#unity hardware

[gloriousunderstanding]

Playing Myst (realMyst: Masterpiece Edition from 2014) for the first time as an adult. Currently deep in a math puzzle and fuck, I love it.

It's on sale for $4.50 on Steam right now if you're curious.

[treasure-mimic]

So, let me try and put everything together here, because I really do think it needs to be talked about.

Today, Unity announced that it intends to apply a fee to use its software. Then it got worse.

For those not in the know, Unity is the most popular free to use video game development tool, offering a basic version for individuals who want to learn how to create games or create independently alongside paid versions for corporations or people who want more features. It's decent enough at this job, has issues but for the price point I can't complain, and is the idea entry point into creating in this medium, it's a very important piece of software.

But speaking of tools, the CEO is a massive one. When he was the COO of EA, he advocated for using, what out and out sounds like emotional manipulation to coerce players into microtransactions.

"A consumer gets engaged in a property, they might spend 10, 20, 30, 50 hours on the game and then when they're deep into the game they're well invested in it. We're not gouging, but we're charging and at that point in time the commitment can be pretty high."

He also called game developers who don't discuss monetization early in the planning stages of development, quote, "fucking idiots".

So that sets the stage for what might be one of the most bald-faced greediest moves I've seen from a corporation in a minute. Most at least have the sense of self-preservation to hide it.

A few hours ago, Unity posted this announcement on the official blog.

Effective January 1, 2024, we will introduce a new Unity Runtime Fee that’s based on game installs. We will also add cloud-based asset storage, Unity DevOps tools, and AI at runtime at no extra cost to Unity subscription plans this November. We are introducing a Unity Runtime Fee that is based upon each time a qualifying game is downloaded by an end user. We chose this because each time a game is downloaded, the Unity Runtime is also installed. Also we believe that an initial install-based fee allows creators to keep the ongoing financial gains from player engagement, unlike a revenue share.

Now there are a few red flags to note in this pitch immediately.

Unity is planning on charging a fee on all games which use its engine.

This is a flat fee per number of installs.

They are using an always online runtime function to determine whether a game is downloaded.

There is just so many things wrong with this that it's hard to know where to start, not helped by this FAQ which doubled down on a lot of the major issues people had.

I guess let's start with what people noticed first. Because it's using a system baked into the software itself, Unity would not be differentiating between a "purchase" and a "download". If someone uninstalls and reinstalls a game, that's two downloads. If someone gets a new computer or a new console and downloads a game already purchased from their account, that's two download. If someone pirates the game, the studio will be asked to pay for that download.

Q: How are you going to collect installs? A: We leverage our own proprietary data model. We believe it gives an accurate determination of the number of times the runtime is distributed for a given project. Q: Is software made in unity going to be calling home to unity whenever it's ran, even for enterprice licenses? A: We use a composite model for counting runtime installs that collects data from numerous sources. The Unity Runtime Fee will use data in compliance with GDPR and CCPA. The data being requested is aggregated and is being used for billing purposes. Q: If a user reinstalls/redownloads a game / changes their hardware, will that count as multiple installs? A: Yes. The creator will need to pay for all future installs. The reason is that Unity doesn’t receive end-player information, just aggregate data. Q: What's going to stop us being charged for pirated copies of our games? A: We do already have fraud detection practices in our Ads technology which is solving a similar problem, so we will leverage that know-how as a starting point. We recognize that users will have concerns about this and we will make available a process for them to submit their concerns to our fraud compliance team.

This is potentially related to a new system that will require Unity Personal developers to go online at least once every three days.

Starting in November, Unity Personal users will get a new sign-in and online user experience. Users will need to be signed into the Hub with their Unity ID and connect to the internet to use Unity. If the internet connection is lost, users can continue using Unity for up to 3 days while offline. More details to come, when this change takes effect.

It's unclear whether this requirement will be attached to any and all Unity games, though it would explain how they're theoretically able to track "the number of installs", and why the methodology for tracking these installs is so shit, as we'll discuss later.

Unity claims that it will only leverage this fee to games which surpass a certain threshold of downloads and yearly revenue.

Only games that meet the following thresholds qualify for the Unity Runtime Fee: Unity Personal and Unity Plus: Those that have made $200,000 USD or more in the last 12 months AND have at least 200,000 lifetime game installs. Unity Pro and Unity Enterprise: Those that have made $1,000,000 USD or more in the last 12 months AND have at least 1,000,000 lifetime game installs.

They don't say how they're going to collect information on a game's revenue, likely this is just to say that they're only interested in squeezing larger products (games like Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail, Fate Grand Order, Among Us, and Fall Guys) and not every 2 dollar puzzle platformer that drops on Steam. But also, these larger products have the easiest time porting off of Unity and the most incentives to, meaning realistically those heaviest impacted are going to be the ones who just barely meet this threshold, most of them indie developers.

Aggro Crab Games, one of the first to properly break this story, points out that systems like the Xbox Game Pass, which is already pretty predatory towards smaller developers, will quickly inflate their "lifetime game installs" meaning even skimming the threshold of that 200k revenue, will be asked to pay a fee per install, not a percentage on said revenue.

[IMAGE DESCRIPTION: Hey Gamers!

Today, Unity (the engine we use to make our games) announced that they'll soon be taking a fee from developers for every copy of the game installed over a certain threshold - regardless of how that copy was obtained.

Guess who has a somewhat highly anticipated game coming to Xbox Game Pass in 2024? That's right, it's us and a lot of other developers.

That means Another Crab's Treasure will be free to install for the 25 million Game Pass subscribers. If a fraction of those users download our game, Unity could take a fee that puts an enormous dent in our income and threatens the sustainability of our business.

And that's before we even think about sales on other platforms, or pirated installs of our game, or even multiple installs by the same user!!!

This decision puts us and countless other studios in a position where we might not be able to justify using Unity for our future titles. If these changes aren't rolled back, we'll be heavily considering abandoning our wealth of Unity expertise we've accumulated over the years and starting from scratch in a new engine. Which is really something we'd rather not do.

On behalf of the dev community, we're calling on Unity to reverse the latest in a string of shortsighted decisions that seem to prioritize shareholders over their product's actual users.

I fucking hate it here.

-Aggro Crab - END DESCRIPTION]

That fee, by the way, is a flat fee. Not a percentage, not a royalty. This means that any games made in Unity expecting any kind of success are heavily incentivized to cost as much as possible.

[IMAGE DESCRIPTION: A table listing the various fees by number of Installs over the Install Threshold vs. version of Unity used, ranging from $0.01 to $0.20 per install. END DESCRIPTION]

Basic elementary school math tells us that if a game comes out for $1.99, they will be paying, at maximum, 10% of their revenue to Unity, whereas jacking the price up to $59.99 lowers that percentage to something closer to 0.3%. Obviously any company, especially any company in financial desperation, which a sudden anchor on all your revenue is going to create, is going to choose the latter.

Furthermore, and following the trend of "fuck anyone who doesn't ask for money", Unity helpfully defines what an install is on their main site.

While I'm looking at this page as it exists now, it currently says

The installation and initialization of a game or app on an end user’s device as well as distribution via streaming is considered an “install.” Games or apps with substantially similar content may be counted as one project, with installs then aggregated to calculate the Unity Runtime Fee.

However, I saw a screenshot saying something different, and utilizing the Wayback Machine we can see that this phrasing was changed at some point in the few hours since this announcement went up. Instead, it reads:

The installation and initialization of a game or app on an end user’s device as well as distribution via streaming or web browser is considered an “install.” Games or apps with substantially similar content may be counted as one project, with installs then aggregated to calculate the Unity Runtime Fee.

Screenshot for posterity:

That would mean web browser games made in Unity would count towards this install threshold. You could legitimately drive the count up simply by continuously refreshing the page. The FAQ, again, doubles down.

Q: Does this affect WebGL and streamed games? A: Games on all platforms are eligible for the fee but will only incur costs if both the install and revenue thresholds are crossed. Installs - which involves initialization of the runtime on a client device - are counted on all platforms the same way (WebGL and streaming included).

And, what I personally consider to be the most suspect claim in this entire debacle, they claim that "lifetime installs" includes installs prior to this change going into effect.

Will this fee apply to games using Unity Runtime that are already on the market on January 1, 2024? Yes, the fee applies to eligible games currently in market that continue to distribute the runtime. We look at a game's lifetime installs to determine eligibility for the runtime fee. Then we bill the runtime fee based on all new installs that occur after January 1, 2024.

Again, again, doubled down in the FAQ.

Q: Are these fees going to apply to games which have been out for years already? If you met the threshold 2 years ago, you'll start owing for any installs monthly from January, no? (in theory). It says they'll use previous installs to determine threshold eligibility & then you'll start owing them for the new ones. A: Yes, assuming the game is eligible and distributing the Unity Runtime then runtime fees will apply. We look at a game's lifetime installs to determine eligibility for the runtime fee. Then we bill the runtime fee based on all new installs that occur after January 1, 2024.

That would involve billing companies for using their software before telling them of the existence of a bill. Holding their actions to a contract that they performed before the contract existed!

Okay. I think that's everything. So far.

There is one thing that I want to mention before ending this post, unfortunately it's a little conspiratorial, but it's so hard to believe that anyone genuinely thought this was a good idea that it's stuck in my brain as a significant possibility.

A few days ago it was reported that Unity's CEO sold 2,000 shares of his own company.

On September 6, 2023, John Riccitiello, President and CEO of Unity Software Inc (NYSE:U), sold 2,000 shares of the company. This move is part of a larger trend for the insider, who over the past year has sold a total of 50,610 shares and purchased none.

I would not be surprised if this decision gets reversed tomorrow, that it was literally only made for the CEO to short his own goddamn company, because I would sooner believe that this whole thing is some idiotic attempt at committing fraud than a real monetization strategy, even knowing how unfathomably greedy these people can be.

So, with all that said, what do we do now?

Well, in all likelihood you won't need to do anything. As I said, some of the biggest names in the industry would be directly affected by this change, and you can bet your bottom dollar that they're not just going to take it lying down. After all, the only way to stop a greedy CEO is with a greedier CEO, right?

(I fucking hate it here.)

And that's not mentioning the indie devs who are already talking about abandoning the engine.

[Links display tweets from the lead developer of Among Us saying it'd be less costly to hire people to move the game off of Unity and Cult of the Lamb's official twitter saying the game won't be available after January 1st in response to the news.]

That being said, I'm still shaken by all this. The fact that Unity is openly willing to go back and punish its developers for ever having used the engine in the past makes me question my relationship to it.

The news has given rise to the visibility of free, open source alternative Godot, which, if you're interested, is likely a better option than Unity at this point. Mostly, though, I just hope we can get out of this whole, fucking, environment where creatives are treated as an endless mill of free profits that's going to be continuously ratcheted up and up to drive unsustainable infinite corporate growth that our entire economy is based on for some fuckin reason.

Anyways, that's that, I find having these big posts that break everything down to be helpful.

[ipilokko]

// 10 People I'd like to know better //

I got tagged by @kbthebearcat and @captain-clandestiny THANK YOU GUYS

🎧Last song🎧: I am not sure to be honest 😭 i was listening a mixed playlist on shuffle but i last remember listening to return to forever and when i fall in love

🎨Favorite color🎨: THE ONE AS MY BLOG BACKGROUND i am obsessed 💔 AND A WARMER TONE OF MUSTARD YELLOW tbh all the natural colors really 🤭

📚last book📚: I am not much of a reader, but i read "Ağrı Dağı Efsanesi" as homework. (Browsed the recap but sshhh)

🍿Last movie🍿: Ugh i am so embarrassed but Sonic 3. MY FRIENDS FORCED ME OKAY?!. Like you can't expect someone who likes "The Game", "Silence of the lambs", "there will be blood", "Jane Eyre" etc to like such a movie- i am REALLY picky about what i watch. But yeah it was Sonic 3 I'm sorry 💀

📺 Last tv show 📺: It was "Baby Raindeer" i guess... It was alright.

🍔 sweet/spicy/savory 🍔: Savory 😌

🌀Current obsession🌀: ASSASSIN'S CREED ASSASSIN'S CREED ASSASSIN'S CREED ASSASSIN'S CREED ASSASSIN'S CREED

Finished the ezio trilogy and now playing unity and black flag. Torturing myself by replaying missions (in unity) over and over until i perfectly ghost them. People hate that game for some reason but i like it a lot tbh

🔍 Last thing searched 🔍:

I was answering the ask then i called Hargrove "passed away recently". i was sure it was not as "recently" so i searched to find out. 2018 was the date. He was such a nice trumpeter. I found about him after coming up with Roy and now one of his songs i think is roy if he was a song. Here's the song for those wondering !

👀looking forward to👀: nothing specific. But i am curious about the gt of that upcoming fable game. Probably can't afford it and don't have the hardware to run it so I'll watch the gameplays 💀

People I'd like to know better:

@justagiantpotato @pipinpali @pacthesis @alserm @ohnobrooo @paxmorgana @guaxinimraccoon @olivexing @territorialrain

[interstellarsystem]

Self-Expression Checklist (Sort Of)

We're slowly building up our confidence in being "weirder" in public. Mainly starting with the clothes--we're trying to consciously wear more self-expressive things related to our alterhumanity and... Honestly, everything else we have going on. We're at a point where we have a good, safe group of IRL friends to be around and we're craving being more expressive with ourselves.

Things we have, currently:

Kandi bracelets with current fronter's names on them.

Therian/otherkin symbols on jewellery. (Our favourite is a theta-delta pendant we put on a chain from the hardware store!)

An alterhuman (alt key) patch on our bag, and a nonhuman unity flag patch ready to be added to it.

A tail clipped to our bag.

Trans and disabled flag stickers on our cane.

Things we're planning on adding/doing:

Patches to represent all of our main fronters and putting them on our bag.

Patch with psychosis, autism, adhd and tourette's symbols on them--also for our bag.

Disabled flag patch.

Terrorpunk symbol patch.

Plural rings patch.

LGBT+ patches (xenogender, trans, bi, poly).

Getting more jewelerry with alterhuman symbols (needing an alt key).

More general clothing that represents our alterhuman identities (pins, patches, clothing in certain styles, etc).

More stickers for our cane.

Honestly getting all of this stuff together is fun. The front bracelets especially, because no one who doesn't know we're a system even really questions or notices them, which is both funny and convenient for when we don't feel like explaining.

I guess in a lot of ways, being so forward with it all is a risk. But.. It's one we're willing to take. We've met a few alterhumans and a few plurals in our town, and we're willing to bet there's more out there. We basically want to be a walking billboard that lets anyone with weird identity stuff going on know they're safe around us, not just on an if-you-know-you-know basis with subtle symbolism that you'd have to really read into.

[elderscrollsconceptart]

i've said this before but: i, personally, am *not* looking forward to any TES remake made in Unreal. i think it handles certain physics and lighting aspects much, much worse than Havok, the engine that original Oblivion uses [and technically also Skyrim, though heavily modified by that point]. i think UE5 is likely to kill a lot of the charm and unique feel of Oblivion, and i'm a lot more hopeful about things like Skyblivion. i've never loved an RPG made in Unreal, and Oblivion is one of my favorite games of all time partially because of the versatility of Havok. obviously i could be wrong, and honestly i hope so! but given bethesda's track record [and microsoft in general, which is their parent company], i think it's likely to be a lot... flatter than the OG.

So Ive been thinking about this constantly for the past few months. It's definitely possible the remake won't match the "vibe" of OG Oblivion. That concerns but as well. Half of Oblivion's charm is how janky and lowkey..bad? It is 😭 Thats not a knock btw! Games and genres often become DEFINED by their flaws despite their positives! Skyrim is awesome but id bet one of the first things the average gamer remembers about Skyrim is the ridiculous "giants hit you so hard you fly into space" bug. For Oblivion it's the absurb (and endlessly memed) behavior of it's NPCs.

I wouldn't be shocked if the outsourcing studio drops the ball as Oblivion is a huge and clunky game to begin with. Even a remaster would be hard to do. That said, all negativity/optimism we can have at this point is wholly based on leaks and assumptions so it's fair to reserve final opinions until we actually get a real look at the remake if/when it releases.

I will be honest and say I'm personally cautiously optimistic about the remake since as charming as the OG is, it's a technical and unoptimzed mess beyond the memes and charm of silly physics glitches. I love OG Oblivion! I also want to be able to play it without having to do a bunch of mods to (try!) to make it work on my PC.

IMO literally all the remake/remaster would need to do is improve things like draw distance, get rid of the absurd CPU restrictions the OG has, and make Oblivion run stable on modern hardware.

I've talked about it before but id very happily accept a 1 to 1 port of Oblivion for modern hardware if all they did was ensure the game ran smoothly. I've genuinely only been able to have a single full playthrough of Oblivion, and that was on the xbox 360. He'll I'd take a Switch port of Oblivion if it was in HD at least. I just want a stable game experience that doesn't require me to have an old dual core CPU or try a bunch of janky 12 year old INI tweaks and memory patches.

I've tried probably half a dozen times to get the game working on PC with the necessary performance patches/stability fix mods and I *still* can't get the fixes to last thru an entire playthru before some stability issue major quest bug forces me to quit.

Morrowind has OpenMorrowind which makes the game fully stable and playable on modern hardware (like my phone!) Daggerfall has Daggerfall Unity which has innumerable improvements and also allows the game to be played on modern hardware with little issues. Skyrim has been ported to everything except apple smart watches and is playable basically everywhere with only moderate stability issues.

Oblivion is the *only* semi-modern mainline TES game that is super jank out the box and doesn't have some "fixed" version that allows it to be playable and stable on modern hardware. If something like OpenOblivion existed, an official remake/remaster wouldn't be necessary

I will reiterate the super frustrating CPU restrictions the PC version has unless you use mods to circumvent them. Game literally will start crashing on you if you have a multi core CPU. Old games tend to have technical problems like this, but given almost every other mainline TES game has a safe and stable version that exists for modern hardware, its not fair that Oblivion gets ignored in this matter. We deserve a permanent and officially fixed version of Oblivion, be it a remake or a remaster. We shouldn't just rely on mods and fan projects to fix old TES games.

Daggerfall is another good comparison since yes, by remaking Daggerfall in Unity you DO lose some of the original game's charm, but you also gain a shitload of stability and graphical improvements which make the game accessible to modern gamers.

In lieu of a fanmade Oblivion project in the vein of OpenMorrowind/DaggerfallUnity, Oblivion NEEDS a remaster or remake to make it accessible on modern hardware. Skyblivion is cool! But it still looks like Skyrim with different architecture. That's not a knock on that project, it's just true since it's literally the Skyrim engine. In the same way Morrowblivion looked like Oblivion despite being a "remake" of Morrowind into Oblivion's engine. Skyblivion is a FULL remake of Oblivion (with some changes from what I understand) but we still deserve an official Oblivion remake/remaster.

Skyblivion doesn't negate an Oblivion remake and an Oblivion remake doesn't negate Skyblivion. If anything they compliment each other since they each would be doing things the other isnt/cannot do.

An Oblivion remake/remaster might suck (or it might be great!), but regardless of our feelings on the matter, its simply true that the OG grows less and less accessible the further we get from it's release 19 years ago...We deserve to be able to play Oblivion on modern machines. I hope the remake allows us to do that (and that it comes out to begin with lol)

Peace out yall ✌️

[notnights]

your gangle cosplay is really cool, do you have any tips for someone trying to make their own?

Thank you! I appreciate it. And it depends on what you're going for with it! I've seen a lot of different Gangle cosplayers with different interpretations which are creative and fun to make I imagine! So I can't really advise any specifics on crafting etc since I don't know what you're going for.

For me when I cosplay I want to get as "accurate" as I can with the character design. I unfortunately am not very good at sewing and shaping and stuff but you can see that didn't stop me, I made it as well as I could. And Gangle is obviously one of the more difficult characters I've ever decided to cosplay so wasn't ever going to be accurate with her unless I did like... a puppet method or something. (From my understanding this falls under the "creature" cosplay category?)

Idk if these will help at all, but it's good to start with visualizing ideas you want to try for before hand:

Ideas for a Navi, Bill Cipher and Gir from Invader ZIM cosplays that went no where.

Thinking outside the box also helps in the sense of, other forms of crafting, skills or items, you wouldn't think to use might help with what you're making!

Examples:

I used fursuit methods to help build my NiGHTS cosplay, I also used quilting methods to help make Gangle's ribbon limbs.

When making Circus Baby I wanted an exhaust fan that actually spun, turns out there are plenty of tutorials on how to make your own fidget spinners so used that method to make a light weight one out of cardboard and pennies for that piece! When making Gangle 2.0 to keep the shape I wanted to infuse wire into the edges of the ribbon limbs. The best method for this would have been to hand sew floral wire to an extra piece of fabric with fishing wire, then sew that one in with the edges of the the limbs. I however was only 1 and a half week away from a con and still had a ton of pieces to finish so I got a bunch of cheap wired ribbon, and infused those inside the limbs. (Kept the shape well enough but I'm at the point where I want to remake them again lol.)

Instead of using traditional adhesives like hot glue, maybe something like silicon adhesive can be used and other more hardware based unities can be used. Hardware stuff in general helps. Similar stuff they sell at craft stores can often be found cheaper at hardware stores. I've had the benefit that my father is a handyman so I grew up with a lot of that tool usage, and loved going to hardware stores with him because sometimes I'd find something that would make me be like "WAIT I CAN USE THIS For that art project I've been trying to do."

This admittedly also comes from my doll customization hobby, which believe it or not, has a lot of power tool usage to make those pretty little dolls! Some of these things I used for my Gangle. Making cute ribbon outfits or bows for dolls, you have to burn the edges of the ribbon you've cut, least it fray (in Gangle 1.0. each ribbon you see has been lovely burnt by candle LOL) when Gangle 2.0's ribbon fabric it would run after getting snagged on stuff, I made a "sealer" I'd use for making doll wigs. Watered down glue (this case Modge podge because its already watery) and painted it over any places that would receive a lot of friction as the solution admitted made the satin a tiny bit duller so didn't want to paint the whole thing with it.

Sometimes you can use the methods/shapes from existing clothing to help you make what you want. When I made my NiGHTS cosplay I found a little decorative halloween jester hat which I used as a reference to make a pattern for NiGHTS' hat/horns.

Speaking of, and also in relation to that hardware thing. Thrift shops are a great way to find random pieces of stuff you think can help with your project especially if they're going to be items you cut up/modify anyways. I wanted the illusion of floating when making my NiGHTS and musing about a Tatsumaki cosplay so wanted to use tacky clear platform heels to make it happen lol. And thrift shops have a ton of used shoes. I only needed the platform part and remove the straps so didn't need anything brand new. While I didn't find clear ones at the time I did find other platforms that helped with my NiGHTS, the feet were so big on the costume it shadowed the heels anyways and kept the illusion. (bonus concept of that Tatsumaki idea)

When I needed a squeaker for a cosplay piece I just bought a 99 cent dog toy and disemboweled it for one. In the same kind of "cheat" I just got a wielding mask, removed the mask part, and attached my Gangle mask to it to make a way method to take it on and off.

Anyways that was a lot of examples, but they're times when my dumb dumb brain was like "wait!!! I don't have to do this the hard way and get what I'm looking for!!" and it saved me from said hard way of getting what I wanted.

[scotianostra]

The Scottish actor Alex McCrindle passed away on Aoril 20th 1990.

Born on 3rd August 1911 in Glasgow, Alex McCrindle started work at the age of 10 years, probably like many of us, delivering milk. At 15, he left school and got a job in a timber merchants’ office. He started his acting career playing heroes in plays put on by the Boys Brigade. Later, after moving to Glasgow and getting a job as a manager of a hardware firm, he joined the Glasgow Clarion Players. A pioneer Scottish theatre group with strong links to the Communist Party, this was a predecessor of Glasgow Unity and Glasgow Citizens.

McCrindle went to lectures on drama at Glasgow University and had become so engaged in theatrical matters that he had to choose to give up his hardware career. He was lucky to be able to become an indentured apprentice at Queen Theatre in London He finished up as an electrician but became immersed in the world of theatre and actors along the way.

He eventually became a formable actor himself. In the period 1937-9, he appeared in a dozen plays on the first broadcasts of television, including `Juneo and the Paycock’, before the medium was closed down for the duration of the war, sometimes being credited as Alex McCringle or Alex McGrindle, as well as in his own name. he was also in the cast of the classic Hitchcock film, `The 39 steps’, although he was more proud of his nationwide tour of `Six men of Dorset’, about the Tolpuddle Martyrs, in 1937

McCrindle began a history of the actors’ union, Equity, but was unable to finish it due to being called up for the Royal Navy during the Second World War. He produced the first ever play performed on board a RN ship during war, `Androcles and the Lion’, transmitted over the Tannoy!

He starred in the British BBC radio show `Dick Barton Special Agent’ from 1946-51, which ran for 700 episodes and had 15 million listeners. Alex played the role of Jock Anderson one of Dick Barton’s key henchmen and was widely loved for the role and enormously popular in it. In 1947, he was producer of the childrens TV programme `Larry the Lamb’.

Although he also branched out very successfully into scriptwriting, McCrindle was effectively blacklisted because of his Communist and Equity activities for much of the important years of his career, especially from the late 1940s to the end of the 1950s. In the 1950s, he appeared – often uncredited to escape the blacklist – in a string of small budget movies as a character actor. But, in the main, blacklisting resulted in him devoting more time to building up Equity and securing improved pay and conditions for Actors, to meet this objective he was sent by his union to found Scottish Equity, which only had 15 members before he began his work. He worked at this full-time for the next seven years, leaving the union in a flouring position north of the border. In this period, he only worked in British television and then only twice during the early 1960s.

In the later stage of his career, he began to secure significant parts in films and TV programmes from `The Saint’ in 1965, and then through many other projects, with increasingly more significant parts, to `All Creatures Great and Small’ and `Taggart’ and then, in the 1977 first `Star Wars’ movie in which he played a rebel general.

George Lucas, short of capital, offered the actors on the movie "points" in lieu of salary. Big stars such as Alec Guinness, could afford to indulge in some capitalist speculation and take "points" and, in the event, the film proved to be the best move Guinness ever made financially. "Hollywood thought Darth Vader was a tough nut," one luvvie has recalled, "but they hadn’t met Alex."! He campaigned through Equity for bonuses for all actors in Star Wars, among them R2-D2 (who was played, or operated inside, by Birmingham-born Kenny Baker), who also took a working wage and contributed to the success of Star Wars.

Alex had a great love of Scottish poetry and regularly read it aloud to audiences. He produced and read his own selection of 37 poems by William Soutar (Glasgow, Scotsoun, 1989) and raised money for Brownsbank Cottage., the former of the great Scottish writer, Hugh MacDiarmid, now a home for "writers in residence"

He was married twice, the first was Sandy, the second wife, Honor Arundel, the Communist children’s author and Daily Worker film critic. (See entry for Honor Arundel.) The home of McCrindle and Arundel in the fifties was always a hub of Party activity and organisation, as the writer Doris Lessing notes in her autobiography. Alex became close friends with Paul Strand, the famous photographer, and was a major asset to Strand in his `Tir a Mhurain’ photography project. He went onto become Strand’s agent in Scotland, negotiating with Compton Mackenzie and visiting the School of Scottish Studies in order to help set up the project.

In the 1980s, with US screenings no longer debarred to him, he appeared in dozens of major roles on television mini-series, including "Reilly: The Ace of Spies" and in film such as `Eye of the Needle’. As late as 1987 he played the role of a jailer in `Comrades’, the film about the Tolpuddle Martyrs.

Alex McCrindle’s obituary in the Times was headlined "Communist stalwart" and stated that he remained committed to an "unrelenting Marxism which lost nothing of its purity and uncompromising severity". His daughter Jean also became involved in politics and an award for drama was named after him. Alex McCrindle died on April 20, 1990 in Edinburgh.

[wellbelesbian]

Seven Sentence Sunday

thanks for tagging me @hushed-chorus!

here's another snippet from my Shoulder To Shoulder sequel fic. i had originally wanted to post it yesterday as that was the day of Durham Miner's Gala, but didn't finish it on time, so i'll just post it when i get it done.

Even the yellow and white LGSM banner is smaller than most here, made with wood, fabric and paint we could get for cheap from hardware and crafts stores.

"Now, that's just showing off." Niamh rolls her eyes as another banner passes us. It's twice the size of most of the others, a portrait of four bland, blonde men shaking hands while limply holding a clover, thistle, rose and daffodil. At the top it reads Durham Miner's Association, Trimdon Grange Colliery, and at the bottom, Unity is strength.

"Do you think they're compensating for something?" Agatha nudges Baz suggestively and he shakes his head with a chuckle.

rambling and banner photos below the cut

i'm allowed to make fun of the trimdon grange banner, it's my hometown's and everyone agrees is stupidly large and hard to carry. why does it need this massive red trim? just to be big and obnoxious!

(picture is my own)

anyway. i said this in my author's note at the beginning of Shoulder To Shoulder, but my great uncle Tommy (my grandad's big sister's husband) was a big figure in the Miner's Union. he died of cancer about ten years back and hundreds of miners came to his funeral to pay their respects.

his side of the family lives pretty far away, and i don't get to see them often, but yesterday was Durham Big Meeting (also known as the Miner's Gala), a huge gathering of ex-miners where they march with their banners. it's a celebration and memorial in one. and this year, my uncle has been painted on a new banner (he's the one in the middle), so my extended family came up for the weekend. turnout was actually lower than usual due to the rain, but ah well.

my great auntie, his wife, asks me every time i see her "have you got a girlfriend yet?" (i'm chronically single 😭) and told me she wishes her husband had still been alive when their grandson came out, and could have met his boyfriend. i have every faith that he would have been an ally, just like her. he was such a strong, funny, loving man.

so yeah. this new fic was inspired by that banner (also the Mark Ashton Trust and LGSM banners) and the Miner's Gala, and then I decided to explore more things Simon and Baz would have lived through between the end of STS and now.

hopefully i can finish it in at least a somewhat timely manner.

tags and hellos: @forabeatofadrum @j-nipper-95 @artsyunderstudy @that-disabled-princess @prettygoododds @confused-bi-queer @imagineacoolusername @ic3-que3n @aristocratic-otter @larkral @ivelovedhimthroughworse @cutestkilla @shemakesmeforget @fatalfangirl @ebbpettier @you-remind-me-of-the-babe @alexalexinii @youarenevertooold @shrekgogurt @bookish-bogwitch @thewholelemon @shutup-andletme-go @supercutedinosaurs @theearlgreymage @ileadacharmedlife @alleycat0306 @carryonsimoncarryonbaz @comesitintheclover @blackberrysummerblog @orange-peony and @noblecorgi

[nightmare-castle]

I kinda lied. This is another smaller update, because...

*cries silently*

Ahem - for some reason ClipStudio Paint did not like my old GPU. I fought and struggled with it for a year - sometimes it would display the correct resolution of an image, sometimes not. Brushes were just straight up broken most of the time. Exporting to any format was a nightmare as it wouldn't preserve quality. And forget anti-aliasing. It was either jagged edges or blur.

So when I managed to finally get everything colored and put into Live2D Cubism, it was a fucking mess, to say the least. Small mistakes or lack of quality is amplified a hundredfold in Live2D, and needless to say, with poor quality, incorrectly rendered files coming out of CSP when animated looked like hot flaming pixel garbage.

You can see the difference in the screenshot above, where I've opened the sketch image for Nightmare's sprite redesign from CSP into Medibang. All that shitty blurry worthless detritus is CSP, and the smoother lines drawn over are in Medibang. These two files are the same canvas size (4500 x 7200) and resolution (350ppi). The difference is ridiculous. I have a new GPU in a completely new PC now, and CSP works correctly more often but not always with my new hardware. So I'm abandoning it completely. Which sucks, because I did upgrade to 2.0 EX and paid for it. Waste of money and time.

So what does this mean for the game? It means I have to do all of the sprites over. Again. Which is a huge setback and so, so many hours of work. Each of these sprites, while I only have to do the art once for each, is extremely tedious with a zillion layers per sprite with all the little details and articulated pieces separated out. And then I have to go back into Live2D and re-map these new sprites to the animations, test everything, implement them in Unity, replacing all of those old sprites, reworking the code, testing, testing, and testing some more.

So it's gonna be a minute before I can do that big juicy update I wanna do to show off all the redesigned elements of the game. BUT IT'S GOIN', Y'ALL. Slowly but surely. We're getting it done.

also yes he no longer has the stupid jacket his emo phase is over he grew up and put on an old man sweater you're welcome

[slink-a-dink]

Why is the unity game engine bad

Basically, how I understand it, is that Unity is introducing a new pricing plan/model that takes effect January 1st, 2024, that based on certain thresholds of how many download’s and revenue a game has made in the last year, game developers will have to pay a certain flat rate PER INSTALL, which didn’t exist before. Many people reinstall games or the like after buying it once, so every reinstall counts as a new install, and charges the game company.

So many developers feel rather blindsided, because they feel this could fuck them over financially, they’ve got threeish months to decide what they want to do and many are talking about delays to jump ships. Those currently working on a project are likely to swap over to avoid this. While charity games won’t be affected and they’re trying to clarify things to make it sound better because the initial drop sounded even fucking worse, it feels really rough still.

https://forum.unity.com/threads/unity-plan-pricing-and-packaging-updates.1482750/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=company_global_blog_2023-09-13_updated-forums-faq

(This one has the statement:

Q: If a user reinstalls/redownloads a game / changes their hardware, will that count as multiple installs?

A: Yes. The creator will need to pay for all future installs. The reason is that Unity doesn’t receive end-player information, just aggregate data.

God damn!!)

Some sites for info—

While not the main point, there’s also concerns about the CEO selling stocks right before the news:

Many devs have expressed their distaste for this, the devs of Cult of the Lamb, has stated they will delete the game come january 1st. VideoCult has put the game Rain World on a 50% sale and mentions de-listing it. Innersloth, the minds behind The Henry Stickmin Collection and Among Us has stated this would cause delays, and many developers will feel similarly. Even if they backpedal completely on this decision, so many are probably not gonna use it now, shooting themselves in the foot big time.

[manyblinkinglights]

ugh my room looks nice when I remove the MULTIPLE LAUNDRY BASKETS OF CRAP from my bookshelves, leaving only books. However! That! Is my crap!

That is a significant capital investment IN CRAP. Old mic, controllers, flight sticks, spare keyboards, bags of pokemon figurines, batteries, stickers, post-its, CRAP. Blank CDs, ripped CDs. Stores of emulation in potential laid in by past mbl against future hardship. HDDs.

I still read and daydream, but I MAKE videogame( asset)s, these days, I don’t have the same endless well of need to play them. Plus old games aren’t that great anyways—I’m glad to HAVE played them and been shaped by them, but if I’m really in trouble someday I don’t need to be able to emulate a PS2. Indie games and phone games (VRChat itself will eventually even be a damn phone game)—I should probably shed a lot of this hardware.

The REAL thing that should be done is properly install all the software for emulation on my backup pc, get all my backup hdds in place, get it all working, and then discard the old stuff. But that’s so much. I use that neural architecture for Blender and Unity now, not other teams-of-people’s lifeworks.

Other people can archive the video games… I think I should discard my old hardware of just video games. I will always be able to turn to video games in better times but it’s not worth unusable stores of physical crap that I will have to leave behind if eg I become homeless, versus stolen comics and ebook library that just needs any screen. I don’t NEED this STUFF. I’m not into weird enough stuff to personally need to hold on to piles of it. I can MAKE my OWN stuff. Stuff is other people. Maybe the real stuff is the people we meet along the way

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Object permanence

I'm on a 20+ city book tour for my new novel PICKS AND SHOVELS. Catch me at NEW ZEALAND'S UNITY BOOKS in AUCKLAND on May 2, and in WELLINGTON on May 3. More tour dates (Pittsburgh, PDX, London, Manchester) here.

#20yrsago Phone DRM cartel lowers fees from outrageous to merely ridiculous https://web.archive.org/web/20050413205335/http://news.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/mobile/0,39020360,39195029,00.htm

#20yrsago Bush’s iPod filled with infringing goodness https://memex.craphound.com/2005/04/13/bushs-ipod-filled-with-infringing-goodness/

#20yrsago Felten: Why the RIAA is suing Internet2 users https://web.archive.org/web/20050413223053/http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/archives/000797.html

#20yrsago BBC Creative Archive launches, without DRM https://web.archive.org/web/20050413173407/https://creativearchive.bbc.co.uk/archives/what_is_the_creative_archive/project_faqs/index.html

#15yrsago Horrifying stationery https://web.archive.org/web/20100419065151/http://www.behance.net/Gallery/13th-Street-_quotStationery-of-Horror_quot-(Design)/440850

#15yrsago BITTER SEEDS: Alternate WWII novel pits English warlocks against Nazi X-Men https://memex.craphound.com/2010/04/13/bitter-seeds-alternate-wwii-novel-pits-english-warlocks-against-nazi-x-men/

#10yrsago HOWTO make a working Apple ][+ watch https://www.instructables.com/Apple-II-Watch/

#10yrsago NSA declares war on general purpose computers https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/as-encryption-spreads-us-worries-about-access-to-data-for-investigations/2015/04/10/7c1c7518-d401-11e4-a62f-ee745911a4ff_story.html

#10yrsago Exploding the Phone: the untold, epic story of the phone phreaks https://memex.craphound.com/2015/04/13/exploding-the-phone-the-untold-epic-story-of-the-phone-phreaks/

#5yrsago Quantifying Boris Johnson's body-count https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/13/control-c/#the-nasty-party

#5yrsago Virginia's election-day holiday https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/13/control-c/#ralph-northam

#5yrsago Fighting the EU Copyright Directive in court https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/13/control-c/#control-c

#5yrsago Trump will deliver killing blow to the USPS https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/13/control-c/#art-1-sec-8

[beardedmrbean]

Life in Afghanistan has gotten perpetually worse for Afghans living under Taliban rule for the last three years as the humanitarian crisis continues to escalate, rights for women have all but vanished and Kabul remains essentially shut off from the international community.

A quarter of Afghans face "acute" food insecurity, more than half the nation requires humanitarian assistance, and according to the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), nearly 70% of the country is "subsistence insecure," meaning they do not have reliable access to basic resources like food, water, housing or health care.

After the Taliban takeover of Kabul on Aug. 15, 2021, the nation’s economy "basically collapsed," according to the UNDP, in large part because international funding through government donor plans, like the Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund, were shut down.

TALIBAN PARADES AMERICAN WEAPONS 3 YEARS AFTER CHAOTIC WITHDRAWAL FROM AFGHANISTAN

The Taliban has further exacerbated its own economic crisis by propelling its extremist ideologies and enforcing oppressive bans on women by barring their access to the workplace or education. 

In three years since Washington concluded its "War on Terror," many have questioned whether life in Afghanistan is worse than it was before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the U.S. and its subsequent invasion.

"If it's not worse, it's heading in that direction quickly," Michael Rubin, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and expert on security issues in the Middle East and South Asia, told Fox News Digital.

The Taliban has not only reinstated harsh bans on women, it has also brought back corporal punishment through public floggings and group-enforced executions. Additionally, the Taliban's supreme leader, Mullah Hibatullah Akhundzada, in May threatened to reinstate stoning women to death for adultery – a Taliban punishment on women that was never fully eradicated even during the U.S. incursion. 

"The biggest difference between now and pre-2001 is the Taliban are much better resourced," said Rubin, who spent time with the Taliban before the 9/11 attacks.

TALIBAN VOWS TO PUBLICLY STONE WOMEN TO DEATH IN DIRECT MESSAGE TO WESTERN DEMOCRACIES

Rubin said that even though the Taliban are not directly funded by international humanitarian groups, it has found ways to siphon off funding for its own gains. 

The Taliban marked the three-year anniversary of the takeover of Kabul in a parade on Wednesday at Bagram Air Base – formally the largest U.S. military base in Afghanistan – while showing off U.S. military hardware that had been abandoned following the withdrawal.

While neglecting any mention of the hardship Afghans face, speeches championing Taliban efforts to squash opposition to the extremist group were flaunted, along with a reference to Afghanistan’s continued isolation from the international community.

"The Islamic Emirate eliminated internal differences and expanded the scope of unity and cooperation in the country," Deputy Prime Minister Maulvi Abdul Kabir said in reference to a term the Taliban uses to describe its government, according to an AP News report. "No one will be allowed to interfere in internal affairs and Afghan soil will not be used against any country."

Former U.S. military machinery abandoned at the airbase like helicopters, tanks and vehicles were displayed alongside soldiers holding light and heavy machine guns.

"The Taliban holds these parades yearly to rub their victory and our defeat in our face," Bill Roggio, senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and founding editor of "The Long War Journal," told Fox News Digital.

Afghanistan has largely remained an international pariah over its human rights violations. But even as some countries have begun to allow for diplomatic engagement with the insurgent group, Western nations remain highly concerned over how Afghanistan has once again become a haven for terrorist organizations.

"Afghanistan is far more dangerous today than it was prior to 9/11," Roggio said. "The Taliban is in full control of the country, and it is sheltering and supporting al Qaeda and allied terror groups."

Roggio said al Qaeda is once again running training camps in at least 12 provinces across the country with very little internal resistance.

[libertineangel]

Obviously I despise bloatware, poor optimisation and the ever-increasing demands placed on computer hardware but that one post saying "everything should be tested on a laptop with 2GB RAM and integrated graphics" is a bit much, like that spec would've been pretty naff 20 years ago and I don't think it's a bad thing that games look better than Morrowind now

Games were beautiful enough ten years ago, with Assassin's Creed Unity and MGS Ground Zeroes - one of which ran perfectly on my 2012 mid-range gaming laptop and one of which ran like shit - and I think that's a fair point in time to switch focus to optimising, but the setup the original post described would be like trying to run DOOM on a BBC Micro

[redheartkonpa]

A foreword to the impossible but necessary tale of the Red Hearts. Full foreword at https://tinyurl.com/5bvchanr

It’s about first contact in the modern day.  Not the past.  Not the future.  Now.  Contact with a different version of ourselves.  An ancient civilization of humans transplanted from our distant past to be born anew among the stars.  

It’s not about invasion.  

It’s not about the apocalypse.  

It’s not about a utopia.

They don’t want or need our labor or resources.  

They need our culture, our emotion, our identity.  

Because they’ve lost theirs.

This story most likely cannot exist.  But it should exist.  And it will exist. 

This story cannot exist for one simple reason:

The idea that nations shaped by centuries of exploitation would choose to partner with extraterrestrials with god-like resources to exchange culture for emotion, healing for humanity, is preposterous. 

The notion itself is alien—difficult to even wrap one’s mind around.

Any one who has lived through the brutality and betrayal of colonization is unlikely to cooperate with such ridiculously advanced “aliens”, no matter how peaceful their intentions, no matter how benevolent the visitors are, no matter how many lives could be saved.  After 50 years? 100 years? Maybe some progress could be made.  But a week?  A month?  The time-table of this story?  It would be… an unreasonable expectation.  

But that would make this story impossible.  

So join me in suspending some disbelief.

Here are the conditions that make this preposterous story have potential:

First, they leave.  Well, not exactly.  They ask for permission to move from orbit near the moon to geosynchronous orbit.  The UN tells them no, so they stay in the further orbit.  For as long as it takes for the governments of the World to let them approach.  Despite an imminent threat from their enemies, from Earth enemies, they don’t care.  They’ll wait.  As long as it takes.

They have the hardware to level the planet.  But they don’t.  They wait.  They do nothing without consent. 

They unify:  a hostile force would seek to divide and conquer.  It would want us weaker.  To the extent the Red Hearts are welcome to get involved in such things at all, they seek and encourage unity and collaboration.  The Red Hearts want us stronger.

They lay out very specifically what they want, what they have to offer, and their motivations and reasoning.

They woke up empty. No joy. No wonder. No pain. No emotion.  No feelings.

They lost their souls.

They need our guidance to grow them back. 

[spacenutspod]

Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus spacecraft is pictured in the grips of the Canadarm2 robotic arm shortly after its capture Credit: NASA After delivering more than 8,200 pounds of supplies, scientific investigations, commercial products, hardware, and other cargo to the orbiting laboratory for NASA and its international partners, Northrop Grumman’s uncrewed Cygnus spacecraft is scheduled to depart the International Space Station on Friday, March 28. Watch NASA’s live coverage of undocking and departure at 6:30 a.m. EDT on NASA+. Learn how to watch NASA content through a variety of platforms, including social media. This mission was the company’s 21st commercial resupply mission to the space station for NASA. Flight controllers on the ground will send commands for the space station’s Canadarm2 robotic arm to detach Cygnus from the Unity module’s Earth-facing port, then maneuver the spacecraft into position for release at 6:55 a.m. NASA astronaut Nichole Ayers will monitor Cygnus’ systems upon its departure from the space station. Cygnus – filled with trash packed by the station crew – will be commanded to deorbit on Sunday, March 30, setting up a re-entry where the spacecraft will safely burn up in Earth’s atmosphere. The Northrop Grumman spacecraft arrived at the space station Aug. 6, 2024, following launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. Get breaking news, images, and features from the space station on the station blog, Instagram, Facebook, and X. Learn more about Cygnus’ mission and the International Space Station at: https://www.nasa.gov/station -end- Julian Coltre / Josh FinchHeadquarters, Washington202-358-1100julian.n.coltre@nasa.gov / joshua.a.finch@nasa.gov Sandra JonesJohnson Space Center, Houston281-483-5111sandra.p.jones@nasa.gov Share Details Last Updated Mar 21, 2025 LocationNASA Headquarters Related TermsInternational Space Station (ISS)Humans in SpaceJohnson Space CenterNASA Headquarters