#algorithm abbreviation

[ceyhanmedya]

Algorithm

New Post has been published on https://hazirbilgi.com/what-is-algorithm-how-is-it-created/

Algorithm

What is algorithm? How is it created?

Algorithm ; It is the name given to the combination of methods and steps planned to perform a job or solve a problem. It is generally defined as a set of operations with a clear beginning and end, used in the field of programming or in solving mathematical problems. It is the regular determination of the movements, processes or works required in order to carry out the work planned to be done, in steps.

It is one of the two approaches used in problem solving and is more preferred than the heuristic solution approach. It is among the subjects that must be learned before a programming language for a computer programmer and can be defined as the most important topic of programming.

History

This concept first appeared in the 9th century and was first introduced by Khwarezmi . The scholar, whose full name is Ebu Abdullah Muhammed Ibn Musa al-Khorezmi, made great contributions to the field of mathematics by putting his work in algebra into writing. Harezmi’s most widely known book with Latin translations; Hisab is al-algebra and al-mukabala (حساب الجبر و المقابلة). This book is also described as the first known collection of algorithms .

The word algorithm originally comes from the word ‘ Algorism ‘. The reason for this is that Khwarezmi’s book was difficult to pronounce in Europe after it was translated into Latin, and Europeans who could not say the name of Khwarezmi called it ‘Algorism’. 

As a result, although the concept of Algorism began to be used in the sense of problem solving with Arabic numerals, it turned into its current form over time and started to be used in a general context. Finally, after the 1950s, especially with the developments in computer technologies, a concept came to represent the way almost every work to be done in the field of programming and the steps to be applied for its construction.

Algorithm creation

The algorithm can be in the form of prose and narrative, or in the form of a flowchart . Generally preferred is the one in the form of a flowchart. In order to create a process, some symbols are used to describe the work to be done. These symbols are of great importance, especially in terms of developing a program and understanding the process.

In order to create an algorithm, the work or problem to be done must be clearly defined and solution methods must be determined. In order to do the work or to implement the solution, all the steps that will lead to the result from the initial movement should be specified in the order of application. One of the most important concepts in this subject is the flow chart; The schematic representation of the solution of an algorithm is called a flowchart. 

Some flowchart commands are as follows;

Start-Finish (terminator)  

Input  

Process  

viewing 

Decision  

iterative process  

manually entered value

Examples

Example 1 (Explanation with everyday concepts)

Targeted Job:  Going from home to school

Start: Home

End: School

Algorithm:

Step 1: Open the door Step 2: Put on the shoes Step 3: Close the door Step 4: Exit the building Step 5: Walk the road Step 6: Walk to the 2nd fork Step 7: Turn left Step 8: Finish the road Step 9: Enter the school.

Example 2 (Explanation with programmatic concepts)

Intended Business:  Finding the factorial value of a number entered by the user

Getting Started:  Starting the program

Finish:  Show the result

Algorithm:

Step 1: Run the program Step 2: Define the variables factorial,i and n Step 3: Define the initial values of the variables factor = 1 i = Step 4: Read the n value entered from the screen Step 5: Repeat until (i=n) equality is achieved factorial = factorial*i i = i+1 Step 6: Show the value of the factorial variable

Some Important Algorithm Types

Search algorithms

Memory management algorithms

computer graphics algorithms

Combinatorial algorithms

Graph algorithms

evolutionary algorithms

genetic algorithms

Crypto algorithms or cryptographic algorithms

Rooting algorithms

Optimization algorithms

Sorting algorithms

Data compression algorithms

Conclusion

This concept can be encountered by people in all areas of life in general. Because the concept of algorithm represents the way to the solution rather than the solution. A plan prepared for a journey to be made and the steps determined for the completion of a job basically represent the algorithm. 

An algorithm that has not been implemented and whose results have not been observed is not deemed appropriate for patenting by law. But algorithms in software have been the subject of much discussion at this point. 

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[leafington]

𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙢𝙤𝙧𝙚 𝙞 𝙙𝙧𝙞𝙣𝙠 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙞𝙣, 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙡𝙤𝙣𝙜𝙚𝙧 𝙢𝙮 𝙣𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩𝙨 𝙜𝙚𝙩. - kento n.

content warning !! - enemies to lovers w nanami (i caved), blackfem!reader, ngh modelceo!reader, ceo!nanami, me putting my business and entrepreneurship knowledge to use, light intoxication, suggestiveness at the end

a/n - IM BACK YALL WOOOOOO, sorry for making u wait @jellicatty 🙁

For years, Nanami has held himself to competition with you and your company. If he had a tier-list of all the people he hated, you were a close second to Gojo. To say he hated your guts was an understatement, some thought he just had some sort of lingering grudge, others assumed you two just got off the wrong foot but they couldn't be far from wrong. That man practically wanted you dead, and that's a hard call to make from someone who was raised well.

His mother was nothing short of a good woman, she taught his son to do great things—respect elders, women, and children alike, offer up his seat to those who needed it more than him, never pray upon someone's downfall no matter how hard they made his life. Each and every time he comes across your presence, he closes his eyes and mentally apologizes to his mother.

Your being insinuates such hatred within him. The way you arose to popularity out of nowhere due to what? Daddy's money? Your looks that earned you sexiest woman alive four years in a row? He wasn't accepting that 'model starting their own company' bullshit, not that he didn't believe one couldn't, just not you.

He recalls the very first moment he met you, three years ago when you made his life hell. 'Japan's Top Model, L/n Y/n, announces her official clothing line.' Who knew a simple headline could turn his future upside down? At the time, he'd only heard of you once or twice over a news article or a random scandal that just so happened to sneak into his algorithm. But this was different, it effected him in every way possible.

Suddenly, he has competition. 'LVS' stocks had reached a pinnacle point within just a few weeks of launching, he'd never seen those abbreviations before, the next, his own business was constantly being compared to by this new threatening company. All things after that basically consisted of Nanami fighting for his top spot. You can't even describe how upset he was when he first met you. A beautiful woman, buttering up the chairman into letting you attend the business meetings that he [Nanami] went to, pretty tits bouncing when introducing yourself to the other members of the council, and that gleam of something in your eye when you finally met with Nanami.

"So you're the one hogging No. 1?"

He doesn't give a damn how many of the other pervs fell for your charm, to him, you were the devil in disguise.

Nanami Kento despised you with every fibre of his person. Even at this formal event.

"Sexiest woman alive"? Damn right you were. He can see how easily the others fell for you, if he didn't have his head screwed on tight, he would've been the next one to take you in the office.

That black sleeveless maxi dress kept him on his toes the entire night, curves and assets prominent. The way you held your glass of sparkling rosé, chatting it up with whoever that unfortunate soul was that thought they would get you in their bed after this was all over. Nanami held his own drink, a good amount of scotch that'd get him through the remainder of the event without bashing someone's head in. He's trying to listen to his colleague brag about his latest product of his work that's been selling well, but you being in his line of sight smiling and giggling seemed way more appealing.

In no way is Nanami a man who occupied himself with women, until he found a good place to settle and retire, a relationship didn't have any room in his life. To the best of his abilities, he ignores the now reciprocated exchange of stares, only sipping from the modern glass whenever he felt he needed the extra loosening.

And loose he was.

You look good. Too good. He turned his head to avoid indulging, not with the woman who's downfall he's prayed upon. Though it's far too late because that scotch is getting it's moneys worth having already downed three glasses and bringing him closer and closer to the woman he claimed he loathed.

His compliments were unlike anything he's ever thought of you. "You look stunning tonight." "Your stylist did an amazing job." "The pictures do you no justice." Drunk words are sober thoughts as they say. His eyes were telling more than his words, he wanted you bad.

Compared to any other elderly male he knew what to say to have you feel won over, even if you were well aware of his hatred towards you. So.. though it was just for a night, you returned the favor. Addressing his compliments with your own, insisting that the media makes such false claims about his person, feeling him up, and eventually dragging him to the bathroom to show him exactly how you shot to the top.

"You minx." He hisses as your kisses trail lower from his jaw. "Oh? What happened to all that talk you were doing?" You effortlessly tug his tie off, allowing it to hang from his neck. "Do you do this with every man you want to surpass?" He grits, fighting his natural urges to give in. "Very few, only the ones that act uppity and look good in a suit."

"Fuck... I hate you so much."

©2024 leafington dont steal please!! :)

[beholdingslut]

i am sick of having to hear people say SA in real life. i mean i lowkey believe you're a coward for censoring yourself for the algorithm online anyway but we don't even have any of that in person. just say the words. and even more awkwardly is when there's someone offline who doesn't understand and then they have to have it explained to them, rendering the abbreviation void.

[quackitytheduck]

in an age of evil corporate sponsored algorithms here are some ways to search for something more accurately on various sites that i know off the top of my head

TUMBLR

if you want to search for blog posts from a specific date and you have a browser available you can use the template [blog url].tumblr.com/day/[year]/[month]/[day]

ex. quackitytheduck.tumblr.com/day/2024/09/15

you can also utilize the archive with [blog url].tumblr.com/archive

ex. quackitytheduck.tumblr.com/archive

TWITTER

click/tap the three dots next to the twitter search engine and do "advanced search" which will let you search for posts with "all of these words" "this exact phrase" "any of these words" "none of these words" etc.

you can also use shortcuts in the engine itself:

from:[user] (tweets from a specific acc)

to:[user] (replies to a specific acc)

lang:[abbreviated language] ex. lang:en

since:[date] AND until:[date] (tweets starting from and up to specific dates) ex. since:2024-09-15 until:2024-09-16

i've been informed all of this twitter stuff can be found here

AO3

you can use the "any field" block for a LOT of things

otp:true only shows fics tagged with a specified relationship (use in conjunction with a relationship in the "relationships" block)

otp:false only shows fics tagged with multiple relationships

-relationship_ids only shows fics with no relationship tags at all

a lot of the other ones i know can be used with the regular search filters

i've also been informed that all this can be found here

why did i even make this post

yeah that's all i got go crazy

[coupleofdays]

So I just stumbled upon a whole Wiki dedicated to creating programs for playing chess. One of the old programs, from the 1970s, described on the site is called simply "Master", or "The Master Chess Program". They even have a picture of it being used:

Apparently "Master" in this case is an abbreviation of "Minimax algorithm Tester".

[colorisbyshe]

The tiktokification of censorship (ie use of “grape” instead of rape, “unalive” over suicide/kill/murder) is making rounds in the twitter discourse again and I think what’s left out of this discussion is the real source of a lot of this self-chosen, self-enforced censorship: the proliferation of youtube true crime.

This “The Panoptic Moderation Team Made Me Use Deeply Unserious Language To Describe Atrocities” stemmed from amateurs, mostly white women, treating true crime like hot gossip and thus hot gossip like a career. It came from white women scrolling reddit threads about Unsolved Mysteries and then repeating every dogshit theory and insensitive comment as a form of a side hustle to make quick money.

And when they started getting hit with copy right strikes for just throwing in unedited, 2 minute news clips and, yes, weren’t included in the Fun Video algorithm for describing graphic abuse, mutilation, and other violence, they decided that it must just be the use of words like rape or suicide. I don’t doubt there is a true censorship (by that I mean removal from the algorithm, not necessarily wholesale removal) of videos that have words like rape or torture or suicide in their titles or descriptions but most of it has just been “videos detailing extremely graphic atrocities have been demonitized and aren’t hitting the top 100 daily videos” or whatever.

When people decided 10-50 minute videos that try to explain horrible crimes were too much effort and just repeating headlines and alluding to horrific abuses in 30 second to 5 minute videos on tiktok was much better, the said paranoid thinking prevailed and people assumed that it’s the Evil Censors targeting “buzzwords” and not just like… normal moderation trying to keep graphic content from trending.

They assumed since they weren’t making big bucks off of other people’s suffering, no one on any app is allowed to use the words suicide, murder, rape, sexual violence or even use more sensitive euphemisms or just abbreviations.

Like, again, I’m not denying some moderation has wrongly removed content using these terms without anything graphic or threatening attached. Or saying that demonetization of graphic content is necessarily and always a good thing.

But I am saying that a lot of this furor has begun because people tried to use real crimes and suffering to make a quick buck, did not care about being sensitive or respectful, and came up with quick, quirky alternative terms to try to continue to make a quick buck with no consideration to the victims, and that’s how we landed here. Absolute thoughtlessness AND rancid attempts to make money are at the heart of this.

It’s not “puriteens can’t use adult words,” it’s “(often white) adults are trying to find a way to monetize everything at the expense of everyone else and for once the systems in place aren’t making it easy for them, although most of the difficulties aren’t even rly there.”

[jayflrt]

HELLO!

I like your work a lot like it's genuinely Hilarious so I thought you would be the best person to ask for this.

I want to make a writing tumblr for enhypen but I'm a little lost because I've never used tumblr (as a creator) before LOL just used twitter and AO3 to write/socmed for fictional fandoms (tbh this is my first time like being a proper fan of a kpop group as to occasionally liking a song or two).

Anyways! What I've gathered from my experience on twitter and the writers I've followed here is obviously your blog should have an intro about you (inc. what you're comfy with, what you write, etc.) and a master list of your works BUT some of Tumblr's mechanics are Confusing.

Like,

1) should I create specific tags for my asks?

2) on twt, usually you create a tweet like "Hi! New to #___twt, looking for moots blah blah" to get an initial burst of likewise new people to bond and communicate with, does it work similarly here and if so/not please elaborate TT

3) is the etiquette to reblog every work you like, or is that spammy and you should just like them?

4) is there any other advice you have for navigating tumblr (like odd quirks)

5) ALSO this is a small dumb question but in the fandoms I've been in until now we usually used socmed au instead of smau do you have any idea why that's different (low-key smau is smarter tho bcus it's a shorter abbreviation)

I think that's all. I tried going through your rules and intro again, but I didn't see anything on whether an ask like this was alright or not, but I hope it is! I didn't want to Like intrude, but I felt most comfortable asking you because you're also desi ❤️❤️.

Anyways!! If this is something you don't want to/don't feel comfortable answering or it's like annoying genuinely just ignore this, I don't want to be make anyone uncomfortable!

omg thank you so much ml, i'm so glad you enjoyed my works!! 🥹 welcome to the kpop community first of all!! did you recently become an engene? :') and welcome to the tumblr ff community too! honestly i feel like if you can navigate ao3 just fine then tumblr shouldn't be too difficult after a while but i'm sure it's confusing at first 😵‍💫

as for your questions i'll answer them in the same order you asked them:

1. honestly i'm not 100% sure if there's any real purpose behind specific tags for your asks other than organization personally LOL but it's pretty helpful if you want to go back to look through your asks for something instead of scrolling past all the posts on your blog !!

2. omg yes i love the twt intros 💗 honestly for tumblr i think i just started posting content right away whenever i made a blog 🤧 i think intros are usually just in your navigation anyways but if you want to talk to different authors then it doesn't hurt to send an ask!! usually people communicate with different authors via the ask box 🥰

3. all sorts of interaction is great but i think reblogs are preferred!! i typically use likes as my bookmarks and then reblogs to comment on work or share it to a wider audience. the algorithm for tumblr works so that your likes don't show for others (unless you make it public on your profile) but your reblogs are on the dashes of people who follow you

4. ooh i'd say make use of the tagging system!! using tags like #enhypen fluff or #enhypen x reader on your fics will make it easier for people to find your work 💘

5. HAHAH I USED TO CALL IT SOCMED AU TOO BEFORE I JOINED TUMBLR 😭 i still use social media au as a tag but i think smau is more widely used here!! not exactly sure why but im guessing its just easier to tag 🙂‍↕️ i get you tho bc i experienced the same culture shock

dont worry you're most welcome to send asks !! 🥰💘 and thank you for reading my rules and intro!! i definitely don't turn away anyone who's looking for advice <33 also omg fellow desi 🫶 welcome to enhablr !

[carpisuns]

Hey sorry reddit refugee with a quick question, I dont really identify with the super-fandom side of tumblr. A lot of my feeds get a lot of random like (character)x(character) fanfics and I'm wondering if there are a few common tags i could block to minimize seeing them?

Hey there, welcome to tumblr! Sorry if I tell you something you already know but I think this info is really important for curating your experience here.

While tumblr does have an option for a feed based on an algorithm, I’d say like 90% of users don’t use it. We use the “following” option, which shows only posts from people you follow, in the chronological order they were posted—with no additional posts chosen by an algorithm. If you’re on mobile it looks like this.

I just wanted to make sure you knew about this because if you are not interested in seeing certain kinds of content, I’d say the best way to not see it is to not follow people who post it a lot. Fill your dashboard with content you enjoy by following people who post the kinds of things you like.

That being said, of course no one is gonna share your taste 100% and the people you follow will likely post about things you don’t care about. Blacklisting tags will definitely help with that. People usually tag fandom posts with the fandom name or an abbreviation for it. so for example if you don’t want to see posts about the owl house you could block the tags #the owl house and #toh. (Also, if that’s the case, you should probably unfollow me, since I post about that a lot lol.)

Most shippers use a specific ship name, usually a combo of the two characters’ names, so figure out what it is and block it if you don’t want to see that ship. So for example, #zelink for zelda x link. I think that’s a much more common way of tagging ships here than character x character or character/character.

When you come across a post you don’t like, it might be helpful to check how the reblogged or the op tagged it and then block those specific tags.

If you don’t know how to block tags on mobile:

Tap the person icon on the bottom right of the screen. Then tap the gear icon on the top right. Go to general settings > filtering and add each individual tag you want to block. (On desktop I recommend downloading XKit—it has a lot of helpful customization options.)

There really isn’t a way to guarantee you don’t see any shipping fanfic posts on your dashboard in general, but again, if you don’t want to see that, don’t follow people who post it a lot. And don’t feel bad about unfollowing if you need to. I feel like the culture here is a bit different from something like twitter or Insta because our follower counts are private so they’re less of a focus. I wouldn’t worry too much about someone being offended that you unfollowed. Most people understand that we’re all trying to curate our experience.

Hope this helps! Have fun :)

[hfbinks]

Fandom 101

— How to start out

Be positive

Speak & comment on what you like! You'll attract others with the same interests and makes it so much easier to squee about your favourites

ㅤ

Don't like, don't look

If you see something you don't like, ignore it, mute it, block it! Interactions will bring you more of the things you don't like. Due to the algorithms working in the background of most social media platforms, you'll get more stuff you don't like when you comment on it. (It's also incredibly rude on top of it)

ㅤ

Don't use works without explicit permission/say it's yours

When someone says no to using their work, respect that and don't repost it. Apps like Instagram and tiktok made repost accounts popular, but basically, they're stealing art and taking away from the original creators.

ㅤ

Respect other fandoms/cultures

Different languages use different lingo, other fandoms have different dynamics. One popular example would be "cp" in Eastern fandoms, the abbreviation means "character pairing" and is often misunderstood by people from other areas.

ㅤ

Be nice

We're all here for a good time, don't be an ass! We never know what's happening in someone else's life outside of fandom, so give people the benefit of the doubt, be kind, be gracious and just enjoy the little escape from reality.

ㅤ

Ship & let ship

Preferences differ; if you don't like a ship/shipping in general, ignore/mute/block. People flock to fandom for different reasons and none of the reasons is better or worse than the next. There is no superiority to be won by ship wars.

ㅤ

Don't use AI

AI uses stolen art as database. Don't do it. There are essays by people a whole lot smarter than me about this topic and why AI is bad. If you love your artists and writers, don't use it to "make your own" or finish a fic that hasn't been updated in a while.

(I'm happy to help find reading material if needed!)

ㅤ

Interacting with Artists & Writers

Tell them what you liked, be positive & don't ask for updates! First of all, we're all humans, so please don't treat us like faceless companies, existing to spew endless supplies of fan works. Second, as fans we like to scream and cry about our faves, so if you like something, feel free to say so! A wonderful conversation could bloom from that.

ㅤ

Dark Content

If that's not your cup of tea, that's fine! Don't harass people who enjoy it though! Dark content, dead dove, etc. has nothing to do with someone's morals or their character. And nobody has to justify their interest or disinterest!

ㅤ

Find your crowd. And most important: be nice & have fun!

In the end of the day, you'll meet a many wonderful people in fandom and people you don't click with, but that's okay! Find your niche you feel most comfortable in and simply enjoy fandom!

ㅤ

Feel free to save & share this graphic and post! This is far from complete but hopefully makes it easier to get to know fandom etiquette when you're new 💚🥕

ㅤ

I also wrote a handy guide on how to comment on AO3 when you're new or have absolutely no idea what to talk about: How to comment

[cyle]

I've run into an interesting behavior with search lately. In my current fandom, posts may be tagged "Lorem: Ipsum dolor sit" OR "Lorem Ipsum dolor sit" without the colon after Lorem. I would expect searching either tag to show me the same results (ignoring the presence of the colon), but they don't: each search will only show results matching the exact tag.

Is this intended behavior, or should it be reported as a bug? If it's intended, what are the challenges with making tag search more flexible to allow it to recognize both those examples as the same tag?

right now, it’s exact (so not a bug, no), which was very intentional in the past but i don’t know if it really makes sense anymore, for the reason you stated. wouldn’t it be nice to visit “The Last of Us” tag page and see stuff tagged just “tlof” or whatever abbreviation is used and posts tagged with just the show’s character names and whatnot? feels like that’d be closer to the intention of those spaces.

it’s challenging though because there’s a lot of overlap. for example, i think way back when the “got” tag page showed a bunch of game of thrones content and a bunch of k-pop content, because two big things shared that tag. figuring out how to have the same tag mean more than one thing at an algorithmic level is difficult.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: John D. Haltigan, Tamara M. Pringsheim, Gayathiri Rajkumar

Published: Feb 2023

Abstract

There has been an increasing recognition among both medical and psychological professionals, as well as the public media, of a concerning trend for child and adolescent users of audiovisual-based, algorithmic social media platforms (e.g., TikTok) to present with or claim functional psychiatric impairment that is inconsistent with or distinct from classic psychiatric nosology. In this short communication, we provide a detailed historical overview of this transdiagnostic phenomenon and suggest a conceptual model to organize thinking and research examining it. We then discuss the implications of our suggested model for accurate assessment, diagnosis, and medical-psychiatric treatment. We believe there is an urgent need for focused empirical research investigation into this concerning phenomenon that is related to the broader research and discourse examining social media influences on mental health.

Abbreviations

ADHD, Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder; DID, Dissociative Identity Disorder; FTLB, Functional tic-like behaviors; MPD, Multiple Personality Disorder; NSSI, Non-suicidal self-Injury; OCD, Obessive-Compulsive Disorder; TS, Tourette's Syndrome.

--

The global burden of mental illness in children and youth is a leading cause of disability globally, accounting for ∼13% of the total burden of disease in this age group [1,2]. Notably, this estimate excluded personality disorders given limited epidemiological data at the time, suggesting that the global burden of mental illness and children and youth is likely underestimated. There are robust sex differences in the expression of common clinical, personality, and behavioral traits and disorders, especially during adolescence (e.g., females:neuroticism and depressive/internalizing disorders and symptomatology; males:aggression and antisocial/externalizing disorders and symptomatology [[3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12]]). However, greater understanding of the overlap among their symptom expression and sex-linked prevalences, as well as their social and biological correlates is needed. Recent quantitative work examining their symptom overlap has enhanced insight into the transdiagnostic dimensional structure of common clinical and personality psychopathology [[13], [14], [15]].

At the same time that our understanding of transdiagnostic relations among common clinical and personality disorders and symptomatology has progressed, there has emerged an increasingly urgent need to understand the magnitude and developmental significance of social media use on mental health [[16], [17], [18]], especially during adolescence given it is a critical developmental window during which emotion regulation capacities are unfolding [12,16,17,[19], [20], [21], [22]]. The urgency of this need has been magnified by the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic which has been associated with increased social media use and perceived individual social isolation and psychological/psychiatric distress [[23], [24], [25], [26], [27], [28]], including suicide-related mortality [29].

One social media site that has received increasing media and research scrutiny as a potential conduit or ‘spread vector’ for mental illness symptoms and disorders is TikTok [[30], [31], [32]]. There has been a well-documented uprise in popular content creators with self-described tics or Tourette's Syndrome (TS) and other self-diagnosed mental health symptomatology on the TikTok platform [[37], [71]] leading some to characterize the phenomenon as “TikTok's sick-role subculture” [30]. This uptick has coincided with increasing numbers of youth who have presented to clinical providers or psychiatric services during the COVID-19 pandemic with what have been termed functional tic-like behaviors (FTLBs) [31,33,34]. Similar phenomenon has also been recently chronicled with respect to dissociative identity disorder (DID) [35].

These more recent examples of mental health-related issues appearing with notable penetrance in the social media ecosystem have emerged within the context of a broader fusion and coalescence of individual self-diagnosis, including anxiety, depression, eating disorders, autism, and gender identity-related conditions on social media platforms, perhaps most notably on the social media site Tumblr during the first decade of the 2000s [36], but also Instagram and most recently on TikTok as well [[37], [38], [39]]. The continued evolution of this trend underscores an urgent need for increased understanding of the influence of social media on mental health, including its phenotypic clinical presentations and the possibility that increasingly algorithmic social media platforms may serve as a vehicle of transmission for social contagion of self-diagnosed mental illness conditions. Moreover, a greater understanding of the contributions of both personality and common clinical psychopathology to the ways in which social media platforms impact, facilitate, and ultimately inform the emerging debate about the definitions and contours of what is and is not considered mental ill-health is needed.

1. Audiovisually immersive social media: TikTok

TikTok was initially launched as a platform for users to post short clips of dancing, singing and comedy. The social media app launched in 2018 and had approximately one billion active monthly users worldwide by 2021. During the COVID-19 pandemic, this number increased. TikTok has a distinct algorithm, which allows users to receive content tailored to them, based on their preferences, interests and current state of mind. Depending on the length and type of interaction on a post, TikTok algorithms curate an audiovisually entertaining, sensory-immersive stream of personalized videos to their "For You" page.

User content on TikTok has evolved from the app's launch, with more content creators advocating for awareness surrounding issues such as feminism, mental illness, body positivity, disabilities, and gender identity. Notably, there have been many accounts that have received millions of views for their journey with their disability and/or mental illness, especially TS. These accounts have grown in popularity and their content has appeared to gain widespread traction as viewers engage with the content and learn how content creators perform everyday activities, while having tics that can largely affect their functionality in day-to-day life.

2. Before TikTok: Tumblr and the origins of online identity fandoms

Tumblr is a social media network that was founded in 2007, reaching peak user popularity in early 2014 based on the number of daily blog posts [36,40]. The creation of ‘fandoms’ (fans of a particular person, team, fictional series, etc. regarded collectively as a community or subculture) provided users who typically were seen as outcasts, a sense of community and belonging, as demonstrated by its company's mission statement; “Tumblr is a place to express yourself, discover yourself and bond over the stuff you love. It's where your interests connect you with your people” [40]. Journalist and internet historian Katherine Dee has written “Tumblr became a place for people to fantasize and build upon ideas about real identities. There was an aesthetic dimension, a dimension of roleplay, a feeling of camaraderie with others—but it was often pure fiction [41].” This identity element was also noted as a feature of social media more broadly: as Moreno et al. [39] noted “Social media also allow users to create online identities that may reflect their real identity or a newly-developing identity.” Mental health content such as eating disorders and depression, along with numerous other common clinical mental disorders, were often disclosed on Tumblr [36]. Accounts promoting eating disorders, self-mutilation, and suicide became popular and with half of Tumblr's visitor base being under the age of 25, raising concern for the potentially deleterious effects of social media use on adolescent mental health. Tumblr implemented a policy against blogs of this nature in 2012. Similar issues also manifested on the social media platform Instagram where non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) content and corresponding NSSI-related identities became a concern [39].

3. Personality and common clinical psychopathology: mental illness as identity-selection?

3.1. Tics, Tic DO, and Tourette's syndrome (TS)

An increasing number of reports from the US, UK, Germany, Canada and Australia have noted an increase in functional tic-like behaviors (FTLB) both prior to and during the COVID-19 pandemic, coinciding with an increase in social media content related to Tourette syndrome and tics [[31], [32], [33], [34],[42], [43], [44]]. These FTLBs differ from classic Tourette syndrome (TS) both neurotypically and phenotypically. Neurotypically, FTLB age of onset (typically 12–25 years) is later in development relative to classic TS with onset in early childhood and improvement of tic behavior in late adolescence. Phenotypically, FTLBs are characterized by an abrupt and explosive presentation of symptoms over hours or days of mostly complex phonic and motor tic-like behaviors with high severity, with many patients able to provide the exact date of onset or inciting event. In contrast to the rostro-caudal evolution of motor tic symptoms which develops over years in TS, FTLBs often predominantly affect the upper limbs, with complex movements of the arms and hands, including clapping, sign language, throwing objects, banging oneself on the chest, head or thigh, or hitting other people.

In TS, motor tics usually precede verbal tics, with the most common vocal tic being throat clearing, and less than 15% of those diagnosed with TS ever developing any complex vocalizations. In contrast, complex vocalizations are a prominent feature of FTLBs, including a large repertoire of random words, phrases, or offensive statements. Tourette's Syndrome is a highly prevalent disorder in youth, affecting approximately 1% of school-age boys and 0.25% of school-age girls [45]. The mean age onset of tic symptoms is approximately 6 years of age for both males and females as is the peak clinical presentation (when received at a specialist clinic) at 10 years of age. Some studies suggest there is a small but significant difference in tic severity between boys and girls, with girls having slightly more severe and more persistent tic symptoms with a higher resolution of tic symptoms in late teens for boys [46,47].

A large majority of those demonstrating FTLBs are adolescent females, which also forms a core user group of TikTok. Patients with FTLBs are also more commonly diagnosed with anxiety and depression, than those with TS which frequently co-occurs with neuropsychiatric conditions such as Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) [33,34]. FTLBs are in keeping with a Functional Neurological Disorder in the context of anxiety and depressive symptoms and diagnoses, and more broadly with affective dysregulation. Many presenting to psychiatric clinics have also noted they have seen popular videos on Tourette's syndrome and have since started sharing the same tics [32].

3.2. Dissociative identity & other mental disorders

A similar phenomenon has been observed in individuals with self-diagnosed Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) or adjacent quasi-psychiatric terms such as “person with Dissociated Identities” and “plurals” [35,48]. Indeed, the evolution of the online culture associated with DID or multiple personality disorder (MPD) has been richly chronicled [49]. The pluralist's online culture is an umbrella moniker that includes five distinct languageidentifiers regarding the etiology of Plurality defined by Plurals themselves including: (1): Traumagenic-Adaptive; (2) Traumagenic; (3) Traumagenic-Cultural; (4) Endogenic; and (5) Exogenic [35]. Notably, the endogenic and exogenic identifiers were identifiers created ‘de-novo’ and have no relation to empirical nomenclature. Based on these identifiers, three groups of plurals have been described. While the first two groups are related to conventional psychiatric clinical interpretations of and empirical research into DID (e.g., as potentially trauma-based), the third group is a pseudo-psychiatric group that includes those who identify as plurals but as not disordered [35].

Hashtags such as #DID, as well as #borderlinepersonalitydisorder and #bipolardisorderhave received millions of views, and popular content creators post videos capturing them ‘switching alters’ (i.e., plurals). Impressions from both the lay public and clinical professionals have converged in the observation that a salient feature of this emerging DID and self-diagnosed mental illness social media posting and discourse is that it has a distinct appearance of being romanticized, glamourized, and sexualized (or possibly malingered) [[48], [49], [50], [51], [52]]. Accordingly, this may be one explanation for why many users claim to have ‘rare’ disorders like DID (with prevalence estimates ranging from 0.01% to 14% depending on sample characteristics and the methodology used to assess DID; especially among children the disorder is extremely rare [[53], [54], [55], [56]]), as well as the emergence of a ‘plurals community’ for DID. Such plurals communities include non-traditional peri-psychiatric non-disordered notions of DID that community members have created on their own and are liberated from conventional psychiatric nosology. It has been noted that non-diagnosed (or undiagnosed) claims of DID can negatively impact others in the DID plurals community who have clinically diagnosed DID and are seeking functional reintegration as a therapy endpoint [35].

4. Diathesis-stress: an integrative model of vulnerability towards understanding social media, personality-identity confusion, and psychopathology

Although many social media users and online community members will be exposed to both media and community content that reflects peri-psychiatric conditions or self-diagnosed conditions, most will not adopt peri-psychiatric behaviors or conditions and/or seek professional clinical assistance. Indeed, positive effects of online social communities for coping with stress, relationship-building, and for enhancing feelings of belonging and shared experience among people experiencing mental illness, as well as other minority and marginalized groups, have been described [35,36,38,57,58]. What is needed in our view is an integrative explanatory framework for what places a seemingly increasing subset of individuals at-risk for or more vulnerable to adopting peri-psychiatric behaviors or conditions. The diathesis-stress model of individual differences to environmental context [[59], [60], [61], [62]] provides an organizing heuristic to begin to develop such an explanatory framework. Classic diathesis-stress or vulnerability-stress models postulate that poor developmental experiences (e.g., stressful or resource-poorenvironments) are most likely to impact the development of individuals who carry vulnerability factors, which are latent diatheses that result in increased risk for psychopathology when “triggered” by exposure to negative or otherwise stressful developmental experiences. Latent diatheses reflect biological or social-cognitive predispositions to react and behave in specific ways; psychopathology reflects signs, symptoms, and behaviors associated with mental illness or inconsistent with mental health in the normative range. While not inherently stressful per se, the social media environment is a relatively novel environment in evolutionary history and the negotiation of social relationships through the scopic medium of increasingly algorithmic, audiovisual social media may pose a unique set of conditions that place individuals with latent diathesis to personality and behavioral psychopathology, particularly that defined by deficits in emotion regulation and negative emotionality (NE) [63], at increased risk for the development of psychopathology [19,36,64,65].

Relative to males, adolescent females are at higher risk for depressive and anxiety-related disorders [6], along with higher levels of negative emotionality and personality trait neuroticism [7,9]. Accordingly, one possibility in the case of ‘TikTok tics’ is that the functional purpose of FTLBs—which are disproportionately prevalent in females based on empirical data to date – is to seek affirmation and/or draw attention to oneself to acquire social capital in online communities [36,66] while simultaneously maintaining an unconventional peri-psychiatric identity that may mask feelings of anxiety, depression, and possibly lower self-esteem [19,30,67]. It is also plausible that the social stress and isolation due to the COVID-19 pandemic operated in a dual-risk capacity in addition to unique personality and behavioral factors associated with social media use and participation in online communities themselves [19,64,65,68]. In any event, what seems to be clearly indicated by the preliminary clinical, empirical, and journalistic information is that for a subset of predominately adolescent-aged female youth, use of audiovisual-based social media platforms such as Instagram and TikTok, especially at moderate and high levels, is associated with the manifestation and course of FTLBs, less self-reported levels of psychological well-being [69], increased internalizing symptomatology [70], and self-diagnosis of various mental illnesses [71]. With appropriate diagnosis and intervention, particularly identification and cognitive behavioral treatment of emotional distress, social and/or generalized anxiety and affective dysregulation, youth with FTLBs have demonstrated a decrease in severity or remission of symptoms in the short-term [72]. This pattern of successful intervention in youth with FTLBs underscores the importance of widespread awareness of the possibility of social contagion influences on mental illness and identity confusion among young people, their parents, and mental health care practitioners [30,73,74].

5. Social awareness and implications for mental health assessment

Concerning the broader question of whether social media is causally related to the rise in rates of adolescent mood disorders, self-harm, and suicide since 2010 in the USA and UK, it has been pointed out that the rise paralleled the years “when American teens were obtaining smart phones and becoming daily users of social media platforms such as Instagram” [17]. The same is true of the unique clinical presentation of FTLBs which first emerged into clinical awareness in 2019 in Germany [32], as well as with the increasing recognition of the DID-plurality community and emergent discourse [35]. More broadly, there has been a recognition of vast online ‘neurodivergence’ ecosystem in which classical mental illness symptoms and diagnoses are viewed less as mental health concerns that require professional attention, but rather as consumer identities or character traits that make individuals sharper and more interesting than others around them [49,[75], [76], [77]].

The above recognition of this ostensibly heterogeneous sociogenic illness behavior, loosely bounded by classical notions of mental health diagnoses, suggests the possibility that the increasingly algorithmic [78] and audiovisually immersive social media environment is a scopic medium [79] in which various ‘neurodivergent’ or sick role [30] identities or personas can be claimed at will, at any given moment—with no antecedent biological basis or tether to empirical reality—with positive social and emotional reinforcement and resonance from the associated online community (e.g., via the use of hashtags; user-to-user sharing and amplification of content) [36]. This social and emotional resonance may amplify and reinforce identification with the persona and may even predict later behaviors in line with it [80]. Sharing emotions, feelings, and thoughts around one's self-diagnosed mental illness identity within a solely techno-mediated scopic performative milieu in which such feelings, emotions, and beliefs are amplified may increase the likelihood that the ‘self-diagnosed’ identity is reified and incorporated into one's self-concept, regardless of its correspondence to external reality and conventional taxonomies of mental illness [36,80]. Said differently, the capacity for emotion regulation around the nature of one's self -identity is increasingly being techno-mediated externally, rather than internally within the self.

Recognizing and responding to this possibility by researchers and mental health practitioners is an urgent public health priority in our view, given extant evidence suggesting that the social media environment is a mental health risk factor for adolescents and youth struggling with elevated personality psychopathology and inchoate personal identities during the transition to young adulthood [17,19,20,22]. In addition, whether and how social media technology is a contributing force in both potentially inducing sociogenic illness while simultaneously influencing how professional mental health organizations evolve with respect to understanding and defining mental illness—thus potentially immunizing current sociogenic illness from classical diagnoses of mental illness—is crucial to take stock of in order to rigorously inform public health discourse and policy [81].

--

Also:

Abstract

Currently, we are facing a new manifestation of functional neurological disorder presenting with functional Tourette-like behavior (FTB). This study aimed to show characteristics of this phenotype presenting as an outbreak of “mass social media-induced illness” (MSMI) and to explore predisposing factors. Between 5–9/2021, we prospectively investigated 32 patients (mean/median age: 20.1/18 years, range: 11–53 years, n = 16 females) with MSMI-FTB using a neuro-psychiatric examination, a comprehensive semi-structured interview and aspects of the Operationalized Psychodynamic Diagnostic System. In contrast to tics, numbers of complex movements and vocalizations were nine times greater than of “simple” symptoms, and of vocalizations one and a half times greater than of movements. In line with our hypothesis of MSMI, symptoms largely overlapped with those presented by German YouTuber Jan Zimmermann justifying his role as “virtual” index case in current outbreak. Typically, symptoms started abruptly at a mean age of 19 years and deteriorated gradually with no differences between males and females. In all patients, we identified timely-related psychological stressors, unconscious intrapsychic conflicts, and/or structural deficits. Nearly all patients (94%) suffered from further psychiatric symptoms including abnormalities in social behavior (81%), obsessive-compulsive behavior (OCB) (47%), Tourette syndrome (TS) (47%), anxiety (41%), and depression (31%), about half (47%) had experienced bullying, and 75% suffered from coexisting somatic diseases. Our data suggest that pre-existing abnormalities in social behavior and psychiatric symptoms (OCB, anxiety, and depression), but also TS in combination with timely-related psychological stressors, unconscious intrapsychic conflicts, and structural deficits predispose to contagion with MSMI-FTB.

[bluenpinkcastle]

mixed feelings and complicated thoughts

Next week, 07-10 September, is BrickCon 2023, the longest-running LEGO fan exhibition in the United States. The convention is usually in Seattle, Washington, but this year, it's in Bellevue, which is perhaps a little bit closer to where I live. It's a wonderful convention and if you are local or have the ability to attend, I strongly recommend it :) Meanwhile. I am registered to display a MOC (My Own Creation). This will be my first ever public display and I'm a little bit nervous. I've built a pink castle defending against a skeleton army, which will likely be categorized into the "fantasy" display area. One of the other women in my LEGO Adult Fan of LEGO (AFOL) / LEGO User Group (LUG) posted elsewhere on social media that she would be displaying her "Umbridge House" and that it would probably be placed for display within the "fantasy" display area. I'm mildly concerned about how our displays might be placed near each other, as they are both pink and "fantasy". Why is this a concern for me? I'm part of the QUILTBAG (Queer/Questioning, Intersex, Lesbian, Transgender, Bisexual, Asexual/Agender/Aromantic, Gay) community and I don't feel comfortable around JKR/HP (abbreviated to avoid algorithms, henceforth known as "the garbage human") because of how damaging that author is to the entire community. The garbage human not only says and supports positions damaging to queer lives, but she is one of the only authors I've heard of who read her entire publication contract and kept her rights to her work. This means that for every HP toothbrush sold, the garbage human gets money. So while the LEGO Group is not giving the garbage human money directly, they are required to pay a certain profit/percent of the licensed LEGO they sell back to the owning company, in this case Warner Brothers, who then generates a royalty check back to the garbage human. The garbage human then uses the millions of dollars made in profit to purchase lobbyists all around the world. These lobbyists spend a great deal of time and effort drafting political bills in countries all over the world, including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and a whole bunch of other countries, in order to specifically remove the rights of all QUILTBAG personnel. I have a really difficult time understanding how people can claim they love and support the QUILTBAG community only to actively give money to those who are using said money to take away rights and endanger lives. I know there's a lot of thoughts out there about how people have a right to like what they like and it's too much work for people to care about issues like this. I know many people who have a very powerful sense of nostalgia for HP. HP got a lot of people through some very tough times. But. The love/obsession of many of the fans often chooses to turn a blind eye to the actual and real damage and danger of financially supporting the garbage human. I know it's possible people don't understand that buying LEGO HP is giving the garbage human money to fund horrible things. Or maybe they don't care, as they can't actually see the damaging actions and they would rather remain ignorant. Or they know and just don't care because their own comfort and happiness is more important than "other" people's lives and rights. If I arrive at BrickCon and I find that I am displaying next to HP MOCs, is it fair for me to ask to be moved? I know this is a very sensitive topic and I am open to all well-thought-out and considerate comments. It's possible I'm missing something and I do appreciate the views of people who aren't me, so long as those comments are respectful.

[kineticpenguin]

*glances at Facebook*

Okay. I guess I can see why you do that. Some of my friends were in the Navy, I live in a Navy town, and every politician always says stuff like this to show their support for the sainted Local Business. But who is this person, anyway?

Australia? I'd understand if it was a weird location error because I am in a port town in Washington, abbreviated WA, and Australia has Western Australia, also abbreviated WA. But this lady is from Sydney, NSW.

Now, at this point I was kinda tempted to make a snarky comment, because of a fun fact: Many of the Independence-class Littoral Combat Ships the US Navy bought were built by Austal USA, the American subsidiary of Austal, an Australian shipbuilder. Basically it's an Australian company with some local rebranding so the government trusts the foreigners enough with their sensitive tech.

The Littoral Combat Ships are... bad. REALLY BAD. So bad, in fact, that the US Navy is trying to get rid of them. Even if the imagined mission for them still existed, the ships all have the fundamental problem of falling apart at the seams. It has all been a big blunder, the Navy wants them gone, Congress doesn't because Soviet-style make-work projects are fine as long as they're for the military.

But, I gave her page a glance, and she seems okay, and technically, the Austal-built LCS were not, in fact, built in Australia. They were built in Mobile, Alabama. So just another day in the algorithm being weird.

If you've read this far, thanks for allowing me to waste your time.

[talenlee]

Decemberween '23 — This Year's ASMRtists

If you’re not familiar with it, ASMR is an abbreviation meaning ‘autonomous sensory meridian response,’ a science sounding name for a reaction that some people get to a range of stimuli. This effect can be caused by a whole host of triggers but at least in the community on Youtube there’s a body of people who engage with it because of its ability to affect relaxation and restful mindsets. If you’re not familiar with what this looks like, it looks like a bunch of people making long videos with a strangely hushed affect.

And I watch and listen to them, to help me relax!

If you are familiar with it, hey, here’s some of the artists I’ve been watching this year, as the ASMR effect shifts around in my head and how I respond to it. One thing that people who don’t experience ASMR might not realise is that you can rely only on the effect being modestly unpredictable. Some stuff may cause it reliably for months and then suddenly, nothing. It pushes me to partake of new things regularly, and to that end, every year, I try to look at what artists are ‘new’ to me that I haven’t mentioned before.

Here then are four artists that I started paying attention to this year:

ASMR "Criminal" Lawyer Gets You Out of Trouble | BETTER CALL SAUL Parody

Watch this video on YouTube

I feel like I’ve watched more Amy Kay, like maybe I watched her years ago and I never got around to mentioning her. That’s probably likely, because she has an entire queer-read story about you being some variety of monarch, who started out being referred to as a dude, and then as the story evolved, the woman you’re talking to starts referring to you differently. Then eventually the series splits into two threads, with one half referring to ‘my lord’ and the other ‘my lady.’

Oh and then a cult got involved, it was an interesting story.

Anyway, Amy Kay does a lot of different types of video. Some of it is very mundane, some of it is very fantastic, and you’ll know if it’s the kind you respond to. Also, and this shouldn’t be a thing, but in the ASMR space, there’s a common responsiveness to media trends. When a Harry Potter movie comes out, a lot of people will make Harry Potter themed videos. It’s just a heavy trend, and I try not to hold it too much against the artists who are algorithm-responsive, but I am grateful when I see people fade out on it.

Amy Kay does have some videos about Harry Potter content, but it seems to be a thing of the past for now.

ASMR My Friend Brushes and Plays With My Hair

Watch this video on YouTube

Cosmo is an ASMR puppet. Cosmo is not unique as an ASMR puppet, but Cosmo is a puppet that does ASMR. And it’s a big friendly kind of puppet. You’re not going to see stuff that you won’t see from other ASMRtists by the way. Cosmo does roleplays about Recent Events (hi, Barbie Movie Tie In moment) and Cosmo does hand-focused gameplay videos (like Solitaire and Rush Hour), and Cosmo even does draw-along and ramble videos. In every way, Cosmo creates the most typical and normal content any middle of the road ASMRtist can produce, except for the alienation that comes from Cosmo being a puppet.

Alienation is important to me in ASMR. Roleplays don’t want to be realistic because they can’t be. Sometimes there are people who aim for normal, everyday kind of vibes, or expected behaviours, but because ASMR content is fundamentally weird (why are we all whispering?), the closer it gets to normalcy, the less likely it is to land for me. Give me something weird, give me something that recognisably can’t be real, and let me patch the gap in reality myself.

Cosmo’s great, and Cosmo isn’t real, but Cosmo exists and is my friend.

ASMR | making comfort food for a cold day

Watch this video on YouTube

I’m really selfconscious about my ASMR habits, especially since a lot of the ASMRtists I follow are very attractive women, some of whom are markedly younger than myself, and that makes me feel… oogy. It does mean that when I find myself responding to an ASMRtist who isn’t a pretty white girl, I try to make sure I mention it, and share their work. In this case, ASMRdido got on my radar through long, patient, whispered explanations of mathematical game concepts – particularly, the Monty Hall problem.

The other thing he does that I find useful for study is long (long) videos of playing a softly sounded, wood-and-velvet game called Close the Box. Close the Box is a great solo game because it underscores how little pieces you need to make a game out of something and still make it engaging.

ASMR-The Vintage Ice Cream Parlor Role Play🍨(Spooky Creations)

Watch this video on YouTube

And finally, Lloyd’s ASMR is a channel that’s… I think deliberately weird. Lloyd really turns up the ambient sound so if you don’t like the SHHHHH of an empty room, you might not like these. They’re slow, deliberate videos, and usually you can see the structure being something Lloyd has props for, reiterated in a new form. Door to door salesman, visiting a store, visiting an old style store. It’s a bit like a comprehensive library in that if you like one thing you can probably find ten or twenty versions of the same thing, even if they don’t make sense. Like you don’t get door to door bakery salespeople.

Lloyd is someone I like because of his gentle demeanour and I like the way that I, forgive me, don’t have to pay much attention. There’s not going to be a really funny joke or something I need to respond to, the way that (say) survey question videos invite me to. I know what I’m getting and I know there’s a reasonably large quantity of it, but also that it’s not about to impress me. It’s just sweet background noise and I’m not going to need to be afraid of something shocking or funny happening.

There! Here’s some stuff I’ve been listening to this year and I think makes my ability to focus and study better.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

[wuxiaphoenix]

Twenty-XXth Century Problems

The problem with the computerization of knowledge is that your access to it is only as good as your search engine. And search engines are notoriously difficult to program, meaning they’re often of doubtful quality. The wrong words, wrong word order, or wrong abbreviation can throw your results wildly off - if, in fact, if brings up any results at all.

(Written while silently swearing at a search engine that brings up 0 when I looked for juniper, when there are four varieties sitting on a counter. Oy....)

Janet Kagan put this to good use in her Mirabile stories, hinting first that they’d lost some of the colony ships’ database info, then some of the index (“No, searching for insectivores did not bring up bats”), then a reveal that an answer to a long-standing problem had been hiding in plain sight until someone went through all the science article archives by hand.... And even then, the searchers had to know what timeframe they were looking for.

And that was a case where hand-searching the archive was even possible. If everything was completely up to computers, down to which texts to pull up to “better fit” some algorithm of what users were “supposed” to be interested in-

We’d have a lot of information loss, even if it was technically still in the archive. If you can’t find it, it might as well not be there.

This is why I am and always will be in favor of hardcopy books and backups of, well, everything. It gives you the option of a brute force search, as good as your eyes and attention can manage. And it allows for the serendipity of having the right book land on your head (or your toes, ow), while you’re looking for something else entirely.

Writing fiction, in particular, is an exercise in putting together facts and speculations that normally never come within nodding distance of each other. A nonfiction writer may be able to narrow their focus to the recent history of herb-gathering in the Appalachians, and those are worthy and interesting books. But fiction is about people, and so has to include at least a stripped-down approximation of the messiness of human lives. The facts you need can jump from local herbs to local folk medicine to folk medicine in other countries that use ginseng to the fact that folk medicine also includes incantations against haints and oni... and that’s just for starters.

(Forget the sirens singing of sex to lure sailors overboard. If they changed their tune to “unlimited inter-library loans” - they’d likely get me, is all I’m saying.)

Scientific advancement also often relies on juxtaposing things a regular search engine might never put together. As one researcher put it, the real advances don’t come from “Eureka!” but from “Say, that’s funny....”

And don’t forget one of the most useful plot twists in Attack of the Clones - planets made to disappear from the Jedi Archives. Your characters might theoretically have the galaxy’s best scientific research at their fingertips, but can they access it?

So the next time someone laughs at a quiet crewman for lugging his microfiche library from starport to starship and back - one of the first things a successful enemy attack does is cut communication lines. Like, say, access to the space Internet.

There may come a time when the laugh’s on them!

[firespirited]

Tumblr's tweaking the algorithm a little so when you search for dolls instead of things directly tagged #dolls (i use search because a lot of folks tag just the brands or #doll community) lately, things have changed.

//For background: there's always been at least one person a week who feels seen by Iris by the goo goo dolls; there are anime, cartoons with characters called doll or who are dolls, bands with doll in the name, Dolls was a character on Wynonna Earp. Black trans women who use the term dolls for eachother, female rappers and porno stars with a name that's xxxx doll. The dollette/coquette aesthetic folks. A dozen posts a day about mentally playing with characters like dolls and tumblr users playing with jpegs like dolls. There are the real doll sellers and owner personal blogs. Porcelain, ancient, reborns, clowns and plushies along with the small kpop plush dolls that expanded to many fandoms, a few folks selfies where they're 'dolled up' or enjoy being called doll. Some disturbing roleplay, some disturbing writings about children. The occasional 'barbie doll diet' ED tag.

As you can tell, vast subject. Takes some filtering to get what you're looking for. //

This past week or so, the search expanded and it's not to do with the words or tags used but the photos. The new arrivals are women wearing babydoll tops, women with large breasts (possibly very similar to posts usually tagged bimbo doll) and older women in bikinis. There are also eating disorder pictures unrelated to dolls that reuse photos previously tagged as dollette when uploaded to tumblr, the text is vague enough to not set off anything but finely tuned filters looking for abbreviations and expressions used by the ED communities.

I think tumblr is testing some kind of auto categorizer for pictures, maybe so it can suggest tags to users or suggest like minded tumblrs even if you don't tag your posts.

All that to say that if you have an ED, the dolls search page isn't entirely safe, if you have the ed not sheeran, and leet speak variations on pro ana tags you'll block those but not the untagged ones that are using pictures previously used for dollette/coquette. I have dollette muted but those posts showed up. No idea what's going on under the hood but if your triggers are serious, browse with caution and stick to a variety of tags instead of vaguer fandom or craft terms that could contain stuff you can't mute.

What's interesting is that this image categorizer may prove very helpful in the future with specific triggers like guns or clowns or flashing lights that often go untagged, it could be used to mute a picture and say 'may potentially contain flashing lights'. That would be very very good for this website's accessibility.

Either way, take care. Having a firefox tab open with your filtered content page while browsing a search term can help you quickly identify what you'd rather mute and put it in your settings without having to rescroll from the start.