Copying paragraphs for handwriting

Writ Beyond Measure

2016.09.25 23:32 imaginarystudy Writ Beyond Measure

A writing community for Ravenclaw writers of all genres and forms, from novels to poems to fanfiction to journals. We offer support in the form of prompts, writer's block help, reading and editing, and writing quotes and inspiration. We also run special events, including for NaNoWriMo. To request access to our subreddit, please fill out [this](https://goo.gl/forms/RP1slGy6XMHvpL6U2) form.

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2021.10.23 07:22 CryptoChief r/CC Cointest official subreddit.

Official subreddit for the CC Cointest.

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2024.05.19 17:42 HumanityFirstTheory [Case Study] GPT-4 succeeded on a coding project, while GPT-4o and Claude 3 Opus both failed

I had to build a simple Node.js application, I asked Claude Opus, GPT-4o, and GPT-4 to build it. I used the same exact prompt for all three.
Background Info:
I design websites for clients, and lately I've been feeding the entire text copy of sites into LLM's for new copy inspiration and to give LLM's an idea of what the business is about (to do things like sitemap optimization and creating new information architecture).
But, it's a time-consuming process to manually go in and update all the information. I decided to see if Claude 3, GPT-4, and GPT-4o could build a simple node.js app that would take in a sitemap and then create a full transcript of all of a website's copy, which I could then copy-and-paste into GPT or Claude.
The Prompt I Used:

I'm a web designer working on redesigning several sites for my clients. I need to generate a full text transcript of all the H2's and paragraphs used on their existing sites, but it is time-consuming to manually visit each page and copy + paste the content. Please build me a node.js app that will scrape the entire sitemap of a website, and then extract headings and paragraphs of each page, and then compile it all in one text document. The sitemap will be located on the /sitemap.xml page. On the results page, you should list the entire content in the left hand column and then have a button that says "Copy App" which will copy all the results into the clipboard. Include all H2's and Paragraphs from each page you crawl in the final transcript. Thanks!

The Results:

Model	Result	Did it fix its code when fed the error message?
Claude 3 Opus	Failed, code did not work.	No, despite being fed the console error numerous times.
GPT-4o	Failed, code did not work.	No, despite being fed the console error numerous times.
GPT-4	Succeeded from the first attempt.	-

Discussion:
Despite trying to nudge both Claude 3 Opus and GPT-4o in the right direction by telling it what was going wrong, both did not fix their errors and instead introduced more errors.
GPT-4 was the only model that got everything right from the first-go *and* made some changes to the code base successfully when I asked it to (I wanted it to exclude all blogs from the final transcript).
I really hope that they do not remove GPT-4 and force GPT-4o on us.
I also used Claude 3 Opus when it first came out and I swear they did something to it to make it worse. I remember it being much more competent at code. I built an entire template showcase marketplace for a popular website builder platform with Claude 3 Opus when it first came out.
Curious to hear what your experiences are.

submitted by HumanityFirstTheory to ChatGPTCoding [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 17:24 Wonderful-Cricket157 O-Level Chinese (barely in a week) 🥲

Our O-Level Chinese examinations (Paper 1 and 2) are on May 27th, just seven days away. I'm feeling overwhelmed because I only have a few days left to prepare.
Currently, I'm a consistent E8/D7 student in Chinese and struggle with recognizing even primary school level words. I often mix up characters like 在 and 再. When it comes to writing essays (作文), I can barely think of anything to write.
In Paper 2, there's a section where we need to fill in the blanks, which I always ignore. I can't finish the paper because I spend an hour on the first half and the rest on comprehension. For comprehension, I usually just copy the paragraph without reading the questions carefully. I also skip the last question of every comprehension section because I can't produce Chinese characters from memory—that's how bad my Chinese is.
I'm hoping to aim for at least a C6, but I’m relying on moderation or the bell curve since I've heard that many students pass despite generally doing poorly. Do you have any tips for preparing for the Chinese O-Levels? 😭

submitted by Wonderful-Cricket157 to SGExams [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 17:01 thatotherchicka April 2021 - Question #37

“37. The drawback entry is to be filed through a CBP-authorized electronic system and must include all of the following EXCEPT:
A. Claimant identification number
B. Port code for the drawback office where the claim is being filed
C. Drawback entry number and provision(s) under which drawback is claimed
D. The 8-digit HTSUS classification, of each item being exported
E. Amount of refund claimed for each of relevant duties, taxes, and fees”
Let’s go to our table of contents for modernized drawback and see if we can find information on how to submit the drawback claim:
https://preview.redd.it/3bj1ydicd3uc1.png?width=747&format=png&auto=webp&s=be992d8496d3fef069eb6bcbfa5946eb4c54071c
Let’s go to 190.51:
§ 190.51 Completion of drawback claims.
(a) General —
(1) Complete claim. Unless otherwise specified, a complete drawback claim under this part will consist of the successful electronic transmission to CBP of the drawback entry (as described in paragraph (a)(2) of this section), applicable Notice(s) of Intent to Export, Destroy, or Return Merchandise for Purposes of Drawback on CBP Form 7553, applicable import entry data, and evidence of exportation or destruction as provided for under subpart G of this part.
(2) Drawback entry. The drawback entry is to be filed through a CBP-authorized electronic system and must include the following:
(i) Claimant identification number;
(ii) Broker identification number (if applicable);
(iii) If requesting accelerated payment under § 190.92, surety code and bond type (and, for single transaction bonds, also the bond number and amount of bond);
(iv) Port code for the drawback office where the claim is being filed;
(v) Drawback entry number and provision(s) under which drawback is claimed;
(vi) Statement of eligibility for applicable privileges (as provided for in subpart I of this part);
(vii) Amount of refund claimed for each of relevant duties, taxes, and fees (calculated to two decimal places);
(viii) For each designated import entry line item, the entry number and the line item number designating the merchandise, a description of the merchandise, a unique import tracing identification number(s) (ITIN) (used to associate the imported merchandise and any substituted merchandise with any intermediate products (if applicable) and the drawback-eligible exported or destroyed merchandise or finished article(s)), as well as the following information for the merchandise designated as the basis for the drawback claim: The 10-digit HTSUS classification, amount of duties paid, applicable entered value (see 19 CFR 190.11(a)), quantity, and unit of measure (using the unit(s) of measure required under the HTSUS for substitution manufacturing and substitution unused merchandise drawback claims), as well as the types and amounts of any other duties, taxes, or fees for which a refund is requested;
(ix) For manufacturing claims under 19 U.S.C. 1313(a) or (b), each associated ruling number, along with the following information: Corresponding information for the factory location, the basis of the claim (as provided for in § 190.23), the date(s) of use of the imported and/or substituted merchandise in manufacturing or processing (or drawback product containing the imported or substituted merchandise), a description of and the 10-digit HTSUS classification for the drawback product or finished article that is manufactured or produced, the quantity and unit of measure for the drawback product or finished article that is manufactured or produced, the disposition of the drawback product or finished article that is manufactured or produced (transferred, exported, or destroyed), unique manufacture tracing identification number(s) (MTIN) (used to associate the manufactured merchandise, including any intermediate products, with the drawback-eligible exported or destroyed finished article(s)), and a certification from the claimant that provides as follows: “The article(s) described above were manufactured or produced and disposed of as stated herein in accordance with the drawback ruling on file with CBP and in compliance with applicable laws and regulations.”;
(x) Indicate whether the designated imported merchandise, other substituted merchandise, or finished article (for manufacturing claims) was transferred to the drawback claimant prior to the exportation or destruction of the eligible merchandise, and for unused merchandise drawback claims under 19 U.S.C. 1313(j), provide a certification from the client that provides as follows: “The undersigned hereby certifies that the exported or destroyed merchandise herein described is unused in the United States and further certifies that this merchandise was not subjected to any process of manufacture or other operation except the allowable operations as provided for by regulation.”;
(xi) Indicate whether the eligible merchandise was exported or destroyed and provide the applicable 10-digit HTSUS or Department of Commerce Schedule B classification, quantity, and unit of measure (the unit of measure specified must be the same as that which was required under the HTSUS for the designated imported merchandise in paragraph (viii) for substitution unused merchandise drawback claims) and, for claims under 19 U.S.C. 1313(c), specify the basis as one of the following:
(A) Merchandise does not conform to sample or specifications;
(B) Merchandise was defective at time of importation;
(C) Merchandise was shipped without consent of the consignee; or
(D) Merchandise sold at retail and returned to the importer or the person who received the merchandise from the importer;
(xii) For eligible merchandise that was exported, the unique export identifier (the number used to associate the export transaction with the appropriate documentary evidence of exportation), export destination, name of exporter, the applicable comparative value pursuant to § 190.11(b) (see § 190.22(a)(1)(ii), § 190.22(a)(2)(ii), or § 190.32(b)) for substitution claims, and a certification from the claimant that provides as follows: “I declare, to the best of my knowledge and belief, that all of the statements in this document are correct and that the exported article is not to be relanded in the United States or any of its possessions without paying duty.”;
(xiii) For eligible merchandise that was destroyed, the name of the destroyer and, if substituted, the applicable comparative value pursuant to § 190.11(c) (see § 190.22(a)(1)(ii), § 190.22(a)(2)(ii), or § 190.32(b)), and a certification from the claimant, if applicable, that provides as follows: “The undersigned hereby certifies that, for the destroyed merchandise herein described, the value of recovered materials (including the value of any tax benefit or royalty payment) that accrues to the drawback claimant has been deducted from the value of the imported (or substituted) merchandise designated by the claimant, in accordance with 19 U.S.C. 1313(x).”;
(xiv) For substitution unused merchandise drawback claims under 19 U.S.C. 1313(j)(2), a certification from the claimant that provides as follows: “The undersigned hereby certifies that the substituted merchandise is unused in the United States and that the substituted merchandise was in our possession prior to exportation or destruction.”;
(xv) For NAFTA and USMCA drawback claims provided for in subpart E of parts 181 and 182, the foreign entry number and date of entry, the HTSUS classification for the foreign entry, the amount of duties paid for the foreign entry and the applicable exchange rate, and, if applicable, a certification from the claimant that provides as follows: “Same condition—The undersigned certifies that the merchandise herein described is in the same condition as when it was imported under the above import entry(s) and further certifies that this merchandise was not subjected to any process of manufacture or other operation except the allowable operations as provided for by regulation.”; and
(xvi) All certifications required in this part and as otherwise deemed necessary by CBP to establish compliance with the applicable laws and regulations, as well as the following declaration: “The undersigned acknowledges statutory requirements that all records supporting the information on this document are to be retained by the issuing party for a period of 3 years from the date of liquidation of the drawback claim. All required documentation that must be uploaded in accordance with 19 CFR 190.51 will be provided to CBP within 24 hours of the filing of the drawback claim. The undersigned acknowledges that a false certification of the foregoing renders the drawback claim incomplete and subject to denial. The undersigned is fully aware of the sanctions provided in 18 U.S.C. 1001, and 18 U.S.C. 550, and 19 U.S.C. 1593a.”
(3) Election of line item designation for imported merchandise. Merchandise on a specific line on an entry summary may be designated for either direct identification or substitution claims but a single line on an entry summary may not be split for purposes of claiming drawback under both direct identification and substitution claims. The first complete drawback claim accepted by CBP which designates merchandise on a line on an entry summary establishes this designation for any remaining merchandise on that same line.
(4) Limitation on line item eligibility for imported merchandise. Claimants filing substitution drawback claims under part 190 for imported merchandise associated with a line item on an entry summary if any other merchandise covered on that entry summary has been designated as the basis of a claim under part 191 must provide additional information enabling CBP to verify the availability of drawback for the indicated merchandise and associated line item within 30 days of claim submission. The information to be provided will include, but is not limited to: summary document specifying the lines used and unused on the import entry; the import entry summary, corresponding commercial invoices, and copies of all drawback claims that previously designated the import entry summary; and post summary/liquidation changes (for imports or drawback claims, if applicable).
No where in there does it say you need to provide the 8 digit HTS code. The answer is D.

submitted by thatotherchicka to CBLE [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 16:17 LoganWY How I self-advocated (Long story no TL:DR)

Today I want to tell my story of how I self-advocated and what I did to achieve that goal. I'm telling my story to help those who are in a similar position to what I was in and to inspire those to self-advocate.
To recap from my earlier posts. I have ADHD and fell under the "multiple disabilities" characterization. My high school teacher claimed that I have autism (Not diagnosed). I personally don't believe I have autism or at the very least I have a high functioning autism. Throughout most of my school career, I was in a self-contained classroom with kids with severe disabilities. Even if I was in the general population I had a paraprofessional or peer tutor. I never believed that I should have been in that position. As a consequence, I never really learned any social skills, I was segregated, and felt like that people didn't want anything to do with me because I was sped. The reason why I ended up in this position was probably a combination of me having the "multiple disabilities'' characterization and me testing low in three year revaluation tests. If you want more info on this then feel free to search my profile. This is an alt account and is primarily used to ask questions about special ed so It's really easy to find stuff about me.
Before I get into my story I just want to make it clear that I'm not against special ed. There's good and bad people in every profession. I believed I was in danger for myself and for my future. I don't believe that my teacher was evil and had the best of intentions but he was putting me in a position that was hurting me and I had to act. If you have any questions or feedback feel free to let me know in the comments. Another thing is that this post has been really hard to make. It opened up some old wounds and as a result took several days to write.
Here's my story: So in late middle school I was tired of the placement that I was in. I was tired of not having friends, Not being able to socialize with my peers, not being able to date. I also was thinking about what my life will look like after high school, I was concerned that I was going to never have friends, Never be in a relationship, and not have the social skills to make those friends. I was generally very concerned for my future. So I decided that for my 8th grade year (2017-2018) I would do my absolute best for both my behavior and academics. Throughout the year nothing changed. I was hoping that me doing well would show that I didn't need any support but at the end of the year I still had paraprofessionals in most of my classes and was being pulled out for tests. In the summer between middle school and high school all I can think about is I want high school to be different. I wanted friends, I wanted a relationship, and I had dreams of me in the student council. When I got into high school I had peer tutors along with paraprofessionals (Peer Tutors are general ed students who sign up as an elective to help special needs kids. They basically serve the role as paraprofessionals with less responsibility). I did everything again and had the exact same result. In January of 2019 (freshmen year) I decided that my current strategy wasn't working. They also started making the peer tutors fill out behavioral checklists for their student(s) by grading them on how well they behaved/followed directions and gave them badges that say "peer tutor" which made me feel singled out. Because of that the peer tutors felt more like babysitters then someone that is an equal. So I went to my special ed teacher and asked him to remove the paraprofessional and the peer tutors. He told me no and said that I needed them. I changed my strategy again and I was going to ask for the Peer Tutors to be gone first, then focus on removing the paraprofessionals. I was more concerned about the peer tutors over the paraprofessionals because I was concerned that since they were part of the student body that this was going to affect me when I was running for the student council. I was worried that they'd tell others I was special needs then people would think I was incompetent. So every 2 weeks I would ask him again to remove them and each time he would give me a different excuse on why I couldn't be alone. Here's some of the excuses he gave me: "The peer tutors need to be there to collect data", "You need to prove that you can do the work yourself", "It's not up to me. It's the general education teacher that decides if you need a peer tutor or an aide", "Peer Tutors are supposed to represent a trainer for a job. If you refuse training then you're going to get fired". I brought it up again during my yearly IEP which took place in March. Once again my teacher said no, bringing up another excuse. As far as I can remember, my parents were neutral about the aide situation. Later one peer tutor was removed, what happened is that the peer tutor moved to a different town and they didn't bother on sending a substitute. A win is a win so I celebrated it. At the end of my freshman year I was pretty much defeated and didn't achieve the goal of being 100% independent. Over the summer I took a look at my situation and decided that my current plan is not working. I knew that when my sophomore year of high school starts I will have aides and peer tutors in classes. I knew that if I wanted to get what I wanted I would have to do something big. I knew that I would have to put up a fight, and put in a lot more effort. Over the summer I developed a war mindset inspired by two quotes from Sun Tzu:
"Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win”
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”
I knew that I can't be going into sophomore year blind, so I started drafting a plan. I created a Google doc outlining my goals and what I wanted to accomplish. I knew that I won't be able to win every battle and that I need to choose which fight is worth fighting for. I thought to myself, “Well the peer tutors we're given training on the first day of school and probably have strategies to deal with poor behavior but what about planned well organized protests?” So I began researching strategies on how paraprofessionals/peer tutors dealt with negative behavior and reverse engineered those tactics. I read forms, I Watched YouTube videos and found as much information that I could find. For the peer tutors I didn't know too much about them. I didn't know if it was something that only my school did or if other schools did it. I did some research and found out that other schools had a peer tutor program and some have uploaded training videos on YouTube. Some peer tutors told me that they did babysitting and did nanny work so I looked up babysitting tips. I reverse engineered all of those tactics and came up with strategies to counter those techniques and put all that information that I learned into a google doc that I can use for future reference. During this time I also researched how to become a better negotiator and started learning a little bit of psychology. The plan was to first negotiate and if that doesn't work I will protest and make demands and negotiate. Over the summer I got really good at negotiating and practiced a lot on my father and my sister (they were totally oblivious). To this day I use those negotiating tactics. After I created my document and was satisfied with all the information, I went to bed that night and knew that I have already won and that my sophomore year will be my last year that I 1-1 peer tutor or aide.
Fast forward to the first day of school, as expected I had peer tutors and aides assigned to me in classes. My sped teacher had a chalkboard On the back wall full of sticky notes that had everyone's schedules and a name of someone was assigned to that student for each class. This time around I only had one peer tutor outside of the special ed classes. This is a big improvement over the three I had before but I still have my original goal of having none. For the paraprofessionals I had 2 in Gen classes.The goal was to first remove the peer tutors then the paraprofessionals. Even though this seems to be an improvement I continued with the plan. Since this was the first day, the peer tutors were in another classroom learning policies and other stuff they needed to know so I was alone for the day. I walked over to my special ed teacher and ask him one final time to remove the peer tutor he says no and then I asked him to let me be alone for 2 weeks so I can prove I don't need help and he still denies me. I then tell him that I will allow the peer tutor for 2 weeks and after that she needs to go. My teacher doesn't respond. (To add context the peer tutor that I had, she was a peer tutor in my math class in the prior semester so I already know who she was. We used to talk a lot and was surprised when I saw that she was assigned to me.)
For 2 weeks she mostly left me alone with her occasionally checking up on me. For those 2 weeks I purposely close my self off and adopted a body language that would subconsciously discourage her from approaching me. I did this by keeping my head low and staying as focused as possible. The only thing she did was confront me when I start packing up 2 minutes before the bell rings. She tells me that I shouldn't be packing up and to pull my stuff out again. I tell her no and hold my ground. She writes in my planner that I packed my stuff up early and refuse to pull it out. That happened like 2 or 3 times. On Thursday on the second week my class was tasked to create a PowerPoint. FYI this was a mythology class, while I was doing this PowerPoint I decided instead of manually trying to type in the locations and people from this mythology which the names were very long and complicated. I decided would be easier just to copy and paste them in. My peer tutor sees me doing this and doesn't say anything. At the end of class she writes that I plagiarized in my planner and tells my special ed teacher in person what happened. My sped teacher pulls me out of class (I had his math class right after mythology) and starts telling me that my peer tutor has seen me copy and pasting paragraphs and goes on this lecturing on why plagiarizing is bad. I explained to him that I wasn't copying paragraphs It was only copying names and locations and explain my reason for it. He didn't believe me but he didn't make me retake the assignment. After that I was pissed off and the next day I confronted her about it. I forgot what her reasoning for not telling me was but I told her that she needs to look into things before she makes false reports. After that incident, I decided to wait a week before I ask my teacher to remove her. Also during those first 3 weeks I turned down help from peer tutors and paras if possible In the special ed classroom. I did this to prevent sending any mix signals. I personally didn't mind if I had to work with a peer tutopara or not In the actual sped classroom. I only cared if it was in any of the general education classes. I just thought it would look contradictory if I was accepting help in the sped class and then requesting peer tutors to be removed from my gen classes.
At the beginning of the fourth week I went to school early and went to my sped teacher's class before first hour starts and then I again asked him to remove the peer tutor and the paraprofessionals. He says no again and brings up that I was being academically dishonest by plagiarizing. I tell my side of the story once again on what happened and he still doesn't believe me. At this point I leave and more pissed off. At this point negotiations didn't work so I started small protests by preventing the peer tutors from filling out my planer and the behavioral checklist. Most of them didn't care since there was other students they can fill out and they only need to fill out one to be graded for the day. One peer tutor gave me the puppy dog eye treatment and I eventually cave and let her fill it out. I still let the one peer tutor that was assigned to me in the gen class due to me being the only student and my intention wasn't to ruin, her grade. During the fourth week I began brainstorming ideas on how I can do a massive protest.
On Thursday of the fourth week of school, a walk into the mythology class and it started out like any other day. Class started and my teacher starts talking. I pull up my phone to respond to some messages and my peer tutor sees me. She asks me to hand my phone over to her and I tell her no. She tells me that I can't be on my phone and I tell her okay but I'm still not giving it to you. She then pulls out her phone and puts it on the table. She then tells me to put my phone on the table. I tell her no again. A few minutes past and the teacher finishes up talking. She passes the assignment and immediately my peer tutor begins to try and help by reading the questions. I slide the packet over closer to me and start ignoring her. I was hoping that she will get the hint and leave me alone. She doesn't so put on my hoodie and tried to mentally block her out. I don't remember what she said during all this since I was blocking it out but I do remember her touching me and the general ed teacher coming over and start assisting the peer tutor. It was a lot of pressure and I was actually about to give up because it was too much. But they both gaved up before I did and I was very relieved. After that, the class was pretty much quiet. The peer tutor wrote an entire paragraph on what happened. I walked to my math class and sat down. I then see my peer tutor walking into class and ask for my sped teacher. I already knew it was about me. I see them talk for 2 minutes and sure enough I see my teacher calling me over. I walked outside the classroom and me and the teacher begin to go at it. We end up saying the same things we have said before. However, my teacher this time mentioned that if I keep up my behavior that he's going to call in a meeting with my parents. The rest of math class was pretty much the same. However, my English class with the same teacher he went on a rant about using accommodations seeing that he had a disability growing up which was tourette's and he were love to have a peer tutor. I was quiet for the whole class since I was already exhausted because of everything else that had already happened. For the rest of the weekend, I've been coming up with plans on how I would be able to pull off a massive protest.
Now for the good news. On the fifth week of school, I noticed that my peer tutor was missing. My teacher pulled me aside again and told me that he decided that he was going to pull her for 2 weeks to see how well I would do without her. I told him thank you, that's what I wanted since the beginning of the school year. After those 2 weeks he didn't reinstate her and I didn't have a peer tutor or paraprofessionals in gen classes since. The deal moving forward was as long as I had a D or better he wasn't going to send any support unless I asked for it. My relationship with that sped teacher also had improved significantly. Later in my Junior year of high school I ran in my school's election and won. I was given the social media position.
In hindsight, I'm glad I didn't have to pull off a big protest. But the same time I wish that this situation could have ended in a different way.
Everything that I just told you is only the tip of the iceberg. There's so much detail that I had to leave out just to make this story shorter. Lot of it I'm still processing even though I found great strength in myself fighting back against a system that I believe was ruining my life. That war mindset hasn't left my mentality yet. I'm still dealing with the consequences of me being in special ed. Everything I told you happened 5 years ago and I'm still living through it like it just happened. I'm mentally recovering and eventually I will recover. Right now I'm in therapy and I'm writing down everything I can in a Google doc to process everything emotionally. Maybe one day I'll give that story to a writer and make a book out of it.
If you have any questions feel free ask them, I would love to answer them.

submitted by LoganWY to specialeducation [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 16:12 LoganWY How I self-advocated (Long story no TL:DR)

submitted by LoganWY to specialed [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 13:18 pillowcase-of-eels [Music] Emilie Autumn's Asylum, pt. 6 – High-concept musician responds to online criticism by waging successful attrition war against her own fanbase

🪞
Welcome back to the Asylum write-up, where we explore the decade-long slow-motion car crash that is the Emilie Autumn fandom.
Sorry this installment took so long to upload! Just a heads-up, I may take some time to deliver the last one too – these posts take forever to format on Reddit's finicky-ass editor, and my dumb real life is currently keeping me from precious Internet time. Thank you for your patience! You have my word that everyone who pre-ordered the final installment will receive a PERSONAL, HANDWRITTEN letter autographed and illustrated by me, a list of the snacks I consumed while composing this write-up, some exclusive behind-the-scenes secrets, and a pony.
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4.1 – Part 4.2 Part 5

Places, everyone This is a test Throw your stones Do your damage Your worst, and your best (...) And if I had a dollar For every time I repented the sin And commit the same crime I'd be sitting on top of the world today (“God Help Me”, 2006🎵)

Quick recap of where we left off. First, there were five to ten halcyon years of pleasant and meaningful interactions between EA and her blossoming fanbase, prominently by way of her official forum. Then, circa 2009-2010, EA's online presence shifted towards sudden anger outbursts, ban-hammering, and an increasingly top-down communication style.
This created a sort of primordial rift within the fanbase, between those who supported EA's right to speak her mind and regulate her own fan spaces however she pleased – and those who thought that her reactions were rude and inappropriate (at best), and that even fan spaces should allow for reasonable, non-abusive criticism of the artist.
Between a poorly-handled book release (see Part 3), the controversial (Part 2) or dubiously true (Part 4) contents of said book, and serious shade from various former collaborators (Part 5), more and more fans had pressing thoughts about EA's work ethic and choices. EA attempted damage control through drastic forum rules that made it virtually impossible to voice any “serious” critical opinion. It didn't work, of course: instead of squashing the mutiny, she created a schism.
Critical fans and active haters started congregating on unofficial platforms.

“WITH MUFFINS LIKE THIS, WHO NEEDS ENEMIES?”: TROLL LIKE A GIRL

So here we were, the early 2010s. The official forum (which had about 700 members in 2006, if you recall) was now thousands-strong, reaching just over 12,000 registered users in 2012 – not all of them active, but still. In terms of sheer numbers and content creation, the party was POPPIN'... but increasingly in parts of the Asylum that escaped EA's jurisdiction, such as Tumblr, where they could speak their mind freely.

You play the victim very well You've built your self-indulgent hell You wanted someone to understand you Well, be careful what you wish for, because I do (“I Know Where You Sleep”, 2006🎵)

In one wing of Asylum Tumblr, a smattering of call-out blogs emerged, which laid out EA's various lies, faux pas, shitty takes, and general deep-seated terribleness in detailed timelines and screenshots (or, short of that, long-winded bullet points). While many such blogs framed it as “serious” whistleblowing and did their best to remain as fact-based and neutral as they could, there was some genuine disgust, animosity and creepiness towards EA on that side of Tumblr; for some ex-fans, “exposing the truth” was mostly justify obsessive hatred, prying and verbal abuse. Some, for instance, felt the bizarre need to side with EA's mother in their estrangement. (One user, with the URL “emilyautumnfischkopf”, argued in a serious and down-to-earth tone - but with zero sources - that EA's upbringing had been nothing but peaceful and supportive until she ungratefully kicked her loving family to the curb for no reason at all. They were later revealed 🔍 to have an alternate handle as “eaisalyingcunt”.)
Either way, through these blogs, a number of potential drama bombs that had mostly flown under the radar were dredged up from over the years – some of which were hard to ignore, even for supportive fans. Where to begin?
There was that nonsense in-joke song, captured twice on camera during the 2009 tour (to very little outrage, at the time), crassly called “Manatee Retard”📺. Or EA's scathing response, in print, to a wheelchair user who found it insensitive that she used a bedazzled wheelchair as a prop to do sexy acrobatics on stage. (“Your offence taken at my hard-won self-acceptance proves that I indeed have something to fight against”, she wrote). Spoken word tracks where she made trivializing knock-knock jokes about serious mental illnesses she didn't have, like schizophrenia and OCD. Multiple instances of calling Britney Spears a “bimbo” and a “Hollywood fucked-up”, resentfully claiming that she only shaved her head because she was “hopped up on drugs” and certainly not because she was “bipolar”, a word the press liked to wield as an insult anyway. (“That's almost like calling someone a retard!” Yeah, heaven forbid.) The meanest, most distasteful paragraphs in the book. Basically everything problematic EA had ever said or written.📝 In retrospect, it had been a long time coming, but it was a lot to take in – and certainly more off-putting, even to less emotionally invested fans, than silly lies about her age and last name.
In another wing of Asylum Tumblr, some fans had had it up to here and just wanted to have fun. 🎵 If Plague Rats had learned one valuable lesson from EA, it was how to crack a joke in the face of absurd tragedy – and the general state of the EA fandom certainly warranted a few.
In 2012, Fight Like a Girl was released. After six long years, three of which had been peaceful, the Opheliac era was officially over. The new album and ensuing tour confirmed that the Asylum had entered a process of glamorous Broadway-style militarization. 🎵📺
The mood board was “Roman general meets Vegas showgirl meets Victorian street urchin”.🪞 The color palette was, to naysayers, “musty pink and rotten, stale piss yellow”. 🐀 The keyword was “REVENGE” (through the power of... self-expression! sorority! brutal assault with rusty medical implements!). The chorus of the title song had an intriguing run-on line about getting “revenge on the world, or at least 49% of the people in it” 🎵 – which seemed like an awful lot, and was widely interpreted (to cheers, boos, or uncomfortable sighs) as a misandrist jab at literally all men on Earth.
The show was essentially a demo version of the musical, in that the setlist vaguely reflected the order of events in the story – but prior reading was essential in order to get what the hell was going on on stage. This one Broadway reviewer had not perused the literature before seeing the show 🔍, and hated: the set, the choreography, the skits, the plot, the lyrics, the music, the concept. (Seriously, you should read the review. It's not even my show and I feel like quitting show business.)
Pre-show VIP encounters, now violin-free, were lorded over by EA's new manager🐀, whose official title was “Asylum Headmistress”. (Interesting choice – she sounds fun!) The swag bags were less substantial than before, and the “greet” part of the meet-and-greet was rarely more than a quick hug and photo op.
On Twitter, EA continued to embrace her “I am very badass” fronting attitude...

Often wonder if cyberbullies r aware they’re fucking w/ a girl who’s BFs w/ maker of the SAW films & is marrying a knife-throwing scorpion. (🐀📝)

...and her taste for needlessly inflammatory statements. About an aisle sign in a supermarket:

If this does not infuriate you, then you're a fucking potato.

(Again with the confounding crypto-ableism, EA! 🔍) She also went through a phase of raging against Lady Gaga 📝, who had stolen her idea of using a wheelchair on stage as an able-bodied woman. 🔍 That failed to convince anyone that she wasn't the histrionic diva that haters made her out to be.
Spurred on by EA's rallying cries and “us vs them” mentality, loyalists turned the white-knighting up to 11. On Twitter, some Plague Rats got into cat fights with Lady Gaga's Little Monsters (what a time to be alive). Others tried to balance out the Tumblr negativity with initiatives like “Spreading a Plague of Love” – a “positive-only” confession blog, whose extreme fangirling, comically drastic rules and hyper-defensive tone📝 did not debunk the increasingly popular notion that “true Plague Rats” were a bunch of authoritarian and hopelessly brainwashed fanatics.
EA truthers and other anti-fans started lashing out at anyone who dared express any positive opinion of EA, solidifying claims that the backlash against EA was just a conspiracy of bitter, hysterical bullies.
All this to say: every passing day brought new reasons for fans to get mad at EA and each other, and everyone in the Asylum was in need of a laugh. It's not easy having a good time.🦠
Leading up to Fight Like a Girl and in the years that followed, user-submission-based meme blogs took off, most notably “Spreading a Plague of Lulz / Troll Like a Girl”. A lot of the early submissions were absurdist humor and toothless, cheezburger-Impact memes (a style that was, oddly, already dated at the time). Those often originated in good fun, and from loyal fans, on the official forum. But there was also true snark, satirizing EA's questionable ethics, outrageous claims, and easily spoofed artistic gimmicks. A new slang of Asylumspeak emerged: Glittertits (slight NSFW), GAGA!!, EA Gusta and all its memeface variants, Get outta mah house!, Are You Suffering?, Fight Like A Goat, [Random celebrity] copied EA (a subgenre in its own right), ...
Most of the “trolling” was directed at unrepentant bootlickers and, to a lesser extent, red-in-the-face haters and creeps. Meme blogs would post joke comments under “serious” or gushing submissions on Wayward Victorian Confessions, and taunt loyalist accounts by tagging them in their posts. When a few people complained on WVC that almost all of the Bloody Crumpets to date had been thin white able-bodied women, and a few fans responded by sharing their dream-casts for a more diverse line-up, the blog was flooded for days with confessions that “X should be a Crumpet” (candidates included RuPaul, Mitt Romney, Nicki Minaj, EA's therapist, and the WVC admins). Farcical shenanigans like that.
Ah, but some people will always cross the line, won't they. EA threads popped up on merciless, bully-friendly snark platforms like Lolcow, Pretty Ugly Little Liar, and Encyclopedia Dramatica. Snarkers with a mean streak and obsessive haters mingled in some of the more aggressive, 4-chan-spirited retaliation against EA – which would be called “brigading” in modern parlance. This included flooding EA's Goodreads page with one-star reviews (see part 4), repeatedly editing her Wikipedia page to include her legal name and birth year, and ensuring that Googling said name would bring up current pictures of her.
All of this compounded agitation fragmented the once-united fandom beyond recognition.🦠 Through substantial disagreements among fans, personal bickerings, layers upon layers of inscrutable in-jokes, and cross-platform telephone games, the Asylum morphed into a booby-trapped Escher room.
Satire blogs were taken in earnest. Earnest fan blogs scanned as satire. Memes would get called out as abuse. Appreciation without attached criticism would get mocked as bootlicking. Obvious jokes made by EA would be taken at face value. One divisive confession could trigger days and days of debate, to the point that WVC eventually banned confessions in response to other confessions. New waves of infighting created a confusing web of rival sub-factions🐀, each accusing the others of being toxic, cliquish, and delusional.
The shared fantasy was broken, the collective vision had crumbled, no onez was speaking the same language anymore. Fans would jump down the throat of other fans who held almost identical views about EA, except for that one thing she said or did that one time. Everyone had differing thoughts on what should or shouldn't acceptable to discuss, question, excuse, make fun of.
War is hell.

SCORCHED EARTH SHENANIGANS: HONEY, I SHRUNK THE ASYLUM

Would you tear my castle down Stone by stone And let the wind run through my windows Till there was nothing left But a battered rose? (“Castle Down”, 2003🎵)

Haters vs sycophants is not really the kind of conflict where one side can come out on top (if you're participating, you've already lost). But in the long tug-of-war between “grassroots” and “EA-sponsored” fan spaces, the ultimate winner is obvious – in that the former is gasping in agony, a shriveled husk of its former glory, while the latter... is non-existent. This is due in no small part to EA's tendency, like the Czars of old, to settle conflicts by setting Moscow on fire.🔍)
That's not entirely fair: unlike EA, the czar only did it that once.
By early 2013, as EA was gearing up for her third Fight Like a Girl tour at the end of the year, the official forum was... not as lively as it once had been. Not just because of the stifling rules and disgruntlement towards EA, or because EA herself hadn't really posted anything on there in years; the Internet was also changing, and forums in general were fast becoming passé.
This made it difficult for EA to create a safe space where she could talk to fans, and fans could talk to and about her, in a way she deemed suitable (ie, a space she could gate-keep and regulate enough to keep it completely free from negative criticism). Social media was a minefield; she still posted regularly, but didn't interact very much. So EA and the Headmistress came up with a way to filter out the unbelievers: an official fan club📝, aptly called the “Asylum Army”, with a $100 entry price.
Joining the AA came with a dog tag, a sew-on patch, and a lifetime membership certificate signed by EA and – for some reason – the Headmistress. (Unlike EA's best friend and sound engineer back in the forum's heyday, I don't think fans ever really embraced the FLAG-era manager as part of the Asylum in-group. She came across more as a coordinator / businessperson / adult chaperone, at best.🐀) So, slightly better goodies than you'd get by joining the other AA 🔍 ... but not by much. The main appeal was that members would have access to exclusive content, special merch, giveaways, early bird tickets for future shows, and regular video chats with EA.
The concept itself drew a fair amount of criticism, as you can imagine. Between the name🐀, the price, and the inherent gatekeeping of a pay-to-join fanclub, many balked at the monetizing of a concept that had once (like, three years back) been significantly more DIY, grassroots, and inclusive. 📝🐀
Then again, many also longed for a positive, drama-free space where fans could just be fans. And while the creation of the AA was generally recognized as a quick cashgrab, a lot of people were surprisingly cool with it. EA was trying to finance her dream musical, after all – although a number of fans wished she had gone about raising funds in a less sketchy way.
So around 400 fans shelled out (which, according to the Headmistress📝, “basically cover[ed] the cost of running the fanclub itself – keeping the database up, website, etc.”). Enough for a close-knit, but sizable community. But already, there was a conflict of interest: a high fanclub entry fee essentially demands that you pledge loyalty to the artist over loyalty to your fellow fans, who wish to join but can't afford to. Sharing, caring, and ensuring no one felt left out were some of the more positive values cultivated in the fandom... but leaking exclusive content would surely piss off other paying members🐀, and make EA feel betrayed all over again. (And she had barely just started to mellow out on social media!)
...But then again, this is the internet. After the first month of secret AA drops (lyric sheets, some photoshoot outtakes – nothing too juicy, really), there were, yes, some leaks. EA was predictably miffed, and retaliated by... ghosting the fanclub for weeks at a time in its first few months of existence (great look!). She eventually found the “solution” to her problem, by providing something you couldn't right-click-save (and which had been part of the promised perks to begin with): live interaction.
Over webcam, she was her usual in-person bubbly, charming, funny self. Everyone seemingly had a good time during the fanclub video chat, and this gave people faith and hope.
There were a few more events, giveaways, etc. As promised, ahead of the fall 2013 tour (the last one to date, it would turn out), AA members got priority access to show tickets and VIP bundles. The latter were much pricier than before, and only included soundcheck, a photo-op, and three goodies: a tin of loose-leaf tea, a signed printer-paper setlist, and a small flag that said “F.L.A.G.”.🔍 Some stuff continued to leak – but, as some of the outlaws pointed out (scroll down to the Disqus comments), they were mostly relaying information that was relevant to the entire fanbase, such as updates about ongoing projects (the dragged-out recording of the audiobook, for one).
In early 2014, lifetime memberships were closed, and replaced with monthly, quarterly and yearly subscription tiers. Bizarrely, you ended up paying $3 more per month if you bought a $99 yearly subscription📝 – but it did include the patch, dog tag, and piece of paper!

Sometimes I kind of want to be part of the cool kids and register to the Asylum Army. Then I remember how it came about, what you could get for the same price a couple years ago, how the whole thing was and is handled, and that I won’t support any of this bullshit. (And then I roll around naked in all the money I’m saving.) (🐀)

Still, a number of fans rejoiced at the affordable monthly option, and joined – if not for the exclusive content and merch (which were... okay, but not much to write home about), then for the friendly, drama-free exchanges with an artist they actually did love, in spite of all the frustration.
For the still-too-poor or still-undecided, there was always the forum! It wasn't as active as it used to be, but a few die-hards still managed to keep the lights on... until, inevitably, Someone Did Something and Ruined Everything. (Once again: EA's wrath is spectacular, but rarely completely unprovoked.) The incident features one notable figure in the Asylum community. Let's call him the Collector.
OK, so maybe you remember the meme I linked to in Part 4, with Christian Grey and the ginormous EA hoard. Well, that's the Collector's collection. The “Violin” promo that I called the "Holy Grail of the fandom" in the same paragraph? Also his. The handwritten lyrics that went for $940? Guess who won that auction. Over the years, the Collector had probably spent five figures on EA merch and shows, and although that fact was a little unsettling, he was a very active, easy-going, and generally well-liked fixture of the fandom.
One day in 2012, shortly after the Headmistress had replaced EA's old Chicago BFF as main forum admin, the Collector's account got banned or restricted over something dumb. When the ban wasn't lifted as quickly as he hoped, he took it... the way one takes things when one is unhealthily invested: he started spamming Headmistress and the mod team with increasingly rambling and abusive emails (lost to time, probably for the best). When that didn't work quickly enough, he tried a different route.
One of the many auctions that the Collector had won, some years prior, was EA's old iPod Touch📝 – which contained all of her favorite tunes and, buried somewhere in the data cache... a phone number. Which the Collector tried calling. And wouldn't you know it: EA picked up. She congratulated him on his sleuthing skills, listened patiently as he made his case, apologized for any distress caused by the unfair account restriction, and then they got married.
Kidding! She freaked the fuck out, hung up, and banned him for life from the forum and all EA shows and events.
After his ban, the Collector allegedly still tried to attend at least one VIP pre-show (one source in the comments says he was allowed to buy some merch, refunded for his ticket, and escorted out). He joined the Reform forum to bitch about EA and try to rally people to his cause, possibly made revenge posts about her on darker snark forums, and continued to hound the Asylum mod team. So in June 2014, EA came up with a radical and unexpected fix to the Collector problem.

The official Asylum Fan Forum has been shut down permanently. I have personally paid thousands of dollars each year to keep the forum safe and secure for you ... Unfortunately, the forum has not been kept safe and secure for me, a truth which disappoints me greatly, instead becoming a place where people who have physically threatened myself and my staff prey upon forum members, pressuring them to contact me and my staff on their behalf. If the gullible wish to humor my stalkers (who live in their parent’s basement at age 30 something) and thus put me in danger, they may do it on their own dime. They may also fuck off, because stupidity can kill, and I won’t be your victim. To those who enjoyed the forum, you know who to thank for its closure. (“On the closing of the Asylum Forum”)

Voilà! This is how a decade-long archive of shared history ends: not with a bang, but with a dirty delete and a sod-off communiqué.
The obliteration of the forum took everyone by surprise...

I was actually on the forum when it was taken down. I was navigating between posts and when I went to click on a different board, an error message came up. I honestly cried a little, I'm not ashamed to say. (WVC admin on Reddit, 2024)

...and I do mean everyone:

Chicago BFF / ex-admin, the next morning: Whoa, EA forum shut down? Ex-mod: It turns out that if someone spends enough years actively “waging war” to destroy what they can’t have, eventually they’ll be successful. * eye roll * Not even mods got prior warning. Just all the sudden, poof, gone. BFF: Really? She did not let the moderators know?! This is sounding worse and worse. Uggh. I’m so sorry. Such a loss. (...) Ok, threats are serious, but why not just put it in archive mode so no one can post? (...) Sad. I shall light a candle in the forum's honor. (Facebook posts; scroll down for screenshots)

It was a gut punch, especially for people who had poured countless hours into the community, or could have used some prior warning to save years of their own writing from the role-playing threads. One last chance to take a look around the place that had meant so much to so many.

From the wording of the announcement of closing the forum and a number of other things, it sometimes seems like EA doesn't like her fans much. :/ (🐀)

Three months after the forum was nuked, Battered Rose (a venerable EA fansite, which had been around since the Enchant era and had one of the most complete EA galleries online) announced that it was shutting down too.📝 The admin, who had also been a long-time forum mod, cited a lack of “time, energy, passion, or money” to keep the website going... and being upset at the sudden disappearance of the forum. It was, truly, the end of an era for the Asylum.
...Well, no point in living in the past. For those who could afford it, and still wanted to talk to/about EA after that (not everyone did 🐀), there was always the Asylum Army fanclub!
Over the summer of 2014, EA held regular live chats and Q&A's, and... many attendees really enjoyed them, and thought the AA was well worth the money after all. She also quietly parted ways with the much poo-pooed Headmistress around that time.

Just spent over 4 hours giggling, drinking tea and playing guessing games in chat with EA and other Asylum Army members ... No griping, no downers, just lots of fun. I think I like the way the ‘new fandom’ is going and now I’m really glad I finally decided to join the Army. (September 4, 2014🐀; Battered Rose had closed the day before)

The forum was lost forever, but perhaps that was a chance for a fresh start. Could this fanclub thing really be the Asylum Renaissance that fans had been longing for?

...I have come today to a very difficult but necessary decision, and that is to discontinue the Emilie Autumn Official Fanclub. The site itself, and the community chatroom, will remain open to you indefinitely, but I will no longer be making updates to the site. (Newsletter, September 8, 2014📝)

...Never mind, then.
Turns out the fanclub had been the Headmistress' idea all along. EA had been reluctant from the start, and although she really enjoyed the live chats with a safe community of people “who are there for the right reasons”, she couldn't overcome her fundamental discomfort with the concept. Lifetime and regular members would receive a bunch of digital downloads and a -35% coupon on the Asylum Emporium for their troubles. EA said she would definitely pop back once in a while for live chats, for free, just for fun, but to my knowledge, she never did.
And so the most devoted fans were left standing in the rain...

She is happy, she made it. She is fulfilling her dreams, found love and happiness after all the pain. I understand that she now doesn’t need “us” anymore ... That doesn’t change the fact she broke my heart with taking the Asylum Army and the forum from me. Yet, I am happy for her. (🐀)

...while naysayers pointed and laughed, Nelson-style.🦠

I don’t feel sorry at all for the people that paid for the Asylum Army fan club. Most of them knew that EA is an atrocious business woman and has broken many promises before. In fact, I laugh at them. They seriously thought that EA would actually stay consistent with this? (🐀)

EVERYTHING MUST GO: THE ASYLUM WHOLESALE

EA fans were left without an “official” home for about three years. This gave them plenty of time to be annoyed at EA for: not releasing the audiobook on time, not materializing any new project for a while... and the new sin of peddling random, ridiculously marked-up AliBaba jewelry as “merch” on her official store. Think faux-antique cameo pendants and $30 Big Ben rings (...because the Asylum story is set in London, get it?).

The whole accessories section looks like a tacky overpriced English souvenir shop. (🐀)

The fanbase lost a lost of steam in those in-between years, because there wasn't much to stick around for. As evidenced by the positive reception of the AA live chats, even in the midst of unresolved drama, out-loud interactions in a friendly environment have always been EA's saving grace. Considering the amount of online hate, there are shockingly few accounts of bad IRL encounters with EA: most people say that in live conversation, she comes across as a fun, warm, and genuinely sweet person. Some report that their negative opinion shifted after meeting her.
But there were no chats or live shows anymore. There was only social media, where she ignored questions and vague-posted about overdue projects – and the newsletter📝, which was all saccharine love-bombing to promote bland dropshipped trinkets. For fans who remembered the handcrafted merch (and two-way communication) of the early years, it was a bitter pill to swallow.

CONTINUED IN COMMENTS

submitted by pillowcase-of-eels to HobbyDrama [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 12:06 Roro-Squandering An Anecdote of Disinterest

I just wanna tell a story.
I was covering for a 9th grade art class recently. They had a project. Choose an artist - any visual artist - and make a poster that met the following conditions: it had facts about the artist, and it had five miniature replicas of their work that you drew. To someone who likes art, this is a fun and easy project. To someone who doesn't, this is still a project that doesn't require much effort, and could still get some fun squeezed from it.
What I ended up witnessing: three of about 14 students chose Leonardo Da Vinci, most likely because he's what shows up if you just Google 'artist'. Three more chose the same artist that was used in the example in the instruction sheet.
I strolled around the room to see what people were up to. I point to a kid's poster, and read a line out loud. "Leonardo was an illegitimate child, fortunately." Now just what the HELL does that mean? I ask the kid. "I don't know," he says. "Okay but first of all, do you know what an illegitimate child is?"
"A child who isn't legitimate?"
"Well, yeah, no, it's a child whose parents weren't married and maybe we don't know who one of the parents were. But more to the point, why is that fortunately?"
"I dunno. I just copied it off the site."
Another student cuts in: "Yeah, I found the same site. That's how it's written."
"Well didn't you read the rest of the paragraph?"
He turns his computer to me, and indeed that line in the bolded heading for a paragraph. A bulging ad that refuses to fully load interrupts the paragraph, so I can't see how the paragraph ends or what makes Leonardo's illegitimacy fortunate.
I probably could have had a small sliver of fun doing this project, but they sure weren't having any. It definitely resonated with the common complaint on this sub where kids will say "Why don't we do anything fun?"
Because you do everything the least fun way possible.

submitted by Roro-Squandering to Teachers [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 12:00 AutoModerator Weekly Reminder: Rules and FAQ - May 19, 2024 (Now with updates!)

Below you will find a weekly reminder of our Rules and partial FAQ. It's definitely a long read, but it's worth your time, especially if you are new to the community, or dropping by as a result of a link you found elsewhere. We periodically revise our rules, this weekly notice will help keep you informed of any changes made.
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Users are expected to know the rules before posting. If you are warned or banned for violating the rules, ignorance is not an excuse.
Moderators will remove posts and comments and/or lock threads in accordance with the rules above. Typically this happens when threads have gone off-topic in a way that is not productive for the OP, or comments overall have become contentious or disrespectful.
If a poster continues to argue or to willfully violate these rules, temporary and permanent ban procedures will be followed. Any attempts to avoid or bypass temporary bans will result in a permanent ban. User bans will not be discussed in the sub. Questions posted about user bans are subject to removal and the poster subject to warning/ban procedures. The mod team will not discuss a specific user ban with anyone other than the user involved.
New accounts are subject to manual approval until they are no longer deemed "new" by the mod team. This helps to weed out trolls and ban evaders.
We rely on Automoderator to scan for specific words and phrases that are not welcome here and notify the mod team to review the comment or post. This includes slurs of any type and platitudes such as "Love them as your own!"
The mod team uses a combination of blacklisting and banning when dealing with trolls.
We employ the use of a bot that automatically bans anyone who comments in subs that have historically harassed our users. If you are picked up by the bot for telling trolls to get fucked, reach out via mod mail and we'll get you sorted out.
The rules above as well as ban procedures are considered guidelines only; some deviation may be necessary on a case by case basis and/or at the mod team's discretion.

13. Ban Procedure

These actions are at moderator discretion.

Pornography will result in an automatic permanent ban.
Extremely egregious content will result in an immediate permanent ban.
You may receive a 7 or 30 day temporary ban for first and second rule violations, depending upon severity.
Continued rule violations will result in a permanent ban.
Willful attempts to avoid or bypass temporary bans will result in a permanent ban.
We recognize the reddit site-wide rules of using alt names to get around bans and will ban those as well as report them to reddit admins.

FAQ - About the Rules

What does Kindness Matters mean?

Shortest version? Don't be an asshole. People come here for support and advice, they do not come here to be yelled at or told they are the reason everything is going sideways. There are ways to point out that someone may want to do some reflection on their own actions and reactions without being an asshole about it.
The purpose of this subreddit is to provide support and a sense of belonging for struggling stepparents. We aren't here to pass judgement, but rather to offer support, empathy, and constructive commentary. That does not include "hard truths" or "tough love." Stepparents get enough of that in every other subreddit, we're not passing it out here. Be respectful.
Remember, most people aren't going to come to a sub like this when everything is going great and everyone is getting along. People are coming here when they are down, when they are feeling defeated and stretched to the limit. Kicking someone when they are down is shitty behavior and we don't tolerate it.

What about being kind to the kids?

"Won't somebody think of the children?" Pearl clutching isn't needed here. If you read the Kindness Matters rule closely, you will see that there is a clause in there about name calling children. We don't allow it. We also don't allow people rolling in telling OP that they feel sorry for their stepkids because OP is feeling overwhelmed and overloaded.
If anyone is advocating slapping, spanking, or any other form of violence, report the comment immediately. We do not advocate violence towards children of any sort. The mod team does not advocate any sort of physical punishment at any time.
Venting about behaviors is not the same as insulting the kids. However, if you see a post or comment where kids are being name called or dragged to the point of no return, use the report button. We try to catch the posts and remove them before they hit the sub, but we cannot see every comment without your help. Use the report button to bring problematic comments to our attention. Don't engage in a war of words on our subreddit.

Why is this sub such an echo chamber?

Not allowing contributors to pile on and tell OP that they are a terrible human being who should never be around children does not equate to being an echo chamber. Many contributors here will offer OP suggestions to help them work through their resentments and frustrations, and the most egregious situations are called out. We simply ask that it be called out with respect.
If you feel that a post is simply too much for you to handle without following the rules, move on to another post.
If you believe that a post itself is crossing the rules report it. If the mod team has approved the post, it is because the mod team believes that the OP needs help from the community or needs a moment to vent and move on from their vent. That does not give you license to pile on disrespectfully. Unless it is proven that OP is a bot, assume that OP is a human being with real thoughts and feelings and has posted from a place of vulnerability.

Why can't I tell OP that they are an asshole?

Because this isn't a judgement sub. We aren't AITA, we don't want to be AITA.
Comments with terms like YTA, NTA, ESH, NAH will be removed.
Don't start your posts with INFO either. We generally recognize that as a fishing attempt for more information to pass judgement on OP, and again, we are not a judgment sub.

But OP asked if they were an asshole?!

Their post somehow got past our automoderator. Just use the report button. We will address it with OP.
If you've asked if you are an asshole, a-hole, a*hole, a**hole, whatever, don't be surprised if your post is removed without warning. This isn't a judgment sub. If you want judgment, you know where to go.

What is a gendered slur?

While it seems that everyone understands what racist slurs are, people struggle understanding the concept of gendered slurs. Generally speaking, we are talking about derogatory nouns or verbs that are used to negatively describe people or situations based on gendered terms.
We've gone back and forth on this a few times, and the truth is, we get it, it's your safe space and you want to be able to vent about BM/BD how you want to vent about them, without us telling you how to vent about them. Fair enough. Vent away. What we are going to stick to here how people are referring to other users and to stepchildren.
Examples that are not allowed:
- "My SD is such a little bitch."
- "She dresses/acts like a slut."
- "My SS acts like a pussy."
- "My SS is such a beta male."
- "You are all fucking whores."
- "Any dude who is raising some sluts kids is a cuck!"
- "Little Lord Fauntleroy over here thinking he runs the house!"
- "You're just the bangnanny, get used to it."
Don't call users here names, don't call stepchildren names.
Masking the term with asterisks or other neat little tricks might get you around the bot, but if we see it, we're removing it and quite possibly giving you a time out. The intended word is still there and you deliberately tried to skate the rule.
As there is not enough space to list every term that is offensive and does not belong, nor every situation in which term or phrase may be allowable in context, this rule is enforced based on moderator discretion.

Seriously? You are the language police now?

We're here to talk about stepparenting. And we would like for that to happen in a respectful way. Attacking each other doesn't help. Belittling stepchildren draws in trolls who don't understand your frustration, all they see is an evil stepmonster talking shit on the internet about a poor, innocent baby. Yes, even if that "poor, innocent baby" just robbed you blind and set fire to the house on their way out the door. That's just how it goes.
We are aware that this is a relatively new rule and a lot of older posts and comments contain a lot of problematic language, including some from mods themselves. We are growing and evolving, and rules change as the sub grows and evolves.

What does No Drama really mean?

Pretty much what it says, do not bring drama from other subs into this sub. Do not engage in vote brigades. Do not try to incite other subscribers to riot in a different sub. Don't follow posters into this sub from other subs to continue to harass them. Do not badger someone or derail threads. Do not harass community members because you don't agree with them. There's enough drama in the daily lives of subscribers, more isn't needed.

What is thread derailment?

When a comment chain has devolved to the point where all you are doing is arguing back and forth with someone about the same thing over and over again, you have derailed the thread. Also known as bickering. It's what children do. We assume if people are in a stepparent role they are adults. We expect you to act like it.
If you aren't a stepparent, or in a stepparenting role, consider that perhaps this subreddit isn't for you. If you want to participate, do so with respect. Thread derailment, arguing, bickering, and nitpicking are not allowed.

But what if they didn't answer my question?

No one has to answer your questions. This is a support sub, not an inquisition. Jumping on a bandwagon with "OP is evading the question" in a 20 comment long chain is the epitome of thread derailment. You'll find more information about trolling below and how this might be considered such.

Why am I being silenced? I'm just asking for a back and forth!

Thread derailment, badgering, and nitpicking are considered harassment. Continued harassment of either community members or mods will get you banned.

Why can't I look at someone's post history and comment about it?

No mod in the history of this sub has ever once said post histories are forbidden. What we do frown upon is using someone's post history to attack, belittle, or otherwise harass someone.
Example Post: "My stepkid's mom really hates me. How can I make this better?"
- Okay: "Based on the timeline and your post history, it looks like this may have started as an affair. Unfortunately there's going to be outstanding issues for a long time due to that. Try focusing on yourself and how you can move forward without worrying about how someone else feels about you."
- Not Okay: "Holy shit! You were the OW! What the hell do you expect, homewrecker?!"
Example Post: "I am completely overloaded and feeling very down about myself."
- Okay: "In your post history you mentioned that your spouse wasn't really helping around the house. Has that changed at all?"
- Not Okay: "LOL, you already got the answers you need in your post on relationships. You are stupid for sticking with your lazy spouse."

Why can't we crosspost stuff to other subs?

We can't stop you from doing so. The problem isn't that something has been crossposted, it's when the community that it's been crossposted to feels the need to come over here and harass OP. When we see that happening, we lock the post and start passing out bans. If you did the crossposting, you'll be banned. If you participated in the brigading, you'll be banned.

What if it's my own post?

Again, we can't stop you from doing so. We prefer that you don't technically crosspost, but rather just copy and paste your post. Why? Because inevitably the above will happen. Redditors from other subs will follow you back to /stepparents and start attacking users here. It just happens.

What is "brigading"?

Reddit defines vote manipulation and brigading as follows:
Using multiple accounts, voting services, or any other software to increase or decrease vote scores.
Asking people to vote up or down certain posts, either on Reddit itself or through social networks, messaging, etc. for personal gain.
Forming or joining a group that votes together, either on a specific post, a user's posts, posts from a domain, etc.
We, along with pretty much every other subreddit that has ever had to deal with this nonsense, further define brigading as this: You saw a post on another sub that linked to our sub either via a link in a comment or a crosspost. It was basically saying something along the lines of "OMG, check out these assholes over on /stepparents! They literally hate all their stepkids!" And then you and your friends come over and start hammering on OP and telling OP how much they suck. Congrats, you have just participated in a brigade.

What is this whole Report, Don't Rant thing about?

If you see a post or comment that breaks the rules, instead of engaging, report it. When you report it, it sends notification to the mod team. We will act on it where appropriate. Engaging with bad faith users may result in your comments being removed. If you repeatedly do so, you may end up being banned.

What if I see an obvious troll?

Report it.

What if they are being really mean in comments?

Report it.

What if they are harassing me in private messages?

Step 1: Report them to admins. You can report harassment to reddit by using this link or send a DM to reddit admins. Include the link to the DM, admins can see your inbox and providing a direct link is helpful for them to weed out bad actors.
Step 2: Block the person so they cannot directly contact you again.
Step 3: Send us a mod mail and let the mod team know. Tell us who they are and what they said, send us a screenshot if you can - admins can see your DMs, mods can't. We'll take action where necessary by banning from the sub if they aren't already banned.

What do you mean by No Naming & Shaming?

Just as we prefer to not be linked to or crossposted from, we do not allow linking to or calling out other subs by name. If you see something you want to share, say it's a hot post that has hit the front page and a stepparent is being absolutely flayed, just refer to it as "that hot post that hit the front page." If you want to complain about other places in general, "other parenting/advice/judgement subs" will suffice. Absolutely under no circumstances should you link to anywhere else.

I can't link to other subs?

Do not directly link to another sub. (e.g.: "/insertsubnamehere is ridiculously hostile to stepparents!")
Do not name other subs. (e.g.: "I won't link to it directly, but insertsubnamehere is ridiculously hostile to stepparents!")
Do not abbreviate other subs. (e.g.: "I know that ISNH is ridiculously hostile to stepparents!")

I can't ping other users?

Do not summon another user with a username ping/tag. (e.g.: "insertusernamehere was being an asshole.")
If you are agreeing with someone, it is okay to link to them. (e.g.: "I agree with insertusernamehere, you need to take a couple of steps back and reflect on this.")

What does No Platitudes mean?

Sanctimonious, overused clichés that grossly oversimplify the stepparenting experience are neither wanted nor allowed here. We have all heard it a thousand times before, we don't need to hear it again. It's not nearly as insightful and wise as some would like to think.

Why don't you people understand it's a package deal?

Any comment that suggests that OP should have known what they were getting involved with, or that they needed to understand that the kids were part of some package they needed to accept before signing up for marriage is subject to immediate removal.
This is one of the most insensitive things you can say to a stepparent. Most stepparents were aware of the children, but they were probably not aware of all of the family dynamics.

Why can't you just love them like they are your own?

Demanding that a stranger you do not know love children that are not biologically theirs as if they were theirs can be incredibly damaging to someone who is already in a vulnerable situation. Any comment that falls along these lines will be removed.

What do you mean by No Trolling? I was just...

No means no. No trolling. No pretending to be a stepparent and then whipping out the Greatest Hits Bingo Card of The Worst Stepparent in the History of Stepparents. We see you. We've seen you a thousand times.

What does "concern trolling", "gish-galloping", and "sealioning" have to do with stepparenting? This isn't a debate sub, why are you using debate terms?

That's absolutely right, this isn't a debate sub. And yet, here we are, day after day, having to defend ourselves against this sort of thing. So, enough. No more. Usage of any of these things will get you banned.

What is "Concern Trolling?"

A concern troll is someone who disingenuously visits sites of an opposing ideology to disrupt conversation by offering unwanted advice on how to solve problems which do not really exist.
- Example Post: OP expresses concern that she will feel, and possibly act, differently towards her stepchildren after her husband decides that no, he doesn't want anymore children after all.
- Example Concern Troll pulled from actual mod mail after their comment was removed: "Possible child abuse claims need to be sorted out well before whatever empathy you believe the OP was looking for."

What is a "Devil's Advocate"?

"I'm just playing devil's advocate here, but have you considered that maybe BM is just really tired and needs a break, too?" BM has dozens of different mom based subs alone on reddit she can complain on, this sub is for stepparents. The stepparent doesn't need to consider that maybe BM is just really tired and needs a break.

"Gish-galloping?" What does that even mean?

The Gish Gallop is the fallacious debate tactic of drowning your opponent in a flood of individually-weak arguments in order to prevent rebuttal of the whole argument collection without great effort. The Gish Gallop is a conveyor belt-fed version of the on the spot fallacy, as it's unreasonable for anyone to have a well-composed answer immediately available to every argument present in the Gallop.

And "sealioning?" What's that?

Sealioning involves jumping into a conversation with endless polite, reasonable questions and demands for answers, usually of entry-level topics far below the actual conversation (e.g. "please prove sexism exists"). This tactic differs little from harassment; instead of discussion, the point is to derail discussion, receive criticism (for their ignorance) so as to look like a victim, or to make someone feel overwhelmed and quit talking.

Who gets to define what is considered asshattery?

The mod team, of course! If we feel that comments are out of line, are trolling, are leading up to a fight or "just asking questions", we are going to remove them and most likely ban the offender.

FAQ - Sub Questions

Posting Guidelines for Stepparents

Body text is required, we suggest you use line breaks between paragraphs as a wall of text is difficult to read. Posts that have only a title are likely to be removed. Instead of using names (even fictitious ones), try to use the sub acronyms. It helps our users to follow along if you use the acronyms and not names.
Assign a post flair that accurately describes what your post is about and what you are seeking. If you are posting an update from a previous post, include a link to that post.
Flairs are applied to posts to determine what a person is looking for. When submitting a new post, you should choose a flair that specifies if you are looking for advice, support, etc. The following link flair is available and is color coded with side bar links so that you can search by flair:
- Advice - For when you are specifically asking for advice or help.
- Announcement - Mod Use Only, for subreddit announcements.
- Daily (Formerly TTP) - Mod Use Only, for our daily discussion threads.
- Discussion - A little advice, a little "How does your family handle this?"
- JustBMThings - Pretty sure this is self explanatory!
- Legal - Asking for legal advice? Tag it with this!
- Miscellany - Just a sort of off topic thing? Use this tag.
- Resource - Sharing a good resource or asking for one? This is the tag you need!
- Support - For those days when you want nothing but a good old fashioned cry and some community love.
- Update - Updating us on something that you posted about previously? Use this one!
- Vent - We all need to vent sometimes. Respect the tag as a vent. This isn't how OP talks all day every day.
- Win! - Celebrate those wins with us with this tag!
- Megathread - Mod Use Only, for large mega threads (typically around major calendar events.)

Posting Guidelines for Bioparents

Stepparents is a support community for stepparents, by stepparents. As bioparents, you may want to have more insight into how the stepparent in your life feels or thinks. You may have questions on how to ease the transition for your partner. However, please keep in mind that this community was not created for you. It was created for your partner or your ex's partner. If you are seeking support on how to deal with a stepparent, there are other subs more suited for your situation and your post is subject to removal.
There are some posts from bioparents we will accept:
- Seeking advice on how to support your partner as they navigate stepparenting
- Seeking resources to help you better support your partner
- Seeking resources for your partner
There are some posts from bioparents we will not accept:
- Complaints about how the stepparent is too involved in your kids lives
- Vents about how the stepparent is not involved enough in your kids lives
- "Cautionary tales" advising stepparents to back off
- Seeking advice on how to tell the stepparent to back off
- The Do's and Dont's of Stepparenting
- How your kid's stepmom is literally The Worst
Comments from bioparents that are helpful and supportive are welcome and appreciated. Comments from bioparents that are not helpful or supportive are not welcome and subject to removal. There are several other subs that may meet the needs of bioparents better than we can. We recommend /coparenting, /parenting, /parents, /blendedfamilies, and /singleparents as starting points.

Guidelines for Stepkids

At this time, we do not generally accept posts from stepkids. Comments from stepkids that are helpful and supportive are welcome and appreciated. Comments from stepkids that are not helpful or supportive are not welcome and subject to removal. If you are a stepkid seeking support, we highly recommend /stepkids. It is a very supportive community specifically for stepkids. We also recommend /blendedfamilies as another potential group for support.

What the heck are all these acronyms? I'm confused!

Check out the Common Acronyms wiki page. We try to keep this updated as new terms are introduced to the sub.

Why aren't my posts or comments showing up?

New posters and accounts go through a waiting period before their posts will show in the sub and the comments on posts automatically. During the new account approval period the mod team will check posts to be sure you aren't attempting to circumvent a ban with a shiny new account. Please be patient while the timer runs down on your "new" status and the mod team approves your posts and responses.

Why was my comment removed?

Comments are removed when they do not follow the rules of the sub. These rules are published in several places for your reading pleasure.
Comments are removed at moderator discretion. In some cases your comment may be removed while another remains up. If you find this to be the case, and you believe the comment to be violating the rules, instead of arguing with mods or demanding they remove the additional comments, just report it.

This comment/post is really offensive! Why is it still up?

All moderators are volunteers and have busy real lives. Sometimes things get past us. The best thing you can do is report anything you find offensive or inflammatory. It's the quickest and most reliable way of alerting us to an issue.

I've received a hurtful/unwanted PM from someone about my recent post. What should I do?

If you receive an unwanted/hurtful PM from a name you don't recognize, please report it to Reddit Admins using our handy pre-populated form. Be sure to include the permalink to the message. We've been dealing with a few unhappy folks who like to attack stepparents, and reporting it to the admins is the only way to make it stop.

What are the general moderator guidelines?

Users are expected to know the rules before posting. If you are warned or banned for violating the rules, ignorance is not an excuse.
Moderators will remove posts and comments and/or lock threads in accordance with the rules above. Typically this happens when threads have gone off-topic in a way that is not productive for the OP, or comments overall have become contentious or disrespectful.
If a poster continues to argue or to willfully violate these rules, temporary and permanent ban procedures will be followed. Any attempts to avoid or bypass temporary bans will result in a permanent ban. User bans will not be discussed in the sub. Questions posted about user bans are subject to removal and the poster subject to warning/ban procedures. The mod team will not discuss a specific user ban with anyone other than the user involved.
New accounts are subject to manual approval until they are no longer deemed "new" by the mod team. This helps to weed out trolls and ban evaders.
We rely on Automoderator to scan for specific words and phrases that are not welcome here and notify the mod team to review the comment or post. This includes slurs of any type and platitudes such as "Love them as your own!"
The mod team uses a combination of blacklisting and banning when dealing with trolls.
We employ the use of a bot that automatically bans anyone who comments in subs that have historically harassed our users. If you are picked up by the bot for telling trolls to get fucked, reach out via mod mail and we'll get you sorted out.
The rules above as well as ban procedures are considered guidelines only; some deviation may be necessary on a case by case basis and/or at the mod team's discretion.

I've been wrongly banned/Why can't I comment here?

Due to an influx of harassment from users with specific user histories, we have employed a user history ban bot as described above. If you think this has affected you and wish to appeal, please message the mods.

Why was I banned without warning?

There are numerous reasons that the mod team might opt to move perm banning without warning. Message the moderators if you have specific questions.

submitted by AutoModerator to stepparents [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 11:17 No_Jackfruit8016 Bruh how do I do this

My teacher gave us this question and I copied it down (sori for bad handwriting) I don't even know where to start pls help

submitted by No_Jackfruit8016 to GCSE [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 10:18 Personal_Matter9041 Help! What should I do about writing speed?

So I'm preparing for 2025, started practicing some answers recently. My handwriting is what I've shared in the picture. This is when I'm writing at about 80% of my Max, but when I go beyond this my handwriting suffers. And at this rate in able to write about 150-180 words in around 10-11 minutes. I also have kinda smaller handwriting and I'm not still used to writing spaced lines like I've seen in a lot of answer copies.
So my question, how should I work towards improving my speed without further compromising on the readability and aesthetics?

submitted by Personal_Matter9041 to UPSC [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 08:32 Randi20 Is the surviving spouse required to submit the Will of their deceased spouse to probate court?

BACKGROUND INFO (feel free to skip ahead to the QUESTION in 3rd paragraph) : I am the only biological child of my father, who passed in Jan 2021; he was still married to my step-mother when he died. He told me he left some money in his Will for me, not as much as he would have liked to, because it caused a huge argument between him and his wife. He also said the Will stated he was leaving all of our old family pictures (most of my childhood photos) and family heirlooms to me, things that have no sentimental value for step-mother, but she has not cooperated to turn over any of this.
Step-mother has verified she has his Will, even read off some of the items promised to me over the phone. Then I found out my father had put together a special box of items for me, which she opened and described as "beautiful", and she told me there was a diamond ring my grandmother owned in that box. My grandmother was THE most special person in my life, and I cherish the things she gave to me growing up. I told step-mother I want that box, my father invested his time to make it special for me and it contains a connection to my grandmother, and I want the old family photos. I live 700 miles away and it's very difficult to travel due to health issues, so I offered to pay to ship these items to me, but makes excuses not to do so.
QUESTION: I haven't been able to get a copy of the Will from step-mother, I know she has it. I have periodically checked to see if I could find his Will online, in their state of Minnesota, but there are no probate records for my father and it's been over 3 years since he died. Isn't there a requirement to submit the Will of the deceased person to be filed on record, even if it's determined that probate isn't required?

submitted by Randi20 to EstatePlanning [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 06:03 Accomplished-House28 Commercials and Copyright: Clearing Up the Controversy

There have been a number of posts lately asserting that characters from TV commercials before 1989 are in the public domain due to a missing copyright notice.
This is not correct. Notice is not a reliable indicator in this case.
The real story is found in the Code of Federal Regulations, at 37 C.F.R. 201.20(h)(2):
"In the case of an untitled motion picture or other audiovisual work whose duration is sixty seconds or less, in addition to any of the locations listed in paragraph (h)(1) of this section, a notice that is embodied in the copies by a photomechanical or electronic process, in such a position that it ordinarily would appear to the projectionist or broadcaster when preparing the work for performance, is acceptable if it is located on the leader of the film or tape immediately preceding the beginning of the work."
In other words, the notice only needs to be visible to the broadcaster, not the general public.
This myth is busted.

submitted by Accomplished-House28 to publicdomain [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 02:04 not_a_robot_teehee Which Sisyphean tasks are worth it?

I'm finishing up my first year. I didn't try to be the friendly doormat type of teacher--it just sort of happened. And I really try to look at my students in the best possible light, I try to be stoic about things, and I tried really, really hard to make my classes almost impossible to fail (alas). I greet every student with good morning and good afternoon. I say the same things every day every five minutes. I nag and remind and wax poetic about how one must crawl before they walk and walk before they run. I remind people to keep their feet on the floor. I talk to students about their gambling (phone) addictions, using the DSM-5 criteria. I blocked Google on GoGuardian. I talk about how the human brain is a quintillion times faster than punching out-of-context questions into Google or ChatGPT or whatever. I ask people to put their phones away and somehow they text their friends the pencil and paper assignments anyway and I get duplicate answers from the quietly failing friends who have my classes at different times throughout the day. I get Snapchat AI a lot on anything that involves chromebooks, or anything that uses logical cognitive processes. I ran out of copy machine money. I made four versions of the upcoming final exam and printed them at the public library (I ran out of copy machine money).
So--what's worth fighting for? Cell phones? In-class discussion? Drafts and revision? Cold calling? Reading aloud?
For cellphones: My department is mostly brand new, with a couple of burnt out veterans. One idea everyone is floating is collecting cell phones at the beginning of every class. I'm not sure about it, but right now reified as a sliced-bread solution.
For in-class discussion: One idea that might actually be worth it for me is to make porpsicle storcks (tongue depressors) and enforce participation. I figured, because I was new, that people simply enjoyed silence (and darkness) in the classroom. I've discovered, though, that I had to do a zillion little things every day because I excised discussion from my slate of options.
Because High School is not college, I'm okay with making participation part of the grade next year. I little birdie told me that only work ought to be graded, but there's no other place on Earth where people can finish their work and then just sit there for 40 minutes waiting for a bell to ring. Colleges don't do it. Workplaces don't do it. So I figure the environment dictates the activity, and participation needs to be graded, otherwise people are going to pretend that using their phone under their desk with their heads on the desk makes them invisible.
For drafts and revision: Early in the year I asked students to write a paragraph and I remember clearly a student saying "I ain't writing a goddamn fucking paragraph." And they didn't. So I made my classroom anti-reading and pro-stupid-videos-all-the-time. And students complained about watching 5-10 minute chunks of not-so-High-Quality-Instructional-Materials. I walked the class through EdPuzzles and asked open-ended questions, and I got the selected responses and blanks. I handed papers back and got blanks again. My content area is one where writing across the curriculum is more than a stupid idea--it could actually work in a school where people write goddamn fucking paragraphs.
For cold calling: I was informed that students of low SES/academic achievement would experience pants-shittingly-bad anxiety if I asked them a question. So I would ask the whole group a question and count to 270 slowly in my head. Then I would move on to the next thing. So next year, I'm going to have a lot of people with shit all up in their pants.
For reading aloud: I was informed that the majority of the students at the High School are aliterate and illiterate, and that asking them to read aloud is like duct taping their hands and feet together and throwing them in a kidnap van. So I read everything. But I think my informants were wrong about a lot of things.
Also: My school doesn't have a phone policy. It's up to me to put on an iron coat and run my own gauntlets. I think they want to wait 5-10 years for national momentum to build. Maybe it won't. Maybe it will.
So, all that to say: Which battles do you fight? Do you win? If not, is it worth it for you to be Sisyphus, and where in the 180 or so days does it pay off for you.
Thanks for noticing me.

submitted by not_a_robot_teehee to Teachers [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 01:00 DependentAnxious3251 mediocre PI lor??

My PI (I work as a CRC full time in clinical medicine) submitted my lor to interfolio and she sent me a copy of the letter afterward, as a confirmation that she finished..
I’m so afraid that this letter will be seen as mediocre! Spent more than half the letter talking about the role and “how hard it is to get.” Then just listed (1 small paragraph) that I’m involved in every aspect of the research, have submitted some pubs + abstracts. Mentioned I went to a conference. Then.. that’s basically it.
She did state at the end that I’m (in general, in the context of me as a working professional, not specifically regarding research) proactive, open to feedback and good at applying it (she literally wrote “never makes the same mistake again” ??). She wrote I communicate professionally.
But like she mentioned nothing about my aptitude for research, didn’t expand on all the research I do— didn’t even mention I’m leading a project like a supervisory role with my own “students.” It read more like what kind of employee I am than what kind of researcher I am. Will this be a red flag for a research letter?? Especially considering I was planning on making this activity an MME and expanding on this all?
I’m starting to reconsider using this letter but it’s also from my gap year job :/ or am I overthinking it and it’s a good enough letter? Please help :(

submitted by DependentAnxious3251 to premed [link] [comments]

2024.05.19 00:10 TheIndulgery Using ChatGPT as a novel writing aid

I'm currently writing a fantasy / litPRG novel and have been using ChatGPT in creative ways to help with it. I had some requests on how so instead of replying to everyone individually I figured I'd make a post! I will include screenshots so expect this post to be long! Also, it's from my actual book so please don't steal my shit. lol
I'll break it up into 5 sections:

Standard editing help
Character and creature sheets
The cool stuff
A ChatGPT summary of the types of prompts I've used so far
A recommendation by ChatGPT on how authors can get the most use out of it

A few notes to start:

I'm currently using the paid version of 4o. I paid for 4 because I use it a TON for work and the ability to upload screenshots is a huge help. Turns out it's great for doing screenshots of formatting, character sheets, etc for writing too. I originally started with 3.5 and just kept migrating the story to newer versions as they came out. Other than query limits I haven't noticed any difference in quality.
I do NOT have it write any parts of the story for me. As an experiment I had it try to write a fight scene and kept adjusting the prompts but it just always came out shit. It's really not good at writing wholesale.
After every chapter I copy and paste it into the same conversation so that it keeps a running log of the story.
It's terrible at emotional interactions and dialogue. It tries to make everything hopeful and goes with the most generic, Hallmark Card type of interaction
It's also bad at giving suggestions or ideas for long scenes. It wants to resolve everything in a few paragraphs so it'll go from 2 people fighting to reaching a deeper understanding and being fully great with each other in like 2 paragraphs

Keep in mind that although it's great as a reviewer, editor, and something to bounce ideas off of, it can only provide suggestions. The hard work of writing has to be done by you. I spend about 2 hours a night and at least 4 hours a day on weekends writing and maybe 10 minutes a day in ChatGPT. Much like spell or grammar checkers, it's a useful tool but no substitute for doing the work
Editing and grammar:
This is pretty straightforward. I'll copy and paste sections and ask it to fix the grammar, bolding any changes it makes and striking out any words it removes so I can review the changes. The only issue I've had with this is that if I try to post an entire chapter it'll sometimes pause in its review and ask if I want to continue. Sometimes when it does that it loses sentences or even a paragraph where it broke. Now I just do smaller chunks. It'll explain why it made the changes too, so it's improving my grammar as I go.
Character and creature help:
This is also pretty straightforward. I already have my main characters written up and I know which ones are coming later, but sometimes I want mooks or neighbors, and other times I need creatures. I'll ask it for more than I need and pick the best ones. Some of the prompts:
"Create 5 creatures that you'd find in Wisconsin. There should be a day version and a night version, the night version being tougher and having more attacks. For each come up with 3 offensive and 3 defensive powers. Also describe them in the format of a character description in a D&D style monster manual."
https://preview.redd.it/n2e5pfx9691d1.png?width=825&format=png&auto=webp&s=41abb9ae9a8c984ea1837b0a3b292885822b1e5e
"Based off the fight scene I just described and the attached screenshot of the person's character sheet, come up with 5 attacks, skills, or magical abilities that person could develop. They should reflect that person's personality, character sheet, and fighting style."
https://preview.redd.it/05t0977p691d1.png?width=572&format=png&auto=webp&s=35a55418b0ce7230225ac79e632632f4aac43f6a
https://preview.redd.it/kio2yals691d1.png?width=592&format=png&auto=webp&s=443d537f20d4c8956441214ea38ecd1e2af651bb
Mooks:
https://preview.redd.it/9dxzjn85791d1.png?width=606&format=png&auto=webp&s=11ca003c702f77d5ea27e55abbb6a20f7573d409
https://preview.redd.it/kvudyz97791d1.png?width=603&format=png&auto=webp&s=7fd6ee23d5719a0f73abf6b65b694c5523f6223f
The cool stuff: This is where it really shines and has helped me avoid a lot of pitfalls that I notice when I'm reading other authors' books:
"Review the story and look for any words that I reuse a lot. Ignore standard ones like 'and, they, him, etc'"
All authors have their favorite words that get repeated way too often. I'll find them and suggest alternate descriptions. It goes beyond just providing new words.
"I want to avoid repetitive descriptions. Please review the story and identify any times I've repeated descriptions, turns of phrase, etc. Categorize them into "fight scenes", "Emotional scenes", and "area/scene descriptions"
This has been a power prompt for me. We tend to describe things a certain way and it identifies areas where changes can be made to make it more dynamic and varied.
https://preview.redd.it/n0s3w4l2891d1.png?width=787&format=png&auto=webp&s=6f8bbb75a01216bbef6b4792740154a1ea4f40ef
https://preview.redd.it/zy9jj32a891d1.png?width=755&format=png&auto=webp&s=b6a3ee793ee610a96416268ae407aab70c6d3785
"Please review the story for any inconsistencies. I'm specifically looking for ways I've described the system or world as working that I later contradict."
I've had mixed results with this one but overall it works really well.
It's also useful for all those items that you forget, especially if they enhance someone and they're supposed to be using a skill or ability from it:
https://preview.redd.it/wz4gn43v891d1.png?width=662&format=png&auto=webp&s=b278e32bd76464dfa09395115d8bb401a759d789
I also use it to bounce ideas off of. Sometimes the ideas are generic but often it comes up with ideas that I hadn't thought of. I don't like it decide the plot or directions, but it's like chatting with an editor or reviewer and the two of you bouncing ideas off each other. I'll reply to its posts with things like "I like number 3 but it's coming too early. What if we had them go to place X instead of that, saving that for later?" Character [xx] is going to have these skills and plot points in the future. Knowing that, please tailor all skill and plot suggestions with the idea of driving towards that narrative in a balanced, natural manner. None of the ideas should feel forced and they should all happen naturally as the story progresses. As I paste new chapters please incorporate the changes into that long term progression and adapt as required.
"I think I want character B to starting feeling like they're not contributing but I'm having trouble thinking of ways to express that naturally. I don't want it to feel forced. What are some situations they could end up in that'd highlight that? Who could they fight with?"
"I feel like character A is getting too complacent and it outpacing the other people, but they've become the lynchpin of the fights. I plan on introducing XX situation and it'll make them weak in XX area. I'm going to post a few paragraphs with that, tell me if it rings true with the character growth I've been using for the rest of the story."
"I'm going to paste the first half of a fight that the characters are in but I'm realizing I don't have any ideas for how they'll win. What are some ideas based off the creature's character sheet you posted earlier?"
And I asked ChatGPT to make a summarized list of the types of requests I've asked of it. Here's what it came up with:

Sure! Here's a summary list of the different types of requests you've made for help with plot, development, and ideas:
Character Development and Backstory
Character Sheets: "Review this detailed character sheet and suggest any improvements or additional details to enhance the character's depth and complexity."
Skills and Abilities: "Analyze this new skill for Zavier and provide feedback on how well it fits with his Opportunist class and how it could be further refined."
Unique Items: "Evaluate this rare weapon designed for Tess and suggest any changes or enhancements to make it more unique and impactful."
Emotional Growth: "Read through this scene where Cass confronts his fears and self-doubt during a battle. Provide feedback on how to enhance his emotional growth and make it more compelling."

Plot Development

Story Arcs: "Review this key story arc that introduces a major conflict between Tess and Zavier. Suggest any improvements or additional elements to make the conflict more engaging."
Combat Scenes: "Analyze this combat scene where Luna and Cass fight a pack of mutated wolves. Provide feedback on how to make the scene more dynamic and showcase their growth and new skills."
Plot Twists: "Suggest a surprise plot twist that could be integrated into this battle scene to challenge the characters and force them to adapt quickly."
Character Conflict: "Evaluate this scene where Tess and Zavier have a heated argument about their training methods. Provide feedback on how to enhance the tension and emotional impact."

Scene and Setting Descriptions

Sensory Details: "Enhance this description of a forest setting by incorporating more sensory details. Suggest specific sounds, smells, and tactile elements that could be added."
Creature Descriptions: "Review this description of a new creature the family encounters. Suggest ways to make the creature more terrifying and unique."
Action Scenes: "Read through this action scene where Tess takes on a giant mutated bear. Provide feedback on how to make the scene more thrilling and showcase her skills more effectively."

Dialogue and Internal Monologue

Character Dialogues: "Review this conversation between Zavier and Tess where they discuss their fears and hopes. Suggest ways to make the dialogue more natural and emotionally resonant."
Internal Monologue: "Analyze this internal monologue of Cass as he prepares for a solo battle. Provide feedback on how to make his thoughts more vivid and revealing."
Emotional Depth: "Evaluate this scene where Luna comforts Cass after a failed mission. Suggest ways to enhance the emotional depth and strengthen their sibling bond."

Item and Skill Creation

Loot Items: "Review these unique items dropped by the Ironhide Boar. Suggest any changes to their descriptions, stats, and effects to make them more interesting and balanced."
Weapon Effects: "Evaluate this new special ability for Zavier's chain weapon. Provide feedback on how to make it more versatile and impactful in combat."
Skill Development: "Suggest a skill progression path for Luna that focuses on her luck-based fighting style. Provide ideas for potential skill upgrades and their effects."

Theme and Tone

Maintaining Tone: "Ensure that the tone of this new scene remains consistent with the rest of the story. Provide feedback on balancing dark moments with hopeful ones."
Descriptive Variety: "Review this repetitive description of a battle scene and suggest ways to make it more engaging and varied, using dynamic verbs and sensory details."
Balancing Emotions: "Evaluate this scene that balances intense action with emotional depth. Provide feedback on how to show the characters' vulnerabilities and strengths more effectively."

Feedback and Revisions

Improving Flow: "Review this written scene and suggest improvements for better flow and engagement. Identify any areas where the narrative could be more fluid."
Avoiding Repetition: "Identify any repetitive language in this chapter and provide alternatives to keep the narrative fresh and interesting."
Constructive Feedback: "Provide feedback on the latest plot progression and character development. Suggest ways to enhance the story's impact and make the characters more compelling."
These prompts should guide you in requesting specific feedback, edits, and suggestions for your writing.

And finally, I asked ChatGPT what kinds of prompts to use to make the most of its ability to help writers:

To make the most of my abilities as an AI assistant, authors should use prompts that focus on detailed feedback, specific suggestions for improvements, and brainstorming new ideas. Here are some examples of effective prompts that can help authors maximize the benefits of using my assistance:
Character Development and Backstory
Character Sheets: "Review this detailed character sheet and suggest any improvements or additional details to enhance the character's depth and complexity."
Skills and Abilities: "Analyze this new skill for [Character Name] and provide feedback on how well it fits with their class and personality. Suggest any enhancements or refinements."
Emotional Growth: "Read through this scene where [Character Name] experiences significant emotional growth. Provide feedback on how to make the growth more compelling and realistic."

Plot Development

Story Arcs: "Review this key story arc and suggest any improvements or additional elements to make the conflict more engaging and impactful."
Combat Scenes: "Analyze this combat scene and provide feedback on how to make it more dynamic and showcase the characters' growth and new skills."
Plot Twists: "Suggest a surprise plot twist for this scene that will challenge the characters and force them to adapt quickly."

Scene and Setting Descriptions

Sensory Details: "Enhance this description of a [setting] by incorporating more sensory details. Suggest specific sounds, smells, and tactile elements that could be added."
Creature Descriptions: "Review this description of a new creature the characters encounter. Suggest ways to make the creature more terrifying and unique."
Action Scenes: "Read through this action scene and provide feedback on how to make it more thrilling and showcase the characters' skills more effectively."

Dialogue and Internal Monologue

Character Dialogues: "Review this conversation between [Character A] and [Character B] and suggest ways to make the dialogue more natural and emotionally resonant."
Internal Monologue: "Analyze this internal monologue of [Character Name] and provide feedback on how to make their thoughts more vivid and revealing."
Emotional Depth: "Evaluate this scene where [Character Name] comforts [another character]. Suggest ways to enhance the emotional depth and strengthen their relationship."

Item and Skill Creation

Loot Items: "Review these unique items dropped by [creature] and suggest any changes to their descriptions, stats, and effects to make them more interesting and balanced."
Weapon Effects: "Evaluate this new special ability for [Character Name]'s weapon and provide feedback on how to make it more versatile and impactful in combat."
Skill Development: "Suggest a skill progression path for [Character Name] that focuses on their [specific fighting style or ability]. Provide ideas for potential skill upgrades and their effects."

Theme and Tone

Maintaining Tone: "Ensure that the tone of this new scene remains consistent with the rest of the story. Provide feedback on balancing dark moments with hopeful ones."
Descriptive Variety: "Review this repetitive description of a battle scene and suggest ways to make it more engaging and varied, using dynamic verbs and sensory details."
Balancing Emotions: "Evaluate this scene that balances intense action with emotional depth. Provide feedback on how to show the characters' vulnerabilities and strengths more effectively."

Feedback and Revisions

Improving Flow: "Review this written scene and suggest improvements for better flow and engagement. Identify any areas where the narrative could be more fluid."
Avoiding Repetition: "Identify any repetitive language in this chapter and provide alternatives to keep the narrative fresh and interesting."
Constructive Feedback: "Provide feedback on the latest plot progression and character development. Suggest ways to enhance the story's impact and make the characters more compelling."
These prompts are designed to help authors get the most out of my abilities by focusing on specific aspects of their writing that can benefit from detailed feedback, suggestions for improvements, and creative brainstorming.

Hope this helps!

submitted by TheIndulgery to ChatGPT [link] [comments]

2024.05.18 23:30 AutoModerator Concrit Commune - May 18

Welcome to the Concrit Commune, where you can get bits of your fic looked at... for a small "price."
For the purposes of this thread, concrit is defined as - pointing out things that could use improvement and also giving suggestions on how to do so. Compliments are always welcome, of course.
The rules:

State your Fandom Title Rating Any Applicable Content Warnings Link - AO3, FFN, etc. at the top of the comment.
Post a few paragraphs (copy and paste to a comment, please) of your fic, or your plot premise, or your character bio, or your world building, whatever you need help with.
There is a soft limit of 500 words. Not your whole fic.
Please post an outside link to underage and extreme-explicit violence/rape content. Try Just Paste Me which includes rich text options.
If you, the author, are looking for something specific - the phrasing of a particular part or if a character's reaction is believable - please ask!
If you just want to hand out advice without throwing your own fic in, you're quite welcome to.
If you post part of your fic you must give concrit to someone else in the thread!

Since we're all here to give and receive help from other people, a certain level of respect for the author and the work they've put into their fic is expected as a baseline courtesy and should be reciprocated.
Tearing into a fic or author without regard for their effort isn't constructive even if there is decent criticism attached. Moreover, it discourages people from participating if they know that insults await them.
You aren't expected to treat this thread like the Comment Cooperative, advice and honesty and pointing out flaws is what we're here for.
Some helpful tips to keep things running smoothly:

Keep your comments helpful to the author, not just smashing out your opinion.
Be polite and civil.
Be kind. At a minimum, showing your peers professional courtesy is expected.
Phrases like "I think" or "I believe" can lighten your tone.
Elaborating on why you think something could be changed is not only more useful to the author but keeps statements from being abrupt.

Timezone Changes
From the first posts of 2022, we ran a long trial where we shifted the timezone of the Comment Cooperative and Concrit Commune threads approximately every month. The trial was proposed due to feedback that some people consistently miss the influx of comments due to the timing of the thread, and a changing time would give everyone an opportunity to be in the first period of the thread and also might help with picking up some new subreddit members who want to participate.
At the end of the trial, we sought feedback on the changing times, which times were preferred and at which people were able to participate more. While found that most people wanted the timezone changes to continue and also received feedback on what didn’t work as well. Most of this was regarding inconsistencies in the number of weeks and the communication of when changes would occur.
The last time we changed the times, it caused a lot of confusion. To avoid that happening again, we have updated the post to include the schedule of these changes and automated the scheduled changes. As you can see, the post time will shift by 6 hours every month. For at least the first 4 months, the new time will be stickied for the first week and if that works well, we should be able to continue that. If there are any inconsistencies in the times, please let us know in modmail so we can fix it up!

Months	PST	EDT	GMT	CEST	JST	AEST	NZT
February, June, October	Saturday: 8:30am	Saturday: 11:30am	Saturday: 3:30pm	Saturday: 5:30pm	Sunday: 12:30am	Sunday: 1:30am	Sunday: 3:30am
March, July, November	Saturday: 2:30am	Saturday: 5:30am	Saturday: 9:30am	Saturday: 11:30am	Saturday: 6:30pm	Saturday: 7:30pm	Saturday: 9:30pm
April, August, December	Friday: 8:30pm	Friday: 11:30pm	Saturday: 3:30am	Saturday: 5:30am	Saturday: 12:30pm	Saturday: 1:30pm	Saturday: 3:30pm
May, January, September	Saturday: 2:30pm	Saturday: 5:30pm	Saturday: 9:30pm	Saturday: 11:30pm	Sunday: 6:30am	Sunday: 7:30am	Sunday: 9:30am

Please note that there may be a difference of an hour during parts of the year due to daylight savings in various timezones.

submitted by AutoModerator to FanFiction [link] [comments]

2024.05.18 20:05 Hereibe Post Mortem Breakdown Of the Lore.Fm Debacle

People Involved

TikTok user unravel.me.now, face of Lore.fm and sole person appearing in all the official TikToks
WishRoll, the company behind Lore.fm that has previously made an AI-story-generating app, and was on Forbes 30 Under 30 for their music-sharing app Kiwi

Timeline

May 6 24 TikTok user unravel.me.now posted a TikTok titled "pov: you built a personal app for yourself that turns any ao3 fic into an audiobook but your mom is asking you what you're listening to when you're washing the dishes (it's a 90k word gojo x reader angsty slowburn).
From May 6 - May 16 the account continues to upload videos where the app allegedly goes from a personal project to a fully completed app called Lore.fm calling for Betas and eventually fully launching on May 16 2024 posting invite links & puzzle videos to guess the invite code of the day to generate buzz. The videos with the invite code puzzles have since been deleted since the screenshot below.
Throughout May 6 - May 18 (the time of posting for this write up) any negative comments or comments that expressed concerns were deleted by unravel.me.now. Any comments that contained polite questions deemed too difficult to answer were also deleted.
People with experience in creating and launching an app noticed that it is highly unlikely this was a simple personal project considering how fast it got everything together for launch. Later people began to research the creators of this app, but at this time any comments expressing suspicion this was a simple personal project striking lightning were deleted.
Each video marketed the app as "Audible for Ao3". Unlike Audible, which uses voice actors and gains full rights and permission from authors, Lore.fm used AI generated voices (created with voice actors who consented to their voices being used for AI) and did not ask for any permission.
The way the app was intended to work according to the Apple Store was that users could add any link they wanted and the app would generate an audiobook with the voice they selected. This data would be stored both locally and on Lore.fm's servers.
On TikTok, unravel.me.now was saying that eventually the app would have even more capabilities. Eventually the app developers wanted a "Spotify Wrapped" experience. They wanted a top charts list with most listened to fics on the platform.
In Lore.fm's TOS it explicitly bans using the app to circulate and disseminate various things like scams, solicitations, etc. This implies the app was always intended NOT to be only a personal library.
May 16 2024 officially launches in the Apple Store and the Google Play Store. It uses Archive of Our Own's urls in it's demo pictures. According to the opening paragraphs of the TOS there was no data scraping for AI learning nor was there any third party selling of data. According to Privacy Policy they work with third-party partners and services to obtain data about their users.
May 16 2024 The Privacy Policy on lore.fm confirmed that despite conflicting comments by unravel.me.now on TikTok, the app WOULD store a copy on the users device and on lore.fm's servers. Their policies stated that it was the users granting them permission, despite knowing for a fact their users would not be uploading material with a clear copyright in their name. "Information submitted to lore.fm will be transferred to, processed, and stored in the United States. When you use the Software on your computing device, User Content you save will be stored locally on that device and synced with our servers. If you post or transfer any Information to or through our App, Software, and/or Services, you are agreeing to such Information, including Personal Data and User Content, being hosted and accessed in the United States."
May 16 2024 u/totallymandy posts a reddit thread titled "Audible for Ao3 :/" which brings attention to this app from people who do not use TikTok.
Redditors find one of the rare times unravel.me.now answers a question, confirming that lore.fm cannot access locked fanfiction (fanfiction on Archive of Our Own that has been set to be viewable only by people who are logged into an AO3 account). See screenshot section below.
This quickly spirals into multiple threads all over Ao3, Tumblr, and Twitter. There were posts on Tumblr prior to this one, but the post that ended up traveling wildly through Tumblr was posted by creativitycache on May 16th
May 16-17 Authors begin massively flooding into the [team@lore.fm](mailto:team@lore.fm) email inbox to Opt Out. The team is unprepared for this, and begins responding with wildly unprofessional and guilt tripping responses. Eventually as the flood continued the responses became standardized. Ex 1, Ex 2, Ex 3
May 17 It became clear the lore.fm team is monitoring both Tumblr and Reddit, as they are linking directly to reddit threads in their replies and are addressing Tumblr posts in response to private dms. rivkae-winters on Tumblr got some of the first replies showing they were actively reading threads on other websites. It was just as unprofessional as you'd expect.
May 16 Users became aware that previously the team that worked on lore.fm produced a story-generating AI app that has gotten terrible reviews. This deepens the distrust that data uploaded to Lore.fm will not be later used for furthering AI stories, despite the current TOS. Redditors, Tumblrites, and whatever Twitter users call themselves now all began to speculate just how the app was planning on running. Where were they getting the funds? Where were funds projected to come from in the future?
May 17 A TikTok is posted by unravel.me.now stating they are pausing release of Lore.fm. This TikTok does NOT state they are shutting down entirely, but that they are considering it and are opening a discussion. They continue to delete any critical comments on their TikToks. Other users pointed out that this TikTok contains language accusing any detractors of ableism, not mentioning the main reasons people are upset/not actually addressing the concerns people have, calling other screen readers poor products, and using auto-generated captions that were not edited and have multiple errors in them despite touting themselves as an accessibility company.
May 18 lore.fm is finally pulled from the app stores. The main website remains online, as does their TikTok account.

Problems With The App

Copyright laws are a nightmare, and I'm not touching the legalese breakdown here. Just in general, that. AO3 doesn't have an official app for deliberate reasons, due to the app store's policies.
Using AO3 as a content-generator for an app. If it were a screen reader, or one of the other various apps that read things in a pleasant voice for accessibility reasons, there would be no problem. But this was a separate app that did not link back to AO3 or allow its users to give AO3 writers any interaction/feedback. This app essentially billed itself as a way to package free fan work provided to AO3 as content it controlled.
Suspicion of intent. How were the developers going to recoup their costs? Why wasn't the data encrypted? Why were they marketing this as specifically for AO3 instead of a general accessibility tool? Why were they not addressing any concerns brought to them before or after launch? Why were they marketing this as a small personal project that implied it was a fan-created app, instead of putting their company name big and bold on it? What were their intentions regarding their other story AI app?
Opt Out/Consent Since this app was in a legal quagmire, clearly not designed primarily as an accessibility tool, and was hiding all criticism, authors did not feel comfortable with their work being used for this app. They were especially furious that they had to reach out to the lore.fm team and ask to be taken off- they had nothing to do with this project and yet were being told it was their responsibility to refuse instead of lore.fm's responsibility to ask. Authors were also upset on behalf of all the works marked Anonymous, Orphaned Worked, works where the Author's didn't have a way of even hearing about this app's existence, and deceased Authors who never could have predicted an app like this.

Let me know if I missed anything!

Screenshots

https://preview.redd.it/ih6hlzjw081d1.png?width=2268&format=png&auto=webp&s=0292f5a62a756299f49580b72a20804ed2590de6
https://preview.redd.it/ngwoiwo8y71d1.png?width=829&format=png&auto=webp&s=de40598b9d3320013d6582b834ec6d212b4a066c
https://preview.redd.it/pbhgg0rnz71d1.png?width=1079&format=png&auto=webp&s=086effc0fe50654bdf54a09dcf485d5d9cf4538e
https://preview.redd.it/dqvu2wtq081d1.png?width=828&format=png&auto=webp&s=0860068738176c6b4284f8ad018b2f4aceedccb3

submitted by Hereibe to Lore_Fm [link] [comments]

2024.05.18 18:52 Prevatteism Ron DeSantis Signs Bill Weakening Climate Regulations, Expanding Fossil Fuel Use

https://truthout.org/articles/ron-desantis-signs-bill-weakening-climate-regulations-expanding-fossil-fuel-use/
The article is here, but below I copy and pasted the first couple paragraphs elaborating on the legislation.
“Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis signed legislation on Wednesday that will weaken climate regulations and expand fossil fuel use in the state, even as Floridians experience the increasingly devastating effects of global warming.”
“Although Florida Republicans passed several regulations in 2008 to mitigate the effects of the climate crisis, they have since dismantled those regulations piece by piece.”
“The legislation signed by DeSantis this week expands the use of natural gas, limits regulations on gas-based appliances, and reduces regulations on gas pipelines in the state. It also eliminates requirements for government agencies to hold meetings in hotels across the state to discuss the effects of the climate crisis, and ends requirements that those agencies consider climate-friendly products when making necessary purchases, like fuel-efficient vehicles.”
“The legislation goes into effect on July 1. While it will not affect the growth of solar power in Florida, it does limit other renewable energy sources in the state, including the “construction, operation, or expansion of certain wind energy facilities & wind turbines.”
Overall, I think it’s obvious I don’t think this is a good move to make (I live in Florida) especially when it’s May, we’re already experiencing upper 90’s, soon to be over a 100, terrible humidity, and 2024 has already been said to be on track to breaking heat records. Hundreds of people die every year due to the extreme heat, but evidently maximizing profits for the Fossil Fuel Industry is more important to DeSantis, rather than protecting the well being of the people he’s supposed to be representing.

submitted by Prevatteism to PoliticalDebate [link] [comments]

2024.05.18 17:28 Corvocard How can i format this:

I copied a text that came without the "merge formatting" option.
Now there are several spaces between the lines and I want to know if I can solve this using some command.
Sentences in the same paragraph are separated for some reason.

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2024.05.18 16:52 Unknown_Pleasur No way to report Plagiarism

Someone at a large multinational corporation copy-pasted an entire paragraph from a news article as a post under her name. When I went to report this plagiarism, I discovered Linkedin does not allow this. This is very convenient for the Narrative Machine, of course. And it reveals Daniel Roth's cynical depravity.

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2024.05.18 15:26 ewk Zen Master Buddha and the 5 Reciprocities

First of all https://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/filial-sutra.htm, the memes...

At that time, upon hearing the Buddha speak about the virtue of parents' kindness, everyone in the Great Assembly wept sorrowfully and addressed the Tathagata, "On this day, how can we repay the deep kindness of our parents?"

I can hear Seth Meyers doing his Ttump impression, "The Great Assembly came up to me, a big Great Assembly, a strong Great Assembly, tears streaming down it's faces..."

If one can print one copy, then one will get to see one Buddha. If one can print ten copies, then one will get to see ten Buddhas. If one can print one hundred copies, then one will get to see one hundred Buddhas.

This is like an old 90's email chain, right? If you HAND COPY it you get one hundred Buddhas? WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? Who has handwriting that good? And who is going to feed those Buddhas and bail them out of jail when they get picked up for disturbing the peace?
Anyway, onto the post.

Filial Piety now acknowledged as "early Buddhist"

Filial piety was practiced by the early Indian Buddhists (1) as a way of requiting for the debt to one’s parents, (2) as a chief ethical good action, and (3) as Dharma

This is a big deal because modern Buddhist scholarship is emerging from a "dark ages" of the 20the century, where too much was decided based on too little evidence. Specifically, Mahayana was considered "mostly chinese" which led to claims about filial piety not being Indian in origin, which has now been debunked. So lots of debunking. Pretty much anything written in the 20th century has to be reexamined.

Filial Piety in Zen

If the lineage is the "parent" then some of these Zen references will make more sense:
A. Requiting for the debt to Zen Master Buddha and the lineage.
B. "In the context of the historical lineage" as an ethical requirement (study, dharma interviewing the past)
C. As the Law, that is, you acknowledge your lineage as part of a co-existence with that lineage, and the laws emerging from that coexistence.

examples (you thought it had already got weird)

Someone asked, "Filial devotion - what is it?" Zhaozhou said, "Your mother is ugly."
A monk asked Caoshan, "How is it when the mourning clothes are not worn?" Caoshan said, "Today Caoshan's filial duty is fulfilled." The monk said, "How about after fulfillment of filial duty?" Caoshan said, "Caoshan likes to get falling-down drunk."
[Before his enlightenment, Dongshan asked] Yün-chü, "An icchantika is someone who commits the five heinous sins. How can such a one be filial?" "Only in so doing does he become filial," replied Yün-chü.
Master Langya Jiao said, Propositions of being and nonbeing are like vines clinging to a tree. When the tree falls the vines wither, a fine pile of rotten firewood. Dahui remarked, "Langya very much appears to be mistaking a thief for his son, but even so it's hard to requite such a huge favor."

.

Welcome! ewk comment: Since Zen came before Buddhism, we have this whole problem of trying to define Zen usage of altered Buddhist terms. Rather than assume Buddhism came first, assuming Zen came first (in accord with Zen teachings) we have to realign what we think in order to understand what Zen masters meant to their own audience.

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2024.05.18 11:55 ExpressPineapple5486 My Asian Mom said she never loved me

I was raised by my grandparents up until I was 15 years old when they passed. My parents were always working, my mom especially went out of town a lot when I was a kid, sometimes she’d go for 2 weeks, and rarely she’d call me first. She never cook, we never had a traditional family dinner together at home.
I didn’t do well in school in my teenager years and was feeling su*cidal. My parents always see me as a troubled child despite being quiet and shy. Instead of helping me study herself, my mom sent me to this lady’s house, where she watches kids study everyday after school until 9-10pm in the evening. The method? We had to memorize one paragraph at a time from a text book and copy them by hand pages by pages. If you get sleepy, you have to do it while standing up for hours. You can’t talk to other kids, and you eat your dinner while memorizing and writing, no breaks until your family picks you up. Sometimes you go on Saturdays too. Pretty sure it was a scam because she doesn’t teach us anything, just yell if we do something bad. And they always wonder why I don’t have friends.
Fast forward recently, I just turned 30 and married, she keeps pressuring me to have a child, but I told her I’m not ready or even sure that I want to bring a child into this world, and she said she’ll take care of the child, and I told her, you were never there for me, and somehow we got to a conversation about her first and only grandchild from my sibling. She told me thank god she came out very pretty, but even then I don’t feel attached to her. And she continued to tell me, “even with you and your sibling I never really felt anything at all.“
Funny enough, her statement suppose to hurt me but I just felt numb. It was more of a confirmation than hurtful comment. And get this, she expects that her kids to just care for her, like invite her to trips, give her flowers on mothers day or birthdays, anything that she can show off to her friends without actually putting in the work of being a mom.
This is just a fraction of it btw and thanks to her I will always think I’m unlovable, couldn’t even get love from my own mom lol She also once told me that I bring badluck into the family and I’ll remember that forever.

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