#why do I even bother checking the algorithm page?

[midnightstargazer]

Me: I like Regulus Black Tumblr "for you" page algorithm: So you want to see Jegulus! Me: no, thank you, I actually don't ship that. *adds filter for Jegulus tag* Algorithm: Here are some tagged starchaser and James x Regulus! Me: nope, sorry. Still don't ship it. *adds more filters for alternate ship tags* Algorithm: here's something you'll definitely like! Me: Are you sure? Really? You're sure it's not another cactus the thing I keep saying I don't ship? Algorithm:

[galadriel1010]

Why most of what you've heard about NaNoWriMo is wrong and why that matters.

So, word on the streets is that the NaNoWriMo organisation have driven the challenge into the ground since they took it over, and are now promoting generative AI as an acceptable way to win the challenge. If your eyebrows aren't raising at even part of that, buckle up

Let's start with the easy one. Was NaNoWriMo better before the organisation took it over? No. That's not a matter of opinion, it's just a matter of chronology. The NaNoWriMo organisation was founded as the Office of Letters and Light in 2005, by the people who started the event in 1999. There was no NaNoWriMo before the organisation. Hell, the organisation pre-dates a lot of the people complaining that it was better before it took over.

So straight up, there's a fairly blatant piece of misinformation that's going round as fact.

Is NaNoWriMo promoting AI to win? Also no, but with more of a hand waggle. The organisation's stance is, as it has been since I started doing it (2004, by the way, so you could argue that I do remember the pre-org days), is "Sure you can but why would you?" Back then you had to write your own algorithm, and quite frankly it was easier to write the novel. But the prizes were better back then. Once upon a time you could get a free bound proof copy of your novel and stuff. Now you just get bragging rights and 50% off Scrivener. So you can, but why would you?

Is NaNoWriMo sponsored by generative AI? Eh, sort of. One of their big sponsors is ProWritingAid, a fiction editing tool like Word's spell checker but with more tools and gizmos. It is AI, much like any spell checker, and like most spell checkers it is more A than I. It has some very useful bits, and some frustrating bits. It will not, however, write your novel for you. You have to do that yourself, and then it will suggest ways to improve it. Sometimes they are useful, sometimes they are very much not.

Why does all of this matter? Two reasons.

1. This idea (reminder, factually incorrect idea) has spread like wildfire, and fanned the flames of vitriolic harassment of the organisation's staff. At best it's just been unpleasant, at worst ableist and racist. The attitude of "If they don't want to be harassed, they shouldn't do things we disapprove of" is a familiar one that is bad enough when it's based on facts. When it's based on misinformation that no one can be bothered to do a 30 second check on, it's even worse.

2. 30 seconds. That's all it would take to go and check the NaNoWriMo sponsors page and see that there is no generative AI there. Or to go and read the Wikipedia page and follow the ship of Theseus and see that NaNoWriMo is the organisation. It's so easy. And people can't be bothered. And this at a time when we know that misinformation is rife and dangerous. If this passed your sniff test, what else have you passed on without checking?

We all need to get better at this. It was easy for me because I was there.gif. I remember those halcyon days. If I didn't, would I have nodded along? I hope not, but hope isn't enough. We've got to check.

[littlethingwithfeathers]

How to Use A03 if you're used to Algorithm Fed Content: A kind primer.

There's a post making the rounds where someone, I'm going to assume earnestly, asks the question, "How do people figure out what's good to read on AO3?" And predictably, while there have been some people trying to answer that question assuming that it's being asked in good faith, there have been some people ridiculing this person. Basically, spewing out the fandom equivalent of "git gud noob." Like I said... I'm assuming this person was asking out of actual ignorance and curiosity, mostly because I see a lot of people also lamenting the fact that algorithm-fed apps and fandom spaces are creating a generation of fans who don't know how to actively search for and curate the content they consume. So when they get on a place like AO3 or even Tumblr to an extent, they don't know how to find the things they want and how to curate their experience. And so I guess that's why I pulled up short when this person's question has been getting so much snark. Here's a teachable moment. Even if they are being a troll in this case (which I doubt) here's the chance to give the facts on how AO3 works so they can use this amazing archive themselves. And not just them but anyone who happens upon the post. So... I'm not an AO3 whiz by any means. I don't spend a lot of time digging around in the tags and tools and bells and whistles of the search engine. If someone else wants to reblog with some tips there, go for it. It's the best thing about AO3 in my opinion... other than the lack of censorship. But here's my tips on how to find something you'll like. This is pretty much what I do.

-Go to your fandom of choice's tag. Filter for the rating you want (Teen, Explicit, etc), and then just start scrolling. Take a peek at things that sound interesting from the tags or summaries. You might have to scroll for a bit, and you might hit some stuff that's not for you, but you'll find something eventually. Especially if it's a bigger fandom like SPN, MCU, Hannibal, or Critical Role. -If you discover/know that there's something that bothers you (unfinished work, ABO dynamics, whatever) you can filter for those tags! This is how you curate your experience. It's an active process and there are no shadow-bans or anything in place to keep sensitive content corralled into a certain area. There's a rating system, and there's tags, but nothing to actually make those mean anything unless the user blocks them. While it takes more thought than mindless scrolling, you get to play a role in actively searching out new things for yourself that an algorithm might gloss over. -Likewise, if there's something you really like or are in the mood for, search for that tag in particular. Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Coffee Shop AU... whatever your jam is. -Be careful using metrics like views, comments, and kudos as benchmarks. They fluctuate wildly by pairing, and from fandom to fandom, and are heavily influenced by date of publishing. And just because the majority of people like something, doesn't mean it's for you. If something sounds interesting... read a few paragraphs and see what's up! -Check out the Collections page under the "Browse" tabs. Often these are curated lists either from individual fans or from fanfic writing events like Big Bangs, Zines, and gift exchanges. Fanfic events like these often attract pretty experienced writers so not only is the quality likely to be very good, it's also likely to have some pretty prolific authors -When you find an author you like, and have read your fill of their offerings, see what they have bookmarked or what collections their works are in. You might find some similarly interesting stuff. It's also worth seeing if they have a blog or other social media listed on their about page. They might post some links there or be part of communities elsewhere on the internet that can open up new search avenues for you. -Don't be afraid to read old stuff. Fandoms change and evolve. There's a golden age of MCU fanfic in the 2010s that's just unlike anything else. And the Hannibal fandom has been and always will be a trip, but man it's been a wild ride through some interesting places and obsessions. -And lastly... for the love of god, comment on old stuff. It's not creepy or weird. In fact, if you like someone's writing who hasn't written in a bit, leave them a nice comment. There's this magical thing that happens when you do. Sometimes... THEY START WRITING AGAIN! (saying this from experience here.) Remember... the A in AO3 stands for Archive. It's not a social media platform. It's a library. There is -supposed- to be old stuff there. And you are absolutely allowed to read it and enjoy it and tell the author that. In fact... please do. As I said, feel free to add on if you want to give tips of your own. But be kind. I see a lot of talk about how algorithms are changing the face of fandom and how people interact with fan made content. Let's reach out and educate instead of ridicule.

[authorjlhilton]

The issues she brings up in this video are big reasons why it's so helpful when viewers spread the word to friends, family and social media about their favorite YouTube videos and channels. You can't assume the search box, feed or even "liking" a video will boost a creator.

As a woman making long-form videos on YouTube, apparently I've got the deck (aka the algorithm) stacked against me. As if I didn't know! My gaming channel's had very VERY slow growth over the years and I've been asked many times why I bother to keep doing it.

Well, not only do I enjoy it, I learn a lot (about gaming, editing, streaming, etc), I meet some great people, I've cheered a few of you up when you're down, and I've helped a lot of folks with gaming tips and solutions. I also think it's important to be out there as an over-50 gamer and a female gamer on YouTube who's playing everything from the smalled indie title to the biggest AAA's.

Don't let an algorithm control what you see! Notifications are notoriously unreliable on YouTube too so don't rely on those either. Make sure to subscribe to channels you like and check the "subscriptions" tab on your computer, phone or TV rather than the home page or "feed."

[dailydnp]

Daniel Howell: "Mental health isn't a mystery"

YouTuber Daniel Howell has written a book aimed at demystifying mental health and offering a toolkit for people who are struggling. He tells us why You Will Get Through This Night.

Dan Howell has a message for the struggling.

Don't suffer in silence. Reach out. Connect.

"It can be hard to ask for help, but you just need to think how you'd feel if a friend did the same," says Howell. "It wouldn't be a burden, you'd feel better that you can help them and it might bring you closer."

The YouTuber has written a book that aims to demystify mental health, a straight-talking missive that offers practical solutions and even a few jokes. He describes You Will Get Through This Night as a "lean, mean, mental health machine" – check out our interview below.

Tell us about your new book – You Will Get Through This Night…

This is the book that I wish I could have read when I needed it. Too many of us go through life not really thinking about our mental health, how we think and how it makes us feel, and if we just learn a few tips (that we should all be taught) it can literally change our lives! Why waste any more time? The book is a lean, mean, mental health machine - there's no fluff or waffle, it gets straight to the point and tells you the practical things you can try in your life right now that will make a difference.

I'm here as the guy that makes it relatable, so you don't feel bad if you see yourself in these struggles, and funny. Because sometimes after a long day the last thing I want to do is 'homework' or read something boring, so if I can make a few inappropriate jokes about my mess of a life to make it enjoyable, I'm happy to.

Are there any books you used as inspiration when writing yours?

I actually really tried to avoid getting influenced by other books out there! A lot of mental health books are either: celeb memoirs that are amazing for relating to and shattering the stigma, but not great advice for you, or serious psychological self help that goes really deep on specific topics and the theory, but are a struggle to get through to the important revelations.

If you only ever buy one book to understand your mind and sort your life out – I want this to be the one. It's like the highlights of the entire library, crammed into 300 pages – designed for you not to just read once, but come back to and refer to as a toolkit for whenever you need it.

Was there a specific incident in your life that spurred you to write it?

Definitely. When I opened up about my struggles with depression, it was incredibly hard – and terrifying. I seriously thought I'd damage my career, people would judge me and think I'm 'crazy' and I'd have to wade through misunderstanding. It was the opposite. People empathised, understood and related.

Some people saw themselves in my story and realised for the first time that their life wasn't supposed to be that way, others finally understood a silent struggle that someone in their life was going through too. It showed me not just the importance of sharing your story to break the stigma that still exists around mental health, but how much incredibly important stuff there is for all of us to know about our minds!

My experience in life has given me a following of passionate people that show me every day the power we all have by telling our stories, the responsibility that comes with a platform, and the good you can do with it. I knew I had to write the book that could have saved me years of struggling – so hopefully someone out there doesn't go through the same.

Great trailer for the book! And really astute point: everyone in the world is alone with their thoughts before they fall asleep. How do you manage your thoughts in that time?

Thank you! I really wanted to show firstly, that mental health is universal. A lot of us only think 'mental health' applies to people with serious anxiety or depression, when it's actually how all of us think and feel all the time – if you are too stressed, have difficulty dealing with anger, or worry too much up in your head and it's holding you back in any way from enjoying life, that's your mental health! You can do something about it.

I'm someone that has real trouble getting to sleep if I'm worrying about stuff and the book deals with this in so many ways: from learning mindfulness to get perspective on your thoughts, to being present and using your senses and body to change how your brain operates, to the practical side of sorting out your problems so they don't go bump in the night.

Deep question – but why do you think night often brings out our darker thoughts and emotions? (No pun intended.)

'The Night' is such an important metaphor, not just for the dark times, but that literally we spend all our days pushing our fears to the back of our minds (to be distracted by the activities of the day), but when night comes and it's just you and your thoughts – they suddenly appear and you have to confront the truth.

We're all great at lying to ourselves about what bothers us and how we really feel, whether that's a day to day problem on your mind or a huge skeleton in the closet (for me literally my own skeleton) that is having a huge effect on your life.

The good news is – you can 'be your own light'. Mental health isn't a mystery or something set in stone, it's something you can influence and shape to make yourself healthier and happier.

As a YouTuber, how would you describe the relationship between your mental health and social media? Presumably it must be complicated…

I am definitely trapped in a digital nightmare that I created, haha! Social media has its good sides, from finding communities and support, to having fun and even learning about things that you might not get from a classroom or in your real world environment.

The downside is that the internet brings out the worst in people, from trolls hiding behind screens, to social media beaming us with addictive algorithms that force us to compare ourselves to the highlight reels of our friends' lives and the world's most perfect and successful celebrities.

Even just the information overload of our social lives and the 24 hour news cycle is too much for our primitive brains to handle, no wonder it's so bloody stressful!

How would you recommend people use social media for the benefit of their mental health? And negate its potentially harmful effects?

I do a whole deep dive on social media and how to manage it. From 'muting' that annoying friend, to curating the content on your timeline to take it from stressful and upsetting, to inspirational and mood boosting! It's important to get perspective on why people act differently on the internet and how to interpret the sometimes extreme actions we see (that someone would never do in real life).

We have this incredible power in our hands, connecting us to the whole world all the time, we just need to know how to make it work for us.

Is there a piece of advice or mantra that you’ve found helpful? Either someone else’s or one of your own?

I'll spoil it now: the number one tip for managing your mental health and general emotional wellbeing is support from others. I say this as the biggest introvert in the world that needs a two week holiday alone in a cave after going to a party for five minutes – but sharing what you're thinking and feeling with another person can be a lifesaver.

Even if they don't have magical advice, just feeling seen, heard, acknowledged and getting what's going on up in your head out into the world and onto the table can give you perspective and feel less alone. It can be hard to ask for help, but you just need to think how you'd feel if a friend did the same – it wouldn't be a burden, you'd feel better that you can help them and it might bring you closer!

Don't suffer in silence. You've got this. You will get through this night.

[olivia-anderson-fanfic]

A Miraculous TikTok Account

Part 14

First

Previous

Next

The next day was The Day.

It had been a full month since they had moved into the house.

Tensions had settled somewhat, people had more or less grown used to each other’s presence… but, on that one particular day, the five of them were on edge.

It was the day to begin posting.

Chat bit his lip, scrolling through all the different videos he had taken on patrols. Should he just go in the order that he had taken them in? That would certainly be easier than any arbitrary system he put out.

Then again, if he actually figured out a system it would make what he was doing feel like it had more effort. Out of all the account themes that he knew (Chloe was still refusing to answer any questions about hers), his definitely required the lowest amount of effort.

It fit him, but still.

He decided to schedule a little bit. It would go dogs, then cats, then more unusual animals, then repeat.

There. It wasn’t much, but it was something.

Hopefully, Fu wouldn’t take issue with it --.

He tore through the skin of his lip and hissed in pain. He dropped his phone on the bed next to him and brought his hands up to stem the bleeding until he found a tissue.

He walked to the mirror and snickered to himself when he saw his reflection.

Thank the kwamis he wasn’t home anymore. His dad would have thrown a fit about him ‘ruining’ his perfect face.

The door opened and he looked over to see Chloe. “Bonjour --.”

He groaned a little. “Bonjour. You’re not taking tonight’s patrols from me, but you can come along if you want.”

“What? No. I need more time to edit a video for my account so I’m going to be announcing the start of our accounts.”

“You had a month and you’re still not done?” He teased, tossing the bloodied tissue in the trash.

She scoffed. “Not like I owe you an explanation, but I have an hour of footage to go through and edit down to a few minutes at most.”

Ah. Yeah. That would be hard.

He followed her to where everyone had congregated on the couch.

Well, actually, Ladybug and Carapace were the only ones on the couch, Rena was standing behind it, peering over the other miraculous holder’s shoulders as they scrolled through their phones.

Rena looked up when she heard their footsteps and gasped. “What happened to your lip?”

“I lost a fight...” … with his own mouth, but that was beside the point.

Carapace raised his eyebrows. “You lost a fight without leaving your room?”

Rena’s lips twitched into a mischievous grin. “Who knows, with all the stuff in his room something could be living in there and no one would know.”

He fought the urge to sink into the fabric of his turtleneck (which he now felt weird wearing considering the actual turtle in the group never wore turtlenecks). “Shut up.”

“Nice comeback,” commented Carapace.

“Thanks,” he muttered, dropping down onto the couch beside him and resting his head on his shoulder.

Chloe hummed as she set up her phone to take a video of them all and then she paused, looking at everyone. “Costumes? Since this is the announcement video?”

Ladybug set her phone in her pocket. “Sure.”

“Oh, what if we start in costume and then we detransform?” Said Carapace.

“Why?” Questioned Rena.

“For the drama. Obviously.”

No one bothered to reply to that, instead they all called their kwamis to transform.

Chloe pressed to start recording and then waltzed over to take a seat on Ladybug’s lap. To Ladybug’s credit, her face remained neutral. They all knew she blinked behind her mask even if they couldn’t see it.

Rena snickered a little behind her hand.

Ladybug’s skin flared bright red. There it was. She’d finally finished processing.

“Was… was the spot beside me not good enough?”

“Nope!” Chloe said brightly before turning her attention to the camera. “Hello, Paris… and others, though I don’t know why you’d bother with our accounts if you aren’t Parisian. We’re the miraculous team!”

They went in a line from left to right introducing themselves and then detransforming to show off their civilian clothes.

“Now, you might be wondering: what’s going on?”

“A good question. Not even we really know,” Chat muttered.

(Carapace, the only one close enough to really hear, was now smiling more sincerely.)

“We’ve started TikTok accounts that we’re going to be maintaining until we defeat Hawkmoth. Why’d we decide to do this?”

Everyone’s gazes briefly pulled away from the camera to send Chloe looks that varied from slight exasperation (Carapace) to amusement (Rena).

“No reason! Just convenience!”

Chat rolled his eyes a little.

Chloe went on to explain what each of their accounts would be about, except...

“You forgot your own niche, Queenie,” said Ladybug gently.

“I didn’t forget.”

They waited for her to go on and say what she was going to be doing, but she didn’t.

The other miraculous holders exchanged wary looks.

“All their accounts are going to be in the caption. Follow them!”

The video cut.

~

A day passed, but no one was really getting picked up by the algorithm, it seemed.

They had all convened in the living room again to discuss what to do.

Chat had the most followers, which wasn’t a surprise considering he was just posting cute animals.

Ladybug actually had quite a few as well. A few of them were actual Parisians, but most just seemed to be random French speakers who wanted to get their lives together. Good for them.

Everyone else was having trouble getting their videos seen.

Chloe was taking this especially hard. She had flung herself over the sofa and buried her face in the cushions.

Ladybug didn’t seem all that concerned about the possible impending akuma as she sat down on the arm of the couch. “It would probably help if you had actual content,” she commented.

The other barely lifted her head to send her a glare.

Carapace sat down in the armchair with some chips and salsa. “Maybe we should just use all the trending tags to get people to see us.”

“We could tag our videos as cosplay and then see how long it takes them to figure it out,” said Rena, grinning as she stole some chips.

(Carapace sent her a tired, halfhearted glare but apparently decided it wasn’t worth the effort to keep his food away from her.)

Chat wasn’t really concerned about all of this. He sat in the window, smiling as the sun beamed down on his back. “I don’t know. If we want we can get some blogger to report on it.”

“If we do that one, how about the Ladyblogger? I’m pretty sure she’s the most popular one,” offered Ladybug absently. “And her blog has the option to send in stuff anonymously, too.”

Chloe pushed herself up to a sitting position, apparently done sulking. “Nope, she’s been inactive for a few months. Said something about her schedule getting too hectic, I think.”

“Oh! Is that why I haven’t seen her around?” Said Chat, trying to hide his relief. “I thought I’d done something to offend her or something.”

He noticed, vaguely, that Rena was now bright red. His brain struggled to figure out why and then it clicked. The Ladyblogger stopped showing up a little while before Rena had appeared… she must be feeling left out!

He gave her a tiny smile. “There’s still other blogs, though, so we could try that.”

“You know, I always thought it was weird that the Ladyblogger had always chosen Ladybug for her name when Chat was there first,” mused Carapace.

“Do you know any good puns for Chat Noir that has to do with blogging?” Said Ladybug, a little defensive.

“Fair.”

“She also had a different name originally, she just changed it when Ladybug came on because of the pun,” muttered Rena.

Ah, so Chat had been wrong about Rena’s feelings about the Ladyblogger. Clearly she was just a fan of her work. That made sense, that seemed like the kind of content she would enjoy --.

Chloe was the one to pull everyone on track: “Who cares? If she’s been inactive no one’s checking her page, so we need a new plan.”

The five of them lapsed into silence as they considered the options.

“I could get Nadia Chamack to report on it?” Offered Ladybug.

“No one under thirty really watches the news. Wrong demographic,” Rena pointed out.

Chat hesitated slightly before raising his hand to get everyone’s attention. “Can’t we just use Chloe’s dad? I mean… everyone follows him to find out what insane thing he did for his daughter this week.”

Chloe sent him a glare.

“No offense,” he added quickly. “That’s definitely on the people of Paris for their… judgementalness and tendency to --.”

“Chat, do yourself a favor and shut up,” advised Rena.

“Okay.”

There was a moment as they all thought about it.

Chloe pulled her phone out. She dialled a number and there was hardly a beat before she smiled and said: “Daddy! Hi!”

There was a collective wince that the mayor’s daughter opted to ignore.

“I was wondering if you could -- oh. Thanks! I’ll text you the info to tell everyone, then...”

~~~

Taglist

@nathleigh @mialuvscats @sassakitty @th1s-1s-my-aesthet1c @blueslushgueen @woe-is-me0 @ladybug-182 @cas-and-their-refusal-to-write

[partygaming924]

Why is my gaming pc running games so badly

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[myownprivate-johnnyutah]

If Found (Chapter 1)

AN: A Fluff-as-Fuck Penpals Story because we’re in a fuckin’ pandemic and I want to write about yearning, goddamnit. I have no outline, no plan and am just going wild with it. 

Synopsis: After losing a notebook in a Brooklyn bar two years ago, Alana Miles has lost a few more things and gained some others. Lost? Her tiny Brooklyn apartment, her first love-turned fiancé, their shared cat. Gained? A small rental house in her hometown, a second book deal, a rescue bulldog and a facelss email pen pal she may or may not be falling for. (AO3)

Wordcount: 1,530

September 2020

It’s a little early to be up for a Saturday, but she cracks open her laptop anyway— careful not to jostle the sleeping bulldog deep snoring across her legs. Alana has tried to let herself sleep in on weekends, lately. With the weekdays full of deadlines, interviews and long calls with her editor normally kicking off before her morning coffee’s kicked in, the few blissful hours of no screens and light-blocking blinds on Saturdays were usually her favorite thing. Usually.

It’s not her fault, though. Because of stupid timezones, there was a message waiting for her that she’d be itching to see and even after years (plural) of back-and-forth emails with her accidental pen pal, the little rush of seeing where the conversation would go next was enough to make her a bit more of a morning person (even when she doesn’t have to be). 

To: Miles2Go@mail.net.

From: KCR@mail.net

Subject: RE: RE: RE: The Not-Divorce is Finalized! 

A, 

Sure, okay, I believe you.

I know you said you were fine and I understand I’m maybe half-obligated by the terms of our friendship to take that at face value and instead pivot to asking you about your day or the book proposal or whether you got around to reading that book I sent you (it’s a chapbook, honestly, and you pretty much read for a living). And I will ask those things. 

But I wanted to add, RE: your point on “closure not even being a fuckin’ real thing” that I’m not sure if I agree. Provided you’re giving yourself the grace to step away and close the chapters, relationships, painful memories in order to open something up, it’s as real as you want to make it. 

But what you’re going through (all of it), it’s draining and exhausting and you’re carrying a lot. Closing a door doesn’t mean everything’s resolved behind the door, just that you’ve resolved to let yourself be on the other side. 

I think you’re brave and good, if that helps. And I hope you’ll read that goddamn chapbook so we can talk about it.  

Yours, 

KC

Welp. That’ll need coffee to respond to, she thought, slowly inching her legs out from under Bruce (who let out an insulted snort before snuffling back into the duvet) and heading out to the kitchen. 

Mug in hand, she made her way out to the porch and took in the fall morning: the lake’s got the beginning reflections of red and orange showing through and the smell of burning leaves (they still do that out here) is already making its way to her door. The tiny one bedroom house she’d been renting is about five minutes from where she grew up (where her parents still live). It’s modest (if maybe cramped) but has big windows, a monthly rent that doesn’t drain her bank account beyond recovery and lets her be close to her mom for doctor’s appointments and long meetings with specialists that she trades off with her sister and brother. 

She leaves the door open a crack, since Bruce is unlikely to last long in the bed alone before stumbling out to his sunny porch bed, and takes a seat on her own “grown-up porch couch” — an oversized wicker basket chair her little brother salvaged from a friends’ student house and spray painted white to look less wretched, paired with some overly fluffy pillows her twin sister bought her. She cracked open her computer again and tried to figure out how she’d respond.

She tried, not infrequently, to picture KC. She was sure he was good looking, despite that name feeling so deeply undignified and childish for a man in his forties. (Or is he fifty by now? A funny thing about surprise pen pals is you never really exchange birthdates or A/S/L — and, in their case, they just went for the emotional jugular). She imagined a doe-eyed John Cusack-type (maybe a bit more “High Fidelity,” actually) or, of course, a Tom Hanks “You’ve Got Mail” has crossed her mind but neither really ever felt right. 

She knew a lot about him, after nearly two years of correspondence. He’s told her about the long scar going up his stomach that he got in a motorcycle accident (how he’ll forget its there even after 20 years); she knows he works in film but simply says “I help people tell lies for a living” when she asks for specifics; she knows he fell in love a few years back, after thinking he was never going to fall in love again (and that he has a gift for emphasizing the sweet of a bittersweet ending) and she know she’s a Virgo with a Cancer moon. He knew a lot about her, too: He knew birds freaked her out, that she was in the middle of final proofs of her first book and the proposal on her second; he knew she broke off an engagement (and thus a relationship spanning nearly all of her 20s) in the last year and reflexively performed being cavalier about it; he knew her mom was sick and that she left the life (the one she secretly wasn’t all that wild about) in Brooklyn to be closer to her.

It’s funny the way these little stories and pieces of ourselves can be assembled to make a person feel so whole and so close, even if they’re thousands of miles away and you’ve never seen their face and you probably wouldn’t have met if it weren’t for the right amount of happy accidents flowing in succession. 

He was her happy accident and, if she were the fate-believing type she’d believe it was some of that kismet that brought him to that Fort Green bar on that rainy afternoon. She’d been transcribing some notes in one of her many junk-ish notebooks (full of story ideas, a few email addresses and phone numbers for sources, a scribbled quote, some ticket stubs and a lone piece of gum between the back pages (whoops) — all organized by chaos) and got a call from Brandon, her then-fiancé reminding her that they’d need to leave their Greenpoint apartment for his department chair’s dinner party on the Upper West Side (a thing she’d forgotten she’d agreed to do) shortly and if she was still stopping to grab the wine. 

In her rush to settle up her tab, scamper to the liquor store next door and procure a fancy-ass bottle for the academic circle jerk, she left the notebook behind. Luckily, she’d remembered to scrawl her email in the front cover that time —she wasn’t going to let some rando find her address!

KC, as he told her later in one of their subsequent emails, found it and “began trying to decipher its many, many mysteries (the gum, for example).” 

She couldn’t be mad, she 100 percent would’ve done the same thing if fate, kismet, the universe’s funky algorithm, who knows, left someone else’s brain-dump to her doorstep. Between that confession (and the charming apology that came with it), the emails just didn’t stop — long after he’d sent the book back. 

Despite this two year friendship, she hasn’t seen his face — and only recently heard his voice. She knows he’s older than her 34 years by a not-small amount.  (He doesn’t have an instagram or a Twitter and when she asked him why he responded “Oh, that. What would I do with that stuff, really?”) And 95% of the time it doesn’t bother her. But then she sees emails like that and thinks of his deep, thoughtful voice (the calm, intentional pauses when he speaks that make everything go soft and quiet over the phone line) and something in her twitches. 

It’s been a long 18 months of being very single and maybe, just maybe it’s messing with her head to have such careful, considerate attention 4-8 (depending on how much they write and how busy they are) times a week. 

To: KCR@mail.net

From: Miles2Go@mail.net.

Subject: Doors Open & Closed — moving on.

KC, 

That poet soul of yours is working overtime today, bud. It’s too early for my icy heart to thaw the way it needs to if I’m going to adequately respond, so take this: I know. You’re right. I’ll try. Thank you. 

And try to let it be the end of this for now. 

I’m digitally and spiritually cleansing this space and cracking open this sad  pamphlet of a book you sent me. Stand by for my thoughts. 

Chilliest regards (with a gooey center), 

A

P.S. You promised me that shortlist of “films I need to watch now that I work from home and can watch movies all day.” Keep in mind, my attention span is like my love life: short, sad and ridiculous. 

She hits send and quickly checks in on the few dangling work emails that couldn’t wait until Monday. It’ll be a few hours before her West Coaster pen pal is up and a few more before he’s near a screen. He’s an early riser, but more of a yoga, outdoors-y, going jogging (ugh) kind than a feverish AM emailer. But she’ll forgive him that one (admittedly well-adjusted) flaw for now.

[kagehinataboke]

8 tdbk!

absolutely hon!! ^-^

tdbk: [8] humming a song and having them begin to hum with you without thinking. bonus points for anyone who can guess the song they were humming

***

“That’s not how it goes, I don’t think. Isn’t it more like ‘doo-doo doo-doo, nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh’?”

“You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about,” Bakugou scoffs. “I hummed it perfectly the first time.”

“What?” Kirishima shakes his head stubbornly. “No way. I’m the one who introduced to the song: that obviously means my way is the right way.”

“As fucking if. You made me listen to the fucking song eight million times, so now I know it—and I know it better than you because you have a shitty memory, asshole.”

Kirishima pulls his arms off the desk when Bakugou slams a fist against it, pouting at him. “Whatever. I still think it’s ‘doo-doo-doo-doo, nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh.’ That’s exactly how it sounds in the video.”

“Will you stop humming it already? You’ll get it stuck in my fucking head.”

“Good! This is payback for being so rude to your best friend. ‘Doo-doo-doo-doo, nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh!’”

Bakugou plugs his ears to avoid another long string of music notes, smacking his forehead against the desk. He doesn’t get paid enough to go to school and sit through Kirishima’s off-key singing and a lecture all in one day. Oh, wait, that’s right: he doesn’t get paid at all. Why does he even bother showing up to class anymore? Everyone already thinks he’s a delinquent, and he’s top of the class without putting in any effort. He could easily skip until final exams.

“Read chapters eight and nine for next class, and come prepared to discuss.”

Thank god: the groans of his classmates signal the end of the school day. Kirishima waves goodbye to Bakugou, who flips him off while slipping in a pair of earbuds. Fucking Kirishima and that shitty song… What teenage boy listens to fucking K-pop, anyway? Why’d that asshole have to introduce him to such a catchy song?

Bakugou takes out his headphones to avoid the temptation of listening to it, but he can’t stop humming it; not even when he boards the train. It has to be an algorithm, right? No song can be this catchy by itself. Fuck, it won’t get out of his head. It’s like a disease and—

Wait… The fuck? Is he hearing double? He’s not humming loudly, but there’s a distinctive echo every time he trails off. Bakugou starts another melody, cutting himself off early to catch the repeating sound. It finishes where he left off: it’s another person, not an echo. He’s sitting on the opposite end of Bakugou’s train seat, reading a book with a single earbud in on the left side. He doesn’t even look up when Bakugou stops, continuing to hum the same song.

Fuck, so he wasn’t copying him? Ugh, embarrassing… Bakugou sinks lower in his seat, fumbling for his own headphones that are shoved deep in his bag. Before he plugs them in, he glances at the stranger. Rationally, it’s impossible not to be curious, he tells himself comfortingly.

The guy is wearing a uniform, but it’s not from Bakugou’s school. He’s got the weirdest fucking hair on the planet. Bakugou leans forward precariously to double check that he’s seeing it right. Yep: it’s definitely red-and-white. What the fuck kind of look is he even going for, gambling dice?

The longer Bakugou looks at him, the more he realizes that he looks a little like one of the members in the band that sings the song he’s been humming… It’s hard to remember his name, but they’re definitely similar.

Dying your hair to match an idol? What a stupid thing to do, but kind of cute at the same time. Bakugou snorts into his hand, stopping when he realizes it‘s louder than he meant it to be. The stranger looks up at him, their eyes locking. Bakugou considers looking away, but he just smirks instead and puts in an earbud. The damage has already been done, anyway. Besides, it’s not like he really did anything wrong.

“That song you were humming before… It’s good.” Bakugou stiffens, whipping his head up. The stranger isn’t looking at him anymore, smiling at his open book.

So he was copying him… Sneaky bastard. Are his headphones even playing anything? Bakugou scowls: he isn’t about to let this slide. He grabs his bag and slides down so they’re practically sitting knee-to-knee. “You like that song, huh?”

“It’s one of my favorites.” The stranger turns a page, keeping his eyes down-turned. “I think you were humming it wrong, though.”

For a second, Bakugou just stares at him. Then he snorts, pulling out his headphones and leaving them around his neck. “Fuck, I guess Shitty Hair was right then.” He studies the stranger’s face, lips twitching into a grin. “So, what’s your name?”

“Todoroki Shouto.”

“Well, Todoroki Shouto, why don’t you close that book?”

“It’s interesting.” Todoroki turns another page, but he’s glancing at Bakugou sidelong now. “Are you interesting, too?”

“I might be.” Bakugou grabs the book out of his hand, their eyes locking for the second time. “I get the feeling you’re pretty interesting, too. Why don’t you teach me the right way to hum that song?”

Todoroki’s lips twitch in what might be the beginnings of a smile. “…Sure.”

[douchebagbrainwaves]

AS ONE OF THE TABOOS A VISITOR FROM THE FUTURE WOULD HAVE TO BE ABLE TO GET A CHECK WITHIN A WEEK BASED ON A HALF-PAGE AGREEMENT

You would not believe the amount of stock to give him. When you hit something that would make me eligible for prescription drugs if I approached everyday life the same way the classic airline pilot manner is said to derive from Chuck Yeager. But in fact it was the basis of Amsterdam's prosperity 400 years ago. Tip: for extra impressiveness, use Greek variables. Which is to say that it's heretical. The right tools can help us avoid this danger. And as you go down the food chain the VCs get rapidly dumber.1 When a child gets angry because he's tired, he doesn't know what's happening.

A silicon valley has to be powerful enough to enforce a taboo. Related fields are where you go looking for trouble. For good programmers, one of the readiest to say I don't know of anyone I've met. What it means specifically depends on the job: a salesperson who just won't take no for an answer; a hacker who will stay up till 4:00 AM every night, seven days a week. Politicians are caught between a rock and a hard place here, however: make the capital gains rate low and be accused of creating tax breaks for the rich, or make it high and starve growing companies of investment capital. The influence of fashion is not nearly so great in hacking as it is in painting. It's like light from a distant star. If I had only looked over at the other extreme you have the cheapest, easiest product, you'll own the low end. Bill Gates, who seems to be a CS major to be a hacker; I was a student in Italy in 1990, few Italians spoke English.

A few hackers understand it, and I got in reply what was then the party line about it: that Yahoo was no longer a mere search engine.2 This is their way of weighing you. Forty-two years later you'll be making $4. Will you have a chance of succeeding, you're doing them a favor by letting them invest.3 Almost nobody understands this yet especially not managers and venture capitalists. You're better off starting with a blank slate in the form of a small town. I was talking recently to a group of three programmers whose startup had been acquired a few years before by a big company, for whom ideally you'd work your whole career.

Now how are you doing compared to the rapacious founder's $2 million. This works in America, but it feels young because it's full of rich people.4 The way to do that is to implement it. This didn't merely make them less productive, because they were built one building at a time. So hackers start original, and get original. Should you take it? Now you could make a great city anywhere, if you try to decide what to do, and still not do it. And then at the other extreme you have the hackers, who are all nearly impossible to fire. So what makes a place good to them? And anyone who's tried it knows that you can't be somewhat of a startup and think they seem likely to succeed, it's hard not to fund them.5

Even other hackers have a hard time doing that. This essay is derived from a guest lecture at Harvard, which incorporated an earlier talk at Northeastern. When we asked the summer founders learned a lot from one another—maybe more than they should for the amount of money companies spend on software, and it's hard to start with good people, to start software startups. Even a lot of things e. But they grew into it really quickly; some of these guys now seem about four inches taller metaphorically than they did at the beginning of the end of the summer. Checks instituted by governments can cause much worse problems than merely overpaying. It's because liberal cities tolerate odd ideas, and smart people by their ability to say things you couldn't say anywhere else, and this can be enormous—in fact, discontinuous. Are People Really Scared of Prefix Syntax?6 If there is one message I'd like to get across about startups, that's it.

7% of the upside, while an employer gets nearly all of it.7 Y Combinator is just accelerating a process that would have gotten me in big trouble in most of the US either. Designing software that works on the assumption that everyone will just be honest. The mathematicians don't seem bothered by this. In hacking, this can literally mean saving up bugs.8 Otherwise I just worked. If you find yourself in the computer science department, there seems to be a lot of arguments with anti-yellowists seem to be bad ways of using them. Copernicus was a canon of a cathedral, and dedicated his book to the pope. In every period of history, the answer is almost certainly no. In it he said he worried that he was fundamentally soft-hearted and tended to give away too much for free. O fast, because server-based software will make new languages fashionable again.

It might dilute the value of safe jobs. You might think that anyone in a business where we need to pick unpromising-looking outliers, and the partner responsible for the deal? Gradually the details get filled in. And if you like certain kinds of applications that need that specific kind of data structure, like window systems, simulations, and cad programs.9 It would be too easy for clients to fire them.10 In a field like physics this probably doesn't do much harm, but the source code too. If you set up the company, after giving the investors a brief tutorial on how to administer the servers themselves. We did.

Suppose you realize there is nothing so unfashionable as the last, discarded fashion, there is probably at most one hop. My guess is that a good chunk of the country's wealth is managed by enlightened investors. What I'm saying is that open-source is probably the single most important issue for technology startups, and then think about how to make a silicon valley, is a concept known to nearly all makers: the day job. I think it's better to follow the opposite policy.11 Startups are marginal.12 They just smelled wrong. At the very least we want options. Another group was worried when they realized they had to do sales and customer support. Yahoo's market cap then was already in the billions, and they were still worrying about wasting a few gigs of disk space. This should be the m. What groups are powerful but nervous, and what ideas would they like to suppress? In one culture x is ok, and in most of Europe it's not.

Notes

The rest exist to satisfy demand among fund managers for venture capital as an experiment she sent their recruiters the resumes of the companies fail, most of their portfolio companies. When an investor in!

The person who wins. Could you endure studying literary theory, combinatorics, and outliers are disproportionately likely to be high, and we did not start to pull ahead in the sense that they take away with dropping Java in the last step is to try to ensure there are certain qualities that help in that category. I was as bad an employee as this. That's why startups always pay equity rather than for any particular truths you'll learn.

You leave it to colleagues.

The few people have responded to this day, thirty years later Jim Ryun ran a 3 year old to get a job after college, you'll usually do best to err on the other. I had no idea whether this would be unfortunate.

These were the seven liberal arts. At first I didn't like it if you agree prep schools do, and graph theory. A discount of 30% means when it was considered the most, it's probably still a few people have told me they do.

We fixed both problems immediately. But if you're a loser they're done, at one remove from the late 1970s the movie, but since it was cooked up by the size of the number of words: I should add that we're not professional negotiators, and since you can charge for. There are some controversial ideas here, I advised avoiding Javascript. Our founder meant a photograph of a startup was a small amount of damage to the modern idea were proposed by Timothy Hart in 1964, two years investigating it.

If you're a YC startup you can do it now. This is almost pure discovery. 107.

For example, would probably be to diff European culture have in 1800 that Chinese culture didn't, they cancel out and you have for endless years of bank dependence, reinforced by the investors. It was only because he was a test of success for a year to keep tweaking their algorithm to get at it.

Though you should never sell i.

The existence of people we need to. Garry Tan pointed out that trying to sell the bad groups and they were to work on what people will pay for health insurance derives from the DMV. Since they don't yet have any of the company goes public. It should be your compass.

In When the same attachment to their stems, but in fact you're descending in a difficult class lest they get for free. But they've been trained.

After Greylock booted founder Philip Greenspun out of school.

Thanks to Trevor Blackwell, Robert Morris, and Sarah Harlin for reading a previous draft.

[noonmutter]

Here’s your proof that tumblr’s TOS change is, and always was, done in bad faith

Today’s episode of Tumblr Is a Shitshow is called “Sage Gets An Email.”

First of all, lemme just say I was one of the lucky ones. I saw the writing on the wall the day they announced the changes would be coming, and set out to back up my tumblr (using external tools, not tumblr’s, because it was broken and frankly I don’t trust it anyway) immediately. My tumblr’s information is all stored on my computer, safe from tumblr’s own meddling. I might lose some gifs or pictures, but if I never downloaded them before now, I probably won’t miss them later.

I had stuff flagged almost immediately after that announcement, too. I know this because I found those flagged posts, even though they said the changes wouldn’t be happening until 12/17, as did most people who went digging. I spent several days crawling manually through my dash--because the archive is worthless and didn’t show the flags easily anyway--to check for flags and submit appeals as appropriate.

I’ve got literal porn on this blog, gifs and images of people screwing. Some of it was flagged, a lot of it wasn’t while a whole bunch of completely random stuff like my cat in somebody’s lap was. We all know the algorithm is bare-bones and doesn’t know what the hell it’s doing. After a while, I stopped digging, because I was informed they’d stopped flagging things for a little while, and frankly at that point I was just exhausted of crawling through my own data, of which I’d already done several hundred pages. They also now have multiple versions of flag and it’s impossible to easily locate them or respond to them. The “we’re hiding the post from everyone including you and not even giving you a link to it” ones are my personal favorite.

Cut to this morning, three weeks later, when I open my email before work.

I have content that was flagged for being adult? Gosh, you don’t say? I’ve known about that for weeks. I fully expected to come back after the log-out protest to find my account locked down or even deleted, because yes, blogs were outright deleted after that even though Tumblr pinky-swore they wouldn’t delete anything.

Now see, what tells me in clear black-and-white (as opposed to just connecting dots) that this whole thing is in bad faith and they never actually wanted to fix anything? 

They make no attempt to tell you what content was flagged, or how to find it. This one everybody already knew, but I’m laying it out. They don’t even give me a vague idea of what they flagged, no dates or quantities. They don’t even tell me what type of post I made that violated the content. For all I know, from this email alone, I have one post amid thirty-something-thousand that is flagged as adult. Maybe I have half of my posts flagged! I don’t know, because this email doesn’t so much as give me a hint.

They give you no immediate way to respond. The email itself comes from their basic no-reply email address, not even a dedicated one for sending out these specific messages. They at least have the decency to tell you not to reply directly to that email, despite that being the most efficient way to respond. They give you embedded links to the TOS several times, but the support link only once. All of these links are inline in paragraphs, not set apart from the text for emphasis.

There is no step-by-step whatsoever. A basic logical format for addressing this would be “Here’s a link to the post in question. Check that post, and then check out community guidelines. If after rereading those guidelines you feel the post was flagged incorrectly, you can appeal it by clicking HERE [stonking great noticeable link specifically for this purpose].” Tumblr doesn’t even bother with step one, and kind of meanders around telling you the rest. ”Asking us to review the decision” is completely separated from the “Support Center” link by multiple paragraphs, and it’s written in such a way that it’s not clear that the Support Center is where you should be going in the first place.

They include a completely unnecessary sentence to chide you and excuse themselves. "While we do not judge anyone for their desire to post, engage with, or view this kind of material on other platforms, it simply no longer belongs on this platform" is not important or meaningful to the email in any way. It serves one purpose: to shake a finger in your face, and to say “not that there’s anything wrong with that, just not in my backyard.”

As of 12/23/2018 there is still no way to efficiently view which of your posts were flagged. The way to see your flagged posts is still so convoluted, unintuitive, time-consuming, and not explained anywhere that it can only suggest they didn’t ever actually expect anyone to do it, possibly that they didn’t want anyone to do it.

I personally write clearer and more concise guides on how to do any number of things at work every day. I write these for our business partners, our customers, and my coworkers. It is not hard to do better than this.

This shit is exactly why I’m not bothering to report pornbots for Tumblr anymore, I just block them from bothering me.  This is why I’m only giving new content to Pillowfort. Tumblr doesn’t care, has not cared, and will continue not to care about correctly policing itself or protecting its users.

Fuck Tumblr.

[hollenka99]

Peer Pressure

Summary: Jack had pushed and pushed. He'd chipped at Sean's mind until he cracked.

Warnings: Like with The Friend, there’s a whole bunch of unhealthy/toxic friendship and resentment. Plus Chase’s suicide is referenced.

Sean's problems begin when Angus gets worse. Jack's always had a big mouth. He tends to speak before he truly thinks things through. Sean's technically to blame for that. However, it hasn't been much of an issue until now. The first time Jack brings it up, he hates to reject him. The painfully dejected look in his best friend's eyes breaks his heart. He wants to help, he really does. He just can't. Not long after, he spends an hour or two looking for a game with an open world. Perhaps he could put on an Australian accent for the anniversary of the character's first appearance. Nothing comes up. Life gets in the way. Sean forgets about the search for a while. Jack never allows him to forget for too long. What starts as "I'm worried about Angus" soon morphs into "Angus only called me Jake once today". The longer it goes on, the more desperate Jack gets. And angrier. Sean has never seen such frustrated fury in his friend. He wishes he never had to. He's not sure when exactly their friendship takes a turn for the worst. It happens after he dyes his hair green, that's all he knows. Sean is excited to dress up as a superhero and Jack is just as pleased to make a new friend. Jackie as a character is expected. His age though? Not so much. Sean never intended for him to be sixteen years old. It causes conversations about school and whether the boy would need an education in the first place. Sean doesn't necessarily see the point. Jackie was currently the only minor in their world. Even if he created a character with children at a later date, the kids would probably be the wrong age group to attend school with Jackie. If it was that important to Jack to see the young superhero have an education, he would have to do it himself. Being home-schooled would also allow Jackie to do his job. 'His name is Marvin.' Jack says a couple days after the magic set video. Sean can't say he was expecting this. Although, he probably should have. It had just been a dumb video. The mask was cheap, something to use once and forget about until you throw it away in a big spring clean. The magic set was the same, only with extra smaller parts. Nothing was meant to come from it. He hadn't even given himself a name. It was just 'Jack the Magnificent'. Where the hell did 'Marvin' come from? "This better not happen again." Jack demands. "I don't want another Angus. God knows you're not going to help." Oh please, would he shut up about Angus already. How many times did he have to tell Jack it wasn't possible before that information got through his thick skull? He's tried. Slightly out of spite, Sean prints out all records he's kept of his research efforts and hand delivers them to the egos' home. Whoop-de-do, it triggers another argument. The Skype call to Signe is long. He thinks he can move on. Oops, haha, I didn't mean to create you but I still want to be on good terms with you. No, of course he can't get on with his life. Jackie has to get himself gravely injured. The demands come from two this time. For once, he's happy to co-operate. The doctor character is fun to play. Screw Jack with his questions about the accent and backstory. It's his channel anyway. If he wants to play a character a certain way, he will do just that. In the case of Dr Schneeplestein, he is an eccentric doctor who probably should have his license checked on and a father whose children were the reward in marital blackmail. The best part is that there are a surplus of games revolving around hospital procedures. See, he could think things through. So there. Not fully satisfied, Jack begins to bargain for a tweaked home life on Schneeplestein's behalf. The doctor suddenly has trust issues regarding his wife instead of her being a cheating, manipulative woman. In the compromise, Sean is also made to increase Schneeplestein's medical competence. When Sean points out the whole joke was that the doctor has dubious qualifications, Jack reminds him he isn't the doctor they'd requested. He guesses that's true. He doesn't want all this to become truly canon yet. That's why he is pleasantly surprised to find videos that are uploaded privately still work to develop an ego. Perfect. Until it isn't. Jack comes complaining about the confliction in 'Henrik' caused by the subscribers still believing the old characterisation. He asks if the egos were a joke to Sean. If anything is a joke, it's their relationship half the time. There are times where he can't think straight thanks to the stress Jack dumps on him. He wishes the guy would shut up for once. Yet, somehow, Sean can't bring himself to change his character. He could, theoretically it would be so easy, but he can't. For the hell of it, he throws in a little extra. They can't die. Or, to be more specific, they can't die for long. Jackie gets stabbed and bleeds out? Easy, just deal with the wound and he should wake up after a while. What this means for Peter, who knows? Sean is thankful when the accountant isn't granted life. That's one less person to keep happy. Like seemingly everything ego-related he does, it backfires. Within a year, this fail safe will have caused more suffering than hope. Sean isn't to know. However, he convinces himself he's done the right thing for once. He sure as hell knows how much trouble it's going to cause him if they don't believe that too. He makes an irreversible mistake in the October of 2016. He gets so caught up in the teasing and build up that he doesn't contemplate how this will affect everyone. Sure, to him it's a bit of red paint. But to Jack? He doesn't want to imagine the scene Jackie discovers. God, he can't believe he's been so thoughtless. Resurrecting the dead is exhausting, he finds. He postpones visiting Jack for a day before realising his avoidance is likely making matters worse. The dread cumulates to the point he swears he will be sick if he doesn't actively focus on his breathing. The loophole he made in September might have ensured nobody died permanently but it never mentioned scars. It's not visible behind the bandages but he knows it's there. Jack is pissed off. Rightfully so. Matters worsen even more after Jackie vanishes while attempting to get away from their fighting. It's just another thing that's ruined the egos' perception of him. If he thought the hill Jack was ready to die on was Angus, he's got another thing coming. There's only so much he can take before he has to force apathy for the sake of his sanity. He understands he can't control Antisepticeye. Once this situation is dealt with, he vows, the demon will never be used on his channel again. The subscribers' love for the character will have to ignored. It's too risky to play Anti again. He puts the red suit on again. In the short video, only a minute or so in length, Jackie sprints through poorly lit corridors to the exit. Sean acts scared and looks behind him frequently as he runs. It is uploaded privately. His community didn't need to know anything about this. He hopes with everything he's got that it works. Nothing. For days, for weeks, for months. Sean doesn't bother letting the egos know what he'd tried to do. It's guaranteed Jack and Marvin would tell him to try harder. He has no idea what that means in this context. Their lack of respect causes him to give up all efforts to have a good relationship with them. Jack still comes over every now and again. Their birthday goes far better than he'd hoped. Plus, Marvin appears to be coming into his own magic-wise. Sean doesn't like what Jack is implying when he mentions he's stopped learning German. At least he appreciates the video he made before Christmas with Henrik.   In an emotional slump, he buys a bunch of Lyons boxes and mini chocolate eggs. It's just a parody of Dude Perfect from someone with zero accuracy. Then he does the stupid thing and creates life again. Fuck it, his wife hates him and he may never see his kids again. Chase Brody's depression causes him to pretend to shoot himself before the end card plays. When Jack calls him and demands to know what the hell he was thinking, Sean has no answer. Afterwards, the ego doesn't provide his creator with any updates. Insisting he has the right to talk to Chase only makes him more hated. Despite having never met before, Chase already resents him. The next time an ego is intentionally created, Sean's going to be there to intercept them. They're not going to enter that home and have their opinion of him influenced by people who wished he wasn't in their lives. The next new guy would be given a fair chance to see Sean for what he was. A massive screw up when it came to the ability he's unsure how to master. In no way is he some villain. August is around the corner when Jack asks to visit. The two of them seem to be on the same page that day. Sean is more than happy to hang out and cheer him up. Believing Jack would be empathetic, he begins a conversation about how the YouTube algorithm was bothering him. Over three years of working as a duo on the Jacksepticeye channel meant Jack should understand where he was coming from. But, of course, his friend makes it all about himself and his own problems. Why wouldn't he? It's what he usually does. They argue because apparently that's the only way they communicate with each other nowadays. Jack sure knows how to pack a punch. Being friends with him shouldn't be such a struggle. Sean snaps. The emotional fatigue of trying to keep up with the algorithm and all this fighting causes him to make one of the worst decisions he'd ever go through with. If Jack wants him to be the bad guy, fine. Sean would be the bad guy. Just this once, he'd actually be the asshole. "You want to sleep, I'll let you sleep." He threatens when Jack begins walking off mid-argument. "Bring back Jackie. He's been missing for months. Do something!" Jack flings viciously back seconds before he marches out the door. He can tell Signe regrets asking him how the gaming session went. He dresses as Schneeplestein as soon as he finalises his plan, pretending he aims to save a version of himself in Bio Inc Redemption. He loses. Oops. He acts as he feels the real Schneeplestein would, desperate not to watch another patient die. He sends the video to Robin for editing. The final uploaded product is nowhere near what he'd recorded. His audience are all talking about Anti. They were praising him for his acting and Robin for his editing. But... he never included Anti. Any recollection of filming the final scene was non-existent. And the parts with Henrik getting possessed weren't him either. The more he thinks about it, the further the terror sets in. Jack had pushed and pushed. He'd chipped at Sean's mind until he cracked. It had only meant to end with Jack slipping into a coma. Just a chance for Sean to focus on his own problems for once. He would have gotten Henrik to wake his patient up when Sean was ready. God, he just wanted peace for a change. It was never meant to happen like this. Marvin is deaf in his rage. Chase is equally distraught. They forbid Sean from entering their home. Henrik is missing and Jack is unresponsive. What had he done?

[mermaidylluria]

Warning to all you mers on Tumblr out there: The purge has officially begun. My account just got flagged, and the only things I have on here are my own event photos (which are all family-friendly & fully clothed), and mermaid art (both classical and new, some of which has an LGBTQ focus- and may, at times, *gasp* in some cases feature kissing). So.. just as a heads-up, the whole Tumblog censorship hubub is a real thing. My hope was that in a page FULL of mermaids, it would be obvious what the space was about- that it was absent of pornographic or ANY kind of child-endangering content, n’ be subsequently left alone.  But it appears that’s not the case.  So now that we know mer art is going to be targeted (after all, “NEKKIT BEWBIES, ER MAH GURD!!”), I suggest we all get ready to either defend our posts (via disputing flagged content), participate in some kind of (peaceful, preferably meaningful & artful) protest, or just leave the platform all together. 'Cause this tells me that they're not only flagging classical art, they're also trying to eradicate LGBTQ content, and NONE of that is okay.  Personally, I’m going to do all 3.  Fight and dispute, while making preparations to move my space elsewhere.  Where that’ll be I’m not sure yet, but if we loose, I want a place for my mermaid stuff to go, and the demigods at Tumblr better be aware, I’m taking my decently-well-known bellydance n’ other blogs w/me too, if I’m forced to leave.

And just for my personal 2 cents on the matter?  Dear gods, not ALL of the internet has to be child friendly. XP Censorship like that happening on YouTube, Facebook & now Tumblr stifles creativity (look at channels like Glam&Gore, who can’t barely do SFX makeup anymore because she keeps getting demonetized), silences valuable artistic and minority voices, removes audiences for burgeoning creators (who, btw, may NOT be engaging in pornographic content in ANY way), and forces narrow-minded, puritanical standards of "decency" (which are by FAR the minority), over others' ability to operate successfully in that medium. This smothers decent, AWESOME things like art, science, expression and SO much more. XS  See, it’s not about the p0rn.  It’s about the CENSORSHIP.  This is the internet. It was designed to dispense and SHARE information, ideas, inspiration, fun, etc. Not be a surrogate nanny for your kids. XS

ANNNNYWAY, if you want to read more about what is and is not allowed on Tumblr now, you can visit: https://tumblr.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/231885248. (And be sure to read to the bottom, where users can find out how to appeal post & entire blog flags under the last 2 questions.)  And if you have a mermaid blog where ANY kind of toplessness is involved, note that "female presenting nipples" is distinctly mentioned, which, as I'm sure lots of you already know, directly impacts classical AND modern art- one of the few things on Tumblr that can be shared WITHOUT a copyright, as well as a TON of mermaid art, classical and otherwise. XP 

What does this mean?  Well.. in simple terms, it means that stuff like Botticelli and Picasso are no longer welcome on Tumblr.  It means that Reubens, Waterhouse and Rodin, if they have artistic interpretations of naked women in their work, cannot be shared on Tumblr.  Even though their works are featured in international museums of the highest callibur, lauded all over the world as legends of innovation, vision, unparalleled beauty, & precision, expression & creativity, and world-famed for their social and economic value.  Those.. are not welcome here now, apparently.  Meanwhile, images & videos stolen from present-day & other modern hard-working artists, photographers, cartoonists, writers and other creators from allll over the world arrre hunky-dory. XP  DaFUQ, Tumblr??? (At -least- they mention mis-attribution & non-attribution on their new guidelines now. That at least, is an improvement. X*)

But now.. let’s see how that’s directly affected my blog, shall we..?  ‘Cause, as I mentioned before, I figured surely since I didn’t actually have any pr0n on my pages, I & other mer pages should be safe, right?  BZZZZZZZT, WRONG.  After getting this e-mail (pictured above), I went through my whole blog and found the 4 posts that were "flagged" as having adult content. *rolls eyes* 

3 of them were reblogs &1 was an original post. 

2 of those posts were queer-positive modern art. 

1 was a photographic collection of pieces FEATURED IN "W" MAGAZINE, 

And the last is a piece of classical style, queer-positive art. XS 

One of the modern pieces doesn't even show nipples, just saggy bewbies COVERED with small seashells. 

The other modern-style piece was a Rackham style drawing, where the tatas are but a mere suggestion of simple lines and dots. 

One was shown in a INTERNATIONAL FRICKING FASHION MAGAZINE SPREAD, which was apparently suitable for SOMEONES' interpretation of public consumption, 

and the last only shows suggestions & curvatures of breasts! (Showing the side and outer portions of the female chest, with no nipples. XP)

-And WHY AM I HAVING TO JUSTIFY THIS???? THIS IS ART. THIS IS NOT P0RN. Again I say "WTF, Tumblr????" XS

As you can see, 3 of my posts were reblogs, so I had no means of disputing those posts.  (According to their new guidelines, the owner of the original post has to do that, and if they are found as having “inappropriate content,” there’s no further means of appeal.)   But one of them, one of the very first posts I ever made in this blog, was an original, so I was able to refute its being deemed as inappropriate.  FIrst, you have to go through allll of your posts to find.. whatever it is someone’s had issue with.  (Whether it’s a person who’s flagged it or something chosen by Tumblr’s algorithms/keyword alert systems, I have no idea.)  But they don't even bother to link you in your notification e-mail, so first you’ve gotta FIND what’s being flagged before you can repeal it.  (I didn’t even know what I was looking for at first.  They never specify.  Would it be a tiny new icon near the Edit and Share buttons at the bottom?  A wee little flag pointer, outside of the post itself..?  Do I got to my posted page n’ try to find it?  Or will it be in my Posts stream, & the whole post be red..?  Who knows?)  But eventually, after enough scrolling, I found what I was looking for.  A big red bar across the affected posts.  -And if it’s a post you can do something about, they give you a button to push on the designated "flagged" work, at the top right. After you hit the "dispute" button, you’re given a largely blank page.  In the center, you get to choose between Dispute, Cancel or Learn More.  No “tell us why you feel this should not be flagged, why it doesn’t violate our rules,” nothing.  Nowhere to speak your peace.  You just hit a button, and you’re done.  You get no say, other than “I object, your honor!”  NOT COOL, people. NOT COOL.  You clearly don’t wanna hear the voices of your content creators, or, at least, enough to allow them to speak for the work they felt appropriate enough to post..

Reading this from another media source?  Please don’t discount this issue if you don’t personally have a Tumblog.  It doesn't really matter whether you use tumble or not, whether you think it's lame or not, etc. The problem is much, much larger than that, and it’s growing.  This is another very large, social media platform that's being affected by censorship in the name of marketing- and thus, be child-friendly.  They want the whole family to be able to come and see all the ads they wanna put here, and without that, they don’t make their money.  So anything not child-friendly, even vaguely PERCEIVED as not child-friendly (by God only knows whose standards), is being wiped out from the whole platform.  Don’t believe me?  It’s happened on YouTube, on Facebook, and likely, many others.  Do some googling and check it out for yourself.  YouTube is a platform that’s being strangled by this phenomenon right this very second.  There are videos on it.  Go see. Now.  ‘Cause if we don’t educate ourselves about this n’ do something to fight it, what’s happening to YouTube is our future.  Not just here on Tumblr, but EVERYWHERE.

Big Brother isn't just watching, guys, he's stealing your open arenas for personal and creative expression, so he can better market to you & yer kids.  He wants EVERYONE to buy his Stuff.   And if the kids can’t see it here, they won’t ask mommy and daddy to go get it for them.  So out classical art, and LGBTQ content, and mermaids go.  Out the door.  (Meanwhile, who do kids love?? UM.. MERMAIDS.  HELLO!!!  What should be educating them about history and the arts?  UMM.. FINE ART, HELLO.  Who teaches them about tolerance and diversity and SO MUCH MORE?  Umm.. THE LGBTQ community!  Who teaches them about what human bodies look like, and that it’s okay to have ANY kind of body?  UM.. BODY POSITIVE ART, THANK YOU.)  

We need to put the kaibosh on this somehow, now. Not just for Tumblr, or Facebook, or YouTube. We've got to find SOME way of letting the Big Boys know this is not activity we will tolerate. 'Cause the places to freely express ourselves are going to continue to diminish, get scarcer, and fewer.. until they're all.. gone.

ART =/= PORN, YOU IGNORANT, PURITANICAL, MONEY-GRUBBING FISHTITS.  LEARN TO POLICE YOUR OWN CHILDREN, MORE EFFECTIVELY POLICE GENUINE CRIMINALS, AND LEAVE THE REST OF THE INTERNET ALONE.  Please.

♥

[tfrohock]

Twitter -- Write Your Own Epitaph

Now that it seems Twitter is going to resort to its old flame-worthy self, I’ll be withdrawing even more from that particular platform. More than anything, it’s because Twitter has turned into Facebook in terms of its algorithms. I no longer see the people I want to see. Instead my feed is full of people the algorithm wants me to see due to the amount of engagement their profiles receive. I know a lot of you have worked hard for those blue checks, but I’m just not interested in 24/7 self-promotion anymore—yours or mine. It’s all become just so much noise.

I’m not leaving Twitter altogether just yet. I’m taking a wait and see stance, but if the past is any indication, it’ll devolve into people screaming, and I’m just done with that.

Frankly, I’ve pulled back from a lot of social media lately. I remember doom-scrolling one day and just wondering why was I bothering? Absolutely nothing I saw in my feed made me happy or even made me think. I’d just become numb to it all.

I pay to get my news through a reliable news source, so individual Twitter-takes are irrelevant to me. Having a large follower count or an even bigger bank account doesn’t equate to taste or intelligence, and I have better things to do than fan the flames for narcissists who need constant validation through clicks.

I’m on Facebook because of family, my job, and close friends. I also belong to several groups on Facebook and tend to spend more time in private groups than anywhere. Likewise with Slack—I’m in a couple of private groups there, and I tend to focus my energy in that direction. I run my blog posts through Tumblr, so if you’re still there, you can give me a follow there, as well.

I’m here at my blog and newsletter, and I’ll try a few new apps to see if something fits, but otherwise, I’ve resumed reading, watching television/movies that interest me, and writing. My anxiety levels have gone down and I feel calmer, and something else—I’m feeling much more creative.

I already follow several authors on their newsletters, so I won’t lose touch with the people I enjoy interacting with on Twitter. Insofar as my free time goes, I’ve simply found much better ways to spend it.

I’ve read several books in the last couple of months. Here are the ones worth mentioning:

The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride by Daniel James Brown — Probably the best and most thorough history of the Donner Party that I’ve read. It reads like a novel and is perfect in every way.

The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell — History, fiction, and mystery all rolled into one, it is a certifiable page-turner that you will not be able to put down. Stay for the afterword, I promise you won’t regret it.

When I Sing, Mountains Dance by Irene Solà, Mara Faye Lethem (Translator) — This is a series of short interconnected vignettes about people in a village high in the Pyrenees, their lives, and their ghosts. Poetic and brilliant.

Black Mouth by Ronald Malfi — I reviewed this one in a previous post.

Helpmeet by Naben Ruthnum — A haunting little novella that is perfect for a cold autumn night.

In terms of movies and television:

Werewolf by Night — An absolutely delightful take on the 1940s horror films. The show had a lot of heart and a great cast.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (1982) — This is the 1982 stage production with Angela Lansbury and George Hearn in the title roles. As I rewatched it for the first time in over thirty years, I found myself smiling with enjoyment and simply marveled at how wonderful and relaxed I felt. Nothing like a little play about a serial killer barber and his demented cannibalistic lover to bring perspective to my life.

She Will — I watched this over the summer, but I wanted to mention it, because it is horror and a wonderfully good one. It’s about old women and young women and healing. Very nicely done.

I’m currently reading Alex Bledsoe’s Dandelion, which is a great possession novel set in the rural south. If you’re looking for a cool series to watch, I highly recommend Cracow Monsters (Polish) on Netflix and I’m currently watching Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities, because who isn’t?

Of course, I’m spending more time here on my blog and in the newsletter and writing my own stories. I have a short story that had too pat of an ending, and I think I’ve now discovered a way to fix it before I resubmit it. My horror novel is coming along nicely, and I’ve got a couple of other projects on the back burner that I’m working on as time allows.

So if you’re in interested, keep your eye out for me. If I land on a new app that fits me, I’ll give it a shout-out here. The best place to find me, though, will always be here and through my newsletter. I won’t blast every blog post through the newsletter, but I will do summaries from time to time.

Meanwhile, watch for me, and I’ll watch for you, as well.

[chalabrun]

end-to-end, ch. 1

Word Count: 1,372 Pairing: Elliot Alderson/Jessica Jones Rating: T Warnings: Some alcohol references Summary: A particular type of encryption where a message is scrambled in a way that, at least in theory, only the sender and receiver—and no one else—can read it. 

( READ ON AO3 ]

Hello again.

I know, it’s been awhile since we last spoke to one another. Probably a few weeks now, at least. You’re probably expecting a status update. A brief line of no more than 140 characters and some emojis; a longer, heartfelt post made on Facebook or venting to complete strangers on Reddit. I could do that. But, I don’t have any of those things.

Wait. You knew that already.

I guess I can show you.

I had to move out, put my things in storage. It’s in a place no one will look because I made sure of it. It was done in the middle of the night, and with E-Coin taking over as the world’s currency, it could just be chalked up to a lack of funds and rising prices—the devil and demon of every person nowadays. That, or it had something to do with being an Ex-con. Krista’s old boyfriend will probably think so.

I think I’ll miss it. People are so used to being programmed to walk certain routes that street names and numbers becomes inconsequential. What was 217 East Broadway in the Lower East Side became a street, the low-hanging trees that provided thin coverage from the intense summer sun until long after noon, the chipped sidewalks and the hot grease wafting from Bo Hai Dumpling Town hung like a shroud. It wasn’t always a pleasant smell, but it was familiar. The sort of unpleasantness you became so accustomed to that you’d miss it.

And now?

I found something new.

The nice thing about wearing hoodies and dark jeans is that you don’t really stick out in the streets. In corporate America, you wear light pastels and neutral colors because it’s sterilized,so you blend in incongruously and indifferently. An employed and dispassionate statistic. It doesn’t have the grease and spit of the inner city on its shoes. Bleached and sanitized with sharp angles and watery glass surfaces. It always reminded me of being part of a motherboard. What did that make me? The GPU or CPU? Maybe the APU, both.

It’s all about blending in, knowing your environment.

Most of all, like other dissimilar species, it’s about a symbiotic relationship. I think I’ve found that recently.

“Anything?”

Her feet clop behind me, the shelves to the desk’s right and her back is turned to me, but I can see the sloshing amber liquid splash inside a tumbler. The sharp sting of alcohol follows it, but it’s alright. From here, the remnants of my night on her couch within the office in evident, but she doesn’t have any clients yet. Even if she did, a single blanket is easy to justify and fold away. My belongings are stashed beneath it.

I can feel her presence to my right lean against the window sill, arms folded with the tumbler in hand. In the laptop’s reflection I can see her wearing her usual hunter green tank top and distressed, torn jeans. We have our uniforms and anger management issues in common.

But, that’s not what she’s asking about.

“She posted on her timeline three days ago,” I answer, not bothering to lean aside where she can see the Facebook page I’d pulled up. Hacking wasn’t really necessary. We’d already checked her DM’s the day before, but I was going to check it again. “From Chinatown. 3 PM from an iPhone 6.”

“What about?” Jessica prompted me, surprisingly patient. We’d been working together for almost a month now. I think she’s getting more patient with me, a little less sarcastic. Even if a little less is unnoticeable to most people she talks with, like Malcolm or her adopted sister, Trish Walker. Even now, it wasn’t gentle. A hastiness was present, ineffable.

We work well together, brains and brawn. A symbiotic relationship.

You’re probably wondering how this dynamic works, don’t you? That’s alright, I should’ve said something.

“That’s not her phone. If I can trace the signal and the nearest cell tower it was sent from, I can get a better approximate location.”

“So, why aren’t you? We have to act fast, Elliot. Not like the fucking cops.”

Jessica Jones is a loner. She doesn’t work well with others and avoids them. Deflects from attempts to bring down her walls. With anger issues and a tendency to isolate and self-medicate. It was almost like looking in a mirror.

Two sides of the same coin.

“I’m coming with you.” I can hear her kick off from the window sill she’s leaning on. There’s a tense, frustrated atmosphere in the air. The product of two like-minded, polar-approximate people in the same room. The amount of cohesion wasn’t smooth unless you consider gravel and grit smooth. A lone wolf with no desire for a pack.

She stood next to the desk chair’s armrest, defiant and glaring down at me. “That wasn’t part of our agreement,” came her clipped rebuttal, a snarl on her lips. Arms folded, Jessica cocked a hip. “I thought this was some…Pinky and the Brain bullshit. You act like some drone on steroids and I do the groundwork.” She clapped her tumbler down with an audible clunk. “Besides, if you didn’t get the goddamn memo, I don’t do the teamwork horse shit. The last thing I need is to be some fucking babysitter.”

“I’m not saying you have to guard me. I just need to be at the location in person.” I couldn’t remove my eyes from the screen. The tracking algorithm was close and needed an eye on it.

“Did the last few days not happen or what?!” she rebutted back angrily. “You came to me, not the other way around! You wanted my fucking protection from whatever bullshit you’re caught up in!”

The clacking on the keyboard stopped, my eyes never lifting. But, my attention was there, flicking to her in hyperfixated intervals. “That’s not why I did,” I replied quietly, throat dry. “I don’t need protection. What we both need is what we lack.”

Frustrated, Jessica snatched the glass and stalked away towards her couch, flopping unceremoniously upon it. “You said you needed the abilities I have, Alderson. Why the hell else are you here?” she fumed at me. “Yeah, you’re a good hacker, but you’re also a liability. And that’s the last thing I fucking need.”

…I wasn’t sure how else to explain this to her. How did you break away years of walls when neither was really poised to budge? Easy: you didn’t. People were difficult to understand, stressful at best. Loneliness may have been a constant shadow looming over me, but sometimes, it was preferable to being in a room with a thousand conflicting voices and pretending like those people somehow got along. I went to Jessica Jones because I couldn’t return home and because of what I could bring for her. Being a skilled hacker was rare in New York. Being a hacker who at one time owned the FBI and Whiterose’s networks was even rarer. I was an asset, a valuable one. Anyone could see that. Even someone who normally didn’t stand to benefit from someone like me.

The parts of a machine didn’t have to get together once a week for book clubs over Starbuck’s. They just had to run together to complete their tasks.

My gaze on the screen precipitously drifted towards her. “Let me do what I have to. Completely separate from what you are.” That was my offer, my final condition. That we didn’t have to evolve into something parasitical was what we both wanted. Dependency and attachment didn’t suit us. I knew my features were like stone, carved into place. Her plaster was only a little more malleable than my own.

The pregnant pause was long. Long past term.

“…Fine,” Jessica groused as she downed the rest of her spirits in one gulp. “But if you get into trouble, that’s on you, Alderson.” Her own terms were harsh, but clear. We were partners, not friends or something more.

And that suited me just fine.

She grabbed her leather jacket and stalked towards the door, slamming it emphatically behind her.

I returned to the command line. It wouldn’t be much longer now.

[ptolemaydev]

𝐀𝐩𝐩𝐬 𝐀𝐫𝐞 𝐓𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐘𝐨𝐮 – 𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭’𝐬 𝐠𝐨𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐨𝐧?

𝐀𝐩𝐩𝐬 𝐀𝐫𝐞 𝐓𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐘𝐨𝐮 – 𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭’𝐬 𝐠𝐨𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐨𝐧? https://ptolemay.com/.../apps-are-tracking-you-whats.../

This topic of apps tracking and collecting users’ data has not arisen in the recent period but has been a rather major debating issue since the technology developed and started reaching the hands of millions around the globe. While using an application on your mobile device its system is mostly programmed to track each move and collect some valuable information about you and your behavior to then use it for different purposes.

Yes, this might sound a bit creepy and even scary but most apps that collect data do not really use it against you or to harm you. On the contrary, your data is collected by apps and mostly sold to third parties by which apps generate income. The third parties might include advertisers to offer you goods and services that you are most likely to purchase but the data is also considered to be sold to the government. Now let’s see how apps collect data, why so, and how you can prevent that!

𝐇𝐨𝐰 𝐃𝐨 𝐀𝐩𝐩𝐬 𝐂𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐚?

Any apps that you install and use on your mobile devices collect some sort of data about you. This is done when you use their apps and interact with what the app has to offer, be it games, educational materials, fitness apps, social media, etc.

The most common way that you are tracked is for example when you see the ‘Cookies’ on a website and you agree to accept them and when companies put special files and algorithms in apps that are doing most of the job for them.

Companies that sell goods for example may track every item you’ve selected, put in your cart, bought/not bought, what goods you searched for, etc. They will track your purchasing pattern and use it to then offer you a more customized user experience that will probably result in more of your purchases and more profit to the brand. Every time you connect to the company and their app you should be aware that all your moves are being gathered. This is very important to companies and it is considered to be working successfully as well.

It is crucial for companies to track their consumers’ data and offer them relevant goods/services. They are also tracking your location through your mobile device that will allow them to, let’s say, recommend stores near you and offer products/services available in your region. Companies are spending a fortune on advertising, while they might be targeting the wrong groups of people. When particular algorithms track and collect users’ data it lets companies save a huge amount on advertising and offer their consumers what they are more likely to purchase.

𝐖𝐡𝐲 𝐃𝐨 𝐀𝐩𝐩𝐬 𝐍𝐞𝐞𝐝 𝐌𝐲 𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐚?

As I see it there are two major reasons why apps are collecting users’ data:

1. To offer a better experience and in some cases increase sales

2. To sell it to third parties.

So, in the first case, apps are gathering your data, behavior, location, information to offer you a better experience while using the app and in a way ‘force’ you to buy or spend more as they offer you a customizable experience. This means that after your data is tracked, algorithms can understand your behavior and make conclusions and predictions about what you are more likely to spend your money on. Consequently, apps will only demonstrate to you those products/services that are most suitable for you (as the algorithms predicted) and there will be a bigger chance that you will give the company more money!

In the second case, apps are tracking and collecting your information to sell it to third parties, such as advertisers, Facebook, Google, Amazon, Apple, etc. As most of the apps in the Apple Apps Store and Google Play are free, they have to find a way to generate profit. Tracking and selling user data is one of the very common ways to do so. Apps will track your purchase history, your interests, preferences, usage durations, location, usage times, and many more. All these data are collected by so many apps and sold to giant companies.

When the bigger companies such as Facebook, Google, Amazon, Apple get their hands on the data of millions of users around the globe they use it to offer and recommend targeted ads, friend suggestions, pages, websites, blogs, from which they are making money as well. While they also have access to your location, they will be presenting you ads available near you that will also increase the chance of you spending more money!

𝐏𝐭𝐨𝐥𝐞𝐦𝐚𝐲 𝐋𝐢𝐦𝐢𝐭𝐬 𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐚 𝐂𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧

Ptolemay takes this issue very seriously and we are taking the following actions to prevent third parties from tracking users’ info, hacking into the app, or even gathering users’ data:

o Ptolemay keeps all data on the servers that were built custom.

o Ptolemay builds servers only on reliable and trusted cloud infrastructure providers (Digital Ocean, AWS).

o Safe Code. Ptolemay does not store critically important data in code that allows the application to be hacked by decompiling.

o Ptolemay uses reliable encryption algorithms.

o Ptolemay uses refresh tokens. We update the keys to reduce the likelihood of hacking.

Securing users’ data is Ptolemay’s priority and our developers are professionals and experienced in ensuring safe storage of valuable data.

𝐖𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐡 𝐀𝐩𝐩𝐬 𝐂𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐌𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐚 (𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐭)

According to some statistics, the top three apps that know the most about their users include Facebook, Instagram, and Tinder. The data they collect can be anything like your location, personal data, phone numbers, financial info, biometrics, browsing history, education info, photos, recorded payments, transactions, etc.

These apps collect most of your data and here are the % of users’ personal data they possess: Facebook(70%), Instagram(58.82%), Tinder(55.88%), Grindr(52.94%), Uber(52.94%), Strava(41.18%), Tesco(38.24%), Spotify(35.29%), MyFitnessPal(35.29%), Jet2(35.29%)

𝐖𝐚𝐲𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐏𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐚 𝐓𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠

There are so many apps that have been tracking users’ data already for a long time but it doesn’t seem that everyone cares about it. I see it as there are two groups of people: those who do not care if apps track data and those who do not want valuable data to be collected by apps and sold to third parties. I believe many people do not show much concern for this as it doesn’t harm them in any way and sometimes even improves user experience. I also believe that as long as apps do not track really valuable data or personal information that may result in court trials, I think it may not bother many users.

However, many want to take action to prevent apps from collecting information about them. Here’s how to prevent apps tracking data on iPhone and Android:

𝐢𝐏𝐡𝐨𝐧𝐞: When iOS 14.5 came out the biggest hit was the new “App Tracking Transparency” feature that was introduced. This feature allows you to decide if you want apps to track your data or not. This eventually means that if you choose to not allow apps to track data you will not be shown targeted ads based on collected information, your location, e-mail address, phone number, and other data will not be shared with third parties or data brokers.

In order to activate this feature, you can go to Settings > Privacy > Tracking and enable the feature. With this, apps will ask you to allow or not allow tracking, and by clicking ‘don’t allow’ your data will not be shared!

𝐀𝐧𝐝𝐫𝐨𝐢𝐝: Android doesn’t yet have such an easy feature of not allowing apps to track data as the new iOS 14.5 but there is still a lot you can do. When you first download an app or open one for the first time, it might ask you permission to allow access to different things on your phone, be it your contacts, camera, microphone, calls, etc. You can easily tap do not allow and your data will be safe. If you want to check if other apps have permission to some data, you can follow these steps (might vary by phone): Settings > Apps (Application Manager) > Choose an app > Permission > Turn off the points you do not want the app to access! Or users can head to Security Settings > App Permissions and see what apps access what data and adjust those!

𝐒𝐨, 𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭’𝐬 𝐆𝐨𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐨𝐧?

So, looking at today’s image, I can tell you for sure that there are tons of apps that gather information about you and use it for different purposes. You might not care about it if this doesn’t actually harm you (which mostly doesn’t), but you might be worried or skeptical and you can in some ways control your data from being accessed. Overall, you might want to look over the permissions that you give to apps that you install so that they do not track some personal data of yours but if you are using apps that Ptolemay has developed, you do not have much to worry about.

|𝐖𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐧 𝐛𝐲 𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐚 𝐁𝐨𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐯𝐢𝐥𝐢