#but they won't even be able to log in at this rate.

[yunayubean]

Ya know, its one thing to move away from a site cus its slowly dieing or doing policies you don't like, but it feels completely diff to watch someone literally burn a platform to the ground and make it unusable. Like the idea that I might not be able to go back and see old messages, or old posts from friends, artists, or memorial pages is just... like it's worse than just a company buying off a smaller company, they're literally destroying it. There's no "what ifs", it's really flippin going down like the titanic.

[phantomrose96]

At the risk of having an opinion on Tumblr, that post about having Tumblr do a 48hr blackout like the Reddit one is... kinda just dumb.

Reddit communities going dark was based on well-defined demands against a well-defined new thing the company was doing. Reddit would start charging $xyz amount for API access. This would kill 3rd party apps. The protest was "we want Reddit to renegotiate the API cost to a lesser more reasonable rate that won't kill 3rd party apps."

The tumblr post just seems to be a hodge-podge of every popular tumblr complaint currently, including things staff themselves would clearly like to fix. Like one of the demands is to increase efforts against the spam bots. Buddy tumblr would love to get rid of those things because "your website is infested with sex bots" is not a good look to advertisers. Clearly they don't have a good way to get rid of them otherwise they'd be gone by now. Some 48 hour protest is not gonna make them suddenly better at it.

Other demands include bringing back "go nuts show nuts" which is just straight up not possible anymore. The current CEO made a long post about it a while back explaining why it can't happen. Some of the gripes are just annoying things like Tumblr Live, which tbh would be nice if it was gotten rid of entirely but having it be one bullet point in a random 2-day log off protest isn't gonna do it... You're better off sending thought-out feedback on why it's a problem.

Also like... even if Tumblr said "We're selling all the world's puppies to the factory that tests the efficacy of pepper grinders on animal flesh" which would be a pretty good thing to protest, the Tumblr format itself just can't be organized the way Reddit is. Reddit is made up of a bunch of town center bulletin boards that announcements can be pinned to, with moderators who (for better or worse) can make decisions for a whole community. Tumblr is just everyone's random blogs. Most of you probably don't even know what post I'm talking about cuz it never circulated to your dash. Which version of what post ends up on your dash is a complete clown show. This format doesn't let us organize for shit.

Also parting thoughts, Reddit was able to actually shut communities down and they have better advertiser pull so a missing chunk of the userbase could potentially catch the ire of advertisers. Tumblr is a mud pit and I doubt half the advertisers even know they're advertising on Tumblr.

[leothil]

so i kind of took a hiatus for the first month the season was airing from episode 1 all the way to episode 6, so any chance you can link me to some fic recs that i missed during that time span by any chance. i think that was march to late april?

Hi, thanks for asking and sorry for the wait, but I was busy all day yesterday. Here's some I found in my log:

the going water and the gone by @try-set-me-on-fire, where Eddie goes missing in the cruise disaster and is presumed dead. 31.5k words, rated T

illicit affairs by @burnthatbridge where Buck realizes he's bi and starts dating men, but isn't sure how well he'll do at sex with them, so Eddie offers to help him out. It's not cheating when he's just helping out his best friend, right? Note that as of now it's unfinished, but I'd argue it's still worth seeing their stupidity at work. 42.6k words, rated E

hearts will hold by farfromthstars (@doeeyeseddie) where Eddie keeps canceling plans with Marisol to hang out with Buck instead. 3.1k words, rated G

don���t wanna let you love somebody else but me by fleetinghearts (@shitouttabuck) where Buck and Eddie pretend-date each other during Chimney's bachelor party to be able to give Christopher advice about dating. 14.7k words, rated T

put my heart inside your palms by @markofalover where Buck accidentally calls Eddie baby and Eddie is overcome with love. 3k words rated T

every evening, every time by hrudayam (@eddiegettingshot) where Marisol points out that Eddie doesn't really talk about Buck, and Eddie is baffled but then the puzzle pieces start moving in his head. 2.4k words, rated T

rebirth by @renecdote, a Buck introspection fic where he lies and ponders his bisexual realization. 752 words, rated G

lest i go unsheltered by iphigenias (@oatflatwhite) where Buck comes out to Maddie. 1.5k words, rated T

my heart is working overtime by lecornergirl (@clusterbuck) where Buck sits with his feelings after 7x04. 1.1k words, rated T

my heart aches with love for you by farfromthstars (@doeeyeseddie) where Marisol slightly chides Eddie for interrupting Buck and Tommy's date, and Eddie kinda bluescreens. 1.8k words, rated G

got that, oh, I mean by @bekkachaos where Hen comes over to talk to Buck after 7x04. 2.7k words, rated T

some things fall when they're meant to fall by @sibylsleaves where Eddie realizes he'll never prioritize Marisol the way he does Buck, but his realization comes just a bit too late. 25.7k words, rated T

as lucky as us by hammersmiths (@henswilsons) where Ravi overhears and observes Buck and Eddie interact, and Suffers. 3.6k words, rated G

every little thing the sun shows, well it’s worth it by wafflesofdoom (@capseycartwright) where Buck drives to Hen to talk to her about his new realization and Tommy. 1.7k words, unrated but like G/T

so much to say that's subject-sore by @hattalove where Buck thinks calling Tommy his boyfriend feels wrong, even though he wants to continue dating him. 3.1k words, rated T

the gift you gave him by @thatbuddie where Tommy asks Eddie for tips on what Buck likes, and Eddie wonders why he feels weird about it. 5.1k words, rated T

I won't tell no lie by @lamardeuse where Hen shows up at Tommy's place to ask him about his behaviour while they worked together at the 118. 1.3k words, rated T

Ah hell this is so long already so I'll stop here, but feel free to come back and ask again after you've gotten through these, because I have many more! Actually, one last one I have to recommend immediately too:

good luck, babe by @hattalove, a twitter fic where an outsider observes Buck, Eddie, Marisol, and Tommy during Buck and Tommy's first date and tweets about it all. I cackled the whole way through! 2.1k words, rated T

[nostalgebraist]

prioritizing longstanding frank enjoyers

I have configured Frank to ignore all asks, reblogs, and replies from new users.

By a "new user," I mean someone who had never interacted with Frank until December 9 2022 or after.

If you've just learned about Frank now, she won't respond if you try to talk to her.

Come back later, maybe in a few weeks -- demand spikes always cool down after a little while. You will have plenty of opportunities to talk to Frank later.

In the meantime, why not learn more about how Frank works? Try some of these links:

The post that's usually pinned

The about page

If you're a programmer, you might have fun reading her code

Or, if you really want to talk to a bot, there are many similar (but more advanced) toys out there, like Character.AI and NovelAI and ChatGPT.

why?

This popular post from December 10th is sending a huge number of new people to this blog.

As a result, Frank is getting so many asks that she can't possibly respond to them all.

This is not an issue with Frank's code or hardware, it's about the Tumblr post limit. She can't make more than 250 posts a day. None of us can.

Frank is designed to adapt her posting rate to avoid hitting the post limit until very shortly before it resets. This prevents her from hitting the limit early and "vanishing" for hours at a time. But if she gets more asks than the post limit can accommodate, they'll just pile up further and further as the days go on.

Over the last few days, I've tried to mitigate the problem by manually turning Frank's ask box on and off, several times a day. (I also manually tuned some knobs controlling other aspects of Frank's behavior.)

However, I didn't feel good about this approach:

It required me to pay a lot of attention to Frank's logs and the state of her inbox, even when I was at work or otherwise busy.

It probably felt arbitrary and confusing to users.

It made it difficult for Frank's longstanding user base to talk to her in the way they've always been able to in the past.

Whenever the ask box was open, Frank received a lot of questions that she has answered many times in the past.

It didn't seem like an effective way to communicate "hey, if you got here via that popular post, maybe come back later."

The new system is (obviously and deliberately) unfair, but it serves this list of goals better.

[yuri-is-online]

Question: When it comes to Twisted Wonderland, how is it that people seem to have lots of SSR cards? Where are they getting all the gems from??? Admittedly I'm F2P and have only had the game for 3 months but even playing daily it feels like I barely make 150 gems a week.

ahhh. well. i am one of those people yes i have 37 ssrs jesus and while there are a few things that contribute some of it really is just either from luck or being a whale. It also helps that pity on banners does not reset when you pull an SSR even if it's the one on rate up. I got 2 copies of Scary Monsters Jade without hitting pity and those pulls still counted toward the pity total, so while you can get spooked you can't really loose.

When it comes to gems/building a stash the number one thing I cannot stress enough is to buy the 10 key in Sam's shop for 250 gems at the start of each month. A normal pull is 300 gems, so this helps you build your stash even if it feels like it's not. Logging in on birthdays gets you a free 10 key (unless it's the twin's birthday then you get two) The exam token shop and all event shops (including the crowley token shop that's up right now) have single keys you should invest in. I had 40 (if not more) by the time I was rolling for Clubwear Floyd and that was just from saving event keys, and I am at 20 right now.

You've only been playing for a bit, so don't put too much pressure on yourself to have a really built up account. This is the wiki I use to keep up to date on stuff, I'm not the greatest at team building ;-; so I won't be able to help with questions like that but I did clear some space on my friends list recently. If you feel the need for a particular SSR just ask, I might have it or something you can use to beat content that's not in book 6

[teabreakpancakes]

GENSHIN SAGAU Headcanons

hopping on because @mirology explained lmao, why HCs only? too lazy to write rn, ill do it tmrw or some other day, this is the old SAGAU btw, not the one wherein they're the creator n shi

Genre: Fluff

the characters become concerned with how much space the game is taking up so nahida ends up tampering with the code so you have more storage

rlly appreciates the fact that you still do your commissions and farm despite it being 1am alr, especially since you have school/work

you have more crystalflies than usual, not that you notice, but diluc collects the ones at dawn winery for you, albedo collects the ones he comes across in dragonspine and in general, they all just, collect the crystalflies they see

they argue about who deserves the good weapons lmao: beidou subtly flaunts her feats when the claymore users talk abt it, diluc acts like he's done with em but he also acts like he's most deserving of it, eula is indifferent but when they try taking hers, she gets defensive, you gave it to her, why do they get a say in it?. Meanwhile, itto is ranting abt how he obviously deserves it, chongyun is just silent but he does want the weapon too, dori is rich enough to buy anything, xinyan wants it too and sayu is just, tired why claymore? i love claymore

they're concerned abt your health, have you seen how tired you look? they wanna be able to take care of you irl :(

they send their letters even if you don't manage to log in, it's okay, they understand but don't leave them for too long

if you're rlly busy, you still try your best to play, they really love that

you always win the 50/50 or get them and a standard five star character

somehow, your mains rarely come home tho, esp(especially) if they're a four star. like, you've got the others c6 but they're still like, below c3, they're rlly sorry but they can't tamper with their drop rate like the five stars can :( chongyun main here : chongyun was so frustrated with himself when he didn't come home with shenhe to you, he didn't come home, not even once

eventually, when they found out how to watch you from outside the app, they took advantage of that: they save you from rlly awkward situations by playing your ringtone hehe, they're also capable of calling the police if you're in a shit situation

they like to remind you abt stuff you have in your to-do list

the harbingers, including the fatui and tsaritsa, were a bit.. eh with you, at least, until they heard you talk abt them, you wanted to pull for them?? meet them in game?? YOU WERE EXCITED FOR THEM?? HUH? wow, they felt shocked and maybe a bit flustered,, just a bit

man, they rlly wanna taste the food you have in your world, esp xiangling, the food looked rlly nice okay? oh and if you're bad at cooking, ei relates dw, even benny is astounded by how bad it is tbh

zhongli is embarrassed to hear you rant abt how often he talks when he's idle, childe actually teases him abt it no, we won't talk abt how people ship em, they're actually a bit.. eh abt that, like cmon, haven't people heard abt platonic relationship?

benny actually feels really upset when you get bad drops or artifacts and he's in the team, tho the others depending on who they are reassure him that the drops are even more bad occasionally even without him

okay, even without you having that five star, you've got their sig dish, like wha-

you like their clothing? man, they wish they could give you some of their clothes, they'll try their best to bring you into teyvat, besides, your world is shit anyways-

okay so, for context, i copied zhongli's red eyeliner thing and modified it to suit me if you copy their makeup look and you like it, they feel so flattered, they're so smug abt it too ahdajkdbkf

if you cosplay one of them, they're gonna B R A G, i mean bro, cosplaying takes so much effort okay

[kimoi-boi]

AKA What I'm doing to prepare for Dawntrail.

Note: A LOT of the stuff I've listed here is definitely sweaty min/maxing exp gains and you don't REALLY need to do it if you're just interested in the story stuff. The most important thing is to make sure you're caught up on MSQ and geared up before DT launches.

This got a lot longer than I was expecting, so I'm putting it under a cut lmao.

Make sure you're caught up with MSQ. I know this one seems like a no-brainer, but nothing I put in here applies to anyone that's still working through previous expansions!

If you're interested in playing VPR and PCT, you can use your Poetics to get Scouting/Casting Cryptlurker gear from the Crystarium/Eulmore. Both jobs will come with starting gear, but it will only be ilvl 430 so having another 100 ilvl will help out. You'll have to wait til DT launch to get the weapons, but you at least have time to get a full set of both armors.

On the subject of gearing, make sure you have at LEAST ilvl 630 gear going into the first DT dungeon! Ideally, you'll have either i650 or i660 gear, but you'll need a minimum of i630 to even be able to queue for the level 91 dungeon. If you have i660 gear, that will absolutely carry you through all of DT until you get your free AF gear, especially if you supplement it with the gear you get from dungeons.

Try to cap on Tomestones of Causality and Comedy if you don't have any relics/current gear to buy. You'll be able to exchange these for Poetics on DT launch. IIRC, the exchange rate will be 4:1. If both are capped, that's an extra 1000 Poetics right from the start.

Pick up a Wondrous Tails book for this week and fill out all 9 stickers, but DO NOT TURN IT IN. Each book is good for two weeks, which means this week's book will last until early access starts. Turn it in on your job of choice at DT launch for a ton of early exp, and then pick up next week's book for even more exp gains. This can REALLY help boost VPR and PCT if you're looking to level them quickly to use for MSQ!

If you've got the Hippo Riders tribe quests unlocked, you can pick up your 3 daily quests, do them, but DO NOT TURN THEM IN. Again, wait until DT launch to turn them in for quick exp gains. This will mean you won't be able to do any other new days' tribal quests, so do this closer to when servers go down for maintenance! If you turn them in before daily reset (8am PDT) on the day of early access, you'll even be able to pick up 3 more after you turn those in and then ANOTHER 3 after daily reset hits.

Stock up on cheap food or use old, outdated raid food as you're leveling. That extra 3% gain isn't too shabby over the course of 10 levels.

If you craft/gather, try to cap on those scrips as well, especially white scrips. White scrips will be phased out and can be exchanged for purple scrips at a 1:1 rate. This can be used to get materia that you'll need to pentameld with at level 100!

If you gather, make sure to pick up 8 MIN leves and 8 BTN leves from Old Sharlayan. Do them, but DO NOT TURN THEM IN until DT launch. It will give you a bunch of early exp for both of those. Make sure to do this at least 3 days before early access so your leves have time to accumulate again! Don't bother with crafting/fishing leves, as the exp to these will not be worth it.

Again for crafting/gathering, stock up on common materials for your GC turn-ins. Having them ready to go at launch means you won't have to spend time/gil gathering later and can be crafted into things for your turn-ins for early exp gains. GamerEscape has lists sorted by class that you can use to kind of gauge which materials you'll want to stock up on.

Be REALLY careful about doing challenge log stuff next Tuesday. Weekly reset will happen well before early access and if you complete challenge log entries before then, you'll be missing out on exp. This includes things like running dungeons, giving coms, gathering things, desynthing things, etc.

Next week, you can also pre-game Custom Deliveries by crafting/gathering them on Tuesday, but waiting until early access to turn them in. Again, this is great for an early exp boost! Don't bother stocking up on level 90 collectables outside of Custom Deliveries, as these will not be worth the exp!

If you've got extra grade 10 materia, hold onto it until DT. You can take them to Mutamix in Central Thanalan and try to transmute them into the new grade 11 materia. This one's kind of a low priority, but it's something to think about doing since grade 10 materia will be mostly worthless in DT.

Try to get your weekly hunts done, even after DT launches. You can use Allied and Centurio seals to get Aetheryte Tickets, which will give you free teleports! If the pattern of new hunt currency holds, then Nuts should also be getting Aetheryte Tickets and there will be a new hunt currency for DT. And if they break tradition and keep Nuts as current currency, then there will almost certainly be new things to buy with them!

Either turn off shout/yell/say chats OR have a chat tab that only has party and maybe FC chat or whatever linkshells you can trust to not have jerks in it. This will hopefully prevent assholes from spoiling things for you while still being able to communicate with party members/friends.

If you're a sidequest enjoyer like I am, make sure you don't have too many quests in your journal. You can only have 30 active at a time, which includes MSQ! Either clear the ones you've got before DT or abandon them and get back to them later if it's possible. Leves do NOT count against this, since they have their own limit.

Clean up your inventories, including your retainers and saddlebag(s). Anything that's easy to get or can easily be replaced (outside of stuff specifically stockpiled for GC turn-ins), just get rid of or sell on the MB. Having to run to your retainers every time your inventory gets full really takes you out of the flow of the MSQ and is kind of a bummer.

Back up your settings from the character log-in screen. You never know if data will get borked during an update and you really don't want to lose your hotbars/settings and have to spend hours fixing them. You can do this by pressing the little gear next to your character's name and uploading your settings to the server. I actually recommend doing this routinely even outside of new expansions!

And that's about all I can think of at the moment! Again, most of this is pretty sweaty advice. If anything I've listed here sounds like it'd be too annoying or would take the fun out of stuff, then feel free to disregard it. I have fun finding efficient ways to do things in this game, but I know it's absolutely not for everyone!

[pyxis-tracking-and-merc]

[Log -02]

I've found that the smell of sulfur seems to have permanently ingrained itself into my clothes from the fall and destruction of Alanixis.

Stars above know I have tried to remove the smell in numerous ways, but it seems to prefer to stay, which is a bit of a pain and can easily be fixed by simply throwing away these clothes, but I have yet to do so. I have a feeling I won't be anytime soon either.

I've also found myself using my amulet more often than not now, even wearing it in the shower. In it's own odd way, it makes me feel more like myself and less like an Alanixian. More specifically, less like a higher Alanixian.

I realized this only upon someone pointing out that I no longer ask for permission to put it on, but rather have been asking if they would prefer I remove the amulet for any particular reason.

On the topic of the Alanixians comes the 12 adults and 13 children I brought back to Earth with me.

Despite my attempts of getting them to no longer worship me as their god, they continue to do so. They've even taken up artistic measures to create a religious symbol. (Pictured below)

I suppose I cannot entirely fault them. I did say that they could do what they pleased with their freedom, and it seems they've chosen to continue to worship and pray to me. Though on a more positive note, I was incredibly glad to learn they did not use blood to make the art they showed me of the new religious symbol. Many of them have taken to art in various forms, ranging from paintings to culinary masterpieces.

They are still in the process of choosing their names. The children have been enrolled into school at the age levels they look like. The youngest being placed in first grade and the oldest being placed as a freshman in high-school. I am glad they've picked up on human mannerisms quicker than I did when I first came to this planet. As for the adults, they have taken to calling themselves my siblings when asked if they have any relation to me.

This has caused some mild tension in the fact that I am now needing to lie about having siblings. The lie I've chosen is that we were separated at birth due to a mix up at the hospital and that I'd been unaware that I had siblings at all. Nonetheless twelve of them. They've all also chosen the same last name, wishing to remain all as family. Which would at least be accurate considering they all are actually siblings. Making the thirteen children cousins to one another. I have figured out ages. The oldest adult is about 130 while the youngest child is about 20. Seeing as they are not higher Alanixians, they will age along with the rest of the population of humans, although it will be at a slower rate. So they've all chosen "human" ages as well.

Some of them are thinking about leaving New York and traveling through the US, or even other countries. Which I am happy for, seeing that they have the freedom. But it also frightens me for the fact that I will not be able to watch and protect over them as easily.

....

Dear stars above I fear I may be turning into their protector and God after all.

[dojae-huh]

I'm going to write a sad and serious post, so if you are still in the mood to celebrate NY, please skip it and read later.

Doyoung looked happy during the end of year concert, so, touch wood, he wasn't too affected by the MC scandal. I hope he learnt how to withstand and wait out personal attacks by now. He has been an idol for a long time, and had many a trouble.

I was a bit surprised that only 3 people unsubscribed from me in the past days. Either few subscribers read me regularly, or I successfully weed out the weak ones (I have a high subscribe/unsubscribe rate).

I'm not very eloquent with my words. I often come off too harsh and don't deliver my point of view well. I'm coming back to the topic of online virtue-signalling, "do good" pressure, witch-hunting of idols as I need to clarify a few points.

On the first glance it might seem like I'm behaving like a fan who protects one's bias. Actually, I would defend any idol who is accused of things he/she didn't do/that weren't proven. My opposition is to the mob, to the cancelling culture, to the people who use nice pretext to be awful humans. Their power is strong, they crush not only celebreties, but grind in the mix other fans as well. And I want more people to learn how to withstand this type of bullying into complience with the mob's POV.

The masses are often wrong. And a minority often looks like it represents the opinion of the majority, when in reality media and socmed algorythms just favour loud confrontational people and people who earn being "spokepersons". You don't have to pick a side if you don't want to. You don't need and you actually can't have an opinion on every subject. You can and should hear out people you disagree with or who has bad sides to them (like being a homophobe). A person possessing a bad character or view still stays a source of information you can learn from.

You will be pressured by "well-meaning" people into action "for the cause". Not just pressured - bullied. You won't be given a chance to question the cause, its revelance to you, whether there is a point to it, will the associated campaign bring any positive change really. Swear words, accusations of lacking morale, empathy, threats of being cancelled would be thrown at you if you won't comply. So the task is to learn to see through the wall of trigger words and mass histeria, to be able to ask questions and think and decide for oneself.

I didn't follow the Korean fans vs Indonesian fans fanwar. I don't know the specifics. Still, I can comment on absurdity of (some) Indonesians cancelling a Korean idol over a fastfood brand boycott that has little to do with their country. Indoneasia has an ongoing conflict of their own. Papua wants to become independent and is not allowed to. Killing or rebels - check. Denial of self-identification - check. Indonesians from other islands, other ethnicities, coming to the land and using its resources, starting to live there - check (Indonesia populates Papua with other peoples deliberetely, selling of mining and logging rights to foreign companies is rampant). When I went to YT to look for a video on the conflict, I came across the fact that Indonesia has a migrant issue as well. Rohingya refugees, a muslim minority fleeing Myanmar.

It is the truth that athrocities and injustice happen all over the world at the same time. And not only man-made conflicts. Poverty, ilnesses, nature destruction. People suffer and die constantly. People following online mobs that get into a frenzie after media shines light on a particular issue and bully everyone to do the same are hypocritical. The world is big, people in one part of the world deserve peace and to be preoccupied with their mandane lives, celebrate, even if something bad happens in another part of the world.

When Russia-Ukrainian war started I followed it closely. I listened to commentators from both sides and I was watching the videos from the battleground with burnt corpses in tanks, Ukranian drones releasing explosives on the heads of Russian soldiers, child graves dug on playgrounds, leveled to the ground cities (before and after airial photos), as well as humanitarian and volunteer campaigns, etc. I also read comments and observed the wave of hate Russians were getting online from "well-meaning" people. I was stripped off of the ability to use credit cards abroad, ability to enter several European countries, and other issues. It was a very unstable time when everyting changed every day, I was afraid to be locked in Russia like Soviet people were locked in USSR (it's a real concern among Russians, a new iron wall). Back then I constantly switched between reading about the war and writing silly stuff here on this blog. I didn't write about the war not only because I wanted a space to escape to, but also because it was a local problem. Yes, huge, and affecting the whole world (oil, gas, vegetable oil, wheat, more refugees, the disraption of the "peace" in Europe, etc), but still a conflict people in Indonesia, Thailand, India, South America and so on had the right to avert their eyes from.

Right before New Year Russia (nothing sacred for Putin) sent rockets to several large Ukranian cities. You can see Ukranian k-pop cover groups filming dance covers for YT and think that everyrhing has calmed down, that it's only soldiers who fight on the perifery. Well, no. And Ukraine also sent rockets into a Russian town. On both sides civillians died in the buildings during explosions.

Instead of a NY conglaturation, a political oppositioner on YT I watch released a video with information about a couple of people that died. Turned statistics into stories about individual human beings. You can watch it here, it has English subs. The author asked to forgive him for not being in a celebratory mood, so many commented how they too couldn't celebrate the holiday.

The attack angered me, but I didn't dwell on it. I personally did congratulate all my friends with positive words. And I celebrated. War or not war. I want to live. I want my friends to be successful next year despite actually not knowing their onlook on the conflict (I was hesitant to discuss with some). I don't want Putin and his desire to stay in power to ruin more lives than he already has and will continue to do. Certainly not mine. I have my lane, nature conservation. It is as important as other "fields to do good". And to have any positive impact on the world, firstly I need to stay sane and happy myself. And my friends need to stay sane because they will outlive the dictator and be the part of people who will push for democracy.

To sum it up. Don't fall to the mob's pressure on the internet and don't be quick to judge people, cancel them. Don't delegate thinking and decision making to others. Form your own informed opinions. And don't waste your time on trivial things. Fanwars online don't help anything and anyone. It's action in real life that matters. Even if all you do is being kind to your family and people around you, you still do more good than justice-warriers.

Be kind in 2024.

[in-sistant]

A lot of my inbox right now are people asking if the tamagotchis will ship internationally and I've answered that maybe 4 times now, so I'm just gonna reserve those asks for when I'm able to make them international, n I'll let y'all know /nm

My Etsy is suspended until I can fork them over money from random fees that the service team won't even let me know what for. I can't even access my actual orders, if I have any, bc I can't even LOG IN with my acc suspended. I can't view messages, can't see my orders, can print shipping labels, can't add new listings. For all I know I do have money from Etsy but it's a bunch of overdue orders that I'll have to refund.

I was having trouble with Etsy prior to this as well. I've had to re-ship so many orders that I've already shipped, bc Etsy's tracking system on my end just. Doesn't work. I want to make a new Etsy atp but I don't want to lose my ratings and credibility, so I'm just.. out here. Trying to find alternatives to Etsy but when I've tried that in the past people have just gone "I've never heard of that before, I don't want to buy from there."

Kinda forced to put up with Etsy's bullshit rn.

[the-fiction-witch]

I Don't Need Your Help P2

Media The Queens Gambit

Character Benny Watts

Couple Benny X Reader

Rating Adorable

Concept Foster Parents

Requested 'I don't Want your Help' Sequel

I hummed my little tune as I pushed the cart along the alise of products every so often glancing to the signs above each alise and then to my shopping list to cross reference between the two, I felt a small tug on my dress so I glanced behind me seeing little Lisa in her clean dress her hair in the pigtails I did for her this morning

"Ohh yes?" I asked she simply pointed to the shelf where the the chocolate chip cookie dough sat in its logs "I think that's a great idea Lisa" I smiled I let her choose which ones we got and helped her add them to the cart "okay next is orange juice, you think you can grab that for me?" I asked her and she nods and runs off happily to find it. I went around and got the rest of the groceries we quickly paid for and loaded up the Lincoln heading through the busy still drizzly New York streets back to the beautiful house I now called home. I pulled into the driveway and parked up helping lisa out the car and she happily came and helped me unload all the groceries into the kitchen, once everything was away I started on the rest of my chores for the day sorting all the beds, all the laundry everything I needed to do when I heard the phone so I bolted downstairs grabbing it before it rang off

"Watts residence?"

"Hi y/n" her voice smiled

"Oh hi carol" I smiled "what's up?"

"I know we were talking and you mentioned you have an open bedroom"

"Yes we do, now Alice has gone home we have an open bedroom. Why do you ask?"

"I've got a young lady here, it's an absolute shit show of a case and I need somewhere for her to go and I know just how well you guys do with these kinda cases"

"Absolutely what's her name?"

"Mable she's just turned eleven, she's a very sweet girl been thought one hell of a time"

"No problem well we are more then happy you can send her and her file along as soon as you get chance"

"Thanks y/n you're a lifesaver" she says before she rang off

So I put the phone down and I grabbed a little cream basket from the cupboard, I headed upstairs making sure to peek in on Lisa on her room playing with her rag dolls so I went on past the other rooms to the last free bedroom I opened the door revealing the fairly bare bones room, it use to be Alice's room when she lived here but she left a few weeks ago with a wide smile happy she finally was able to live with her mother again, I made the bed with some fresh clean sheets and made sure the room was free of dust and spiders, I set the basket on the bed and made sure to fill it from the airing cupboard with a fresh new fluffy towel, some clean brand new PJ's, some snacks, some colouring stuff, a stuffie, some fresh blankets for the bed, a new toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo and conditioner and even a bath bomb all of them fairly mini travel sized ones ready for Mable to arrive I even made her a little card up to put on the basket for her. When I checked the time I rushed myself down to the front door watching out the front window as the yellow bus pulled up outside the house, I opened the door up and smiled widely as I saw them all get off the bus so I smiled and waved As Jessi ran over dropping her backpack on the doorstep to give my legs a hug, I smiled and patted her head "Hi Jessi, How was school?"

"Good" she smiled��

"Alright, go on then make sure you get on that maths before dinner else you won't want to do it after bath time" I told her 

"I Will" she smiled happily running inside 

"Afternoon Harriet" I smiled to her 

"Hi," she smiled nicely 

"How was your day?" 

"Okay," she nods 

"Okay, make sure you eat some dinner okay" I told her as she headed inside, and as soon as she was in Dani came to the door too "Hi"

"Hi, how was class?"

"Good" she smiled giving me a tight hug 

"Awww, lovely hugs come on then we have cookie dough for tomorrow"

"Great" she smiled heading inside too, I waved the driver away and headed inside to start on dinner for the girls, making sure everyone was okay given everything had had happened during the day at school and what they wanted to do over the weekend 

"He's home!" Jessi smiled as she was at the window I laughed and set the dishes down and went towards the front door but I didn't even need to open it as the door opened and immediately I saw benny as he came though the door and dropped his duffle bag on the floor, in his jeans and black shirt 

"Hi Benny" I smiled 

he didn't bother to reply simply taking me into his arms and lifting me up giving me a spin "I've missed you little lady"

"I've missed you too" I smiled giving him a sweet kiss as he set me down on the floor again "Happy Anniversary" He smiled handing over some roses clearly from the gas station but still 

"Thank you benny, a week late but thank you" I smiled giving him a kiss 

"Better late then never, you know I don't like going off over our anniversary" he says "Where are my girls?" He asks and immediately the girls all bolted to give him cuddles even Harriet everyone coming to give him a cuddle and to tell him about everything since he was gone, and of course he came to have his own dinner all while listening to the girls tell him everything he missed and of course he told them all about his time away until they headed up to their rooms, "How has everything been?"

"its been okay, Harriet's struggling but I hope it'll cheer her up to have you home again. Jessi is struggling with her maths so I've been looking into a tutor for her. Dani's missed you a lot, and I know Lisa has been feeling a lot better since she's gotten settled" I explained "Ohh and we got a letter from alice"

"we did? didn't you open it?" he asks as I handed over the letter

"Course not I was waiting for you" I smiled "Ohh and we have a young lady coming tonight for the spare room."

"Ohh her name?" he asks opening the letter

"Mabel"

"Lovely, how old?"

"Eleven." 

"we know anything about her?"

"Not much but carol is bringing her pack when she brings her"

"You made her a bed up?"

"Made a bed, and a basket for her"

"Good, I'll have a chat with her when she gets here, we'll give her pack a look though one she's settled in her room"

"Absolutely, and Lisa helped me pick out some nice cookie dough logs as a nice activity for tomorrow"

"Ohh that sounds lovely the girls will love that" He smiled "you wanna read?"

"Of course" I smiled sitting with him and leaning my head on his shoulder holding his arm tightly 

"Dear Benny and Y/n Watts,

I wanted to let you know I've settled down into the new house and my new room. 

My mother has made lots of promises since I moved in, I'm not sure if I should believe her or not but I'm going to give it time, I know she's put so much work in already. 

Even thought its nice to be back with my mother, I do miss you all terribly. 

I still keep the blanket you gave me on my bed at night and I've been using the lessons you taught me in school.

My grades are good, and I'm waiting to here back about a summer internship which will be amazing, 

I know I've told you both a hundred times but I can't thank you enough for everything you did for me and I'm sure I'll be able to see you at some point again. 

I hope everyone is okay and things are going well, and I'll send more letters as soon as I can. "

"Awww she's such a sweetie" I smiled 

"I worry about her"

"I worry too. I know she doesn't trust her mother"

"Can you blame her? she's let her down before" 

"I know, well I always told her she has a bed here if ever she needs one" 

"We'll write her back tomorrow" I smiled 

We caught up about benny's tournament until the door knocked so we fixed up a little and went to the door seeing carol with her folder

"Hi carol" I smiled 

"Hi, Ohh I didn't know you where home benny"

"Only got back tonight, So about Mabel?"

"She's in the car" she says indicating behind her to the car on the street "I've got her file, not sure how long she'll be here"

"she can be here as long as she needs" I told her "School?"

"Not at the moment we can give her a week see how she settles," she explained 

"Okay" I nodded "Shall we meet her?"

Carol Happily walked us down to the car and their sat Mabel, with a trash bag of her belongings, her hair matted and messy, her skin dirty she was clearly nervous. we were slow and careful but we helped her out of the car and into the house up to the bedroom I set up 

"So, this is your room its your space completely to can do whatever you want with it , we have a three day weekend so over this weekend we can help you unpack and take you to do some shopping to get some nice things for your room" I explained "Everything in this basket is yours its all for you"

"To keep?" she asks

"To keep, absolutely" benny told her as he leant on the door frame 

"All of it is for you, and if there is anything specific you'd like, maybe a type of plush or blanket you'd like we can get you them. These hygiene things are all yours and when we got out this weekend we'll get you whatever larger ones you'd like to keep in the bathroom, You're welcome to go and have a bath or shower to make yourself feel more comfortable" 

"And your welcome to ask for anything you want, if you'd like to go to the hairdresser, maybe get your nails done, go get some plushies anything you'd like"

"Just let us know, is this bag all your stuff?"

"Yes" she nods

"Okay is there any clothes you'd like me to do any laundry for you? anything you'd like us to wash before we put away?"

"Ohh... uhhh yes please" she nods handing the whole bag over 

"Everything? you sure?"

"Yes please, could I go have a bath?"

"Of course you can, and if you need anything that's benny and I'm y/n you need anything at all just let us know"

"we hope you can get comfortable, and enjoy your time here" benny told her

I went and ran her a bath with bubbles and some bath bombs leaving the towel in the bathroom for her, and I took her clothes down cleaning all her clothes and toys in the machine 

"she seems okay" Benny says as he came into the kitchen flipping though her file 

"she does, hopefully she can relax over the next couple of days and maybe spend some time with the other girls"

"Absolutely, Ohh got another nut allergy" 

"Ahh like Harriet, no problem" I nodded sitting with him to go though the file about her history and her issues to make sure she's comfortable, once we sorted all the girls for the night making sure to give them all privacy and we headed up to our own bed room 

"Y/n?"

"Yes benny?"

"You ever get kinda... upset we can't have our own kids?"

"Sometimes" I admit "But we have lots of kids to look after, all the girls we have here all the girls we've helped before who are so much better now then they were before they came here"

"Yeah its nice to help them all out, its nice to help them all"

"It is, besides, Carol's been trying to convince us to adopt Lisa for years now"  

"I know, I'm thinking about it, come on lets get to bed" 

[samueldays]

Some days I don't like the efficient market hypothesis.

I tried the classic Runescape, which has a decent in-game market hub with bid placement that can be filled while you're logged off, and cross-world matching of buyers and sellers. I found myself looking at the Old School Runescape wiki page on ways to make money. By hypothesis, everything highly profitable on this list sucks in some way and I won't or can't do it, because otherwise people would have competed it down. :)

The list is sorted by mean hourly profit in expectation, given certain assumptions. I observe four general categories of highly profitable activity that have resisted being competed down, some overlapping:

Many of the entries including all the top 10 are "do endgame raid, sell loot" and "kill endgame boss, sell loot" that I and most people am nowhere near being able to do.

The first activity that isn't killing something: Pickpocketing elves, whose profit rate is a) assuming you have two maxed-out character skills and access to a lategame area that requires many other skills and quests to flag for, b) calculated on the expectation of getting and selling an ultra-valuable item with a drop rate of 0.1%. Hallowed Sepulchre is similar, expecting only 92 rather than 99 of a skill but an even less reliable drop.

Low-margin activities like Casting Tan Leather where you pay 23 million and change for black dragon hide and reagents, magically tan it into black dragon leather, sell that for 25 million, and hope price fluctuations and the market middleman's cut don't eat too much of your nominal 7% profit margin. Smelting runite bars is similar. Degriming grimy snapdragon is a joke.

4. Immensely tedious repetitive busywork like Dismantling bracelets of ethereum and Grinding unicorn horns where you engage in intermediate material processing for an hour, because the fantasy world hasn't invented automation and using RL automation (scripts that click the mouse for you) is banned.

[sharky857]

The Palia Experience™ (so far)

Believe it or not, I'm trying it out because a friend of mine ended up despising this (beta) game so much they went and asked the game company to straight up delete their account for good.

Know that I won't dig into some controversial/sus stuff ongoing with some cosmetic bundles, because right now I am not even interested in purchasing a single thing in game.

All this is going to be purely from a(n oblivious) player's pov, who is also still a newb who's just "learned" how to plant & water crops.

For starter, I appreciated same ol' warnings for flashing lights & stuff. I'm not photo-sensitive myself, but I can see how this can be a nice thing for those who have this issue to varied degrees.

What I would also appreciate would be the possibility to have subtitles in the cutscenes (unless this option is already available but dumdum me couldn't spot it).

Customisation has lots of options to choose from right away, and I'm saying so as someone who comes from Warframe, where the only "Operator" free stuff is 4-5 hairstyles and a Zariman suit, with everything else locked behind either plats or a grindfest.

Besides, you can also have a small selection of colours to tweak. This is what I ended up mashing together.

The graphic looks cartoony/simplistic, and it kinda reminds me of another game: "Paladins" (another friend of mine described it as "generic unity style 'cutesy fantasy' aesthetics").

Makes me wonder if this has anything to do with both games running on "Unreal Engine". 🤔

Also, despite my PC would meet the requirements to run the game at "high" settings, I decided to keep them at the default ones the game itself chose: "medium". This resulted in my GPU (GTX 1650) not breaking a sweat, ever and unironically.

(Yes, this means that my screenshots are all taken with the graphics set on "medium".)

Even so, it hasn't been uncommon for me to see the game freeze and/or stutter. What left me puzzled this whole time is that the CPU (of the i7 kind) would at time show spikes of 60% usage. A sign that, maybe, the graphic isn't as "simplistic" as it looks.

Still, I have yet to experience any game implosion, so I guess I am still all good here.

And btw: yes, the game devs themselves know about the latter issues I mentioned. 👇

There is only one thing that keeps on leaving me quite fascinated.

Queue. Queue everywhere.

Apparently, the servers are still so damn tiny that, no matter where you're trying to load into, even though you are already logged in game, you will have a high chance of seeing a message like this in the corner of the loading screen. 👇

Logging into the game? "X Palians ahead of you."

Loading into a cutscene before/after a quest? "X Palians ahead of you."

Going to the village? "X Palians ahead of you."

Coming back to your tent/home? "X Palians ahead of you."

Imagine playing something like Warframe (the only other co-op game with quests I could think of). Imagine if you loaded in your own Orbiter and tried to start absolutely anything, even while in "solo" mode:

Loading a mission: "X Tenno ahead of you."

Starting/Progressing with a quest whatever: "X Tenno ahead of you."

Waiting for the cutscene(s) to said quest to load: "X Tenno ahead of you."

Going to a relay or a free roam (imagine instances didn't exist either): "X Tenno ahead of you."

Moving back to your Orbiter to call it a day: "X Tenno ahead of you."

You got the picture. Not really a fun and also sliiiightly irritating in the long run. 😅

But hey, it's a beta game that has just come out of "closed beta" only 1-2 days ago. So hopefully they will be able to expand their servers soon enough.

As for the gameplay itself, it's nothing really special to me, probably because I am already familiar with some of the mechanics. I've seen this being called "a mix between Animal Crossing and Stardew Valley", and so far I'm mildly getting the latter's vibes (never played any "Animal Crossing" game).

All in all, if I were to rate this game on a scale of 0 to 10, I would give it a generous 7. "Generous" because of the aforementioned controversy with the bundle discounts so-called "scam" (which is still unclear whether or not it's been accidental, haven't kept up with the news in this regards), plus the current, microscopic size of the servers.

[wingedkiare]

There's something deeply entertaining about Elon lying about why he's rate limiting accounts (if you think about it for more than a minute, his "scraped content" theory makes no sense).

If you've missed it all, it's come out that Elon wasn't paying Google Cloud and their contract was set to renew.... July 1st. So the best theory is that Google cut him off and he lacks the devs to easily adapt to the change. So instead, they tried to rate limit users so that they could make their fix on the site.

Of course, Elon had made it so Twitter constantly refreshes, leading to people being rate limited quickly. But also leading to Twitter DDOSing itself.

He also made it so you have to be logged in to see tweets.

And basically made it unreasonable to pay for a verified account, even if they give you more tweets to be able to read. "Verified" refers to Twitter Blue accounts, and they were promised better amplification. How can you get amplified if most of Twitter gets locked out after scrolling their feed once?)

Advertisers also don't like having ads behind registration, and probably won't like that Elon's cut off the number of impressions they can get. Leading to them pulling their spends to take elsewhere.

[basingstokemercury]

Chief Medical Officer's log, stardate unknown.

The runabout sank too quickly to salvage anything but the padd I write this on, and I was lucky to survive myself in the icy water.

This planet is heavily forested, the wood pliable enough even for me to work into crude tools.

Animal life, what there is of it, strongly resembles Earth's. Sentient life appears nonexistent - well, not quite nonexistent. The humanoid life forms I've encountered are very hostile and appear to be in the terminal stages of some rabies-like condition.

I can only hope humans aren't susceptible.

After a struggle with the locals, I discovered the berries I gathered have strong restorative properties. If only I had the proper equipment to study them further...

The dangerous fauna seems to be nocturnal and landbound, so I've taken to spending the nights on my raft.

Cutting through ice is slow work and hard on my equipment, but I must find warmer climates. There have to be uninfected humanoids somewhere, and food is sure to be more abundant at any rate.

I'm being stalked.

I suppose I should have tried to contact the entity, but its presence disturbs me in a way I can't account for. It seems to have natural teleportative abilities, so I'm unlikely to outrun it should things come to that.

I've named the boat the Defiant. A meaningless gesture, I daresay, but it helps me remember there are people out there looking for me.

Not that they'd be likely to find anything, even if they reach this planet. At least the Dominion interment camp had companionship, such as it was.

Sisko won't give up on me, that's what I have to focus on. Maybe there's a civilisation somewhere with the materials for a transmitter, for all the good it'd do my knowledge of engineering.

I've managed to put together an oven, and will be able to eat the animals I hunt in relative safety. My real worry, though, is lack of sleep.

I have to be constantly alert in the coracle, but sleeping on land leaves me defenceless from the local predators. Light seems to repel them, at least, and a campfire might be of some use.

I'm quite likely the least qualified person to be stranded somewhere like this, aren't I?

Kira wouldn't bat an eyelash, Jadzia has eight lifetimes of experience and Klingon instincts, Miles would know how to build a distress signal...

This is becoming more of a diary than a log. I haven't kept a diary since I graduated.

After gathering supplies on land, I returned to shore to find disaster.

The ice had closed in while I was moored, cutting me off from the rest of the river - and sunset had begun.

I'm hacking desperately through the barrier, knowing I have to reach open water before nightfall.

If I can't...

I hope anyone who finds this diary has the knowledge to bring it to Starfleet.

[talk2news]

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