#actually i think it might actually genuinely BE illegal to advertise anything else here. like ive never in my life seen an ad for like

[skenpiel]

Wait do you not see weight loss ads everywhere where you live?????

NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i dont think i EVER see weight loss ads honestly. of course fatphobia is still very real and rampant here as much as anywhere else but i think weight loss things are like. kinda hush hush, if that makes sense. you never OUTRIGHT say your product is for weight loss, or that you should get plastic surgery if youre fat, or whatever. but its like. “heres our protein bar if you wanna be Healthy AND environmentally friendly (important to say) this fucking like bar of nuts and dried fruit contains ALL the nutrients of a full meal, so you dont even have to eat anything else 🥰🌈💗✨” so they never outright say “heres some horrible and both physically and mentally damaging things you can buy to stop being fat” even if thats essentially what they mean. :(

[ectonurites]

a very very genuine question: so its bad to repost art but no one says anything when people repost things from the source material/creator's sketches.....why?like sure everyone who likes it may recognize the style but there are plenty of fan artists i recognize immediately, new or old art, with or without. to me it just feels the same, like either dont repost art or people should be able to repost stuff, i dont see how they can work at the same time. and this isnt me saying people should be allowed to repost and all that bc i do understand the theory of why reposting hurts artists, just that the logic doesnt seem to fit once it extends to famous artists/creators. just bc its official and easily recognizable makes it okay? how does that work? again, there are plenty of fanartists who are easily recognizable and lose no money when people repost their work (bc they posted it for free) and from my own observation, it seems it just, somehow, makes them want to do art less (from what i have read from artists themselves). why do we not consider that when it comes to official creators? wouldnt they also feasibly be less motivated seeing their hard work plastered across the internet for free when thats the sole way they make their income? and its not a system where its solely sticking it to the man bc it hurts the artists income, as well. but if it makes them happy to see people enjoying and sharing their work with others, drawing interest, why isnt it the same with fan artists? people often repost art, not out of malice or intent to claim credit, but bc they enjoy it + want to share it, esp on social media where sharing isnt a feature (instagram, for example) again im not trying to justify reposting, just confused about the contradiction

First of all instagram does have a form of sharing posts- stories. Which yes they are temporary by default, but you can use the highlight feature to collect your favorite things you’ve shared from people right there on your own profile AND it links back to the original post and can permanently be on your profile as long as you keep it there. You can even label them and everything! But then moving on to answering more of your actual questions

To start: this is a very complicated thing. And I feel everyone trying to answer it might have slightly varied opinions. 

I personally see a pretty clear distinction between ‘Officially published/released’ works (like comic book [as like you’ve probably seen I frequently post comic panels] or other materials that may have been released in creator guides, official video game art, promotional art for things, etc etc) as opposed to like, personal work and fanart. Because with official works:

There’s usually a source to buy it and you should if you’re referencing it a ton (while I don’t own every comic I’ve ever read I do have a lot and if I did read something first through illegal means [because some comics are just straight up hard to find due to age/being out of print] and enjoyed it I try to seek out a physical copy after if possible)

There is a level of far wider recognition (I know you personally might find fanartists’ styles recognizable but like, things that are in mainstream media.. have just such a higher profile. it’s not really comparable) 

If you’re not supporting the official release you’re harming the big company that published it far more than the individual artist (like, the individual artist probably also wouldn’t appreciate it, because it can effect them for sure as well, but they’re not gonna be taking the brunt of the damage unless it was entirely self-published work, which I’d definitely categorize differently from what I’m mainly talking about here.)  

Often fanartists/professional artists who aren’t that well known, in addition to wanting to just create work for the sake of it, also want to build their own platform, to have an audience that they interact with. Or like, if they’re offering commissions, a bigger platform puts you in a position where people will actually see the art and want to commission you. When you say reposts of smaller artists’ fanart doesn’t ‘loose them money’ because they didn’t charge to post it, you’re missing the fact that it makes them loose out on proper linked-back-to-them exposure. Especially like, when a repost account on insta or something says ‘ah yes credit to [username] on tumblr’ the vast majority of people who see it aren’t going to then open up a whole different website and look for the artist. Some people might! but if there’s anything i’ve learned from working professionally in arts marketing it’s that people want things that are convenient and directly in front of them. Someone who wants to see more works because they liked one is significantly more likely to click on the username of someone who posted it rather than opening up a browser or a different app and searching a separate name put in the caption. 

Then honestly, I do feel weird about reposts of professional artists’ more personal works unless the artist has stated they’re fine with people reposting with credit. It should be about the comfort level of the artist. I think a lot of professional artists who aren’t in a position where they’re as worried about building a platform, because they already have one and might have professional connections/opportunities already lined up, might not really care about reposts especially on a website they don’t use. (Like tumblr. I’m coming at this mostly from a comics artist perspective here, but most professional artists I see are waaaay more active on twitter and instagram than tumblr) If it’s a website they don’t use, it’s not taking away from the platform they had been building there for themselves. And also, some artists really just don’t give a shit, which is their choice they can make with their work! But that’s not a universal thing. One artist being fine with their personal art being reposted =/= all artists being fine with it. 

In my own experience as a fanartist, when I see my art reposted without credit, especially when it’s art I’ve also already posted on the same platform... it’s definitely disheartening. Even worse is when the repost gets even more attention than my original post. (something that has happened to me multiple times!) Like, it can get so upsetting!  Because it lets me know that someone else was using my art to build their platform and I got exactly zero benefit out of it. Then when it’s reposted with credit it’s a little less annoying, but I still don’t... get much out of it. Especially if it’s an instagram repost and they credit my tumblr not my account on there, since insta captions don’t actually do links unless it’s to other insta accounts. Also with insta for example, I have a 'business’ account set up so I can look at and track popularity of my posts and see how they’re doing as something to keep in mind when considering posting times, etc etc. When other people repost my art there I have no control over it. That sucks a lot! Also, when I quite literally ask people not to repost my art (it is IN! MY! DESCRIPTION!) and they still do, it’s just straight up disrespectful. I asked for a boundary to be respected with my work and people have just completely ignored it. That doesn’t feel good at all.

But, conversely, I’m gonna talk about my more professional irl work for a sec. I’m a graphic designer, so I do things like posters, logos, etc, When I design a poster for a client that is meant to be advertising something, even if it’s got my own original illustration or something as part of it, I know my name isn’t necessarily going to be attached to it the same way as it is with my personal work. I get a credit line somewhere, but that’s in a fine print probably not even on the poster itself at all, but that’s like, part of what I signed up for. I already get paid separately, I am giving permission for my work to be out of my own hands in that way. Professional work for a client is often setup in some way similar to this. I don’t get mad when I walk down the street and see a poster I made up somewhere without it directly ‘linking’/referencing back to me (aside from maybe my signature if it had an illustration), in fact I go ‘OMG ITS THERE ugh wait i see one pixel is off oh noooooo” and then move on with my day. It’s just an entirely different situation because that kind of work has a different arrangement from the start, where you know it’s going to be put in a different type of circulation.

So yeah, my word isn’t god here, but I definitely see official releases as having a different set of permissions based on the fact that they are published in an entirely different situation. And I think reposts of personal art aren’t cool if the artist isn’t okay with them, no matter how big a platform they have. Other people probably approach this with a slightly different perspective, but that’s mine!

[thatyanderecritic]

Hey we saw the ask Kai answered about XOBD. As things are, if you do post about the full game we’re gonna have to assume it was stolen and can’t let that pass. It's not cool. If the game has no value to you, please do something else instead. If it was a joke, that’s not great either. It could still make others think it’s okay to pirate the game. If you didn’t mean harm and want to make that known, feel free to message us. If you had talked to us we could’ve tried to get you an actual review copy

@gb-patch

I’m trying to control myself from being a sarcastic piece of shit but honestly, this ask didn’t put me in a good mood. So I’m just going to get my humor out of the way so I can be serious here: “Bold of you to assume that people would pirate your game.”

Firstly, my comment about pirating the game was a joke. 

And no, I’m not going to apologize for it since it was an obvious joke for a question that was barely even seen or linked on our masterlist. It took me 30 minutes to even find the post since tumblr is a god forsaken app. That being said, I know damn well the reason why you’re bringing up this passing comment was because I didn’t give your game a stellar “review” on my first impression piece. I’m pretty sure that it started with one person on your team seeing that post, reading it and getting salty over it, thinking: “This isn’t a fair judgement. It still a demo. That’s just nick-picking.” Ect ect. Maybe send it to someone else you’re close to on the team (who isn’t busy at the time) so you can gripe about it together. Either way, someone jumped down the rabbit hole that is our blog to valid your thoughts going “This blog doesn’t know what they’re talking about. They’re picky.” Whatever. Obviously you checked out if we made any other post about your game first (since that’s the most important thing here) and saw that I answered that question. Still salty from the not so great review, you picked up and over thought about a joke made on a random anon question. “*scoff* They don’t take our game seriously.” > “If they don’t like our game this might be an actual threat.” Not only over thought, this was an easy to “call us out” and take the high moral ground. It’s not that hard to think in the other perspective here. If I made a game and I saw not so stellar review on it, I would most likely do the exact same thing. But unlike you, I would address the review since that’s was the post causing my problem and not go at a different angle to make the reviewer look bad. Though, I have to admit, clever rat tactics to you good sir/miss/mx. I tip my hat to you for trying to put me in an ethical/moral checkmate.

And please, spare me about the pirating issue. With or without the joke, people are going to pirate. If it’s something illegal, pirates sure as hell don’t care about opinion much less a joke about pirating. And let me tell you about pirates… if they were pirating your game, they were never planning to buy the game or even planning the game for that matter. It’s the simple case of “You have to pay for this? No thanks, I rather pass… oh wait, it’s free?! Never mind, I’ll take it even though I was never interested.” And of course the other half of pirates are 13 year olds who don’t have access to their mom’s credit card. More often than not, the people who buy your game are the people who genuinely want to play the game while the pirates could give less of a shit (unless they’re kids with no credit cards). It’s not what most game dev thinks would happen when there’s a pirated version. If a person is gonna pay, they’re gonna pay. If a person won’t pay, they’ll never buy the game unless it’s free. How do I know? I was 13 once, with no mommy’s credit card. Quite frankly, pirating is a pain since downloads aren’t easy to find and you have a higher chance in bricking your laptop than actually playing the game. It’s way easier to just buy and most people do if they want to play a game their interested in. The minute I got my own money, I started paying for my own shit and haven’t pirated since. Really, game devs shoot themselves in their own foot by putting a spotlight on pirating and alerting everyone “Hey, my game has a leak/easy to leak.” What more, just like how people say “don’t feed a troll”: don’t challenge a pirate. A pirate loves nothing more than to see people salty. By making this ask, you’re the one encouraging pirates to pirate your game. Literally going against the point of this ask. Congrats, you played yourself.

Don’t even bother about the review copy of your game. I have my integrity being a critic. It’s one thing if a follower or a fan of our blog offers to buy us a game to review but it’s an entirely different thing when the game developers send a review copy. That’s shady and puts us in a moral dilemma of “we should give a nicer review because they made an exception for us.” YOU are having benefits by sending a copy. It’s free advertising and basically bribing for a nice review. It may work for other critics, but not here. We will only consume the same media as any other consumer to give an even leveled review. Save your words that “if you give us a copy, it’ll be the same as everyone else.” It may be the case but the fact you gave us a review copy will lose our credibility. It’s basically like a company sponsoring a youtuber. If they gave that youtuber free shit, of course they won’t say anything bad about it; meaning it’s not an entirely truthful review. But if we were to give a bad review and be brutally honest, then we look like a bunch of mutts who bites the hands who provide to them. Either way, it’ll be your win and our loss.

I was already planning to buy Blood Droplets to not only review but legitimately enjoy myself but honestly, fuck that now. Going to a store to buy bread just to be called a thief by the cashier right when I’m handing over the money doesn’t encourage anyone to buy your shit. Though I’ll admit, a part of me wants to buy the game so I can spread pictures around of my receipt and say “Does this look like a pirate to you?” You want me to post some pictures around that I also downloaded your free demo from your itch.io page (do you really think I would go to a third party site for a free demo???) for my first impressions post too? But honestly, I’ll look like a clown if I do that 🤡 I don’t know what I’ll do about your game yet. If you see my receipt floating around on tumblr during your full game launch, you’ll see that I made up my mind.

[razanartuk]

23 with kleinsen?

from here

23. “I immediately regret this decision.”

“And no one will know what we’re doing here? Like, the Feds won’t find out and come bust us for falsifying emails?” Evan asks, nibbling on the nubby remnants of his fingernails as he hesitantly follows Jared into his bedroom. Jared’s laptop is already on, waiting for the two boys to enact their plan.

Rarely does Evan ever chew his nails down enough to make them bleed, but the temptation to do so is practically always there. The only thing stopping him from ripping up his cuticles entirely now is the fact that Jared is sitting right there in front of him and Evan doesn’t want to creep him out any more than he’s certain he already does.

This feels illegal, but maybe it’s just the way Evan talks about it. Jared doesn’t seem bothered by what they’re doing. Then again, Jared isn’t exactly known for being discreet or tactful in any sense, except maybe with things that have to do with him on a personal level.

Still, Evan is pretty sure Jared wouldn’t do anything illegal where anyone else could see him. Jared is more of an “anything is legal as long as you don’t get caught” kind of person. Evan is more the kind of person who gets caught doing something incredibly minor but winds up being questioned by the local authority because he “looks and acts suspicious” when it’s just social anxiety making it a nightmare to talk to people he doesn’t know.

“Uh, no. That’s the whole point of using a VPN.” Jared swivels around in his computer chair, which Evan notes looks brand new. It must be nice to come from a family with money like the Kleinmans or the Murphys. “Hides your IP address and makes it like, nearly impossible for anyone to trace sketchy shit back to you. It also makes targeted advertising more difficult so I get a lot less ‘hot singles in Rochester are ready for you’ ads while I’m jacking it. You weren’t even paying attention when I was explaining how that works, were you?”

“Gross,” Evan takes it back. If Jared has sat and jerked off in a chair that his parents bought for him (of course, he hasn’t, because Jared isn’t an animal and he’s actually kind of a neat freak when it comes to his room’s cleanliness), Evan would rather be destitute and retain a shred of dignity than ever come by any money and do something similar. Scrunching up his nose in disgust, he takes a couple steps away from Jared, who smiles and laughs in a way that is almost adorably innocent and completely mischievous at the same time. “I um, was focused on something else, so no, but—”

“—Listen, Evan. I said I’d do this for you on like, the world’s shittiest commission fee of 20 bucks, but I can’t have you disrespecting the Kleinman Castle like this.”

“The Kleinman Castle,” Evan repeats, monotone.

“Yeah,” Jared gives an enthusiastic chirp, “That’s what I call my room. Are you jealous?”

Evan sighs deeply, pinching the bridge of his nose, “I immediately regret this decision.”

In a way, he is jealous, but that is not something he feels like admitting to Jared. Especially when it feels like Jared is intentionally pulling out all the stops on ways he knows how to push Evan’s buttons.

Evan can count on one hand the amount of times he’s known Jared to take anything seriously. The only thing that comes to mind recently is that he had seemed pretty genuinely concerned when Evan first explained the situation with the Murphys, but maybe that was just wishful thinking on his part.

“Hey, c’mon. If you back out on me now, I’m charging you the original 2k I asked for,” Jared scolds him in a lighthearted manner. He doesn’t mean it, but Evan doesn’t have to know that.

“I should just go tell the Murphys the truth. It can’t get any worse if I do, right?”

“Oh yeah, sure. It just means that Zoe will hate you and probably never ever want to see or speak to you ever again,” if Jared sounds jealous, it’s because he’s jealous. Nothing against Zoe, of course. She’s a sweet girl, kind of standoffish at first but if she decides you’re cool she’s alright. Loves music, or at least likes that it gives her a way to escape from the reality she lives in for a short while. The way Evan idolizes her is annoying.

Evan can barely say two words to her on a good day, but Jared is convinced that Evan has this fantasy life where they go to college together, he marries Zoe and they live happily ever after in a big house making cute little baby Zoes and Evans and god it’s all just so fucking heterosexual. Made more nauseating only by the fact that Jared tries to get Evan’s attention any way he knows how to and there is no such thing as Evan over-analyzing their relationship.

“The mom will go back to blubbering about the fucked up ideal vision of her son that never actually existed and then she’ll wind up re-enacting the whole plot of Next to Normal, and who even knows what dad will do. He seems like the kind of guy who might press charges.”

“He’s a lawyer, I think.” Evan recalls Larry specifically telling him that he works at a law firm, but the ‘I think’ is thrown on anyway; in case he’s wrong.

“Then he would definitely take you to court. So no, I don’t think you should go tell them the truth. I think the best thing you can do for yourself right now is let me work.”

Evan wants to think that maybe Jared is just messing with him again, but that all sounds pretty accurate to what chain of events might conspire to become reality if he does come clean about what really happened with Connor in the computer lab. Zoe most likely would hate his guts. Cynthia was too nice to hate anyone, but she probably would be thrown into a downward depressive spiral where she would desperately try to cling to her own vision of Connor rather than accept what the truth was. And Larry… Well, there was no shortage of scenarios Evan could see involving Larry wanting to protect his family from ne’er do wells like Evan.

“I guess you’re right. Let’s just try to write one email and see how that goes.”

“Okay, cool. I have some ideas.” with that, Jared sets to work typing.

[dandelionpie]

So I’ve been Having Ideas About My Future lately. And right now this one feels like the very beginning of a soap bubble - the part where you’ve started to blow into it but it hasn’t closed around itself yet. And I want to be really cautious with it so it doesn’t just pop before it can even get into the air, so I wasn’t gonna talk about it for a while, but also.

[Click through for a very long post about Maddy’s Career Options - replies are fine but please be gentle with my baby bubble hopes]

Okay, you guys.

So I was on the phone with my mother the other day, and I was having a sort of a panic attack (you know, like you do when you’re on the phone with your mother [kidding this is not normal and should not be trivialized, etc]), and I was trying to conceal this fact from her but it was Not Working. And I was dismayed about where my life was going, my lack of definite plans for a career, etc., and she said, “You know, I was actually gonna tell you - we had a lady come visit our school the other day and she’s an art therapist.”

And...here’s the thing. Usually my mother’s career suggestions kind of go in one ear and out the other. Because my mom’s great! Really! But she isn’t me, and she doesn’t always get what my life is like. So I usually just say “hm, yeah, I’ll look into it,” and then I don’t.

But I had genuinely just forgotten that art therapy existed. I knew about art, and I knew about therapy, and I knew somewhere in the back of my mind that people were putting those two things together, but somehow I’d just sort of filed that info in the General Trivia drawer instead of the Potential Grown-Up Jobs one. And...I’m getting sort of cautiously excited about the idea.

RANDOM OBSERVATIONS I HAVE HAD SINCE THAT CONVERSATION

(I Started Writing Them Down and Then They Became Legion)

Every piece of art I like has a strong psychological element. That’s the common thread, dammit. That’s why I’m so picky about song lyrics, that’s why I can’t get into a book unless it’s got some sort of strong interpersonal/intrapersonal thread for me to snag my little English major hooks in. At the end of the day, the narratives that interest me are the ones where people are constantly feeling and processing things and I have to think a lot about why they’re doing that the way they’re doing it.

Not trying to sound like I think I’m super virtuous or whatever, but I tend to see good in most people, which might be an asset in that field? I get along well with a lot of personality types that friends of mine have cited as abrasive. Like, I can find people obnoxious but still notice enough of their good qualities to enjoy their company or at least tolerate it. And that’s a strength that’s served me well on a personal level, and a little on a professional level too (getting along with people helps just about anywhere), but I never thought of it as something I could use to particular effect in an actual career track.

That said, I have NO background in psychology. I had a couple lab rats, but they didn’t really teach me any of their secrets.

On cursory examination I have decided that I Do Not Like neurology. I have a lot of friends who seem to love it and that’s great, but....look, it just freaks me the fuck out. Maybe it’s because I’ve spent so much of my adulthood (read: all of it) preoccupied with the vulnerability of my physical being to various surgery-requiring problems. But the idea of my mind (that place where I spend so very very much of my time) being subject to the physical limitations of my brain (a part of my corporeal body [which has in the past proven itself to be somewhat unpredictable]) is so fucking terrifying to me that I’d prefer to spend as little time on that as possible please and thank you.

(Aside: I know the phrase “I don’t like the Brain; I just like the Mind) is like peak dualism, but I’m sure you all know what I mean, right? It’s possible to think about and work with the mind without focusing on the physical brain that gives rise to it. I’ve been doing that on the client end of things for years.)

A lot of the art I do is actually pretty therapeutic! To me, I mean. I never did figure out how to translate the whole cancer thing into an autobio comic (I eventually realized I simply didn’t want to and it was one of the most liberating moments of my life). But I have been relying on art for years to process my trauma. Most of my creative projects and ideas for them go back to that in some way, even if it doesn’t come across to the other people who experience them.

That said, I am...not the biggest autobio comic fan. There are so many things about that genre that rub me the wrong way. I’m glad it exists, I just don’t tend to enjoy consuming or creating autobio comics.                                       However, this might be a chance to see autobio comics through a new lens! And it also has the potential to set me apart - there are quite a few art therapists, but I’ll bet there are fewer whose background is in comics specifically.

I could have an office. I could go into private practice and have a place that I could build into a safe space for people to talk about their problems and work on them. I know it’s just a little thing (and I’m not sure yet if private practice would be feasible/right for me, at least right away), but I like the idea of making physical space for that kind of work.                                                                  (And if I sometimes also used it as a studio for comics, well, I don’t think that’s illegal or anything.)

I could be relatively independent in my career. I could work for an agency (and I think I’d probably have to, at first, but I gotta look into how all that works), but I could also spend at least some of my time in private practice, or working pro bono or on a sliding scale, or doing other stuff that allows me a great deal of flexibility and control over my schedule.

I like the idea of a type of schooling that has experience built into it. Like, you have to get a certain number of internship hours before you can be certified. I’m sure there’s more to it than that, but it’s nice to see a field that’s so up-front about the fact that you need experience before you can do your job.

A lot of art therapists work with traumatized kids, and I find that prospect faintly terrifying. But also maybe it would be good to get over that, if I want to Help People and Use My Strengths to Do Good Things In the World. Those kids are gonna be traumatized either way, and if I can handle it, it’d probably be cool if I helped them.

It would be so nice to not be broke literally all the time. Even with student loans, I think this has the potential to help that happen, if I do my research and play my cards right. And I might even be able to work *gasp* less than 40 hours a week, thereby freeing up my time for other projects. Or, you know, kids. Hell, maybe I’d even be able to feed them.

Nobody would be able to make me work Saturdays.

Not sure yet whether it’d be better to get an Actual Art Therapy Degree or do a more general thing and then get a specific art therapy certification after/during that? I’m leaning towards the latter because I’d like more versatility, but I’m getting the sense that the rules for who can call themself an art therapist are slightly stricter in Oregon, so I’m gonna have to talk to the people who run the program.

What with the horse in the hospital and all that, I was thinking about a career in activism. But I’m not sure I have the temperament to be a lawyer, and I hate talking to strangers (I’ll do it if I have to, but damned if I’m gonna go door-to-door every day). But this way, I could maybe help activists balance their lives and their activism. Activists need therapists.

I could help people like me, with medical trauma. I know all about medical trauma! It has literally been a constant since I was 18! And in college and after, I hated feeling like my problems were fake and that my illness affecting my life was the result of some moral defect. Without therapy, I don’t know if I would have kept going to doctors and trying to figure everything out.

Visual art has in many ways been a great avenue leading away from self-harm, for me. The physicality of it is so much more powerful, for me, than almost anything else.

I’ve been so conflicted lately with lots of ideas about art-as-saleable-product vs. art-as-catharsis-and-narrative-control. I kind of thought my interest lay in the former but now I’m wondering if maybe it’s the latter. Like, I still love comics and storytelling and I want to make comics for people to read, but at the end of the day, I don’t want to do advertising. I don’t want to build a brand. I just want to tell stories and draw pretty pictures that make people happy. And I know that’s not what art therapists do, but in some ways it feels like the field still lines up better with my goals than commercial illustration. Does that make sense?

Lewis and Clark has a program. PSU has a program (though not an art therapy one specifically I think). There are online ones and low-residency ones as well, although honestly I think I function best in a classroom. Right now I think I’m leaning towards L&C because I’ve heard really good things about their education grad programs from a couple of people, but: gotta look further into it.

I’m liking the prospect of being a student again. I like going to lectures. I like notebooks and pencils and pens and libraries. And according to one person I talked to, as a therapist you actually have to keep taking courses throughout your career as the field changes. It’s like a condition for licensure or something (at least in some parts of the field). I’d love to be able to keep learning my entire life in such a deliberate way.

And I think I’d be better at being a student now than I was at Reed. I remember realizing waaay too late that you could just...ask your professors for help with stuff. And they could say no! But they weren’t going to, like, set me on fire. So what if I just set up a meeting with someone involved in a program and said, “Hey, look, I have no psych background and an intense interest in therapeutic work; how do I do this?” They could tell me to go away, but that’s probably about it. In a way, I think it might be nice to take another stab at academia - redeem myself.

(I have no idea what my Reed GPA is and should probably figure that out. Pretty sure I got a C in Chem and at least one other class? But maybe they won’t mind.)

My original plan had been to fund my comics habit with a freelance illustration career. Because almost nobody makes a living in comics, at least not just in comics. It happens, but very rarely does it happen with creator-owned work. A lot of indie comics artists freelance or have some other sort of art day job, and I thought that was a lifestyle I could get into.  

But the Horrible Deep Dark Secret is...I don’t actually like freelancing that much, at least with my life the way it currently is. I mean, I love drawing and I love not being broke, so please keep sending people my way if they want someone to draw something (please please please I need the money). But the illustration industry is downright exhausting. It’s so hard to switch off, and it’s so much work even convincing people you deserve to get paid, let alone getting them to pay you. Mad kudos to anyone who has the time/energy to do that, but I’m not sure I do, at least at this point in my life.

But if I was planning to supplement my comics with another, art-related career anyway, what if I did this instead? What if it ended up being something I, Maddy, could enjoy and feel good about? Doing this (with my temperament) might actually a) pay better b) offer me more time and c) lend a sense of structure to my days that I definitely need and that freelancing sorely lacks.

Actually, having comics projects might even help with work-life balance in this field. I don’t know yet, but I’ve been told that a lot of therapeutic practice is establishing healthy boundaries between your work and your life, and I think it might help to have somewhere else to pour emotional energy when I’m off the clock.

Having another career wouldn’t mean I couldn’t make comics. Hell, it wouldn’t even mean I couldn’t sell comics. I could still make a website and freelance sometimes. I could still set up a Patreon. I could still publish my stuff on the web and in real life. I could still table at cons. And if things started going better than I’ve been planning for them to go, comics-wise, I wouldn’t have to keep being a therapist full-time. I’d have some flexibility, especially in private practice.

Anyway, I literally just started thinking about this a few days ago, so I have no idea if I’m gonna stay this excited about it. But...I’m enjoying looking into it. I’ve felt so much more hopeful the past few days - like my life might actually go someplace I could like. It’s a nice feeling and I would like to keep it.

I dunno. I’ve talked to some people and I’m gonna talk to some more people. Maybe set up an interview at the college in the next couple months if I can swing it. Prereqs would probably be somewhat hellacious, but that’s what I get for majoring in the humanities.

Okay cool I’m gonna go eat something and clean the kitchen. 

[filmcave]

Not the Same

There is an unusual battle going on right now in the world of cinema. But it also acts as a microcosm and sort of shard of a hologram for other battles happening.

Like every battle there plusses and minuses to each side and naturally the other side sees each other as a kind of threat.

At its core is a philosophical question: Does size matter? The Sophomoric and silly undertones of sexual innuendo aside in this question, it is entirely genuine.

When Louis and Auguste Lumiere screened the first public movie ever in 1895, at the Grand Cafe in Paris, certainly the size of the screen was not the fascination. How could it be? The magic of the moment was seeing flickering light and shadow images dancing on a plain surface transporting the audience to another place and time.

Employees leaving the Factory (in Lyon)

What an incredible moment and experience this mst have been for this audience. Even if they could not have sensed the economic and cultural impact, they were seeing something no one had publicly seen before.

The “moving pictures” were the attraction. The fascination, fear and amazement they felt must have been palpable. This was not an innovation in cinema, it was the creation of it!

From that point forward changes in the production, distribution, performance and experience of cinema are all that was left.

And we know that those changes have proliferated and in many cases advanced film. With the exception of one area - film analysis and discussion. This area has languished in the scrap heap of literary criticism. This is not to say people don’t have or choose not to 'advertise their opinions (far from it). As a conglomerate of disciples of film critics commentary has de-evolved and been reduced to a range of thoughts that can be best described as the binary “I liked it” / “I didn’t like it” dialectic. Yawn, how uninteresting.

When this is typically combined with a lack of understanding of that “that on the screen” came to be the discussion becomes an exercise in auto asphyxiation. Straining and stressing under the weight of its own limitations.

If we begin to look at the individual components of “how its made” we can chart a path towards understanding better the purpose and mission of the film. Most people depart the cinema soon after the final shot of the story. But even as they leave they are well aware there is a very long line of credits. In so e simple sense they probably understand that each one of those people played a role in the creation of that film. But a movie is Spam in a can, if it never gets shown.

This is the point where the evil genius of Netflix enters. Over the 120+ years that cinema has been made public. Many advancements in the movie going experience (and dubious ones) have been cauterized by a single ethic of the social contract. A movie goer needed to get off their fat ass and find their way to an actual physical theatre, buy a ticket and watch the movie in the temporary co-habitation with strangers.

At one point in time the cinemas who screened these films figuratively had a captive audience. There was one or two cinemas in town. They showed one movie for an entire week and then it was gone. Limited supply (number of seats, days and films) made for high demand. People dressed up and went in droves. The film studios owned the theaters, production equipment and the actors were “under contract”. It was an oligarchy of the wealthy. They had immense power and influence.

This power began to fade as independent distributors and cinemas began to crop up. Like in professional athletics actors became free agents where they could take their skills and reputations where they wished. Unions formed and the power dissipated. The website statista estimates the global film industry will be $50 billion dollars in 2020. Thats a pie a lot of people would like to stick their snout into.

Enter Netflix et al. Otherwise known as the Satans of Silicon Valley. Before I pontificate on SVS it might be helpful to philosophize on the question of what kind of value they bring to this world to begin with.

To begin with they are a society. An insulated, top down culture presided over by people with certain kinds of brilliant intellect and intelligence around a few extremely limited things. On top of this there is a self perception that is also pointed outwards as a marketing message cum “social good”. For them to see themselves as valuable parts of society at large they must perpetuate and proselytize this ethic/message. It is a nearly completely corrupt mentality especially devoid of emotional intelligence and a genuine sense of greater good. For many of the FANG stocks (a prescient acronym for Facebook, Apple (Amazon), Netflix, Google) the trick is to write some code, give it to a “user” for free and then have that user do all the work to build a successful revenue generating business. Its genius and entirely immoral. The users are the product, they develop and refine the product, allow a given company to take or steal their information which that company can then use to sell shit right back to them In the words of Karl Marx, the workers are the means of production AND the product.

Allthe company needs to do is continue to convince the users they need to keep working. They fo this by “engaging them” in things that touch in fears, dreams, hopes and deficiencies.

Ok, so a bit of a deviation here but the core point, relative to our topic of screen size, is to examine what value (if any) Netflix is bringing to the movie game.

Lets start with their motivation. First, middle and last Netflix is a growth and consumption machine. But if we look at the content they “recommend” it is created, design and directed to appeal to YOU. Their business wet dream is to have you intravenously fed chemically and neurologically customized euphoric content. Like the masses in The Matrix they need you to have a stable income and an all you can eat mentality. Why else would they continue to push new movies and episodes having them start before the last has finished.

So, how about the quality of said content. Well, financially speaking, they are agnostic on that. However, to steal your attention away from other content (including real life) they need to convince you its better.

This is where awards come to play. Any kind of award will do but of course when you’re talking about insatiable appetites, you’re talking the big awards. Golden Globes, Grammy’s, Oscars. And winners from the elite festivals. And when you’re taking in obscene amounts of cash, there’s lots to spend..and spend they do. For many years Amazon was a money losing venture. Not any more.

According to Statista Amazons Q4 revenue in 2018 was $72.38 billion

Apple - $62.9 B in the same period

Netflix - $4.19 B

Google - $33.7 B (reported for Q3 as parent company Alphabet)

Those four quarterly revenue streams combined (over $173 billionj is more than the annual GDP in Rhode Island, Vermont and New Hampshire.

So, yeah...its all about the Benjamins

Right. So no surprise there. Its not illegal to make money.

But this is the kernal of the issue for chain cinemas. Netflix is taking revenue from them.

Lets look at the core matter regarding quality of work. At this point the poster chold for this is the astounding and impressive film: Roma.

Its is the brainchild of Alfonso Cuarón and it is making waves (if you’ve seen it this is a pun) because of the awards and recognition is has garnered but also by the way Netflix has accomplished it. They have a brilliant beautiful film on their hands the credit to which needs to firmly given to them. They are exploiting the opportunity to attract filmmakers by giving them broad artistic license and backing movies studios shy away from or don’t support due to a personal beef with the artists.

So far as this empowerment to the creators I say “good for you Netflix”. It is certainly their right to distribute it in whichever wsy and to the degree they wish. Its their toy. Obviously it gives them a monopoly in who sees it when its not in cinemas - their customers. This cultural shift might be upsetting or off putting to many for many reasons. But the notion of adopting technologies that already exist comes to mind.

Some credit does need to be accorded to Netflix. They fully funded the vision and sensibility of a Director, cast and crew and single handedly provided access to an extraordinary mvie to millions of people who might not otherwise have access to see it. Kudos.

However...

I first saw Roma on my large screen TV and loved it. I begrudgingly gave credit to Netflix for this coup. But...it haunted me and got me to thinking. The “what about” questions began to creep to my consciousness. It was too good and I wanted more. But the “tiny” 45” screen and schmaltzy TV speakers were incapable of delivering the full, Director intended experience.

But I was stuck. Netflix had cleverly rigged the game. To qualify for the Oscars, the film needed to be shown on a movie house screen in a minimum number of locations. Netflix complied - but barely.. And so, under carefully controlled limited release it was made available. But if you have the misfortune of not being close enough to a legitimate movie screen, you were out of luck. Nay, this lack of good fortune extended further when I learned there were a few 70 mm high definition sound copies out there.

For a cinephile, large screen format is nirvana. Seeing a movie conceived, shot and meant for a large screen is an experience irreplaceable. It can’t be recreated anywhere else.

So sticking this instant classic into a small screen is like telling a great writer they can only use half the alphabet. A musician half the notes. Or a chef food but no spices. Whats the point of trying?

If Netflix wishes to keep its toys to itself, so be it. But really how much farther do they think they have advanced cinema beyond Employees leaving the Factory. Not very far to me.

And watching an epic film like Roma on anything other screen than a large cinema screen, with stereo sound...not the same.

[velartrill]

fighting back 101

you too can help organize a local paramilitary.

because this is going to come to violence, and right now the people with all the guns and training are on the side of fascism. instead of fighting to be allowed to join them, help defend your own community. if you don't have a community worth defending, find one. if you're willing to uproot your life for the USM, you should be willing to uproot it in service of fascism's targets

and for the record? if you're not willing to stand with ALL marginalized people, if you're not willing to fight with & for black folks, immigrants, american muslims, women, queer people, people with disabilities, everyone this regime wants to destroy, your willingness to resist fascism is utterly hollow.

let's talk about some of the things you can do if you're not willing to participate in actual bloodshed, or like me are physically disabled to the point that you'd be no use in combat. because we don't talk about these things enough. and that's fucked as hell because they're so much more important than shooting people. only a minority of personnel ever see front-line duty; the majority are needed to keep the whole ugly machinery of war and survival running.

this is actually an advantage we have over right-wing paramilitaries. if the actual USM comes after us we don't stand a chance of winning in outright conflict, but as the people we mainly have to worry about at this stage are the lone wolf nazis and fascist paramilitaries. and the cool thing about fascists is that they're idiots. they're obsessed with blood and guns and glory. they're all about waving their dicks around and making a show of how powerful and masculine they are. they don't operate on sound military strategy; they operate on what will make them personally feel good.

i can't say that this tendency never arises on the left, but i think there's still hope for us to get over it and exclude our egos from the military planning process.

so, without further ado, here are some absolutely vital non-combatant roles we need people for:

be a medic. people are going to get hurt and we need personnel capable of stitching them up when they do. take first aid classes, stockpile medical supplies. bandages, painkillers, antiseptics, antibiotics. the prescription-only shit you can find on the dark net and it's not even illegal to possess most of the important ones; controlled substances are the only thing you need to worry about getting caught with. (just don't fucking use antibiotics cavalierly, for the love of god.) even if you can't learn battlefield medicine yourself, stockpiling resources for those who can is still valuable. which brings me to my next point:

run a safehouse. violent resistance movements need places to regroup. if nothing else, you can offer up your home and keep it well stocked for combatants who need to take refuge there. keep rations (MREs are good) and clean water stocked, as well as medical supplies and weapons, if possible. resistances need networks of safehouses to be able to operate effectively. note that operating a safehouse means getting good at opsec. the entire point of a safehouse is that the enemy doesn't know it exists, and that can easily be compromised by spreading need-to-know info too widely. don't advertise online. work with local cells, and only give out your address in person to personnel you know to be reliable and to have the same respect for operational security you do. also, be realistic about what information you need to know. make sure people who trust you don't share intel with you that you don't need to know. you don't generally need to know where other safehouses are you. you sure as hell don't need to know about troops movements that don't affect how you're running your safehouse. understand that as the person whose name is on the contract or property deed, you're the first person the cops will grab if they find out people are operating out of your home. make sure you have covert signals in place to indicate whether it's safe to crash at your place or if you've been compromised and allies need to stay away. this can be as simple as lighting a candle in a window every night that your home is safe to approach, but it needs to be something self-limiting, so you don't need to personally intervene to shut off the signal. if you've been compromised, you won't have the opportunity to.

be a mole. this is one of the hardest jobs in any resistance, arguably more than front-line combat, and extremely dangerous, and you genuinely should not even *try* if you're not already in a position where you have access to government intel and materiel. being a mole means being extremely careful with the information you provide. don't give out anything that could identify you - you don't want to wind up like Reality Winner. even if you're willing to take a bullet for the cause, remember that you'll be able to do much more good alive than dead or in federal prison or a CIA black site. being a mole also means carefully respecting the need-to-know status of all intel. you should know as little about the people you're helping as you need to know they're trustworthy. remember that this is a fight, not a social club, and that knowing your place could mean the difference between life and death for the people you want to help.

and if you're working with a mole, understand that they're in the cold. you have a close network of fellow travelers to keep you steady and on course. they don't, out of necessity. respect the enormous dedication it takes to work behind enemy lines, but don't lose sight of the fact that they might turn, or just not be steady allies. lots of moles, very understandably, are conflicted about their allegiances. consider the provenance of all intel with care before you act on it. make sure you have covert signals in place by which your contact can indicate they're compromised, because they can and will be used to feed you false intel if that happens.

do social engineering. like i said, our main enemies in this war are total dumbasses. this means a good bit of con artistry can go a long way if you're good at manipulating people, consider using that to squeeze intel out of the enemy or lead them into traps. hell, you might even be able to get two different factions of fash (because the militia freaks aren't quite as buddy-buddy as you might think) into a shooting war with each other, neutralizing two nests of vipers without firing a single shot. good conmen are crazy vital to any resistance.

run comms. the internet is great but it's damn near impossible to use anonymously, and it'll be the first thing to go in any urban warfare. get good at radio. establish encrypted radio links with other members of your cell. teach people voice procedure, because trying to run shit by radio is a mess without that. have backup codes and frequencies in place in case one is compromised. like i'm not gonna lie, being a radio operator is probably going to be like the most vital job when we start fighting back. coordinating operations citywide will give your cell the ability to respond rapidly and effectively to new intel. and speaking of intel:

just straight up fucking be a spy. this is not some extremely glamorous and dangerous position, and it's actually one of the safest and easiest jobs for anyone to do. you don't even need to do it full-time. all it involves is reporting intel (even *publicly available* intel like when you see a cop car heading down the street) to people who might find that intel actionable.

provide transportation. lots of the people who might be willing to fight on the front lines are not going to be able to mobilize easily. if you have a car, or better yet a van, then helping transport personnel is one of the most valuable things you can do. vehicles are also great places to set up comm centers because they're harder to identify, cut off, and secure than buildings just by virtue of being able to move from place to place.

work as a specialist. the revolution is going to need tech support. they're going to need counseling. they're going to need lawyers. they're going to have a million different civilian needs. but you can't just hire a civilian plumber when you've got a couple of revolutionaries hiding out in your spare bedroom. you can't just call geeksquad when your hard drive is full of sensitive compartmentalized intel. having trustworthy professionals to call on when disaster strikes can be the difference between success and capture.

support morale. fighting back is going to suck, and the people in the most stressful positions need to be reminded why they’re putting themselves on the line. art, songwriting, speeches, all the traditional propaganda forms are invaluable here. so are reporters, people who will follow up after actions your organization participates in and tell your people exactly how much they accomplished, present the stories of the lives you’ve altered for the better - and remind you to do better when you screw up. don’t let anybody forget what you’re fighting for - especially your leadership.

on a more personal note, something we all need to understand is that the psychology of war is ugly. you need to be prepared for depression, despair, breakdowns. it's so important for people to feel like they're making a difference, and to be able to retreat to civilian comforts when necessary.

and there is going to be drug use.

this is something you need to be prepared for. you can't expect people to stay clean and sober when they're sacrificing their comfort and potentially their lives for the cause. so a culture of harm reduction when it comes to drug use by the troops is absolutely vital. don't kick people out of your safehouse for shooting up heroin. but also make sure you're not letting people head into combat or other situations that require alertness and steady reflexes while high or drunk or otherwise chemically impaired, whether that’s infiltrating a precinct or just driving to the grocery store. and your medics need to be prepared to handle overdoses. and withdrawal.

the better you support the morale of your personnel, the less you’ll have to worry about this.

finally: if you yourself have military experience, particularly within the US military, your skills and knowledge are absolutely invaluable, even if you aren't personally fighting on the front lines. we need people like you we can trust to be dedicated to the cause to train and lead others. we need people who have experienced the psychology of combat, people who know what they are and aren't capable of, so we're not just throwing a bunch of civilians into the meat grinder and hoping a few capable soldiers emerge.

please feel free to spread this document in any format you see fit. i'm also happy to add people's suggestions or answer sincere questions.