sensitive data. It’s critical to:

Implement end-to-end encryption

Follow GDPR, HIPAA, or other industry-specific regulations

Use secure APIs and authentication mechanisms

Security measures must be baked in from the design phase, not added later.

Conclusion

AI chatbot development is a multi-stage journey that combines strategic planning, technical expertise, and ongoing refinement. By following these key steps—from goal setting and tool selection to testing and optimization—you can build a chatbot that not only automates tasks but also enhances user experience and delivers business value.

As businesses increasingly embrace automation, AI chatbot development is no longer optional—it’s a competitive necessity. Whether you're a startup or an enterprise, investing in a well-planned chatbot strategy can lead to smarter interactions, happier customers, and a more efficient organization.

[creconsult]

U.S. Apartment Market Rebound: Surprising Hotspots 2025

The 2025 U.S. Apartment Market Rebound: What’s Fueling the Recovery The U.S. apartment market rebound in 2025 is more regionalized than ever. While housing affordability remains a national issue, rental demand is growing in specific metros, fueled by job growth, migration, and shifting renter preferences. Florida, the West Coast, and the Midwest are emerging as clear leaders—each for very different reasons. See how these trends began in our 2024 housing analysis and what’s different now. Florida's Apartment Market Rebound: Growth Fueled by Migration The Florida apartment market rebound is one of the clearest signs of the broader U.S. recovery. Jacksonville, Tampa, and Orlando have experienced double-digit demand increases, driven by a combination of job creation and population growth. According to CoStar, these cities top the national momentum rankings for multifamily performance. Jacksonville’s population grew by 9% between 2020 and 2024. Tampa’s rent growth outperformed national averages even as thousands of new units entered the market. These trends reflect a broader shift toward affordability and lifestyle-driven relocation across the Southeast. Need more context? Visit our Florida rental market tracker. Tech-Driven Rebound on the West Coast Rental Market The West Coast apartment rebound in 2025 is gaining speed. San Francisco, San Jose, and Seattle are reversing prior declines thanks to renewed tech hiring and a return to urban living. San Francisco’s rent growth ranks first nationally, while San Jose has seen the strongest leasing uptick in over five years. According to CBRE, AI and biotech firms are expanding in California, leasing office space and drawing talent back downtown. In Seattle, a constrained development pipeline has preserved rent gains, despite slow initial recovery post-COVID. Explore more in our West Coast multifamily market review. Midwest Rental Markets Join the U.S. Apartment Market Rebound The Midwest apartment market rebound is a quiet but powerful trend in 2025. Chicago and Minneapolis are outperforming expectations with high occupancy and controlled rent increases. Chicago ranks top 10 for both rent growth and vacancy tightening, proving its ability to digest new supply. Minneapolis continues to benefit from a favorable rent-to-income ratio, which has helped maintain strong affordability and high demand. The city’s restrained new construction approach is supporting a landlord-friendly environment while keeping renters’ costs stable. Want more regional analysis? Check out our Midwest housing outlook. Corporate Relocations & Supply Decline Shape the 2025 Multifamily Market A major driver of the U.S. apartment market rebound is corporate relocation. Atlanta, Raleigh, and Charlotte are among cities attracting Fortune 500 headquarters, increasing rental demand and strengthening absorption. Simultaneously, multifamily construction has slowed sharply. The National Multifamily Housing Council forecasts a 48% drop in new completions in 2025. This tightening supply will likely stabilize or boost rent prices as demand continues to outpace deliveries. Related: Why corporate moves are transforming rental markets. Final Thoughts on the U.S. Apartment Market Rebound The U.S. apartment market rebound is multifaceted. Florida shows how population growth fuels demand. The West Coast demonstrates tech’s power to reenergize housing. And the Midwest proves affordability remains a major competitive edge. As corporate relocations and supply slowdowns shape what’s next, watching these regional patterns is essential for investors and renters alike.

[xinotsine-3]

Week 9: Digital Citizenship and Software Literacy: Instagram Filters

Hi fellow friends! Have you ever opened Instagram, scrolled through Story filters, and found filters that slimmed your jaw, brightened your eyes, and smoothen your skin to glossy porcelain, and thought about, “Why do I look prettier on Instagram?”. We all rely on beauty filters in our daily lives. It’s not just about beautifying your face; they actually redesigned it. People do not even notice it’s happening, and that’s what makes them so powerful. 

With over 500 million daily Instagram Stories users, filters have become the norm for online self-presentation. Augmented Reality(AR) filters are not just for fun anymore, they have silently grown into a cultural mirror, reflecting and reinforcing an extremely particular and typically unachievable ideal of beauty. The so-called “Instagram Face” is now a thing: a perfect, ambiguously ethnic, almost AI-like combination of characteristics that appears “natural”, but is far from it (Haines 2021). It’s the result of ambient, subtly edited footage that gives you the impression that you’re still you, just better. But the term “better” version comes with a cost. But what happens when you switch back to your original camera? You might feel something wrong with your face. That is not a coincidence, that’s design.

There is a reason why we’re discussing this in the context of digital citizenship and software literacy. Let’s just be honest, when filters become so commonplace that your own natural face feels strange, it’s not just about beauty. It’s all about power, control, identity, and mental wellness; it’s about how apps influence us while claiming to help us. 

Snapchat dysmorphia is a term created to describe what we’re experiencing nowadays. People used to bring photos of celebrities to cosmetic surgeons, now they bring filtered selfies of themselves (Migala 2025). Studies show that more frequent usage of beautifying filters selfies is associated with higher body image problems, particularly among young people. What about the gender divide? Oh, this is real. Guys typically use filters for memes and jokes. Meanwhile girls “expected” to appear cute, faultless, and filter-polished. Even 10-year-olds understand how to perform beauty online.

But, just maybe, there is space to push back. Some people see filters as an opportunity to experiment, challenge binaries, and play with identity. This relates to cyberfeminist theory - Donna Haraway’s cyborg vibes, in which technology can be used for liberation (Haraway 2017). But it isn’t the norm, is it? Most filters simply duplicate the same Western, sleek, white-coded beauty ideal, only now it’s ambient. Filtered to appear natural. Fake, but believable. Real, but only because we have forgotten what it looks like.

You are not a filter. You are not a brand. You are not a glitch.

YOU are YOU. And this is enough.

#MDA20009 #DigitalCitizenship #InstagramFilters #filter #unfilteredselfies

Haraway, D 2017, Key Thinker: Donna Haraway - Rethinking Political Thinkers Resources - Oxford Learning Link, Oup.com, viewed 10 June 2025, https://learninglink.oup.com/access/content/ramgotra-choat1e-resources/ramgotra-choat1e-key-thinker-donna-haraway#:~:text=Haraway%20argues%20that%20the%20fusion,for%20technological%20progress%20(see%2038.2..

Haines, A 2021, From ‘Instagram Face’ To ‘Snapchat Dysmorphia’: How Beauty Filters Are Changing The Way We See Ourselves, Forbes, viewed 9 June 2025, <https://www.forbes.com/sites/annahaines/2021/04/27/from-instagram-face-to-snapchat-dysmorphia-how-beauty-filters-are-changing-the-way-we-see-ourselves/>. 

Migala, J 2025, What Is ‘Snapchat Dysmorphia’? A Detailed Look at the Trend, EverydayHealth.com, viewed 9 June 2025, <https://www.everydayhealth.com/wellness/united-states-of-stress/what-snapchat-dysmorphia-detailed-look-trend/>.