#a little perspective

[soaringeaglesingingjoy]

There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved.”

Acts of the Apostles 4:12 NLT

https://bible.com/bible/116/act.4.12.NLT

[voiarc-draws]

did that color wheel challenge! see if you can figure out who everyone is… hint; one is an oc, three are from an obscure camp!

[kaisumisucreations]

the lads go outside

[transboyhalo]

The feds propoganda trying to paint the islanders as the bad guys for pressing the island destroying button... girl why was there an island destroying button in the first place!!!

Guys please this post is about a fictional minecraft roleplay server. Hawaii has not been bombed. I am a mere fandom blog. This post has no relevance to real life events.

[ganondoodle]

rough concept for the unique boss within the deku-tree (required for the quest to repair the mastersword; boss name is a placeholder)

(totk rewritten project)

[rollercoasterwords]

the tiktokification of ao3

or: some of you fundamentally misunderstand ao3 and it really, really shows

i was talking about this with a friend a few days ago and since then i've seen multiple posts of various sorts that have just made me think about it more, so. here is me breaking down a disconnect i see particularly with younger members of the marauders fandom (i say marauders specifically just bc that's the only one i'm plugged into):

okay, so i've seen many (usually younger) marauders fans either talking online about how they wish ao3 was more like social media (specifically regarding algorithms) OR talking about ao3/fanfiction/fanfic writers as if they are operating under the same etiquette/guidelines/assumptions they would bring into social media platforms. this ranges from being mildly irritating to genuinely harmful, and i want to talk abt why.

first - you have to understand that social media, in this day and age, exists in a profit economy. and when i say social media here, i'm referring to platforms like tiktok, twitter, instagram, etc. all of these platforms exist in a profit economy where content is a product that can be monetized. this leads to a few important distinctions:

people posting on these social media platforms are generally posting with the intent to get their content seen by as many people as possible, as quickly as possible

they post with this intent because once their content is consumed by enough people, it becomes a product that they can monetize

therefore, if that content gets popular enough, these people can become influencers, where content creation is an actual job and their audience are, in a sort of vague and obscured way, similar to consumers purchasing a product

because of the profit economy surrounding social media, there are certain assumptions + forms of interaction that bleed across almost all social media platforms. the ones relevant to this little essay include:

operating under the assumption that anyone posting anything on the internet wants to go viral, ie. be seen by as many people as possible as quickly as possible in order to grow an "audience"

these influencers are creating content for us, their audience, so they should want to please us. they should also be trying to appeal to the broadest possible audience. therefore, if we dislike their content, we have a right to make that very, very clear.

in that same vein, we have a general right to critique content creators, as they are making a profit and we are the consumers purchasing their product--much like you might feel entitled to a certain standard of service in a restaurant where you are paying for the food.

when you carry these assumptions over to a platform like ao3, it creates problems. why? in a nutshell: because ao3 exists outside the profit economy

ao3 is a non-profit. it does not have an algorithm because it is not trying to sell you anything. this means that the writers posting their work on ao3 are not making a profit. we are not influencers. we are not creating monetized content to sell to a consumer-audience. where consuming content on other social media platforms might be comparable to eating at a restaurant, reading fanfiction on ao3 is more like coming over to someone's house and eating cookies that they made for free. you are in their house. the cookies are free, given as a gift. so what happens when those assumptions outlined above start to bleed over from other social media?

assuming that anyone posting fanfiction online wants their work to go viral -- i've seen this with popular fic writers getting questions like, "are you worried x isn't going to be as popular as y?" those questions are usually not ill-intended, but they demonstrate a fundamental lack of understanding about why writers post work on ao3. it's not to go viral. it's not to build any sort of online following. most of us who post on ao3 have jobs or schoolwork or other commitments, and writing fanfiction is something done for fun, out of a love for writing. those sharing their work online might be seeking community, but that is fundamentally different from seeking an audience, and in no way involves internet virality. if someone is posting fanfic on ao3 with the hope that it'll "go viral," then they likely either won't continue writing fanfic for long or will reach a point where they have to re-evalute their motivations, because seeking joy and validation by turning your art into a product for consumption just isn't very sustainable.

influencers are creating content for us, so we have a right to let them know if we don't like it -- nope!! fic writers are not influencers. yes, even the popular ones. no matter how much other people might blow their work up on social media, fic writers are still outside the profit economy. they are not creating content for an audience. they are not creating content for you. they are writing because they love it, and they are generously sharing it. if you don't like it, don't interact with it. you are never entitled to loudly and publicly proclaim how much you dislike a fic. i talk about this more here

we have a general right to critique fic writers, the same way we do with content creators/influencers -- again, no. you should not be treating fic writers the way you would treat an influencer on another social media platform, no matter how popular they may be. this is not to say fic writers are beyond all reproach; rather, it is a call-in to check your entitlement. fic writers are not little jesters entertaining in your court. they are not subject to your whims. they do not have to do things for you. they do not have to write things you like. in that post i linked on point 2, i talk about what etiquette might look like if you're really concerned that a fic writer is doing something harmful, but that is not what i'm talking about here. i am talking about the proliferation of negativity i have seen, especially on twitter and tiktok, where people essentially just talk shit about fics or fic writers as though they are entitled to have those fic writers working to please them. this is gross, and it needs to stop. you wouldn't go over to someone's house, eat the cookies they baked to share, and then spit those cookies back in their face and start shouting about what a shitty baker they are. or maybe you would--in which case, congratulations! you are Not A Good Person.

anyway, at the end of the day, a lot of this can be boiled down to: Because ao3 exists outside the profit economy, fic writers are not influencers, and you should never be treating them as though they are. i think i see this disconnect largely with younger people just because they've maybe only ever really understood social media within this sort of influencer-consumer-culture economy, and genuinely don't understand how to interact differently with the internet. so, consider this post a call-in to reevaluate the way you interact with fic writers and the etiquette you use when it comes to engaging with fanfic on ao3! i promise that ao3 being different from social media is a very, very good thing, and also a very, very rare thing, so let's treasure it and focus on fostering community rather than trying to morph it to fit the mould of influencer-audience dynamics that we see almost everywhere else <3

[lazylittledragon]

do any other artists feel like. yeah you're a 'good artist' because you draw things that look nice, but like. TECHNICALLY? you're really not great

i really hate that i can recognise that yes, my art is good, but is it VARIED? is it dynamic?? is my anatomy good? is it full of texture and colour theory? do i know how to do This? can i do That? no, not really. and that's quite painful actually

[irisbaggins]

In rewatching the season, I'm noticing how clever Aabria and Brennan were in crafting Tula's story. How well thought out everything was.

Specifically, the bear. It's been mentioned so many times before, but with the context of the completed season, I cannot help but be in awe at the skilful storytelling at display here. The way in which the Blue is described to appear wrong only in reference to Tula and her heart, the way in which Tula talks about curiosity and and having experienced knowing someone who died because of it. Of how Aabria describes to Izzy how Tula looks when she heals the bear, of how Aabria specifically points out that Tula recognises the commonalities between herself and the bear. These breadcrumbs that mean little in the beginning, that tell everything at the end. It's amazing, stunning, masterful storytelling. I am in awe.

[ghostcak3]

he's having a good time 😌💖

[genderqueerpond]

We don't talk enough about the fact that Amelia Pond, s5 Amelia Pond, before the timeline is reset, isn't just a normal orphan. Her parents didn't die, didn't abandon her, and didn't send her away. They never existed in the first place.

And if her parents never existed, then Amelia cannot exist. She is a causal impossibility.

"People fall out of the world sometimes, but they always leave traces." A photograph. A face carved into an apple. Yes. Sure.

A child.

Now that's too big, surely.

But that's what she is. She is exactly the same as these things. A trace. An echo of something that could never be, never was, never could have been.

And the universe should never allow it. A whole person, that's just too much. She could not have continued to exist indefinitely, in normal circumstances, after her parents never existed.

In normal circumstances.

Because the Doctor didn't just save her from things coming out of the crack in her wall. He saved her from going into it. And he didn't just save her from the threat of going into it simply because of its vicinity.

No, by arriving when he did, he interrupted a process that was probably already in motion. And then by arriving again only moments later on a cosmic relative timestream (too quickly for the process to complete) and yet in the local relative timestream, years later --- years of a potential future caught midway through the process of rewriting -- he solidified that existence. Amy is a creature from another timeline, caught in amber. The Doctor prevented her from never existing, but only after she could already never exist.

And so, no one around Amelia thinks about it. Neither does she. There's some kind of consciousness block, because if you thought about it, really thought about it, for two seconds you'd realize she cannot exist. And the human mind can't deal with that. So, to protect itself, everyone's brain simply slides off it before ever noticing. They just assume that her existence makes sense, and don't question it, and don't notice what they don't question, that is staring them in the face.

But of course, to some extent they do notice. They can't think it, but they notice subconsciously that there's something they can't think. They notice there's something wrong with her, something uncanny. And they don't like it, and they alienate her even more because of it.

"Does it ever bother you Pond that your life existence doesn't make any sense?"

[evildilf2]

Real as fuck

[soaringeaglesingingjoy]

So if the Son makes you free, then you are unquestionably free.

John 8:36 AMP

https://bible.com/bible/1588/jhn.8.36.AMP

[canisalbus]

Idk why but I can imagine Vasco and machete looking at the stars together since there was probably not a lot of light pollution in their time than there is nowadays so the stars were probably wayyy more visible

[fez-pwned]

wheatley more like FREAKLEY!

[pocketgalaxies]

We want to destroy my mother. (insp by @dadrielle)

[chilledstrawberrysoda]

Kevin Day isn't actually a coward, Neil and Andrew just have very different ideas of what it means to be brave. Kevin is a survivor. He spent most of his formative years walking a middle ground of being useful but not so much that he showed riko up. He had every reason to be afraid of riko. He was the only one that truly understood what riko was capable of aside from Jean. Neil and Andrew are fighters, they are all or nothing types, they don't understand how someone could walk a middle ground just for something that resembles safety when they fought so hard to not give in to threats until it threatened someone they care about and almost killed themselves in the process. Kevin didn't even know he was ALLOWED to fight back because that was never an option. Leaving the only life he's ever known was so much braver than anyone gives him credit for. It isn't until he has something to fight for and is given permission (not just by the moriyama's and Neil but by himself) to be his own person for the first time that he is able to defy his abusers.

It's not cowardly to do what you can to stay safe. Not everyone has Andrew and Neil's blatant disregard for their own personal safety. Being afraid of pain and death is perfectly reasonable.