#but it’s on a pretty small level. which is why community and collaboration are so important!

[blueish-bird]

writing a Part 1 CSM fic where everyone’s just hanging out, but I can’t work on it for too long or it makes me sad and lonely and a little hopeless because. at least they have each other and an apartment/home and know how to make food lmao.

[burst-of-iridescent]

in relation to the ask you got about zutara loosing popularity—i say this as someone who’s been a zk stan for almost ten years now, but the ship was never that popular outside of fandom culture you can find on tumblr, twitter, old forums, fanfic sites, etc. i joined an atla facebook group some years ago and had to leave because of the totally unwarranted hatred people had for zutara. honesty, i think some people underestimate the huge impact atla had and still has on non-fandom people. everyone loves it. the ‘normie’ fanbase is made up for a solid % of cishet men who are indeed misogynistic and homophobic, and not because they don’t ship zutara so they must be bad. i mean, have you seen all the hatred characters like katara and korra get for simply being humans with flaws? that’s mostly cishet men talking. zukka also is massively popular on twitter, tumblr and ao3, and that is because this specific fandom culture is known for not really caring about canon—yet i read some nasty stuff about them. i personally am not a fan of the ship but certainly not because they’re gay. but a lot of ‘normie’ atla stan’s are dudebros who can’t stomach the fact that a beloved male character of theirs can be gay.

fandoms might seem huge from the inside, but it’s a small group as opposed to the many people that consume a piece of media and then just… move on. that’s the reality with every big non-canon ship, not only zk. spend a day in the hp fandom and you may end up thinking everyone is crazy about drarry, dramione and wolfstar—but casual watchers don’t care about any of those, and though i don’t know the numbers, youtube is a huge platform, so i think it’s safe to assume that casual watchers outnumber fandom people.

yep, i agree. i've only been in zutara fandom since early 2021, but having been in a variety of different fandoms since 2013, there is a really major difference between how fandom works and general audience works for the same media property. it's just a natural consequence of the significant disparity in interest and passion.

and like you said, it's also extremely difficult for zutara fandom to exist in fandom spaces outside of tumblr. i've never been on facebook, but that sounds like an awful experience, and sadly unsurprising. instagram, tiktok and reddit in particular are just horribly toxic cesspits that love to hate on zutara and zutara shippers at any opportunity, and though i'm not on twitter, i've seen enough of the drama that goes down there to know it's probably not much better. tumblr is pretty much the safest space for zk fandom (which is saying a lot, given the levels of hate and harassment here alone) so obviously polls conducted on sites with a low presence of zk fandom are going to be skewed against zutara.

that's why i don't really care how well we do in polls or how popular we are. i would ship zutara even if it was just me, myself and i against the world lmao. having this wonderful community that is constantly creating and collaborating and enjoying the ship together is just a lovely bonus.

[hopeshoodie]

Ok so in light of the Independent article (see my tag #fusebox layoffs for more info), I’ve been trying to piece together the sequence of events that lead to FB Going to Shit™. 

All of the below is based on articles, tweets from the staff, and dates from screenshots. Especially with the Matchmaker stuff, I’m using the dates I personally accessed the stories- that might not be accurate to when they were actually released to an international audience, just when my phone updated the app. In hindsight, I’m not a great person to do this because I have a shit memory and don’t keep receipts, so if you have any corrections PLEASE lmk either in the dms or replies. 

In sum, the timeline appears to be:

1. Key players left Fusebox in early 2020. 

The one that people are probably most familiar with is David Gallopim, one of the artists who helped define the S2’s distinct style, leaving sometime before March 2020. He seemed to indicate that there was conflict over the new art style of S3, and released assets he’d designed of Harry in his own style (notably way prettier than Harry looks in-game). 

But probably more important to the direction of the company, Michael Othen, one of the co-founders and former CEO, left in July of 2020 (I had thought it was earlier in the year but according to LinkedIn it was July). It’s much more unclear why he left, but it’s notable because he was a huge force in making the game inclusive of LGBTQ characters. 

So all in all, not a great sign when employees who had a huge hand in creating the content and direction of a game that defined its success jump ship. Especially after the game was seemingly hitting its stride, with the host of Love Island (the TV show) doing a sponsored Let’s Play of S3 and projects in the works like Boat Party and CMM.

2. It seems like Fusebox‘s CEO/executives hired new management, either in 2020 or early 2021. Employees complain that the executives don’t understand what it takes to make a game and are pulling the studio in the wrong direction. It’s unclear if the newly hired execs had experience. 

Wil Stephens, the CEO/founder, has been with FB since its inception but also appears to have only founded game distribution ventures and not worked in any development or employment capacity. If that’s the case, maybe the complaints about lack of experience/knowledge about the mechanics of making games work are about him. If not, then some of the newly hired execs would likely be to blame. 

Paul Virapen, COO, was brought on in November of 2020. He’s worked with Disney’s gaming division, Big Pixel studios, Wooga. The quality of that experience is dubious since he headed up the ‘let’s make apps for Apple watches, it’ll be the next big thing’ department… Lol. Notably also, all of his roles had been in the executive/managerial realm, not the development teams, so the complains might have been about him. THIS IS SPECULATION, but I’m willing to bet that Virapen was a if not THE driving force in switching Fusebox’s focus entirely to matchmaker. All the studios he’s worked with have primarily produced and promoted Match 3 games, and he has a background working with big studios that produce games for large international audiences, not small studios making narrative games for limited audiences.

A new Manager of Finances, Ruth Erskine, was brought on in December of 2020

Rob Goddard, a new producer, was brought in January of 2021

Several key operations positions were filled by existing employees being promoted to management- 2 as far as I can tell. But as a whole it seems like December 2020 was a huge shift in leadership for the upper management while a lot of the other teams expanded but kept their old players as well.

3. At some point in late 2020- mid 2021, the executive team made the decision to switch LITG’s focus from a narrative pass-based game to a Match 3 incorporating romance narrative cut scenes. In early 2021, Fusebox teased more content to come while releasing S3 (seemingly referring to Matchmaker and not S4). In the interim between S3 endings and Boat Party’s release they put out an interview confirming the new game will be Match 3 but did seem to indicate that the plan at that time was for Matchmaker to be a side project with a different development team and not replace the main game. Notably, the LITG writers and artists were reassured that their roles will continue to exist (according to the independent article) as they’re working on S4.

3. In September of 2020, Matchmaker became briefly available in the US. That’s when I first downloaded it, at least. It would be added/removed from the google play store multiple times before having a unilateral release in July of 2021. 

Throughout 2020, Matchmaker is available to Asian audiences solely with LITG S1 getting rolled out in incremental updates. 

Eventually, Beanie Quinn is released (March 2021)

LA Noir is released (May 2021)

Seduction Games is released (late May or June 2021- I got the update and played it June 3rd, but hadn’t opened the app for a month or so. It might have come out before then, which is unfortunate for this timeline since it’s so inextricably linked to the open letter and layoff dates)

LITG S2 is released (only like 20 levels of it) the same month- June 19th for me. Notably, all of these stories are only released to an international audience, with the UK and USA still not having access to the app.

4. At the same time, Fusebox’s internal affairs are pretty quiet from 2020-2021, at least on social media. 

S3 comes out in 2020, Boat Party comes out later in the year and finishes in 2021. Post S3 in October of 2021, a survey goes out gauging player interest in new art styles and representation, which was pretty in keeping with past actions and seemed promising for S4. 

Boat Party features a promising cross promotion implementing irl brands into the game. It’s unclear if enough money was made from this on FB or the sponsor’s end to make that strategy viable, but that might’ve impacted management’s outlook for the profitability of LITG.  

Fusebox teases more content for the summer on Instagram, and then follows up and confirms it’ll be a proper season.

5. More key players leave in early 2021

Ed Sibley is still listed as Narrative Direction on LinkedIn, but he’s not credited as a writer on Season 4 (he was on 3,2,and 1) and started work with NetSpeak games in May of 2021, so we can assume he left around then or at least transitioned away from Fusebox then.

Fred Francis, another writer who had been on the team since S1, turns in his resignation ‘weeks’ before the layoffs were announced in late June. So we can assume he made his exit sometime early June or late May.

6. Prior to the release of Seduction games in May/June, staff expressed concern about the biphobia in Seduction Games. No sources have given a specific time when this took place. They were reassured that the problem would be corrected prior to release, but then the story was released as is to an international audience in June. The article released by the Independent is unclear- there might have been discussion prior to the open letter where staff expressed concerns and then were reassured before the game going live. OR the open letter might have been the first expression of concern by the staff. I tend to think the former, and the open letter was a response to Matchmaker going live with Seduction Games anyways, but I have no proof for that. On May 24th, 31 employees sent an open letter of concern regarding the problematic content in Matchmaker. This letter isn’t public, so we don’t know the scope of the employees' concerns or who the employees were.

7. To resolve the situation, a meeting between the staff and at least the COO (likely more than just him though) was held sometime after May 24th. Allegedly, Virapen was disrespectful to the employees who had questions, refused to answer, and ended the meeting early before any resolution was had by closing his laptop and leaving the room. At least 4 HR complaints were made in the wake of that meeting, we do not know the nature of those complaints. 

8. Some time mid-July (maybe July 26th? A writer tweeted about their job ending soon on that date), employees were made aware that the LITG app would move into ‘sunset mode’. It’s unclear what was communicated, but it seems as though S4 will be heavily delayed or cancelled altogether and no future seasons would be made. Writers begin to post about looking for work on Twitter

9. June 30th- The majority of Fusebox writing staff announce on twitter they’re out of work. In addition to the entire writing staff, unity engineers and producers are also let go.

10. July 5th - Fusebox executives respond to an article by MCVUK with a statement asserting they were “consulting with [their] employees on a proposed change to its business model” that would focus on producing Matchmaker content. They also expounded that the move was to secure “cash injections and and continued support from respected investors across the media and gaming industry”

11. July 6th- Fusebox announces that S4 will be delayed from the summer release date and that there is no fixed release date. 

12. August 2nd- three jobs are posted to Fusebox’s careers page on their website, one being Head of Narrative Content. In the job listing, it specifies that they’ll be maintaining existing properties as well as new ones, and that because of the co-development model (re:fusebox outsourcing Matchmaker to another studio) the new Narrative Lead must collaborate with external content creators.

Hopefully posting this timeline gives players a better understanding of how radically Fusebox has changed in the course of 2021 (and how royally they screwed over the people who made LITG what it is). Again, please let me know if you have receipts showing dates are different or things to add. 

[sasquapossum]

In thirty-plus years of working in tech and participating in tech communities (both online and off) I’ve noticed that different specialties seem to have their own distinct and persistent personalities.

Security/crypto folks have consistently been the worst kinds of people. I don’t mean morally, though I could write a separate post about how that does apply to “crypto” as that term has been hijacked by the blockchain crowd. I mean they’re just arrogant, condescending, trollish, etc.

Programming-language types tend to run second, though there are more exceptions. Folks who work on compilers or libraries for “modern” or “high level” languages tend to be bad, while folks who work on interpreted “scripting” languages are often decent.

HPC and embedded folks are generally pretty chill, which is interesting because many of them would be well within their rights to look down their noses at the rest of us. What they do is often both difficult and important. There’s a bit of an old-school hard-ass vibe to many on the embedded side, but they’re not obnoxious.

Database folks are all over the map, as are front-end folks.

Operating system folks (including storage) tend toward the obnoxious side - strongly so among those who work on the Linux kernel.

Network folks tend to be nice enough, but kind of myopic. I’ve met many who don’t even seem to realize that interesting and complicated things happen to data when it’s not in flight. They see all of the - admittedly considerable - complexity in their own world and think understanding it makes them masters of everything. Not so.

I haven’t known a lot of game developers, but the general impression I get is that there are somewhat more devils than angels.

Obviously exceptions abound, as do “Jekyll and Hyde” code-switchers. I’ve known some very cool security and compiler folks. I’ve known HPC folks who were true assholes. One fairly prominent filesystem developer was generous and funny and all-around cool 90% of the time, but I’ve also seen him make some of the most sexist and personally demeaning (not to me) comments of anyone I’ve ever met in tech.

My point here is not just to stereotype or complain but to help people choose their path in tech. There are interesting technical problems in every specialty. Really. It’s often the “vibe” of those around you that will affect your happiness. It’s why I quite deliberately got out of doing kernel stuff around the time that Linux became ascendant. Along with big company vs. small company, tech itself vs. the tech side of some other business, bleeding edge vs. established, private vs. public vs. academic, folks should consider whether the community of practice in each specialty is a good fit for them. If you’re aggressive and competitive and comfortable with a high level of “political incorrectness” try security or kernel work. If you’re more curious and collaborative, maybe try HPC or AI. If you’re extremely diligent, maybe even obsessive, I actively want you to consider embedded systems because I want all of my devices (including my car) to work. As I said, these “personalities” seem quite persistent. Over literal decades, such differences really can affect your happiness, passion, longevity, and success.

[bytheangell]

If you are still taking prompts, what would you think about writing something(s) based off of this, either/both, the Professor/TA, or the Writer/Editor?

Dedication (modern AU, Herongraystairs, check the link in the ask for full writer/editor prompt, a wonderful plot idea by @high-warlock-of-brooklyn!) (Read on AO3)

This is the first book Will and Tessa are collaborating on. They’ve written plenty of books individually and Jem’s worked with each of them in turn. But this is the first time they’ve co-authored, an experience that’s proving unique and challenging for all of them.

Being with Will and Tessa while they work on a new project is always a blessing and a curse. They’re two of the best writers of their generation and when they work on their own they’re brilliant, but when they work together - well, they’re also brilliant, but that brilliance is coupled with the occasional near-catastrophic clash of opinions and emotions.

Which is where Jem comes in.

Where Will and Tessa are so driven by passion and feelings, Jem finds it much easier to distance himself from their project (and from the writers themselves) enough to see the bigger picture and find solutions before the issues build up. Like many things about the three of them, it’s a perfect balance - they just work, better than anyone (including Will, Tessa, and Jem) ever imagined possible when they first got together.

It’d been a messy start, with Will and Jem already together but both developing serious feelings for Tessa after they met during a book event. The three of them quickly became very close. There were whispers of which of them would end up leaving, then confusion when the answer was none: instead of two of them growing closer and shutting the third out, they all seemed to adjust and adapt naturally around the three of them coexisting. They aren’t perfect, but they are perfect for each other, at least as far as Jem’s concerned.

Jem knows that what they have is special, which he reminds himself of over and over as Will and Tessa sit on opposite sides of the sofa, voices quickly elevating to nearly shouting over an issue with one of the characters Will is in charge of writing: one he’s chosen to give a pretty damning curse from a trickster faerie in this land of magic their current collaboration is set in.

“Tell him he needs to make the changes, Jem,” Tessa insists, the third time she’s repeated the demand now.

“Tell her that this plot adds depth, and without it, he’s boring,” Will counters. “Sometimes people - characters - need to be brutally honest about their own faults and issues. Sometimes people are disappointing.”

That’s how Jem can tell things are spiraling: when Will and Tessa - who have effectively communicated and collaborated on half a dozen bestsellers and who love each other more than Jem’s ever seen two people experience love - refuse to speak directly to one another. The moment they start talking around each other and at Jem instead is when he knows he has to step in and diffuse.

Usually, it’s a matter of taking a break, getting some fresh air, and coming back with clear minds. Jem normally isn’t one to pick sides, but this is different. He isn’t worried about the direction of the book… but after reading the latest draft from Will, which Will wrote while refusing to speak to either of them for a full week, he’s worried about Will. And he knows Tessa is, too.

“Perhaps a good starting point would be admitting this isn’t really about the character at all,” Jem says softly, gazing closely between Will and Tessa. Will looks a bit guilty and Tessa looks away entirely, which tells Jem that he’s right in guessing their concerns are also less plot-based.

“...what else would it be about?” Will asks defensively. But they can all sense how he’s been pushing them away lately, much like the cursed character undeserving of love he’s written in. It’s obvious that Tessa isn’t sure how to bring it up or else she would’ve already. Or maybe she already had and it hadn’t gone well.

“Tessa, would you mind making some tea?” Jem asks, waiting until she’s out of the room to turn back to Will.

“Will… you know this is about you. You barely talk to anyone for a week then come back with this character in such a self-deprecating mindset…”

“That’s ridiculous. He’s just a character,” Will says, but Jem can tell he’s entirely unconvinced of his own words.

“So if Tess came back having written Evangeline that way?” Jem counters, and there’s that look of subtle guilt, right back on Will’s face as he frowns and pieces together why Tessa’s so upset with him.

“I fucked up, didn’t I?” Will sighs.

“We’re not mad at you,” Jem’s quick to point out. “We’re just worried. It’s been a while since you tried to push us away like this, I just want to make sure you’re okay. We both do. Take it out in the writing if you want, but talk with us, too. Alright, my love?”

Jem’s tense as he waits. This has one of two options: Will relents and listens to him and they all have tea and talk this out, or Will storms out and they don’t see him again for another day or two.

Will stays. “I’m just letting the pressure get to me,” he admits. “I’m sure that’s all it is... But yeah. Okay. Tea.”

Tea, meaning ‘I’ll stay. I’ll talk. I’ll try.’ Jem leans over and places a barely-there kiss on Will’s lips before he relaxes back in his seat. Reaching out a hand that Will readily takes, Jem gives it a tight squeeze as they both wait for Tessa to return.

They talk.

In the end, the character arc stays. With a few redeeming modifications at Tessa and Jem’s entirely unbiased suggestion, of course.

---

A little over halfway through the first draft things seem to stall out. They have a progress deadline that week with the publisher and they’re cutting it close - mostly because Tessa keeps tossing everything she writes without giving Jem the chance to look it over. Recently she’s let her curiosity get the best of her, delving into research she should be allowing Jem to help with.

...and when he says ‘delving’, what he really means is stubbornly obsessing over, nitpicking bits of lore to streamline, and doing hours and hours of research for single-line references.

“When was the last time she slept? Like, an actual night of sleep?” Jem asks Will one day after a quick touch-base meeting that went… not terribly, but not particularly great, either.

“You need to get her out of here. No books. No wifi. I tried to kick her out but… well, you can imagine how well that went,” Will admits, and Jem winces in sympathy.

“The Time Out Cottage?” Jem asks, referring to a small cottage they own for unplugged getaways, where the wifi signal is nonexistent and a landline exists for emergency calls. “That means we’ll both be out of easy reach, and with that Friday deadline-”

“I can handle it,” Will cuts him off. “She’s been getting in her own way for days now, but she refuses to listen to me.”

A few minutes later Jem tentatively knocks on the door to the small study that does, in fact, look more like a makeshift research library. He nearly doesn’t see Tessa behind the small mountain of books on the floor, but he hears her pen tapping rapidly against the hardwood. No, not just rapidly - anxiously. He knows that action all too well.

“Tessa, what number is that?” he asks, the question needing no further explanation past his accusatory tone and pointed look at a coffee mug, which is next to a second coffee mug, which is next to a cup of black tea.

“Four? No, wait… what time is it?” she glances around and seems surprised by the height of the sun in the sky. “It’s afternoon already?”

Jem sighs. “It’s nearly four o’clock, Tessa, and your blood is probably about 90% caffeine. Come on, get your things, we’re taking a trip.”

Tessa looks immediately horrified. “No! I can’t, we can’t! The deadline, and I still have to streamline the fae lore between the two-”

“Will has it handled for 24 hours. That’s all we’re asking. 24 hours without research.” “Jem, you know-”

“-that you’ll be twice as productive once we’re back and you’re refreshed instead of running on fumes and fever dreams?” Jem cuts her off, his tone kind but insistent. He bends over and picks up a piece of paper. “Tessa, my love, this is nearly incoherent.”

Tessa reaches up to take the page from him and frowns. “I… okay, I can make out some of this, but I’m pretty sure that bit talks about aliens which isn’t any more reassuring. Will did say I was writing myself in circles, but I thought he was just, well, being Will, so... Yeah. Okay. Maybe I need to step back for a bit.” Tessa sighs. “The Time Out Cottage?”

“I already packed you a bag,” Jem confirms with a soft smile, leaning down to kiss the middle of her forehead before reaching out a hand to help her up off the floor.

When they return exactly 24 hours later, Tessa gets back to work and the lore practically falls into place between the two of them.

They meet the Friday deadline without a problem.

---

Jem spends his free time playing violin while Will and Tessa go through the first draft and begin to brainstorm fixes for plotholes, new minor characters to add to scenes that feel a bit lacking, and other small improvements to really round out the story and the world they’re weaving. They both claim to think clearer with his music in the background so he stays, even if he doesn’t feel particularly useful for this stage of the process until they have a single, coherent draft to hand over to him.

These are the moments Jem’s own insecurities and flaws float to the surface. The moments he watches Will and Tessa, so alike, so perfect for each other, connect on a level he isn’t privy to. He knows it’s a silly thought, that he and Will have their own things, as do he and Tessa. But sometimes he wonders if they truly need him around, or if he’s simply just become too much a part of the routine to actively get rid of.

He watches them sit next to each other with shoulders touching, hunched over a small screen, whispering back and forth. There’s a small smile on his face, one that’s wistful and tinged with hints of longing that, much to his dismay, they pick up on.

“I know that look,” Tessa says, catching Jem’s gaze and drawing Will’s attention before Jem can wipe the expression from his face. “Get over here. I think we’ve done enough work for today.”

Will is the first to move over, making room for Jem in the middle of them. After placing his violin back in its case Jem heads over to join them on the sofa, embracing the way Will and Tessa immediately crowd into his space once he’s settled, both placing a comforting kiss to his temples simultaneously before resting their heads on each of his shoulders and a placing a hand in each of his own.

They talk a bit, not about the book, but about anything and everything else, and fall asleep there, still entwined together.

---

It’s rare for any part of one of their books to be a surprise to Jem upon publication. He sees all the drafts, talks them through the acknowledgments and dedications, double-checks the reference pages against the chaotic piles of books and notes around their home.

So he’s immediately (and rightfully) suspicious the moment they hand him the first advanced copy and tell him to open it, watching his every move with eager expressions. Excited, but anxious.

‘A dedication to the one most dedicated to us:

This book would not be what it is without the kind heart, encouraging words, and infinite patience of James Carstairs. Neither would we. Jem, you are a light in our darkest hours, and we don’t know where we’d be without you.

We hope we’ll never have to find out.

Jem, our love, will you marry us?’

Jem reads, then re-reads the dedication. He closes the book, then opens it again, reading it a third time for good measure.

“Well?” Will asks impatiently, earning himself a nudge in the ribs from Tessa. Will huffs.

“I see you’re as dramatic as always,” Jem says quietly, instead of answering the question posed in the book. He knows his answer. He’s known for a while now what his answer would be, should the topic ever present itself, but he gets a bit of joy from making Will wait in anticipation just a short while longer.

“He wanted to be even more dramatic and show you at the event tomorrow,” Tessa admits. “But we decided against it. We thought you deserved the chance to say no without two hundred sets of eyes on you.”

Jem raises an eyebrow. “You think I’ll say no?”

“You haven’t said ‘yes’ yet,” Will points out, but he doesn’t sound nervous about it. Nor should he be.

“Yes,” Jem says, smiling brightly. “Of course it’s yes.”

[lesbian-vmin]

Why do you think Vmin are "allowed" these questionable (at least for those who ship them) moments? I find it curious that some things are really pushed to the front (jikook for sure), and then sometime we get the vmin moments and left to wonder are they real or fanservice? I really despise the thought that either Jimin/V/other members are doing this on purpose, because they genuinely seem authentic (as much as a celebrity can be on camera), 1/2

Honestly, the whole moment of Jimin saying that he didn’t keep in touch with his members at all was pretty weird. Jimin, since day one, has painted himself as someone who loves his members very much. He doesn’t want to be away from them for too long, and he seems more interested with collaborating with each one of them individually before moving onto people outside of his group. This might be why we don’t have him collaborating with other artists while Jungkook, Hoseok, Namjoon, and Yoongi have all done so. And of course BTS as a whole. (I don’t think Taehyung and Jin have? But I might be forgetting something) And Jimin has a great voice. There’s no reason anyone wouldn’t want to feature him in a song. So I’m sure there are people who want to collaborate with him, and I imagine he’s gotten offers. (This is relevant to the ask, I promise.) Although language barriers may be a reason (he might not be as comfortable collaborating with people he can’t communicate with well as some of the others are, excluding Namjoon (and maybe Jungkook is getting there) who is better at English.)

So we can look at this several ways. We can take Jimin at his very minimal word and assume that he didn’t communicate with his members at all during his vacation. In which case, I would assume that he took it as a very much needed break from them, and decided to focus on the time that he was able to spend with his family. Or, we can assume that not every word is 100% true. Maybe when he says he didn’t keep in contact, he doesn’t mean that he didn’t keep in contact at all. Maybe he messaged them once in a while to see how they were doing, but didn’t contact them regularly. Maybe he did keep in contact with them, but just wasn’t talking about his vacation. They could have talked about anything under the sun, but since they weren’t sharing vacation details, he may have counted that as not keeping in contact. Because people would question, “mm, if you guys were in contact regularly, why don’t you know details about each other’s vacations?” If they happen to be talking about something, and another member seems to not know the information. He didn’t want to give anyone a reason to question things like that. We can also wonder if he did, in fact, keep in contact with them, but he doesn’t want to share certain things about the members and his personal time. So he just told us that he didn’t stay in contact with them. I don’t know whether to take Jimin at his word for that specific moment, but I also don’t think it matters whether they stayed in contact or not. Even if the members are close and consider each other friends or family, they don’t have to remain in contact at all times. I don’t think it’s weird for friends to go on vacation (say, home for the holidays) and not talk to each other. In fact, it’s the truest friends that can come back after not speaking for a week to months at a time and act like normal (instead of being awkward each other). Act like no time was lost. (At least this is how I see it because it’s how I am with my friends. I don’t typically keep in regular contact with people who aren’t physically around me [I don’t text much, so unless someone like talking on the phone or video chatting, we probably wouldn’t stay in contact while apart] because I like to enjoy the company of those I am actually with. This might have been the case for them. It doesn’t mean they aren’t close or don’t care about each other.)

Disclaimer. This post may talk about topics that could offend easily offended people. If you are easily offended. Don’t read. You have been warned. Also I talk a lot about both Jikook and Vmin in here. Skip to the Vmin part if (for whatever reason) you don’t want to read about Jikook. But I’d rather you really read the whole post because this goes beyond shipping and focuses on them as people.

JIKOOK

The way Jikook is pushed to the front to me is actually one of the things that make me feel like they are fan service a lot of the times. (I’m not saying anything bad about Jikook because it’s pretty obvious that Jimin and Jungkook both adore each other and love being around each other, but they really are pushed quite hard and obviously.) I don’t know why that is. I don’t know the company’s reason behind pushing Jikook so hard, but I have at least one idea as to why they would do so (if they aren’t a couple). Because Jungkook is the “manliest” member of the group, and Jimin is the most “feminine.” You have Jungkook who is tall, broad, and strong. Then there’s Jimin who is small and cute, and he doesn’t try so hard to be manly these days. (I felt like he tried to present himself like a strong man in early debut because he didn’t want people to view him as the smallest and weakest member of the group, but it’s pretty clear that he became more confident in who he actually is over the years. And this is not a hint toward any gender-identity because I’m a firm believer that a man doesn’t have to fit the “masculine” spectrum to identify as a man. I feel like that’s leaning toward toxic masculinity).

Anyway, focusing on the Jikook thing, I think that’s why they get pushed forward a lot. And I hate to say that about Big Hit because it’s a bold statement to make, but it makes sense. They can easily look like a couple because it’s easy for people to imagine Jungkook as the “man” and Jimin as the “woman.” Since there are many shippers who ship for fetish reasons instead of gay right reason, these kinds of ships are likely to draw people in. It’s unfortunate, but it’s also true. Because of heteronormative culture.

The big moments between Jikook, like I said, often look like fan service to me. That being said, I’m not saying all of their moments are fan service. It just looks like interactions between them are more likely to be focused on during editing because of the reasons I’ve stated above. It might be something they aren’t aware of because it’s just editing their natural interactions to be the front and center focus of productions, but I think that’s what’s happening. And it kind of makes me feel bad for them because it’s like the company is making a show of their relationship (regardless of what kind it is). Even if they are in a real romantic relationship, I can assure that’s not why they are pushed to the center, and it’s far more likely it’s for marketing purposes. So, yes. I hate it for them, even if they are in a relationship together because it could be the company saying “look at these two. Aren’t they precious?” But it feels more like “Look at these two. Don’t they look like a “real” couple between a boy and a girl because Jungkook is oh so strong and Jimin is oh so dainty?” Even if Big Hit is LGBT friendly, it doens’t mean that they can’t do/say homophobic things (even unintentionally) or that they can’t market BTS for a heteronormative culture, and a culture that fetishizes gay people or uses being gay for entertainment. (Edit: and fantasizing.) I’m not saying it’s right for them to do so, because I don’t agree with it at all. And I’d hope that’s not the reality of it (because I really want for Big Hit to be different), but it seems like it sometimes.

Now before I get into the Vmin part, I’m going to share a disclaimer. Because I hope people don’t come at me after I’ve already admitted that it’s pretty obvious that Jikook are close and love each other. I’ve mentioned a potential romantic relationship between them, so I’m not dismissing them as the “real” couple (and I’m also, ffs, not saying there is a “real” couple between the two). I adore Jikook, and I wouldn’t even be sad if they were ever confirmed. So. Keep that in mind for this next part.

VMIN

I don’t want this to turn into a post of me comparing Jikook and Vmin, and I decided to answer this ask because I was sure that I could answer it with that intention in mind. So let’s see if I can do this right.

When it comes to Vmin, I feel like there are far less moments that can be chalked up to fan service. There are clear moments that are fan service, so I’m not saying Vmin don’t participate in that at all, but it seems like they do less than Jikook. (And I know this is a comparison right here, but I hope it doesn’t get taken the wrong way but) When Jikook does fan service, it’s so seemless and natural. When it comes to Vmin, it’s sometimes a little awkward, and they’re more shy. I don’t know what that means for the two different types of relationships, but I’m not getting into that (because then it becomes comparing the two in a way I don’t want to on this blog).

I think Big Hit chooses Vmin friendship moments to focus on because they know that people love their “platonic soulmate” dynamics. But, when it comes to “shippy” moments, these aren’t pushed forward as much. Because Taehyung isn’t broad and manly like Jungkook, so it probably seems a little too gay. And that’s not okay. It doesn’t sell as well as a couple that can be imagined as heterosexual. (And I also think this is why Jikook is the bigger ship, honestly.)

That’s it, and I know I didn’t address everything in this ask. And I’m sorry for that. But I tried to focus on what (I think) was the main point. And I wanted to make it about something very real rather than about ships.

So while I did, in fact, compare the two, I’m not comparing their “realness” or anything like that. I’m comparing their marketing value because I think that’s what it boils down to when we get to see what we see. And if anyone comes at me for my comparison on a personal shipping level, you will be ignored because that’s not what this is about. And if you can’t get that from what I’ve said thus far, then you aren’t reading my words and heart correctly.

I do want to talk really quickly about them faking it, and I’m going to focus on Vmin for this because it’s a Vmin blog. I don’t think they fake it. Because some moments are so subtle that they’re clearly trying to be hidden, and some are so natural that they clearly weren’t thinking about it too much. That aside, I don’t think they would fake their close bond. When Jimin wrote a song and was told that he would sing it with Taehyung, he didn’t have to make Friends. He could have made the song about anything he wanted, and we would have taken it with just as much enthusiasm. It was his choice to make friends, and I believe he put his heart into that song. Since it was the first song he ever had part in for an album, it’d be pretty disrespectful to claim that he’s just trying to save face or not being honest in it. And I know a song could be chalked up to how well it sells, but I think that’s for the company to worry about, but as an artist myself, I know that your heart and soul goes into anything you create. And I just don’t feel right about blatantly disregarding a personal song, so yes. It’s one of my main arguments why Vmin are obviously, honestly, close and care about each other. And I will stand by that forever.

EDIT: All right. I went through this post and personally cherry picked the things I wanted you guys to focus on when reading instead of you doing it yourself. Because you’re hung up about the fact that I mentioned that Jikook has fan severice moments (even though I said the same thing about Vmin), so you’re clearly cherry picking, not reading the whole damn post, or getting hung about the fan service instead of focusing on my main fucking point. I NEVER said they weren’t close. In fact, I took the TIME to put a DISCLAIMER stating that it’s PRETTY OBVIOUS that they’re close, and that they genuinely like spending time together. I get that I said “Vmin has less fan service moments” or whatever. Let me clarify: What I meant was that it’s the EDITING and the fact that they FOCUS SO HARD on jikook that makes a lot of their moments feel like fan service. There’s no shortage of Jikook moments, and it’s NOT because Jikook are the only ones with moments, it’s because they’re the ones that make the cut most often. And I stated the reasons why I think that is. I literally even explained the thing about the editing and said, “It might be something they aren’t aware of because it’s just editing their natural interactions to be the front and center focus of productions,” but sure. Dismiss whichever statements you want. Because clearly you get to decide what I mean instead of me. Also, “So, yes. I hate it for them, even if they are in a relationship together because it could be the company saying “look at these two. Aren’t they precious?” But it feels more like “Look at these two. Don’t they look like a “real” couple between a boy and a girl”

And, in case it’s not clear from how I talked about their relationship here, I am, in fact, a Jikook shipper, too. I stated at least TWICE in here that I wasn’t trying to dismiss the realness of them. And I talked about how shitty it is for the company to use their relationship (if real) for marketing. And unless they’re ever confirmed, that’s what they’re doing. It’s marketing. Because if the company wanted people to care about their real relationship, they would let them come out. And that is NOT me dismissing the fact that they could be in a real relationship. If you can’t tell from what I’ve just written right here, I’ll clarify by repeating what I’ve already said in the post. Because if the are in a real relationship, I can guarantee you that is not why they get pushed so hard or shown the most. It’s because their masculine/feminine vibes are marketable. There are Jikookers, LIKE ME, who ship them because they like Jikook. But you can’t deny that there are a lot of Jikookers who ship them because they’re a straight girl in love with Jungkook and imagine herself in Jimin’s place because it’s easy to see. If you are one of the real Jikookers that ship them for their actual relationship and would LOVE it if they were ever confirmed, then fine. That’s not about you. But you have to admit that there are a LOT of shippers out there (not just Jikook) that ship them with guys because they don’t want them to end up with another girl that’s not the fan doing the shipping. Yet they still would be upset if they were ever confirmed because then it means they’re actually gay.

I love Jikook, and this post wasn’t intended to dismiss their relationship or bring it down. And I’d say I’m sorry if that’s the impression you got from it, but if you’d actually read and not choose which parts to focus on, you wouldn’t have gotten that impression. I just hate it that you guys got that impression because I do genuinely like Jikook. As much as Vmin, honestly. I was focusing on how the company treats the two ships, but sure. Dismiss every time I’ve drawn the post back to that point.

[avkamfher]

Logs of a playing DM - The RCBs of RPGs

As on this Tuesday I’ll be starting a new game as a player character with people I know from my VR games. Already getting some signs from the active DM for this homebrew that this is not going to be an average game in terms of story telling and it might be really bad or semi okay.

We have a group chat going at the moment and in preparation for session 0 he has sent out the following.

“As a reminder, try not to plan too closely for a race/class combination. Instead, focus more on why your character is or wants to be an adventurer. Collaborate with each other to describe your relationships. As you solidify those relationships Tuesday, a few of you may decide that a small band of dwarven miners is more fun and interesting than thst hodgepodge collection of eccentric characters.“

In the past from the few characters I’ve played the Race and Class play a pretty big part in motivations. Like a Teifling Paladin, as a random example, it is 8am ish so my writing is a little wonky right now.

‘Harold was always been shown kindness from the local perish since he was a teifling and the neighboring villages always saw him as a blight. After years learning the ways of a Paladin he sought to change the minds of the local population on the nature of his people. All was good until Harold’s uncle stole the perishes artifact that allowed them to commune with their god. Harold is heeding the call to hunt down his uncle and return the artifact to restore peace to this small part of the world.’

That has an established trope to overcome for a character arc not all evil looking people are evil, allows the DM to do some Scooby-Doo level side quests with the uncle, and provides a clear motive for the character. Which can also be a good drag and drop into any campaign.

As a counter point to my own example it is the same narrative except no race or defined class.

‘Sam lived in a small part of the world full wonder and plenty. The local perish took care of them, especially Sam, who took a keen interest in what the perish did. Until a dark day came when their holy artifact used to commune with their god was stolen by Sam’s evil uncle. Sam knew it was their time to bring peace back to their part of the world.’

We still have the motivation on the evil uncle however that is rather one dimensional and would make form something that has a 30min air time with a clean wrap up. Yes, you can add the race and class after that generic background. Though that does still allow the “Yes, And....” aspect of an TTRPG however the Race and Class feel like an afterthought of writing a rather vanilla background.

I feel that having the race and class defined with the background is needed to properly have a well rounded character for a session 0. You don’t need a full on character sheet all set and ready to go, just an inking on what you’d like to play.

For this game I got 5 ideas on paper with a clearly defined Race, Class, and Background in mind. My process was what is a race I haven't played yet and what class would feel appropriate for that race, after getting that established I jotted down just a blurb of a background to be properly fleshed out once I get the defined narrative from the DM.

Due to how long this is becoming I’ll use one of my 5 character ideas.

Race: Leonian Class: Barbarian Background: Was a part of a pride, Was kicked out due to landing the killing blow on the leaders pray and now seeks to regain his honor.

Super quick and simple blurb to understand this guy likes to murder and his character arc is to regain his honor in the eyes of his pride leader, super simple plug for any game since there is honor in battle and can be used as a powerful message that he won’t just kill to kill but only if needed and will do the honorable thing as a warrior.

That all started by thinking of the Race and Class then tailoring a Background to fit that character like a nice jacket or pants. It is good to have a well defined background to lend to the story telling though need to have the other elements of Race and a Class to properly define the idea for the character to drive your individual story along with the over arching narrative.

[cheiyunn]

Sweet Tea Party [1-3]

~~~~~~[1]~~~~~~

--Downtown--

Koharu: (Well. That was dangerous…)

Koharu: Feli’s cake… that goes beyond a plain ‘surprise’

Koharu: ...oops, is this the cake shop Feli recommended? It’s pretty damn crowded

Salesperson: Come on in~!

Koharu: Which one to choose… well I don’t really understand the types here..

Koharu: (Hm..? The person choosing the cake over there…)

???: What to choose… well I guess because I’m here I guess I’ll buy a little pricey one

Koharu: I knew it was Matoba !

Wataru: Eh..? Koharu-san?

Koharu: What a coincidence. Did you also come to buy a cake?

Wataru: Yeah. The cakes from here seem to be delicious

Koharu: To go as far as coming to Ikebukuro, you must really like it

Wataru: Haha...it’s kinda embarrassing to show this side of me

Koharu: It’s embarrassing ain’t it? Its not rare to spot a guy who likes sweets

Koharu: Brushing that aside… I’m saved!

Wataru: Eh?

Koharu: I don’t really eat that many sweets, so I don’t really know what kind of cake type to choose

Koharu: Can you help me choose?

--Moved to restaurant--

Koharu: Oh, that was so helpful! There were so many kinds of chocolate cakes

Koharu: I was about to randomly buy 5-6 of the pieces in the middle

Wataru: If you did that, it’ll be a tea party with too similar cakes

Koharu: Feli said that wouldn’t do. It was lucky that you knew alot about these cakes

Wataru: I never thought that being a cake lover would be useful like this

Wataru: Do you not eat that much cake?

Koharu: Well, rather than cake, I would say eating meat or sake was better

Wataru: Is that so. But then… why would you hold a tea party? Koharu: Well that is… rather than Fantome, its more like it’s HARU’s character image?

Koharu: Its important because the fans want to see that kind of stuff

Wataru: I see..

Koharu: As long as I post it on the blog, its apart of band activities. Well it may be individual to our band only though

Wataru: I feel a sense of professionalism. Our blog is a little bit more random

Koharu: Nono! Thats just Fantome’s way of doing stuff

Koharu: Isn’t it better for fans to see small daily-life stuff like Argo’s or Furai’s?

Wataru: Yes… what you say will be good study material!

Koharu: Studying… you’re diligent huh

~~~~~~[2]~~~~~~

Koharu: By the way, in the Fes, is there a bassist you’re particularly interested in?

Wataru: Eh? That's a pretty serious question all of a sudden

Koharu: Nah, I mean there was the first fes round last time right?

Koharu: If I stood there as a participant, I would look at it as a somewhat of a place of competition

Wataru: ...yes

Koharu: and then I’d get a feel of the other band’s performance and from perspective different from the ones previously-

Koharu: Simply speaking… It’d make me wanna get better and hone my skills on the bass because I thought they were really good.

Wataru: ….I understand

Koharu: To compare myself to other bassists, I’ve never thought of that before

Wataru: ...that would be Akebono-san

Koharu: eh?

Wataru: If I had to choose a bassist I’ve had my eyes set on… that would be Akebono-san

Wataru: Of course yours, and the other band’s bassists have their own flair, but-

Wataru: When they played at the Fes, I felt that Akebono-san bass skills were on a completely different level

Koharu: ...I agree. Thats right, his bass ability is kinda something out of this world per say…

Koharu: That level of skill yet he’s younger than me? What's with that guy? Is he really some kind of alien?

Wataru: Ahaha.. Even he’s always said that

Koharu: He’s always… aah, thats right. Argo and Gyro have been at it since the days in Hokkaido

Wataru: Rather it wasn’t that we were really close, but more like our history is extensive

Wataru: I’ve never really had a one-on-one talk with Akebono-san either

Koharu: Hm.. then, why don’t you call him now to talk?

Wataru: Eh- call Akebono-san? But aren’t you busy preparing for a tea party…

Koharu: Its fine since I still have time. Rather, this seems like a good opportunity anyway

Koharu: Regardless, just ask if he’s free right now!

Wataru: Well for now… I guess I’ll send a message

--Moved to park--

???: Ah, little brother-kun, over here-

Koharu: Oh there he is… wait, little brother-kun?

Wataru: Thats.. Gyro’s guitarist is my brother so Akebono-san occasionally calls me that

Koharu: Ah.. Satozuka right. Oh yeah I’ve heard he had a brother

Ryo: Hello Mitsurugi-san. This is like a meetup of the basses~

Koharu: Yo-! Wait I mean, why were you in Ikebukuro?

Ryo: The radio waves around here are good today. So I was communicating with the stars

Koharu: ...I- I see

Wataru: You don’t have to worry too much about that... 

Koharu: Well, I’m also in a vampire themed band, I don’t think I’d fret about an alien

Koharu: Regardless, since the 3 of us are together, Let's just discuss about the bass!

~~~~~~[3]~~~~~~

Ryo: The sound of the bass is similar to the universe’s

Ryo: Of course the universe itself it silent but the quiet beats of spaceships and the stars around fill it

Koharu: o-oh…

Ryo: Thats why when I first touched the base, it had a similar feel. By capturing the vibe of the universe, I was able to quickly sync with it

Wataru: ...I think what I  understood was that Akebono-san’s pace was in a completely different dimension..

Koharu: ...yeah. To put it in another way, that's the only thing I understand

Ryo: I like the both of your basses as well. Because its a sound that lies close to the world each band has created, and it supports it.

Ryo: I like the basses of Fuurai and Ipsi but I feel like the direction each sound is going in is a little off

Koharu: Oh, thanks. If you’re the one telling me that, I don’t feel any mal intent

Wataru: I agree. Thank you

Ryo: Can I ask something?

Koharu: What is it? But I can’t teach you anything if it’s in regards to technique

Ryo: How do you use the bass to get close to your band’s world?

Wataru: ...pardon?

Koharu: You.. you can do that much yet you can’t reach it?

Ryo: I’m just making the sound that Nayuta wants. By doing that, we can make alot of Earthlings happy

Ryo: Gyro’s sound is Nayuta. Thats why my bass is also Nayuta’s bass

Koharu: Well, everyone has their own ways of thinking but… is that personally alright with you?

Ryo: Yeah. I’m happy

Koharu: Then, I can’t really say anything more…

Ryo: But, the Argona who create a sound together, and the Fantome who create their world together, I also like them too

Ryo: So I wanted to ask how the both of them are so tightly knit to each other’s band worlds

Wataru: I just… try to be aware of each member’s thoughts and wishes, not only in the bass but also within the lyrics

Ryo: Ah I get that. The feelings conveyed through your lyrics and music are well received

Koharu: As for the form of my band.. I think it actually might be close to Gyro

Wataru: That means…?

Koharu: We’re shaping our world in Feli’s image. In a way, it’s similar to Gyro’s Asahi

Koharu: But.. after we have the image, we create a song by collaborating and gathering our individual thoughts and phrases

Koharu: The costumes and makeup are also apart of that process

Wataru: There are different forms of bands like this…

Ryo: How interesting.. Ah, thats right. On the topic of that, there was one more thing I wanted to ask Mitsurugi-san

Koharu: This time I’ll answer any question you have. What is it?

Ryo: Why are you dressed as a woman?

[recentanimenews]

INTERVIEW: Rajorshi Basu on Creating Studio Durga and the State of Anime in India

All images via Studio Durga

  What constitutes “anime” is a topic of much debate. The general public associates the word “anime” with a particular visual style. Purists, on the other hand, believe that only animation made in Japan can be considered anime, regardless of whether the visuals are on the K-On! end of the spectrum or the Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt end of the spectrum. This is, to an extent, understandable. But can such a strict definition continue to hold weight in an era where anime is becoming increasingly global? Can a production from outside Japan that possesses all the traits we have come to associate with anime be called anime?

  The members of Studio Durga — an independent animation studio based in New Delhi, India — certainly seem to think so. They proudly claim to be India’s first anime studio. While India has worked on anime in the past — in the form of co-productions with Japan (such as Ramayana: the Legend of Prince Rama) — what sets Studio Durga apart is the fact that they work without any foreign assistance, be it from Japan or elsewhere. Their debut work Karmachakra — an 80-minute Bengali-language film, the first in a series of films — is an entirely independent film, made by a core team of only seven members for animation production. Karmachakra is pending release, but the first 20 minutes of the film have been uploaded on YouTube as a “pilot episode” — which won awards at the Independent Shorts Awards 2020: the Platinum Award for Best Animation Short, and Honorable Mentions for Best Web Series/TV Pilot and Best Original Score. Karmachakra is a supernatural mystery-drama, aimed at an older audience — something that is rare in India, where animation has long been seen as a medium for younger audiences only. The Indian anime community has reacted very favorably to Karmachakra, with many heralding it as a step forward for animation in India.

    I reached out to Studio Durga founder and CEO Rajorshi Basu, who was kind enough to answer my questions. We had a great discussion, not only about Karmachakra, but about anime and 2D animation in general. Here’s what he had to say:

(The following questions and answers are lightly edited for clarity and content.)

How did you get into anime and manga?

  Rajorshi: The first anime I recall watching was Ninja Robots on Cartoon Network — way back when I was three or four years old and didn’t really know it was called anime. There was Heidi, Girl of the Alps, also on Cartoon Network, a title from the World Masterpiece Theater collection of anime. It was my first exposure to the work of many old masters, including Hayao Miyazaki. Then they started showing anime on the Toonami programming block, with Cardcaptors and Dragon Ball and all that stuff.

  Animax was also a huge factor. I used to check out a lot of stuff on Animax before it finally went away. And then of course streaming services happened. But yeah, it was tough to get your hands on anime and manga back then. I remember that you would just chance upon secondhand manga in shops. That was procurement back in the day. But now it’s a different ballgame; one can just open up Netflix and find all kinds of different shows. Throughout the years there have been a lot of different shows that have influenced me, and all of that comes into the stuff that we are doing. I think this idea of doing an Indian anime was something I’ve had since my early teens to late teens.

So you decided pretty early on that you wanted to make an Indian anime, is that right?

  Rajorshi: Yeah, this idea has been with me for roughly half my life. It's just that I actually knew how to do it after a whole lot of experiences. Especially after visiting Japan in 2013. I went there for a pop culture research program where we were actually given access to facilities that make Japanese entertainment, including animation.

  So did you face any opposition in pursuing this path?

  Rajorshi: We faced nothing but opposition, actually. In 2017 we’d put out a trailer on YouTube and, you know, it was just a sort of demo. It's not there anymore; we took it off. This was way before we brought out the actual trailer that you see right now. It was only after we took it to the quality that we wanted that people started thinking about the possibility of, you know, Indian anime. Especially after 2019, when the two movies (Weathering With You and Dragon Ball Super: Broly) were released in India. The community started considering the possibility that Indian anime can happen. 

  I think there are two main challenges. One challenge (which we’ve kind of got past) was finding the right people for the production because hand-drawn animation is a lost art and it's very tough to find people who pursue that. It was tough finding people, which is also why we are a very small team. We somehow managed, over a number of years, to finish the movie production. 

  The other challenge (one we are facing right now) is distribution. I think that’s because India does not have a proper distributor for anime. Of course, we see some anime on Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and Crunchyroll. Disney+ Hotstar, which actually has the biggest reach in India, don't showcase any anime. There is a solid market and demand for anime in India but there's hardly any supply, which is why we thought we’d fill that gap in the market. It depends on what kind of channels you go through when it comes to distribution. I mean, we are in talks with Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, and we want to be in talks with Crunchyroll. But it's very hard to find people, to find the correct approach or routes through which you take this product. I think that's what matters. In terms of distribution, routes matter more than the product itself because if you are talking about Netflix or Amazon Prime, they are going to look at it as an independent movie and they are also going to want to see examples of such production that has made it in the market and things like that.

  Obviously, there's a huge demand but there needs to be a distributor that recognizes the demand and what it means when something like our product (or anyone who is doing an animated film that is not for kids) gets licensed. Distribution is the final roadblock we are facing right now because when it comes to quality and production values, all of the people that we have talked to have appreciated our work. But when it comes to actually slating on an acquisition session, there's always some kind of discrepancy there. There's no one to handle animated movies when it comes to India, unless you’re talking about the kids’ market. That's a totally different topic.

  You raise an important point about 2D animation being something of a lost art. In particular, the whole Japanese anime workflow is totally different from what most people are used to doing. So, how did you learn it, and how did you find people with this skill?

  Rajorshi: So the current core team is a team of four people, including myself. I personally handle everything other than the actual drawing, because although I’ve studied design and art and all of those things, music and film production is what I have primarily been trained in and what I have experience in (the former of which I'd been recognized with a scholarship for from Berklee College of Music). Compositing — the final “look” of anime — is something that I learnt entirely on my own through observation and software/workflow research. So I know the process of anime production. There is hardly anyone who makes animation through this process in India. So I would say it is something very unique to our studio. 

  The people that I have, they were actually making the transition to college back when I hired them. They had considerable skill when it came to illustration and making animation, but it was this project that got everybody up to a certain level. The core team that I started with are still working together — basically the four of us, but we extend sometimes to 10 people. And if you’re talking about the total number of people involved in this project, it’s over 30. But finding the core team took a long time. I’d actually thought of starting a business with this around four or five years back, and since then it’s been about finding people to execute and help out in the process. 

  When it comes to hand-drawn animation, there is talent out there. There just needs to be a product that makes use of those talents. I wanted to create a forum where talented artists could join in and showcase their capabilities. It’s not that 2D animation is completely not there, it’s just that it’s not focused on by people as a career option because there are no outlets for it that are monetizable. I think that’s more of the problem. When you look at some talented students from NIDs [National Institutes of Design, India], you will find that they are very much capable of doing everything that we do. It’s just that there’s no forum or platform to create a product like this which makes use of both the anime production process as well as the hand-drawn aspect of it. 

So if you look at, say, Chinese animation studios, the way they started off was by doing subcontract work for Japanese anime studios. They slowly built up their own base, their own talent pool, and then started to make originals of their own. So, why did you decide to start off with an original rather than go through this process?

  Rajorshi: Chinese animation actually has a much richer history. They’ve been doing their own intellectual properties for longer than they’ve been outsourcing. But with India that is actually not the case. When it comes to 2D animation we’ve had collaborations with Japan in the past, whether it’s Ramayana or Batu Gaiden. But our main aim was to do something that was completely Indian-produced. I think that’s the main draw, so that we could call it India’s first anime. 

    Let’s talk a bit about outsourcing outside our realm of animation: when it comes to 3D animation and VFX. India is actually a world player in the market when it comes to 3D assets and VFX being outsourced to us. But when it comes to intellectual properties, there’s pockets of brilliance that surface from time to time, especially in the non-3D space, because the 3D space is a framework in itself, a framework that I personally have also been very connected with in the past, in all the projects that I’ve freelanced for (when it comes to music, editing, and the post-production side of things). When it comes to hand-drawn animation, I would say that there are these pockets of independent production which do not find the correct outlet or distribution platform. But they’re there; they’ve been there for a very long time. They’re not necessarily practicing the anime art style like we’re doing, but they’re doing hand-drawn animation nonetheless. And the quality and execution is something that’s worth showing to the world, it’s just that there’s no proper distribution channel as I was saying. Why anime? That’s because there’s huge demand for this particular art style. Since there was already a demand for it, as well as respect in the community for something that is a product made by India for India, that is where we came in and thought “this is a niche we want to fill.” 

  And look, most of the artists who worked on this project have already worked on commissions for foreign clients all of their lives. We don’t look at outsourcing as a route that we necessarily have to do first before we make our own intellectual property. Because we do that anyway: when it comes to making small animations for brands, or working for clients that are primarily non-Indian. The whole idea about this project is that it’s by India and for India. I wouldn’t go so far as to call it a statement, but it is a specific niche that’s appealing to a lot of people, thankfully.

So let’s talk a bit more about Karmachakra itself. When I saw the trailer on YouTube, the art style stood out to me, and it reminded me of a couple of things. One was the works of Mamoru Hosoda, with his distinctive style of flat shading. The other was Shin Sekai Yori, which has sticker-like 2-dimensional character designs but with mood lighting and effects and appropriate color palettes to create an atmosphere. Were any of these your inspirations, or were there other influences?

    Rajorshi: I mean, Mamoru Hosoda is an inspiration for any animation filmmaker. My personal inspiration, in terms of direction and in terms of storytelling, is Satoshi Kon. You know, works like Perfect Blue, Millennium Actress, Paranoia Agent: all these films and shows that are very loved, conceptually and thematically. My second influence would be the directorial signature of Tetsuro Araki (Death Note, Attack on Titan); I think that directorial signature is very alluring. In terms of how to tell a story through many characters, I’d say Durarara is an influence. I mainly chose to go with urban fantasy, inspired by the unique approach that light novels like Boogiepop or Nisio Isin's works take. Other than that, I think my all-time favorite director is Shinichiro Watanabe (Cowboy Bebop). 

  Some more important key influences that left a huge mark on my imagination of what the medium can be are:

Wolf's Rain, Black Lagoon, the Steins;Gate franchise, Terror in Resonance, Michiko and Hatchin, Barakamon, Mushi-Shi, Great Pretender

Spirit-world action-comedies like The Devil is a Part-Timer, Blood Lad, Hoozuki’s Coolheadedness, and Noragami

Mind Game from director Masaaki Yuasa

Any project involving character designer Yoshitoshi Abe, like Texhnolyze, Serial Experiments Lain, etc

There's also the noitaminA block stuff; short, offbeat 11-episode per cour series with a broader audience in mind. Brings to mind the makers of the noitaminA logo animation, Studio Rikka and their charming sci-fi works such as Time of Eve and the like.

  In terms of manga:

The superlative, mind-game ridden works of Shinobu Kaitani

The out-of-this-world panelling in works by Keiichi Koike

The poignant interpersonal/social drama from folks like Shuzo Oshimi and Inio Asano

The artful, satirical guro manga from people like Shintaro Kago

The sprawling, epic series from the legendary Naoki Urasawa, such as Monster and the like

Brilliant food/drink manga such as Bartender and Sommeliere by Araki Joh, or even Oishinbo.

  These are just names I can think of right now, but there’s actually plenty of influences for all of us here at Studio Durga.

  Let’s talk about the OP. From Episode 0 of Karmachakra, what strikes me as its most "anime" element is its OP. From the song itself, with its “anime theme song” vibes, to the color palette reminiscent of the Psycho-Pass OP, to the character-focused cuts reminiscent of the Baccano and Durarara OPs, to the text on screen reminiscent of the Cowboy Bebop OP: this OP screams "anime." OPs usually are a studio's way of enticing viewers to watch an anime, so clearly, a lot of effort went into this OP. And it's a really attractive and alluring OP. What went into the making of this OP? How did you storyboard it, and how did you compose the opening song? How much more effort was it to animate, comparatively?

    Rajorshi: The OP song was composed, arranged, produced, and played by me more than six years ago. At the time, I was inspired to make a melody and instrumentation that sounds “classic anime.” It was a personal project back then, and I had no idea I was going to be using it for an anime production of my own in the future. So when it was time, my mom helped with the lyrics and I asked Tanisha (the singer who I've collaborated with on the ED as well) to sing out the lyrics composed for the song. It was a blast to make. Unlike the ED, which I composed much more recently, the OP arrangement is more busy than minimal, which was my style back then and which probably works better for the usual high-energy anime OP.

  Unlike background scoring, which is set to edited bits of animation, the animation for the OP was set to the music instead. We were using a scratch track and timing every cut to whichever hit we wanted it to fall on. The choreography and transitions took more time than standard animation, as the entire thing was meant to seamlessly flow with non-stop fluid animation. The effort varies in anime production from shot to shot, but in the case of the OP, it was about tying together an entire string of money-shots. Apart from the animation, we had a lot of fun with the compositing as well. Doing MVs is the most enjoyable activity for us.

Let’s talk about the world of Karmachakra. What inspired it? Personal, lived experience or literature and other media?

  Rajorshi: Karmachakra is a series of movies. The second and third are what we’re working on right now. The second is more of the action-thriller kind, and the third/finale is along the lines of philosophical sci-fi. But the first one is more of a mystery-drama. I’m a huge mystery buff; that’s a sort of personal favorite genre of mine. So thematically I think the first movie of Karmachakra is mostly a mystery-drama with certain supernatural elements and certain cultural elements to those supernatural elements. So there’s many different layers. I usually like to do something that is layered, something that is character-driven but layered not only in the histories of the characters but in the lore that ties it all together with a supernatural theme, and also the third layer that puts them in a cultural context. These are basically the three levels that we’re working on when it comes to Karmachakra. 

    When it comes to cultural influences, there’s me being a Bengali and hence making this in Bengali. That is something I had in mind from the beginning. Having connections to the Bengali film industry, getting some of the best names from there to do voice acting on this: that was definitely part of the plan. 

  For the script, I’ve had many, many different influences. My background is quite varied. Since I was a kid I’ve always been a music buff. I was very much into classic/prog rock and concept albums from the '70s and '80s, apart from my production and performance background in jazz, jazz fusion, RnB, soul, and funk. So storytelling is a huge part of music for me, whether it’s through film scoring or whether it’s through a concept album where you tell stories through music itself. Other than that, I graduated in English literature, which is a huge part of the general approach I take to things when it comes to layering and writing for film. For this production, between film, literary works, musical works, and anime, there’s a LOT of influences. I wanted to take all those influences and make something that was cohesive enough for someone who was watching, but at the same time wasn’t predictable or cookie-cutter like.

Are there any talented Indian animators you’d like to spotlight?

  Rajorshi: I would like to talk about Ghost Animation. They’ve been working on little animated clips for Bollywood movies for a very long time, but recently they made a short film, Wade, set during a flood that happened in Bengal. They put it up on Kickstarter, promoted it, and successfully got it funded. I think it won an award at Annecy or something. And it’s all hand-drawn.

  Apart from that, there’s a couple of guys who’ve been in the Indian anime community and illustrator community for a very long time. Their names are Krishna and Balram Bannerjee, but they’re informally called the Xong Bros. They’re primarily comic artists, so they don’t do a lot of animation, but they also work on animation for indie games made by foreign studios: they make some trailers and the like for them.

  There was also this short film that was commissioned by Royal Stag Short Films, called Death of a Father. Entirely hand-drawn. Not the anime artstyle, but entirely hand-drawn.

  Lastly, there’s Jazyl Homavazir. A long-time animator, illustrator, and coach in the Indian comics/animation scene in the art style of manga. Both him and the Xongs are dear friends of ours who support and appreciate our initiative.

Do you have any parting thoughts for our readers?

  Rajorshi: I would say don’t make any compromises. If you know you’re capable of doing something, whether it is independently or whether you have backing or whatever it is, don’t make any compromises and do something that is only an approximation of what you actually want to do. If you have a vision, just go ahead and do it, and then see what happens. You might succeed, or you might fail, but that will be a learning experience. Just because something is tangentially related to whatever vision you might have, don’t settle for less.  

  Are you excited for Karmachakra? Let us know in the comments!

    Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

  By: Manas B. Sharma

[today-only-happens-once]

remote learning for the teacher!au

Y’all remember my teacher!AU? Yeah, so headcanons about them trying to do remote learning:

This got LONG so now it’s under a cut!

Logan:

As he would say, it is “not his preferred method of teaching”. He tries to take some comfort from students that are performing better academically since going online, but there’s also a number of students that start struggling a lot more, so it mostly balances out. 

Lots of videos of him explaining things because he knows the kids are used to his explanations and he doesn’t like most other online options.

Daily assignments that are pretty small in scope because he believes it to be a better way to encourage routine and pacing for his students rather than trying to do Big Things over a long period of time

Is usually at least a little bit frustrated with the circumstance because he is not as effective this way

and Logan likes hands-on learning as much as he can, but he can’t with remote learning and that’s super frustrating

A part of him is maybe a little bit jealous of the teachers of younger grades that can do fun at-home science stuff. High school chem and physics is harder. The experiments he was going to run with his classes can’t be done at home because of the chemicals involved. 

Logan gets a lot more lenient with deadlines because he knows that some kids have challenges at home and/or technology limitations that will impact a student’s ability to get work in on time. He still has deadlines, but if a kid gets work in late? Accepted for full credit. No questions asked. 

Generally is pretty on-top-of-it for grading because that’s what he spends most of his during-school-hours doing when he’s not responding to emails or using one-on-one video calls with students who need extra help

He doesn’t say it very often, but he misses his students so much

Has not cried, but he has gotten upset to the point of needing to literally walk it off. He goes on walks after the school day hours are over to clear his head and give himself a break. 

Roman:

If Logan “Doesn’t Prefer It”, Roman just flat out hates it

Spring musical was canceled a week before it was supposed to go on, which was devastating for Roman. He keeps in contact with his theater kiddos, tho, and plans for some cast meet ups via video chat. Some end-of-the-year stuff. 

Has definitely cried multiple times. 

For teaching specifically, Roman can’t stand it. His English classrooms are very collaborative and discussion-driven and he hates that he’s had to basically resort to mostly “read this and answer questions” kinds of assignments. 

He also starts to feel wildly inadequate as a teacher, but Logan is there to remind him that this is exceptional circumstances to be teaching in and Roman is doing everything he can to be of help and continue the learning of his students, and that’s all he can be fairly expected to do right now. Cognitive distortions and all that. 

He’s done a few small things to mix it up, but he doesn’t want to become too unpredictable because he knows a lot of his kids need routine and predictability in this very uncertain time. 

He does a once-every-handful-of-weeks “check in question” assignment where students write a small (or long if they want) response to a general “how are you doing?” kind of question. Just as a way for Roman to let them know he cares and check in about his students mental and emotional well-being because like. It’s easier when you see them every day in person, and much harder when you never see them at all.

He hosts weekly optional video call meetings with his classes, and that helps. They chat and play some review games. But Roman feels a little better, being able to get eyes on his kiddos and see their faces. 

Roman misses his students and the theater kids so much and tells them so when he’s feeling especially emotional (nothing over-the-top dramatic, but once in a while on his daily online posts, he’ll add “missing you all!”)

Once a student commented “Miss you too, Mr. Prince! Have a great weekend!” on a Friday reminder post from him where he ended with “missing you all” and Roman got unexpectedly emotional about it. 

Roman gets super involved in all the senior-send-off things the school tries to do to compensate for no in-person graduation, no prom, etc. Since he teaches freshmen and seniors, he’s got a soft spot for them. 

Patton

Yeah, he’s not a fan. He recognizes that it’s necessary, but it’s so so hard to do his job as an IS teacher when he can’t be there with the kids. 

It also takes away his favorite part of his job--which is regular, daily interaction with his kiddos. 

Patton makes lots of phone calls and sets up video conferences with his kids and their families, but it’s still not the same, y’know?

He does his best though. He tries. And when he starts to feel inadequate too, Logan helps with that also.

Patton cries sometimes. He cries for his students and for the seniors and for the state of the world. But he tries to look on the bright side as well. He reminds himself and his students that social distancing is how a community takes care of itself, so isn’t this whole thing actually kind of cool? The level of collaboration born out of care and love? And he focuses on some hobbies to keep himself busy, asks the kids what they’re doing in their free time to check in on them and will chat with them for a bit about their interests, etc. 

He misses the school and his students so much it physically hurts sometimes, but he tries to keep moving forward. 

Virgil

Basically at his wits end in terms of stress.

Emotionally, Virgil fluctuates between “seething and misdirected anger” (never at students but like. Logan has had to stop him from yelling at their neighbors who had some people over once instead of social distancing) and “mental and emotional flight in the form of every distraction he can find” 

Teaching-wise... like I said. He’s stressed.

Because he’s an art teacher, right? And he does a lot of hands-on art because that’s the kind of art that he finds interesting and helpful in terms of managing his anxiety which is one reason why he went into art education in the first place.

But now he’s gotta find a way to make basically all of his art units that remain for the year some kind of digital peice

Which is fine, he guesses, because he does know how to teach digital art. It’s actually one of his classes that he teaches. But all of them have to be digital now, and some kids have more resource access than others, and... it’s a mess.

Virgil struggles with similar cognitive distortions to Roman. Logan and Patton both help him out with that when it gets bad. 

He’s almost always listening to music or watching something or making something because doing something constantly--even if its just watching something--helps him from feeling useless and/or helpless which then helps him manage his anxiety.

He adopts Roman’s “regular check in question” thing and does that with his own kids. that also eases a level of his anxiety that he hadn’t even realized he’d had--anxiety manifesting from worry about his students that he no longer got to see every day, and some of whom he knew would have a rough time not getting to come to school every day. 

[soveryanon]

Reviewing time for MAG173!

- … It was absolutely terrible, horrible, upsetting, and I loved it – it was indeed answering that little question about the children, the answer was still absolutely horrifying even given the circumstances, and I needed to hear that level of discomfort&upset from Jon and Martin themselves about victims in general. (Though I’m a bit “it took CHILDREN for you to truly react with horror?!” x”))

I really like how this episode already felt like something that was… not a conclusion (really not; not yet), but something that couldn’t have happened right at the start of the season. It demonstrated explicitly why the “smiting” is not a viable option; it returned to the foreground what the actual problem is (the Fear-system, not the individual avatars having a small or large benefit in it); and it allowed for Jon and Martin to let their points come across a bit more explicitly in a way that didn’t feel like a full blown-up conflict either. They argue, they have conflicting views, but they’re also getting better at understanding the other’s mindset and limitations (the journey is not only through the domains; it’s also a journey of navigating with someone else who operates differently from you, and has other ways to cope, and learning how to push forwards carrying your differences).

- The “statements” of the children were heartbreaking ;_; Poem for The Stranger, formal report for The End, botanic manual for The Flesh, theatrical play for The Web… and now a children’s book for The Dark.

Stylistically, the use of repetitions and more simplistic words, constructions and reasoning, in Jack and Caitlin’s stories, really made me feel that it was about children, for children, in the mind of children? I love that their fears felt extremely logical: there is an absolute certainty in their fears, in what the monsters are, what they would do to them. The monsters and their tortures (what they want to do to the kids) are simple, but also very concrete and straightforward (and so is the name “Night Street” for the territory! It tells what it is). The kids’ beliefs are ruthlessly clinical. There’s no need to be fancy; it works as is. Even the adults’ rules sound concrete – but arbitrary and cruel, becoming neglect, leaving the kids at the mercy of monsters. And it’s interesting that we don’t see the monsters actually catching any of the kids: the apocalypse is mostly an extension of their fears removing anything that could appease or protect them (there is no light, no day after the night, nobody comes when they scream and the “adults” are unresponsive and useless; the kids are on their own).

On that note, pretty sure that the adults mentioned were not actually there (“Dad’s dead. Mum’s here but she lost it a while back. So now it’s just me.”, “Some grown-ups are not in bed, but they do not want to help Jack. They want to be alone. They don’t want any children around at all. They tell Jack it is after his bedtime, and put him in another dark room where he cannot run…! So no grown-ups told Jack to run into the dark.”, “Her mother is downstairs, but she is part of the sofa now. She won’t stop staring at the television and laughing. Laughing and laughing. She doesn’t like it, when Caitlin is awake. She doesn’t hear it, if she screams.”), mostly convictions in the kids’ mind to reinforce their hopelessness. But aouch: it seems like the domains, while showing some aspects of other fears (the kids are constantly hunted, what the monsters could do to them is close to Flesh-territory, etc.), are not really functioning as “collaborative” projects. If they were, pretty sure that some parents could be ensnared by Desolation or Beholding, for example, forced to watch their children getting tortured but unable to help and save them ;;

How the fear worked was also very on point for children’s psyche:

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: “Callum smiles and says he’s found a brand new monster! Jack doesn’t want to hear about it. He knows that when Callum tells him what it is, then it will start to chase him. He won’t see it, of course, because it’s just too dark! But he will know it’s there.”

Callum literally creates the fears of the monsters, which creates the monsters themselves. The conviction makes them true. And it really works that way when you’re a kid! Something that has been told to you, or that you saw/read somewhere (“Caitlin read a picture book once, full of horrible spiky fish with big eyes and crooked teeth. She would see them every time she went to bed for weeks. That was what the monsters looked like, she was sure of it. They would grip her, with their nasty cold fins, and bite her head clean off.”), is too powerful to be contained in pages and becomes a tangible threat that you’re sure is personally coming after you.

- … I live for the Dark vs. Eye animosity and:

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: Childish fears are… simplistic. MARTIN: [LONG EXHALE] ARCHIVIST: Direct. [SHAKINGLY] The Eye prefers the more complex neuroses and disquiets of a fully developed mind…! So the children are allowed to age… MARTIN: [DEEP INTAKES OF BREATH] ARCHIVIST: And they are placed in domains where their fears can… mature. Domains like this one. MARTIN: Christ, that’s… that’s messed up! ARCHIVIST: … Yes.

… The Eye throwing the kids at The Dark, because they’re not that satisfying on their own, so The Dark can have them. Beholding, please.

é_è Regarding the kids’ fears “maturing”, we get glimpses of that with Jack and Caitlin – there are very clear Hunt-vibes (being constantly pursued), but also some Lonely (nobody is coming for them), some Flesh and Slaughter (getting mutilated, consumed, being meat for the monsters), and I could very well see some Spiral sneaking in (not being confident in their sense of reality)…

The most upsetting part is how this domain and its function… felt thought through? That sort of grooming requires organisation to engineer a fear-machine. It’s not only instinct and impulse: it’s planned, organised towards a goal because current things are not good enough as is. It was stated time and time again (by Leitner, by Gertrude, by Gerry) that the Fears were mostly impulse, not really “thinking”, but this domain feels so… calculated, demonstrating a form of sentience behind it? I think that was the most upsetting reveal this episode – of course children wouldn’t have been safe, but to learn that they’re “allowed to age” only for their fears to develop and get more satisfying for The Eye? That’s truly horrifying.

(- I’m also a bit relieved to know what is happening to them, because there could have been “worse”: this episode could have talked about people who were pregnant when the Change happened, or about very very young infants. Though I can’t help but wonder about the babies and how they can grow up without adults to mirror, without forms of communication with their peers. Right now, the only hypothesis I have would be that they… could become “Inheritors” as described in MAG134, if left on their own and only raised with and around the Fears?)

- … I really wasn’t expecting Callum to come back, after the Church Of The Divine Host chapter seemed to have closed with Manuela. Well – I had trouble leaving behind the faint possibility that “Rayner” had somehow managed to hop into a new host, but I wasn’t expecting Callum to come back for himself.

(MAG073) ARCHIVIST: You said it started with a kidnapping case? BASIRA: Yeah. Callum Brodie. Twelve… twelve years old. Disappeared from his home in Dalston three weeks ago. Sitter was asleep when the mother came home, the front door was open, there was no sign of him. There was no forced entry so it started out as a missing persons case, but they got a witness claiming he’d seen three unknown figures entering the Brodies’ home that night, so it was kicked up to Serious Crime. There was some back and forth with Kidnap Squad since no ransom demand had been made, but not much progress in terms of finding the kid. […] The briefing was pretty short. We were told that Callum Brodie had been found and it was suspected he was being held by a man named Maxwell Rayner, with an unknown number of accomplices. There were suspicions that there might be cult involvement. That’s when I phoned you. […] Next to him was an old chair that looked like it could have come from a dinner table. The wood was stained, covered in dark mould, and tied to it with thin metal wire was Callum Brodie. The kid's eyes were blank, though not clouded like the old man’s, and his face was locked in a silent scream. Rayner was facing him, thin, bony hands raised to his face. Something was… something was flowing out of his mouth. It looked like ink, but it flowed more like a heavy fog than any sort of liquid. It drips down his forearms and onto the floor, where it… it rolled towards Callum, climbing up the chair and oozing across the boy’s body towards his face. It was moving slowly, and had just reached his chest. The roaring sound seemed to come as it convulsed out of the old man’s mouth. […] The kid seemed fine. I mean, I’m sure he’ll need a lot of counselling, but he didn’t seem physically any worse for wear.

(MAG140) ARCHIVIST: So Edmond Halley was… Rayner. Or, at least… whatever was inside him. You said he was dead, though. BASIRA: I thought he was. We shot him to hell before he could, uh… “pour himself” into that kid.

(MAG143) MANUELA: But I could see in his eyes that Maxwell was so very tired. And all the words fell to nothing. Instead, we began the search for his successor, a new host for his… continuation. He would regain his strength, and we would plan our next move. It was difficult, though. The approaching culmination had meant Maxwell had not prepared another host, and the search for another vessel was… long and involved. Finally, about eighteen months ago, we found one: a child, whose father had, by coincidence, been directly marked by The Dark. It was a desperate plan, but we were desperate, a shadow of what we had been. Maxwell left me here, to guard the Black Sun, and everyone else left to help in his rebirth. [INHALE] But it didn’t work, did it? I can only assume we were too weak to hide from you, and you struck when Maxwell was vulnerable.

+ Manuela’s words kinda confirming the hypothesis that he was the son of MAG052’s statement-giver, Phillip Brown, the awful cop who had reported on Robert Montauk’s death (MAG052: “Martin hasn’t had much luck tracking down Mr Brown himself. According to Caroline Brodie, his ex-wife, she left him in 2004, after his dismissal from the prison service pushed him further into alcoholism, and he became abusive. She said she got a single letter from him in 2009, asking for reconciliation, but she never replied. Martin says the letter was postmarked from Waterford in Ireland. But he’s been unable to track Mr Brown any further.”)

… I immediately went with the same reasoning/hope as Martin when listening to this episode, that it wasn’t actually Callum himself but Rayner/a dark cultist possessing him ;; And nope ;;

(MAG173) MARTIN: That’s the avatar for this place? ARCHIVIST: Callum Brodie, thirteen years old. He guides the children through their fears of The Dark. MARTIN: This is that kid Basira went after last year, right? The one the darkness cult took. So, so that’s not even a kid, that’s whatever was inside Maxwell Rayner, it’s just wearing his body! ARCHIVIST: [CALLING] Callum? [FOOTSTEPS APPROACHING] CALLUM: Yeah, what? ARCHIVIST: You remember when those people kidnapped you. What happened? CALLUM: Mm, it was fun! I just hid and the cops came and got me. [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] ARCHIVIST: Tell the truth. [STATIC RISES] CALLUM: Augh…! I, I–I was, I was scared, alright? I was really, really… scared. [STATIC FADES] And it was dead dark, and… I couldn’t see anyone and, I didn’t know where I was and… And there–there was something on my face, and it was cold, and, and slimy, and it didn’t like me. Then there was a bang, and it was gone…! And… the police were there. [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] ARCHIVIST: And what happened to the thing that tried to take you over? CALLUM: Dunno, it… went away. ARCHIVIST: It died in the light. CALLUM: Whatever! ARCHIVIST: And it was after that you started shoving smaller kids into cupboards, right? CALLUM: Yeah. Give them a taste of it. Make them afraid of the dark. [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] ARCHIVIST: But you’ve always pushed around smaller children, haven’t you? CALLUM: They made me feel sick. I hate them! ARCHIVIST: And now? CALLUM: Now everyone’s afraid of me!

That was another thing which hurt a lot in this episode: the fact that, so far, Callum’s story felt “simple” in its horribleness: a kid, who got kidnapped by a cult, who almost got possessed by an evil Dark-something, who was rescued, who was probably traumatised but still physically saved. Basira had offhandedly mentioned that he would need help to process what had happened to him, but as far as we could tell, he was just a blameless victim who went home and that was it. And he still is on that front! … And he also turns out to be, and already was before the kidnapping case, a bully. And he’s only thirteen – you can’t judge and evaluate a kid’s actions as you do adults’! But what can you do, then?

It stings that Callum took on that role, because his father was an awful man and Caroline Brodie had apparently left him while pregnant or when Callum was a few weeks old, so Callum never really knew him, and the show has stated time and time again that blood doesn’t condition you to become someone or something, but Callum became a bully too even without his father (whether it’s independently or because the consequences of Philip’s actions were felt in other ways than his presence). It stings that Callum turns out to be both a victim and a bully, not caused but still nurtured by his own trauma: trying to reclaim some control by putting younger children through experiences similar to his own, and by trying to lie about how traumatising the kidnapping had been to him. And it’s still made clear that… the trauma led him to this. Brushing with the powers led him to this. And it’s still a thirteen-year-old kid that was probably let down and not cared after enough after his traumatic kidnapping (and was not provided with the necessary redressing before that, when he was a regular bully).

- Re: Jon compelling Callum to tell the truth:

* So Jon can still do that! I was wondering, since Oliver had pointed out Jon’s passiveness in his new role and Jon had not displayed the ability again since the Change, so far.

* I have various “!!” feelings about Jon not taking kids’ bullshit at face value and having the ability to make them tell the truth very matter-of-factly. That was… almost domestic. (And yeah, feeding the “Jon&Martin AU where they adopt twenty kids”)

* There has been a HUGE constant amongst avatars to picture their path towards their patron as logical and wanted, when we had had hints that it wasn’t that simple (Mike Crew comes to mind, in MAG091: “There are echoes of resignation, I think, almost desperation. That can’t be right, though. What reason would I have had not to jump? Not to become as I am now. Perhaps I just didn’t know the true joy of vertigo. It doesn’t matter.”). We got a vivid example with Callum, who tried to pretend that the kidnapping had been on his terms when he was actually terrified. Again and again, I can’t help but think about Jonah: if Jon were to compel him, to rip the truth from his struggling tongue, would we get a quite different biography from what he had sent to Jon in MAG160, which had been on his terms?

- ;; It was horrible and made a lot of sense that Jon… plainly accepted that the “ruling” avatar was a kid, but that Martin had more trouble understanding it. Jon had direct experience with children’s cruelty and intra-violence (his bully was 18 when he was 8); Martin’s own traumas, as far as we know, came from the adults that surrounded him (his father leaving, his grandfather dying, his mother falling apart).

Jon already knew very sharply that children can hurt children in “normal” circumstances, and had read enough about the Powers touching children or shaping their lives:

(MAG009, Julia Montauk) “Whatever I had seen my father doing in there, its effects had long since vanished. I don’t know why my father did what he did, and I doubt I ever will, but the more I go over these events in my head, the more sure I am that he had his reasons.” (MAG109) JULIA: I tried to live a normal life. I really did. I took jobs working in the backroom of offices where I wouldn’t need to meet anyone. I had boyfriends who promised they didn’t care. I burned through half a dozen counsellors. None of it worked. You see, my father’s always remained one of the darlings of the true crime community.

(MAG067, Jack Barnabas) “We sat on a bench as the sun went down, watching the sky redden, and Agnes asked me a question. It was the first time she’d said anything more than a few words since we left my flat. [STATIC] She asked me if I had a destiny.” (MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “And on top of that, sleeping peacefully among the fire… a baby. Untouched, unharmed, and to our eyes, alight with a burning divinity. We baptised her with the boiling water of Asag and named her… “Agnes”, as had been her mother’s final request. But… raising a messiah, as it turns out, is a lot more challenging than creating one.” (MAG145) ARTHUR: You might be right. But Agnes did. That’s the thing about an… “incarnation”, isn’t it? She was a child and… person as much as she was a god. And we messed that right up…! … I still remember when Diego brought us a book on childcare. [CHUCKLING] Roger’s body was still in her room, blackened and smoking from… when he tried to feed her. I thought for a moment he’d brought another one of his damn Leitners, but no! It was just a… regular ol’ book on looking after children…! But I was an idiot. Saw it as… attacking my leadership.

(MAG081) ARCHIVIST: There were supernatural things in the world, but they were rare – isolated and exaggerated, vastly outnumbered by wild tales and drunken imaginings. The one name I held in my mind as a true source of evil was Jurgen Leitner, and I knew him as the worst of it, for it was his name that had marked the encounter that scarred my youth. […] I do not know how many of them there are, or precisely how they separate, but I do know that the Eye – Beholding – was not the first that I encountered in my life. The first was the Spider. The Web. And I have no idea what that might mean. I was eight years old when my grandmother gave me the book.

(MAG101) MICHAEL: When he was in school, [Michael Shelley] lost a friend to something like me. His friend was named Ryan, but those in power simply called him schizophrenic. I don’t know if he was, but it doesn’t matter. He was so dreadfully afraid his world wasn’t real that to make it so was almost nothing. Michael was there when he was taken; he never got over what he saw. Or didn’t see. After much searching and despair, it drove him into the waiting arms of the Institute, where he met Gertrude Robinson.

(MAG111) GERRY: The things out there weren’t like taming fire, they couldn’t be contained or used for light or warmth. The best you could hope for from them, would be that they don’t spot you, and instead my mum chased after them, obsessed with others who had tried to stare at them without being blinded: y’know, Flamsteed, Smirke, Leitner. Idiots who destroyed themselves chasing a secret that wasn’t worth knowing. And the worst thing was, she marked me as a part of that, without my understanding. Or consent.

So no surprise that Jon had all the background knowledge to be already ready for this situation… and that Martin required more time and was more explicitly hurt and shocked by the concept.

There were two big layers of horror in that domain: how it operates on the kids, and how Martin&Jon were seemingly powerless, unable to put a stop to it, while the situation was indeed intolerable:

(MAG173) MARTIN: Wh–what about the avatar? Alright, I know you said it didn’t change anything, that the domain would still exist, but at this point I don’t care, alright? Anyone who’s chosen to spend their apocalypse tormenting children– God, you–you need to end them. Now. ARCHIVIST: … It’s not that simple! MARTIN: Seriously? Seriously? ARCHIVIST: [LONG SIGH] … Fine. […] You see? MARTIN: See what, Jon, what am I supposed to see? That you don’t want to kill a… thirteen-year-old kid, big revelation! ARCHIVIST: I don’t know what you want me to do! MARTIN: I want you to use your power, I want you to help them, I want you to make things better! ARCHIVIST: There – is – no – “better” anymore. MARTIN: You keep saying that, and I hate it! ARCHIVIST: I keep saying it because it keeps being true, you know that! [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] MARTIN: What I know is that leaving children here is… i–i–it’s inexcusable, i–it’s monstrous! ARCHIVIST: Martin, tell me what you want me to do, and I will do it! [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] MARTIN: … [SLIGHTLY MUFFLED] Tell me about this place. … I need to know. […] The sooner we get back to the Archives, the sooner we can put a stop to this. All of this. They just… [INHALE] They’ll just need to hang on a little longer. ARCHIVIST: … Right. [EXHALE] Right.

* Outside of the supernatural, it’s a very concrete situation: what can you do, as an (unequipped) adult, if you’re witnessing a child torturing children in a community in which you don’t belong? What is the thing that needs to be done to improve the situation?

* Added with the supernatural, as was mentioned: the torture would keep going anyway if Callum was removed. And Callum is a kid, who was clearly traumatised himself and is fighting for survival – how could he deserve death for it? Yet, he’s enjoying the pain he inflicts; yet, he’s not the problem. (The problem is, as Martin pointed out again, the apocalypse itself. The problem is the Fear-machine, the system the Fears put in place.)

* … Ethical concerns about the “goodness” of smiting a thirteen-year-old to lower the pain of other kids aside, “smiting” Callum probably would have made things worse for the other kids: it would have given them an example that… monsters can kill even the most powerful of you. That your “friend” (who is also a bully) can be taken down, that you can disappear, that you can die. Concretely, it would probably have caused more fears for the kids.

- Overall: I’m glad that this episode demonstrated that no, the “smiting” is absolutely not viable nor reliable. It’s petty revenge. It doesn’t do anything good (and is probably feeding The Eye, so contributing to the awful system), it doesn’t free people nor does it decrease their sufferings. Yet: is it okay to let people enjoy the chaos be and keep benefitting from it? There is not clear answer about what Jon and Martin “have to” do, but I perfectly understand their frustrations…

- I’m still laughing so so hard that Jonah… is never relevant. Avatars can immediately identify Jon as all-powerful or even the apocalypse-bringer:

(MAG164) HELEN: What would I have to gloat about? Much as I am delighted by this brave new world in which we find ourselves, I can take no credit for it. This was all… you!

(MAG165) NOT!SASHA: Well, of course you want to wallow in my shame like your voyeur master!

(MAG166) HELEN: We’re all here, Martin. The Stranger; The Buried; The Desolation; all of us. But The Eye still rules. All this fear is being performed for its benefit. And so, there are now exactly two roles available in this new world of ours: the watcher, and the watched. Subject, and object. Those who are feared, and those who are afraid. And Jon, well… he is part of The Eye; a very important part.

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: “This report is being sent to: The Great Eye, that watches all who linger in terror, and gorges itself on the sufferings of those under its unrelenting, stuporous gaze! And its Archive, which draws knowledge of this suffering unto itself. […] Perhaps once it might have horrified me, or given me some sense of pursuing the ultimate release of the world that you have damned.”

(MAG169) JUDE: Fancy seeing you both here. To what, exactly, do I owe the pleasure, the honour, of being graced by the great and powerful Archivist, harbinger of this new world, and his, uh… valet…? […] Just messing around~! Wouldn’t want to keep you from your oh-so-special business, Your Holiness.

(MAG171) JARED: Mm. … So, is there any way this doesn’t end in me dead? I’m guessing that’s on the docket if you’re here. Unless you’re just here to smell the flowers.

(MAG172) ARCHIVIST: “THE SPIDER: Oh, Francis… It’s such a shame, but I couldn’t do such a thing even if I wanted to! The man in the audience saw to that!”

(MAG173) CALLUM: … You’re the Eye guy, right? ARCHIVIST: That’s right. CALLUM: So you’re like… real important. ARCHIVIST: [HUFF] I suppose I am!

But Jonah? Jonah “I am to be a king of a ruined world, and I shall never die.” Magnus? Never heard of ‘em.

(But aouch, the identification of Jon as connected to The Eye and/or being responsible for the apocalypse is not helping him… He was feeling guilty about it even before leaving the cabin. I wonder how much time before someone points out and reminds him that Jonah framed him and planned and pushed for the apocalypse to happen? Martin had clearly identified Jonah as the one responsible, but it’s been a while since he was last mentioned…)

- Back to “what are the tape recorders DOING” because mmmm…

(Season 5 trailer) MARTIN: Are you still… [SIGH] “feeling it”? Seeing everything? ARCHIVIST: Yes, I, I’m trying not to, but… all of the fear, th–the anguish, i–it just… [INHALE] It keeps coming at me in waves, rolling over me, filling my head with such… awful sights. MARTIN: … I’m sorry. That sounds… [SMALL EXHALE] That sounds horrible. ARCHIVIST: … I wish it was, Martin. I really wish it was. … But it feels… right. [MIRTHLESS HUFF]

(MAG162) MARTIN: What happened? The tapes, were you– […] Look, Jon, I… I, I know it hurts, but you’ve just got to… ARCHIVIST: No, no, lo–look… I, I–I was listening, and I–I was filled with this… hatred. This anger; I–I wanted to leave, and hunt down Elias, a–and…! MARTIN: W–wow, okay… ARCHIVIST: But, when I thought it… the–there was… [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] There was something else. Th–this place, it… it didn’t want me, it… [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] didn’t want us to go. MARTIN: … What do you mean? ARCHIVIST: This cabin. [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] It’s not right. And, when I thought that, I–I felt… It, it all poured out of me down… into the tape. MARTIN: [SIGH] ARCHIVIST: A–a–an–and it… felt good. It–it felt… right. MARTIN: Okay. [BREATHES IN] So you’re recording again? ARCHIVIST: I might need to. If we’re going to make it…!

(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: They won’t hear you, Martin, they’re all… too busy waiting to die. MARTIN: Jon… ARCHIVIST: They sit here – [STATIC RISES] the image of everyone they hold dear locked in their mind, knowing they’ll never see them again. Waiting for the order; dreading the bullet or the drone or the barbed wire that will tear them to shreds and leave them nothing but a bloody– [STATIC REACHING A PEAK] MARTIN: J–Jon, enough! Enough! [STATIC FADES] … Please don’t tell me these things. ARCHIVIST: I… I’m sorry, I– There’s just so much! There’s so much, Martin, and I know all of it, I can see all of it, and I– It’s filling me up, I need to let it out! MARTIN: I’m sorry, but tough. Okay? Tha–that’s not what I’m here for. [VOICE IN THE DISTANCE: “No… No!”] MARTIN: I can’t be that for you, I–I just can’t. ARCHIVIST: [QUIET] I… I know. [SILENCE] I–I’ll use the tape recorder…! [PLASTIC OF A TAPE] I just… [INHALE] You probably want to wait outside.

(MAG164) ARCHIVIST: We’re fine. MARTIN: A–are we? I mean, that place is– … I don’t, I don’t feel fine, okay, and you were there a long time doing your… y–you–your guidebook, which, you know, I get it, but that place is…

(MAG165) MARTIN: Yeeaah, good call. Hum, in that case, do you want to… do your thing now then, before we start moving? But, are we close enough? [ROARING IN THE DISTANCE] ARCHIVIST: … Yes… Yes, I–I think so. Good idea. MARTIN: Thanks! ARCHIVIST: You, uh… [SHUFFLING] You might want to take a bit of a walk. This… feels like a strange one…

(MAG166) ARCHIVIST: I… It’s hard to put into words. Loo–l… [SIGH] Look, we can talk about it later, we’re– coming to a… “domain of The Buried”, and [STATIC RISES] I would really rather… […] [INHALE] [WHIMPERING] Ah… [GRUNT] MARTIN: Jon? Are you… ARCHIVIST: We’ve been… close for too long, I need to, uh… [INHALE] You might want to take a walk. MARTIN: Hm.

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] [LONG EXHALE] [CREAKING SOUND] Oookay. Time you went for a walk. [FOOTSTEPS] MARTIN: Y–yeah, about that… [CREAKING SOUND] You sure you’ll be okay on your own? […] You… [INHALE] You vomit your horrors. [SIGH] ARCHIVIST: [REVULSED SOUND] Uh! I’m… not sure I like that metaphor…! MARTIN: “Puke your terrors”? ARCHIVIST: … Just go. MARTIN: Alright. Fine, I’m going.

(MAG171) JARED: You still do that talk-y thing? You know? Drink up all the fear and spit it back out? ARCHIVIST: Sort of, yes. JARED: Alright. Well, I’d like to hear about my garden. [SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: … Okay! MARTIN: Look, if this is some kind of trick– ARCHIVIST: It isn’t. […] MARTIN: Jon, are you… alright? ARCHIVIST: Yeah, hum… Sorry. MARTIN: No, it, it’s alright. JARED: Is it really that bad? Seeing what I’ve done here? Or… uh! Is it maybe that deep down, you think it’s as beautiful as I do?

(MAG172) ARCHIVIST: Ah… Hold up, I–I need to, uh… [RUSTLING OF CLOTHES] MARTIN: Now, seriously? We’re almost out of here. ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] I’m sorry…! Not really up to me…! MARTIN: Fine. [SIGH]

(MAG173) MARTIN: Slow down, I can barely see a thing! ARCHIVIST: … Sorry. […] Look, I would just really like to get through here, as quickly as possible. MARTIN: How come? This one seems like the quietest place we’ve been in a while! It’s just… rows and rows of quiet houses. I mean, I know some people don’t like that sort of thing, [CHUCKLING] but I’m actually finding it kind of relaxing s– ARCHIVIST: [AGITATED BREATHING] Martin…! Please. [LOUD BREATHING] MARTIN: … Jon…? Where are we? ARCHIVIST: I–it’s complicated. MARTIN: That’s… not an answer! ARCHIVIST: Can we please just move on? […] Do you really want to know that? Really? MARTIN: [FRUSTRATED BREATHS] ARCHIVIST: I’ve been trying very hard to keep this one bottled up…!

Jon had also mentioned that they could have gone another way in MAG169; the statement in MAG171 was prompted by Jared, who wanted to hear about it; and MAG170 was even given by Martin. Jon had almost left the Web’s domain without giving one, and tried to “keep this one bottled up” in MAG172, and only gave it when prompted by Martin. Is Jon displaying a bit more control over his need to “pour out” the domains’ statements?

Once again: there are very two different things at play. On the one hand, the fact that Jon and Martin have to “experience” the domains by going through them, and the fact that Jon sometimes feel saturated to the point he has to “pour out” into the tapes to be able to function again. The two do not feel connected or necessary to each other: the tape recorder clicked on in MAG167 and recorded something that wasn’t a domain’s statement (but one about the previous Team Archive), and Jon didn’t give the house’s statement in MAG170 – that was Martin. What are the tape recorders, and is this feeding them somehow…?

- Sob about Martin trying to lighten the mood at the beginning of the episode, because it just created a rift right away – Jon already knowing the horror of the situation, and Martin thinking/hoping that the situation around there was okay-ish, allowing for light jokes:

(MAG173) MARTIN: Slow down, I can barely see a thing! ARCHIVIST: … Sorry. MARTIN: No prizes for guessing who’s in charge here, eh? ARCHIVIST: Mm, I–I suppose not…! MARTIN: You know… I really miss the days when I could blame broken streetlights on the council. A strongly-worded letter just doesn’t feel as forceful when it’s addressed to “whichever Dread Power it may concern”. ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] [SIGH] Hm.

Please, Martin, send many strongly-worded letters to Jonah to hiss about the current problems.

Also, SOB ABOUT THIS BIT:

(MAG173) MARTIN: This one seems like the quietest place we’ve been in a while! It’s just… rows and rows of quiet houses. I mean, I know some people don’t like that sort of thing, [CHUCKLING] but I’m actually finding it kind of relaxing s–

Because ahahahahahaha: lonely!Martin liked the “quiet” in season 4, and “rows and rows of quiet houses” puts me in mind of MAG150’s statement with the Lonely suburb ;;

- The fear that The Web could be messing with Martin is still fresh in Jon’s mind, uh?

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: Martin, tell me what you want me to do, and I will do it! [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] MARTIN: … [SLIGHTLY MUFFLED] Tell me about this place. … I need to know. ARCHIVIST: I thought you hated listen– … [INHALE] Are you… sure that’s what you want? MARTIN: Of course it’s not…! [BAG JOSTLING] But I need to hear it.

;; Jon trying to check if Martin wasn’t mindcontrolled, since it sounded out-of-character…

(But: it made sense for Martin, and it’s also one more thing that couldn’t really have happened at the beginning of the season. Martin didn’t want to hear about Jon “vomiting” his horrors – it’s not that he was living in denial about them happening, he knew very well about them. But as was mentioned, “knowing” and “understanding” are two different things: Martin could hear that the children were terrified and preyed upon, the statement “only” provided details and the way the domain was operating. It brought no catharsis, no clue about how to make it stop and help the kids. It just made Martin another voyeur, aware of the situation… and unable to do anything short-term to solve it.)

- It’s sad and I’m glad that Jon and Martin’s differences are shining and conflicting a bit more obviously nowadays. At the core of it: Jon knows how to navigate through this new world, knows how it works, what is happening around them. He already knew about the children getting tortured, why they were there, that they were being groomed to become more satisfying for The Eye. Martin… doesn’t, and Jon tends to forget that: while Jon has to bear the knowledge, it also makes some of his actions hard to follow (Martin didn’t understand why Jon was walking so fast), and Martin’s hypotheses and hopes ruled out before he even voiced them (Jon already knew that Callum was in charge and that “smiting” this domain’s avatar wasn’t a comfortable option). But it doesn’t feel to me like they’re heading towards full-blown conflict, quite the contrary: there are tensions, there are mutual frustrations over the other’s behaviour, but they don’t forget that the apocalypse is responsible for it, and are getting better at wording what they’re feeling. Martin had pointed out that Jon wasn’t very open about his feelings, and it’s true; and it’s also true that Martin seems to be misunderstanding Jon’s level of control over their situation, to the point that… they’re both occasionally hurting each other.

(- Re: the slapping reference, I thiiiink it was Jon’s attempt at a sardonic joke like he had done in MAG154, and it just didn’t land because it sounded accusatory with a tint of cruel edge instead:

(MAG154) ARCHIVIST: I–I’ve been trying to a–avoid, being, hum… Sticking to old statements? Thank you, for your little “intervention”, by the way. MARTIN: Look, I wouldn’t have had to if you hadn’t– ARCHIVIST: Yes, no, I know, I’m sorry, uh– that didn’t… come out right. Honestly: thank you. [EXHALE] It’s been hell, but… I–I did need to hear it.

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: [LOUD, LONG EXHALE] [STATIC FADES] Is that enough for you? Do you need to hear more? MARTIN: … I… ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] [STATIC INCREASES] “See Luka. See Luka sleep–” [RUSTLING OF CLOTHES] MARTIN: No, no! No, that’s enough, that’s… enough. [STATIC FADES] [FOOTSTEPS] ARCHIVIST: … Thank you for not hitting me this time. [SILENCE, PUNCTUATED BY SCREAMS] Was that what you wanted? What you needed? MARTIN: … No. [SLIGHTLY MUFFLED] No, it didn’t help at all. ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry. MARTIN: … Let’s get out of here.

Martin hasn’t slapped Jon three times for the fun of it or for his own benefit: he had previously tried to shake him awake (MAG160) and to talk him out of it (MAG169, MAG172) when Jon was supernaturally ensnared. But, also: Jon is perfectly entitled to be bitter about it.

I wonder if Martin will try to find another way next time, though (MAKE OUT WITH HIM, HE WON’T BE ABLE TO TALK, MARTIN.))

- Sob over the fact that Martin “wanting” something reminded me of his outburst at Tim…

(MAG079) TIM: Alright, fine. Fine. What do you want? What’s your light at the end of these spooky damn tunnels – and don’t say “everyone happy forever”, because that’s not happening. … Well? MARTIN: I don’t know. I don’t know!! I want to find out what’s going on; I want to save Jon; I want everyone to be fine, and you know what? If we were all happy that wouldn’t actually be the end of the world!

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: I don’t know what you want me to do! MARTIN: I want you to use your power, I want you to help them, I want you to make things better! ARCHIVIST: There – is – no – “better” anymore. MARTIN: You keep saying that, and I hate it! ARCHIVIST: I keep saying it because it keeps being true, you know that!

And Jon is really reminiscent of Tim right now? Convinced that they’re stuck in this situation forever, almost reproaching Martin for daring to hope? While Martin’s hope indeed feels too idealistic and unreachable, despite technically being… the bare minimum.

- Jon… hasn’t always been this fatalistic about the current situation in season 5. He began the season with hopelessness, but then was the one to offer hope, before… apparently reverting back to despair:

(Season 5 trailer) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] … What? What do you want? … The world is…! It’s over. You’ve won. What can you possibly still need to hear? […] MARTIN: “How are you feeling in general”, then? ARCHIVIST: … Unchanged. [PAUSE] I don’t know if it’ll ever change again…! […] MARTIN: Maybe I should, uh… pop down the village? See if they have any coffee instead? ARCHIVIST: It’s gone, Martin, and the people are…! MARTIN: Yes, I know, Jon, I’m not ignorant, I’m just… I’m just not ready for complete despair yet. ARCHIVIST: “Like me”. MARTIN: … I didn’t say that. ARCHIVIST: You didn’t have to.

(MAG161) MARTIN: Jon, it’s not your fault… ARCHIVIST: Martin, can we not do this again. MARTIN: Sorry. ARCHIVIST: I’m just… I’m mourning a world I killed…! MARTIN: I know… ARCHIVIST: And we’re all trapped in its rotting corpse…! […] MARTIN: Jon, I… This isn’t healthy. ARCHIVIST: Healthy? I am an avatar of voyeuristic terror, whose unquestioned craving for knowledge has condemned the entire world… to an eternity of torment, “healthy” i–isn’t, i–it’s not…! […] No, it’s not, I’m, I’m sorry, I just… [RUSTLING OF CLOTHES] [INHALE, EXHALE] It hurts. MARTIN: I know. ARCHIVIST: … I need time. MARTIN: I know. But we can’t stay in this cabin forever…! [DISTANT HOWL] ARCHIVIST: Why not? It, it’s quiet here, an–and I have you…! […] MARTIN: Well, that as may be, we can’t just stay here forever. ARCHIVIST: What could possibly be out there that you want to see? MARTIN: A way to stop this, a way to turn the world back! ARCHIVIST: [HINT OF A DISHEARTENED SMILE] … Do you really think there is one? [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] MARTIN: Well, if there is, it’s not in here, is it? ARCHIVIST: It’s so… It’s so loud, out there? The agony, the–the terror, I can see it all so much more clearly…! MARTIN: I’m sorry. ARCHIVIST: No, it’s– [SIGH] I love you, I just… I need more time. [SILENCE] MARTIN: It’s alright. [RUSTLING OF CLOTHES] [CREAKING SOUND] ARCHIVIST: [SOFT EXHALE] MARTIN: It’s alright, I’m good at waiting.

(MAG162) ARCHIVIST: “This place wishes to be our tomb. But The Eye does not wish that. No. [STATIC INCREASES] The Eye wishes instead that it be my chrysalis. It is time that I emerge…” [STATIC REACHING A PEAK] […] MARTIN: So you’re recording again? ARCHIVIST: I might need to. If we’re going to make it…! [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] MARTIN: Back to the Archives? ARCHIVIST: Seems the best place to start. [RUMBLE OF THUNDER] MARTIN: Uh… Y–eah, alright! [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] ARCHIVIST: Martin… It’s going to be a hard journey. […] MARTIN: Do you think it’ll do anything? Confronting Elias? ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] I… [SIGH] Maybe? MARTIN: No, I’m serious. Do we… [PAUSE IN THE PACKING SOUNDS] Is there a chance that we can undo this? ARCHIVIST: [LONG INHALE] Gertrude didn’t think so. [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] MARTIN: … Right. ARCHIVIST: [SOFT] But she’s dead. [FIRMER] Let’s find out for ourselves. […] Besides, there’s… far worse out there. Better to try and avoid it, I think. MARTIN: We’re not even gonna try? We, we’ve got your lighter, maybe we could just– ARCHIVIST: We can’t fight the world, Martin. MARTIN: [AMUSED DEFIANT HUFF] Says you.

(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: It means the journey will be the journey, regardless of how we choose to make it. […] You could see that tower from anywhere on Earth. And it can see you. And if you walk towards it, eventually you’ll get there. But you have to go through everything in-between. […] MARTIN: What’re you doing here? [PLASTIC RATTLING] It’s dangerous. Could… get yourself blown up, like all these poor… [PLASTIC RATTLING] Who d’you think they were? Really don’t see why they can’t just… go round, picked a better place to… [STEPS THROUGH LIQUID] [SIGH] I guess there… aren’t really any “better” places anymore, are there? [STEPS THROUGH LIQUID] It’s all this. Or worse, or… or different.

(MAG164) MARTIN: How much further do we still need to go? [STATIC INCREASES] ARCHIVIST: A long way. Through many dark and awful places… […] MARTIN: Can we turn the world back? [STATIC RISES, STRONG] ARCHIVIST: Wow! Hum… I–if the Fears are removed, yes; but they–they can’t be destroyed while there are still… people to fear them; th–then they can’t be banished back to the space where they came from, it’s not… there anymore, I… Oh! Uh… MARTIN: J–J–Jon, what’s wrong? ARCHIVIST: Uh, it’s, uh… I’m sorry, trying to know things about them directly, i–i–it’s like… [STATIC DECREASES] [EXHALE] God, it’s like looking into the Sun…! MARTIN: Okay, okay – okay, alright, that’s alright.

(MAG167) ARCHIVIST: Help us with what? MARTIN: ‘xcuse me? ARCHIVIST: Annabelle, help us with “what”? Our–our, our journey, killing Elias, vanishing the Entities – what? […] Wi–without… trust, without a, a reason… Gertrude needed both the purpose her mission gave her, and the control her position allowed. To be here, like us, without a, [INHALE] a reason, without someone to ground her, she… She’d have power but… no control. No real… purpose. Perhaps she’d dedicate herself to a, a doomed quest like us, but– … [QUIET] No… I think this would have broken her. And she’d have resigned herself to… ruling her domain. […] MARTIN: [INHALE] [SNORT] Ssso. If you say Gertrude wouldn’t have been able to go on without a reason… ARCHIVIST: Yes, Martin, you are my reason. MARTIN: Just wanted to make you say it…! ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] MARTIN: Cool.

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: I feel badly for those that exist in his domain, o–of course, I do, but… At least, their suffering will be over, eventually.

(MAG170) ARCHIVIST: M–Martin, if you… did; i–if you wanted to forget… a–all of it, stay here and just… escape. I… I would understand. MARTIN: … N–no…! It’s comforting here, leaving all those… painful memories behind, but… It’s not a good comfort, it’s… I–it’s the kind that makes you fade, makes you… dim and… distant.

(MAG171) MARTIN: Jon. We are… doing good, right? Making things better? ARCHIVIST: … I don’t know if that was… ever an option.

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: I don’t know what you want me to do! MARTIN: I want you to use your power, I want you to help them, I want you to make things better! ARCHIVIST: There – is – no – “better” anymore. MARTIN: You keep saying that, and I hate it! ARCHIVIST: I keep saying it because it keeps being true, you know that! […] MARTIN: [INHALE] [CLEARER] The sooner we get back to the Archives, the sooner we can put a stop to this. All of this. They just… [INHALE] They’ll just need to hang on a little longer. ARCHIVIST: … Right. [EXHALE] Right. MARTIN: Come on.

After the surge of hope towards the end of MAG162, Jon has made more and more small comments implying that he doesn’t think that there is a “better” solution (theirs is a “doomed quest”, Oliver’s victims will ~at least~ die, Martin staying in his domain would have been a way to “escape”, etc.) I wonder what is happening in Jon’s mind: is it the journey starting to take its toll on him, things feeling hopeless because he has to face the concreteness of this new world, which feels all-powerful, too complicated, too big, impossible to undo? Or did he “know” something that he hasn’t told Martin, back in MAG164, or did he drew from there the conclusion that it was impossible to get rid of the Fears? In any case: it’s good that Martin is still pushing for hope and for a solution. What would be the alternative? Just stopping and getting a domain to rule over? Keeping on with the journey through the horrors forever ~since at least they’re together uwu~?

- Re: Jon apparently not daring to hope (anymore) vs. Martin accidentally sounding very bossy and ignorant by wanting Jon to save things… at the core of it, I think that there is a misunderstanding between them regarding Jon’s powers, which makes sense for both of them.

For Jon: his powers can’t do much good. Growing as an Archivist came with taking live-statements and condemning people to his nightmare zoo, where he could only watch and not intervene (with mentions that he used to try). Saving Melanie and Daisy, annihilating the Dark Sun, was accompanied by new victims, constantly tortured, leaving them a wreck. He never “saved the world”: The Unknowing would have failed on its own with no intervention necessary, and Melanie was right to point out that them trying to do good… had invariably caused bad things all around. Saving Martin meant getting his last mark, setting him up for Jonah’s apocalypse.

But for Martin: Jon saved him from The Lonely twice. Martin’s own “powers” (disappearing in front of Georgie, his Lonely training) never came at the cost of sacrificing innocents – only himself. And Jon was able to stop hurting innocents when monitored, after Martin took Jess Tyrell’s complaint: bad people, bad avatars, would keep hurting people. But it seems that in Martin’s mind, there are still “good” ways to use one’s powers (saving people, smiting avatars) without negative consequences – which… isn’t really the case. The powers are granted by the Fears to provide more fear for the Fears.

(- Amongst the sad things regarding Martin’s horror at being a passive witness to the children’s suffering: technically, it was long-due as a horror, since the very beginning of the show. They knew, as Team Archive, that the things happening out there were hurting actual people, real people. That some of them were still alive. Jon began season 4 lightly apologising about their passivity, in the Web’s web-development statement. Martin is horrified at their passivity now, but technically… they’ve never really tried to help people for the sake of helping people — the worst cases being Jon’s own victims.)

(- I shouldn’t hoooooope but ;; The fact that Jon seems to be reaching rock-bottom re:hope and being unable to do anything good, to make things “better”… still makes me wonder if he might not manage to get Daisy back for a short while.

Alternatively: that would be the rock-bottom. To have to smite her, or to help Basira in killing her as promised… because there is no other option.)

- Right now, Jon and Martin indeed feel powerless, but there are various elements contributing to this. First: at the beginning of the journey, reaching the Panopticon was supposed to be the start to trying to undo the apocalypse, not the final objective; right now, as they go through domain after the domain and the horrors are more concrete, it’s easy to forget that the journey wasn’t supposed to be their answer and solution.

Jon is also getting his powers from Beholding, who has never been a passive agent when it comes to knowledge – Jon had noted how hard it had been to listen to MAG154’s tape (containing a way to… cut one’s connection to The Eye), and had even expressed his difficulty with burning Gerry’s page because of the knowledge it could still provide. When Jon had tried to know how to get rid of the fears in MAG164, he had noted that knowing about the Powers was more intense – and had to quickly stop. Why would The Eye nurture the hope of undoing the apocalypse making it all-powerful?

Meanwhile, Martin has noticed that he was “always following, never leading”, doesn’t have a clear understanding of the domains, doesn’t have powers, which… seems to limit his options. He’s also proved to be able to think outside-of-the-box when it came to providing plans, in the past, and had sometimes displayed a more “intuitive” feel of the powers (with Peter and Simon), so that could come in handy – just… not in the current environment.

Overall: Martin and Jon are limited right now, having trouble understanding themselves and conveying it to the other (but are still trying!), and clearly in need of other perspectives… So here’s to hoping that Melanie&Georgie, Basira (… and potentially Daisy but I don’t wanna hope TT_TT) could help. I doubt that the entirety of season 5 would be a hopeless exploration of this apocalyptical world in which everyone suffers almost-forever and then dies?

… The other option right now is Annabelle, who had told Martin that she was calling “to help”: given that Jon&Martin are lacking options… Martin could be a bit more open this time if she tries to reach him again – or at least, listen to what she has to say, even if it’s only venom.

  New organisation for season 5, as announced everywhere!

I see absolutely no downside to this as a listener: I’m glad that RQ are allowing themselves more time to work on the show safely and remotely (operating safely during the pandemic means that the logistics of almost everything has changed, you can’t expect people to keep up), I’m glad that the series is lasting longer time-wise (yay!), I’m glad that I’ll have two 6-weeks-break to breathe a bit /o/ And honestly, if they end up needing more time and have to space out episodes/hiatuses for even a bit longer, full support, I hope that they won’t hesitate if it’s deemed necessary (or even healthy!).

Curious about the fragmentation in three acts – that’s another structure of tragedy, it… could mean that we’re technically in the “prologue” to the core of the season? Well, the segmentation in three is also interesting for events: we’re currently in the journey towards the domain, there are only Vast, Hunt and Spiral remaining, which could mean that MAG176 is the last zone before the Panopticon, and then… And then. Act I being the journey, Act II and Act III regarding the Panopticon (research into the Archives) and Hill Top Road? Eye-arc and Web-arc? (I’m still a bit “MMMM” about a few words said during one of the Q&A, which could imply time/timelines shenanigans at some point…)

MAG174’s title is… well, my adjective for it would be the title itself, damnit. I… It… it could be the perfect title for a Vast domain (Simon, where are you.) AND for monster!Daisy barging in into that domain, WorriedForDaisy.jpg

[dark-academia-newsroom]

Advice for early career and student journalists

I’m making this post because students will often reach out to me for advice. I’m always happy to chat, but thought I would do a brain dump on tumblr as an easy-to-share resource. I’ll continue adding things as I think of them. 

First, who I am: Right now, I’m the audience engagement editor at the Center for Public Integrity, one of America’s oldest, Pulitzer-prize winning, nonprofit newsrooms. I handle digital strategy, social media, partnerships, crowdsourced investigations, newsletters, metrics, SEO and help with membership building. I also sometimes report when I can. -whew- Before that, I was doing audience engagement at POLITICO. I hope my experience can be useful to you! ✨

Low-hanging fruit: 

Network but IRL: I feel like I could have done this more when I was an undergraduate student. There are a ton of groups that regularly host events like the Online News Association, Society of Professional Journalists, the Asian American Journalists Association, National Association for Black Journalists, National Association for Hispanic Journalists and more. I personally like smaller events so that you can get to know people on a more intimate level. Conferences are sometimes intimidating but special tracts or scholarships for students are really great opportunities that you should take advantage of. 

Reach out to people you admire: First, they might actually end up being your colleague or superior one day. It’s also great to get advice from journalists you want to emulate. If you want a similar career, learn from the best! 

Have a portfolio: It doesn’t have to be fancy –– my first portfolio was on tumblr! It helps to have your work in one place so employers can have your information and experience on hand. 

Build your social presence: It doesn’t just help with clout. Employers can get a sense of who you are and based on what you tweet (since journalist Twitter is still a thing), it shows that you’re thinking critically about the conversations going on in the industry. 

Keep up with industry news: Read Nieman Lab, Poynter, Pew research etc. You’ll be remembered not just for reporting, but for executing journalism smartly. Plugging into tough conversations in the industry also helps build your news judgement. 

Be active at your campus paper: It’ll help you get experience and internships which lead to jobs!

P.S. A job interview starts the minute you walk through the door or pick up a phone, not when you’re sitting down across from the hiring manager. Use every minute you have with them to impress. 

For the workplace: 

Journalism is best when it’s collaborative: Aim to work with people who will elevate your journalism. They might be on a different team from yours entirely. 

Go the extra mile, but know your limits: This one is pretty self explanatory. If you can do something, say yes. But if your plate is full you should communicate that to your editor and they will help you reprioritize. They should work with you, especially if you’re still in school. 

Ask questions: I still sometimes hesitate to ask my director questions. But it’s important to make sure you have your ducks in a row. Depending on the story, asking questions might even be a matter of safety. 

Speak up: If you have an idea you want to spitball, share it with your editor or at the all staff meeting. It might be intimidating, but it’s better to be generous with your ideas. You can’t build from nothing. Btw, you might know something that other people don’t –– even if you feel you’re the least experienced because of your age. You have something to contribute and people should recognize that. 

Roll with the punches: Don’t beat yourself up too badly when you make a mistake. I sometimes think back on errors I’ve made, especially while covering breaking news. I learned from those mistakes and did better the next time. That’s what counts. 

Join your diversity committee: If you care about an equitable world, start with your newsroom. If you don’t have a diversity committee, start one! 

Join your coworkers for drinks or hangs: Camaraderie amongst coworkers builds a strong team. I'm not promoting alcoholism...but journalists do have strong livers for a reason.

Keep your receipts: If there’s ever an issue with senior management, write the incident down, export your emails and screenshot your messages. The first thing HR will ask for is proof. Also, don’t send anything you don’t want other people to see.

For reporting: 

Think outside the box: With interactives, video, graphics and social media, there’s a ton of ways to experiment with different forms of storytelling and soliciting feedback from audiences to help inform your work. You’ll be remembered for implementing something new. 

Don’t get attached: Editing is a bitch, no matter what the medium. You’re gonna see a lot of red lines or cuts. Don’t be discouraged. It’s normal! Unless you can make a case for why something is really strong or necessary to include, you might want to check yourself and see if you’re being too precious about your work. I found that my editors were wise enough to make decisions that strengthened my copy.

Listen humbly: Always consider the possibility that the story that you originally had in mind could be completely wrong. Journalists are not experts at everything. Be flexible and report on what you find. Treat people with dignity and compassion.

Journalism is a service: Before you report a story, ask yourself who you’re serving by reporting it. How are you contributing to the narrative? What impact do you hope this will make? Who are you holding accountable? How are you lifting people up? Who isn’t being heard? 

Diversify your sources: Make sure POC, women, LGBTQ+ are represented in your work, even if they’re not explicitly talking about their identities, you’re highlighting their voices and expertise. 

General advice: 

You are your best hype-man: No award or accomplishment is too small. Celebrate! And #humblebrag.  

Question everything: Even your editor and yourself! 

Know your worth: Don’t let anyone drag you down. And if you can’t afford it, don’t work for free. 

Objectivity isn’t real: “Both sides” journalism is not it. Why? It fails to acknowledge injustice and structural inequalities our country is built on. The role of media is to use it’s power and influence to inform and hold people accountable for upholding those structures. If something is wrong, call it out. 

Wellp, these are all the things that I can think of off the top of my head. Let me know if I missed anything! :’) 

[dailyaudiobible]

04/29/2021 DAB Transcript

Judges 9:22-10:18, Luke 24:13-53, Psalms 100:1-5, Proverbs 14:11-12

Today is the 29th day of April welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I'm Brian it is a joy and an honor, a true privilege to be here with you today around the Global Campfire, where we are still gushing about the arrival of our new little baby in our family. Reagan, China, and Ben are doing great and I'm trying to think how many days canI get away with talking about her in a row, but everything is adjusting well as it should, and we are excited. So, let's…let’s…let’s move to what we've come here, what we’ve come here every day to do. Let's move toward the Scriptures. So, we just to center ourselves. Lot’s is going on. There's plenty of stuff we can find to be anxious about or fear or doubt or worry about. There's plenty of things in the world that if we need to seek out these emotions, we can find things to be stressed out about. And we can still do that when were done here if that's what we want but let's set it all aside and just come into this oasis around this Global Campfire together and take the next step forward because so…so often the next step forward is the next step we need to take and it's taking that step in the right direction that matters. And, so, let's…let's invite the Scriptures into our day and into our lives. We’re reading from the Good News Translation this week. We’re working our way through the book of Judges. Today chapter 9 verse 22 through 10 verse 18. And we are beginning to transition out of the Gideon story by hearing a little bit about his son Abimelech who killed all of his brothers to become the ruler. So, we’ll…we’ll pick up from there. Judges chapter 9 verse 22 through 10 verse 18.

Commentary:

Okay. So, in the gospel of Luke today we finished the gospel of Luke today by reading the final chapter. And, so, that concludes the gospel of Luke. Tomorrow we will begin to…to move into the last, the final of the four Gospels, the gospel of John and we'll talk about that. It's very different than these first three Gospels that we’ve read – Matthew, Mark, and Luke - which are the synoptic Gospels. They share a lot of the same material and the same stories although told a little bit differently in each of the Gospels. But today we have this…this story of Cleopas and they’re walking out of the city of Jerusalem, 7 miles to another village called Emmaus, when Jesus comes up alongside of them. And it's such a fascinating story. It’s such a fascinating story, the way Jesus reveals Himself to his friends. It's…it's like He's there and they don't recognize Him or He's there and they recognize Him, and He disappears. It’s kinda confusing on one level. Like, why wouldn’t He just reveal Himself as He looked? And why is it that they…that He looked different? Like, how is it that they didn't recognize Him after spending so much time with Him? But it was like, once their eyes were opened then they could see, which had sort of been the…one of the fundamental things Jesus had been saying all along throughout His entire ministry. For me personally as I’ve looked at that, like how did they not recognize Him, just begun to realize that they did need their eyes opened because they were going to need to see Him differently. He was returning to the Father. It was His Spirit that would remain with them. They were going to need to see through the eyes of the Spirit. They were going to need to begin to be able to see Him in each other because they were to become a body, the body of Christ. They were beginning to understand that they were a part of Christ. And we need the same thing. We are a part of that same body. And we look at the story like the road to Emmaus. I love that story. I think I love that story. Well Emmaus…Emmaus is a place, although to be honest there are several candidates, I think two or three candidates for where that place might actually be, but we visit one of those places every time we go to Israel. It’s called Emmaus Acropolis. And, so, there’s a Byzantine monastery, an ancient Byzantine monastery there. And I love to stop there because there’s a little…small little loop trail and you can just walk…it’s like a 15-minute walk if you're going slow. Just really contemplative, where you just kind of walk and you put yourself in that position of walking down the road and then…then Jesus just kinda comes up alongside of you and begins to open your eyes. And I love when they speak about this. They say, “weren’t our hearts burning inside of us when He was opening up the Scriptures.” It’s like their eyes…the eyes of their hearts were being awakened. They were waking up to a new reality that everything had changed even though everything looked pretty much the same. Things had shifted and that shift changed the world. Like we were talking about yesterday, that…that shift brought us to this moment, but how often have we been walking along the road to life and Jesus comes up alongside of us, maybe not in bodily form, but the spirit leads, and we are unaware of it. We don't recognize. We’ve gone back to sleep. Our eyes are closed, when we have been awakened into a new reality. And certainly, when get into the writings of Paul we’ll be talking plenty about that new reality that we are to live into, that is to change the world, that is to reveal God's kingdom, that is to shift everything toward its intended order. But here as we stand in the in between, between the third and fourth of the Gospels that we will read and encounter it's important for us to stick with what the final story that we got the gospel of Luke looked like and just examine our own hearts for the ways in which we just don't recognize what God's doing. It just doesn't look the same. And yet if we would open our eyes, the eyes of our hearts we would see so clearly.

Prayer:

Jesus, we invite You into that, but we first thank You. We first thank You for the example of Your life that shows us what it looks like to be human, what it’s supposed to be like, how it can be for us because of You, how we have permission to be true even in a culture that is so false, even in a world that is so false and so full of darkness. It is still also full of light and we are part of that light. We just…we just don’t always have eyes to see, we just don't always recognize it. And, so, Holy Spirit come. Open the eyes of our hearts that we might see You and that we might see what You are at work in and that we might see what we are invited to collaborate with You in on this earth we pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Announcements:

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Also check out the Daily Audio Bible Shop. There are resources that have been developed there over the years for the journey, the journey through the Bible in a year. And, so, check that out as well.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, humbly thank you. Thank you for your partnership. We began on this journey…well…15 1/2 years almost ago and we’re moving through year 16 now, seven days a week every day and we’ve been in this together all this time or we wouldn't have been here at all. And, so, thank you profoundly for your partnership. There is a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you are using the Daily Audio Bible app you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner, or the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement you can hit the Hotline button in the app or you can dial 877-942-4253.

And that's it for today. I’m Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Hi Daily Audio Bible family this is Renzo in Florida and I just really just wanted to give a little message. You know, sometimes it's very, very hard to come to the presence of the Lord. One, because we want automatic answers and two, usually we just do all the talking. But I just want to say sometimes just let God speak and just sit in His presence. It can be hard but just sit in His presence and just sit and let Him speak to you. Sometimes in the conversation we do a lot of one way talking but sometimes we just need to quiet down and listen. And it's so hard but it's true. And just sit in God's presence and listened to Him. I'm just praying for you guys and I just want to pray for this lady that said she's about to lose her right eye and I just really want to pray to God heals her. Father God I just please pray for this lady whose name I can’t remember God, but you know her name Lord. Just please just help her right eye to become completely healed. Please, the tumors be gone, and the blood be gone in the name of Jesus, who will be restored God. I believe in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth it will be healed Lord and we just thank you God. Thank you, God. Just please, just heal her in Jesus’ name we pray. Amen. I love you guys. I'm praying for you. Jesus loves you.

Hey this is PG from NC I want to say first off hello to the entire DAB family but specifically today I want to say to hello to Lazarus formerly prodigal. Brother I’ve been listening for years and I've never heard you sound this clear - clear minded, clear hearted. Clearly there's joy, clearly there's a sense of promise and purpose and I am so excited for you. In fact, I want to pray for you. Lord, I thank you today for Lazarus. I thank you for the work you've done in his life over the weekend. And God I just pray that You would continue to do that work. Lord first off, I…I pray that not only would he be empowered but Lord I pray that his life would be a testament to the resurrection power that's available to us, to live life this way - clear, certain, purposeful, powerful, empowered by Your Spirit. Lord I think You that other people will see it and then just as in the book of John, Lord that because of his life other people will see and believe in You. Lord I also pray that just like the arisen Lazarus, God now that he’s stepped up out of the grave Lord, I pray that You would restore his family. God, I pray that You would put the pieces back together and Lord, I thank You that, God, that You're not just…You've not just done a work but You're continuing to do a work in him. Lord would You do a work in us in the same way. Lord, I pray blessings over him today. Lord, everything he lays his hands to, God I pray that You would be in. And Lord I pray for the rest of our DAB family. God, would You make us like that - empowered, clear, certain. Amen.

Those of us who are in Christ Jesus there is no condemnation yet there are still those who choose to walk away from the path of Salvation choosing darkness over the light preferring to do wickedness instead of that which is right and even though God desires that everyone be saved our Salvation depends on how we've actually behaved Jesus said that to the extent that you've done this to the least of these my brothers you’ve done it also unto me our faith should produce fruits that benefit those around us for all the world to see and if our motives are pure and our hearts are filled with love then we'll be storing up much treasure in the heavens above because when we say I want Jesus to walk with me we need to realize the scripture actually says two cannot walk together unless they agree so we need to do a brutally honest self-evaluation and if we find that we're still in the faith after such close soul searching examination we need to go to the Lord in prayer and ask him to help us with those areas we found to be lacking knowing that we have his word and the holy spirit's backing and knowing also that he's the rewarder of all those earnestly seeking and that he will give our faith as well as our hearts a much needed tweaking providing our hearts with a humble posture of continually seeking his face knowing that he will pour out upon us an abundance of mercy and grace oh Ye of little faith rest assured today that God will fully equip us to overcome any obstacle placed in our way

blindtony1016@gmail.com. Like to give a shout out to Annette Allison and also to Sally Young. Know that you are both in my daily prayers and very much loved. And once again Brian and the Hardin family thank you for this wonderful podcast for God's Holy Spirit to flow. Keep it flowing y'all.

Oh, praise God from whom all blessings flow. I just heard Lazarus who has risen from the dead. Oh, my goodness what a wonderful story. We’re so rejoicing with you Lazarus. What a mighty God we serve. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Hi this is Stew from Irvine CA I wanted to deliver a prayer for Alavia from New Mexico who called in in regard to her challenged relationship that she has right now. She feels herself to be unequally yoked and she's reconnected with Jesus. And this is a relationship of three years. She's finding this to be a struggle and her…her relationship partner has recently proposed. And, so, she's struggling and asking for prayer. So, I first wanted to speak just briefly about the concept of being unequally yoked. That's from second Corinthians 6:14 and it's making reference to the physical yoke that used to be put on oxen. There was a small oxen. It was considered the weaker oxen. A larger oxen. And you put this yoke on them they would actually go around in circles and they wouldn't be able to actually complete anything successfully. So, when we’re unequally yoked we cannot perform a task set before us and certainly a task of God's plans for us. So, I…my prayer is that heavenly father you would give insight and discernment to Alavia and that she would be in a position to understand that this is very special time, that by reconnecting with you God she has now been given discernment and understands that this is going to be problem for her and that she'd make the right choice in relationship to drawing close to you and in how she attends this relationship. I ask for all this in the name of your son Jesus. Amen.

Hello this is Running Bear and that's my trail name. So, I'm just asking prayer for my kiddos. My wife passed away four years ago and they, of course, have gone through that strategy of watching mom but the other big tragedy in our life is just how people avoid us. And we've learned through many different avenues that this is commonplace within our American culture, that we avoid suffering at all cost. And our family’s presence in other families makes them have to reflect and evaluate and recognize that suffering’s coming no matter what to all of us. And, so, while we can recognize that people are avoiding us because there’s stuff in their own life that they don't want to deal with, it’s still…there's so much that I feel like my kids could avoid if the Christian community around us, which is a dynamic group of people, could really love them and follow through with their promises, which for the most part over the past four years has just been abandonment. And, so, just really be praying for my kids as they're teenagers now and they're really reflecting upon that and taking measure of all of that. And…and there's a bunch of stuff for them that…that they really are hurting and wanting God to be the answer but struggling to see that.

[alwaysahiccupandastrid]

As a drama/performance student who’s hoping to go into acting, let me just say right now that Rachel Berry would never have made it on Broadway.

Oh, she has talent and there’s no denying that. But so do so many other girls and boys. You can’t make it in the business based on talent alone - you don’t get to become a success immediately, you have to work your way up and prove that you’re right for a role or for success. You have to work hard and always remember to keep learning.

That was something that was taught to us very early on in drama - no matter who you are or where you come from, whether you’re an amateur student or a success movie star, you can ALWAYS learn. You should always be challenging yourself and learning. You should always strive to improve and better yourself whenever possible.

Rachel never seemed to want to do that. She got into NYADA (after stalking the dean, which is something else I’ll go into in a minute) and then quit before finishing her education to do Funny Girl - which she then quit to do a TV show that failed. First of all, a casting director is going to take one look at this behavior and immediately decide “no - she cannot commit”. You don’t abandon your studies or the role you do have just because something that’s only maybe better comes along. Obviously many great actors do TV shows and pilots that fail, that’s not my issue - my issue with Rachel is that she never put the work in. It was always the bare minimum. “Oh, I’ve done a year and a half of studying at the best arts academy in NY, I don’t need to study anymore because I got one part on stage” - it does NOT work like that. She couldn’t commit which is a risky behavior in ANY job.

Part of being an actor or performer is criticism - you are ALWAYS subject to criticism. You will NEVER make it in the business if you can’t handle that criticism. Rachel would throw bitch fits and sob and play the victim EVERY SINGLE TIME someone made the slightest criticism of her.

Let’s delve deeper - first, Cassandra July.

Yes, Miss July was a bit mean and rude - but she’s a professor at a top NY arts academy. If you get into a top arts academy like NYADA is in the show, you are not there to fuck around - anyone who gets in has to be committed 100% to their studies, both practical and theoretical. Cassandra July is not there to baby the students and lift their egos - she is there to train and prepare them for the harsh reality of seeking a career in the arts.

In the very first episode of S4, on her first day in class, Rachel shows blatant disrespect to a professor by rolling her eyes. You do not do that to a professor in any subject, let alone a dance teacher. If you can’t respect your teachers or the people who you are learning from, you should not seek a career in the arts. This also goes for ANYONE you work with; if you work with a director or actor on a play or on a TV show, for example, you should always seek to learn from them, even if it’s something small. 

If you are studying the arts, especially at a level where they’re preparing you to be professional actors/singers/dancers, they HAVE to be hard on you. Hell, I didn’t even go to drama school but my drama teachers were always brutally honest with me. They made it clear that “Megan, you HAVE to be louder”, “you MUST learn your lines and practice without a script”, “your accents are terrible”, “don’t just stand there and recite lines! Move!” Etc. Etc. It may be harsh but Cassandra has to be brutally honest so that the kids know what they’re in for; yeah, they’ll get told that their noses are too big for a part. Yeah, they’ll be told “you need to drop a few pounds” or that they’re ugly, etc. It’s sad but true.

“Your pique turns are sloppy” - she’s literally pointing out to Rachel something to improve on. Sure, it’s not the nicest way but no one should be at a performing arts school and expecting nice.

Rachel’s disrespect of a teacher/professional continued for the whole time Cassandra July was on the show. She called her teacher out, was extremely rude and said “you’re jealous because we all have careers and yours is over”, so on so forth. I’m pretty sure if you were actually attending a drama school or performing arts academy, and you had the nerve to turn around and say that, you would be expelled and tossed on your ass before you could utter another word.

If a teacher says “I don’t think you’re ready to do the tango/for this part”, you should listen. They’ve been in the business for a LONG time, far longer than you have, and with loads more experience. The best you can do is listen and decide to study harder and better yourself. Rachel flatout ignored this advice and went ahead anyway because she wanted to be the Star NOW, no hard work or struggle or patience to be seen.

Let’s just say this; you don’t go to the dean of the uni/college and call one of the professors “a lunatic”.

Now Carmen Tibideaux:

For a start, Rachel choked her audition - it’s bizarre and ridiculous that she got in. She didn’t get in on her audition, but because she stalked and harassed Carmen until the dean gave in and came to watch her. In real life, if you fuck that audition up, that is it. You don’t get another chance until the following year when you apply again (and yes, it’s common to apply for drama schools multiple times until you get in - some people who go on to be successful actors have been known to audition as many as SEVEN times).

Realistically, Tibideaux should have not given Rachel that chance because she didn’t deserve it. No other candidate got that chance - in real life, no matter how talented an auditionee is, NO ONE is given more of a chance than anyone else. Everyone is judged on their audition, that’s it. Rachel may be talented but there are many others just as talented and even MORE so than her.

Also, Tibideaux could have in fact had a restraining order against Rachel. This crazy little girl turns up again and again like a complete twat, begging and pleading and just not understanding that she had her chance, she can have another chance NEXT year. I’d have seriously filed some kind of motion against Rachel, as I’m sure any other teacher or head would.

Despite the fact that Tibideaux gave Rachel chance after chance, Rachel was still rude and frankly ungrateful. Tibideaux makes valid points that Rachel is underperforming in EVERY single class. She’s not making an effort to be a part of the NYADA community.

If the dean of your college says that, you do NOT argue back. You do NOT attempt to say “I’m doing great, I’ve handled everything this school has thrown at me”. Rachel’s delusions of herself and her talent are laughable.

I could have applauded Carmen Tibideaux for turning around and telling Rachel how it is: “You are not the first supernova to come through here. You are talented, you have drive. What you don’t have, is you have no foundation. You don’t listen, and you don’t take direction. That’s why you need NYADA. You’re not ready.”

You can’t just expect to be fresh out of school or college and getting the fucking lead in hit Broadway shows. You start as ensemble, you learn, you work your way up. Rachel was too selfish and full of herself to do that. Also, the fact that she cannot listen to criticism or take direction screams that a director would NEVER hire her. She can’t take direction, and that will get her nowhere in her career. You have to listen, you have to collaborate and listen to everyone’s ideas as well as contributing your own.

The actual fucking nerve of a Rachel Berry saying “you’re wrong and I’m gonna prove it to you” - she would be out on her ass and never hired again, never accepted into an arts academy again. If someone older, wiser and more experienced tells you something, you LISTEN.

As an actor myself, we don’t do all of this hard work to be famous (at least, not those of us who actually love our work) - we go through student debt, years of no sleep, years of constant rehearsals, of being in the background waiting for our turn, of learning and honing and crafting our skills so that we can maybe one day do the thing we love most professionally. We actors/dancers/singers/performers are storytellers - we try to craft something meaningful or to tell a story we feel needs telling.

Carmen said something very true and on point: “do you care about the work or is it just about the spotlight?” Rachel never cared about the work - she never cared about being a storyteller or creating art. To her, it was all about the fame and attention.

Some other things:

After quitting, especially in the way she did, Rachel would definitely not be allowed to continue her studies where she left them at NYADA, if at all. At best, she would audition and get in the following academic year, and have to start from the bottom again. Most likely, however, she would not be allowed to study there again.

People in the industry talk. If Rachel was hard to work with when with even a few people, it would seriously damage her chances of being hired again. They would immediately throw away her resumé.

Even her choked audition was fucking irritating as a performer - if you screw up your lines or forget them or whatever, you don’t stop and ask to go again. You carry on. If you’re on Broadway and you get the words wrong, you cannot ask to start the song again in front of the entire audience. It’s extremely unprofessional. At school, when I did my guitar exams, that was KEY - “if you play the wrong note, do NOT go back and redo it - just keep going. You’ll get more points for carrying on than for doubling back”.

^So Rachel stopping and starting is immediately a no-no. At best, they would let her restart just once - but they would not let her have another chance. Even if she was given another chance and she aced it, the damage is done - she wouldn’t have gotten in.

Kurt aced his audition, didn’t mess up or stop, and didn’t harass the dean of NYADA to make sure he got in - Rachel messed up, stopped, harassed Carmen and was a brat. How the Hell did Rachel get into NYADA but not Kurt?? If Kurt didn’t get in, then Rachel DEFINITELY shouldn’t have, end of story.

In short, Rachel is the worst character and it actually pisses me off how inaccurately she’s written in regards to being at a performing arts academy/her success on Broadway. The writers wanted us to root for her so desperately but I would just skip the majority of scenes she was the focus of because she irritated me that much. If the writers wanted to make us root for her, they should have SHOWN her accepting that she had to start in the background and work her way up. They should have at least not let her get into NYADA.

[missmalice202]

Designing Your Melody: Chapter 03 - Candy Hearts

Chapter 01  -  Chapter 02

Luka Couffaine was, under normal circumstances, a pretty chill guy. To anyone who knew him, they would think that nothing could ruffle his feathers. Under normal circumstances.

This was definitely NOT one of those times.

He had been out delivering a package for the courier service he worked part time for when a tornado with midnight blue hair had collided with him, leaving her sprawled out on the sidewalk and the folder she had been carrying exploding like confetti. He couldn’t help but chuckle at how utterly frantic she had been. She had been in such a panic, she even sounded chaotic; a cacophony of discordant notes and clashing chords. Apologizing profusely as she scrambled around to gather her papers, Luka felt the need to grab her hand, if only to distract her long enough to take a breath. It wouldn’t do to have the poor girl pass out in the middle of the street because she had been hyperventilating so hard.

Then, as quickly as she had crashed into him, she took off again, sprinting away as fast as her feet could carry her. Still a little stunned from the encounter, he hadn’t noticed the paper she had left behind in her hurry. But when it crinkled under his boot as he stood back up, he saw it.

He had definitely not anticipated being stunned speechless for a second time so soon after regaining his own stable footing. The sketch she had left behind spoke to his soul on a primal level. Normally, he didn’t let things affect him so strongly, but there was just something about the outfit that she had put to paper that lit a fire in his creative heart. The melody ringing in his ears as he gazed at that paper was overwhelming.

Snapping out of his reverie, Luka had attempted to chase after the girl, but she had disappeared without a trace. He looked down at the design to see if there was anything on it that could point him in the direction of his newest muse. And the fates had smiled down upon him: there, in the bottom right hand corner, were three small letters. MDC.

Relieved that he at least had a tiny clue as to who his mystery designer was, he had carefully folded up the page in his hand, stuck it in the inside pocket of the leather riding jacket he wore when he was making deliveries, and went back to work.

But the melody wouldn’t leave his mind. As he raced his bike through the crowded streets, narrowly avoiding parked cars and pedestrians alike, all he heard echoing in his ears was the same melody, over and over and over again. Playing in a constant loop. Driving him to distraction, which was a dangerous thing to do when fighting through rush hour traffic on the congested city streets.

So he had forced himself to focus, ignoring the tune crying out for his attention.

After he was done with his deliveries for the day, he had pulled out his cell phone, opened up his twitter, and posted his location, allowing his followers to find him if they wanted to come see him perform. He had found that it was easier to use social media to advertise his performances rather than tie himself down with a specific venue at a specific time. It gave him a sense of freedom to showcase his music as little or as much as he wanted. And today, he needed to be surrounded by his own music, if only to drown out the invasive melody still circling around his mind.

He played for a few hours, his guitar case open on the sidewalk in front of him so passers-by could throw some euros in if they liked his sound. But that wasn’t the reason he played. He played for the music itself. Sure, the money he earned was appreciated, but he would have played even without it. To him, music was a part of him, as natural and necessary as breathing. He usually didn’t even have to concentrate on his fingers pressing against the strings of his guitar. But today, he had to really focus to keep his hands from playing the song that was aching to be let out. Once again, he ignored its desperate plea for release. It was still too raw and too personal for public exposure yet. He wouldn’t play that song until he found her again.

Feeling his phone vibrate against his leg from inside his front pocket, he took a break and checked the time. With a smile, he packed up his guitar, slung it over his back, and took off on his bike towards the waterfront where his mother’s houseboat, the Liberty, had been moored. He wasn’t one to live his life by keeping to a schedule, but there was one exception: meeting up with his friends to play a video game he had recently been involved in.

As he pedaled down the streets on his way home, he thought about how such a simple thing as a video game could completely change his day to day life. He usually wasn’t one to spend time in front of a screen. His music took up too much of his time for that. But after hearing his friend and co-collaborator, Nino, talking about how awesome the soundtrack of the game was a few months ago, he had been intrigued. He had gone to Nino’s house for a jam session one day and he had convinced Luka to give it a shot.

That was all it had taken to get him hooked. The music alone would have captivated him, something he hadn’t really considered possible before. Apparently, video game music had come a long way since he had last picked up a controller when he was a little kid. But the game mechanics, the online play, the community of it was what drew him in for good.

Immediately after leaving Nino’s house that afternoon, Luka had gone to the store and picked up a copy of Ultimate Mecha Strike 4 for himself. It wasn’t long before he was spending as much time playing with a controller as he did with his guitar.

Once his DJ friend had realized how into UMS4 Luka had become, he invited him to participate in a few missions with his clan. Apparently, they were a big deal in the gamer world, so Luka thought “why not?” and joined them. Playing with a team brought a whole new feel to the game. He normally had a really hard time communicating with other people; word play had never been his strong suit. But having a degree of separation between him and the person he was talking to in the form of his headset seemed to make it easier for his thoughts to get across. And Nino’s clanmates were nothing short of amazing.

Luka knew that Nino played with some friends of his from high school, but he never told Luka who they were. Which was ok with him. He didn’t need to know anything about the people on the other side of the screen any more than they needed to know anything about him. The anonymity actually made him more comfortable being himself.

Now, months after becoming an official member of “Miraculous Kwami”, Luka considered his clanmates to truly be his friends.

Finally arriving back at the houseboat he called home, he carried his bike down the gangway and hung it from the hooks in the ceiling of the cabin. With his mom backpacking around Europe searching for “the sounds of inspiration”, he and his sister had taken the opportunity to clear out some of the disorder she had been so fond of. He knew that as soon as she returned, chaos would take over the Liberty once again, but for now, the Couffaine siblings would enjoy a bit of serenity in their home.

“What’s up?” he heard a soft voice ask as he came down the stairs leading below deck. He looked over to the blue wrap around couch against the wall and saw his purple-haired sister sitting there, playing on her phone. Juluka had really come out of her shell over the past few years, her budding modeling career probably being the main reason for that. Or possibly her relationship with Rose, her extremely bubbly and energetic girlfriend. Now those two were the epitome of “opposites attract”, but Luka could understand their relationship. What one lacked, the other one made up for. They created a perfect harmony with each other, though sometimes when they got together, they were sweeter than those candy hearts sold during Valentine’s day and left him feeling a bit nauseous. On those occasions, he simply grabbed his guitar and found a park to play in, giving them some privacy to have some alone time. One drawback of living on a boat was thin walls.

“Work was pretty busy,” he answered as he set his guitar on the stand against the wall next to the couch. “I think I rode at least 50 kilometers this morning.” He sighed as he sat down on the couch next to his sister.

“Ouch,” she winced in sympathy, still tapping on her phone, “you’ll be feeling that in the morning. Anything else happen today?” She tucked her purple tipped black hair behind her ear and put her phone down next the her, finally giving her brother her full attention.

“Actually, yeah,” he responded, chuckling to himself. “I got run over by a muse while I was on my break this morning.”

“A what now?” Sometimes her brother could be so weird, she thought.

“This girl crashed into me while she was running somewhere and ever since, I’ve had this song stuck in my head. It won’t go away and it’s driving me a little crazy.” He reached into his jacket pocket to show his sister the source of his inspiration, when her phone started ringing.

“Wow, sounds like you’ve got some songwriting to do,” she murmured as she grabbed her phone and started walking away. “I’ve got to go. I’m meeting Rose at a little bistro she wanted to try together and I’m already running late. We’ll talk when I get back.”

Watching his sister’s willowy form walk up the stairs, he tucked the folded paper securely back into his pocket before withdrawing his hand from inside his jacket and heading further into the cabin to where his bunk was located.

After checking his phone to confirm the time, he took off his riding jacket and set it next to him on his bunk. Game time, he thought to himself, grabbing his teal tinted controller from the charging dock next to his bed. Donning a set of blue headphones and he was ready.

-xXx-xXx-xXx-xXx-xXx-xXx-xXx-

Luka was the first to arrive at his clan’s hideout tonight, it would seem. He walked around for a bit while he waited for the others to load in. After only a few minutes, he saw a notification pop up in the lower corner of his screen. LADYBUG is online. He smiled. Out of all the members of his clan, he enjoyed playing with Ladybug the most. There was just something about her voice that resonated in his ears when he talked to her. The distortion through the headphones wasn’t enough to mask how clear her voice was, like the ringing of a bell.

He turned his avatar around so he could see hers when she arrived at their base. When he saw her avatar pop on screen in front of him, he pressed the button on his controller to perform an elaborate bow. “Good evening, Lady luck,” he playfully greeted her.

“Hi there, Viperion. Long time no see,” she responded with a wave.

“What’s the plan for tonight? Who else is going to be on, do you know?” A small part of him wanted it to be just the two of them. It wasn’t often that they got to play as a pair since they were usually joined by the other members, but he enjoyed spending time with the red and black lady.

She walked over to where his avatar was standing. “I just got off the phone with Rena, so she should be joining us soon. I haven’t spoken with Carapace or Chat today, but I haven’t heard of any reason why they shouldn’t be on. Did any of the others say anything to you about when they would be on after I logged off the other night?”

“Monkey said something about preparing for a competition, so he might not be able to get on, but Pegasus said he’d be here a little later. And as far as I know, Ryuko is planning on being here.”

“That’s good. We have enough people to try for that bow you’ve been wanting. It’s a limited time event, so we need to grab it for you while we have the chance. I know I’m going to be busy for the next couple of weeks.”

“Oh?” He was interested in what could possibly pull her away from her favorite game. Ladybug was almost always online, even if she was just lurking around their hideout, chatting with the other members of their clan.

“Yeah,” she answered. “I’ve got a really important project coming up and I need to focus on that. I already royally screwed up today, and I can’t afford to make any more mistakes.” Just by the tone of her voice, Luka could tell that she was upset about her blunder.

“Do you want to talk about it? Sometimes it helps to share the burden with someone else.”

Her soft giggle echoed in his ears. “Thanks, Viperion. I’m good. I already ranted to Rena about it, so I’m fine now. Just a little stressed out.” She sighed. “This project is the biggest thing I’ve ever done and it could make or break my entire career.”

“Okay, just remember that if you ever need to vent or anything, I’m here for you.”

“Thanks.”

Just then, other notifications began popping up on his screen.

CHAT NOIR is online.

CARAPACE is online.

RENA ROUGE is online.

“Looks like the gang is starting to arrive,” Ladybug commented. “Let’s get to work.”

“Ready whenever you are,” he responded with a smirk. “Let’s get that loot.”

-xXx-xXx-xXx-xXx-xXx-xXx-xXx-

Setting his controller back on the charging dock, Luka stood up and stretched his arms over his head, arching his back to work out the kinks that had developed after sitting in the same position for such a long period of time. Glancing at his cell phone to see how long he’d been at it, he was shocked to discover it was almost midnight! He had to get to sleep ASAP. He had to head to the studio in the morning for a recording session with Jagged Stone.

After his regular guitarist, Vivica, had taken some time off for maternity leave, the rock legend had been desperate to find someone to fill in. When he had shown up at the Liberty and discovered that his former guitarist and Luka’s mom, Anarka, was no longer in the city and therefore no longer available to help, Jagged had heard Luka playing and immediately asked him to fill in whenever he had the time.

At first, Luka had been shocked that his idol wanted to work with him. But over time, the novelty had worn off as he realized that Jagged had a tendency to be completely immature at times and extremely temperamental. Luckily, it took quite a bit to ruffle Luka’s feathers and he usually ignored the megastar when he was having a meltdown.

Mentally preparing himself for the trials he was sure to endure at tomorrow’s recording session, Luka took a deep breath, holding it for a moment with his eyes closed before slowly exhaling. He stripped off his clothes and slipped between his sheets clad only in his boxers.

Turning his bedside light off, he closed his eyes and felt himself drift off to sleep, the melody that had been plaguing him all day now acting as a lullaby and lulling him to sleep.

Chapter 04

*This chapter was really hard for me to put together. I knew what I wanted to happen, and I saw it happen in my head, but apparently, Luka is a little stubborn when it comes to being put onto paper. Hopefully he isn’t so temperamental next chapter, because he’s such a sweet, soft boy that I’d hate to have to do anything bad to him because he made me angry hahaha. Until next time XOXO*

[zeffiroh]

Wikipedia just turned 20!!!

[ID: Origami W,  a gift for wikipedia END ID]

[ID: Origami models of arabic numerals two and zero, symbolizing wiki’s 20th birthday END ID]

send thanks and love to wikipedians.>>>

have a looksie at the birthday celebrations(twas on 15th), and confetti are still around.>>>

[ID: gif of puzzle globe(wiki logo) bursting, metaphorically the burst of knowledge and joy wiki gives, a gif from the creative commons bday stash of wikipedia END ID]

“Wikipedia started as an ambitious idea

…to create a free encyclopedia, written by volunteers, for everyone in the world. It seemed impossible.

Over 20 years, Wikipedia has become the largest collection of open knowledge in history. How did it happen? People, like you.

Made and sustained by humans.

Meet the movement.”

[ID: Graph,WIkipedia: citability vs helpfulness of articles on academic timescale .helpfulness increases from elementary academia to graduate academia as wikipedia articles are stuffed with knowledge from archives and enthusiasts, but elitist academic institutions have created a situation wherein the citability of these articles drops down from elementary levels to graduate studies.  END ID]

graph is taken from this aptly named article, “time to stop wikipedia shaming”

It is as if the main theme of wikipedia “ is edited by everyone” is taken as a flaw. the fascist and elitist gate-keeping control is not more evident anywhere but when wikipedia is shamed. Articles are locked, users banned and multiple people editing it makes it much more reliable than papers and books written by bigoted academics and reviewed by bribed editors (case in point- Sigmund Froyd’s theory of female sexuality, cough cough)

It is “the best thing ever,” because “anyone in the world can write anything they want about any subject—so you know you are getting the best possible information.” - Michael Scott - The Office

This dialogue was used to identify Michael as an idiot, but it has the opposite effect, as this is truly the most beautiful missions of all time.

The thing about wikipedia is it is a macrogasmic entity of knowledge. Edits materialize at a rate of 1.8 per second. But perhaps more remarkable than Wikipedia's success is how little its reputation has changed. It was criticized as it rose, and it still is a matter of superiority complex in academic gate-keepers to state that Wikipedia is a blog and encyclopedias are more trustworthy etc etc, that wikipedia is not a source, and similar shaming tactics, when actually wikipedia is, in fact a tertiary SOURCE and, a more frequently updated encyclopedia.

Wiki is the only not-for-profit site in the top 10 most used sites , and one of only a handful in the top 100. It does not plaster itself with advertising(it could, but it doesn't, just to make it a comfortable and easily comprehensable resource), intrude on privacy, or provide a breeding ground for neo-Nazi trolling, and still broadcasts user-generated content. Unlike the other top social platforms , it makes its product de-personified, collaborative, and for the general good. More than an encyclopedia, Wikipedia has become a community, a library, a constitution, an experiment, a political manifesto—the closest thing there is to an online public square. It is one of the few remaining places that retains the faintly utopian glow of the early World Wide Web. A free encyclopedia encompassing the whole of human knowledge, written almost entirely by unpaid volunteers: Can you believe that was the one that worked?

Wikipedia is not perfect. The problems that it does have—and there are plenty of them—are discussed in great detail on Wikipedia itself, often in dedicated forums for self-critique with titles like “Why Wikipedia is not so great.” One contributor observes that “many of the articles are of poor quality.” Another worries that “consensus on Wikipedia may be a problematic form of knowledge production.” A third notes that “someone can just come and edit this very page and put in ‘pens are for cats only.’” Like the rest of the tech world, the site suffers from a gender imbalance; by recent estimates, 90 percent of its volunteer editors are men. Women and nonbinary contributors report frequent harassment from their fellow Wikipedians—trolling, doxing, hacking, death threats. The site's parent organization has repeatedly owned up to the situation and taken halting steps to redress it; several years ago, it allocated hundreds of thousands of dollars to a “community health initiative.” But in a way, the means to fix Wikipedia's shortcomings, in terms of both culture and coverage, are already in place: Witness the rise of feminist edit-athons.

The site's innovations have always been cultural as well as computational. It was created using existing technology. This remains the single most underestimated and misunderstood aspect of the project: its emotional architecture. Wikipedia is built on the personal interests and idiosyncrasies of its contributors; in fact, without getting gooey, you could even say it is built on LOVE. Editors' passions can drive the site deep into inconsequential territory—exhaustive detailing of dozens of different kinds of embroidery software, lists dedicated to bespectacled baseball players, a brief but moving biographical sketch of Khanzir, the only pig in Afghanistan. No knowledge is truly useless, but at its best, Wikipedia weds this ranging interest to the kind of pertinence where Larry David's “Pretty, pretty good!” is given as an example of rhetorical epizeuxis. It is one of the reminders, that the internet is a wonderful space.

In 2000, around a year before Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger cofounded Wikipedia, the pair started a site called Nupedia, planning to source articles from noted scholars and put them through seven rounds of editorial oversight. But the site never got off the ground; after a year, there were fewer than two dozen entries. (Wales, who wrote one of them himself, told The New Yorker “it felt like homework.”) When Sanger got wind of a collaborative software tool called a wiki—from the Hawaiian wikiwiki, or “quickly”—he and Wales decided to set one up as a means of generating raw material for Nupedia. They assumed nothing good would come of it, but within a year Wikipedia had 20,000 articles. By the time Nupedia's servers went down a year later, the original site had become a husk, and the seed it carried had grown beyond any expectation.

Many similar sites have languished. They came up against a simple and apparently insoluble problem, the same one that Nupedia encountered and Wikipedia surmounted: Most "experts" do not want to contribute to a free online encyclopedia.

This barrier to entry exists even in places where there are many "experts" and large volumes of material to draw from. Napoleon Bonaparte, for instance, is the subject of tens of thousands of books. There are probably more dedicated historians of the Corsican general than of almost any other historical figure, but so far these scholars, even the retired or especially enthusiastic ones, have been disinclined to share their bounty. Citizendium's entry on Napoleon, around 5,000 words long and unedited for the past six years, is missing events as major as the decisive Battle of Borodino, which claimed 70,000 casualties, and the succession of Napoleon II. By contrast, Wikipedia's article on Napoleon sits at around 18,000 words long and runs to more than 350 sources.

The Wikipedia replacement products revealed another problem with the top-down model: With so few contributors, coverage was spotty and gaps were hard to fill. Scholarpedia's entry on neuroscience makes no mention of serotonin or the frontal lobes. At Citizendium, Sanger refused to recognize women's studies as a top-level category, describing the discipline as too “politically correct.” (Today, he says “it wasn't about women's studies in particular” but about “too much overlap with existing groups.”) A wiki with a more horizontal hierarchy, on the other hand, can self-correct. No matter how politically touchy or intellectually abstruse the topic, the crowd develops consensus. On the English-language Wikipedia, particularly controversial entries, like those on George W. Bush or Jesus Christ, have edit counts in the thousands.

Wikipedia, in other words, isn't raised up wholesale, like a barn; it's assembled grain by grain, like a termite mound. The smallness of the grains, and of the workers carrying them, makes the project's scale seem impossible. But it is exactly this incrementalism that puts immensity within reach.

The stars of Wikipedia are not giants in their fields but so-called WikiGnomes—editors who sweep up typos, arrange articles in neatly categorized piles, and scrub away vandalism. This work is often thankless, but it does not seem to be joyless. It is a common starting point for Wikipedians, and many are content to stay there. According to a 2016 paper in the journal Management Science, the median edit length on Wikipedia is just 37 characters, an effort that might take a few seconds.

From there, though, many volunteers are drawn deeper into the site's culture. They discuss their edits on Talk pages; they display their interests and abilities on User pages; some vie to reach the top of the edit-count leaderboard. An elect few become administrators; while around a quarter of a million people edit Wikipedia daily, only around 1,100 accounts have admin privileges. The site is deep and complex enough—by one count, its policy directives and suggestions run to more than 150,000 words—that its most committed adherents must become almost like lawyers, appealing to precedent and arguing their case. As with the law, there are different schools of interpretation; the two largest of these are deletionists and inclusionists. Deletionists favor quality over quantity, and notability over utility. Inclusionists are the opposite.

Most dedicated editors, whether deletionist or inclusionist, are that category of person who sits somewhere between expert and amateur: the enthusiast. Think of a railfan or a trainspotter. (Wikipedians disagree on which is the better term.) Their knowledge of trains is quite different from an engineer's or a railway historian's; you can't major in trainspotting or become credentialed as a railfan. But these people are a legitimate kind of expert nonetheless. Previously, their folk knowledge was reposited in online forums, radio shows, and specialist magazines. Wikipedia harnessed it for the first time. The entry on the famous locomotive the Flying Scotsman is 4,000 words long and includes eye-wateringly detailed information on its renumbering, series of owners, smoke deflectors, and restoration, from contributors who seem to have the most intimate, hard-won knowledge of the train's working. (“It was deemed that the A4 boiler had deteriorated into a worse state than the spare due to the higher operating pressures the locomotive had experienced following the up-rating of the locomotive to 250 psi.”)

Pedantry this powerful is itself a kind of engine, and it is fueled by an enthusiasm that verges on love. Many early critiques of computer-assisted reference works feared a vital human quality would be stripped out in favor of bland fact-speak. That 1974 article in The Atlantic presaged this concern well: “Accuracy, of course, can better be won by a committee armed with computers than by a single intelligence. But while accuracy binds the trust between reader and contributor, eccentricity and elegance and surprise are the singular qualities that make learning an inviting transaction. And they are not qualities we associate with committees.” Yet Wikipedia has eccentricity, elegance, and surprise in abundance, especially in those moments when enthusiasm becomes excess and detail is rendered so finely (and pointlessly) that it becomes beautiful.

In the article on the sexual revolution, there was a line, since deleted, that read, “For those who were not there to experience it, it may be difficult to imagine how risk-free sex was during the 1960s and 1970s.” This anonymous autobiography in miniature is an intriguing piece of editorializing, but it's also a little legacy of the sexual revolution all by itself, a rueful reflection on a moment of freedom that didn't last. (The editor who added “Citation needed” is part of that story as well.) In the article on the anticommunist intellectual Frank Knopfelmacher, we learn that “his protracted, usually freewheeling, invariably slanderous late-night telephone monologues (visited alike upon associates and, more often, antagonists) retained a mythic status for decades among Australian intellectuals.” The Hong Kong novelist Lillian Lee, we are told, seeks “freedom and happiness, not fame.”

Pedants have a reputation for humorlessness, but for Wikipedians a sense of humor is at the core of the good-faith collaboration that defines the project. There is probably no need for an exhaustive history of a giant straw goat erected in a Swedish town each Christmas, but the article on the Gävle Goat chronicles its annual fate fastidiously. It is prone to vandalism by fire, and the article centers around an exacting timeline that lists the date of destruction, the method of destruction, and the new security measures put in place every year since 1966. (In 2005, it was “burnt by unknown vandals reportedly dressed as Santa and the gingerbread man, by shooting a flaming arrow at the goat.”)

Why do Wikipedians perform these millions of hours of labor, some expended on a giant straw goat, without pay? Because they don't experience them as labor. “It's a misconception people work for free,” Wales told the site Hacker Noon in 2018. “They have fun for free.” A 2011 survey of more than 5,000 Wikipedia contributors listed “It's fun” as one of the primary reasons they edited the site.

This is why the meta side of Wikipedia—the Talk pages, the essay commentaries, the policies—is suffused with nerdy jokes. We're so used to equating seriousness with importance that this jars at first: It's hard to square the encapsulation of all human knowledge with a policy called “Don't be a dick” (since revised to “Don't be a jerk”). But expressing the directive that way carries a purpose. It's the same purpose that drives Wikipedians to collect and celebrate the site's “Lamest edit wars,” which include long-running skirmishes on Freddie Mercury's ancestry, the provenance of Caesar salad, the proper pronunciation of J. K. Rowling's surname (“Perhaps it rhymes with ‘Trolling’?”), the wording of certain captions (“Is the cat depicted really smiling?”), and the threshold of notoriety required to appear on a list of fictional badgers.

Few architects of a world encyclopedia would think to include a forum for jokes, and in the unlikely event that they did, no one could anticipate that it would be important. But on Wikipedia the jokes are very important. They defuse tensions. They foster joyful cooperation. They encourage humility. They promote further reading and further editing. They also represent a surprise return to the earliest days of Enlightenment reference works. Samuel Johnson's dictionary, compiled in 1755, gives one definition of “dull” as “not exhilarating; not delightful: as, to make dictionaries is dull work.” Perhaps the most important encyclopedia of the late modern period, the Encyclopédie, is barbed with satirical and anticlerical quips: The entry on “Cannibals” cross-references with “Communion.”

Wikipedia ought to serve as a model for many forms of social endeavor online, but its lessons do not translate readily into the commercial sphere. It is a noncommercial enterprise, with no investors or shareholders to appease, no financial imperative to grow or die, and no standing to maintain in the arms race to amass data and attain AI supremacy at all costs. At Jimmy Wales' wedding, one of the maids of honor toasted him as the sole internet mogul who wasn't a billionaire. And that's what's awesome about it. It realizes that in as a society, we don't have to work to sustain ourselves, that's something we built the society for, we work to collect what we like, and that's our earning from the labour. Wikipedians work for curiosity and satisfaction and collect knowledge and joy.

The site has helped its fellow tech behemoths, though, especially with the march of AI. Wikipedia's liberal content licenses and vast information hoard have allowed developers to train neural networks much more quickly, cheaply, and widely than proprietary data sets ever could have. When you ask Apple's Siri or Amazon's Alexa a question, Wikipedia helps provide the answer. When you Google a famous person or place, Wikipedia often informs the “knowledge panel” that appears alongside your search results.

These tools were made possible by a project called Wikidata, the next ambitious step toward realizing the age-old dream of creating a “World Brain.” It began with a Croatian computer scientist and Wikipedia editor named Denny Vrandečić. He was enthralled with the online encyclopedia's content but felt frustrated that users could not ask it questions that required drawing on knowledge from multiple entries across the site. Vrandečić wanted Wikipedia to be able to answer a query like “What are the 20 largest cities in the world that have a female mayor? The knowledge is obviously in Wikipedia, but it's hidden. To get it out would be huge work.” .

Drawing on an idea from the early internet called “the semantic web,” Vrandečić set out to structure and enrich Wikipedia's data set so that it could, in effect, begin to synthesize its own knowledge. If there were some way to tag women and mayors and cities by population size, then a correctly coded query could return the 20 largest cities with a female mayor automatically. Vrandečić had edited Wikipedia in Croatian, English, and German, so he recognized the limitations of using plain English semantic tagging. Instead, he chose numerical codes. Any reference to the book Treasure Island might be tagged with the code Q185118, for example, or the color brown with Q47071.

Vrandečić assumed this coding and tagging would have to be carried out by bots. But of the 80 million items that have been added to Wikidata so far, around half have been entered by human volunteers, a level of crowdsourcing that has surprised even Wikidata's creators. Editing Wikidata and editing Wikipedia, it turns out, are different enough that they don't cannibalize the same contributors. Wikipedia attracts people interested in writing prose, and Wikidata compels dot-connectors, puzzle-solvers, and completionists. (Its product manager, Lydia Pintscher, still comes home from a movie and manually copies the cast list from IMDb into Wikidata with the appropriate tags.) ANd wikipedia is amazing because it isn't bothered by the possoibility that AI does sort of take over, or that there is canabalistic editing, its an evolving landscape, with its freedom to exist.

As platforms like Google and Alexa work to provide instant answers to random questions, Wikidata will be one of the key architectures that link the world's information together. The system still results in errors sometimes—that's why Siri briefly thought Bulgaria's national anthem was “Despacito”—but its prospective scale is already more ambitious than Wikipedia's. There are subprojects aiming to itemize every sitting politician on earth, every painting in every public collection worldwide, and every gene in the human genome into searchable, adaptable, and machine-readable form.

The jokes will still be there. Consider Wikidata's numerical tag for the author Douglas Adams, Q42. In Adams' book The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a group of hyperintelligent beings build a vast, powerful computer called Deep Thought, which they ask for the “Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything.” What comes out is the number 42. That wink of self-awareness—at the folly and joy of building something as preposterous and powerful as a world brain— is why, with Wikipedia, you know you are getting the best possible information.