#With recent instances of people using our content without permission

[iliveforaussiegrit]

“Australian ex-racing driver Mark Webber, boasting nine victories in his career, arrived in São Paulo for the Brazilian Grand Prix and shared thoughts on his admiration for Ayrton Senna, retirement, and his fondness for Brazilian barbecue.”

“As the Rolex ambassador, he arrived in São Paulo in November for the Brazilian Grand Prix. Despite not boasting world titles, he, a fan of the band INXS ("the songs are timeless"), played tough against prominent figures in the sport. Nowadays, he cruises around in a Porsche and manages fellow countryman Oscar Piastri's career at McLaren.”

“With stints at Red Bull, Minardi, Jaguar, and Williams, and nine victories under his belt — including two on Brazilian soil — Webber discussed Ayrton Senna (whose grave he visited on this recent trip), the accident at the 1999 24 Hours of Le Mans, likely to become a documentary, where his car somersaulted in a cinematic manner, and life after retiring from the sport ("I used to be a sharp weapon, now I'm a gentleman").”

GQ Brasil📸

[musicandphilosophy]

Sign up for our listserv here.

AMS 2023 Schedule

Saturday, October 11th

12:30-2:00pm- Workshop/Business Meeting (Governors Square 12)

Workshop discussion of 'White-Hot Jazz:' Aesthetic Judgement and the Racial Imagination in Occupied Paris, Kira Dralle (University of California, Santa Cruz)

Respondent: Charles Kronengold (University of Minnesota, Twin Cities)

[Access reading here. Please do no circulate without permission of the author.]

8:00-10:00pm- Panel: Archives (Location: Vail)

"Earth as Sound Archive," Peter McMurry (University of Cambridge)

"Materiality, Mobility, and Music in an Early Modern Maritime Archive," Nathan Reeves (Northwestern University)

"How would a post-custodial archive look like in the case of the AUMI Consortium?," Valentina Bertolani (University of Birmingham)

"What is the Status of a Vaulted Tape When the Building Burns?," Michael Heller (University of Pittsburgh)

Abstracts

Earth as Sound Archive

Peter McMurry (University of Cambridge)

Do archives need humans to exist? Recent archival studies (e.g., post/decolonial studies, media archaeology) highlight the significant gaps caused by the various political and social contexts in which they were established. But even in these critiques of archival ontologies, humans play a central role in establishing and maintaining archives and their holdings. Yet in this moment of anthropocenic reckoning, it seems equally viable to reflect on archives beyond the human, and particularly what historian of science David Sepkoski has called “the earth as archive.” In this paper, I consider three different instances of geological listening in which the earth functions as a kind of sound archive: first, the noise of boulders being pushed by mountain rivers until they become sand in the ocean, an auditory experience Charles Darwin used to conceptualize the deep time of the earth; second, the emission of sound from bubbles in glacial ice which have recently been recorded and analyzed as a way to measure the rate of ice melt (Tegowski et al, 2014); and finally, in a slightly different configuration, the increasing use of sound (and ultrasound) waves in oil extraction, both to query the earth-as-archive in order to locate oil wells and also to extract oil more efficiently. Listening to the earth-as-archive offers affective and geological insight, yet it also suggests the ways listening itself can easily become co-opted as a tool of environmental destruction, contrary to a long history of sentimental listeners from the Romantics to the World Soundscape Project.

Materiality, Mobility, and Music in an Early Modern Maritime Archive

Nathan Reeves (Northwestern University)

Throughout the early modern period, Spanish overseers of the city of Naples maintained a fleet of galley ships that provided military protection to its busy port and patrolled the coasts of the wider kingdom. As was typical throughout the Mediterranean, these ships relied on rowing labor from enslaved men (mostly north Africans and Ottoman Turks) and local convicts, identified collectively by contemporaries as galeotti. Given the constant provisioning these ships required, Spanish bureaucratic officials called veedores kept meticulous records of rations, munitions, equipment, and the crews themselves. Today held in the military section of the Archivio di Stato di Napoli, the archive of this fleet preserves traces of musical life in a maritime carceral space. Alongside contents ranging from cannons to coils of rope, surviving inventories document the presence of musical instruments and the galeotti musicians who would have played them.

This paper examines how Spanish state agents monitored the movements of people and objects within an internal economy dependent upon forms of unfree labor, including music-making. Drawing from recent discussions in early modern studies, I consider these inventories as subjective records of space that index contemporary material associations between objects and their functions. The organizing principles of veedores allude to idiosyncratic notions of material and aesthetic value that temper the Foucauldian vision of panoptic state surveillance. Taking up Ann Stoler’s call to think along as well as against the archival grain, I argue that the maritime archive of the Mediterranean galley reveals music’s circulation within a fluid, contingent space.

How would a post-custodial archive look like in the case of the AUMI Consortium?

Valentina Bertolani (University of Birmingham)

The music archive has long favoured collections produced by a single creator, be it a composer, performer, collector. However, continuing to produce archival collections based on the primacy of individual creators is not enough to record the complex assemblages of many musical experiences of the last century. This paper mobilizes the concept of post-custodial archival paradigms, community ownership and long-term sustainability of these models in the case of the Adaptive Use Musical Instruments (AUMI) ideated by Pauline Oliveros, Leif Miller and Jackie Heyen in the early 2000s and the consortium created around AUMI (http://aumiapp.com/).

The diversity and dispersion of AUMI documentation (e.g., coding of various versions of the program; paper-based and digital documentation such as meeting minutes, email exchanges; performance documentation such as video; and traces of online presence) makes it a perfect candidate to apply post-custodial archival principles. Indeed, the post-custodial archive, theorised by Terry Cook (1994), articulates ‘a turn from “archives” as collection or location to “archiving as practice”’ (Zavala et al. 2017, 204). The work presented in this paper is based on interviews with members of the consortium and a survey of existing materials and it will propose possible ways forward on how to archive an experience such as the AUMI consortium. This case study can offer a paradigm for many other musical experiences since WWII in which the communal aspect is paramount (e.g., the Deep Listening community also started by Pauline Oliveros, improvising collectives, the live-coding community).

What is the Status of a Vaulted Tape When the Building Burns?

Michael Heller (University of Pittsburgh)

In 2008, a massive fire tore through Building 6197 of the Universal Music Group in Hollywood, a building known to employees as the “Video Vault.” This structure was a storage facility containing over a half-million master tapes recorded by luminaries of American music. While reports vary, the blaze likely destroyed over one hundred thousand tapes, a devastating loss of cultural artifacts documenting American popular music. The list of artists affected is sobering: Billie Holiday, Louis Armstrong, Chuck Berry, Patsy Cline, Mary J. Blige, Elton John, Slayer, on and on. Yet this was hardly the first tragedy of its kind. Earlier fires had destroyed storage facilities of Atlantic and MGM Records, and in other instances record executives have intentionally destroyed archival materials in order to save money on storage costs.

This presentation considers what it means to preserve massive holdings of cultural history in the storage facilities of commercial record companies, facilities that have been repeatedly shown to be both inaccessible and fragile. In particular, it examines the fuzzy epistemological boundary between archives and vaults. While the two are often conflated in news stories about tape losses, in practice their missions can differ widely in regard to user access, preservational priorities, and conceptions of perceived value (economic, cultural, and otherwise). The presentation draws on Achille Mbembe’s theory of necropolitics to ruminate on the status of vaulted tapes, as objects which are perceived as having tremendous value, yet are intentionally shunted away from listening ears for decades, until they are (sometimes) destroyed.

[lastchancevillagegreen]

Wednesday, 9 August 2023:

Official Release Series Discs 22, 23+, 24 & 25 Neil Young (Reprise) (released Friday, 29 July, 2023)

On the 29th of July I did a tumblr post about the CD version of this box. I didn't open the contents, but I have opened this box. Before I begin detailing what is found here, let me just say this: I bought this set directly from Greedy Hands, Neil Young's store on his website. I've long exhausted my patience with amazon and their lousy packaging, terrible shipping practices and endlessly high/low/high prices, so I went directly to the source. Besides, Young's price was almost $30 less than amazon!

That being said, oh boy! The box arrived in a cardboard box that had been managed and was half open. The shipping box looked as if Trump's parking garage lawyers trampled on it like their client did our rights to vote. I was shocked by the shape of the packaging box. When I opened it up, which took virtually no effort, I was stunned to see absolutely no bubble wrap, no cardboard partitions, not even crumpled up paper making a feeble attempt to keep the actual box of vinyl from being damaged. fortunately for me my box survived without any problems (sure the corners are already rubbed white in spots, but more on the poor quality of this entire set soon). Rest assured, I've have made my one and only purchase from Greedy Hands. I'll now look to places like Universal or Warners or where ever I know for certain they package with quality and care.

As for those who love to ridicule fussbudgets like myself who expect the packaging to be pristine by saying, "you don't play the box/ packaging/ album cover/ whatever" they are correct. But when I drop damn near $200 I don't expect everything to be shambles excpet the actual vinyl. In the 21st century we have given, courtesy of amazon, permission to too many dealers to treat our toys like garbage. Amazon started this trend of not caring about quality and too many people have picked up on it. But enough of that. Above you see the front of the box and the back of the box (the box is numbered but no one seems to no how many were pressed, somehow mine is #765). Below, take an upclose look at that giant hype sticker (which still isn't half as big as the hype stickers found on Lou Reed reissues).

There are four albums in this set. Three will be posted here and the fourth will get it's own entry. This is in part due to the fact I recently posted the original vinyl pressings of these albums on tumblr. I'll link accordingly as I move down the line of each album. People are raving about the sound quality and if they sound as good as that Harvest box I just blathered on about here I'm excited to hear these albums.

But before I delve into them, let me just say, my original vinyl jackets look almost nicer than these new jackets do (and if that sounds hyperbolic, I'll amend that and say they look as good as these new ones). Did they toss these around in the manufacturing plant? The corners are dinged, the albums were filthy dirty (I had to clean every one because it was as if children of the parents in the manufacturing planet made dirt pies and then carried the jackets over to their parents to be filled with records after the covers were made) and in some instances the slot where the albums slide into are dinged and rubbed white. Nice work guys! Nothing like dropping almost $200 bucks and getting a brand new set of albums equitable to what I could find in a used record shop. My brother found a used copy of an original pressing of Freedom last weekend when I was in Chicago and it looked nicer than the jacket of this new pressing. I simply do not understand that state of consumerism in the world today. I know there are more important things (HunterBidenHunterBiden) but my heavens.

First up is Freedom. Originally a single upon release in 1989 it is now a double album. Below is the album cover and the back of the jacket. Look at what a mess this jacket is. I think it looks like it could be mistaken for an original if there were two albums and NYA logo on it. It is especially noticable on the back of the album.

Below are the front and back of the inner sleeve. This is different from the one I posted and linked to at the top of the Freedom entry. The differences? The sleeve isn't paper as in the original pressing and the opening for the album is on the side, like all (or most) European pressings, instead of at the top like all US pressings. Yes, those are minor differences, but they are differences. When you understand this box was pressed in Germany, that might explain the differences.

I don't carp about everything associated with this set, mind you. I was disappointed this wasn't on the original Reprise label of brown and orange and I'm not certain why I ever thought it would be. That being said, as much as I dislike the post-modern Reprise logo found on this label, it's made better simply by bigger font used across the board. On the original pressing the font is tiny and it always looks way too tiny. Here's the font size fits better and works far better. Below are all four sides of this now double album.

The second album in this box of four is, to me, the main attraction for desiring this big box of records: Ragged Glory. It went from being a single album to becoming a triple album. Neil amended the title to Ragged Glory Smell The Horse (and you can see that amendment on the album cover below) and included four new tracks that had never appeared on the album before. I mention the originals of these tracks in the linked entry from last July and I'll not detail them a second time.

Below you can see the album cover and the back of the album. Look at that cover. I swear my original copy is in way better condition than this new version that looks like all of California played with it before boxing it up.

Then there is the inner sleeve. It's made like the inner sleeve for Freedom: glossy, opens at the side instead of the top. My apologizes for showing only one side. The umpteen photos I took of the black side of the inner sleeve refused to focus and I am not giving one more minute to the @#$! digital camera and its unending idiosyncrasies. The black side of the inner sleeve is not glossy like the one in the original US pressing. This is more a flat matte finish and it is dull and it looks like it might have been from 33 years ago (even as mine from 33 years ago still shines and is jet black instead of faded black).

As I indicated this was originally a single LP in 1990 and has now been turned into a triple. Actually it is a double with a third album being devoted to the four bonus tracks Neil has suddenly added. Below are the first four sides of the label.

The next two labels showcase the four bonus tracks which have been added to this release, the entire reason I wanted this on vinyl.

The third and final album I'll post in this entry (but not the final album in the box) is Weld. Originally released in 1991 and with only a vinyl release in Europe, it went from a double album to a triple album. Of all the albums in this set, this one (and the next in the next stand alone entry) look the best. Below you can see the album cover, the gatefold and then the back of the jacket.

It has been ages since I've played this album. I look forward to hearing it whenever I bother with it because I saw this particular tour which I mention in my original Weld entry. Below are all six of the labels for this now triple LP.

The next album in this set is Arc. Since I have only 30 spots for photos and six photos of Arc I am doing a stand alone entry for the album. You can find it here. (Any typos will be amended later after tonight's festivities seeing a band in Springfield.)

[otonymous]

⚠️ PSA: Everybody Hurts (When People Repost)

Hello @thebestaqua32​,

Thank you very much for your Ask.  I cannot tell you how much I appreciate the fact that you are reaching out to ask me for permission before actually doing so.  Unfortunately, I do NOT allow my work to be reposted by anyone other than myself, on any platform, whether it is Wattpad, Instagram, Twitter, etc.

What follows is by no means directed towards you, dear @thebestaqua32​, but I thought I’d take this opportunity to talk about something many creators (writers and artists alike) have been dealing with for a while now, and me, myself, recently.

Over the course of the past 3-4 weeks, I have found instances of my work being reposted to no less than 3 different platforms, once with attribution in difficult to see fine print with no links back to the original source of my work, and twice with absolutely no credit at all.  As you can probably imagine, it was quite upsetting to me that pieces I’ve worked so incredibly hard on was being distributed in such a manner, and a lot of time and energy was expended in order to rectify the situation — time and energy that could’ve been otherwise used to create more content for my lovely readers and followers.

Unfortunately, reposting without permission from authors and artists is a common occurrence, and some may not realize the damage doing so can inflict.  I seek here to try to explain why reposting in this manner hurts everybody, not just the content creator.

Argument #1: 

“How can I possibly hurt someone by reposting their work?  The more likes and comments I generate on this post of mine just means I’m giving them free publicity!”

This is something I’ve heard many reposters say in defence of their actions, and while publicity is definitely a good thing for content creators, that is only the case if the people consuming a piece could be bothered to check its original source — that is, if exposure is a guarantee of user traffic being driven back to the creator’s website, social media accounts, etc.  And oftentimes, especially in this digital age of “see it and forget it” fast-consumption, most cannot be bothered to do so — the action that is one-step removed proves to be too much of an effort, even if it is merely clicking a link.

Please also consider this: many creators depend on commissions to make a living.  This avenue of revenue has only become more important in current times because we are in the midst of a pandemic.  People are literally relying on these funds to pay their rent and feed and support themselves and their families.  The ability of a creator to support themselves is thus dependent on the size of their fan base or their numbers of followers.  If people cannot be bothered to check the original source of a piece of writing or artwork, this essentially cuts down on their potential earnings.  You cannot commission a piece from someone or support them if you don’t know of their existence.

This is especially so if things are reposted without proper credit at all, as was the case with one of my works.  The worst part was that the stolen piece was taken from a project where the proceeds from all commissions were being donated to charity.  In doing so, the thousands of people who liked this post had no way of finding out about this charity project, which means that even if they would’ve been interested in donating, they would not have known how.  In essence, this translated to less money being raised to help those who really needed it in dire times.

So please, please, please do not think that the act of reposting hurts no one because that is simply not the case.  There needs to be a direct link between people that engage with the content and the creator, which is why reblogging on Tumblr is excellent (feel free to reblog any of my content here if you wish, dear @thebestaqua32​) and retweeting (without quotes!) on Twitter is great.  These are among the best ways to support us!

Argument #2: The act of reposting could potentially contribute to the decline of a fandom.

Imagine you spent hours, days or even weeks working on something — pouring your heart and soul into a piece — and when you finally shared it to the world, not much happened.  Maybe you got a few likes here or there, a couple of comments if you were very lucky.  How would you feel?  What conclusion would you draw?  Some might feel discouraged, others might stop creating altogether.

Imagine then, that same post receiving tons of comments and likes and legitimate shares because someone with a bigger following reposted it on their own social media account without your knowledge.  Imagine what you would’ve done with this information — the feeling that others loved and enjoyed your work and wanted to see more.  Perhaps it might’ve encouraged you to continue creating.

Case in point:

I wrote this letter.  And if I weren’t alerted to the existence of this post, I would’ve never known that thousands of others had liked my work.  Also, that’s 124 comments I didn’t get the chance to read.  Furthermore, this was a piece that was written for the charity project.  Imagine how many potential donors we might have received if people knew about its source.

Feedback is absolutely crucial to creators.  It enables us to discover what others did and did not like.  Not only can it serve as a compass of sorts to guide our artistic progress and work (and create pieces that can cater to the needs and desires of those who consume it), it is also a point of communication between members of a given fandom.  It builds community.  And without a strong sense of community, a fandom flounders and could eventually fizzle out.

Without content creators, there is very little for people to consume.  Please support all of us by not reposting our work, especially without our knowledge and/or permission.

With that being said, please accept a giant THANK YOU from me to you for reading till the very end.  It is very much appreciated. 🙏🏻💕

[dreadfutures]

aight let‘s talk ao3 tags again

the very nice tag wrangler I’ll be quoting from has given me permission to share their kind and thorough responses (all bolding/emphasis is mine) without identifying information. and we very nicely go through some of my own tags from my long fic Dead Pasts, Dread Futures. Many, many thanks to this wrangler for explaining so much to me.

Anyway. I present these discussions as a peacable offer of: these are many writers’ concerns, and they are valuable, and worth considering. don’t dismiss concerns about the tag limit off hand, and don’t insist that edge cases don’t matter.

tldr; at the moment, after all this discussion and back and forths and bullying, I still believe that having 75 tags, period, as the limit across ALLCharacters/Relationships/Fandoms/Additional Tags penalizes longfics. Period. If it were even a limit of 100 tags, or broken down by Tag Type, it would be a little more forgiving. For advertising and for content filtering purposes, it only helps writers and fic visibilty to be specific and thorough in tags. A limit like this just so clearly has the potential to negatively affect large fandom/large ensemble/long fics.

It feels like this decision is being very broadly based on a "for the majority" mindset, which has never been what AO3 is about, without actually physically looking at the kinds of fics it will affect. The tag system on AO3 has been able to give fic filtering and reader-judgement a nuance that no other platform has accomplished, and longfics and large ensemble fics still, I think, depend on that as both a courtesy and necessity. I saw the rough math someone did and know that almost all fics currently on AO3 are <25k or something like that, and sure, for the average oneshot, or for even a fic <100k, a tag limit that's very strict across all tag categories probably won't be felt at all. But it's clearly something that people who write certain types of fics, and take them very seriously, will feel. Like I genuinely don't want to have a million tags. I want to tag relevant content that allows potential readers to filter & include & exclude my fic as they so choose, but also, if it does show up in their search, I want to give them the information they want to be able to decide if they want to read my fic or not. I don't want to have to put all my content warnings into a giant summary, or into a giant author's note that grows and grows. The tags have been a very helpful way of accomplishing those. Being able to cut down on parallel/synned tags is great, but it still seems like longfics that deal with multiple fandom entries, large casts, and require content warnings will butt up against that limit very quickly.

tag limit discussions:

- long fic writers adding tags as they go

- writers of franchises with many installments and ensemble casts

- writers with extensive content warnings

- use of tags to clarify a filtered tag

- use of tags to demonstrate how content is handled

off the bat - stop being jerks

look, I know objectively fics don’t need to be tagged at all. I lived in the wild west, too, when “lemon” meant anything from the merest mention of arousal to an explicit vanilla sex scene to all out dead dove craziness. a large part of me still is of the opinion that readers should just read shit, and if they decide they don’t like it, just dip. but that’s not what we’re about here. tagging is a kindness that we voluntarily undertake, and it’s also a form of advertising.

tags are useful for their specificity, for filtering and exclusion purposes

(that’s one of the cruxes of the arguments both pro-shippers and antis make: you can filter things! But you can only filter things if they’re tagged.)

I also understand that a few asshole writers have ruined this for all of us by purposefully adding so many tags it slows down the site and makes pages fail to load and hides other fics because the tags take up 10 pages. i also am frustrated with kinkmemers who just have prompt fill fic dumping grounds that span multiple unrelated fandoms and are impossible to navigate.

...the answer is not to suggest to writers that we put all our content warnings and pairings and etc. in our summaries, or our A/Ns, or to insert a first chapter that is a placeholder summary/tags page/world state. tags are useful for their specificity, for filtering and exclusion purposes.

I also have been dealing with people being murderously angry, and super self-righteous and targeting and mean about my own tags, and tags in general. people who are anti-tag are being giant fucking dicks about it. like get over yourselves and let’s just talk about a website function lol. tags are useful for their specificity, for filtering and exclusion purposes.

THE ANSWER IS NOT TO GET RID OF TAGS.

Alright, so now that we’ve gotten that flippin’ straw argument aside.

The next thing anyone has been doing is going to my page and critiquing my tags. Let’s address redundant tags.

(the wrangler has done this nicely! no ridicule necessary!)

using my fic as an example:

If you tag your fic Female Lavellan/Solas (only), it will show up in the following searches: Inqusitor/Solas, Female Inquisitor/Solas, Lavellan/Solas, Female Lavellan/Solas.  If you tag your fic Inquisitor/Solas (only), it will show up only in the Inquisitor/Solas search and in none of the others.  If you tag with the most specific version, it will show up in the more general versions, but not the other way around. So there's no real reason to tag with the more general tags.

Though I will point out that if you don't use the canonical tag      and tag your character or relationship with a custom name it will      be synned to the nongendered version, because at some point the DA      wranglers decided that they didn't want to make gender      assumptions.  So "Annabelle Lavellan" will be synned to "Lavellan      (Dragon Age)" rather than "Female Lavellan (Dragon Age)", and      someone searching for works with specifically "Female Lavellan"      won't see it.

Response: In the fanfic writers server I'm in, we've talked about how tags work and are supposed to work extensively in the past.  There's just always been a lot of confusion, which I think has been added to when people go and try to double-check for themselves and find instances where this treeing/synning is broken. Someone put out this guide (also here) for AO3 meta text this year, which has been referred to by multiple people in the server, and it says:

What if you wrote a fic for something where there's a movie based on a book, but the movie's really different, and you've used both things that are only in the movie and things that are only in the book? In that case you either tag your fic as both the movie and the book, or see if the fandom has an “all media types” tag and use that instead of the separate tags. If the fandom doesn't have an “all media types” tag yet, you can make one! Just type it in.

“All media types” fandom tags are also useful for cases where there are lots of inter-related series, like Star Wars; there are several tellings of the story in different media but they're interchangeable or overlap significantly, like The Witcher; or the fandom has about a zillion different versions so it's very hard, even impossible, to say which ones your fic does and doesn't fit, like Batman. Use your best judgement as to whether you need to include a more specific fandom tag such as “Batman (Movies 1989-1997)” alongside the “all media types” fandom tag, but try to avoid including very many. The point of the “all media types” tag is to let you leave off the specific tags for every version.

Which I believe is in direct contradiction to guidance to use the most specific tags, so that's definitely one source of confusion. The most recent ao3 meta text guide (https://archiveofourown.org/wrangling_guidelines/2 I think this one) doesn't present itself in a way that makes this clear for writers tagging their own works. The way authors usually go about tagging things (and what's in the FAQ) is to start typing into one of the boxes and look for what populates the drop down, which doesn't lend itself to knowing that there are trees, or knowing what tags are interrelated (it seems like a whole grab bag of tags get suggested, some in-fandom and some outside of fandom, some canon/parent/meta and some children/random freeform, in just about any field you start typing in).

I'm not sure what can really be done about this. Many of us have turned to ao3-comment-of-the-day and their posts about using Tags, and various sources on google, and have clearly come up with a whole load of conflicting advice.

Fundamentally, finding parent/meta tags for a tag as you’re tagging a fic is NOT clear to writers. The fact that a nested and a meta tag can both be suggested one after the other when filling in tags largely contributes to redundant tags.

Writing for Multiple Fandom Entries

Here’s what a tag wrangler had to say about my fandoms:

As with the relationship tree, you can look at the fandom tree  here:      https://archiveofourown.org/tags/Dragon%20Age%20-%20All%20Media%20Types  and see how the fandom tags are related. Going back to your story Rogasha'ghi'lan as an example, it's tagged with Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: The Last Court.  But as I said, you only need to tag with the lowest relevant level(s) on the tree in order for your fic to show up under the higher levels.  So if you tag with      Dragon Age: Inquisition and Dragon Age: The Last Court, it will show up not just under those categories, but also under Dragon Age (Video Games) and Dragon Age - All Media Types.  And of course because you've tagged with the specific, if someone searches under, say, Dragon Age (Video Games), but doesn't want Inquisition or Last Court fic, they can use the exclude filter to show only the earlier games.

(So that's two more tags you can remove with no effect on searchability!)

In my (but not only my) own case, I am indeed writing for Origins, DA2, Inquisition, and Last Court extensively within the same fic, so I should be tagging for all of those, specifically, still. In order to make sure my fic is seen by the correct fans, I need multiple specific tags.

Longfic Tag Bloat (adding tags as you write a fic)

And like many other longfic writers, even if I narrow down my character tags only to those with dedicated character arcs longer than 5 chapters, I still have Loads & Loads of Characters (including Dalish from the Chargers!).

A lot of longfic writers I know add characters, relationships, and content warnings as they go along.

At 170 chapters/580k words, Dead Pasts had a ton of important relationships (for example, like Vivienne & Lavellan), and as a story it's nowhere near done. I found myself planning an arc from 171 onward that would introduce a very important relationship (Felassan & Lavellan). This is how longfics end up with so many, many, many character tags and relationship tags, which is another major criticism people seem to have about "people who abuse tags."

A solution that people propose online is "split your fic." Which is actually what I ended up doing...but the old relationships and fandoms from DPDF still apply to Rogasha'ghi'lan, so Rogasha'ghi'lan will have the same number and more tags than DPDF.

If I hadn't split the fic, I would have just kept adding tags to Dead Pasts...and still had the same problem of continually adding tags. They're not superfluous tags: someone who wants to see a plot that is deeply influenced by Vivienne & Lavellan will find that in my fic; someone who is looking to see a major Felassan & Lavellan friendship grow and drive plot will also find that in my fic.

My fic is long; there are other fics that are longer, or are going to be longer, with casts that are just as large or larger, with many relationships, and that's not even talking about content warnings.

Polycule / Relationship Tags

"Tagging a polycule like Iron Bull/Dorian/Lavellan requires four      tags: Bull/Dorian/Lavellan, Bull/Dorian, Bull/Lavellan,      Lavellan/Dorian"

This assumes that people who like Lavellan/Dorian will want to read Iron Bull/Dorian/Lavellan, which is often not the case.  If your story Is Iron Bull/Dorian/Lavellan, tag it that way!  It doesn't make any sense to me to tag with the pairs as well unless the story would be of interest to people who read for that pair, or unless that pair relationship is a big step in the story (like, if you have established Lavellan/Dorian, and then they bring in Bull, you might tag for both that pair and the trio). I mean, you can tag how you like, there's no requirement that tags correspond to content. But for me, personally, if I search on Dagna/Lace Harding (I am weak for dwarf women!) I do not want to get a Dagna/Lace Harding/Sera fic.

My personal tastes don't include poly fics, but several writers I know who write poly fics are adamant that: tons of readers will not know of the possibility of the poly fic until it shows up in a search result, and the individual relationships often are significant to the fics, especially in fics that are not oneshots. For example, a great number of "fav fics" are stumbled-across! We aren't interested in the Sera/Dagna/Lace polycule ourselves, but someone might not have considered it, found it, and said, "Hey! That's my new favorite." But if polycules are segregated and only searchable by the polycule itself, alas, what's the option for visibility at all if not tagging it as Lace/Dagna in addition?

Additional Tags

Knowing when something is a "character" and when something is "additional"

Knowing that "Warrior Lavellan" (or the [Name] Mahariel) would be more useful in an Additional Tag vs. a Character Tag is also something I'm not sure how we're supposed to know? Like, I'm glad to know it now, but it's definitely not at all obvious without you telling me why it would be more useful in Additional vs in Character. Especially when to me: Warrior Lavellan is a character, and the fact that it populated the Character tag for me says that it's a Character. Because like I said, the guidance has been: start typing, and if it appears in the drop down, use it. Or, for example, my friend has the Well of Sorrows personified as a Character. Like an actual character. Does that have to go under Additional Tags, or as a Character? How do I know?

Additional tags as tone/content indicators

A lot of writers / readers have approached the Additional Tags as a surface-level overview of understanding how an author is approaching many topics concerned in the fic. Like, Vivienne is a character in my fic, but specifically I am Vivienne-positive, which I feel is important to denote because she's important to my fic, and she's a divisive character. Mood/tone/theme indicators like "Pro-Vivienne" or "we are Vivienne-positive in this house" (or like Male-Female Friendship, or "Expansive Lore" vs "Lore - Freeform" which denote different things to me) in tags (which in the comments section on the ao3 blog post get derided as "chatty tags") are still important to me, though they're useless or far less likely to be used for filtering. (I had the thesis of the conflict of my fic: “empathy is the enemy of free will” “but hope is a choice” as “chatty tags,” among some that were more mundane but important: “sera shows up late in fic”)

More seriously, there are fics that have content warning tags for filtering purposes but also clarify those content warnings to give context to readers and allow them to make a decision whether or not the content actually fits their preferences, ie, one that specifies domestic abuse as a tag (which would be in the Additional Tags) for filtering purposes but also specifies "domestic abuse not present in x relationship" (which would also be in the Additional Tags, but is useless for filtering purposes, but is immensely helpful and demonstrably used by readers to decide if they're going to even bother reading the author's note of that fic).

People are also nervous that not being able to thoroughly tag content warnings is going to end up with unhappy readers amid all the purity culture flaming that's going on lately.

Like, personally I err on the side of "suck it up, reader, and just read and find out," for a lot of things (not talking about content warnings, but talking about mood/tone additional tags), but also, given that there is already a venue here to let readers know what they're in for...taking that away sucks.

I hate a giant fic summary as much as people hate 10 pages of tags, but at least one can hide tags in their preferences, and likewise the thought of starting a fic up front with a giant author's note that gets continually updated with content warnings also isn't super appealing. Leading with a giant author's note that lays out: this is my world state and this is my character's spec and this is my character's background so you know how I'm going to approach this and these are all of the content warnings for the fic as a whole, just feels like getting into "My Immortal" territory. There's definitely a balance to be had between the art of writing a summary, what to include in an author's note, and what to include in tags, but this still seems like it's going to be fairly limiting for writers in these large franchises, especially for longfics that span a lot of topics.

It feels like this decision is being very broadly based on a "for the majority" mindset, which has never been what AO3 is about, without actually physically looking at the kinds of fics it will affect. The tag system on AO3 has been able to give fic filtering and reader-judgement a nuance that no other platform has accomplished, and longfics and large ensemble fics still, I think, depend on that as both a courtesy and necessity. I saw the rough math someone did and know that almost all fics currently on AO3 are <25k or something like that, and sure, for the average oneshot, or for even a fic <100k, a tag limit that's very strict across all tag categories probably won't be felt at all. But it's clearly something that people who write certain types of fics, and take them very seriously, will feel.

Like I genuinely don't want to have a million tags. I want to tag relevant content that allows potential readers to filter & include & exclude my fic as they so choose, but also, if it does show up in their search, I want to give them the information they want to be able to decide if they want to read my fic or not. I don't want to have to put all my content warnings into a giant summary, or into a giant author's note that grows and grows. The tags have been a very helpful way of accomplishing those. Being able to cut down on parallel/synned tags is great, but it still seems like longfics that deal with multiple fandom entries, large casts, and require content warnings will butt up against that limit very quickly.

[softrozene]

Thank you for reblogging that "on anon hate" piece. 🥺 It's something I'm scared of and I know that's silly 😅 and uh can you share how you get over anon hate? I could use any advice and thanks if you answer I hope your back feels better!!!!!!

Warnings: Dealing with anon hate and slight mention of mental illness/su*cide.

Of course, Hon, and thank you! It also is not silly at all! I used to have that fear on my old blog, and it did end up happening (as it does time from time here) so I can give you tips and whatnot.

First, let me address the problem that I have been seeing while I have been lurking. These past few days I have noticed an increase in anon hate or anon asks that try to pass off being good, but you can tell they are just condescending. It hurts to see that especially in the One Piece fandom where I have seen nothing but support aside from the occasional anon that gets unruly- But when that happens we all come together to defend that writer. That is what a good fandom is.

So, these few bad anons are trying to stir something up and it does work unfortunately and that is something I can’t stand. Especially when they go to blogs and harassing the writer in THAT writer’s safe space. Like hot damn, they are shitty people to do that.

These Past Few Days:

Of course, in one of the instances, I saw these past few days one of the “bad anon” was purely miscommunication and they apologized to that writer since. The other bad anon to a different writer was purely a total jerk since they were able to successfully hurt the writer mentally.

The anon function is meant for a lot of good things such as shy people, people wanting to give constructive criticism, those who do not want their blogs to be known by many people, people who get overwhelmed, people who want to spread love without it being a big deal (even though it is. Your hearts are big for that and everyone loves you for that pure intention).

The anon function is not meant for hate- That is abusing the anon function.

I, personally, use the anon function for my mutuals when I get anxiety when requesting something or just wanting to tell them how much they mean to me- When people use the anon function for that, such as their anxiety/they are just shy and whatnot I see them as hella brave for doing so. In this case, you are brave <3

HOWEVER- When people decide to use the anon function to send hate: That is literally the lowest thing you can do in not only my eyes but other people. You are sending hate knowing that it may not trace back to you. So, congrats if you do this- You are a coward.

As for whatever reason, someone wants to send hate, in the cases, I saw recently it was because the writers were wanting to open up to more fandoms. Fuck those anons who made the writers change their minds. It is not the anon’s blog- It is the writer’s. They are allowed to do whatever the hell they want without anyone’s permission. It is their safe space.

If you as an anon- Feel so obligated to send a writer or any other person your opinion on their blog saying you do not like something they wrote, you don’t care for this or that, or in your eyes, they are taking too long on your request, and you spam them with hurtful words ON THEIR BLOG, NOT YOURS- I really hope you can find peace one day because that ain’t it chief.

How fucking dare you try to hurt someone in their own safe space.

Those who have sent hate:

I genuinely hope you find a better thing to do with your life. I hope your words do not affect the person they reached. I have not a clue why anyone sends hate and it still bothers me today that they do but if you have any bit of empathy think of not just the person who you send hate to but the people that love them.

You could be the last thing that makes them go over a dark edge.

You have no idea what the person you send hate to is going through.

That person you sent hate to can have mental illnesses that makes them think whatever you say is true and seriously you are the biggest asshole on the planet if you wanted that to happen.

That person can be suicidal. (Of course, to some jerks who believe others will not act because of something on the internet, they have things outside in their real lives that make them feel that way. Your words can just be a breaking point.)

They could be clinging onto a shred of a will to live- Do not be that jerk that ruins it. Karma does bite back.

Words do hurt others and no matter how silly you may think it is- Words do have an impact.

Let me say that again because there are jerks who don’t believe that: You may think it is silly, but words do have an impact.

Now for the question, this lovely anon asked- How do you deal with anon hate?

Anon hate is going to happen, unfortunately- Especially to those who do not deserve it at all, and I despise that so much.

Personally, for me, it honestly still bothers me from time to time, but I have grown to get past it with multiple methods, so I hope these help.

Report and block them.

This is the top recommendation that I suggest. I have been sticking to this one without mercy for this blog and it has worked wonders. Anons who send hate are trying to get a reaction out of you so the easiest thing to get them to knock it off and move on with their lives is to report them for harassing you and blocking them. You can block anon asks by the three dots (I believe it’s been a while lol).

Bad anons thrive on attention. Just do not give a reaction and they will stop eventually.

Laugh it off

My actual first anon hate on this blog made me laugh so hard because they told me to off myself, but they misspelled it terribly. Yeah, it stung but it was more funny than hurtful to me. So if their message are hurtful remember that these people are abusing the anon function- A cowardly act and that makes it even funnier since they don’t want to deal with any consequences based on their behavior. In other words: They are childish.

If they are relentless then that usually means they are obsessed with you which is not healthy. (Lowkey recommend they see a therapist.)

Just call them out on having a crush on you and if they continue to harass you- Most likely denying it as hateful anons do, then you can safely say that yes, they have a crush on you (I used to do this on an old blog and when I tell ya it gets them mad lol)- This method works to just laughing it off so eventually you can grow to ignore them.

If you absolutely have to answer it- Tag your friends/mutuals or make sure they can see it so they can defend you. They are your support system

In this fandom- I always see so much support when it comes to getting hate so I know that it will happen. I can’t vouch for other fandoms/places of tumblr though.

Take the option to be on anon on your blog away- They go quiet really fast

Seriously- If it is bothering you please just take the anon function away until you feel comfortable enough to allow anons back on. You may feel sad for the good anons but they will understand why you did so. After this, please seek your support system if you need to vent about that bad anon.

My favorite other option that you can do while mixing it with these other options is to continue being you out of spite. Show them that no one can change you.

For my fellow sensitive people: Our subconscious minds think everything is true. It will hear or see one thing and it has no filter so it will go: Oh yeah- That is 100% correct- Even whatever you just read from the anon. For those who get hurt by anon hate and have a mental illness like me- I also suggest trying to rewire your brain with positive affirmations so it will be easier to realize that whatever the anon says is not true at all. It may take a while or may not be for everyone but it can help.

Overall?

It sucks but the best thing to do is to ignore, block, and continue on with your day spreading love and knowing you are a good person compared to them.

Maybe one day they can learn to love themselves and stop hating others (if the bad anon claim they do love themselves and can continue to be that way that just means they are extremely toxic and narcissistic and definitely will not switch their away around any time soon) but in the meantime be the bigger person than them (or have badass friends who don’t care and will fight to the death for you- For legal reasons that is a joke).

You have many options but just know that anon hate does not set your whole mood. That they may get off on sending hate but that is what their whole hobby is. While yours can be sending love- Your whole world does not consist of being on tumblr. It may be a safe space for you but remember you can also start anew if you need to. Do not let some silly hateful anon ruin your mood or make you afraid to go online. Do not give them that power.

Now on a much happier ending note, remember that these bad anons do not care about you if they are sending hate. However, there are people who go out of their way to tell you that they adore your content/your blog. They care and I think it is beautiful that they show it and come together to help others when needed.

This turned into an essay oops (1712 words yo)- Anyway, I hope that this helps you anon and I hope that it helps anyone else who may come across it. No matter what just remember you are loved.

[newproletarians]

new proletarians

Alright, so I’m feeling a few things. I’m angry and confused at the world and my place in it, and I don’t want to lose sight of my heart. The reason that’s even on the table is that I feel—in a very real, day-to-day sense—the urge to just let it callous over with grey boogers, or whatever callouses over the hearts of Squidwards everywhere. Regular old life can do that to a devastating degree, but so can the usual suspects—things like real trauma and tragedy. I’d like to say I’ve experienced a little of both at this point in my young life, but I’m still fighting the calcification of my heart. Let’s hope that in just throwing my brain at the proverbial wall, some things stick that are worth sticking. Maybe my clarity can also be yours, reader. Maybe we can snuggle up with ourselves tonight, content that we know what the fuck is going on in the world, and smugly abstain from that which our friends could never imagine abstaining from, and which we’ve known we’ve needed to abstain from for decades. Whatever. It’s wordy. It’s a fucking blog, future me. They’re supposed to contain words. Also, maybe, if I’m writing a blog where the over 50% of the audience is myself, writing it is supposed to feel at least a little similar to masturbating.

Where to begin? Well, let’s start with this: I am a college-educated youth who attended what’s commonly referred to as the best public university in the world. I received a rolled up piece of paper symbolizing a degree on a stage with other students and professors a year and a half ago. So it’s recent. And right off the bat, in my young adulthood, I have a chip on my shoulder, having that big qualifier of “public.” I went to the world’s fanciest college... for the proletariat. What does that mean? For me, this brings to mind a lot of issues having to do with the distribution of wealth in the United States, in addition to what the hell is going on economically here and in the world—but that’s something to get into later. The more pressing issue is what the hell the role of a college-educated young person is today. DFW pretty succinctly laid out an idea of what that could be in his famous address. His point was basically that college (specifically, a liberal arts education) gives you the critical thinking skills necessary to be able to get through life under capitalism (or whatever you want to call the current regime) without going crazy. I think we can do better than that. Also, fuck it, I’m giving myself permission to be temporarily pissed off, because fuck that, dude. I know that rage isn’t always an indicator of fruitful conversation, but I gotta let some steam out somewhere. I’m sure that it’ll only lead to me being better down the line. God—I am pissed. About how we’re deciding to go about talking through issues we’re having as a society (on Twitter, but also in comments sections and in NY Times articles). I have so much anger, I’m just now realizing, and I need to process it without stupidly burning myself out on it. It’s a subject for later, and not what we’re talking about right now. Right now, we’re talking about the role of the college-educated youth today. I think we’re getting somewhere, too. I don’t think the role of the college-educated youth in today’s scenario is to correct their friends and families, nor is it to Tweet about how embarrassing, vulgar, or otherwise horrible stupid people are—however embarrassing, vulgar, or otherwise horrible they may be. The role, to me, has to do with learning this stuff. Learning about systems of power, systems of abuse (many of which hum merrily along in universities—looking at you, Searl. [My anger, you guide me, but you also lead me astray]).Staying ON POINT. The way it has to do with these things is that today’s C.E.Y. needs to notice them, understand them, then DO something about them. There are, for instance, things that we learn about privilege and prejudice in university that we may be tempted to hurl at our elders back home as insults. Our jobs, as young students, are to be sexy, fashionable, charismatic stewards of the new age. Instead of yelling at our parents about being racist, we should, say, intervene in a subtle way that guides rather than punishes. That preserves trust and connection in relationships while simultaneously doing our best to right centuries-old wrongs. But this is about so much more than that. Our role is about how we conduct ourselves as the nations intelligentsia. But that’s a question. I’m not answering it here, try as I might. I still don’t know how I feel about it. It stretches into all corners of life, this role. For instance, into several things in my life I’m mad about.

For instance, I kind of hate my closest loved ones. Oops. That’s where I’m at. Am I supposed to ignore these feelings? They’re there, they’ve been there, and if I know anything about our brains, it’s that feelings shouldn’t be ignored. That’s what dumb ass patriarchs think. The funniest/saddest part of that is that they, said dumb asses, tell themselves that suppressing their feelings is the manly thing to do. It’s honestly just the cowardly thing to do. Men are so afraid of confronting their feelings that they would rather go their entire life wearing a life three sizes too small than mention a thing about it. Anyway. They’re conditioned to feel this way by their surroundings. This—this is a great point that I would love to be a major takeaway here. The thing about being educated is that you’re aware of systems, that systems need to be changed. Fault the people who can change the systems, if anyone, but really, even they are just products of the system. The good thing is that, as a powerless mass of atomized society, we have been created by these systems knowing SOME things that are wrong with it. Now we, the crumbs of dust living in and created by the gargantuan grandfather clock of life, have the sentience necessary to band together and make switch out some gears. Picture a big hand of made of dust, fixing the clock. That’s us. That’s what the role of college educated students is today. But that’s not so much the point of this paragraph, so much is the fact that I kind of hate my closest loved ones—which feels so good to say. My best friends, for instance, are really rough individuals. One is an obvious, obnoxiously insecure, compulsive liar. He’s not super tall and weighs almost 300 pounds. It’s not nice to say this stuff, but the purpose of life isn’t to be nice about everybody all the time in your own head, or on your own anonymous blog. He alienates everyone I bring him around with his bizarre persona. His insecurity is so deep that I shit you not, almost a majority of the interactions I’ve had with him would very reasonably get a “come on,” response from anyone. He has to create little talking points to make his life feel acceptable. He’s one of those people who constantly refers conversations back to their insecurities, and how they feel so secure about them, for this reason and that reason. It’s like, Christ, man. Come on. I feel a lot more ways about this, but I’m a little scared he’ll see this some day. I’m worried he’s going to die young, because he is extremely overweight. His doctor said he’s a few months away from a heart attack/stroke unless he takes immediate action, which it seemed like he was taking initially, but it doesn’t really seem like it anymore. I don’t know. The whole situation feels extremely choked by our inability to just communicate with our fucking words. And yes, I am sounding angry, I’m not actually this angry, but consider these the bubbles from a can of soda that’s been shaken. What will be left is the only-slightly-bubbled soda. That’ll come soon. For now, there are bubbles. New paragraph.

The point that I was trying and failing to get to in the previous paragraph is that I don’t like this guy. He has a lot of great qualities, and he’s certainly not a bad person to have in one’s life—as in, he’ll never cheat on his spouse, and he’ll always go the extra mile for his friends in a certain sense. But I don’t. I wish I could just talk to him about this weird, bizarre, fucking deal breaking shit, but I just can’t. Our communication is choked. I don’t think it’s his fault, though. I think it’s to do with overlapping systems of culture that make it difficult. Maybe. Maybe that’s not the point here, and the real point is just that I feel stuck in that situation. Moving on.

(TW: sexual assault)

Another friend is a fucking bona fide sexual assaulter. He practically got #metoo’d, on a personal level. His gf broke up with him because he sexually assaulted the female half of their best-friend-couple. He fingered her while sharing a bed with her and his gf, for some confusing reason. We talked about it and he gave me this wordy, bizarre, incongruent tale of what happened. It involved a LOT of details and qualifiers. When I talked to the dude half of the couple, the guy who was (and still is) with the woman who got assaulted, he said that my friend just straight up did a ton of nonconsensual shit. He also said that when his gf told other people, more people came forward saying this guy had been creepy to other women in their friend circle. This friend absolutely has a history of gaslighting and successfully avoiding trouble by forcing his way. I need to talk to him, but again, fucking choked. I have no ability to have any kind of “real talk” with him. We do not have a venue, and the prospect of confrontation is absolutely debilitating to the average WASP-y dude. Which brings us to our next situation.

I have a great friend I met in undergrad. She is very well-liked, and while I definitely don’t agree with everything she thinks, I really value her friendship. Her boyfriend is a fucking nightmare. Not really, honestly. There are actual nightmare boyfriends. This boyfriend is more of a waking nightmare. The kind of nightmare that becomes worse because it’s so hard to call out. It just keeps going. I’ve kept CLOSE track, and every SINGLE time I’ve hung out with them as a couple, this guy crosses the line. He says condescending, mean, weird, bizarre, shit that... there’s just no better way to say it than he crosses a line that normal people don’t cross. I haven’t counted, but we’ve probably hung out close to 30 times. Every time it happens, every time I give him another chance. I got a little counseling about this situation from a friend’s mom, just in casual conversation, and her advice was to figure out what in me upset me about this guy. At that point, I realized that what Eric Andre said is true: advice is stupid. Also, that I am not going to run my life based on what this person, who I previously looked up to in a god-like way when it came to relationships, says. I am going to figure it out on my own, because it seems like everybody’s solution to relationship issues is to never talk about them, or to have some kind of inner-peace solution that makes getting abused not suck so bad (looking at you, DFW). Ugh. Okay. Moving on, again. Because yep, there’s so, so much more. Again, asking questions here, not answering them.

Also, if you’re reading this and thinking “damn, bro, your life is boring,” that’s my point. This is just normal life. These are just normal people. This is the water we’re swimming in. It’s fucking tense, man. Living in the United States is tense.

I’m running out of steam at this point, but God damn it. My brothers are dick holes. And we’re great friends. They are guys who don’t ever cause a fuss, avoid confrontation at all costs, and are nothing but rewarded for it. Sometimes I think I have something to learn from them in that regard. But is that really the life we want to live? Just don’t communicate your issues? It’s just frustrating. They act superior to others, but are categorically unable to have an honest, undiplomatic conversation. They act superior to others, and are treated as superior. It feels a little like talking to robots, talking to them, decoding what they’re saying to ascertain how they may actually be feeling in a given moment. I have no idea how they feel about me. Or anything. I don’t even think they know or care. I think they just get by, and they’re rewarded for it.

Alright, moving right along. My dad. Damn do I want to not talk to that guy. I can’t talk about anything real with him. It’s like playing ping pong where the other person can only hit the ball if it goes where his paddle already is, and his paddle’s made out of glass. 

This is a sample of some real life issues I am dealing with, spoken as honestly as possible, as is evidenced by the rampant spelling and grammatical errors. College works into this as the thing that has given me recourse for dealing with this stuff. As a college educated youth, I can approach life in an informed, good way. This is life. Etc.

What am I walking away with? Well, I now know for sure that I have a lot of shit to work through. MAYBE more than one Tumblr post. Also, I guess I am proving that people still Tumbl in 2021. I am starting to really understand what the questions I have are. I think part of my issue stems from some feeling of being “out of the loop,” or having some natural, in-set outrage about not understand what’s going on, which was founded by years of being the same height as the people around me’s knees, being the youngest person in my family. Everyone around me were skyscraper people with adult conversations happening way up there. It’s a little imposter syndrome, I think, too. It comes from being the youngest, I think, too. Mixed with a natural sensitivity that I’ve noticed people like me have. 

My goal is to get better at living my life. That involves understanding how I want to live, it involves understanding what my values really are, thinking through them a little, and more. I think it’s really worth it. In the meantime, I am not a work in progress. I am a fucking careful, cool, bright, talented guy who is not perfect, but is working on it. And I am going to postpone making any big decisions about my personal life until I get some clarity.

I thought I’d get more to the subject of the new proletarians, which is something I was thinking about today when listening to Harmontown and asking myself questions about what college is for if it just makes us unemployable, debt-ridden, twitter douchers. Anyway. We’ll get to it again sometime.

This was nice. Let’s do this again sometime.

[chancebird98]

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The Practical Benefits of Resolving Coverage Disputes through Mediation.

Posted: Tue, 17 Nov 2020 08:00:00 GMT [source]

Understand, though, that arbitration does not work for everyone, although it's successful in the substantial bulk of cases. Everything you claim is personal, with the exception of your financial info as well as anything that might come to light regarding the potential of damage to anybody, most particularly your youngsters. Note, too, that you need to at the very least find out about mediation prior to you can get legal aid for any type of court negotiation. We recognize the challenges facing separated or dividing parents and we are right here to assist you to find a way with them together. We provide a confidential and neutral household arbitration solution based in Plymouth and also we offer arbitration across Devon, Cornwall as well as Somerset and Dorset. to see if the arbitration procedure can assist you and also your family members, instead of prolonged and pricey legal action. By mosting likely to a household mediator there is the opportunity that you can lower your expenses and shorten the painful procedure without the need of litigating.

See Our Arbitration Videos.

If they desire to do so, they ought to refer the matter back to the courts. It does not matter that the address was not stated, your ex is not going to depend on court regarding having moved. As in all instances, the court's major concern is the well-being of the kid in question. The court will certainly constantly put your kid's best interests initially and also this primary problem will certainly determine the result of any application for an order. Both events will certainly require to offer honest, authorized details concerning their finances for arbitration to work.

Why Corporate Counsel Should Use Pre-Suit Mediation to Avoid Costly Litigation Daily Business Review - Law.com

Why Corporate Counsel Should Use Pre-Suit Mediation to Avoid Costly Litigation Daily Business Review.

Posted: Thu, 22 Oct 2020 07:00:00 GMT [source]

Once it seems that a youngster has endured or is most likely to endure substantial injury, a reference to social solutions must be made. The mediator will certainly offer the parent who has made the claims a chance to make the recommendation themselves within that working day or by 10 am the following early morning at the most recent. Mediation is unlikely to continue when guarding issues are under examination.

Coaching And Also Support

At the end of the procedure, the mediator will make a decision on how the monetary properties should be divided. This is not automatically legitimately binding as well as should be made into an approval order and afterwards sent to the court. The order can be disputed by either celebration, however it is most likely that the court would support it unless it decided it was considerably unreasonable to one event. The arbitrator's duty is to consider all the evidence in the case as well as use the legislation to decide on how your finances should be divided. The mediator should be legally certified and also registered to serve as an arbitrator in England as well as Wales.

In Court procedure the CAFCASS police officer will certainly report back what the children state as well as this may imply the youngsters are reluctant to say anything or provide their true dreams as well as feelings. Adaptability-- In mediation there can be adaptability as to when, where and also on the number of occasions the children talk to the mediator. In the alternative court procedure a CAFCASS police officer will determine when, where and on how many celebrations they will certainly see the youngsters.

When experiencing separation or splitting up, it can be tough to discover ideal plans for your kids. Youngster Inclusive Arbitration can aid parents to collaborate and also take on board their children's sights. The mediator will intend to learn from you much more regarding your kid to help produce a relaxed as well as pleasant environment, this may be your child/ren's likes, hobbies, what they're efficient or take pleasure in etc

How do fathers lose custody?

A father who fails to properly feed, clothe, or groom his child could be at risk of losing custody. Additionally, failure to provide a clean and safe living environment or the basic necessities of life are all considered a form of neglect. If the neglect endangers your child, it's possible to lose custody.

It is a positive to go on with arbitration, however you need to be conscious of the monetary expenses if independently funded. Your mediator can assist you financially intend, to ensure that you can budget plan to manage the solution. Many individuals who go to mediation fix their issues within two or three sessions. All the same, we would certainly suggest that you analyze your finances and also establish what you can as well as can not pay for throughout the procedure. Your moderator, need to you determine to go ahead with mediation, will have the ability to sustain you regarding economic plans and also assist you in devising an effective economic budget plan. It really relies on the variety of concerns that are to be discussed in arbitration, and also exactly how well you and also your ex-partner interact. Nonetheless, usually mediators Europe about us of people manage to fix their issues in two to three sessions.

access mediationeurope mediators Europe why us here! will certainly be provided a confidential session and informed that the mediator does not report every little thing back to the parents unless the youngster accepts this. This enables children to get points off their upper body, ask questions they might not otherwise feel all right concerning asking, as well as generally be reassured that things will improve. The conference with the youngsters is private, and also the moderator will agree with your kids exactly how and also what info will certainly be fed back to you as parents. Sometimes kids more than happy to share with both of their parents what they have gone over and also the conciliator will assist them to make clear the points they want to make. In other cases the conciliator concurs with the children what he/she can state to the moms and dads.

However most mediators, particularly those in the NFM network, strongly concur that the kid. should be included any place possible. If this practice avoids a lot more youngsters tipping into the unsafe world of public legislation and court proceedings it needs to be a good thing. Whilst Family Mediation can take place along with various other solutions, it will certainly be important for the mediator to know even more about the nature of social services participation with your family. The conciliator may request your approval to call your social employee for more information to make sure that they can ensure mediation praises any kind of various other family members work being offered by social solutions.

. A conference will certainly then be set up between the mediator and also the child/ren either face to face or video clip telephone call. The session will certainly discover a selection of strategies and also circumstances such as attracting, talking about how things want to the youngster as well as where they see themselves. The purpose of the arbitration session is to assist youngsters really feel listened to, respected as well as paid attention to and also not to ask the youngster what they want to occur with future arrangements. We have qualified moderators that can see your youngsters as part of the pairs arbitration process or alternatively as a 'one-off' session. Kid Inclusive Mediation provides children of a suitable age the possibility to reveal their sensations and yearn for the future. It additionally assures them that their parents are taking their sights seriously, although it is explained to them that they are not being offered the power to make decisions, simply to state what they think as well as really feel regarding their circumstance.

Dividing moms and dads are confronted with really crucial choices concerning their youngsters. Mediators encourage moms and dads to focus on their children's demands as well as health as well as to co-operate with each various other as parents, in spite of the ending of their pair relationship. In mediation, the youngsters determine what information is passed back to the parents. This provides much higher self-confidence in claiming just how they truly feel and also what they really want.

[toomicsguide]

Toomics Cheats

Toomics Guide

Toomics guide turned into these days released. For now, in accordance to the apple app keep coverage, we're unable to assist any type of adult content material inside our app that is why you'll now not be capable of get right of entry to our adult webtoons at the app. We're sorry for the inconvenience. We do, however, have a extensive variety of webtoons you can select to read from our app. We inspire you to test them and we hope you revel in them as a lot as we do. Near. 254. posted through. U/sillynigerian. 1 year in the past. Archived. All of the 18 manhwas from Toomics. [ removed by reddit in response to a copyright notice. ] 1.6k feedback. Percentage. Save cover file. 94% upvoted. This thread is archived. New feedback can't be posted and votes can not be cast. Type via. 28 nov. 2019 - explora el tablero de serxius "Toomics" en pinterest. Ver más ideas sobre ilustraciones, dibujos y arte. Eilis, a smart scholar with a notable future, becomes buddies with the 2 new college students, jason and acton. [13] with the aid of 2015, it claimed over seven-hundred titles, however approximately half of them had been defunct. [10] numerous omics journals have names similar to existing guides. For instance, biomed important set up the magazine of biomedical technological know-how in 1994,[16] even as omics installed the magazine of biomedical technology omics hired round 2,000 human beings, about two thirds of whom are woman. [1] in 2016, the agency had revenue of $eleven.6 million and generated a earnings of about $1.2 million. [1] the government of india has waived taxes whilst granting sponsored land for the development of recent headquarters. In the end, why is it possible to look at 18+ content material with the netflix app? Hi there, fuzzymath10 and thanks to your evaluation. First, we would love to thank you to your hobby in Toomics! We're usually striving to offer a better service for our users and are continually taking outstanding consideration in each and each one among our users' hints and feedbacks! We're constantly in the works on enhancing our english Toomics app and our Toomics internet site every day with dreams of improving our customers' analyzing experiences. What phrases do people use when looking for an app? The right keywords can help an app to get found greater often, and increase downloads and revenue. App annie tracks thousands and thousands of keywords so that you can get more downloads on your app, and recognize what key phrases your competitors are using. Find out what users think of Toomics - limitless comics by means of analyzing the evaluations and checking the score. I need to refund my subscription for my one month premium skip, it simply commenced so are you able to please refund ok i remember the fact that the purchases give money to the illustrators but maximum of the comics were published months if now not a yr ago and that 12+ recommendations issue is just soliciting for parents to be p**sed off at you this app is good i love the comics which might be in here however when i visit the genres there is best boys love i don't see any girl's love so it makes me a little disillusioned that they do not have a good deal variety inside the app but it's still right i rad an awesome amount of comics right here however i assume i would give a 5 superstar in the event that they had greater variety in it and would add a woman's love genre this app is ideal i love the comics which are in right here however when i visit the genres there's handiest boys love i don't see any girl's love so it makes me a bit disenchanted that they do not have an awful lot variety in the app but it is still exact i rad an amazing quantity of comics here however i think i would deliver a five superstar in the event that they had extra variety in it and might upload a girl's love genreedit: thank you for the response 😁 the app loads simply quality but i can not appear to parent out how to scroll thru the episodes so if i'm doing some thing wrong please get back to me. When you have any novel which you do not locate in this app then you definately have the choice to request them so they may upload that novel for you. This utility has vip club also because a few fabric in this app paid. To study that cloth you need to pay some fixed costs. Simply you have to improve your membership to vip member to avail all capabilities of this app. In case you improve your membership to vip, you'll have ads fee comedian to read. Analyze person response in your experiments and app releases. Mixture comments about bugs and characteristic requests to adjust your roadmap. Consumer reviews affect conversion to installs and app rating. Featured and helpful opinions are the primary to be observed by users and in case of no response can affect download fee. That is why it's miles fantastically recommended to reply to them. Permit's discover how to grasp this unusual manner of communication along with your app customers and shape an excellent starting method. Therefore, you may enjoy the modern day and freshest collection with out disappearing. Remember to replace the new version often to experience the unique content material of Toomics. Toomics mod apk gives you a platform to study a ramification of novels — like, motion, romance, bl, drama, thriller, and plenty of greater. كل ما تبذلونه من القراءات المفضلة الواردة في مكان واحد لكل من المشجعين المتشددين والقراء الهزلي لأول مرة! حلقات جديدة يتم تحديثها أسبوعيًا لجميع المسلسلات حتى تتمكن من قراءة القصص المصورة المفضلة لديك كل يوم! Read action, horror, romance, college. [tokyo sharehouse] a portal website online for all of your share residence and visitor house desires focused inside the tokyo place. Toomics content are all covered via copyright law. Any unauthorized use, sharing or duplication can be punished with the aid of copyright legal guidelines. Https://Toomics.com/fr/webtoon/element/code/97958/ep/0/toon/4999/a/df330012920?pid=fr_gg_cid-df330012920_closean&subpid=loc_physical_ms9055716&channel=google we percentage most effective felony and secure suggestions and tricks. There's no surveys, no payments and no download. Overlook approximately rip-off, demanding gives or lockers. All is loose & smooth! No register! Use our website with no restrict and no payments. The letter alleged that omics used pix and names of personnel that both not worked at nih or did not offer permission, and asked omics not to use the name of its groups institutes or personnel for anything different than "true factual statements". [7] omics responded by modifying its website and providing emails and letters from the nih employees ostensibly agreeing to serve as editors of omics journals. Those employees later said that while they did agree to serve as editors, they did not provide permission for their names to be used in marketing materials; furthermore, they had not actually handled any manuscripts. Because i have provided all the information about this application in this article. This application is recently released and get famous in a short span of time. It has a positive rating of 3.2 stars out of 5 stars on google play store. Also, it is placed in the comic's category of google play store. This application is a lite weighted app. So don't worry about disk space. This app is developed by Toomics global for android users from all around the world to read their favorite material in one place without any charges. With this. If you have any queries or facing any issues while installing emulators or Toomics - read comics, webtoons, manga for free for windows, do let us know through comments. We will be glad to help you out! Toomics is a free comics application developed by Toomics global. The latest v1.20, which is packed with comics, Toomics, read, webtoons, manga, free features, is stable and working according to our tests. The app has 5.00 / 5 rating from 1 votes and 905 downloads from users on our site.

[utaprifanzine]

Why you people just complicat everything?That fancy move with the penny wasn't necessary🤔Just make the zine available to everyone on Google drive and post a normal link to! Easier for you and us 🤦‍♀️I was really excited for the zine and now I am just very disappointed 😑Please don't make anymore zines if that how you will "share" them 🙂 I feel really bad for the artists and writers who worked hard on the zine but now the majority of us can't enjoy their works💔

Hi there!

We’re sorry that you feel that way. As we’ve said before, the only reason the PDF access is $0.01 is because storenvy blocks orders that amount to $0.00, which means that we had to set the cost at $0.01 so people could make a successful request for the PDF access without adding anything else to their cart. Of course, we refund the penny after we grant access since the digital version is completely free.

We realize that some other zines who have a digital content release post a public link that people can use for ease of access, but unfortunately that’s far too risky given the number of potential issues that it could cause. 

For starters, reposting is a huge issue when it comes to virtually any kind of digital media. While it can be argued that there’s no foolproof way to completely prevent content theft, the more measures that you can take to prevent it, the better. The file is not saturated with watermarks (which, by the way, can be removed) and appears exactly as it does in print, which makes it all the more important to protect it from reposters who steal the content without permission and/or credit at the very least, and claim it as their own at the very worse. 

Secondly, allowing anyone to download and view the file also opens up the risk of monetary profit by a third party. Giving open access to the file means that anyone can potentially print off however many copies they want and sell them.  Admittedly, given that utapri (in the west) is such a small fandom, this is a very unlikely occurrence, but still a possibility. And given how touchy Broccoli is with people making profit off of their franchises (they have ordered multiple “cease and desists” to japanese doujin artists in the past), that’s not a risk that we’re willing to take.

It’s for these reasons that the file is restricted, to where it can only be viewed by a specific list of email addresses which we add to as more people request access. If anything bad happens, it’s imperative that we have a record of who has had access to the file, if we have any hope of putting a stop to a bad situation. Dumping a public download link on twitter offers no protection, and means we can’t do anything to help protect our contributors should an issue arise, since we won’t know who has seen the file and to what extent it has been shared.

Relying on an honor system would be nice and easy. But frankly it’s just not realistic.

Furthermore, all of our contributors maintain the rights to their work and are allowed to post/use them however and wherever they like outside of the zine. We’ve only asked them to wait until September 1st to post their work publicly, so if you follow the zine contributors it’s likely that you will see their pieces in the future. 

In addition, there have been multiple people who have had issues with storenvy and asked us for an alternative way of requesting access, which we’ve given them. The second most recent post on our blog concerns this very issue, and it shows the name of the admin to be contacted for access  in such an instance. 

The zine is by no means exclusive, and many people have, by this point, either ordered a physical copy or requested access to the PDF. We’re not inclined to believe that the majority of interested people are put off by our method of distribution. Whether or not people would like us to make another zine will depend on the amount of interest that’s shown in our next project, but thank you for your opinion on the matter.

We’re sorry that you’re disappointed with the measures we take to protect our contributors. Thank you for raising your concerns with us, and we hope you understand.

[seojoni]

The Most Importance of WordPress Website Security

Some people think that they do not get to care much about the safety of their WordPress website. Unfortunately, most of the people realize the importance of security only their website or blog gets hacked. WordPress is on the list of most user-friendly and popular content management systems that you simply can find lately. At an equivalent time, this platform may be a common target for spammers and hackers. According to a recent report, 9 out of 10 sites that get hacked are supported WordPress. However, it's important to stay in mind that WordPress is one of the foremost secure platforms. within the same way, if your website is correctly maintained and secured, it won't be easier for hackers to attack it. Actually, most hackers don't attack unpopular platforms. Therefore, they attack WordPress websites because 61% of internet sites of today are WordPress based. Now, you'll be wondering why your website is in danger despite the very fact that it's very low traffic. Actually, most hackers hack small, unpopular websites to not delete important files or steal data. Their goal is to use your web server so as to send spam emails. Actually, after hacking your website, they're going to install a special software program which will send tons of spam emails. And you will not realize that somebody is taking advantage of your server without your permission. You don't get to be scared. We are getting to share with you a couple of important tips that will assist you to secure your WordPress website. 1. Don't choose Premium Plugins that are offered for free of charge If you're running your online business on a decent budget, you're trying to find ways to save lots of money. this is often completely understandable. However, it's not an honest idea to download your required premium plugins from any website they're sold on. What you would like to try to do is attend the official website of the plugin whenever you would like to reinstall that plugin. What happens is that free plugins contain malicious software like Malware. Therefore, you'll want to shop for the plugin you would like from the official website of the service provider. 2. Use.htaccess to guard your Important Files If you've got been an experienced WordPress user, you'll have accessed and used the. access file. Once you've got changed this file, know that it'll have an excellent impact on the safety of your website. If you've got never worked with.htaccess, you would like to understand it first. Basically, this file is liable for the configuration of your web server. Besides, it contains specific rules that your web server follows so as to handle the files of your website. Primarily, this file is employed for creating user-friendly URLs for every website . apart from this, it's also wont to make necessary security-related modifications to your website. Given below are a couple of things that the file will allow you to try to to to your WordPress website as far as security is concerned: Block suspicious IP addresses Deactivate directory browsing Allow selected IP addresses to urge access to wp-admin Block bad bots 3. Hide your Author Usernames It is not an honest idea to use WordPress defaults. the rationale is that nearly every WordPress user knows the default username that WordPress uses for every website. Often, the default author username of a WordPress website is the administrator. Therefore, you've got to vary it. If you do not change it, it'll be easier for hackers to access your website and use its contents and other features. If your website has quite one author and nobody of them is that the administrators, you're good to travel. However, if you've got a little website and you're the sole administrator and Arthur, you'll want to make a separate user for your post. do not forget to assign the author's role to the user. this is often important because you can't allow that user you've got all the rights to form necessary changes to your website. In other words, the user should have limited access. 4. Hide your site Login Page If your security strategy involves hiding login pages and files, it won't be enough. After all, these elements of your WordPress website aren't getting to prevent hackers from getting access to them. But it'll a minimum of make it harder for them to hack your website. Hiding your site login page won't require quite a couple of seconds if you decide for the proper method, like a plugin. If you progress or rename your WordPress login page, it'll make it much harder for a hacker to urge unauthorized access. Actually, most sorts of attacks are programmed. Therefore, if you've got a special login page, they're going to need to invest in far more effort to attack your website. You can choose between tons of plugins which will make this job easier for you. for instance, you'll try WPS Hide Login for this purpose. 5. accompany a Reliable Hosting Company According to statistics, 4 out of 10 websites are hacked simply because they were more vulnerable. This vulnerability is thanks to the hosting platform. Therefore, it's an excellent idea to settle on a number that features a high-security level. Given below are a couple of features of an honest hosting service: Malware scanning and detection of suspicious files Automatic theme updates Firewall protection Optimized for word WordPress Support for the foremost recent version of mySQL and PHP These are just a couple of important things that will assist you to choose the proper hosting company. Choosing the foremost popular and reliable provider may be a great idea if you would like to get on the safe side. In short, if you're trying to find tips to secure your WordPress website, we propose that you simply follow the ideas given during this article. it's not an honest idea to ignore the safety aspect of your website if you're serious about what you're doing. Remember the safety of your website is of paramount importance. if you need more information about wordpress divi theme 

please visit our site: wordpress website

[hereticaloracles]

TNO Watch: Arrokoth

Helios’ Astrological Angle on Arrokoth- What are your boundaries in this life, Heretics? What lines will you not cross? Which Rubicon will you do anything to overcome? These are the questions posed by the most recently named TransNeptunian Object, which happens to have the distinction of being the furthest observed body with a human spacecraft!! We have literally been there! It is so far out, in the cold and the dark, out past the boundaries of the known- and we went and had a look. That is amazing and a testament to the best of what we can be. Anyway, without further ado, here’s Arrokoth!

The Astronomy– 486958 Arrokoth is a trans-Neptunian object located in the Kuiper belt. It is a contact binary 36 km (22 mi) long, composed of two planetesimals 22 km (14 mi) and 15 km (9 mi) across, nicknamed “Ultima” and “Thule”, respectively, that are joined along their major axes. Ultima, which is flatter than Thule, appears to be an aggregate of 8 or so smaller units, each approximately 5 km (3 mi) across, that fused together before Ultima and Thule came into contact. Because there have been few to no disruptive impacts on Arrokoth since it formed, the details of its formation have been preserved. With the New Horizons space probe’s flyby at 05:33 on 1 January 2019 (UTC time), Arrokoth became the farthest and most primitive object in the Solar System visited by a spacecraft. At the time of the New Horizons flyby, the object was originally nicknamed Ultima Thule and was referred to as such in the media from the time. Arrokoth was discovered using the Hubble Space Telescope as part of a search for a Kuiper belt object for the New Horizons mission to target in its first extended mission; it was chosen over two other candidates to become the primary target of the mission. With an orbital period of 298 years and a low orbital inclination and eccentricity, Arrokoth is classified as a cold classical Kuiper belt object.

The Myth– Arrokoth was named for a word glossed as “sky”, from the Powhatan language of the Tidewater region of Virginia and Maryland. The pronunciation and meaning of the word, however, are not entirely certain, as the language became extinct in the late 18th century and little was recorded of it. The only record of the word was collected in 1610–1611 by English writer William Strachey, who had a decent ear but bad handwriting, and scholars since have had considerable difficulty reading his notes. The meanings of the words are also often uncertain, as Strachey and the Powhatan had no language in common. Siebert used comparison with other Algonquian languages to interpret Strachey’s handwriting and deciphers Strachey’s records as ⟨arrokoth⟩ ‘sky’ and ⟨arrahgwotuwss⟩ ‘clouds’. He reconstructs these as the word /aːrahkwat/ ‘cloud’, pl. /aːrahkwatas/ (cf. Ojibwa /aːnakkwat/ ‘cloud’), from the Proto-Algonquian *aːlaxkwatwi ‘it is a cloud, it is cloudy’. Given that the first vowel is long (/aː/), that syllable would have been stressed, for ARR-o-koth.

Arrokoth’s name was particularly chosen by the New Horizons team to represent the Powhatan people indigenous to the Tidewater region which included the state of Maryland, where Arrokoth’s discovery took place. The Hubble Space Telescope and Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory were both operated at Maryland and were prominently involved in Arrokoth’s discovery. In analogy, the Chesapeake Bay region of Maryland is significantly associated with the Powhatan people native to that particular region. With the permission of the elders of the Pamunkey Native American Tribe, the name Arrokoth was proposed to the International Astronomical Union (IAU) and was announced by the New Horizons team in a ceremony held at the NASA Headquarters in the District of Columbia on 12 November 2019. During the ceremony, New Horizons principal investigator Alan Stern justified their naming of Arrokoth, stating:

“ The name ‘Arrokoth’ reflects the inspiration of looking to the skies, and wondering about the stars and worlds beyond our own. That desire to learn is at the heart of the New Horizons mission, and we’re honored to join with the Powhatan community and people of Maryland in this celebration of discovery. ”

In acknowledgment to the Powhatan people’s significance to the Tidewater region of Virginia and Maryland, Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division, asserted that Arrokoth’s name “signifies the strength and endurance of the indigenous Algonquian people” and that their heritage “continues to be a guiding light for all who search for meaning and understanding of the origins of the universe and the celestial connection of humanity.” Prior to the ceremony, the name was accepted by the IAU’s Minor Planet Center on 8 November 2019 and the New Horizons team’s naming citation was published in a Minor Planet Circular on 12 November 2019.

Why It Matters– Okay I could not have a better representative of this new wave of Transneptunians. There is so much to unpack here, and I love all of it. Arrokoth is the boundary of what we have known, and it was given a nickname with severe Nazi connotations, and we’re not going to dive into the Nazi prevalence in NASA (thanks, Operation Paperclip!)- but its amazing that name was rejected for a traditional word to honor indigenous Native American cultures. With permission sought from Elders too! That is massively Uranus in Taurus, and I love seeing it.

There is however some good in the original name, that carries over to the new one. Pushing the boundaries of the known and seeking discovery for discovery’s sake is probably the greatest aspect of humanity. We are curious, seekers, and we want to KNOW. We seek understanding of our universe, and we are willing to put in the work to understand our place in it. Of course, that can be taken to extremes, as the Nazis (god, what is with me and Nazis today?) showed us with the experiments they carried out. This could be something to watch out for with Arrokoth, “the ends justifying the means”. For instance, the medical experiments that were carried out were barbaric, inhumane and nothing but evil- but they advanced medical knowledge and led to breakthroughs that later saved lives. I am in no way defending these actions and they hurt my very soul to know they were committed, but it is inarguable that we benefit now for it. In a world where we benefit so much from the suffering of others (who do you think makes your clothes and puts together your iPhone that needs rare earth minerals which are mined in the poorest parts of the world?) is Arrokoth asking us to look deeper at what we build our world on? Or is it highlighting our tendency to look up with our head in the clouds rather than see what is happening all around us?

Then we have to address the problems of the United States, which is built on the corpses of Native heroes. So many cultures just erased… and replaced with their conquerors. It is important to think of these things and address them as the United States goes into its Pluto Return under some horrifically dark and stormy skies while being led by a petulant tyrant who couldn’t truly lead if the perfect middle east peace solution was pissed out of Putin’s tiny shriveled dick on him. Our position in history has been attained by blood and suffering, and even if you have never committed an atrocity or killed anyone, you still directly benefit from what has gone before. There will be a reckoning, and its happening now. With the other Native Transneptunians, Sedna, Quaoar, Teharonhiawako and Sila-Nunam (Ice, Chaos, Creation, and Air respectively) in addition to Arrokoth, what will we see in the future? Uranus in Taurus will bring an awakening to the land, and as we see more awareness and power returned to its traditional stewards, anything is possible. Time will tell.

This is also one of those I would look to for a marker of astrologers, by the way. There is a certain long view that is needed, a love of the stars and planets and their stories. To truly tell them properly, there must be a love when you look into the darkness and see it made of diamonds. Mind you there is a fair amount of colonizing that happens in the astrological world, what with the army of white girls in floppy hats and secondhand tarot decks who just listened to Stevie Nicks for the first time calling themselves a Bruja on Twitter and claiming that they’re an expert in Vedic Astrology or descended from this ancient witch bloodline. This Transneptunian demands respect, so tell the stories with the reverence they’re due, and dont claim them as your own for clout. Stay in your lane, Becky.

To find out where it shows up in your chart, go to astro.com, put in your birth details and in the extended options, all the way at the bottom of the next page, there will be a menu of additional objects. Under that is a blank space where you can enter the number 486958, for Arrokoth. Once you have it entered, generate the chart! Where does Arrokoth affect your life? Let us know in the comments below!

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TNO Watch: Arrokoth was originally published on Heretical Oracles

[techawareness]

Six Android 10 Features That Google Copied From iPhone & iOS

Google just officially announced the Android 10 update, and we were quick to install it on our Pixel 3. Well, given that it already had the Beta 6 installed, the Android 10 final update was just 6MBs in size. You might already have an idea of what Android 10 features are coming to smartphones in 2019. The list includes Dark Mode, Focus Mode, Sound Amplifier, Live Captions, etc.

Anyway, a couple of months ago when Apple released the iOS 13 Beta version, I told you about what iOS 13 features seemed inspired by Google’s Android. Now, it’s time to give the same treatment to Android 10 and let’s see what features of Android 10 are already present on iOS 12.

Six Android 10 Features Google borrowed from Apple And iPhone

1. Location Permission

Location Permission on iOS and Android

Privacy is the highlight of new Android features in 2019 and you can now allow location access to a particular app only when you’re using it. This way, the app won’t be keeping your location data even if it’s running in the background all the time. Well, Apple has already added the said privacy feature to iOS and iPhones in the past.

 2. Gesture Navigation

Navigation Gesture on iOS 13 and Android 10 comparison

Google has already faced much criticism regarding Android’s gesture navigation system. When releasing Android Pie, the search giant didn’t think twice before stuffing half-baked Android Pie gestures. All because it didn’t want to leave behind in the race. Now, the gestures on Android 10 work almost the same as they do on the iPhone. For example, you can swipe along the bottom edge to switch between the apps.

Also, iPhone’s long-standing back gesture is on Android 10, you can swipe from the left or right edge of your phone to go back. It’s another thing that this major change messed up the menu bar that’s accessed by swiping from the left edge. Still, Android does offer the old 2-button 3-button navigation as extra options which is a good thing. Maybe, some users might not want to jump right away.

3. Audio Balancer

Audio balancing on iOS 13 and Android 10

If you open iPhone’s Accessibility page, you’ll find an option to balance volume levels for your right and left audio channels. The same functionality has now become a part of Android’s accessibility suite.

The volume adjuster could be of great help at times, and I have personally experienced it recently when I had trouble hearing from one of my ears. I simply adjusted the audio so I could hear an equal amount of audio from both ears.

4. Sound Amplifier

Sound Amplifier on iOS 13 and Android 10

iOS 12 brought an accessibility feature that doubles as your very own surveillance tool. You can enable the Live Listen feature in the Control Center and use your AirPods (or PowerBeats Pro) to listen to all the audio captured through the iPhone’s (or iPad’s) mic in real-time.

Google’s new Sound Amplifier feature also does a similar job. However, a difference here is that it only works with earphones using a 3.5mm jack to Type-C port. Also, Google’s offering seems to be giving a lot more control option than Live Listen

5. Wi-Fi Password Sharing

Wi-Fi Sharing on iOS 13 and Android 10

Giving away their Wi-Fi password to other people is not everyone’s cup of tea. So, iOS allows you to share your Wi-Fi connection without telling your password. On Android 10, Google has also added a Wi-Fi password sharing feature. But it works somewhat differently. You can use a QR code to share your password with others. Certainly, it seems to be a more practical approach than what Apple has done. For instance, that bar code could be helpful during a house party and your guest won’t keep asking you for the password.

6. eSIM Support

eSim Support on iOS 13 and Android 10

eSIMs are modern-day replacement of the conventional SIM cards that we have been using for ages. Device makers have made our lives easier by putting the SIM card tech inside the smartphone, allowing users to switch between carriers seamlessly.

Apple’s iOS allows iPhone users to set up eSIM on supported devices. Google has been shipping eSIM on its phones since Pixel 2 (that means before iPhone XS), but it was only limited to Project Fi. But now with Android 10, users can finally put that extra hardware to some real work.

Hope so you all like this content-rich article, this article is written by Siddhant Jha, he is interested in the domain of Google and got expertise in companies like Xiaomi, Realme, OnePlus and more who collected all information and leaks regarding this topic and compile in one place. You can follow him on Twitter.

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[siliconwebx]

Pipdig Updates P3 Plugin after Reports Expose Vendor Backdoors, Built-in Kill Switch, and Malicious DDoS Code

Over the weekend, Pipdig, a small commercial theme company, has been at the center of a scandal after multiple reports exposed a litany of unethical code additions to its Pipdig Power Pack (P3) plugin.

On Friday, March 29, Wordfence threat analyst Mikey Veenstra published a report with code examples of the backdoors Pipdig built into their plugin, along with some unsavory and questionable additions to the code.

“We have confirmed that the plugin, Pipdig Power Pack (or P3), contains code which has been obfuscated with misleading variable names, function names, and comments in order to hide these capabilities,” Veenstra said.

These include an unauthenticated password reset to a hard-coded string, which was deliberately obscured with code comments indicating it was added to “check for new social channels to add to navbar.” Veenstra also demonstrated how the plugin contained code for an unauthenticated database deletion, wherein the Pipdig team could remotely destroy any site WordPress site using the P3 plugin.

The code for remote site deletion was removed in version 4.8.0 but it still a concern for users who haven’t updated. Michael Waterfall, iOS Engineer at ASOS, tested the “kill switch” function and demonstrated that it still works with prior versions.

It also confirms they lied. They _still_ have the ability to wipe any blog that hasn't updated to the new plugin version (4.8.0), which they hurriedly released to delete the kill switch after they were exposed the other day. pic.twitter.com/bNMfRQUBpr

— Michael Waterfall (@mwaterfall) March 31, 2019

Veenstra’s investigation also uncovered questionable remote calls in the plugin’s cron events, undisclosed content and configuration rewrites, and a list of popular plugins that are immediately deactivated when P3 is activated, without the user’s knowledge. He found that some of these plugins are deactivated alongside admin_init, so any user attempts to reactivate the plugins will not stick.

Wordfence estimates the P3 plugin to have an install base of 10,000-15,000 sites. The changes made in version 4.8.0 of the plugin are not transparently identified in the changelog, so it’s not easy for users to know what has changed. The content filtering and the plugin deactivations remain in the most recent release. These types of veiled functions performed without permission could have unintended consequences on sites using the plugin, which non-technical users may not be able to fix themselves.

Pipdig P3 Plugin Performed a DDoS Attack on a Competitor’s Site

Jem Turner, a freelance web developer based in the UK, published a lengthy analysis of the P3 plugin the same day that Wordfence released its analysis. She drilled down further into the remote requests, demonstrating how Pipdig has been using the P3 plugin to perform a DDoS attack on a competitor who also provides WordPress themes and installation services to bloggers. The code triggers an hourly cron job on users’ sites, effectively using their customers’ servers to send malicious requests to the competitor’s site.

The code comment tells us this is “checking the CDN (content delivery network) cache”. It’s not. This is performing a GET request on a file (id39dqm3c0_license_h.txt) sat on pipdigz.co.uk, which yesterday morning returned ‘https://kotrynabassdesign.com/wp-admin/admin-ajax.php’ in the response body.

Every single hour night and day, without any manual intervention, any blogger running the pipdig plugin will send a request with a faked User Agent to ‘https://kotrynabassdesign.com/wp-admin/admin-ajax.php’ with a random number string attached. This is effectively performing a small scale DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) on kotrynabassdesign.com’s server.

Turner also contacted Kotryna Bass, Pipdig’s competitor, who said she had contacted her host after finding that her admin-ajax.php file was under some kind of attack. Bass’ exchanges with her host are also published in Turner’s report.

Turner’s post explained how Pipdig’s P3 plugin code manipulated links to point to their own products and services when a user includes a link to a competitor in the the content:

Here we have pipdig’s plugin searching for mentions of ‘blogerize.com‘ with the string split in two and rejoined – concatenated – to make it harder to find mentions of competitors when doing a mass ‘Find in Files’ across the plugin (amongst other things). When the plugin finds links to blogerize.com in blogger’s content (posts, pages), they’re swapped out with a link to ‘pipdig.co/shop/blogger-to-wordpress-migration/’ i.e. pipdig’s own blog migration services. Swapping these links out boost the SEO benefit to pipdig, and the vast majority of bloggers wouldn’t notice the switcheroo (especially as if the page/post was edited, the link to blogerize would appear in the backend as normal).

The plugin did not ask users’ permission before performing any of these actions and most of them were implemented with obfuscated code. Turner’s investigation also covers how the P3 plugin could harvest data and change admin passwords. Many of the findings overlap with Wordfence’s analysis.

“I was aware that Wordfence had been contacted for an opinion, although I was unaware they were writing a post and vice versa,” Turner said. “I wasn’t surprised that they wrote about it though, given the risk to WordPress users.”

She has been in contact with authorities regarding Pipdig’s unethical coding practices and privacy violations.

“From my side of things, I’ve been in contact with Action Fraud (submitted a report through their website) and NCSC (who pointed me back to Action Fraud and gave me a number to call). From pipdig’s side, there are threats of legal action in their blog post but I’ve received nothing yet.”

Pipdig’s Public Response Skirts Critical Concerns

Pipdig Creative Director Phil Clothier published a public response from the company which opens by characterizing the recent investigations as “various accusations and rumours spreading about pipdig” and includes an emotional plea regarding how distressing recent developments have been for his company. He claims that his team and their supporters are being harassed.

After pushing out the 4.8.0 version of the P3 plugin, removing some but not all of the offensive code, Clothier opts for a Q&A style format for his post, putting every question in the present tense:

Do you DDOS competitors? No.

Do you “kill” sites? No!

Do you have the ability to kill sites via the pipdig Power Pack? No

Regarding the “kill switch” feature they built in, which detects all tables with the WordPress prefix and drops each of them, Clothier said it was simply a function to reset a site back to its default settings. He deliberately misrepresented what it does:

There was function in an older version of the plugin which could be used to reset a site back to the default settings. This function had no risk of of malicious or unintentional use. I can say categorically that there was no risk to your site if you were using a pipdig theme. This feature has been dug up and labelled a “Kill Switch” for maximum negative impact on us.

Clothier claims the function was available in the P3 plugin in July 2018 when a third party started posting Pipdig themes for sale on their own site:

A 3rd party was able to download all of our themes illegitimately and post them on a clone of our own site. This included previews of our themes and the ability to purchase them. We were first alerted to this by people which had purchased a pipdig theme from there, but were finding that certain features did not work correctly. After investigation, we found that the victim had purchased the theme from the 3rd party, thinking it was us. The 3rd party not only gained the financial benefit of the theme payment, but also used it as a way to inject malware and ads into the victim’s site. The reset function was put in place in order to remove the 3rd party’s ability to host preview sites with our themes. It worked, and they have since disappeared. The function was then removed in a later version of the plugin.

This is a false claim, as Wordfence pointed out in an updated article. The first instance of the code responsible for database deletion was committed to the plugin in November 2017.

The company failed to address the most critical concerns presented in the Wordfence analysis in its first pass at issuing a public statement. Instead, on the matter of coordinating a DDoS attack on competitors, Pipdig blames users and suggests they may have added the competitor’s URL to their sites.

“We’re now looking into why this function is returning this url,” Clothier said. “However, it seems to suggest that some of the ‘Author URLs’ have been set to ‘kotrynabassdesign.com’. We don’t currently know why this is the case, or whether the site owner has intentionally changed this.”

Further investigations published by Wordfence today showed that Pipdig also added DDoS code to its Blogger templates and was actively issuing malicious requests up until yesterday:

During the investigation of Pipdig’s WordPress plugin and themes, we also came across some curious code associated with their Blogger themes. This code is part of Pipdig’s suspected DDoS campaign against their competitor, and was active until April 1, four days after Pipdig’s denial of any such behavior.

Some of Pipdig’s Blogger themes have been confirmed to make external JavaScript calls to Pipdig’s server, specifically to the script hXXps://pipdigz[.]co[.]uk/js/zeplin1.js.

On March 31, as the investigations became public, Pipdig deleted its public Bitbucket repository and replaced it with a “clean one,” removing three years of commit history. Wordfence and many others cloned the repository before it was deleted and saved snapshots of pages to cite in the investigation.

That clean repository @pipdig published earlier today in place of the one containing all of their malicious code… They changed the reported release date of version 4.8.0. pic.twitter.com/YqKASTUZE7

— Nicky Bloor (@nickstadb) April 1, 2019

Pipdig’s public statement contains a number of other false claims that are outlined in Wordfence’s followup piece with code examples. Clothier closes the article by casting aspersion on the press, presumably to encourage customers not to trust what they read from other sources.

I contacted Pipdig for their comment on recent events, but Clothier declined to answer any of my questions. One of those was why the plugin disables Bluehost’s caching plugin without informing customers.

Another one from the @pipdig plugin. If you use one of their themes on @bluehost then they intentionally slow your website down by disabling the BlueHost cache plugin, then they can inject content with the title "Is your host slowing you down?" CC @jemjabella @heyitsmikeyv pic.twitter.com/48DUXsDyBj

— Nicky Bloor (@nickstadb) March 31, 2019

Clothier said he didn’t have any comments beyond what he said in the public statement but encouraged anyone interested to read the new comments added to the code in version 4.9.0:

We’ve also updated version 4.9.0 of the plugin which includes extra commenting in the code, which will hopefully help clear things up like issues with Bluehost caching and the_content() filter.

If anyone is unsure, we recommend updating to the latest version as always. However we also contend that the previous versions had no serious issues too.

Pipdig declined to answer questions about licensing but the products do not appear to be GPL-licensed. This may be why the company deemed it within its rights to take action on those who they believe to have “stolen” their themes.

Pipdig Customers Share Mixed Reactions to Reports of Vendor Backdoors and DDoS Attacks

In what is perhaps one of the most brazen abuses I’ve ever seen from a theme company in WordPress’ history, Pipdig’s user base has unknowingly been used to target the company’s competitors. Regardless of the company’s motive in combatting the unauthorized distribution of their themes, these types of backdoors and undisclosed content rewrites are indefensible. They prey upon user trust and in this case the victims were primarily bloggers.

I think that's why so many of us are so angry. Bloggers are the lifeblood of #WordPress, you create content and for the most part don't have big budgets to spend. So when someone takes advantage of that those at the "low budget" end of the market, those that cant afford devs…

— Andy Powell (@p0welly) March 31, 2019

One of the more puzzling aspects of this story is that many of Pipdig’s users seem to be unfazed by the gravity of the findings in these reports. Without full knowledge of the inner workings of a product, many customers make decisions based on how they feel about a company, regardless of being confronted with facts that should cause them to question their experiences.

I’m not concerned. I trust them. And I’m certainly not panicking and acting on the words of two blog posts citing their competitors. They’ve served me well for years.

— Caroline Hirons (@CarolineHirons) March 29, 2019

Others are angry to have had their sites used in an attack. Getting set up on a new theme is not a trivial task for non-technical users who may have had to pay a developer to launch their sites in the first place.

Honestly? I’m really angry. I trusted them for years, and in return my site has been used maliciously against other small businesses. I’ve been watching this unfold since Friday but even this update shocked me. https://t.co/mPsO8EoHBp

— Charlotte (@bycharlotteann_) April 2, 2019

“My mind is absolutely blown by pipdig’s public response,” Jem Turner said. “I understand that they were counting on their users’ completely non-tech background to bamboozle them, and it certainly seemed to be working in the beginning, but anyone with even the slightest bit of coding knowledge can see that they are lying and I genuinely don’t understand how they think they’ll get away with it.”

The crazy part is if we want to be really real about this, it's more like

The cable guy cut a big hole in my wall and installed a door handle on it. He took some painter's tape and scrawled "THIS IS A CABLE BOX" on the drywall. Then looked me in the eyes and said "No I didn't."

— Mikey Veenstra (@heyitsmikeyv) March 31, 2019

This incident shines a spotlight on how unregulated the commercial plugin and theme ecosystem is and how little protection users have from companies that abuse their power. If you are a Pipdig customer affected by this incident, there is no assurance that the company will not build more backdoors into your site in the future. The plugin updates are not reviewed by any kind of authority. Fortunately, there are a few actions you can take to create a safer environment for your website.

First, look for GPL-licensed themes and plugins, because they grant you more freedoms as the user and are compatible with WordPress’ legal license. GPL-licensed products are also a strong indication that the authors respect user freedoms and the shared economic principles that this open source license supports.

Many reputable theme companies choose to host their products’ companion plugins on WordPress.org for ease of distribution and shipping updates. The official directory does not permit these kinds of shady coding practices described in this article and all of the plugins go through a security review by the WordPress Plugin Team. If you are concerned about code quality and the potential for abuse, do a little research on your next prospective commercial theme provider or opt for free WordPress.org-hosted themes and plugins that have undergone a more rigorous vetting process.

😉SiliconWebX | 🌐WPTavern

[aisulinn]

[Translation Script Only] Florist/Bookshop(Karaoso) Manga

Source : 【おそまつ】花書(カラおそ)まとめ【腐】

Artist : 48Sensei/しば [pixiv id: 324108 ] [twitter: 48sensei ] [tumblr: 48sensei]

I DID NOT HAVE THE PERMISSION TO REPRINT so this is just the translation script! THE ARTIST DOESN’T ALLOW ANY REPRINT SO PLEASE NOTE THAT

Please read it side by side with the manga on the link~!

48sensei made a compilation of the florist/bookshop karaoso that they posted on twitter! It’s really cute so I just wanted to share it with you guys!

It’s 42 pages long so.... MORE UNDER THE CUT!

Notes:

Italic = inner thought (thought bubble or thing that’s not in speech bubble)

Bold = the writing that’s bold in manga

one paragraph = one panel

*__* = sfx

Divider = different section/scene according to the twitter post (note that 48sensei posted the pages separately on twitter)

ENJOY!!

***

PAGE 1

Radio : Good Morning! The first rank of today’s fortune telling is for you Geminis!

Kara : *yawn*

 Screen : First place = Gemini

             Second place = Sagitarius

             Third place = Aquarius

 Radio : Your lucky item iiis…. RED GERBERA!

 Kara : Heheheheh~ ♪

 Kara : Good morning my flowers. As always, today too you’re beautiful it’s blinding

  PAGE 2

Kara : heh

 Kara : Hello, my lucky baby. You will surely bring me wonderful fortunes today

 Oso : Good morniiing~

 Oso : is it open yet?

Kara : welcome!

 Oso : excuse me, is it okay if I just buy a single flower?

Kara : of course!

  PAGE 3

Oso : okay, good!

 Oso : I want the red…

Kara : Red gerbera…

 Oso : what?

 Kara : A red gerbera...

  PAGE 4

Oso : Wow! How do you know which flower I want? Are you an esper?

Kara : HUH?! Uh…

 Kara: Pardon me, the red gerbera… It’s this flower over here right?

Oso : yup! Sorry to buy just one. I happened to see my fortune today and my lucky item is red gerbera~

 Oso : Now to think about it, this flower was also in the book I read yesterday… so yeah

 Kara : Sir, are you perhaps a Gemini? Because I am one too

 Oso : You too? I saw this morning’s fortune! Haha, somehow I feel like I can relate to you more now

PAGE 5

Kara : thank you for the wait

 Oso : thank you

 Kara : *doki*

 Oso: I recently start working on Akatsuka Bookshop. If you like books, please come and stop by! See you!

 Kara: Ah, thank you very much!

 Kara: Thank you, baby. You’re really giving me wonderful fortune

  PAGE 6

Kara : COME ON NOW! TURN! MY GEAR OF LOVE!

 Naration: As he gets closer to Karamatsu, Matsuno Osomatsu starts doing stuff like “Flower Arrangement Fair” or “Gardening Fair” frequently

Co-wrkr1 : Matsuno san, we’re doing that kind of fair agaain~?

Co-wrkr2: Do you like flower that much?

Oso : It’s not that! I told you horticulture system is really popular right now!

Co-wrkr: really, now~?

Oso : REALLY!

***

***

PAGE 7

Oso : Minette sensei~ I did it!!

Ichi : Niisan! FOR REAL?!

 Ichi : then, then?! How far did you go?!

Oso : Karamatsu kun has the same zodiac as me! ❤

Ichi : then?!

 Oso : isn’t that wonderful?! The chance of that is only 1/12!! I wonder if our birthday is close~

 Ichi : eh?

 Ichi : by “did it” you mean, that? That’s all?

Oso : what do you mean “that’s all”? Well, that IS all

  PAGE 8

Ichi : huh??? What the hell! I THOUGHT YOU DID MORE YOU IDIOT! Your hands touched and your hearts went doki ☆ for instance! Or maybe he said something like, “compared to this flower, Matsuno san is more beautiful”. OR MAYBE YOU KNOW? END IT WITH A BANG AND MAKE A DATE PLAN OR SOMETHING? NO?!

Oso : You have a wild imagination, huh

 Ichi : No those ideas are overused and heck they’re actually really lame?? That is why I already expected those from you, niisan…

Oso : I mean you know, today is the first  time I talked to him! Knowing his zodiac is already a great achievement, right?

Ichi : WHAT?

 Ichi : seriously??? I mean, every day, the only thing talk about is this “karamatsu kun”…. That’s why I thought…

Ichi : What?

 Ichi : YOU WERE NOT EVEN ACQUAINTANCE YET?? YOU ONLY SEE HIM FROM AFAR? UNTIL NOW??

Oso : He doesn’t even know my name yet…  I’m sorry

  PAGE 9

Ichi : *slump*

 Ichi : hah~~~ I’m really disappointed in you, niisan… Ah~~ The deadline for the storyboard of my next series is in two weeks… Ah~~ It’s impossible… I’m dead… Let’s just die….

Oso : Come on~ I even gathered up enough courage to talk about the lucky flower with him! For you!

 Oso : niichan did his best you know? Don’t you wanna praise me?

 Ichi : …….

 Ichi : did you at least properly show him your appeal?

Oso : I said “I’m working on Akatsuka Book shop! Come by if you love books!” ❤

Ichi : Does he... look like the type that loves book? That Karamatsu kun?

Oso : ………………^^

  PAGE 10

Ichi : you fucked up didn’t you

Oso : I DIDN’T!! I'M JUST GETTING STARTED

 Oso : well, that is why…

 Oso : You’re doing book signing event at my bookshop~

Ichi : HAAAAAH??? I DIDN’T HEAR ANYTHING ABOUT THIS?!

Oso : So that I can ask for the decoration flower at Karapippi’s, don’t back out on this

 Ichi : YOU’RE USING YOUR LITTLE BROTHER FOR THIS?! I REFUSE!!

Oso : LOOK WHO’S TALKING?! YOU’RE THE ONE WHO’S USING YOUR ANIKI’S LOVE LIFE FOR MANGA REFERENCE!!

Naration : ★Without noticing each other’s feelings, the gear is turning!

 ***

***

PAGE 11

Co-wrkr2 : Matsuno saaan~

Oso : here~

Co-wrkr2 : Have you ordered flowers for this week’s Minette sensei’s signing event yet?

 Oso : uh.. no, not yet….

Co-wrkr2 : From Flower Akatsuka right? Should I go?

 Oso : DO--

 Oso : DON’T!! DEFINITELY DON’T DO IT!! I’LL DO IT SO YOU DON’T HAVE TO!

Co-wrkr2 : I-- I see..? But you already said that two days ago…

 Co-wrkr2 : if you’re slacking off again the boss will be mad

Oso : I’m not slacking off!!

 Oso : it’s just… I need more preparation for my heart when it comes to flowers….

 Co-wrkr2 : what?

Oso : NOTHING!! I’M GOING NOW! *dash*

  PAGE 12

Oso : Good evening~

Kara : Welc--

 Kara : --come

 Kara : ah, the red gerbera guy!

Oso : what?

 Oso : red gerbera guy….?

 Kara : pardon me… you’re the one who bought red gerbera recently, right? So I just…

Oso : Oh!

 PAGE 13

Oso : Ahaha you remember! Thank you~ HE ACTUALLY REMEMBERS?! SERIOUSLLLY???!!!!

 Oso: but red gerbera guy is like… haha that purple rose guy

Kara : purple rose?

Oso : you know? Glass Mask?

 Kara : I’m sorry, I don’t really read a lot of books

Oso : Ah I knew it. It’s an old manga anyway~

 Oso : oh, I’m not here to chat

Kara : Then what can I help you with today?

 Oso : erm… This week, our shop will be having a signing event of a manga author, that’s why we need some flowers

Kara : Do you have any certain color you’re hoping for?

Oso : The author personal color is purple so I thought maybe purple shades flower is good

Kara : purple…

 PAGE 14

Kara : we have purple roses!

Oso : eh, for real?

Kara : yes

 Kara : look! Look how pretty this girl is! *smile*

 Oso : *kyun*

 Kara : Purple rose has “Pride” or “Elegance” or “Honor”, for its meaning…

 Kara : that author surely is a lovely person that is no less than these roses~

Oso : well, sure…

 PAGE 15

Kara : to be chosen for that person’s gift…

 Kara : this girl must be very happy

 Oso : heh

 Oso : all right, I’ll take that one

 Kara : Thank you very much!

 Oso : I love this side of him~

***

***

PAGE 16

Oso : okay then, Friday at 10

Kara : okay, noted!

Oso : I’ll look forward to it!

 Oso : somehow it feels like a date. Yay~

Naration : it’s actually just delivery time

Kara : u-- um…

Oso : hm?

 Kara :  uh… last time… you told me to stop by your place… right?

 Oso : ...to my shop?

Kara : yes. Then, uh… the next day I decided to stop by

 Oso : EH!!!??

Oso : seriously~~!!??! The next day!! I!!  I was working at the back for a whole day, packing and wrapping returned goods~~~?!?! Haaaaaah~~~!!! What a waste!!

Kara : but you were not there

 Kara : that was too bad…

Oso : I-- I’M SORRY! That day was exactly the day I’m working on the back, so I already said that I won’t come...

Kara : so, Matsuno san

 Oso : eh? Why do you know my name…

 PAGE 17

Oso : oh, my nametag… Ah, it’s written my full name here, how embarrassing

 Oso : it’s because in this part of town there’s a lot of Matsunos…

 Kara : here, as a gift for coming here today. Please accept this

 Oso : eh, are you sure?

Kara : of course! It’s my sincere feelings.  I will continue on my service

Oso : Thank you… I’m really happy

PAGE 18

Oso : MINETTE SENSEI!!!!!!

Ichi : THE FUCK YOU WANT?! THE PRESSURE OF THE SIGNING EVENT YOU SET UP FOR ME IS ENOUGH TO SEND ME TO HELL

 Oso : I got a rose

Ichi : what?

 Oso : ka-- ka-- Karamatsu kun gave me this…

 Ichi : …………serious?

Oso : SERIOUS!!!

 Ichi : wait!! OSOMATSU NIISAN CALM DOWN!

Oso : *boeh*

Ichi : CALM DOWN AND HEAR ME OUT!!

 Ichi : you know, I’m a shoujo manga author that’s why I’m pretty familiar with flower language

Oso : o-- okay

 PAGE 19

Ichi : do you know the meaning of a single rose?

 Oso : I don’t

 Ichi : do you wanna know?

 Oso : no

 Ichi : WHAT ARE YOU BEING SCARED FOR! PAY ATTENTION!

Oso : NO!! YOU’RE MAKING THAT FACE SO IT’S GOTTA BE SOMETHING BAD RIGHT?! ICHIMATSU YOU IDIOT! YOU DARK! NOOOO~~!!!

 Ichi : love at first sight

 Oso : …..what?

 Ichi : a single rose means…

 PAGE 19

Ichi : “love at first sight”, osomatsu niisan

 Oso : *furiously blushing*

 Oso : ha, haaaaa~~~?!?! NO NO NO THAT’S GOTTA BE A LIE!!!?!?

Ichi : this is some content! Some progress? Right?!?! Yes~~!!!

***

***

PAGE 20

Kara : I finally gave it out~~~

 Kara : I feel so happy he actually accepted it that I could fly. But he probably doesn’t understand its meaning….? But, if he knows what should I do….? No, even if he knows it shouldn’t mattered… But I feel like it’s too soon

Kara : …but

 Kara : it has been my dream since a long time ago

 Kara : To give a flower that is attached with my feelings, to the person I love

 Kara : People who bought flowers from this shop, they all put their feelings in those flowers. When they’re happy, when they’re sad, when they want to encourage someone…

 PAGE 21

Kara : I envied them. I thought that someday I want to feel that way about someone too.

Kara : hnggh *throb*

 Kara : daaammnn isn’t that person superrrr cute?! Red flowers really suits him~~!! Maybe I should give him carnation next?

 Kara : *ha*

 Kara : I have to stick to the flower he requested. If I beautifully arranged it, I’m sure he’ll be glad

 PAGE 23

Oso : wow!! It’s great~ splendid! So beautiful! That’s what I call a pro~

 Kara : thank you very much! I did my best into this! So that I can make you happy, Matsuno san!

 Kara : But as I thought, the color red suits you better

Oso : eh? Me?

Kara : that’s right, Matsuno san

 Kara : Please allow me to give you another gift. For your charm overshadowed an even the most beautiful flower…

Oso : Karamatsu san…. *the sound of Osomatsu’s ribs breaking*

 Kara : hmm?? What is that breaking sound? Heh, my imagination is pretty wild, huh?

Ichi: No it’s overused and actually really lame!!!!!

 Kara : anyhow, I will do my utmost best *sneeze*

 Kara : heh, Matsuno san must be talking about me right now

***

***

PAGE 24

Naration : previously on this manga, he got a gift that means “love at first sight” from his crush

Ichi : There’s no way a person that works around flowers doesn’t know their meanings? He has a thing for you, I tell you!

Oso : that’s what he said but…. Isn’t it to good to be true?! Well I never thought that he hates me or anything, but to think that far….?

 Co-wrkr2 : Matsuno saaaan~!

Oso : YEASH!

Co-wrkr2 : The florist is here!

 Oso : o… okay~! HE’S HEREEEE

 Oso : Ah~ I can’t bear to look at his face right now… come on, pull yourself together

Poster : MINETTE SENSEI SIGNING EVENT, TODAY!

 Oso : sorry for the wait~

 Flo : hello, I’m from Flower Akatsuka

 Oso : hu-- huh?

 Flo : Let’s see… you ordered these flowers, right?

Oso : excuse me…

 PAGE 25

Flo : yes?

 Oso : the usual shopkeeper… um, that Karamatsu san…

 Flo : oh, I’m sorry! He should be the one who’s doing today’s delivery but he’s not feeling well at the moment

 Oso : eh?

 Flo : after making this flower arrangement his condition dropped, so he’s resting right now. I’m a temporary part time worker that helps him sometimes. I’m really sorry he couldn’t make it.

 Oso : oh no, that’s fine

 Flo: The truth is he wanted to come and deliver this himself. He said “because I already poured my heart into making this!”.

 Oso : I see…

 PAGE 26

Oso : it’s…

 Oso : really beautiful…

 Flo : I think he will come back to work next week, so if you want, please stop by! Thank you very much for the purchase!

 Oso : …..

 Ichi : that’s too bad

Oso : *startled*

 Ichi : I was looking forward to meet this so called “karamatsu kun”~

Oso : he’s not feeling well… I wonder if it’s a cold

 Ichi : maybe? I mean, this is season makes you prone to colds

Oso : ….

 PAGE 27

Ichi : are you worried?

Oso : that’s… well… That’s because I never saw him sick…

 Ichi : According to shoujo manga theory, in this situation you must pay him a visit and bring him stuff. This is an event that will surely shorten the gap between you two. But, you don’t even know his address right, niisan?

 Oso : ….know

Ichi : what?

 Oso : I actually know his house…Karamatsu kun’s house...

 Ichi : what….?

 Ichi : Niisan… No way… You’re a stalker? That far? That’s really creepy…

Oso : NOPE! YOU’RE WRONG!!!  NO NO THAT’S WRONG! I HAPPENED TO KNOW ACCIDENTALLY!

 PAGE 28

Oso : one day I just… Happened to see Karamatsu kun going home, then I got so overwhelmed and the next thing I know….

Ichi : that’s called a stalker

 Oso : BUT THAT’S ONLY ONE TIME! AFTER THAT I’M DOING IT MODESTLY!

Ichi : then why don’t you go?

 Oso : what?

 Ichi : why don’t you go bring him something?

Ichi’s face : “REPORT PLZ”

Oso : his face is too easy to read

 Oso : but isn’t this too meddlesome…?

Ichi : don’t worry don’t worry, just trust the theory!

Oso : But if he report me to the police I can never live it down

Ichi : report? you’re right…

 Ichi : welp, maybe you can’t but… I’LL THINK OF SOMETHING SO IT’S FINE!

Oso : What the heck have you been blabbering about?!

***

***

PAGE 29

*At Karamatsu kun’s house*

Oso : I DID IT SOMEHOW

 Oso : the nameplate is right. Even for me this kind of behavior is really creepy…

Oso : I mean, if I were him I’d be so annoyed if someone doing this when I’m so tired and in the middle of my sleep… Ah but, I’m already here…

 Oso : ……

 Oso : ah~~!! This is soooo unlike me!!  LET’S JUST GO WITH A BANG!

 Oso : HERE GOES NOTHING!!

*ding dong*

 *dragged feet*

 Oso : *doki doki doki*

 PAGE 30

*click*

Oso : DOKI

 Kara : yes…?

 Oso : goo-- good evening

 Oso : …..

 Kara : HUH?!

Oso : UM!! THIS IS!! I’m really sorry to come here so suddenly!

 Oso : how should I put this…. Um….  I’d rather you don’t ask me the reason why but I heard that you’re sick and sleeping in so I just came here without thinking… or something…

 Kara : ……what? A dream?

Oso : it’s not a dream…

 PAGE 31

Kara : Oh… Even though I thought my temperature has gone back to normal, the fever comes again…? Or is it my hot heart that’s continuously thinking of him creates a convenient vivid hallucination… *doki doki*

Oso : Somehow you look fine? Thank god~

 Oso : I rarely got sick so I don’t really know what to bring. I bought you pudding and Pocari Sweat

 Oso : Please take this if you want

Kara : ah, yes. Thank you very much

 Oso : well then, I’m sorry I dragged you out even though you’re not feeling well

Kara : eh? You’re… You’re going home?

Oso : yup!

 Oso : I mean, you know… I thought I could see you today but I couldn’t…? So I thought I just wanted to see your face even just for a while

 PAGE 32

Kara: *stabbed*

 Oso : Just kidding nyahaha~ Ah, but please let me tell you this real quick, about today…

Oso : thank you for the flower

 Oso : they’re really

 Oso : beautiful….

 Oso : w-- what…?

 *door closed*

Kara : …….did you come because you’re worried?

Oso : …. Yes

 Kara : I wanted to see you too, Matsuno san

Oso : Is… is that so….?? GYAAAAAA HIS VOICE HIS VOICE HIS VOICE!!

 Oso : TOO CLOSE!! MOREOVER…

 PAGE 33

Oso : ISN’T THIS WHAT I SAW IN ICHIMATSU’S MANGA?! KABEDON!!!! OR MAYBE DOADON?! IT’S SHORTEN THE GAP BETWEEN US ALRIGHT~! IT’S WAAAAY TOO CLOSE!

 (t.n: kabe= wall, doa=door)

Kara : *huggies*

Oso : ah

 Kara : I’m sorry, I’m still kinda dizzy and woobly

Oso : SERIOUSLY?!

 Oso : then go back to bed, if you don’t sleep it won’t go away. I’m going home too anyway

 Kara : don’t wanna

Oso : what…

 Kara : come with me, Matsuno san

Oso : No, I really shouldn’t…

 Kara: didn’t you come because you’re worried about me?

 PAGE 34

Kara : I’m really happy… Can’t you stay? Just for a while?

Oso : A-- are you kid...?

 Oso : okay I get it, but just for an hour okay?

 Kara : okay! Yaay!

 Oso : you… that’s not fair

Kara : can I eat the pudding?

Oso : sure... you can eat as many as you like…

***

***

PAGE 35

Oso : are you sure it’s okay to stay up?

Kara : I’m pretty sturdy and the fever has gone down anyway

 Oso : we’re sitting next to each other now… we’ve been waaay to close since then it’s driving me nuts

Kara : ah, this is really tasty!

 Oso : for real? I’m glad! I really like this so I thought I should bu…

Kara : *stare*

 Oso : ……..o...kay....

 Oso : should I eat one too…?

 Kara : Matsuno san

Oso : YESH!

 Kara : I heard from my part timer who delivered the flower, he said that the shop keeper who wear red glasses is worried about me

 Oso : o-- oh….

 PAGE 36

Kara : But I never thought that you’d pay me a visit too

Oso : a-- about that, that’s…

 Kara : why do you care that much about me?

 Oso : !!

 Kara : ah, sorry… That’s badly put…

 Kara : When I got the work request from you, even though I know it’s for the author,

Kara : the truth is you’re the only one I was thinking about while doing the arrangement

 Kara : um… I… gave you a single rose…

 PAGE 37

Kara : and I feel somewhat satisfied with that… But it’s not good enough, I have to say it to you with my own lips…

 Kara : there’s something that’s been bugging me…

 Kara : you might have found out already because of that rose but I

 Kara : I…..!!

Oso : .....

 PAGE 38

Oso : ……..? Karamatsu ku…

Kara : *wobbly*

Oso : WHAAAT??? YOU’RE KIDDING!? WAIT…

 Oso : that was close… aren’t your fever getting worse?

 Oso : I told you it hasn’t gone away yet! Sheesh…

 Oso : I’m barging in your room then

 Oso : Haah… I’m glad we’re inside your house… I wonder if your blood pressure went up because of tension and excitement….

Oso : but you know, my heart is going all over the place too nyahaha~!

 Oso : …..

 PAGE 39

Oso : *smoking*

 Oso : that was deeeefinitely a confession!!!!!

 Oso : Now to think of it! As soon as I’m alone with him the atmosphere turn into something dangerous! The feeling of the event that’s going to come was overwhelming!!

 Oso : But I didn’t think that you’re that serious, Karamatsu kun. Do you seriously like me?!?! This is baaaaddddddd

 Oso : I’M REALLY HAPPY

 Oso : but he hasn’t confessed yet… maybe he’s not but I’d like to think that he would….

 Oso : *sigh*

 PAGE 40

Oso : Should I just wait? Or I wonder if it’s better if I’m the one who says it?

 Oso : somehow, I feel like you saw right through me

 Oso : when you gave me flower I was smiling like crazy, eventhough we don’t have any special relationship I went ahead and come to your doorstep, my heart exploded with that awkward hug, and I always turn red when the atmosphere is nice…

 Oso : what am I? A teenage girl?? Well but it’s only just now…

 Oso : but I guess it’s the best if I don’t say it? Probably you want to be the one who say it right, Karamatsu kun…

 PAGE 41

Oso : what a cute sleeping face

 Oso : *looks around*

 Oso : Get well soon *peck*

 Oso : I’ll…. I’ll go ho…. What the hell am I doing just now… seriously it’s bad…

 Oso : well then, see you later Karamatsu kun

 PAGE 42

Oso’s letter :

Thank you for today!

I put the keys in your mail…

Line : Oso05

08 XXXX XXX

See you Next week! ^_^

Osomatsu

 Kara : It’s… IT’S NOT A DREAAAAM~~~~~!!!!! I feel like I’m guilty of doing something embarrassing when my health is butchered but I got his contacts as a result!! Yaaaaay!!

Author : the continuation of this probably will be in a book! Please read it if you can! Even though it ends like this, it’s actually not done yet!

[continuations]

World After Capital: Bots for All of Us (Informational Freedom)

NOTE: I have been posting excerpts from my book World After Capital. Currently we are on the Informational Freedom section and the previous excerpt was on Internet Access. Today looks at the right to be represented by a bot (code that works on your behalf).

Bots for All of Us

Once you have access to the Internet, you need software to connect to its many information sources and services. When Sir Tim Berners-Lee first invented the World Wide Web in 1989 to make information sharing on the Internet easier, he did something very important [95]. He specified an open protocol, the Hypertext Transfer Protocol or HTTP, that anyone could use to make information available and to access such information. By specifying the protocol, Berners-Lee opened the way for anyone to build software, so-called web servers and browsers that would be compatible with this protocol. Many did, including, famously, Marc Andreessen with Netscape. Many of the web servers and browsers were available as open source and/or for free.

The combination of an open protocol and free software meant two things: Permissionless publishing and complete user control. If you wanted to add a page to the web, you didn't have to ask anyone's permission. You could just download a web server (e.g. the open source Apache), run it on a computer connected to the Internet, and add content in the HTML format. Voila, you had a website up and running that anyone from anywhere in the world could visit with a web browser running on his or her computer (at the time there were no smartphones yet). Not surprisingly, content available on the web proliferated rapidly. Want to post a picture of your cat? Upload it to your webserver. Want to write something about the latest progress on your research project? No need to convince an academic publisher of the merits. Just put up a web page.

People accessing the web benefited from their ability to completely control their own web browser. In fact, in the Hypertext Transfer Protocol, the web browser is referred to as a “user agent” that accesses the Web on behalf of the user. Want to see the raw HTML as delivered by the server? Right click on your screen and use “view source.” Want to see only text? Instruct your user agent to turn off all images. Want to fill out a web form but keep a copy of what you are submitting for yourself? Create a script to have your browser save all form submissions locally as well.

Over time, popular platforms on the web have interfered with some of the freedom and autonomy that early users of the web used to enjoy. I went on Facebook the other day to find a witty note I had written some time ago on a friend's wall. It turns out that Facebook makes finding your own wall posts quite difficult. You can't actually search all the wall posts you have written in one go; rather, you have to go friend by friend and scan manually backwards in time. Facebook has all the data, but for whatever reason, they've decided not to make it easily searchable. I'm not suggesting any misconduct on Facebook's part—that's just how they've set it up. The point, though, is that you experience Facebook the way Facebook wants you to experience it. You cannot really program Facebook differently for yourself. If you don't like how Facebook's algorithms prioritize your friends' posts in your newsfeed, then tough luck, there is nothing you can do.

Or is there? Imagine what would happen if everything you did on Facebook was mediated by a software program—a “bot”—that you controlled. You could instruct this bot to go through and automate for you the cumbersome steps that Facebook lays out for finding past wall posts. Even better, if you had been using this bot all along, the bot could have kept your own archive of wall posts in your own data store (e.g., a Dropbox folder); then you could simply instruct the bot to search your own archive. Now imagine we all used bots to interact with Facebook. If we didn't like how our newsfeed was prioritized, we could simply ask our friends to instruct their bots to send us status updates directly so that we can form our own feeds. With Facebook on the web this was entirely possible because of the open protocol, but it is no longer possible in a world of proprietary and closed apps on mobile phones.

Although this Facebook example might sound trivial, bots have profound implications for power in a networked world. Consider on-demand car services provided by companies such as Uber and Lyft. If you are a driver today for these services, you know that each of these services provides a separate app for you to use. And yes you could try to run both apps on one phone or even have two phones. But the closed nature of these apps means you cannot use the compute power of your phone to evaluate competing offers from the networks and optimize on your behalf. What would happen, though, if you had access to bots that could interact on your behalf with these networks? That would allow you to simultaneously participate in all of these marketplaces, and to automatically play one off against the other.

Using a bot, you could set your own criteria for which rides you want to accept. Those criteria could include whether a commission charged by a given network is below a certain threshold. The bot, then, would allow you to accept rides that maximize the net fare you receive. Ride sharing companies would no longer be able to charge excessive commissions, since new networks could easily arise to undercut those commissions. For instance, a network could arise that is cooperatively owned by drivers and that charges just enough commission to cover its costs. Likewise, as a passenger using a bot could allow you to simultaneously evaluate the prices between different car services and choose the service with the lowest price for your current trip. The mere possibility that a network like this could exist would substantially reduce the power of the existing networks.

We could also use bots as an alternative to anti-trust regulation to counter the overwhelming power of technology giants like Google or Facebook without foregoing the benefits of their large networks. These companies derive much of their revenue from advertising, and on mobile devices, consumers currently have no way of blocking the ads. But what if they did? What if users could change mobile apps to add Ad-Blocking functionality just as they can with web browsers?

Many people decry ad-blocking as an attack on journalism that dooms the independent web, but that's an overly pessimistic view. In the early days, the web was full of ad-free content published by individuals. In fact, individuals first populated the web with content long before institutions joined in. When they did, they brought with them their offline business models, including paid subscriptions and of course advertising. Along with the emergence of platforms such as Facebook and Twitter with strong network effects, this resulted in a centralization of the web. More and more content was produced either on a platform or moved behind a paywall.

Ad-blocking is an assertion of power by the end-user, and that is a good thing in all respects. Just as a judge recently found that taxi companies have no special right to see their business model protected, neither do ad-supported publishers [96]. And while in the short term this might prompt publishers to flee to apps, in the long run it will mean more growth for content that is paid for by end-users, for instance through a subscription, or even crowdfunded (possibly through a service such as Patreon).

To curtail the centralizing power of network effects more generally, we should shift power to the end-users by allowing them to have user agents for mobile apps, too. The reason users don't wield the same power on mobile is that native apps relegate end-users once again to interacting with services just using our eyes, ears, brain and fingers. No code can execute on our behalf, while the centralized providers use hundreds of thousands of servers and millions of lines of code. Like a web browser, a mobile user-agent could do things such as strip ads, keep copies of my responses to services, let me participate simultaneously in multiple services (and bridge those services for me), and so on. The way to help end-users is not to have government smash big tech companies, but rather for government to empower individuals to have code that executes on their behalf.

What would it take to make bots a reality? One approach would be to require companies like Uber, Google, and Facebook to expose all of their functionality, not just through standard human usable interfaces such as apps and web sites, but also through so-called Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). An API is for a bot what an app is for a human. The bot can use it to carry out operations, such as posting a status update on a user's behalf. In fact, companies such as Facebook and Twitter have APIs, but they tend to have limited capabilities. Also, companies presently have the right to control access so that they can shut down bots, even when a user has clearly authorized a bot to act on his or her behalf.

Why can't I simply write code today that interfaces on my behalf with say Facebook? After all, Facebook's own app uses an API to talk to their servers. Well in order to do so I would have to “hack” the existing Facebook app to figure out what the API calls are and also how to authenticate myself to those calls. Unfortunately, there are three separate laws on the books that make those necessary steps illegal.

The first is the anti-circumvention provision of the DMCA. The second is the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA). The third is the legal construction that by clicking “I accept” on a EULA (End User License Agreement) or a set of Terms of Service I am actually legally bound. The last one is a civil matter, but criminal convictions under the first two carry mandatory prison sentences.

So if we were willing to remove all three of these legal obstacles, then hacking an app to give you programmatic access to systems would be possible. Now people might object to that saying those provisions were created in the first place to solve important problems. That's not entirely clear though. The anti circumvention provision of the DMCA was created specifically to allow the creation of DRM systems for copyright enforcement. So what you think of this depends on what you believe about the extent of copyright (a subject we will look at in the next section).

The CFAA too could be tightened up substantially without limiting its potential for prosecuting real fraud and abuse. The same goes for what kind of restriction on usage a company should be able to impose via a EULA or a TOS. In each case if I only take actions that are also available inside the company's app but just happen to take these actions programmatically (as opposed to manually) why should that constitute a violation?

But, don't companies need to protect their encryption keys? Aren't “bot nets” the culprits behind all those so-called DDOS (distributed denial of service) attacks? Yes, there are a lot of compromised machines in the world, including set top boxes and home routers that some are using for nefarious purposes. Yet that only demonstrates how ineffective the existing laws are at stopping illegal bots. Because those laws don't work, companies have already developed the technological infrastructure to deal with the traffic from bots.

How would we prevent people from adopting bots that turn out to be malicious code? Open source seems like the best answer here. Many people could inspect a piece of code to make sure it does what it claims. But that's not the only answer. Once people can legally be represented by bots, many markets currently dominated by large companies will face competition from smaller startups.

Legalizing representation by a bot would eat into the revenues of large companies, and we might worry that they would respond by slowing their investment in infrastructure. I highly doubt this would happen. Uber, for instance, was recently valued at $50 billion. The company's “takerate” (the percentage of the total amount paid for rides that they keep) is 20%. If competition forced that rate down to 5%, Uber's value would fall to $10 billion as a first approximation. That is still a huge number, leaving Uber with ample room to grow. As even this bit of cursory math suggests, capital would still be available for investment, and those investments would still be made.

That's not to say that no limitations should exist on bots. A bot representing me should have access to any functionality that I can access through a company's website or apps. It shouldn't be able to do something that I can't do, such as pretend to be another user or gain access to private posts by others. Companies can use technology to enforce such access limits for bots; there is no need to rely on regulation.

Even if I have convinced you of the merits of bots, you might still wonder how we might ever get there from here. The answer is that we can start very small. We could run an experiment with the right to be represented by a bot in a city like New York. New York's municipal authorities control how on demand transportation services operate. The city could say, “If you want to operate here, you have to let drivers interact with your service programmatically.” And I'm pretty sure, given how big a market New York City is, these services would agree.