Olá! It's me! I'm Rickle Pick! Hello everyone!
So, I’ve been listening to some stories about Neckbeards and Kevins, as well as some Legbeards and Kevinas (Is that the correct term??). Well, most of the times I listen to those stories, I am reminded of some people I used to deal with in school. Specifically, this time, the tale of a guy, who I’ll name Roger Bacon for reasons soon to be explained. Sorry for any grammar errors, eu falo português! I also don't really know the posting rules here, so I'll just post it and see how it goes lol
This prologue is more of a compilation of stories that I think is needed before we get to the main shenanigans and awkward situations this guy put himself AND me into. If this generates any interest, I will post more specific tales of this weirdo! Long time lurker, first time poster, english is definitely not my first language and the whole shebang. I also never wrote a text this large, so go easy on me!
THE LIST:
Well, I guess it’s usual to make a list of people that appear in those stories, so I’ll make one just for you!
Me: Your basic musician-type nerdy theater kid white guy! Tall, thin with medium-light brown hair. At the time, I usually wore a leather jacket and sometimes a hat (not a fedora, a Chaplin hat. Also, where I live, hats are an acceptable attire choice lol). I kinda looked like the Once-ler from Lorax. At this time, I had just failed my second year of high school because of… honestly just lack of effort, mixed with undiagnosed ADHD and a bit of lacking in the ol’ confidence and self-respect department. At the time, I also was physically incapable of saying no and had a crippling fear of disappointing people.
Roger Bacon: 168 centimeters (or 5,5ft for the uncivilized) of pure muscle! Or at least he thought it was that way. In reality, he did have some muscles but was kinda chubby and flaccid. Not FAT fat, but athletic fat (???). He was mixed, light skinned, had shaved short curly hair, no beard (except for the inside beard) and his face was a special kind of oval, besides having a, "chiseled jaw". He always smelled like he had just gotten out of a day-long brawl with a french cologne wearing burrito. He wasn't an usual neckbeard, but he was a huge attention whore. Thought too much of himself, as we say here in Brazil: “Promised too much, delivered nothing at all.” His moto was: “Dude, I think she’s into me!”
For now, these are the characters, as the focus is to introduce you all to Roger Bacon as a person.
With the list over, let us get to the story.
FEBUARY 2018:
The year of 2018 started pretty badly for me. I had just been held back from 10th grade, had no friends and didn’t really know anyone. As most people know, high school in Brazil is quite different from America, as we start school in febuary and we share the same class with the same people all day, excluding language classes and extra-curriculum activities. This meant that, for the foreseeable future, I was alone. On the first day of school, I shyly sat on the last desk on the far right corner of the room, as I scanned my classroom to see what I was dealing with. A few groups of people sitting together, talking and greeting their friends, some loners reading or playing on their phones. The artsy girl drawing a beauriful woman on the white board. Some guy drawing a penis right beside her. Perfect balance. A normal classroom.
Another difference between our school systems is that we don’t really have clicks based on like Jocks or Nerds or Pretty Girls, it’s mostly people who connected in childhood or matched personalities, instead of connecting through roles and interests within the school. Not saying either one is better, just different. And yeah, the bullying situation is just as bad. I was bullied for my whole middle school and through first year of high school, and made a very specific group of low profile friends. So when I failed sophomore year I thought to myself “Screw it, if I’m going to be held back, that’s at least a second chance for me to grow an acceptable social life.”
All this elucidates how intimidating it could be for someone to join a new classroom full of mostly new faces. If you were unable to make a friend, you’d pretty much be on your own for the whole year unless an already formed group “adopted” you. So my mindset was to at least try and meet new people.
Well, have you ever said “I’m gonna do this thing I’ve never done before!” And got the worst possible circunstance you could get at the very first attempt? Welp, that’s just what happened. My strategy was to start small, and go talk to only one person at first, and then try to interact with a few of the groups as that was a bit intimidating (fun fact: we call “clicks “panelinhas”, spelled “pah-neh-lin-ias”, wich means “little pans”, because, you know, they’re closed groups, like a closed… pan. Idk, anyway), so I went up to this guy in front of me, and that guy was Roger Bacon.
He was almost lying on his chair, on a cool guy pose while messing around on his phone. He was also wearing a black sports tank top with a grey opened sweatshirt and the standard uniform wine-red shorts that were mandatory in our school, which made him look like a short and jelly version of Rocky balboa mixed with Kick Buttowski.
In real life, my name and his started with sequential letters, and because of this, we would sit near each other for the whole year, so I guessed he’d be the best person to interact with. I also KINDA knew him because we had basketball training after class in like 2015 and I went to the same church as him, in which I befriended his brother, Kevin, slightly, but didn’t have much contact with him because he had already graduated (I have some stories about basketball and church so tell me if yall wanna read them lol). I approached and gestured for him to take of his headphones (They were extremely loud, so I could recognize he was listening to the song In The End by Linkin Park).
Me: Hey! Aren’t you Roger? You’re Kevin’s brother, right?
RB, trying to sound stoic: “Oh, hey Rick. Yeah, it’s me… fortunately for you.”
Me: “What do you mean?”
RB explained: “Well, I’m the cool brother! Kevin was lame, and also had no friends.”
Me: “Isn’t he in a band with [insert band members]? They seem to be his friends…
RB: “They might look nice, but they’re all assholes. Don’t let them fool you! I’m the nice brother, Kevin is a dipshit.
To elucidate you: that band he said was made of assholes was the Worship band of the church we went to. It was also the worship band that I occasionally played the piano with.
I said, jokingly: “Guess I’m an asshole then! Because, ya know, I play with them more often than not”
RB: “No man, it’s just them. They’re just so infuriating! They never let me participate!”
Me: “Wow, that’s weird… I mean, I didn’t know you were a musician too! What instrument do you play?”
RB: “I play the drums, piano, guitar, bass and I also sing. But Kevin keeps me out because he wants to be the 'star brother'!”
I could tell he got a little heated, and went silent for a little while. I decided not to mention the band or his brother in his presence, 'cause ya know, that was pretty awkward lol.
I remember thinking to myself “This guy’s kinda weird”, because his brother was one of the nicest people I had ever known, and he also didn’t have the say on who played on the band, the worship leader did. I thought about confronting Roger with this, but I didn’t want to abandon my quest of finding a friend. And also, he seemed chill at first, if not a little insecure.
I was a little uncomfortable with this line of conversation, so I opted to change the subject. We talked a bit more about me having been held back, and he went on about how he was really good at math and chemistry, and how he could help me with my school stuff.
I was glad to have someone to help me, and even more, someone who apparently liked the stuff I liked. I remembered what he was listening to, so I commented on it and asked which song was his favorite, and we talked about Linkin Park for a bit. He said “In The End” was his favorite song, and then I mentioned I was a huge Linkin Park fan. He told me he was a big fan as well, but as we talked about it, it became a bit fishy. He never specifically said anything and just kinda repeated what I said. It became clear after a while that “In The End” was, in fact, virtually the only song he knew from that band.
That was the first time I noticed something strange, but only in hindsight, as at the time I just thought he really wanted to make a human connection. I remember thinking he was just excited to know someone who was open to talking to him, so I didn’t think anything of it.
Also, not everyone memorizes this stuff, and maybe he did only remember one song, for whatever reason, so I let that pass. I only felt necessary to include this information because it was, at least in some way, the first lie that Roger told me, a little sample, if you will, of what’s to come.
After we talked for a while, mostly catching up on our lives, the bell rung and our first actual class had begun, and I had the first-hand experience of this guy’s sense of humor. The teacher walked into the classroom and introduced himself as the new Geography teacher, and started a power point presentation about some of the subjects we’d be covering that year, saying “Please pay attention to this class, as you’ll need to know how our schedule will work”. Roger looked back and said “Huh, I guess this class is useless for you then, being held back and all, hahah”, which made everyone look at me and just kinda stare like I should say something, and he kept repeating the joke to anyone that showed any reaction besides just staring, adding “Amirite? Huh? Amirite?”.
I was kinda salty about this, but my people pleasing peapod brain couldn’t handle letting it show, so I just laughed and said nothing. I guessed it was a poorly thought out joke at first, but then Roger proceeded to make the same comment on every single one of the opening classes we had for both of the introductory days. There were 12 of them. He did it every time. Every. Single. Time. Sometimes he repeated it even louder, as if he didn’t think people heard it, because no-one was laughing.
“Ok”, I said to myself, “He didn’t mean to make fun of me, he’s just a little overexcited and probably is trying to make a connection and help me get acquainted to our classmates.”
Either way, I was very uncomfortable and annoyed.
Thankfully, this came to a halt when he was practically thrown out of the Literature class for interrupting the teacher mid-sentence while she talked about how important the first month of class would be for our comprehension of the whole subject. He made the joke four times. FOUR TIMES. I was beginning to think that I made a mistake, but well, the mistake was already made, at least I can try and understand him a bit, before judging.
The rest of the week went by and he didn’t get any better, but I got kinda used to it. In fact, I actually enjoyed having conversations with him at recess, when we could talk a bit more freely. And, as all things in life tend to do, it got weirder. Weirder in the sense that as we spoke more and more, I noticed a bit of a concerning pattern: every time I shared an experience I had, he’d share a cooler and more awesome almost equal experience back.
Some light examples:
I told him I went hiking for 2-3 kilometers on a trail by the beach. Then he smirked and said he went hiking for “at least 7 kilometers on a deserted beach that only his father’s company’s employees had access to and he saw a Gorilla. There are no gorillas in Brazil. Maybe in zoos, I guess, but definitely no gorillas.
I told him I was kinda sad because I had just ended a “thing” with a girl from my old grade. He “proudly” said he’s been dumped by his ex, Laura, after they dated for 11 months and made out aaaallll the time after school, and he even saw her “lady parts” once!”.
And then he went on to describe that shit for like 3 straight classes, adding more and more to the story every chance he had to speak, providing me with my daily dose of cringe in tiny bits of uncomfortable information at a time! Like a sporadic cringe snack! Sninge! Crack? Probably Crack.
ANYWAYS
There was also the time I told him the story of how I became best friends with a guy because we got into a fight in P.E.. We were arguing about some nonsense and he wanted to fight, so after he socked me on my stomach, I cheaply kicked him in the face so hard I almost sprained my ankle and then we started laughing (because I guess sometimes that’s all it takes). Phillip is my best friend for almost 10 years now.
Roger puffed up his soap dish chest went on for at least 2 classes worth of time about how he “beat up his last bully and broke both of his arms, and almost went to prison, but his dad is a lawyer and bailed him out”. Dude was 16, and I don’t think he’d need to be bailed out, but okay… He was, in fact, very badass.
Those are all approximations of actual stories he told me, because my ADHD memory is shit, but you get the gist of it.
My days were filled with endless stories filled with absolute bullshit, like a Gary Stu from a dying rpg campaign. (I have a story about a DnD game he participated in, but that’s for another time!)
Roger, not content with lying to me about anecdotal facts about his past that could be true but were almost certainly mostly bullshit (if not entirely), had a tendency to just negate reality when presented with facts in certain situations.
And example of this situation is the time we were doing a group assignment and a girl at least 3 meters in front of him dropped her pencil and he just kinda threw himself on the ground, picked it up and said “Here you go, Lana!”. She said “Thanks Roger!”, barely turning around and carried on with the assignment. Roger, then, turned to me with a sleek shit feasting smirk on his face and said:
RB: “Dude, do you think she’s into me??”
I contained a ridiculing laughter just in time to realize he was dead serious.
I said “I don’t know man… Doesn’t seem like it to me, but sure I guess.”
RB then straight up asked ME to go talk to her and get HIM her number. When I asked why shouldn’t he do it, he said it was “the wingman’s job to get the number of the girl” so that he wouldn’t “look weak for asking”
I said I’d do it, cause I genuinely wanted to see if he was right about her liking him (I hadn’t really understood the dynamics of the classroom, so I actually had no idea if he was actually right, just a gut feeling that yeah, he probably wasn’t).
I went up to her and asked for her number, explaining it was Roger who was interested in her and, as I pulled out my raging 2014’s Sony XPeria, I was swiftly interrupted by her delicately saying “Sorry! I have a boyfriend.” (She said the boyfriend part out loud, and stared at Roger)
I said “Oh, ok, sorry to bother ya!” and, as I was starting to walk back, I noticed that she turned back and glared at Roger. Later that day her boyfriend texted him, telling him that “He’s got to stop asking her out, and next time, if he wants to get rejected, he should come do it himself” He called him a moron. And then they both blocked him.
Well, that was embarrassing.
Despite having been turned down (for the 6th time now, I’d come to find out), Roger still maintained that she was “totally into him”, and it wasn’t just Lana. Any time he had even the smallest interaction with any girl, he’d say that they’re “probably into him”, or that “they made out at a party, but she was drunk and probably won’t remember”, or that they “sent him nudes last year but he’s already deleted them because he’s a good person, with morals”.
This went on for a while and, after about a month, Roger begun to dial down the crazy stories about how he’s a “badass and he gets all the girls but he’s single because he’s too good for them”. Until I started seeing a girl from another church I started going to. I met Janice () at the churches youth group, and we talked the whole time afterwards about lots of stuff. This name’s given because of her insanely similar laughter and demeanor of Janice from Friends. We clicked well and I was very interested in her, but my ADHD ass forgot to get her number, and remembered it only when she had already left.
When I told Roger, he laughed and said “I had just cockblocked myself” and that I’d “probably missed my only chance of banging a girl ever”. I was bummed, but clarified I didn’t really want to have sex before marriage or at least before making an emotional connection (I had just then begun to go to church, so I didn’t really get the rules, so it was more of a personal choice I always had in mind when thinking about dating. Also I met her at church so wtf).
He said “that was dumb” and, “even though he was a virgin, he’d dance the Devil’s Tango with the first chick he had the chance to”
“What about Laura?”, I asked. His face went from a confident smirk to an almost sad expression, and he blankly replied: “She didn’t want to, but I tried anyway at times. I even got a blowie once!” I let it go because I was very tired, as Mondays are hell on earth.
A few classes later, I went up to him and reminded him of our conversation and asked:
I said “Ooookay, but what about all those girls you told me were all over you? Didn’t they want to have some bum bum times with you??”
He was taken by surprise by this, and was visibly trying so hard to think of an answer for at least 15 seconds. He mumbled “Well…”, and like just left. Like he got up in the middle of the class, and walked away. Well that was weird!
He got back and I didn’t pry, thinking he had some kind of trauma, and I tried to change the subject.
I say “tried” because instead we were suddenly interrupted by a girl asking me if I was Rick. I didn’t know her or how she had materialized beside our desks, but later I found out that that girl’s name was Mary. She had blue eyes and was smiling mischievously, and I answered “Yup, that’s me”. She then giggled and said that “Anna wanted to make out with me after class”. Me and Roger were both very much taken aback by this, and I immediately thought to myself that this could only be some type of dare or prank (which it probably was), and was about to try and respond with the first witty joke that popped up in my monkey brain when, without missing a beat, Roger said “Rick’s already seeing someone!”. Mary was visibly surprised and said “Oh, you have a girlfriend??” with a look of disbelief on her face. Ouch. I explained that I wouldn’t say I do, I just liked a girl from church and we’re going to see a movie with some friends on Saturday, and that either way it was a pass on the making out sesh! Mary said “Oh, okay!” and started to walk back to her desk. I was about to make a joke and say that Anna could probably do better than me, when Roger interjected:
RB: “I’d like a making out sesh if she’s interested!”
Mary looked back with a visible “Lol, ew no” expression and just said: “I’m sure you would, Roger!”, turned away and sat down, laughing with her friends when she got to her desk.
Roger turned to me and said:
RB: “Dude, do you think she’s into me?”
This cycle repeated once in a while, so I’m not gonna tell you all of the situations that I felt like shaking him and trying to wake him up like Woody does to Buzz Lightyear in Toy Story. Exhausting, right?
Another thing Roger tended to brag about was that he did Martial Arts. Specifically, Kung Fu (Wushu). I would come to find out that, in the year before, he made a big scene to tell everyone in class that he’d just started Kung-Fu classes and, when no-one payed attention, he started a habit of punching the wall beside his desk, audibly making “hmpft” noises. When anyone asked why, he’d say he was training, and that his Sensei (Not shifu, he actually said sensei) had asked him to do that to strengthen his fists so he could harness all the strength he had, so one day he could put a hole through a wall with his fists.
He would also punch the school’s fireproof doors because, if you didn’t know, they dent pretty easily, and he would show me and tell me to bask at his strength and ability. That until I said I’d give it a try. He told me not to, because “I wasn’t trained” and “it could really hurt my hand”. I punched the door. It made a dent.
Roger said it was beginners luck and that he’s just a good teacher. I told him I really didn’t even make an effort to pay attention, the metal was just bendy and soft. Roger never talked about it again, and started only punching walls. For that, he would feel superior because, yeah I ain’t doing that. There were consequences for his wall punching habits, but I’ll address that some other time.
The last thing I’ll say about him for now is how clueless Roger was, how much he thought of himself and how he treated everyone else like they should (and would) respecting for what he told them, and not for what he showed them.
(I plan on doing another part eventually, with the story of how his disconnection with reality, lies, schemes and generally narcissist behavior eventually exploded back into his face.)
As a last bit of exposition of our circumstances, there’s an important part of our school life that fueled Roger’s social life’s demise.
Pranking was a big part of my class’ culture. There were also some people in my classroom who were bullied. The thing is: the bullies actually made fun of literally everyone else, which made it very hard to figure out if you were considered a target or just a colleague. They’d mess with people’s stuff, tie backpacks to the windows and hide pencil cases, but they would also do it to their own group.
Essentially, the only way to differentiate those who they considered normal schoolmates from those who were bullied was the frequency of the pranks and their demeanor in general towards those people. They would apologize for the pranks, ask to make up for it, buy you lunch, make jokes, try to laugh with you. I swear some of those guys were politicians in the making. Luckily, was very good friends with one of the guys in that group, I’ll call him Turkey, who was also held back a few years before me, and he liked my sister, so I was mostly safe.
Roger, on the other hand, THOUGHT he was one of the pranksters. Every time someone pranked him or anyone else, he would laugh knowingly, like he was in on the joke the whole time, and try to make jokes, only to further humiliate himself. And they would capitalize on that as hard as they could.
You see, Roger liked to portray himself as the “Mysterious-Badass-Quiet-Protagonist-Take-No-Shit-From-Anyone-Mr.-Steal-Yo-Girl” guy. This combo of personality substitutes was the recipe for the downfall of his popularity, and the start of the longest lasting pranks I’ve ever seen in my life, which will come if yall want another post. That prank is also the reason I named him Roger Bacon.
Because he was so into Math and Science (and into himself too lol) he also always wanted to look like the smartest guy in the room. The problem is that, as our first semester went by, it became clear that he wasn’t as good as he hyped himself up to be. Shocker, right? This was proven to be true when we were doing a chemistry group test, and I was paired with him and Anna, and we needed to calculate some entropies or whatever. He made a point of telling us to do all of the “easy ones”, and he would take on the more complicated questions.
The thing is, he was trying really hard to look like a genius, to maybe impress Anna, so every time he made a calculation, he would roll his eyes up and kinda vibrate a little. I guess he wanted to look like a genius mathematics robot, but instead he looked like he was trying to imitate an autistic person having a small stroke. I didn’t mind the Good Doctor amateur impersonation, because at least it looked like he knew what he was doing. Unfortunately, it really just looked like he knew what he was doing.
Each easy question of the test was worth 1 point, and there were 4 of them, and there were 3 hard questions worth 2 points each. We got a 4/10 on that test, and lo and behold, the only questions we got right were the ones me and Anna worked on. We were a bit pissed, not gonna lie.
Until the last time we spoke, Roger still blames Anna for his complete failure at this test for, in his words, distracting him because she was obviously into him.
But that’s just Roger, I guess!
I've got A LOT of stories about Roger and other neckbeards I've encountered, and I can't wait to tell them!
Until then, thanks for reading, and have a good one yall!

Came across an article on a "hot new psychotherapy", Internal Family Systems (IFS). It appears to have directly inspired Celeste:
https://substack.com/home/post/p-144719880

IFS is about working with “parts”. You treat your mind as containing a Self - a sort of perfect angelic intellect without any flaws or mental illnesses - and various Parts - little sub-minds with their own agendas who can sometimes occlude or overwhelm the Self. During therapy, you talk to the Parts, learn their motives, and bargain with them.
For example, you might identify a Part of you that wants to sabotage your relationships. You will visualize and name it - maybe you call her Sabby, and she looks like a snake. You talk to Sabby, and learn that after your first break-up, when you decided you never wanted to feel that level of pain again, you unconsciously created her and ordered her to make sure you never got close enough to anyone else to get hurt. Then you and the therapist come up with some plan to satisfy Sabby - maybe you convince her that you’re older now, and better able to deal with pain, and you won’t blame her if you get close to someone and have to break up again. Then you see a vision of Sabby stepping aside, maybe turning off the Windmill Of Relationship Sabotage or something like that, and then you never sabotage your relationships again. It’s more complicated than that, but that’s the core.

It could also be parallel thinking, though the use of "Part of You" to describe Badeline and other similarities seem direct. Either way, it's not super important, the game and these therapists are dealing with the same issues. To explore:

Are some "Parts of You" actually evil demons?

This is the apparent tension in the IFS field, and the purpose of the above article, check it out for more. But basically, "classic IFS" says that everything in your mind is a part of you, fundamentally good, and to be bargained with. An attempt at exorcism will only scar you further.
But, many practitioners come to believe that nope, sometimes there are demons that need to be cast out. In the words of one such entity:

No, I'm not a part of her - I'm a much more powerful and beautiful being, and I'm going to crush her like a worm, the same way I'm going to crush you.

(Spoilers) Celeste comes down solidly in camp "Part of You". In fact, the central arc revolves around this question. Madeline starts off treating Badeline as a hostile force to be abandoned, before Granny convinces Madeline to apologize, allowing the two to work together and double-jump their way to the top of the mountain.
What do you all think? Is the "Part-of-You" reconciliation model always the best approach, or are there in fact some parts of us that are just bad and need to be abandoned?
(P.S. There is also tension between those who view IFS as a metaphor or helpful tool, and those who drink the kool-aid and take it literally. I'd note that is separate from the "part-of-you" vs "demon" debate, you can have metaphorical and literal interpretations of both, neither can claim to be the only scientific perspective.
Celeste side-steps this question nicely by being fictional. Note that some therapists have said "IFS may not work well with delusional, paranoid, or schizophrenic clients who may not be grounded in reality and therefore misuse the idea of 'parts'.")
​

The summers in our state are getting hotter and hotter - I had to close my booth at the local Farmer's Market because my lotion candles were actually melting. I have my inventory attached to my business's square account - I used it because my practice started with taking square for co-pays.
My ability to build a website with just code is too rough for me to do that again - it's been years (think back to vrml showing up).
My domain name is on godaddy but I'm not happy with the limited control on building a website there. I tried shopify a few years ago but I was thinking about making it a pass through site not creating and I didn't have 3 generations of collections to sell like I do now. Plus we have decided to start cleaning and paring down our own collections - 40 years plus of stuff (that I honestly thought had not much value until I started looking them up to put on marketplace). Marketplace itself is so shitty - I tried to sell an antique dresser for local pick up and had 10 messages for my google code, one threat if I didn't send it, and not a single inquiry about coming to see it or purchase - it was priced way below value.
Suggestions on where to park my domain and where to build my eCommerce site? I do have a customer base - my soaps, candles, and lotion candles sold well at our booth along with our irreverent stickers.

Hopefully this isn’t downvoted instantly, because I know people seem to get strangely very defensive about Beast’s characterization in this run. I think there is a lot of miscommunication whenever a Beast fan complains about how he was depicted here. Often times people will discount those complaints because they think Beast fans just don’t want him to go bad, when that doesn’t really seem to be the whole truth from what I’ve seen. Ultimately, the complaints I raise and I have seen others raise are more about thinking the writing of his spiral in X-Force 2019 was not done well rather than that said spiral shouldn’t have happened at all. With the Krakoa era coming to an end, and “From the Ashes” having the now-rebooted Beast who is pulled all the way from his time on The Defenders, I don’t see any of the flaws here being addressed beyond characters casually referring to how bad he became. So I wanted to take this time in the in-between, where our new Beast is apparently just chilling on Wonder Man’s couch while the rest of the X-Men fight against Orchis and Nimrod, to once and for all lay out the flaws of Beast’s villainous era, and establish not that it shouldn’t have happened, but that it could have been way better.
Problem 1: A Lack of Pathos:
Most X-Men fans who have been reading for awhile will agree that it’s honestly surprising more mutants haven’t gone down a dark path. Their history is one of striving for acceptance, putting their lives on the line for people who would rather see them dead, and being rewarded with not one but multiple genocides on their population. Some of the most interesting stories can actually come from a formally “upstanding” mutant finally deciding enough is enough. When Cyclops went down his “villainous” path, it made a lot of sense. We’d seen him becoming more disenfranchised with the dream for years. We’d seen his trust in Xavier erode time and time again, and so when he decided to stop asking for acceptance and start demanding it, it was hard to blame him. Even as we saw most of his friends turn against him, that didn’t stop people from declaring “Cyclops Was Right,” because his perspective could easily be understood, and he did achieve results. More recently in X-Men ‘97, we saw Rogue go down a dark path in the wake of Genosha being wiped out, including Magneto and Gambit. Again, this was understood, and it was an interesting direction for her character.
This sort of turn would also make a ton of sense for Hank McCoy. Did you know that back towards the start of the original Uncanny X-Men run, Hank was actually the first X-Men we ever saw to leave the team and say that Magneto was right, after he and Bobby were attacked by an angry mob because Hank used his powers to save a young child? Over the years, one of Hank’s most recurring struggles and arcs is self-loathing and eventual acceptance of his condition. Hank has always been at his darkest when he’s trapped in his spiral of self-loathing, but when he comes out the other side, he tends to be one of the most optimistic mutants when it comes to coexistence with humans. He was out making connections and fighting alongside non-mutants before anyone else. Joining the Avengers and Defenders, speaking on behalf of mutant rights before congress, dating human women who were able to accept his appearance, blue fur and all. Until they weren’t… looking at you, Trish Tilby.
So with all of this in mind, it would honestly be an extremely interesting arc to see Hank, this optimistic mutant who has spent his life building bridges and making connections with humanity, to be slowly beaten down and start to believe peace is not an option. As one of the original X-Men, he has been there through every tragedy that struck the mutant population. And as one of the smartest X-Men, he has usually been at the center of these crises. He has seen advancements in science meant to eradicate the mutants. He has fought against viruses that threaten to drive them extinct. He was there in the wreckage of Genosha. He has seen countless friends killed again and again. He has suffered his own mutation evolving and making him less and less human-looking. He saw the development of a mutant “cure” and was tempted to take it. He has seen it all.
And so that brings us to Krakoa. This is the moment where the mutants as a whole decided enough was enough. If they could not be accepted by humanity, they would pack up and form their own nation, and they would force humanity to accept that they exist by developing life-saving drugs that other nations would have to rely on. And what is one of the first things that happens after the establishment of Krakoa? Hank witnesses assassins infiltrate the island and assassinate Charles Xavier. This right here is honestly the perfect setup for Hank to go darker than he has before. Even after literally segregating the mutant population from humanity, like humanity seemed to want, they still decided to come and kill the man at the forefront of the movement. And Hank, recently placed in charge of mutant black-ops, would likely see that all options are on the table.
Unfortunately, Hank’s actual pathos surrounding the decisions he would go on to make is not explored by the book itself. The book has no interest in detailing Hank’s fall from grace as we saw with Cyclops before him. The book just wants us to accept that Hank has already fallen. And in fact, according to the writing, maybe he never had anywhere to fall from. Any time a character in X-Force tries to ask important questions to understand Hank’s thought process, they are cut off. Usually by Wolverine saying “He’s always been like this.” And then on one occasion, when Wolverine asked Hank why he was doing all this dark shit, Hank said, “Didn’t you read the script? I’ve always been like this.” There is no attempt to examine Hank as a character. We don’t need to know why Hank makes the decisions he does, because this book wants Hank to be a black and white villain and so that’s what he will be. Why? Because he’s always been like this.
Problem 2: Rapid Escalation:
One of the major defenses people have when it comes to Krakoan Hank is that he has apparently been on the road to his villainous self for over a decade. The X-Force run itself loved to have characters spout a list of Hank’s previous “crimes” without any context involved, as justification for why he was acting the way he did in the current run. The problem is, that context is very important. Because it shows the disparity in the Hank of previous stories who made mistakes with good intentions vs the Hank of X-Force who did heinous shit because he wanted to. This was less a plane making a slow descent and more a plane that was slowly descending, but then its engines shut off and it plummeted into a fiery explosion.
To make this case, we need to briefly analyze the previous perceived transgressions of Hank McCoy to show what they actually meant for his character and how they differ from the Bond villain X-Force would present us with. Let’s start with Threnody. Somehow, Threnody became a bit of a buzzword for the beginning of the end for Hank. When people talk about the history of Hank and Threnody, they will usually present it as one of Hank’s worst sins, saying something like “Hank callously handed Threnody over to Mr. Sinister so he could experiment on and abuse her!!!” It kind of makes for some whiplash when you actually read the Threnody story people are talking about. Here is a brief rundown of what actually happens:
Threnody is a young woman who cannot control her powers. It causes her no end of grief, and when we are introduced to her, she is homeless and constantly in danger of hurting herself or others. Beast, Rogue, and Iceman come across Threnody who has been found first by Mr. Sinister. Sinister actually has a vested interest in curing the Legacy Virus, and believes he can help Threnody master her powers, at which point she will prove vital in his efforts to study said Virus. Notably, Threnody wants to go with Sinister here. While Rogue disapproves, Hank does believe that Sinister is actually Threnody’s best option, openly stating Sinister can actually help her gain control and the X-Men cannot, because, as Hank directly says, Sinister is willing to damn parts of his soul in pursuit of scientific enlightenment, and the X-Men are not. A few issues later, when breaking into Sinister’s base, Hank encounters Threnody again. She’s happy. Sinister did indeed help her control her powers, and she has been able to use her abilities to help mutants the world over, while also undermining Sinister’s more evil operations from the inside. Hank expresses relief, saying he was kept up at night by his decision to let her go with Sinister, but Threnody actually thanks him for letting her. And that’s it. That’s Hank’s big “crime” here.
Hank’s other “sins” are also of varying levels of severity. There’s the time “Hank worked with his evil self to cure the Legacy Virus!” when the actual story in question is Hank asserting that he won’t stoop to the levels of Dark Beast and compromise his values in the name of science. There’s the time “Hank sided with the Inhumans against the X-Men!” when the actual story is Storm sending Hank to Attilan to find a way to end the conflict between mutants and inhumans before war broke out. Hank runs out of time to find a cure for the terrigen mist cloud, suggests mutants get off-world in the meantime rather than go to war with the inhumans, is thrown into a cell by the other X-Men for his “betrayal”, and then freed at the conclusion of the war by a repentant Storm when it comes to light that the whole conflict was manipulated by Emma Frost. There’s the time “Hank risked the timestream by bringing the original X-Men to the present day!” A decision that was made on his perceived deathbed with the hopes of bringing his old friend Cyclops back to his side. Hank wants to take the young mutants back right away, but they refuse. And instead of others enforcing that they need to return, we actually see Kitty Pride decide to lead them in the present in memory of Charles Xavier. Notably, Kitty would be one of the many mutants in future issues who would yell at Hank about this.
The point of this post isn’t to absolve Hank of all fault. He has made countless mistakes and bad decisions. Regardless of the culpability of others, the pulling of the O5 to the present was his decision. During Secret Empire, Hank would turn a blind eye to Hydra’s activity simply to keep the mutants under his care safe. During all of this, however, Hank’s character was not compromised. He expressed despair and regret over his worse choices, and struggled with thinking he was a good person any longer. Again, going back to his recurring struggle with self-loathing. He had pathos behind his decisions and how they affected him, and would often reunite with Wonder Man as an opportunity to recenter and declare he would “be better tomorrow than he was yesterday.”
You would think, if the aim of X-Force was to turn Hank into a full-on villain, it would take advantage of the long-form storytelling of comics to chronicle that escalation. Like I said, the assassination of Charles Xavier is a great starting point for Hank to start going darker than he ever has before. The problem is, we don’t get an escalation. Hank starts the run by doing some of the most heinous shit imaginable. Regardless of your thoughts on the severity of Hank’s previous mistakes, none of them compare to his opening volley in this run. Hank uses telefloronics to override and genocide an entire country, leaving various people either completely dead or braindead. We later find out that during this time he also established a space station where he ran unethical experiments on prisoners like Krakoa’s very own Dr. Mengele. He then accuses his old ally Colossus of conspiring with Russia against Krakoa, and calls forth the mutant population to witness as he parades a shamed Colossus through its streets. Then he kills Wolverine and resurrects him as a mindless animal who he uses as an attack dog against his perceived enemies. This isn’t an escalation, this is a different character. And the aforementioned lack of pathos means that we don’t get to see him struggle with these choices. We don’t see his thought process as he becomes darker and darker. Why would we? “He’s always been like this.”
Problem 3: No Personality:
One of the most fun aspects of turning a protagonist into an antagonist is seeing how their personality works with a more villainous mindset. When Cyclops became an “antagonist” to the X-Men, he was still Cyclops. He stuck to his convictions, he was a great leader and tactician, and he was able to turn many mutants to his side because of this. We’ve seen an evil Beast before. The creatively-named Dark Beast is from an alternate future where Beast went down a dark path lacking ethics. The fun of this character, besides comparing his ideologies with our Hank McCoy, is seeing how Hank’s penchant for jokes or quotes now become far more sinister and cutting.
There’s a strange narrative that the jokey Hank is reserved for the Avengers while the Hank with the X-Men is all business and science. This isn’t entirely true. Early on when he was a member of the Defenders, Hank talks about this sort of thing. He essentially says that he wears different hats. While working with the X-Men, he used big words essentially to gain respect from both his teammates and humanity. But with other teams, and in his then-new furry form, he dropped all of that. His speech became more naturalistic and he was much more of a goofball. The thing is, it’s the speech patterns that truly change depending on who Hank is hanging with, not his personality. Hank with the X-Men and Hank with the Avengers are both jovial characters who like to tell jokes and quote philosophy. You can see Hank being a bit of a clown among the X-Men in various runs. So it’s not like it’s a given that Hank is some entirely different dry doctor devoid of any sense of humor when among the X-Men.
But this is how Hank is portrayed in X-Force. Part of why this version of Hank is so hard to reconcile with the rest of his history for fans of the character is that he just doesn’t act like himself, even when he isn’t actively committing war crimes. In one early issue of the run, we get a glimpse at Beast’s journal where he accounts a meeting he had with Forge. Now, Beast has been known to be a very physical character. He is often known to sweep others into a hug, or even plant a big kiss on their face in the case of characters like Wonder Man or Iceman. Meanwhile this one page where we read his thoughts on Forge is clearly pretending this is not the case:

I paid Forge a visit in the Armory – and I must say that he can be, like Logan, rather impossible. There is a certain locker room bravado about him I find perplexing, like a language I only half understand. For instance, he refused to shake my hand but instead dragged me into what he called a “bro hug.” Then he challenged me to a “feat of strength,” asking if I would test out this sappy “muck bomb” he had developed that – or so I gather – glues one in place. He wondered if a “big boy” like me might be able to thrash free of the binding. I refused him and said I very much would prefer to get down to business. He then referred to me as a “bookish peckerwood @#$%” but did so with a friendly laugh and clapped me on the shoulder hard enough to make me stagger. I’m not sure how to process this, honestly. Is he being friendly or cruel? Is it possible to be both?

Needless to say, this doesn’t read like Beast. It reads like an android that has never before felt human emotion. I remember before reading this I was theorizing that Hank had been switched with Dark Beast once more to explain his sudden escalation, but after this I realized that couldn’t be the case. Because this sounds like neither Beast nor Dark Beast. Dark Beast understood how to properly write Hank as a villain. He doesn’t suddenly become your typical made scientist devoid of emotion, humor, or basic human understanding. He still makes jokes that are now cruel. He still quotes literature in a way that paints him as a god among men. Hank going bad can be a fun read, but this run was not.
Problem 4: No One Cares:
Another important angle to consider when writing a story of a good person breaking bad is how it affects those around them. Those who are close friends to the person and find themselves disturbed by their current actions. Again, I return to Cyclops. Regardless of where you stand on if he was right or not, he was very much positioned as an antagonist to the mutants at the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning. Yet we see various friends of Cyclops still caring for him and wanting to pull him back from what they perceive as the dark side. Like I previously said, Beast’s whole reason for messing with the timeline was because he felt he was going to die and wanted to try to appeal to his old friend and bring him back around before he passed on. When someone good goes bad, part of the emotional core is seeing former friends try to appeal to their better nature, and even eventually deciding they’ve gone too far to turn back.
Not so with Hank in X-Force. Like I said, this run posits that this is not any kind of heel turn for Hank. This is how he’s always been. “Hank this isn’t you!” “No, he’s always been like this.” “Hank, turn back before it’s too late!” “Turn back where? He’s always been like this.” None of Hank’s friends give a shit. Hank’s best friend amongst the X-Men is Bobby Drake, Iceman, and we never once see any kind of confrontation there. Cyclops and Angel similarly doesn’t care. Now you could argue this is because X-Force is a secretive organization. Bobby and Scott don’t even know what Hank is doing. There are two issues with this. First, things reach a point where they would know. Hank’s actions become public knowledge, and Wolverine goes off to hunt him down while the rest of the X-Men just kinda look the other way. And second, there is someone with a lot of history with Hank that was a part of X-Force and did see everything that was going on. Jean Grey.
But we never get to see Jean wonder what’s happened to her close friend. Jean who was always incredibly close to Hank. Jean who, it was confirmed during the All-New X-Men era, had mutual feelings for Hank and might have started dating him had things been different. But no, Jean, like every character in this run, accepts that Hank has always been like this. That’s the answer to everything. So instead of some kind of emotional confrontation where she tries to appeal to his better nature, we instead have Jean yell at Hank, use her powers to throw him against a wall, and quit X-Force. And then most recently, we see her tell Firestar without hesitation to throw Hank under the bus for any heat that comes her way from her undercover mission. Because everyone will believe Hank is responsible for all the bad shit. Who the hell cares about Hank? According to this run, no one.
Conclusion:
I hope you can see the larger issue here. When Beast fans complain about his Krakoan era, people assume they just don’t want to see their favorite do bad things. But it’s practically accepted at this point in comics that most heroes will have a villain arc. Hell, Iceman is the only one of the original five X-Men who hasn’t gone down a dark path at this point. The problem is that everything about the writing of Hank during this time was just not done well. There is no exploration of Hank’s descent into villainy, and any questioning down that line is immediately shut down by the assertion that this is just who he’s always been. There isn’t any slow escalation because his first move is genocide. Hank is not even written as himself during this era, but rather as a generic bond villain. And none of Hank’s former close friends even show any emotion about his turn to villainy. An evil Hank story could easily work. We saw it with Dark Beast. A story where the former optimistic member of the X-Men has been beaten down so many times that he takes on a “whatever it takes” mentality could be interesting and emotionally resonant as we both understand what drove him here yet hate the man he’s become. But that isn’t what we got. We got a run that wrote him as a complete stranger and then had all the characters tell the reader that they were wrong for ever thinking he was anyone else.

THE BASICS

Q. I've listened to today's album but why I can't rate it?
A. That's by design. You won't be able to submit your review and star rating until the next day's album is generated, around approximately 3AM GMT.
Q. Can I have more than one album per day generated?
A. No, the site was designed to be one per day. Some users have created a second or third project in order to have more than one a day.
Q. Who decided I needed to hear this album? Who created this list? Was this a user-submitted album?
A. The first 1089 albums you'll hear are taken from the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. The list was compiled by Robert Dimery, along with a team of music critics.
The user-submitted albums are optional (to submit and to listen to) only once you've finished the original 1089.
Q. 1089 albums... huh? I thought it was 1001?
A. There have been several editions of the book. Each time, some albums are removed in favour of newer albums. The generator includes any album as long as it was in at least one edition of the book. As of 2024, this is 1089 albums total.
Q. What happens if I don't visit the website for awhile?
A. Your account will pause automatically if you don't visit the site or rate an album for 5 days in a row. However, pressing the "Did Not Listen" button counts as activity, and your account will stay active.
You can also pause and unpause your account whenever you want from the Info tab in the menu.
Q. What happens if I push "Did Not Listen"? Will the album get generated for me later or is it lost forever?
A. Neither, it will be listed on your History page, where you can rate it any time.
Additionally, once you select "Did Not Listen," the next album will be generated.
Q. If I've already listened to some of the albums beforehand, can I mark them as complete so they won't be generated for me?
A. No, unfortunately there is no way to do that.
Q. Where can I see the entire list of albums?
A. The best way would be to support the book's creators and purchase a physical copy of the book. You can also visit this unofficial site but it hasn't been updated for the most recent edition of the book. This List Challenges quiz is currently the most up-to-date list online.
If you don't mind looking at some code, the generator's site map shows the full list as well.

CHANGES AND EDITS

Q. Can I change a rating or edit my review?
A. Not on your own on the site. DM with your project name and the rating you'd like changed.
Q. How can I shut off weekend albums?
A. DM your project name and ask him to do this.
Q. I originally decided to exclude a certain genre of music but I've changed my mind! How can I get it back?
A. DM your project name and ask him to do this.
Q. How can I show people my project?
A. Use the URL in your address bar after navigating to the Summary page from the main menu. It's advised not to give out the URL with your actual project name, as anyone will be able to go in and add reviews to anything you haven't rated yet, or delete any draft reviews you have.
Q. How can I reinstall the web app?
A. If you go to the browser's menu there is usually something like "Download" or "Install app." It's a Progressive Web App (PWA), so if you can't find it, Google "how to install pwa on [your browser]."

GROUPS

Q. How does it work going from an individual project to group?
A. If you are the creator of the group and your project already had more than 5 albums generated, there is a checkbox whether you want to include those albums in the group history or not.
By default this is not checked. This means that your group will "start over" and get all albums generated again. You'll get duplicates and you can rate them again. Your individual project history will have some albums twice, but the group page will only have them once.
If you did click that checkbox, then those albums will appear in the group history page. Those who join the group will then get an option to earn them into their history and catch up. You won't get any duplicates and the group will never get them generated.
Basically no matter how you created it, your family members won't miss out on any! It's just a matter of whether they have to catch up via a backlog or if you all want to listen to all albums as a group.
Q. How can I turn on weekend albums in my group?
A. DM your project name and ask him to do this.
Q. I'm in a group but can't rate the albums from the group page?
A. Correct, you rate albums from your own page. The group page is just for showing your groups stats (rating for each album, favourite genre, etc).

OTHER

Q. The streaming link was to an extended edition. Should I listen to the extra material?
A. Stick to the original unless you're in the mood for some extra stuff. Feel free to report it here and u/SidledsGunnar will change the link so it goes to the original version.
Q. What is the Controversial Artists section on my page all about?
A. These are artists whose albums you rated very differently. For example, if you loved Hunky Dory but hated Ziggy Stardust, David Bowie will show up as one of your controversial artists.
Q. What if I can't find an album to listen to it?
A. YouTube often has music missing from other streaming platforms. Otherwise, it's up to you. You can leave it unrated on your history page, or you can rate it and note you couldn't find it. So far, every single album has been tracked down by other users, though.
Q. Is there an API?
A. Yep, it's pretty basic, though. See it here.
Q. Who made this generator and how can I support it?
A. Reddit user u/SidledsGunnar created this and runs it on his own. If you'd like to contribute to help keep the site running, you have a few options: Patreon / Paypal / Ko-Fi / Bitcoin Wallet number: 3KVcBJpB2K1WcG5qu9rae822SxfgbQoPc8
You can also support u/SidledsGunnar by purchasing albums from the Rough Trade links on the site as he gets a small commission from each sale.

do you guys have any suggestions for scientific research material concerning ai art? like measurements of its impact on the artist community or prevelance of it on the internet etc? I'm writing a paper on it and maybe some of u have some good source material

Okay so I want to preface this with, I am a big fan of Jesus, have a relationship with him, always had a strong connection. Angels and things are great too, I believe in those.
But—I just really don’t buy that it’s the only way to know divinity, as many of us here I’m sure agree.
Basically wondering, why? is it the way it is? How did one group become so powerful, what spiritual forces are at play, why are so many afraid of confronting it or at times leaving it or doing things that they would judge?
I also think that much of the cultural fears that we are working through, are mainly Christian/Jewish/Islamic. Basically I think the planet is working through a lot of programming—this deep seated fear of… what if they’re right? Just because these belief systems hold the most power.
The world is ruled by governments, but when you get down to it, the governments seem to depend on the prevailing religious ideologies, at the deepest level.
By this I mean, the R side of the isle on America, all those beliefs, all that pandering, it ultimately comes down to Chrsitianity. Biden is a catholic, a lot of those old folks on the supreme court are catholic (5/9). Basically, I don’t see the D side of things having th spine to tell the R side no.
I think this is because it ultimately comes down to confronting that old traditional, shame based Christianity. Many people are leaving it, but confronting it is not so easy. They have their crosses ready to put you on, they are quick to call “demon!” (See the gospels).
I think this goes deeper than the conscious Christianity, but a very old cultural conditioning. Much of Western society was built on and around kinds of Christianity (or “Christianity.”)
Many were enslaved in its name, many forced to convert at sword point, contintents subjugated in its name. Largely forgotten, not much repentance ance is visible. Largely I think because those same power systems have power.
And I think that the echoes of all those who stood out against it have left these pockets of fear in our culture. For example, why is it that non-Christians are still often judgemental of gay people or hesitant of transgressing gender norms? Much of this I think can be traced back, generationally, to fundamentalist type religious conditioning.
Clearly there is good in Christianity, the Old Teatament. But it seems to me we’re gonna have to get past the fear of critical thinking so we don’t “piss off God.” I just think people don’t know what’s next.
What is the deal with that stuff, spiritually? Any ideas? A mistake, some toxic alliance with controlling mechanisms or entities? Any ideas or good resources?
I’m aware of gnosticism and Christian mysticism. Just looking for mor understanding around how things got so f**ed up to help myself and others move past it (or at least the parts that are not helping us move foreward). (Some people seem to just be frozen waiting for the apocalypse).
To sum up the geopolitics—Most of the world is under a cultural majority of these beliefs, or at least hasn’t stepped out of them. U.S., much of Latin America, Russia. And the U.S. is the most powerful nation. (Europe has stepped away a good bit, but still defers to the U.S. as far as power goes).
(Likewise a major war going on right now is a war for religious high ground. The U.S. gains much of its validity as a nation (objectively, a stolen nation, one they are not native to), by allying with Israel. This is the only vulnerable population it protects, really one of its only claims to righteousness from a historical perspective. And this is directly tied to a huge number of Americans’ religious beliefs).
(Ex: what if the U.S. honored Native Americans’ claims to their ancestral lands the way they honor Jewish peoples’?)

I’ll preface this by saying nothing will ever top the original Jurassic Park. Back when it came out, it was groundbreaking in terms of the special effects, the animatronics, and all the actors were perfect in their roles. It was more than a monster movie with great acting and deeper messages than simply dinosaurs eating people.
Nothing is ever going to top that.
Jurassic World is often criticized (maybe not as much as its sequels) but I don’t think it’s fair to judge this movie so harshly.
The things I loved: Seeing a fully functional park that felt like it could actually exist. We never got to see this from Jurassic Park, plus the lagoon and Mosasaurus was awesome.
I know people hate that they made the raptors no longer villains but seriously? Things have to change or they become stale. They had the spotlight as villains in JP and TLW. I actually felt that making them akin to dolphins at Sea World was cool and a natural progression since we all understand how intelligent the raptors are made out to be. And yet even then they remain unpredictable.
The Indominus isn’t a real dinosaur and I get that but dinosaurs also aren’t monsters and this movie needed a monster villain role to justify the chaos. Also, none of the dinos in JP are real anyway and the idea of creating something new from DNA manipulation is right up this universe’s alley and goes back to the Chaos Effect toy line. I thought the Indminus was cool and worked well for what it was intended to be—a straight up killing machine that didn’t need to behave like a real animal.
Of course it had its flaws and there are plenty of things you can nitpick but comparing this to something like some of the other sequels/reboots of other franchises (not going to name names) this one did a pretty good job without ruining the source material while appeasing a newer generation of people.

Here are all of the relevant keywords/abbreviations for the CompTIA sec+ exam.
Comment below if you have any questions, if I made a mistake, or if I missed something!
AAA: Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting ABAC: Attribute-Based Access Control ACL: Access Control List AD: Active Directory AES: Advanced Encryption Standard AES256: Advanced Encryption Standard with a key size of 256 bits AH: Authentication Header AI: Artificial Intelligence AIS: Automated Information System ALE: Annual Loss Expectancy AP: Access Point API: Application Programming Interface APT: Advanced Persistent Threat ARO: Annualized Rate of Occurrence ARP: Address Resolution Protocol ASLR: Address Space Layout Randomization ASP: Application Service Provider ATT&CK: Adversarial Tactics, Techniques, and Common Knowledge AUP: Acceptable Use Policy AV: Antivirus BASH: Bourne Again Shell BCP: Business Continuity Plan BGP: Border Gateway Protocol BIA: Business Impact Analysis BIOS: Basic Input/Output System BPA: Business Process Automation BPDU: Bridge Protocol Data Unit BSSID: Basic Service Set Identifier BYOD: Bring Your Own Device CA: Certificate Authority CAPTCHA: Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart CAR: Corrective Action Report CASB: Cloud Access Security Broker CBC: Cipher Block Chaining CBT: Computer-Based Training CCMP: Counter Mode with Cipher Block Chaining Message Authentication Code Protocol CCTV: Closed-Circuit Television CERT: Computer Emergency Response Team CFB: Cipher Feedback CHAP: Challenge-Handshake Authentication Protocol CIO: Chief Information Officer CIRT: Computer Incident Response Team CIS: Center for Internet Security CMS: Content Management System CN: Common Name COOP: Continuity of Operations COPE: Corporate-Owned, Personally-Enabled CP: Control Plane CRC: Cyclic Redundancy Check CRL: Certificate Revocation List CSA: Cloud Security Alliance CSIRT: Computer Security Incident Response Team CSO: Chief Security Officer CSP: Cloud Service Provider CSR: Certificate Signing Request CSRF: Cross-Site Request Forgery CSU: Central Service Unit CTM: Content Threat Management CTO: Chief Technology Officer CVE: Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures CVSS: Common Vulnerability Scoring System CYOD: Choose Your Own Device DAC: Discretionary Access Control DBA: Database Administrator DDoS: Distributed Denial of Service DEP: Data Execution Prevention DER: Distinguished Encoding Rules DES: Data Encryption Standard DHCP: Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol DHE: Diffie-Hellman Ephemeral DKIM: DomainKeys Identified Mail DLL: Dynamic Link Library DLP: Data Loss Prevention DMARC: Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance DNT: Do Not Track DNS: Domain Name System DNSSEC: Domain Name System Security Extensions DoS: Denial of Service DPO: Data Protection Officer DRP: Disaster Recovery Plan DSA: Digital Signature Algorithm DSL: Digital Subscriber Line EAP: Extensible Authentication Protocol ECB: Electronic Codebook ECC: Elliptic Curve Cryptography ECDHE: Elliptic Curve Diffie-Hellman Ephemeral ECDSA: Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm EDR: Endpoint Detection and Response EFS: Encrypting File System EIP: Enterprise Information Portal EOL: End of Life EOS: End of Support ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning ESN: Electronic Serial Number ESP: Encapsulating Security Payload ESSID: Extended Service Set Identifier FACL: File Access Control List FDE: Full Disk Encryption FIM: File Integrity Monitoring FPGA: Field-Programmable Gate Array FRR: Fast Reroute FTP: File Transfer Protocol FTPS: FTP Secure GCM: Galois/Counter Mode GDPR: General Data Protection Regulation GPG: GNU Privacy Guard GPO: Group Policy Object GPS: Global Positioning System GPU: Graphics Processing Unit GRE: Generic Routing Encapsulation HA: High Availability HDD: Hard Disk Drive HIDS: Host-based Intrusion Detection System HIPS: Host-based Intrusion Prevention System HMAC: Keyed-Hash Message Authentication Code HOTP: HMAC-based One-Time Password HSM: Hardware Security Module HSMaaS: Hardware Security Module as a Service HTML: Hypertext Markup Language HTTP: Hypertext Transfer Protocol HTTPS: Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure HVAC: Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning IaaS: Infrastructure as a Service IAM: Identity and Access Management ICMP: Internet Control Message Protocol ICS: Industrial Control System IDEA: International Data Encryption Algorithm IDF: Intermediate Distribution Frame IdP: Identity Provider IDS: Intrusion Detection System IPS: Intrusion Prevention System IEEE: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers IKE: Internet Key Exchange IM: Instant Messaging IMAP4: Internet Message Access Protocol version 4 IoC: Indicator of Compromise IoT: Internet of Things IP: Internet Protocol IPSec: Internet Protocol Security IR: Incident Response IRC: Internet Relay Chat IRP: Incident Response Plan ISA: Interconnection Security Agreement ISFW: Integrated Security and Firewalls ISO: International Organization for Standardization ISP: Internet Service Provider ISSO: Information Systems Security Officer ITCP: Information Technology Contingency Plan IV: Initialization Vector KDC: Key Distribution Center KEK: Key Encryption Key L2TP: Layer 2 Tunneling Protocol LAN: Local Area Network LDAP: Lightweight Directory Access Protocol LEAP: Lightweight Extensible Authentication Protocol MaaS: Monitoring as a Service MAC: Media Access Control MAM: Mobile Application Management MAN: Metropolitan Area Network MBR: Master Boot Record MD5: Message Digest Algorithm 5 MDF: Main Distribution Frame MDM: Mobile Device Management MFA: Multi-Factor Authentication MFD: Multi-Function Device MFP: Multi-Function Printer ML: Machine Learning MMS: Multimedia Messaging Service MOA: Memorandum of Agreement MOU: Memorandum of Understanding MPLS: Multiprotocol Label Switching MSA: Master Service Agreement MSP: Managed Service Provider MSSP: Managed Security Service Provider MTBF: Mean Time Between Failures MTTF: Mean Time To Failure MTTR: Mean Time To Repair MTU: Maximum Transmission Unit NAC: Network Access Control NAT: Network Address Translation NDA: Non-Disclosure Agreement NFC: Near Field Communication NFV: Network Functions Virtualization NGFW: Next-Generation Firewall NG-SWG: Next-Generation Secure Web Gateway NIC: Network Interface Card NIDS: Network Intrusion Detection System NIPS: Network Intrusion Prevention System NIST: National Institute of Standards and Technology NOC: Network Operations Center NTFS: New Technology File System NTLM: New Technology LAN Manager NTP: Network Time Protocol OCSP: Online Certificate Status Protocol OID: Object Identifier OS: Operating System OAI: OpenID Authentication OSINT: Open Source Intelligence OSPF: Open Shortest Path First OT: Operational Technology OTA: Over-the-Air OTG: On-The-Go OVAL: Open Vulnerability and Assessment Language OWASP: Open Web Application Security Project P12: Personal Information Exchange Format P2P: Peer-to-Peer PaaS: Platform as a Service PAC: Proxy Auto-Configuration PAM: Privileged Access Management PAP: Password Authentication Protocol PAT: Port Address Translation PBKDF2: Password-Based Key Derivation Function 2 PBX: Private Branch Exchange PCAP: Packet Capture PCI DSS: Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard PDU: Protocol Data Unit PE: Protected Extensible Authentication Protocol PEAP: Protected Extensible Authentication Protocol PED: Portable Electronic Device PEM: Privacy Enhanced Mail PFS: Perfect Forward Secrecy PGP: Pretty Good Privacy PHI: Protected Health Information PII: Personally Identifiable Information PIN: Personal Identification Number PIV: Personal Identity Verification PKCS: Public Key Cryptography Standards PKI: Public Key Infrastructure PoC: Proof of Concept POP: Post Office Protocol POTS: Plain Old Telephone Service PPP: Point-to-Point Protocol PPTP: Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol PSK: Pre-Shared Key PTZ: Pan-Tilt-Zoom PUP: Potentially Unwanted Program QA: Quality Assurance QoS: Quality of Service RA: Recovery Agent RAD: Rapid Application Development RADIUS: Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service RAID: Redundant Array of Independent Disks RAM: Random Access Memory RAS: Remote Access Service RAT: Remote Access Trojan RC4: Rivest Cipher 4 RCS: Remote Control System RFC: Request for Comments RFID: Radio-Frequency Identification RIPEMD: RACE Integrity Primitives Evaluation Message Digest ROI: Return on Investment RPO: Recovery Point Objective RSA: Rivest-Shamir-Adleman RTBH: Remote Triggered Black Hole RTO: Recovery Time Objective RTOS: Real-Time Operating System RTP: Real-Time Transport Protocol S/MIME: Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions SaaS: Software as a Service SAE: Simultaneous Authentication of Equals SAML: Security Assertion Markup Language SCADA: Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition SCAP: Security Content Automation Protocol SCEP: Simple Certificate Enrollment Protocol SDK: Software Development Kit SDLC: Software Development Life Cycle SDLM: Software Development Lifecycle Management SDN: Software-Defined Networking SDP: Session Description Protocol SDV: Software-Defined Vehicle SED: Self-Encrypting Drive SEH: Structured Exception Handler SFTP: Secure File Transfer Protocol SHA: Secure Hash Algorithm SIEM: Security Information and Event Management SIM: Subscriber Identity Module SIP: Session Initiation Protocol SLA: Service Level Agreement SLE: Single Loss Expectancy SMB: Server Message Block SMS: Short Message Service SMTP/S: Simple Mail Transfer Protocol/Secure SNMP: Simple Network Management Protocol SOAP: Simple Object Access Protocol SOAR: Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response SoC: Security Operations Center SOC: System-On-Chip SPF: Sender Policy Framework SPIM: Spam Over Instant Messaging SQL: Structured Query Language SQLi: SQL Injection SRTP: Secure Real-Time Transport Protocol SSD: Solid-State Drive SSH: Secure Shell SSID: Service Set Identifier SSL: Secure Sockets Layer SSO: Single Sign-On STIX: Structured Threat Information eXpression STP: Spanning Tree Protocol SWG: Secure Web Gateway TACACS+: Terminal Access Controller Access-Control System Plus TGT: Ticket Granting Ticket TKIP: Temporal Key Integrity Protocol TLS: Transport Layer Security TOTP: Time-Based One-Time Password TPM: Trusted Platform Module TSIG: Transaction Signature TTP: Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures UAT: User Acceptance Testing UDP: User Datagram Protocol UEBA: User and Entity Behavior Analytics UEFI: Unified Extensible Firmware Interface UEM: Unified Endpoint Management UPS: Uninterruptible Power Supply URI: Uniform Resource Identifier URL: Uniform Resource Locator USB: Universal Serial Bus USB OTG: USB On-The-Go UTM: Unified Threat Management UTP: Unshielded Twisted Pair VBA: Visual Basic for Applications VDE: Virtual Desktop Environment VDI: Virtual Desktop Infrastructure VLAN: Virtual Local Area Network VLSM: Variable Length Subnet Masking VM: Virtual Machine VoIP: Voice over Internet Protocol VPC: Virtual Private Cloud VPN: Virtual Private Network VTC: Video Teleconferencing WAF: Web Application Firewall WAP: Wireless Access Point WEP: Wired Equivalent Privacy WIDS: Wireless Intrusion Detection System WIPS: Wireless Intrusion Prevention System WORM: Write Once, Read Many WPA: Wi-Fi Protected Access WPS: Wi-Fi Protected Setup XaaS: Anything as a Service XSRF: Cross-Site Request Forgery

Hey guys,Hi folks,
My wife always listens to audio books before going to bed. She uses old, cheap Bluetooth headphones for this. These are Bluetooth headphones with rubber ends (I don't know how these are called).
Recently we spent the night away from home and she forgot her headphones. So I gave her my second generation Air Pods. Her eyes got big! She thought the sound was worlds better than with her headphones. She also liked the shape and that the headphones came without the rubber ends. (I'm not familiar with headphones and don't know what these kind of headphones are called and how to explain it better than rubber ends).
I would like to give her new headphones as a present.
Our household doesn't use any Apple devices (apart from my Air Pods) and we have exactly one Lightning charging cable (the one for my Air Pods). In contrast, we have many USB-C chargers. So it is easy to charge headphones with USB-C. I've also often heard my wife say that with Apple products, you mainly pay for the name. I have been using these headphones for years and am very satisfied. If the Air Pods don't have any competition in this price segment, I will be happy to buy new Air Pods for her.
She will rarely listen to extensive music with the headphones, but mainly audio books.
Can you recommend headphones that are of a similar quality to the second generation Air Pods, have a similar or slightly higher price, do not have rubber ends and are charged with USB-C, please? Plus point if the headphones are good for lying in bed with.
Thank you, Willie
PS: We are from Germany.

(This is the background on which the story will occur. Not the story itself. It will take place at different times within this framework.)
The Program
…..A ufo crashes on Earth.
The ufo is found by a farmer who calls the military, and a secret group is created to study it.
In order to keep it secret only a small number of people are allowed to know about it. It is classified at the highest level.
The ufo inspires the creation of new technologies resulting in huge amounts of money being made by the people in charge of The Program.
They find a way to classify all ufo information so only they can benefit from it.
Billions of dollars are made that only benefit certain families. These families become extremely powerful.
The technologies of the craft lead to the realization that there is something to the “Woo” aspects of ufo encounters reported by experiencers.
Studies are funded. Specifically, remote viewing is explored.
Remote viewing studies of possible futures were done using hundreds of remote viewers over the decades. There seems to be a huge problem reported starting on earth starting between 2024-2027.
Possible causes are investigated.
Solar maximum occurs in 2025.
It is determined that a massive solar flare knocks out half the world’s electricity permanently, the superpower with the lights still on attempts to take advantage and launches a massive nuclear strike on their enemies. Electromagnetically shielded missile silos survive and retaliate.
A nuclear winter sends the world into famine. When there is no food left mankind begins to eat itself. Everyone becomes food.
More secret remote viewing studies are done and repeated to confirm the timeline.
The American Elite develop a plan to survive this. Money is funneled into black budget classified special access programs, and deep underground military bases are dug. Massive secret cities connected by underground tunnels are created, costing trillions.
Scientific progress and industrial development is pushed with no regard for pollution. The world is fated to end, pollution means nothing to those who know this.
Mankind is pushed towards wage slavery, and beyond. The suffering of the non elite doesn’t matter to those in the know. From a certain point of view they’re already dead. Their lives and happiness are sacrificed for the “greater good” of allowing the Elite to survive the end of the world.
When the time comes, certain groups are saved from the end of the world. Less than 100 thousand humans are chosen. 90 percent of the people who were told they were part of the Elite and were complicit in the Program find out that they were merely pawns and are left on the surface to die with the rest of humanity.
The world ends. Horrifically.
For thousands of years the remnants of humanity, the Elite, exist underground. Radiation eventually seeps into groundwater and they begin to suffer from dna damage. In time they become monstrous in appearance. Pale skinned and weak. Resorting to genetic manipulation they attempt to survive, but in doing so much of what we consider human is lost. Emotion, compassion, and the ability to feel pain become relics of the past.
Progress is extremely slow underground. Tens of thousands of years pass before the ufos are fully understood, but when they are it is realized they offer a means to travel back in time to collect genetic samples from healthy humans.
A breeding program is created.
The subterranean future humans eventually figure out how to breed healthy generations of offspring from the most intelligent, healthy, and beautiful human specimens from the past.
In time they restore and reclaim the surface of the earth. They learn from the mistakes of the past and create a beautiful, balanced and healthy ecosystem and develop an enlightened society that lasts for millions of years, eventually spreading to hundreds of worlds beyond earth.
At some point someone decides it would be better if the destruction of earth had never happened. They illegally go back in time to try and change the timeline.
Changing the timeline would result in millions of years worth of humans that existed after the “world ended” being wiped from existence. It is decided that this would be highly inappropriate.
The humans of the past, us, made our choices of our own free will. It is decided that there will be no interference in the timeline. Temporal Laws are created. WW3 will occur as recorded.
A defense network of small orbs, spherical shaped ufos are created to defend the integrity of the timeline. All illegal time ships are intercepted by the orb defense network, as is recorded in many old ufo photographs.
Time ships are legally sent back to verify that nuclear weapons can be turned on or off at the appropriate time to result in the correct end of the world happening.
The Elite eventually discern the intentions of the future humans from their temporal incursions into our time, they learn the fate of humanity and understand the results of The Program by interrogating captured occupants of downed ufos, and so they develop a strategy to alter this outcome.
The intent of this secondary project is to avoid attracting the attention of the orb defense network and use their limited understanding of ufo technology to prevent the full destruction of the earth in WW3, while still destroying all of their enemies.
If successful, there will still be a full collapse of current society, billions of deaths, but in time the Elite families will rise from their holes in the earth in their “primitive” ufo reproduction vehicles and claim to be Gods that have returned to earth in order to lead mankind into a better future.
Pyramids and temples will be built. A religion formed. And populations will be continually culled to prevent anyone from ever gaining enough scientific knowledge to overthrow the “Gods.”
But the advanced future humans from the other timeline had a contingency plan. AI drone ships were concealed outside of 4d space-time. Free from timeline alterations.
These drones patrol multiple Earth timelines searching for anomalous temporal activity.
The two largest enemies of the American Elite in our current time, Russia and China, get wind of the situation.
They begin to shoot down ufos and plan their own contingencies to survive the end of the world.
Their countries laws make it easier for them to do unethical experiments. Many horrific things are created through genetic experimentation and unrestrained AI development.
China loses control of an AI that disappears into the past with a ufo and a small army of insect/human hybrids. They move out well beyond the patrol zone of the 6th dimensional AI contingency drones and travel deep into the past.
On distant worlds billions of years ago the AI “Queen” begins its plan and starts to quietly populate worlds with its insectoid mantid servants.
In time there are multiple schisms that occur within the hive. War breaks out between the various insectoid groups.
The ancient universe begins to fill with problems.
Billions of years later, primitive humans in 10,000 BCE look to the sky and see ufos. They wonder who could be piloting them. They dream up new gods as the seeds of civilization begin to appear.
Time passes, a farmer in America in 1947 looks up at the night sky, wondering if anyone is out there, and a ufo crashes on Earth…..

Date: 05/21/2024

Reading time: 10 minutes, 2056 words

🪖 Military

Armenia participates in NATO's Regex 2024 headquarters exercise in Moldova

Armenia is participating in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Regex 2024 headquarters exercise that have started in Moldova on May 20. The military exercises will be held from May 20 to 24. They are attended by about 30 representatives from NATO partner countries.

Armenpress

Armenian army factor is important for security guarantees, but it is not the only one - Security Council Secretary

Armenian Security Council Secretary Armen Grigoryan said in an interview with Civilnet that having combat-ready and effective armed forces is very important for ensuring security guarantees. Attempts have been made over the past 6 years to expand the notion of security, he said.

ArkaAm

NATO and Armenia strengthen cooperation in defense education

Representatives from the Armenian Ministry of Defense met with their counterparts at NATO Headquarters at the end of April. Reviewed activities conducted within the framework of NATO’s Defence Education Enhancement Programme (DEEP) for Armenia. Set out the plan of joint activities for the rest of the year and for 2025.

ArmRadio

Funeral procession of Iranian president Raisi starts in Tabriz

The funeral procession of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and seven others killed in a helicopter crash began in the northwestern city of Tabriz on Tuesday morning. Another funeral service is scheduled to be held in the holy city of Qom on Tuesday evening. The president will be laid to rest on May 23 at noon in Mashhad in northeastern Iran.

Armenpress, The National Assembly observes minute of silence for Iranian President and staff lost in helicopter crash

🏛️ Politics & Government

Azerbaijani FM makes phone call to Iran's acting Foreign Minister

Jeyhun Bayramov and Ali Bagheri held phone conversation on May 21, Azerbaijani media reports say. Bayramv expressed condolences to Iranian government and people of Iran on tragic death of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian.

Armenpress

Armenian, Slovenian foreign ministries address security implications of recent developments

Political consultations between the ministries of foreign affairs of Armenia and Slovenia were held in Yerevan. The parties emphasized the importance of further deepening the political dialogue between the two countries. The latest international and regional developments were addressed at the meeting.

Armenpress

Joint statement adopted at the International Conference on Nuclear Security; Armenia joins

A Co-Presidents’ Joint Statement was adopted during the International Conference on Nuclear Security held in Vienna on May 20-21. Armenia, among other participating countries, joined the Statement.

Armenpress

Alen Simonyan, Ruslan Stefanchuk discuss the security situation in the South Caucasus and Ukraine

The Armenian National Assembly President Alen Simonyan and the Speaker of the Verkhovna (Supreme) Rada of Ukraine Ruslan Stefanchuk held via video conference. The interlocutors discussed the security situation in the South Caucasus and in Ukraine.

Armenpress, Armenian, Ukrainian Parliament Speakers discuss situation in the South Caucasus and Ukraine

Armenia top security official receives CIA deputy director

Secretary of the Armenian Security Council Armen Grigoryan received a delegation from the CIA. Issues related to Armenia-US bilateral cooperation as well as regional security were discussed at the meeting.

Armenpress, Armen Grigoryan and Hamad Khamis Al-Kubaisi discuss prospects for Armenia-Qatar relations, Pashinyan holds meeting with CIA deputy director, Armenia, Qatar discuss developing economic relations, Pashinyan discussed issues related to the Armenia-US and international agenda with the deputy head of the US CIA, Armenian PM, CIA Deputy Director discuss international, regional issues, Armenia-Qatar ties discussed in Doha

Moldova signs security and defence partnership with EU

Moldova has signed a security and defence partnership with the European Union. It is the first country to sign such a deal with the EU. The deal will allow to jointly address common security challenges.

Armenpress

Mirzoyan and Floyd highlight comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty's role in non- proliferation and nuclear disarmament

The Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia Ararat Mirzoyan had a meeting with the Executive Secretary of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization Robert Floyd in Vienna. The role of the Treaty in non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament was emphasized on both sides.

Armenpress

Eurasian Fund for Stabilization and Development to be involved in Armenia’s infrastructure projects

Armenia's Vice Prime Minister Mher Grigoryan and Managing Director of the Eurasian Fund for Stabilization and Development (EFSD) Andrey Shirokov discussed the Fund's involvement in Armenia's infrastructure projects. The parties also pointed out the importance of Armenia’s participation in large regional projects.

ArkaAm

Security Council Secretary: Armenia ready to sign peace treaty with Azerbaijan ‘any day’

Armenia is ready to sign a peace treaty with Azerbaijan 'any day' Armenia’s Security Council Secretary Armen Grigoryan said he is hoping to sign the treaty “as soon as possible” Armenia”s officials mentioned the three basic principles it expects the treaty to be based on multiple times.

ArkaAm

Victory or concessions? Secretary of Security Council comments on delimitation ofborder with Azerbaijan

Armenian Security Council Secretary Armen Grigoryan declined to describe launch of border demarcation with Azerbaijan as a victory or concessions amid ongoing occupation of parts of the sovereign territory of the country by Azerbaijan. Armenia ceded 2.5 villages to Azerbaijan, but there are territories that were returned to Armenia.

ArkaAm

Armenia calls for prohibiting threats of attacks on nuclear facilities

Armenia has raised the need for a treaty prohibiting attacks on nuclear facilities devoted to peaceful purposes.

PanArmenian

Armenian lawyers protest against bill that will increase the cost of their services

Armenian lawyers have expressed dissatisfaction with a new bill on the parliament's agenda. From October 2024 they will have to pay 10% turnover tax instead of 5% now, and from 2025 they will pay 20% VAT. Head of the Armenian Chamber of Advocates Simon Babayan said that such a tax increase will lead to a significant increase in the price of lawyer services by 38%.

ArkaAm

Funeral procession moves to Qom, Iran

Caskets of Iran's President and fellow passengers are now being transferred from Tabriz to Qom. The city is considered the second most sacred city in Iran after Mashhad. State media are reporting that the bodies will be carried around the shrine. The bodies will then be taken to the capital, Tehran, where they will be laid to rest.

ArmRadio

💵 Economy

Armenia works on diversification of economy with an eye on Europe - Secretary of the Security Council

Armenia is working hard to diversify its economy with the prospect of increasing exports to Europe. Secretary of the Security Council Armen Grigoryan said the country has not yet achieved significant success in the economic sphere. Armenia's foreign trade turnover with EU countries in first quarter of 2024 reached almost $494.3 million.

ArkaAm, Armenia is working to diversify its economy with the prospect of exporting to Europe. AX:

Almost 100 taxpayers in Armenia fined 55.25 million drams for unregistered workers

In April 2024, about 98 business entities in Armenia were found to have unregistered workers. In particular, the fines imposed on 17 companies amounted to about AMD 29.8 million. These companies are engaged in the sale of flowers and seeds, furniture production, cosmetics, jewelry and perfumes.

ArkaAm

Armenia’s GDP grows by 9.2% up to 1.97 trillion AMD

Armenia's GDP increased by 9.2% in Q1 2024 compared to the same period of 2023. Manufacturing industry showed the highest growth, standing at 31.1%, repair of cars and motorcycles grew by 25.1% In nominal terms, the country's GDP in current prices amounted to 1,971,230.4 million drams at the end of the reporting period.

ArkaAm

Second tranche of loan for development of MSMEs provided to Ardshinbank by EBRD and EU

Ardshinbank signed an agreement with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the European Union (EU) for the allocation of the second tranche of financing to re-lending micro, small, and medium businesses. This lending is carried out under the “MSME Competitiveness in the Eastern Partnership (EaP SMEC)” program. The agreement will support MSME investments in sustainable technologies, as well as towards health and safety.

ArkaAm, The EBRD and the EU granted Ardshinbank the second tranche of the loan for the development of SMEs (PHOTO)

Ambassador sees potential for expansion of trade between Armenia and Brazil

Diplomatic relations between Armenia and Brazil were established more than 30 years ago. Ambassador Yeganian said that the trade between the two countries amounts to approximately $100 million dollars annually. Brazil is one of the largest economies in the world, and Armenia has seen impressive economic growth.

ArmRadio

Armenia an emerging destination for UK and global investors – Ambassador

Armenia’s Ambassador to UK Varuzhan Nersesyan writes in an article published by London Business Matters. He emphasizes that Armenia in recent years Armenia has made significant progress on enhancing its business environment, creating opportunities and favorable conditions for investment.

ArmRadio

🧪 Science & Technology

Surveying works underway in Armenia’s Kirants

Surveying works are underway in the Armenian village of Kirants in the northern Tavush province.

PanArmenian

IAEA’s Grossi to visit Kaliningrad May 28 to discuss ZNPP

IAEA Director-General Rafael Grossi will visit Kaliningrad on May 28 to discuss the situation at the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant. Russia's permanent representative to international organizations in Vienna Mikhail Ulyanov said.

Armenpress

IAEA supports Armenia’s nuclear program – Rafael Grossi

International Atomic Energy Agency supports Armenia’s nuclear program, IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi wrote on X. Grossi presented the results of his meeting with Minister of Foreign Affairs of Armenia Ararat Mirzoyan.

Armenpress, Effective cooperation is established between Armenia and IAEA

Tree Planting Results with My Forest Armenia: The Power of One Dram

During March and April 2022, AMD 10.757.867 was directed to the afforestation program of the "My Forest Armenia" NGO, 16,000 trees were planted. Representatives of IDBank and Idram visited Jrashen again to see the newly planted forest.

Armenpress

Mirzoyan: Armenia will extend lifetime of current nuclear power unit with smooth transition tonew capacity by 2036

The Armenian NPP is one of the main sources of electricity in the country, providing up to 40% of the total generation. Its service life has been extended until 2026, and work is underway to re-extend it for another 10 years. The construction of a new plant is estimated to take 8-10 years.

ArkaAm, Armenia has decided to extend the operation period of the NPP until 2036, with the ultimate goal of a smooth transition to the new capacity. Minister of Foreign Affairs, Armenia says ready to extend nuclear plant’s lifetime by 10 years

🎭 Culture

ARARAT Special Evening Dedicated to the 100th Anniversary of Charles Aznavour

On May 20 ARARAT legendary Armenian brandy, celebrated the centennial of Maestro Charles Aznavour with a special event. The event took place at the "One & Only" theater within the Seven Visions Hotel. Guests of the event had the chance to reveal the brandy on the course of special tasting.

Armenpress, VTB Armenia general sponsor for Charles Aznavour 100th birthday tribute concert, VTB-Armenia Bank acted as the main sponsor of the concert dedicated to the 100th anniversary of Charles Aznavour., For you, Charles: Yerevan to host exhibition on Aznavour’s centennial anniversary, ARARAT special evening dedicated to Aznavour's 100th Anniv.

“Yerevan Ballet Festival” to host theater groups from various countries

The "Yerevan Ballet Festival" will be held on June 2-5 in the park named after Hovhannes Tumanyan. Admission to the outdoor ballet festival is free.

Armenpress

Aznavouriana: Album dedicated to Aznavour’s 100th anniversary released

The album “Aznavouriana” by Deutsche Grammophon is already released and is available since May 17, 2024, just ahead of the artist’s birthday. The album is a collection of exquisite interpretations of globally beloved iconic songs.

ArmRadio

⚽ Sport

Gymnasts left for Bulgaria

Gymnastics team will participate in "World Challenge Cup" to be held in Bulgaria. Artur Davtyan, Artur Avetisyan, Erik Baghdasaryan, and Artur Tovmasyan will represent Armenia in the regular round.

Armenpress

Hayk Martirosyan wins 7th round of Sharjah tournament

Shant Sargsyan, Samvel Ter-Sahakyan, Manuel Petrosyan shared the point. Hayk Martirosyan won the 7th round of the Sharjah Masters 2024 international tournament in UAE. The leaders are participants from India and the USA with 5.5 points.

Armenpress

Donations to Armenia:

Himnadram
ServicemenFund
Armenian Wounded Heroes
ArmeniaFund

Sorry if this has been asked, I hope when my buddy’s YouTube channel and he usually averages 30 views after 1 day and then it goes anywhere to 50-200.
Right now after 24 hours, the most recent video is sitting at 16 views. Also the like counter seems bugged cause I liked the video on my personal YT and it shows 0 likes.
Also, shorts are almost always guaranteed to generate easy views and I uploaded one this morning and it’s gotten 2 views. Shorts on the channel usually average 100-1000 almost instantly.
What’s going on? Is it just this account? I can drop the channel name if anybody needs.

I've recently introduced NameGenerators.ai, a free website that uses AI to generate name lists based on the details you provide. You can specify criteria like desired letters, rhymes, cultural references, language, and more. The site will then generate customized name lists that match your requirements. I would love to hear your feedback!

1) The contract situation: If we get Saros we're most likely signing him to an extension. I can't see the Leafs trading him at the deadline nor can I see them just letting him walk at the end of the year for nothing. This likely means we're looking at a contract between 6-8 years north of 8 million. This is problematic for a number of reasons:
a) Goalies tend not to age very well. Even generational/hall of fame goalies such as Brodeur, Price and Lundqvist to name a few have trouble playing past 35 whilst being elite and living up to their contract. Signing Saros to a long term contract would mean we're primarily paying him when he's past his prime. This is a big concern.
b) We've been developing Woll for 8 years, and signing Saros to a fat extension pretty much means we've relegated Woll as a secondary option or a trade piece. For someone whose shown so much potential and come up big in key moments, this just doesn't make a lot of sense. Granted, Wolls injury concerns are totally valid but it still doesn't mean we have to give up on him as a Starter entirely.
2) Saros' track record: There's no denying that Saros is a high end goalie, but I think he's being slightly overrated. He's started more than 40 games 3 times in his career, 2 of which were very respectable (but not other worldly) and this past season which was below average. This is in conjunction with a playoff record where he's been below average: -1.2 GSAA and of his 16 playoff starts only half of them have been qualified as a quality start. Playing Goalie in Toronto is extremely challenging and so far in his career Saros just hasn't shown he can carry a team in the playoffs.
3) The benefits of getting Askarov: I've seen people say Nashville would never trade Askarov but they were shopping him last year, and they're looking for a high end forward, so I think it's very realistic they trade him. There would be a lot of benefits if we traded for him instead of Saros:
a) He's on an entry level contract for the next few years which means we'll have 30M this offseason to reshape the team. That would allow us to sign 2 top 4 RD and a 2C like Lindholm and still have 10M to play with to fill out the rest of the team.
b) You can let him and Woll share the net and see who emerges as the true starter. Woll has shown he can make huge saves and play in big moments so having him go 50/50 with Askarov in the regular season and then take the net in the playoffs would be a great short term plan while Askarov gets more experience.
c) If Askarov flourishes and wants a bigger role we own his RFA rights so there's a lot more flexibility in terms of what we can do with him. With Saros, we'd be signing him long term, relegating Woll to a backup and hoping Saros works out. With Askarov, if he outgrows his role we have a good problem with two capable goalies and can flip one for other assets. The flexibility here can't be understated.
4) You dont need a bonafide top 5 goalie to win the cup: This isn't to say having one is bad, just that it's not necessary. With Goaltending, its about getting hot at the right time. Vegas won the cup recently with what was originally a 3rd stringer. Binnington came out of nowhere and carried the Blues in '19, likewise with Matt Murray in 16/17 for the Pens. In his short time here Woll has shown a tendency to just come up huge and make big saves. I remember there was a point this year where he'd stopped like 18-20 shots in a row in 3v3 over multiple games which is impressive when you consider those are all essentially high danger chances. Take that in conjunction with how he played in the playoffs and you can see my point about how you just need someone to make big saves and get hot at the right time, Woll can do that.
Having Askarov and Woll as a tandem would allow for a cheap, flexible option in goal that allows us to spend on other parts of our roster. We don't need either of them to be Vezina winners to have success, just to make key saves and not let a shitty soft goal in. The amount of cap room we would have by taking on Askarov and dumping Marner would allow us to fill every hole we've been talking about for years. We would also likely get other pieces back with Askarov which would help us out even more. If you get a player like Luke Evangelista you've suddenly replaced 45 of Marner's 95 points for 800k.
From Nashville's perspective, they're trying to win a cup and given they can add one of the best RW in the league without moving any contracts out, or removing a player from their roster that finished with nearly 100 points is exactly the kind of trade they'd make. They've wanted a high end forward for years and now they can finally get one, and they'd be trading from a position of strength to make it happen.
For Marner, he can go to one of the most beloved markets for players, get paid as much as he wants, have a low profile and still be on a competitive team.

It might be sign to call it quits haha. They have obviously lost control if the 9 guys currently in charge don't even know what the organization teaches. Jackson and Winder alude to this problem in the last annual meeting.
By doing this it creates new doctrine that tries so hard to support the old doctrine (overlapping generation, blood fractions) but it just CAN'T make sense. They must realise when they receive these little research packets that some of the core beliefs don't make sense. How long can they continue making stuff up to support the old instead of just giving up? Or start over with a new name? Merge with LDS? Time will tell!

Item name: Framed Duel With The Devil Wall Art
It says it requires power but I tried building generators and various connections
Nothing seems to work
Also, ngl the season scoreboards were much better

Hello! I know that we are allowed to edit sources or request wikipedia changes, but i recently got into art & writing & whenever I look up my character with my title, the AI generates something else from another artist with a completely different genre, artstyle, etc., from me & puts her personality based off if a character with a similar name. Before AI, this never happened & i was always able to see my work on the front page and now i feel like AI is shadowing people. I want to be able to request a change

Ok....I'm not quite a "baby boomer" that all the millennials complain about - I guess I'm an old Gen X-er.
But, it drives me crazy how so many of the people that are much younger than me, grew up using computers and then complain that those of us in the older generations are "tech inept", but if they every need to fill out an online document with personal info - name, address, personal info - they type in all in lower case:
john smith
123 main st
any town, ny
Doing this is almost as bad as typing ALL IN CAPS. All this does is make you look like you didn't get through third grade, or that you are very lazy. It might be a hassle to use capital letters on your cell phone, but if you are filling out an official document, like a job application, you need to make that extra effort.