#we can already tell that this has been in the works since 2020

[dredshirtroberts]

i'm remembering why i don't stay on dating apps for long and why i have a hard time making connections with folks in general. if i have to teach one more fucking person about polite conversation with people you do not know yet, i swear to GOD.

[honestlywynter]

Stop Obsessing Over The Void And Subliminals (kinda rude rant)

as a person who started interest in the loa in late 2020 discovering subliminals. LOA is simple, idk why it took me 4 years to understand. manifesting is easy.

if you have struggles with manifesting. don't panic imma help you from being like me 😜.

1. Realize you are in control

Stop STOP and i mean fucking STOP. Giving the void and subliminals so much fucking power and bitching about it " OH MY GOSH i didnt enter the void wtf am i gonna doooo 😪 " or " THE SUBLIMINAL SAID 5 Seconds and it would work where is my SP? "

like gorl u sound desperate as fuckkkkk lol

but heres how we change this. first the problem is YOU. why the fuck you depending on some tool? thats like me depending on my feet to make my decisions and getting mad when my feet dont say shit back to me. LOL

but no you just need to strengthen your self concept. you can do this BYYYYY

- repeating affirmations during the day

- changing your thoughts

- Rampages

- &&&& Drumroll pleaaaaseeeee .... 🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁

Sleep affirmations. they slip into your consciousness at night :)....At the end i will link my FAVORITE VIDEOS, for the self concept.

2. MANIFEST

oh shit you thought this was gon be long huh? no bookie its just two things. better your self concept and start manifesting. NOW i am gonna some tips.

stop giving the 3d power when you make the 3d...

EXAMPLE:

you start your day saying " oh i have my ideal body im soooo freaking happy i finally did it, like i been x pounds for everrr and i love my body "

and then the second you look in the mirror you like " damn bruh i wish i had my ideal body "

cause like why tf did you just ruin your fucking manifestation, why did you fucking react????

When you look in that mirror this is what they mean by " old story ".

Instead, look in the mirror and close your eyes and imagine your ideal body, or just deny it. " who the fuck is that in the mirror, gorll ik thats not me cause i got my ideal body ive had it since 1823 "

ALSO

dont let your thoughts rule u, u rule them. if you are in public and think " omg they looking at me cause think im big" NO dont do that...

instead say

" Girl they looking at me bc i got my ideal body, and i been had it since a baby in da tummy ahh"

exactly change that mindset. thats it. all you have to do is catch yourself, improve your thoughts and your self concept will be thru the mf roof. So den you can manifest in a snap of a fingerrr. period thats the magic 🪄 sauce bookie. also dont say will say have cause you already have it bookie bear ;)

im open for questions and i am open to telling what ive manifested WITHOUT some dumb ass void or subliminal lol.

heres the video; BTW LOOK AT HER PAGE SHE HAS MUCH MORE.

[jmtorres]

i just saw a post about how we just have to "live with" covid and wanting more protections from our government is unreasonable because we'll never wipe it out, it jumps species and is in all sorts of animal populations (like, true ok) so why even try to

and apparently the argument was aimed at people (who I haven't seen in the wild) who are arguing we should still be in lockdown. and i have mixed feelings about the idea of extended lockdown or attenuating isolations; but my main feeling at this point is not that the government should keep us apart but that the government should be trying to make it safer for us to be together

things the government could/should be doing about covid:

we know that ventilation/air movement helps a shitton. we should be incentivizing upgrades to ventilation systems in all public buildings with shit like rebates or tax deductions, while phasing in eventual legal requirements. (and uh. it has occurred to me that the US might actually be doing this sideways by there's currently this decade enormous tax incentives in re energy efficient upgrades for slowing climate change and you know. energy efficient hvac does tend to improve ventilation. extra point to biden here.)

mandatory paid sick leave so workers aren't under social or economic pressure to work when sick

passing out RT-LAMP tests like metrix that actually work instead of the rapid antigen tests that have become less and less reliable as the virus mutates

i don't know how you'd write this law but like 95% or more of computer-based work can be done remotely and companies should not be allowed to force people to return to the office. I know there's people who want to be back in person and I'm not saying they should be forced to stay home but ffs I know of at least two people CLOSE to me who worked remotely before the pandemic and at some point their workplaces tried to tell them they weren't allowed to do that anymore despite the pre-existing contracts. stop canceling remote work for people that want, need, or prefer it.

for that matter, every college lecture that was an online class during covid should still be offered as an online class, there is no reason to force students into auditoriums in person. you got the communications infrastructure up and running, why are you tearing it down. give people the OPTION. it increases accessibility for everyone!

covid vaccine immunity lasts about four months. this should be well-publicized and everyone should be able to re-up for free every four months. "every year, like the flu vaccine" is demonstrably not often enough. actually "for free" isn't good enough start handing out $10 gift cards you will be shocked at how many people who are resistant to the idea of vaccines will fold for $10 a shot

are there already laws on the books about masks in medical settings that some medical professionals are blatantly ignoring because they forgot what best practices were before the plague and they're 'tired of masking'? if not, pass laws. if so, fucking enforce them

oh another incentives for upgrades phasing into legal requirements thing: brass doorknobs and railings over stainless steel or whatever. microbes do not survive on brass surfaces

i mean. i know this one sounds too extreme to a lot of people but. UBI.

most if not all of these measures will prevent or ameliorate other pandemics of different diseases that may arise in the future. and just. generally improve our health and quality of life for other reasons.

I haven't felt safe to go to a concert since 2020. Maybe if I knew a venue was legally required to have ventilation to a certain standard and that none of the ticket takers and ushers were on the job sick to avoid risking loss of paycheck or job, and knew a larger percentage of the crowd had up to date vaccinations--maybe if any or all that, I might ever feel comfortable going to a show again.

wouldn't it be nice if those of us who have been disabled, by covid or other conditions, had accessible remote options but also occasionally felt safe enough to interact with and participate in wider society?

one of the arguments on the post I saw was how isolation was massively psychologically damaging and various strata of society were affected in all sorts of ways, from undersocialized kids to increased depression in--well across the board, I think. and here's the thing: WE KNOW. PEOPLE WITH CHRONIC HEALTH CONDITIONS, LONG COVID OR OTHERWISE, KNOW ISOLATION SUCKS REAL BAD. because we, both for our own health and due to disability ostracism, are still isolating and isolated more than most.

what are you as individuals or societies, what are our governments, doing to help make it safe and accessible to rejoin you????

[marleemutt]

TLDR: im a black trans artist who can use some help right now following the sudden passing of my only sister - her doberman is now the responsibility of my parents and we can use help for his food, supplements, toys etc.

Kofi (help me send Chewy orders to my parent's house)

Wishlist (literally send him things like toys, treats, etc.)

⬇️ more info ⬇️

hey guys

some of you might be aware of this already, but early October, my eldest sibling & only sister suddenly passed away due to a seizure, she had been dealing with epilepsy her whole life.

this has been incredibly difficult for me, and my family. her passing was incredibly sudden, she was only 30.

for the past month or so ive been struggling to find any motivation to draw, and barely able to work.

she was the incredibly devoted owner of a doberman named Remi(Ramsey). Me and my sister traveled 4 hours to pick him up three years ago. He's a goofball who tears up socks and needs constant supervision. My parents love him, but I can tell he is a lot of work for two people who have fulltime jobs and have lived long lives.

I'm going to try to help them take care of him as much as possible, I feel that it's the least we can do to honor my sister's memory, since she loved him so deeply.

My sister always wanted a doberman, for years she would watch videos about dobermans and talk about them to anyone who would listen.

Remi wasn't easy to raise - I shared a room with my sister when she got him in 2020, she still worked a 9-5, five days a week, so I was his nanny for most of his difficult childhood. I was his chew toy for the first year of his life about - but that only made him bond closer to me. If he wasn't following my sister, I was choice #2. Dobermans are "velcro dogs", they were bred to guard their owners, and because of this, they are fiercely loyal. I've been moved out of my parent's place for going on 3 years, and my sister had just moved with Remi out a few months prior to her passing.

A week before my sister's sudden passing, we had to board Remi at my dog daycare job while my family and I took a trip out of state. When dropping him off, although he was happy to see me again for the first time in months, the moment my sister turned her back to him he began to panic. He got through the boarding all right but my coworkers told me he would cry and wait by the door for me or her. When my sister picked him up, they said he jumped all 80+lbs into her arms.

Since my sister's passing, Remi has been directionless. He's with my family, people he trusts, but he's bored, confused, and heartbroken. My sister would often take him to the dog park, social events, on runs, etc. but my parent's can't do that in their age. If my apartment allowed large dogs, I would take him, but I can't, and I see him maybe twice a month if possible.

Ramsey's Christmas List

I made a christmas list for him of things that might help my parents better take care of him. We're trying different food brands out because he struggles with frequent stomach issues, and we can't seem to figure out what food my sister was feeding him. This list is by no means a necessity for him, but I tried to add things to help with his boredom and keep him stimulated when my parents can't give him all their attention.

i do want to state that my family is capable of providing him with the essentials to live, we arent irresponsible. i would just like to help my parents out since a 3 year old 80-90lb doberman is a lot of work to be suddenly placed on them soley. And I worry for his health and well-being sometimes - Remi has a tendency to eat/tear random objects when he's bored.

please consider donating whatever you can. Everything goes directly to him.

thank you for taking the time to read this, and possibly reblog if possible. ❤️

[damienns]

My GIF Making process: Screen capturing using MPV player, Organizing files, 3 Sharpening settings, Basic Coloring PSD + Actions set

This is a very long post so heads up.

I’ll try to be as thorough and true as much as possible to the way I make my gifs (I already use Photoshop Actions which I’ve long since set up but now for this tutorial I’m reviewing them to show you the exact steps I’ve learned to create my gifs 😃) and present them to you in a semi-coherent way. Also, please bear with me since English is my second language.

First things first. Below are the things and tools we need to do this:

Downloaded 4K or 1080p quality videos (let’s all assume we know where to get these—especially for high definition movies and tv series—so this post doesn’t get removed, okay? 😛)

Adobe Photoshop CC or the CS versions can work as well, but full disclosure I haven’t created gifs using the CS versions since 2020. I’m currently using Adobe Photoshop 2024.

mpv player. Use mpv player to get those frames/screenshots or any other video player that has a screen grabber feature. I’ve used adapter for the longest time but I’ve switched to mpv because the press to screenshot feature while the video is playing has been a game changer not to mention ultimate time saver for me. For adapter you need to play it in another video player (like VLC player), to get the start and end timestamps of the scene you want to gif which takes me ages before I can even open Photoshop.

Anyway! Please stop reading this post for a moment and head over to this amazing tutorial by kylos. She perfectly tells you how to install and use mpv player, both for Mac and Windows users.

One thing I have to share though, I had a tough time when I updated my MacOS to Sonoma since MPV is suddenly either duplicating frames or when I delete the duplicates the player seems to be skipping frames :/ I searched and found a solution here, though it didn’t work for me lol. My workaround for this in the meantime is decreasing the speed down to 0.70 then start screenshotting—it’s not the same pre Sonoma update but it works so I’ll have to accept it rather than have jumpy looking gifs.

Now, after this part of kylos’ tutorial:

you can continue reading the following sections of my gif tutorial below.

I want to share this little tip (sorry, this will only cater to Mac users) that I hope will be helpful for organizing the screenshots that MPV saved to the folder you have selected. Because believe me you don’t want to go through 1k+ of screenshots to select just 42-50 frames for your gif.

The Control + Command + N shortcut

This shortcut allows you to create a new folder from files you have pre-selected. As you can see below I have already created a couple of folders, and inside each folder I have selected screenshots that I want to include in one single gif. It's up to you how you want to divide yours, assuming you intend to create and post a Tumblr gifset rather than just one gif.

Another tip is making use of tags. Most of, if not all the time, I make supercorp gifs so I tag blue for Kara and red (or green) for Lena—just being ridiculously on brand and all that.

Before we finally open Photoshop, there's one more thing I want to say—I know, please bear with me for the third? fourth? time 😅

It's helpful to organize everything into their respective folders so you know the total number of items/frames you have. This way, you can add or delete excess or unnecessary shots before uploading them in Photoshop.

For example below there are 80 screenshots of Kara inside this folder and for a 1:1 (540 x 540 px) Tumblr gif, Photoshop can just work around with 42-50 max number of frames with color adjustments applied before it exceeds the 10 MB file size limit of Tumblr.

Sometimes I skip this step because it can be exhausting (haha) and include everything so I can decide visually which frames to keep later on. You'll understand what I mean later on. But it's important to keep the Tumblr 10 MB file size limit in mind. Fewer frames, or just the right amount of frames, is better.

So, with the screenshot organization out of the way, let's finally head over to Photoshop.

Giffing in Photoshop, yay!

Let’s begin by navigating to File > Scripts > Load Files into Stack…

The Load Layers window will appear. Click the Browse button next.

Find your chosen screenshots folder, press Command + A to select all files from that folder then click Open. Then click OK.

After importing and stacking your files, Photoshop should display the following view:

By the way, I'll be providing the clip I've used in this tutorial so if want to use them to follow along be my guest :)

If you haven't already opened your Timeline panel, navigate to Windows > Timeline.

Now, let's focus on the Timeline panel for the next couple of steps.

Click Create Video Timeline, then you’ll have this:

Now click the menu icon on the top right corner then go to Convert Frames > Make Frames from Clips

Still working on the Timeline panel, click the bottom left icon this time—the icon with the three tiny boxes—to Convert to Frame Animation

Select Make Frames From Layers from the top right corner menu button.

So now you have this:

Go and click the top right menu icon again to Select All Frames

Then click the small dropdown icon to set another value for Frame Delay. Select Other…

The best for me and for most is 0.05 but you can always play around and see what you think works for you.

Click the top right menu icon again to Reverse Frames.

I think Photoshop has long since fixed this issue but usually the first animation frame is empty so I just delete it but now going through all these steps there seems to be none of that but anyways, the delete icon is the last one among the line of feature buttons at the bottom part of the Timeline panel.

Yay, now we can have our first proper GIF preview of a thirsty Lena 😜

Press spacebar to watch your gif play for the very first time! After an hour and half of selecting and cutting off screenshots! 😛 Play it some more. No really, I’m serious. I do this so even as early (lol) as this part in the gif making process, I can see which frames I can/should delete to be within the 10 MB file size limit. You can also do it at the end of course 🙂

Now, let’s go to the next important steps of this tutorial post which I’ve numbered below.

Crop and resize to meet Tumblr's required dimensions. The width value should be either 540px, 268px, or 177px.

Convert the gif to a Smart Object for sharpening.

Apply lighting and basic color adjustments before the heavy coloring. I will be sharing the base adjustments layers I use for my gifs 😃.

1. Crop and Resize

Click on the Crop tool (shortcut: the C key)

I like my GIFs big so I always set this to 1:1 ratio if the scene allows it. Press the Enter key after selecting the area of the frame that you want to keep.

Side note: If you find that after cropping, you want to adjust the image to the left or another direction, simply unselect the Delete Cropped Pixels option. This way, you will still have the whole frame area available to crop again as needed and as you prefer.

Now we need to resize our gif and the shortcut for that is Command + Opt + I. Type in 540 as the width measurement, then the height will automatically change to follow the ratio you’ve set while cropping.

540 x 540 px for 1:1

540 x 405 px for 4:3

540 x 304 px for 16:9

For the Resample value I prefer Bilinear—but you can always select the other options to see what you like best.

Click OK. Then Command + 0 and Command + - to properly view the those 540 pixels.

Now we get to the exciting part :) the sharpen settings!

2. Sharpen

First we need to have all these layers “compressed” intro a single smart object from which we can apply filters to.

Select this little button on the the bottom left corner of the Timeline panel.

Select > All Layers

Then go to Filter > Convert for Smart Filters

Just click OK when a pop-up shows up.

Now you should have this view on the Layers panel:

Now I have 3 sharpen settings to share but I’ll have download links to the Action packs at the end of this long ass tutorial so if you want to skip ahead, feel free to do so.

Sharpen v1

Go to Filter > Sharpen > Smart Sharpen…

Below are my settings. I don’t adjust anything under Shadows/Highlights.

Amount: 500

Radius: 0.4

Click OK then do another Smart Sharpen but this time with the below adjustments.

Amount: 12

Radius: 10.0

As you can see Lena’s beautiful eyes are “popping out” now with these filters applied. Click OK.

Now we need to Convert to Frame Animation. Follow the steps below.

Click on the menu icon at the top right corner of the Timeline panel, then click Convert Frames > Flatten Frames into Clips

Then Convert Frames > Convert to Frame Animation

One more click to Make Frames From Layers

Delete the first frame then Select All then Set Frame Delay to 0.05

and there you have it! Play your GIF and make sure it’s just around 42-50 frames. This is the time to select and delete.

To preview and save your GIF go to File > Export > Save for Web (Legacy)…

Below are my Export settings. Make sure to have the file size around 9.2 MB to 9.4 MB max and not exactly 10 MB.

This time I got away with 55 frames but this is because I haven’t applied lighting and color adjustments yet and not to mention the smart sharpen settings aren't to heavy so let’s take that into consideration.

Sharpen v1 preview:

Sharpen v2

Go back to this part of the tutorial and apply the v2 settings.

Smart Sharpen 1:

Amount: 500

Radius: 0.3

Smart Sharpen 2:

Amount: 20

Radius: 0.5

We’re adding a new type of Filter which is Reduce Noise (Filter > Noise > Reduce Noise...) with the below settings.

Then one last Smart Sharpen:

Amount: 500

Radius: 0.3

Your Layers panel should look like this:

Then do the Convert to Frames Animation section again and see below preview.

Sharpen v2 preview:

Sharpen v3:

Smart Sharpen 1:

Amount: 500

Radius: 0.4

Smart Sharpen 2:

Amount: 12

Radius: 10.0

Reduce Noise:

Strength: 5

Preserve Details: 50%

Reduce Color Noise: 0%

Sharpen Details: 50%

Sharpen v3 preview:

And here they are next to each other with coloring applied:

v1

v2

v3

Congratulations, you've made it to the end of the post 😂

As promised, here is the download link to all the files I used in this tutorial which include:

supercorp 2.05 Crossfire clip

3 PSD files with sharpen settings and basic coloring PSD

Actions set

As always, if you're feeling generous here's my Ko-fi link :) Thank you guys and I hope this tutorial will help you and make you love gif making.

P.S. In the next post I'll be sharing more references I found helpful especially with coloring. I just have to search and gather them all.

-Jill

[kanmom51]

Like Crazy - new insights

*This is a reposting of my latest reblog due to issues with that specific post.

***This has been sitting in my drafts since April 2023!!!

This is the post I reblogged and the basis to my own post.

Yep. I had some of a post written way back in April 2023, but the pieces just didn't come all together for me.

After Muse's release and specifically after the BTB yesterday where JM discussed Who, Muse and the lyrics, we also saw the change made to Who's lyrics from "you" to "she" things started to clear up for me. But then, a friend also shared a picture of the original lyrics of Like Crazy, which were subsequently altered before recording. We discussed these changes and I now feel that this is it! This is the missing piece to my post.

I mostly left what I wrote over a year ago in tact, adding the missing pieces to this puzzle that makes this post with what I feel is a little more insight into Like crazy.

Needless to say, these are my opinions, how I see the lyrics, the ones that made the cut and the ones that stayed in JM's lyrics journal.

So, let's get started:

Here I was thinking I'm the only one who was seeing this...

I do hope I'm reading this right, before going off motormouth about something that maybe isn't what is being said, but to hell with it, this is something I've been thinking too and I'm just gonna come out and say it.

We're all over 18 here right?

This is a subject we can talk about?

The more I listen to this song, the more I think it to be true too.

First of all, before starting off, I want to link this ask:

**Shock and awe... "she" wasn't part of the original lyrics for Like Crazy . Colour me surprised to learn the same is true with Who (even though JM didn't actually write the song himself). Oh, and if we are on that subject already, how not surprising to see the process of writing the song with John Billion, who happens to be one of the writers of SNTY as well (me sitting here thinking of several words and references that could have been somehow suggested and inserted into the song. No idea who (nah, I'm telling lies, I know exactly who). How shocking (NOT) to see that the artist actually had input with the song lyrics of which he is not credited in writing.

Again, the depth of the song, the layers to the song and the multiple interpretations too.

JM told us this song is about him struggling. He told us he was going through a period where he was drinking too much. He was finding fulfillment in ways other than performing, as performing is part of him, he is a performer, someone who needs the stage to express himself. The stage is where he is at peace, the stage being a piece of him that he was missing.

We saw his outburst of emotions in the first day of MOTS ON:E (that was my first experience of BTS and he literally broke my heart - and later seeing him being mocked for it infuriated me).

This was October 2020, around 6 months into the pandemic. The uncertainty. This is their first online performance and from there until Muster another 9 months go by. We know from Festa 2022 that the pandemic screwed up all of their plans. The uncertainty, working on and releasing BE and then Butter and PTD everything leading up to the PTD online concert, a year after MOTS ON:E. For those that performing is their life, standing in front of an audience and giving it their all, it's a hard pill to swallow. The unknown, if they will ever get back to perform on stage in front of a live audience, when this is who they are, their essence, it can be unbearable. JM wasn't the only performer to go through this. It's just that he shared this with us. He showed us his pain and vulnerability and was mocked for it by many. Shame on them!!!

So, again, JM told us with Like Crazy, that he was filling in that hole. Alcohol was mentioned by him specifically. But listening to the song, I think it's quite clear that sex was a very big part of it as well. Looking for that rush, that high. It's clear as day, for me anyway, in the lyrics.

(I think we could last forever I'm afraid that everything will disappear Just trust me)

[Verse 1] She's saying Baby, don't think about it There's not a bad thing here tonight Baby, you can leave it Stay with me until today

[Verse 2] Watch me go Wet me all night (Away) And morning too Don't come if you're drunk

In this loud music It fades me It's a drama-like story I'm get used to it Have you come far to find me that you used to know? Yeah, I know You know, I know (Ooh)

[Chorus] I'd rather be Lost in the lights Lost in the lights I'm outta my mind It holds to the end of this night Every night You spin me up high The moon that embraces you Let me have a taste

[Post-Chorus] Give me a good ride (Oh, I'm fallin', I'm fallin', I'm fallin') It's gon' be a good night (Oh, I'm fallin') Forever you and I

[Interlude] Mmm-hmm Yeah, hey Mmm-hmm Ooh-woah Mmm-hmm Mmm-hmm (Forever, you and I)

[Verse 3] Me reflects in the mirror I'm going crazy without hesitation I'm feelin' so alive, wasting time

I'd rather be Lost in the lights Lost in the lights I'm outta my mind It holds to the end of this night Every night You spin me up high The moon that embraces you Let me have a taste

[Post-Chorus] Give me a good ride (Oh, I'm fallin', I'm fallin', I'm fallin') It's gon' be a good night (Oh, I'm fallin') Forever you and I

[Outro] This will break me This is gonna break me (Break me) No, don’t you wake me (Wake me) I wanna stay in this dream, don't save me Don't you try to save me (Save me) I need a way we (Way we) I need a way we can dream on (On, on, on)

Those are the lyrics he recorded.

But you see, there were changes made to the lyrics he was working on originally, and we got to see some of them.

This specifically:

Reading this draft and the final ones there are a few things that just fall into place for me (and I'd think for anyone that reads them), loud and clear:

First of all, obviously JM is singing about drinking too much alcohol. If the final lyrics hinted to losing himself in alcohol, the draft lyrics are ever so clear regarding that point.

Second of all, the sex. I think JM was pretty straight forward using the wording he was using. "Give me a good ride" can be other things, if you twist it around to try and explain it away, but bottom line, those lines within the context of the lines in the draft, like "just go turn off the light, you and me..." not to mention the whole chorus, to me the reference is obvious.

Next, I talked about the many references to JK in this song in this post:

This is all also relevant when it comes to my next point being the fact that to me it's clear that JM wrote this song referencing a special someone with whom he shares a high level of intimacy. A special someone that was there by his side when JM was struggling. A special someone that was struggling seeing JM going through everything he was.

To that person JM wrote (in the draft): "oh baby don't you cry, just wanna see your smile..."

These lines, they were too much. Too obvious. Too intimate. And they were left out probably because of just that.

So JM went with other lines. A little less obvious perhaps, and yet still very telling. The finale of the song:

No, don’t you wake me (Wake me) I wanna stay in this dream, don't save me Don't you try to save me (Save me) I need a way we (Way we) I need a way we can dream on (On, on, on)

Now, you could claim that the song is about an inner struggle. JM struggling with himself, talking to himself, and yes, that could very much be part of the message JM, the king of layering, is going for. But see, that's exactly the point. JM is the king of layering, of having several meanings and messages within his lyrics and creations. And this is not different. There is no mistaking the reference to another person, not JM himself, in the lyrics. The way he uses the "you" in the lyrics, at times could pass as you being the alcohol, at times the you being himself in the mirror, but at times it's clearly a third party he is talking to. Especially in that finale to the song, that someone that wants to lift him out of that stupor he is in, to wake him up, to save him, when he is unwilling, not ready to accept that help just yet (same person he asks not to cry, knowing that he is making them sad). There are also the clear JK references in this song. The "you are me I am you" being the loudest of them all.

But JM being JM, he showed us in his own way what this song was about, opening up and allowing us to see his drafts.

And then he gave us Letter. Hidden, and private and intimate. Addressed not to us, but to that person that was always there by his side, that person he addresses in Like Crazy telling him "forever you and I". Now, in Letter, being in a better, healthier place, he can repeat the sentiment of them together forever. A sentiment JK had mentioned in the past (omg, that was so very awkward).

And now using lines like : "I sincerely hope we are forever" and "But don’t forget that we’re always together"...

The lyrics, the sentiments, the drafted lyrics that never made it, like the use of "Dangshin", I have talked about it all. Letter was for JK. Period.

When seeing Like Crazy again, the lyrics, the struggle, the person by his side, the intimacy, and Letter, I'm kind of thinking that not only is Letter a love ode to JK. That is stating the obvious. But it's also JM's acknowledgement and thank you to that person that stood by his side in his most difficult of times.

JK.

Bottom line:

Like crazy is about JM struggling and self medicating with alcohol and sex.

It's personal about himself, his struggles, but also includes a person that is there by his side, one he is highly intimate with, one who is there with him together. That person is there, spending the nights with him, in that escape world JM created for himself. Sad seeing JM struggle, trying to find a way to help JM out of that pit but being unable to do so, staying by JM's side all the same.

We know who that person is.

Same person he addresses Letter to.

[renthony]

Just curious. How bad has Biden been at controlling COVID-19 in your view?

First: I already responded to a similar question you left on this post.

Second: Biden has been atrocious for COVID-19 safety and management. COVID-19 is still killing people, and our president has done a horribly insufficient job in mitigating that. "Better than the Republicans" is not the same thing as "good" or "effective." Biden's abysmal reaction to COVID-19 is part of why I'm so thrilled that the Uncommitted campaign for the Democratic primary has achieved some success. That particular campaign is focused on ceasefire in Palestine, but the People's CDC explained in a statement how Palestine is also very much a public health issue. We need to scare the bastard and actually do some of that "pushing him left" that people claimed they'd do after getting him elected. Though it seems to me like a lot of people just settled for, "okay, we got rid of Trump, we don't have to worry anymore."

Third: While I'm at it, people have to do more than vote. You have got to get involved. You have got to do more than participate in the presidential election once every four years. Join a union (may I recommend the IWW?), follow the guidance of The People's CDC, volunteer for your local Food Not Bombs, get involved in a tenants union like the Autonomous Tenants Union Network, read Riot Medicine, get trained in first aid and get involved in a street medic group, read up on your local politics and get involved on the small-scale, do something in addition to voting in the presidential election. Even if you're limited in how much you can personally participate, find the people who are talking about these issues and signal boost them, and share the information with others who may be more able to participate more. If you can tell people to go vote in the presidential election, you can also tell them to go do other things, too.

Now, with all of that out of the way, here are some links related to Biden's abysmal COVID-19 response:

During his 2020 campaign, Biden promised immediate $2K stimulus checks. Instead, he delivered $1,400. Sources: [x] [x] [x] [x] [x]

Velena Jones for NBC Bay Area: "‘Too expensive': Bay Area residents shocked over new COVID vaccine prices"

Reuters: "COVID vaccine manufacturers set list price between $120-$130 per dose"

Joseph Choi for The Hill: "Free COVID-19 test program to be suspended for now"

Disability activist Alice Wong writing for TeenVogue: "Covid Isn't Going Anywhere. Masking Up Could Save My Life," and the follow-up article, "COVID and the 2024 Election: What Biden and Democrats Owe High-Risk People."

Laura Weiss writing for The New Republic: "Democrats Can't Keep Ignoring Covid in 2024."

David Cohen and Adam Cancryn for Politico: "Biden on '60 Minutes': 'The Pandemic is Over.'"

Alex Skopic for Current Affairs: "COVID-19 is Still a Threat. So is Biden’s CDC."

Adam Cancryn for Politico: "Biden Appears to be Over Covid Protocols."

Paul Thornton for the Los Angeles Times: "Covid Still Rages, and the Biden Administration Isn't Helping."

Eric J. Topol for the Los Angeles Times: "The U.S. is facing the biggest COVID wave since Omicron. Why are we still playing make-believe?"

We should have free, universal testing. We should have free, universal vaccination. We should have free, universal treatment. We should have financial assistance for those of us who can't work outside the home. We should have mandated work-from-home for any job that can be done remotely. We should be emptying prisons and paying attention to the way disease and abuse proliferate inside their walls. We should have COVID-19 safety PSAs and government support for universal masking. We should have free distribution of N95s. We should have mandated masking in medical settings and public spaces. We should have a higher minimum wage. We should have healthcare reforms. We should have strong worker protections. We should have improved infrastructure. We should have a president who gives a single flying fuck about how many of us are dying.

And we have none of it.

But we sure seem to have money to keep dropping bombs, arming cops, terrorizing the vulnerable, and imprisoning innocent people to use for slave labor.

[linkyu]

tell me about your defense contract pleage

Oh boy!

To be fair, it's nothing grandiose, like, it wasn't about "a new missile blueprint" or whatever, but, just thinking about what it could have become? yeesh.

So, let's go.

For context, this is taking place in the early 2010s, where I was working as a dev and manager for a company that mostly did space stuff, but they had some defence and security contracts too.

One day we got a new contract though, which was... a weird one. It was state-auctioned, meaning that this was basically a homeland contract, but the main sponsor was Philip Morris. Yeah. The American cigarette company.

Why? Because the contract was essentially a crackdown on "illegal cigarette sales", but it was sold as a more general "war on drugs" contract.

For those unaware (because chances are, like me, you are a non-smoker), cigarette contraband is very much a thing. At the time, ~15% of cigarettes were sold illegally here (read: they were smuggled in and sold on the street).

And Phillip Morris wanted to stop that. After all, they're only a small company worth uhhh... oh JFC. Just a paltry 150 billion dollars. They need those extra dollars, you understand?

Anyway. So they sponsored a contract to the state, promising that "the technology used for this can be used to stop drug deals too". Also that "the state would benefit from the cigarettes part as well because smaller black market means more official sales means a higher tax revenue" (that has actually been proven true during the 2020 quarantine).

Anyway, here was the plan:

Phase 1 was to train a neural network and plug it in directly to the city's video-surveillance system, in order to detect illegal transactions as soon as they occur. Big brother who?

Phase 2 was to then track the people involved in said transaction throughout the city, based on their appearance and gait. You ever seen the Plainsight sheep counting video? Imagine something like this but with people. That data would then be relayed to police officers in the area.

So yeah, an automated CCTV-based tracking system. Because that's not setting a scary precedent.

So what do you do when you're in that position? Let me tell you. If you're thrust unknowingly, or against your will, into a project like this,

Note. The following is not a legal advice. In fact it's not even good advice. Do not attempt any of this unless you know you can't get caught, or that even if you are caught, the consequences are acceptable. Above all else, always have a backup plan if and when it backfires. Also don't do anything that can get you sued. Be reasonable.

Let me introduce you to the world of Corporate Sabotage! It's a funny form of striking, very effective in office environments.

Here's what I did:

First of all was the training data. We had extensive footage, but it needed to be marked manually for the training. Basically, just cropping the clips around the "transaction" and drawing some boxes on top of the "criminals". I was in charge of several batches of those. It helped that I was fast at it since I had video editing experience already. Well, let's just say that a good deal of those markings were... not very accurate.

Also, did you know that some video encodings are very slow to process by OpenCV, to the point of sometimes crashing? I'm sure the software is better at it nowadays though. So I did that to another portion of the data.

Unfortunately the training model itself was handled by a different company, so I couldn't do more about this.

Or could I?

I was the main person communicating with them, after all.

Enter: Miscommunication Master

In short (because this is already way too long), I became the most rigid person in the project. Like insisting on sharing the training data only on our own secure shared drive, which they didn't have access to yet. Or tracking down every single bug in the program and making weekly reports on those, which bogged down progress. Or asking for things to be done but without pointing at anyone in particular, so that no one actually did the thing. You know, classic manager incompetence. Except I couldn't be faulted, because after all, I was just "really serious about the security aspect of this project. And you don't want the state to learn that we've mishandled the data security of the project, do you, Jeff?"

A thousand little jabs like this, to slow down and delay the project.

At the end of it, after a full year on this project, we had.... a neural network full of false positives and a semi-working visualizer.

They said the project needed to be wrapped up in the next three months.

I said "damn, good luck with that! By the way my contract is up next month and I'm not renewing."

Last I heard, that city still doesn't have anything installed on their CCTV.

tl;dr: I used corporate sabotage to prevent automated surveillance to be implemented in a city--

hey hold on

wait

what

HEY ACTUALLY I DID SOME EXTRA RESEARCH TO SEE IF PHILLIP MORRIS TRIED THIS SHIT WITH ANOTHER COMPANY SINCE THEN AND WHAT THE FUCK

HUH??????

well what the fuck was all that even about then if they already own most of the black market???

[qqueenofhades]

do you think there's a considerable amount of (young) people refusing to vote for biden because of i/p, or do you think theyre just a loud minority? i cant really tell, myself

I have been keeping a fairly close eye on polls (at least the good high-quality large-sample ones, not the numerous trash ones which currently flood the sphere), actual voting results, and other empirical data that relies on non-social-media blathering. And while we will still need more data and see if anything changes, at this point I think we can presume that any electoral effect of the I/P situation is already baked into Biden's expected results and performances, and I honestly don't think there's much, if any, of a measurable effect.

I say this because first of all, one of the most recent high-quality, large-sample youth polls (I think it was YouGov, but I can't be sure) had precisely 0% of voters between 18-29 listing foreign policy as their top priority in 2024. There were other expected priorities: the environment, the economy, American democracy, abortion rights, LGBTQ+ rights, etc -- but not foreign policy. Now, caveat emptor about this being only the people who respond to polls, the fact that most polls have been largely junk this primary cycle (notably, they have way overestimated Trump's performance and way underestimated Biden's), and so forth. However, even in libertarian New Hampshire, which tends to wander more than the other solidly-blue presidential election New England states (as a number of them still have Republican governors), "ceasefire" only garnered 1% of all write-in votes, and Biden won commandingly despite not being on the ballot. In South Carolina, he just won 97% statewide, and even the Democrats who skipped the primary due to it not being particularly interesting or competitive (as compared to the highly competitive open primary in 2020) still generally say that they plan to vote for Biden in November. So overall, Biden is doing even better at this point in the primary cycle than he was in 2020, where Sanders' early wins in Iowa and NH were generating chatter about an upset. Once again, this is early and we are working with a limited sample size, but despite everything, I think we can posit that the "Democrats/Black people/Hispanics/young people won't vote for Biden because of xyz issue and therefore We Are All Doomed" thesis is at best, considerably overinflated and at worst, totally untrue.

Likewise, to be blunt: the loudest voices shouting about how they will never vote for Biden because of the Gaza situation either don't vote at all, only voted once in 2020 under extreme duress and haven't voted since, and otherwise aren't being taken into account either in polls (which are bad data because they are by nature experimental and speculative) or actual voting results (which reflect the way real people actually voted in elections). The reason the YouGov sample might not have pulled any voters between 18-29 listing foreign policy as their top priority very well could be because these people flat out don't vote and therefore won't pass any "likely" or "registered" voter screens, so despite all their yelling on social media, there's not been any actual impact. Now, this is not to say that there won't be; there has, for instance, been speculation that Biden might be hurt in states like Michigan, which have a large Arab-American population. Michigan is obviously one of the traditional Blue Firewall states that Hillary lost in 2016 and which Biden retook in 2020, and any electoral wobbling there would be ominous for his overall results. However, this is also reckoning without the fact that there is now a largish chunk of old-school GOP/independent voters who say they will not vote for Trump under any circumstances, with that number growing if he's explicitly convicted of a felony. Some of these voters might sit out, or vote for Biden, or maybe decide to vote for some stupid crackpot like RFK Jr., but the point is, if they do in fact not vote for Trump or even vote for Biden, that changes the electoral math.

Likewise: there are about 40,000 Arab-American voters in Michigan. Biden won the state by 154k votes, or 3.35%, in 2020. Even if every single one of those voters voted FOR Trump this time (which would be insane, but never mind), that alone would not be enough to flip the state from Biden, and that's reckoning without the votes that Trump will lose elsewhere. I've seen a few left-leaning publications such as the Guardian picking up the "will Biden's stance on Gaza hurt him in November" question, and the loud social media blabbermouths want to insist that it will because it makes them feel important, but at this point, I honestly don't see widespread electoral evidence of it, because, put bluntly: Democrats vote. Posturing social media "progressives" largely don't. Therefore for all the screaming they do, their views do not get incorporated into the actual results, which is a damn good thing for us.

So in short: No, as of right now, I don't think there is in fact a substantial anti-Biden protest vote, and the people threatening it the most were never going to vote for him anyway. This has gone on long enough that if it was going to flag up as a major thing, I think it would have. There will always be the idiots throwing away their vote on some stooge like Cornel West or Jill Stein (lol), but once again, these people were never going to vote for Biden in the first place and it is not necessarily the case that we need to put undue credence in their threats. Not that we can slack our vigilance, as we cannot and every single person who can vote blue in 2024 needs to fucking do so if they're interested in continuing to live in a democracy, but the situation is not apocalyptic, and yet again, the Online Leftists are far from the most reliable metric of how effective their screaming actually is. So, yeah.

[digi-lov]

Digimon 🤝 Pokémon

KoKabuterimon ST9-07 by GOSSAN from ST-9 Starter Deck Ultimate Ancient Dragon

Heracross PAL 006 by GOSSAN from Scarlet&VioletーPaldea Evolved

So. I don't like the idea that you can't be a fan of both Digimon and Pokémon. A while ago, I got an ask from a Pokémon fan asking how Digimon is any better than Pokémon, and I didn't really know how to answer that? I love both? I also like Yo-Kai Watch, by the way. You don't have to drag something down to elevate something else.

It does bother me that I sometimes get the feeling from certain kinds of Pokémon fans that they hate on Digimon, like it's their duty? I even had an argument with someone in real life who was convinced Digimon was a Pokémon rip-off, despite knowing nothing about Digimon in the first place.

But obviously, not all fans are like that, I'm a big Pokémon fan myself! I've played essentially all main line games and many side games. The Pokémon Special Manga was the first manga I read and is among my all-time favorites. I'm also active in my local Pokémon TCG community! I'm actually an official Pokémon TCG Judge, and I volunteer alongside my partner at our local card shops weekly "Pokémon School," where we teach children how to play the game. Although that sometimes also entails how to read cards, how to act respectful to your opponent, how to focus, what to look out for when building decks, how to tell if a card is fake, and much more...

That's another reason why I'm sad the Digimon Card Game only has an English language release in the West. Otherwise, I'd have introduced it to the kids already!

But yeah, I'm rambling a bit, my point being I don't want any hate, just love here. You don't have to like Pokémon. But it's definitely possible to like both.

So I wanna take a moment to show a couple of artists you know from the Digimon Card game who also like Pokémon!

Sanosuke Sakuma

Sanosuke Sakuma has been doing illustrations for the Digimon Card Game since the first set! Their strong point are cute characters, with most of their cards being of Baby Level Digimon (Lv.2) or Child Level Digimon (Lv.3). You can check out posts I did of their cards under #Sanosuke Sakuma

They also have been working as an illustrator for the Pokémon TCG since 2013 and have been working as character designer and illustrator for the main line Pokémon games since Pokémon Sun and Moon (2016).

GOSSAN

GOSSAN had been doing illustrations for the Digimon Card Game since BT-04 (2020) and have done over a hundred cards by this point. They're among the most likely artists to do game references and are very good at depicting action! Check out more of them under #GOSSAN

They also have been working as an illustrator for the Pokémon TCG since 2021 and already have a couple of Alternative Arts under their belt. Notably, they even got to illustrate the Alternative Art of Mewtwo Vstar, featuring it fighting Charizard, both of which are among the most popular Pokémon.

tessy

Tessy has been an illustrator for the Digimon Card Game since late 2020 and has been featured in almost every set since. Check out my posts featuring their cards under #tessy

While there is no Pokémon card featuring rheir art just yet, they entered and reached the semi-finals of the Pokémon TCG Illustration Contest 2022 with both their entries for Charizard and Bulbasaur.

Spareribs

Spareribs won second prize overall (and first for Devimon) of the Digimon Illustration Competition 2022 with their entry 「Fallen」. Ever since they've been working as an illustrator for the Digimon Card Game. You can see posts with their cards under #spareribs

They also entered the Pokémon TCG Illustration Contest 2022 and made it to the semi-finals with their entry for Greninja.

I hope we can all continue to share our passion for colorful critters. Thank you very much.

[papermint-airplane]

I'm really not doing well guys. Tl;dr my life sucks a lot. That's all you need to know.

My job is still jerking us around on the layoffs. They started in October of last year with "we're selling the department and laying everyone off in February" then when March rolled around and nothing had happened yet, told everyone "lol just kidding the buyer dropped out". So a lot of people quit because this clown company just told everyone it was willing to sell their jobs out from under them and didn't give a shit who was affected or how.

My job is not a job that can function when short staffed. It was already short staffed before they pulled this fakeout layoff shit and now we're lucky to have two people scheduled at any given time. They're paying thousands in overtime, begging people to come in even for a couple of hours on their days off because we don't have enough people to cover one shift, let alone the three they need because the department is 24/7. Customers are rude and entitled. I've been threatened, I've been called horrible names, I've been told I'm a shit human being and don't deserve to live. I'm not allowed to hang up on them. I'm expected to sit there and just take it and not say anything. Most days, we're so busy that I can't take my daily fifteen minute break or even get up to go to the bathroom. And that's only scratching the surface of what goes on at my job.

I have had a history of overworking myself in that job and everyone knows it. I've had literally hundreds of public panic attacks, three full-on mental breakdowns where I was screaming and literally tearing handfuls of my hair out in front of my coworkers from stress, ended up in the hospital twice because I thought I was having a heart attack, and took off three months in 2020 to check myself into an inpatient mental healthcare facility all the way across the country. I have had countless meetings with my supervisors and their supervisors and HR about the toxic work environment and shitty management. I had to beg them to take me off my 8 day rotation (four days of ten hour shifts, four days of eight hour shifts, all in succession with no days off in between) because I started shaking and laughing uncontrollably around day 6 because I was having a literal fucking breakdown. I have literally had to be taken away from work in an ambulance before.

On top of my anxiety being the worst it's ever been (and that includes when I lived with my abusive father), my depression has gotten so bad that all I can do nowadays is work and sleep. Sometimes I don't even get fully in the house before I pass out because I'm so exhausted. I have woken up on my living room floor after work more than once. I told them that I could no longer work shifts like that nor could I take overtime for my own mental health. And they still act like I'm lazy because I don't work 14 hour shifts daily. Bitch, I'm barely holding it together with my weekly 40 hours, and I'm expected to work every Thanksgiving and Christmas but that's just not enough. Nothing I do is enough. And now I don't even have enough energy for the few things I have that I still enjoy. Want to know why my Sims story is on hiatus? Because I have to force myself to do literally anything other than sleep. My house looks like a disgusting hoarder's nest because I can barely move on my days off. I cry all the time. I can't stand to be touched. I shower excessively because I feel filthy when I come home from work in a way I can't adequately articulate. My eczema is so bad that my neck and face are literally covered in bloody red rashes. I look horrible. I feel worse. I have gained over 150 lbs since starting that job in 2006. My thyroid is busted. Some days, I truly believe that I died long ago and this is my own personal Hell.

Now they're telling us that "we definitely have a buyer for the department and all the contracts have been signed". They said there'd be a transition period, after which we'd be laid off but we'd be told when the transition period begins. Now, we got an email telling us we're halfway through the transition period and are probably getting laid off in August "but we don't know when in August, so stay tuned." At this rate, I'm likely to show up one day and be told to go home. I have no idea when that will be and I have no way to know how to prepare.

The only reason I'm still putting up with this bullshit is because...well, to be honest, I've put in a lot of applications and got absolutely no replies. I'm an unemployable useless sack of shit. My company is at least giving us a really good severance package. I'm getting 17 weeks of pay (one week for every year I've worked there) plus another four weeks of pay, plus a $1000 bonus for staying through the transition period. I think I will also qualify for unemployment. I'm trying not to freak out but I don't know what I'm going to do when my severance runs out. I have only had two jobs in my entire life: a grocery store job when I was a teenager for 3 years and this job that I've had for nearly 18 years. My resumé is one page. I have no skills outside of this job. I'm never going to get hired anywhere that's going to pay me anywhere near what this hellhole of a job paid me.

I truly wish I were brave enough to kill myself but I'm not. I keep living and it keeps getting worse and I'm bombarded with hundreds of news articles and Tumblr posts every day telling me how the world is falling apart around me, so even if by some miracle I manage to find a job that pays me enough to fucking live, I don't have a future anyway. I'm almost 40 and I keep waiting for my life to begin but it never does. And it never will. I will never be happy. I will never be safe. I don't deserve happiness. I don't deserve safety. My own fucking parents hated me from the moment my mom read the lines on her pregnancy test. If my own parents can't love me, nobody can. I'm on medication and in therapy but sometimes, I wonder if it's doing anything at all. You can't fix what's wrong with me. I was just born wrong. And no matter where I go or what kind of job I end up in, the same shit will just keep repeating over and over and over because that's all I deserve. I'll just keep on hurting until global warming or war takes me out and I end up in real Hell.

In an hour, I'm going to regret writing any of this and probably delete this post. Because I'm supposed to take it and not say anything.

My Sims are the only thing that gives me any comfort anymore. Even then, I don't have the energy or attention span to do the things I want. I'm just as irrelevant on Simblr as I am in real life. If I disappeared tomorrow, nobody would notice.

[zhongwans]

How ZZH's Instagram account was compromised

aka the question that's been plaguing us all since last year. But now we have enough info to put together a theory. (As always all this info is thanks to the hard work of QV and her friends. I'm just compiling)

During 813, Xie Yihua's son, Abner, said in a comment on Bilibili that ZZH's instagram account isn't actually his. It was set up by staff when ZZH was still under the management of his former boss, Yu Zheng, and that the phone number that was registered to the account doesn't belong to ZZH.

This means whoever has access to the actual phone number can reset the password and take control of the account.

Also how on earth did Abner know the details of the IG's account's security (or lack thereof)? Did his mother tell him? We already know Xie Yihua is ZSJ's handler.

On June 2020, ZZH posted on his IG after months of inactivity, and in the comments section he thanked a woman named Virginia. We can infer from their convo that he had lost access to the account sometime ago and that this Virginia helped him gain access again.

Based on ZZH's IG activity, he did stop posting for a few months and only started posted there again when he started filming WOH. That's when he thanked this Virginia person.

There's an interesting comment under Flora's tweet saying that when they first read this, their interpretation was that this Virginia helped ZZH gain access to his account by setting up a VPN for him. And I was the same. That's also how I initially interpreted it, that ZZH wasn't able to access his IG because of the Great Firewall. But with all the info that has come to light, it looks more like ZZH was unable to access it because it was set up by someone else, with a number that didn't belong to him. And Virginia probably helped him by contacting whoever it was that had access to the account in Yu Zheng's management.

So if all this time ZZH's IG account was under the control of someone from Yu Zheng's studio, how did it wind up in the hands of ZSJ's team?

Recently, Yu Zheng was seen promoting the hat from ZSJ's brand. (Photos from bluebird and QV)

It's worth noting that Yu Zheng doesn't seem to like ZZH very much. He interacted with a ZZH anti and implied that it's ZZH fault Zhao Ge did not air. So why is Yu Zheng promoting "ZZH's" brand if he doesn't even like him?

The person Yu Zheng interacted with literally has the username 'zzh liar' and is an active ZZH anti.

And for those who don't know what Zhao Ge is, it's the show where Yu Zheng asked ZZH to come back for additional shoots while he was still recovering from his knee injury. This is widely understood to be the reason why ZZH's knee was messed up for good. More details here.

Zhao Ge was already running into problems way before 813. The script had a lot of elements that likely got it into trouble with the censors, plus in December 2020 more than a hundred industry folks signed a letter calling for a boycott against Yu Zheng and another person for being notorious plagiarists and all around shitty human beings. If it's not the script that sank Zhao Ge's chances of airing, then it's Yu Zheng's awful reputation as a plagiarist amongst his peers. Even before 813, the chances of Zhao Ge airing were not looking good.

Yu Zheng was brought to court by Taiwanese author and producer Qiong Yao for plagiarizing one of her novels, and a Beijing court later ruled in her favor. He was ordered to pay her millions. So you know...Yu Zheng is quite literally a criminal. That along with the script is probably why Zhao Ge will never see the light of day. ZZH should actually be the angry one here because his knee was pretty much ruined forever just for a shitty drama that will never even air.

A document that was circulated amongst ZZH fans last year and associated with him can also be linked back to a lawyer that once worked on Yu Zheng's legal counsel. Coincidence? Maybe. But it's interesting how many times his name comes up in relation to ZSJ.

And this is just personal speculation but I wonder if Yu Zheng was pissed when ZZH blew up after he was no longer within his management, and he could no longer reap the benefits of ZZH's fame for himself. Remember during the WOH concert ZZH mentioned that a lot of old friends suddenly came up to him after WOH's success, asking for all sorts of favours and whatnot, and then him apologizing for not being able to attend to them all. Looking back on that, it's interesting that a lot of people involved in the scam had more or less a connection with ZZH in the past. The Chens from the teashop, Xie Yihua, Zhang Su, Xiao Chu Nada, etc. And now Yu Zheng.

So yeah this is it. Yu Zheng's involvement with ZSJ was the last piece of the mystery behind the compromised IG account.

[acesofspadess]

This Is The Voice

a/n: everyone needs some more Niall

summary: you're the mega mentor, and Niall doesn't know that

“This is the last knockouts ill ever get to coach and im really excited because our mega mentor this season is one of the greatest singers and people of all time.”

“Shes a legend in the industry.”

“She is an EGOT”

“So the mega mentor this season is……… Y/N L/N! Or Horan to Niall”

BLAKE

“Well this like a full circle moment for me. You were here as Adams advisor in the first season and now you are mega mentor in my last season.” blake looked down at 29 year old you who was reminiscing. “What does that say about our relationship.”

“That whenever you're here I lose.” you laughed at him as he shook his head. “You let yourself lose to an 18 year old Blake.” his eyes widdend at that, “Oh man, i forgot you were only 18. I feel so old. And now your married too.” he shook his not wanting to think about it any more.

—-----

KELLY

“You still havent seen Niall yet?” Kelly and you had a moment to chat before the artist came in. “no and I feel so bad. I've been super slow on my answers to his text. I just want to hold him.”

I've know Y/N since she was around 18, we got to perform together in Vegas almost 12 years ago.

“Im so glad it's Blake’s last season. Hes just had a very good vibe.” Kelly filled you on some behind the scenes.

“Oh thats good, he really can be a pain sometimes.

And I've also been able to work with her and tour with her and learn from her. Shes so young and has taught a lot of artist with singing and being on stage. I love that all these artist are gonna get that same experience today.

—---------

CHANCE

There was a knock on your dressing room door and you opened it to see Chance. “Y/N!” He cheered as he opened his arms up for a hug. You laughed and thanks the heavens you werent wearing heavy makeup as he was wearing white. 

Y/N… shes a legend in the industry. Grammy award winning artist.

“And when was the last time i saw you?” you laughed at his question. “Probably Grammy’s 2020…?” he shook his head, “how could i foget miss album of the year.

Her being a top tier artist for so long and having so many experiences is something that we could all grow from. 

After Chance had run down his artist for you, you waited for them to come in and laughed at whispers you heard. “Well hello there, I love your hair.” you told Nariella whose hair was similar to your ginger colour. “I actually got the idea from you.” you both laughed and whispered an ‘i like you already’. 

I just think its so amazing for her to be here and represent black women and girls. Shes definitely someone i look up to.

—---------

NIALL

It was finally time to see your love. Niall was supposed to be meeting Riley… but you didnt let that happen. You were facing the camera, your back facing the direction Niall would walk through. 

“Riley Tate-”

You turned around at the sound of his voice and he immediately stopped talking. “Hi love.” you  were smiling so hard at his reaction to seeing you before he scooped you up in a hug and twirled youn around.

“Why are you here- wait. Your da mega mentor?” his accent was thicker because of the surprise and you loved it. 

I mean to work with Y/N L/N the queen of pop… im getting goose bumps thinking about it now, its just amazing being in her presence 

Thats your wife Niall

Say it again 

“Well now that your here i was going to ask you if you wanted to come to a golf course with me.” Niall had his head on her shoulder and he could feel the laugh that came from her at his words.

Shes an absolute legend, and she teaches me something everyday, i cant wait for her to teach my team.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Alright love, Gina, shes really shy, reminds me of you when you came to write for the band.”

Niall laughed his beautiful laugh as you hid your face in your hands. “Don't remind me.”

“You might have to tell her to speak up.” you nodded at the information and were ready to see her. “And then she sings, and a different person comes out, a lot like you.” you cooed at his comparison seeing how much Gina meant to Niall.

“Now Kates kinda got the jazzy, Amy Winehouse-y vibe.” you ‘oo’ed’ at the information. “Lets see what they got.”

You watched as they walked around the corner and saw them subtly freak out at seeing you. You got up from your seat with the help of Niall(not that you needed it but he always held his hand out for you).

“Look who ive got!” Niall cheered from behind you as the girls gave you hugs.

I saw the ginger hair and Niall leaning on her and was like- please… ITS Y/N”

“How are you?” you asked hugging them both.

I was not expecting Y/N to be in the room with Niall. I was very starstruck.”

“Im gonna sing ‘somebody that i used to know’,” Gina shared her song and you marvelled at the softness of her voice. “Im very close to my dad, and he was a DJ and that was a song he always loved.”

“Thats beautiful Gina truly.”

Listening too her sing brought chills to your skin. 

You cheered as she finished and let Niall say what you know hes been holding in.  “And that sass that youve got this week.” Niall admired with a little laugh. “Really?” you loved how she went from this marvellous singer to this soft spoken girl. “I wasnt expecting that.” Gina thanked Niall before she looked at you and you shook your head.

“You gave me chills seriously, the only thing is ‘for lack of better wording’ understanding your words.” you watched as she took the advice and applauded her silently knowing if you were in her possician you would have certainly started crying.

“Yeah keep those words separate. Its very easy to go-” and you watched as he broke off his words in example. “You know what I mean. So give your self a bit of space.”

“I like that bub. I like that a lot.” 

You listened to him sing the words slowly and closed you eyes in sereness. “That staccato.” you pitched in. “her first audition to right now,” he looked at you threading his fingers with yours, “completley diffrent person.” you laughed softly squeezing his had. “I was just like you when i started, you can ask him.” he kissed your temple lightly in admiration, “she still is. Cant give her a compliment without her hiding away. Huh, beautiful?” you did as he knew you would and tucked your face into his neck. “See.” 

You turned your head to watch Gina and Kate play fight as theu swapped places. “I really wish you guys liked each other.” you joked sitting up properly. “I know so much hatred in here.” Niall joked back with you adjusting in his seat. “Its just awful.” Niall lost it, throwing his head back in laughter, letting you hear his laugh again. That would always be your favourite song. 

~~~

“Ooh we've got a guitar.” you saw the shaped guitar and immediately fell in love. “Its my baby.” Kate spoke. “Gonna have to get me self one just like that,” you all laughed before Niall looked at the gap between your seats and pulled your seat closer to his. You grabbed his hand and kissed it before looking back up at Kate. “what song are gonna sing love.” you asked as Niall sat back in his seat. “Im singing ‘Call Me’ by Blondie.”

“Oh lets hear it.” 

Kate had the stage presence of a lifetime. “Very good!” you clapped proudly. “Thank you.” you smiled as Niall began to speak. “My favourite parts are when its chilled.” You agreed with him softly as he continued to speak. “Dont stay with the-” Niall sang in a high pitch for example and you nodde your head. “Towards the end it gets a bit crashy for me. I wonder if there's a way of toning it down?” he looked to you for advice. “Tone down the crashing for more like ‘TOMS’ or something like that?” you offered and he took it. “Yeah so we can offer some more jazziness.” he agreed while drumming in the air, “you wanna come back up Gina?” You smiled widely hearing the softness and joy in his voice when he talked to her. “Im thrilled to pieces. I asked a really close friend of mine when were younger, who is now very successful, what is the best piece of advice you can give me. He said ‘have fun’. So i hope your having fun and getting to meet people that youll remain friends with forever.”

You watched Gina and Kate turn to each other and you hugged yourself. “Awwe that makes me so happy.” Niall grabbed your hand and held it in the air. “And one day you might marry them.” you all laughed before Niall spoke up again. “You're the best ladies.” you watched as they walked away and Niall rested his head on shoulder again. “I love you. You're amazing.”

“I love you too Ni.”

`````````````````````````````````````````````

Niall taglist:

@youcan-nolonger-run @ravenclawdirectioner

@luxiorchive @maeflowers653

[symbiotic-slime]

Hi!!!! I am a bit clueless about how tumblr works but I saw your reblog about your malev venom au and I would absolutely love to hear more about it. I did post the original but unfortunately it is not on my main blog and I don’t know how to submit an ask on a side blog (did I mention I have no idea what I’m doing?)

no worries!! tumblr’s kinda weird, I don’t think you can submit an ask from a side blog for some reason BUT ANYWAYS I am so thrilled to yap about it!!

so basically my idea kinda focuses on how similar Arthur and Eddie’s careers are. Arthur’s a PI and Eddie’s an investigative journalist, so if they could just end up in the same place it wouldn’t be unreasonable for them to run into each other while on the job. To get Arthur and John to San Fran in the 2020s, Kayne uses his time magic bullshit and sends Arthur and John to there in Earth 688B (the fancy number for the world the Venom movies are set in) to get him some type of mcguffin. there’s a lot of cults in malevolent, so I was thinking maybe there’s something involving the elites in the city that Arthur has to investigate and then steal from later.

Eddie Brock is also investigating this cult but for different reasons. given that it’s the elites in the city, maybe it has something to do with like corrupt officials siphoning money to themselves. or it could be similar to the LIFE Foundation case from Venom 2018, where homeless people were disappearing and being used as guinea pigs for the symbiote trials. either way, he’s trying to get to the bottom of this and expose the corruption. while he’s working on the case, maybe trailing one of the officials in question, he runs into Arthur and they decide to work together on this case.

cue a bunch of shenanigans as they’re both trying to hide the fact that they’re sharing a body with another entity. they’re both doing an awful job at it, they keep talking to themselves and seem to be listening/responding to no one, but neither of them bring it up in case the suspicion is turned onto themselves. John is incredibly suspicious of Eddie and Venom is suspicious of Arthur so Eddie and Arthur’s truce gets strained.

eventually, while like breaking in to get intel on the cult or something, Eddie and Arthur are caught and surrounded by the cultists. Arthur is panicking, trying to figure out how to get out of this situation when Eddie asks him to just trust that he can handle it and for Arthur to get behind him. Arthur does, since there’s not much else he can do, and Eddie transforms into Venom and kills the cultists.

cue John describing Venom to Arthur like: “FUCK OARTHUR. The man we were with has transformed into a hideous beast. He's... grown much larger and is covered in writhing black tendrils. His eyes are are a pearly white and his mouth... His mouth is huge and bristling with wickedly sharp teeth. Oh my god, Oarthur. Jesus Christ, he’s fucking EATING the cultists! Their blood is spattering in crimson smears as their limp bodies fall to the floor.” (credit to @cyborg-empress for that lovely description) because what Arthur clearly needs in a situation where he’s already panicking is for John to describe in excruciating detail how a monster is killing people.

The cultists die and Venom retreats back into Eddie’s body. He runs over to Arthur, swearing that he can explain what just happened. Arthur is understandably freaked out because he just heard John tell him the guy he was working transformed into a monster and started eating people, but he decides to hear Eddie out. He reasons to John that if Eddie was going to eat them, he would’ve done so already on the countless times they’ve been alone together while working on the case.

Eddie tells Arthur about his LIFE Foundation investigation and how he met Venom. Venom pokes their head out to say hi and introduce themselves to Arthur and John is immediately jealous that they can take a physical form separate from their host’s body. After Eddie is done explaining, Arthur decides to tell him about John. Eddie and Arthur decide to remain a team while investigating the cult, and it goes a lot smoother since their secrets are out in the open.

Arthur and John get a chance to use their abilities on the case, just not in combat because let’s be honest they’re not the greatest at that lol. one of their leads turns up dead, Eddie’s slightly panicking because he doesn’t know where to continue this investigation, and Arthur touches their lead and sees how he dies, giving them a new lead to discover who killed them.

While they’re working together, John and Arthur learn more about how to handle their relationship. Insane to say that Venom and Eddie are somehow the more stable relationship in this story because they’re also very deranged but in comparison to John and Arthur they have more of their shit together (and I’m also setting this ambiguously after their divorce/reunion Venom 2, just with some canon divergence since they’re still in San Fran and not Mexico). Arthur goes to Eddie for advice and Eddie tells Arthur that the first step is being honest with one another. Arthur just laughs (but they do start to be more honest with each other <3). Eddie also advices them to “pick their battles” (shout out to the one person who left that note on my other post— you’re a genius) and that not everything is with fighting over since it will just further jeopardize their relationship.

Venom, after watching John and Arthur fight for the millionth time, has a Rosa Diaz moment and tells Arthur that “you two just need to bone”. Arthur has a mini heart attack and is absolutely MORTIFIED. Eddie is furiously blushing and not making eye contact with them, but tells them that if they’re interested in doing that it can help relieve some of the frustrations.

some time during the case Kayne dies (apologies if you are a Kayne enjoyer— I completely understand why people like him he just gets on my nerves). I think he should die in a very unserious way, maybe something similar to Cletus’ death in LTBC where Venom just says “fuck this guy” and bites his head off.

anyways, once everything is said and done Eddie and Arthur get coffee or lunch together. John and Arthur are getting along a lot better, so Eddie askes if they took he and Venom’s advice. Arthur turns beet red and tells him that it’s not an appropriate thing to be asking him. Eddie laughs and smiles knowing.

in my head, Eddie buys Arthur this t-shirt. John vows to never tell Arthur what it says. The end.

[fans4wga]

Where Are My Residuals? Actors/Writers Share Horror Stories On Picket Line, Social Media

"With all the strike talk about low pay, WGA and SAG-AFTRA members are starting to play a little show me yours and I’ll show you mine when it comes to their (paltry) residual checks.

Just about everyone has a story to share about how their residuals took a serious nose dive with the advent of new media. A recent story in The New Yorker about how actors on the once successful Orange is the New Black never enjoyed a financial windfall only exacerbated the angst felt by actors and writers these days.

Here’s a sampling of their stories:

With all the strike talk about low pay, WGA and SAG-AFTRA members are starting to play a little show me yours and I’ll show you mine when it comes to their (paltry) residual checks.

Just about everyone has a story to share about how their residuals took a serious nose dive with the advent of new media. A recent story in The New Yorker about how actors on the once successful Orange is the New Black never enjoyed a financial windfall only exacerbated the angst felt by actors and writers these days.

Here’s a sampling of their stories:

Jason Belleville (Home Economics): “I wrote on the first season of Cobra Kai, which is one of the biggest shows in Netflix history. I think I have more money in my pockets right now than any residuals I’ve seen from that. I was also was an executive producer of a show for Netflix called Sneakerheads, which was a smaller show, but it premiered No. 1 one in a bunch of countries for a little while. I have yet to see $1 from that. And I was a writer and EP on that, in comparison. Some of them [broadcast shows he worked on] you can still get some money from but obviously, it’s not like it was. But there’s always a steady trickle that comes in to remind you that you once worked, right? The [residual] formats for cable and for networks are clear and transparent. Whether they’re as much as we want them to be or not, they’re at least something that you can rely on. Whereas, some of these YouTube shows, these [shows licensed to] Netflix. This whole strike is about having money you can rely on through the years so you can pay for your mortgage, you can take care of your kids, as opposed to opening an envelope and going ‘oh, it’s a nickel this time.'”

Aisha Tyler (Criminal Minds, The Last Thing He Told Me): I do a show [Whose Line Is It Anyway] that is double and triple and quadruple pumped in the United States and maybe 50 countries, and I don’t see any residuals. I know it’s been very frustrating to me and my co-stars. It’s theft. We generate all of the creative output on that show. We are the writers, we are the performers, we do everything and we don’t get compensated for it. I already I already threw a couple of temper tantrums so you can see I’m a bit more sanguine about it now but we’ve been fighting about it for years and it’s just pure and simple. It is creative theft."

Mike Royce via Twitter (writer-producer, One Day At A Time, Men of a Certain Age): “Some people are wondering how residuals will work for this, and since One Day at a Time had the somewhat unique experience of running on streaming, cable AND network TV, I can tell you how it worked for me. In 2020, season 4 of ODAAT was on the Pop Network (cable). Later that year CBS repeated it, because it was the pandemic and they needed programming. I co-wrote an episode with Gloria Calderón Kellett so we split the residuals. For the Pop showings I got (lower) cable residuals, but the CBS repeat paid me half the network residual (exactly what it should be for a co-written episode) … For perspective, that one CBS repeat of one episode of ODAAT paid me roughly the same as I’ve been paid IN TOTAL for one episode of ODAAT streaming on Netflix 24/7 for the last 4-6 YEARS. In other words, 1 network repeat residual = 5 years of streaming residuals. This is why we’re on strike."

Sarah Sokolovic (Big Little Lies, Homeland): “I can tell you the money I made from residuals dropped in 2015 to less than half in 2018. And the funny thing about it was I was on two, Emmy-award winning shows. It’s not on the side of the individual producers, of course. It’s really about the studios making sure that the basic contract has things in place so that actors like me benefit from their work residually over time. There was a time when I was traveling out of the country, so I had to have my mail forwarded to my mother. She was helping me with deposits, physical checks at the time. She opens a check and she goes, ‘Sarah, it’s three cents’. I said yes. She said it actually costs more to mail it.'”

Marqui Jackson (showrunner, All American: Homecoming): “Just in general, residuals are not what they used to be. You can’t depend on residuals to even begin to sustain a living in between gigs. It’s just kind of like extra money because sometimes they’re as low as a couple of bucks. I don’t think there has been a wellspring of residuals from All American: Homecoming, even though we are doing well. It is hard to fight for the right number when you don’t know what the numbers [ratings] are. That’s part of why we’re fighting because if they’re making money off on our content we should be part of it.”

John Carroll Lynch (Trial of the Chicago 7, White House Plumbers): “I’ve noticed that anything I do for streaming is not even one-tenth of the residual stream that I got for something terrible that I did. I certainly got paid more for an episode of The Visitor, which is a show I did when I first got here and only lasted one season. I got higher residuals by about 100 percent to what I get when it [was licensed to] Netflix. At some level, we’re dealing with a different group of people who have union institutional memory. Disney as a corporation has institutional memory of using unions, often much to their chagrin. That’s true of Warner Bros. and Universal. Apple, Amazon, and Netflix all come from Silicon Valley which has no institutional memory of unions. It’s time to teach them what sharing needs to be.”

Kevin Sussman (The Big Bang Theory) “For me the big issue is residuals for streaming. I’ve known that it’s been untenable for years. I was surprised that it took this long for there to be a strike like this. I’ve seen residuals for my own shows absolutely tank once they go to streaming. I’m lucky because I was on The Big Bang Theory, which was on a broadcast network for years. Since it moved to streaming [like Max and Amazon Prime], it’s night and day. I don’t see how it’s possible for an upcoming actor these days to actually be able to make a living.”

Charlie Barnett (Men in Black 3, Russian Doll): I have those check stories of like $9 coming out. Twenty years ago, if I had the career that I have today, it would be entirely different. I can’t afford to buy a house. We just moved into a smaller place in order to start saving. It would be improper to say that I don’t have a certain amount of privilege in the position that I am. I have to recognize that. But us in these positions in of height, have all the ability to fight for the people who are under us, who are still climbing. Just the background deal that they said is historically different is bullshit. I started out in background. Are you going to tell me that I’m going to sell my image in perpetuity to a studio? It’s insane. What happens to my career for the rest of my life? It doesn’t provide any safety, any protection, any ability for growth for what this industry is, for what it’s always been. These contracts that we have built off of network television have stood for so long. We have not seen any growth through the streaming platforms. It’s kind of the Wild West. The conversation point in saying over and over again, the industry we are funding and continuing to put millions and millions of dollars into, is not profiting us. It’s BS. It’s also mirrored in the fact that half of these execs, their pay is raising continually, year and year. We have not seen growth on our side. And through the writers as well.”

[anamoon63]

Hi guys, I am writing this in case anyone wonders why I have been kind of MIA lately. No, I haven't forgotten you, but I have had a difficult week, more than a difficult week, I have been through a real ordeal. Where or how it started it's a long story which I don't have the time or the energy to tell, so I'll just share a brief chronology of what happened during this past week.

Friday May 3 - I turned in my finished work and set out to do my sims posts, play and rest for the weekend since more work would be coming my way on Monday.

Saturday May 4 - My husband came down with the flu, I spent most of the day with him in the emergency room.

Sunday May 5 - I spent it taking care of my husband, who fortunately no longer had a fever. I barely slept two hours at night giving care and medication.

Monday 6 May - My birthday, we couldn't go out for dinner as usual, so we celebrated at home.

Tuesday, May 7 - My son comes down with the flu, too, another afternoon in the ER and sleepless night caring for him and bringing down his fever.

Wednesday, May 8 - My son starts to feel better, and begins to recover very quickly. I start working on the following translations, at the same time I take care of both my husband and my sick son, do food, laundry, order home medicines, and all kinds of small chores, including disinfecting things. It's like going back to 2020.

Thursday, May 9 - My husband no longer has a fever but does have a cough that won't go away and minor problems with his asthma.

Friday, May 10 - Mother's Day, my son was feeling fine, my husband still had a cough, and had a doctor's appointment at noon, when he returned, we celebrated at home just like on my birthday, I spent the rest of the day working, and juggling a thousand other things. In the evening my daughter started to feel sick, but still no fever.

Saturday, May 11 (yesterday) - My daughter woke up with a fever, another visit to the ER. She was prescribed flu medicine, painkillers and rest, and sent home.

And that's my odyssey so far. On top of it all, from Wednesday through Saturday we were in the middle of a heat wave with temperatures of 37ºC with real feel of up to 45ºC; at night we get a "cooler" temperature of 29ºC. So imagine a person with a fever of 38 ºC and with this heat, obviously it's not of much help.

Surprisingly, I haven't gotten sick so far, but I'm not claiming victory. I have been taking care of my family for a week, sleeping two or three hours a night, getting up at different times to check on them, or give them medicine. I don't have time for getting sick! Lol. Thankfully, everyone is better and last night for the first time in a week I was able to sleep straight through. Honestly, I don't need many hours of sleep, but I am routinely and usually I am in bed a 11 pm and up at 8 am every day, so all this did upset my sleep cycle a little bit.

Anyway, that is the reason why I wasn't here much, since the whole day I was too busy, and at night I was so tired all I wanted was to go to bed. I apologize if I've fallen behind on your updates, I'm not ignoring you in any way, I just didn't have the strength or the time, not even to play The Sims. If I did, it was just a little free play to distract myself.

Last week I told you that I was juggling a lot of things, well now I have even more things, lol, at times I feel really exhausted, and even a little cranky from lack of sleep, the first few days my feet and legs hurt so much from going back and forth, but I'm fine, healthy, and in good spirits. Today I believe, as never before, that the universe does not send you more than you can handle.

At this point my family is already in recovery, if I don't get sick too, it's likely by I'll be able to get back to my simming routine. Now, if I do get sick, I hope to recover as quickly as the others. Whatever happens, I'll be around. Know that, even if I don't comment, I read you, and I am with you, especially with those who are going through difficult times of any kind.

Ok, I said to myself this was going to be a short post, but I made a wall of text instead (for a change). My apologies if it's written in a sloppy or confusing way, I just wanted to write it quickly to let you know where I have been and what has been going on with me these days. I hope you are all well, please take care of yourselves, health is a treasure that can be lost at any moment, the flu is a nasty disease, we must never let our guard down and forget to take the necessary measures to prevent it.

Last, but not least, I want to thank all of you who have mentioned me, tagged me, sent me asks and/or stars to my inbox, commented and/or liked what few posts I could do these days, I appreciate it very much and I'll try to reply to you as soon as I can, though I've fallen so far behind that I don't know if I'll be able to find your mentions in my notifications. In any case, thank you very, very much to all of you for thinking about me in my absence. 💗 I'll see you soon, hopefully, with more sim adventures, stay tuned!