#bootstrap examples

[divinector]

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[dandelionjack]

i believe that bootstrap paradoxes / stable time loops are inherently religious. if something exists as an effect without cause, if something has been there because it has always been there, if any surrounding events would shift around it to accomodate its always-being-there, if something sprung into existence out of the void because it always had to have sprung into existence, if something exists for no reason and with no apparent explanation once you begin to unravel the chain of events that supposedly lead to its arrival, then that something can be understood as none other than the work of God. God the writer; God that inserts a self-balancing perpetual motion engine into the narrative to resolve a plot hole. a bridge strung over the chasm of impossibility. it came to be because God-the-author decreed it so. because without it the story would grind to a halt, and that's the sound of the universe collapsing

nobody tell the doctor. they'd never get over it.

[codingflicks]

Bootstrap Team Section Design

[horreurscopes]

the whole adhd going trendy thing that's now being discussed in, like, npr podcasts (insofar as tiktok is an extension of "the mainstream") is fascinating because that was basically a stage of self actualization that tumblr went through, like, at least three or four years ago. y'know; that's not a symptom of adhd, that's a common human experience. everyone forgets to eat produce in the fridge sometimes. everyone's mind occasionally wanders during a conversation, and so on.

but at least in circles of tumblr with critical thinking skills this has led to better insights, "culturally" (as in - people here don't have to go looking themselves for anti-psychiatry literature to encounter these ideas; it is something that can be absorbed via osmosis if one is interested in social justice and sees relevant topics on the dashboard, which i think is generally a good thing), about the systems of oppression that lead people to attach themselves to these medicalized labels; why, for example, a diagnosis that means "there is something broken in my biological make-up that makes me ontologically unable to complete tasks, and therefore it is not my fault, nor a moral reflection of my character, if i am unable to work myself to exhaustion" might be so appealing to so many people in a society where creating capital for the ruling class via wage slavery is a sign of virtue; and what incentives the psychiatric institution may have to both diagnose and medicate people to fix "can't work" syndrome.

(and yes, people here still debate to exhaustion what "actually adhd" vs, lets say, "culturally adhd" means; but that's not what this post is about. to me it is very similar to the chemical imbalance model of depression: is it likely there are certain individuals who one day, simply and for no reason, experience their ability to feel joy "turning off"; or even individuals who are more genetically vulnerable to becoming depressed when faced with adverse circumstances [the way a tendency towards alcoholism can be inherited]; but these are a small number in comparison to the great majority of depression sufferers who would not be labelled "mentally ill", were it not for the systemic circumstances one is unable to escape, and consequently, cope with.)

and yet now that this conversation has reached the "mainstream", it boggles the mind that the conclusion even the most liberal cultural outlets reach all basically amount to "we need better, more accurate diagnostic tools" and a call for more nuance in psychiatry, so as to better distinguish those "real" sufferers of broken brain disease, who are then allowed to use stimulant drugs to be shaped back into the rank and file (aka, people who have a magical brain that reacts in a special, morally acceptable way to stimulant drugs as long as they are not used recreationally), from the "fakers", who need to grit their teeth through their personal failure to make themselves do shit they would not choose to do were it not for the threat of starvation, homelessness and death, and pull themselves up by their bootstraps (aka, people who have normal non-magical brains which respond to stimulant drugs in dirty, hedonistic, cheating-the-system ways).

and not, you know, the fact that "working yourself to death doing dull boring punishing work" culture might be the biggest cause for people identifying with "really struggle to work myself to death doing dull boring punishing work" syndrome, or than an institution founded on categorizing people via their inability to conform to a set of social norms that do not exist in an apolitical vacuum, might have an incentive to create a label for it.

[zecroswe]

Self replicating and self annihilating, Mage Viktor, his goals, and Jayvik.

I have a lot of thoughts when It comes to Arcane as a show and I love season 2 a lot. One thing the show that I have been thinking about is Mage!Viktor and his true goal. You may wonder what I mean with this, after all his goal seems quite clear, 'prevent the Glorious Evolution/the end of the world and in the process break the timeloop/cycle Viktor and Jayce are trapped within'. And yes that is true, It is his goal! But if It was the only purpose of his actions, wouldn't the AU timeline Ekko ends up in be enough?

After all, that timeline has no Hextech and no Hexcore. The Glorious Evolution cannot take place in this timeline, so why did that timeline not break the cycle? Well let's first establish the nature of the timeloop/cycle.

Jayce and Viktor seems to be within a unstable multidimensional bootstrap paradox loop/cycle. I say unstable because the butterfly effect is very prominent in the show, so a small variable can change things significantly.

We don't know if there is a 'Original' timeline that started the cycle, so It seems safe to assume that the cycle is a bootstrap paradox with no clear origin point, something that in turn causes Jayce and Viktors partnership and the invention of Hextech to also be a Paradox. In this cycle there also seems to exist certain events that will more or less always happen, but not necessarily in the same way, or in other words, constants and variables within the timelines.

One of those constants seem to be that Jayce will always attempt to invent Hextech.

So if the goal was just to prevent the Glorious Evolution, the simple way to achieve It would just be to stop Jayce from inventing Hextech, but Mage!Viktor doesn't do this, because he can't do It, It would go against the true purpose of actions.

After a lot of thought and discussions with my older sister sense the show ended (also being insane about Jayvik), we came to a conclusion. Mage!Viktors goal is not just to prevent the Glorious Evolution or save Runeterra.

His goal is to save Jayce

To find a timeline were Jayce survives, with or without Viktor.

The reason to stop the Glorious Evolution is not only because It is the end of humanity and a world of dreamless solitude, but because It is a world without Jayce in It.

Suddenly a lot of the hoops Mage!Viktor goes through makes a lot more sense and also why the AU timeline Ekko ends up in doesn't achieve Mage!Viktors goal.

Jayce is most likely not alive in that timeline. According to Amanda, Jayce was exiled due to Vi dying in the explosion.

And well, we know what Jayce was about to do in the Main timeline when he *Only* got expelled and his research was ordered to be disposed of. It is very likely that Jayce in the AU timeline went through with taking his own life and AU Viktor most likely wouldn't be there to interrupt the attempt.

With this in mind and other key events in the show, finding a timeline were Jayce survives is actually really difficult! It is literally more likely that Jayce dies somehow than him living a full life time, I am not kidding. The amount of fail states that exist for this is honestly insane, so let's go through them shall we?

I will go through a few key events as examples and use certain scenarios to explain the potential chain reactions. Think of It like a flowchart, but without the chart. I can't take all variables into account, but I will show of some key examples to hopefully make sense of my point.

Exhibit A: The Blizzard

This is were the timeline spaghetti starts and were there is already multiple ways Mage!Viktors plan can go wrong.

Scenario 1: Mage!Viktor doesn't interfere

In this scenario two things could most likely happen. Either A: Jayce and Ximena die in the blizzard, or B: Jayce somehow survives the blizzard but Ximena still dies.

version A: Jayce is dead, Fail-state 1

Version B: Jayce is alive, but this will most likely lead to Jayce being exiled from Piltover due to Ximena not being around to speak up during the trial, and I am concred for Jayces mental state without a support network, the butterfly effect will most likely result in Jayce being dead somehow. Fail-state 2

Scenario 2: Mage!Viktor saves Jayce and Ximena but gives Jayce a Non-Acceleration rune or no rune at all

There is only one result of this. Jayce and Ximena both survive the blizzard.

Jayce is alive, but without the Acceleration rune, Ekko won't be able to invent the Z-drive and might be trapped in a AU timeline and as a result Arcane Herald Viktor will succeed with the Glorious Evolution, killing Jayce, Fail-state 3

Exhibit B: The Robbery

There is a lot of variance here and a few fail-states, but most of the fail-states are linked to the trial.

Scenario 1: Jayce doesn't get robbed

In this scenario Jayce would still keep his research a secret and most likely would not meet Viktor because his room is no longer a crime scene. This could would either lead to A: Jayces experiments with the crystals goes wrong and he blows himself up, B: Jayce doesn't succeed and is still stuck in his research or C: Jayce still gets put on trial somehow for having illegal contraband.

Version A: Jayce is dead, Fail-state 4

Version B: Jayce has no one to ask for help with his research and according to what Jayce wrote in his journal, his grades at the academy are dropping and might be at risk of expulsion.

Considering what Jayce almost did when he got expelled....Yea i think It is safe to call this a fail-state. Fail-state 5

Version C: Jayce would be put on trial and the nature of his research would come into question. He would still probably be expelled from the academy due to the illegal nature of his research. The main diffrence is that Viktor might not be at the trial this time and not be inspired by Jayce. Meaning that Viktor would probably not seek Jayce out, meaning that Jayce probably would go through with his attempt uninterrupted. Fail-state 6

Scenario 2: Jayce gets robbed

Well we got a example of a fail-state in the show for this but it is still worth mentioning. A: One of the kids dies in the explosion or B: Jayce dies in the explosion.

Version A: As mentioned earlier, Vi or any of the other kids dying in the explosion leads to Jayce getting exiled. Fail-state 7

Version B: Jayce is dead. Fail-state 8

Exhibit C: The Hexcore

Won't go into too much detail here because It would take waaaay to long, but the Hexcore is basically a exponential fail-state here. Considering what the Hexcore can do and what Jayce does with It in the show, the Hexcore basically means that any scenario Viktor dies a potential fail-state. Because one could argue that if Viktor dies at any point when the Hexcore is invented, Jayce will likely use It to do necromancy on Viktor, putting everything on track for the Glorious Evolution, or fail to do necromancy instead do something else insane that may or may not get him killed. The Hexcore is a temporal mine of fail-states, one that cannot really be prevented fully because Hextech + Viktor = Hexcore gets invented, and as established, No Hextech = No Jayce and No Viktor = No Jayce. Fail-state 99+

It is impossible for Mage!Viktor to stop the cycle before the Hexcore due to all the fail-states mentioned above. The only chance he has is if Jayce someone stops Arcane Herald Viktor before the Glorious Evolution starts. The Hexcore needs to be properly disarmed, or else It metaphorically explodes and Jayce dies.

Conclusion:

Mage!Viktor and Viktor in general is just as codependent for Jayce as Jayce is for Viktor. Both of them are fully willing to bend all of reality for each other. They both doom and save each other over and over and over again, just to stay together. The only way this cycle breaks is if they both make It out alive or both of them die together (I think they live but I digress). Mage!Viktor probably would not predict Jayce to stay with Viktor, It was not a requirement for his goals after all, but Jayce would never abandon Viktor and Viktor would never abandon Jayce.

In a way, Jayce and Viktors bond is the anomaly, self replicating and self annihilating, the beautiful intersection between order and chaos. Viktor replicates the cycle by trying to save Jayce and Jayce keeps self annihilating through his attempts to reach Viktor, knowingly or not, by inventing Hextech. They are soulmates by choice, the universe is trying to separate them any chance It gets and yet they keep fighting just to be together, and I think that is beautiful!

TL;DR: Mage!Viktors primary motivation is to save Jayce and find a timeline where he doesn't die before or during the Glorious Evolution. This process is extremely complicated because the universe does not like Jayce Talis existing because according to the timloop/cycle paradox, his existence is a time-space anomaly. Jayce and Viktor are both insane and willing to break all laws of time and space to be with each other. Thanks for coming to my TED talk.

[codingquill]

Essentials You Need to Become a Web Developer

HTML, CSS, and JavaScript Mastery

Text Editor/Integrated Development Environment (IDE): Popular choices include Visual Studio Code, Sublime Text.

Version Control/Git: Platforms like GitHub, GitLab, and Bitbucket allow you to track changes, collaborate with others, and contribute to open-source projects.

Responsive Web Design Skills: Learn CSS frameworks like Bootstrap or Flexbox and master media queries

Understanding of Web Browsers: Familiarize yourself with browser developer tools for debugging and testing your code.

Front-End Frameworks: for example : React, Angular, or Vue.js are powerful tools for building dynamic and interactive web applications.

Back-End Development Skills: Understanding server-side programming languages (e.g., Node.js, Python, Ruby , php) and databases (e.g., MySQL, MongoDB)

Web Hosting and Deployment Knowledge: Platforms like Heroku, Vercel , Netlify, or AWS can help simplify this process.

Basic DevOps and CI/CD Understanding

Soft Skills and Problem-Solving: Effective communication, teamwork, and problem-solving skills

Confidence in Yourself: Confidence is a powerful asset. Believe in your abilities, and don't be afraid to take on challenging projects. The more you trust yourself, the more you'll be able to tackle complex coding tasks and overcome obstacles with determination.

[alpaca-clouds]

Wait! So, nobody knows there are Pirates of the Caribbean books?

So, a week ago I learned that... really nobody bloody knows about those books? Really?

I knew that Disney really had not done their part in advertising those books, only to then be very surprised to learn that the books did not sell. Like, duh, Disney, in a pre-tiktok world, you cannot just assume that people will find out about those books you publish, if you do not tell anyone about it. Unbelievable, isn't it?

But yeah, indeed. There are a couple of pirates of the Caribbean books. Now mind you, most of those books - or rather: all but one - are "young reader" books, so they are not particularly challenging in terms of language, or story. They have been released under Disney Press and mostly have been marketed through Scholastic back in the day. (As such, it will not surprise you to learn: None of these books ever was translated into any non-English language.)

Only one book I would actually call GOOD. The one that was not targeted at kids. However, I will say: I had fun with all of the books back in the day. They were fun books, that often did immitate the voice of the characters rather well, and gave some nice interesting background to the universe as a whole. So... Let me talk about the books a bit.

The Jack Sparrow Series

The Jack Sparrow series is the longest series among the Pirates of the Caribbean books, that basically go into Jack's life as a teenager. Long story short: Growing up as Teague's son, he kinda rebels against his father a lot. Thus, he runs away as a young teen and finds his own pirate crew. Most notably among them of course a certain Bootstraps Bill.

There are a couple of other characters in this. We see for example the young Annamaria, and some other background characters from the movie as crewmates. We also see his first meeting with both Norrington and Gibbs in those books.

Additionally these books (again, this is a fairly long series) go a lot furhter into the Nahua gods and how they cursed Cortez, as Cortez's ghost is a recurring villain in those books. And yes, this quite clearly says: Jack knew the gold was cursed. He knew from the beginning, but it is one of those common themes: Nobody ever listens to good old Jack.

It should be noted: These are books for fairly young readers. Meaning: The prose is fairly simple as it is aimed at a very young reading level. Meaning, too, that the books are fairly short. For the books of this series I usually needed about two to three hours per book to read it from beginning to end. I would guess most of these books are about 30-40k in length.

Now, compared to the other books, these apparently did not sell that bad. I would argue that this mainly is because even if the kids who found those books at Scholastic did not need to be very invested in the franchise to read those books. They were fairly nice child friendly Pirate adventures.

The books are named:

The Coming Storm

The Siren Song

The Pirates Chase

The Sword of Cortez

The Age of Bronze

Silver

City of Gold

The Timekeeper

Dance of the Hours

Sins of the Father

Poseidon's Peak

Bold New Horizons

The Tale of Billy Turner and other Stories (anthology of the side characters of the series and what they do after the end of the series.)

Now, the books are technically out of print by now. Though I think these are fairly available in libraries still - and go for fair prizes on used book portals. So these are probably the easiest books from this list to get.

The Price of Freedom

Now, chronologically the next books that came out for Pirates of the Caribbean, is also the one actual adult novel. The Price of Freedom. If you wonder where you know the name of the author from: A.C. Crispin is fairly known for her writing of extended universe material. Most notably she has written the Spock series for Star Trek and the Han Solo trilogy for the Star Wars books, though I guess those are among the "Legends" now.

This is actually written as a proper novel - and a long novel at this. The book has more than 600 pages.

This story starts out with Jack Sparrow having joined the EITC. Having worked for them for a couple of years now, he is by now the First Mate on the ship The Wicked Wench. When the ship gets attacked by pirates, the current Captain suffers a heart attack and dies, making Jack finish the trading route on his own. Eventually he makes port in Africa, where the current overseer of the EITC hears of this: Cuttler Beckett. He invites Jack to his mansion, realizing the two of them have much in common. Most notably, they both believe in the magical things out at sea - and that there is indeed a magical island somewhere out there.

Now, Cuttler Beckett has two slaves working on his estate, that he suspects of stemming from that island, and he has a plan: If Jack saved those slaves, they might be willing to tell Jack about that magical place - and if Beckett then is able to find the island, he could not only proof his family, that he is not insane, but also gain the Lord title, he has been trying to get for so many years.

As I said: This book is actually really good. Like, sure, some things in it have not aged perfectly, I generally have to say it still aged fairly well. Most notably for a book that came out in 2011 is that the main relationship in this book is a polyamorous relationship between Jack and two non-white women.

(It should be noted: It is fairly clear in the books that Jack is mixed race and at the very least quarter-Black. Think of that what you will. This is not really white-washing of a character, given that indeed the authors of the screenplay wrote him as white - but books then gave his mother African ancestry.)

Sadly, nobody fucking knows that this book exists, because Disney has not marketed this back when it came out AT ALL. This book's release was so underadvertized (even though it released basically at the same time as the 4th movie), that several book logistics companies had not stocked this at all. So, obviously this book did not sell at all, and never got a second print, making it expensive as fuck. However, you can borrow it in several libraries still.

Due to the bad sales and the fact that Crispin was diagnosed with cancer not long after the book came out and died of it, we sadly never got a sequel to this book, which means that we also do not know how the story of certain characters end.

The Legends of the Breathren Court

Rob Kidd, who wrote the young Jack Sparrow books, was also hired to write another series of books that were once more aimed at young readers.

The plot is basically like this: Jack had gotten himself a curse - which is bad. But there are even worse news: He needs the help of the other pirate lords to safe himself. The only good news: He has the Pearl now, the fastest ship in the Caribbean, thanks due some minor magical upgrades. But it is not going to be easy to convince the other pirate lords to help him.

Now, I should say: This series sold by far the worst. I would argue the main issue is, that these are kids books, but take place when Jack is in his 30s. While the Jack Sparrow books could be easily understood by kids, who had nearly no idea about the plot of the movies, you do need to understand the movies for this series rather well. So yeah. The book series was cancelled halfway through, though Robb Kidd did those fans of the series a solid, by convincing Disney to allow him to at least provide the last few books as epubs on his website. :)

Still, the series was cut down due to the cancellation. So the ending is a bit... chaotic.

The series is made up of the following books:

The Caribbean

Rising in the East

The Turning Tide

Wild Waters

Day of the Shadow

These books are usually available easily online. Not to buy, but, you know... Through other means.

Some thoughts in the end

I am honestly kinda sad, that the entire thing with those books never went anywhere. Disney did want at some point to get an extended Universe going for Pirates of the Caribbean, with more lore and everything. Back in the day there was also a game in development, that was supposed to be a AAA single player experience - but basically they cancelled it pretty much last minute. :/ And it is kinda sad.

I do think that this franchise could have been very interesting - if Disney did not rely too much on Jack Sparrow as a character. Now outside of Depp being a misogynist pig who needs, but refuses therapy, I do think that generally speaking the franchise would have been stronger, if they did not construct everything around this one character. Because fun fact: We do not have a whole lot of seafaring fantasy stuff out there and the worldbuilding in those books is really super interesting.

Some part of me wants to write a sequel to Price of Freedom - but I doubt that anyone is ever gonna read that, based that nobody knows the book xD

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Hi, odd question I’m about to ask you. But with Skully did we technically make a time paradox? For example in Minecraft there was this theory that the player went back in time and started everything and became their own great great(a lot of greats) grandparents. So considering the fact that the TWST characters was the reason that Skully became the King Of Halloween and created the Halloween that the TWST characters know to day. Sorry if this is confusing it’s just the only way I know how to explain this.

Yup, I believe the specific term is “bootstrap paradox”. This is when an event makes itself to happen, thus creating a loop of causality.

The NRC characters mention the importance of Halloween in their world, as well as all of their fun traditions. Then they share these ideas with Skully (who was sucked in from his own time period hundreds of years ago) within the book. After leaving the book, their memories of the events within were erased but everyone is still left with a faint feeling resulting from those experiences. It’s based on that vague feeling that Skully is inspired to share the jubilant version of Halloween the NRC boys shared with him all over the world. This made Halloween the phenomenon it is today, and Skully the historical figure in Twisted Wonderland responsible for it. The Nightmare Suit he wears in the real world is even a design he recreated based on the memory of a ��dream” he had.

Halloween in the real world continues to be a huge thing… but if Skully was the one who spread Halloween around (it existed in his hometown already but was quite niche beyond his home) then that means he must have already been inspired… meaning he already encountered the NRC students… meaning Halloween is already a big deal… etc. Thus the event causes itself to happen!

[divinector]

Our Service Section Design Bootstrap

[kaysshifting]

no one, even the most experienced shifters, will ever have all the answers

so stop looking for all the answers

now, please don’t take this in a negative way, because it’s not at all

i think a lot of people are very left-brained when it comes to shifting, because.. why wouldn’t you be? shifting to another reality is something that we grew up seeing only in fiction (my little pony, narnia, alice in wonderland, peter pan, etc.. seriously, it’s a lot), also meaning that it’s something you think you aren’t able to achieve or have, because we are raised to “suck it up”, “pull yourself up by the bootstraps”, “deal with it” and so on, so it’s understandably hard to believe that you in fact can have everything you want, whenever you want. so, in turn, they feel the need to question everything about it

i’ll use an example i saw a while ago on tiktok i believe, and i don’t remember the creator so please let me know if you know who im talking about. think about shifting as driving a car, so i’ll use myself with this scenario

when i get in my car, i don’t know every mechanism in the car that makes it work. i just know that it works. i know how to drive, and i know how to get to my destination, but im not worried about the actual car itself, because i know it works.

does this make sense?

you don’t need to know every single thing about shifting to shift

i literally cannot repeat this enough. we do things every single day that we don’t know the inner mechanisms of, yet we still do it because we know. it. works.

stop worrying about all the little details and go SHIFT.

trust in yourself. trust in your consciousness. trust in the universe.

[nikethestatue]

The problem that I have around the Tamlin narrative in general is that I feel like people who are obsessed with him and view him as a victim don't really understand SJM's world building. Especially when it comes to High Lords and what they are.

i'll preface this by saying that I am not a Tamlin hater. I think he is somewhat of a confused dude, but I feel like he is genuine, if unforgiving.

But let's examine what High Lords are in plain terms.

These are currently the 7 richest people in the world:

Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Larry Ellison, Warren Buffett, Bernard Arnault, Larry Page/Sergey Brin

That's what the Seven High Lords are in terms of wealth and influence. They essentially hold the wealth of Prythian in their hands.

Now, add incomparable magical abilities, and powers which can control the elements (fire, water, darkness, air, earth, mind control, etc.) weather, sustain entire courts, mist entire armies, transform into beasts and when it comes to Rhys, actually heal the Cauldron (though dying in the process). When they put their minds together they can bring people back from the dead.

Outside of the mega ultra super duper powerful daddy that is Rhysie, all other HLs are pretty much evenly matched. What Tamlin has which for example Tarquin doesn't, and even Helion, is actual experience. He's been a High Lord for at least a couple of hundred years. He also wasn't Under the Mountain for 50 years. He still had his powers, and though it was a messy situation, he was given an option to find an out from this predicament.

So Tamlin, in fact, is an ultra powerful High Lord, chosen by the Power, imbued with immense abilities, and who possesses natural magic, which allows him to actually maintain his Court. His Court literally exists because of him and his power.

Which brings me to my first point.

Feyre destroyed Spring!!!! OMG. That thoughtless bitch!

The Court cannot be destroyed. Especially not by Feyre. Maybe by the Cauldron. I am not even sure that a Court could be taken over by another HL, because if it's a seasonal Court, the other HL would have to have the power to sustain it as such. So I am not sure how Beron, for example, could take over Spring. Because Spring is tied to Tamlin's power.

Unless the Power abandons a High Lord, he is always a High Lord. So Tamlin is fully empowered and is a High Lord just like Thesan or Beron.

Rhys is responsible for the downfall of Spring! He treats Tamlin terribly!

Rhys, is general, is not obligated to treat Tamlin with any special deference. They have a painful and violent history together, but Rhys was the one who took Tamlin under his wing back in their youth, and he also maintains that Tamlin should be in charge of Spring. He doesn't have to like him. But Rhys didn't go to the King of Hybern demanding that he find a way to eliminate Tamlin. Tamlin went to the King to have him break the Feysand bond.

Tamlin needs a redemption arc!

No he doesn't. Tamlin was redeemed in ACOWAR when he saved Feyre during the Hybern rescue and then when he helped bring Rhys back from the dead.

Tamlin has had his arc.

What Tamlin needs is a responsibility arc. Where he picks himself up by his bootstraps and becomes that High Lord that he is supposed to be, not for himself, but for his people. His girlfriend leaving him for another man is not reason enough to completely go to pieces. He needs to move on and find the will to change his life and his behavior.

For the record, Elain isn't the gal to make him do this. It's on him. It's not on her to stroll into Spring, make a flower crown and make it all better for him. That's not any woman's responsibility.

Tamlin is not the victim of people or circumstances. Everyone in Prythian suffered the same as he. He is currently the victim of his choices.

The only redemption arc that he has is to redeem himself.

[ohnoitstbskyen]

I heard a raw line from Guilllermo Del Toro the other day about monsters being the perfect way to express human failure:

“…monsters, I believe, are patron saints of our blissful imperfection, and they allow and embody the possibility of failing.”

And i was wondering your take on this quote in relation to things like vampire and werewolf and other semi-monster subtexts. “Monstrous” humans that are ironically allowed to act more human more often than… humans. I just find the attempt to make an outlet for imperfection while still at large criticizing it fascinating.

I mean, yeah, there's a long history of interpreting monsters through queer, anti-colonial, feminist and other Outsider lenses for exactly those reasons. The monster is the Other who is vilified by the in-group, which represents all that the in-group hates. The monster must, by its nature, fail to live up to the standards and expectations of the in-group, which is why it must be destroyed. But that also means the monster is free from the standards and expectations of the in-group, including oppressive and bigoted ones.

So, as an example, if you're queer, and rhetorically treated as inhuman and monstrous and diseased anyway, or eugenically classified as a deviant mutation or sub-derivation of "real" people, there is real appeal and a real sense of resistance in claiming monsterhood, in embracing it and glorying in it.

In part, that's what the rallying cry "we're here, we're queer, get used to it!" meant and still means. It is a reclaiming of monsterhood as a source of strength and community and pride, rather than shame. Slurs are used to Other queer people, to set them apart from "real" people and mark them out as a monstrous deviation from the virtuous norm - slurs are used to call us monsters. And thus a lot of queer people find a lot of power and freedom in reclaiming them, in turning their Othering into a flag to rally around.

And I think that's still a big part of the appeal of the monster, honestly, that freedom from being what someone else thinks you ought to be.

If you're a monster, you don't have to have the perfect body, you don't have to suppress your lust or your love. You don't have to shave your body hair or dress correctly for your assigned gender, or have a white picket fence house with a spouse and 2.3 children. You don't have to sit primly at the dinner table, you don't have to repress your emotions, you don't have to hate the foreigner or despise the gays or fear the trans agenda. You don't have to have a small, straight nose or perfect cheekbones, you don't have to wait to fuck until you're married, or pretend you want to fuck at all. You don't have to want to get rich or be a CEO, you don't have to pull yourself up by your bootstraps or be on your grindset, or cheer when the cops clear out a homeless camp.

To be a monster is to be free from the inhumanity that is forced on us by white supremacy, by fatphobia, by heteronormativity, by imperialism, and by the interests of capital. To be a monster is to be human in all the ways that are inconvenient to oppression.

... but I went off on a tangent there a little bit - vampires and werewolves, right. I have no theoretical or academic basis for any of this, so this is entirely a personal hot take, but I think vampires are perhaps a bit more about "passing" as a fantasy. Not necessarily in a gender sense, but the ability to keep your true nature undetected by the "normal" folk, while the secret things that make you different also make you dangerous and powerful. Surviving by stealing sustenance from a world that hates you, on terms that are entirely yours to dictate. "I will survive even if it kills you," that kind of vibe.

Werewolves, on the other hand, feel more like a defiant, angry embrace of the monstrous. Transforming into something vast and powerful and furious, growing out of your skin, out of your form, out of your boundaries; howling your nature to the moon and mauling any motherfucker who has a problem with it. Giving in to all the beastly unnatural urges, and diving into the horrible monstrous wants and desires that boil inside you (which, remember, include things like Not Wanting To Fuck or Wanting To Hold A Girl's Hand In A Lesbian Sort Of Way). Less the "I outfoxed your social game and drank you dry" slick vampire power fantasy and more the "call me a slur one more time and I'm going to wear your entrails like a fucking scarf" power fantasy.

Again, that's just personal hot takes, everyone's understanding of the monstrous in relation to themselves is different. I've seen a number of genderfluid and nb people use monstrousness as a way to defy occupying a shape that can be gendered for example.

[codingflicks]

Bootstrap slider with Text Animation

[all-pacas]

list of chase's political/social opinions:

fat people are gross/lazy

death penalty is bad

murder is wrong, soldiers do not get a pass

if society promotes teenagers as sex objects, it's not wrong to talk about them as such

not a huge fan of illegal immigration because it took him so long to get a green card, but also not a fan of the right-wing politician they're treating who has those views, so ???

if a closeted gay man wants to stay in a miserable marriage, what's the problem

"if you're a burden on others you should kill yourself" which is super ablest, but he also makes it very, very clear he's talking about his abusive mother and how he wishes she had died quickly instead of him being forced to care for her and his sister when he was still a child! like, it's a fucked up thing to say, but in the conversation it's more specific than generalized, you know?

euthanasia is fine

list of foreman's political/social opinions:

poor people are scammers/lazy/take advantage of the system

poor people are drug addicts

he makes several republican-leaning jokes circa 2004 - he makes a john kerry joke at cameron in one episode and a france joke in another; these were both common right-ish wing jokes of the time

what i am saying is he is such a classic small r republican. pull yourself up by your bootstraps etc etc.

death penalty is fine

racism is bad

euthanasia is wrong

being gay is fine, not using protection and getting HIV is kind of your own fault tho

list of cameron's political/social opinions:

she personally "could never" get an abortion, but we don't know if she is pro-life in general or it's just a personal thing of hers.

"no one" wants an autistic/disabled child. there's also several examples of her trying to white knight house, drugging or lying to (fat, disabled) patients "for their own good", she's lowkey a bit ableist!

death penalty is wrong.

euthanasia is wrong (although she might come around).

killing evil people is okay; killing for the "greater good" is fine (i don't actually think this is hypocritical related to the above bullet points! she differentiates between societal good and personal evil.)

cheating -- whether an affair or to get ahead -- is always wrong

[commodorez]

What was the purpose of the panels of blinking lights on those big mid-century computers? Were they showing calculations in progress?

Excellent question, this is one of my favorite subjects! Blinkenlights serve a number of functions. Hollywood tended to use just the lights to make it look like a computer was busy doing something, but real computers had more than just lights on their front panel. Let's walk through a few examples of use cases with photos of computers I've seen over the years at museums and vintage computer festivals:

Some front panels were built to be used for diagnostics. Computers like these were primitive enough that they required constant care and debugging to do their jobs, especially the early vacuum tube machines (everything pictured here is transistorized). You could tell what peripherals were being used, but also check the status of registers, carry flags, status flags, data, various buses, etc. It was also a way to see if a program had "gone off into the weeds" and started doing things that were irregular, possibly due to a software bug, or a problem with the hardware.

On many of these machines, you can enter programs directly into the main memory using the front panel, but it's an incredibly tedious process -- something to be avoided if possible. Consider it a last fallback.

Other times, it's a starting point, which we call "bootstrapping" (this eventually evolved into the term "booting"). You aren't likely to program everything on such a limited interface, but you are more likely to enter in a small program that can tell the computer how to run a more complex peripheral, like a paper tape or punch card reader, or maybe some type of magnetic storage device. Once you can get a program loading off of a larger permanent storage device, you can load up software to interface with a terminal of some kind which is much easier.

Eventually, the microprocessor made home computers a possibility, but many were only equipped with a front panel out of the box. You would have to add in a serial card, more RAM, possibly some ROMs, and either a teletype or glass terminal in order to get a more sophisticated and intuitive interface from the computer, capable of programming in a higher level language. Some were considered more like trainers, or hobbyist devices, and simply lacked that ability, meaning all you got was a front panel with switches and lights.

I made my own front panel to see what the experience was all about:

Then everything changed in 1977, with the introduction of these three machines: the TRS-80 Model I, the Commodore PET 2001, and the Apple II. They were what you might call "appliance computers" and they had no need for a front panel.

Hopefully that answered your question!

[arim-viola]

I recently finished watching Arcane. Fair warning, there are MAJOR spoilers ahead. PLEASE GO WATCH THE SHOW IF YOU HAVEN’T!!!!

This series has one of the most beautifully complex and heartbreakingly human examples of disability representation that I’ve ever seen. It is groundbreaking. There are multiple characters with disabilities who I could do a deep dive on, but today I’ll be mainly talking about Viktor.

For personal context, the first season of Arcane came out in November 2021. It was one of the most difficult years for me medically. I almost lost the rest of my vision due to a glaucoma pressure spike, and I started experiencing long term chronic pain, which was later diagnosed as fibromyalgia.

Although we have different disabilities, watching Viktor’s story unfold was very emotionally cathartic for me and I deeply resonate with his character.

Viktor is a character with multiple disabilities including a physical disability that impacts his ability to walk and later on in the series he develops a terminal illness. He uses multiple aids including a cane, an ergonomic axillary crutch, a brace on his right leg, and a back brace. Part of me speculates that he had a condition such as degenerative disc disease that impacted his spine, but that’s one of my own personal head-canons.

Due to his own personal life experience, he made it his mission to help others using science. He devoted his life to his research on the Hexcore. He knew that his time on this earth was finite, and he did not want to waste a single moment. After his diagnosis with his illness, he became consumed by this idea of glorious evolution, to push beyond his humanity through the use of magic and science. And this can be problematic when it steps into the territory of eugenics, as seen in some timelines in the series.

But there is another perspective I’d like to share. At the beginning of the series Viktor states:

“Nobody's ever believed in me. A poor cripple from the undercity. I was an outsider the moment I stepped foot in Piltover. I didn't have the benefits of a patron or a name. I simply believed in myself, which is why I’m here, because I think you're on to something. I want to help you complete your research."

He had to “pull himself by his bootstraps” to build a life for himself in Piltover. He had to evolve beyond his beginnings. This is an ideology that society instills into folks with disabilities. The idea is always centered around overcoming your disability. You are mainly seen from the framework of resilience, or pity. You exist despite your flaws. Your disability is not seen as something that’s an inherent part of your humaneness, but rather a situation to overcome. This framework makes each day a constant battle between the body, the mind, and the spirit.

Viktor becomes so consumed by the idea of progress and evolution that he completely rejects his humanity. He states:

“Humanity, our very essence, is inescapable. Our emotions, rage, compassion, hate. Two sides of the same coin, intractably bound. That which inspires us to our greatest good is also the cause of our greatest evil!"

He has this character shift where he believes that emotions will only lead to suffering. And he then converts others to his cause. He feels he is helping them but the truth is he is erasing their humanity.

But Jayce Talis, his lab partner, who has been with him since the very beginning, said one of the most beautiful lines that of dialogue I’ve ever heard in the last act of the series. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. He said:

“You've always wanted to cure what you thought were weaknesses. Your leg. Your disease. But you were never broken, Viktor. There is beauty in imperfections. They made you who you are, an inseparable piece of everything... I admired about you."

I cried when I first watched this scene. And I still do every time I hear it. I realized that was something I really needed to hear, and that no one had ever told me that. Viktor and Jayce’s bond is something that's incredibly special, and everyone deserves to be seen in that way. Disability is a part of the human experience, but society doesn't see it that way. When you are disabled or gain a disability, society sees you as inherently broken. And whether you recognize it or not, you internalize that about yourself. That’s where ableism comes from.

Jayce also gains a disability later in the series which gives him a unique perspective on part of Viktor’s experience. And those lines that he shares with us, he shows us that he cares about Viktor’s inherent humanity. He understands that his disabilities are an inherent, inseparable part of who he is. And that they don’t make him any less of a human being. And neither do his emotions. Everyone deserves someone in their life who will love them that much.

Another thing that I thought was beautiful is that they never tried to erase Viktor’s disability. First they made his cane not look medical, it has so much personality as well as functionality. And throughout the series his cane evolves into a magical staff. When he was revived by the arcane his body did not feel in the same way as it did before because now it was made from a combination of metal and flesh. His leg and back brace became fused to him. And Jayce had to build his brace out of his hammer. Viktor didn’t fall into any of the usual stereotypes for characters with disabilities. His arc and Jayce’s arc were incredibly innovative.

I thought the end was very beautiful. It’s definitely a tear jerker. Part of me hopes they were transported some place where they can live happily ever after doing science and helping people.

Anyways, I could talk about them for ages. I’ll likely write more about them soon, but I’d love to hear your thoughts on the series as well! What did you think? Do you have a favorite character?