prokopetz:

prokopetz:

What we’ve gotta understand is that “the modern Internet is abolishing spaces for adults” and “the modern Internet is abolishing space for children” are compatible phenomena. Neither group is being favoured: the modern Internet is abolishing spaces for adults (i.e., because grown-up topics aren’t advertiser friendly) and the modern Internet is abolishing spaces for children (i.e., because online communities which consist principally of people who have no money are hard to sell things to). The Internet that contemporary corporate interests are trying to build isn’t a space for anyone – it’s the digital equivalent of an Ikea showroom.

Like, when I say that the greater part of contemporary social media is fundamentally hostile to human life, I’m not indulging in hyperbole or constructing an ironic metaphor. I mean that 100% literally.

jeanjauthor:

dduane:

AI-Created Art Isn’t Copyrightable, Judge Says In Ruling That Could Give Hollywood Studios Pause

A federal judge on Friday upheld a finding from the U.S. Copyright Office that a piece of art created by AI is not open to protection.

The Hollywood Reporter

“While cameras generated a mechanical reproduction of a scene, she explained that it does so only after a human develops a ‘mental conception’ of the photo, which is a product of decisions like where the subject stands, arrangements and lighting, among other choices.

“‘Human involvement in, and ultimate creative control over, the work at issue was key to the conclusion that the new type of work fell within the bounds of copyright,’ Howell wrote.”

If you read the article, you’ll find it has some solidly good news, and some very excellent arguments for human-instigated creativity rights.

animentality:

katajainen:

dduane:

dduane:

unicorn-elvis:

ms-demeanor:

katy-l-wood:

badgraph1csghost:

badgraph1csghost:

tchyp:

desert-palm:

Reblogging again. Firefox is an excellent, safe and fast browser and everyone should consider using it.

Don’t just consider it. If you have the ability to switch to Firefox, this is your official notice to do it.

Stop everything you’re doing and go download and install Firefox.

If you’re saying, “well, I need Chrome because I need such-and-such extension for my job”, the computer will not explode if you install another browser. Use Chrome ONLY for work tasks and use Firefox for everything else. If you’re concerned about losing your bookmarks, Firefox can import your Chrome bookmarks.

[ID: Firefox Library window. The “Import and Backup” panel is expanded, displaying the option, “Import Data from Another Browser”, which is also circled with a red MS Paint ellipse. ID end.]

And, don’t forget to install uBlock Origin while you’re at it.

Forgot a thing. Subscribe to Mozilla VPN for bonus points. It’s basically the only truly secure VPN service in the world right now.

For $5 a month, you can completely conceal your online activities from your ISP in a manner that isn’t just immediately monetised or turned over to the cops. No, it’s not free, it does cost money, but the money doesn’t go to line a billionaire’s pockets.

I wonder how much of this is because of work/school from home forcing people to use Chrome so all their stupid monitoring softwares and platforms can work.

This is also your reminder that you don’t have to use just one browser. You can use chrome for all the monitoring bullshit your office wants you to run and use firefox for everything else.

Be sure to add the multi account containers extension to your firefox, which allows you to be logged in to multiple accounts on the same website at the same time in the same window but in different tabs.

look on my five open tumblr accounts (not sideblogs, accounts!) ye mighty and despair.

Firefox is super good, folks. It’s good in a general “google shouldn’t own everything in the entire fucking world” sense AND in a “this is an actual good product that does lots of cool shit” sense.

ALSO make sure to add the Ublock origin extension on Firefox - I haven’t seen a youtube ad in five years and you don’t have to either.

While you’re at it, why not add the Wayback Machine extension so that if you go looking for a page that has been taken down the wayback machine will automatically offer you an archived version instead; also handy for documenting people’s shitty takes and winning arguments after they delete the original post!

Worried that Firefox is going to slow down your computer? In benchmarks, modern versions of chrome and firefox are pretty much the same speed but you can still install the auto tab discard extension ANYWAY so that it will snooze unused tabs in order to keep your computer running faster. Set it to sleep, discard, close, and store tags at your discretion!

And while you’re at it: install Firefox as your mobile browser for android and add those extensions to your mobile browser! Mobile adblock is here, baybee, save your data and enjoy a better mobile experience! And install it on iOS! iOS can’t add extensions, but at least it’s better than safari, and if you want a somewhat more private iOS browsing experience try firefox focus for iOS (which is also available on android but you can accomplish the same thing with extensions).

Anyway, firefox is good.

Also: in January 2023, Chrome is making some changes to plugin architecture that effectively neutering adblockers.  If you want good adblocking, you won’t have it in Chrome.  Use Firefox

(In fairness, some Chrome-derived browsers like Vivaldi and Opera have openly parted ways with Chrome about this, and more power to them, but Firefox is the way to go.)

Firefox is what we use around here. It’s terrific. 

Reblogging, because it’s true. :)

Firefox on laptop, Firefox on the phone. Keeping Edge around for some work stuff that won’t work anywhere else (I KNOW, but I wasn’t the one who wrote the code that way…).

spacedace:

Had a dc x dp brain worm, feel free to use as a prompt <3

Sidenote, I decided to get fancy with the Ancients titles because of course I did lol

Shifting Where = Space (Danny)

Eternal When = Time (Clockwork)

Ever Onward = Speedforce (Ellie)

—

Bruce watched the footage again.

And again.

Again.

It didn’t make sense.

A week ago every television, radio, computer, phone - even the LED billboards - had been taken over to deliver a message. Across the United States. In every territory it held. Every military base. Down in the depths of the oceans where American submarines tried to creep past Atlantian patrols. In the endless cold white of Antarctica. Even far above in the International Space Station. Any place the United States Government had control over, any place one of its citizens found themselves. There was the message.

The face of an entity, human in shape but not in form. Hair as gleaming white as starlight, eyes bright as the twisting dance of the Aurora Borealis, skin as cold and blue as the tail of a comet. The entity wore armor as black as the depths of space with a crown to match, the later glinting and shifting with the twisting birth and death of galaxies. A cloak of nebulae danced down his shoulders, eclipsing the world beyond the entity entirely.

He named himself, jaw tight, expression serious.

High King Phantom of the Infinite Realms.

The Shifting Where. Son of the Eternal When. Father of the Ever Onward. His Epitaphs many and ever growing. The True Balance. The Bridge Between. The Devourer of Dark. The Last Child of Between. The Great One.

King of the Dead. King of the Infinite Worlds. King of so much more than Bruce had ever even known was possible.

King who had declared war. Who marshaled his endless armies. Who spoke of warnings, of efforts to reach a peace, of trying again and again and again to find a way to not plunge into violence and bloodshed. All things living come to call him King in time, he had no want or need to go out and hurry that along. But there were no options left to him now. He had tried for peace. He had been denied.

He would not see his people suffer any longer. Would not see those he’d sworn to lead and protect imprisoned by fools who had sworn themselves enemies to all the afterlives. Would no longer permit the vicious cruelty to continue.

The message was a final warning.

A final offer.

Keep reading

abronzeagegod:

libraford:

katy-l-wood:

synebluetoo:

an-autistic-with-personhood:

guerrillatech:

Why would you hide that in the notes

I want an ice maker and enough room in the freezer for a pizza and that is IT.

I want the dumbest fridge you got. Gimme the orange tabby of refrigeration. I want my fridge to pull the wrong lever and turn my enemies into llamas instead of killing them. I want the following features: keeps things cold, has compartment that keeps things colder, a door that opens and shuts.

“Here at Stupid Jeff’s Dumb Appliance Warehouse we sell the dumbest fucking appliances. Check out this fridge. This fridge won’t ask you about your day, this dumb fucking fridge doesn’t know what an Elon Musk is and won’t fucking tell you what bullshit that dumb monkey is slapping into his phone today when you try to get some fucking milk. We took out all those "smart” electronics and in their place we put a loaded Glock 9mm that is put right up to that light that turns on when you open the door, which is the smartest thing in this fucking stupid fridge and let me tell you that fucker is on thin goddamn ice, if it gets too smart and tries to turn on before you open that door, the Glock will blow it to hell. Speaking of ice, this stupid fridge makes it. It makes ice, it keeps things cold, it comes with shelves. It’s sturdy enough that when your ex comes back to your place looking for their stuff that they think they left behind like nine months ago and they know that you don’t have it, but they wanted an excuse to come start a fight with you and throw a chair at your head but miss you and hit your fridge MICHAEL, this fridge will keep trucking because it gives zero shits and it only lives to keep things cold. Come to Stupid Jeff’s Dumb Appliance Warehouse, if you ask us if we have an app, we break your kneecaps.“

hummingirls:

finnglas:

onemillionwordsofcrap:

spandexbutterfly4lyfe:

adhd is so embarrassing ur basically like “I have to have fun right the fuck now or I’m throwing myself off the roof” 90% of the time and you also have very little control over this

This was the single most important thing for me to start understanding re: my undiagnosed ADHD, and it’s the thing no one tells you except other ADHD sufferers. My brain’s reward system is so broken that boredom rapidly becomes indistinguishable from a depressive episode. There’s no healthy, normal ability to experience something as simply being a little dull–as soon as my brain isn’t getting regular hits of stimulation, I start clawing at the walls. This is what makes working in a structured environment and initiating tasks so difficult for me, not malice or other character flaws.

What makes it worse is that, if you’re like me, when you were growing up, the only way your authority figures knew how to perceive this was “they’re just goofing off,” and therefore, would deprive you of anything remotely stimulating until you’d done your work, thinking that – if it worked like it would with an NT kid, you’d do your work faster so you could get back to having fun.

Instead, they just pulled the plug on any tiny bit of power you had running to your necessary brainwaves and put you into longterm shutdown mode.

But then….you grew up…with only that method for coping ingrained into you. So no matter how much you may know logically, now, that you have to have the “fun/interesting/challenging” cord plugged in for your brain to have any juice at all, you feel guilty for having to plug that in FIRST instead of as a reward for doing Adulting. So you just sit there, unplugged, not getting anything done.

Or maybe that’s just me.

even the most supportive and well meaning people in my life struggle to understand how painful lack of stimulation is, how immobilizing executive dysfunction is, and how i cannot feel satisfaction the way they do. the number of times i’ve been told “won’t it feel so nice to accomplish it and have it off your plate?” and having to explain that i don’t feel relief or pride when i finish a task, just exhaustion, and that’s part of why it’s so hard to even start it

queeranarchism:

mtndewloyalist-x:

silvasaliva:

having cash is like having secret money. like whos gonna find out i’m buying tacos with this crisp $20 bill??? not my bank account, that’s for sure

That’s literally why the government wants to stop it

Defend cash. The existence of a cash economy  is so so necessary for the survival of every population that the government wants to kill. Homeless people, sex workers, undocumented people, addicts. They all need cash to survive.

branchesofyggdrasil:

manifestingdestiel:

moony-moons-world:

imagitory:

midwesternlikeope:

aromantic-goldfish:

zediina:

rowark:

bisexual-boredom:

moonlighteduniverse:

silver-tongues-blog:

opalescentdragon:

lunarcanine:

dragon-in-a-fez:

consider: teenagers aren’t apathetic about everything they’re just used to you shitting all over whatever they show excitement about

Teen: *gets a job*

“I GOT THE JOB!”

Parents: Well, when I was your age, I already had 5 jobs and was supporting my family

Teen: *gets all A’s*

“I worked really hard!”

Parents: Well, of course you did, this is the expectation, not a celebration.

probably why so many teens take to social media where they can enthusiastically share their interests and achievements and get positive feedback that their parents never gave

A LITTLE LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK

This hit hard

I remember once, when I was in my early 20s, I was an afternoon supervisor at my job, and I worked with mostly teenagers, and the one day this one kid, who was like 15, was bored so I suggested he could clean out the fridge. He did and when he was done I said he did a good job.

After that, this kid was cleaning out the fridge at least once a week, and I was like, “why are you always cleaning the fridge?” Like, I didn’t mind, but it seemed odd. And he said, “one time I cleaned the fridge and you said I did a good job. I wanted to make you proud of me again.”

Literally, I changed the entire way I interacted with teenagers after that. I actually got a package of glitter stars and I would stick them on their nametags when they did a good job, and they loved it.

My manager had commented on how hard these kids work and I said, “they’re starved for positive feedback. They go to school all day then come to work all evening and no one appreciates it because it’s expected of them, but they’re still kids. They need positive feedback from adults in their lives.”

Like, everyone likes feeling appreciated. Everyone likes being complimented and having their efforts be noticed. Another coworker (who was a mother of teenage children), hated that I did this, and said they were too old to be rewarded with stickers, but like… it wasn’t about the stickers. The stickers were just a symbol that their effort was noticed and appreciated. I was just lucky that I learned this at a time when I was still young enough to remember what it was like to be a teenager. I was only 2 years out of highschool at that point and highschool is fucking hard. People forget this as they get older, but ask anyone and almost no one would ever want to go back and do it again, but they expect kids to suck it up because they’re young so they should be able to do school full time, plus homework, and work, and maintain a healthy social life, and sleep, and spend time with family, and do chores and help out at home, and worry about college and relationships and everything else, and then just get shit on all the time and treated like they’re lazy and entitled. And then they wonder why teenagers are apathetic.

For a german exam I had to argue against an article that was essentially „kids these days, they don’t care about anything and are constantly on their phones“ and really it was the easiest essay I‘ve ever written.

Teens don’t talk to adults bc adults only ask „so, how‘s school“ to then interrupt them two sentences in. And because they can’t engage in a conversation about buying houses and working in a bank. I would’ve loved to talk about philosophy and politics and history with family the way I did with friends and in class but because I was young no one took what I had to say seriously.

And no, teens aren’t always on their phone. They’re on their phone when they’re bored. You think I‘m on social media when I‘m with my friends? When I‘m talking about something I‘m interested in?

Maybe the reason kids are so distant and always on their phone during family parties and the like is because you‘re failing to engage and include them.

Whoop there it is

When you respect kids, they really respond and learn from you. But if you treat kids like “theyre just a kid, what do they know??” then you’ll never find out.

As a Disneyland Cast Member, I’ll add my own experience onto this –

Very frequently, when I first speak to a child while I’m at work, they’ll kind of withdraw and act uncomfortable and shy. Their parents will then rather frequently tell them to not be shy and try to coax them to talk to me – whenever that happens, I always, without fail, politely dissuade the parents from pressuring them.

“I’m a stranger,” I’ll tell the kid’s parents. “I don’t blame them for not talking to me – if they were anywhere else, they’d have the right idea, to not immediately trust me.”

I cannot tell you how many times I’ve seen that same kid – simply after hearing their initial reaction being validated, instead of reproached – immediately open up to me after that. I also cannot tell you how many times that child and I would go on to start a friggin’ marathon conversation, and I got to hear all about how great their day was or what their favorite Disney movies were or what rides they liked and didn’t like or how much they like a certain Disney character or song…all from me validating that initial feeling and showing genuine interest in what they had to say.

This isn’t just young children, either. I will always remember being positioned outside the Animation Academy one day and starting up a conversation with a young lady, perhaps 12 or 13, who joined the line with her father a full 25 minutes before the class was supposed to start. Now keep in mind, we do a drawing class every 30 minutes: there was no one else in line at that point, and no one else joined the girl and her father in line for a full fifteen minutes. So I could tell pretty quickly that this girl was very emotionally invested in getting a good spot for the drawing class: a conclusion all the more bolstered by the fact that she had a notebook under her arm. I asked her if she was an artist – she said yes, but seemed uncomfortable at the question, so I skipped even asking her if I could see her work, instead admitting that I myself wasn’t very good at art, but that I’m trying to get better and that I love the history of Disney animation. On the screens around us was video footage of different Disney concept art and animation reels, so I pointed one of them out (for Snow White) and asked if she knew the story behind the making of the movie. Upon confirming that she didn’t, I proceeded to get down on the floor so I could sit next to her and her father and dramatically tell the whole story of how “Uncle Walt” created the first full-length animated motion picture, even though everyone and their mother thought he was an idiot for even trying, and how the film ended up becoming the first Hollywood blockbuster. After the story was over, the girl’s father said that his daughter really wanted to be an animator when she grew up, and she finally felt comfortable enough to open her notebook and show me some of her artwork. It was wonderful! Every sketch had such character and you could tell how much work she put into it! And I could tell how much telling her that – and sharing that moment with her, where we got to connect over something we both really enjoyed – had meant. And after the class was over, she sought me out to show me what she and her father had drawn – and sure enough, hers was great! (Her father’s was too, really. XD)

People, kids and teens included, love sharing what they love and how they feel with others. You just have to give them the chance to show it.

A LITTLE LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK!

-~-

I feel like I am obliged to add one more thing: don’t ever think that the kids won’t feel your unspoken judgements cause they do!

I felt always like a ‘problem’ in my family, until I was about sixteen, I got this teacher who was litterally the first to tell I was worthy. He changed my life up till this day.

Also how do grown ups imagine how ‘we’ will ever learn to engage in conversations with adults properly if you don’t teach us?

This post is

Everything

I told one of my new coworkers (who is 26) that he was doing really well and that I was proud of him and his progress. I thought he was going to start crying for how quietly he said “really?”. 

Positive feedback makes the biggest difference to everything.

jewish-kulindadromeus:

postingtreyf:

jewish-kulindadromeus:

histrionicintrovert:

hindahoney:

Because I’m only seeing other Jews posting about this, non-Jews I need you to be aware that for the past month or two there has been a wave of bomb threats and swattings at synagogues all across the US. They usually do it when services are being livestreamed. I haven’t seen a single non-Jew talking about this. High holidays are coming up in a few weeks, which is when most attacks happen against our communities. We’re worried, and we need people to know what’s happening to us.

Bomb threats and 'swatting' campaign hits dozens of synagogues

The synagogue bomb threats and swatting have hit more than 20 synagogues over the past month, according to security experts.

The Forward

(this article was published August 15 2023)

this is awful on its own, but on top of everything else it has lead to cops and other law enforcement swarming synagogues, which is a one way ticket to all jews of color feeling too unsafe to enter. This is a fucking nightmare

Nooot looking forward to how much more security there’s probably going to be for the high hols than the increased amount there usually is. This shit is going to be extra costly for shuls who’s security budgets are already pretty tight.

#idk if ‘religious freedom’ is actually a thing that exists if a religion’s communal buildings require security to prevent terrorism

don’t hide this in the tags, it doesn’t exist if this is what we’re forced to do, esp bc it means most JOC can’t freely practice their religion at all

sharkcougarhawksnakescorpion:

lasrina:

animate-mush:

sharkangelic:

wheeloffortune-design:

you know you’re good at your job when every single person tells you “thank god you’re back”

Boss makes a dollar
You make a dime
You read unsanitary pirate slash
On company time

Look if you read fanfic on the clock and everyone is still relieved that you’re back you must just be that got-dang good at your job

Fam, some jobs are like being a firefighter. 90% of the time you’re not doing anything that important, but by golly, when they need you, they need you.

Some jobs, you can fuck around for six hours a day, but you know what you’re doing so well that the work you do in two hours would take somebody else ten.

Some jobs, you spend those two hours preventing other people from making mistakes that would take 100 hours to fix if you weren’t there to steer them right.

So don’t buy into the idea that if you’re not working 480 minutes a day, you’re not doing enough to get paid a day’s wages. That’s the capitalism talking.

You’re a better employee when you keep your morale up, and sometimes you do that by reading fanfiction on the clock in between putting out your little fires.

My grandad worked nights for the railroad, and he liked to say that he got paid for what knew, not what he did. There would be nights without a single train, but someone had to be there to make sure that any train that came by was on time and on the right track. It could be so slow the guys set up a projector and watched x-rated films on the clock. OP, I think your okay.

siriwesen:

jv:

jv:

jv:

Oh

OH!!!

OhOhOHHhhhhhh!!!!!!!11!!eleven11!!!!!

The ✨

Fucking 😻

European Union’s 🌈

Digital Service Act 🥲

Forces large social platforms 🥳

To always offer ♥️

a non-algorithmic option 🌟

To EU users 🤟

Fuck

Yeah

EU!!!!

Originally posted by eggfucker1

[source]

I see US tech jounalists on Mastodon, once again, charging against the EU for “damaging european users” by forcing companies to deliver “a subpar experience”. So let me paste something I wrote over there a few weeks ago:

——

I keep seeing very important US tech journalist here talking about how Threads not launching in the EU is:
- somehow shameful and a sign of how “you can’t innovate in the EU”
- a problem for the EU, which will led us to creative interpretations of the GDPR to finally allow Meta to launch here.

And I think folks from the US tech scene really, really don’t understand several things:

1) how incredibly hostile the EU (and a good chunk of the European political parties) are to “big tech”.
2) how surprisingly immune to lobbying the EU Parliament appears to be.
3) how actually popular it’s that the politicians take a hard stance against macrocorps. Every time the European Commission has gone against big tech most the press and the people have cheered them as our champions against evil.

And I can’t even start describing how IMPORTANT for the future could be that people started being able to turn off YouTube algorithmic recommendations. I think YouTube shares with meta, pretty much 50/50, the responsibility for the global resurgence of fascism we have seen in the last decade.

The EU isn’t perfect but I celebrate every time they get pissed at big tech firms for data and privacy breaches.

Or having 20000 different charger cables. 10/10 EU in this regard. Be hostile against algorithms targeting consumers.

luminarai:

ALT

ALT

ALT

ALT

hey, hi, I was just on the former bird app and came across this info from a brand new study and now I cannot stop screaming internally??? what the actual fuckkkk

theres’ an article from the guardian here and here is the actual study:

Red blood cell capacity of modern menstrual products: considerations for assessing heavy menstrual bleeding

Background Heavy menstrual bleeding affects up to one third of menstruating individuals and has a negative impact on quality of life. The di

BMJ Sexual & Reproductive Health

prokopetz:

hmantegazzi:

prokopetz:

We don’t just need to bring back mixed-use zoning, we also need to bring back corner stores where the owner lives on the second floor. Heck, I’m pretty sure that’s the only way to prevent mixed-use zones from being cannibalised by corporate horseshit in our present climate: only allow businesses which are also the owner’s primary residence.

This is as simple as to stop enforcing residential zoning. People will spontaneously decide to open stores in their garages or such if they’re allowed (or at least not forbidden) to do so.

I mean, the demand for it exists in all residential neighbourhoods, without any doubt, and not only for grocery stores. In no time you’ll also have beauty salons, cafes, diy stores, dinners, bakeries, mechanic workshops, gyms, liquor stores, etc (I’m just mentioning whatever is 3 blocks around here).

Surely some of them will cause the ire of NIMBYs, and maybe even justified concerns of otherwise favourable neighbours (believe me, having a liquor store less than a block away isn’t that fun when you’re trying to sleep and their clients don’t), but most of them will be such a convenient solution to everyday needs that I’m sure most people will be in favour of keeping them all.

Well, no, it’s not quite as simple as not enforcing residential zoning. If you establish mixed-use neighbourhoods without further regulation or oversight, what usually happens is that property-holding companies rapidly gobble up all of the available lots and you end up with a wasteland of derelict strip malls and empty Airbnbs with a WalMart in the middle, and few or no actual residents.