#finding stuff

[imaginebetterfutures]

Useful (not AI) Tools for Writing

For years I've been compiling a list of useful tools for writing (fiction and non-fiction) and I thought it might be fun to share it.

What am I missing? What do you use and love? I'd love to keep building this list!

Historical Research

General plug: Librarians!!! They want to help you.

Search for words/signs in Brooklyn

Encyclopedia of Hair

Underwear, a history

Newspapers.com

Historical (and modern) meeting minutes

Find a grave

Political TV Ad archive

Oral Histories

Columbia

National Archives

MoMA

Archives of American Art

The Oral History Review

Words

Wordnik

Dictionary of American Regional English

Scrivener built in name generator

Lose the very

Scene Setting / Images

Animals & Plants by geolocation (also good for general scene setting)

Flickr world map

Past weather by zip code

Google Maps streetview / Google Earth

General Inspiration

Oblique Strategies

Worldbuilding

Tarot decks (my personal favorite is this one)

The Thing from the Future

The Picture Game

Misc

Data is Plural -- a newsletter full of interesting datasets

[akio-ghost]

help

ok so basically i need to find digital scans of all national geographic articles from 1960-1971 i'm looking for one of the only pictures of my grandfather when he was a boy the article would be about a Fife and Drum Corps

[reasonatedtarot]

These ones are supposed to be the tame ones. 😁😁😁

[just-french-me-up]

'ao3 needs a like and dislike button'

what you need, my algorithm-rotten minded friend, is a grip

[vikramsharma007]

[randompurr]

How to find a game/movie/song that you forgot the name of?

Google the fck out of what you remember 🤣

For a song: I found a song by using the dun dun music sounds someone one Reddit is probably looking for it and already found it.

Actually for everything I would use Reddit sometimes quora has stuff but it’s annoying to navigate

The key components is a scene from the movie or game, what was done, clothing, or what was said if you remember a word of the name you can also use it!

[ashestoashis]

is there a way of finding posts you've commented on/replied to but haven't have clicked 'like' on? i hope tumblr adds that function - or maybe it's already here and i just don't know where to find it? 🤔

[dilaofan]

unfortunately my dunmeshi welfare vision is an unusually catty kabru. practise safe binding my friends

(笨蛋 = dumbass, idiot, dimwit, etc.)

[kendyroy]

Seeing Logan in the TVA makes me laugh so hard for some reason? Like I know he’s lived to see technology evolve and stuff, but there’s something so funny about a guy from the 1800s standing in some kind of retro-futuristic timey wimey agency to me. Man is confused as hell.

like what da hell is a polar bear doin in arlington texas

[goldensunset]

did you know? if you do your laundry you can get your clothes back

[osheamobile]

Keep seeing the (extremely correct) posts about keeping your stuff on physical media - CDs, DVDs, blu-rays, books, etc.

And yes, 100%, do not get rid of your physical media in favor of streaming. I did some of that about a decade or so ago before I learned better and there are books and CDs I now need to find again.

But something that I see a lot of people dismiss is that the digital versions are more convenient. Taking ebooks to travel is so much better than taking up half your backpack, having digital music is genuinely better than swapping out discs

The thing is, it's not mutually exclusive. Rip your CDs and DVDs but keep the discs - you can toss the cases in favor of more condensed storage and leave them in your closet until you need them again. Strip the DRM from your ebooks - you paid for them the same way you'd have paid for physical paper tree-based versions - and burn them to CDs as well for safekeeping.

You can play MP3s just as easily as Spotify in cars and in much the same way, and you can stream movie files from your computer to your TV just as easily. Tech can be both convenient and for personal preservation - you can do both.

Keep your physical stuff because streamers can just get rid of anything at any time, but you absolutely can keep the convenience of the modern digital era at the same time.

I spent several months last year digitizing the roughly 1200 discs that we've accumulated for the past thirtyish years - music, movies, TV - and it was not only the most fun project I took on, it's been the most rewarding because we have movies that aren't available to stream. But I can stream it to my TV with director's commentary any time I want.

[chloesimaginationthings]

RIP Michael Afton.. you would of loved FLAF

[starzovermarz]

stupid

[corviiids]

my top bit of advice going into the new year: compliment people. especially strangers. literally everyone you interact with if you can. when you buy coffee in the morning compliment the barista's tattoos. when you're chatting with a coworker tell them that by the way you like their outfit. always find something they've chosen to do on purpose. nail polish, jewellery, tattoos, hair colour/style, statement accessory, outfit, etc are all good bets. things people hope will be noticed. things that aren't too personal so it doesn't make them uncomfortable (eg probably not their physical features). i've gotten into the habit of scanning everyone i talk to for something about them that i think is cool so i can tell them. it's a great habit because it makes me notice people and realise just how many neat little details there are in people's presentation of themselves that might pass me by if i wasn't paying attention. and it brings out so much joy. you'd be surprised how much it disarms people to receive an unexpected compliment from someone they don't know. it is the most sincere smile you will see all day long. it feels nice to make people happy but it also means you win the social interaction. establish dominance by complimenting a stranger's earrings and disappearing into the fog

[spirkbitch]

one more opinion about star trek fashion

it actually shouldn’t look like stuff you would wear (or at least a lot of it shouldn’t)

i’ve seen a lot of praise for modern trek fashion being better than classic trek because ‘people would actually wear that’

look at what people wore as everyday fashion 200-300 years ago, would you wear it? probably not, maybe for the novelty of it, but definitely not every day.

like, yeah this stuff looks crazy

it’s 300 years in the future. some of them are aliens, makes perfect sense to me that they would wear ridiculous extravagant clothes that look strange to my 21st century eye

similar to how if you showed modern fashion (especially alternative fashion/runway fashion) to someone dressed like this,

they would probably think we’re crazy.

yet for some reason modern trek wants us to believe that hundreds of years into the future people still just wear zip up hoodies?

(idk if the spock fit actually is a hoodie or not but come on man, the zipper? nothing more futuristic than a zipper?)

or this dress that looks like i could buy it in a 21st century target?

(not to hate on chapel, she’s just the only one i can find decent pictures of out of uniform)

also why is everything so grey now? when was it decided that people don’t wear colors in the future? i can not find out of uniform pictures where any of these people wear color, all black, white, grey, and maybe a bit of muted green.

tldr

clothing design in star trek should be just as important as clothing design in a period piece. i don’t think a screencap from any star trek should look like it could just as easily take place in the 21st century, i should see some crazy outfits. the clothes can do a lot of the heavy lifting to remind us that this is supposed to be far in the future.