#just in case of readmore fail

[qeyond]

not me realizing after I got full back into this fandom but my partner and I call each other "Bee" online and in person as a cute nickname and usually don't call each other by our names cuz thats just what couples do sometimes

but anyway imagine ya boy Alex (me), local Beyond Birthday enthusiast and historian, walking around with their partner of the last 6 and a half years being called and calling their partner Bee...

I'm actively ignoring it and not making it a Thing but also like.... hello??

evidence slowly stacking against me every month that I am not, in fact, B, and I'm SWEATING AND LAUGHING NERVOUSLY.

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

Wanted to ask, is Eridan's relationship with his dad ok? Like when Eridan was learning how to use his harpoon gun he seemed very much distressed and not enjoying any of it

The only real canon characterization we have of seahorsedad is that the version of him that's Cronus's lusus is "stern, fatherly" and that he ditches Cronus for Hussie, although that last one is mostly just a Bit so I don't really count it as characterization. He's also willing to go along with Eridan "doing something ridiculous," though, again, that's kind of a Bit and it's unclear how canon that is.

((cw for abuse and stuff beneath the readmore))

As such, pretty much anything I say is going to be pure extrapolation that serves my characterization of Eridan, and I can't really back it up with hard textual evidence. But, personally, I think Eridan believes his relationship with his lusus is "good" in the way that many children growing up beneath strict, emotionally neglectful, and even outright abusive parents do.

We know that Eridan has very few friends. He doesn't even really talk to half the people in their group chat, and according to Feferi, he's never spent more than a few days underwater, total, in his whole life. Add onto that that lusus murder (and, by extension, the culling of the orphaned troll) has been his duty long enough that he describes it is "the only thing i evver did," I think it's a reasonable assumption to make that he also has no IRL friends, aside from Feferi.

And to give an idea of how old Eridan was when he started having to murder lusii, here's how old Vriska was when she was expected to start feeding spidermom:

This, and the fact that Dualscar was called "Orphaner" because the job of feeding Gl'bgolyb was his even into adulthood (as he lived before the Summoner's rebellion and the removal of adult trolls from Alternia), and the fact that no one, including Feferi, ever shows any gratitude towards Eridan for performing the job, supports the idea that feeding Gl'bgolyb has always been a violet blood's responsibility. After all, Feferi makes overtures about not being better than other trolls, but she sure does revel in being royalty when she can get away with it. It'd be in character for her to not be particularly grateful to Eridan because she sees lusus murder as fundamentally being his responsibility, especially if he started when they were both REALLY young.

In other words, Eridan was expected to start murdering lusii (and by extension, other trolls) from the moment he was old enough to do so, which, judging by how old Vriska was when she started killing trolls for Spidermom, is not very old at all.

Also, given the lifespan of violet bloods, it's entirely possible - and my personal belief - that Seahorsedad was Dualscar's lusus as well as Eridan's. Even without that being the case, since it was always Eridan's job to hunt and kill lusii, the biggest possible culprit for inducting him into his role would be his lusus.

And let's be clear, I think the fact that having to murder lusii/trolls is the biggest culprit for what's fucked Eridan up the most. The pressure of having the safety of the entire race on his shoulders, the fear of Gl'bgolyb and what happens if he ever fails, and the guilt of taking lives (which we do know Eridan thinks about) have left him with genuine struggles caring about other people, a nasty martyr complex (which isn't unjustified), extremely unstable and negative emotions, shattered interpersonal relationships, and a deep, nihilistic sense of resignation towards his place in society. The latter has directly led to him attempting to embrace that place by tricking himself into thinking he believes in hemocasteist, sea dweller supremacy rhetoric - which his actions contradict - because, without the game's intervention, he had no other options available for him but to become a key figure in the imperial army, continue murdering other sapient creatures until he died, and watch all his few friends die before him, either when they got culled, killed on the battlefield, or purely dropped dead of old age.

And, like... a parent who does that to their child, even if we assume the absolute best (that Seahorsedad does genuinely care about Eridan), can't possibly have a fully healthy relationship with said child. And I think it's not unreasonable to assume that the best is not what's happening between Eridan and Seahorsedad, because Eridan's psychological profile is so fucked up that I highly doubt he was receiving much, if any, actual affection or support from his lusus. Personally, I think his lusus was "stern and fatherly" in the worst possible way - high expectations, no emotional warmth, and complete disregard for Eridan's psychological well-being, as long as he was producing adequate results.

Because Eridan craves attention, and has very little distinction between good and bad attention. He's naive and trusting to a fault, hardly ever suspects anybody of lying to him, and has basically no social skills. These all say to me that Seahorsedad is just, like... not giving him any emotional attention at ALL.

And poor Eridan is just 13 years old - still too young to fully realize how poorly he's being treated by people who are supposed to care about him. Like, yeah, he's completely obnoxious and exhausting to talk to, and you can't really blame Feferi or Kanaya for being sick of listening to him, but at the same time, some of the shit they do to him as a result is honestly just mean. Like Kanaya is just actually bullying him- training him up to be a wizard as a joke, shitting on him behind his back with Rose, making fun of him to his face - and yet:

He's just that fucking desperate for people to care about him and support him; I can't help but think he's just not getting that at home, you know?

So I think if you asked Eridan, he'd say that his relationship with his lusus was good, and that his lusus was proud and noble and stoic, and absolutely a great custodian, and there were no problems at all.

But I think if you were to dig deeper into their relationship, you'd start to hear worrying things like that Eridan never got to celebrate Twelfth Perigrees, and was instead dragged out to go lusus hunting because it was particularly easy to do so on that day. Or that his lusus had to pull the trigger FOR him the first time they ever went hunting, because his own hands were shaking too hard. Or that he'd be locked out of the hive every time he cried, until he stopped crying altogether. Or that he thinks he's never been sick a day in his life because he was never allowed to have an off day and not go hunting and now he's just used to ignoring any and all symptoms. So on and so forth.

He reacts EXTREMELY POORLY to Feferi saying she feels like she needed to look after him - more poorly than to the initial news that she was trying to break up with him:

And I think that's because weakness was punished in his household growing up. He wasn't allowed to be weak - he was nobility, royalty. He had duties, responsibilities. If he faltered, their whole race died. And when you consider the fact that "you have to kill things for the good of everyone you care about, all the time, constantly," is the abject lesson that's been hammered into him since he was old enough to walk and talk, the fact that he's so incredibly fucking adamant about murdering angels starts to be a little... sad. He's just stuck in that mindset. He doesn't know how to escape it.

So... yeah. In summary: his relationship with his dad is great!

[homoquartz]

i just wanna reiterate the show was very clear that the cat king doesn't Actually care about edwin

under a readmore because i realize i'm being silly about this

the cat king understands that keeping edwin in town is dangerous for him and could get him sent to hell, but refuses to remove the bracelet until 1. he successfully pressures a minor into sex or 2. edwin completes a task that requires a great deal of time in an unsafe location

and when edwin IS sent to hell, the cat king does not risk anything trying to help him get back out. pointedly, he says he will wait.

he sends cats to spy on edwin, but the cats are not there for protection. notably the cat king never appears when they could actually use him (eg the devlin house, esther's house in the finale), despite the cats watching

the one time he is of assistance, it also conveniently throws a romantic rival out of the running when he reveals monty is tricking them. he is aware of the risks here with esther and the mushrooms, but he doesn't follow to help out. in fact, he wanted edwin to stay and entertain him, despite knowing edwin's dearest friends were at risk. edit: i can see it as him wanting to keep edwin away from the danger, if you want it to be that

yes he told the girls esther's backstory, but they had to seek him out for it. he tells them upfront he'll allow edwin to be tortured if it means he, the cat king, is safe. by all means, let me know if i'm missing some genius machinations by him off the top of my head, but i don't believe so.

is he lonely? sure. does he like edwin? sure. but he doesn't CARE about edwin, he's not looking out for edwin's wellbeing at any point. as soon as edwin became more inconvenient than fascinating, the cat king would certainly move on

his purpose in the narrative is, in part, to provide a foil to charles as a romantic interest. where the cat king fails, charles comes through. where the cat king is selfish, charles is selfless. where the cat king is romantically available, charles isn't.

he also serves as a metaphor for edwin's distraction about his own desires and sexuality. which, like the cat king, was unsettling and only somewhat wanted, and got in the way of solving cases, but was also engaging and ultimately harmless.

my point being he was never intended as a valid love interest, nor would he be a good one.

counterpoint: sexy

[daftpatience]

hi pen friend!! I got a pilot kakuno pen recently and I am playing around with it. However!!! I learned that I really like having thicker bold lines and I’m kinda sad that the non on my shiny new pen is so so very fine. Is there a way to broaden the nib a little or do you maybe have recs for a pen with a slightly broader nib? (I have been preferring pilot pens with a 1mil nib size, those have good thicc lines that I like. Even a little thicker without being a marker would also be IDEAL) This is gonna be a work pen for me so being durable would also be a nice bonus.

ooh so!! there are a couple things you can do in this case!!! IM PUTTING IT UNDER A READMORE CUS I RAMBLEEEE letsgooo

• swapping out the nib pilot kakuno nibs are compatible with many other pilot pens including the 78G, Prera, Plumix, Penmanship, and Metropolitan! it can be hard sometimes to find spare nibs for this brand, so if this is what you wanna do i'd suggest hunting around any local pen shops that might carry nib replacements + ebay/facebook marketplace/etc.

• grinding the nib down this option is usually not recommended for beginners, but i'm all for fucking around with things i own (sometimes to my detriment) so i'd definitely look into it! especially with something as affordable as a kakuno - most fountain pens are tipped with a somewhat fancier metal (iridium, osmium, gold, palladium, etc) which you Don't want to grind all the way away, but kakunos are not tipped with anything special. they're just plain stainless steel through and through, and i see no issue in giving grinding a go in that case! you'll definitely want to watch a lot of videos on the process - most involve a whetstone and/or extremely fine grain sandpaper & lots and lots of smooth, confident hand movements.

the two i learned are these: smooth, long strokes where you tilt the pen from a low angle to a high angle, and figure eights. the angle of the pen is extremely important, and you'll have to be careful to ensure everything is balanced.

i've ground down a cheap knockoff lamy to a WIDE chisel before, and it came out better (albeit still a bit scratchy) than it used to write (because it wrote like shit originally) imo, as long as the inkflow is even and consistent i don't mind a little feedback on the page.

• getting a pen with a broader nib ok this is where i recc some more pens!!! if you're looking for a workhorse that's a little broader or juicier than a kakuno, i cannot overstate my love for the platinum preppy in 05 (medium nib). this little thing is an absolute legend. they can sit inked and idle for an entire year thanks to the cool seal mechanism in the cap, and i've never had one dry start on me before. they're cheap, feel amazing, i can go on. since they last so long, usually the first failing point is their bodies rather than their nibs, so if you want something a little more durable you can upgrade to a platinum plaisir (which is just a preppy with a metal body!)

i can also highly reccomend Lamy safaris for their ease of nib swappability and range of options! you can go all the way from an EF to a 1.9mm chisel tip >:)

the pilot metropolitan is a universally beloved pen for its quality, though i don't have one so i have no personal stuff to say! this and the lamy are a little pricier than the preppy/plaisir/kakuno but with that comes the bump up in quality and longevity. things to consider!

in general i'd say that any fountain pen with a snap cap rather than a screw cap will work well for work - since unscrewing and rescrewing a cap all day as you do things is sort of a pain in the wrist. i find myself leaning to my lamys & preppies when im working since its so much faster and easier to pop that thing lol.

[knightprincess]

Chaotic Mischief (A Star Wars Oneshot)

Warning: Fluff, Clone Humor, little bit of flirting (tiny bit of Wolffe x Jedi Reader)  Words: 4.7k 

The Build Up!

Mischief wasn't uncommon among clones, especially the Shinnies and the troopers whom had been freely allowed to become individuals. 79's during the downtime was where the ideas of mischief were thrown around. Sometimes they were as simple as pulling pranks on some poor unsuspecting soul. Other times it was far more risky, such as daring a Shinny to obtain the helmet of a superior. Something that was far harder to do than the troopers believed. Chaos was always sure to happen when the 501st were back on Coruscant, Fives and Echo were normally the ones behind it, although Jesse, Kix and Tup had also helped on occasions, Hardcase too when he wasn't too busy flirting with one of the many beautiful patrons. 

:readmore:

On the odd occasion when Rex was reunited with Cody, Thorn, Gregor, Wolffe and Howzer, things could really get interesting. The last time the six were together, a game of truth or dare happened. To say there were more dares than truths being told, was the understatement. Cody had told so many stories about Obi-Wan, the others joked about him being the inaugural member of the Obi-Wan Fan club. Thorn had been tasked with getting a kiss from the most beautiful person at the bar, of course Thorn had fun with it, why just settle for one, when all of them were beautiful in there own way. 

Gregor had stood up on the bar, doing a mini dance while stripping from his plastoid armor. All while Wolffe had generally questioned his own sanity and that of his brother. Gregor of course paid little mind to those he shared a booth with, instead reveling in the attention he got from those who enjoyed the show. Howzer on the other hand, decided to challenge almost all his clone brothers to an arm wrestling match. Even when he knew the odds weren't in his favor. Echo and Fives, making a wager. If Howzer lost against both of them. All six in the booth would have to go through with a particular dare, they had in mind to commit. Although neither gave details on what they had in mind. Without a second thought, the drunk Commanders and Captains had hastily agreed. Only to regret their decision mere seconds later when Howzer was swiftly defeated by both Arc Troopers. Although neither gave any indication on what they had in mind or when it would be put in to play. 

They did however taunt Rex about it, over their rotations on the battlefield. Never failing to remind him of the wager and dropping subtle hints of what was to come. The moment they returned to Coruscant, and found out the remaining Commanders and Captains were also back for down time, was when Fives' famous wicked grin appeared upon his lips. Echo merely shaking his head, both with dread for the reactions and to control his overactive imagination. Even more so when he remembered the discussion to involve several Jedi in the fun and games as well. 

"Put us out of misery" commented Cody, as he looked to the two Arc Troopers collectively referred to as the Domino Twins. A neon blue drink in hand as he prepared for the worst case scenario, knowing when it come to the pair, anything was possible. Even the impossible. Fives and Echo could only share an expression of pure mischief. Something that only brought more dread to the six before them. 

"You've heard of helmet switch-a-roo, right?" asked Fives, knowing the question was daft. Especially since Rex dealt with that on the battlefield let alone during down times. The last game of switch-a-roo had also included an unwilling Dogma, whom had somehow ended up with Tup's helmet. Tup himself had Jesse's, whom in turn had Fives helmet. Five's had Echo's helmet, who had Kix's one. Even Hardcase had gotten involved and worn Dogma's helmet. Although Rex had caught on, it had taken General Skywalker a little longer to realize. 

"We're daring you to the big brother. Armor Switch-A-Roo" laughed Echo, watching with amusement as the golden eyes of his brothers become flooded with concern, dread even on what they were going to be doing while wearing the armor of another. "And you'll be spending the day in each others off duty roles" quickly added the Arc Troopers, stifling a laugh when Wolffe's head hit the table, a loud groan escaping him. Of course it would be something like that. Yet the groan was in response to realizing some of them would be around the Jedi Temple and Senate, as well as the military base. 

"If we die I'm haunting the two of you" commented Gregor, a spark of amusement flashing through his golden eyes. Even more so when he realized, whomever got his armor, would have the duty of protecting a certain favored Jedi. His iconic laugh soon escaped him, especially when he knew the odds of fooling Jedi were against them. They're own General's knew them well and would surely recognize something was off. Just as the many senators roaming the senate building would notice when something was off with Thorn. 

"Do we at least get to choose who we switch with?" questioned Howzer, his head smacking against the sticky table mere moments later when both Fives and Echo had both shook their head. Denying them what would have made the game of Switch-A-Roo easier. Only now did Cody and Rex share a look of dread. Gregor once again laughed, this time nervously. Where as Thorn grabbed his bright blue drink and downed it, in an attempt to drown the horror threatening to bubble up. 

"Care to deliver the blow and tell us" slurred Thorn, watching as the duo took the helmets from the back of the booth. Choose to switch the helmets instead of using words. Although the pair, planned to tell them again in the morning, when they were nursing a hangover, if only to remind them it wasn't a nightmare but the reality they had agreed to when making the wager. 

Echo handled the helmets with care, looking closely at the individual markings. How each were different, and made them easily identifiable. Carefully he handed Wolffe, Gregor helmet, the obvious choice, as Gregor was the only one Wolffe could realistically pass as. Gregor on the other hand was given Thorn's helmet, confusion soon washed over his tired features. He'd wrongly assumed he'd receive's Wolffe's helmet in response, so was surprise to get the one belonging the Coruscant Guard. 

Rex had been the one to be receive Wolffe's helmet. A chuckle had instantly ripped from his throat, even more so when it would be obvious he wasn't the tough battle worn Commander. Cody had been given Rex's helmet, to which an instant wicked grin appeared on his lips, it being clear he knew what chaos he'd cause while dressed as his old friend and brother. Something that only brought gripping dread to Rex. Thorn on the other hand received Howzer's helmet, swearing under his breath, as it would mean he'd be in close proximity to many Jedi General's, a thought that brought both dread and of course amusement, would they take notice of the little things. Howzer on the other hand, quickly determined the only helmet left was Cody's, to which he cheered, clearly his silent prayers to the maker had been answered. 

"Remember whatever chaos you cause while wearing the others armor, has to be explained by said owner" casually spoke Fives, confirming the Jedi would be none the wiser of the mischievous antics, and would thrust ask about the odd inconsistencies should they be noticed. "Wolffe we wish you luck. Gregor is on protection duty for (Y/N) tomorrow" laughed the Arc Trooper, his laughter only growing upon hearing the growled yet muffled response. Of course they'd thrown him head first at (Y/N), he be an idiot if he thought they'd let the opportunity pass them by. After all his affection for the Jedi Knight was only known by those sharing the booth and a few others. It was a closely guarded secret Wolffe had unintentionally let slip during the last game of Truth or Dare. 

The Morning Of! 

When morning come, each of those apart of the mischief groaned. Wolffe in particular found himself with confusion. Why did he have Gregor's Commando armor? Where was his own?. He soon noticed the little light in the top corner of his datapad blinking, sighing as he carefully placed Gregor's helmet to the side and grabbing the small device. Instantly regretting the decision upon seeing a video message from Fives there. 

"So that wasn't a nightmare" commented Wolffe, throwing the pad on his bunk before once again reaching for Gregor's helmet. Carefully studying it, the many markings scattered all over it, even a few scorch marks, the fading yellow paint around the visor, even the bright blue light to appear, when held in a certain way. The battle worn commander, taking notice of how heavy the helmet felt compared to his own, even the roughness beneath his fingers. 

"How the kriff does Thorn see in this thing" voiced Gregor, walking into the nearby desk, as he flicked at the black painted shade over the top of the visor. The commando's words pulling a rare chuckle from Wolffe. The commander amused by Gregor holding his arms out in an effort to gain stability while wearing the foreign helmet, and making his way over to the spare bunk without tripping or bumping into anything else. "I saw Rex, poor bugger, looks ridiculous wearing your armor" joked the Commando, taking off Thorn's helmet just in time to witness Wolffe display his signature eye roll. "It kind of looks like Rex shrunk in the dryer" laughed Gregor, receiving another chuckle from Wolffe, clearly the battle worn commander could imagine it. 

"Makes you wonder what the others are going to be like?" questioned Wolffe, suspecting the others would probably have a better fit, especially Cody, whom had Rex's armor. Howzer too could probably get by without much trouble with Cody's armor. "I'm expecting Thorn to complain about not having a kama" added the commander of the wolf pack, recalling Thorn asking the night before how Cody, Howzer and Gregor could operate without one. Even pointing out both Arc Troopers to issue the daring mischief were in ownership of one. 

"Oh he's already started. Stated he felt naked without one" laughed Gregor. As if on cue, Thorn walked passed, stating he already missed not wearing the belted cape, even how lost he was without it. His next words were asking Gregor to take care of his precious kama while impersonating him for the day. 

Cody, Rex and Howzer soon appeared behind Thorn, all but scaring him into the small room completely. Gregor's laughter ringing out as Wolffe also offered a chuckle, but that was more to see Rex practically drowning in his armor. Gone was the dark blue markings, instead he donned the familiar grey wolf insignia. It was odd for Wolffe to see his armor on another, although he soon reminded himself it was only for a few hours, then all would be back to normal again. 

"I feel like a kid wearing their parent's clothes" admitted Rex, once again re-adjusting one of the shoulder plates, carefully placing Wolffe's helmet on the desk. 

"You look like a kid wearing their parents clothes" commented Wolffe, amusement flashing in both his golden eye and dull cybernetic one. Thorn chuckling breaking the silence quickly, as Cody mentioned he wanted to take a picture to remember this. 

"Don't forget we have to think of something to say if we're caught" reminded Howzer, shuddering to think that was a possibility. At the same time he knew the risks were high, some of them were around observant senators, others around the Jedi, whom could likely sense when something was amiss. "And to explain everything tomorrow" 

"Already got mine" announced Thorn, chuckling although not elaborating any further. Wolffe piped up mere seconds later confirming he too had something in mind for explaining everything the following day, although even he'd admit explaining why his armor didn't have its normal snug fit was going to be a little more difficult. Cody also hinted he had something in mind, as did Rex whom could already predict what Cody was going to get up to. 

"Have fun flirting with (Y/N), Wolffe" remarked Cody, only receiving a huffed growl from the commander in question. It being clear he regretted revealing that secret, even more so when his brothers so often teased him about it. Even General Plo did although he did so in an encouraging way, almost as if he knew something others didn't. "Why does (Y/N) need protecting anyways, she's a bad-ass Jedi Knight" asked the commander of the 212th, finding it odd a Jedi with (Y/N)'s reputation would need protection. 

"Targeted by Dooku and some separatist leaders. Her cover was blown the last time she went on an assignment to protect Senator Amidala" explained Gregor, revealing the truth few knew of. "(Y/N) and Senator Amidala could pass as sisters, hence why (Y/N) had posed as her during a previous assignment. Sadly it had gone wrong, resulting in a bounty being placed on the Jedi Knight, hence her designated temple and senate duty" added the Commando, recalling (Y/N) being frustrated the last time he'd been on protection duty, she wanted to do more to help the Republic but was restricted on what she could do. 

"Alright boys, lets get this show on the road" voiced Fives from the door way. Echo leaning against the opposite side. Rex immediately noticing they'd swapped helmets again. Both Arc Troopers breaking down in laughter upon looking around the group. Thorn's grumpiness about not having a kama, Gregor practically being squished into Thorn's armor. Rex's almost drowning in Wolffe's, Cody attempting to straighten Rex's kama, while Wolffe shifted uncomfortably in Gregor's armor. Howzer on the other hand, seemed content on messing with the visor shade on Cody's helmet, almost as if he was trying to re-adjust it a little. 

The Mischief!

"Anakin, I think there might be something wrong with Rex" spoke Obi-Wan upon reaching his former padawan, concern ringing in his voice. At first the Jedi Knight looked confused, Rex wasn't anywhere in sight. Just as Anakin was about to voice the obvious, Rex appeared, running along and practically hugging Obi-Wan as if he was the alternative to gravity. Ahsoka chuckled slightly, quickly whipping her hands up to stifle her amusement. 

"Seems normal to me, maybe a little more caf than usual" announced Anakin, chuckling as Obi-Wan raised an eyebrow in suspicion. The Jedi master untangling himself from Rex, recalling the time he'd had to do the same with Cody weeks before hand. The moment Obi-Wan walked away, Rex got his datapad out and chased after Obi-Wan, asking him for an autograph. Leaving behind a slightly confused Anakin and Ahsoka in a fit of laughter. Plo Koon chuckling to see it, although he didn't voice he had long since worked out what was going on, instead choosing to allow the mischief to continue. 

"Master Plo" called Ahsoka, upon controlling her fit of giggles and regaining some composure. "Are any other clones acting oddly?" asked the Padawan, recalling seeing Commander Wolffe wrangling the 501st boys earlier, she'd never seen them behave so quickly, although Fives, Echo, Jesse, Tup and Kix seemed to be the exception, giggling like school children in the corner of the mess hall. 

"Howzer seemed to be fond of causing confusion and chaos in the debriefing earlier" commented Plo, recalling the Captain had been hyperactive, almost skipping around the room. WIndu had practically grabbed his shoulders and all but forced him to stand still, not that it worked, within seconds Howzer was moving around again, twirling on the spot and practically bouncing off the walls. He'd started singing at one point. 

"Rex, Howzer. Who's next?" questioned Anakin, almost dreading the response he'd get. "Maybe they switched the caf brand again. Rex always did say the last one tasted like droid oil" commented the Jedi Knight in hopes of explaining everything. Although if there was more than the two it would be harder to explain it. 

"What's your reasoning for Wolffe deflating?" asked Ahsoka, seeing the confusion to pass over Anakin's features. Plo on the other hand chuckling slightly, refusing to give it away he'd worked out what was going on, instead he'd found himself with curiosity whom else was involved and the explanations each come up with. Particularly Howzer whom had to explain the debriefing. 

"Looks like Thorn's having a good day" commented Padme, upon joining the group of Jedi down on the many halls. She'd come at the request of master Yoda, although it appeared to be a troublesome time. She'd passed many padawan's and younglings seemingly lost and confused about where they were going. Just as she'd bared witness to Howzer running away from Windu after tapping him on the shoulder and shouting "Tag your it".  

Within seconds of the words leaving Padme's lips, Commander Thorn come waltzing down the hall, signing loudly and occasionally twerking. He'd thrown his hands up several times, the contents of the mug with Fox's name penned on long since gone everywhere. A few padawan's had been pulled into a dance, as a few masters had too. Each seemingly taken by surprise. "He was like that at the senate building as well. Flirted with senator Chuchi" laughed the Senator of Naboo. A smile on her lips to see the battle worn troopers seemingly having fun, a rare but welcome sight. 

"Let me love you" called Rex, as Obi-Wan ran back down the long hall. The captain hot on his heels. Ahsoka once again bursting in to fit of giggles, as a few other younglings did too. Some of the masters looked confused as to what was going on, most shaking their heads with a little amusement before continuing. Even (Y/N) couldn't help the laughter to escape her, she'd always had a love for mischief. 

"Your not going to do anything out of the ordinary are you, Gregor?" asked Obi-Wan when he stopped to catch his breath, hiding near one of the large windows overlooking the courtyard below. "I don't think I can take any more oddities today. First Cody's memory loss, now Rex" added the Jedi Master, still trying to wrap his head around Cody's apparent memory loss. Maybe it was the hit to the head during the prior battle, or the alcohol from the night before. Either way it was unsettling, although his loyal commander seemed to have some whereabouts. Keeping the boys of the 212th in line. 

"No sir" responded Gregor, his response coming a little too quickly. "Just doing my duty protecting the Princess Jedi here" added Gregor attempting to act normally, although he knew some of his actions could be explained away by lasting damage from previous head injuries. Obi-Wan soon poked his head around the corner again, quickly dodging back when Rex passed by asking those around if they'd seen the negotiator. Dread filled Obi-Wan when another Jedi Master pointed right at him, causing him to dart from his position and around the nearest corner. 

Howzer coming around the same corner moments later, shortly followed by a confused Mace Windu. Padme shaking her head slightly, as she regained some of her lost composure. Never had she seen the temple in such disarray, although she would admit it was nice seeing a less professional side of the peacekeepers. Howzer's voice soon rang out through the hall as another comment escaped him. "Gonna catch me?" His comment more of a question towards the Jedi Master behind him. 

"Thorn, where's my mug" yelled Fox, storming down the hall towards the other commander. Thorn had since stopped singing and dancing, instead acting scared as he held up the ordinary white coffee mug. Although Fox's name had since been crossed out, being replaced with Thorn's own name. Thorn soon skipped off down the hall, giggling like a school girl as he all but taunted Fox with the ordinary white mug. Ignoring Fox yelling at him to come back and all but swearing about losing the mug again. 

"And that's my cue" commented Gregor before throwing (Y/N) over his shoulder and walking off. Plo chuckling by the shock squeal to escape the Jedi Knight. Where as Padme and Ahsoka resorting to looking to each other for confirmation, at least to ensure they'd both seen Gregor pick up and all but run off with (Y/N). Anakin on the other hand blinked a few times, beginning to question his own sanity and that of the troopers around him. Slowly he was becoming suspicious, who else was going to act like they'd been hypnotized to act like kids, were his Jedi brethren going to start acting like it too? 

"Pretty good view of chaos from up here" commented (Y/N), as she attempted to get comfortable over Gregor's shoulder. Well over Wolffe's shoulder. Although she hadn't voiced it, she was well aware Wolffe was in Gregor's armor, her senses not failing her. The arm securing her legs in place, only tightening as she attempted to wiggle around to gain comfort. 

"Not a bad view from this end either" commented Gregor, finding himself glad for the thick armor, as he was sure he would have felt (Y/N)'s foot, thud against his thigh had he not be clad in plastoid. 

"If I didn't know any better Captain. I would have thought you were flirting" spoke (Y/N) 

"If I didn't know any better I would say you were enjoying it" responded Gregor, placing her back on her feet upon reaching the destination of the courtyard. The rare occasion where it was quiet and as normal tranquil. 

"Should I ask why you brought me here?" asked (Y/N), moving to tidying her messed up hair, and straighten out her robes. Gregor on the other hand moved to sit on the steps, in front of the tree, ignoring the benches close by. 

"Meditate" retorted Gregor, not bothering to turn around to face her. Although he suspected there would be a response shortly. 

"Is that an order?" commented (Y/N), moving to sit at his side. 

"Yup" 

"I'm known to bend orders" laughed (Y/N), knowing there was truth behind her words. Although her former Jedi Master Plo Koon, always said she had a talent for still getting the job demanded from her done. She still got the needed results even if she did go about it a little differently.

"This will be the first you'll obey" replied Gregor, a playful tone to his voice. 

"What makes you think that?" whispered (Y/N) when she was close enough, there was no doubt he'd hear her. 

"Cause I asked nicely Princess" breathed Gregor. Almost surprised when the almost famous Jedi Knight seemed to concede and do as she was told, the words Roger Roger escaping her in a sarcastic tone. "Care to accompany me to 79's tonight?" 

"Maybe" cheekily responded (Y/N). "Would be nice to see you in your own armor and without said helmet" commented the Jedi Knight, a grin appearing across her lips as she peered over. Seeing as Wolffe stiffened inside Gregor's armor. "Not to worry Commander, my lips are sealed" 

"Have to work on that later" flirted Wolffe, as he settled back into the act of being Gregor, imitating his brother's famous laugh mere seconds later. Once again (Y/N) peered over to him, suppressing a chuckle as she attempted to regain her focus. Although it seemed to be a lost course at this point. 

The Aftermath

When it come to explain the events of the day before. Some found it far easier than others. Thorn had simply explained it away as having too much caf that morning. He been hyperactive and in the mood to continue his running war with Fox for the prize coffee mug. He explained the flirting with Senator Riyo Chuchi as finding her particularly beautiful the day before. 

Wolffe had simply said he'd lost a wager to Rex and had thrust agreed to keep the boys of the 501st in check. As for his armor not fitting properly, he mentioned something about Wrecker playing a prank on him, payback for something to have taken place at 79's before the last deployment. 

Cody too had a simple explanation. He'd mentioned he'd visited the medbay upon returning to Coruscant after the last rotation on the battlefield. The headache combined with the hangover of all hangovers. He'd managed to keep the boys in check but his memory was spotty. Thankfully Obi-wan had brought the excuse and let it go after a few days of ensuring he had no after effects from the injury. 

Rex on the other hand, almost chocked on his morning caf to learn what Cody had gotten up to in his armor. Although he'd been thankful for his explanation fitting with what had taken place. He'd simply said he'd joined the Obi-Wan fan club, after hearing Cody endless go on and on about how great the Jedi Master was. Cody had attempted to hide behind his datapad, covering his heated cheeks of embarrassment. Of course Rex would say that. 

Gregor on the other hand struggled to come up with something when faced with explaining Wolffe's actions to (Y/N). He tripped over his words multiple times before the Jedi Knight had put him out of his misery. Revealing her knowledge of the mischievous dare each had taken part in and thrust knew Wolffe had been her protect the day prior. (Y/N) had spent time reassure Gregor following it, even helping him to come up with something should another Jedi question him. 

Howzer almost had a heart attack upon finding out what Thorn had done the day before. He'd almost throttled the Commander to have impersonated him. No flimsy excuse was going to get passed Windu on this one. Nor the other Jedi to have been apart of the briefing. Eventually Howzer settled for being influenced by Rex, Thorn and Gregor, as well as having too much caf that morning. Sending the younglings in the wrong direction had been put down to a light hearted joke, after all everyone knew Howzer had a soft spot for kids. 

Echo and Fives on the other hand managed to get hold of the records from the Senate building, Jedi Temple and Military base. Laughing to no end, especially seeing how Gregor had also played silly sods with the civvi medics and admirals while impersonating Thorn. No one had been safe from the chaos Gregor had caused. The recordings of Thorn impersonating Howzer throughout the Jedi Temple were just as funny, especially when Kix pointed out some of the younglings and padawan's had also played along with the game of tag. 

Jesse's favorite recording had been of Cody impersonating Rex yelling "Let me love you" while chasing Obi-Wan down the hall. Seeing an array of emotions pass over Anakin's features had brought him to tears with laughter. The blank look, turning to confusion, questioning his own sanity, slight amusement, back to questioning his own sanity then finally settling on enjoying the chaos.

Kix had been the one to point out, both Plo Koon and (Y/N) had likely figured it out but had opted to keep the truth a well guarded. Something Wolffe later confirmed at 79's, (Y/N) also verifying it in her own words, just as she revealed Aalya Secura and Ahsoka had also worked out something was up, but not said anything. Instead both women happy to watch as chaos unfolded. (Y/N) also corroborating to both Echo and Fives, neither Obi-Wan or Anakin were none the wiser about the mischief to test them, just as the unsuspecting victim of Mace Windu had yet to truly put the pieces to together. Even Master Yoda seemed to be content on keeping the truth a guarded secret for now. 

Tup had asked for the security recordings, intending on making a few videos of the chaos and sending them to the six to have taken part. He'd also congratulated Fives and Echo on masterminding the whole thing. The duo known as the Domino Twins cementing themselves as the most mischievous pair, thrust finally achieving their goal of overtaking Waxer and Boil. Although both knew the pair from the 212th Legion would eventually fire back in an effort to regain their lost titles. 

[danphantom]

if ur curious abt the dans that i mentioned here's a post explaining them yippee

split core is an au sort of based in the doppelganger au--its a branch-off of it really--where clockwork wasnt happy with dan's progression and decided to teach him a lesson by splitting his core into the vlad and danny halves--red and green. however, a third core had formed over time--the dark core--and a third dan came out with them who was just the personification of all his bitterness and hatred. they looked like this (and forgive the old art i need to draw them again soon)

and yall know doppelganger dan. hes just the redeemed dan from my doppelganger au/comic lol. he came back for revenge after TUE's events, but he was captured and (forcefully) rehabilitated by the fentons, mostly jazz. then his timeline's vlad showed up thanks to danny and threw him for a loop, but it ended up being what he needed to truly get better! also then later valerie showed up and things got complicated lol. this is him in case youve forgotten

i mentioned "apprentice dan" and that was basically an au where dan was clockwork's apprentice! it was a way for clockwork to look after him without having him interfere with timelines by being part of them. i didnt develop this au a lot, i kind of only had a design and one shitpost comic, but i look back on it fondly. here's the art (also very old now)

and finally, my attempt at a post-agit dan... i settled with just having him be in the clone vessel FOR NOW, because i kinda vibe(d?) with the idea of him being in the vessel to be anchored to the timeline but when he goes ghost he turns into his usual ghost form! here's the vessel design i landed on

i actually just remembered i DO have two more dans from crossover aus i made in the past. how the hell did i forget saiyan dan and phantomborne dan. ESPECIALLY phantomborne dan.

here's saiyan dan first--it was a dragon ball z crossover where jack was a saiyan with amnesia which made danny a half saiyan. i cant remember exactly how i handled dan in this, but i THINK i made dan some time travel situation where he came to the past to make danny an evil saiyan (theyre both half saiyans in the au). this was him

finally...phantomborne. this was my baby au that i was kind of obsessed with for a hot minute so i absolutely cannot believe i forgot about it until now. but it was my bloodborne crossover au where danny was a half beast due to a failed blood transfusion experiment and he could transform at will. dan, however, was a full beast, and he was still danny from the future--there was time travel that i implemented using the au version of clockwork, who kind of acted as a less creepy gehrman with time powers. i think i made him responsible for the reason hunters wake up from the hunter's dream and everything has respawned, like they want back in time??? idk lol. but yeah dan is a full beast in the future bc he was never cured of his beasthood + gave into his beastly urges. he's pretty sick and uses the beast cutter weapon. here's a pic of him with danny

ok i think thats for real all of my dans now thank you for coming to my ted talk and apologies for the longass post. i hope yall had that post cutter thing turned on lol. i know i could have used a readmore but i didnt want to <3

[pitviperofdoom]

Tell me about your Mycroft on Enola Holmes opinions please! I also have opinions about his characterization in the movie :) they’re not nice opinions but I otherwise enjoyed the movie

Yeah overall I enjoyed both Enola Holmes movies but this One Thing made me mad and I'm gonna bitch about it under the readmore.

I spent every scene he was in wanting to eat glass, his characterization made me so angry. It's almost impressive how they utterly failed to make Mycroft Mycroft-like at pretty much every possible angle.

Is Mycroft Holmes a misanthrope? Absolutely. But that doesn't mean he's an angry, hostile asshole who treats everyone like shit, it means he avoids people. Like here he is going out of his way to be unpleasant, as if Mycroft Holmes has ever in his life gone out of his way to do anything. This man has computer brain and lives at a club where he can sit in a corner and not talk to people because he can't be arsed to participate in polite society, and you want me to believe he's wringing his hands over his sister not participating in polite society? No sir I am not buying what you're trying to sell me.

Mycroft with a young lady in his charge would basically be Mr. Bennet from Pride and Prejudice--he'd be shutting himself away with books and puzzles and occasionally laughing at the antics from a safe distance.

Honestly the final nail in the coffin was when the maid character flat out told Sherlock that Mycroft didn't have the same spark of genius as him and Enola, he's basically a weird angry OC at that point because Mycroft's entire character is "smarter genius than sherlock, but lazy."

I also have a couple of minor gripes about Sherlock's character: First, Enola tells him that he can deal with the "hoits and toits" while she takes care of the common people, when in the original stories Sherlock's whole thing was taking cases from regular people with problems that the police either couldn't or wouldn't address. Second, the part in the first movie where Enola gets slapped by the school headmistress and immediately runs to her brothers and they blow her off? You're telling me Sherlock Holmes wouldn't take one look at her and know someone just hit her, or that he'd let it slide if he did? The man who told Violet Hunter in the Copper Beeches that Rucastle's job offer was shady as hell and he wouldn't allow a hypothetical sister of his to take it? That Sherlock Holmes???

Rest of the movie was fine though. And the second one was good because Mycroft wasn't in it.

[whumpsday]

this is not whump, but i wanted to talk about it due to the recent incident of a couple of hateful transphobes trying to infiltrate the whump community (and thankfully failing). it's nothing important, just me venting on some stuff they were saying. under a readmore in case that's not your jam. tw for discussion of religiously-justified transphobia

the "god doesn't make mistakes" argument for the eradication of trans people is soooo fucking dumb. transphobes who make this argument are so selective. like, if you were to be real general with it, you could argue that dyed hair (and people with dyed hair), even like- someone getting blonde highlights- should be JUST as morally reprehensible to them. but no, they specifically highlight trans people despite the fact that the logic they're using could apply to any number of things. because it's not actually about god, they're just using religion to justify their hate.

and the real kicker is there are TONS of devout christians who AREN'T transphobic, who are completely loving and accepting! i know at least 6 among my whump mutuals alone, and several more irl! it just makes it even more obvious they're attempting to use god to justify their hatred, which, while i am not a christian (i am a non-religious jew), kind of sounds to me like the opposite of what you're supposed to to? like wasn't jesus all about love and stuff? love thy neighbor???

i just hate it when people try to use religion to justify their bigotry like this. it's always so selective and obvious what they're doing. my love goes out to my fellow trans siblings on whumpblr, the christians on whumpblr who accept us as we are, and ESPECIALLY the trans christians whose faith and gender alike would be questioned by users like these two bigots. through this incident, we have undoubtedly proven ourselves a strong community of love that does not tolerate hatred.

in conclusion:

"God blessed me by making me transsesxual for the same reason God made wheat but not bread and fruit but not wine, so that humanity might share in the act of creation." - Julian K. Jarboe

[rotfront-cunt]

Alrighty I am going to use my silly little account to sort of document my attempts at finding these three keys.

I want to preface this by saying that everyone who sees this please be so cool about it and not tell me things I haven’t learned yet or give me hints I want to try this as without help online as possible.

(note) at the bottom of the readmore I have left a single thing I’d want any hints about. If u care please read the last two bullet points after my spiel. Thanks!

That being said here begins what I’ve currently done in this key quest.

I got through the opening sequence on the Penrose, as well as the entry level of the facility. I’m assuming and really hoping that there’s no key in these two areas. My biggest fear for this entire quest is that because these are so hard to find I am going to leave an area too early and in the first area where u really cannot do very much, I am scared that is the case. BUT! I am going to try and put that out of my mind and speak on the worker level of the facility.

I played the game standard style until I got the radio essentially because I couldn’t think of much of anything to do other than reading a lot of numbers on documents along the way. I found it interesting rereading documents it’s been a bit since I checked out like the various gestalt suspected of breaking laws and the interrogation logs.

This time around I have taken special note of the Mensa key.

Like I said it’s been awhile since I’ve been in the earlier parts of the game so my memory fails me as to if more keys have numbers and symbols scrawled on them. The key has a 14 on the front and a large X on the back.

After opening the butterfly box and picking up the plate of eternity I’ve taken down a few things from the memory of arianes quarters in rotfront sector 6. First off *that* song is playing quietly while u are in the apartment and that makes me feel things now lol.

Anyways I immediately checked all the radio frequencies. In the rotfront memory the only two not giving off static were the weather channel and the frequency for opening the door to leave the memory. While weather didn’t exactly seem important I took it down anyways along with the string of numbers that opens said door.

After leaving the memory I immediately saved and turned on the radio once more.

While the radio is populated with the various frequencies needed to open the safes on this and later floors I took note of two other frequencies. I didn’t write them down because I was dumb but I can find them again.

These two frequencies both held very distorted messages, seemingly number stations as well. One station read out an achtung before stating it’s numbers. It was heavily staticy but it didn’t sound like the same numbers as the Penrose achtung message that started it all. I’m hoping to go around the floor and perhaps on later floors and seeing if I can get either of these stations a bit less distorted depending on what room I’m in if not I will try to transpose the numbers anyways. I decided to stop for now because despite how much I love this game for some reason I can’t play it for long periods of time :(

Final notes mostly to myself.

- I think it is important from this point on to have my phone camera out for every cutscene, or begin recording my sessions, in case something comes up that I’d like to look at. I regretted not getting to see the infographic on isa when she is first introduced

- I started this quest on a new profile entirely and I’m worried that that may be the wrong thing to do. The problem with not knowing anything is I don’t know if I need to have completed the game or not in order to find these keys.

*This is the one hint I would ask from someone*

I don’t want to try and go through the game this thoroughly again just because I had a false start.

- along these same lines I really hope survival difficulty isn’t part of it. I tried the game on the hardest settings and a single swipe from a eule took Elster down to red health. I am not *that* good at video games lmao. So if the keys must be found on a specific setting this would also be information I’m willing to accept from folks.

This concludes rotcunts broadcast on her terrible key quest. If you’ve read this far ur a real one <3

[clarenecessities]

why toyguru's an idiot pt. 2

Okay, let's try this again. This is the second part of my little breakdown of the situation, and I'm actually going to lead with a video I reference midway through bc like... well, it's a good video. No sense burying it under a readmore. It's about 40 minutes, but it's got very concrete examples of just how much copyright infringement we've all been committing like, daily.

This is the part where I addressed some of the arguments I saw while picking fights in YouTube comment sections, like a well-adjusted adult does. Mostly the common ones, but a few special exceptions. Looking at this now I think I may have been a little too vague in some of my answers, but Part Three is shaping up to be a fucking doozy so I guess that'll be remedied eventually.

Alright, before I get into the YouTube Comments Arguments section I wanna go over a couple other things I found that I (still not a lawyer) think show precedent for Scott's use being infringement rather than fair use. Haven't looked into too many individual cases yet, but I've been flipping through Title 17 and I've found a few interesting caveats which may or may not be supported by the cases I haven't gotten around to reading yet (guess we'll see). Let's start with Brammer v. Violent Hues Productions, LLC No. 18-1763 (4th Cir. Apr. 26, 2019). A film festival, Violent Hues, used a photograph by Russell Brammer which showed the Adams Morgan neighborhood in DC. Brammer reached out to ask for compensation, and while Violent Hues removed the infringing content from their website, they refused to compensate the plaintiff.

The court found the first factor, the purpose and character of the use, weighed against fair use because the use was not transformative. Unlike technological or documentary uses that involve contextual change, Violent Hues used the photograph precisely for its content, that is, to depict Adams Morgan. Although Violent Hues claimed that its use provided film festival attendees with “information” regarding Adams Morgan, this use “would not be hindered if it had to comply with Brammer’s copyright.” Further, using the photograph to illustrate a website promoting a for-profit festival without paying for a license was commercial use. In addition, because the defendant, at best, acted negligently, the panel rejected the district court’s finding that Violent Hues’ use was in “good faith.” - Copyright Office Index's summary of the case

Scott's use of Ethan's (and, remember, others') images, as I outlined in my first post, is not transformative in any way. While he may be offering commentary, it is not on the photographs themselves, and the purpose of the pictures he uses is the same as the photographers' (at least in Ethan's case)—an artistic, clear, and aesthetically pleasing depiction of the figures. As Violent Hues claimed its use of the picture provided "information", Scott's representative claimed that the "images used are instrumental in illustrating these subjects more effectively", which would be a function even less hindered by complying with copyright. In a parallel to Brammer v. Violent Hues, the pictures were instead being used to illustrate a channel promoting a for-profit company. I concur with the court's finding that negligence is incompatible with good faith, because the only 'good faith' argument to be made is directly laid out in 17 U.S.C. § 504(2) (bear with me), and Scott did not have reasonable cause to believe that his usage was protected. He made assumptions, didn't question them, and then told his subscribers he was totally protected, like a ninny. Further,

[...] the court concluded that “the copying here fails the ‘ultimate test’ of fair use: Violent Hues’ online display of Brammer’s photo does not serve the interest of copyright law.” Indeed, while some content “sharing” online may be fair, “If the ordinary commercial use of stock photography constituted fair use, professional photographers would have little financial incentive to produce their work.” - still the Copyright Office IndexWhich is a heck of a mic drop, if you ask me, but I'd like to return briefly to Scott's unreasonable belief in his protected usage. See, 17 U.S.C. § 504(2) imposes limits on the penalties of such infringement, specifically that if an "infringer was not aware and had no reason to believe that his or her acts constituted an infringement of copyright" then they pay less per infringement. So should Scott be aware, or have reason to believe that his acts constituted copyright infringement?

I'd argue that any reasonable person, when accused of a crime—especially a malum prohibitum situation, where there may be statutes you're unfamiliar with—would and should look inwards and say, "wait, I'm innocent, right?" and then try to prove it. Scott's not a 'lay down and die' kind of dude, he's been fighting these accusations the whole time, often to his own detriment, but did he actually do any research? He clearly googled "Fair Use Doctrine", if his little "YOUTUBERS BEWARE!" video is any indication, but frankly I don't believe he made any effort to understand Fair Use beyond, at most, seeing 'education' in there and seizing upon it as his excuse retroactively. There are oodles and oodles of articles, videos, essays, so much out there breaking it down into easily digestible formats that Scott either didn't consume or didn't comprehend, and certainly didn't have anyone explain to him. Actually, a brief aside—I found a pretty solid YouTube video breaking Fair Use down that I recommend to anybody who prefers videos to text. Its information on YouTube's strike system and the CASE act are slightly out of date, as it was published about 4 years ago, but it's examples of Fair Use are spot on [[refer to beginning of post or click here]]

I mean heck, in his latest counterclaim he explicitly refers to 17 U.S. Code § 107. Or, sorry, to "applicable provisions of the DMCA, including the Fair Use Doctrine under Section 107 of the Copyright Act", never mind that the DMCA doesn't even amend § 107. But this, beyond his earlier references to the 'fair use doctrine', proves he has direct knowledge of § 107's text, and should therefore know his argument for its application is flimsier than a house of cards. He has, once again, shot his own argument in the foot, and 17 U.S.C. § 504(2) doesn't play around. But he wants to talk about provisions of the DMCA? Let's talk about provisions of the DMCA. Now, while flipping through 17 U.S.C. I stumbled upon (okay, sought out) 17 U.S. Code § 1202(b)(1), which covers the removal or alteration of "Copyright Management Information" (hereafter CMI) that can be used to identify the copyright holder. It's kinda poorly defined, but 17 U.S. Code § 1202(c)(7) includes under the definition of CMI "Identifying numbers or symbols referring to such information or links to such information." which I think applies pretty indisputably to watermarks, but as I've said (and will keep saying so that nobody gets complacent), I'm not a lawyer. I'm just a vindictive little nerd with internet access and a love of research. I don't actually know that this would be admissible before the CCB, despite being part of Title 17, but statutory damages for §1202 violations are $2,500-$250,000 per violation. So with 48 removed/obscured watermarks just as of Ethan's initial blog post, that's $120,000 minimum, more than 4 times the max damages allowed by the CCB (which is capped at 30k). 17 U.S.C. § 504(2), which I mentioned above, provides that any infringement is subject to $750-$30,000 per instance, and if willful infringement is found it bumps the max up to $150,000 per instance. So if we once again limit it to Ethan's initial findings (81 of his photos), that's an additional $60,750-$12,150,000. Twelve million dollars, dude. Now I don't think any judge in their right mind would award that, or frankly that Ethan would seek that much in the first place, but when I say Ethan could come down on Scott a lot harder I fuckin' mean it. Scott is out here complaining that he's being blackmailed and harassed? It could be so much worse for him. And you know what? I think that's a good point to segue into the arguments I saw out in the YouTube trenches, and why I think those arguments are weak and/or dumb. ARGUMENT:Ethan is being petty. How could you take someone's YouTube channel over some pictures of toys? COUNTERARGUMENT: I'm being petty. Ethan is protecting his copyright. Nobody seems to appreciate that a valid copyright claim is a courtesy, a notice to the infringing party that they're violating copyright law. It's more like a cease and desist than the death sentence people seem to believe it to be. Let's take a moment to define some terms. Per YouTube Help:

A copyright claim refers to either a copyright removal request or a Content ID claim, which are 2 different ways to assert copyright ownership on YouTube. [...] If any copyright owner finds their copyright-protected content on YouTube without their authorization, they can submit a copyright removal request, also known as a "takedown notice" or simply a "takedown". It is a legal request to remove content from YouTube due to alleged copyright infringement. [...] When your content is removed due to a copyright removal request, a copyright strike is applied to your channel.

This ties into another argument, "Submitting three strikes at a time is a dick move" or something to that effect. Ethan, as a copyright owner, cannot apply a strike. All he can do is submit a claim. If ContentID finds a match to its database, it's a strike. If the accused does not contest the claim, it's a strike. Strikes expire after 90 days, and after your first one you have to complete a little training course on copyright, which I assume Scott did after his first strike for using copyrighted music, but I guess that didn't stick. You get three strikes, and then, you're out. This comes with an important caveat:

If your channel is part of the YouTube Partner Program, you're eligible for a 7 day courtesy period. After 3 copyright strikes, you'll have 7 additional days to act before your channel is disabled. During this period, your copyright strikes won’t expire and you can't upload new videos. Your channel will remain live and you can access it to seek a resolution for your strikes. If you submit a counter notification, your channel won't be disabled while the counter notification is unresolved. If the counter notification is resolved in your favor, or the claim is retracted, your channel won't be impacted.

The reason Scott's channel was initially deleted is because he failed to log into his YouTube account for (at least) ten days to dispute the claims. After it was returned to him, he tried to wriggle out of changing anything & jumped on the defamation train, so Ethan filed more claims, we entered the purgatorial 'courtesy period', and we've stayed there to this day.

ARGUMENT: YouTube dismissed 101 claims as invalid, so there was no infringement. COUNTERARGUMENT: That is very obviously not how any of this works. YouTube is not a court of law, does not have lawyers reviewing each individual copyright claim, and has always been extremely up front about these facts. Here's another place Scott has shot his ability to plead ignorance in the foot. In one of his community posts, he said, "I and my attorney firmly believe all of my videos are protected by Section 512(g)". That is, and I can't stress this enough, the section which allows YouTube to take his content down without liability. He keeps saying YouTube has a "guilty until proven innocent" policy, but they're acting pursuant to the section which he cites. YouTube is subject to the provisions of the DMCA, right? So what does that mean? Essentially, so long as YouTube complies with the DMCA's rules, they're in a "safe harbor" where they cannot be held liable for the activity of their users. If some guy uploads the entire Disney catalog one day, YouTube can't be sued for copyright infringement, because they've provided a method for copyright holders to issue immediate takedowns, a sort of stopgap to allow holders time to bring court proceedings against infringing parties. Furthermore, there was a little case (well, a series of cases merged into one Big case) called Viacom International Inc. v. YouTube, Inc. which precipitated the development of ContentID. By adding their copyrighted material to the ContentID database, copyright holders can protect against the unauthorized upload of their material. The catch, of course, is that ContentID is primarily for catching infringing videos and songs, and does very little to protect against small-time infringements like lifting photos off the internet for your YouTube videos. YouTube found no copyright infringement because ContentID doesn't have all of Ethan's photos uploaded. Why would it? Literally why would it. But Scott seems to be under the impression that YouTube manually reviewed these claims, or would ever in a million years accept liability for declaring something infringement or not. Or at least, so he'd have us believe. All you have to do to defeat a copyright claim/avoid a strike is swear under penalty of perjury that there was a mistake or misidentification. That's it. That's all. And Scott, believing there was a mistake and that his work was totally fair use, so swore. So YouTube accepted the counterclaims, and told Ethan if he wanted the content taken down again, he'd need to take it to court. It's not a judgment by YouTube, and it in no way exonerates Scott. ARGUMENT: Ethan doesn't even own the copyright for these photos. They're protected IPs, they belong to (Company)! COUNTERARGUMENT: This is probably the most common argument I saw, which Scott didn't help by repeating ad nauseam. Someone called it "the same as NFTs" which… astounds me on multiple levels. Somebody else said "A copyright is a piece of paper giving someone ownership over an intangible through government offices." which is both really specific and really wrong. There isn't necessarily a piece of paper, and the copyrighted work doesn't have to be intangible. Like dude, what? If I do an oil painting, you're telling me I can't copyright it because it exists in the physical plane? Yeesh. But hey, enough kicking around. Let's take a trip to the third edition of the Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices, which is the "governing administrative manual for registration and recordations issued by the U.S. Copyright Office on or after" January 28th, 2021. (Please believe me when I say you want me to use the short form citation on the quotes from this).

As with all copyrighted works, a photograph must have a sufficient amount of creative expression to be eligible for registration. The creativity in a photograph may include the photographer’s artistic choices in creating the image, such as the selection of the subject matter, the lighting, any positioning of subjects, the selection of camera lens, the placement of the camera, the angle of the image, and the timing of the image. Example: The Office receives ten applications, one from each member of a local photography club. All of the photographs depict the Washington Monument and all of them were taken on the same afternoon. Although some of the photographs are remarkably similar in perspective, the registration specialist will register all of the claims, because each photographer selected the angle and positioning of his or her photograph, among other creative choices. - Compendium (Third) § 909.1

Compendium (Third) § 909.2 goes on to clarify that the subject matter of the photograph need not be copyrightable itself, although more in the sense of 'you can't copyright a mountain, but you can copyright your picture of it'. And it stands to reason, doesn't it? A photographer owns the photos they take and develop, not the subject matter, so only the usage has the potential to infringe copyright, barring extenuating circumstances.

The only area where this gets thorny is in the commercialization of photographs. Let's consider Gaylord v. United States, 595 F.3d 1364 (Fed. Cir. 2010), concerning the Post Office turning a photo of a copyrighted Korean War monument into a stamp. They altered the colors and added snow, but the court found it insufficiently transformative to outweigh the commercial gain (over $17 million dollars) and the fact that the sculpture and stamp served a common purpose: honoring Korean War veterans. On the other hand, there's Mattel Inc. v. Walking Mountain Prods., 353 F.3d 792 (9th Cir. 2003), which was about toy photography specifically (we know her!). The defendant, Thomas Forsythe, took a bunch of pictures of (generally nude) barbies in compromising positions with kitchen appliances and food, as a commentary on society's objectification of women. He sold prints, and publicly displayed the works in galleries and a few shows—ultimately he made $3,659 (though Mattel investigators comprised half of his total sales) off the series.

The "purpose and character of use" factor in the fair use inquiry asks "to what extent the new work is transformative" and does not simply "supplant" the original work and whether the work's purpose was for- or not-for-profit. Campbell, 510 U.S. at 579, 584, 114 S.Ct. 1164. A work must add "something new, with a further purpose or different character, altering the first with new expression, meaning, or message." Id. at 579, 114 S.Ct. 1164. [...] In assessing whether Forsythe's photographs parody Barbie, Mattel urges us to ignore context — both the social context of Forsythe's work and the actual context in which Mattel's copyrighted works are placed in Forsythe's photographs. However, "In parody, as in news reporting, context is everything." Id. at 588, 114 S.Ct. 1164 (citations omitted). We conclude that Forsythe's work may reasonably be perceived as a parody of Barbie.

Which is to say, so long as your use is Fair Use, you can take pictures of copyrighted and trademarked IP.

And, as you may recall, Ethan's pictures are part of his reviews. So even if we were to suppose that (Toy Company)'s copyright superseded Ethan's as the photographer, and his works were ruled insufficiently transformative (which would be very difficult to prove without contradicting decades of law and centuries of common-law), there's a precedent for findings of Fair Use in such cases, even against giants like Mattel. Trademark is a stronger disincentive for the sale of toy photographs, but so long as you aren't attempting to benefit financially from an association with the trademark holder or their product, you're probably fine. I don't have citations for this bit because I haven't done any research into trademark law beyond the Wikipedia page, 'cause it doesn't really feel applicable to any of this, and it's a stupid argument for other reasons. ARGUMENT: Retroblasting is behind this!/Ethan must be a fan of Retroblasting! COUNTERARGUMENT: So many people blamed this on Retroblasting, a guy I'd never heard of, that I actually looked him up and watched his video on Scott. Wasn't crazy about it, myself. Didn't do much to materially support his claims and (sorry) he's got a terrible reading voice. I have no idea why so many folks seem so convinced that he orchestrated this somehow, let alone how he would have done so. By messaging Ethan and telling him "Hey, Toyguru stole your pictures"? Ethan says it was a real life friend that tipped him off, and I believe it, but why does it even matter? The point is that Scott stole his pictures. I'm still considering hitting up some of the other folks he's stolen from, as a professional courtesy. Are they gonna claim I'm an agent of Retroblasting? Is the Copyright Office itself an agent of Retroblasting, for writing and managing copyright law in the first place? Nobody had to orchestrate anything, man. Scott used people's work without credit or permission, and while he got away with it for a long time, he could hardly do it forever. ARGUMENT (direct quote): just because it originated from his website doesn't mean it as his copyright violated. I informed Scott on multiple occasions he was in violation of The LEGO Group's Fair Use Policy by displaying his logo on a minifig. See below:

We can't allow the use of LEGO copyright materials such as brand names, logos and trademarks like the 2x4 brick or the LEGO minifigure for commercial purposes such as promotional campaigns, marketing and PR. This also applies to items such as building instructions and parts. For more details, see our Fair Play policy.

So, every single video that opened with the pirate ship, displaying the minifig not in the background, but displaying his brand logo prominently. This is a copyright infringement. COUNTERARGUMENT: Uh oh! This one's 100% true! 😬 Perhaps I was too hasty in suggesting he do stop motion with his LEGOsona to avoid further infringement. He couldn't have just used a spadille torso?? They must make those. He made like three toys of himself, why did he go with the LEGOsona? ARGUMENT (direct quote): I know squat about this takedown, but looking at The Figure in Question's site he has his logo on his pics and pretty clearly states that his pics aren't to be used without permission of attribution. Is it really that hard to ask for permission? It's probably less work that cropping the pics to remove Ethan's info. COUNTERARGUMENT: It's definitely less work than cropping the pics to remove Ethan's info. A one-time, "hey man, do you mind if I use your photos in my videos?" could not have gone astray, and including a credit that just links back to FiQ takes about 8 seconds. I timed myself doing it just now, it is precisely 8 seconds. Now. To wrap up I'd like to address a few things Scott himself said that weren't part of a specific argument but were materially incorrect enough that I think they merit correction.

"There is also a thing called the doctrine of fair use, which is why none of the claims made by it--by this particular person were found to be in violation by YouTube's standards. Fair use is what allows YouTube creators to do things like this [plays copyrighted clip from Austin powers without commentary] or like this [shows a screenshot of Fox News, including photos] I just took a snapshot from a news site this morning, like literally just whatever was on the top. You can do that! It's called fair use, you're allowed to show images from online and videos, as long as it is within the fair use doctrine." -Scott in his "YOUTUBERS BEWARE!" video

Those examples aren't even kind of within the fair use doctrine <3 hope this helps In one of his community posts:

Once again Ethan Wilson from figureinquestion.com has put false copyright strikes against my channel. All images I use are approved by the Fair Use Doctrine and the Digital Millennium Act and my videos are all educational in nature. I have had 101/104 of his false claims dismissed so far because it is all in legal fair use, but the final 3 are still "undecided/under review" which is what is keeping me from posting new videos.

As I've said, the fair use doctrine can't "approve" anything. The DMCA—wait, he forgot the 'Copyright'. The "DMA" cannot "approve" anything. His videos' educational quality is, at best, subjective, and as we addressed above YouTube's dismissal of claims was simply because he submitted a counterclaim in the first place, not because it was all "in legal fair use". Here's another community post:

To Ethan Wilson who has put 104 claims against my channel for copyright infringement, please know I never intentionally used any of your images. If your images were used inadvertently, it is only because they were nice images I liked with no idea they could potentially be yours.

You can't accidentally upload a picture to a video program. Like sure, maybe you grabbed it while dragging a bunch of pictures, but that means you failed in your duty as a videographer to ensure you had the rights to all images, and you applied effects/transitions. The images were absolutely used intentionally, and their quality—far from the compressed thumbnails displayed on Google Images—indicates that he downloaded them directly from the source: Ethan's blog. He could perhaps claim he downloaded them from someone else that had already appropriated Ethan's work, but A. you can track that kinda thing on someone's hardware, so it wouldn't hold up in court, and B. that would just demonstrate further negligence! What part of 'watermark' does he not understand?

All of this work will now be erased forever in a few hours because I may or may not have inadvertently used an image you believe is your copyright. [...] All you need to do is ask and I will gladly edit out the 5 seconds of my video you have a legal copyright to with documentation.

Scott does this thing where he like… okay, look at his language here. "May or may not", "inadvertently", "an image you believe is your copyright". It's like he read a blurb about the passive voice and only retained 30% of it. He writes like a marketing agent and it makes my skin crawl. "All you need to do is ask" and then shoehorning in "[that] you have a legal copyright to" and "with documentation" to make himself seem so reasonable and like he just needs one little thing. Bah. There's no legal argument associated with this part, it just irritates me. If you're gonna lie to my face, at least do it well.

Finally, please note that while this channel is for educational and humor purposes, 80% of my consultant clients have come from them finding one of my videos and then reaching out to my via SpectorCreative.com for my consulting business. Without my channel I will lose out on my main source of marketing for my company and my living. Losing this channel will be like losing 80% of my income all due to three videos with a still image nd my narration that lasts less than 10 seconds on screen.

Back to factual stuff. He's contradicted his later representation's message, that his channel is strictly educational ("humor" isn't covered under fair use) and further underlined his financial dependence on the use of others' work. In conclusion: Scott's really bad at pretending to be smart, and maybe people in YouTube comment sections aren't the ideal of the advocatus diaboli I had hoped for. It turns out mostly they're kinda dumb. Darn.

[jekyll-doodles]

wait 😲💡 if youre alagadda persona trade miracles can not you make the lords human again

For irl reasons, no. because I'm not much of a writer.

For the bit, however, technically yes. I'll refer to the persona character as "Jekyll" for clarification. under a readmore because it turned out longer than expected bhfdjskb

"Jekyll" is a active healing green, and although the returning of a whole human body and memory would be more of a regeneration thing, these deals could and would be viewed as a Healing venture. Its the end goal and such.

Returning the citizens to themselves would be simple but slow. Though the world they knew has changed quite a bit, and adjusting will take a long while, no one will notice if someone goes missing every once in a while. The lords, however, present a unique problem, given the seemingly ever watching eyes of the Ambassador along with having no real way to phrase "returning them to their human forms" without tipping them off, but everyone wants something (more power, an escape, etc.), its only a matter of figuring out what they desire and then phrasing.

035 would be fairly simple. One would just wander their way to his containment cell -- not called Ghostly for nothing after all, gotta avoid detection and only need to manifest a voice to make a deal -- and make the mask an offer: "Jekyll" will give him his former body back, on the condition that he seeks revenge on the Ambassador. The how and when and then Whatever he decides to do after is up to him. The sprite just supplies they think it'll be funny to see the ambassador fall. And if he needs the motivation to do so, a friendly reminder that failure to hold up his end of the deal with result in its nullification. Back to being a mask in a glass case. "Jekyll" conveniently fails to mention when they plan to collect on this deal.

Now, since he doesn't recall ever being human, there'd be no need to specify. Once agreed, its a snap and poof -- an unconscious human man, clothed because it'd be cruel not to also give him clothes, laying in the containment cell next to a broken mask. Sprites don't tend to meddle too much, so it'd be up to the foundation to deal with him and the Crisis he'll expereince when he wakes up. All those forgotten memories resurfacing, being a semi-normal human again the sprite left some magic intertwined, and then having to figure out just how he's suppose to seek revenge now. But has to. For his family, his friends, the citizens, and in the back of his mind, himself. To go back to being a mask in a glass case... I'd imagine he wouldn't want to think about it too much. Probably makes him claustrophobic.

As for the king... I'm afraid that falls way out of "Jekyll''s jurisdiction. Just a healing sprite, and it'll take more then a bandaid to fix that mess. For now, perhaps just putting him into a deep sleep would suffice. It might ease some of his misery -- hard to tell with cosmic horrors, ya know

[betagrove]

I think it's funny how close Kingdom Hearts keeps getting to having interesting things to say about gender politics with its character plots but it always renders itself moot bc it thinks the gender roles in question are awesome & real & true actually. Readmore for ppl who dgaf about kingdom heart

KH1 & CoM are both really refreshing takedowns of Sora & Riku(& Repliku)'s toxic masculinity and possessiveness / rivalry over Kairi. KH1 casts Riku as in the wrong for trying at all costs to be Kairi's savior and "beat" Sora for her affection, and admonishes him for selfishness and ego, but then CoM turns around and puts a mirror in front of Sora to go "Hey, asshole, that could so easily be you too." It shows that even if Sora doesn't directly want control over women the way Riku did over Kairi or Ansem wanted over the Princesses of Heart, his attitude towards Kairi / Naminé still strips them of their personhood.

Naminé herself has a great arc in CoM of seeking a form of existence through recognition & affection via Sora / Repliku, but coming herself to the conclusion that this charade is harmful to all of them, and reluctantly letting go of them both, now relying only on herself. She then goes on to lend perspective to Xion, Riku, and Roxas when they needed it most, and becomes kind of a symbol of emotional maturity & doing the right thing even when it's hard (through Reverse/Rebirth, Days, KH2, and Coded she is a major player setting up dominoes behind the scenes for every victory we win up through KH3)

This is of course downplayed by the rest of the series refusing to allow Kairi to do anything but be a damsel in distress (even when she gets a keyblade in KH2 she isn't allowed to use it ??), and minimizing the importance of Naminé's contributions to the plot, then refusing to give her any sort of catharsis like Roxas got (they even revert her arc of self-determination by giving her Riku (guy who was like vaguely coworkers with her under Ansem TW and I guess refused to kill her one time) to provide the masculine hero figure she harmed herself trying to chase in CoM)

Then Terra's reprisal of the connection between toxic masculinity & darkness in BBS is pretty interesting too. He's actually not a particularly egotistical, selfish, or violent guy in the beginning. When he loses mastery to Aqua at the trial, he's understandably crestfallen, but instead of lashing out, he seeks guidance. Unfortunately Xehanort, a male figure of authority, gets under his skin and espouses to him that anger and violence are integral to who he is as a man & individual. Even then, Terra is opposed to this idea, ashamed that he succumbed to urges of anger against Braig in Radiant Garden, but Xehanort continues to isolate him from his family & convince him that they are unable to understand him. He's told / shown over and over that the only way to protect those he loves is through domination & power, and it culminates in his fight against Eraqus (who is similarly short-sighted here) where you unlock the Dark Impulse command style and strike him down. The death of his master drives his anger even further, turning it back on Xehanort, playing into the long-con and getting him bodysnatched. He ultimately fails to save anyone through imposing his power over others.

Aqua has a similar but contrasting arc of being isolated from her family, but in her case she's just getting wildly parentified / diagnosed with Oldest Sister Disorder. She's also taught that Terra's darkness is inherent to who he is, and that it's her responsibility to handle all the emotional burdens singlehandedly without any system of support. She's lead to feel that anything bad that happens / Terra & Ven's decisions she disagrees with are due to her failure as a leader, leaving her unable to see the real external factors causing these events. After getting some clue of what's really going on, she is able to put Terra & Ven in the safest possible positions in the aftermath of the story climax, but only by continuing to sacrifice herself, dropping into the Realm of Darkness, still feeling like their fates are her fault. 0.2 gives us some fun stuff of her dealing with her low self-esteem & guilt, and she ultimately plays another important role in sealing the Door to Darkness in KH1 by saving Mickey and Riku.

Then in KH3 Aqua gets turned Nortmode by a random darkness attack (not any of the legit trauma she had or being in literal hell for 10 years?), saved by Sora without any hand in her own liberation, then continues on to job against Vanitas so she can be saved by her little brother, then get paid dust the rest of the game. Meanwhile Terra gets to do a bunch of cool shit & then Eraqus shows up at the end to be like "Terra you're the man of the house now and in charge" as if the whole point of BBS wasn't that the most important thing was communication & understanding between these 3 instead of offloading responsibility / leadership onto either Terra or Aqua. Sigh

[zoejayw]

hello im back with my questions,, ty in advance !! - do u have any tips for the composition of front pages/ cover pages? like how to position the title and the text etc? - what are your thoughts on studying art you dont like? do you think its worth spending time to look at a piece and just pick out stuff u dont like so u can avoid it? - your post on your other blog about how you dont want to be a professional artist but youve also never wanted anything else just resonated with me so hard. did u find enlightenment in the ~3-4 days since u said that and could u share it w us pls and ty - i really appreciate art like yours where symbolism etc isnt extremely obvious and it means that when i revisit that work i get to discover new stuff each time!! its wonderful. any advice for making sure your art is conveying that level of info correctly and youre not overdoing it or making it so subtle that no one picks up on it?

hihi anon welcome back ill stick these under a readmore because its getting very long

i honestly have no specific advice regarding this one! i would go about treating it the same way i'd treat any other combo of images/words, where i view the space taken up by the words as it's own compositional element same as anything else. i'm very very bad at typography and i'd suggest looking at the works of people who do do typography for inspiration, because the way people who Know typography use text is soooo different from the way the rest of us plebians are doing it. but anyway, heres a few really rough examples of the way you could position text on a title page for something. you can see immediately that the aspect ratio of the areas where your other visual elements would be is wildly different between all of these things, which means you'd need a different proportioned drawing to adequately use the space in each case. so i feel like this is the kind of thing it's really important to thumb out ahead of time, just so you're not left with awkward crops or dead space once you go to add text

i think studying things you don't like is insanely critical in all areas, not just art. in many ways engaging with something you like is much more passive than engaging with something you don't. I find that on average, people are less likely to pick up on individual elements of art they like compared to art they dislike. You need a little bit of roughage for things to stick in your brain, sometimes. It has to burn going down a bit. Being able to understand and articulate what you think isn't working about a piece or a style lets you isolate elements that do work, and lets you get that much more in line with your own taste. The array of art I like is impossibly wide and varied. The stuff I explicitly and without exception dislike is a much smaller and more concrete pool of things, and knowing what those things are so I can avoid them is much more helpful for narrowing down my own technique than having five billion different styles I actively aspire to. I think analyzing stuff you dislike is also interesting when you take the time to question if what you're seeing and disliking is an area where the artist is unskilled on a technical level, and failing to execute something, or if the execution is intentional/successful but merely outside of your taste bracket. This can be kind of an arbitrary distinction at times but I find it helpful to at least give some thought to. If something feels unskilled - what would a more skillful execution look like? Would you like it then? If something is just outside of your tastes - where do you think the appeal lies for people who do find it appealing? You can get a ton of mileage out of this stuff

unfortunately i did not find enlightenment there. my problems with becoming a professional artist are not the same problems everyone else is having for the most part. there was a lot of replies on that post about how being an artist under late stage capitalism sucks and while thats true thats not whats stopping me. what's stopping me is my horrible health problems and recent development of a life ruining disability. i Can't pursue art professionally, or literally any other field, because i can't put in more than a couple hours of work a day max on anything. i had to delete that post because it was honestly really frustrating to have to sit through a bunch of tags in my notifs that boiled down to 'ugh yeah i would LOVE to be a professional artist if it didnt involve doing/learning stuff i didnt want to sometimes, and instead i was just giving enough money to live on to do exactly what i want whenever i wanted' which is just to me a deeply entitled mindset. A lot of creatives actually Do get paid to make whatever they want whenever they want! But these are the kind of people who have spent years and years of their life building up a following and improving their craft. I'm not sure why people think they should be allowed to skip that part and go right to getting paid for it.

As for symbolism, I think you're looking at it a little bit wrong! There is no one level of symbolism i'm using that can get 'correctly' conveyed, it just isn't possible. Communication in general, but especially in the case of more abstracted symbolism, is an inherently asymmetrical act. The ability to communicate something relies just as heavily as it does on your audience's ability to understand and interpret as it relies on your own communicative skill. Visual literacy in particular varies a lot from person to person, because it's not taught in the same way as textual literacy or verbal literacy. A find a lot of the symbolism I use pretty blunt and not that subtle. Some of it is also stuff that I know nobody but me will ever notice. Plenty of stuff is in the middle ground between these two extremes. Having a wide spread ensures that there will be at least a little bit of something for everyone, and that those people who are dedicated enough to return back to your work later will find it newly rewarding. I really don't know to convey How to do this because there's an almost infinite number of things you can do with visual symbolism, so my advice would be primarily

understand when you are working with imagery that has become cliched. Almost everything has been done before, but some things have been done more than others. The term has a lot of negative connotations, and is very much down to a matter of opinion/culturally dependent, but there's some types of imagery that are just sooooo overused that anyone with familiarity on the subject is probably already sick of it. This does not mean you can't use them. This means you have to be careful. Think about stuff like biblical imagery in the west, like something being in black and white with one object selectively colored, like red string imagery, like visuals where a character looks into a mirror and sees a reflection different from their true self. This is all stuff i'd consider to be cliched. The benefits of cliched imagery is that it is accessible enough for even the least visually inclined viewer to understand what is being conveyed by it. The downsides are that it's very easy to come off as trite to anyone with more familiarity. My personal tastes for working with cliche is to lean into it. If you know what you're doing has been done before over and over again, embrace that. Don't try to be subtle with it; trying to be subtle with something that is too culturally ubiquitous for subtlety always reads as insanely condescending to me. my gut reaction is 'oh you think you're being clever with this? youre not!' so i try not to be clever. like with how i'm using tarot imagery for my comic. tarot stuff is obscenely cliche at this point. although some individual instances are more or less subtle than others, overall there is zero attempt to mask what i'm doing. it's pretty much got a big neon sign on it that says 'hey guys! we're doing a tarot thing! so lets all have a fun time with that!' when you use cliche, try and do it because your audience is familiar with it, not despite that.

trust your instincts. you don't have to understand your own symbolism. you don't have to be able to sit down and explain in words what everything you're drawing means. if we were only going to limit ourselves to things we could explain in words, we could just be writing things instead of drawing things. visuals don't have to translate 1:1 to concrete literary ideas and something just feeling right can be more than a good enough reason to include it. it's not bullshit or fake symbolism or pretentious just because you can't sit down and bust out an essay about it. some stuff is allowed to be ambiguous or weird. we would never get any New imagery if we were limited to using imagery that could be explained. toss whatever you can in wherever you can and let it coagulate into something coherent as you go.

consider the way your body of work informs itself. if you randomly stick a pineapple into one image, that could mean something, but it could also not. if you become the guy who sticks random pineapples into every drawing, then it definitely means something. you don't need to artificially curate this, but rather, you can just lean into the sort of visuals you find intriguing/compelling and allow that to become symbolic or meaningful through its presence in your larger body of work. symbolism is inherently relational, there is no discrete visual which is on its own a symbol. it has to relate to something outside of itself to mean anything. you can build that meaning yourself.

hope this is helpful or interesting at least!

[mistfallengw2]

TIME FOR MORE BARELY COHERENT RAMBLES

On the topic of Aurelia being "not a mother but weirdly motherly" towards others, I want to point out that in her mind that means making extra sure they're looking after themselves (food, sleep, being safe), that they know how to fight just in case, that they can ask her to help with anything, instinctively prioritizing their well-being during combat, and of course awkwardly hovering around them if she feels like they could need help (words are hard so that's the next best thing). That's a given with Adamas and he's the only one she's forward about it (calling him son and so on), but what makes it extra amusing to me is that she ended up with more "kids" than expected by consistently acting like that regardless of her being Commander-levels of busy. [under readmore because it got long oops]

- Aurene is as close to a daughter to her as an elder dragon can get, to the point she and Adamas (and Tocchix by proxy) refer to each other as siblings. Aurelia has complex feelings about it due to external factors (mostly self-doubt and such), but surprisingly she's overall okay with it, at least in private.

- Tocchix is in the previously mentioned awkward spot of being her son's adoptive brother, and she genuinely cares for him beyond what's expected in regards to Adamas's wellbeing. On Tocchix's side, things are similar and he admires her a lot, and he quickly settled on considering her extended family, akin to Alyt (who he calls his aunt for simplicity).

- Markus was the first to help her after she tumbled out of the Mists, and he did so in spite of her being almost feral due to the trauma of it all. In turn that sparked lots of motherly and protective feelings towards that kid who has now grown up into a fine Lionguard, but it'd be weird for a charr to consider a human like a son, right? As for Markus, you could refer to Aurelia as his mother and he'd need a few long seconds to register what you said (to be fair, for a long time he did want her to stay at the farm and become his second mother).

- Taimi jokes a lot about her acting like a mother and fretting about her health because it's annoying to her, but she also likes seeing Aurelia being a softie in general. To Aurelia, that's just looking out for her like anyone should (you gotta make sure all soldiers can keep up, especially if younger or wounded), and seeing her grow up in spite of her difficulties made her particularly attached to the young prodigy. She likes listening to her ramble about stuff beyond her ability to comprehend.

- Braham is in a weird spot, because she doesn't want to be Eir's substitute, but she does feel like she has to take on the role to make amends for failing to save her. Braham obviously had a lot to unpack in the mommy issues department, and Aurelia was "okay" with letting him unleash his grievances on her (something something she feels like Adamas should have done that with her, so that feels deserved in her mind), though she did draw the line when he put himself in danger. Now that things are settled, the dynamic is healthier and he does genuinely consider her as the mother figure that is there when he needs it, and jokes about it are not uncommon (picked it up from Taimi).

- All of the above's partners get gradually included in the motherly treatment by extention. It's in the name after all, you know, children in-law. Still, it's often done to a more awkward degree, because she's more intentional with it. Maeveryl likes her so they don't mind (HoT was a rough time, but in hindsight they appreciated her being realistic about things), Deryn thinks she's awesome (and she's used to having additional parental figures anyway), Huki was a bit intimidated at first but now thinks it's a cute thing (and pushes Tocchix to be more forward with her), Fynn and Kai find it funny (mostly because they can poke fun at Markus for it), Gorrik is Gorrik (Aurelia did try to show interest in bugs one time, and now he eagerly prepares lectures in advance). - Ellara called her mommy once as a joke and she never recovered.

[elite-amarys]

amarys, at your earliest convenience, i'd appreciate some advice.

i have a beldum now that was... very insistent about being caught, and any tips you have in taking care of one (... and the evolutions) would be appreciated.

[@starlightandspirits]

Today seems to be the day everyone is seeking my advice on steel types. I am absolutely delighted by this, and I do hope you and Vivian will continue to ask questions and send me updates on how training is going.

First of all, congratulations on your new teammate. Beldum are delightful pokemon. They are also incredibly simple, so you will find their care to be quite straightforward. Most care guides you find online will provide you with correct dietary suggestions, though I am also happy to go over these details with you as well. The real trick to training a Beldum lies in upgrading its computing power. I will be placing this advice below a readmore as well.

Beldum have, at most, 4 commands/functions which they can execute. They do not have access to all 4 immediately however, this is what you will be training them to learn. I will first lay out the 4 functions, and then describe how to unlock each one.

Eat

Rest

Attack

Observe

The first 2 functions are available to all healthy Beldum, and you should have no issues prompting them to execute either. The third function they learn as they mature, but this rarely takes long at all. The last function is the real key to their growth, but I wish to focus on the third for a moment.

You will notice there is no function for affection or expression. That is not to say that they do not experience love or emotions (although what they do experience is incredibly simplistic and often purely reactive), it just means that they have no specific function for expressing such things. This means that this type of expression will, 90% of the time, be expressed via the "attack" function. You will also notice that there is no limiter function. Everything a Beldum does, they put all that they have into. This is reflected in their single learnable move being Take Down. Are they happy about something? Take Down. Are they frustrated? Take Down. Sad? Take Down. I strongly recommend building some core muscles so that you can brace yourself against the multitude of Take Downs you will be on the receiving end of.

Teaching your Beldum to observe is tricky. It requires you to hold them still, keep their focus on you, and watch as you complete an action. They will likely wander off or assume you are requesting a Take Down while you are trying to teach this, and I will warn you and anybody else reading this that teaching the observe function takes an incredible, almost mind numbing amount of repetition. You are going to feel like your efforts are meaningless, or like you are failing your Beldum. This is normal. Even when they begin to show signs of understanding the observe function, they will likely often default back to one of the other 3 functions which they have more control of and understanding over. Patience and perseverance are key when training a Beldum.

The good news is that if the Beldum you found was following you around and interested in pokeballs it has likely already begun to grasp the concept of observation. A Beldum which follows its trainer around without attacking or (as was the case with Linux) randomly going into rest mode is one that may be ready to evolve soon. That said, Metang can be incredibly difficult to control if they did not gain a strong bond with you as a Beldum. This is because they are only half made up of the Beldum you began with - their other half does not know or trust you at all, and as a Metang they have a newfound sense of identity and sentience. Every decision they make they make as a pair, so if the half of the Metang that was your Beldum does not have a strong sense of trust and loyalty to you, you are going to have a very hard time raising them as a Metang.

Raising a Metang is an entirely different post, as this one is already getting quite long. For now, my recommendation would be to train your Beldum away from other Beldum for now, in order to gain that critical one on one time to bond with it before it begins to prep for evolution. Fine tune their observe function, and give it plenty of polishes and attention. Once you have appropriately bonded, collect no small amount of spare metal and move your training to the section of the Polar Biome above Chargestone Cavern, where the wild Beldum tend to congregate. After some time your Beldum should naturally attract another Beldum who is ready to evolve. You will know it has chosen a partner when they lock eyes and stare at each other for anywhere between 5 minutes to an hour. You can attempt to catch another Beldum to bond with it in the hope that they will evolve together, but there is no guarantee that your two Beldum will choose each other, so this is not really recommended.

Once they begin to evolve they will use the extra metal you have provided to build the contraption which fuses their minds and upgrades their appendages. And then you will have your Metang! To celebrate, I would recommend allowing them to chase some local Nosepass around. They love to interact with the magnetism, and doing so will go a long way towards helping you bond with what is about to be a very rebellious, intelligent, and high-energy pokemon. Metang is easily the most difficult of the line to raise, but we will cross that bridge when we come to it. :).

[gh0stsh4rk]

The Gang Gets Put into a Saw Trap

Okay this idea has been plaguing me so here are my speculations about if members of the gang ended up in saw traps (what they would be and why they would/wouldn't survive)

:readmore: Okay alphabetical order, Charlie !

If he doesn't get put in a trap for stalking then John definitely gets him for his drug use. Based on Charlie's Home Alone and the ending of Chardee Macdennis 2: Electric Boogaloo Charlie actually has a chance. He's willing to put himself into great physical pain to achieve a goal, but in Charlie's Home Alone he also proves how little foresight he puts into most things. Any level of complexity and Charlie is dead. If he listens to the instructions he has a chance, but will he ? As for the trap...the classic bathroom trap. I could go reverse bear trap because of the substance abuse, but Charlie's history as a voyeur lines up with Adam's quite well. Low chance of survival just based on the need to collaborate with another person and not let them kill him. (Rather than a poisoned cigarette it would be poisoned alcohol, which he would take without convincing.)

Next up is Dee

Dee would likely end up in a trap for her consistent history of putting her own comfort and convenience over other's wellbeing. We see this when she leaves the Waitress in a bog in Dee Sinks in a Bog, getting Cricket to leave the priesthood in The Gang Exploits a Miracle, and leaving him and others to burn alive in Mac and Dennis's apartment in The Gang Squashes their Beefs. Dee ends up at the helm of the shotgun carousel and I see her saving no lives and failing jigsaw's test. Next is Dennis

We all know Dennis's sin is lust, and of course it is his sexual impropriety that lands him in a trap. In both parts of The Gang Goes to Hell he practically hunts a barely of age girl, and in The Gang Buys a Boat he makes it just clear enough what the implication of being on a boat is that it's worrying even to Mac. All of this lands Dennis in the Bedroom trap. Dennis shows a high pain tolerance in Chardee Macdennis, even managing to avoid reacting to having his hand pierced with a dart. However, I'm not sure vanity would allow him to gouge his eyes out like he would need to for this trap. He might be able to, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Next Frank

Frank's history of running sweatshops is not exactly a secret. Frank admits to deaths in his sweatshops in Charlie Goes America All over Everybody's Ass, and it's not that surprising after seeing how he tells Mac to run his own sweatshop in The Aluminum Monster vs Fatty Magoo. We learn more of the gruesome details of this in Making Dennis Reynolds a Murderer when he continues the tradition of forgetting he's hot, just like in Frank's Little Beauties. All of this lands Frank in the Acid room trap and needless to day, if any of his victim's family members had the chance, Frank wouldn't make it out of that room. Frank dies. Finally, Mac.

Mac or Ronnie the Rat has a long history of snitching. In The High School Reunion he rats on Adriano for having fake drink tickets, but that's a fairly small crime compared to his snitching nearly costing his father his life in Mac Kills his Dad. This lands Mac in the Venus Flytrap trap. Unfortunately for Mac based on his performance in Mac Day and his admission to Charlie that his new sunglasses in Pop-Pop: the Final Solution are to hide how scared he is, he isn't the badass he thinks he is. He's not digging a key out of his eye anytime soon. Mac fails the test.

Bonus !

The gang as a whole likely would end up in the featured trials of Saw V, and in most cases, would not survive. HOWEVER--the gang of Season 2 with Franks guidance may have a chance to make it out alive. As Dennis explains in Chardee Macdennis, his mind is strong but his body is weak.

Thanks if you stayed for this rambling !! I may have to do something like this again it was fun :)