#a joke from one million years ago on the internet

[lolobizarreadventuresshatpost]

Iggy's too, please...

[colleendoran]

Great Big Good Omens Graphic Novel Update

AKA A Visit From Bildad the Shuhite.

The past year or so has been one long visit from this guy, whereupon he smiteth my goats and burneth my crops, woe unto the woeful cartoonist.

Gaze upon the horror of Bildad the Shuhite.

You kind of have to be a Good Omens fan to get this joke, but trust me, it's hilarious.

Anyway, as a long time Good Omens novel fan, you may imagine how thrilled I was to get picked to adapt the graphic novel.

 Go me!  

This is quite a task, I have to say, especially since I was originally going to just draw (and color) it, but I ended up writing the adaptation as well. Tricky to fit a 400 page novel into a 160-ish page graphic novel, especially when so much of the humor is dependent on the language, and not necessarily on the visuals.

Not complainin', just sayin'.

Anyway, I started out the gate like a herd of turtles, because  right away I got COVID which knocked me on my butt. 

And COVID brain fog? That's a thing. I already struggle with brain fog due to autoimmune disease, and COVID made it worse.

Not complainin' just sayin'.

This set a few of the assignments on my plate back, which pushed starting Good Omens back. 

But hey, big fat lead time! No worries!

Then my computer crawled toward the grave.

My trusty MAC Pro Tower was nearly 15 years old when its sturdy heart ground to a near-halt with daily crashes. I finally got around to doing some diagnostics; some of its little brain actions were at 5% functionality. I had no reliable backups.

There are so many issues with getting a new computer when you haven't had a new computer or peripherals in nearly fifteen years and all of your software, including your Photoshop program is fifteen years old.

At the time, I was still on rural internet...which means dial-up speed.

Whatever you have for internet in the city, roll that clock back to about 2001.

That's what I had. I not only had to replace almost all of my hardware but I had to load and update all programs at dial-up speed.

Welcome to my gigabyte hell.

The entire process of replacing the equipment and programs took weeks and then I had to relearn all the software.

All of this was super expensive in terms of money and time cost.

But I was not daunted! Nosirree!

I still had a huge lead time! I can do anything! I have an iron will!

And boy, howdy, I was going to need it.

At about the same time, a big fatcat quadrillionaire client who had hired me years ago to develop a big, major transmedia project for which I was paid almost entirely in stock, went bankrupt leaving everyone holding the bag, and taking a huge chunk of my future retirement fund with it.

I wrote a very snarky almost hilarious Patreon post about it, but am not entirely in a position to speak freely because I don't want to get sued. Even though I had to go to court over it, (and I had to do that over Zoom at dial-up speed,) I'm pretty sure I'll never get anything out of this drama, and neither will anyone else involved, except millionaire dude and his buddies who all walked away with huge multi-million dollar bonuses weeks before they declared bankruptcy, all the while claiming they would not declare bankruptcy.

Even the accountant got $250,000 a month to shut down the business, while creators got nothing.

That in itself was enough drama for the year, but we were only at February by that point, and with all those months left, 2023 had a lot more to throw at me.

Fresh from my return from my Society of Illustrators show, and a lovely time at MOCCA, it was time to face practical medical issues, health updates, screening, and the like. I did my adult duty and then went back to work hoping for no news, but still had a weird feeling there would be news.

I know everyone says that, but I mean it. I had a bad feeling.

Then there was news.

I was called back for tests and more tests. This took weeks. The ubiquitous biopsy looked, even to me staring at the screen in real time, like bad news. 

It also hurt like a mofo after the anesthesia wore off. I wasn't expecting that.

Then I got the official bad news.

Cancer which runs in my family finally got me. Frankly, I was surprised I didn't get it sooner.

Stage 0, and treatment would likely be fast and complication-free. Face the peril, get it over with, and get back to work. 

I requested surgery months in the future so I could finish Good Omens first, but my doc convinced me the risk of waiting was too great. Get it done now.

"You're really healthy," my doc said. Despite an auto-immune issue which plagues me, I am way healthier than the average schmoe of late middle age. She informed me I would not even need any chemo or radiation if I took care of this now.

So I canceled my appearance at San Diego Comic Con. I did not inform the Good Omens team of my issues right away, thinking this would not interfere with my work schedule, but I did contact my agent to inform her of the issue. I also contacted a lawyer to rewrite my will and make sure the team had access to my digital files in case there were complications.

Then I got back to work, and hoped for the best.

Eff this guy.

Before I could even plant my carcass on the surgery table, I got a massive case of ocular shingles.

I didn't even know there was such a thing. 

There I was, minding my own business. I go to bed one night with a scratchy eye, and by 4 PM the next day, I was in the emergency room being told if I didn't get immediate specialist treatment, I was in big trouble.

I got transferred to another hospital and got all the scary details, with the extra horrid news that I could not possibly have cancer surgery until I was free of shingles, and if I did not follow a rather brutal treatment procedure - which meant super-painful  eye drops every half hour, twenty-four hours a day and daily hospital treatment - I could lose the eye entirely, or be blinded, or best case scenario, get permanent eye damage.

What was even funnier (yeah, hilarity) is the drops are so toxic if you don't use the medication just right, you can go blind anyway.

Hi Ho.

Ulcer is on the right. That big green blob.

I had just finished telling my cancer surgeon I did not even really care about getting cancer, was happy it was just stage zero, had no issues with scarring, wanted no reconstruction, all I cared about was my work. 

Just cut it out and get me back to work.

And now I wondered if I was going to lose my ability to work anyway.

Shingles often accompanies cancer because of the stress on the immune system, and yeah, it's not pretty. This is me looking like all heck after I started to get better.

The first couple of weeks were pretty demoralizing as I expected a straight trajectory to wellness. But it was up and down all the way. 

Some days I could not see out of either eye at all. The swelling was so bad that I had to reach around to my good eye to prop the lid open. Light sensitivity made seeing out of either eye almost impossible. Outdoors, even with sunglasses, I had to be led around by the hand.

I had an amazing doctor. I meticulously followed his instructions, and I think he was surprised I did. The treatment is really difficult, and if you don't do it just right no matter how painful it gets, you will be sorry. 

To my amazement, after about a month, my doctor informed me I had no vision loss in the eye at all. "This never happens," he said.

I'd spent a couple of weeks there trying to learn to draw in the near-dark with one eye, and in the end, I got all my sight back.

I could no longer wear contact lenses (I don't really wear them anyway, unless I'm going to the movies,) would need hard core sun protection for awhile, and the neuralgia and sun sensitivity were likely to linger. But I could get back to work.

I have never been more grateful in my life.

Neuralgia sucks, by the way, I'm still dealing with it months later.

Anyway, I decided to finally go ahead and tell the Good Omens team what was going on, especially since this was all happening around the time the Kickstarter was gearing up.

Now that I was sure I'd passed the eye peril, and my surgery for Stage 0 was going to be no big deal, I figured all was a go. I was still pretty uncomfortable and weak, and my ideal deadline was blown, but with the book not coming out for more than a year, all would be OK. I quit a bunch of jobs I had lined up to start after Good Omens, since the project was going to run far longer than I'd planned.

Everybody on the team was super-nice, and I was pretty optimistic at this time. But work was going pretty slow during, as you may imagine.

But again...lots of lead time still left, go me.

Then I finally got my surgery.

Which was not as happy an experience as I had been hoping for.

My family said the doc came out of the operating room looking like she'd been pulled backwards through a pipe, She informed them the tumor which looked tiny on the scan was "...huge and her insides are a mess."

Which was super not fun news.

Eff this guy.

The tumor was hiding behind some dense tissue and cysts. After more tests, it was determined I'd need another surgery and was going to have to get further treatments after all.

The biopsy had been really painful, but the discomfort was gone after about a week, so no biggee. The second surgery was, weirdly, not as painful as the biopsy, but the fatigue was big time.

By then, the Good Omens Kickstarter had about run its course, and the record-breaker was both gratifying and a source of immense social pressure.

I'd already turned most of my social media over to an assistant, and I'm glad I did.

But the next surgery was what really kicked me on my keister.

All in all, they took out an area the size of a baseball. It was  hard to move and wiped me out for weeks and weeks. I could not take care of myself. I'd begun losing hair by this time anyway, and finally just lopped it off since it was too heavy for me to care for myself. The cut hides the bald spots pretty well.

After about a month, I got the go-ahead to travel to my show at the San Diego Comic Con Museum (which is running until the first week of April, BTW). I was very happy I had enough energy to do it. But as soon as I got back, I had to return to treatment.

Since I live way out in the country, going into the city to various hospitals and pharmacies was a real challenge. I made more than 100 trips last year, and a drive to the compounding pharmacy which produced the specialist eye medicine I could not get anywhere else was six hours alone.

Naturally, I wasn't getting anything done during this time.

But at least my main hospital is super swank.

The oncology treatment went smoothly, until it didn't. The feels don't hit you until the end. By then I was flattened.

So flattened that I was too weak to control myself, fell over, and smashed my face into some equipment.

Nearly tore off my damn nostril.

Eff this guy.

Anyway, it was a bad year.

Here's what went right.

I have a good health insurance policy. The final tally on my health care costs ended up being about $150,000. I paid about 18% of that, including insurance. I had a high deductible and some experimental medicine insurance didn't cover. I had savings,  enough to cover the months I wasn't working, and my Patreon is also very supportive. So you didn't see me running a Gofundme or anything.

Thanks to everyone who ever bought one of my books.

No, none of that money was Good Omens Kickstarter money. I won't get most of my pay on that for months, which is just as well because it kept my taxes lower last year when I needed a break.

So, yay.

My nose is nearly healed. I opted out of plastic surgery, and it just sealed up by itself. I'll never be ready for my closeup, but who the hell cares.

I got to ring the bell.

I had a very, VERY hard time getting back to work, especially with regard to focus and concentration. My work hours dropped by over 2/3. I was so fractured and weak, time kept slipping away while I sat in the studio like a zombie. Most of the last six months were a wash.

I assumed focus issues were due (in part) to stress, so sought counseling. This seemed like a good idea at first, but when the counselor asked me to detail my issues with anxiety, I spent two weeks doing just that and getting way more anxious, which was not helpful.

After that I went EFF THIS NOISE, I want practical tools, not touchy feelies (no judgment on people who need touchy-feelies, I need a pragmatic solution and I need it now,) so tried using the body doubling focus group technique for concentration and deep work.

Within two weeks, I returned to normal work hours.

I got rural broadband, jumping me from dial up speed to 1 GB per second.

It's a miracle.

Massive doses of Vitamin D3 and K2. Yay.

The new computer works great.

The Kickstarter did so well, we got to expand the graphic novel to 200 pages. Double yay.

I'm running late, but everyone on the Good Omens team is super supportive. I don't know if I am going to make the book late or not, but if I do, well, it surely wasn't on purpose, and it won't be super late anyway. I still have months of lead time left.

I used to be something of a social media addict, but now I hardly ever even look at it, haven't been directly on some sites in over a year, and no longer miss it. It used to seem important and now doesn't.

More time for real life.

While I think the last year aged me about twenty years, I actually like me better with short hair. I'm keeping it.

OK. Rough year. 

Not complainin', just sayin'.

Back to work on The Book.

And only a day left to vote for Good Omens, Neil Gaiman, and Sandman in the Comicscene Awards. Thanks. 

[dayoldtea]

Joe passionately rambling on about Y/N for six mins and thirty-four seconds video

Pairing: Joe Keery x Actress!Reader

Word Count: 1.5k

Category: Fluff. That's all.

Warning: None

Summary: Steve Harrington and Penelope Carter did not stay together at the end of the fourth season of Stranger Things, and the internet has a lot to say about that. In contrast, to warm the hearts of Stenny's fans, one fan shares a six mins and thirty-four second compilation of Joe Keery passionately rambling on about you, his girlfriend, and coincidentally Penny Carter herself.

"Joe literally pinched himself upon seeing Y/N on set for the first time." Matt Duffer told during an interview with Variety in June 2022. "You remember that, right?"

Ross Duffer, sitting next to his brother, laughed as he shook his head, arms crossed over his chest. "There's no forgetting it." He joked. "They sat next to each other in the script room, and you could just see how nervous he was. It was a really fun thing to watch."

Matt nodded, humming as he did so.

"Yeah, I think that's why we can say that we were kind of prepared for the negative fan reaction regarding Steve and Penny's tragic ending in season four, you know?" He added. "We knew from the beginning that it would be hard to convince the audience that Steve and Nancy should be something when we had Joe Keery in love with Y/NY/L/N since the first time he saw her."

To say that the internet was in mourning would be an understatement.

The fourth season of Stranger Things had premiered some time ago, and for fans of the TV show, that was synonymous with hope. This time, Steve Harrington and Penelope Carter will finally be together.

The development from friends to lovers between the characters was something that fans had longed for since the first season, which unfortunately did not happen. Penelope received a tragic ending in Upside Down, and the scene in which her bloodied body was embraced by a miserably distraught Steve had generated thousands of disgruntled tweets and videos on TikTok — most of them featuring puffy-eyed girls, tears streaming down their cheeks as the scene in question played in the background.

Steve and Penelope hadn't gotten the ending they deserved, but you and Joe were the protagonists of another story, this one being in real life, and knowing that you two had been together for more than four years mended a little the crack left in the hearts of Stenny fans.

One video in particular, accumulating a little over 1,5 million views on YouTube, had been shared by a Twitter account along with the hashtag JusticeForStenny, on the rise since the last episode of the fourth season was aired:

@stennylover: steve and penelope didn't get a chance to be together and I know everyone here is heartbroken about it, but here is a compilation of joe passionately rambling on about yn for six mins and thirty-four seconds to warm your hearts

The video in question begins by showing the title text in white capital letters on a black background, the instrumental of Paper Rings by Taylor Swift playing in the background:

Joe Keery passionately rambling on about Y/NY/L/N for six mins and thirty-four seconds straight.

cut

The first recording shows Joe standing in front of a white background during the Glamour's friendship test, arms behind his back and eyes fixed on the floor. He was wearing a plain black shirt, the length of his hair a little shorter than that sported by Steve Harrington indicating that he was preparing for another role.

"I— I was just mesmerized the first time I saw her, honestly." He shakes his head slowly, his lips curving into a comforting smile. "She was visibly excited to be on set. It was like it was her first time in an environment like that, and it was really adorable to see her so excited about every little thing that happened." He said before looking at the camera, the smile not abandoning his lips. "When we had scenes together— which happened a lot, I used get so fucking nervous." Joe laughed, his cussing censored by a beep. "I was constantly getting my lines wrong because of that, and she's always been so thoughtful and patient about it, you know? Which only made my situation worse, actually." He joked, scratching the back of his neck as his eyes meet the floor once again. "She would always ask me if I needed a break, because, you know, she genuinely thought that these mistakes were because of fatigue or something, when internally I was like, 'Oh, I'm fine, I'm sorry about that, I'm just, you know, thinking of a way to ask you out on a date.'"

The video then cuts to the Wired autocomplete interview granted by Joe and Gaten Matarazzo.

Gaten is holding the styrofoam board while the phrases with "is joe keery" remain hidden under white stickers.

"Okay, so let's see what we have here." Joe hums as he pulls out the first sticker. "Is Joe Keey," he begins, "Y/N/Y/L/N's boyfriend in real life?"

"I love the fact that your first question has to do with Y/N." Gaten joked.

"Yeah, I was about to say that, man." Joe played along, leaning forward with one hand on his knee. "But yes, I am Y/N's boyfriend in real life."

"Title he's most proud of." Gaten punctuated, raising his index finger.

Joe clicked his tongue, a smug smile adorning the corner of his lips. "I mean, my girlfriend is Y/N/Y/L/N." He makes a point of stressing your name as if no one knows. "You don't meet many guys this lucky."

Gaten contracted his face in a fake expression of disgust, shaking his head before looking directly at the camera.

"We are still on a mission to find out how much he is paying Y/N."

The next cut is from an interview of Joe to GQ Spain where he was responding to some comments from fans on the internet.

"Youtube." Joe announced before the edit added a lofi song along with a video of Stranger Things fan comments on a scene of Steve and Penelope in the second season, then focusing on one specific user. "I honestly don't know how Steve doesn't realize that Penelope has a crush on him. Is he an idiot?" He reads as the comment remains on the screen.

The video then turns back to Joe.

"I mean, yeah?" He laughs, the video returning to the commentary session as Joe's lines were added as a response along with a typing sound. "I see a lot of Y/N—my girlfriend, in Penelope, you know? Not just because she plays her, obviously, but also because they're both so smart and have such a gentle soul that it's almost like they're magnetic, so when someone asks me what the similarities are between me and Steve, I make it clear that I'm a little smarter when it comes to girls, because I would never let someone like Y/N or Penelope get away. Thank you."

The video then cuts to an interview of Joe on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Kimmel.

"Can we— Can we talk about Y/N/Y/L/N?" Jimmy asked as he leaned over his desk. The audience whistled and clapped loudly as soon as your name was mentioned, making Joe smile. "I mean, we all love her here, and we know you've been together for years— over three years, right?"

"Yeah, that's right." Joe squeaked, shaking his head. "We kind of got tired of just being on screen, you know?" He made a joke, laughing at the thunderous reaction from the audience.

"Man, this is so cool!" Jimmy exclaimed genuinely, causing Joe to nod his head and mutter an almost inaudible "thank you." "And how was the preparation for you two for this fourth season? If I'm correct, the recordings were interrupted due to the pandemic, right?"

"Oh, yes, unfortunately we had that setback and that's why there was a significant delay compared to the other seasons." Joe explained.

"And you two were together during that time?" Jimmy inquired curiously, arching his eyebrows. "Practicing the script together and all that stuff?"

Joe crossed his legs, interlacing his fingers over his lap.

"Well, we did a lot of fun stuff during those months, and of course discussing the script ended up being one of them, but we also kind of took that time to disconnect a little bit, you know?" Joe replied, "We cook together, we write songs together, we learn about gardening on YouTube…" He enumerated with his fingers, "just a bunch of cool stuff."

"Oh, that sounds amazing." Jimmy said in an impressed tone. "Just a couple discovering new hobbies, right?"

"Yeah, but Y/N, she's just— she's just a lot smarter and more talented than me, you know?" Joe said amidst a laugh. "She can act, she can write, she can sing, she can knit, she can read a book about what are the right garden pots for each kind of seed and suddenly become a big Wikipedia on the subject…" he rambled, gesticulating excitedly, "It's amazing. She is amazing. I'm one hundred percent sure she could build a rocket from scratch if she wanted to."

"Wow." Jimmy smiled, exchanging a quick glance with the audience before facing Joe again. "So I guess we can say you're a little bit in love, right?"

Joe blushes, his eyes dropping to the floor before turning to Jimmy. "Yeah, I kind of am."

[tragedytells-tales]

Brooo I love your writing so much!! It’s literally so great😭 can you write the brothers (or just Lucifer and Satan if that’s too much) with a teen!mc (platonic obv) that is VERY gen z. Like if they’re able to have their phone while in Devildom then they would constantly be talking about stupid internet drama while using strange terms. They know the stuff they say is weird but that just encourages them to be even more unhinged and chaotic. I just thought it’d be funny :) thanks if you decide to do this!!

"I hear you loud and clear! My apologies for this taking so long, I was only able to come up with something for Lucifer and Satan."

--------------------------------------

Lessons in cringe culture

Notes - Teen!MC, Headcanons, Shitpost, comedy just pure comedy

Characters - Feat. Lucifer and Satan

Summary - MC has a few ideas on how to make these ten million years old demons more modern. Are they good ideas? Who knows and who cares

Warnings - Not proof read

TW - None

Lucifer:

[ New word to vocabulary - Gyatt ]

- So MC teaches him gyatt. And not actually on purpose, but not on accident either. They had the thought of saying it out loud around him just to see if it would be a good enough substitute for "god" that they could say it without almost smiting the Avatar.

- They had the thought about a week ago and completely forgot about, but they couldn't just sit there silently when they got jumpscared by the newest update to celestialdrop Valley

"You can now drink mayonnaise."

- Either way he is scared of teenagers of MCs variety because he was sitting in pure silence, minding his whole business while MC did something on their phone, until suddenly they screamed from the top of their lungs

"GYATT DAMN?! LEVI YOU WON'T BEEEEELIVE THIS!"

- Not only did they startle him out of his old ten million years aged bones, and dared to swear in his presence, but then before running to show Levi whatever it was that sparked this outburst MC turned to him and asked

"Are you all good?"

"...Yes? Why would I not be?"

- They give him the most evil of smiles before leaving. The smile was so evil that it sent shivers down his spine, for a human it was a devilish little smile that he knew meant nothing but trouble.

- The things he'd give for a single one of his technically adopted family to be normal ( <-- He literally handpicked everyone in the house, and he's no better but he's also the oldest so )

- He asks MC about it later and gets a proper explanation, only thing is that now he can't ground them for the improper use of language because the use of "gyatt" was surprisingly clever and smart

- Damnit MC, stop getting the braincell!

- He genuinely starts using it in secret whenever he wants to say "goddamn", he dare not utter it around his brothers lest they start bullying him

- Jokes on him, he gets drunk and slips up in the group chat!

Satan:

[ New phrase to vocabulary - It's my turn with the braincell! ]

- Speaking of. One would think that because he reads so many things and has so much knowledge and is technically the youngest of his brothers that he would know at least a bit of funky phrases

- He does. He knows Devildom phrases specifically. But he's also stupidly smart, smart stupid if you will, so he takes things MC sometimes says a tad to literal

- So imagine his surprise when they say "Hey, it's my turn with the braincell. I need it for algebra, hand it over!!!" While studying with their friends

- If you imagined very, very surprised then you are correct

- Aka: he's worried about the amount of concussions MC must've had for them to lost so many brain cells that they need to borrow and take turns with them from others

- He would've also questioned where and how they’re getting the brain cells they’re borrowing if he weren't so concerned in the first place

- He genuinely asks them what kind of brain cells are they missing to see how he can help

- They tell him "My brother in christ, I'm simply jesting about" and now he thinks MC is a sickly Victorian child with a lack of brain cells who got cursed

- Congratulations MC, you've tricked the smartest person in the house, but at what cost?

- The cost of him texting the group chat that MC has lost brain cells and needs to borrow some, that's what. All because they're too busy laughing to properly explain, and now Levi and Belphi are clowning on everyone else because they ALL fell for it too

- The price of living with beings who are over ten million years old is a steep one

- He steals the phrase and instantly starts telling his brothers to borrow brain cells btw, he's adapting

- He's been stealing phrases from MC for a while now, but this one is his favorite

- ( They taught him "fuck this thing, fuck that thing, fuck you, fuck you, you're cool-" last week, they’re not allowed to be friends anymore )

AN - The idea of teaching Lucifer "gyatt" made my lungs hurt, but then the thought of Asmo learning "down bad", Beel learning "bussin", and Mammon learning "L + Ratio + you fell off + fatherless" also made me lose it. I just wasn't sure how to go about that. ( Also thanks for the compliment!!! I hold it ever so gently,,, )

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

My IRL ex who lives abroad now is dating my online friend who also lives there and I am deceiving them, AITA?

All of us are Asian, 29. Fake names are used.

My ex (Fred) was my childhood best friend, we grew up together in the same conservative society, people expected to see us marry since we were kids, all that jazz. At 18, we both moved away and kept up LDR. Moving meant big changes of course, I was in a huge city and I had internet access for the first time. I became a BTS fan in 2013, I started creating and reading a lot. I joined tumblr, made friends from all over the world. I was being radicalized rapidly, and I figured out I was bi too. My world was suddenly a million times bigger.

He however, didn't change much. He was scientific minded unlike most people here and his friends were all STEM kids but they were still functionally right leaning. He was racist when it came to BTS or East Asians in general. He was ignorant and happy to ignore queer existence, he used to say things like queer people needed to be shown the right path. We were turning out to be quite the opposites. Eventually we broke up. He was heartbroken, he tried to drag me back in many times and I avoided him like plague. I managed to ditch him completely when we were about 23. He left for USA to study.

Around the same time I befriended one of my closest online friends, Daphne. We lived in the same state but she was always traveling so we never got to meet. We're both hellsite veterans and keep our identities under lock & key so we don't know our real names or exact place of work, but we know each other's deepest kinks and childhood traumas, and stories about our exes. We both had the same kind of interests, politics, and fandoms, we're both bisexual. I've also come out as a trans man a few years ago and I go by a masculine name online, can't transition IRL. Daphne's known me since my girl era. Daphne left for USA last year for her Masters.

Now the wild part, by some twist of fate, Daphne met Fred who's also working on his Masters in an adjacent field. It is by no means a niche subject and USA is the fourth largest country, they still found each other. He sang in our first language at some party, he's very hot, and... he's into BTS like her. Wild. So they're now dating.

They started following each other on twitter and he followed a bunch of her friends including Me! We have exchanged pleasantries and while on his account he has his real name and location, mine is a mixed bag account with my fake name and my (sfw) queer creations all over it.

I know who He is but he doesn't know who I am, he thinks I'm just one of Daphne's dudes, and Daphne doesn't know that she's dating my ex who she had promised to drop into the Challenger's Deep (joke). My reasoning for hiding the truth is-- It's still not safe for me to be out IRL and he can mess it up. I remember his bigotry, I hate him, I have every right to avoid him and here that means not revealing my identity. But it's been years so maybe he has changed, and Daphne is my friend. So, I feel like a massive ahole for not telling her at least. At the same time she really did hate my racist homophobic right leaning ex a lot, so knowing the truth will make things awkward and I don't want to lose my friend.

So, there you have it. AITA?

BTW, no I'm not into BTS ships or reader insert fantasies, that's not what I create. I know someone would ask about it so there. I'm also Not attracted to Daphne, if I was I'd have asked her out straight away, I don't play around about my crushes.

What are these acronyms?

[philsmeatylegss]

Hiii I just saw a post Abt the v day video and how it's fucked up and such and I was just wondering why? I found it a few years ago but it was just kinda cute tbh what's wrong with it? Lmao I'm definitely a newer phan, I only started really following their stuff in like 2017 so I don't know too much about early dnp lol

Oh fuck I’m old

I think it’s safe enough to finally talk publicly about it.

Basically the vday video was a video Phil made for Dan for Valentine’s Day. He uploaded it privately onto his YouTube channel which Dan had the password to so Dan could see it. At this time, Dan was on vacation (pretty sure in India) and he wouldn’t have been able to see a video of that quality just through text or email. Shitty luck, the same time he privately uploaded it, infamous YouTube glitch happened where all private videos became public. And one of the videos that went public was the v day video.

There’s a lot of jokes about Dan in 2012, but it’s actually really depressing. Dan wasn’t out yet and he had a fuck ton of trauma surrounding his sexuality. 2012 is when dnp started blowing up enough to where they became part of popular early YouTube so people saved the v day video when it was uploaded.

They’ve only addressed it a few times in which they said it was an April Fool’s prank, which obviously doesn’t make sense, but what were they supposed to say? According to legend, people would keep reuploading the video and Phil would spend hours taking them down one by one and it would say “AmazingPhil took down this video for copyrite.”

It was a catalyst to just a really shitty period for dnp. All aggressively heterosexual clips from Dan’s liveshows are my 2012. “FYI I like vagina” is 2012. People were contacting his 14 year old brother to ask about him and Phil. That alone is both fucked up to drag a kid into this, but remember that Dan still wasn’t out to his family. It was probably so fucking terrifying when his YouTube life, especially regarding his sexuality and relationship, clashed with his family life for the first time.

There’s a noticeable difference between their relationship in videos from 2009-2011 and 2012-2015. And it is most likely because dnp blew up pretty big in 2012 and started going from making YouTube videos for fun to doing it as a job with the added pressure of millions watching. And the catalyst, or at least metaphorical catalyst, from the switch between being openly touchy feely giggles to strict, five feet apart mates is considered to be the vday vid.

It was a big problem in the phandom since it was leaked to around 2017ish. A lot of people were circulating it and word was that they were still being taken down years later, implying that Phil was still searching for the video years later.

The phandom used to be primarily 12-16 year olds. And when you’re that age, speaking from experience, you don’t understand the complexities of the situation and just kinda thought “teeheehee phan is real XD.” When in reality, it was a very sensitive and serious thing that wasn’t meant to ever be seen by the public. It’s literally where the cherry lube and kissing at the Manchester Eye reference is from.

Rightfully so, the video became more and more taboo to mention and most people caught on that it was a shitty thing to upload or share it. It used to be really taboo and affectionately was often referred to as “the video that shall not be named.”

It honestly has a backstory that is so story-like that it seems unreal. So much had to happen for it to be leaked and the impact it had on them was so large it’s like a black hole in phandom history.

It’s possible not all of this is accurate, this is just the basic lore of it. So while I don’t think the internet police will drag you to prison for saying you watched the vday video, this is the context behind it. Do with it what you will.

Spending your entire preteen, teen, and now 20s as a phannie will fry your brain in unimaginable ways. I knew this off the top of my head😭

[7grandmel]

Todays rip: 04/03/2024

Willievan Afton Polkka

Season 8 No Album Release (Read More) Ievan Polkka (In-Game Version) - Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA

Ripped by KnightOfGames

Requested by realchickenmanny! @realchickenmanny

One of the most fun parts of keeping up to date with SiIvaGunner is getting to see the rise of new jokes being used on the channel - which weird sources are trying to become mainstay running gags, which feel as if they're failing to really catch on, and so on. I talked about this in relation to Season 8 in particular back with Joke-Explainer™ 7000 Fusion Collab, back when the Season had just kicked into gear a few weeks ago, and even in that short time since there's been a few rising star jokes worth considering. One of the most surprising newcomers to me, then, is the very subject of Willievan Afton Polkka: the Five Nights at Freddy's fan song Stuck Inside, by Black Grpyh0n ft. The Living Tombstone.

Five Nights at Freddy's has of course always had a pretty prominent presence on the channel since back in Season 1 with the Circus rips a la Goodbye To Love, where the entire gag was built on how FNAF games lack much of any real music to make rips of. But there's another way this gag has been utilized in rips of the games - by instead using the rips to cover The Living Tombstone's immensely popular FNAF fan songs as if they were official theme songs of the games. The cultural impact these songs have had on many an internet dweller is undeniable: back with Five Dreams at Night 1.16, I covered an example of these using the song It's Been So Long, which currently sits at 312 MILLION views on YouTube. (and, of course, The Living Tombstone's first ever FNAF song was used as the credits theme for the feature film last year!)

All that is to say, that I find the usage of FNAF fan songs - old and new - to be a fantastic fit for SiIvaGunner, as influential nuggets of pure pop culture self-expression on YouTube. Stuck Inside, used by Willievan Afton Polkka and six other rips all released after the start Season 8, is a far more recent song than the nostalgic FNAF songs of old, themed around the story depicted in the FNAF movie - yet even without that nostalgia, it's got an absolutely fantastic melodic hook and creepy, yet ominously cheerful tone to it. After hearing it for three or so rips, I was sold - the team had clearly taken a liking to the song, and I was now amidst the various other commenters noting how fun of a listen it was.

That was, of course, before I went to look up which rippers were behind which of these eight rips. Eight rips using Stuck Inside, made in the span of two weeks - and they were ALL made by KnightOfGames.

And look, KnightOfGames is already one of my favorite rippers, I've admired the earnestness and quality in his output since I first began listening to the albums and connected the dots of who was behind what (plus, in his own words on mlp racism anthem (comix zone arrange - every MLP rip specifically goes through him for approval to ensure peak pony quality!). But this sheer commitment to rendering Stuck Inside in these SUPER distinct styles, making a one-man effort appear like the work of multiple contributors through sheer variety and rate of uploads - it genuinely did make my jaw drop when I found out! All of these are bangers in their own way, but I felt the need to single out Willievan Afton Polkka in particular for how much of a fun escalation it proved to be SO early into the meme's life - it's the kind of rip that I wouldn't have expected to see uploaded until several weeks from now.

Ievan Polkka is of course a very sillycore banger in its own right no matter what you do with it, but the idea to have Stuck Inside's vocals be sung by Miku herself over the former song's backing beat is such a genuinely inspired idea, this clash of old and new internet fandom music that, on the surface appear, like oil and water. Yet the somewhat uncanny cheeriness to Stuck Inside's melody that I mentioned earlier ends up fitting in perfectly, appearing far more sincere and lighthearted in the arrangement as a result - and all topped off perfectly by the use of Moonbase Alpha-like Text-To-Speech clips to match Stuck Inside's occasional squeals. Just for good measure, the rip lastly explores juxtaposing the tonal differences of the two songs, by using the original vocals for a small segment in the middle of the rip, before returning to the good-fun Miku vocals.

Willievan Afton Polkka is, above all else, another release in the long line of excellent vocaloid rips on the channel, much like Rolling Start and As Miku Collides. And much like those two rips in particular, there's a sort of personal feeling to the rip - in part due to how exclusive Stuck Inside as a SiIva joke still is to KnightOfGames himself, but also due to how much fun the guy clearly had in arranging it in a seemingly-bizarre style such as this. There are some mashups and edits that you think of just from hearing songs for the first time, the "surprised this hasn't been done yet"-type of rips, but Willievan Afton Polkka feels like the complete opposite: the kind of out-there rip idea that could only be done by someone who knows Stuck Inside like the back of their hand. That's a level of commitment that I just have to respect - and I hope with my whole heart that Stuck Inside eventually becomes picked up by other members of the team as Season 8 progresses.

[httpknjoon]

instagram official | ksj

plot | Your fans cheered as you two finally posted photos of each other on your personal accounts, possibly confirming the relationship. But it all changed quickly when you accidentally started an Instagram live.

words | 1.1k+

genres | humor/crack, barely fluff, actors!au

pairing | actor!jin x famous!reader

disclaimer | usernames used in the fic are all fictional.

note | first drabble entry for this new series! probably an introduction on how this whole series will go for the next entries. anyway, let me know your thoughts.

main masterlist | drabble series

Y/N & Kim Seokjin finally made it Instagram official

At last!

Y/N-JIN fans, make some noise! Earlier this day, Y/N and Jin finally made it Instagram official. The longtime rumored couple posted photos of each other on their separate accounts, seemingly confirming the dating rumors.

In JIn’s account, he posted a photo of Y/N covering half of her face with a script while winking at the camera. It appears that it was taken on one of the sets of their latest movie together, Maybe Yes, Maybe No. Y/N wore the iconic baby blue dress from the said film.

“No more maybes.”  Jin captioned, referring to his character’s line from the movie. He added a single red heart.

On the other hand, Y/N posted a photo of Jin holding a magazine cover of himself next to his face. It appears to be taken during their stay in France during the promotions of their 2020 movie, Lonely People. She simply captioned the image with a butterfly emoji.  

This was the first time the couple posted about each other on their Instagram account after four years of being linked together. Back in 2017, when they worked on their first movie together and chemistry immediately became noticeable to the audience. A source told us that the romance started during the movie production.

“They began taking interest in each other right after their first screen test for Cornelia Street.” the source shared. “They began going on each other’s trailers during their free time and breaks, having their alone time. Jin even visited Y/N in London when she was shooting her own scenes there for almost two weeks .”

At last, after years of jokes and speculations, fans received confirmation from Y/N and Jin. To Hollywood’s newest couple, we wish you well with your relationship!

Both posts were two of the fastest photos to ever reach a million likes on the social media site. Fans immediately shared their thoughts and excitement with it, trending Y/N and Jin on Twitter. Short video clip edits of you two resurfaced again. It instantly became a hot topic since you two have the most active stans all over the internet. Even making locals updated about everything.

@seokjinniesy/n : i can finally leave this planet, knowing that y/n and jin are officially together [insert that Spongebob levitating reaction pic]

@GabbyWong : OMG Did #Y/NJin just confirm their relationship? I've been shipping them since I was twelve!

@starringy/n : please welcome the hollywood's power couple finally made it official [insert screenshots of your Instagram posts]

replying to @starringy/n

@y/nfavouriteco0kies: i hope jin posts more pictures of y/n bc that girl posts nothing but pictures of her cat 😩😩

urfavecatlady started a live video. Watch it before it ends!

The video was all pitch black. Almost fifty thousand viewers wait for something to happen. Both yours and Jin’s fans comment their thoughts. Some are asking what’s going on. While others just reply with random affirmations and support for your so-called romantic relationship. 

But they only heard voices in the background. Yours was the first one to be audible and recognizable, “We already posted the photos eleven hours ago.”

“Yeah, now give us our money!” Jin’s followed protest was heard.

A male voice laughed, “I said that it has to be on Instagram for a day. I’ll give you twenty dollars each  if the photo lasts until tomorrow.”

You crossed your arms over your chest as your eyes threw daggers towards Donny, Jin’s best friend. Jin sat beside you on your hotel room’s couch, doing the same thing too. On the other hand, Donny laughed at you two.

“Who knows things might still happen?”

“Things are already happening. I had to uninstall my Twitter with all the mentions I’m getting,” you spoke out.

When you posted Jin’s candid photo on your Instagram account, you immediately got notifications from Twitter popping up just seconds after. You ignored it at first, going on with your busy day. But it kept on vibrating for a straight thirty minutes like a freaking vibrator. You decided to uninstall the app. After your first shoot for the day, your manager told you the aftermath of your and Jin’s Instagram postings. There was chaos on both media outlets and social media sites.

But you just posted photos because of Donny. Earlier today, You, Jin, and Donny just finished having a room serviced breakfast in Jin’s hotel room when a dare was made.

“You two have the strictest managers. You cannot do shit every time.” he scoffed, taking a sip of the remaining coffee from his cup.

“Strictest manager.” Jin scoffed. “Namjoon still lets me have my phone even though I already drunk posted shit for like four times now. Maybe this one right here has that manager”

Your eyebrows raised, “Nope. Hayley is literally my best friend.”

It's true. Your manager for years is like an older sister to you. Except she also acts as your strict guardian sometimes. Donny remained unconvinced, wearing a smug smile on his face. Both you and Jin shared a look with each other. Yours and Jin's high level of competitiveness are both showing off.

“I will bet you forty dollars if you guys post anything right now that can possibly make your managers go crazy.”

So you did post something. Both you and Jin know your cards and how to play with them. Not less than two minutes, you two let go of your phones from your hands. Hailey later came in, asking you to get ready for your shoot.

“Well, that’s–” Donny paused from his sentence when he checked his phone. “Y/N, you are live on Instagram?”

“What?” you asked, eyebrows scrunched together, before reaching for your phone next to you. But it wasn't there. You looked around the couch. Then, you stood up, quickly spotting your phone.

"No, it's– Oh, shit!"

Jin and Donny watched as you curse constantly while tapping on your phone. After that, you moved your head from your screen to both of them with your eyes wide.

"Hailey's going to kill me–"

"Y/N!"

Your manager's voice can be heard outside your room as she knocks repeatedly on your door. You instantly ran next to Jin, using him as a human shield for your manager's incoming bullets.

"Donny... Can you open the door?" Jin told his friend, who chuckled before doing what he was told. Jin whispered to you, "Why is she so mad today?"

"I promised I won't post anything for today after the whole posting thing." you giggled. "Also, I promised I won't do shit while she's out on a date."

After you hurriedly ended the accidental Instagram live, everyone once again jumped to Twitter.

@sniperfory/n: These two dorks are literally earning millions with their movies and brand deals and they created this whole thing just to win forty bucks 💀💀💀

@seokjinniesm0on: wait a damn minute [insert a clip of that Instagram live]

@Y/NJINFAN: i am just a bet. for forty dollars. 💔💔💔💔💔💔

A day later, after the live chaos, when everyone already cooled down, Y/N simply addressed the whole thing with one tweet. Saying:

@YNOFFICIAL : Unfortunately, we didn’t get the forty dollars.

THE A-LISTERS TAGLIST

@seolaquotes @fatimaaaaa129 @bangtannieshope @jub-jub @yoontaethings @kissme-ornot @dayyy-siii @sleepy-daydreams @veronawrites @cuteipat @stoop18 @ratherbefangirling @babystarcandy-gcf @akirawhore @alpacaparkaseok

PERMANENT TAGLIST @dunixxd​ @cixrosie​ @victoryscreech61 @moonchild1 ​ @jksjx​ @embrace-themagic ​ @buttvi​  @starbtslove​  @missseoulite

[ms-revived-frogs]

Andrew Tate Rape Culture in Schools

Hey gyns, just wanted to share this article. 

Teachers, girls call out Andrew Tate influence as rape threat revealed.

Girls as young as 10 are being subjected to daily sexual harassment in schools, with one group reportedly offered cash to make porn films.

Female teachers and girls as young as 10 are being subjected to daily sexual harassment in Sydney schools, with some teachers so frustrated they're considering walking off the job.

As leadership in some of Sydney’s private boys’ schools warn parents about the dangers of their sons watching internet personality Andrew Tate videos, young girls are being joined by female teachers in speaking up about shocking sexual harassment.

Some teachers have reported being called a “c**t” on several occasions, while others have had been told sexual explicit jokes by boys as young as 10.

The alert has been sounded by schools after The Daily Telegraph revealed a misogynistic, homophobic and anti-Semitic chat group created by a group of Knox Grammar students.

Tate, a controversial international influencer and former professional kickboxer, has been criticised for his views on women, including that they should “bear some responsibility” for being raped.

In videos shared rampantly on TikTok, which thousands of Australian children have access to, Tate espouses that women “belong in the home”, “can’t drive”, and are a “man’s property”.

He was banned from Facebook and Instagram, where he had racked up five million followers, in August.

Scots College’s head of students James Bowles warned parents about Tate’s viral videos that had clocked up billions of views on TikTok in a newsletter to parents last week.

He cautioned that students were at risk of being influenced by Tate’s rants advocating violence against women, the illegitimacy of depression and “a slew of other insensitive and uneducated opinions”.

Trinity Grammar deputy head Bradley Barr also issued a warning about Tate, saying his “reach probably extends into many of your homes and to the social media feeds of many of your sons”.

Collective Shout movement director Melinda Tankard Reist, who has been talking to students and teachers in public and private schools across Australia over the past decade, says the stories are getting worse and the children are getting younger.

Along with female students as young as 10, Ms Tankard Reist said female teachers were reporting disturbing sexual harassment from young boys, with some being brought to tears.

The speaker, writer and media commentator said female students were in “deep distress” over Tate’s influence.

“For the last few months around the country, without exception, they will ask me: Will the boys be spoken to about the influence of Andrew Tate?” she said.

“They want to know what’s been done to expose his harmful teachings.”

Girls are reporting that boys are treating them “more harshly, more aggressively,” she said.

“They’re expecting that they should be able to, quote unquote, put girls in their place, that girls are lesser than them and don’t deserve to be treated,” Ms Tankard Reist said.

“I have girls telling me that boys expect to be able to show constraint and strangle them.”

Ms Tankard Reist has no doubt the problem is getting worse.

“So what grades 5 and 6 girls are telling me used to be what the senior girls told me,” she said.

“They’re telling me that boys are threatening to rape them.

“Three girls, two weeks ago, told me – they were all 14 to 15 – that boys have threatened to rape their mothers and sisters if they didn’t send naked pictures.”

She also reported that a group of year 7 girls were offered cash by their male peers to make “porn films for them and their mates”.

The women and girls advocate said other female students had told her that they had been subjected to sexual moaning, grunting, groaning noises boys make in class, in the schoolyard and on the school bus since they were in grade 2.

“This turned into female teachers describing being subjected to these noises as well and I’ve had more female teachers this year tell me they’re leaving the profession because of this,” Ms Tankard Reist said.

“Two weeks ago, I was in the Maitland region. They were telling me that every day they are subjected to being called the C-word by boys.”

Another teacher told Ms Tankard Reist that she overheard a 12-year-old boy ask another boy, ‘How do you know you’re having sex’?

“The other 12-year-old boy replied, ‘When she starts to cry’.

“I’ve had young female teachers in tears telling me what it’s like to be propositioned by boys,” she said, reporting that one teacher had caught boys trying to take photos up her skirt under the desk.

The teachers said they were having difficulty punishing students for this behaviour, reporting a lack of backing from the education department.

“I’ve had school principals, one of whom came out of the Defence Force and went into teaching, tell me that he found teaching harder than when he was working in the Defence Force because he said even when students are in danger, he’s not allowed to suspend or expel them,” she said.

Some of the stories Ms Tankard Reist and her team have recorded from female teachers are posted on the Collective Shout website.

“I’ve been sexually assaulted by two male students, one in grade 10 and one in grade 11 in my second year of teaching (I was 25),” one teacher said.

“It was an awful experience and I didn’t feel supported by the all-male leadership team at all.”

Another reported that a boy in year 6 class began humping the floor and moaning, with the deputy principal dismissing the behaviour as “age appropriate” and “normal”.

“It infuriated me that the behaviour was considered ‘normal’ and was thus not dealt with by leadership,” the teacher said.

“In my opinion, we’ve done these young boys a huge disservice by not addressing and redirecting these behaviours.”

Another woman, who was contemplating moving into the profession, amid massive shortages in the industry, says stories like this have deterred her.

“I thought leaving a construction industry (dominated by male egos, gender pay gaps & gendered promotions) would mean my dignity and sexual harassment would be less of an issue,” she commented.

Ms Tankard Reist said teachers feel “hamstrung” about reporting sexual harassment, with some considering leaving the profession because of the lack of protection.

“I’m not blaming the boys. My view is that a sexist culture grooms sexist boys, and Andrew Tate is part of this grooming process,” she said.

Ms Tankard Reist said the most popular type of porn videos and content shared among young boys was “rape porn, torture and sadism”.

“And then everyone’s surprised at the behaviour of these Knox boys,” she said.

“Why are you surprised?

“The global porn industry is that the biggest department of education in the world.”

The expert has also joined a growing list of psychologists and educators calling out platforms like TikTok as dangerous entities, saying they’re “fuelling violence against women and girls”.

“They bring together boys, they encourage boys into this herd mentality, this pack mentality, they give them a sense of belonging,” she said.

One ballooning online phenomenon that has come under criticism recently is the “incel” or “involuntary celibate” community, a subculture of people, mostly men, who define themselves as unable to attract romantic or sexual partners and express their anger and frustrations online.

Ms Tankard Reist called the growing community “both a repository of these harmful ideas … they broadcast these harmful ideas and draw more boys in, especially disenfranchised boys who always are looking for a tribe”.

“We are struggling to raise happy, healthy, resilient, emotionally literate, empathetic, young people,” she said.

“We're driving the empathy, especially, out of boys.”

Reading through this just made me depressed. And of course the article focuses on the boys, and not the girls who are literally going through human rights violations at prepubescent ages. It seems every time women make some steps, they’re rolled right back. Roe v. Wade being overturned, Andrew Tate being a rulebook for young boys. Every time I feel like maybe boys and men might respect us, I’m let down. It’s apparent now that men might never really respect us, seeing as how easy it was to have even the younger generations turned against girls and women - all with the power of social media. It’s also apparent that for true gender equality, boys need to be kept under strict regulation on what they watch. Lord knows the type of men these boys will grow up to be. 

[nanairomiso]

Working in Japan

This is a repost of a thread I made on Twitter, but essentially, it's a breakdown of how much I made working as a freelancer in Japan. Consider a cautionary tale if you're thinking about moving to Japan.

So i made roughly 5 million yen last year, right? Highest i've ever gotten after 14 years in Japan (higher than what i made at my old company even). Awesome, right?

Well, since i am freelance, i have to cover my own expenses. this includes lights, internet, software, other equip or transport I need for work. So once you subtract all of that, roughly 3 mil yen, I have about 2 mil yen left. Not terrible, but not great.

Now, from this 2 mil, I have to subtract health insurance, which a monthly payment of about 12000 yen (144,000 a year). Ouch, but like, necessary. 1.8 mil is still not.... the worst.

We still haven't paid into the pension system :smiling_face_with_tear: This payment can be made monthly, but you get a bit of a discount if you pay for a year up front (short for money, jp govt?).

So that's about 200,000 yen. Just gone.

It's just me and 1.6 mil yen left…. okay…

Did I mention there's a city tax? I haven't received it yet, but it's roughly 150,000 for Osaka city. Are you crying? Because I'm crying with my 1.5 million yen. Want to cry harder? If I were to convert this to USD, it's less than 10K for the year......

And that 5 million yen from all my work last year is ABOVE AVERAGE. The average wage in Japan is currently 4.1 million before taxes... IS IT REALLY ANY WONDER PPL AREN'T HAVING CHILDREN?? I CAN BARELY AFFORD MYSELF LMAO

There is one major difference between freelance and fulltime employees though. Companies will cover half of your pension and a certain percentage of your health insurance, so maybe salaried employees end with a 300,000 more in their wallets.

But freelancers? This includes animators, comic artists, video editors, etc. Or people that aren't employed full-time?? We have to cover our insurance and pension.

Freelancers are really out here with no money.

This is all to say, basically, working in Japan is a joke. Honestly the amount I pay for healthcare is too high for quality of care I receive most of the time and I'm not even sure I'll receive pension from the govt (because they have no money)

Did i mention that pay into a separate retirement plan in the states because i do not trust the japanese govt?

XDDD i've moved beyond anger. i can only laugh at my circumstances.

OH and japanese politicians have just been pocketing MILLIONS of YEN. YOU KNOW. THAT AVERAGE JAPANESE CITIZENS AMT IN YEARLY WAGES. THEY POCKETED THAT TASTY UNTAXED MONEY UNTIL THEY WERE EXPOSED A FEW MONTHS AGO

So yeah, the cost of living in Japan is low, and seems affordable from the point of view of the US dollar. But when you work in Japan?? When you make money in yen?????

[cacartoon]

what decided you to do the game 6 au ?

While it’s more personal to me I suppose I could explain it now so no one goes at my throat when I block them or delete comments.

Many years ago, when I was only a young teen, I ran this old ask series on DeviantArt that first explored the concept of different worlds colliding as one. It admittedly and definitely was cringe and pretty bad but it had its following. That following turned toxic. And sadly so did I.

It’s not excuse but I was dealing with undiagnosed depression anxiety and paranoia. So this didn’t help my situation as a went downhill. By the time I was 18-19, I had already tried to, do something I’m never gonna be proud of and thank goodness I failed, and I finally had enough. So I deleted and stopped the project all together. After some bumps and nearly 4 years later of fans either begging me to continue, shaming me, or even threatening my life, I ran away from the internet. Of course it didn’t mean I stopped making fun crossover content. I always loved the idea and one day on TikTok I made a joke post with the Game 6. That post got 1 million views. And the next one got 4 million. And soon Game 6 took off and took over my life, only now I have more control and the new fanbase actually saw me as a human being and respected my emotional and mental state. It hasn’t been an easy road. Heck even nearly 4 years later I’m still being harassed by people who clearly don’t know when to quit, but I’m happy making my own content and enjoying the fandoms I grew to love so dearly.

[the-journal-in-law]

Hidden

Prompt from: @gingerly-writing

"Outcasts? But you're the most powerful hero team alive!"

"Powerful enough that no one else can trust us. Telepathy. Time travel. One touch kill. Radiation. Necromancy." The superhero shrugged. "We can't be allowed in regular society, or so people say. So we stay here, together. And sometimes, on the rarest of occasions, we venture out to save the world."

The civilian stared. At the comfy-looking but cheap clothes the superhero was wearing. At the cottage deep in the middle of the woods - right in the middle, they weren't joking.

The civilian had gotten lost - well, that was an understatement. How did one accidentally find themselves stuck in a forest tucked away in the edges of the city? They weren't sure themselves.

But they hadn't expected to find this.

In a world where superheroes were praised and worshipped for their heroism, whoever manifested powers was treated with a life of luxury. Unless they turned to villainy, in which case the world was doomed.

The civilian suspected superhumans were given everything they wanted to prevent exactly that. There had been exactly two cases in history where superheroes sought to usurp humanity. (It was suspicious that the number was so low, but the government probably had a hand in that.)

Superhumans were a rare thing, a one in a million occurrence. Once they were born, they could be given anything from a power that could destroy a large city to something that could bend reality itself.

There were two special cases. A pair of twins, born presumably a hundred years ago; there had never been a confirmed birthdate. They had had seemingly limitless power.

But one day, they just - disappeared.

Only to appear when a nuclear war almost started between two warring countries five years later. Then again, during a series of earthquakes that threatened to destroy an entire continent half a century ago. And the most recent - to defeat the two supervillains who had had grudges against the world.

Humanity's Immortal Protectors, they were called.

No one knew exactly what they looked like, but one reporter had managed to catch a blurry picture of them before they vanished after apprehending the world's second supervillain.

The civilian had run that photo through countless apps, edits, and filters, just to see if they could get an accurate representation of the superheroes.

That was how the civilian recognised the face that answered a knock on the door of a cottage in the middle of nowhere.

"But why are you here?" the civilian exclaimed. They could understand the government wanting to hide them away - the government was always hiding something - but surely they'd had enough sense to provide the most powerful beings of all time with something.

What if they became supervillains? It wouldn't be hard for them to end humanity in a blink of an eye. Maybe in even less than that.

"Rest assured, we do not have any villainous intentions," a voice interrupted their thoughts.

The civilian froze. Their heart beat loud in their ears, and they became hyper-conscious of their surroundings. Suddenly, they felt all too aware of who exactly they were with.

"I won't hurt you," the superhero said. But the civilian saw that his eyes looked colder than before - and was that a hint of disappointment? But it was gone as soon as they'd thought it.

"Are you reading my mind?" they asked and immediately regretted it.

The superhero smiled, but it was empty of the anticipation that had been there when he answered the door. He didn't answer the obvious question.

He stepped aside. "Come in."

The civilian wasn't about to refuse a superhero, much less this one, so they shut their mouth and went in.

The inside of the cottage was...surprisingly normal. There was a kitchen to their left and a living room to their right. A kettle steamed on the white counters, and a TV was mounted on the wall. The civilian wondered how they worked. Surely the electricity and internet from the city didn't go this far?

"We have solar panels," the superhero said, making the civilian jump. "And a special device that connects us to networks all around the world."

"That's creepy," they muttered.

The superhero snickered. "We've been called worst things."

"Brother?" a voice called.

From the hallway appeared a woman - the second half of the immortal duo. She looked like a female version of her twin.

When she saw the civilian, she froze. She blinked once. Twice. "What is that?"

The civilian's wide-eyed expression contorted into offence. "I'm sorry?"

"Did humans get bigger since the last time we saw them?"

The civilian stared at her, then at her brother, who looked as serious as ever. "Sorry?" he repeated, not comprehending.

She looked at him with a confused face for a few more seconds before snorting. Amusement lit up her eyes. "Just kidding. You people haven't changed that much in the last thousand years. Well, except for your lack of webbed hands."

There was so much wrong with what she said.

"Don't tease them too much," her brother scolded.

Her smile turned wicked, and her aura gained a sinister edge, sending chills up the civilian's spine.

"We mustn't let them live in ignorance," she cooed. Her voice seemed almost otherworldly, laced with some kind of magic.

"Sister!"

The civilian blinked, jarred out of their trance. When they regained their awareness, they realised the woman was gone.

"I'm sorry about that," the superhero said. "Ignore everything she just said. Isolation has affected her a bit more than it has me."

The civilian squinted at him, still disoriented.

What was that?

"One of her powers," he said. He looked at them with that hint of disappointment and resignation. "Suggestion."

The civilian shivered at the name. They glanced warily at the hallway his sister had come out of. Opening their dry mouth, they asked, "Did we...really have webbed hands?"

The superhero broke out into surprised laughter.

Taglist: @memepsychowhowantsuperpower-blog@faeruine@a-sunset-outside-my-window@sketxhdragxn@kaiwewi @eri-would-like-to-not-thanks @bownkboo @those-damn-snippets

[barbiegirldream]

Hey Sally!

I left the fandom almost a year ago, but I still check in here and there. I was curious, how do you handle the stress of being in fandoms? Doesn’t it get overwhelming with the amount of drama and antis? I get overwhelmed with everything even when checking in for a few minutes every few months, there is always something going on and it’s never positive. I had been in the fandom since February 2020 and it was still the case back then. Even prior to hitting Dream hitting 2 Million, but it’s so much worse now. The fandom is smaller and instead of people trying to ride Dreams wave of success, it’s the same exact people except now they’re trying to ride the wave of his “downfall”. It’s disheartening to see people change, and I wish it were for genuine reasons. The genuine reasons exist, many people could dislike him for them but that is not the case at all. I say that because this reaction and hatred towards him is never expressed to others who have done similar things, and worse. I always wondered why Dream face revealed instead of leaving the internet and living on a farm far far away 😭 That’s a joke, but actually something I would have done if I were him (which I’m not)

I don’t really get stressed about it. I mean let’s be serious No One has been preying on Dream’s success since 2020 and they realized he was going to surpass all of them. They’re jealous little creatures who think it they could just get that hit tweet or that viral video Dream will fade from existence. It doesn’t matter he’s already swept them all. He walked into YouTube in 2019 and got his Diamond play button his world records his world wide notoriety. What took others a decade he did in three years.

Dream is Happy despite their very best efforts and he’s always going to beat them for that fact alone

As for me I am like the sims who get joy from those around them being unhappy

[mitchipedia]

That time Heather Armstrong roasted me on her popular blog, dooce

I mentioned yesterday that I interviewed Heather Armstrong, who wrote the blog dooce and that she later wrote about how excruciating the experience was for her.

Armstrong took her own life this week. She was talented, funny, and insightful, and she helped invent professional blogging, which led to today’s social media influencers and indie journalists.

I was not offended by the piece Armstrong wrote after I interviewed her in 2006. I thought it was a fair rap. However, I was disappointed that I’d set out to interview someone I admired, and that person had found the experience horribly painful.

Yesterday, I said I was unable to locate Heather’s blog post, but a friend online found it and sent me the link this morning:

On being a total nutjob

A few weeks ago Jon and I gave an interview to an IT magazine for an article about accidental entrepreneurship. They wanted to know how this website now pays our mortgage when I originally started it so that I could make obnoxious fart jokes online. Short answer: I had to give a lot of head.

It was a phone interview, and they recorded it so that they could incorporate it into a podcast (when it’s posted I’ll link to it here), and I can honestly say that I have never been more uncomfortable giving an interview. One, it was only a couple days after I had discovered that someone I thought was a very cool person was making viciously mean comments about me in a public forum, and every time I answered a question into the phone I could hear in my head how this person would make fun of the way I said things. Two, in order to make sure that they had a clean edit for the podcast, the guy conducting the interview wouldn’t say anything for at least 10 seconds after I answered a question, and that disorienting pause made me think that my thrilling discourse had bored him into a coma.

Here’s the article that followed from that interview. It’s … fine. Not my best work, but not bad either.

Accidental Tech Entrepreneurs Turn Their Hobbies Into Livelihoods. InformationWeek interviewed five accidental entrepreneurs, including the founders of del.icio.us and Digg and the author of the blog Dooce, to find out how they freed themselves from the paycheck-to-paycheck grind.

The article I wrote is perhaps notable today as a time capsule of Internet history. I also interviewed Joshua Schachter, the co-founder of a bookmarking site called del.icio.us; Kevin Rose, who co-founded digg; Mena Trott, co-founder of Six Apart, the company behind Movable Type, LiveJournal, and TypePad; and Tom Davis, author of personal information manager software called Zoot, which is similar in mission to more recent applications like Evernote and Microsoft OneNote. (I’m pleased to see that Zoot Software is still around.)

I did a brief follow-up article a few years later, focusing on Armstrong alone: Maytag Crosses Popular Blogger, Gets Spun Dry. I talked at the end about how I felt about reading Armstrong’s article about our interview.

News of Armstrong’s death this week shook me in the same way Anthony Bourdain’s death shook me. Like Bourdain, she was struggling with demons, and the demons beat her.

I can’t help thinking that her living so much of her life in public, sharing her insecurities and self-loathing with millions of people, was not helpful to her mental state. And I need to think about how that relates to my own online habits.

[nation-of-bros]

Just wanted to say I hope you get some mental health help. You need to be severely delusional to believe all the fake news and bullshit you are putting out into the world. Karma is going to get you back for all the toxicity and poison you are spilling out all over the internet. People who think from a place of hate like you are bound to get what they deserve. What an idiot to fall for all that Russian propaganda. Absolutely wild. Research shows people that are less intelligent are more likely to fall for conspiracy theories...and you fell for all of them, hook, line and sinker. I really hope you get what you deserve: the same hatred and suffering you are wishing on others as their homeland is invaded, they are bombed in their homes, and it's all a joke to you. I'm a teacher--I use your blog as an example of someone who falls for misinformation and doesn't check their sources. How does it feel, knowing you are an example of being stupid enough to fall for fake news? My students were disgusted people like you exist and so am I.

I remember, you wrote to me many months ago your silly story that you were a teacher representing me as a negative example to your students (October 2022). Seems like the booster has already affected your memory. :D

And in all that time you still consumed my blog instead of just ignoring me? Should I feel flattered that I've drawn you into my orbit? :D

If you tell me the same story again in the future, I will delete your message immediately. In any case, I don't see any insight gained in your nonsense. You're just a drone that would work perfectly in any totalitarian system.

Instead of breeding more drones, you should finally start reading my texts without that firewall in your head to understand their true meaning.

Your morals are flawed

I don't give a damn about your naive karma talk. I am not a Hindu.

And it is also not credible for someone like you, who most likely discriminated against other people, excluded them from public life because of a refused vaccination, and even destroyed their livelihoods by losing their job due to a lack of vaccination subscription, to talk to me about karma! First of all, realize what you have caused with your behavior.

For example, an Italian here once told me the psychological hell he had to go through just because he "didn't believe in science" and refused the vaccination. He was persecuted like a witch by hysterics. In the end, he accepted the shots because of the pressure and has been suffering from myocarditis ever since, just like his boyfriend, just like millions of others around the world. He may now die 10 or 20 years prematurely. Who knows. So how can people like you reconcile this with their conscience?!

I'm honest, I despise people like you, because you are hypocrites, you think you are the good guys, but in reality you are the devil's henchmen with your moral babble, since you have understood absolutely nothing. Your fate will be to endure the shit you defend so much. This is true karma. If one day you did become aware of what you and billions of other people have done, you would most likely lie in a corner crying because the feelings released by the awareness, the truth, overwhelmed you. But I don't trust you to have that much empathy.

Ukraine is just another symbol of your falsehood

If Ukraine were really so "bombed," hundreds of thousands wouldn't come to Germany, apply for social assistance and return to their homeland two weeks later, while the German state regularly transfers the money to their accounts. This is not Russian "propaganda", but a fact that has also been discussed politically in the mainstream here, but which the established parties do not want to change because they are just as coward as you. The truth is, the war there is limited to a few areas. Many Ukrainians, especially in cities like Kiev, still have time to play online games or spread their state propaganda on social media, pretending to be the heroes of humanity.

Meanwhile, there are also Ukrainian men who couldn't buy their way out and are drafted into the war, but don't want to fight for an utterly corrupt state and either live underground or try to escape to the West, which isn't easy because males aged 18 are not allowed to leave Ukraine. Again, I'm wondering how you're going to justify this morally, especially when living comfortably in a country that has long since abolished conscription. When will you finally start to grow out of your good-human illusion and recognize the situation for what it is?

It makes me so upset that you ignore everything that doesn't fit into your smooth world view. There has been a civil war in Ukraine since 2014. Get to grips with the background! Zelenskyy is not a great man. I see no difference if the Ukrainian state, like the Russian state, forces men to go to war. I wonder if you would be willing to die on the Eastern Front for your supposed freedom instead of demonizing people like me who criticize all this hypocrisy and want a peaceful solution and not more weapons shipments.

In addition, Ukraine is not the world; in Africa alone, thousands of children starve to death every day. Or the terrible earthquakes recently in Libya and Morocco, where more people died suddenly than civilians in the entire Ukraine war. Then there is still the Yemen war, for another example, which is a thousand times worse than the little death in Ukraine. Are you interested? NO! Because the mainstream doesn't tell you that, because it doesn't fit into their worldview, because the weapons with which Saudi Arabia is waging this cruel war in Yemen come from the EU and USA. So instead of lecturing me about karma, deal with your own ugly state that you indirectly support, which is constantly causing shit all over the world! Your naivety and indirect approval is ultimately your own true bad karma.

You are part of the fascist system

The mainstream and politics have conditioned you perfectly with 24/7 propaganda in order to transplant exactly the opinion into your mind that is politically desired at the moment: flu viruses as a deadly epidemic, unquestioned glorification of Ukraine, no doubt about the need to save the climate. At least in the EU, these are permanent topics of the day, around which EVERYTHING revolves, as if we had no real problems: When a guest on a talk show has a completely different opinion instead of just handle a few things slightly different than the other talk show guests , he is immediately put down as an enemy by the others. But most of the time only politicians, virologists, climate researchers or never serving self-proclaimed war experts from the university who represent an opinion that conforms to the system are invited. In this way, they all build together an illusion, a matrix that makes you feel that there can only be one defensible moral opinion and all others are just the views of crazy weirdos, conspiracy theorists.

This gleichschaltung, extreme synchronization at all levels of society, is typical of totalitarian systems. But the facade they have put up with an apparent offer of political parties and elections, these fake basic rights that they take away from you when fear prevails, is just a mirage.

When, as an unvaccinated person, I was not allowed into public spaces for a long time, with the exception of supermarkets, while vaccinated citizens enjoyed a completely normal life again, even though it had long been obvious that the vaccinations did not provide any protection at all, I experienced this madness first hand: They lived normally, while I was only mercifully allowed to enter supermarkets so that I wouldn't starve. At least they showed me that much mercy, although quite a few vaccinated people wanted unvaccinated people to stay like dogs at the door here too. In this way, not only were families destroyed forever, but the entire society was irreparably divided. This is not my doing, my karma, this is your fault. I'm just an observer of this madness, snaking my way through the thicket unscathed and taking photos of your antics to immediately present them on my animal channel.

Finally open your eyes and recognize the contradictions! Recognize your own reprehensibility. Repent and ask for forgiveness.

I don't have to do it because I don't violate the free will of others.

[selfieignite]

2014 KoreAm magazine photoshoot and cover story of John Cho.

John Cho Delights in Rom-Com Role in ABC’s ‘Selfie’

October 28, 2014

In the new ABC rom-com Selfie, John Cho goes where no Asian American actor has gone before.

story by ADA TSENG photography by JACK BLIZZARD

John Cho can’t stop raving about how he got to ride a horse for his new TV show Selfie.

“About a month ago, [creator] Emily [Kapnek] came to me and said, ‘We’re writing a storyline where you’re riding a horse. Can you ride a horse?’” remembers Cho. “And I said, ‘I can’t, but you have to keep that in. I’ll learn.’”

Turns out he only needed one lesson to gallantly ride a horse for a scene that’s a play on the familiar knight-inshining- armor trope.

“Apparently, I’m a natural,” he jokes. Why hasn’t anyone asked him to ride a horse before? “That’s a good question!” he says. “Now I get to put it on the resume as a special skill.”

Cho plays Henry to Karen Gillan’s Eliza in ABC’s new half-hour comedy Selfie, which premiered on September 30. The show borrows the premise of the 1964 musical My Fair Lady, based on the 1916 play Pygmalion, transplanting the characters from early-1900s’ status-obsessed England to 2014’s Internet-obsessed America. Selfie’s pilot introduces Eliza Dooley (a nod to Eliza Doolittle) as a social media star with millions of virtual friends but no actual friends. One day, after she is publicly humiliated by a boyfriend whom she didn’t realize was married, she sees a presentation by her co-worker Henry Higgs (shortened from Higgins), who is a talented marketing expert at their pharmaceutical company. He also happens to hate everything about the wired millennial generation. Convinced she needs to be rebranded, Eliza begs Henry to help her change her image.

Though the Henry character in the film, played by Rex Harrison, looks down on Audrey Hepburn’s Eliza, the Selfie team wanted to make sure their modern Henry was influenced by Eliza just as much as Eliza is “transformed” by him. Though Henry confidently takes on the challenge to make her into a less self-absorbed person, in the process, she also teaches him that all work and no play is no way to live a fulfilling life. (“What’s more irresistible than opposites being thrown together?” says Cho.) Their modern take is less about external behaviors — manners and proper elocution — and more about internal values: learning to empathize and live in the present, instead of being constantly glued to one’s smart phone.

Perhaps because My Fair Lady and Pygmalion take place in England, the character of Henry was originally envisioned as an older English man. However, when the casting directors were having challenges finding the right person for the role, Cho’s name was suggested. (“We looked at tons of different actors, and really, once we kind of opened our minds and said let’s get off of what we think Henry is supposed to be and just talk about who he is — we just need a brilliant actor — and John’s name came up,” Kapnek told The Toronto Star.)

And it turns out there was no reason the 21st-century Henry couldn’t be Korean American.

“John and I actually met at a table read for the first episode of Selfie,” remembers Gillan, well-known to audiences for her roles in Doctor Who and Guardians of the Galaxy. “So in essence, we met in character. As soon as John began to deliver Henry’s lines, everything came to life. He breathed life into the character, and through that, into my character, too. It was really exciting.”

But back to the horse. “The character of Henry has been taking horseriding lessons surreptitiously for three years on the chance that he’d be invited up to his boss’s ranch,” explains Cho. “And he’s frustrated because he’s trying to impress his boss, but he keeps getting thwarted and is unable to show off his equestrian prowess.” He pauses. “But the point of the story is that John Cho got to ride a horse!” He laughs. “In fact, I got a little too obsessed with the horse. I was probably not a good actor that day because I was too excited about the horse.”

For Cho, it was more than the fact that riding a horse was fun. As an Asian American actor in Hollywood — even a successful one whose almost twodecades-long career has spanned indie films (Shopping for Fangs, Better Luck Tomorrow), mainstream comedies (Harold & Kumar, American Pie) and sci-fi classics (Star Trek) — Cho says he doesn’t often get to participate in stories that involve what he calls “American mythology.” He feels that Asian Americans mostly get shut out of Hollywood stories depicting this country’s history, unless they’re Chinese railroad workers or launderers. He racks his brain, trying to think if he’s ever seen an Asian American guy ride a horse on TV before. Though he loves Westerns, he knows it’s unlikely he’d be cast in one.

But never say never. How likely was it that he would become this generation’s Henry Higgins?

At this year’s Television Critics Association Summer Press Tour, as he was promoting the show, Cho called his casting as an Asian American male lead in a romantic comedy TV series “revolutionary,” a word he regrets using in retrospect. It was an offhand comment, but the media ran with it.

He’d rather point people’s attention to the fact that, during the panel, there were many questions about Scottish co-star Gillan having to speak in an American accent, but no questions about them as an interracial couple.

He was surprised, but relieved. Normally, he’d not only be prepared to talk about his race, but also have a strategy to steer away from it, so that his Asian-ness didn’t dominate the conversation, especially for a project like Selfie, which has a multicultural cast, but doesn’t harp on the characters’ ethnic backgrounds. There were only two Asian references in the pilot. The first was about how Henry’s eccentric boss Sam (played by Homeland’s David Harewood) thought it was OK to kiss Henry on the mouth as a greeting because he read an article on the web called “Kissing Koreans: Greenlight!” — which, because it was actually more of a joke about the boss’ inappropriate touching and the fact that the Internet is full of lies, could have easily been a “Kissing Europeans: Greenlight!” joke left over from when they envisioned Henry as British. The second, which eventually got cut and transplanted into a future script, had Henry insisting his friendship with Eliza is completely platonic and joking that a red-headed Korean would definitely make an ugly baby.

Selfie isn’t trying to comment on racial issues in America; it’s aiming to be a clever workplace comedy with a “will-they-or-won’t-they?” couple at the center of the hijinks. And from the outset, it seems like ABC is banking on their new show by Kapnek, who recently helmed the ABC comedy Suburgatory. Selfie advertisements seem to be everywhere, from eye-catching billboards along major freeways to the cover of the fall TV insert of Los Angeles magazine, to the top of the popular IMDB.com movie database homepage. It also says a great deal that Selfie was given the Tuesday 8 p.m. time slot, the only new ABC show that’s been tasked with leading the day’s prime-time block of programming.

In another marketing move, ABC released the pilot online over a month early to get the buzz going, a strategy that Cho thinks is related to the public’s initial ambivalence over the show’s title. “The word ‘selfie’ has so much baggage,” says Cho. “It’s provocative, which is why I liked it, but the word implies narcissism, so there was a disinclination to like the show. People had to be convinced it was a real show.”

But Cho doesn’t seem worried. “I think the work speaks for itself.”

The Selfie crew is gathered at the Warner Bros. lot in Burbank on a Wednesday morning in September, using Cho and Gillan stand-ins to prepare for the first shot.

In the maze of different sets — the pharmaceutical offices, cubicles, hallway, bathroom and apartment spaces — the production team watching the monitors can’t necessarily see John Cho, but they can hear him. He’s belting out a song in the background before he gets ready to shoot his scene. Cho’s known for being goofy on set. While shooting the pilot, he had Gillan laughing whenever he pulled out his phone and blasted Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.”

Gillan and Cho’s onscreen chemistry is apparent, therefore the tension that arises from keeping their characters apart is irresistible. In the episode they’re shooting, Henry has started dating a very proper, clean-cut “gentlewoman,” as he calls her (a female version of himself played by actress Allison Miller), and Eliza, despite the fact that she has a boy toy of her own, seems to be a little jealous. She’s hurt that Henry didn’t tell her he was dating somebody. In his defense, it just happened 10 minutes ago, he says. But I tell you every single detail about my love life, she argues. A habit I’m desperately trying to break you of, he banters back.

There are certain images in television and movies that we see so often that they border on cliché — girl likes boy, boy likes girl, but they can’t admit it, so they bicker instead and somehow get stuck in the glistening rain together — yet minority actors who are usually relegated to supporting roles don’t often get to play these arcs.

“It’s funny,” says Cho. “I’ve had to do romantic scenes in my career” — he’s been paired with Paula Garces in the Harold & Kumar trilogy and Gabrielle Union in the 2009 ABC science-fiction drama FlashForward —“but by far, they’re the minority of the things that I do. But in life and in movies, I’ve seen it so many times. [Romantic scenes] are in almost everything! So I had a sense of how things should go, what the beats should be, and that’s not informed by what I’ve done as an actor, but what I’ve seen as a viewer. It was new and unfamiliar, but familiar at the same time.”

Back in 2009, in interviews promoting the release of Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, Cho often talked about the fact that he thinks about the Asian American community with every role he chooses.

Five years later, does this pressure still weigh on him? “When I was first starting out, it was a lot of rejecting stuff,” he says. “Saying ‘I’m not going to do that sh-t, these ching-chongy roles, even though I had no place to be turning things down. In the middle part of my career, I became more aware that people were aware of me — Asian Americans in particular. And sometimes it almost felt like I was bullied, how burdened I was by what Asian Americans might think of me.”

Though Asian America may feel like we have a stake in his career, for better or worse, Cho says it sometimes feels like we have a disproportionate amount of influence on him. With the diverse fan base of both the Harold & Kumar and Star Trek franchises, he finds that the majority of fans that come up to him on the streets are not Asian.

“I’m trying to come at it from a more authentic place,” he says. “Selfie would be an example of me reading the script and thinking, ‘I don’t think I’ve seen an Asian guy in this particular kind of role.’ It personally touched a nerve, and I took delight in it.”

Another unique aspect of Selfie that Cho enjoys is the language, which he calls “a mix of old Hollywood screwball dialogue, meets arcane English, meets hashtag jargon.” In addition to snappy rhythms, rhymes and couplets mixed into the characters’ repartee, Eliza is constantly talking in a mix of LOLs, Internet lingo and pop culture references. (“At the beginning I made a decision Eliza would talk like she’s on a lot of coffee,” says Gillan. “Now I’m regretting that.”) Whereas Henry is more proper, referring to dating as “courting” and feeling the need to airquote Eliza’s suggestion that he needs to “get some,” emphasizing his distaste for casually lewd slang that comes out of his mouth so unnaturally.

“I’ve never had this kind of dialogue in my life,” says Cho, of this elevated language that’s often the domain of theater. “Henry sometimes feels like he was educated abroad, like at a Swiss boarding school.”

Though Cho may be less uptight than his character, he seems to share a similar crankiness about social media.

“Every minute I spend on Twitter feels like a waste of time emotionally,” he says, balking at the idea that increasing one’s Klout score in this day and age may actually be a smart career move. After all, even though Cho, and therefore his character, doesn’t look a day over 30, in real life, one could argue he, at 42, is at least one technological generation over the millennials who talk in OMGs while updating their Instagrams with overfiltered selfies.

The married father of two harkens back to the good ol’ days, when instead of judging quality through Facebook likes and retweets, good criticism was valued “in the way a poet can give voice to how much you love a woman.” He refers to Jonathan Franzen’s condemnation of Facebook as a private hall of flattering mirrors. He brings up Noam Chomsky’s media documentary Manufacturing Consent to explain how “it’s impossible to tell the truth in a two-minute news story, so you start at failure and end at worse failure. And I felt like Twitter was an extreme example of this.”

However, his involvement with Selfie has softened his stance against social media.

“I see young people who are very self-expressive in a way that I couldn’t have even grasped at that age,” says Cho. “I saw an Ariana Grande tweet, where she had typed out some emotions on her iPhone after her grandfather passed away, taken a picture of it, and tweeted it out to her followers. It was so fresh and emotional, a way of sharing a Polaroid of her state at that time. So maybe Twitter is proving me wrong.” He hesitates. “But I don’t know. I can’t go there. I’m a private person. Even interviews are an exercise in avoiding revealing anything about myself that’s real, and I dislike that these are the new rules of fame, that you must reveal more than you wish.”

So, now that he’s tweeting more, how has he reconciled his aversion to social media? “I haven’t,” he claims, though it seems like he’s found a strategy that works for him. Cho’s Twitter is filled with funny photos that seem to give fans a glimpse into his personal life, but if you look closer, he’s found a way to make jokes while still keeping his social media existence predominantly work-related. His profile photo of him in a beard and twirly mustache is from a Selfie promo that’s yet to air. A photo where he jokes that he’s styling K-pop hair is a wig he’s wearing on the set before it was styled properly. And there’s Gillan’s Ice Bucket Challenge video, where he makes a cameo as an official ice thrower dressed in a Red Power Ranger outfit—“Very important role,” jokes Gillan, “his best one to date” — and further highlights their onscreen appeal to the masses.

And, of course, there’s a Twitpic of Willow, the white steed.

“[John] actually was great with the horse,” Gillan confirms reluctantly. “I audibly gasped when I first saw him riding towards me. It was a sight to behold. But don’t tell him I said that.”

[x] [x]