Vocabulary workshop level f answers review 7-9

r/OverwatchUniversity: Discussion, Help and Guides

2016.05.10 17:11 r/OverwatchUniversity: Discussion, Help and Guides

/OverwatchUniversity is a subreddit for learning about the game Overwatch. Featuring VOD reviews, guides, answers for all your questions, and more!

[link]

2012.10.23 01:58 Hotline Miami: Gratuitous Violence

Welcome to Miami, where you answer weird phone calls, put a mask on and go kill people. This subreddit is related to game series Hotline Miami by Dennaton games and published by Devolver Digital. Certified by the Russian International Censorship Committee

[link]

2011.08.28 00:51 xtc46 A subreddit for general treadmill enthusiasm

A subreddit for general weight training discussion, focused on intermediate level and above in experience and strength, for those ranging from strength sport competitors, sports that benefit from weight training, or weight training enthusiasts. Or for people to tell WeaponizedSleep to eat more.

[link]

2024.06.10 00:59 famedmae Type me based on the PhantomWithin's questionnaire

L (logic)

* How much time and energy do you spend researching or studying? Do you like researching and studying, and why?
I tend to spend a lot of time studying. Any dead time I experience is usually spent reading whatever I find interesting. I generally like learning just to learn. I don’t necessarily need an end goal. The act of studying is simply enjoyable. Though, I do want to acquire as much knowledge as possible as well. There are nights I’ve stayed up studying math and physics, at times when I have had no practical use for either subject, simply for fun. Though, I suppose part of why I do things like that, is because I generally dislike the idea of other people being superior to me in any way, shape or form (slight exaggeration). I don’t like knowing that someone knows something that I don’t.
* How many of your own opinions do you form? How often do you do actual thinking on your own, more than just finding an existing answer?
I do tend to form my own conclusions about things. I generally don’t believe my conclusions to necessarily be the truth, but I do try to draw connections between everything, and reason out stuff on my own. I suppose my reddit comment history could be relevant here. How embarrassing. I tend to use my reasoning to fill the gaps in my knowledge when necessary, which can have the effect of making me look more knowledgeable than I really am in conversation. I am generally open to other people’s points of views, but I don’t rely on other people’s reasoning or statements, per se. Stuff generally needs to make logical sense to me before I’m able to draw any conclusions. I do also enjoy exploring theoretical matters in dialogue, for various reasons. One would be that other people’s thoughts and responses can spark my own creativity, leading me to understand subjects more thoroughly. There’s also the fact that some people are more knowledgeable in certain subjects than I am. I also just enjoy talking to people. I love seeing people reason. Highly entertaining.
* How often do you talk about concepts or facts? Why exactly do you talk about it, and what do you like talking about most?
Seems I’ve already answered this to an extent. I do like sharing my thoughts and knowledge with other people. I often spam my friends with long rants about whatever I find interesting in that particular moment, whether that be pottery, resin, weaponry, mathematics, typology, theology or ancient history. When I disagree with someone, I tend to interrogate them with “why” questions endlessly, questioning all their reasoning and making remarks like “if that is true, then what about x”, and such, in hopes of guiding them towards what I believe to correct with their own reasoning. I am curious about other people's beliefs in general. I suppose I often ask my friends questions I already know the answers to, just to enjoy their reasoning. Possibly a bit off-topic, but I believe it to be at least somewhat relevant.
* Do you struggle with thinking about things by yourself? Does this bother you, and how much? How well do you handle criticism from others when it comes to your logical concepts or factual knowledge?
I wouldn’t say I struggle to think about things by myself. I rather enjoy brainstorming, actually. Well, I am more fond of engaging in divergent thinking than I am convergent thinking, although I’m not especially insecure in either kind of thinking. As for how I handle criticism, it really depends. There have been moments where criticism has affected me to a significant extent and made me doubt my abilities. I am usually open to criticism, though.
* Did you enjoy answering the above questions? Would you say this is a major part of who you are or your identity? Was it boring? Is it a difficult topic?
I would say that it is a relatively major part of my identity. The topic wasn’t especially boring. I’m fairly adept at finding enjoyment in most activities. I’ve always enjoyed answering questionnaires and surveys, probably because I’m quite fond of categorizing things. This topic isn’t especially difficult to answer.

E (emotion)

* Do you consider yourself a creative person? What do you do that's creative?
I do consider myself a fairly creative person. I often create stories in my head, generally containing relatively elaborate storylines and power systems. I don’t know the exact amount, but I’ve probably made at least 30 full fledged stories, with a proper beginning, middle and end, and there are hundreds of stories drifting around in my head that I’ve never ended up finishing. Though, I am hesitant about sharing my stories with friends. Ideas generally come naturally to me.
* How do you feel about expressing your own emotions? Are emotions part of your decision-making at all? How much of a role do they play in your decisions?
I can be quite expressive of my emotions around friends. I don’t necessarily dislike the act of showing my emotions, but showcasing negative emotions can make me feel weak. I can be fairly reserved in how I present my emotions around people I’m not hugely familiar with, or in large groups. I would still consider myself to be decently expressive though, and I don’t necessarily mind that. As for my decision making, I’m uh, struggling to properly answer that part of the question. My emotions do affect my decisions, of course, but I don’t know to what extent. I consider myself a fairly emotional person. I definitely weigh certain emotions when making decisions, such as shame and fear, along with excitement, and in social settings, I tend to consider other people’s feelings to a fairly large extent.
* How much effort do you put into creating a positive emotional influence on other people? Do you try to do this at all? Do you like exploring the emotions or creativity of others?
Creating a positive emotional influence on other people isn’t my top priority per se, but I do often tell friends and family I appreciate them, and I’ve gotten into the gotten into the habit of trying to make people feel fulfilled emotionally. I do like caring for others emotionally, but it can feel a bit awkward. I don’t always know what to say when consoling others, but I’ve gotten reasonably comfortable comforting others over time. I am very curious about the minds of others. I try to figure out how other people’s emotions and thought processes work, which can often lead me to spamming others with questions. I don’t particularly care for exploring or manifesting the creativity of others, though.
* Do you feel uncomfortable with the idea of sharing your emotions? Do you struggle with knowing exactly how to connect with others on a deeper and more emotional level? Do you struggle with knowing how to go about dealing with and handling your emotions?
I don’t really mind sharing most of my emotions with close friends. Mostly, anyway. Outside of that, I’m not particularly fond of sharing negative emotions, since that can make me feel vulnerable. I don’t like feeling weak or vulnerable. I don’t believe I necessarily struggle with knowing how to connect with people. I do feel like I can connect with people fairly well, although I’m not sure how apparent it always is. My emotions can be bothersome at times. I suppose I don’t really know the best way of dealing with them yet, but that’ll likely come with time. I should already have enough tools at my disposal. When I’m at my healthiest and happiest, I tend to ignore my emotions, the ones holding me back, at least. That isn’t consistently the case, however. A bit off-topic, but I guess it might also be worth nothing that I have rather high stress levels. I don’t mind doing stressful things, though.
* Did you enjoy answering the above questions? Would you say this is a major part of who you are or your identity? Was it boring? Is it a difficult topic?
I found answering the above questions to be reasonably enjoyable. Definitely wasn’t boring. I noticed that talking about expressing my negative emotions made me feel nauseous, which was interesting to see. I do enjoy observing my reactions. My emotions seem to be connected to my identity. I have strangely strong emotions, and I’ve been reflecting on them a lot as of late. I still feel nauseous, actually. Strangely beautiful. I’ve noticed that my attitude towards my emotions might be a bit inconsistent, I guess? I suddenly feel a lot more comfortable sharing my emotions. I suppose insecurities can be overcome.

F (physics / foundation)

* How much time and energy do you put into your physical health? Do you try new healthcare or self-care products often? How often, and what kinds of products do you like trying?
I’m not sure I would call my health a top priority, but I do consistently go to the gym, and I am very particular about wearing sunscreen whenever I go out in the sun. I don’t go out of my way to try new healthcare products. I use moisturizer and sunscreen, and that’s about it.
* How much do you care about your physical appearance, including fashion choices, or decorating the physical environment for comfort? Do you like exploring the physical environment (food, nature, architecture, etc), or doing physical activity?
I do care about my physical appearance, and I can feel insecure if I feel I look bad. I am generally pretty confident in my appearance, though I don’t really do much regarding it. I don’t care much about fashion or physical decoration. I do consider it very interesting to explore new places and environments. I’m a bit too curious in general, leading me to dejectedly mourn the fact that trespassing laws exis- uh. Anyway, I generally just want to explore the world as much as possible. Don’t have any particular opinions about food or physical activity. I suppose I occasionally admire other people’s sense of fashion.
* Do you like talking about your personal tastes often? How often do you explore the personal tastes of others? What about your own health or the health of others? Do you like creating or exploring comfortable environments with others?
Personal tastes? Nothing in particular that comes to mind at the moment. I suppose I’m a bit of an art connoisseur. I don’t really pay attention to my health very much. I do care about my skin health, and I don’t want to get wrinkles, but beyond superficial stuff like that, I don’t really care. Well actually, I do care about my physical strength. I want to be competent, and so I don’t want others to be stronger or faster than me. I pay attention to my hygiene and others’ hygiene. I’m particular about washing my hands thoroughly, and I maintain that others do so as well. I regularly shower and always apply perfume/deodorant. I don’t really care about creating comfortable environments with others.
* Do you stress about what people will think regarding your personal tastes? Do you prefer to follow fashion trends in worry that people may judge your own style? Do you worry about being sick or in poor physical health often? Are you able to take criticism about your health, aesthetic choices, personal tastes, or physical appearance?
I don’t really care if people judge my personal tastes. I’ve never really been the kind of person to care about following fashion trends. I don’t really mind getting sick, as being sick gives me an opportunity to relax comfortably. My ability to focus is also heightened while sick, for some reason or another, so that’s another perk. I don’t especially care about my health, personal tastes and aesthetic choices being criticized. My appearance I can be a little sensitive about, I suppose. I'm not sure I readily take advice regarding my appearance.
* Did you enjoy answering the above questions? Would you say this is a major part of who you are or your identity? Was it boring? Is it a difficult topic?
Answering questions is fun in general, but this topic wasn’t particularly engaging, compared to the other ones. I don’t really consider my physical choices to be a large part of my identity, and I’m somewhat ambivalent about most things relating to this topic.

V (volition)

* Do you know how to get what you want? How much effort do you put into figuring out how to get what you want? Do you just take action and get started, do you plan, do you research or try to get advice from others?
I usually research before doing anything. I’m a naturally indecisive person, but really, taking action is better than being stuck in analysis paralysis. Taking action can be difficult for me at times, but it’s something that I’m getting better at. I don’t really spend much effort trying to figure out what I want, since I already have a fairly decent idea. I have a rough idea of what I want to make out of my life, and the idea of living it out is fairly exciting. My plans aren't especially precise, however. I have been anxious about whether I’ll be able to fulfill my plans in the past, but I’m not worried about that at the moment. I don’t really take advice from others regarding my life, although, I will occasionally discuss my plans with others, but I generally ignore advice that I don’t agree with.
* How often do you feel motivated to work on your future? How often are you busy working on a goal for the future? Do you prefer routine, or often fall into routine? Is your routine making progress on a goal? What makes you change your routine? What makes you start working on a goal?
My motivation is sporadic. While I have ideas for what to do in the future, I don’t currently have any long-term goals that I actively work towards. My goals are more fluid in nature. I tend to abandon routine when doing something that interests me. As mentioned earlier, I often neglect rest if I’m doing something I’m passionate about. Outside of that, I do appreciate having some semblance of a routine, as it does keep me grounded, I suppose. Competition and a desire not to waste my life are my main motivators to work on goals, along with general enthusiasm, of course.
* Do you like guiding or helping people reach their goals? What kinds of goals do you prefer to help people with? Are you a leader, or do you prefer to work in groups where you're an equal? How and when do you take charge, if ever?
I suppose I do try to motivate others to an extent. There have been moments where I’ve attempted to get my friends to better themselves, take initiative, or to think less pessimistically, but that’s about it. I don’t mind motivating others on occasion, but it isn’t a focus of mine. I generally don’t opt for leadership roles, largely because I dislike the responsibilities attached. I don’t like being bossed around, though. I often take charge when working in smaller groups, and that can be nice.
* Do you overwork yourself? Do you worry that you might be lazy or that you aren't progressing quickly enough? Does it feel impossible to find the right method forward? Are you able to take criticism over your choices for working towards your goals? How do you respond to being challenged?
I experienced burnout a little while ago, and during that period, I did sometimes worry about being “lazy”, to the point where I remember someone calling me lazy in one of my dreams. That has lessened as my mental health has improved. Outside of that, I do dislike “wasting time” and not being productive, although in my case, being productive simply means to use my time decisively and purposefully. I don’t necessarily care very much about what most people associate with productivity. What I personally want to do matters more. It depends, but I will often attempt to prove myself when challenged.
* Did you enjoy answering the above questions? Would you say this is a major part of who you are or your identity? Was it boring? Is it a difficult topic?
It was interesting. It was definitely a little harder to write about than physics was. I do consider volition to be important, and it is definitely something that I relate to my identity. I want to control my own life and live it without other people’s influence, and I want to become more assertive. Talking about volition isn’t particularly stressful, it soothes my heart, actually. Though, the topic has stressed me out some amount before, likely because I was dealing with burnout, though.

Additional

* Please share any mental or physical health struggles or diagnoses that may affect your answers or how you interact with the world
Asperger’s syndrome.
* You may also optionally share a rough age range to help clarify your current life circumstances for anyone reading
18-20 years old.
* Let us know anything else about you that might affect your answers or how you interact with the world
I am genuinely curious what I'm expected to write here. My other typology, perhaps? Well, that sounds like it would be more fun for you to reason out on your own, so I shall refrain from mentioning it, for I am a varlet.

submitted by famedmae to attitudinalpsyche [link] [comments]

2024.06.10 00:53 Yeager1990 Too many options and no clarity

Hello, I will try to keep the point of this post simple.
I work for a large international manufacturing company in the central US. I started as a factory worker with a HS diploma and worked my way to being an expert in the facility and a leader at multiple levels with excellent reviews. During my time at entry level, lower supervision, and operations superintendent, I worked on my associate's degree through the local community college paid for by my employer. During my Operations Superintendent role, my TMOD manager came to me with an opportunity for a new position in a training development/HR role. After mulling back and forth on the idea of moving to HR, which I never found appealing, he sold me on a few practical points. For me to continue my rise through the company, I needed to check some boxes.
Complete a bachelor's degree
10 plus years of company management experience. Checked
A cross-functional move or foreign assignment of two years.
I was next in line for multiple promotions that were on 2 years or less timelines and would be making 100k plus in a year from now. That quick path would have been my ceiling until I checked the previously mentioned boxes. This was nearly impossible with the workload and lack of opportunities for lateral moves at that level. So came his offer: take this position that the company desperately needs and that I am solely qualified for and, over the next 3-5 years, will check the remaining two boxes to raise my ceiling to the corporate/executive level. While in this cross-functional lateral role, I would see those I worked next to and mentored move into the roles I was groomed for. I jumped to this role regardless, and it has been a very rough journey with a lot of imposter syndrome on my side. My goals in this new assignment have not been clear or motivating. A bright side is my reputation in the company seems to be rock solid but different than I had perceived and I am still seen as a good leader with high potential. I have had many candid and honest conversations with my manager, but our styles of communication and leadership are vastly different. We only 5 years apart in age but he has his whole career in HR with a MBA as of last year.
I feel I have made a decision that has put my future career path in jeopardy and raised more questions about what I want and what the company plans for me.
Currently the only development goal I have been given by my manager is the complete my bachelors and I just completed two community college associate's at the beginning of May. My other two work related goals seem like fodder to keep me busy with meaningless work. He just pulled me in to tell me if I don't meet them its no big deal or reflection on me.
I am currently enrolled in an online management degree program at a fairly respectable regional university, and my company is paying for it. They are also considering paying for my Masters depending on maintaining my high potential rating.
My concerns are this. I feel I had carrots dangled to get me in my current position where I feel trapped.
I was promised development opportunities within the organization to develop leadership and he now has hired outside contractor to do this without giving me an opportunity.
He promised training and access to computer systems that would develop my creative skills in program and training design, and this has been dangled in front of me while my peers actually receive it. Each time I ask I am gaslit with a different answer.
I am currently performing functions of positions multiple salary grades higher than my own and functions that have never existed before that I created and developed successfully.
I brought up my plans to major in management and I don't get a clear answer as to if that is a good path for me when before this role that was clear.
My performance reviews are all rated as exceptional, but my potential rating for promotions was knocked down, supposedly to protect me from internal poaching. This feels like gaslighting
I am not arguing that my salary is not generous as it has gone from $55,800 in 2019 to 90,000 with guaranteed bonus this year.
I feel either I have a ego issue (which don't we all) and a horrible case of imposter syndrome or I am being secretly pigeon holed and career gas lit.
Has anyone experienced this or do I just need to hear a suck it up buttercup and move on?

submitted by Yeager1990 to careeradvice [link] [comments]

2024.06.10 00:52 kayakero Why wordpress is the top CMS in the world when it comes to start a website

WordPress has firmly established itself as the leading Content Management System (CMS) globally, and several factors contribute to its dominant position. Its popularity stems from its versatility, ease of use, robust community support, and extensive ecosystem of plugins and themes. Here are the primary reasons why WordPress is the top choice for starting a website:

1. User-Friendly Interface

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2. Open-Source Platform

Being an open-source platform, WordPress is free to use, modify, and distribute. This openness has fostered a large community of developers who contribute to its continuous improvement. Users benefit from constant updates, enhanced security, and new features without additional costs.

3. Extensive Plugin Ecosystem

One of WordPress’s greatest strengths is its vast plugin ecosystem. With over 58,000 plugins available, users can extend their website's functionality in virtually any direction. Whether it’s for SEO, security, social media integration, e-commerce, or performance optimization, there’s likely a plugin available to meet the need.

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WordPress offers thousands of themes, both free and premium, catering to various industries and styles. This extensive selection allows users to quickly change the look and feel of their website without extensive design knowledge. Themes are customizable, enabling unique and professional designs that align with brand identity.

5. SEO-Friendly

WordPress is designed with SEO best practices in mind. It generates clean and optimized code, offers a variety of SEO plugins (like Yoast SEO and All in One SEO Pack), and allows users to manage meta tags, URLs, and other critical SEO elements easily. These features help websites rank better in search engine results.

6. Community Support

The WordPress community is one of its most significant assets. There are numerous forums, blogs, tutorials, and online courses available for users of all skill levels. This extensive support network makes it easier for beginners to find help and for advanced users to find solutions to complex problems.

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While no platform is immune to security threats, WordPress takes security seriously. Regular updates and a wide array of security plugins help protect websites from vulnerabilities. The active community also ensures that any security issues are quickly identified and patched.

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WordPress is incredibly flexible and can be used for various types of websites, including blogs, business sites, e-commerce stores, portfolios, and forums. It scales well with the needs of the site, handling traffic spikes and large amounts of content without compromising performance, especially with proper hosting and optimization.

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With plugins like WooCommerce, WordPress seamlessly transforms into a powerful e-commerce platform. WooCommerce, in particular, powers a significant portion of online stores globally, offering extensive features for product management, payment processing, and order tracking.

10. Multilingual Support

WordPress supports multiple languages, making it a global platform. Plugins like WPML (WordPress Multilingual Plugin) and Polylang allow users to create multilingual websites easily, catering to a diverse audience.

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As a CMS, WordPress excels in content management. It offers robust features for creating, organizing, and publishing content. The Gutenberg block editor further enhances this capability by providing a flexible, block-based approach to content creation, enabling more dynamic and visually appealing layouts.

12. Cost-Effectiveness

Starting a website on WordPress can be very cost-effective. The core software is free, and there are numerous free themes and plugins available. Even premium themes and plugins are often reasonably priced, offering significant value for their cost.

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WordPress and its ecosystem of themes and plugins are regularly updated to add new features, enhance performance, and improve security. This ensures that websites remain current with the latest web standards and functionalities.

14. Integration Capabilities

WordPress integrates well with various third-party services and tools, such as email marketing platforms, payment gateways, and social media networks. This interoperability makes it easier to build a cohesive online presence.

Conclusion

WordPress's dominance as the top CMS in the world is a result of its user-friendly nature, flexibility, extensive customization options, strong community support, and commitment to continuous improvement. Its ability to cater to a wide range of website types and its robust features for SEO, security, and e-commerce make it the go-to choice for both beginners and seasoned web developers.
Whether you’re starting a personal blog or a large-scale e-commerce site, WordPress provides the tools and resources necessary to build and maintain a successful online presence.
More reviews:

submitted by kayakero to reviewsforyou [link] [comments]

2024.06.10 00:50 jetstreamer2 [DIPLOMACY] Communications from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Second Roman Republic - 2074

MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS OF THE SECOND ROMAN REPUBLIC

This e-letter is addressed to the Embassy of the UNSC in Thessaloniki.
Per bilateral discussions held last year, the Second Roman Republic is presenting the UNSC with a draft intelligence sharing agreement with regards to the Garden of Eden. We believe the signing of such an agreement is a crucial stepping stone for future cooperation on containment and as such we welcome any and all feedback from the UNSC.
Draft Proposal can be found below:

Intelligence Sharing Agreement Between the Second Roman Republic and the UKOBI-Nordic-Siberican-Cypriot Confederation Regarding the Garden of Eden
Preamble

This Intelligence Sharing Agreement (hereinafter referred to as "the Agreement") is made and entered into on this day, [Date], by and between the Second Roman Republic (hereinafter referred to as "the Republic") and the UKOBI-Nordic-Siberican-Cypriot Confederation (hereinafter referred to as "the Confederation"). The Republic and the Confederation are collectively referred to as "the Parties" and individually as "a Party."
Recognizing the mutual benefits of cooperation in matters of national security, and desiring to enhance the ability to counter threats posed by the Garden of Eden (hereinafter referred to as "Eden"), the Parties hereby agree as follows:

Article I: Objectives

1.1 The primary objective of this Agreement is to establish a framework for the sharing of intelligence related to the Garden of Eden to enhance the security and defense capabilities of both Parties.
1.2 The Parties agree to share information that is relevant, timely, and accurate to effectively capture, analyze and potentially counter the activities and influence of Eden.

Article II: Scope of Intelligence Sharing

2.1 The Parties shall share the following types of intelligence related to Eden:

Strategic intelligence
Tactical intelligence
Operational intelligence
Human intelligence (HUMINT)
Signals intelligence (SIGINT)
Geospatial intelligence (GEOINT)
Cyber intelligence

2.2 The intelligence shared may include, but is not limited to:

Threat assessments
Information on foreign intelligence activities and networks
Information on military capabilities and movements
Cybersecurity threats and vulnerabilities
Economic activities linked to security concerns
Political developments within Eden that may impact security

Article III: Methods of Intelligence Sharing

3.1 The Parties shall establish secure communication channels for the exchange of intelligence, including encrypted digital communication, secure telephonic communication, and face-to-face meetings if deemed necessary.
3.2 The Parties shall designate points of contact within their respective intelligence agencies to facilitate the timely and efficient exchange of information.
3.3 The Parties agree to hold regular joint intelligence meetings to discuss current threats and developments related to Eden, assess shared intelligence, and plan joint actions if necessary.

Article IV: Handling and Protection of Shared Intelligence

4.1 The Parties agree to handle and protect shared intelligence with the highest level of security to prevent unauthorized access, disclosure, or misuse.
4.2 Shared intelligence shall be classified according to the national security laws and regulations of the providing Party, and the receiving Party shall afford it an equivalent level of protection.
4.3 Each Party shall ensure that shared intelligence is only disseminated within its government and military structures on a strict need-to-know basis.
4.4 In the event of a security breach involving shared intelligence, the affected Party shall immediately inform the other Party and take all necessary measures to mitigate the impact of the breach.

Article V: Limitations and Restrictions

5.1 The Parties recognize that certain intelligence may be subject to national security restrictions and may not be shared in full. In such cases, the providing Party shall share as much information as possible without compromising its national security.
5.2 This Agreement does not obligate either Party to share intelligence that is not related to the Garden of Eden.
5.3 The Parties shall not share any intelligence received under this Agreement with third parties without the express written consent of the providing Party.

Article VI: Use of Air Infrastructure and Airspace

6.1 The Republic agrees to grant the Confederation access to its air infrastructure and airspace for the purpose of conducting reconnaissance and overflight operations related to the Garden of Eden.
6.2 The Confederation must provide notification and obtain clearance from the Republic at least 48 hours in advance of any planned reconnaissance or overflight operations.
6.3 The Republic reserves the right to deny or restrict access to its air infrastructure and airspace if such operations are deemed to compromise its national security or interests.
6.4 The Confederation shall ensure that its reconnaissance and overflight operations are conducted in compliance with the air traffic control regulations and guidelines of the Republic.
6.5 Any data and intelligence gathered during these operations shall be shared with the Republic in accordance with the provisions of this Agreement.

Article VII: Review and Amendment

7.1 The Parties agree to review the effectiveness of this Agreement annually and make any necessary amendments to enhance its effectiveness.
7.2 Amendments to this Agreement shall be made in writing and signed by authorized representatives of both Parties.

Article VIII: Duration and Termination

8.1 This Agreement shall enter into force upon signature by both Parties and shall remain in effect for an initial period of ten years.
8.2 Either Party may terminate this Agreement by providing six months' written notice to the other Party.
8.3 In the event of termination, the Parties agree to return or destroy all shared intelligence in accordance with the providing Party's instructions.

Article IX: Final Provisions

9.1 This Agreement is made in duplicate, with each Party receiving one copy. Both copies are equally authentic.
9.2 This Agreement is governed by the principles of mutual respect, non-interference, and cooperation.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, the undersigned, being duly authorized by their respective governments, have signed this Agreement.

For the Second Roman Republic:
Lucius Varro
Praetor of Foreign Affairs

For the UKOBI-Nordic-Siberican-Cypriot Confederation:
[Name]
[Title]

[Date]
[Location]

submitted by jetstreamer2 to worldpowers [link] [comments]

2024.06.10 00:47 AssuasiveLynx First 180 PT! Let's go

https://preview.redd.it/170fuksajm5d1.png?width=2560&format=png&auto=webp&s=03fb474b94ce0632311a83be3afc435a6c708f10
just got my first 180 practice test and wanted to celebrate! i can't believe I got here!

submitted by AssuasiveLynx to LSAT [link] [comments]

2024.06.10 00:13 NotGatling 32 [M4F] US/Online - What my dating profile would look like on Amazon

32-year-old male finding his way through life, ready to begin the next chapter in life! ^{Soon 33}
☆☆☆☆ 3 Customer Reviews 4 Answered Questions
Price: Varies ✔ Small chance he is eligible for Amazon Prime.
Stats: 6' tall / 195lbs Hazel Eyes INFJ
Appearance: https://imgur.com/a/L9Nf9Ej *^{Hair will return 2025. Bald by choice.}
Only 1 In Stock. Images show minimal wear or tear and may include a lifetime warranty.
He has called Maryland home for the last 10 years and is open to relocation.
He's got his life together and is ready to share it with someone special.
The TL:DR version: Best described as a gamer who enjoys nature, exploring, and living life. Looking for something serious.
Product Description
The product is currently traveling across the United States via Airbnb. The journey started in January 2024 and has been West Coast focused so far. Currently, the product is in the Portland area for the summer. He then plans to head East slowly to Pennslyvania to spend time with the family for the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays.
NotGatling is a down-to-earth, semi-nerdy, sarcastic, witty human with semi-dark humor. It is hard to pinpoint his personality as it can jump from goofy and playful to serious, depending on the event/occasion.
NotGatling's interests and hobbies range from gaming/geek things to exploring nature and cities, whether it's hiking, kayaking, backpacking/camping, or going to pop-up shops/events, concerts, new food places, or museums. When he isn't exploring, he can usually be found gaming, watching his comfort shows(Bobs Burger, Community, Parks N Rec), or watching Hockey. He is a Capitals fan but is rooting for the Oilers.
Product Information
Education

Level of Education	Details
Bachelors	Network and Cybersecurity
Future Plans	Wants to acquire a Masters or begin a Bachelor program in the science field.

Work Experience

Job	Details
Army	2011 - 2017
IT Engineer / System Administrator	2017 - Current
Dream Job?	He thinks its teaching. But with IT pay. One can dream.

Customer Questions & Answers
Question: Why is he trying out the digital nomad lifestyle?
Answer: His work is implementing hybrid work next year. He is taking advantage of his last year fully remote to explore.
Question: What is he looking for in a potential prospect?
Answer: He is seeking someone who shares his interests. He usually vibes best with people who like playing video games and exploring nature, cities, or new food spots.
Question: Does he want kids and to have a family?
Answer: He had a vasectomy back in 2022 once Roe vs Wade was overturned. He doesn't want to 100% rule out the possibility of a family but leans heavily towards the DINK life.
Question: What does a breakdown of his day look like?
Answer: He lives the early birdlife and finishes work just after lunchtime. After work, he can be found exploring a nature spot, going to the gym, or checking out a local attraction. When he isn't out and about, he is usually gaming or researching what's next.
Customer Reviews
☆☆☆☆☆ The best son I've ever had. - A text from Mother
A blessing from god. You're down to earth and never ask for anything in return. You could stop by and visit more often, but I understand you're living your life.
☆☆☆☆☆ Truly an amazing person. - An old Army friend.
Thank you very much for taking this trip with me. I truly appreciate you and all you have done with me and for me since I first met you at WLC 2 years ago. Stay wonderful and beautiful you! Try your best to find joy in everything you do.
☆☆☆ Why don't you visit more often? By the rest of his family. *^{When he lived in Maryland}
You live 2 hours away?! Why don't you drive up here every day and visit us?!
Check Out
To add to the cart, send a message with information about you. Age, pics, location, info about you. It all helps.

submitted by NotGatling to r4r [link] [comments]

2024.06.10 00:13 NotGatling 32 [M4F] US/Online - What my dating profile would look like on Amazon

Level of Education	Details
Bachelors	Network and Cybersecurity
Future Plans	Wants to acquire a Masters or begin a Bachelor program in the science field.

Work Experience

Job	Details
Army	2011 - 2017
IT Engineer / System Administrator	2017 - Current
Dream Job?	He thinks its teaching. But with IT pay. One can dream.

submitted by NotGatling to R4R30Plus [link] [comments]

2024.06.10 00:06 The_whoknew2little Is leaving kids by themselves for seven hours considered neglect in Colorado?

Hi. We live in Colorado. My ex and her partner left our kids--12(m), 10(f), 7(f)-- and his kids--11(f), 9(m), 6(f) at home alone today for at least seven hours while they attended a meditation retreat.
At 12:45 pm, I picked up my seven-year-old for some pre-planned special time, and when I called my ex to let her know I was there, her partner's eleven-year-old answered. She was alone in the house watching her six-year-old sister and my seven-year-old. My daughter told me that her mom and her mom's partner left at 8 a.m., and that the kids had been alone since then. She said the eleven-year-old was responsible for watching the seven and six-year-olds while the other kids wandered the neighborhood. When I dropped my daughter off two hours later, at 2:45, there were still no adults at the house, although at least one of the wandering kids--my ten-year-old--had returned.
I get my kids tomorrow and will be able to get more details from them then. I don't know how long the wanderers were wandering. I don't know if there was an adult checking in. I don't know how easily they could reach their mom if something happened. There are other questions I need to answer.
But if it is what it appears to be--that the kids were left home alone for at least seven hours--is that considered neglect?

submitted by The_whoknew2little to AskALawyer [link] [comments]

2024.06.10 00:04 dumblonde1021 Ideas for pages!

Hi there! I’m new to reddit but I’ve been bullet journaling for three years. I’ve been struggling with burnout and lack of ideas lately. I’m looking for some inspiration for types of pages to include in my monthly spread! Attached is the kind of stuff that I currently do. I’m trying to get more into building my covecalendar page theme into all of the monthly pages too! Show me or tell me what you do!

submitted by dumblonde1021 to bulletjournal [link] [comments]

2024.06.10 00:01 PLpro12 How do I optimize my Amazon FBA listings for visibility during holiday seasons?

1. Conduct Thorough Keyword Research
Effective keyword research is the foundation of a successful Amazon listing. During the holiday season, consumer search behavior changes, and it’s vital to adapt your keywords accordingly.
Use Holiday-Specific Keywords
Incorporate holiday-specific keywords that potential buyers are likely to use. For instance, if you’re selling toys, include terms like “Christmas gifts for kids” or “holiday toy sale.”
Utilize Amazon's Search Terms Report
Amazon's Search Terms Report provides insights into what keywords customers are using to find products. Analyze this data to identify high-performing keywords and integrate them into your listings.
Leverage Competitor Analysis
Examine top-performing competitors' listings to discover additional keyword opportunities. Tools like Helium 10 can help you uncover these keywords and implement them effectively.
2. Optimize Your Product Title
The product title is one of the first elements that customers see, making it a critical component for SEO and conversion.
Incorporate Primary Keywords
Ensure your primary keywords are included at the beginning of the title. This not only boosts SEO but also immediately conveys the product’s main attributes to potential buyers.
Highlight Key Features and Benefits
Clearly state the product’s key features and benefits. For example, if selling a tech gadget, include specifications such as “4K Resolution” or “Wireless Connectivity.”
Include Seasonal Keywords
During the holiday season, incorporate seasonal keywords like “holiday sale,” “Christmas gift,” or “Black Friday deal” to capture the festive shopping mood.
3. Enhance Product Descriptions
A well-crafted product description can significantly improve your listing’s visibility and conversion rate.
Use Bullet Points for Clarity
Bullet points make it easier for customers to quickly digest product information. Highlight key features, benefits, and any unique selling points.
Tell a Story
Engage potential buyers by telling a story about how your product can enhance their holiday experience. This emotional connection can drive conversions.
Incorporate Long-Tail Keywords
Long-tail keywords are specific phrases that are less competitive but highly targeted. Integrate these into your product description to capture niche searches.
4. Optimize Backend Search Terms
Backend search terms are crucial for improving your product’s discoverability on Amazon.
Include Misspellings and Synonyms
Incorporate common misspellings and synonyms of your primary keywords to capture a broader audience.
Use All Available Space
Amazon provides 250 characters for backend search terms. Make sure to use all the available space to maximize your keyword coverage.
Avoid Redundancies
Ensure there are no redundant keywords in your backend search terms. Each word should be unique to maximize SEO potential.
5. Utilize High-Quality Images
High-quality images are essential for attracting customers and improving conversion rates.
Showcase the Product from Multiple Angles
Provide images that showcase the product from various angles, highlighting important features and details.
Include Lifestyle Images
Lifestyle images show the product in use, helping customers visualize how it fits into their lives. This is particularly effective during the holiday season when buyers are looking for gifts.
Use Infographics
Infographics can convey critical information quickly. Highlight key features, dimensions, and any unique selling points through visually appealing graphics.
6. Leverage Enhanced Brand Content (EBC)
Enhanced Brand Content (EBC) allows brand-registered sellers to add rich content to their listings, which can significantly enhance visibility and conversion.
Tell a Compelling Brand Story
Use EBC to tell your brand’s story and differentiate yourself from competitors. Highlight your brand’s values, mission, and unique selling points.
Include High-Quality Images and Videos
Rich media content such as images and videos can provide a more engaging shopping experience. Use these to demonstrate product features and benefits.
Use Comparison Charts
Comparison charts help customers see how your product stacks up against competitors. This can be particularly persuasive during the holiday shopping season.
7. Encourage Customer Reviews and Ratings
Positive reviews and high ratings are crucial for building trust and improving your listing’s visibility.
Provide Excellent Customer Service
Excellent customer service can lead to positive reviews. Respond promptly to customer inquiries and resolve any issues quickly.
Follow Up Post-Purchase
Send follow-up emails after purchase, politely asking customers to leave a review. Make it easy for them by including a direct link to the review page.
Offer a Great Product Experience
Ensure your product meets or exceeds customer expectations. A great product experience naturally leads to positive reviews.
8. Run Targeted Amazon Advertising Campaigns
Amazon Advertising can boost your product’s visibility during the competitive holiday season.
Use Sponsored Products
Sponsored Products ads appear in search results and product detail pages. Target high-performing keywords to increase visibility.
Implement Sponsored Brands
Sponsored Brands ads showcase your brand logo, a custom headline, and multiple products. These ads can drive brand awareness and conversions.

Leverage Sponsored Display Ads

Sponsored Display Ads target shoppers both on and off Amazon, based on their shopping behavior. Use these to retarget customers who have viewed your products or similar items.
Monitor and Adjust Campaigns
Regularly monitor the performance of your ad campaigns. Adjust bids, keywords, and targeting based on performance data to maximize ROI.
9. Optimize Pricing and Promotions
Competitive pricing and attractive promotions can significantly enhance your listing’s appeal during the holiday season.
Use Dynamic Pricing Tools
Dynamic pricing tools adjust your prices in real-time based on competitor pricing and market demand. This ensures your prices remain competitive.
Offer Limited-Time Promotions
Limited-time promotions create a sense of urgency, encouraging customers to make a purchase. Use deals such as “Lightning Deals” or “Holiday Specials.”
Leverage Coupons
Coupons are a powerful tool to attract bargain-hunting holiday shoppers. Highlight the discount in your listing to increase visibility and attract more buyers.
10. Utilize Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) Benefits
Maximize the benefits of Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) to enhance your product’s visibility and appeal.
Ensure Prime Eligibility
Products eligible for Amazon Prime enjoy increased visibility and appeal to Prime members. Ensure your inventory is fully stocked to meet demand.
Use Amazon’s Multichannel Fulfillment
Amazon’s Multichannel Fulfillment allows you to fulfill orders from other sales channels using your Amazon inventory. This can help streamline operations during the busy holiday season.
Monitor Inventory Levels
Keep a close eye on your inventory levels to avoid stockouts. Use Amazon’s inventory management tools to forecast demand and manage stock effectively.
11. Leverage Social Proof and External Traffic
Driving external traffic to your Amazon listings can boost visibility and sales, especially during the holiday season.
Use Social Media Marketing
Promote your listings on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest. Use holiday-themed content to engage your audience and drive traffic.
Collaborate with Influencers
Partner with influencers to reach a broader audience. Influencers can create content showcasing your products, driving traffic, and increasing sales.
Leverage Email Marketing
Email marketing is a powerful tool to drive traffic to your Amazon listings. Send holiday-themed newsletters with special promotions and product highlights to your subscriber list.
12. Monitor and Analyze Performance
Regularly monitor and analyze your listing’s performance to make data-driven optimizations.
Use Amazon Seller Central Reports
Amazon Seller Central offers various reports that provide insights into your listing’s performance. Use these reports to identify areas for improvement.
Track Key Metrics
Track key metrics such as conversion rate, click-through rate, and sales velocity. Identify trends and adjust your strategies accordingly.
Implement A/B Testing
A/B testing allows you to test different elements of your listing to see what performs best. Experiment with different titles, descriptions, images, and pricing to find the optimal combination.
By implementing these strategies, you can significantly enhance the visibility and performance of your Amazon FBA listings during the holiday season. Stay proactive, adapt to market trends, and continuously optimize your listings to maximize your success.
Helium 10 - 20% OFF Discount (Limited Time)
An all-in-one Amazon seller tool to easily find, list, and sell 10K+/month products! Disclosure: I get a small kickback if you click through - Thanks for reading! DM if you have any questions :)

submitted by PLpro12 to newamazonsellers [link] [comments]

2024.06.10 00:01 Wasthereonce Weekly Hip Hop Album Review #7: Brother Ali - Shadows on the Sun

Weekly Hip Hop Album Review #7: Brother Ali - Shadows on the Sun
Welcome back to our weekly hip hop album review thread! For week number #7, we'll be diving into the album "Shadows on the Sun" by Brother Ali.

About the Album:

Wikipedia/Discogs Page Link
YouTube Link
Release Date: May 27, 2003
Region: Minneapolis, Minnesota
Number of Tracks: 18

Track Listing:

Room With A View
Champion
Star Quality
Prince Charming
Win Some Lose Some
Pay Them Back
Blah Blah Blah (feat. Slug)
Shadows On The Sun
Prelude
Forest Whitiker
Bitchslap!
Back Stage Pacin'
When The Beat Comes In
Missing Teeth (feat. Slug)
Dorian
Soul Whisper
Picket Fence
Victory! (Come Forward)

Question Section:

There's a tier list of questions. Focus on answering the Level 101 questions first, but feel free to challenge yourself by answering the questions for the greater Levels.

Level 101: Basic/Main Questions
Level 201: Intermediate
Level 301: Advanced
Level 401: Expert

(When you answer these, please leave the question's number for the question you are referring to.)

101 Level Review Questions & Prompts (Basic):

(These are the main questions. Focus on these if you're just starting out.)

Share your thoughts on the album. What did you like or dislike about it?
What are your favorite tracks from the album, and why? Feel free to score each track on a scale from 1 to 10. You could also give a more detailed review of each one.
Do you think this album brings something original or unique to hip hop? Describe what it is.

201 Level Discussion Questions (Intermediate):

What emotions or feelings does the album evoke for you?
What do you think about the production? How does it compare to other producers?
What are some lyrics or wordplay from the album that you have never heard before?
Any criticisms or aspects you think could have been improved?

301 Level Discussion Questions (Advanced):

What other albums from that era are comparable to this one? Are there other albums/songs that sound completely or almost completely similar?
How has your perception of the album evolved with repeated listens?
How does the album sound as a cohesive project? Does each track flow nicely from one to the next? Would you rearrange the track list? How so?
What societal, political, or other issues does this album address, if any?

401 Level Discussion Questions (Expert):

How would you describe the sub-genre of the album? What themes or vibes does it have?
How does the album's artwork and other packaging contribute to the overall experience?
Has this album influenced later artists or hip hop's history at large, if at all?
What is the local legacy of this album where it was released? How did it influence the culture there?

Feel free to share your own reviews, thoughts, and opinions on the album in the comments below!
Reminder: Please keep all discussions civil and respectful. Let's focus on sharing our love for hip hop.
Looking forward to hearing your thoughts!

submitted by Wasthereonce to hiphop101 [link] [comments]

2024.06.09 23:53 FewWillingness1081 SaaS Startup Tips: How do SaaS companies find customers in 2024?

How are both B2B SaaS and B2C SaaS companies finding clients?

There's never been a better time than now to start a SaaS startup. Whether you intend to focus on the B2B space or B2C, SaaS companies are experiencing extreme customer success. The sheer amount of companies that existed before the pandemic, compared to now is outsized and growing at an amazing scale. Many companies changed their work model, enabling millions of workers to work from home. In order for this to be successful at scale, requires technology to fundamentally support the many workers and their ever-evolving task lists.
Customer success is the primary ingredient for the success of many SaaS startups in 2024. By helping their clients achieve their business goals, customers have been more likely to stay loyal to their favorite SaaS products as they grow and succeed.
At the core of every SaaS business strategy, 3 key points stand out:

Customer Retention
Customer Engagement
Customer Satisfaction

Harnessing these three areas helps you build a strong and durable customer base.

Customer success at the forefront of your SaaS company

For B2B & B2C SaaS startups, the customer success departments have evolved from simply handling tickets to collecting and analyzing customer feedback in an effort to optimize the customer experience. This doesn't need to be something reserved for the larger players in the space. As an early-stage SaaS you want your customers to spread the word to their friends and colleagues, about their experience, so going above and beyond is a must! Let's put this idea as a fundamental requirement, and the next set of activities will help you to scale your products at lightning speed!

Stop struggling to get initial users for your SaaS product

Why is Reddit ranking so high in Google Searches? Saas
I [will] make a strong argument that we often cannot see the solution to our problems because we are too close to the problems to see our surroundings in the first place. The more you've optimized and automated your SaaS, the more you realize that there's less to do, up to a certain point. The next thing you typically pivot focus to is growth through marketing or advertising. So you start to post in DigitalMarketing, socialmedia, and marketing for ideas on how to perform outreach, enhance your seo, and even dabble in PPC. If you're lucky, you'll begin to see that there are issues with basic things, because members of Reddit will happily point them out to you.
If you haven't already seen this post, it's a good thread, and I recommend you check it out. The OP reveals some reasons why their product is struggling to gain traction. The community on Reddit is fantastic for providing insights as to what can be useful. Especially in communities such as SaaS, while others sometimes are not so forgiving (cough, cough, Entrepreneur).
Most of us SaaS founders don't actually have the luxury of spending time doing this. It's very much a make-it-or-break-it type scenario. Those of you who feel this way will certainly appreciate the next few bullet points that I will provide that should help you to begin generating traffic to your SaaS landing page [immediately].

Find the subreddit or community (Reddit, Linkedin, Facebook, Slack, Quora, X (Twitter) that you think aligns with your product niche.
Answer every question that you believe aligns with your target consumer, such as the "How-to's", or "Why's" that appear in the "Best", "Hot", and "New" tabs. Browse through each and every single tab.
Post only if you think what you have to add is immensely utilitarian, otherwise, spend time engaging through comments, and providing resources, links, and sources to any material you share.
Make sure your profile is optimized, because if you [do] provide any information that stands out, both happy and unhappy users will pounce on your profile to find anything that they can use to their advantage (be ready for the trolls).
Check your analytics. You'd be surprised to realize that some posts (that you don't create) will get thousands of views. A small percentage of viewers will then roll into your website to see what you have to offer, for their own reasons.

If 1,000 people visited your website from this tactic, consider that maybe 50 - 100 of them might actually be your customers, maybe even smaller. The better the offering on your landing page, the more likely you'll even get sign-ups for your SaaS with free trial periods, or free offerings!
Repeat this every day, and you're now generating 10,000 - 20,000 (or more) potential clients to your website daily. Some days will be great, others not so great, but you've found a method that now works, and is proven!

Leveraging social media (organically) to scale your SaaS

I like to break social media platforms into 2 categories:

Literature-driven communities:
1. Reddit
2. Quora
3. Linkedin
4. X (Twitter)
5. Slack
Social Media Apps:
1. Instagram
2. Tiktok
3. Pinterest
4. X (Twitter)

Yes, I purposefully placed "X" in both categories because it had a great mix of both content types, and was originally based on small "tweets", but now it provides a lot more media, and I find myself spending less time reading.
Literature-driven communities are apps that you're potential SaaS customers have to stop and read, to find something interesting, even on mobile. While the "social media apps" are full of videos, and media fighting to hook your attention. This rapid-scrolling behavior is conducive to "doom-scrolling", making it much harder to capture the eye of your potential customers.
I would recommend investing more time into "Literature-driven platforms", as I think you'll get far more engagement without the need to sell your soul for likes, and followers. In fact, I only have about 100 followers on Reddit at this time, yet I still managed to gain 50,000,000+ views on my content in May 2024.
Also, here's another great Reddit Post about finding customers for your B2B SaaS.
https://preview.redd.it/x95xhu7qam5d1.jpg?width=1200&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=dcb583cf047e3a068ad65f7593e56f343878f5f5

Opening up to friends, family, and colleagues as early customers

As you launch your product you're typically stuck in a paradoxical situation of needing to convince new clients with testimonials from previous clients. It's not easy to convert potential users without any data or feedback. It's much easier to do this when you have traction, but that's now always the case for a new SaaS founder.
Here are a few methods you can use to attract clients of your product early, in exchange for much-needed testimonials and referrals:

Offer your product to your "inner circle". This includes friends, family, colleagues, connections on Linkedin, or members of your social club.
Give discounts, and extended trial periods. It may cost you next to nothing to give your product out to testers, but having received a testimony repays you 100-fold!
Run surveys on Survey Monkey, or Usertesting.com - Not only will you get structured feedback from prospective users, but some of these testers might be willing to stay on, and use your product for an extended period.
Offer lifetime deals to early adopters. This may not be very fun, but it's a real opportunity to start bringing in revenue, validating certain functions and capabilities, and again, creating testimonials that you can use to convince new clients that your service works.

Consider this your beta trial (B2B SaaS) period. B2B SaaS founders typically will leverage their existing network at the beginning due to a high likelihood that they have some level of corporate experience (at least I hope!) going into their new venture. To get started, all you need is a Minimum Viable Product (MVP), which represents the leanest version of your app idea. Customer feedback will significantly add value to the long-term outlook of your product at this stage.

Using analytics to optimize your sales funnel

How to build a SaaS sales funnel
This next section is dedicated to BareMetrics, who inspired many of the lists that you'll see.
First, let's talk about what a SaaS sales funnel actually is, according to BareMetrics:
"In sales and marketing, the “funnel” refers to the process of qualifying leads and converting them to customers. You pour in leads at the widest part at the top of the sales funnel. As you work on converting them through the sales process, the funnel narrows. The bottom of the funnel is where your hottest qualified leads pour into your business as customers.

The traditional sales funnel is broken down into a few stages as leads engage with your brand:
Awareness: This is where your prospects become aware of your product and your brand. They’re just learning who you are, what you do, and that they have a problem you can solve.
Discovery: This is the phase where prospective leads are doing some initial research, narrowing down the products and services that can help them solve their issue.
Evaluation: In this phase, prospects are conducting more serious evaluations, weighing the pros and cons of making a purchase, as well as comparing you to your competitors.
Intent: This is the final phase of the funnel before a purchase is made. Logic, numbers, and value-driven communication are the keys to making that final persuasive push.
Purchase: This is where leads have ultimately decided that your brand meets their needs. They then join the ranks of your paying customers! Your work isn’t done, though: You still need to help them through the welcome and onboarding phase.

For your SaaS business, you have one key additional stage you need to consider: retention. Unlike other retail businesses, you don’t just want your customers to make a one-time purchase. You have to continue persuading them of your continued value each month. In this phase, you can also use the insights you gather about the customer and their behavior to upsell with features that meet their specific needs (and, in turn, increase your average revenue per user)."
Beautifully written (in my opinion). Retention also deserves much of your focus here as a SaaS entrepreneur. You have to convince customers month-over-month that you're not only maintaining quality, but the product has a roadmap for improvement. The use case that attracts initial customers doesn't necessarily guarantee that they will keep coming back. You're going to have to keep an ear out for what they are saying, and use as many opportunities as you can to understand what their needs are. I did something like this on Reddit within the dating app space.

Learn which metrics you should be tracking to optimize your SaaS sales funnel

Hubspot CAC Recovery Chart - SaaS companies
Hubspot has a great write-up about 15 metrics that you should be tracking. Here they are (below):

Customer Churn
Revenue Churn
Customer Lifetime Value
Customer Acquisition Cost
Months to Recover CAC
CAC: LTV Ratio
Customer Engagement Score
Qualified Marketing Traffic
Leads by Lifecycle Stage
Lead-to-Customer Rate
Customer Health Score

Every SaaS startup is different, and what they use to track overall growth and retention varies from company to company. Generally, most experts can agree that at a minimum, if you're team is focusing on optimization, these items should be reviewed every day, if not weekly within your organization.

What tools you should be using to optimize your SaaS sales funnel

Best analytics dashboard for my SaaS product - Mixpanel
My favorite tools for tracking data throughout your sales funnel are as follows:

Unbounce / LeadPages - Landing page tracking and optimization
Hotjar.com / Inspectlet
Mixpanel.com / Google Analytics
Squarespace.com / Wix / Webflow
Stripe.com / Square / Braintree
Mailchimp.com / Hubspot / Constant Contact

I also included some variants in this list. Notice that I did not include any ad platforms here. I know many marketing agencies would kill me, but it's not a necessary tool. Most of us have been taught to spend money on ads, to start tracking users to your platform, but if you're not generating at least 10,000 monthly visitors to your website organically (today), then you should take the organic route. Here's a resource on how to start getting clients for your SaaS startup. Only when you've exhausted all other ways of generating organic traffic, you should invest in advertising.
For me, it may be worth it to bring in another resource, who can guarantee me organic traffic with proven strategies, than pay for a PPC campaign, full of bot clicks from bot farms!

Create comparison content with competitors

Just recently I found a thread in SaaS talking about their journey with SEO. After 6 months of implementation, their strategy now brings in passive sales, due to their commitment to content creation. Many SaaS founders are admitting that creating "comparison content" with competitors is a great way to leverage a larger brand's presence in the SERP space. I highly recommend you invest in creating feature matrices detailing where, why, and how you stand out from other competitors on the market.

What you should do after you've gained thousands of new customers

Let's do a short recap to identify how we've gotten here.

We officially launched our SaaS
We invited our inner circle of friends, family, and colleagues as initial testers of our B2C SaaS, and leveraged our professional network for B2B SaaS.
We offered discounts, trials, or lifetime deals in exchange for feedback and testimonials.
We've highlighted initial success stories as case studies on our SaaS brand website, to help us convince new clients
We've set up a sales funnel (feedback loop) to track conversion success at every core inflection point using top tools like Mixpanel, Unbounce, and Stripe.
We're implementing organic social media strategies that drive 10,000+ visitors to our SaaS landing page every month, which helps us optimize our sales funnel (5).
We've invested in a customer retention strategy, equal to our outreach strategy. Tools such as Mailchimp (newsletters), and SMS marketing (Twilio.com) work well here.
We've exhausted growth, and need to further 10x our user base. Now's a great time to consider influencer marketing, affiliate marketing, or paid ads.

The decision to invest in a team or organic social media assets to continue growth, or take the path of investing in ad campaigns for growth really depends on where you see yourself in 2 - 3 years. Some people want to build a SaaS product that helps them live a simpler life, assisting in an exit from the traditional corporate 9 - 5 pm. Others desire to take the VC route, raise funds, and scale to extraordinary heights, eventually going public through an IPO.
No matter what your decision is, none of this can happen without achieving success in steps 1 - 8. For some SaaS founders, they will achieve every point mentioned within 6 months, while others might take 6 years. A good example of this slow and steady approach is Mailchimp of course!

Getting customers for your SaaS is easier than you think

This article will single-handedly provide you with the links and resources needed to build a customer base within your first 6-months of launch. Within 2 - 3 months you could even exceed the 1,000 user mark. For some 100 customers is also great, it just depends on who you're targeting (B2B vs. B2C). Make sure to focus on customer success, get those testimonials, and establish dominance by giving your loyal clients a bespoke experience!
If you found this article helpful and are ready to continue executing, feel free to grab a copy of our book The Growth Checklist. It's the only book around that guarantees growth within 30 days, or we'll fully refund you the value of the book. If you've already purchased a copy, and are struggling to execute upon any strategies, you can simply book a meeting with me here.

Find us on your favorite platforms

We also wrote this article, along with other similar ones on the following platforms:

submitted by FewWillingness1081 to u/FewWillingness1081 [link] [comments]

2024.06.09 23:52 Wieda I played 203 commander games in 2024 and these are my stats

Hello EDH, here are my stats for my decks and games in 2024. I apologize for my English; it is not my first language.
My overall win rate is 44.83% in 203 EDH games. I played 101 times online, 48 times with my playgroup and 54 times in a local game store. My decks vary in power level, and I usually adjust to match my opponents.
Bonus stats are:
How often did Player 1 win? 60 times -> ~30%
How often did Fast Mana win when it was played in turn 1 or 2? 19 times -> 34,5% (55 total that is a frequenzy of 27%)
And here am my stats for my paper decks.

Decks	Time played	Times Won	Winrate
Patron of the Kitsune	28	12	42.9%
Dihada, Binder of Wills	23	12	52.2%
Dr. Madison Li	15	3	20.0%
Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit // Sam, Loyal Attendant	12	7	58.3%
Éowyn, Shieldmaiden	12	5	42.7%
Chiss-Goira, Forge Tyrant	12	4	33.3%
Zurgo and Ojutai	11	7	63.6%
Nahiri, Forged in Fury	10	6	60%
~~Sauron, Lord of the Rings~~	9	7	77.8%
The Ancient One	9	4	44.4%
Rin and Seri, Inseparable	7	3	42.9%
Sidar Jabari of Zhalfir	7	2	28.6%
Tom Bombadil	7	2	28.6%
Dogmeat, Ever Loyal	6	3	50%
Caesar, Legion's Emperor	5	2	40%
~~Syr Gwyn, Hero of Ashvale~~	4	3	75%
Borrowed deck	2	1	50%
Precon	4	0	0%
Brews	20	10	50%

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2024.06.09 23:46 Aalina809 Heavy periods

I am 32(F) I normally have heavy periods since beginning. I did some blood tests back in February showing hemoglobin of 9.6 and Ferritin 7. I improved my diet and take 28 mg iron gummies, do you think if change in diet and taking iron would actually contribute to any increase in levels despite of heavy periods. Anyone having experience or who did regular blood tests to observe can share please

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2024.06.09 23:28 arctic-tlsp-monkeys Any good?

Hi yall is this bike any good ? I will use it just a few times a week maybe 20-30 minutes once evey 2-3 days just so i can move a little bit

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2024.06.09 23:26 arctic-tlsp-monkeys Choosing a bike (600 eur max)

Is this any good? Also what does size mean, i thought bikes were just kids/adults lol

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2024.06.09 23:21 AffectionateSink4918 Warranty Covers Refurbished Only

I bought an HP 5101 Printer three months ago and loved it until the carriage broke. Because it was under warranty, they asked that I send it back which I did. Took a week for them to receive it. I called three times over the course of the following week asking when the replacement would be shipped and they told me that they had yet to register it as received on their end. Finally a new one was shipped out, received it a week later, so three weeks without a printer. Turns out, they do not give you a new printer, it is a refurbish. Of course, I went to use it and there is a massive problem with how it is printing (basically, it printed fine on plain paper but the color was printing only red on glossy paper which is the whole reason I purchased the printer). I spent over 1.5 hours on the phone with them and the support person maintained the whole time that all of their refurbished printers are tested to factory levels (if all was equal, why not just send me a new printer?) and that I had to send the printer back again to receive another. If the past wait time of three weeks is expected this time around, that will mean six weeks without a printer and interruption to my business. Because of this, I looked at the BBB's review of HP and am stunned that every single office is rated an "F." Be advised that they do not replace a broken printer under warranty with a new printer, that it will be a refurbished one, and expect to have a significant downtime in your work without a printer. Additionally, review their BBB website reviews so you can make an informed decision as a consumer.

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2024.06.09 23:19 Mariners_bot Post Game Chat 6/9 Mariners @ Royals

Please use this thread to discuss anything related to today's game. You may post anything as long as it falls within stated posting guidelines. You may also post gifs and memes, as long as it is related to the game. Please keep the discussion civil.
Discord: Seattle Sports

Line Score - Game Over

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	R	H	E	LOB
SEA	1	0	0	0	0	0	2	0	0	3	6	10	0	7
KC	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	2	2	5	9	1	5

Box Score

KC		AB	R	H	RBI	SO	BA
3B	Garcia, M	5	0	0	0	0	.256
SS	Witt Jr.	5	0	1	0	1	.320
1B	Pasquantino	5	0	1	0	1	.243
DH	Perez, S	4	0	0	0	3	.299
2B	Loftin	4	1	1	0	0	.283
LF	Melendez	4	1	1	2	1	.165
C	Fermin	4	2	1	0	2	.292
RF	Renfroe	4	1	2	2	0	.201
CF	Isbel	3	0	2	1	0	.219
PR	Blanco	0	0	0	0	0	.255

KC	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	P-S	ERA
Ragans	6.0	3	1	1	1	9	107-72	3.08
Klein	0.2	4	2	2	0	0	15-9	6.35
Zerpa	0.1	0	0	0	0	0	2-2	2.16
Anderson, N	1.0	1	0	0	0	1	14-8	3.70
Stratton, C	1.0	0	0	0	0	0	9-6	5.46
McArthur	0.2	2	3	2	2	1	30-17	5.27
Smith, W	0.1	0	0	0	0	1	5-3	5.57

SEA		AB	R	H	RBI	BB	SO	BA
SS	Crawford, J	5	1	2	1	0	1	.226
LF	Moore, D	4	1	1	0	1	2	.213
CF	Rodríguez, J	5	1	2	1	0	2	.269
C	Garver	4	0	0	0	1	2	.176
DH	Raleigh	5	0	2	2	0	1	.206
RF	Haniger	2	1	0	0	1	1	.217
RF	Raley, L	2	0	0	0	0	1	.258
1B	Locklear	4	1	1	1	0	1	.250
LF	Robles	1	0	0	0	0	0	.129
3B	Rojas, J	2	1	1	1	0	0	.270
2B	Bliss	3	0	1	0	0	1	.217

SEA	IP	H	R	ER	SO	P-S	ERA
Kirby	7.0	5	1	1	4	96-68	3.81
Muñoz, A	1.0	0	0	0	1	15-9	1.67
Baumann	1.0	2	2	2	3	21-13	3.24
Voth	0.2	2	2	1	0	12-7	3.42
Saucedo	0.1	0	0	0	0	2-2	2.81

Scoring Plays

Inning	Event	Score
T1	J.P. Crawford homers (6) on a fly ball to right center field.	0-1
B5	Kyle Isbel out on a sacrifice bunt, first baseman Tyler Locklear to second baseman Ryan Bliss. Freddy Fermin scores. Hunter Renfroe to 2nd.	1-1
T7	Tyler Locklear doubles (1) on a sharp fly ball to right fielder Hunter Renfroe. Mitch Haniger scores.	1-2
T7	Josh Rojas singles on a sharp line drive to right fielder Hunter Renfroe. Tyler Locklear scores.	1-3
B9	MJ Melendez homers (7) on a fly ball to right field. Nick Loftin scores.	3-3
T10	Julio Rodríguez singles on a ground ball to right fielder Hunter Renfroe. Josh Rojas scores. Dylan Moore to 2nd.	3-4
T10	Cal Raleigh singles on a line drive to right fielder Hunter Renfroe. Dylan Moore scores. Julio Rodríguez scores. Mitch Garver to 3rd.	3-6
B10	Hunter Renfroe homers (6) on a fly ball to left center field. Freddy Fermin scores.	5-6

Highlights

Description	Length
Cole Ragans against the Mariners	0:07
George Kirby against the Royals	0:07
Bullpen availability for Kansas City, June 9 vs Mariners	0:07
Bench availability for Seattle, June 9 vs Royals	0:07
Fielding alignment for Seattle, June 9 vs Royals	0:11
Starting lineups for Mariners at Royals - June 9, 2024	0:09
Bench availability for Kansas City, June 9 vs Mariners	0:07
Fielding alignment for Kansas City, June 9 vs Mariners	0:11
J.P. Crawford: Home Run Statcast Analysis	0:13
An animated look at J.P. Crawford's home run	0:11
Breaking down Cole Ragans' pitches	0:04
Cole Ragans' outing against the Mariners	0:23
Breaking down George Kirby's pitches	0:04
George Kirby's outing against the Royals	0:25
Measuring the stats on MJ Melendez's home run	0:13
A deep dive into MJ Melendez's home run	0:11
J.P. Crawford's leadoff homer (6)	0:30
George Kirby In play, out(s) to Maikel Garcia	0:18
Kyle Isbel's sacrifice bunt	0:30
Tyler Locklear's first MLB hit	0:30
Josh Rojas's RBI single	0:29
Cole Ragans fans Mitch Garver	0:06
Cole Ragans'nine strikeout performance	1:58
George Kirby's strong outing	1:45
Kyle Isbel out at first base after a review	0:46
MJ Melendez's game-tying homer (7)	0:30
Freddy Fermin called out on strikes.	0:09
Julio Rodríguez go-ahead single	0:27
Cal Raleigh's two-run single	0:30
Hunter Renfroe homers (6) on a fly ball to left center field. Freddy Fermin scores.	0:29

Decisions

Winning Pitcher	Losing Pitcher	Save
Baumann (3-0, 3.24 ERA)	McArthur (2-3, 5.27 ERA)	Saucedo (3 SV, 2.81 ERA)

Attendance	Weather	Wind
	76°F, Sunny	9 mph, R To L

HP	1B	2B	3B
Tony Randazzo	Alex Tosi	Dan Bellino	Phil Cuzzi

Game ended at 2:19 PM.

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2024.06.09 23:04 r3crac BANGGOOD Deals (9.6.2024)!

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2024.06.09 22:53 throwaita_busy3 TSH 4.49, is it my birth control?

Hi,
Im a 27 year old female, 5’3” 144 lbs, with no medical issues. Never had an STD. No smoking, no drinking. Only take psychiatric medications in addition to hormonal birth control pills.
I’ve been on “the pill” for ten years. I started my period at 14/15 years old and was on birth control by 17 (mom’s choice). For most of my life I have been a very thin, small person with anxiety, so my TSH was tested numerous times by concerned doctors and it was always normal.
A few years ago my TSH came back “on the cusp” of “too high”. I did gain a considerable amount of weight but I believe that was due to being on Zoloft which helped me regain my appetite that I lost due to anxiety. I had no symptoms of hypothyroidism.
Over time my periods have gotten to be pretty long. I only let myself have a period every 3 months which my gyno recommended, but when I had them I would actively bleed for 7-8 days with spotting here and there for a couple days after. Sometimes I’d even have breakthrough bleeding.
Transvaginal ultrasound and paps came back normal at those times.
Just recently I was having spotting and strange pain, so I went to the gyno. She said my cervix was “inflamed” but everything else looked normal. I bled a lot from the pap but no more spotting happened. She took the following labs/tests (I’m interested in becoming pregnant in a couple years) and here are the results:
Transvag US shows small amount of fluid in uterus “indicative of minimal hemorrhage” which was written by the radiologist but not yet reviewed by my gyno. Everything else normal.
TSH levels were 4.49 mIU/L
FSH and LH were tested but idk why since I’m on bc. Respectively they were 0.9 and 1.0 mIU/L
Estrogens, total was 351 pg/mL
AMH was tested for ease of my mind and was 4.11 ng/mL
Pap normal
What I’m wondering is if long term use of the pill is wreaking havoc on my body. I never had high TSH before. It’s gradually gotten higher. I was told the BC can make my cervix irritated over time and even read that it can atrophy the endometrial lining. Mine is thankfully normal at .7cm.
I want to get off BC and use condoms now; my husband and I would be ok with a pregnancy but would prefer to wait so I’m not worried about it. I’m wondering if BC is the culprit?

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2024.06.09 22:50 TitanAura The Struggles of Adapting Peak Fiction Under Strict Production Constraints

\"But why not do both?\"
This is a follow-up to my last post defending the anime's decision to cut content for the sake of pacing but let me give you the TL;DR so you don't feel the need to have read that one before this as this post covers the same bases (and then some): The anime is first-and foremost the story of Rudeus Greyrat and must therefore prioritize his perspective, even at the cost of other characters' moments, regardless of how beloved those individual scenes are to fans of the Light Novels (myself included).
So let me start by addressing the strongest counter argument made in response to that post: "But the first season, and even Cour 1 of season 2 was able to maintain excellent pacing while having relatively few cuts! Why does the pacing in cour 2 still *FEEL* so rushed in comparison despite cutting so much?" That is an astute observation! And, quite frankly, you are asking the right questions. And for anyone planning to skip straight to the end of this admittedly \daunting* essay, here's a TL;DR for you: Episodes 19 & 20's reduced quality and heightened pace were done deliberately to provide the last 4 episodes of the season the space they need to breathe.* Continue reading if you want to find out how and why this had to be done.
It would be a fool's errand to argue that Cour 2 is NOT cutting less content than prior cours (because it absolutely is, and by quite a lot too), nor will I be arguing that the cour does NOT suffer some level of pacing issues because it absolutely is (see first post), rather I will be arguing in defense of the purpose of limiting the scope of what gets adapted, and why such decisions are necessary in the first place. However, before I delve any further into the specifics of Cour 2's production struggles, first I should elaborate how its production schedule differs from S1.

PART 1: Production Scheduling (aka setting the pace)

In case you were unaware, Season 1 was originally slated to be released in 2020 but was delayed to January of 2021 so it could actually receive all of the extra care and polish it truly deserved. For S2, Studio Bind's production staff, by contrast, had to make due with the time they were initially given. More time (and consequently more budget) usually fixes most production issues, but very few (extraordinarily rare) series ever receive that benefit and doing so twice was likely never even considered a possibility.
Sadly we are not in the alternate timeline where S2 benefitted from the same advantages that gave us gorgeous custom world-building OPs for every episode that freed up even more additional screen time for dialogue and character development (in some cases literally depicting entire chapters such as Paul's POV being shown during Ep 17's STUNNINGLY well executed OP montage). Thanks in part to that decision, S1 had significantly more wiggle room to work with, especially pertaining to the secondary cast, allowing it to more evenly adapt the world building, character development, and main narrative plotline of Mushoku Tensei as a whole utilizing that extra runtime (90 seconds per episode adds up to a LOT over the course of an entire season, plus the 5 EDs, that were integrated as needed on a per-episode basis, for an additional 7 1/2 minutes which adds up to a WHOPPING 43 1/2 MINUTES over the course of that 24 episode run and I should point out that S2 Cour 1 ALSO benefitted from this for the first 5 episodes including the OVA, giving that cour an added 9 minutes to utilize with Cour 2 receiving a paltry 3 minutes as only the 1st episode integrates the OP/ED runtime).
It's simply the reality that polish and quality was prioritized for S1 while scheduling and budget were prioritized for S2. If you want to be especially harsh, one could say S1 was treated as art, while S2 was treated as a commercial product, which is why I've set my expectations accordingly and hope this post helps others do the same. This becomes more apparent when you take into consideration that Studio Bind were also working on Onimai at the same time as S2 given their air dates were only 6 months apart. So not only was S2 not being given the same scheduling priority, it was COMPETING for resources. Given the BD sales numbers for every project they've released, at a minimum we can be assured that Studio Bind has been financially successful at least but the double edged nature of that success also means that certain priorities may have shifted away from MT and towards the new cash-cow. There's a reason I phrased my previous post so specifically: These episodes are a fine adaptation of Rudy's story.... and not much else because it simply doesn't have the screen time or resources to focus on anything besides Rudy's share of the narrative and character development.
Which ties directly into the second reason as to why cour 2 FEELS so rushed, even in comparison to cour 1. The contents of Volumes 10, 11, and 12 are significantly more *LINEAR\* with more individual events being depicted compared to Volumes 1-9. This translates to more content vying for screen time. But how much content are we talking about here? Well, I don't want to go too deeply into raw numbers as that's not really the point but let's set a baseline with some quick-n-dirty math to illustrate:
S1c1 covers 1326 pg / 3 = 442 pg/vol (11 episodes) = 40.2 pg / ep S1c2 covers 1280 pg / 3 = 427 pg/vol (12 episodes + OVA) = 32.8 pg / ep S2c1 covers 1268 pg / 3 = 423 pg/vol (12 episodes + OVA) = 32.5 pg / ep S2c2 covers 1381 pg / 3 = 460 pg/vol (12 episodes) = 38.3 pg / ep
Obviously these are EXTREMELY rough numbers that don't take into account any of the cut content, non-chapter related pages, nor the difference in available runtime afforded to S1 that I previously mentioned, but just by raw page count, that's technically LESS content than what the first 11 episodes of Season 1 had to adapt! Surely they could just tweak a few things to make everything fit! Unfortunately, it's not that simple. You see, there's a distinct lack of a certain type of content that made the lives of the production staff significantly easier by providing plenty of opportunities to pick and choose what made it into the final cut of an episode's runtime to keep the mainline story of Rudeus chugging along at the leisurely clip we're accustomed to.

PART 2: Narrative Fluff (aka work smarter, not longer)

Spoiler: It's the sheer density of secondary character POVs. The very ones we often grieved being cut as the episodes were coming out during S1. They add depth and complexity to the characters (and are, imho, singularly the most *profoundly insightful* pieces of writing Rifujin-sensei has ever produced) but 90% of the time are simply repeating the same events from a new perspective. HOWEVER, when adapted to an audio-visual medium, you can SHOW both perspectives simultaneously and let the audience infer what's going on in a secondary character's mind through the use of voice acting, animation, staging, lighting, OST, and sound design thereby allowing the anime-only audience to receive 90% of the same information that was conveyed during those same events in the novels.
The "missing" Eris POV is the primary example of this disconnect between how little LN readers think Anime-onlys are inferring and how much is being successfully communicated to them even if they themselves can't properly articulate what it was they took away from any particular scene. I highly recommend paying close attention to Eris' face in the 3 following episodes after the events of Turning Point 2 RATHER THAN READING THE SUBTITLES (dub watchers have an advantage here but BOTH performances do an incredible job) and you'll see (and hear) what I'm talking about. Sure we don't get every beat of her thought process spelled out for us in quite the same level of detail as in her POV chapter, but you can sense her inner conflict while watching Rudeus practice Disturb Magic as they ride into the outskirts of Fittoa and her heartache at seeing him standing forlornly in the ruins of his destroyed childhood home. The idea that she doesn't feel "worthy" of him is already being communicated by her facial expressions and her body language. Her letter stating how they aren't "well-balanced" in combination with that visual information is already providing context clues to the viewer as to what's going on in her head. In her final scene you can hear the sheer depth of her love give way to a deeply instilled sense of self-loathing, just by the tone of her voice, as she hoists Rudeus up onto that pedestal. Yet as she nears the end of her melancholic monologue more of that brash, passionate nature of hers seeps back into her delivery as pours her heart out.
To quote Harry Plinkett: "It's so subtle, you might not have even noticed... but your brain did."
The only emotion you could argue was nerfed by the adaptation is the depths of her self-loathing for having "taken advantage of him" after their night together but they still get a line in about their age and size difference, which when heard in her self-flagellating tone describing how "awful" she's been to him, you can easily make that inference. But you might also say "AHA even in those 3 episodes they left out how devastated she was when Rudy beat her using the demon eye after she finally gained some confidence in her strength" to which I say: Watch Ep 13: Missed Connections and, again, pay attention to Eris. Every part off the Buffalo was used.
They also never deliberately spell out her ardent belief that Rudeus is so strong and smart and amazing and brave and perfect that regardless of whatever she wrote as she struggled to find the words to leave in her letter, he would just clairvoyantly understand her intentions.... but you don't really NEED that spelled out for you when her final appearance is her shouting to the high heavens about how in love she is directly juxtaposed with Rudeus reverting to his former self-image shut away in his bedroom after very specifically misunderstanding the meaning of her words and actions! "I LOVE THIS MAN she screams as the man she loves thinks to himself "I can't believe she doesn't love me anymore." Seeing that, anyone could conclude "Were you expecting him to just KNOW what you meant??" Yes. Yes she was.
The Eris' POV wasn't "skipped content"... it was integrated. It's broken up and repurposed in bits and pieces over the course of 4, count 'em, FOUR separate episodes but 99% of it is there if you know what to look for (which for anime onlys is considered rewatch value).
By going through this in such agonizing detail I hope I'm properly communicating one of the greatest hang ups LN readers seem to have (or adaptational purists in general) relative to their expectations: You are putting entirely too much value into dialogue, monologue, and the text of a script relative to every other element the medium has to offer. The absence of TEXT does not diminish the SUBTEXT. An individual viewer might not know WHY they believe a character motivation exists as it does, but by and large most will pick up on those details whether it be deliberate (in the case of a certain psychologist youtuber who keeps nailing plot predictions over and over BECAUSE ALL OF THE INFORMATION YOU NEED IS RIGHT, THE F**K, THERE) or subconsciously (in the case of most passive audience members).

PART 1 (COUR 2): THE RESCHEDULENING (aka MATH)

Now, having detailed how a POV chapter can actually be efficiently absorbed into the runtime of the show without disrupting or sidetracking the main narrative, let's re-examine the topic of how (as well as why) this affects the production schedule. As I previously stated, overall Volume 1-9 have quite a number of POV chapters to work around as buffers to the rest of the content. Don't believe me? Let me break it down a bit more then:
Vol 1 contains ~ 2 1/2 POV chapters out of 10 = 25% Vol 2 contains ~ 2 3/4 POV chapters out of 11 = 25% Vol 3 contains ~ 1 POV chapters out of 15 = 6.5% (one of the longer action heavy volumes, yet only 3 eps) On average ~19% of content is POV. Vol 4 contains ~ 2 1/4 POV chapters out of 12 = 19% Vol 5 contains ~ 4 POV chapters out of 11 = 36% Vol 6 contains ~ 2 1/4 POV chapters out of 15 = 15% On average ~23% of content is POV. Vol 7 contains ~ 1 1/4 POV chapters out of 8 (technically 9, short prologue + epilogue combined) = 15.5% Vol 8 contains ~ 2 POV chapters out of 12 = 17% Vol 9 contains ~ 3.75 POV chapters out of 12.5 (several very short POVs, adjusted for fairness) = 30% On average ~21% of content is POV. Vol 10 contains ~ 2 POV chapters out of 14 = 14% Vol 11 contains ~ 2 POV chapters out of 16 = 12.5% Vol 12 contains ~ 1 1/2 POV chapters out of 16 = 9% On average ~12% of content is POV. ^\Note* Several chapters are not purely dedicated to secondary character POVs but rather "cut aways" between Rudy's own perspective and are occasionally EXTREMELY short (I assigned 1/4 amounts for especially short POVs to give them weight, but to prevent over-representing them. Additionally while chapters vary in length they generally represent individual events which I feel is a more apt form of measurement to relate to the anime adaptation in place of page counts (you're not gonna find the table of contents, copyrights, or the author's afterward being adapted after all). These are VERY rough estimations and should not be taken as "objective" measurements.))
Look at that proportional difference for Volume 10-12 relative to the other cours. While production had the advantage of consistently folding a little more than 1/5 of the content into the current runtime the current cour has almost 10% more content competing for the same amount of screen time as the cour before it. In fact, it's significantly LESS screen time as only the 1st episode bypassed the OP/ED compared to Cour 1's 4 episodes (and if you include the OVA, cour 1 already had a 24 minute head start in addition to the extra 3 per ep for a whopping total of 36 extra minutes of runtime over cour 2), Even if we're exceedingly generous and assume the next 4 episodes skip the OP/ED each, that would still leave it at a 24 minute disadvantage just in comparison to cour 1, not to mention the additional screen time afforded to S1 as I've already covered.

Part 3: Screen Time as a Resource (aka Content / Time = Stress)

In a novel characters can engage in chapter length diatribes or strategic planning in their own heads, engage in "talking is a free action" whilst in a fight to the death, and all sorts of ridiculous temporal bending contrivances that simply do not translate to the screen where time is the single most precious commodity (unless you're a shonen protagonist charging up your kamehameha). So let's view this from the scriptwriters' perspective to understand why they are forced to make some very difficult choices. As you are starting work on your assigned episode(s), the show's production committee makes the call that while previously you were afforded as much as ~300 minutes (5 hours) to convey ~1K pages of material, this time you only get ~255 minutes (4 1/4 hours) to convey ~1200 pages of the same density of material. Much more information to convey in much less time and you only JUST BARELY scrapped by to include as much as you could the last 3 times. That's means that at a MINIMUM, 200 of those pages are destined for the cutting room floor.
Though speaking of shounen protagonists, action set pieces are extraordinarily useful for either expanding OR condensing a scene's runtime by exactly as much as you need to fit within an episode's runtime. Need to add time? Go balls-to-the-wall, high-octane, budget-melting sakuga insanity that outshines even the source material (Turning Point 2/Eris vs Assassins) or you can condense high page counts into surprisingly short runtimes while still conveying the impact and information stored in those several pages worth of text. High impact, malleable screen time, same information conveyed. More time to dedicate to world building and secondary character development. As such, S1 (cour 2 especially) had a TREMENDOUS amount of leeway in how much they wished to expand OR condense action scenes at their discretion compared to the (comparatively) action-lite S2 (for Cour 1 at least).
So then you might ask with Cour 2 revving up the action again, why is it instead CUTTING tons of those action scenes rather than merely truncating them to make space for dialogue scenes like the prior cours? The short answer is there's already no time to spare. The longer, more complex answer is action scenes can't exist in a vacuum. In the same way you have to accelerate and decelerate in your car evenly to get from point A to point B safely, you can't simply hit 0-60 mph in under 2 seconds and you certainly can't go from 60 to 0 in a fraction of a second unless you want an episodes' pacing to liquify like your internal organs. Before, during, and sometimes after a fight scene is initiated, several questions need to be answered for the audience like "Who/what is fighting?" "Where are they positioned?" "What is the level of threat?" "What are the stakes?" "What are the win conditions?" with greater or fewer questions depending on the complexity of the scene or it's meaning to the character(s). Failing to provide the audience adequate answers to these questions can easily result in a nonsensical farce.... unless that's literally your intention. Thankfully, the requirement for winding down action is much simpler. After a beat of heightened tension, your protagonist simply lowers their guard/weapon and the message communicated to the audience is "the threat is over" and within seconds you can move to the next scene.
Most major encounters follow this rhythm throughout the series, with individual chapters dedicated solely to these fights, spanning page counts that are generally (but not always) on the higher end. In general, there are only 1-2 major battles per volume. Vol 11 and 12, by contrast, have several chapters that contain a half dozen individual skirmishes apiece that make adapting the material a total NIGHTMARE to pick and choose what makes the cut. So as an example, a weirdly high amount of time is seemingly spent establishing the succubus encounter in ep 19. Why you may ask? So they could ride those same rules of engagement straight into the following montage to inform the audience "these fights possess the same rules of engagement we just established" without having to spend the additional time winding up each one individually (another, more humorous example, is Ruijerd "dueling" the 3 North God students in a row). The montage also pulls double duty by conveying both the passage of time and distance. You'd think truncating roughly 1/5 of the entire volume into a scant 60 seconds would give them plenty of extra time to work with, but sadly, the ability to condense content is still only enough to break even with the established pace.
Another major element that placed Season 2 at a massive disadvantage is that Season 2 had to use it's precious 25th episode OVA to *catch up* on content that was deferred from Season 1 as Sylphy's POV chapters starting all the way back in Vol 4 did not make the cut. So rather than getting a jump start, the OVA was actually just catching up on deferred content that could not be included DESPITE all of the tremendous advantages I've previously discussed. And even then, it still needed to skip all but a few scant details from the intervening chapters that bridge the gap between Sylphy becoming Silent Fitz and Ariel's entire entourage fleeing to Ranoa's University of Magic resulting in all but 5 of them being slaughtered by assassins in hideously gruesome fashion. In a nutshell, Season 2 actually only has 24 episodes to dedicate to itself, and most of the benefits of scheduling seems to have heavily favored Cour 1 over Cour 2.
At this point, assuming like everyone else who joined up with Studio Bind, you are yourself a massive fan of the series and absolutely love these novels, you are effectively being asked to CHOOSE your favorite ~~children~~ chapters to sacrifice in the name of ending the season at a satisfying arc conclusion. Sure you could just adapt at the same rate of chapters-to-screen time as before and conclude the final 12th episode with THAT THING THAT HAPPENS but somehow I feel like doing so would result in death threats being strapped to a brick and hurled through your office windows. You've certainly maintained the integrity of the show's original pacing, but telling fans to sit tight until the next production cycle is ready in another 2-3 years feels like a recipe for disaster.
And frankly, Vol 12 has some INTENSELY heavy dialogue/monologue scenes filing out the back half of the volume that are going to need significantly more screen time to convey the necessary information relative to the first half as it is ENTIRELY Rudy-centric. So the only way to get there with enough time to allow the season to reach a natural and satisfying conclusion and still hit all of the vitally necessary plot threads is to put those proverbial chapter babies containing some of your favorite character interactions and world building on the alter as a ritual sacrifice for more time on the clock. And what did those sacrifices get you? 5 episodes. A range of 105-117 minutes (depending on OP/ED usage) of screen time to cover the single densest volume since vol 3 (see above). Barely one episode ahead of pace (but in terms of available screen time still barely ahead) of prior cours. And if you think it's unfortunate that ACTION was being cut, oh lordy I have some *bad news for you.\*

Part 4: Screenwriting as an Artform (aka how write story gud)

"But why are they STILL so stretched for time if they have access to and are utilizing all of these time-saving techniques?" Well I'm hoping the previous 3 parts of this gargantuan multi-tiered super essay have helped establish the constraints Studio Bind are working under compared to the prior cours. Cour 2 is working with significantly LESS screen time, with MORE events to manage and they're already so stretched for time that even multi-chapter spanning story events like the Merchant caravan are being cut entirely, rather than merely abridged, to make up that difference.
The requirement for "essential viewing" grows ever higher as mundane scenes like coming in and out of the teleporter still HAVE to be given priority over fan-beloved moments of character development because as uninteresting as those kinds of expository, utilitarian scenes are, they serve a far more vital purpose in a screenplay for communicating to the audience the "BUT, THEREFORE, BECAUSE" flow of script writing (watch the video it's extremely short and a great explainer, but essentially "But = Complication", "Therefore = Next logical action", "Because = Character motivation for performing said action"). You literally cannot skip these unremarkable, bog standard scenes because doing so would commit one of the deadliest sins of storytelling that I was alluding to when discussing how to establish action scenes: The Discontinuity of the dreaded "AND THEN" statement. If you're watching a movie and it's a series of "and then this happened and then that happened and then this person showed up" it ceases to be less a story so much as watching someone's attention span annihilating slideshow of vacation photographs.
As an example, scenes like the ones that establish how, where, and why Rudy and Elinalise use the teleporter to get from Ranoa to Begaritt are slow, mundane, and heavily time consuming and yet are so absolutely necessary as a scriptwriter to take the time to make sure the audience can follow along the logical thru-line for how these scenes connect to one another. If you skip such seemingly trifling, yet necessary information, the audience is not going to react by saying "oh THAT SCENE I LOVE is coming up" but rather "wait, why are we in a desert?"
As an example I'll use the last 2 episodes to demonstrate. The logical flow of episode 19 into 20 proceeds as follows (some parts are truncated for *relative* brevity):
"Rudy needs to leave for Rapan. THEREFORE he tells everyone goodbye, BUT Nanahoshi knows how to teleport there. THEREFORE he changes his route with Elinalise. THEREFORE they get prepared BECAUSE they want to save Zenith, BUT Cliff proposes to Elinalise BECAUSE he feels his lack of commitment was making her nervous. THEREFORE Elinalise is caught off guard BECAUSE she originally intended to leave without telling him to break off their relationship. THEREFORE she accepts his proposal. THEREFORE they travel to the teleporter, BUT teleporters are considered a source of danger to adventurers. THEREFORE they study it first as a safety precaution. THEREFORE they verify it's safe operation and use it. THEREFORE they arrive in Begaritt, BUT they are attacked by a Succubus. THEREFORE Rudy needs to detox himself BECAUSE they want to keep their promise to Cliff and Sylphy. THEREFORE they continue their sexless journey, BUT they are attacked several more times. THEREFORE they kill the monsters and proceed with caution. THEREFORE they arrive in Rapan in ~6 weeks. THEREFORE Geese is surprised to see them when they arrive, BECAUSE he only sent the letter so recently. THEREFORE he takes them to see Paul. THEREFORE they reunite with Paul, BUT Paul has fallen back into depression BECAUSE they lost Roxy while failing to find Zenith. THEREFORE Rudy tells Paul about his marriage and pregnancy with Sylphy. THEREFORE Paul recovers BECAUSE of the joy and pride he feels for his son BUT still feels worthless BECAUSE of his failures. THEREFORE Paul finally notices Elinalise. THEREFORE he apologizes BECAUSE ....uh y'know that thing that happened. THEREFORE Paul and Elinalise reconcile BUT Paul is confused that she didn't sleep with Rudy BECAUSE of her curse. THEREFORE she explains her husband Cliff's magic tool BUT Paul can't believe she has a husband. THEREFORE they get into another spat BUT the rest of the party returns during their argument THEREFORE Rudy learns that Roxy is lost in the labyrinth. THEREFORE Rudy starts to panic as the party begins to squabble. THEREFORE Elinalise takes Rudy's shoulder to draw his attention BECAUSE she realized he was panicking. THEREFORE Rudy asks to be caught up on the situation. THEREFORE Paul describes the difficulty of the Teleportation Labyrinth. THEREFORE Rudy gives Geese the book detailing it's depths which he borrowed BECAUSE he would be using a teleporter to get to Begaritt, BUT it will take Geese time to read it. THEREFORE Paul calls the meeting to a close to allow Geese to adjust their strategy using the book. THEREFORE Rudy, Paul, and Lilia start talking, BUT Paul is still a crude dude. THEREFORE the topic turns to sex BUT Lilia is in denial about being a total sex freak. THEREFORE Paul teases her BECAUSE he knowns how much she likes it rough. THEREFORE they retire for the night after some locker room talk. THEREFORE they depart for the labyrinth the following day. THEREFORE they reach the labyrinth and begin their descent, BUT Paul is breaking formation to show off in front of Rudeus. THEREFORE Elinalise scolds him, BECAUSE she wants to keep her family safe. THEREFORE Paul flippantly dismisses her claims of thinking of him like a son, BUT he is unaware of their connection through Sylphy. THEREFORE they continue further into the Labyrinth maintaining their formation, BUT they encounter new monsters. THEREFORE Rudy starts to cast a spell, BUT Talhand advises him not to use fire BECAUSE it fills a room with poison BECAUSE the concept of carbon monoxide poisoning exists but isn't fully understood in this universe BUT he also advices not attacking the ceiling BECAUSE it could cause a cave-in. THEREFORE Rudy uses ice magic to kill the remaining monsters. THEREFORE they advance to the second stratum in proper formation. THEREFORE they breeze through the second formation and take a break before entering the third. THEREFORE Geese uses the opportunity to inform Rudy that the next section is where Roxy went missing and may still be near that area BECAUSE teleporter traps only warp victims within the same stratum. THEREFORE as they approach where they lost Roxy, Geese asks Rudy where he'd look for Roxy based on his intuition. AND THEN Using his intuition, Rudy notices condensation on a wall and uses his Roxy Odor Snoof Sense to detect Roxy's location through a damn wall despite being a contrivance BUT it's the same contrivance used in the source material THEREFORE shut up. THEREFORE we cut to Roxy BUT she's being surrounded by monsters. THEREFORE she casts numerous spells to hold them at bay, BUT she runs out of mana. THEREFORE she believes she's about to die BUT Rudy saves her just in the nick of time. THEREFORE Roxy is shaken to her core at the sight of the man who saved her despite not recognizing Rudy, BUT then her POV didn't play out the way it did in the novels THEREFORE LN purists got upset BECAUSE they assumed her POV had been cut BUT they forgot that Roxy's POV has always been shown tremendous favoritism by Studio Bind THEREFORE they jumped to conclusions unaware it would happen the following episode.

THEREFORE Calm down and let Studio Bind cook

Effectively the point I hope I have demonstrated is that there IS a logical and consistent thru-line from scene to scene to scene that an audience can follow (and if you want to improve as a screenwriter, this is a GREAT exercise to figure out what makes your favorite shows tick. It's basically the screenwriter's equivalent to tracing someone else' art as practice). Even these unfairly maligned episodes have a viewing experience that provides a consistent sense of pacing. But if you want to know WHAT precisely feels different about them? Well if I had chosen to break down episodes from any of the prior 3 cours (or the best episodes of this cour), you'd be seeing the word BECAUSE significantly more to fill out every action, reaction, and complication along the way. If "THEREFORE" and "BUT" are the easel and canvas, which are necessary to even begin the process of creating art, then "BECAUSE" is the screenwriter's paintbrush that allows them to breathe life and detail into the characters on screen. The prior 3 cours were awash with "BECAUSE" statements detailing why characters are behaving the way they are in every individual scene so if there's one crime that can legitimately be pinned against several episodes in the latest cour, it's "JUST 'CUZ."

PART FINAL: The TL;DR (aka the... tl;dr)

So having laid all this out in such verbose, granular detail, what exactly does all of this mean?
To put it bluntly, Season 1 being such a near-perfect masterwork of adaptation spoiled the ever loving hell out of us. Having gorged ourselves on that expectation, we've ruined our appetites because now such perks are simply anticipated as standard with a vocal minority now irked by the use of a standard OP simply because it follows the conventions of the medium or (stay with me here) committing the sin of appealing to shonen fans. I know, truly a crime worthy of sudoku because of 14 seconds depicting one of the single most important events in the series. I truly don't understand (seriously, explain it to me please).
The current cour is merely receiving the same treatment most adaptations are given while still outperforming its peers if weekly rankings are anything to go by. Episodes range from pretty good to excellent (Norn and Nanahoshi's spotlight eps being the highlights thus far despite some grumbling) with even the extremely barebones Ep 19 squeezing in what sparse worldbuilding nuggets it can despite the plot literally necessitating that Rudy book it from one side of the planet to the other within a 21 minute period (a production level pacing decision you are still free to criticize). As I said earlier (but it bears repeating) these episodes are a good adaptation of Rudy's story rather than the whole that makes up MT because it simply doesn't have the screen time to focus on anything that falls outside the scope of his perspective given the sheer breadth of competing narrative essential content. As a show, these episodes are still delivering a cohesive and engaging thru-line by being glued to Rudy's perspective. So as long as Rudy remains interesting to watch the audience will be more than satisfied.
Expecting the same anomalous level of dedication AND leniency from the production committee to happen for every season was unfortunately nothing but a pipe dream. Cour 2 is now being forced to make due with what it has and while they are doing a commendable job given the heavy restrictions, it is completely unreasonable to expect them to fit so much into such tight confines. It is the adaptation equivalent of being asked to fit everything into one grocery bag, but not wanting the bag to be heavy.
Could this cour have been scheduled better? Absolutely. Was it possible certain changes to the script or episode direction could have provided more opportunities to explore the cut content? Of course. Is it still a total bummer that the realities of production that have compromised the artistic integrity of our beloved peak fiction? Without a doubt.
We are simply going to have to get used to the fact that S1 may never be topped with our only hope being the return of the waifu-wars for S3 rekindles the beefs between animators vying for shot assignments (which may hopefully still be in the cards god willing).
Of course, I'm not a future seer, so maybe, just maybe, Studio Bind bursts into flames and all of the footage is lost resulting in the quality of the last 3 episodes to be the worst drop off of a television show since the final season of Game of Thrones. If that is the case then I'll be eating more crow than I ever have in my life. But if Studio Bind sticks the landing and delivers on the emotional climax to one of the most beloved arcs among the fanbase that we've anticipated for years, then please calm it down with these exaggerated "cutting content is ruining the show" claims.
Thank you from coming to my Ted Talk and enjoy the rest of the season everyone.

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2024.06.09 22:46 TitanAura The Struggles of Adapting Peak Fiction Under Strict Production Constraints