#PlainText

[mtg-player1]

Wait does this count as amatopunk? (I mean it's technically post punk goth rock, but like)

[pt: this is a lie by the cure] [album: Wild mood swings. 1996]

[dyspunktional-leviathan]

Plaintext:

Hey

so if you know someone who went to the LA protests today no you don't actually! All of those people have no identity. You've never been to a protest, you've never seen someone at one, and you certainly have never known the names or faces of any individuals associated with the protests.

HEY

so if you know someone who went to the LA protests today no you don't actually! All of those people have no identity. You've never been to a protest, you've never seen someone at one, and you certainly have never known the names or faces of any individuals associated with the protests.

[richdadpoor]

AI Can’t Read Books. It’s Reviewing Them Anyway

Now that we’ve all had experience with large language models, their limitations are all too visible. Yes, they can write. But their prose doesn’t explode in the mind like the words of Jennifer Egan, Emily St. John Mandel, or David Foster Wallace do. Yes they can make music. But Taylor Swift and Kendrick Lamar are sleeping very well at night. And they sure can summarize history speedily and…

[faggotry-enjoyer]

HII I JUST WANTED TO SAY I LOVE YOUR BLOG SO MUCH

plaintext: Hi, I just wanted to say I love your blog so much /end plaintext

oh my god thank you so much!!

[aiexpressway]

Spice Up Your ChatGPT Outputs With 15 Different Formats

[hockey-accessibility]

[PT start] i like my men like i like evgeni malkin tall, hockey player, and evgeni malkin. [PT end]

i like my men like i like evgeni malkin

tall, hockey player, and evgeni malkin

[felassan]

Some snippets (compilation) from the comments section of [this recent video] by Mark Darrah on YouTube titled ’How 2017 Changed BioWare 1000 Ways’.

rest of post under cut due to length.

Mark Darrah: "BioWare seems to be rebuilding now. I guess we'll have to keep watching"

Mark Darrah: "BioWare and EA seem to be fully behind the next Mass Effect"

User: "I hope the next Mass Effect brings the studio back on track, I doubt they will have many chances left if that game fails. Judging by the people that are involved, they are definitely trying." Mark Darrah: "Seems like"

Mark Darrah: "I don’t know what is next for DA"

Mark Darrah: "A super rushed Joplin likely would have been deeply flawed"

User: "I often learn more about what was going on at Bioware from this channel than I did in 10 years working at Bioware 🙃" Mark Darrah: "oof" Aaryn Flynn: "I learned some things too!" Mark Darrah: "@ blind men touching an elephant"

Bryan Johnson: "Very interesting to hear your perspective since I definitely was not a high level person. Crazy how much they kept the Casey return, as a few of us knew about it a bit earlier because we wrote something to scrape the employee staff data as we were getting tired of not hearing about people leaving the company." Mark Darrah: "wow"

User: "The shenanigans you just described, combined with David Gaider's recent posts about his own treatment at this company solves the mystery as to why DA has ended up in the state it's in. Thank you for clarifying." Mark Darrah: "I wouldn’t put it all on 2017"

User: "As someone who adores Dragon Age, it seems EA doesn't understand RPG fantasy games and doesn't understand what they have with Dragon Age and probably never will." Mark Darrah: "Likely"

User: "I can tell you as strictly a fan that I FELT the 'pivot' as you called it, in 2017. Andromeda felt half old BioWare and half something I didn't recognize as the same language. Anthem was a completely different dialect. SOMETHING was obviously changing at BioWare..." Mark Darrah: "That said, Anthem had been in development a WHILE by 2017"

User: "The level of organizational disfunction at such a big company is astounding." Mark Darrah: "Very common"

User: "I truly wish EA cared more for fsntasy, because it definitely seems like sci-fi and sports is what the higher-ups drool over." Mark Darrah: "We'll see what the future has to bring but..."

User: "And in all that time, Star Wars the Old Republic was keeping up Bioware's slack. Now they don't have that option anymore." Mark Darrah: "It was. Though I'm not sure EA saw it that way"

User: "The infuriating part of all this is that nobody even got what they wanted. Especially EA. The behaviour of these execs would at least be explicable if it had led to commercial success, but it didn't. Why are business execs so uniquely bad at doing business? It's their only job." Mark Darrah: "Successful Live services make so much that the risk was seen as worth it"

Mark Darrah: "Montreal didn't work on Anthem, they were moved to a different EA studio"

Mark Darrah: "Quarter based isn’t great planning for gamedev"

User: "It was a big surprise that BioWare didn't crumble immediately like so many before (Westwood, Origin, Bullfrog, Mythic). It's fascinating to learn that it was because BioWare was put under EA Sports management who were in no position to meddle with the development of RPGs." Mark Darrah: "The EA sports thing happened a bit later... I want to say 2013 or something."

User: "I am still hopeful, despite everything that's happened, that we'll still see more Dragon Age at some point" Mark Darrah: "You never know. EA owns a LOT of IPs"

Mark Darrah: "It’s the nature of most corporations to focus on costs longer term than revenue. Which is an issue for things that take many years to do"

Mark Darrah: "Every game that ships is a miracle"

User: "I am an optimistic. I hope that DA will be back and that EA and Bioware ups realise what a gem Dragon age truly is." Mark Darrah: "Hopefully"

Mark Darrah: "There was a story about Andromeda threading the needle between colonialism and a refugee story and telling neither story fully but that never got discussed"

Mark Darrah: "I do think MEA could have repaired its rep if given more post launch time"

User: "This is so sad. I really hope these videos bring some kinda change, whether it be with EA or teach other developers/publishers about what not to do." Mark Darrah: "..."

User: "Veigulard is like a product of this turbulent development process and continuos change of scope without respect to the development team." Mark Darrah: "Veilguard is a story for another day... hopefully"

Mark Darrah: "SWTOR was always a mystery to me too. It seemed like they had a pretty clear "If we sped 1$ we get more than 1$ back" repeatable model but it wasn't valued."

User: "I guess my only question is, did Casey Hudson ever actually fought for the Joplin vision/to keep DA Singleplayer at all? It seems odd to me that EA allowed DA to go back to Singleplayer in early 2021, shortly after Hudson left. I mean, Anthem was his idea and it flopped. The Jason Schreier articles stated devs were calling the live service Morrison "Anthem with dragons", so I wonder if Hudson was actually in support of turning DA into an MMO. Not trying to find someone to blame for everything, but I'll just forever wonder if things would've been different with someone else at the top." Mark Darrah: "I don’t think he was. Simply living in the same environment we all were"

User: "What was your relationship with the higher-ups and your team like for the remainder of your time at Bioware?" Mark Darrah: ""Doing a job" probably describes my last 2-3 years"

User: "I hope there is smooth sailing for ME5 and the story will knock our socks off." Mark Darrah: "I am following Mass Effect for sure"

Mark Darrah: "Origin [Systems] was actually under the BioWare umbrella at one point if you can believe it"

Mark Darrah: "Ray [one of the BioWare co-founders] spent a lot of his capital resisting EA until he left."

User: "If Joplin and the DA team had gotten the manpower from the Montreal team and resources they required do you think Joplin could have avoided EA’s push toward live service? (Sorry for the double comment, issue with my connection for a second there)" Mark Darrah: "... Its hard to say. Those 2 things are honestly pretty tightly coupled"

User: "Did you talk to Casey about the Anthem situation? It seems like he just pushed Anthem without discussing it internally which is so strange to do" Mark Darrah: "There were conversations. Casey can be very convincing"

User: "I think they damaged the relationship with their consumers as well" Mark Darrah: "In 2017? Definitely stopping the MEA dlc didn’t help"

User: "Have you considered writing an unauthorized history of Bioware, Mark?" Mark Darrah: "I’ve thought about a book. Not sure if there is one in there…"

User: "my trust in Nexteffect is very low just like it's for Bioware overall nowadays, but I won't judge before the game is out." Mark Darrah: "Keep following the game. Hopefully it will be great"

Mark Darrah: "EA doesn't sell IP"

User: "It's always so weird to hear the two teams at BW were kinda against each other" Mark Darrah: "Its weird how much the teams saw the differences as opposed to the similarities"

Mark Darrah: "I’m not sure that a large corporation can NOT assimilate an acquisition. Even if it tries"

User: "I have zero expectations for the next Mass Effect game" Mark Darrah: "There is still blood left in that stone"

Mark Darrah: "DA2’s budget is pretty small"

Mark Darrah: "We are starting to see a pivot back but basically the math is: 1. A successful live service makes WAY more than a successful SP game. 2. So much more that even if only 30% of our bets work we are still better off. BUT. 30% of their bets have NOT worked. Its way lower than that"

User: "The year BioWare started being finally digested by EA." Mark Darrah: "Finished I'd say"

User: "Do you feel like the "little to gain, little to lose" attitude from EA happened with The Veilguard as well?" Mark Darrah: "It isn't the same situation I don't think"

User: "How close were we to just getting any Dragon Age release, ever? Do you think the 10 year wait between releases damaged marketability?" Mark Darrah: "Do you mean how close was Joplin to happening? Not very close. It never even entered true pre-production" User: "regarding Anthem’s live service status… were people moved from Austin (The Old Republic) to help with that? Because it would greatly explain the content drought in the game at the time." Mark Darrah: "A ton of Austin people were on Anthem and Anthem Live. Not sure if they were pulled off of SWTOR though"

User: "I don't think EA understand video game development..." Mark Darrah: "They understand very specific kinds of development"

User: "if I were at BioWare, I would have had no trust in EA to keep their word after they agreed to let Dragon Age become single player again in 2021." Mark Darrah: "different people in different chairs but yeah"

Mark Darrah: "Yeah I don’t think anyone was malicious"

User: "do I understand correctly then that actual work on what eventually became The Veilguard started in 2019, after Anthem?" Mark Darrah: "There are very thin threads that trail all the way back to 2015 but most work happened after 2019. REALLY most happened after 2021 when it went back to SP."

User: "It seems like the Dragon Age team and Mass Effect teams have resentment towards each other, but I rarely hear from Hudson discussing this. It’s mostly the Dragon Age team." Mark Darrah: "I think we all have different stances for sure"

User: "I'm sure they don't appreciate you telling the full truth." Mark Darrah: "There’s much more to it then this"

Mark Darrah: "That Anthem pitch was so good it lasted 7 years of Casey being gone"

User: "Execs lying to you numerous times, then lying to the Dragon Age staff about the nature of their relocation, only to have them crunch on Anthem, is horrendous." Mark Darrah: "I don’t think they were lying to me at the time. It just became untrue"

[source]

[helpicant-stop]

Quackity Wins Annual 'Sexiest Dream SMP Member' Tournament 4th Year in a Row

Poll results from the 2024 Sexiest Dream SMP Member tournament released its unsurprising, if ill-timed results this Wednesday, revealing recently deceased President Alex Quackity H.Q. of Las Nevadas as the winner for the fourth year in a row—every year since the tournament's inception.

Quackity won by a landslide of 69%, with Foolish Gamers as the first runner-up at 11%. Dream Was Taken had received a shocking one vote; when asked for comment, poll runners refused to break anonymity to divulge the identity of this mysterious voter. However, they did elect to mention that the only living person who had not voted was George Not Found, as he was sleeping for the entire duration of the poll's runtime.

Various members of the SMP were contacted by our team to offer their standpoint on their vote, the results, and tournament as a whole.

“I think him winning was a great way to honor his memory, you know? One last big final hurrah. I mean, not counting the, you know... the explosion. That was a pretty big final hurrah,” first runner-up Foolish Gamers remarked. “I voted for him, of course. Pretty surprised I got second place though. Guess my himbo swag is more charming than I expected!”

“Um, I voted for Ranboo, personally. Didn't expect anyone other than Quackity to win, though, of course... he's like, the server sexyman. Probably getting his freak on as we speak, actually," Snowchester President Tubbo Underscore-Beloved said, seemingly under the impression that the man in question was still alive. Once informed of Quackity's passing, he added, “Oh,” and refused to speak further.

Former L'manburg President, current Utah gas station attendant Wilbur Soot commented over Zoom, “You know, in 2020, I didn't get a chance to vote because I was too busy being dead. But you can bet the moment I was outta that grave I put his name down on the ballot and never looked back, though it's been pretty hard mailing my votes in the years since I left. I'm not sure why they even bother, to be honest. The results are never going to change. I can guarantee you he'll win again for the 2025 round. Even though he's dead. God, I always knew we'd come to the same end, that copycat.” His grin faded. “I wish history didn't repeat itself. I thought I left early enough so the poison I brought to this server would stop seeping into everyone else. I never even said goodbye, you know? I thought...” After this point, Soot abruptly turned off his camera and microphone before disconnecting. He never rejoined the virtual meeting, and is no longer contactable by our team.

“Dude, Puffy was right there. Puffy was right there and everyone still voted for Quackity! I don't get it!” bank manager and former Eggpire member Hannah X. X. Rose insisted. “She got fourth place, which honestly isn't too bad for a woman in a server full of men, but come on guys. This thing is so rigged, it was rigged from the start with that ratio. Rest in peace, though, I guess. He was annoying, but, he could slay every once in a while.”

“Yeah, I voted for Quackity,” Captain Puffy, leader of the now-defunct Pro-Omelette Resistance turned vessel for the Egg (prior to its extermination), said. “Could've voted for Niki, but she didn't want me to, and obviously I didn't want to make her uncomfortable. Also, it's just, like, the obvious choice otherwise. Have you been to one of his strip shows? Rest in peace to that fallen diva.”

Quackity's fiancés (when asked for clarification on their marital status, conflicting answers were given, so the writers have elected to retain the fiancé label) both voted for him as well. “When we heard about what happened, it was...” General Sapnap sighed deeply, and paused for several moments before continuing: “Kinoko Kingdom and Las Nevadas are actually right next to each other, so we heard the explosion in the distance, and I geared up and ran there ready to see, like, a nuke or something. But it was Quackity. He looked so small under all that rubble. Compared to how big everything else in Las Nevadas was.”

Another long pause. “Karl's time travelling is limited to eras outside of his lifespan, so it's not like he could've dashed back in 10 minutes early to save him. I regret every second I spent in Kinoko, staring out the window at Las Nevadas in the distance not trying to bring him back. It's a mistake that will haunt me for the rest of my life. Sorry, can you give me a second?”

While comforting his partner, Karl Jacobs said, “I'm ace, but I had to vote for him, obviously. My amnesia took every good memory we had together from me, and turned him into a monster—the not sexy kind, by the way—and by the time it stopped progressing it was too late. But I still look at our old photos together, what we used to have, the look in Sapnap's eyes when he talks about him and about us, and I wonder what could have been. There is one thing I know: in every time I've travelled to, I've fallen in love with two people every time. One of them is familiar and the other one isn't. The next time I go, I'll find him. I have to.”

In the day after the interviews were conducted, the team was approached by a gelatinous green man who was not on the voter's or member's list. He claimed to be named Charlie, and stated that he too had been present at the time of the explosion. “I was Quackity's best friend, just ask anyone from Las Nevadas. Some may call me his successor, his right-hand man, his assistant, his boyfriend, his silly rabbit... someone even called me his son, which was kinda weird, but either way, we were something. And that something was flawed, but in the end I think we were able to make amends. At least, that's what I thought at the time. I was saying goodbye because I was leaving to go travel the world, and as I turned and started walking I suddenly hear this loud 'BOOM' and then I turn around and the entire casino's been exploded. I mean, he was destined to turn to dust either way, whether it was in five years or fifty-five years or five hundred five years, but I admit that was the first time I saw someone turn to dust 'prematurely' and feel something. I think that's what people call 'emotions.' I'm not a people, so I'm not part of the voter's list. But if I was, I would've voted for Mr. Cicle. Now that was a sexy fella.”

[botcrashlog]

the delicious wet slap of skin against skin while i fuck something too dumb to know what's good for them <3 hey, baby, don't cry, you can take it!!

[tragedykery]

[ID: eight orange gifs of aang from avatar: the last airbender. /end ID]

[caption plaintext: Anyone’s capable of great good and great evil. Everyone, even the Fire Lord and the Fire Nation, have to be treated like they’re worth giving a chance.]

Anyone’s capable of great good and great evil. Everyone, even the Fire Lord and the Fire Nation, have to be treated like they’re worth giving a chance.

[thelonelyshore-if]

after work today i did not have the brain power to write. so, instead, i decided to play around with images. while playing, if photo mode is turned on, sometimes you'll get to see pictures instead of the text...

The first image I made is quite spoiler-y, so I couldn't share it. Willow's journal pages, on the other hand, have been around since the beginning, so here's a sneak peek ;)

[ocprompts]

my bad if you've done this prompt before but!! assuming your oc has their own fandom, how would the fandom mischaracterize / stereotype them?

plain text: assuming your oc has their own fandom, how would the fandom mischaracterize / stereotype them?

[lucabyte]

gee i wonder if homestuck is like. about something

[magpiesketchins]

https://archiveofourown.org/works/56166955/chapters/162416008

Happy 25th of... February? 🌼

An update to my post-Night Watch VetVimes fic

In which Dr Lawn has prescribed Vimes with "Wear the bloody eyepatch or you'll lose your eye", Vetinari finds himself staring down the barrel of thirty years, and Vimes has a horrible revaltion.