#EDIT this won more notes than i suspected it would Wow

[flavescentskies]

Khonshu assumes a bigger size, and appears taller next to Marc and Steven; he's physically overbearing, because that's what he needs to keep Marc and Steven in line as Moon Knight.

However, he had a near ordinary human height, fits-in-car size, appearing next to Jake; maybe a finger or two taller, but that's probably about it. He's of equal standing with Jake, a "friend": the little difference in height is demonstrative of the little sway he has over Jake as a boss.

#khonshu #intrusive thoughts #moon knight #marvel #moon knight series #marvel moon knight #marc spector #jake lockley #steven grant #khonshu x jake #maybe? #i need to vent but i have no company #EDIT this won more notes than i suspected it would Wow #thank you ig?

[isfjmel-phleg]

January 2022 Books

This year’s goal is 250 books again, including rereads.

The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate

This was a gift from a friend, and I enjoyed it much more than I expected. It’s simply written, but quite moving. I can see why it won the Newbery (besides being sad, which is of course a Newbery requirement).

The movie, on the other hand, managed to remove the animal cruelty from a story that’s...primarily about animal cruelty? Rather frustrating.

Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens / Peter and Wendy by J. M. Barrie (partial reread)

Peter and Wendy was a staple of my childhood, but Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens was new to me. It didn’t offer much in terms of story, but it was interesting to observe Barrie developing the character. My edition also had explanatory notes, which were wonderful. A lot of references, like name-dropping characters from Treasure Island and the hints of Hook’s Etonian background, went over my head as a kid, and having the full context enriched the story.

The It’s a Wonderful Life Book by Jeanine Basinger

Recently bought this for my mom, who loves It’s a Wonderful Life, and then ILLed it for myself. Highly informative about the background of the film and includes the short story that inspired, the final shooting draft, and excerpts from earlier drafts.

Behind the Attic Wall by Sylvia Cassedy

An example of the “orphan with issues goes to live with uncaring relatives in a spooky house” genre, with the addition of creepy talking and moving dolls, whose true identities only make them creepier. I was riveted.

Sister of the Bride by Beverly Cleary (reread)

Cleary is always an engaging storyteller, even when she’s writing about 50s/60s Teenager Problems, although I can’t say this is one of my favorites of hers. (Younger teenage sister gets over-invested in her older sister’s upcoming wedding and what it means for her own romantic prospects--majorly could not relate, but that’s a me problem.)

Fifteen and Henry and the Clubhouse by Beverly Cleary

I much prefer Cleary’s books about children (it was delightful to encounter the Quimby sisters again!) to her books about teenagers.

She, the Adventuress by Dorothy Crayder

My first impression was “wow, this was definitely written in the 70s,” but the unique style eventually drew me in. Quite a fun read.

Because of Winn-Dixie and The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo (reread)

I hadn’t read any DiCamillo in years and forgot how much I enjoyed these books. Miraculous Journey had me crying by the end. I don’t often cry while reading.

Knight’s Castle by Edward Eager

I think this one would have meant a lot more if I had any familiarity with Ivanhoe. But judging from what I’ve absorbing from all those Ivanhoe posts that cropped up a while back, Eager seems to have been rather unfair to at least one character in his reimagining.

Rebecca’s War by Ann Finlayson

Surprisingly complex. Rebecca’s dynamic with the young English nobleman occupying her house was well-drawn. Had the good sense to stop short at “maybe someday when they’re older” instead of working in a romance--much appreciated.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman 

I suspect this one might improve on rereads. As a reimagining of The Jungle Books, it was intriguing.

The Diddakoi, The Dolls’ House, The Dragon of Og, The Fairy Doll, Great Grandfather’s House, Impunity Jane, Little Plum, Miss Happiness and Miss Flower, Operation Sippacik, and The Rocking Horse Secret by Rumer Godden

All varying degrees of charmingness, some better than others. The real standout here is The Dolls’ House, which raised interesting questions (the emphasis on dolls’ inherent lack of autonomy speaks a lot, I think, to what it’s like to be a child).

The Secrets of Winterhouse and The Winterhouse Mysteries by Ben Guterson

I had liked but wasn’t utterly captivated by Winterhouse, but I ended up enjoying these sequels more than I expected. They aren’t perfect (the protagonist’s friend is disappointingly underdeveloped) but are surprisingly thoughtful in their themes. (Early in the second book, I was having some issues with a mean-spirited streak in the protagonist’s behavior, and then a respected in-universe adult actually addressed the issue and gave her practical life advice on not being a jerk. Do you realize how seldom that happens in a genre prone to Protagonist-Centered Morality? I was impressed.)

Goose Chase by Patricia Kindl

This one has distinction of allowing a character who started as a dislikable caricature to grow and for the protagonist to rethink her judgment of him, but other than that...I hardly remember this one.

The Golden Name Day by Jennie D. Lindquist

Cute and beautifully illustrated, if somewhat underdeveloped.

Miss Spitfire by Sarah Miller

Miller impressed me with the scope of her research in The Lost Crown and brings the same attention to fact and detail to her fictional account of Annie Sullivan--while still telling an engaging story. (She even has the integrity to point out where she used an anachronism and why she chose to include it!)

Wet Magic by E. Nesbit

Not one of Nesbit’s best, but it was an interesting comparison with L. Frank Baum’s The Sea Fairies, which was published two years before and also features adventures with mermaids.

Eugene Onegin by Alexander Pushkin

An odd choice amid all the children’s books read this month, but I’d like to foray into Russian literature this year, and this was both on hand at my library and a quick read. (I read a 1964 translation by Eugene Mark Kayden, because that’s what we had.) A bizarre story, but I did like it.

Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers

Quite possibly one of the most 1970s books I’ve ever read.

Enemy Brothers, The Reb and the Redcoats, and Tenthragon by Constance Savery (reread)

The first two were read because they’re a joy to revisit, and Tenthragon was for analytical purposes (and wonderful in its own way).

Pauline by Margaret Storey (reread)

Another reread of a stand-out from last year’s books.

The Family Tree by Margaret Storey

While not a lot happens in this book in terms of action, I was fascinated by the orphaned protagonist’s building a connection to her estranged family by piecing together information about their past--and opening the door for righting old wrongs.

Marianne Dreams and Marianne and Mark by Catherine Storr (reread)

I’ve gushed about Marianne Dreams before, but Marianne and Mark, even after a reread, is...kind of baffling? It’s great to have more of these characters and for them to finally meet in real life, but setting it several years after MD, with Marianne as a teenager with very teenage preoccupations and no overtly fantastical elements (it’s ambiguous how much she remembers her childhood dream adventures with Mark, and he doesn’t seem to remember anything) is downright jarring. The tone has shifted into bleakness, Marianne is making terrible life choices, and Mark doesn’t show up until two-thirds of the way through a fairly short book.

Also, it’s not a big deal, but we never do find out Marianne’s surname and not knowing is bugging me.

Thursday by Catherine Storr

A Tam Lin retelling, which means it’s rather bizarre. Storr peppers the text with all kinds of profundity, which is amazing, and the family relationship is realistic and touching (a teenage protagonist who likes and mostly gets along with her parents!). There’s some veering off into very young adult topics that took me by surprise. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it, but I did not dislike it.

Christmas with the Chrystals and Other Stories by Noel Streatfeild 

I ILLed this one for its inclusion of the short story “What Happened to Pauline, Petrova and Posy.” Aside from that piece and the title story, though, this is a rather pointless collection of Christmas-themed excerpts from Streatfeild’s other books.

The Essential It’s a Wonderful Life by Michael Willian

Had some detailed information and diagrams that were interesting (like a floor plan of what we see of the Baileys’ house and a map of Bedford Falls’s main street), but I had hoped for more thorough exploration of the scene-by-scene analysis, and the information sometimes seemed more tailored to the author’s particular interests than inclusive of all aspects that go into filmmaking. (For instance, the make and history of Sam Wainwright’s car, which appears briefly in one scene, is lovingly elaborated on, but there’ s not a word on, say, how costuming is used to convey character or the passing of time.)

The Castle in the Attic and The Battle for the Castle by Elizabeth Winthrop (partial reread)

I hadn’t read the sequel. It ended up being rather a slog.

#random personal stuff #far more progress than last month #because I decided to concentrate on the light and fun this time #and read a lot of rather short children's books

[andinewton]

Based on this post by @acrispyapple​, just a little something I threw together!  Thanks for the idea!  I hope you like it!  (as always, I’m too lazy to edit it right now, so I hope it all makes sense!)

Give me a Break!  - A Victor oneshot

Victor continued with his work, his phone face down on the desk, awaiting the vibration to signal    your next reply.  It never took you long to come around to his way of thinking, even though you seemed to be really riled at his reply this time.  He could picture you now, brow furrowed delicately with a cute little pout on your lips.  His face curved into a smirk before he put his fountain pen back to paper and carried on working.

***

You glared at your phone.  You had taken five minutes out of today’s incredibly busy schedule to try and invite Victor on a trip.  Sending him a message, fishing for whether he might be interested or not, only to have him shoot you down in flames by questioning your work ethic!  Okay, well, fine.  If he wanted to be your boss and nothing else, then that was what he would get.

***

Later that evening, as you tucked into a very basic but still tasty microwave dinner at your tiny kitchen table, your phone beeped a new message.  Glancing at the display you could see a notification from Victor, asking where you were.  On the other side of you was a copy of your latest proposal which you were skimming over to double check it made sense.  Time to launch operation business only.

Taking a picture of the file you attached a short message, simply stating; very busy, boss.  Before putting the phone back down and continuing to eat, your desire to work suddenly fired up by his query.

Another beep.  You were meant to be at Souvenir.

Actually, sir, you said you would take me to Souvenir later.  As no time nor date for said meeting was confirmed with myself or my office, I assumed it was tentative.  Apologies if I misunderstood.

Wow, that felt soooooo good!  It was professional, made your point, even to the degree of apologising to draw attention to the fact it was his fault.  Now for stage two of your plan.

You opened a new text message and sent a brief note to Kiro.  Weirdly, he was the one who supported your not-quite-a-relationship with Victor, and was more than happy to be your venting buddy as well as constant co-conspirator.  You knew Kiro “shipped” the two of you, as he assured you the internet said these days, and he wanted to make it his mission to bring you together.  You admitted you weren’t exactly averse to the idea, and making Victor jealous just might help.  Just minutes later you got a stream of excited emojis from Kiro, followed by the simple phrase; I know just what to do, so go with it!

You were sure whatever it was would get Victor’s attention in no time, the real test would be how he reacted.

***

Victor threw his phone down on the countertop, the metal surface reverberating with the clash.  You were taking it this far, seriously?  Making out your relationship was nothing more than professional?  He would make you pay for that in some not so subtle way.  He started to pack away the ingredients he had bought to make you a special meal, knowing you weren’t coming.  It was a shame to let it go to waste and while he wanted to share this recipe with you he could be just as petty as you were.  Probably even more so.

His phone vibrated the counter as he came back from the refrigerator, glancing at the screen to see it was from Goldman, and a screenshot no less.  Opening it he stared for a good ten seconds before his anger rose to a near impossible level.

Kiro had apparently made a post that Goldman thought should be brought to Victor’s attention immediately.  And he could see why.

Kiro:  Looking forward to a weekend away with my bestie!  Just the two of us, sun, sea, swimsuits, sand, sweet treats, and sangria!

And you were tagged in it.

It was no secret that the two of you were friends, completely platonic yet irritatingly friends who had the press eating out of your hands at the far too many not-dates you went on.  Was this what he had blown off by reminding you that work was important?  A chance to enjoy a tropical vacation with you wearing very little clothing and…he cleared his throat and shook his head, trying to dislodge the image.  Two could play this game.  If she was trying to make him jealous she was not going to succeed.  No.  He would take the high ground and let her go waste her time with the blond pretty boy.

At least that was what he thought.  Until Goldman’s second image came through.  That of your reply.

MC:  Can you believe we get the entire island to ourselves?  Thanks #romanticgetaways for the amazing prize!

She won a private island getaway and she was going with…with…with him?!  Oh, he didn’t think so!  Victor slapped off the lights and headed for the door, grabbing his jacket as he passed.

***

‘Do you think this will work?’  You asked Kiro when he video called you after he posted.  He had talked you through your reply and it made sense.  He knew about the prize you had won, how excited you had been at the prospect of inviting Victor on what you hope might be a romantic little getaway, and he knew the CEO wasn’t keen on your friendship with the star.

‘With that reply it’s guaranteed!’  You could almost feel Kiro’s excitement through the screen.  ‘You are totally going to get him demanding you go with him instead of me!’

‘I mean demanding does sound like him.’  You agreed.  ‘But I can’t see it.  He was obviously put out that I switched to all business and we both know how stubborn he is.’

‘Psshh.’  Kiro made a dismissive noise.  ‘You’ll have him eating out of the palm of your hand.’

‘He’ll probably say that’s unsanitary.’

Kiro’s bubbly laugh echoed through the tiny speaker.  ‘I bet he’s actually okay with the idea of a little food play.’  The wink he gave you was enough to bring a blush to your cheeks.

‘You’re worse than me, I swear.’  You shook your head.  ‘I don’t imagine I’ll hear from him, but if I do I’ll let you…’

You were interrupted by a knock on your door, your head jerking around to look at it.

‘It’s him!  Oh my God, just leave me here on the table so I can listen in!’

‘Nope.’  You waved and cut the call, placing the phone face down on the table before heading over and going up on tiptoes to look through the peephole.  Holy crap, it was actually him!

You glanced down at yourself, still wearing your skirt and blouse from work but barefoot and hair down.  You’d have to do.  Opening the door you looked at Victor, leaning against the wall beside the door with his forearm, glaring at you the moment his eyes found you.

‘Good evening, Mr Li.  To what do I owe this unexpected visit?’  Your tone was clipped and professional but his stern expression didn’t slip.

‘Do you always open your door at this time of night to strangers?’

‘I wouldn’t call us strangers, Mr Li.  And I checked through the peephole first.’  You waved a hand towards it in demonstration.

He straightened from his leaning pose and tugged his jacket so it sat right.  ‘Quit calling me that.’

‘Mr Li?’  You asked, and he gave a brisk nod.  ‘But that’s your name.’

‘We have been on a first name basis for as long as we have been in business.’

‘And I apologise for my lack of professionalism in that regard.’  You bowed your head briefly.  ‘Now, what can I do for you?  It must be important for you to have come all this way at this hour.’

‘I want to know what this is about.’  He thrust his phone in your face just as your neighbour’s door opened, Lucien poking his head around the frame.

‘Is everything alright, MC?  I heard raised voices.’

You smiled pleasantly before emphasising his name.  ‘Everything is fine, Lucien.  Some last minute business that couldn’t wait until morning, that’s all.’

He gave Victor a none too friendly glance.  ‘Shout if you need anything.’

‘I will.  Thank you, Lucien.’

After a final look Victor’s way he closed the door again and you turned your attention back to the man in front of you, who seemed even angrier now than he had a moment before.

‘What can I do for you, Mr Li?  It is, after all, very late.  Is there some sort of emergency?’

‘No, there’s no emergency!’  His tone became exasperated.  ‘I want to know…’

‘This is well out of business hours so I assumed it was urgent.’

‘Are you just going to leave me on the doorstep all night?’  He finally snapped.

‘With that attitude I think I might.’  You begun to close the door but he put his hand against it and held it there, not that you put up much of a fight.  ‘Mr Li, this is very unprofessional.’

‘Enough with the Mr Li, and enough with the professionalism!’  His nostrils flared, you thought in an attempt to stop himself from really yelling, but you just continued to looked at him with a confused expression on your face.  ‘I want you to tell me what this means?’

Again he held out the phone and you leant forward slightly, examining it carefully.  ‘I believe that is a post from the idol Kiro regarding to his plans for this weekend.’

‘His plans this weekend with you.’  He specified.

‘That’s right.’

‘Quit playing dumb, MC.’

‘I don’t know what you’re alluding to, Mr Li, but dumb is the last thing I am playing.’

The sigh he let out was more of a huff.  ‘Are you really going to spend the weekend on a private island with him?’

You shrugged.  ‘I had no one else to ask.  My first choice was unavailable therefore I went with my backup.  If that’s all, sir, I was in the middle of eating.’

‘You said you were working.’

‘I’m multitasking.’  For the first time your irritation slipped through into your voice and you had to take a calming breath before continuing.

He glared at you but you glared right back.  He was in the wrong here and if he were really jealous, as Kiro suspected, he had to do something about it, not you.  You were not caving.

‘This trip?  It was what you wanted to ask me on?’

‘I thought to.  Until you stated you couldn’t possibly find the time and that my workload shouldn’t afford me the time either.  However, I happen to believe in a healthy work/life balance and this short break will be most welcome.’

‘I would have gone with you.’

‘I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that?’  You leaned forward with your ear turned slightly towards him.

‘I said if you had come out and asked me in the first place I would have gone with you!’

‘Asking if you would like a spur of the moment trip wasn’t to the point enough for you?’  You finally snapped back at him.  ‘Your cue then would have been to ask me where to, not to have dismissed me like you have so many other times!  I am tired of trying to be perfect for you, Victor, I mean Mr Li!  I know in future not to bother asking you to anything you would obviously feel is a complete waste of your valuable time.  I’m sorry I bothered you with it in the first place and you will be pleased to hear that from this point on our relationship will be nothing but professional!’

‘You can’t just…’

‘I can’t just what?  Tell you a few home truths?’

‘No!’

‘Decide not to allow you to antagonise me any more?’

‘No!’

‘Go on vacation with Kiro?’

That was evidently the last straw for Victor as he shoved his phone in his pocket, stepped forward, and pulled you to him for a bruising kiss.

You couldn’t lie, it was everything you could ever have dreamed of and more.  You swore you saw fireworks behind your eyelids, your nerve endings tingling throughout your entire body as his lips forcefully took yours, his hands cupping your face as though afraid you might move.  Moving was the last thing on your mind, though, and you made a small satisfied murmur as he drew back from you just enough to allow you to focus on him.

‘Try asking me again.’  He all but growled, the noise making you shiver in such close confines.

‘Would…’ you swallowed, ‘would you like a spur of the moment trip?’

A smile curved the edge of his lips.  ‘With you?  Any time.’

#mlqc victor #mr love victor #oneshot #mlqc oneshot #kinda fluffy #jealous victor #kiro guest stars

[cctinsleybaxter]

2020 in books

2020 was a year of changed reading habits; people reading more than ever or not at all, some changing their tastes and others turning to old comforts. While there weren’t any huge overhauls on my end, more free time did mean a total of 32 in a wider range of genres. In the past couple of years I found a lot of the things I read to be kind of middling and ranked them accordingly, but this year had some strong contenders in the mix. With college officially behind me I love nonfiction again, and I really need to stop being drawn in by novels with long titles that ‘sound interesting.’ A piece of advice to my future self: they will only make you angry.

The Good

The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky I loved the BBC radio play when I first listened to it back in 2017, but didn’t know if I could stomach the idea of actually reading the 700-page book, especially since I already knew the plot (spoiler alert: this had no effect and I gasped multiple times despite knowing what was going to happen; Fyodor’s just that good at atmosphere.) The story follows Prince Lev Myshkin, a goodhearted but troubled man entering 1860s Petersburg high society and meeting all of the wretched people therein as he navigates life, laughs, love, unanswerable questions of faith, and human suffering. I care about it in the same way I think other people care about reality TV shows and soap operas. I’m so personally invested in the drama and feel so many different emotions directed at these clowns that it’s like being a fan of Invitation to Love (with an ending equally upsetting to that of the show ITL is from, Twin Peaks.)

Salt: A World History by Mark Kurlanksy I adored this book. The first half reads a little like a Wikipedia article, and I was worried that it was leaning too clinical and would be disaffected with colonialism and indigenous peoples, but even that oversight is corrected for as the text goes on. It’s not going to be for everybody because it really is just the world’s longest encyclopedia entry on, well, salt, but it’s written with such excitement for the topic and is so well-researched and styled for commercial nonfiction that I think it deserves any and all praise it’s gotten. We have to talk about that time Cheshire was literally sinking into the ground, and companies who were over-pumping brine water to steal each other’s brine water said ‘no it’s okay it’s supposed to that’ so were legally dismissed as suspects.

Midnight Cowboy by James Leo Herlihy Cried. 10/10. The plot of Midnight Cowboy is very classic and actually has a lot in common with The Idiot, as 20-something Joe Buck moves from the American Southwest to NYC and meets myriad challenges as a sex worker. I’ve been obsessed with the movie for a few years now and the book made me appreciate it anew; I think it’s rare for an adaptation to take the risk of being so different from its source material while still capturing its spirit. The movie doesn’t include quieter moments like the full conversation with Towny or time spent in the X-flat, nor does it attempt to touch Joe’s internal monologue or his and Rico’s extensive backstories, but these things are essential to the book and are some of the best and most affecting writing I’ve ever read. Finally! The Great American Novel!

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones I would firmly like to say that this is probably the best horror novel ever written. The setup is very traditional in that it’s about a group of friends facing supernatural comeuppance for a past mistake, but delivery on that premise is anything but familiar. A story about personal and cultural trauma that raises questions about what we owe to each other and what it means to be Blackfeet, with a cast that’s unbelievably real and sympathetic even at their absolute worst. Creepypasta writers trying to cash in on the cultural mythos of lumped-together tribes wish they were capable of writing something a tenth as gruesome and good as this. It could very well be a movie the visuals and writing style were so arresting, and I can’t wait to read whatever Jones writes next.

Found Footage Horror Films: Fear and the Appearance of Reality by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas This is the least accessible title on the list since it’s a college textbook for people with background in film, but it was so nice to read a woman unpacking film theory with the expertise and confidence it deserves that I have to rank it among the best. I had an absolute blast reading it and am going to have to stop myself from bringing up the horror of 1960s safety films as a cocktail icebreaker.

Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy by Heather Ann Thompson

The year’s toughest read by far, but also its most rewarding. Thompson uses mountains of documents, government-buried intel, and personal interviews to explain what happened at Attica from beginning to end, and does a fantastic job of balancing hard facts and ‘unbiased journalism’ with much-needed emotion and critical analysis. It’s more important reading in the 2020s than any kind of ‘why/how to not be racist’ book club book is going to be, and the historical context it provides is as interesting as it is invaluable. The second half drags a bit in going through lengthy trial processes with some assumed baseline knowledge of legalese (which I did not have. All that criminal minds in 2015… meaningless), but aside from that editing and prose are some of the best I’ve seen in nonfiction. 

The Bad

The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn A friend and I decided to read this together because I’m obsessed with how insane the author is and wanted to know if he can actually write.

He cannot.

The Beautiful Thing That Awaits Us All by Laird Barron Barron is an indie darling of the horror fiction scene, so I was excited to finally read one of his collections but can now attest that I hate him. If you’re going to do Lovecraft please deconstruct Lovecraft in an interesting way. I had actually written a lot about the issues I have with how he develops characters and plots, but one of the only shorthand notes I took was “he won’t stop saying ‘bole’ instead of tree trunk” and I feel like that’s the only review we need.

Bats of the Republic by Zach Dodson Look up a photo of this author because if I had bothered to glance at the jacket bio I honest-to-god wouldn’t have even tried reading this.

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone I went in with high expectations since this is an epistolary novella I’d seen praised on tumblr and youtube but oh my god was there a reason I was seeing it praised on tumblr and youtube. This is bad Steven Universe fanfiction. Both authors included ‘listening to the Steven Universe soundtrack throughout’ in the acknowledgements, and to add insult to injury there’s a plug from my nemesis Madeline Miller.

The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton The premise of this one plays with so many tropes I like that I should have been more suspicious. It’s a dinner party with stock characters one would expect of Clue, and rather than our protagonist being the detective he’s a man with amnesia stuck in a 24-hour time loop. Body-hopping between guests, he must gather evidence using the skillsets of each ‘host’ until he either solves Evelyn Hardcastle’s murder or the limit of eight hosts runs out. I read a lot of not-very-good books, and it’s so, so much worse when they have potential to be fun. This is how you lose the most points, and how I abandon decorum and end up writing a list of grievances: • Our protagonist can only inhabit male hosts, which I think is a stupid writing decision not because I’m ‘woke’ but because wouldn’t it make sense for him to also be working with the maids, cooks, and women close to the murder victim? • Complaining about the limitations of hosts makes some sense (e.g- there’s a section where he thinks that it’s hard to be an old man because it’s difficult to get to the places he needs to be quickly), but one of his hosts is a rapist and one of his hosts is fat. Guess which one gets complained about more. • One of the later hosts is just straight-up a cop with cop knowledge that singlehandedly solves the case. We spend some time being like ‘wow I couldn’t have done it without the info all eight hosts helped gather’ but it was 100% the detective and he solves the murder using information he got off-screen. • The mystery itself is actually well-paced and I didn’t have a lot of issues with it (e.g, there’s a twist that I guessed only shortly before the end), which makes it all the worse that the metanarrative of this book is INSANE. No spoilers but the reveal as to why our unnamed protagonist is even in this situation is stupid. I just know they’re going to make it into a movie and I’m preemptively going to aaaaaaaaa!!!

Trust Exercise by Susan Choi The fact that this was the worst book I read all year, worse even than the bad Steven Universe fanfiction, and it won multiple awards makes my blood boil. I could rant about it for hours but just know that it’s a former theater kid’s take on perception and memory, and deals with sexual abuse in a way that’s handled both very badly and with a level of fake deepness that’s laughable. Select fake-deep quotes I copied down because at one point I said ‘oh barf’ aloud: -I’m filled with melancholy that’s almost compassion. It’s sad the same way. -[On a friendship ending] We almost never know what we know until after we know it. -Because we’re none of us alone in this world. We injure each other.

There are also bad sex scenes that I can’t quite make fun of because I think (HOPE?) they’re supposed to be a melodramatic take on how teenagers view sex, but I very much wanted to die. Flowers were alluded to. Nipples were compared to diamonds.

Honorable/Dishonorable Mentions (categorized as the same thing because, well,)

The Life and Death of Sophie Stark by Anna North This book was frustrating because the first third of it is fantastic. It’s set up to be a takedown of the manic pixie dream girl trope, jumping from person to person discussing their relationship with the titular Sophie, and indirectly revealing that she was just some girl and not the difficult and mysterious genius they all believed her to be. Then in the third act, BAM! She was that difficult and mysterious genius and she’s now indirectly brought all the people from her past together. I wanted to scream the plot beefed it so bad, but the good news is I really liked this octopus description.

It was the size of a three-year-old child, and it seemed awful to me that something could be so far from human and obviously want something as badly as it wanted to get out of the tank.

Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women by Kate Moore Cool new nightmare speedrun strat is to hear a 2-second anecdote from a documentary that people used to get radium poisoning from painting watch faces, be curious enough that you buy a book to learn more, and be met with medical and legal horror beyond anything you could have imagined. This was almost one of my favorite books of the year! Almost.

Radium Girls is very lovingly crafted and incredibly well-researched; one of those things that’s hard to get through but that you want to read sections of again as soon as you’ve finished. The umbrage I take with it is that it’s very Catholic. The author and many of her subjects are Irish and their religion is important to them, but it casts a martyr-y narrative over the whole thing that I found uncomfortable. Seventeen-year-old girls taking a factory job they didn’t know was dangerous are framed as brave, working-class heroes, but there’s not a set moral lesson to be gained from this story. Sarah Maillefer didn’t make “a sacrifice” when she agreed to the first radium tests, she agreed because she was terrified. She didn’t think she was helping she was begging for help.

The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins by Anna Tsing Tsing is an incredibly skilled researcher and ethnographer; there are so many good ideas in this book that I’d almost consider it essential leftist text… if I could stand the way it was structured. Tsing posits that because nature is built on precariousness she will build her book the same way, allowing it to grow like a mushroom, and thus chapters don’t progress linearly and are written more like freeform poetry than a series of academic arguments. Some people are really going to love that, but I’m me and a mushroom is a mushroom and a book is a book. I don’t think in the way Tsing does, and while I tried to keep an open mind it’s hard to play along when something is this academically dense and makes so many ambitious claims. As if to prove how different our structuring methods are, I’ve made my own thoughts into a pros and cons list

Things I liked: • ‘Contamination’ as something inherent to diversity • ‘Scalability’ as a flawed way of thinking (Tsing has written whole essays about this that I find very compelling, but a main example here is that China and the US have come down on Japanese matsutake research for being too ‘site specific’ and not yielding enough empirical data) • Discussing how Americans were so invested in self-regulating systems in the 1950s we thought they could be applied to literally everything, including ecosystems • “The survivors of war remind us of the bodies they climbed over- or shot- to get to us. We don’t know whether to love or hate the survivors. Simple moral judgements don’t come to hand.” • Any and all fieldwork Tsing shares is amazing; I especially liked reading about the culture of mushroom pickers living in the Cascades and their contained market system

Things I didn’t like: • Statements that sound deep but aren’t, e.g- “help is always in the service of another.” (Yep. That’s what that means. Unless an organism is doing something to help itself which then nullifies your whole opening argument.) • A very debatable definition of utilitarianism • “Capitalism vs pre-capitalism,” which seems like an insanely black-and-white stance for a book all about finding hidden middle ground • A chapter I found really interesting about how intertwined Japanese and American economies are, but it tries to cover the entire history of US-Japan relations. Seriously, starting with Governor Perry and continuing through present day, this could have been a whole different book and it’s a good example of what I mean when I say arguments feel too scattered (the conclusion it reaches is that in the 80s the yen was finally able to hold its own against the dollar. Just explain that part.) • A chapter arguing that ‘true biological mutualism’ is rarely a focus of STEM and is a new sociological development/way of thinking which is just… flat-out not true

For all the comparisons art gets to ‘being on a drug trip’ this anthropology textbook has come the closest for me. Moments of profound human wisdom, intercut with things I had trouble understanding because I wasn’t on the same wavelength, intercut with even more things that felt false or irrelevant. I can’t put it on the nice list but I am glad I read it.

#2020 #books #long post #(in case the read more isn't working)

[angsty-teen-with-an-angsty-peen]

“Da Kurse of Da Cylo”

(Based on an impromptu story I told to a bunch of rape victims from Albany)

By Angsty Teen (profesional writter)

Prologue: A Stupid Fucking Child Gets Fucking Bored

One day, I got sick after eating chocolate off the floor while my friends were trying to pour holy water on my face. I am now at home, with no one else in sight. My father has left for work and my siblings went to learn more about nursing and how it is not fucking worth it to work here. I am alone with my thoughts and no one can hear them. After a barrage of anti-sematic thoughts, I got immediately bored. “What should I do while my insides turn inside out?” I thought to myself. After a few seconds, however, I had a realization. No one was here to see me do ANYTHING. I could do all that I want. I could look at girls, stare at girls, or wait for the girls to look away so I can gaze at their bottoms. I decided to watch Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

 Chapter 1: He Comes (haha ew it’s a semen jok)

I was readying my arsenal to view the entertainment called “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” using a DVD that I stole from a quadriplegic kid with Down Syndrome who only got it because of the stupid Make-A-Wish Foundation. On my left hand, a bucket to store Koko Crunch as I realized that I do not have popcorn, the staple food for movie watching, and had to degrade to eating pathetic cereals (Oh, woe was me.). On my right, a copy of the script of a movie as the DVD did not have subtitles for a curious reason (note that it’s for A movie as it is actually just the script of “Who Killed Captain Alex?”). I threw the disc in the DVD player. I got worried that I accidentally broke the disc whilst throwing it but I was relieved at the fact that it did not break and I gently pushed it into the DVD player and began watching the movie that was have labelled as “Star Wars: The…SPOOKY Jedi”?!?!? As the movie began playing, it showed a poorly edited picture of the movie poster of the movie that replaced “Last” with “Spooky” and even though it concerned me, I moved on with the watching of the movie. Everything seemed fine but the further the movie kept on playing, the more suspicious I had about the validity of this DVD copy. First of all, various scenes were glitching and the audio was either warped, low quality, or from a porno starring Ron Jeremy. That’s when it happened. During the scene when Kylo Ren was shirtless, he just stared at me with his swollen body and said, “You are going to die.” I was terrified not only by the god-tier quality of his succulent man breasts, but also how it looked like the threat was said directly to me. After that, the television turned off in an instant, and my heartbeat stopped at the moment it did. Immediately, my Lightsaber vibrator kept turning on and off. “No, not now.” I thought to myself to ensure the seriousness of this situation that is taking place and instead just kept it in my pocket to immediately use it after the situation has concluded. Also, my phone started to ring and ring with an unfamiliar ring tone. As I picked up my phone and accepted the call, I asked,

“Hello, who might this be?”

“This is me, Kylo Ren” said Kylo Ren, “and I’m going to kill you.”

Before I was able to gasp and exclaim “Egads!” someone was knocking at my door. I rushed to the door to attend to the person at need as it would be rude not to respond. At the front of my door was what appeared to be a harmless mailman. After further inspection of his well-sculpted body, I began to ask questions.

“Excuse me, Mr. Mailman. Why must you be here without any mail in your satchel? Even if you are done with your job, why must you reside to this location as you were not personally invited by any of the hosts of this establishment?”

The mailman growled and responded, “You do not get it, do you? IT IS I, KYLO REN, THE PERSON WHO WILL NOW DECIDE YOUR FATE AND MY DECISION IS…” as his face melts to form his lightsaber “YOUR LIFE WILL END TODAY.”

 Chapter 2: OH SHIT FUCK WHAT THE FUCK DON’T HURT ME JESUS CHRIST

I walked towards my house at a brisk pace to try to escape from the reach of Kylo Ren’s lightsaber. Fortunately, as his eyes and mouth have melted into his lightsaber, I am confident I can hide somewhere and he will never find out. Unfortunately, I have chosen poorly in wearing my Japanese wooden slippers whilst walking on a ceramic tile and Kylo Ren could hear me with his ears. I decided to walk faster to the 2nd floor of the building. To my dismay, I was too focused on my fashionable pair of geta sandals that I have cornered myself in my own bedroom. Kylo Ren was able to catch up to me as he ran and my house is actually not that big. Kylo exclaims in confidence,

“There is nowhere to run, boy. I have you now!”

“W-w-wait, Mr. Kylo, how are you able to talk w-w-with your face melting and such?”

Kylo slowly raises his lightsaber to reveal his eyes and mouth are still in their solid state.

“Wow, that’s pretty cool.” I said, mildly impressed. “You should put that in the new Star Wars”

“I’m not George Lucas.”

“Okay, tell Mr. Star Wars to add that in.”

“I can’t, I killed him.”

“WAIT WHAT?! ARE YOU SURE, LET ME CALL HIM” I quickly grabbed my phone and called George Lucas.

“Hello, Mr. Lucas. Oh, you’re the mother ~hello… well, that was George Lucas’ mother and she’s crying her eyes out.”

As I said those words, Kylo Ren was already “all up in my shit” and was ready to attack but I was able to dodge it after all those training from all those anime fight compilation videos. I immediately leaped out of Kylo’s range and hit the window, bursting through. Moments later, I just realized that I am now out of my house, flailing amongst the glass shards. I landed on the front yard, the shards somehow only have touched my legs. As I was limping away from my house, I heard another window break. It was Kylo Ren, following me. His pose made it look like as if he was flying gracefully yet with a fierce spirit. His eyes, which are on his lightsaber, were piercing my soul like daggers and his ~ and he smashed headfirst into the ground… and only broke his legs. What was supposed to an intense chase like what would you see in multiple horror movies was just 2 injured wackos limping across the street. After 10 seconds of chasing each other with broken legs, we decided to go to the hospital to treat our legs. Fortunately, as Kylo Ren was a famous star, he was able to pay our medical bill. After our recovery, we immediately went out of the hospital to continue the chase. As the gentleman that he is, he allowed me to have a 10-minute head start. Thus, I ran… I ran so far away and ended up AT MY FUCKING HOUSE AGAIN GODDAMMIT.

 Final Chapter: What the genuine fuck is going on?

Here I am, facing my wretched house once more. I can see Kylo Ren’s beautiful head just over the horizon. He’s approaching and I have no idea what to do. But it was too late, Kylo Ren was holding down the Shift button and was able to reach me in mere seconds.

“We shall finally end this~ what happened to your house?” said Kylo Ren, utterly confused.

“Goddammit, I forgot to lock the door before we left for the hospital and someone took all of my stuff.”

“Oh, don’t worry. Let’s just call the authorities. They can help you recover your lost items and apprehend the culprit.”

“Oh yeah, good idea.”

I grabbed my phone and eagerly pressed the numbers 9 and 1 twice. It only felt like mere seconds that we were at the police station and they have already found possible suspects. They asked us to see the suspects and determine who did it (Which was obviously pointless as we weren’t there during the incident). At the interrogation room, we were told that they found 3 suspects: Han Solo’s shambling corpse, Chewbacca, and a porg~ hold on, where is the porg? We were confused as to who did it, but we were able to immediately make a unanimous decision. We all stared at Chewbacca. As it turns out, however, Chewbacca was a sleeper agent that the police didn’t recognized and was assigned to assassinate the porg, who WAS the thief. We all were happy that the stupid fucking porg is now dead. For Chewbacca’s outstanding performance, they prepared a ceremony just for him the next day and awarded him a medal of some sorts. During Chewbacca’s speech that wasn’t spoken with his language as we all know that he was just muttering the whole time, Kylo Ren and I decided to have a talk.

“Well, here we are.” Said Kylo Ren.

“Yeah, what an adventure, huh?”

“Mhm… which made me think: Do I really have to kill you”

Kylo Ren stared at me with eyes, which are still on the lightsaber, and tried to lean in for a kiss. A kiss that would last for ages. A kiss that would be remembered as the kiss of the century. A kiss that would be told to our adopted children. I leaned even closer to his mouth, which was on the light~ you get the point, and began to prepare my lips. Not for the kiss, however. For a whisper.

“No… but I do.” I whispered in his ear as I stabbed him with my lightsaber dildo. Just like that, Kylo Ren was no more. His melted face was somehow even more lifeless than before. “I have won.” I said to myself. “I have killed that disgusting, filthy, abomination of a character” I have never felt so happy in my life. That surge of happiness was short-lived, however, as I realized that I murdered Kylo during the ceremony, in front of everyone.

 Epilogue

…and that’s how I got arrested. I was sentenced to 50 years in prison. Despite that, they let me go after a week as they forgot what I even did. To be honest, I don’t remember, either. I would look at the text again but I couldn’t bother. I got sick from eating chocolate off the floor while my friends were trying to pour holy water on my face. I decided to go home and maybe watch a movie.

#I hated making this #star wars #kylo ren #creepypasta

[thekryptonianandthecitygirl]

Arms crossed over her chest, she stares right at him, eyes not wavering.

"You're kidding."

"No, I'm not," he simply answers, his tone matching hers as he keeps writing whatever he's on, unphased. She barely holds back an annoyed sigh. Doesn't, really.

"I work better alone, Perry. You know that."

"You've never even tried to work with someone."

"That's because I don't need to." He snorts.

"Are your ankles okay?," he asks ironically, sparing her a brief, amused glance before getting back to his papers. She rolls her eyes.

"They're fine, thanks. And I don't need assistance."

"I know you don't, Lois - otherwise you'd already be at the door, because that attitude of yours is starting to get on my nerves," he reprimands, glaring as he finally puts down his pen and glasses to give her his full attention.

She simply glares back, and he sighs. "The guy is just a stringer, but everything he's send me so far is pretty solid, and I have yet to not publish it. He digged up the story, and he deserves to be the one to investigate it and bring it to light."

She frowns.

"If it's his story and he's so deserving, why are you sending me over there?"

"Because the scale of it is new for him. He's never had to investigate on something that big before. But," he quickly adds before the protest leaves her mouth. "I think he can handle it - he just needs a little help. You're the best around, I think you two could make a good team, and he's good enough that you can actually work with him without getting annoyed."

"Great. So now I'm a baby-sitter," and it's his time to roll his eyes. "Thanks, Perry, I really appreciate all the new experiences I get to live thanks to you."

"Well actually, Mrs Sassy, I think you are going to end up thanking me on this one."

Rising her eyebrows at him in challenge, she balances her weigh on one foot, unimpressed.

"Really? How so?" He smirks.

"The story involves Luthor Corps."

It takes everything she has, but Lois keeps a straight face. He knows he's won, though. Smartass.

"So, do you want to work on a story that can break the perfect image of one of the most famous and beloved billionaires in the country you've always suspected, or are you too busy pouting about having to share it?"

Deliberately choosing to ignore his satisfied smirk, she heads towards the door, not without making sure of sending another glare his way with a mumbled 'Fine'.

Right before she leaves his office, Lois turns back to him, frowning.

"What's his name, anyway?"

"Clark Kent."

She arrives in town early in the night - although the word 'town' is a bit of a stretch, given the size of it. Apparently, the guy decided not to enter the twenty-first century along with everyone else and doesn't have a cellphone, so all she has is the address and time he gave Perry a couple of days ago.

That, and a pretty odd request from the mysterious prodiguee.

Closing the door of her rental behind her, Lois tightens her jacket around herself and enters the old bar where they're supposed to meet. The place is pretty standard: rusty wooden stools, a pool table, dimmed lights, a few booths at the end of the room. A small scene where musician probably comes once in a while, with a dark and dusty velvet curtain behind it. The smell of whisky hangs in the air, and the two morons looking at her like she's some kind of meat are already getting on her nerves.

Ignoring them, she heads towards the bar, and the sixty something year-old man behind it.

"Hi. I'm looking for Joe Cooper, do you know him?"

"Yeah, that's him, over there," he responds, pointing towards a broad figure at the end of the room before going back to his clients. Muttering a quick 'Thanks', Lois adjusts her bag, and walks to her soon to be co- worker, stopping right behind him.

"So: can I call your Clark, or are you sticking with Joe?," she asks, just loud enough for only him to hear. He immediately turns and looks at her, surprise registering on his face.

The first thing that crosses her mind is 'Wow, is that guy tall'. She didn't notice it before, as he was crunched down above the table, but he is. Blue eyes (very blue), black curly hair, strong jaw covered with a three day beard that quite suits him.

Lips slightly quirking up, she extends her hand. "Lois Lane. I was told you had a story that was worth checking?" His shoulders immediately relax, and he shakes her hand.

"Right. Nice to meet you, Mrs Lane," he says, voice deep as he gives her a polite smile. It's a good smile, she decides.

Breaking contact, he gestures towards the bar. "And sorry about that, but Joe would be better around here, if you don't mind."

"Lying to your employer, huh? You sure know how to live on the wild side." His grin grows, amused this time, and, bending his head down for a second before looking back at her, he nods.

"I guess you could say that, yes." His expression then turns apologetic. "I'm sorry, but my shift only ends in fifteen minutes," he starts, visibly bothered by having to make her wait. She waves his apology away.

"It's fine – I'm early: it's my fault, anyway. Can I wait for you here?" she points to the table behind him. He moves aside.

"Of course," and he lets her settle on the bench. "Can I get you anything?"

"I'm fine, thanks."

"Okay. I'll be right back, then." And, with a small smile she answers, he gets back to work.

He's – okay, she thinks. So far. She knew Perry wouldn't have bothered with an asshole, anyway, but she had had more than a few sexist, machist, idiotic encounters in her line of work. She learnt to handle it pretty fast, whether it was mesuring dicks with them before setting things straight, or immediately announcing that she wasn't going to take any shit just because she had a vagina.

So far, it had always worked – or at least, had always gotten her what she wanted.

But he's not like that. She's pretty good at assessing character quickly, and that guy strikes her more as the polite, discreet, well-raised and good-manered gentleman type than the ego maniac, jerk one.

Good. At least she won't have to put up with anything she doesn't have the time for.

Getting her notebook and research out of her bag, Lois takes her eyes off him, and focuses back on the investigation.

She snaps back out of her thoughts and of the theories already building in her head and into the world when a beer is suddenly but carefully settled right in front of her. She looks up to see him take his white apron off before he sits opposite her.

"It's on the house. To make amends," he says simply, then continues at her questionning look. "Mr White told me you weren't exactly thrilled to work with a stringer, so consider this a peace offering." Her eyes roll almost from themselves, but he doesn't look mad.

"Let me guess: he told you I'd act like a jerk and treat you like a newbie."

"No. Well, not on those terms, anyway," and the corners of his lips go up in a discreet smirk. An amused one, she thinks.

"I just like to get a raise out of him," Lois shrugs as she reaches for her glass. "And he did take me off guards. I am a little skeptical about the team work thing, I'll give you that, but I'm not gonna be an ass – you can relax, Joe," she assures, a little smile he returns on her lips. "Besides, I read your stuff: it's not bad." Pursing his lips, he nods.

"I'll take that as a compliment," he says, the note of amusement so subtil in his voice you could almost miss it.

And with a sense of humor, apparently.

"You should. Thanks for the beer," she gestures, taking a sip.

After her three hours drive, it feels like heaven. "So, fill me in: what did you find?"

Expression turning serious, Clark Joe obliges, telling her all about the shaddy deals he noticed while working on the oil plateform near here (she mentally makes a note to find out what the hell he was doing working on an oil plateform, at some point), how he connected it to Luthor Corps, what proof he has or can get, who he can and has talked to. They talk for almost an hour and a half, Lois stopping him only to ask details or enlighten some points. They exchange points of views, ideas, throw theories back and forth.

He really is not bad, for someone who doesn't have much experience in deep investigations (his words). There's some things to correct, of course, and room for improvement, but she doesn't think she's going to have to carry him or anything – he's doing just fine.

(Then again, Perry probably wouldn't have sent her here, if he thought she would have had to. He knows better.)

"Did you start interviewing the witnesses? Employees?"

"I thought about it, but – I've never really done that before. I thought it was best to wait for you." Shaking her head slighty, Lois chuckles.

"At least you're honest about it."

"I never pretended to be a real journalist," and she knows he's not taking it the wrong way when she sees amusement in his eyes. Nice ones, really. "To be honest, I thought Mr White was going to give the story to another reporter all together." She archs an eyebrow.

"And you called him anyway? Not really the kind of right moves, if you want to build a reputation for yourself."

Finishing his own beer, Clark simply shrugs.

"The important thing is that the story gets out, not my name on it."

Well...aren't you an odd one. "So, how much time do you think we need?"

Shaking her head slightly, Lois hides her chuckle, and answers.

"Not long, really. You've done most of the work, so I'd say four or five days, just so we can re-check some things, maybe talk to a couple more people, then edit." She smirks. "You should get back to being a dedicated waiter in no time, don't worry. "

He doesn't miss a bit.

"Wonderful: I wouldn't want to compromise my rise to the top. Speaking of which, I should probably get back to it now, if I don't want to get fired." Lois frowns at that.

"Didn't you say your shift was over?"

"I took an extra one," he explains, helping her gather all the documents she had laid down. "I have a passion for fine jewellery I need to finance," he deadpans, glancing up at her, and Lois holds back her chuckle.

"Right. I could tell you were the type – I bet pearls look great on you."

The next day, she comes back to meet him for breakfast. He manages to get several breaks along the day, and they make considerable progress, putting the puzzle together piece by piece. It's even more satisfying knowing that this could finally help show Luthor's other (and true) side to the world.

She never trusted him – never bought his whole perfect, progressist, nice, smooth guy act. Way too suspicious for her taste.

Working in duo is not that bad - or at least, working with him isn't. It sure is different, but bouncing of ideas and leads off of each other is an interesting way of approaching a job she usually handles exclusively alone. A stimulating one, even. It certainly seems to help reach the goal, and the fact that the process is not unpleasant is a plus, she supposes.

As it turns out, her suspisions were right. Clark Kent slash Joe Cooper has his way with words, and gets the hold of things pretty quickly, managing to follow easily once she's shown him the path. But he's also very perceptive, very smart. Hell, probably even smarter than her.

("You read a lot, don't you?" she asks him at one point after he's raised her suspisions and curiosity yet again, her eyes on his endearing focused scowl while he re-reads an official Lex Corps report. Frowning, he looks up, a bit confused.

"Uhm - yeah, I guess. It was kind of an escape thing as a kid, so," he admits. Sensing a sensitive spot she doesn't want to push, Lois nods. Then, smiles.

"I bet your favorite book was from Spinoza or something." He smiles back.

"Platon, actually," and she rolls her eyes.

"Of course it was.")

He's clever, intuitive, yet...maybe not shy, exactly, but – reserved. That's definitely the word for it, now that she thinks about it. Watching him, and particularly watching him interact with others, even in that short of a time, the reporter in her can't help but motice how discreet he is, self-effacing. It looks like he's been here for at least a month, if not more, yet he doesn't seem to have bond with anyone, or given any detail about his lie and identity all together.

She doesn't mind. As far as she's concerned, as long as they're not screwing something or somedy over, everybody has the right to have their own private thing going, reason or no reason.

Still, Lois thinks that his particular story would be one she wouldn't mind hearing.

"Three days in, and I still didn't get one complaining call or whiny text. Does that guy drug you or something?"

Letting her motel room door shut behind her, she rolls her eyes.

"That's very funny, Perry. Have you been taking comedy classes from Lombard or something?" Kicking off her shoes, she listens as he snorts on the other side of the line.

"I'll take that as a no. So, how is the article coming along?"

Things run their course. They dig in, he learns, the investigation progresses. They work in their usual booth, once in her motel because she can only take so many drunk men yelling at the damn football game.

(He doesn't say anything, but she can see his eyes linger on the TV as they go out of the bar. Men and their sport.)

The next day, it's well past nine when they finally end their round of interviews. She's pretty satisfied with the results and, for a rookie, Clark's done very well yet again, but she's exhausted and God – starving.

Throwing her bag at the end of the bench, Lois lets herself ungraciously fall on it with a growl. He smiles.

"Worn out yet? I thought you were supposed to be unstoppable." The mocking irony in his tone makes her send a glare she doesn't really mean.

"Ahah. Don't pretend you're not glad you don't have a shift right now, witty boy."

"Not even going to try," he concedes. "We made good progress though, right?"

"Definitely." Her lips quirk up. "You're not as helpless as you could have been, Kent," she teases him. She likes doing that, she finds. Again, that makes him smile, then nod in fake gratitude.

"Thank you – that really means a lot. Same to you." Her chuckle is cut short as soon as she smells the french fries approaching their table.

"Here," the girl – Chrissy, she's learnt – says politely as she put the sacred little basket of greesy goodness in front of them. Lois isn't even sorry for the way she immediately leaps on the damn thing. "Your orders should be ready soon."

"Thanks," Clark politely smiles, sending her an amused look before focusing back on his co-worker as she talks again.

"So: how is the investigation going?"

"Well, thanks. Joe here still has a lot to learn," Lois emphasizes, keeping a straight face as she feels his amused gaze on her. "But he's alright," she shrugs non-chalently, stealing another fry.

"I'm sure. Are you going to be done soon?," and even if she looks at her, too, Lois can't help but notice how her eyes linger on Clark – and the small, smitten smile that doesn't leave her face while she does.

"I'm not sure. Lois?"

Trying to hide her amusement, she shrugs again.

"A couple of days, maybe three? We'll see, but it shouldn't take that long."

"Oh, okay. Well, I should get back to it," the young woman motions behind her. "Enjoy." And, with a last smile towards Clark, she heads back to the bar.

Taking a sip of his beer, he focuses back on her, then frowns.

"What?"

"You didn't tell me you had a girlfriend, Clark Joe."

"I don't," and she raises an eyebrow at him as she throws another fry in her mouth. "Chrissy and I are just friends."

"Right."

"We are. It was just - " He stammers a little, getting embarassed. She finds it surprisingly cute. "It wasn't a big thing. And it's over now."

"Look at you, all blushing," she grins, not able to hold back her chuckle when he tries to glare at her. "Okay, I'll stop. But just so you know, it doesn't look like her crush is going anywhere."

"Lois - "

Taking pity on him, she holds up her hands in surrender, a small smirk still floating on her face.

"Fine. Entertain me with something else, then." Relaxing, he shakes his head at her, half amused, half exasperated.

It's not a bad look on him, either.

"With what?"

"Well, first, the obvious question: what is a guy like you doing serving beer instead of taking a proper reporter gig?" He smirks, looks at her. Kind of a - mysterious look, for lack of a better term.

(How ironic, for a journalist – for her. Then again, there's something about him since the beginning, something she can't quite put her finger on.)

"What does 'a guy like me' mean?"

"Fishing for compliment? Really?"

"I'm just trying to understand what you're saying."

"You're just trying to avoid the question."

Giving in, he sighs, and even though she can tell he's not mad, he's careful.

"There's a lot of – unanswered questions about my past. I need to find the answers before I can consider the proper gigs and the proper life."

A part of her wants to dig in, but, feeling a touchy subject, Lois decides to let it go. Which is a first, really – usually, touchy subjects make her pen itch.

"Alright, mystery boy. Tell me where you come from, then. Unless that's classified information too?"

There's a small smile that makes her think something's getting past her before he answers – again. It takes all that she has for Lois to ignore her instincts.

"I grew up in Smallville – it's in Kansas. And now I'll let you get that clever comment you're dying to make off your chest."

"I'm hurt, Smallville," she feigns, proud of herself when he rolls his eyes at the surname. "I would never. Although you do have to introduce me to all your cows and chickens, one of those days."

"No cows, I'm afraid. Lots of corn, though – and a dog."

"Now I'm just jealous."

"I'm sure. What about you? Where did you get that subtil sense mockery from?"

"Oh, all over – Kansas excepted, I'm afraid," she winces in fake apology. He relaxes back on his seat, sighing.

"I can't believe I didn't realize how big a mistake telling you that was."

"Poor thing. Don't worry though! there's plenty to make fun of in my up-bringing, too. Army brat," she explains, pointing at herself with her thumb. "And I bet I've lived in places far more isolated than corn specialist Smallville."

Chuckling, Clark smiles. "Entertain me, then."

Thirty-five hours later, they're done.

A last coma here, a word change there, and here it is: Lois Lane and Clark Kent's collaboration article. His first major publication, her first by-line.

The first of many articles exposing Luthor's questionnable activities to the world, she hopes.

"Do you think it will make a difference?"

"I doubt it," she admits, not wanting to lie to him. His disappointed, hurt puppy expression makes her smile. "But it's a start. Luthor is a powerful man: it will take something huge to make him fall from his pedestral. But our story is a first step – if anything, it will at least install doubt in people's mind."

She shrugs. "Or it could be a total disaster," she deadpans, making him laugh. "Come on, the next round is on me."

His eyes eyes light up, amused and teasing.

"So I take it you thought I did a good job, then?"

Containing her own grin, she gives him a fake unimpressed look, and makes a face.

"Decent."

He smiles.

They spent the next hour and a half sitting in their booth, the first beer quickly turning into a second, a third.

By the time they get up, Lois is way more dizzy than she should.

"You can wipe that smirk out of your face, Smallville," she hisses at they exit the bar, trying her best to glare at him.

He raises his hands, playing innocent.

"I didn't say anything." The amusement in his eyes, however, says a lot. She grunts.

"Whatever."

"Sober as you may be," he starts, the insolent bastard, "can I walk you to your motel?" She crosses her arms at him.

"I'm perfectly capable of walking by myself, Kent."

"Maybe I just want to walk with you," he smiles a smile she can't help but returning. Rolling her eyes for good mesure, Lois hooks her arm to the one's he's offering to her.

She tells herself that the warm feeling settling in her stomach as they start their journey back to her motel is purely alcohol-induced.

"So."

"So."

"What's the next move for you, Clark Joe? Are you planning on staying here for long?" He shrugs against her.

"I don't know. I haven't really thought about it yet."

"Is there more to take out of this place?," and Lois feels his eyes move to her.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you said you needed to find answers, right?" He nods. "Do you think you can find them here?"

She swears his shoulders shift a little at that, his blue eyes fixed on the road ahead of them. He shakes his head slightly.

"I don't think so. I didn't really think I'd find them here in the first place," he chuckles, even though there isn't much humor in it.

In the early night, she can see him swallow down, and hears the slight sadness in his voice. "I don't even know where to look, to be honest."

In the seven days that she'd known him, it's the first time Lois hears him like that. She knows he's not doing it on purpose, that he's not even fishing for compassion, but there's hurt in his voice, desperation. It's raw, and yet, quieted down – like him.

Like he's been carrying a burden for long, so long, and has always made sure to keep it his own, to keep his pain hidden and to himself.

She aches for him. A simple sentence, and yet she's just -

It takes her a moment to get her voice back, which is suprising, a small part of her notes. Lois Lane doesn't really react like that. She's not immune of the horrors she sometimes witness in her job, of course, but she doesn't usually get like that for people she just met, people in general – not so suddenly, not so deeply.

"I'm sorry," she eventually manages, her hand momentarily tightening around his arm. "Maybe I could help: looking for answers is my job."

His eyes meet hers, and this time, his smile is genuine. Grateful. He looks at her for a few seconds, and she thinks she sees something else in there, too.

"I think this is something I have to do on my own. I'm not sure anyone can help me – although if there was, you'd definitely be my first choice," he adds with fake seriousness, teasing.

Lois smirks back. "Well, I should certainly hope so, Smallville. I mean -"

But that night, Lois doesn't get to finish her sentence.

Everything goes fast – so fast.

A flash of light. Tires scrunching. They both turn around, but it's too late. Their smiles froze. After its missed turn, the huge truck coming in front of them tries to get the control back. It does. Its truckload still goes free.

As she watches the huge pieces of wood coming at them, Lois feels herself pulled back and towards the ground. But the ground is covered in ice and they slip, and her head hits something.

The last thing she sees is the tree trunks crashing down on them, and Clark's entire body shielding her as she understands that they're going to die.

After that, everything goes black.

Her head hurts.

That's first thing Lois' aware of as she slowly regains consciousness. She vaguely registers that it's raining, that she's warm, most probaly in her motel room bed. She tries opening her eyes, but it takes more effort than it should.

After a couple of tries, she finally succeeds. With a growl, she painfully sits up, and, as she leans on her right arm, yelps in pain – and that's when it all comes back to her. The bar, the walk, the truck.

Clark.

"Clark." Suddenly wide awake, she frantically looks around her room for him, but he's nowhere to be found. She's alone.

Dropping on her back, Lois lets the enormity of it all dawn on her. He's – Hell, she doesn't even know what he is. What she does know, however, is that the man saved her life.

She can't remember much, but she remembers enough to know he's perfectly fine. At least six tree-trunks have fallen on his back - and given that she's still alive and in one piece, probably broke and bounced off his back – and he was unarmed, the vague memory of him carrying her, whispering that she was going to be okay, inked in her brain.

Wow.

A thousand theories immediately start running in her head. Scientific experiment? Struck of lightening, maybe? Simple very strong body structure? But no, this couldn't be it: no matter how much time spent at the gym, no man would have ever survive that. Plus, Clark clearly isn't the type to go the gym seven hours a - Lois suddenly freezes.

Unless he's not a man – unless he's not human.

As crazy as it may seems, the thought makes sense. She's willing to bet than no Guinness book has ever recorded such a strong amount of strengh on this planet, so the most logical explanation is that he comes from another one, and just happened to live here, on Earth. Sure, he looks exactly like a human-being, but Lois' never believed in the small green alien cliché.

She's never believed in aliens, period – until today.

But that's what he must be. Clark Joe Kent – an alien. Holy freaking hell.

His words come back to her. 'There's a lot of unanswered questions about my past', he had said. 'I need to find the answers.'

"I bet you do, Smallville," she whispers to herself. He wasn't from Smallville, though, she mentally corrects herself. He'd lie about that. Which would be understandable, really.

Yet, she's not sure he did. He certainly didn't seem to be lying, talking to her about his town, about his farm, about his parents. Were they aliens, too? But something wasn't right.

Not only he didn't appear to be lying, Lois believes with all she had that he was sincere, the previous night. He needed answers, he'd said. 'I don't even know where to look, to be honest. I'm not sure anyone can help me.' The people that raised him weren't like him, then.

He was alone.

Lois is surprised to find herself feeling more compassion than curiosity at that realization.

He is, though, which would explain a lot: somehow, he had ended up in a farm in the middle of Kansas, was raised by regular Earth people, grew up wondering about his origins, and was now living to find the truth. Hence, the not so normal life, the lack of proper jobs.

He was probably too busy and desperate to find out where he came from for that – and probably didn't want to stay too long in the same place, at the risk of accidently revealing himself at some point. By helping people, she thinks.

Like he helped her.

Only hesitating for a second, Lois gets up from her bed, grabs her jacket, and heads towards the door.

As soon as she walks in, she knows something wrong.

As she crosses the treshold, Lois immediately scans the room for any sign of him, but the music suddenly stops, and her attention is instantly drawn to the far corner of the bar, where all eyes are directed.

"Or I'm gonna have to ask you to leave," she hears Clark's deep voice.

Making her way into the small crowd gathered, she sees his familiar broad figure, his back to her, as the man in front him responds.

"I think I'll probably just leave when I'm good and ready." And with that, he throws his beer in Clark's face. Laughter rises among the men.

Her blood runs cold.

Clark doesn't immediately reacts, his head still down, and there's a second of silence again before he looks up. Lois can't see his face, but as she starts to move to untie his apron and teach the son of a bitch a lesson, he speaks again.

"Oh, there he is," he says, proud of himself, before pushing him.

Except Clark doesn't move.

The movement was hard, violent, but he doesn't move, and instead, it's the man that almost goes flying, stumbling as a glass he knocked over breaks behind him. Everything stops.

The room goes silent once more, Chrissy freezes, the asshole's face is nothing but shock. Lois herself stops in her track, the tension holding everyone. After what feels like an eternity, Clark starts to move, and her heartbeat starts skyrocketing with fear and anticipation when the young waitress has the good sense to stop him.

"It's not worth it, sweetie."

He pauses, looks at her, looks at the man. Eventually, he takes his apron off, and turns away.

Lois releases a breath she hadn't realized she was holding. But the truck driver doesn't leave him be, feeling courageous again now that he's seen that Clark won't do anything to him.

"Hey asshole, don't forget your tips," he hisses, throwing an empty beer can at Clark's back, making his pack of idiots chuckle.

Clark stops, and just before he leaves, she sees his face, all frustration, tiredness at a humiliation that seem too familiar to him, and her chest tightens.

He's been gone for a good handful of seconds when Lois finally draws her eyes away from the door he's just exited by. The helplessness and ache she feels morphs into anger again as the jokes and chuckles at his expanse start rising.

Snickers, mockeries, brags coming for the filth that is now laughing out loud. Those are the last straw.

As she turns back to go and talk to Chrissy, Lois hears his muffled moans of pains, mixed with a few colourful names he kindly (but not too loudly, she notes) adresses to her.

She smiles.

It takes her half an hour to reach his place.

Chrissy's indications are clear enough, but it's so secluded, so far into the forest – for a city girl like her, anyway – that at some point, she thinks she's lost.

What a delightful last twenty-four hour it would have made: almost getting crushed, an alien discovery, and getting to starve and freeze to death in the freaking woods.

But she doesn't, and, after a short walk, a few curses and a barely avoided fall, Lois finds herself in front of a small wooden cabin. Hidden among the trees, the place is nothing extravagant, quite simple. Nice, though, she thinks. Charming, peaceful.

How adequate, she thinks.

His home is nothing extravagant, indeed, but as she makes her way around it to reach its front, Lois understands why Clark probably chose it.

The lake reflects the orange colored sky as the sun slowly sets, the dark trees bordering it offering a perfect contrast. It's so quiet, she's sure she could hear a leaf fall.

It's breathtaking.

Even seated, Clark imposing figure betray his physical power, but somehow, he looks perfectly in place, in the middle of that painting worthy landscape.

"You know, I never took you for the type of guy who just saves a girl from being squashed and leaves," she starts when she's reached him.

He doesn't turn to look at her, but Lois sits down anyway, settling down next to him and mirroring his position, legs hanging off the deck.

"Nice job on picking the house, by the way - very trendy. A little too big for my taste, though," and she's relieved when she hears him chuckle a little. "The lake view is pretty nice, though. My hotel room's window gives on an alley wherre drunk gentlemen like to come and relieved themselves from all the beer you serve them, so I admit I'm a bit jealous on this one."

"Sorry about that."

He finally looks at her, and Lois turns her head to meet his gaze. He's smiling, but it doesn't reach his eyes - inside them, there's nothing but sadness, hurt. She hates that sight more than she expected to.

She smiles back gently. "All forgiven, Smallville. Although if you're taking suggestions, I think buying the next round would be a nice way to make amends," she deadpans, earning herself an amused look.

"Deal." They look at each other for a few seconds, before his eyes turn more serious again. Concerned, guilty, she thinks. "Are you all right?" She snorts.

Even in a situation like this, the man thinks of her first. Unexpected, from what she's seen and experienced so far from human kind – coming from Clark, she supposes it's not really that surprising. She did smell the perfect, selfless good guy type pretty quickly, after all.

"I feel like I should be asking you this." He frowns. "I went to the bar looking for you – I saw what happened."

He drops her gaze for a second, swallows.

"That was nothing," he tries to shrug it off. Shaking his head slightly, he looks back at her, and smiles a smile that she knows is not quite true. "I'm used to it, anyway," and even it was supposed to have the opposite effect, his words make her heart break a little more. "How are you feeling?"

Shaking her head in disbelief, Lois answers. "I'm all right. No pain, except for the bruise on my arm and the pounding in my head this morning that reminded me a little too much of my hangover days in college," she jokes. "But apart from that, I'm fine."

She looks at him, waits for him to look back. "Thank you." This time, his smile is sincere.

"You're welcome." Chuckling, Lois snorts.

"I can't believe I managed to get hurt in Canada. War zones in Afghanistan and Irak, I'm fine – almost empty fisher town in the world's most friendly country, and I barely avoid getting crushed," she rolls her eyes. "Thank God Perry won't know: I'll never hear the end of it."

He laughs at that, a genuine, big laugh, and she can't help her own smile. "What?"

"Nothing, it's just – well, first, that wasn't exactly the reaction I was expecting from you," and she archs an amused eyebrow at that. "I was getting ready for the hundred questions a minute, to be honest."

"Oh, it's coming, Smallville - don't worry." She shrugs nonchalantly. "I just thought I'll wait a little and get you by surprise: more interesting answers that way," she says seriously, before they both chuckle. "What's second?"

"Most people usually run in the other direction, when they find out. Or go for the looks and the whispered comments whenever I'm around, which is much better," he adds with irony. The corner of his lips strech up as his eyes meet hers.

"Well, I'm not most people," she smirks. The small smile and intense, yet soft gaze he gives her at that wakes something deep down in her, straight down to her insides.

"No, you're not."

Lois suddenly feels the intensity level rise up – and the temperature, for some reason.

"And anyway," she adds in a poor attempt to pretend to ignore the warmth in her entire body and her betraying heart skipping a beat. "You saved my life, so the least I can do is act like a decent human being – it's only fair."

"You'd be surprised," he starts, eyebrows raised. "I once caught an old lady before she fell to the floor, but she saw me coming to her at a speed, well, a little too high to be considered normal."

His eyes light up with amusement. "She hit me with her unbrella and yelled at me to go back to Satan."

It's awful. It really is, but all of the sudden, the image of an helpful Clark confused as he's assaulted by a lady half his size comes to her mind, and that, the ridiculous things she was shouting, and the ridiculous situation itself added to Clark's face right now is just too much – and they both burst out laughing.

It takes them more than a few seconds to finally manage to calm down.

"God," she whispers, wiping the tears that had escaped her away. "People are crazy."

"In their defense, it's not everyday you see a man going faster than a train or coming out of flames unarmed," he argues. Lois is surprised to find that his understanding shocks her more than the fact than he's apparently able to walk through fire.

"You're always taking it, aren't you?" He frowns.

"What's that?"

"Their defense."

His smile falls a little at that.

"I was angry for a long time, actually. Not just at people – at the situation, at myself. At God." He thinks, shrugs. "But at some point, I had to decide what kind of man I wanted to be," he finally says, eyes and head far away. Years away, if she had to guess. "And beating up people just to get even wasn't that. It wouldn't help much, anyway."

After a moment, he comes back to reality. "People are not ready," he smiles, looking back at her. "Maybe they'll never be – I accept that."

Shaking her head, she huffs.

"Well, I don't. The fact that you are who you are doesn't give anybody the right to treat you like that – shouldn't mean you have to go through things like what you've just been through with that jerk at the bar," she adds, her blood boiling again.

Her hold tightens on the wood underneath them. "That's bullshit."

"Thank you." She looks back at him, surprised. After a moment, she understands what he means, and somehow, it calms her down.

"For what?" she says instead of the litany of curse words she was about to drop. "Not being afraid of you because of a few special habilities?" She snorts, both to dedramatize the situation and to make him smile. "Please, Smallville – I've been around, you know."

"Among other things, yes," he teases.

"Yeah, well, that's my point: you shouldn't have to thank me. Or to hide."

"I'm not from here."

She doesn't miss a beat.

"So?"

She holds his gaze, not willing to give him any reason to doubt her words, not willing to accept the way he's decided to seems to see himself. She means it – and what, if he's from another world? She'll concede she was shocked when she first realized, and her head is still kind of reeling at the fact that aliens do exist, and she can understand that that alone is, well, mind blowing.

But he's also just a man, in the end – a good one, at that. In just a couple of days, she's come to realize just how much, not mentionning funny, and kind, and smart. Hell, if she wasn't careful, she bet she could fall for the guy – probably already was, a small betraying inside voice whispers.

He gives her a small smile, then, his face unreadable before they both fall into silence. Eyes fixed on the other side of the lake, each of them lost in their own thoughts.

"Is that the reason for the no settling and no proper reporter gigs?" she asks after a while. "You're afraid that someone might found out?"

He thinks for a beat before answering.

"Maybe on some level, yes," he admits. "But I'm also looking for answers. Where I come from, why I'm here. Why I'm alone."

"You really don't know any of that,?" she blurts out before she can stop herself. He smiles sadly.

"No. My adopted parents found me in a field near their house – in a spaceship," he adds, amused at the look on her face. "Very sci-fi, I know."

"Tell me about it," she whistles. Then frowns. "I'm surprised the Governement didn't show up at their footstep the following day."

"They were as well, actually. For days, my mother was afraid they would come to get me – but they never did."

They leap into silence once more. Lois doesn't really know for how long, too deep into her own reflections. Over those people, that are so good, they took care and protected a small child despite the fact that it could have brought them troubles in more ways than one. Over him, so humble, so human, despite a life and situation that most, including herself, wouldn't be able to handle so gracefully, if at all.

Over how heavy a burden it must have been, for a small child to bear.

Given what he's told her and what she picked up, it doesn't seem like the people that knew were as understanding and kind as his parents.

"It must have been pretty lonely," she says after a while, her voice quiet. "Growing up, I mean." He chuckles, not much humor in it.

"Still is."

And here she is again: aching for him, somehow. Swallowing down as best as she can, Lois turns to look at him, but before she can think of anything to say, he continues, eyes still fixed ahead. "It could have been worse, I guess. My parents were great, so it helped a lot, but – I just didn't feel like I fitted in. I didn't. Hence all the reading," he smirks knowingly at her. She smiles back.

"So Plato and Aristotle were Clark Kent's best friends, huh?" She can picture him, sitting under a tree, reading to try to understand what it meant to be human.

"And don't forget Hank – my dog," he adds with a falsly serious nod, and she plays along.

"Right."

He stares back at the water before his voice rises again.

"I always had to hold back. It was more difficult when I was a kid, but sometimes - " He hesitates, almost ashamed of himself, she thinks. "Sometimes, it's like I'm fifteen again. If it wasn't for Chrissy, I'm not sure I would have stopped myself in time, at the bar," he admits through gritted teeth. Confesses, she realizes.

"I know you wouldn't have hurt him," she says confidently, not wavering for a second when his suprised eyes meet her own. "Even if the son of a bitch deserved it." She tries to keep the smirk out of her face as she shrugs. "Which is why I did."

As his expression goes from shock to amusement, Lois laughs with him.

That night, as he walks her back to her motel, they pass the bar – the bar, and the trucks parked not far from it.

Noticing his gaze, she smirks.

"Do it."

Startled, he turns back towards her, frowning. "You're thinking about destroying that douche's truck – and I really think you should." He hesitates briefly, but eventually, her encouraging smile makes his own grow. "Come on, Kent: show me what you got."

He does.

"So."

Hands in his pockets, he purses his lips, a faint smile on his face. "So."

"There's no way to make you change your mind, huh?" She thinks his smile turns a little fond. There's something else there as well, something she can't quite identify.

"I have to find out where I'm from, Lois – who I am."

"Well, you're Clark Kent, and you have what it takes to be decent journalist. A job, that, might I point out, comes with a lot of perks: this could actually help you in your research."

"Really?," he asks, amused. "How so?"

Lois just shrugs, sure of herself.

"Clearance, means to investigate what you want, helpful sources around the world – you name it. And it's the greatest job in the world, so." She breaks pretense of snobiness when he chuckles.

Her face turns more serious, then. "You can have a normal life, settle down." She sees the slight distress behind his blue eyes at that, and a part of her feels like it's what's he's always wanted, yet had always been deprieved of.

"You don't have to hide, Clark," she says, sincere. "You don't have to be alone."

Once she's sure he's heard her, she shrugs again. "And Metropolis is a pretty good place to live," she adds with a perkier tone, wanting to make that sad look from his face. She pats herself on the back when it works.

"Nice restaurants, great bars, always buzzing. Plus, it could use something other than douches."

"So I'm in the nice guys category, then?", he jokes, bragging.

"Decent," she smirks. "Don't let it go to your head, farmboy."

They laugh, and looking at his ridiculously blue eyes, Lois realizes that she's probably going to miss them. Miss him, in fact.

How about that.

She clears her throat just to make sure her stupid voice doesn't betray her before speaking again.

"Anyway: for what it's worth, I really do think that it's possible. And, most importantly, that you deserve it."

He seems to hesitate for a while, his almost hopeful gaze staring at her. But, after a moment, he drops his head, shaking his head only slightly, as if to convince himself, before looking back at her with a faint smile.

"I can't, Lois – I have to know."

"And you can look and have a life," she insists softly.

As they look at each other, she knows she didn't convince him, though. Sighing, she gives him a small smile, accepting her defeat. "Alright, Smallville," she concedes, holding up her hands in surrender. "Your choice."

There's nothing more to be said, and so they just stand here, face to face. Lois wants to kiss him, and is much too aware that she probably won't have another chance to.

So, she does.

His lips are softer than she imagined, just like the skin under her fingertips, despite the light stubble on his square jaw. She doesn't immediately open her eyes afterwards, but when she does, her face inches away from his, his are still closed.

She smiles when he looks down at her.

"Thank you for saving me, Superman."

A couple of days after their article is released, she receives an email.

"Looks like it wasn't a total disaster, after all. It was a pleasure to work with you, Miss Lane."

Perched up behind her Daily Planet desk, Lois smiles.

"Nice working with you too, Joe."

Days pass, turn into weeks. She keeps investigating, the bad guys keep getting their faces shown to the world.

She thinks about him, sometimes. Often. More than she's supposed to, probably.

It could have worked, she thinks. It's foolish to even think about it (she had only spent one week with the guy, for God's sake) and on paper, it shouldn't have. Not because of the whole alien thing – that, she couldn't care less about. It was on everything else that they weren't compatible, or at least, shouldn't be.

he was an optimictic when she was a cynical, believed in humanity when she lost faith in it a long time ago. He was quiet and reflexive, she was loud and impulsive. He was dangerously close to their human definition of perfect, and she wasoh so far from it.

And yet – yet, she believes it could have worked. She wanted it to.

Too bad destiny had other plans for them.

"Come on, Lois. When are you gonna throw me a bone?"

Leaning towards her, he smirks, apparently pretty proud of himself. "Courtside seats to the game tonight. What do you say?"

Shaking her head slightly, she barely holds back a roll of her eyes.

"I say you should go back to trolling the intern pool," she smiles defiantly, raising her eyebrows. "You'll probably have more luck, " and of course, that's the moment Jenny chooses to show up.

Her smile turns half apologetic, half amused as she hands the youg woman her article. "Sorry."

Steve simply shrugs, and turns his attention to Jenny, waving his tickets.

"Courtside?"

"Don't," Lois advices with a smile, chuckling as she gets back to her computer when Jenny snorts.

"Lombard, Lane, I want you to meet our new stringer, I want you to show him the ropes. Lois, I'm sure you'll recognize your partner."

She's not going to lie: when she turns around, her freaking heart stops.

"This is Clark Kent," Perry finishes for Lombard's sake. "Good luck, kid," he says with an encouraging pat to his shoulder, then leaves.

Leaving her shocked, speechless, questionning what's she's seeing, and probably gaping.

He's shaved, wearing a tie and a plaid dress shirt she'll probably tease him when she regain the abilily, and has the dorkiest pair of glasses perched up on his nose, but there's no mistaken – standing right in front of them, Clark Joe himself.

His short exchange with Steve gives her time to get her self-control back - or at least, enough to get up, control her smile as best as she can, and get her voice back.

The stupid thing in her chest, however, is still going wild.

"I thought cold fisher towns were more your style, Kent," she manages, painfully aware of Lombard's presence next to them. She takes comfort in the fact that Clark seems to be having as much trouble as her containing his grin.

"I thought a change of scenery would be nice," he simply answers, his deep voice almost sending shivers to her spine.

Come on, Lane. "I was told that Metropolis was a pretty good place to live," he smirks, insolent.

"Smart choice, farmboy. Well, in that case." Extending her arm, Lois fights to keep as straight a face as she can. "Welcome to the Planet."

She almost breaks at the slight shock on his face, his eyes widening for a second at her carefully chosen greeting as he takes her hand. After a couple of seconds, he smiles back, amused.

"Glad to be here, Lois."

                                                     EPILOGUE

#clois #pre - man of steel au #clois fics #fics #mine

[forlawfirmsonlymarketing]

Google's May 2020 Core Update: Winners, Winnerers, Winlosers, and Why It's All Probably Crap

Posted by Dr-Pete On May 4, Google announced that they were rolling out a new Core Update. By May 7, it appeared that the dust had mostly settled. Here’s an 11-day view from MozCast: We measured relatively high volatility from May 4-6, with a peak of 112.6° on May 5. Note that the 30-day average temperature prior to May 4 was historically very high (89.3°). How does this compare to previous Core Updates? With the caveat that recent temperatures have been well above historical averages, the May 2020 Core Update was our second-hottest Core Update so far, coming in just below the August 2018 “Medic” update.

Who “won” the May Core Update?

It’s common to report winners and losers after a major update (and I’ve done it myself), but for a while now I’ve been concerned that these analyses only capture a small window of time. Whenever we compare two fixed points in time, we’re ignoring the natural volatility of search rankings and the inherent differences between keywords. This time around, I’d like to take a hard look at the pitfalls. I’m going to focus on winners. The table below shows the 1-day winners (May 5) by total rankings in the 10,000-keyword MozCast tracking set. I’ve only included subdomains with at least 25 rankings on May 4: Putting aside the usual statistical suspects (small sample sizes for some keywords, the unique pros and cons of our data set, etc.), what’s the problem with this analysis? Sure, there are different ways to report the “% Gain” (such as absolute change vs. relative percentage), but I’ve reported the absolute numbers honestly and the relative change is accurate. The problem is that, in rushing to run the numbers after one day, we’ve ignored the reality that most core updates are multi-day (a trend that seemed to continue for the May Core Update, as evidenced by our initial graph). We’ve also failed to account for domains whose rankings might be historically volatile (but more on that in a bit). What if we compare the 1-day and 2-day data?

Which story do we tell?

The table below adds in the 2-day relative percentage gained. I’ve kept the same 25 subdomains and will continue to sort them by the 1-day percentage gained, for consistency: Even just comparing the first two days of the roll-out, we can see that the story is shifting considerably. The problem is: Which story do we tell? Often, we’re not even looking at lists, but anecdotes based on our own clients or cherry-picking data. Consider this story: If this was our only view of the data, we would probably conclude that the update intensified over the two days, with day two rewarding sites even more. We could even start to craft a story about how demand for apps was growing, or certain news sites were being rewarded. These stories might have a grain of truth, but the fact is that we have no idea from this data alone. Now, let’s pick three different data points (all of these are from the top 20): From this limited view, we could conclude that Google decided that the Core Update went wrong and reversed it on day two. We could even conclude that certain news sites were being penalized for some reason. This tells a wildly different story than the first set of anecdotes. There’s an even weirder story buried in the May 2020 data. Consider this: LinkedIn showed a minor bump (one we’d generally ignore) on day one and then lost 100% of its rankings on day two. Wow, that May Core Update really packs a punch! It turns out that LinkedIn may have accidentally de-indexed their site — they recovered the next day, and it appears this massive change had nothing to do with the Core Update. The simple truth is that these numbers tell us very little about why a site gained or lost rankings.

How do we define “normal”?

Let’s take a deeper look at the MarketWatch data. Marketwatch gained 19% in the 1-day stats, but lost 2% in the 2-day numbers. The problem here is that we don’t know from these numbers what MarketWatch’s normal SERP flux looks like. Here’s a graph of seven days before and after May 4 (the start of the Core Update): Looking at even a small bit of historical data, we can see that MarketWatch, like most news sites, experiences significant volatility. The “gains” on May 5 are only because of losses on May 4. It turns out that the 7-day mean after May 4 (45.7) is only a slight increase over the 7-day mean before May 4 (44.3), with MarketWatch measuring a modest relative gain of +3.2%. Now let’s look at Google Play, which appeared to be a clear winner after two days: You don’t even need to do the math to spot the difference here. Comparing the 7-day mean before May 4 (232.9) to the 7-day mean after (448.7), Google Play experienced a dramatic +93% relative change after the May Core Update. How does this 7-day before/after comparison work with the LinkedIn incident? Here’s a graph of the before/after with dotted lines added for the two means: While this approach certainly helps offset the single-day anomaly, we’re still showing a before/after change of -16%, which isn’t really in line with reality. You can see that six of the seven days after the May Core Update were above the 7-day average. Note that LinkedIn also has relatively low volatility over the short-range history. Why am I rotten-cherry-picking an extreme example where my new metric falls short? I want it to be perfectly clear that no one metric can ever tell the whole story. Even if we accounted for the variance and did statistical testing, we’re still missing a lot of information. A clear before/after difference doesn’t tell us what actually happened, only that there was a change correlated with the timing of the Core Update. That’s useful information, but it still begs further investigation before we jump to sweeping conclusions. Overall, though, the approach is certainly better than single-day slices. Using the 7-day before-vs-after mean comparison accounts for both historical data and a full seven days after the update. What if we expanded this comparison of 7-day periods to the larger data set? Here’s our original “winners” list with the new numbers: Obviously, this is a lot to digest in one table, but we can start to see where the before-and-after metric (the relative difference between 7-day means) shows a different picture, in some cases, than either the 1-day or 2-day view. Let’s go ahead and re-build the top 20 based on the before-and-after percentage change: Some of the big players are the same, but we’ve also got some newcomers — including sites that looked like they lost visibility on day one, but have stacked up 2-day and 7-day gains. Let’s take a quick look at Parents.com, our original big winner (winnerer? winnerest?). Day one showed a massive +100% gain (doubling visibility), but day-two numbers were more modest, and before-and-after gains came in at just under half the day-one gain. Here are the seven days before and after: It’s easy to see here that the day-one jump was a short-term anomaly, based in part on a dip on May 4. Comparing the 7-day averages seems to get much closer to the truth. This is a warning not just to algo trackers like myself, but to SEOs who might see that +100% and rush to tell their boss or client. Don’t let good news turn into a promise that you can’t keep.

Why do we keep doing this?

If it seems like I’m calling out the industry, note that I’m squarely in my own crosshairs here. There’s tremendous pressure to publish analyses early, not just because it equates to traffic and links (frankly, it does), but because site owners and SEOs genuinely want answers. As I wrote recently, I think there’s tremendous danger in overinterpreting short-term losses and fixing the wrong things. However, I think there’s also real danger in overstating short-term wins and having the expectation that those gains are permanent. That can lead to equally risky decisions. Is it all crap? No, I don’t think so, but I think it’s very easy to step off the sidewalk and into the muck after a storm, and at the very least we need to wait for the ground to dry. That’s not easy in a world of Twitter and 24-hour news cycles, but it’s essential to get a multi-day view, especially since so many large algorithm updates roll out over extended periods of time. Which numbers should we believe? In a sense, all of them, or at least all of the ones we can adequately verify. No single metric is ever going to paint the entire picture, and before you rush off to celebrate being on a winners list, it’s important to take that next step and really understand the historical trends and the context of any victory.

Who wants some free data?

Given the scope of the analysis, I didn’t cover the May 2020 Core Update losers in this post or go past the Top 20, but you can download the raw data here. If you’d like to edit it, please make a copy first. Winners and losers are on separate tabs, and this covers all domains with at least 25 rankings in our MozCast 10K data set on May 4 (just over 400 domains).   Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

https://www.businesscreatorplus.com/googles-may-2020-core-update-winners-winnerers-winlosers-and-why-its-all-probably-crap/

#googlesearchranking #localseo #dailydoseofmarketing

[isearchgoood]

Google's May 2020 Core Update: Winners, Winnerers, Winlosers, and Why It's All Probably Crap

Posted by Dr-Pete

On May 4, Google announced that they were rolling out a new Core Update. By May 7, it appeared that the dust had mostly settled. Here’s an 11-day view from MozCast:

We measured relatively high volatility from May 4-6, with a peak of 112.6° on May 5. Note that the 30-day average temperature prior to May 4 was historically very high (89.3°).

How does this compare to previous Core Updates? With the caveat that recent temperatures have been well above historical averages, the May 2020 Core Update was our second-hottest Core Update so far, coming in just below the August 2018 “Medic” update.

Who “won” the May Core Update?

It’s common to report winners and losers after a major update (and I’ve done it myself), but for a while now I’ve been concerned that these analyses only capture a small window of time. Whenever we compare two fixed points in time, we’re ignoring the natural volatility of search rankings and the inherent differences between keywords.

This time around, I’d like to take a hard look at the pitfalls. I’m going to focus on winners. The table below shows the 1-day winners (May 5) by total rankings in the 10,000-keyword MozCast tracking set. I’ve only included subdomains with at least 25 rankings on May 4:

Putting aside the usual statistical suspects (small sample sizes for some keywords, the unique pros and cons of our data set, etc.), what’s the problem with this analysis? Sure, there are different ways to report the “% Gain” (such as absolute change vs. relative percentage), but I’ve reported the absolute numbers honestly and the relative change is accurate.

The problem is that, in rushing to run the numbers after one day, we’ve ignored the reality that most core updates are multi-day (a trend that seemed to continue for the May Core Update, as evidenced by our initial graph). We’ve also failed to account for domains whose rankings might be historically volatile (but more on that in a bit). What if we compare the 1-day and 2-day data?

Which story do we tell?

The table below adds in the 2-day relative percentage gained. I’ve kept the same 25 subdomains and will continue to sort them by the 1-day percentage gained, for consistency:

Even just comparing the first two days of the roll-out, we can see that the story is shifting considerably. The problem is: Which story do we tell? Often, we’re not even looking at lists, but anecdotes based on our own clients or cherry-picking data. Consider this story:

If this was our only view of the data, we would probably conclude that the update intensified over the two days, with day two rewarding sites even more. We could even start to craft a story about how demand for apps was growing, or certain news sites were being rewarded. These stories might have a grain of truth, but the fact is that we have no idea from this data alone.

Now, let’s pick three different data points (all of these are from the top 20):

From this limited view, we could conclude that Google decided that the Core Update went wrong and reversed it on day two. We could even conclude that certain news sites were being penalized for some reason. This tells a wildly different story than the first set of anecdotes.

There’s an even weirder story buried in the May 2020 data. Consider this:

LinkedIn showed a minor bump (one we’d generally ignore) on day one and then lost 100% of its rankings on day two. Wow, that May Core Update really packs a punch! It turns out that LinkedIn may have accidentally de-indexed their site — they recovered the next day, and it appears this massive change had nothing to do with the Core Update. The simple truth is that these numbers tell us very little about why a site gained or lost rankings.

How do we define “normal”?

Let’s take a deeper look at the MarketWatch data. Marketwatch gained 19% in the 1-day stats, but lost 2% in the 2-day numbers. The problem here is that we don’t know from these numbers what MarketWatch’s normal SERP flux looks like. Here’s a graph of seven days before and after May 4 (the start of the Core Update):

Looking at even a small bit of historical data, we can see that MarketWatch, like most news sites, experiences significant volatility. The “gains” on May 5 are only because of losses on May 4. It turns out that the 7-day mean after May 4 (45.7) is only a slight increase over the 7-day mean before May 4 (44.3), with MarketWatch measuring a modest relative gain of +3.2%.

Now let’s look at Google Play, which appeared to be a clear winner after two days:

You don’t even need to do the math to spot the difference here. Comparing the 7-day mean before May 4 (232.9) to the 7-day mean after (448.7), Google Play experienced a dramatic +93% relative change after the May Core Update.

How does this 7-day before/after comparison work with the LinkedIn incident? Here’s a graph of the before/after with dotted lines added for the two means:

While this approach certainly helps offset the single-day anomaly, we’re still showing a before/after change of -16%, which isn’t really in line with reality. You can see that six of the seven days after the May Core Update were above the 7-day average. Note that LinkedIn also has relatively low volatility over the short-range history.

Why am I rotten-cherry-picking an extreme example where my new metric falls short? I want it to be perfectly clear that no one metric can ever tell the whole story. Even if we accounted for the variance and did statistical testing, we’re still missing a lot of information. A clear before/after difference doesn’t tell us what actually happened, only that there was a change correlated with the timing of the Core Update. That’s useful information, but it still begs further investigation before we jump to sweeping conclusions.

Overall, though, the approach is certainly better than single-day slices. Using the 7-day before-vs-after mean comparison accounts for both historical data and a full seven days after the update. What if we expanded this comparison of 7-day periods to the larger data set? Here’s our original “winners” list with the new numbers:

Obviously, this is a lot to digest in one table, but we can start to see where the before-and-after metric (the relative difference between 7-day means) shows a different picture, in some cases, than either the 1-day or 2-day view. Let’s go ahead and re-build the top 20 based on the before-and-after percentage change:

Some of the big players are the same, but we’ve also got some newcomers — including sites that looked like they lost visibility on day one, but have stacked up 2-day and 7-day gains.

Let’s take a quick look at Parents.com, our original big winner (winnerer? winnerest?). Day one showed a massive +100% gain (doubling visibility), but day-two numbers were more modest, and before-and-after gains came in at just under half the day-one gain. Here are the seven days before and after:

It’s easy to see here that the day-one jump was a short-term anomaly, based in part on a dip on May 4. Comparing the 7-day averages seems to get much closer to the truth. This is a warning not just to algo trackers like myself, but to SEOs who might see that +100% and rush to tell their boss or client. Don’t let good news turn into a promise that you can’t keep.

Why do we keep doing this?

If it seems like I’m calling out the industry, note that I’m squarely in my own crosshairs here. There’s tremendous pressure to publish analyses early, not just because it equates to traffic and links (frankly, it does), but because site owners and SEOs genuinely want answers. As I wrote recently, I think there’s tremendous danger in overinterpreting short-term losses and fixing the wrong things. However, I think there’s also real danger in overstating short-term wins and having the expectation that those gains are permanent. That can lead to equally risky decisions.

Is it all crap? No, I don’t think so, but I think it’s very easy to step off the sidewalk and into the muck after a storm, and at the very least we need to wait for the ground to dry. That’s not easy in a world of Twitter and 24-hour news cycles, but it’s essential to get a multi-day view, especially since so many large algorithm updates roll out over extended periods of time.

Which numbers should we believe? In a sense, all of them, or at least all of the ones we can adequately verify. No single metric is ever going to paint the entire picture, and before you rush off to celebrate being on a winners list, it’s important to take that next step and really understand the historical trends and the context of any victory.

Who wants some free data?

Given the scope of the analysis, I didn’t cover the May 2020 Core Update losers in this post or go past the Top 20, but you can download the raw data here. If you’d like to edit it, please make a copy first. Winners and losers are on separate tabs, and this covers all domains with at least 25 rankings in our MozCast 10K data set on May 4 (just over 400 domains).

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

via Blogger https://ift.tt/2WsXYgc #blogger #bloggingtips #bloggerlife #bloggersgetsocial #ontheblog #writersofinstagram #writingprompt #instapoetry #writerscommunity #writersofig #writersblock #writerlife #writtenword #instawriters #spilledink #wordgasm #creativewriting #poetsofinstagram #blackoutpoetry #poetsofig

[evempierson]

Google's May 2020 Core Update: Winners, Winnerers, Winlosers, and Why It's All Probably Crap

Posted by Dr-Pete

On May 4, Google announced that they were rolling out a new Core Update. By May 7, it appeared that the dust had mostly settled. Here’s an 11-day view from MozCast:

We measured relatively high volatility from May 4-6, with a peak of 112.6° on May 5. Note that the 30-day average temperature prior to May 4 was historically very high (89.3°).

How does this compare to previous Core Updates? With the caveat that recent temperatures have been well above historical averages, the May 2020 Core Update was our second-hottest Core Update so far, coming in just below the August 2018 “Medic” update.

Who “won” the May Core Update?

It’s common to report winners and losers after a major update (and I’ve done it myself), but for a while now I’ve been concerned that these analyses only capture a small window of time. Whenever we compare two fixed points in time, we’re ignoring the natural volatility of search rankings and the inherent differences between keywords.

This time around, I’d like to take a hard look at the pitfalls. I’m going to focus on winners. The table below shows the 1-day winners (May 5) by total rankings in the 10,000-keyword MozCast tracking set. I’ve only included subdomains with at least 25 rankings on May 4:

Putting aside the usual statistical suspects (small sample sizes for some keywords, the unique pros and cons of our data set, etc.), what’s the problem with this analysis? Sure, there are different ways to report the “% Gain” (such as absolute change vs. relative percentage), but I’ve reported the absolute numbers honestly and the relative change is accurate.

The problem is that, in rushing to run the numbers after one day, we’ve ignored the reality that most core updates are multi-day (a trend that seemed to continue for the May Core Update, as evidenced by our initial graph). We’ve also failed to account for domains whose rankings might be historically volatile (but more on that in a bit). What if we compare the 1-day and 2-day data?

Which story do we tell?

The table below adds in the 2-day relative percentage gained. I’ve kept the same 25 subdomains and will continue to sort them by the 1-day percentage gained, for consistency:

Even just comparing the first two days of the roll-out, we can see that the story is shifting considerably. The problem is: Which story do we tell? Often, we’re not even looking at lists, but anecdotes based on our own clients or cherry-picking data. Consider this story:

If this was our only view of the data, we would probably conclude that the update intensified over the two days, with day two rewarding sites even more. We could even start to craft a story about how demand for apps was growing, or certain news sites were being rewarded. These stories might have a grain of truth, but the fact is that we have no idea from this data alone.

Now, let’s pick three different data points (all of these are from the top 20):

From this limited view, we could conclude that Google decided that the Core Update went wrong and reversed it on day two. We could even conclude that certain news sites were being penalized for some reason. This tells a wildly different story than the first set of anecdotes.

There’s an even weirder story buried in the May 2020 data. Consider this:

LinkedIn showed a minor bump (one we’d generally ignore) on day one and then lost 100% of its rankings on day two. Wow, that May Core Update really packs a punch! It turns out that LinkedIn may have accidentally de-indexed their site — they recovered the next day, and it appears this massive change had nothing to do with the Core Update. The simple truth is that these numbers tell us very little about why a site gained or lost rankings.

How do we define “normal”?

Let’s take a deeper look at the MarketWatch data. Marketwatch gained 19% in the 1-day stats, but lost 2% in the 2-day numbers. The problem here is that we don’t know from these numbers what MarketWatch’s normal SERP flux looks like. Here’s a graph of seven days before and after May 4 (the start of the Core Update):

Looking at even a small bit of historical data, we can see that MarketWatch, like most news sites, experiences significant volatility. The “gains” on May 5 are only because of losses on May 4. It turns out that the 7-day mean after May 4 (45.7) is only a slight increase over the 7-day mean before May 4 (44.3), with MarketWatch measuring a modest relative gain of +3.2%.

Now let’s look at Google Play, which appeared to be a clear winner after two days:

You don’t even need to do the math to spot the difference here. Comparing the 7-day mean before May 4 (232.9) to the 7-day mean after (448.7), Google Play experienced a dramatic +93% relative change after the May Core Update.

How does this 7-day before/after comparison work with the LinkedIn incident? Here’s a graph of the before/after with dotted lines added for the two means:

While this approach certainly helps offset the single-day anomaly, we’re still showing a before/after change of -16%, which isn’t really in line with reality. You can see that six of the seven days after the May Core Update were above the 7-day average. Note that LinkedIn also has relatively low volatility over the short-range history.

Why am I rotten-cherry-picking an extreme example where my new metric falls short? I want it to be perfectly clear that no one metric can ever tell the whole story. Even if we accounted for the variance and did statistical testing, we’re still missing a lot of information. A clear before/after difference doesn’t tell us what actually happened, only that there was a change correlated with the timing of the Core Update. That’s useful information, but it still begs further investigation before we jump to sweeping conclusions.

Overall, though, the approach is certainly better than single-day slices. Using the 7-day before-vs-after mean comparison accounts for both historical data and a full seven days after the update. What if we expanded this comparison of 7-day periods to the larger data set? Here’s our original “winners” list with the new numbers:

Obviously, this is a lot to digest in one table, but we can start to see where the before-and-after metric (the relative difference between 7-day means) shows a different picture, in some cases, than either the 1-day or 2-day view. Let’s go ahead and re-build the top 20 based on the before-and-after percentage change:

Some of the big players are the same, but we’ve also got some newcomers — including sites that looked like they lost visibility on day one, but have stacked up 2-day and 7-day gains.

Let’s take a quick look at Parents.com, our original big winner (winnerer? winnerest?). Day one showed a massive +100% gain (doubling visibility), but day-two numbers were more modest, and before-and-after gains came in at just under half the day-one gain. Here are the seven days before and after:

It’s easy to see here that the day-one jump was a short-term anomaly, based in part on a dip on May 4. Comparing the 7-day averages seems to get much closer to the truth. This is a warning not just to algo trackers like myself, but to SEOs who might see that +100% and rush to tell their boss or client. Don’t let good news turn into a promise that you can’t keep.

Why do we keep doing this?

If it seems like I’m calling out the industry, note that I’m squarely in my own crosshairs here. There’s tremendous pressure to publish analyses early, not just because it equates to traffic and links (frankly, it does), but because site owners and SEOs genuinely want answers. As I wrote recently, I think there’s tremendous danger in overinterpreting short-term losses and fixing the wrong things. However, I think there’s also real danger in overstating short-term wins and having the expectation that those gains are permanent. That can lead to equally risky decisions.

Is it all crap? No, I don’t think so, but I think it’s very easy to step off the sidewalk and into the muck after a storm, and at the very least we need to wait for the ground to dry. That’s not easy in a world of Twitter and 24-hour news cycles, but it’s essential to get a multi-day view, especially since so many large algorithm updates roll out over extended periods of time.

Which numbers should we believe? In a sense, all of them, or at least all of the ones we can adequately verify. No single metric is ever going to paint the entire picture, and before you rush off to celebrate being on a winners list, it’s important to take that next step and really understand the historical trends and the context of any victory.

Who wants some free data?

Given the scope of the analysis, I didn’t cover the May 2020 Core Update losers in this post or go past the Top 20, but you can download the raw data here. If you’d like to edit it, please make a copy first. Winners and losers are on separate tabs, and this covers all domains with at least 25 rankings in our MozCast 10K data set on May 4 (just over 400 domains).

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

[gamebazu]

Google's May 2020 Core Update: Winners, Winnerers, Winlosers, and Why It's All Probably Crap

Posted by Dr-Pete

On May 4, Google announced that they were rolling out a new Core Update. By May 7, it appeared that the dust had mostly settled. Here’s an 11-day view from MozCast:

We measured relatively high volatility from May 4-6, with a peak of 112.6° on May 5. Note that the 30-day average temperature prior to May 4 was historically very high (89.3°).

How does this compare to previous Core Updates? With the caveat that recent temperatures have been well above historical averages, the May 2020 Core Update was our second-hottest Core Update so far, coming in just below the August 2018 “Medic” update.

Who “won” the May Core Update?

It’s common to report winners and losers after a major update (and I’ve done it myself), but for a while now I’ve been concerned that these analyses only capture a small window of time. Whenever we compare two fixed points in time, we’re ignoring the natural volatility of search rankings and the inherent differences between keywords.

This time around, I’d like to take a hard look at the pitfalls. I’m going to focus on winners. The table below shows the 1-day winners (May 5) by total rankings in the 10,000-keyword MozCast tracking set. I’ve only included subdomains with at least 25 rankings on May 4:

Putting aside the usual statistical suspects (small sample sizes for some keywords, the unique pros and cons of our data set, etc.), what’s the problem with this analysis? Sure, there are different ways to report the “% Gain” (such as absolute change vs. relative percentage), but I’ve reported the absolute numbers honestly and the relative change is accurate.

The problem is that, in rushing to run the numbers after one day, we’ve ignored the reality that most core updates are multi-day (a trend that seemed to continue for the May Core Update, as evidenced by our initial graph). We’ve also failed to account for domains whose rankings might be historically volatile (but more on that in a bit). What if we compare the 1-day and 2-day data?

Which story do we tell?

The table below adds in the 2-day relative percentage gained. I’ve kept the same 25 subdomains and will continue to sort them by the 1-day percentage gained, for consistency:

Even just comparing the first two days of the roll-out, we can see that the story is shifting considerably. The problem is: Which story do we tell? Often, we’re not even looking at lists, but anecdotes based on our own clients or cherry-picking data. Consider this story:

If this was our only view of the data, we would probably conclude that the update intensified over the two days, with day two rewarding sites even more. We could even start to craft a story about how demand for apps was growing, or certain news sites were being rewarded. These stories might have a grain of truth, but the fact is that we have no idea from this data alone.

Now, let’s pick three different data points (all of these are from the top 20):

From this limited view, we could conclude that Google decided that the Core Update went wrong and reversed it on day two. We could even conclude that certain news sites were being penalized for some reason. This tells a wildly different story than the first set of anecdotes.

There’s an even weirder story buried in the May 2020 data. Consider this:

LinkedIn showed a minor bump (one we’d generally ignore) on day one and then lost 100% of its rankings on day two. Wow, that May Core Update really packs a punch! It turns out that LinkedIn may have accidentally de-indexed their site — they recovered the next day, and it appears this massive change had nothing to do with the Core Update. The simple truth is that these numbers tell us very little about why a site gained or lost rankings.

How do we define “normal”?

Let’s take a deeper look at the MarketWatch data. Marketwatch gained 19% in the 1-day stats, but lost 2% in the 2-day numbers. The problem here is that we don’t know from these numbers what MarketWatch’s normal SERP flux looks like. Here’s a graph of seven days before and after May 4 (the start of the Core Update):

Looking at even a small bit of historical data, we can see that MarketWatch, like most news sites, experiences significant volatility. The “gains” on May 5 are only because of losses on May 4. It turns out that the 7-day mean after May 4 (45.7) is only a slight increase over the 7-day mean before May 4 (44.3), with MarketWatch measuring a modest relative gain of +3.2%.

Now let’s look at Google Play, which appeared to be a clear winner after two days:

You don’t even need to do the math to spot the difference here. Comparing the 7-day mean before May 4 (232.9) to the 7-day mean after (448.7), Google Play experienced a dramatic +93% relative change after the May Core Update.

How does this 7-day before/after comparison work with the LinkedIn incident? Here’s a graph of the before/after with dotted lines added for the two means:

While this approach certainly helps offset the single-day anomaly, we’re still showing a before/after change of -16%, which isn’t really in line with reality. You can see that six of the seven days after the May Core Update were above the 7-day average. Note that LinkedIn also has relatively low volatility over the short-range history.

Why am I rotten-cherry-picking an extreme example where my new metric falls short? I want it to be perfectly clear that no one metric can ever tell the whole story. Even if we accounted for the variance and did statistical testing, we’re still missing a lot of information. A clear before/after difference doesn’t tell us what actually happened, only that there was a change correlated with the timing of the Core Update. That’s useful information, but it still begs further investigation before we jump to sweeping conclusions.

Overall, though, the approach is certainly better than single-day slices. Using the 7-day before-vs-after mean comparison accounts for both historical data and a full seven days after the update. What if we expanded this comparison of 7-day periods to the larger data set? Here’s our original “winners” list with the new numbers:

Obviously, this is a lot to digest in one table, but we can start to see where the before-and-after metric (the relative difference between 7-day means) shows a different picture, in some cases, than either the 1-day or 2-day view. Let’s go ahead and re-build the top 20 based on the before-and-after percentage change:

Some of the big players are the same, but we’ve also got some newcomers — including sites that looked like they lost visibility on day one, but have stacked up 2-day and 7-day gains.

Let’s take a quick look at Parents.com, our original big winner (winnerer? winnerest?). Day one showed a massive +100% gain (doubling visibility), but day-two numbers were more modest, and before-and-after gains came in at just under half the day-one gain. Here are the seven days before and after:

It’s easy to see here that the day-one jump was a short-term anomaly, based in part on a dip on May 4. Comparing the 7-day averages seems to get much closer to the truth. This is a warning not just to algo trackers like myself, but to SEOs who might see that +100% and rush to tell their boss or client. Don’t let good news turn into a promise that you can’t keep.

Why do we keep doing this?

If it seems like I’m calling out the industry, note that I’m squarely in my own crosshairs here. There’s tremendous pressure to publish analyses early, not just because it equates to traffic and links (frankly, it does), but because site owners and SEOs genuinely want answers. As I wrote recently, I think there’s tremendous danger in overinterpreting short-term losses and fixing the wrong things. However, I think there’s also real danger in overstating short-term wins and having the expectation that those gains are permanent. That can lead to equally risky decisions.

Is it all crap? No, I don’t think so, but I think it’s very easy to step off the sidewalk and into the muck after a storm, and at the very least we need to wait for the ground to dry. That’s not easy in a world of Twitter and 24-hour news cycles, but it’s essential to get a multi-day view, especially since so many large algorithm updates roll out over extended periods of time.

Which numbers should we believe? In a sense, all of them, or at least all of the ones we can adequately verify. No single metric is ever going to paint the entire picture, and before you rush off to celebrate being on a winners list, it’s important to take that next step and really understand the historical trends and the context of any victory.

Who wants some free data?

Given the scope of the analysis, I didn’t cover the May 2020 Core Update losers in this post or go past the Top 20, but you can download the raw data here. If you’d like to edit it, please make a copy first. Winners and losers are on separate tabs, and this covers all domains with at least 25 rankings in our MozCast 10K data set on May 4 (just over 400 domains).

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

https://ift.tt/2AjddzJ

[thanhtuandoan89]

Google's May 2020 Core Update: Winners, Winnerers, Winlosers, and Why It's All Probably Crap

Posted by Dr-Pete

On May 4, Google announced that they were rolling out a new Core Update. By May 7, it appeared that the dust had mostly settled. Here’s an 11-day view from MozCast:

We measured relatively high volatility from May 4-6, with a peak of 112.6° on May 5. Note that the 30-day average temperature prior to May 4 was historically very high (89.3°).

How does this compare to previous Core Updates? With the caveat that recent temperatures have been well above historical averages, the May 2020 Core Update was our second-hottest Core Update so far, coming in just below the August 2018 “Medic” update.

Who “won” the May Core Update?

It’s common to report winners and losers after a major update (and I’ve done it myself), but for a while now I’ve been concerned that these analyses only capture a small window of time. Whenever we compare two fixed points in time, we’re ignoring the natural volatility of search rankings and the inherent differences between keywords.

This time around, I’d like to take a hard look at the pitfalls. I’m going to focus on winners. The table below shows the 1-day winners (May 5) by total rankings in the 10,000-keyword MozCast tracking set. I’ve only included subdomains with at least 25 rankings on May 4:

Putting aside the usual statistical suspects (small sample sizes for some keywords, the unique pros and cons of our data set, etc.), what’s the problem with this analysis? Sure, there are different ways to report the “% Gain” (such as absolute change vs. relative percentage), but I’ve reported the absolute numbers honestly and the relative change is accurate.

The problem is that, in rushing to run the numbers after one day, we’ve ignored the reality that most core updates are multi-day (a trend that seemed to continue for the May Core Update, as evidenced by our initial graph). We’ve also failed to account for domains whose rankings might be historically volatile (but more on that in a bit). What if we compare the 1-day and 2-day data?

Which story do we tell?

The table below adds in the 2-day relative percentage gained. I’ve kept the same 25 subdomains and will continue to sort them by the 1-day percentage gained, for consistency:

Even just comparing the first two days of the roll-out, we can see that the story is shifting considerably. The problem is: Which story do we tell? Often, we’re not even looking at lists, but anecdotes based on our own clients or cherry-picking data. Consider this story:

If this was our only view of the data, we would probably conclude that the update intensified over the two days, with day two rewarding sites even more. We could even start to craft a story about how demand for apps was growing, or certain news sites were being rewarded. These stories might have a grain of truth, but the fact is that we have no idea from this data alone.

Now, let’s pick three different data points (all of these are from the top 20):

From this limited view, we could conclude that Google decided that the Core Update went wrong and reversed it on day two. We could even conclude that certain news sites were being penalized for some reason. This tells a wildly different story than the first set of anecdotes.

There’s an even weirder story buried in the May 2020 data. Consider this:

LinkedIn showed a minor bump (one we’d generally ignore) on day one and then lost 100% of its rankings on day two. Wow, that May Core Update really packs a punch! It turns out that LinkedIn may have accidentally de-indexed their site — they recovered the next day, and it appears this massive change had nothing to do with the Core Update. The simple truth is that these numbers tell us very little about why a site gained or lost rankings.

How do we define “normal”?

Let’s take a deeper look at the MarketWatch data. Marketwatch gained 19% in the 1-day stats, but lost 2% in the 2-day numbers. The problem here is that we don’t know from these numbers what MarketWatch’s normal SERP flux looks like. Here’s a graph of seven days before and after May 4 (the start of the Core Update):

Looking at even a small bit of historical data, we can see that MarketWatch, like most news sites, experiences significant volatility. The “gains” on May 5 are only because of losses on May 4. It turns out that the 7-day mean after May 4 (45.7) is only a slight increase over the 7-day mean before May 4 (44.3), with MarketWatch measuring a modest relative gain of +3.2%.

Now let’s look at Google Play, which appeared to be a clear winner after two days:

You don’t even need to do the math to spot the difference here. Comparing the 7-day mean before May 4 (232.9) to the 7-day mean after (448.7), Google Play experienced a dramatic +93% relative change after the May Core Update.

How does this 7-day before/after comparison work with the LinkedIn incident? Here’s a graph of the before/after with dotted lines added for the two means:

While this approach certainly helps offset the single-day anomaly, we’re still showing a before/after change of -16%, which isn’t really in line with reality. You can see that six of the seven days after the May Core Update were above the 7-day average. Note that LinkedIn also has relatively low volatility over the short-range history.

Why am I rotten-cherry-picking an extreme example where my new metric falls short? I want it to be perfectly clear that no one metric can ever tell the whole story. Even if we accounted for the variance and did statistical testing, we’re still missing a lot of information. A clear before/after difference doesn’t tell us what actually happened, only that there was a change correlated with the timing of the Core Update. That’s useful information, but it still begs further investigation before we jump to sweeping conclusions.

Overall, though, the approach is certainly better than single-day slices. Using the 7-day before-vs-after mean comparison accounts for both historical data and a full seven days after the update. What if we expanded this comparison of 7-day periods to the larger data set? Here’s our original “winners” list with the new numbers:

Obviously, this is a lot to digest in one table, but we can start to see where the before-and-after metric (the relative difference between 7-day means) shows a different picture, in some cases, than either the 1-day or 2-day view. Let’s go ahead and re-build the top 20 based on the before-and-after percentage change:

Some of the big players are the same, but we’ve also got some newcomers — including sites that looked like they lost visibility on day one, but have stacked up 2-day and 7-day gains.

Let’s take a quick look at Parents.com, our original big winner (winnerer? winnerest?). Day one showed a massive +100% gain (doubling visibility), but day-two numbers were more modest, and before-and-after gains came in at just under half the day-one gain. Here are the seven days before and after:

It’s easy to see here that the day-one jump was a short-term anomaly, based in part on a dip on May 4. Comparing the 7-day averages seems to get much closer to the truth. This is a warning not just to algo trackers like myself, but to SEOs who might see that +100% and rush to tell their boss or client. Don’t let good news turn into a promise that you can’t keep.

Why do we keep doing this?

If it seems like I’m calling out the industry, note that I’m squarely in my own crosshairs here. There’s tremendous pressure to publish analyses early, not just because it equates to traffic and links (frankly, it does), but because site owners and SEOs genuinely want answers. As I wrote recently, I think there’s tremendous danger in overinterpreting short-term losses and fixing the wrong things. However, I think there’s also real danger in overstating short-term wins and having the expectation that those gains are permanent. That can lead to equally risky decisions.

Is it all crap? No, I don’t think so, but I think it’s very easy to step off the sidewalk and into the muck after a storm, and at the very least we need to wait for the ground to dry. That’s not easy in a world of Twitter and 24-hour news cycles, but it’s essential to get a multi-day view, especially since so many large algorithm updates roll out over extended periods of time.

Which numbers should we believe? In a sense, all of them, or at least all of the ones we can adequately verify. No single metric is ever going to paint the entire picture, and before you rush off to celebrate being on a winners list, it’s important to take that next step and really understand the historical trends and the context of any victory.

Who wants some free data?

Given the scope of the analysis, I didn’t cover the May 2020 Core Update losers in this post or go past the Top 20, but you can download the raw data here. If you’d like to edit it, please make a copy first. Winners and losers are on separate tabs, and this covers all domains with at least 25 rankings in our MozCast 10K data set on May 4 (just over 400 domains).

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

[daynamartinez22]

Google's May 2020 Core Update: Winners, Winnerers, Winlosers, and Why It's All Probably Crap

Posted by Dr-Pete

On May 4, Google announced that they were rolling out a new Core Update. By May 7, it appeared that the dust had mostly settled. Here’s an 11-day view from MozCast:

We measured relatively high volatility from May 4-6, with a peak of 112.6° on May 5. Note that the 30-day average temperature prior to May 4 was historically very high (89.3°).

How does this compare to previous Core Updates? With the caveat that recent temperatures have been well above historical averages, the May 2020 Core Update was our second-hottest Core Update so far, coming in just below the August 2018 “Medic” update.

Who “won” the May Core Update?

It’s common to report winners and losers after a major update (and I’ve done it myself), but for a while now I’ve been concerned that these analyses only capture a small window of time. Whenever we compare two fixed points in time, we’re ignoring the natural volatility of search rankings and the inherent differences between keywords.

This time around, I’d like to take a hard look at the pitfalls. I’m going to focus on winners. The table below shows the 1-day winners (May 5) by total rankings in the 10,000-keyword MozCast tracking set. I’ve only included subdomains with at least 25 rankings on May 4:

Putting aside the usual statistical suspects (small sample sizes for some keywords, the unique pros and cons of our data set, etc.), what’s the problem with this analysis? Sure, there are different ways to report the “% Gain” (such as absolute change vs. relative percentage), but I’ve reported the absolute numbers honestly and the relative change is accurate.

The problem is that, in rushing to run the numbers after one day, we’ve ignored the reality that most core updates are multi-day (a trend that seemed to continue for the May Core Update, as evidenced by our initial graph). We’ve also failed to account for domains whose rankings might be historically volatile (but more on that in a bit). What if we compare the 1-day and 2-day data?

Which story do we tell?

The table below adds in the 2-day relative percentage gained. I’ve kept the same 25 subdomains and will continue to sort them by the 1-day percentage gained, for consistency:

Even just comparing the first two days of the roll-out, we can see that the story is shifting considerably. The problem is: Which story do we tell? Often, we’re not even looking at lists, but anecdotes based on our own clients or cherry-picking data. Consider this story:

If this was our only view of the data, we would probably conclude that the update intensified over the two days, with day two rewarding sites even more. We could even start to craft a story about how demand for apps was growing, or certain news sites were being rewarded. These stories might have a grain of truth, but the fact is that we have no idea from this data alone.

Now, let’s pick three different data points (all of these are from the top 20):

From this limited view, we could conclude that Google decided that the Core Update went wrong and reversed it on day two. We could even conclude that certain news sites were being penalized for some reason. This tells a wildly different story than the first set of anecdotes.

There’s an even weirder story buried in the May 2020 data. Consider this:

LinkedIn showed a minor bump (one we’d generally ignore) on day one and then lost 100% of its rankings on day two. Wow, that May Core Update really packs a punch! It turns out that LinkedIn may have accidentally de-indexed their site — they recovered the next day, and it appears this massive change had nothing to do with the Core Update. The simple truth is that these numbers tell us very little about why a site gained or lost rankings.

How do we define “normal”?

Let’s take a deeper look at the MarketWatch data. Marketwatch gained 19% in the 1-day stats, but lost 2% in the 2-day numbers. The problem here is that we don’t know from these numbers what MarketWatch’s normal SERP flux looks like. Here’s a graph of seven days before and after May 4 (the start of the Core Update):

Looking at even a small bit of historical data, we can see that MarketWatch, like most news sites, experiences significant volatility. The “gains” on May 5 are only because of losses on May 4. It turns out that the 7-day mean after May 4 (45.7) is only a slight increase over the 7-day mean before May 4 (44.3), with MarketWatch measuring a modest relative gain of +3.2%.

Now let’s look at Google Play, which appeared to be a clear winner after two days:

You don’t even need to do the math to spot the difference here. Comparing the 7-day mean before May 4 (232.9) to the 7-day mean after (448.7), Google Play experienced a dramatic +93% relative change after the May Core Update.

How does this 7-day before/after comparison work with the LinkedIn incident? Here’s a graph of the before/after with dotted lines added for the two means:

While this approach certainly helps offset the single-day anomaly, we’re still showing a before/after change of -16%, which isn’t really in line with reality. You can see that six of the seven days after the May Core Update were above the 7-day average. Note that LinkedIn also has relatively low volatility over the short-range history.

Why am I rotten-cherry-picking an extreme example where my new metric falls short? I want it to be perfectly clear that no one metric can ever tell the whole story. Even if we accounted for the variance and did statistical testing, we’re still missing a lot of information. A clear before/after difference doesn’t tell us what actually happened, only that there was a change correlated with the timing of the Core Update. That’s useful information, but it still begs further investigation before we jump to sweeping conclusions.

Overall, though, the approach is certainly better than single-day slices. Using the 7-day before-vs-after mean comparison accounts for both historical data and a full seven days after the update. What if we expanded this comparison of 7-day periods to the larger data set? Here’s our original “winners” list with the new numbers:

Obviously, this is a lot to digest in one table, but we can start to see where the before-and-after metric (the relative difference between 7-day means) shows a different picture, in some cases, than either the 1-day or 2-day view. Let’s go ahead and re-build the top 20 based on the before-and-after percentage change:

Some of the big players are the same, but we’ve also got some newcomers — including sites that looked like they lost visibility on day one, but have stacked up 2-day and 7-day gains.

Let’s take a quick look at Parents.com, our original big winner (winnerer? winnerest?). Day one showed a massive +100% gain (doubling visibility), but day-two numbers were more modest, and before-and-after gains came in at just under half the day-one gain. Here are the seven days before and after:

It’s easy to see here that the day-one jump was a short-term anomaly, based in part on a dip on May 4. Comparing the 7-day averages seems to get much closer to the truth. This is a warning not just to algo trackers like myself, but to SEOs who might see that +100% and rush to tell their boss or client. Don’t let good news turn into a promise that you can’t keep.

Why do we keep doing this?

If it seems like I’m calling out the industry, note that I’m squarely in my own crosshairs here. There’s tremendous pressure to publish analyses early, not just because it equates to traffic and links (frankly, it does), but because site owners and SEOs genuinely want answers. As I wrote recently, I think there’s tremendous danger in overinterpreting short-term losses and fixing the wrong things. However, I think there’s also real danger in overstating short-term wins and having the expectation that those gains are permanent. That can lead to equally risky decisions.

Is it all crap? No, I don’t think so, but I think it’s very easy to step off the sidewalk and into the muck after a storm, and at the very least we need to wait for the ground to dry. That’s not easy in a world of Twitter and 24-hour news cycles, but it’s essential to get a multi-day view, especially since so many large algorithm updates roll out over extended periods of time.

Which numbers should we believe? In a sense, all of them, or at least all of the ones we can adequately verify. No single metric is ever going to paint the entire picture, and before you rush off to celebrate being on a winners list, it’s important to take that next step and really understand the historical trends and the context of any victory.

Who wants some free data?

Given the scope of the analysis, I didn’t cover the May 2020 Core Update losers in this post or go past the Top 20, but you can download the raw data here. If you’d like to edit it, please make a copy first. Winners and losers are on separate tabs, and this covers all domains with at least 25 rankings in our MozCast 10K data set on May 4 (just over 400 domains).

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

[camerasieunhovn]

Google's May 2020 Core Update: Winners, Winnerers, Winlosers, and Why It's All Probably Crap

Posted by Dr-Pete

On May 4, Google announced that they were rolling out a new Core Update. By May 7, it appeared that the dust had mostly settled. Here’s an 11-day view from MozCast:

We measured relatively high volatility from May 4-6, with a peak of 112.6° on May 5. Note that the 30-day average temperature prior to May 4 was historically very high (89.3°).

How does this compare to previous Core Updates? With the caveat that recent temperatures have been well above historical averages, the May 2020 Core Update was our second-hottest Core Update so far, coming in just below the August 2018 “Medic” update.

Who “won” the May Core Update?

It’s common to report winners and losers after a major update (and I’ve done it myself), but for a while now I’ve been concerned that these analyses only capture a small window of time. Whenever we compare two fixed points in time, we’re ignoring the natural volatility of search rankings and the inherent differences between keywords.

This time around, I’d like to take a hard look at the pitfalls. I’m going to focus on winners. The table below shows the 1-day winners (May 5) by total rankings in the 10,000-keyword MozCast tracking set. I’ve only included subdomains with at least 25 rankings on May 4:

Putting aside the usual statistical suspects (small sample sizes for some keywords, the unique pros and cons of our data set, etc.), what’s the problem with this analysis? Sure, there are different ways to report the “% Gain” (such as absolute change vs. relative percentage), but I’ve reported the absolute numbers honestly and the relative change is accurate.

The problem is that, in rushing to run the numbers after one day, we’ve ignored the reality that most core updates are multi-day (a trend that seemed to continue for the May Core Update, as evidenced by our initial graph). We’ve also failed to account for domains whose rankings might be historically volatile (but more on that in a bit). What if we compare the 1-day and 2-day data?

Which story do we tell?

The table below adds in the 2-day relative percentage gained. I’ve kept the same 25 subdomains and will continue to sort them by the 1-day percentage gained, for consistency:

Even just comparing the first two days of the roll-out, we can see that the story is shifting considerably. The problem is: Which story do we tell? Often, we’re not even looking at lists, but anecdotes based on our own clients or cherry-picking data. Consider this story:

If this was our only view of the data, we would probably conclude that the update intensified over the two days, with day two rewarding sites even more. We could even start to craft a story about how demand for apps was growing, or certain news sites were being rewarded. These stories might have a grain of truth, but the fact is that we have no idea from this data alone.

Now, let’s pick three different data points (all of these are from the top 20):

From this limited view, we could conclude that Google decided that the Core Update went wrong and reversed it on day two. We could even conclude that certain news sites were being penalized for some reason. This tells a wildly different story than the first set of anecdotes.

There’s an even weirder story buried in the May 2020 data. Consider this:

LinkedIn showed a minor bump (one we’d generally ignore) on day one and then lost 100% of its rankings on day two. Wow, that May Core Update really packs a punch! It turns out that LinkedIn may have accidentally de-indexed their site — they recovered the next day, and it appears this massive change had nothing to do with the Core Update. The simple truth is that these numbers tell us very little about why a site gained or lost rankings.

How do we define “normal”?

Let’s take a deeper look at the MarketWatch data. Marketwatch gained 19% in the 1-day stats, but lost 2% in the 2-day numbers. The problem here is that we don’t know from these numbers what MarketWatch’s normal SERP flux looks like. Here’s a graph of seven days before and after May 4 (the start of the Core Update):

Looking at even a small bit of historical data, we can see that MarketWatch, like most news sites, experiences significant volatility. The “gains” on May 5 are only because of losses on May 4. It turns out that the 7-day mean after May 4 (45.7) is only a slight increase over the 7-day mean before May 4 (44.3), with MarketWatch measuring a modest relative gain of +3.2%.

Now let’s look at Google Play, which appeared to be a clear winner after two days:

You don’t even need to do the math to spot the difference here. Comparing the 7-day mean before May 4 (232.9) to the 7-day mean after (448.7), Google Play experienced a dramatic +93% relative change after the May Core Update.

How does this 7-day before/after comparison work with the LinkedIn incident? Here’s a graph of the before/after with dotted lines added for the two means:

While this approach certainly helps offset the single-day anomaly, we’re still showing a before/after change of -16%, which isn’t really in line with reality. You can see that six of the seven days after the May Core Update were above the 7-day average. Note that LinkedIn also has relatively low volatility over the short-range history.

Why am I rotten-cherry-picking an extreme example where my new metric falls short? I want it to be perfectly clear that no one metric can ever tell the whole story. Even if we accounted for the variance and did statistical testing, we’re still missing a lot of information. A clear before/after difference doesn’t tell us what actually happened, only that there was a change correlated with the timing of the Core Update. That’s useful information, but it still begs further investigation before we jump to sweeping conclusions.

Overall, though, the approach is certainly better than single-day slices. Using the 7-day before-vs-after mean comparison accounts for both historical data and a full seven days after the update. What if we expanded this comparison of 7-day periods to the larger data set? Here’s our original “winners” list with the new numbers:

Obviously, this is a lot to digest in one table, but we can start to see where the before-and-after metric (the relative difference between 7-day means) shows a different picture, in some cases, than either the 1-day or 2-day view. Let’s go ahead and re-build the top 20 based on the before-and-after percentage change:

Some of the big players are the same, but we’ve also got some newcomers — including sites that looked like they lost visibility on day one, but have stacked up 2-day and 7-day gains.

Let’s take a quick look at Parents.com, our original big winner (winnerer? winnerest?). Day one showed a massive +100% gain (doubling visibility), but day-two numbers were more modest, and before-and-after gains came in at just under half the day-one gain. Here are the seven days before and after:

It’s easy to see here that the day-one jump was a short-term anomaly, based in part on a dip on May 4. Comparing the 7-day averages seems to get much closer to the truth. This is a warning not just to algo trackers like myself, but to SEOs who might see that +100% and rush to tell their boss or client. Don’t let good news turn into a promise that you can’t keep.

Why do we keep doing this?

If it seems like I’m calling out the industry, note that I’m squarely in my own crosshairs here. There’s tremendous pressure to publish analyses early, not just because it equates to traffic and links (frankly, it does), but because site owners and SEOs genuinely want answers. As I wrote recently, I think there’s tremendous danger in overinterpreting short-term losses and fixing the wrong things. However, I think there’s also real danger in overstating short-term wins and having the expectation that those gains are permanent. That can lead to equally risky decisions.

Is it all crap? No, I don’t think so, but I think it’s very easy to step off the sidewalk and into the muck after a storm, and at the very least we need to wait for the ground to dry. That’s not easy in a world of Twitter and 24-hour news cycles, but it’s essential to get a multi-day view, especially since so many large algorithm updates roll out over extended periods of time.

Which numbers should we believe? In a sense, all of them, or at least all of the ones we can adequately verify. No single metric is ever going to paint the entire picture, and before you rush off to celebrate being on a winners list, it’s important to take that next step and really understand the historical trends and the context of any victory.

Who wants some free data?

Given the scope of the analysis, I didn’t cover the May 2020 Core Update losers in this post or go past the Top 20, but you can download the raw data here. If you’d like to edit it, please make a copy first. Winners and losers are on separate tabs, and this covers all domains with at least 25 rankings in our MozCast 10K data set on May 4 (just over 400 domains).

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

[ductrungnguyen87]

Google's May 2020 Core Update: Winners, Winnerers, Winlosers, and Why It's All Probably Crap

Posted by Dr-Pete

On May 4, Google announced that they were rolling out a new Core Update. By May 7, it appeared that the dust had mostly settled. Here’s an 11-day view from MozCast:

We measured relatively high volatility from May 4-6, with a peak of 112.6° on May 5. Note that the 30-day average temperature prior to May 4 was historically very high (89.3°).

How does this compare to previous Core Updates? With the caveat that recent temperatures have been well above historical averages, the May 2020 Core Update was our second-hottest Core Update so far, coming in just below the August 2018 “Medic” update.

Who “won” the May Core Update?

It’s common to report winners and losers after a major update (and I’ve done it myself), but for a while now I’ve been concerned that these analyses only capture a small window of time. Whenever we compare two fixed points in time, we’re ignoring the natural volatility of search rankings and the inherent differences between keywords.

This time around, I’d like to take a hard look at the pitfalls. I’m going to focus on winners. The table below shows the 1-day winners (May 5) by total rankings in the 10,000-keyword MozCast tracking set. I’ve only included subdomains with at least 25 rankings on May 4:

Putting aside the usual statistical suspects (small sample sizes for some keywords, the unique pros and cons of our data set, etc.), what’s the problem with this analysis? Sure, there are different ways to report the “% Gain” (such as absolute change vs. relative percentage), but I’ve reported the absolute numbers honestly and the relative change is accurate.

The problem is that, in rushing to run the numbers after one day, we’ve ignored the reality that most core updates are multi-day (a trend that seemed to continue for the May Core Update, as evidenced by our initial graph). We’ve also failed to account for domains whose rankings might be historically volatile (but more on that in a bit). What if we compare the 1-day and 2-day data?

Which story do we tell?

The table below adds in the 2-day relative percentage gained. I’ve kept the same 25 subdomains and will continue to sort them by the 1-day percentage gained, for consistency:

Even just comparing the first two days of the roll-out, we can see that the story is shifting considerably. The problem is: Which story do we tell? Often, we’re not even looking at lists, but anecdotes based on our own clients or cherry-picking data. Consider this story:

If this was our only view of the data, we would probably conclude that the update intensified over the two days, with day two rewarding sites even more. We could even start to craft a story about how demand for apps was growing, or certain news sites were being rewarded. These stories might have a grain of truth, but the fact is that we have no idea from this data alone.

Now, let’s pick three different data points (all of these are from the top 20):

From this limited view, we could conclude that Google decided that the Core Update went wrong and reversed it on day two. We could even conclude that certain news sites were being penalized for some reason. This tells a wildly different story than the first set of anecdotes.

There’s an even weirder story buried in the May 2020 data. Consider this:

LinkedIn showed a minor bump (one we’d generally ignore) on day one and then lost 100% of its rankings on day two. Wow, that May Core Update really packs a punch! It turns out that LinkedIn may have accidentally de-indexed their site — they recovered the next day, and it appears this massive change had nothing to do with the Core Update. The simple truth is that these numbers tell us very little about why a site gained or lost rankings.

How do we define “normal”?

Let’s take a deeper look at the MarketWatch data. Marketwatch gained 19% in the 1-day stats, but lost 2% in the 2-day numbers. The problem here is that we don’t know from these numbers what MarketWatch’s normal SERP flux looks like. Here’s a graph of seven days before and after May 4 (the start of the Core Update):

Looking at even a small bit of historical data, we can see that MarketWatch, like most news sites, experiences significant volatility. The “gains” on May 5 are only because of losses on May 4. It turns out that the 7-day mean after May 4 (45.7) is only a slight increase over the 7-day mean before May 4 (44.3), with MarketWatch measuring a modest relative gain of +3.2%.

Now let’s look at Google Play, which appeared to be a clear winner after two days:

You don’t even need to do the math to spot the difference here. Comparing the 7-day mean before May 4 (232.9) to the 7-day mean after (448.7), Google Play experienced a dramatic +93% relative change after the May Core Update.

How does this 7-day before/after comparison work with the LinkedIn incident? Here’s a graph of the before/after with dotted lines added for the two means:

While this approach certainly helps offset the single-day anomaly, we’re still showing a before/after change of -16%, which isn’t really in line with reality. You can see that six of the seven days after the May Core Update were above the 7-day average. Note that LinkedIn also has relatively low volatility over the short-range history.

Why am I rotten-cherry-picking an extreme example where my new metric falls short? I want it to be perfectly clear that no one metric can ever tell the whole story. Even if we accounted for the variance and did statistical testing, we’re still missing a lot of information. A clear before/after difference doesn’t tell us what actually happened, only that there was a change correlated with the timing of the Core Update. That’s useful information, but it still begs further investigation before we jump to sweeping conclusions.

Overall, though, the approach is certainly better than single-day slices. Using the 7-day before-vs-after mean comparison accounts for both historical data and a full seven days after the update. What if we expanded this comparison of 7-day periods to the larger data set? Here’s our original “winners” list with the new numbers:

Obviously, this is a lot to digest in one table, but we can start to see where the before-and-after metric (the relative difference between 7-day means) shows a different picture, in some cases, than either the 1-day or 2-day view. Let’s go ahead and re-build the top 20 based on the before-and-after percentage change:

Some of the big players are the same, but we’ve also got some newcomers — including sites that looked like they lost visibility on day one, but have stacked up 2-day and 7-day gains.

Let’s take a quick look at Parents.com, our original big winner (winnerer? winnerest?). Day one showed a massive +100% gain (doubling visibility), but day-two numbers were more modest, and before-and-after gains came in at just under half the day-one gain. Here are the seven days before and after:

It’s easy to see here that the day-one jump was a short-term anomaly, based in part on a dip on May 4. Comparing the 7-day averages seems to get much closer to the truth. This is a warning not just to algo trackers like myself, but to SEOs who might see that +100% and rush to tell their boss or client. Don’t let good news turn into a promise that you can’t keep.

Why do we keep doing this?

If it seems like I’m calling out the industry, note that I’m squarely in my own crosshairs here. There’s tremendous pressure to publish analyses early, not just because it equates to traffic and links (frankly, it does), but because site owners and SEOs genuinely want answers. As I wrote recently, I think there’s tremendous danger in overinterpreting short-term losses and fixing the wrong things. However, I think there’s also real danger in overstating short-term wins and having the expectation that those gains are permanent. That can lead to equally risky decisions.

Is it all crap? No, I don’t think so, but I think it’s very easy to step off the sidewalk and into the muck after a storm, and at the very least we need to wait for the ground to dry. That’s not easy in a world of Twitter and 24-hour news cycles, but it’s essential to get a multi-day view, especially since so many large algorithm updates roll out over extended periods of time.

Which numbers should we believe? In a sense, all of them, or at least all of the ones we can adequately verify. No single metric is ever going to paint the entire picture, and before you rush off to celebrate being on a winners list, it’s important to take that next step and really understand the historical trends and the context of any victory.

Who wants some free data?

Given the scope of the analysis, I didn’t cover the May 2020 Core Update losers in this post or go past the Top 20, but you can download the raw data here. If you’d like to edit it, please make a copy first. Winners and losers are on separate tabs, and this covers all domains with at least 25 rankings in our MozCast 10K data set on May 4 (just over 400 domains).

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

[nutrifami]

Google's May 2020 Core Update: Winners, Winnerers, Winlosers, and Why It's All Probably Crap

Posted by Dr-Pete

On May 4, Google announced that they were rolling out a new Core Update. By May 7, it appeared that the dust had mostly settled. Here’s an 11-day view from MozCast:

We measured relatively high volatility from May 4-6, with a peak of 112.6° on May 5. Note that the 30-day average temperature prior to May 4 was historically very high (89.3°).

How does this compare to previous Core Updates? With the caveat that recent temperatures have been well above historical averages, the May 2020 Core Update was our second-hottest Core Update so far, coming in just below the August 2018 “Medic” update.

Who “won” the May Core Update?

It’s common to report winners and losers after a major update (and I’ve done it myself), but for a while now I’ve been concerned that these analyses only capture a small window of time. Whenever we compare two fixed points in time, we’re ignoring the natural volatility of search rankings and the inherent differences between keywords.

This time around, I’d like to take a hard look at the pitfalls. I’m going to focus on winners. The table below shows the 1-day winners (May 5) by total rankings in the 10,000-keyword MozCast tracking set. I’ve only included subdomains with at least 25 rankings on May 4:

Putting aside the usual statistical suspects (small sample sizes for some keywords, the unique pros and cons of our data set, etc.), what’s the problem with this analysis? Sure, there are different ways to report the “% Gain” (such as absolute change vs. relative percentage), but I’ve reported the absolute numbers honestly and the relative change is accurate.

The problem is that, in rushing to run the numbers after one day, we’ve ignored the reality that most core updates are multi-day (a trend that seemed to continue for the May Core Update, as evidenced by our initial graph). We’ve also failed to account for domains whose rankings might be historically volatile (but more on that in a bit). What if we compare the 1-day and 2-day data?

Which story do we tell?

The table below adds in the 2-day relative percentage gained. I’ve kept the same 25 subdomains and will continue to sort them by the 1-day percentage gained, for consistency:

Even just comparing the first two days of the roll-out, we can see that the story is shifting considerably. The problem is: Which story do we tell? Often, we’re not even looking at lists, but anecdotes based on our own clients or cherry-picking data. Consider this story:

If this was our only view of the data, we would probably conclude that the update intensified over the two days, with day two rewarding sites even more. We could even start to craft a story about how demand for apps was growing, or certain news sites were being rewarded. These stories might have a grain of truth, but the fact is that we have no idea from this data alone.

Now, let’s pick three different data points (all of these are from the top 20):

From this limited view, we could conclude that Google decided that the Core Update went wrong and reversed it on day two. We could even conclude that certain news sites were being penalized for some reason. This tells a wildly different story than the first set of anecdotes.

There’s an even weirder story buried in the May 2020 data. Consider this:

LinkedIn showed a minor bump (one we’d generally ignore) on day one and then lost 100% of its rankings on day two. Wow, that May Core Update really packs a punch! It turns out that LinkedIn may have accidentally de-indexed their site — they recovered the next day, and it appears this massive change had nothing to do with the Core Update. The simple truth is that these numbers tell us very little about why a site gained or lost rankings.

How do we define “normal”?

Let’s take a deeper look at the MarketWatch data. Marketwatch gained 19% in the 1-day stats, but lost 2% in the 2-day numbers. The problem here is that we don’t know from these numbers what MarketWatch’s normal SERP flux looks like. Here’s a graph of seven days before and after May 4 (the start of the Core Update):

Looking at even a small bit of historical data, we can see that MarketWatch, like most news sites, experiences significant volatility. The “gains” on May 5 are only because of losses on May 4. It turns out that the 7-day mean after May 4 (45.7) is only a slight increase over the 7-day mean before May 4 (44.3), with MarketWatch measuring a modest relative gain of +3.2%.

Now let’s look at Google Play, which appeared to be a clear winner after two days:

You don’t even need to do the math to spot the difference here. Comparing the 7-day mean before May 4 (232.9) to the 7-day mean after (448.7), Google Play experienced a dramatic +93% relative change after the May Core Update.

How does this 7-day before/after comparison work with the LinkedIn incident? Here’s a graph of the before/after with dotted lines added for the two means:

While this approach certainly helps offset the single-day anomaly, we’re still showing a before/after change of -16%, which isn’t really in line with reality. You can see that six of the seven days after the May Core Update were above the 7-day average. Note that LinkedIn also has relatively low volatility over the short-range history.

Why am I rotten-cherry-picking an extreme example where my new metric falls short? I want it to be perfectly clear that no one metric can ever tell the whole story. Even if we accounted for the variance and did statistical testing, we’re still missing a lot of information. A clear before/after difference doesn’t tell us what actually happened, only that there was a change correlated with the timing of the Core Update. That’s useful information, but it still begs further investigation before we jump to sweeping conclusions.

Overall, though, the approach is certainly better than single-day slices. Using the 7-day before-vs-after mean comparison accounts for both historical data and a full seven days after the update. What if we expanded this comparison of 7-day periods to the larger data set? Here’s our original “winners” list with the new numbers:

Obviously, this is a lot to digest in one table, but we can start to see where the before-and-after metric (the relative difference between 7-day means) shows a different picture, in some cases, than either the 1-day or 2-day view. Let’s go ahead and re-build the top 20 based on the before-and-after percentage change:

Some of the big players are the same, but we’ve also got some newcomers — including sites that looked like they lost visibility on day one, but have stacked up 2-day and 7-day gains.

Let’s take a quick look at Parents.com, our original big winner (winnerer? winnerest?). Day one showed a massive +100% gain (doubling visibility), but day-two numbers were more modest, and before-and-after gains came in at just under half the day-one gain. Here are the seven days before and after:

It’s easy to see here that the day-one jump was a short-term anomaly, based in part on a dip on May 4. Comparing the 7-day averages seems to get much closer to the truth. This is a warning not just to algo trackers like myself, but to SEOs who might see that +100% and rush to tell their boss or client. Don’t let good news turn into a promise that you can’t keep.

Why do we keep doing this?

If it seems like I’m calling out the industry, note that I’m squarely in my own crosshairs here. There’s tremendous pressure to publish analyses early, not just because it equates to traffic and links (frankly, it does), but because site owners and SEOs genuinely want answers. As I wrote recently, I think there’s tremendous danger in overinterpreting short-term losses and fixing the wrong things. However, I think there’s also real danger in overstating short-term wins and having the expectation that those gains are permanent. That can lead to equally risky decisions.

Is it all crap? No, I don’t think so, but I think it’s very easy to step off the sidewalk and into the muck after a storm, and at the very least we need to wait for the ground to dry. That’s not easy in a world of Twitter and 24-hour news cycles, but it’s essential to get a multi-day view, especially since so many large algorithm updates roll out over extended periods of time.

Which numbers should we believe? In a sense, all of them, or at least all of the ones we can adequately verify. No single metric is ever going to paint the entire picture, and before you rush off to celebrate being on a winners list, it’s important to take that next step and really understand the historical trends and the context of any victory.

Who wants some free data?

Given the scope of the analysis, I didn’t cover the May 2020 Core Update losers in this post or go past the Top 20, but you can download the raw data here. If you’d like to edit it, please make a copy first. Winners and losers are on separate tabs, and this covers all domains with at least 25 rankings in our MozCast 10K data set on May 4 (just over 400 domains).

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

[paulineberry]

Google's May 2020 Core Update: Winners, Winnerers, Winlosers, and Why It's All Probably Crap

Posted by Dr-Pete

On May 4, Google announced that they were rolling out a new Core Update. By May 7, it appeared that the dust had mostly settled. Here’s an 11-day view from MozCast:

We measured relatively high volatility from May 4-6, with a peak of 112.6° on May 5. Note that the 30-day average temperature prior to May 4 was historically very high (89.3°).

How does this compare to previous Core Updates? With the caveat that recent temperatures have been well above historical averages, the May 2020 Core Update was our second-hottest Core Update so far, coming in just below the August 2018 “Medic” update.

Who “won” the May Core Update?

It’s common to report winners and losers after a major update (and I’ve done it myself), but for a while now I’ve been concerned that these analyses only capture a small window of time. Whenever we compare two fixed points in time, we’re ignoring the natural volatility of search rankings and the inherent differences between keywords.

This time around, I’d like to take a hard look at the pitfalls. I’m going to focus on winners. The table below shows the 1-day winners (May 5) by total rankings in the 10,000-keyword MozCast tracking set. I’ve only included subdomains with at least 25 rankings on May 4:

Putting aside the usual statistical suspects (small sample sizes for some keywords, the unique pros and cons of our data set, etc.), what’s the problem with this analysis? Sure, there are different ways to report the “% Gain” (such as absolute change vs. relative percentage), but I’ve reported the absolute numbers honestly and the relative change is accurate.

The problem is that, in rushing to run the numbers after one day, we’ve ignored the reality that most core updates are multi-day (a trend that seemed to continue for the May Core Update, as evidenced by our initial graph). We’ve also failed to account for domains whose rankings might be historically volatile (but more on that in a bit). What if we compare the 1-day and 2-day data?

Which story do we tell?

The table below adds in the 2-day relative percentage gained. I’ve kept the same 25 subdomains and will continue to sort them by the 1-day percentage gained, for consistency:

Even just comparing the first two days of the roll-out, we can see that the story is shifting considerably. The problem is: Which story do we tell? Often, we’re not even looking at lists, but anecdotes based on our own clients or cherry-picking data. Consider this story:

If this was our only view of the data, we would probably conclude that the update intensified over the two days, with day two rewarding sites even more. We could even start to craft a story about how demand for apps was growing, or certain news sites were being rewarded. These stories might have a grain of truth, but the fact is that we have no idea from this data alone.

Now, let’s pick three different data points (all of these are from the top 20):

From this limited view, we could conclude that Google decided that the Core Update went wrong and reversed it on day two. We could even conclude that certain news sites were being penalized for some reason. This tells a wildly different story than the first set of anecdotes.

There’s an even weirder story buried in the May 2020 data. Consider this:

LinkedIn showed a minor bump (one we’d generally ignore) on day one and then lost 100% of its rankings on day two. Wow, that May Core Update really packs a punch! It turns out that LinkedIn may have accidentally de-indexed their site — they recovered the next day, and it appears this massive change had nothing to do with the Core Update. The simple truth is that these numbers tell us very little about why a site gained or lost rankings.

How do we define “normal”?

Let’s take a deeper look at the MarketWatch data. Marketwatch gained 19% in the 1-day stats, but lost 2% in the 2-day numbers. The problem here is that we don’t know from these numbers what MarketWatch’s normal SERP flux looks like. Here’s a graph of seven days before and after May 4 (the start of the Core Update):

Looking at even a small bit of historical data, we can see that MarketWatch, like most news sites, experiences significant volatility. The “gains” on May 5 are only because of losses on May 4. It turns out that the 7-day mean after May 4 (45.7) is only a slight increase over the 7-day mean before May 4 (44.3), with MarketWatch measuring a modest relative gain of +3.2%.

Now let’s look at Google Play, which appeared to be a clear winner after two days:

You don’t even need to do the math to spot the difference here. Comparing the 7-day mean before May 4 (232.9) to the 7-day mean after (448.7), Google Play experienced a dramatic +93% relative change after the May Core Update.

How does this 7-day before/after comparison work with the LinkedIn incident? Here’s a graph of the before/after with dotted lines added for the two means:

While this approach certainly helps offset the single-day anomaly, we’re still showing a before/after change of -16%, which isn’t really in line with reality. You can see that six of the seven days after the May Core Update were above the 7-day average. Note that LinkedIn also has relatively low volatility over the short-range history.

Why am I rotten-cherry-picking an extreme example where my new metric falls short? I want it to be perfectly clear that no one metric can ever tell the whole story. Even if we accounted for the variance and did statistical testing, we’re still missing a lot of information. A clear before/after difference doesn’t tell us what actually happened, only that there was a change correlated with the timing of the Core Update. That’s useful information, but it still begs further investigation before we jump to sweeping conclusions.

Overall, though, the approach is certainly better than single-day slices. Using the 7-day before-vs-after mean comparison accounts for both historical data and a full seven days after the update. What if we expanded this comparison of 7-day periods to the larger data set? Here’s our original “winners” list with the new numbers:

Obviously, this is a lot to digest in one table, but we can start to see where the before-and-after metric (the relative difference between 7-day means) shows a different picture, in some cases, than either the 1-day or 2-day view. Let’s go ahead and re-build the top 20 based on the before-and-after percentage change:

Some of the big players are the same, but we’ve also got some newcomers — including sites that looked like they lost visibility on day one, but have stacked up 2-day and 7-day gains.

Let’s take a quick look at Parents.com, our original big winner (winnerer? winnerest?). Day one showed a massive +100% gain (doubling visibility), but day-two numbers were more modest, and before-and-after gains came in at just under half the day-one gain. Here are the seven days before and after:

It’s easy to see here that the day-one jump was a short-term anomaly, based in part on a dip on May 4. Comparing the 7-day averages seems to get much closer to the truth. This is a warning not just to algo trackers like myself, but to SEOs who might see that +100% and rush to tell their boss or client. Don’t let good news turn into a promise that you can’t keep.

Why do we keep doing this?

If it seems like I’m calling out the industry, note that I’m squarely in my own crosshairs here. There’s tremendous pressure to publish analyses early, not just because it equates to traffic and links (frankly, it does), but because site owners and SEOs genuinely want answers. As I wrote recently, I think there’s tremendous danger in overinterpreting short-term losses and fixing the wrong things. However, I think there’s also real danger in overstating short-term wins and having the expectation that those gains are permanent. That can lead to equally risky decisions.

Is it all crap? No, I don’t think so, but I think it’s very easy to step off the sidewalk and into the muck after a storm, and at the very least we need to wait for the ground to dry. That’s not easy in a world of Twitter and 24-hour news cycles, but it’s essential to get a multi-day view, especially since so many large algorithm updates roll out over extended periods of time.

Which numbers should we believe? In a sense, all of them, or at least all of the ones we can adequately verify. No single metric is ever going to paint the entire picture, and before you rush off to celebrate being on a winners list, it’s important to take that next step and really understand the historical trends and the context of any victory.

Who wants some free data?

Given the scope of the analysis, I didn’t cover the May 2020 Core Update losers in this post or go past the Top 20, but you can download the raw data here. If you’d like to edit it, please make a copy first. Winners and losers are on separate tabs, and this covers all domains with at least 25 rankings in our MozCast 10K data set on May 4 (just over 400 domains).

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!