#warehouse quality control

[deklo]

i think i’ve already hit art burnout DANG IT

[kultofathena]

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Inspection, Packing and Shipping

Ever wanted a quick look behind the curtain at the quality and shipping department at Kult of Athena?

Our step-by-step process of protecting and inspecting your purchase makes sure your items arrive safely and quickly.

From our fixation with paper crumpling, to our second quality inspection, our team's experience provides customers with the confidence that opening a box from Kult of Athena is unlike opening a box from anywhere else.

Sword Featured: The Napoleonic Saber of Honor (USS712)

[lockea]

I've been seeing a lot of Discourse around outdoor cats that talks past one of the biggest problems addressing community cats/outdoor working cats so I thought I'd chime in with my two cents.

Many arguments I see just... don't think about the cats at all? Or don't consider the logistics of actually addressing the feral cat problem in a humane way. It's always about how outdoor cats shouldn't be outdoors, which is neither realistic nor helpful.

I used to volunteer at an municipal animal shelter in the USA that had a TNR program (Trap, Neuter, Return) and also adopted out community cats to local farms and businesses. Here's my side of the story.

"Your cat doesn't need to be outside" -- Yes, correct. Your domesticated (non-feral) house cat does not need to go outside at all. They can have a fully actualized life safely indoors. When I see this argument, proponents of indoor only cats are correct in most or all their arguments regarding this.

"Outdoor cats are the largest invasive species in the world, and decimate bird populations." -- This is also correct, and part of the reason why you can help by bringing your house cat indoors. Cats are the largest invasive species. Spay and Neuter your cats, bring them inside, and socialize them so they don't become feral.

"TNR doesn't work." -- False. Whether we like it or not, feral cats exist. We have two methods by which we can address the feral cat population -- decimating them (humanely euthanizing the whole colony) or TNR. For a long time, euthanasia was the preferred way to address the feral cat problem. Afterall, if the cats aren't there, doesn't that save the local wildlife population?

Except that we found, studying these colonies, that when a colony is wiped out, the cats of another colony will spread into their territory and continue to have kittens and the population of feral cats is neither controlled nor diminished.

Hence, TNR. What we found performing TNR on cat colonies was that this controlled the population of the colonies, allowing them to stay in their territory, which kept other colonies from spreading (especially colonies we hadn't performed TNR on yet). We at the shelter felt this was the most humane way to control the feral cat population and safely deflate their existence without dealing with the population blooms that euthanasia caused.

"What about kittens?" -- Kittens from these colonies were brought into the shelter, socialized, and fostered out until they could be adopted. Some of these semi-feral kittens needed special homes to be adopted into, but this was the best quality of life for these cats.

"What about cats that get missed during TNR?" -- We would return to the colony several times over a period of several years to perform TNR on the same colony. We mark cats that have been neutered by clipping their ear (this is done humanely, but is the most reliable way to tell if a cat has been neutered so the poor thing doesn't have to have surgery 3-4 times in their life). Also, during the TNR process the cats would be vaccinated to ensure disease did not spread from the colony (i.e. rabies). Still, even getting 60% of the colony TNR'd would dramatically reduce the number of kittens being added to the colony each year. This controlled the population by allowing the territory to naturally deflate in size over time, buying us time to address the larger feral cat problem.

"What if the colony was in an unsafe location?" -- There were two ways we addressed unsafe colony locations -- remember, we know that when the colony is removed, a new colony will move into its place, so we tried not to move the colony unless we really felt the cats or the public was unsafe -- one was to move the whole colony to a new location. Preferably someplace like a warehouse where we have an agreement with the owners of the warehouse. Some of the cats were even relocated to shelter grounds as our community cats. If the colony was small enough we would bring them into our Feral Cats room and adopt them out as community cats.

"What is a community cat?" -- The way the program worked, was that anyone who needed a working cat could apply to the program. These were often rural farmers or businesses with warehouses that needed rodent protection. We trained the farmers and businesses on how to acclimatize the cats to their new home, and as part of the agreement, they had to care for the cats (veterinary care, vaccinations, food and water). This gave businesses and farms an alternative to expensive and environmentally unfriendly rodent control, and also gave these feral cats good places to live out their natural lives.

"Can't you just adopt out feral cats?" -- No. Cats that have not been socialized around humans as kittens, or who have several generations of feral cat in them could not interact with humans in a way that did not cause them undue stress. This was not a humane way to handle feral cats. However, when a cat was brought into the feral cat room, they would be monitored for up to a week. If the cat displayed signs of being semi-social or fully social (hanging out outside of their den, allowing staff to pet them, showing interest in staff in the room), then we would either move the cat into the adoption room or place them in foster to be socialized before adoption. Feral cats who displayed signs of being able to live full and healthy lives with human companions were NOT adopted out as community cats. We also observed this behavior during TNRs and would do the same for those cats too.

"But aren't cats bad hunters?" -- Compared to other species, cats are not the most effective form of rodent control. This is true. However, you have to understand that feral cats exist. There is no "undo" button we can push to stop them from existing. We have to deal with the problem we have right now, which is to safely and humanely decrease the number of feral cats in our communities. And yes, we do that by using cats as rodent control in the community.

"What can I do?" -- Stop saying community cats shouldn't exist. That's not helpful and doesn't solve the problem we have. Bring your cat indoors. Spay and neuter your cats. Adopt from shelters. Volunteer with a TNR team. Support TNR efforts in your community. Recognize that those of us actively dealing with the community/feral problem are trying to do what is in the best interest of our communities and the animals we love. We aren't sitting over here saying these cats should exist -- a feral cat will not have the same quality of life as one that is indoors with a family -- but we have to address the problem in practical terms. We don't have the moral high ground to just do nothing while pontificating solutions that have no basis in actuality.

And yes, it's okay to celebrate community cats. If your local farm has a couple of working cats, that means that farm is helping participate in the safe deflation of the feral cat population. Don't shame a farm or business for using community cats. We're all doing the best we can to solve the problem that we have.

[ophelialoveshandsomemen]

Say what you will about Van Helsing 2004; hate it, love it, be indifferent, But the All-Hallow's masquerade ball went sooooo hard and it had zero right to do so! It's a fun, campy, monster mash movie with wonderfully dated ( and expensive) cgi and non-stop action meant to be a popcorn flick one takes out to watch around spooky season. And it has this* chef's kiss* GORGEOUS 6 minute sequence plopped arbitrarily in the second act, which unexpectedly surpasses nearly every other ball in the last 30+ years of film( notable exception being the Cinderella 2015 ball) for literally no reason other than to be dramatic af.

Like feast your eyes on this Gothic masterpiece!!! Who doesn't want to immediately live in this picture?!??

They used those candles with oil in them so that they would have real candles, real string orchestra( I believe), probably around 100 real life extras( something which is tragically absent in modern film), said extras are all in beautiful fully decked-out costumes( which are in luxuriously dark colours, but nearly no fully black, another thing you cannot say for much modern cinema), REAL CIRQUE DU SOLEIL PERFORMERS for all the acrobatics!!!! Hell, instead of filming in a sound stage, where they could control the reverb and the acoustics and the size of the set and the bloody lighting ( they apparently had a heck of a time emulating the firelight for this sequence) and the temperature( it's very cold in stone churches!) better, they filmed in a Baroque church in Prague! As I said, peak dramatic splendour, jfc...

Think about that a second...They filmed a vampire masquerade in a Baroque Catholic Church( St. Nicholas' in Lesser Town, if you were curious) with amazing over-the-top acoustics and marble statues and real, tiled floors and marble pillars and a choir loft which they very much utilized, covered the pipe organ and the altar with a grand brocade curtain so it wouldn't be so obviously a, you know, a church! And there's a gold gilt elevated and canopied pulpit into which they put two vampire kiddies for, again, the sake of being dramatic.

And the costumes! They remind me of the 25th anniversary Phantom of the Opera Masquerade costumes. Same quality, like they're old, well-cared-for costumes pulled out of a warehouse, instead of fast industry churn-outs. With lots of trim and colour and masks and lace and feathers and..just...ugh.. they are all perfect! Just look at all the head pieces on the ladies and the hats on all the gentleman ( save Dracula of course) and the powdered wigs on the musicians. ANNNNDD! The dresses are historically correct!!!!!! It's the 80's bustle era! Nobody does the 80's bustle era in film anymore and it's a bummer. Oh and one other thing! Anna's ( and other women's) hair, at least here in the ball, is also historically accurate because it's all pinned up! None of those fucken modern beachwaves at a ball! Everybody's got updo's!

Gah, I swear, Dracula in his gold cloak really does things to me in this scene!

By the way, the acrobatics are bonkers in here for just background stuff!! Especially the random guys on unicycles and the dude playing the violin whilst standing on a ball...Like....WHAT?

Anyways, all this to say, that this masquerade ball feels sooo real and tangible and because of that it blows every other film out of the water, and no, I will not change my mind!!!!!

Here's a few more gifs, bcuz, why the hell not, this scene is sexy as fuu*ck?

Alright I need to go to bed now.

[star-crossed-lizards]

I saw my dad for the first time in years yesterday and it went ok but I feel like I’m on a tilt-a-whirl bc of it and I’m calling tf out of work ❤️

[radiance1]

Danny was having a good night, laying down on his side and purring contentedly while his tail swayed lazily. He was living a good life nowadays, freed from his responsibilities as the eternal prince of the Infinite Realms and taking on the mantle of the head of a Familia.

Perhaps, one of these days, he should try and find the wizard who turned him into a cat and thank them for it. What would a wizard even like anyway?

He pondered on that for a moment, perhaps a magical artifact or another could suffice? He stretched. Oh well, it didn't matter right now, he wasn't going to do it so soon anyways.

He opened his mouth, a yawn escaping him as he finished his stretch, tongue peeking out to lick his lips. He changed his position to something more comfortable, sinking into the lavishly soft pillows and reminding himself to get Catwoman something once again for giving him this high-quality cat bed.

Custom made too, multiple times bigger than him, the softest pillows he's ever felt and smelling extremely good. Even when multiple others forced themselves into his bed, even though they had their own as a gift from her as well.

Perhaps another diamond is in order?

His ears perked up as the sound a crash echoed throughout the warehouse, and he lazily peeked an eye open as the sound of paws running towards his direction made themselves known.

His nose twitched, the familiar scent of iron controlling the air as he sighed.

Kevin.

"Graaaaaaaaaaaamps!" A cat of what was once white fur, now stained with blood, skidded to a stop in front of him. Danny sighed once more, other eye opening as he looked at his first, and what others call his second-in-command. "I'm not that old, 150 is still quite young Kevin." He spoke calmly, no real heat in his voice and instead, amusement.

Kevin, predictably, ignored him. "You won't believe what happened tonight." Kevin then turned cheeky, stepping forwards towards his bed, and Danny had half a mind to try and prevent him from staining his bed, before discarding that thought just as quickly. "Guess!"

Danny's stare turned flat, and he had an urge to facepaw. Instead, he sighed, staring at the blood staining the other's fur before resting his head back on his bed. "You died again, didn't you?"

"Yep!" Kevin stepped onto the bed, both face and reply cheerful as the sun. "But that's not it!" Kevin bounced his way over to the elder cat, bloody pawprints marking his path on the previously clean bed.

Danny sniffed, a faint unknown tickling his nose before Kevin flopped on top of him, the blood stains on the smaller cat rubbing off on him, causing Danny to shift position, one that would support the younger better. "Oh, really?" He inquired, reaching out to grasp a glass shard from Kevin's side and placing it onto the bed.

"Yea! I fought spark, the spark!" Kevin purred, tail swishing behind him. "Can you believe it!?"

Danny hummed, picking another shard of glass from his first's skin.

"She was suuuuuper strong! Not stronger than you obviously, but she was really tough, I almost couldn't keep up with her!" Danny used a paw to silently request for Kevin to turn, and he did, with Danny plucking another shard from his skin. "She went all woosh, and boom! And then I went swish, and whish and she could barely touch me!"

"Mhm." Danny shifted, gently lowering the other, younger cat from off of him and instead to his side onto his stomach, reaching over to pick the shards from his back. "Then, then she used her power and then I was going fwoosh! Then I crashed into a nearby window and then we had to scatter because the human inside was mad about it." Kevin chirped, easily moving through his story despite the biggest pieces of glass being currently taken out of his back. "Then I ran all the way here because I wanted to tell you about it!"

"That's nice Kevin," Once he was done, Danny reached forward to lick the other on his head, his tail moving forward-the fur turning from black to glowing white- and flinging the shards of glass up through the air and into the rafters. "However." Danny's speech turned from that of a cat to one of a more humane-like tongue, his eyes narrowing at the form of one of those vigilantes running around the city- this one seems to be the Robin, based on his description of the hero- took the thrown shards of glass as a sign to drop down onto the ground.

"It seems you've managed to have drawn one of the humans into our territory in your excitement." Danny rubbed his chin against Kevin's head, uncaring for the blood soaking into his fur. "I don't blame you, that strain of human is known to be quite sneaky when they want to be."

Robin stood up, cape shrouding his form from ankle to shoulders. He narrowed his eyes at the scene, and Danny, in turn, narrowed his own as the rest of his fur turned glowing white, toxic green eyes staring at the lone human in a den of cats.

A silent threat.

"Care to explain, human known as Robin?"

[the-californicationist]

Just wanted to drop you a note to say that I just found you and I am loving the fact I am not the only Price lover here. When I can think straight after all the sexiness....I may think of something to ask you for... Like Female Reader and Price reconnecting after years apart or somesuch Meg xoxo

Thank you so much! You are definitely not alone. If you ever need a Price fix, you know where I'm at 😅 over here! obsessing. lol.

Hope this is sort of what you envisioned!! A million thanks for the ask!

Origami Tigers

It had been a long time since you had crossed his mind. But, as he gingerly plucked the intricately folded origami tiger from his desk, he knew you were there. You were on his base, somewhere. 

Part of him wanted to rush off to find you. He let his thumb slide over the shining golden paper, thin as tissue, folded and folded and folded in on itself to make this tiny, stalking beast. It was soft, and so carefully made, and it reminded John of those same qualities that he had found in you.

Why had you left? 

It had been out of your control. Your career and his career and the bombs and the guns… it was all a blur. But, ten years had passed since he had held evidence of your paper menagerie in his fingers, and even the thought of your return made his body tingle with the numbness of his shock. 

The tiger fit in his chest pocket, right over his heart, and he went on the hunt. 

He stalked through the main rooms, searching faces, looking in office windows, waiting for that shock of hair to catch his eye, that shallow sloping shoulder, those tiny frag scars on your left hand… 

Just when he thought he had lost you again, he spotted you. You were sitting on top of the hood of his TAC-V, flipping through pages on your datapad, lost in your work. He couldn’t help but sigh at the sight of you. Ten years had been good to you. A woman’s wide hips, a body full of hard work and muscles to show for it, that same glowing skin. He felt like a starving man who had just been fed. He was a machine that had just been plugged back in, a paint pot ready for a brush. Alive. 

“Sparrow?” His voice cracked, low and dark in the quiet of the warehouse.

You turned to him and took him in. He had deep smile lines at the corners of his eyes, and his beard had grown out in full. But, that voice. He was your John. 

“Hey, tiger,” you grinned, “You found me.” 

You jumped down from the vehicle, not knowing how this first meeting would go. Would he be distant? Had he moved on? Did he string a golden ring through his neck chain every morning, or was he single? Did he even want you anymore?

Your questions were all answered at once. 

He scooped you up in his arms, big and heavy, crushing you to his chest. You cried out in relief, saying his name, muffled, your face pressed into his broad chest,

“John…”

“Little bird.”

He pulled you away from him, cupping your cheeks in his hands, and you saw those bright blue irises gleam with fresh, unshed tears. Worry and concern were at war with hope and certainty all over his face, and without so much as a breath of hesitation, he crashed into you with a kiss.

The softness of his lips was so familiar, so comfortingly known, your body responded on instinct, remembering all of the rewards that came with this feeling of his skin on your skin. You celebrated in each other, tasting the inside of your mouths, licking each others’ tongues, trying to scent the other’s past. 

It was as if each kiss and suck and nip at each other was asking: Where have you been? 

Another kiss answered back: Away from you, my love. 

A deep caress with his tongue begged for clarity: Away? Come back to me.

You convinced him with a chaste kiss on his shaven chin: I’m here. 

And here was all that mattered.

AO3 Link

[tyttetardis]

Macbeth Q&A 18th Jan 2024 Part 1

Was lucky enough to get a ticket for the Member's Event at the Donmar Warehouse that took place on the 18th...with the price of the patronages I sure never thought I'd have gotten the chance, but luckily, they also let in some non-members 🥹❤️

The brilliant performance of Macbeth was followed by a very quick cleaning of the stage - thought for sure it would've taken them longer to remove the blood than like 5 minutes - followed by a lovely, little Q&A session.

The Q&A was led by Craig Gilbert (Literary manager) who talked to Annie Grace and Alasdair Macrae (Musicians and part of the acting ensemble) as well as Cush Jumbo and David Tennant.

Anyway, just gonna write down some of the stuff they talked about :) sorry if it's a bit messy! Might be spoilery if you haven't seen it yet but are going to!

To begin with Craig remarked that he didn't think he'd ever seen that many people staying behind for a Q&A before (While I was just wondering why some people even left!? Stressful!).

David introduced himself with "My real name is David "Thane of Paisely" Tennant - while Cush introduced herself with "I´m Cush Jumbo - there's only one of me".

First question was Craig asking them what it was that brought them to the Donmar to do Macbeth - to which David pretty much just replied that 1. It's the Donmar! 2. It's Macbeth! One of the greatest plays of all time in an amazingly intimate space - and that the theatre is famous for its quality of work. So he found it quite hard to think of a reason not to do it!

Cush said she'd worked there before and loves the theatre, how it's so intimate but also a great workspace. Followed by her saying she said yes because David asked her. She talked about how important it was for this play to do it together with the right actor playing opposite you.

David says Max Webster asked him about a year ago if he wanted to do the play - he gave him the dates - and since there weren't any obstacles in the way, David didn't have any excuse not to do it.

He then said that he had slightly avoided Macbeth - there sorta being the assumption that if you're Scottish and has done some Shakespeare plays before you have to do Macbeth. Which he joked was a bit odd since it's not like every Italian has to play Romeo. Then he mentioned that Macbeth is probably a bit more of a jock than he is - that it seemed more like a part for big, burly actors.

Max had laid out his initial ideas to David, a lot of which are in the final production, and David thought he seemed lovely, bright and clever and inventive plus it being the Donmar Warehouse! To which joked that he had last worked there 20 years ago - when he was 8 years old! "It's just one of those spaces" - friendly and epic at the same time where it's such a pleasure to be on the stage.

When Craig asked his next question concerning the sound of the play someone asked him to speak louder as she couldn't hear them - to which David joked that they've gotten so used to whispering. But also said sorry, and that they would!

Alasdair explained a bit about the process of the binaural sound - bit I find it a bit difficult to decipher it all correctly, sorry. He did say that a interesting part of it is that it allows them a controlled environment where they can put all the musicians (and even the bagpipes!) behind the soundproof box so "Poor David and Cush" doesn't have to shout over all the racket.

Craig asked David and Cush what their reaction was when they heard about the concept of the binaural soundscape - to which David replied that it didn't quite exist when they first came onboard - Cush joking they were tricked into it. Then she talked about her and David going on a workshop with Max to get a feeling of how it would all work - and get a sense of how it would sound to the audience, as this was one of the few times, they got to hear that side of it. Their experience of the play being completely different to the experience the audience has.

Cush said they can hear some of the sound - like she can hear some of the animal sounds and David can hear some of the stuff from the glass box - but most of their cues and information comes from timing with each other. She said they won't be able to ever hear what the audience hears - to which David joked "We're busy".

It felt like mixing medias - as it all went quite against their natural stagecraft instinct - but Cush found that in the long run it made things very interesting - like they don't have to worry about getting something whispered to each other - as the audience will hear it anyway.

David said the odd thing is that they don't really know what the experience truly is like. He mentioned that to the sides of the stage there's a speaker for them where they will get any cues that they need to hear. Like they can hear the witches - but they can't hear where they are "positioned" - so they have to learn how to place themselves to fit with what the audience hears. They don't hear everything, though. And the audio they hear is quite quiet, so it doesn't disturb what comes through the headphones.

He thinks it's been exciting - that it's a bit like a mix between film and theatre. It's happening live - but it's also like post-production is happening between them and the audience as it's going on. They just have to trust that the audience is hearing what they are supposed to for it all to make sense.

Cush said she thinks in 10 - 20 years, as these technologies has developed, doing theatre like this will feel a lot more normal - not that they will do it ALL the time, but that they will be doing it - whereas now it's still like an experiment. What Cush really like about the concept is that if was done in a much bigger theatre - then people in the cheapest seats would be able to have an experience much more similar to those in the most expensive seats - they'd be a lot more immersed into the action.

David then talks about how it feels extremely counterintuitive to not go on stage and speak loud enough that the people in the back row can also hear you. And usually, if they can't hear you, you aren't doing your job right! But then it felt very liberating. He loves it.

Cush then talked about how it felt odd waiting in the wings for a cue you can't hear - where you traditionally wait backstage and you can hear your cues, you can hear the rythm and know when it's your turn - so it was quite disconcerting to hear silence. So it's basically down to them now knowing the show and each other's timings - like if David is standing at a certain point, she knows how long she has before she needs to say/do something. So you have to watch each other more closely and really focus on what the others are doing.

David asked the musicians if they can hear everything inside the box, to which Annie replied that they get everything except some extra bits in the soundscape. But they can hear the actors on stage. Annie said it's actually a bit of a mystery to all of them what the audience actually experiences - how the big pictures actually look like - they just have to trust that it's there "Is it there?!".

Someone asked if they had had any adverse reactions from audiences to having to wear the headphones. Quite a bit of laughter all around :P then David said "There's the odd person" and something about if someone hadn't gotten the memo before turning up...but not sure how he ended the line. Then once again says that yes, there's the odd person who doesn't like it and that's fair enough.

The same audience member then said he could see the advantage of it in a big theatre where the distance is big, but not in a small place like the Donmar - to which David very quickly, rather passionately replied that it's not about projection, it's about being able to do things you wouldn't normally be able to do live - where they can speak so quietly that they can't even hear each other when standing next to each other. So even in such a small place, people wouldn't be able to hear that. It's about creating a different play - which isn't to everyone's taste and that's fair enough. But for a play that's been done a hundred and seven million times he thinks it's very valid to try and find a new way into the play - even if it's not for everyone.

Part 2

[mostlysignssomeportents]

How monopoly enshittified Amazon

In Bezos’s original plan, the company called “Amazon” was called “Relentless,” due to its ambition to be “Earth’s most customer-centric company.” Today, Amazon is an enshittified endless scroll of paid results, where winning depends on ad budgets, not quality.

Writing in Jeff Bezos’s newspaper The Washington Post, veteran tech reporter Geoffrey Fowler reports on the state of his boss’s “relentless” commitment to customer service. The state is grim.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2022/amazon-shopping-ads/

Search Amazon for “cat beds” and the entire first screen is ads. One of them is an ad for a dog carrier, which Amazon itself manufactures and sells, competing with the other sellers who bought that placement.

Scroll down one screen and you get some “organic” results — that is, results that represent Amazon’s best guess at the best products for your query. Scroll once more and yup, another entire screen of ads, these ones labeled “Highly rated.” One more scroll, and another screenful of ads, one for a dog product.

Keep scrolling, you’ll keep seeing ads, including ads you’ve already scrolled past. “On these first five screens, more than 50 percent of the space was dedicated to ads and Amazon touting its own products.” Amazon is a cesspit of ads: twice as many as Target, four times as many as Walmart.

How did we get here? We always knew that Amazon didn’t care about its suppliers, but being an Amazon customer has historically been a great deal — lots of selection, low prices, and a generous returns policy. How could “Earth’s most customer-centric” company become such a bad place to shop?

The answer is in Amazon’s $31b “ad” business. Amazon touts this widely, and analysts repeat it without any critical interrogation, proclaiming that Amazon is catching up with the Googbook ad-tech duopoly. But nearly all of that “ad” business isn’t ads at all — it’s payola.

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/27/not-an-ad/#shakedowns

Amazon charges its sellers billions of dollars a year through a gladiatorial combat where they compete to outspend each other to see who’ll get to the top of the search results. May the most margin-immolating, deep-pocketed spender win!

Why would sellers be willing to light billions of dollars on fire to get to the top of the Amazon search results?

Prime.

Most of us have Amazon Prime. Seriously — 82% of American households! Prime users only shop on Amazon. Seriously. More than 90% of Prime members start their search on Amazon, and if they find what they’re looking for, they stop there, too.

If you are a seller, you have to be on Amazon, otherwise no one will find your stuff and that means they won’t buy it. This is called a monopsony, the obscure inverse of monopoly, where a buyer has power over sellers.

But monopoly and monopsony are closely related phenomena. Monopsonies use control over buyers — the fact that we all have Prime — to exert control over sellers. This lets them force unfavorable terms onto sellers, like deeper discounts. In theory, this is good for use consumers, because prices go down. In practice, though…

Back in June 2021, DC Attorney General Karl Racine filed an antitrust suit against Amazon, because the company had used its monopoly over customers to force such unfavorable terms on sellers that prices were being driven up everywhere, not just on Amazon:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/01/you-are-here/#prime-facie

Here’s how that works: one of the unfavorable terms Amazon forces on sellers is “most favored nation” status (MFN), which means that Amazon sellers have to offer their lowest price on Amazon — they can’t sell more cheaply anywhere else.

Then Amazon hits sellers with fees. Lots of fees:

Fees to be listed on Prime (without which, your search result is buried at the bottom of an endless scroll):

Fees for Amazon warehouse fulfillment (without which, your search result is buried at the bottom of an endless scroll)

And finally, there’s payola — the “ads” you have to buy to outcompete the other people who are buying ads to outcompete you.

All told, these fees add up to 45% of the price you pay Amazon — sometimes more. Companies just don’t have 45% margins, because they exist in competitive markets. If I’m selling a bottle of detergent at a 45% markup, my rival will sell it at 40%, and then I have to drop to 35%, and so on.

But everyone has to sell on Amazon, and Amazon takes their 45% cut, which means that all these sellers have to raise prices. And, thanks to MFN, the sellers then have to charge the same price at Walmart, Target, and your local mom-and-pop shop.

Amazon’s monopoly (control over buyers) gives it a monopsony (control over sellers), which lets it raise prices everywhere, at Amazon and at every other retailer, even as it drives the companies that supply it into bankruptcy.

Amazon is no longer a place where a scrappy independent seller can find an audience for its products. In order to navigate the minefield Amazon lays for its sellers (who have no choice but to sell there), these indie companies are forced to sell out to gators (aggregators), which are now multi-billion-dollar businesses in their own right:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/10/monopoly-begets-monopoly/#gator-ade

This brings me back to the enshittification of Amazon search, AKA late-stage (platform) capitalism. Amazon’s dominance means that many products are now solely available on the platform. With the collapse of both physical and online retail, Prime isn’t so much a choice as a necessity.

Amazon has produced a planned economy run as capriciously as a Soviet smelting plant, but Party Secretary Bezos doesn’t even pretend to be a servant of the people. From his lordly seat aboard his penis-rocket, Bezos decides which products live and which ones die.

Remember that one of those search-results for a cat-bed was a product for dogs? Remember that Amazon made that dog product? How did that end up there? Well, if you’re a seller trying to make a living from cat-beds, your ad-spending is limited by your profit margin. Guess how much it costs Amazon to advertise on Amazon? Amazon is playing with its own chips, and it can always outbid the other players at the table.

Those Amazon own-brand products? They didn’t come out of a vacuum. Amazon monitors its own sellers’ performance, and creams off the best of them, cloning them and then putting its knockoffs above of the original product in search results (Bezos lied to Congress about this, then admitted it was true):

https://nypost.com/2021/10/18/jeff-bezos-may-have-lied-to-congress-about-amazon-practices-reps/

If you’ve read Chokepoint Capitalism, Rebecca Giblin’s and my new book about market concentration in the entertainment industry, this story will be a familiar one. You’ll recall that Amazon actually boasts about this process, calling it “the flywheel”:

https://twitter.com/rgibli/status/1561761732108107777

Everything that Amazon is doing to platform sellers, other platforms are doing to creators. You know how Amazon knocks off its sellers’ best products and then replaces them with its clones? That’s exactly what Spotify does to the ambient artists in its most popular playlists, replacing them with work-for-hire soundalikes who aren’t entitled to royalties.

You can learn more about how Spotify rips off its performers in the Chokepoint Capitalism chapter on Spotify; we made the audiobook version of that chapter a Spotify exclusive (it’s the only part of the book you can get on Spotify):

https://pluralistic.net/2022/09/12/streaming-doesnt-pay/#stunt-publishing

Entertainment and tech companies all want to be the only game in town for their creative labor force, because that lets them turn the screws to those workers, moving value from labor to shareholders.

Amazon is also the poster-child for this dynamic. For example, its Audible audiobook monopoly means that audiobook creators must sell on Audible, even though the #AudibleGate scandal revealed that the company has stolen hundreds of millions of dollars from these creators. (Our chapter on Audiblegate is the only part of our audiobook on Audible!)

https://pluralistic.net/2022/09/07/audible-exclusive/#audiblegate

Then there’s its Twitch division, where the company just admitted that it had been secretly paying its A-listers 70% of the total take for their streams. The company declared this to be unfair when the plebs were having half their wages clawed back by Amazon, so they fixed it by cutting the A-listers’ pay.

https://pluralistic.net/2022/09/22/amazon-vs-amazon/#pray-i-dont-alter-it-further

Twitch blamed the cut on the high cost of bandwidth for streaming. If that sounds reasonable to you, remember: Twitch buys its bandwidth from Amazon. As Sam Biddle wrote, “Amazon is charging Amazon so much money to run the business via Amazon that it has no choice but to take more money from streamers.”

https://twitter.com/samfbiddle/status/1572667269284777984

As Bezos suns himself aboard his yacht-so-big-it-has-a-smaller-yacht, we ask him to referee a game where he also owns one of the teams. Over and over again, he proves that he is not up to the task. Either his “relentless” customer focus was a sham, or the benefits of cheating are too tempting to ignore.

Historically, we understood that businesses couldn’t be trusted to be on both sides of a transaction. The “structural separation” doctrine is one of the vital pieces of policy we’ve lost over 40 years of antitrust neglect. It says that important platforms can’t compete with their users.

https://locusmag.com/2022/03/cory-doctorow-vertically-challenged/

For example, banks couldn’t own businesses that competed with their commercial borrowers. If you own Joe’s Pizza and your competitor is Citibank Pizza and you both have a hard month and can’t make your payment, will you trust that Citi called in your loan but not Citibank Pizza’s because they had a more promising business?

Today, all kinds of businesses have been credibly accused of self-preferencing: Google and Apple via their App Stores, Spotify via its playlists, consoles via their game stores, etc. Legislators have decided that the best way to fix this isn’t structural separation, but rather, rules against self-preferencing.

Under these rules, companies will have to put “the best” results at the top of their listings. This is doomed. When Apple says it put its own ebook store ahead of Bookshop.org’s app because it sincerely believes Apple Books is “better,” how will we argue with this? Maybe Apple really does believe that. Maybe it doesn’t. Maybe it does, but only because of motivated reasoning (“It is difficult to get a product manager to understand something, when their bonus depends on them not understanding it”).

The irony here is that these companies’ own lawyers know that a sincere promise of fairness is no assurance that your counterparty will act honorably. If the judge in Apple v. Epic was a major shareholder in Epic, or the brother-in-law of Epic’s CEO, Apple’s lawyers would bring down the roof demanding a new judge — even if the judge promised really sincerely to be neutral.

https://marker.medium.com/moral-hazard-and-monopoly-42e30eb159a8

Ultimately, it doesn’t matter if Amazon’s enshittification is because Bezos was a cynic or because he sold out. Once Amazon could make more money by screwing its customers, that screw-job became a fait accompli. That’s why it’s so important that the FTC win its bid to block the Activision-Microsoft merger:

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/11/23/exclusive-feds-likely-to-challenge-microsofts-69-billion-activision-takeover-00070787

The best time to prevent monopoly formation was 40 years ago. The second best time is now.

Anti-monopoly measures are slow and ponderous tools, but when it comes to tech companies, we have faster, more nimble ones. If we want to make it easy to compete with Amazon, we could — for example — use Adversarial Interoperability to turn it into a dumb pipe:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/08/01/dumb-pipes/#original-asin

That is, we could let local merchants use Amazon’s ASIN system to tag their own inventory and produce a realtime database. Customers could browse Amazon to find the things they wanted, with a browser plugin that turned “Buy It Now” into “Buy It Now at Joe’s Hardware”:

https://doctorow.medium.com/view-a-sku-32721d623aee

But this only works to the extent that Amazon’s search isn’t totally enshittified. To that end, Fowler has a few modest proposals of his own, like requiring that at least 50% of the first six screens be given over to real results, not ads.

“Perhaps 50 percent sounds like a lot to you? But even that rule would force Amazon to show us at least some of the most-relevant results on the first screen of our device…Amazon wouldn’t comment on this suggestion.”

[canduscata]

Episode 5 is one hell of a ride!! So this will be long!!

Firstly we have Susie with her father and you can see she doesn’t like the idea of Eddie being killed, so she starts thinking strategies to keep Eddie safe!! Bobby is a hardcore Susie Eddie shipper hahaha I think he wants both of them to realize they are good together.

Now, they play golf business partners 101!! (Partners who spend quality time together, stay together ;)) Here she mentions she wants him within the organisation… As an active member… I think that’s why she makes him part of the Belgium situation, to allure him with the idea of staying. 

When they are at the farm and the electricity runs off, Susie is girlboss!! But you can see that Eddie is second in command… Blanket goes with him and follows HIS orders!!

The travellers are introduced...

This whole interaction in the caravan was hilarious but I love that both of them are relaxed around each other, in sync when the travellers want in, they both talk at the same time, having exactly the same reaction!! Then they make a decision together!! About passing the weed with the help of the travellers!! They discussed it together like partners!! And Eddie is the one IN CHARGE of the whole exchange and she lets HIM!! 

The moments before the rager, JP takes the poutin and they look at one another. It drives me crazy how they need to find each other to say are you hearing this fucking shit!! They need each other's support!! I’m DEAD! 

These glimpses of the party!! Dancing together slowly… MARRIED!! I just can’t with the fact that the only time they aren’t discussing business or planning something, and they are truly relaxed in very different circumstances, they allow themselves to act on their feelings!! The way he looks at her, my boy is down bad!! AAAaggrrr

Get a man like Eddie that knowing you are hangover will go and say I’m gonna solve this!! Allowing you to rest. That is true love!! 

JP mentions they were cozy… She rolls her eyes (she remembers everything!!) I think because she can’t show she’s interested… she doesn’t allow her to accept her feelings for Eddie, and says it’s a work thing…  

She enters the warehouse and the duke is there leaning back on his chair and when he sees her, he SMIRKS!! (he remembers everything too!) Jesus just be together, pleaseeee!! Not only that, but he is in control, he follows her with his eyes and knows what she’s asking without her saying a word!!!

Here comes my favorite scene of the episode… He is smoking a cigar, she’s with her champagne, walking towards each other... You see it!! In their eyes, they are proud of each other, and what they accomplished!! Of what’s growing!! (and aroused ;))  HOOOOT!!! GOD!! I CAN’T!! 

Then the money is stolen and HE takes charge, of everything and goes to give Susie his opinion and SHE listens!! I love how she says WE need to take a trip to Zeebrugge, because she needs him!!! In the restaurant scene; I enjoy how they finish each other’s sentences, the way they are comfortable around one another, and how they aren't afraid to show their dark side... True love!!

I love how he knows she's disappointed with the Keith situation so he is the one pouring the whiskey and asking HER how she wants to handle the situation (wifey is sad)… and her a very poised woman, who would never take her shoes off in front of anyone, is with her BARE FEET up and relaxed on a couch with HIM!! The intimacy and familiarity!! Aarrggg!! They’ll be my death! And the trust talk, when she says you never know… because even though she should not trust him, she DOES!! 

When Susie is with Bobby discussing the business you can tell she’s clever and knows the business but Bobby is not listening, she is ten steps ahead!! My girl is THE BOSS!! LOVE HER!!

Eddie realizes there's no way out, he's angry and feels disregard for the whole Jethro's situation… I think he’s angry because she didn’t trust him by not telling him anything. 

Comment aside perhaps Geoff and Lady Sabrina’s love story shows us how Susie and Eddie story will be… the longing, the way they can’t be together (different backgrounds) but at the end they are!!

The denim jumpsuit drives me insaneeeee!!

[mitigatedchaos]

"It just comes from the warehouse"

So regarding, "It just comes from the warehouse," I have noticed this trend.

However, in my opinion, this is partly the result of what I'll call Capitalism 1 vs Capitalism 2.

Capitalism 1 - The company makes a product which you want to buy. They advertise to let you know that they have this product at a good price. They then sell you this product for money.

Capitalism 2 - The company tries to suck money out of your wallet during every lapse in attention you have. They make call center workers try to talk you out of cancelling your subscription, and you can only call to cancel between 2:30 PM and 3:30 PM on Wednesdays.

So management might come through and defund the warehouse, and now the warehouse is playing forklift ping pong with the packages. This is not something to be proud of. No one wants to defend this.

What "It just comes from the warehouse" guy is saying is that, "Even if you can't trust management, you can trust me. I won't lie to you on behalf of the company." If the warehouse is a juggling contest and the employee doesn't have the authority to fix the problem, this may actually be the good customer service.

If he doesn't have the authority to fix it, and doesn't know who does, at least he's not wasting more of the customer's time and resources.

In this situation, the customer can trust at least one layer of the company not to lie to him.

It's possible to do worse. For example, if the front-line employees are punished for the warehouse's screw-ups which they have no control over, then they have a much stronger incentive to just outright lie to the customer.

To get the desired attitude, you need at least two things.

First, the front-line employee has to be given the power to solve the problem. This will get you to, "That looks pretty damaged. Take it over to Debra at the repair desk and she'll look at it for you."

Second, the deeper parts of the company like the warehouse, manufacturing, support, and so on have to be of good quality, so that a crushed package arriving is unusual and not the default, and the employees feel they can rely on the rest of the company. If the packages are just always arriving crushed half the time no matter what the front-line employees say, it's demoralizing.

Then, once you have that, you can give the explicit instruction to "speak on behalf of the company" and have it actually followed. You probably will have to give that instruction these days.

[razzmatome]

First

         Lifting on her toes, she pressed her lips to his. She saw his eyes narrow further, but they didn’t close. He was still waiting to see how far she was willing to go.

         Which annoyed her. He annoyed her.

Pairing: Jude/fOC

Words: 2296

CW: Mild suggestive sexual behaviour

Prompt: First kiss

A/N: First fic in a long time but when the prompt was posted in the Discord, my brain went into hyper drive. OC isn't Kate but got caught up with Jude through other means. Headers and borders from @/natimiles

         She was not cut out for physical activity.

         Panting as she ran, Bea could only focus on making sure she didn’t trip over her own feet. The vice grip Jude had on her wrist told her he was unlikely to stop if she fell and being hauled through streets and back alleys was embarrassing enough as it was. She didn’t need to add insult to injury and have him drag her as well.

         But, God, she needed him to stop running!

         They’d been going to check one of his warehouses for a new shipment when he’d realised they were being followed. He hadn’t wasted any time hustling her into an alleyway to cut across town. But it hadn’t done any good as they’d run into even more people who’d ‘wanted to have a word with Mr Jazza’.

         Now they were running. Because she was there. If he’d been alone, he probably would have dealt with them, but he’d made her come along because it was her shipment that had come in. She had tried to tell him that it was fine, that she could check them later, but no. He’d wanted her there, telling her it was pointless for him to check the quality of the fabric later when they could check it now. But now she was a liability to him instead of just an annoyance.

         “J-Jude,” she gasped as he turned down another alley. “Stop!”

         She heard the sharp noise he made but he didn’t slow. At this rate, she was going to pass out. A sharp ache was throbbing in her side and she couldn’t breathe. She needed him to stop. Surely, they’d gone far enough and didn’t need to keep up this pace.

         It finally happened when he rounded a corner sharply. She overbalanced and stumbled. There was no time to react, and she resigned herself to the pain that was coming. Along with the tongue lashing that was sure to come immediately after.

         But it didn’t. Jude pulled on her arm as he turned, keeping her from completely tipping over, and grunted as she fell into him. She felt him stiffen as he braced them both to keep them out of the dirt.

         When he didn’t say anything, she gripped his shirt and fought to get her breathing back under control. Her everything felt like it was on fire and-

         “We ain’t got time to stop, princess.”

         -he was completely fine. Maybe a little winded but fine. Because this was a normal part of his life. She sucked in a deep breath and shook her head. “You go,” she panted.

         “Ha? The fuck you sayin’? They saw ya with me,” he said shortly, pulling away from her and not letting go of her arm. “You think they’re just gonna let ya walk away?”

         She knew that but she was going to slow him down. She could tuck away somewhere to hide and make her way back to safety after they’d passed. Maybe it was wrong to use him as bait to save her own skin, but this was his fault in the first place.

         He took a step back toward her when she didn’t move, making her head tip back to meet his gaze. “Ya thinkin’ of doin’ somethin’ dumb, princess? Somethin’ noble?” he sneered.

         Hiding was hardly noble. “I’m going to fucking pass out,” she snapped back. “I can’t run anymore!”

         “Quit yer yappin’. If you can do that, you can run.”

         She was going to kill him. Tugging on her arm, she hissed as he held on tighter. “Jude, just let-”

         “We’re wastin’ time.”

         “No!” she said, digging her heels in. She could not run anymore!

         “We don’t have time to-”

         “Spread out and find them!”

         Her spine stiffened even as Jude swore sharply at the shout that was far too close for comfort. She reached for his hand, trying to pry his grip off her. “Jude, just go!” she said tightly.

         “Not happenin’ and now yer gonna owe me for this shit.”

         God, what was he going to do? Fight all of them? When he stepped in front of her, she realised he fully intended to do that. She gaped at his back, her thoughts whirling. How was this better than him leaving her behind? He thought she had had noble thoughts? What was this?! It certainly wasn’t going to end with him walking away unscathed and if he got hurt because she was here, she’d owe him even more. She was tired of owing him.

         Looking around, she grabbed the back of his coat and pulled.

         “What the f-”

         “Shh!” Bea snapped, pulling him into a shadowed alcove between buildings. This was a long shot and probably dumb. She could have made it easier, but her sister would kill her if she ever found out she exposed her abilities to anyone. Even if this was a life or death situation, Cate would tell her she wasn’t allowed to do it unless she was prepared to kill everyone around her who saw.

         “This ain’t gonna work,” he growled, crowding into her despite his words.

         She backed into the wall, ignoring how close he was to her. It wasn’t a great idea but if it did come down to a fight, it would be harder for anyone to get past him to use her against him. But her heart was hammering in her chest because he was right. God, this wasn’t going to be enough. They wouldn’t be clearly seen if someone went running past but if they looked back? Maybe she should have tried to push her tired body and kept running. Maybe she should have tried harder to get him to leave her behind. Maybe-

         “Calm down,” Jude muttered. “Yer breathin’ too loud.”

         She was? She couldn’t hear it over the pounding of her heart. This wasn’t enough. They were going to be found unless she did something more. Maybe she could warp the shadows without him realising. It would be tricky without moving her hands and he was so close he was sure to feel her moving. Was there anything else she could do? Anything that didn’t involve using her magic?

         “Princess, quit-” He grunted when she reached up to grab his face.

         This was absolutely a dumb idea, but she was out of good ones. Bea expected him to resist her, he never did what she wanted, but he leaned in when she pulled on him. A curious light was in his eyes, almost like he was waiting to see if she was bold enough to follow through with where they both knew she was going.

         She could feel his breath on her lips, could smell the tobacco on it. But she was focused on his eyes. They’d narrowed but she could still see that damned look in them, daring her to do it.

         “Check that way!”

         Lifting on her toes, she pressed her lips to his. She saw his eyes narrow further, but they didn’t close. He was still waiting to see how far she was willing to go.

         Which annoyed her. He annoyed her.

         She slipped her fingers into his hair, holding him to her. It had to be convincing if they were spotted. They needed to look like a couple stealing a moment in the shadows, not a pair on the run. But she couldn’t do it by herself and right now she was.

         Pulling just away from him, she breathed, “You ass.”

         Oh, she recognised that smug smirk. He wanted her to work for it. This was her idea so it was up to her to do it.

         Ass, she repeated silently. But she leaned in again, slanting her mouth over his. He was watching her still, that smugness hanging in the air around him. Would he rather fight them instead of kissing her? Was this really so horrible that he’d rather risk getting hurt?

         Her irritation got the better of her and she bit his lip.

         His eyes widened a fraction before she felt something shift in him.

         Gasping as he pressed fully into her, her fingers dug into his hair as he deepened the kiss. Her eyes squeezed shut as he didn’t let up. Damn it, she’d wanted him to respond but she hadn’t expected this from him! The kiss was rough and now she was struggling to breathe for an entirely new reason. All she could feel and taste was him and it was overwhelming.

         Hands grasped her hips, holding her right where he wanted. She hissed as his fingers squeezed through her clothes and dug into soft flesh. There were going to be bruises. She already knew her wrist was going to be covered in them and now he was marking her further.

         “Can’t keep up, princess?”

         Damn him. Cracking her eyes open, she was surprised he was still so close. Pale eyes caught her gaze almost immediately but it was the hint of heat in them that truly caught her off-guard.

         “Jude.” She didn’t get to say more as they both heard feet pounding down the alleyway and his mouth found hers again.

         It was hard not to moan as he didn’t hesitate, biting her lip this time. She felt him shift a little before she jumped when he gripped her leg and hauled it up against his hip. Her cheeks heated as cool air hit her skin, her skirt rucking up to expose far more than she wanted, and one hand dropped to his shoulder to push at him. Surely that was too far!

         But she stopped when she heard a low whistle come from behind him. “Well, damn!”

         Jude’s fingers dug into her thigh and he crowded closer between her legs. His kiss was still rough, but it was clear he was paying attention to whoever had spotted them. It seemed they were in the shadows enough that they weren’t immediately recognised but would that last if they couldn’t make this look real.

         Throwing caution to the wind, Bea hooked her leg around his hips and let herself moan. She hated that it wasn’t entirely fake. Her annoyance at him and all of this aside…he did feel far too good settled against her like this.

         “Oi, what are you doin’?”

         Her heart sank and Jude tensed. “No, wait,” she whispered as he leaned back from her.

         “Had yer chance, princess,” he muttered. “Now-”

         “Leave a man alone,” another voice yelled. “We ain’t got business with them!”

         “But-”

         “You really think a man like Jazza is gonna stop to get his dick wet? Get out of there! We’re gonna lose them!”

         Bea held her breath as they listened to the goons leave. Had it…really worked? She sighed before yelping when he snapped the strap of her garter against her thigh. “Excuse me!” she snapped, trying to move away from him.

         He didn’t budge, eyeing her for a long moment. “Didn’t know ya had that in ya.”

         She huffed and pushed at him. “Let go,” she said tightly.

         Her mouth flattened when he snapped the garter again, lifting it further this time. Great. A welt to add to the bruises because she was sure there were impressions of his fingertips on the back of her thigh from how hard he’d been holding it. “Yer the one clingin’ to me,” he pointed out.

         Her fingers jerked open as she realised she was still clutching at the back of his head. But she couldn’t do anything about the leg he was holding. “Jude,” she said, trying to keep calm. “Let go.”

         She felt him toying with the garter again and wanted to smack him when he tugged on it. But the snap wasn’t as hard this time and his hand dropped from her.

         Her leg came down fast, a small hiss leaving her as the heel of her shoe jostled her ankle, and she quickly reached to smooth her skirt down as he stepped back. She watched him out of the corner of her eye as he lit a cigarette and kept an eye on the alley. Once again, he seemed completely unbothered by anything that had transpired. Well, no, not entirely. She pressed her lips together, an amused little huff leaving her as she saw that his hair was messed from her hands.

         “Somethin’ funny?”

         She could not tell him…but someone would and he would know that she hadn’t. “Stand still,” she muttered, reaching out to smooth his hair back into place. She’d messed it up; it was only proper for her to fix it.

         He was eyeing her again and slowly exhaled a long stream of smoke once she stepped back from him. “Make up yer mind, princess,” he muttered, turning away from her.

         About what? She moved after him when he started to leave their little alcove before almost running into him when he stopped suddenly to look at her. “What?’ Bea asked warily.

         Jude rolled his eyes at her. “Ya got us out of that mess so I owe ya for that and for the other thing.”

         “What other thing?”

         “Ya gonna look me in the eyes and tell me ya didn’t just waste your first kiss on someone like me?”

         Her cheeks heated but she didn’t say anything as she looked away from him. “I don’t need anything for that,” she mumbled.

         “Ha, liked it that much, did ya?”

         “I like being alive, Jude.”

         “Shouldn’t be around me then. But I clear my debts, princess, and this won’t be any different.”

         It was just a kiss. If it had mattered to her that much, she wouldn’t have done it in the first place. But as she followed him back toward the main street, she couldn’t help wondering what he considered equivalent payment for a first kiss.

[sterekchub]

Derek gets into craft beer brewing to make werewolf friendly beers. Along the way he develops a beer belly…which only blossoms further the more into it he gets. Eventually he has a werewolf brewing company where his employees all refer to him as “the tank” based on his size.

Derek with a beer belly is...my EVERYTHING. He has to eventually open his own company because Stiles makes a few too many jokes about Derek and how he's becoming a personal beer keg and forgot a beer warehouse- Derek's gut is getting big enough to be a storage tank! Derek in tight jeans and a company T-shirt, love handles poking out the top, belly peeking out of the bottom of his shirt, and jeans so tightly stretched across his ass they're starting to look transparent. He's usually too busy at work to eat so he does a lot of "liquid lunches" but when he does go to company BBQs or has a taco truck come to the brewery (or when he finally goes on a date with Stiles)- it's obvious all that beer drinking has stretched out his stomach capacity and given him a BIG appetite. Most of the time- Derek is casually sipping the wolfsbane free beers to do quality and flavor control to avoid getting drunk. But on more than one occasion Stiles has run into a slightly tipsy Derek, hiccupping and burping and a little less aware of personal space. There's been a few times Stiles has been wedged against a doorway by Derek's bulk, or watched as Derek leans too heavily against a table and lets out a surprised belch as his belly spreads out against the surface. Derek who is a little grumpy and socially awkward so he empties at least a keg or two at the company Christmas party before he can get the courage to ask out Stiles... Ends up so filled with beer, Stiles swears he can hear it sloshing in Derek's stretched gut, his belly wobbling and slightly swaying back and forth with each unsteady step. AND on the subject of Derek "The tank" - the specific stages of Derek swelling with beer. 1. The "I'm not going to drink too much." He tells Stiles not to be ridiculous, he is having a beer or two because it's his job. Nothing more, they don't need a repeat of last week. 2. "Bloated and tipsy" is next. Derek hasn't been skinny enough to actually look bloated, but he reaches a point of "full" and his stomach is gurgling and stretching more with bubbles and the sloshing, carb- heavy weight building and building. It's really the stage MOST coworkers find him in, the middle of his day, happily chugging beer while he's sitting at his computer, one hand occasionally stifling burps as he barks out orders. 3. "Overloaded" comes next, when Derek is relaxed enough to not feel on edge around his coworkers, when he's laughing and joking like he's friends and not just the boss. He gets physical and affectionate with Stiles, will jokingly use his bulk to pin him against the wall (or occasionally go through with his threats to sit on him, which resulted in at least 2 broken chairs). Starts getting the lumbering waddle to his walk, like he's got a water-filled balloon attached to his middle, ready to burst. 4. The final stage is the "Team effort to fill the tank" when Derek is so full - he can't even find the energy to speak in full sentences. Mostly belches out "hic one buaaaaaarp more!" or "I got uaaaarp room for another bwarrrrp one!" It's become a workplace competition to bet how many more beers they can pour down Derek's throat. How wide Derek's gut will have swollen by the end of it.

[unhonestlymirror]

It's KAB time.

I will tell you about one more thing that we encounter here every day. These are KABs (guided aerial bomb), or FABs. Aviation bombs of great power. This is one of the most terrible things that I encountered in the war. Very destructive and the occupiers use these bombs en masse.

You can suddenly come under fire and not even have time to get scared. Hitting a bullet or bursting a mine is a moment but you hear the bomb before it explodes. You hear it approaching with a characteristic sound. And you understand that if it flies at you, there are few chances.

Roughly speaking, there are two types of gliding bombs. Those that were created as controlled (UPAB-500B and 1500B) from the very beginning and modified FABs (high-explosive aviation bombs of general purpose), to which correction and flight control modules are attached These are FAB-250, FAB-500, FAB-1500.

They are not done very well, but the russians have a lot of them, and they can quickly equip the required number of bombs. Enemy planes fly up 40-50 km to the battle line, launch these bombs. They fly to their target and hit it. If they hit, of course.

Something about the quality and design of processing. We often find remnants of control modules as in the photo.

It is obvious that the design provides for quick manufacturing, and the charter is minus the quality. Sometimes bombs fall, but do not explode.

This "specimen" actually lay under our feet for some time. Over time, it was taken away from here and, I think, blown up somewhere away from where it could do harm. They aimed at the road, or at something that was travelling by it.

I can assume that the russians, as often happens, saw ideas about such "recycling" of old bombs in the West. They liked JDAM's technical solution. Their propaganda likes to mention it in the context of the aerial bombardment campaign of Yugoslavia.

One of the russian weapons experts referred to this system (which includes a GPS-based guidance system and wings). He called it the "bra bomb." The russians have always had problems with naming.

The very range of dropping guided air bombs depends on the flight parameters of the carrier - speed and altitude. Accordingly, the higher and faster the aircraft drops, the farther such bombs will fly. KABs are considered a difficult target to shoot down since the bomb carrier does not enter the area of ​​​​air defence.

In addition, we can not afford to keep stationary air defence systems near the front because there are not enough of them to cover objects in the rear. Moreover, as soon as the air defence systems are brought closer to the front, the resistance to their destruction also increases. In a word, it is impossible to reliably protect yourself from KABs here at the front. There is no suitable resource. And even if there was, it would not always be possible anyway.

The russians use these bombs every day and in large numbers. The targets are different. The positions of our units are in the immediate vicinity of the contact line. Logistics routes. Places of possible location of equipment, headquarters, warehouses, etc. They do not hesitate to shoot on the roads and in their own trenches, which were occupied by the Armed Forces. There is a defined list of roads and logistics routes. From time to time, bombs fall either next to these roads or even on them. However, in this case, the effect is questionable.

Daily is that the russians conduct thorough aerial reconnaissance of various depths. Near the contact line, in our rear. These are the same commercial drones as ours, as well as their regular "wings" - Orlans, Zaly, Superkams. Based on the results of the intelligence, they are trying to launch airstrikes at the corresponding points. I don't know what the accuracy statistics of these strikes are, but from what I could assess with my own eyes, I would say that it is not high.

There are objects that the russians have been shooting at for several months in a row and can not hit. Fields, towns, and villages are strewn with debris from these bombs. The worst thing is that they often purposefully launch anti-aircraft missiles at residential buildings, trying to reach infrastructure facilities. Many settlements were destroyed or hopelessly damaged by these bombs. They simply turn walnuts and neighbouring villages into crushed stone and clay.

They use them both during the day and at night. The graphs look variable. In a certain period, concentrated and massive airstrikes took place at night. For example, during the day, they reconnoitred something, and with the onset of darkness, begin shelling the specified coordinates. During the day, the strikes were carried out as a result of more operational reconnaissance or a reaction to some events. For example, the occupiers could receive information that equipment had passed in a certain place. Then they raise the plane and launch a bomb there. Even if belatedly.

Another example. When another KA-52 government helicopter was shot down, they launched 4 bombs on the square, where they thought the MANPADS missile might have come from. With the corresponding accuracy that I have already spoken about. We have repeatedly seen bomb explosions during operation. This solves the problem of high losses of battleboards. Aircraft become unreachable for MANPADS. On the other hand, the bomb's flight time increases, and we have more time to hide if there is such an opportunity.

This story is primarily about how we move forward in a situation where the enemy has air superiority. Under constant airstrikes. When the targets are located in the steppe, like in the palm of your hand, the surrounding fields are mined, and the narrow corridors for movement are restricted and shot at. I can't imagine anyone considering launching a ground offensive without the necessary air assets. But the Armed Forces do it and have success.

[digi-tama-in-your-pocket]

PSA virtual pet collectors, don't buy these cheap v-pets that keep popping up on Ebay

I've noticed these things popping up all over the place. The packaging is very cute, so it's tempting to check it out. But don't. You'll notice almost every single listing here is "new in box" which likely means it's not opened and untested. I don't think that's a coincidence. Likely several crates of these were discovered in a warehouse somewhere and auctioned off to "professional reseller" clowns who take advantage of hobbyists. The only thing they have going for them is that they're usually cheap ( unless the "professional reseller" is an idiot who thinks all old things are worth whatever they think they can get away with. ) and they have a cute design and shell.

I have actually gotten several of these, at first it was intentional because a V-pet discord group told me what they were, they were simply repackaged Hitorikko pets, which were going for a little bit more money than these more cute ones online. So I bought one of each... and none of them worked. Like, they power on, they make noise, the buttons work, but... nobody should be okay with screens like these.

It's easy to look at these and tell me I got a bad batch from a seller who stored them improperly.

Nope.

I thought the same thing at first, but because I wanted a working one, I actually ended up with 9 of these things from various sellers. I tried getting them from a different seller, and then some sellers included them in lots.... every. Single. One. They are all like this.

These are probably very cheaply made defective bootlegs, or they didn't pass quality control and got stowed in a warehouse, only to be auctioned off to the aforementioned e-bay circus entertainers.

If you want this pet, just buy a legit Hitorikko. It won't have a shell this cute, and the packaging has boring clipart-core animals. But they're much more likely to work than the ones with the cute pictures. Maybe it's possible to do a shell swap if you snag some of the bootlegs for cheap, but I'm not comfortable doing that. Besides, I have not seen a fish version of these bootleg pets, nor a dinosaur version of the Hitorikko. Again, look for this package if you want the programming without the shit screen ( Shit screen still entirely possible to get on legit Hitorikko. Never buy vintage pets if they're not willing to show the screen functioning. )

[scorpiussage]

NSFW Alphabet - Johnathan Crane (Scarecrow) 

- I’m not much of a DC fan so this is entirely based off the Nolan movies and what we see of Cillian Murphy’s Scarecrow 

A = Aftercare (What they’re like after sex)

Not an aftercare man at all. For real, you’d be lucky if he stayed in bed next to you after he’s done fucking you - he’s busy and got things to do and places to be. 

But, I think that if you caught him at a vulnerable moment (Scarecrow giving him extra grief or him struggling with the Batman) he might indulge in some cuddling but it would be very short lived and he’d expect you to never bring it up again.

B = Body part (Their favourite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

Loves someone with a brilliant mind, body doesn’t matter to him at all. He just wants someone who’s crazy matches his crazy. 

He’s literally so vain though, like he will not leave the house unless he looks perfect and put together. 

C = Cum (Anything to do with cum basically… I’m a disgusting person)

He doesn’t really have much of a preference to where he cums, just that he does. Most of the time it’ll be in you but he has been known to like to finish on your face from time to time. 

D = Dirty Secret (Pretty self explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

Scarecrow is obv his big secret, but I think that if he took the time to pursue a relationship with you, it would be because both him and Scarecrow are attracted to you. So that might be a dirty secret of his, that he likes to let the other guy take control some times so that he can get his quality time in with you too.

E = Experience (How experienced are they? Do they know what they’re doing?)

Not very experienced, he’s always been a huge dork and also very career driven so he’s never put any time into having sex. That said, he’s incredibly knowledgeable about the human body so even though he’s not very experienced, he knows all the best places to touch you.

F = Favourite Position (idk the names of any sex positions so Im just going try and describe them)

Johnathan is a massive control freak and so his favorite positions are all ones that put him in control of you. You on your knees with your face pressed into the mattress and your hands tied behind your back is a particular favorite of his. 

G = Goofy (Are they more serious in the moment, or are they humorous, etc)

He is literally not capable of being goofy and silly. It’s just not who he is. So sex will always be incredibly intense and serious.

I = Intimacy (How are they during the moment, romantic aspect…)

Not very intimate nor romantic (though he could be if he wanted to, he just doesn’t want to) 

Don’t get it twisted though, he’s possessive and even though he may not show his affections like other people, you belong to him and he’ll remind you of it regularly. 

J = Jack Off (Masturbation headcanon)

Doesn’t masturbate beyond getting excess energy out. He’s not got the time for that.

K = Kink (One or more of their kinks)

He’s got a huge doctor/patient kink to the point he’d convince you to get admitted to Arkham so that he could be your doctor and “give you treatments” 😉 

L = Location (Favourite places to do the do)

His office at Arkham or whatever seedy warehouse he’s using that week, he’s not picky.

M = Motivation (What turns them on, gets them going)

Control and fear are pretty obvious motivators for him. 

N = NO (Something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

Anything church or religion related is a big yikes to him. 

O = Oral (Preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc)

He will only give you head if it means a new way to dominate and control you into doing something he wants. That’s just sort of his personality. 

He’s personally pretty eh about receiving. It feels good and makes him cum, but he could also get that from fucking you so it’s not a necessity.

P = Pace (Are they fast and rough? Slow and sensual? etc.)

Not slow or fast so much as brutal and intense. Getting fucked by Johnathan is absolutely world ending and also too much. You’ll only be able to handle one round at a time from him. 

Q = Quickie (Their opinions on quickies rather than proper sex, how often, etc.)

He’s not one for quickies usually just because he’s very work focused and you absolutely will not tear him away from whatever new thing he’s doing. He has allotted time set aside to fuck you and he will not do it outside of that time.

R = Risk (Are they game to experiment, do they take risks, etc.)

He loves taking risks, it’s sort of his whole thing because there’s a tie in to fear. You have to be someone who will go along with whatever he wants because if you don’t, he’ll get bored with you very fast.

S = Stamina (How many rounds can they go for, how long do they last…)

Average stamina. He could probably do sexathons but he doesn’t have the time for that, his experiments take priority. 

T = Toy (Do they own toys? Do they use them? On a partner or themselves?)

He doesn’t own toys personally but if you own them, he’ll for sure use them on you regularly. 

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

Nothing would turn him on more than teasing you to the point of tears. He’s an absolute sadist about that and he’s unapologetic about it too. 

V = Volume (How loud they are, what sounds they make)

Not loud, actually very quiet but when Scarecrow is in the drivers seat, he does a lot of dirty talk. 

W = Wild Card (Get a random headcanon for the character of your choice)

He’s the kind of man who loves one and only one. So if you start a relationship with him, there’s no ending that relationship, you’re his forever. 

X = X-Ray (Let’s see what’s going on in those pants, picture or words)

Long and average width. Cock size doesn’t matter with a guy like this, he’ll make you cum regardless. 

Y = Yearning (How high is their sex drive?)

Pretty low sex drive, he’s not really someone who spends a lot of time thinking about sex. 

Z = ZZZ (… how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

He doesn’t sleep until he’s certain he’s in a safe location. So unless you do it at his place, he’s not one to fuck and then immediately fall asleep.