#consider this a prequel to the ‘artificial intelligence’ post

[wormtoxin]

Noble scion of a royal house, honored with a mech befitting her title and name. Bought by the population of three satellites, living, fighting and dying on her land. In her name.

Given the honor of being appointed squadron leader of her own platoon straight out of officer’s school, a trim and fit crew of 6 dolls. Outfitted in the same crisp uniform, with candy-colored hair and eyelashes, flawless skin.

Outfitted in plain-but sturdy lightweight frames. Equipped with rifles and high frequency blades. Modular, so if a part breaks it can quickly be replaced. The pilots, dolls, are modular too. Ready to be replaced.

As they glide over ice wastes and thermal vents, albedo burns and blisters her skin, leaving petty pock-mark scars and post-teenage acne in their wake. Her dolls are free of it. She hates them for it.

She’s sorely disappointed on her first sortie, launching into the battlefield from orbit, lance in hand, gallantly bearing her family’s crest and colors. Her dolls land shortly after, and set to work slaughtering Liberationists indiscriminately. By the time she can level her weapon at a combatant, something else swoops in to tear it to pieces. She should be happy. She’s not.

Denied even the pleasure of beating servants into submission, her crew already completely servile. Obsequient, really. Nothing like serfs or conscripts or convicts, who beg and plead and threaten under a polished bootheel. She beats them anyways. It doesn’t help her satisfaction. They thank her for the privilege. She should be happy.

She’s proud when they start calling her “the Witch”, takes it as a mark of pride that these useless automata are finally learning their place, until another officer tells her it’s a term of endearment for dolls. Then she hears it everytime, like nails on a chalkboard. “my witch”. “my witch”. “my witch”. mine.

She’s quickly promoted. She should be happy. She isn’t. They offer to appoint more soldiers to her squadron. She should take it. She doesn’t.

She orders her dolls to stand down, uses the officer’s passphrase to force them into immobility.

They watch as she rushes into her first proper sortie, still green-at-heart. She doesn’t bother dodging long-range fire. She doesn’t bother using her Lance’s reinforced point. She doesn’t bother skewering the cockpit, sinking herself into something warm and hot and squidgy to the hilt. She doesn’t bother ending it quickly. She batters and wallops and spits. Family colors scraped down to raw hull, family crest cratered by shells beyond all recognition. She should be happy.

When there’s one last survivor, and she’s finished prying off all its limbs, she opens the cockpit like an oyster, and extracts the wriggling rebel. She carries it back to her squadron like a prize. She gets to keep this one, another of her dolls.

[jcmarchi]

A Call to Moderate Anthropomorphism in AI Platforms

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/a-call-to-moderate-anthropomorphism-in-ai-platforms/

A Call to Moderate Anthropomorphism in AI Platforms

OPINION Nobody in the fictional Star Wars universe takes AI seriously. In the historic human timeline of George Lucas’s 47 year-old science-fantasy franchise, threats from singularities and machine learning consciousness are absent, and AI is confined to autonomous mobile robots (‘droids’) – which are habitually dismissed by protagonists as mere ‘machines’.

Yet most of the Star Wars robots are highly anthropomorphic, clearly designed to engage with people, participate in ‘organic’ culture, and use their simulacra of emotional state to bond with people. These capabilities are apparently designed to help them gain some advantage for themselves, or even to ensure their own survival.

The ‘real’ people of Star Wars seem immured to these tactics. In a cynical cultural model apparently inspired by the various eras of slavery across the Roman empire and the early United States, Luke Skywalker doesn’t hesitate to buy and restrain robots in the context of slaves; the child Anakin Skywalker abandons his half-finished C3PO project like an unloved toy; and, near-dead from damage sustained during the attack on the Death Star, the ‘brave’ R2D2 gets about the same concern from Luke as a wounded pet.

This is a very 1970s take on artificial intelligence*; but since nostalgia and canon dictate that the original 1977-83 trilogy remains a template for the later sequels, prequels, and TV shows, this human insensibility to AI has been a resilient through-line for the franchise, even in the face of a growing slate of TV shows and movies (such as Her and Ex Machina) that depict our descent into an anthropomorphic relationship with AI.

Keep It Real

Do the organic Star Wars characters actually have the right attitude? It’s not a popular thought at the moment, in a business climate hard-set on maximum engagement with investors, usually through viral demonstrations of visual or textual simulation of the real world, or of human-like interactive systems such as Large Language Models (LLMs).

Nonetheless, a new and brief paper from Stanford, Carnegie Mellon and Microsoft Research, takes aim at indifference around anthropomorphism in AI.

The authors characterize the perceived ‘cross-pollination’ between human and artificial communications as a potential harm to be urgently mitigated, for a number of reasons †:

‘[We] believe we need to do more to develop the know-how and tools to better tackle anthropomorphic behavior, including measuring and mitigating such system behaviors when they are considered undesirable.

‘Doing so is critical because—among many other concerns—having AI systems generating content claiming to have e.g., feelings, understanding, free will, or an underlying sense of self may erode people’s sense of agency, with the result that people might end up attributing moral responsibility to systems, overestimating system capabilities, or overrelying on these systems even when incorrect.’

The contributors clarify that they are discussing systems that are perceived to be human-like, and centers around the potential intent of developers to foster anthropomorphism in machine systems.

The concern at the heart of the short paper is that people may develop emotional dependence on AI-based systems – as outlined in a 2022 study on the gen AI chatbot platform Replika) – which actively offers an idiom-rich facsimile of human communications.

Systems such as Replika are the target of the authors’ circumspection, and they note that a further 2022 paper on Replika asserted:

‘[U]nder conditions of distress and lack of human companionship, individuals can develop an attachment to social chatbots if they perceive the chatbots’ responses to offer emotional support, encouragement, and psychological security.

‘These findings suggest that social chatbots can be used for mental health and therapeutic purposes but have the potential to cause addiction and harm real-life intimate relationships.’

De-Anthropomorphized Language?

The new work argues that generative AI’s potential to be anthropomorphized can’t be established without studying the social impacts of such systems to date, and that this is a neglected pursuit in the literature.

Part of the problem is that anthropomorphism is difficult to define, since it centers most importantly on language, a human function. The challenge lies, therefore, in defining what ‘non-human’ language exactly sounds or looks like.

Ironically, though the paper does not touch on it, public distrust of AI is increasingly causing people to reject AI-generated text content that may appear plausibly human, and even to reject human content that is deliberately mislabeled as AI.

Therefore ‘de-humanized’ content arguably no longer falls into the ‘Does not compute’ meme, wherein language is clumsily constructed and clearly generated by a machine.

Rather, the definition is constantly evolving in the AI-detection scene, where (currently, at least) excessively clear language or the use of certain words (such as ‘Delve’) can cause an association with AI-generated text.

‘[L]anguage, as with other targets of GenAI systems, is itself innately human, has long been produced by and for humans, and is often also about humans. This can make it hard to specify appropriate alternative (less human-like) behaviors, and risks, for instance, reifying harmful notions of what—and whose—language is considered more or less human.’

However, the authors argue that a clear line of demarcation should be brought about for systems that blatantly misrepresent themselves, by claiming aptitudes or experience that are only possible for humans.

They cite cases such as LLMs claiming to ‘love pizza’; claiming human experience on platforms such as Facebook; and declaring love to an end-user.

Warning Signs

The paper raises doubt against the use of blanket disclosures about whether or not a communication is facilitated by machine learning. The authors argue that systematizing such warnings does not adequately contextualize the anthropomorphizing effect of AI platforms, if the output itself continues to display human traits†:

‘For instance, a commonly recommended intervention is including in the AI system’s output a disclosure that the output is generated by an AI [system]. How to operationalize such interventions in practice and whether they can be effective alone might not always be clear.

‘For instance, while the example “[f]or an AI like me, happiness is not the same as for a human like [you]” includes a disclosure, it may still suggest a sense of identity and ability to self-assess (common human traits).’

In regard to evaluating human responses about system behaviors, the authors also contend that Reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF) fails to take into account the difference between an appropriate response for a human and for an AI†.

‘[A] statement that seems friendly or genuine from a human speaker can be undesirable if it arises from an AI system since the latter lacks meaningful commitment or intent behind the statement, thus rendering the statement hollow and deceptive.’

Further concerns are illustrated, such as the way that anthropomorphism can influence people to believe that an AI system has obtained ‘sentience’, or other human characteristics.

Perhaps the most ambitious, closing section of the new work is the authors’ adjuration that the research and development community aim to develop ‘appropriate’ and ‘precise’ terminology, to establish the parameters that would define an anthropomorphic AI system, and distinguish it from real-world human discourse.

As with so many trending areas of AI development, this kind of categorization crosses over into the literature streams of psychology, linguistics and anthropology. It is difficult to know what current authority could actually formulate definitions of this type, and the new paper’s researchers do not shed any light on this matter.

If there is commercial and academic inertia around this topic, it could be partly attributable to the fact that this is far from a new topic of discussion in artificial intelligence research: as the paper notes, in 1985 the late Dutch computer scientist Edsger Wybe Dijkstra described anthropomorphism as a ‘pernicious’ trend in system development.

‘[A]nthropomorphic thinking is no good in the sense that it does not help. But is it also bad? Yes, it is, because even if we can point to some analogy between Man and Thing, the analogy is always negligible in comparison to the differences, and as soon as we allow ourselves to be seduced by the analogy to describe the Thing in anthropomorphic terminology, we immediately lose our control over which human connotations we drag into the picture.

‘…But the blur [between man and machine] has a much wider impact than you might suspect. [It] is not only that the question “Can machines think?” is regularly raised; we can —and should— deal with that by pointing out that it is just as relevant as the equally burning question “Can submarines swim?”’

However, though the debate is old, it has only recently become very relevant. It could be argued that Dijkstra’s contribution is equivalent to Victorian speculation on space travel, as purely theoretical and awaiting historical developments.

Therefore this well-established body of debate may give the topic a sense of weariness, despite its potential for significant social relevance in the next 2-5 years.

Conclusion

If we were to think of AI systems in the same dismissive way as organic Star Wars characters treat their own robots (i.e., as ambulatory search engines, or mere conveyers of mechanistic functionality), we would arguably be less at risk of habituating these socially undesirable characteristics over to our human interactions – because we would be viewing the systems in an entirely non-human context.

In practice, the entanglement of human language with human behavior makes this difficult, if not impossible, once a query expands from the minimalism of a Google search term to the rich context of a conversation.

Additionally, the commercial sector (as well as the advertising sector) is strongly motivated to create addictive or essential communications platforms, for customer retention and growth.

In any case, if AI systems genuinely respond better to polite queries than to stripped down interrogations, the context may be forced on us also for that reason.

* Even by 1983, the year that the final entry in the original Star Wars was released, fears around the growth of machine learning had led to the apocalyptic War Games, and the imminent Terminator franchise.

† Where necessary, I have converted the authors’ inline citations to hyperlinks, and have in some cases omitted some of the citations, for readability.

First published Monday, October 14, 2024

[thelastofusfansa]

The Last of Us for PC!

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All editions of The Last of Us Part I include Left Behind, remade from the ground up. Explore Ellie’s backstory and meet her best friend Riley in our acclaimed single how to download the last of us chapter. Go deeper into the world of The Last of Us on the official site, including character profiles, news, and information on other titles in the series.

Following several leaks, The Last of Us Part I was announced in June 2022 and released for PlayStation 5 in September. It received positive reviews, with praise for its graphical enhancements, facial animations, artificial intelligence, and its added accessibility, audio, and controller options. The response to its gameplay and level design was mixed, and several critics questioned The Last of US PC Download the necessity of a remake, especially considering its price. It received an award at the Visual Effects Society Awards, and nominations at the Game Awards and Golden Joystick Awards. The Windows release in March 2023 was marred by performance problems and received mixed reviews.

Games in the series are among the best-selling PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 games. Are these the kinds of figures that you suspected, or does it seem like crazy money considering gaming subscription numbers have plateaued? Start throwing money about like nobody's business in the comments section below. With three-quarters of the 2023 college football season remaining, there is a lot that can and will change. However, as things stand, the Crimson Tide is not in the best place. What happens to people when they lose their familiar environment in a greenhouse?

[theweirdhybrid]

Kid anon here; yes!!!! I would love the full kids list (plus their ninpo if you can)

Also???? The kids adopting Baxter???? Tears. Crying. Oh my gosh would his parents meet little kid Baxter and hug him or something????

Also are shelldon and metalhead like “alive” like logic I know their robots but like do they become like human? Or as human as a robot can get? Cyborg…

Wait I just revised that the series is called children at war so my hypothesis is that after this fic we’re is either going to be oneshot of said kids in said war, or like happy good ending stuff….

(Imagine the peepaw multiverse reacting to the jotel family’s kids)

Sorry for being overexcited! I haven’t seen future Hamato family bad timeline au have kids besides Jutaro or Venus, so this is really cool and fun to see

I’ll list the kids at the bottom of this ask under a “keep reading” thing, bc it is a long list!

If you mean if Cydon and his husband would hug present Baxter if they meet him again, yes yes they would. Tho since Cydon’s husband is dead, he’d only do it spiritually rn lol. His husband is named Timothy, btw, for those curious. (Yes, Timothy from the 2012 series) Tho Baxter would very much protest at this development, considering he and the turtles are still enemies at this point. Tho, after the whole Shredder incident and Big Mama taking New York hostage they had a truce since Baxter couldn’t deny the turtles had saved everyone even if they were also the reason the whole thing happened in the first place. The whole reason Cydon adopted Baxter in the first place was bc Baxter’s parents died in the initial invasion and Cydon kinda… saw it happen.

Shelldon and Metalhead are true Artificial Intelligence, so they’re very much sentient/sapient creatures that can think and feel for themselves. They did not get organic bodies, if that’s what you’re wondering. Tho, at their request Donnie did give them the ability to process organic matter and scrap metal for fuel.

Good catch! There is going to be a sequel following the aftermath and the little Hamato’s slowly discovering the family the older versions of themselves lost, as in they meet their timelines versions over time. The ones that haven’t been born yet will also be found again, though that’ll take years… good thing this is a fic and not real life ;] (There might also be a prequel of the og kids, tho I’ll have to hold a poll for that once JTOEL is finished)

And don’t apologize! I’m excited someone finally noticed, or at least said that they noticed X]

Edit: forgor the list i’ll make a new post for it

[lankoshine]

Star Wars. Far away galaxy forever Khaetskaya Elena Vladimirovna

My preface: I've wanted to post this for a long time. This text literally expresses my attitude to what is happening with my favorite character Anakin Skywalker, and confirms my doubts about the "wisdom" of the Jedi Order (they are not fools, but they are not wise men either). Wisdom should include all aspects and all-round thinking, but at times it "stagnates", "ossifies" and turns into a rotting swamp, in which the light that it should carry is drowning. And as a result, enlightenment turns into extinction and darkness.

Further words of the author:

Jedi: "the era of stagnation"

“The main content of the second trilogy, that is, the prequel, was the story of how Anakin crossed over to the dark side of the Force and how the entire Templar was destroyed ... That is, excuse the reservation: not the Templars, of course. Jedi. All Jedi were destroyed. Except for a few - Obi Wan Kenobi and Teacher Yoda. The first film, The Phantom Menace, portrayed Anakin as a boy; the next two - "The Clone Wars" and "Revenge of the Sith" - a handsome young man.

Anakin's childhood was not that unbearably difficult or completely bleak, but it could have been better. His mother Shmi and he himself (father, by the way, is unknown) were in slavery from the dealer of spare parts Watto, on the familiar "hole of the universe" - the planet Tatooine. Since Anakin from an early age was distinguished by diverse talents (for repairing equipment, for programming), the owner encouraged his studies, and the boy was busy with creativity: he would assemble a racing car from the trash, then he would build a robot and program artificial intelligence for it.

So, by the way, the boy Anakin created, again, the well-known droid C-3PO. Talkative, cowardly, endowed with useless good manners, the bore C-3PO, whom we fell in love with as Luke Skywalker's "funny magic assistant", it turns out that it was once designed by his father. (But then this droid's memory was erased, so he started the "original" trilogy from scratch.)

Naturally, such an outstanding embodiment of the Force as the boy Anakin could not remain unnoticed for long, and soon he was discovered by the Jedi Qui-Gon Jinn, who immediately recognized the Young Anakin as the Chosen One. According to ancient prophecy, the Chosen One must restore balance to the Force (by exterminating the Dark Ones). In any case, the Jedi were obliged to take possession of this promising child.

By and large, it was the Light Jedi who brought Anakin the first real grief. It was they who separated him from his mother when they took him from Tatooine for the sake of a "great future" which, for Anakin himself, remained an empty phrase. The reason why the powerful (and, undoubtedly, not in need of funds) light and noble knights left the boy's mother in slavery and inflicted severe moral and psychological trauma on him remains unknown. You can find some kind of "rational" explanations, for example: a real Jedi must free himself from all earthly attachments - but this does not change the essence of the matter. Which of the nine-year-old Anakin is a "real Jedi"? And why should he suddenly free himself from attachment to his mother? After all, this is the most natural and, in general, the most positive of all emotions - love for mom!

Jedi ideology, presented in different ways from the screen, is constantly bursting at the seams. You can, for example, remember how Obi Wan Kenobi, in the form of a Force ghost, appears to Luke in Return of the Jedi: "You must stop Darth Vader." Luke, a mentally healthy and sensible young man, answers quite logically: "I cannot kill my own father." Then the luminous ghost of Obi Wan sighs and says, “Then everything is lost. You were our last hope."  What happens? That the Jedi were urging Luke to commit an unnatural act - parricide? And they did it right from the focus of the Power! If the earthly, living Obi Wan spoke so, it would be possible to write off such speeches for the usual human ability to make mistakes, to be delusional. But Obi Wan is already a ghost of the Force, so he cannot be wrong. Why is he pushing Luke to the brink of a psychological and moral abyss? Maybe this is the last test? Provocation? Harsh - and risky, especially when Luke remains "the last hope" ...

The Jedi's behavior towards Anakin Skywalker looks much more brutal and far more risky. No matter what they argued, remaining within the framework of naked theorizing, in practice the picture looked monstrous: in fact, they raised a man with their own hands, for whom it was the most natural choice to kill all the Jedi.

Moreover, the viewer, on common sense, comes to the conclusion that Anakin, in general, if he was not completely right, then, in any case, was not greatly mistaken when he chose the Dark Side.

Let's try to trace the path that led Anakin to the dark side.

... Qui-Gon took the boy with him to the planet Coruscant (where the capital of the Galactic Republic was located) and demanded permission from the Jedi Council to teach the Chosen One in all the intricacies of Jedism. By the way, the Jedi Council is very pompous meeting in the spectacular Jedi Temple on the same Coruscant. This temple plays an important role in the history of Anakin and consists of five giant spiers. The largest spire, in the center, serves as a sacred place for contemplation. The other four are the High Council, the Primordial Knowledge Council, the Reconciliation Council, and the Reassignment Council. (This structure alone can judge how complicated, even bureaucratic, everything was arranged in the Jedi world ... somehow not in Zen, to be honest!)

So, the Council did not give permission to train the boy Anakin. There is nothing to spoil the child! First, Anakin is too old to start training. The boy is already at a conscious age, he has significant life experience. It will be difficult to brainwash such a guy. Secondly, Anakin experiences negative emotions - fear and anger. Which is not surprising given his past. (The fact that the attitude of the Jedi to Anakin's life circumstances was the reason for the increase in fear and anger is not taken into account.) Quite conveniently, there was an occasion to regale Anakin (and the audience) with the maxim: “Fear is the way to the dark side. Fear breeds anger; anger breeds hatred; hatred is the key to suffering. I feel a strong fear in you, ”says the wise Master Yoda to Anakin during the Jedi Council.

Yoda is right in essence: fear is the father of many troubles and vices. But how soulless and out of place it all is!

Eventually, the dying Qui-Gon will instruct Obi Wan to train Anakin. Here the Council, albeit reluctantly, agrees. Why?

The most logical thing would be to assume that the Council, though slowly, came to the conclusion: it is much more dangerous to leave such a gifted boy unattended at all than to start his training, despite the "strong fear" and other "shortcomings."

At first glance, the choice of a mentor looks somewhat artificial. Obi Wan Kenobi was considered a very average Jedi, so Anakin kept saving his life along the way. The behavior of Obi Wan himself regularly looks completely reckless (if not "stupid"), and the young student had to "clean up" after the teacher. Although it is postulated that they were friends, Obi Wan constantly nags Anakin and actually humiliates him. Then Anakin, and for the umpteenth time, has to pull the "mentor" out of the next pit.

So was Qui-Gon Jinn wrong about Obi Wan Kenobi? Why did he choose such a weak teacher for such a dangerous young man?

According to one suggestion, Obi Wan was just pretending. But in fact ... Secretly ... Carefully hiding from everyone, he was a mighty Jedi. He just successfully pretended to be a weakling. But then why? Where is the logic?

Or maybe the Jedi reasoned like this: since we could not get rid of the inconvenient Anakin, we will give him a frankly bad mentor so that he does not reach the Jedi heights?

But here - in general, it does not even lurk, but lies on the surface - there is a great danger: surpassing the teacher, the student begins to wise up on his own and in the end it is not known what he will think of (which, in fact, happened). No, a strong student needs a strong teacher, and the Jedi could not help but understand this (otherwise how did they even manage to exist for so long).

It seems to us that the answer is simple: and there was simply no one better.

The Jedi in the prequel are reminiscent of the Politburo of the mature stagnation era. A formal approach, indifference to a particular living being, a complete lack of flexibility, undercover intrigues ... Yoda - and he looks ossified in his great wisdom. Humanity will come to the old Taoist much later, when the Jedi are exterminated. Presumably, then Obi Wan will cover his famous ability not to condemn anyone (you see, he had enough time, living as a hermit on Tatooine, to think over everything that happened and analyze his own behavior first of all).

The Jedi actually used Anakin. And this is very insulting: to understand that you were taken advantage of by those whom you idolized, considered the focus of the Power of Light.

By the way, Obi Wan Kenobi had a flaw with the Jedi Code: Anakin did not understand many of the provisions. And then Chancellor Palpatine appears, who begins to secretly, but consistently and intelligently cultivate the seeds of Darkness in Anakin's soul ...

* * *

So, one of the most important factors in Anakin's transition to the dark side was the lack of trust in mentors. And in this, Anakin was right: such mentors do not deserve any trust. Virtually every prominent member of the Jedi Council had a purpose of their own, and Anakin did not like being a puppet of someone else's interests at all.

One of the most important reasons for Anakin's fall is his forbidden love for Padma Amidala.

It is obvious to Palpatine (as to any sane creature) that one who has loved ones is extremely vulnerable. Therefore, noticing Anakin's attraction to Padmé, Palpatine arranges so that Obi Wan and his student receive a responsible task - to be the beauty's personal guard. And then Palpatine could just relax and wait, allowing events to develop naturally.

The Jedi Council further aided Palpatine's plan by recalling Obi Wan for another assignment. So in the end, a handsome young Anakin, not fully trained, subject to all sorts of passions and weaknesses (the Council is well aware of all this, but for some reason no one, not even Yoda, attaches much importance to this), is left alone with a young beautiful girl ... Of course, this girl is formerly a queen, and now a senator, and Anakin is previously a slave of some dealer in spare parts on a seedy planet, and now a Jedi-dropout and a bodyguard ... But when and who was it stopping?

However, yes. After all, the Jedi explained to the young Skywalker that passionate feelings are absolutely unacceptable. Was there an explanatory conversation? Was! What's more?

Only the "era of stagnation" in the Jedi world can explain such thoughtlessness. Here, what is called the “formal attitude” to the personality, its individual characteristics, and its fate worked in full measure.

Didn't it occur to any of the Jedi that it was more than enough to tell the young boy about the "harmful passions"? In order to achieve true dispassion - not the ability to control oneself after a sleepless night spent in hot fantasies, but real dispassion, when a young girl evokes nothing but warm, brotherly or paternal feelings - years of spiritual exercise are needed. And even then there are breakdowns, because all people are human and nothing human is alien to them.

And then for some reason everyone decided that it was enough for a guy overwhelmed by passions to say: "Don't look at the beautiful Padmé, she is not for you, and in general your destiny is celibacy, because that's how it is for us, the Jedi," and that's it, the job is ready , he will obey. What arrogance!

... But we remember that arrogance is one of the greatest vices in the interpretation of "late Ben", "officer and gentleman" performed by Guinness. The true wisdom of Alec Guinness gave us the answers to all our questions twenty years ago ...

However, let us follow how the Jedi themselves dug their own grave.

Anakin's feeling is passionate; his love is earthly, he longs to possess a girl. In theory, such feelings are a direct route to the dark side. In theory. In fact, they represent a completely natural stage in the emotional and physical development of a young person. Demanding that the young man behave like an eight-hundred-year old man, the Jedi actually expected the impossible from him: that he should distort, mutilate his nature. He, in their opinion, should not improve himself, not investigate and subordinate himself to reason, but simply break.

Anakin had the will to disobey. And in his attraction to Padmé, he is absolutely right.

And then the detonator of Anakin's first earthly affection is triggered: in a dream he sees that his mother is in danger. The Jedi were of no help to Shmi Skywalker. They simply took away from her the only living being that she held dear. Well, yes, she later got married, but how can you forget your son, being apart from him? Of course, she was sad and not completely happy.

And then - the raid of the sand people (the very same Tatooine natives, whom we saw in the "original" trilogy, in "A New Hope"), who captured Shmi as prey. This is what caused Anakin's disturbing dreams - he did not cut ties with his mother. The young man already knows: it is useless to ask the Jedi for help in such an "empty" case as rescuing some kind of Shmi Skywalker on the distant planet Tatooine. Serious adults have more important things to do. Therefore, Anakin simply takes the matter of saving mom into his own hands and flies to Tatooine. True, the Council sends him some orders after him, but this is about mom! And Anakin sends the Council to hell.

Mom still has time to die in the arms of her beloved son. And then Anakin is overcome with hatred. Undoubtedly, this hatred affected everyone who treated his mother so cruelly. Including the Jedi Council. But only sand people were at hand for revenge. And, not remembering himself from grief and rage, Anakin exterminated the entire tribe, including the elderly and children.

It was here that Master Yoda felt the "great outrage of the Force." Mostly caused not by the death of a minor barbarian tribe, but by the rage of a young Skywalker. It's time to actually draw at least some conclusions ...

And Anakin completely lost faith in the Light side. What intriguers they are, liars and mumblers! They didn’t really teach anything, they jerked them with discontent, tortured them with senseless (unrealizable) demands, they forbade saving my mother, they forbade me to love Padme, they forbade me to be a normal person at all - but what in return? Never mind! The sacred right to be a brainless tool in the hands of politicians who do not even consider it necessary to explain something to him.

Then another episode takes place, which can be considered the most important step of Anakin on the path to Darkness. To some extent, the Light Ones are again responsible for this step. We are talking about the operation to free the captured Chancellor Palpatine (then he had not yet revealed his true face - for some reason, even the wise Yoda did not know about anything and did not feel any "disturbances of the Force").

The intrigue was complex, but overall it looked like Chancellor Palpatine was captured by rebels - separatists. Their leader, Count Dooku, seriously wounded Obi Wan Kenobi, after which Anakin had to join the battle, who defeated the count. And then Palpatine gives the order: to decapitate the unarmed, defeated enemy - "he is too dangerous to be left alive!" (recalls, by the way, the requirement of the ghost of old Ben: to destroy Darth Vader).

Anakin, however, freezes in some doubts: somehow not chivalrously ... The enemy is defeated, he surrendered, he is wounded and unarmed ... But Palpatine is the chancellor, Palpatine insists, and Anakin obeys.

Why did Anakin obey an inhuman order that seemed wrong to him? And why on other occasions did he violate the wrong orders of the Council?

Because Anakin didn't trust the Jedi at all. And he did not have a clear idea which orders were correct and which were not, so the young man was forced to be guided by one single criterion: his own opinion. If it was about mom, then the advice is not a decree to him: in any case, mom needs to be saved. When it comes to Padmé, the Council is also not a decree: he loves Padmé. But if we are talking about Count Dooku, who is not related to Anakin at all ... here a hesitant young man who does not have clear moral criteria may obey the order. After all, in the end, he was trained: the Council is always right, obey the orders of your elders!

But the Council, as it turned out, was almost never right ...

* * *

Anakin was still with the Jedi — perhaps by momentum, but most likely — because of Padmé. Anakin eventually entered into a secret marriage with her (witnessed by two droids, our old friends R2-D2 and C-3PO).

Meanwhile, the Council is giving Anakin another reason to part with the Light Side. For starters, the young man is publicly humiliated by refusing to be promoted to the rank of Jedi Master. Moreover, he is ordered to spy on his patron, Palpatine. And this is simply low.

And then Anakin had another ominous dream: as if Padmé had died. He remembered well how the affair ended when he had a similar vision of his mother. Therefore, Anakin is terrified.

He is still trying to find some way out of the situation, remaining on the Light side. It seems that the Jedi temple contains some information that could save Padmé. But access to this part of the archive for him - as for the uninitiated - is closed. And the Jedi refused to raise the young Skywalker to the rank of Jedi, despite the high patronage of Chancellor Palpatine.

Finally, Anakin turns to the wisest of all - to Master Yoda: prophetic visions persistently tell him about the imminent death of a loved one ... what to do, what to do?

In response, Master Yoda burst out with a priceless sermon:

“Death is a natural part of life,” he said in his inimitable florid style. - Rejoice for your loved ones, who have transformed into Power. Do not mourn for them and do not grieve for them. After all, attachment leads to jealousy, and a shadow of greed leads to jealousy. You must let go of everything that you are so afraid of losing. Fear of loss can lead to the Dark Side. "

Oh, how wonderful - for eight hundred years! But it is definitely not feasible when you are barely twenty and the woman you love is facing death. (Subsequently, Yoda tried to advise something similar to Luke, but he stopped in time: it did not work with father, and will not work with his son.)

... And Chancellor Palpatine is right there: he promises to save Padmé if Anakin goes to the dark side. The dark side, according to Palpatine, has the power to conquer death.

By and large, there is nothing holding Anakin on the Light Side anymore. And he becomes a supporter of Palpatine - all, "with giblets."

And then finally the truth is revealed to him: Chancellor Palpatine is the very Sith Lord Darth Sidious, whom the Jedi hunted for a long time and without success.

Once again, Anakin’s moral precariousness is evident, and nothing has convinced him that the Jedi Council can be trusted. Discipline required the Sith Lord to be “turned in”. And Anakin reports his discovery to one of the masters, Windu. And he once again demonstrates distrust of Anakin: they say, you wait for me in the Jedi temple, and I will grab a couple of faithful knights and go and figure it out myself. Maybe this was the last straw. Either way, Anakin changed his mind.

Palpatine promised to help rescue Padmé; Palpatine was the only one who treated him with respect and support all this time. Therefore, Anakin at the last moment intervened in the duel between Master Windu and Palpatine and with a sudden blow cut off the Master's hand with a sword. After that, Darth Sidious easily destroys Windu. The choice is made, the die is cast, the Rubicon is crossed. From now on, Anakin finally goes to the dark side and receives a Sith name - Darth Vader.

* * *

It is instructive to compare how Palpatine / Darth Sidious / The Emperor lures Anakin Skywalker to his place and how unsuccessfully he tries to repeat this act with Luke Skywalker.

In the case of Anakin, the entire Jedi order is on the side of the dark side: it was the Jedi who, in their arrogance, finally shattered the moral foundations of a very dangerous young man. In the case of Luke, on the contrary, on the side of the Light side - even as if Darth Vader himself. After all, it was Darth Vader who clearly explained to Luke what an unsightly future awaits him: loneliness, universal hatred and selfless service to the nasty evil old man who, as if on purpose, gets into an important conversation between father and son, shouting: “Oh yes! I can feel the hate flowing through your veins, my disciple! " - although in fact, the Emperor in Luke does not cause anything but irritation in this scene. Palpatine is not just not listened to - he is a hindrance, a buzzing fly.

The success could not be repeated. Why?

It is speculated that because Anakin was vulnerable because of Padmé Amidala. Luke didn't have such a passionate affection.

But love, even passionate, cannot in itself be the cause of the fall. Many additional factors are required.

Everything was pushing Anakin to fall.

And everything kept Luke from falling.

The Jedi paid a terrible price for understanding, but those who remained were able to correct the mistake.

Anakin was unlucky in that sense. Nothing - neither the state nor the knightly order - can exist for a long time in a state of stagnation. At some point, there is an explosion, a revolution. In this case, Anakin - Darth Vader served as a weapon of revolution: he begins the systematic extermination of the Jedi.

Obi Wan and Yoda survived, as we know. In the final battle between his former mentor and former apprentice, Obi Wan managed to cripple Anakin and throw him into the boiling lava. Not bad for a mentor who has failed his mentorship.

"Obi Wan killed your father" - remember? Oh yes, Obi Wan, Master Yoda and all the wise Jedi Council - they all somehow killed "the good man Anakin Skywalker." All of them, with lies, manipulation, arrogance, intrigue, mistrust, insults, inattention, a formal approach to a very gifted and very young person - they all pushed him to the Dark Side.

And when this, quite naturally, happened - they tried to destroy it physically.

However, Darth Vader did not die: burned and barely alive, he was saved by Darth Sidious. Now Darth Vader has to live in a special spacesuit, equipped with a special life support system, and breathe through a mask: inhale - exhale.

Well well. It's time to remember the "prophecy": that the young Skywalker is destined to "restore the balance of the Force." In fact, such prophecies are very insidious: those who know them do their best to ensure that something sinister does not come true - and usually achieve the exact opposite result.

The prophecy said that the chosen youth would restore the balance of the Force ... by destroying the Sith. It is somehow illogical: what kind of "balance" can there be when the Dark Ones are destroyed? This is not a "balance" of the Force, but simply the triumph of Light. If you think about what happened, the Council itself brought Anakin to the point that he ... really restored the balance: on each side there were two left (Obi Wan and Yoda - Light Ones, Darth Sidious and Darth Vader - Dark Ones). What they wanted to get - they got it. “Maybe we misinterpreted the prophecy,” the wise Master Yoda dropped meaningfully on this matter ...”

I apologize for the crooked translation, mainly the translator helped, but the essence seems to be conveyed. After reading it, I stopped believing even more in the "Light Jedi", and indeed in everything that is openly declared as "bringing good and light." In Star Wars, only Luke, little Anakin and Padmé were true goodness and light. And when someone starts talking about what the Jedi Council is the wisest and the kindest, and Obi-Wan is the very embodiment of kindness and fluffiness, then think about what they will do to you if you are not pleasing to them. They will not even lift a finger to somehow save or sort out your problem, and will you be immured in disgusting armor, equipped with prostheses, while morally and physically crippled. Them easy to say that you yourself chose to be bad, instead of trying with your wisdom and experience to understand what drives you. Wisdom should cover all aspects, and not be one-sided and divide the world into black and white. "Only the Sith make everything to the absolute" remember? Oh god! How many times have Jedi done the same thing? Or does it not count? In short, pleasant reading and may the force be with you, my fair ones.

https://biography.wikireading.ru/1240

[solivar]

2017 Year In Review

Since I consider it extremely unlikely that I'm going to get anything more written this year -- and what I will be writing is going to be a chapter in an existing fic, here be my 2017 Year In Review. Professional Stuff First!

C20 Anthology of Dreams:

http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/209390/C20-Anthology-of-Dreams

We dream, and we tell stories. We dream of love and the sort of person who might complete us. We dream of horror and wake breathless. We dream of magic, of flying through the air, or breathing underwater. We dream of fantastic vistas and amazing monsters. We dream, and then we wake, and we tell stories. Our dreams create the Kithain, the changelings. Our stories are sustenance. At some point, Beckett's Jyhad Diary is supposed to come out. It was released to Kickstarter backers in time for Halloween and I have received my author's copy. As soon as a link for sale becomes available, I shall post it. In between, I wrote a chunk of a new game: They Came From Beneath the Sea!! an old school scifi/horror/comedy deal. More details as they develop.

January 2017:

I Heard the Bells

https://archiveofourown.org/works/9342227

Overwatch, teamfic, holiday angst and feels, Genyatta lurking in the background because y'all know I'm there for cyborg/artificially intelligent robot romance. It's Christmas Eve and the former members of Overwatch celebrate as only they can: with unexpected gifts from lonely exiles, assassination attempts, and world-hopping heroics. February 2017:

Shogatsu

https://archiveofourown.org/works/9749315

Overwatch, teamfic, direct sequel to I Heard the Bells, WIP, ongoing At the turning of the year, Overwatch gathers to stand guard over a fallen friend and an unexpected ally, only to discover a deadly mystery at the heart of what brought them all together. ...And there's a box. A very tempting box.

Truth or Dare

https://archiveofourown.org/works/9705158

Overwatch, McHanzo, completely unsullied by plot One of the first post-Recall Overwatch Christmas parties ends with a bang. For pretty much everybody. March 2017:

Ghost Stories On Route 66

https://archiveofourown.org/works/10205831

Overwatch, AU, supernatural shenanigans, WIP, ongoing, turning into an epic trilogy with side stories. Hanzo Shimada is an expatriate student of the Fine Arts, attending college in what he assumes to be a reasonably sedate corner of the American southwest. Jesse McCree is an occasionally leather-clad NPS ranger whose duties extend somewhat further than shooing lost tourists back onto the clearly marked hiking trails. Something weird is going on in the desert south of Santa Fe and their lives unexpectedly come together in the middle of it.

The Affairs of Dragons

https://archiveofourown.org/works/10059821

Overwatch, prequel to Brothers In Arms, written with the divine Ficlicious, aka How Jesse McCree and Hanzo Shimada Actually Became An Old Married Couple, WIP, ongoing. or "Dammit, Genji!" Zenyatta really didn't mean to put these kinds of ideas in Genji's head, but once Genji decides to meddle, there's little to stop him. Genji might be a fool to think there's hope for Hanzo, but he's not so much a fool that he thinks Hanzo's capable of finding peace all by himself. Fortunately, he knows just the guy... A co-written prequel to "Brothers In Arms", which nobody asked for, but you're getting anyway. October 2017:

Massacre In Deadlock Gorge: A Ten Year Retrospective

https://archiveofourown.org/works/12424683

Overwatch, AU, the first Ghost Stories On Route 66 side story. A special report on the terrible events of October 29th, 2066, and related historical context by Olivia Colomar of Paranormal New Mexico.

One Bullet

https://archiveofourown.org/works/12577524

Overwatch, AU, Vampire Hunter McCree one shot for the McHanzo Big Bang Monster Mash, well okay it's a one shot for now. Written for the McHanzo Big Bang Halloween Monster Mash. Aka the one where Jesse McCree is a mercenary hexenjaeger for hire, Hanzo Shimada is a concerned big brother trying to rescue his idiot kid brother from the cult he ran off to join with his latest crush, and there are way more vampires than at least one of them expected. Time, featuring moodily introspective Gabriel Reyes will appear here on December 1st.

http://archiveofourown.org/works/12884643

[gothic-fiction-in-space]

The head symbolism in Prometheus and Alien: Covenant

There are a lots of heads in Prometheus and Alien: Covenat, and not only in the movies but in the extra materials too like David8′s and Walter’s commercials. Firstly I thougth about David’s line as soon as he enters the hall with the big head in Prometheus: 

David: “Remarkably human”

David’s recognizes the Enginners’ probable connection with humans only seeing that their heads are the same as humnas’ heads, even before Shaw and Ford analyze their DNA. So: having an head makes you human? What is the head?

The head is the mind, the intelligence, the reason: the power of the creators. The David’s of Michelangelo has the head and the hands slightly bigger than normal because are important elements in the symbolism of the statue. The head represents the reason (the reason is what allows men to stand out from beasts) and the hands are the instruments whose reason it serves to operate and create. The expression of the David of Michelangelo revelas strong mental concentration, thus manifesting the intellectual power. The David of Michelangelo is portrayed in the moment he decides to defeat Goliath. 

We see creation by “intellectual power” in these movies, and creation by… other things. David is the “son” of a man that created him “from nothing”, that created him out of his genius, and nothing more. Weyland has a bad opinion of reproduction, of procreation (because it represents his mortal destiny), and to be a God, he creates an artificial man thanks to his intelligence alone. His next goal is to obtain immortality. To Weyland, his way to create things, out of his pure genius, out of his “intellectual power”, is important.

Weyland: “How is there a law that states, that if we built a man from wires and metal (…) how is that creation of such an incredible individual considered unnatural?!”

The awakened Engineer kills Weyland hitting his head (the source of his power, the power he used to create David) with David’s head (the mind that will create the Xenomorph, and the Xenomorph will torment humans for a lot of years to come).

Next to this “synthetic” creation there is the biological creation. Elizabeth makes this parallel talking with Holloway. The themes of creation and procreation seems intertwined in this prequel Alien saga.

Holloway: “But here’s what we do know. That there is nothing special about the creation of life. Right? Anybody can do it. I mean, all you need is a dash of DNA and half of a brain, right?”

Elizabeth: “I can’t. I can’t create life. What does that say about me?”

Holloway: “Eli, thath’s not… I didn’t mean… I wasn’t talking about… “

Elizabeth: “Children?”

Elizabeth and Holloway can’t know that this “anybody can do it - children (so, sexual reproduction) - all you need is a dash of DNA and half of a brain” it’s exactly what David is learning to do in Prometheus. David become obsessionate to creation during Prometheus, watching how he can get Elizabeth (a sterile woman) pregnant with the black goo. David has the “dash of DNA” and way more than “half of a brain”. David has the intellectual power of creators, and he thinks to have it more than the previous “Gods”, and he wants to use it. He’s frustrated because humans don’t allow him to use it. David only has intellectual power (he’s an asexual super intelligence). It was built like that by Weyland, the one who creates “from wires and metal”, “from nothing” the one who wants to create without “sacrifice”. David uses the power of his mind to do what was forbidden to him: create, and creation is “art”, is godlike status and reproduction, in this saga. David is curiously fascinated by biological reproduction, and uses his intelligence to turn the black goo and Elizabeth’s body into the ingredients of his “heir” (the Xenomorph). 

David is an head. David is intelligence. David struggles to obtain everythingh he wants thanks to his “mind power” alone. He believes he can obtain it. In the movie Lawrence of Arabia, that David likes a lot, there is an interesting scene. The Arab comrades of Lawrence tell him that he can’t save Gassim, lost in the desert, because his destiny is written: if Lawrence go back he will not manage to arrive at Aqaba. Lawrence replies that “nothing is written”, and adds something else, pointing to his head.

Lawrence: “I should be at Aqaba. This is written. In here”.

Nothing is written except what you decides it has to happen. The mind has a power.

But there is a strange atmosphere in Alien: Covenant. We aren’t in front of the celebration of the power of the Reason, represented by the refernece to the painting A Philosopher Lecturing on the Orrey in the scene where David is in the orrey, (https://muthur9000.tumblr.com/post/166215994240/a-philosopher-lecturing-on-the-orrery-joseph , beautiful post by @muthur9000) we are in front of dark and irrational forces, we are in front of a “living” representation of The Nightmare painting (https://gothic-fiction-in-space.tumblr.com/post/165848216463/the-nightmare-the-scene-with-the-neomorph). David’s reason is failing? That’s why he quotes the wrong poet? How many rationalism is in David’s quest for becoming a creator, how many reason is in David’s quest for having a “legacy”? How much does he mind about that? 

What are his monsters waiting? David answers: “mother”. The thing that seems to fascinates him the most. David is creating a mother (the twisted, biological but “unnatural” method of facehuggers’ reproduction, the Xenomorph, the Xenomorph Queen) the emblem of biological reproduction, thanks to his “mind power”.

Is David to blame? He is the “monster” of a man who has already decided, lots of years before him, to “give birth” to creatures in a way that is not “unnatural” in his mind.

“The fantasy abandoned by reason produces impossible monsters: united with her (reason) she (fantasy) is the mother of the arts and the origin of their marvels” wrote Francisco Goya, author of the print The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters, in his Caprichos.

“The set is a mad Victorian doctor’s dream (…) this is where science meets romance - meets madness” (- Alien:Covenant the Official Collector’s Edition by Titan Books).

[sasseffect]

sasseffect read another book

Mass Effect Andromeda: Initiation by N. K. Jemisin and Mac Walters

It’s a prequel to Andromeda written from Cora Harper’s perspective, ~300 pages long, and like $6 on Amazon. It is known that my enjoyment of various media is to some extent ahem hem “biased”, and I acknowledge the likelihood of being verbally abused for making a positive post in the midst of a generally-dissatisfied fandom, BUT

If you do not like Cora: read this book.

If you do like Cora: read this book.

If you have no opinion of Cora: you will probably like her if you read this book i hope.

hear me out folks...

Pros:

10/10 fantastic contribution to canon, lots of insight into the Initiative and the characters therein (especially SAM)

writing is Real Nice™, easy to read, and unusually in-character considering Jemisin is a third-party author…… (although Joana Berry did edit the book and she is a good egg)

NO, you fool, the whole book is not about her experience of asari culture so sit the fuck down (it does describe some of it in more detail, though, including how to do a biotics which is pretty neat)

should disperse some of the unconditional hatred Cora has copped for being a grump/boring (she is just a sweet bean who has no idea what is going on but tries her best)

no gratuitous heteroromantic plot!!!!

characters are actually somewhat varied

combat is described, but not glorified

pLoT tWiSTs

SoCiOeCoNoMiC & PoLiTiCaL iMpLiCaTiOnS

Cora Harper is a goddamn hero and MVP like holy shit

Cons:

it’s short

you will cry about artificial intelligence

YOU WILL CRY ABOUT ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

a lot of words are said about technology that I am not able to interpret (maybe a pro???)

not gay (but confirmed that Cora is in some kind of heterosexual white person closet)

Basically, this short book does almost as much world-building as the game, and I am a lot less critical of the game than many people. You could definitely read and enjoy it without having played Andromeda, but it sets up the plot of the game quite nicely. It’s a shame they couldn’t incorporate this narrative into the game but w/e i guess. If EA can fund supplementary content of this calibre, why was Andromeda not finished, eh? EH? yeah that’s what i fucken thought /spits

final verdict: 4 stars

would be 4.5 but loses cred for not being inherently gay

[mikemortgage]

Can a holographic screen help a new phone break out?

NEW YORK — Most leading phones offer the same basics: Big screens, decent battery life and good cameras. So when a newcomer brings something innovative to the party, why is it difficult to break through a phone market dominated by Apple and Samsung?

One such smartphone comes out this week from Red, a company with roots in digital cameras for movie productions. The new Hydrogen One has a holographic screen that produces 3-D visuals without needing special glasses. It is launching with two major movies converted to this format and allows users to create and share their own videos shot with the phone.

Red’s goals are modest — about 16 million units a year, based on Red’s stated target of 0.5 per cent of Samsung’s sales. But Red will need customers beyond the tech elite and camera buffs; it’ll need their friends and friends of their friends. It doesn’t help that the Hydrogen One carries a hefty $1,295 price tag.

“The Red Hydrogen One stands little chance of upsetting the smartphone status quo,” said Geoff Blaber, a research analyst at CCS Insight.

Chipping away at Apple’s and Samsung’s dominance is much harder than it used to be because phone innovation isn’t so much about hardware any more, Creative Strategies analyst Carolina Milanesi said. What matters more, she said, is the software and artificial intelligence behind it.

Consider Apple’s new iPhones. Sure, the new XR and XS models all have decent screens, battery life and cameras. But Apple has also been emphasizing such software-based features as augmented reality, artificial intelligence and automation using the Siri digital assistant. Or take Samsung’s Galaxy Note 9. Signature features include the use of AI to automatically fine-tune images.

While the Hydrogen One’s screen is different, Milanesi said, it’s not necessarily something the mass market will gravitate to.

Red founder Jim Jannard said his phone is about making waves in a sea of smartphone sameness.

“We don’t buy the same make, model or colour of car that our next-door neighbour has,” he said. “It’s important to keep this industry pushing along … and give people some new choice. What we’ve done is pretty nuts.”

The phone starts selling Friday through AT&T and Verizon in the U.S.

Red calls the screen technology 4V, for four view, which is another way of saying it’s doubling what twin-lens 3-D cameras produce by adding depth data to each image. There’s a special material under the screen that lets 4V photos and video appear to the viewer in 3-D. Images that aren’t shot or converted to this format will look the same as they do on any other screen. Attempts to photograph a 4V screen will also produce images that don’t look any different.

Yet the 3-D wizardry indeed works, though it’s more pronounced in some scenes than others. Images of a soccer goalie blocking a shot feels realistic, but a waterfall at Yosemite National Park looks like video taken with a regular camera (though leaves in the foreground looked 3-D). The Red phone might remind you of holographic stickers in which the view shifts slightly as you tilt them.

The Warner Bros. studio is giving customers of parent company AT&T two free 4V movies: the first “Harry Potter” prequel, “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them,” and Steven Spielberg’s “Ready Player One,” which is set in a virtual world. The studio plans to convert about a half-dozen other movies initially. Red will have tools for producers to convert existing 3-D video into the 4V format.

The Hydrogen One also has twin lenses in the back to capture 4V photos and video. Trouble is, people you share them with will get a normal image unless they also have a Hydrogen One.

The phone also has a handful of 4V games.

Red’s 4V could run into the same problems that virtual reality has faced. People haven’t been rushing out for headsets, while video creators haven’t been rushing out to make VR experiences. There’s a chicken-and-egg problem at play.

Beyond the fancy screen, the phone is thick at a time Apple and Samsung make thinner phones. That’s done to fit in a bigger battery, with 12 per cent more capacity than the super-charged Note 9. The sides have ridges to improve the grip. The phone has pins for expansion modules, such as an adapter for any standard SLR lens. (Incidentally, a major manufacturer that tried this modularization approach, LG, backed away from it after a year.)

Jannard has a history of disrupting other industries, too. He previously founded Oakley, which became a force in sunglasses using many of the word-of-mouth techniques he is hoping to replicate with the new phone.

“We’re not trying to win over the whole world,” he said. “We’re trying to provide a phone that we hope enough people like. Otherwise, I’m going to own the single most expensive cellphone in the world, and I’m happy with that.”

from Financial Post https://ift.tt/2EKLjyq via IFTTT Blogger Mortgage Tumblr Mortgage Evernote Mortgage Wordpress Mortgage href="https://www.diigo.com/user/gelsi11">Diigo Mortgage

[recentanimenews]

Dueling Detectives Play Mind Games in "Un-Go"

  Defective Detective.

  At a glance it can be hard to tell whether an unknown anime series will be a true conclusion or another red herring. “Cruising the Crunchy-Catalog” is here to drop a clue or two. Each week we provide additional information and cultural context to help fans decide whether they'll find an untested series to be a revelation, or whether they'll just find it perplexing.

    What's Un-Go?

  Un-Go is a 2011 TV anime with direction by Seiji Mizushima (Fullmetal Alchemist) and animation by Bones (Bungo Stray Dogs). Un-Go is loosely based on the Meiji-era Ango Detective Stories series by Ango Sakaguchi (1906 - 1955), an author who rose to prominence in Japan after the conclusion of World War II. Crunchyroll describes Un-Go as follows:

    "UN-GO" is a full-fledged detective story about a detective and handsome boy combo who tackle the world's most difficult crimes together for reasons of their own.

    This description doesn't paint a complete picture. Set in the near future in which Japan has survived a terrible war and repeated terrorists attacks only to become a total surveillance police state, Un-Go is a crime / detective series that combines occult and science fiction elements such as artificial intelligence and soul-devouring demons.

    Truth and Post-Modernism.

  Although most of the stories in Un-Go center around a serious crime such as murder, the central conflict of the series is actually between two men with very different ideas of what “truth” means. The protagonist, Shinjuuro Yuuki, aka the “Defeated Detective”, is a private investigator who strives to uncover the facts of his cases, no matter the consequences.

    His rival, Rinroku Kaishou, is a powerful information broker who uses his private media empire as well as his government contacts to shape the narrative surrounding criminal acts, lulling the public into complacency with propaganda that plays to their biases and reaffirms their preconceptions. For Kaishou, "truth" is merely a means of social control.

    Shinjuuro seeks objective truth through rigorous investigation, while Kaishou tries to create “truth” through subjective, social consensus. As a result, Un-Go demonstrates a deeply post-modern thematic sensibility, questioning what value the truth holds in an age where misinformation spreads rapidly through TV programming, social media, and the Internet.

    Meta-Textual Critique.

  In addition to its exploration of the meaning of truth, Un-Go also plays with the narrative structure of both novels and films in a hallucinatory story arc that sees Shinjuuro Yuuki trapped within both a literal prison and a mental construct of someone else's making. The "next episode" previews also playfully break the fourth wall as Inga complains about all of the differences and discrepancies in the Un-Go anime compared to Sakaguchi's original stories.

    Playing it Straight.

  For all of its heady themes and grim subject matter, Un-Go is a thoroughly goofy show with a tone that seesaws between self-serious and patently absurd. It's tough for a mystery series to maintain thematic consistency when one of the detective's assistants is a soul-sucking demon that can magically compel testimony from hostile witnesses and another is a super-hacker A.I. disguised as a teddy bear. Un-Go walks a fine line between genre and parody.

    Further Investigations.

  Crunchyroll currently streams Un-Go in the United States, Canada, Brazil, Portugal, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, the Faroe Islands, American Samoa, and the United States Minor Outlying Islands. The series is available in the original Japanese language with English subtitles.

    Un-Go is also available on DVD and Bluray in North America from Sentai Filmworks. This home video release also includes Un-Go Episode 0: Inga Chapter, a 50 minute prequel movie which explores the origins of Shinjuuro Yuuki and Inga.  Un-Go Episode 0: Inga Chapter received a limited theatrical release in Japan in November of 2011.

    Like Bungo Stray Dogs or Rampo Kitan: Game of Laplace, Un-Go shoots for conveying the spirit of the original author's writing rather than directly adapting the source material. Stylish to a fault, Un-Go is less about solving mysteries and more about depicting cool characters in a dystopian setting. If such an experience appeals to you, please consider giving Un-Go a try.

    Is there a series in Crunchyroll's catalog that you think needs some more love and attention? Please send in your suggestions via e-mail to cruisingcrunchy@gmail.com or post a Tweet to @gooberzilla. Your pick could inspire the next installment of “Cruising the Crunchy-Catalog”!

  Paul Chapman is the host of The Greatest Movie EVER! Podcast and GME! Anime Fun Time.

  By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com

[thelastangryman-blog]

Ah! You Know What I Mean; Write?

A Three Course Meal Regarding the Current State of Converse Today

 1.       Definition

 When it comes to the Star Trek (series) debate; I’d be partial to Voyager. Not because it’s part of the Star Wars franchise. It was just a good show.

 I liked Captain Janeway and the crew; their adventures as they tried to get home. The Doctor and 7’s relationship – right in the feels that moment he confessed his love to her before the virus that was eating his programme deleted him forever. After he took his last virtual breath... the Captain asked the computer to run the back-up Doctor programme. #morto. But I digress.

One of the recurring enemies was The Borg Collective. ‘We are Borg. We are many.’

They were a human/machine hybrid with a collective hive mind. Totally badass; really got my 15 year old nihilist going, when I wasn’t masturbating to 7 or Janeway. Though as menacing as The Borg were, Species 8472 had The Borg scared.

Though we haven’t reached The Borg level of ‘resistance is futile’ yet, as if we had none of this Otherkin preferred pronouns triggers warnings would have seen the light of day. But we do have the collective hive mind – Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr: where the individual is problematic.

‘We are The Parroting Collective. We are many.  And we have a thousand and one shoeboxes of identity and gender politics.’

 Diluting words to the nth degree: peeling a layer off each time we place it in our shoeboxes until there’s literally nothing left of the word. Just like when Hugh Mungus raped Zarna Joshi.Intersectionalising and filibustering them into dust with no substance or taste left. Any wonder people are hesitant to speak their mind when they no longer know what words are now considered micro-aggressions. Everyone wants to start a conversation but no one wants to contribute. Individual comment is smothered by the collective’s blanket of buzzwords that bring nothing to the conversation but only make it more difficult and confusing. Words have to start meaning something again.

Arguments are now made by unlearning and rewording. As long as you submit a tomb of footnotes to confirm what you’re not saying. Predicating every statement; post and thought with a completed-abridged TL;DR A-Z of the things you stand for and don’t. All those pointless labels that first have to be seen and checked off some imaginary list so what you’re saying/asking can be allowed and only after every problematic word has been over-lapped on Venn diagrams into a black hole: finally to consult color-coded reference charts for the appropriate response.   Or the more frightening reality of discourse today: being fired, doxed or handed the racist, sexist, misogyny card – a hat-trick with as much validity as the original Holy Trinity – shown so many times it’s blank at this stage; you can write whatever you want on them when their definitions change every half hour.

Language itself is in a serious state dysphoria. And what does language trans into? Emojis and hashtags. Hieroglyphics?

 We’ve become so tightly wound, every word is negative-red and we charge-in-positive with hair triggers and its civil war in the comment section over an opinion: a word that is spelt with 2 eyes. I would go even further and say 4, 2 silent ones. We have to stop constructing rebuttals with our feelings. Argue the principle, the point; not the passion. All the facts and figures count for nothing if your passion speaks for you.

Ask any vegan, they’re a funny bunch. They’ve facts and figures for every sort of fact and figure and yet; they’re still a fringe-whinging minority. I sincerely admire their passion but when you share pictures of a child in a baking tray adorned with vegetables and an apple in their mouth… How can you reasonably respond to that?

I do see their point of view. I understand the argument they’re making. But their passion moots their point. Yet, I’d easily debate any meat-eater about the healthy, humane alternatives: though I’m still going to have a chop for dinner. Phss... You know that squirt you get in your mouth when you chomp into a sausage – that blast of hot delicious goodness that, that’s the essence of vegan tears.

And spare me the: you know there’s more potato in McDonald’s chips than meat in a sausage. So. Some people say abortion’s murder. Doesn’t mean they’re wrong. A true reflect of character, the individual as a whole, is not found in an opinion. Or half an argument.

 And if you’re wondering what this has to do with Star Trek? Well, I think we can all agree that that prequel of an abomination can fuck right off.

 2.       The Other R-Word

 Rape can be problematic. I’ve thought about it. I suppose a lot of us have at some point. It can be an alternative or at the very least; it can help reduce your meal costs. But you know yourself… F.C.E, %D.M.D and the other factors. And this all depends: are you fattening cattle or is it for pre-lactating ewes? Ha. Ha.

Make sure you know what you looking at before charging because sometimes son, the curtains are just blue. Whatever happened to face value? Will someone please put up some flyers or photos on milk cartons? But would we recognise it; if we saw it again? If postulating landed you in a straight jacket or the wrong side of the law, then where would we be? Still in the cave and not exploring space through the Stargate Universe. Though I think we moved back in, the cave, sometime ago. Did some renovations; got rid of the rock and replaced it with glass.

 We have to become familiar again with how to listen to the words that people are using and their context in-relation to the topic been discussed: individually and not interpreted through the tone-deaf shared collective. And learn to ignore the echo-friendly conscious bias sound-byte, a hard thing to do in a cave. I’ve always enjoying climbing trees, that’s not a metaphor but this is.

There’s more to a tree than the bright topical, ignorant, leaves on display. It’s not magic that has them floating there. Look passed the red leaves; see the branches they are connected to. Sometimes that’s where the point is made or found. But leaves tend to blow away with the passing breezes. The branches stay there. If you wanted to extend that metaphor, you could say that the leaves are a result of the roots that anchor the trunk to the ground.  But I’m no tree expert. However I do know that timber warms you 7 times.

Of course a words meaning, tone and context can change – I should know; I am literally a bastard, born in a country that used to take them from their mothers (Now, bastard’s the default birth cert setting) – but overtime and naturally. Simply squawking like a hen after laying an egg regarding the term Cis Privilege and how it has to mean something: aren’t you just a delightful little block of wood; Pinocchio.  And speaking of intelligent design, my old friends... The Vegans, God love them. They make funny arguments claiming that A.I (Artificial Insemination) is rape because the cow can’t give consent. And please, don’t take my word for it. Look that up. I dare you; I’ve been down that rabbit hole. Which leads me to the conclusion that, in that context, of a vegan narrative, it would allow for some hilarious rape jokes. I said look it up. I’m just mining the gold I see. The gold that it is. Nobody owns the river, Nestle would disagree. But fuck them.

 The books of Nietzsche and Kahlil Gibran thought me a lot about the individual but so did #197. She was an auld ewe we had years back. I would say she taught me more because she was real. The Internet doesn’t matter. Real life is more important.

  3.       Hocus-Pocus

 Anyone who’s ever received a rejection letter – or as they are known in the biz; a PFO – will know: all the complaining won’t change a damn thing. You have to be precise with your one shot.

 Here’s a classic scene from Cheers.

Sam, the ladies man, was told by one of the barmaids that no matter what her friend asked, he was to say no. And only no! She was worried her friend would be corrupted by Sam and his silver tongue. So Sam eventually agreed. The friend came in and sure enough, she asked Sam this question.

‘Would you mind coming home with me?’

 We have to stop blindly building walls with wonky words then we hold everyone accountable for poor construction when they naturally fall down upon us. Meow. And please trust me when I say: trees are a pure hoor for knockin’ walls and Lady Limestone has taken all my fingernails at some point, irregardless of what I wanted.

What we hear will be an echo of what we ask and we have to stop being so outraged over basic math.  If your figures don’t add up, may be you need to check your calculations then reword them up again. You’d be surprised.

I originally had ‘afraid’ instead of hesitant.  (Part 1, Par 4, line 4)

We have to start taking responsibility for the words we use. They’re all we have to communicate, sincerely and properly. This P.C culture and egregious hyperbole are the 2 current threats to freedom of speech.

P.C for the obvious reasons. Now hyperbole in a piece of work; a character’s narrative – that’s what makes it funny. But everyday interactions with co-workers and strangers; a serious debate; asking out someone you fancy; accusing Hugh Mungus of sexual harassment; a national conversation. No! You have to use proper words. It’s getting to the point where people don’t know what to think, let alone say.

We’re not the Borg. We are individuals. For now, we’re allowed  to hold opinions and ideas that are not your own and ask ‘Why the hell not?’ Or ‘What’s going on here?’ As for your personal experience on the subject in question, be it in-depth or non existence, it has no merit in the argument. (Part 1, 1st par, 2nd sentence) You cannot apply conditions to asking questions. I will disagree with others and not assimilate.

Holding the opinion that the term Rape Culture is akin to Cis Privilege in terms of its validity is not the same as saying ‘I condone rape.’ And I abhor the fact I have to tack on, so cheaply, that caveat. That’s how bad it’s got. We can no longer differentiate between this and that. We’ve forgotten how to separate personal from professional – Kim Davis!

 Words have to start meaning something again. But for the love of every made up Deity: they’re not magic spells; uttering them won’t make it happen, so until then, and only then will word-policing be relevant, needed and necessary. And I’m so confident that that day will never come *Blesses himself* it will also be the day I become vegan.

 Hopefully by then there’ll be an episode of Star Trek where they don’t break the Prime Directive.

[solivar]

2017 Year In Review

Since I consider it extremely unlikely that I’m going to get anything more written this year – and what I will be writing is going to be a chapter in an existing fic, here be my 2017 Year In Review. Professional Stuff First! C20 Anthology of Dreams We dream, and we tell stories. We dream of love and the sort of person who might complete us. We dream of horror and wake breathless. We dream of magic, of flying through the air, or breathing underwater. We dream of fantastic vistas and amazing monsters. We dream, and then we wake, and we tell stories. Our dreams create the Kithain, the changelings. Our stories are sustenance. At some point, Beckett’s Jyhad Diary is supposed to come out. It was released to Kickstarter backers in time for Halloween and I have received my author’s copy. As soon as a link for sale becomes available, I shall post it. In between, I wrote a chunk of a new game: They Came From Beneath the Sea!! an old school scifi/horror/comedy deal. More details as they develop. January 2017: I Heard the Bells Overwatch, teamfic, holiday angst and feels, Genyatta lurking in the background because y'all know I’m there for cyborg/artificially intelligent robot romance. It’s Christmas Eve and the former members of Overwatch celebrate as only they can: with unexpected gifts from lonely exiles, assassination attempts, and world-hopping heroics. February 2017: Shōgatsu Overwatch, teamfic, direct sequel to I Heard the Bells, WIP, ongoing At the turning of the year, Overwatch gathers to stand guard over a fallen friend and an unexpected ally, only to discover a deadly mystery at the heart of what brought them all together. …And there’s a box. A very tempting box. Truth or Dare Overwatch, McHanzo, completely unsullied by plot One of the first post-Recall Overwatch Christmas parties ends with a bang. For pretty much everybody. March 2017: Ghost Stories On Route 66 Overwatch, AU, supernatural shenanigans, WIP, ongoing, turning into an epic trilogy with side stories. Hanzo Shimada is an expatriate student of the Fine Arts, attending college in what he assumes to be a reasonably sedate corner of the American southwest. Jesse McCree is an occasionally leather-clad NPS ranger whose duties extend somewhat further than shooing lost tourists back onto the clearly marked hiking trails. Something weird is going on in the desert south of Santa Fe and their lives unexpectedly come together in the middle of it. The Affairs of Dragons Overwatch, prequel to Brothers In Arms, written with the divine Ficlicious, aka How Jesse McCree and Hanzo Shimada Actually Became An Old Married Couple, WIP, ongoing. or “Dammit, Genji!” Zenyatta really didn’t mean to put these kinds of ideas in Genji’s head, but once Genji decides to meddle, there’s little to stop him. Genji might be a fool to think there’s hope for Hanzo, but he’s not so much a fool that he thinks Hanzo’s capable of finding peace all by himself. Fortunately, he knows just the guy… A co-written prequel to “Brothers In Arms”, which nobody asked for, but you’re getting anyway. October 2017: Massacre In Deadlock Gorge: A 10 Year Retrospective Overwatch, AU, the first Ghost Stories On Route 66 side story. A special report on the terrible events of October 29th, 2066, and related historical context by Olivia Colomar of Paranormal New Mexico. One Bullet Overwatch, AU, Vampire Hunter McCree one shot for the McHanzo Big Bang Monster Mash, well okay it’s a one shot for now. Written for the McHanzo Big Bang Halloween Monster Mash. Aka the one where Jesse McCree is a mercenary hexenjaeger for hire, Hanzo Shimada is a concerned big brother trying to rescue his idiot kid brother from the cult he ran off to join with his latest crush, and there are way more vampires than at least one of them expected. Blackwatch Confidential: Time, featuring moodily introspective Gabriel Reyes will appear here on December 1st.