queenofthefaces

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im starting to think you guys dont like it when stories make you feel things

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I don't like this cartoon. I don't like that it has to exist.

I'm still going to repost it every time that the kink community has to bury one of our own who might have been saved if they followed this advice.

[queenofthefaces]

The Places Fandom Dwells: A Cautionary Tale

Just about seven years ago, on 29 May 2007, hundreds of fans with accounts at Livejournal woke uo make the shocking discovery that their blogs, and those of some of their friends and favorite fandom communities, had been deleted without prior notice.

It’s estimated that Livejournal suspended approximately 500 blog accounts. The only notice of this was was the strike through the names of the suspended blogs, which led to this event being called Strikethrough.

At the time, Livejournal was the primary blogging platform for fandom. Its friends list and threaded conversations enabled fans to find each other and have discussions. Its privacy settings allowed fans to share as much or as little as they chose. It was a place to publish and archive fan fic, art, and meta. These features give some idea why the deletions of so many fandom blogs had been so devastating.

Speculation and uncertainty were rampant during the two days it took for Livejournal to finally respond to demands from users for information. At first, LJ stated only that it had been advised that journals listing an illegal activity as an interest could be regarded as soliciting for that illegal activity, which put the site at legal risk. It was eventually revealed that Livejournal and its owners at the time, Six Apart, had been contacted by a group calling themselves Warriors for Innocence, a conservative Christian organization with ties to the militia movement who accused LJ of being a haven for pedophiles and child pornography.

LJ had based the account suspensions on the tags used in LJ blogs. LJ users list their interests in their profiles, and those interests functions as tags. LJ took the blanket view that there was no difference between blogs listing “rape”.”incest”, or “pedophilia” among their interests, and blogs with posts tagged “rape”. “incest”, or “pedophilia”. As a consequence, some of the accounts that were suspended were support sites for rape survivors and gay teens, as well as the fandom sites that posted book discussions, RP, fan fiction, and fan art.

Livejournal grudgingly issued a partial apology to users on 31 May, but it took months for the organization to sort through the suspended blogs. According to Livejournal, most of the suspended accounts were restored. Not all of the suspended accounts were restored, and some of those that weren’t belonged to the support groups and fandoms.

One result of Strikethrough was that many communities and individual fans locked their blogs so the content could be viewed only community members, or those on their friends lists. Other fans opened accounts at blogging platforms like JournalFen, The Greatest Journal, or Insane Journal. There was definitely an atmosphere of mistrust and paranoia that hadn’t previously existed, and part of the problem was that Livejournal had not come through with promised clarification about what sort of content violated the ToS.

So, of course, it happened all over again.

On 3 August, Livejournal once again suspended a number of accounts without warning. This time, the account names were bolded, and the event became known as Boldthrough.

These deletions were the result of decisions made by a group consisting of members of LiveJournal’s Abuse Prevention Team, made up of LiveJournal employees and Six Apart staff, that had been set up to review blog content. This group was had been empowered to declare blog content offensive, a violation of the ToS that was defined by the team as content not containing enough serious artistic value to offset the sexual nature of the material. The team was empowered to terminate accounts without warning.

Anxious and angry LJ users waited ten days until LJ issued a response. Eventually, the ToS was changed to state that accounts deemed in violation of the ToS would in future be deleted only if the offender refused to delete offending content.

Just a few days before Strikethrough, LJ user astolat proposed a new blogging platform and fan fic archive, one that would be be created by fans, for fans. This was the birth of the Organization for Transformative Works, a non-profit organization dedicated to provide access to fanworks, and to protect and defend fanworks from commercial exploitation and legal challenge. Strikethrough and Boldthrough definitely pushed the project along. OTW opened DreamWidth in beta mode in April 2009, and began open beta testing of Archive of Our Own in November 2009.

In mid-January 2010, DreamWidth came under pressure by an undisclosed group who tried to convince DW’s server and PayPal, among others, that DW was a platform for child pornography. DW refused to give in to the harassment and intimidation, and promptly notifed users about the situation. The only consequence of the group’s pressure was that new requests for paid services were temporarily put on hold until DW was able to find a new payment processor service. DW remained true to its Guiding Principles by keeping users informed throughout this incident, and respecting freedom of expression by refusing to delete any posts or blogs to satisfy the demands of the group of trolls.

Which brings us to Tumblr.

Tumblr was launched in 2007. While not all fans have embraced it, citing reasons like character restrictions in replies and asks and the difficulty of finding others who share one’s fandom, it’s certain that the majority of fandoms are well-represented.

However, in July 2013, fans once again expressed outrage when Tumblr - without warning – removed accounts flagged as “NSFW” or “Adult” from public searches, made those blogs inaccessible to Tumblr users not already following them, and deleted a number of tags from its mobile app, including #gay, #lesbian and #bisexual. In a manner unsettlingly reminiscent of Strikethrough and Boldthrough, Tumblr did not immediately respond, and the response posted 24 hours later was widely regarded as a non-apology apology. Tumblr claimed it had been trying to get rid of commercial porn blogs, and eventually asserted that all the removed accounts had been reinstated.

If there’s a lesson to be learned from this, it’s that which George Santayana proclaimed: Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. Most blogging and social networking sites are in business to make a profit, and fandoms make them uncomfortable. They inevitably take steps to control the content being posted, to keep outside groups or their new owners happy, disrupting fandoms and deleting material that fans had considered to be safely stored.

The only solution I can see is for fans to copy and back up the things that are important. Maintain active accounts at several sites. Keep a list of your friends’ pseudonyms and emails.

Because the only thing that’s certain is that it’s going to happen again, when we least expect it.

I highly recommed that you read A brief history of fandom, for the teenagers on here who somehow think tumblr invented fandom: by ofhouseadama.

This article is still being revised. I intend to eventually make proper footnotes at some point, but until then, here’s a list of sources I used in writing this article:

http://astolat.livejournal.com/150556.html

http://astridv.livejournal.com/84769.html

http://boingboing.net/2007/05/31/lj-purge-drama-who-a.html

http://www.dailydot.com/culture/livejournal-decline-timeline/

http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/tumblr-nsfw-content-tags-search/

http://www.dailydot.com/opinion/tumblr-statement-banned-hashtags/

http://www.dailydot.com/society/pros-cons-tumblr-livejournal-fandom/

http://www.dailydot.com/society/tracking-livejournal-fandom-diaspora-infographic/

http://dw-news.dreamwidth.org/16590.html?view=top-only#comments

http://elke-tanzer.dreamwidth.org/951013.html

http://fanlore.org/wiki/Archive_Of_Our_Own

http://fandom-flies.livejournal.com/profile

http://fanlore.org/wiki/Boldthrough

http://fanlore.org/wiki/Dreamwidth

http://fanlore.org/wiki/LiveJournal

http://fanlore.org/wiki/Strikethrough

http://fanlore.org/wiki/Tumblr

http://fanthropology.livejournal.com/374988.html

http://hatteress.tumblr.com/post/55834911159/tumblrs-new-nsfw-restrictions-and-why-turning-off-safe

http://innocence-jihad.livejournal.com/159327.html

http://innocence-jihad.livejournal.com/31786.html

http://liz-marcs.livejournal.com/283323.html

http://liz-marcs.livejournal.com/283781.html

http://metafandom.livejournal.com/114942.html

http://www.metafilter.com/61636/livejournal-suspends-hundreds-of-accounts#1712054

http://missmediajunkie.blogspot.com/2013/05/why-i-dont-use-tumblr.html

http://news.cnet.com/Mass-deletion-sparks-LiveJournal-revolt/2100-1025_3-6187619.html

http://staff.tumblr.com/post/55906556378/all-weve-heard-from-a-bunch-of-you-who-are

http://www.supernaturalwiki.com/index.php?title=LJ_Strikethrough_2007#After_the_Strikethrough_-_On_to_Boldthrough

http://tech.firstpost.com/news-analysis/the-death-of-the-blog-and-the-rise-of-tumblr-210071.html

http://transformativeworks.org/sites/default/files/OTW_Annual_Report_2007.pdf

http://www.dailydot.com/business/yahoo-tumblr-fandom-lessons/

https://zine.openrightsgroup.org/features/2012/fandom:-open-culture-vs.-closed-platforms

http://www.zdnet.com/after-backlash-yahoos-tumblr-quietly-restores-adult-nsfw-blogs-7000018342/

#long post

[queenofthefaces]

i just found out tumblr was storing over three GIGABYTES of cookies on my device without me knowing and that's why it's been running so fucking slow recently... incredible. anyways everyone go clear your fucking cookies. don't let this website run a goddamn video game's worth of disc space in the background for no good reason.

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You know what really fucking Annoys Me about internet censorship is stuff like swear words being heavily censored because that's entirely an American cultural hangup being forced on the rest of us. I don't know a single country where swearing is as taboo as it is in America. In fact most languages have swear words that would have the same effect on an American as giving a Victorian chimney sweep a pepsi max cherry.

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Wow... people having to identify themselves to a government because of they are part of a group that is seen as ¨other¨ or because they want to learn about a certain topic...where i have seen this before...

I don't know... maybe what it is considered one of the biggest red flags in steps of dehumanization of groups, mainly minorities?

Btw, this is what the people behind KOSA are trying to impose in all the United States of America.

[Image ID: News politcs article about USA politics that says ¨Kansas governor passes law requiring ID to view acts of 'homosexuality' online, vetoes anti-LGBTQ+ bill¨ /.End ID]

Link to the article: https://www.advocate.com/politics/kansas-veto-age-verification-gender-affirming-care-abortion

Edit: Since this gained more notes, for those who don't know KOSA is, it is a USA bill that was reintroduced on May 2023 (last year). It is called ¨Kids Online Safety Act¨ (KOSA for short). It has been introduced and reintroduced for a while now since 2022. It is meant with the intention to ¨protect kids¨ by restricting their use of internet by pushing age restrictions and people having to present their ID to use internet or access certain websites, quite similar to the Kansas state bill that got passed. Many groups and people have criticized this bill for the potential censorship it can come with it and do more harm to the kids than help them. Possible censorship that has been suggested this bill can bring is LGBT+ content, politics and news, mental health search, political and social opinions in general (adults included). What is more, it has been put into question the possible invasion of privacy for both minors and adults by having to share an identification to use certain websites. That people could get censored or doxxed by doing this.

As for the bill itself, there was a hearing earlier today in the Senate. ( April 17th-Wednesday). It could take a while before it gets voted and has to pass different stages. Then it would take months (18 months) to be implemented if it gets passed.

I'm not American myself, so i'm not sure how much i can do about this. What i do recommend is making calls to senators and people involved in pushing this bill to make clear your disapproval of it. Try sign petitions or just telling others about it.

Some sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_Online_Safety_Act https://www.stopkosa.com/ https://www.badinternetbills.com/ https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/02/dont-fall-latest-changes-dangerous-kids-online-safety-act

#long post

[queenofthefaces]

forum > help

>hey guys im experiencing this problem running my game

>same here

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thread closed

[queenofthefaces]

[queenofthefaces]

i love finding out the meaning of slangs for “attractive woman” in various languages

chick (english) - baby chicken Schnecke (german) - snail/slug sild (danish) - herring fıstık (turkish) - pistachio тёлочка (russian) - heifer ծիտ (armenian) - sparrow

[queenofthefaces]

Knowledge is empowering

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1. a couple months ago a publicist invited me to a concert and i accepted her invite and she said she’d add my name to the guest list. the night of the concert i was feeling a little tired and not entirely up for walking all the way to the venue and standing around listening to a band i’d never heard of. but then, as i was making dinner, i thought, “why don’t you pretend this is a date night with bill hader?” i realize this is an insane person thing to think. i do often go to concerts with friends; i am not in the habit of pretending bill hader is accompanying me to concerts. but that night i did put on the band’s album and pretend that bill hader was dancing around the kitchen with me while i cooked. and then i pretended that bill hader threw his arm around me on the walk to the venue and walked slower than usual because he’s taller and his paces are longer than mine. then i got to the venue. and i told the lady in the ticket booth that i was on the guest list. and i gave her my name. and she handed me two tickets, and she said, “here, for you and your plus one.” i was all alone in front of the box office. there was no one else around. at no point leading up to this had the publicist mentioned giving me a plus one. i laughed a little to myself at the idea of Imaginary Bill Hader being given his own ticket and then i went inside.

2. on the way home from acting class tonight, a long walk in the cold, i came upon a diner lit in warm golden hues, and i hadn’t eaten all day, and it looked irresistible, so i went inside. “for one,” i said, and the hostess said, “do you want to eat at the bar?” and i said, “no thanks, could i sit at a table?” and i was ushered to a table for two. it was a pretty busy night and i was kind of self-conscious about being the only person eating alone so i was like, “well okay i’ll just imagine i’m on a date with bill hader again haha.” and so i sat there and enjoyed some very good sweet potato ravioli with chestnut-cream sauce, and what was perhaps the best cheesecake i’d ever eaten in my life, all the while imagining bill hader seated in the empty chair across from me. and then at the end of the meal, my waitress came and cleared away my dessert plate, and she looked at me, and then she looked at the empty chair, and then she looked back at me, and then she said, “are you paying separate or together?” again, the other seat was empty. i had been sitting at this table fully by myself for the entire duration of the meal. the waitress had come by the table perhaps five or six times over the course of the hour, seeing me completely alone. and i said, “sorry?” and she said, “separate or together?” and i said, “…together?” and she said, “cool, do you need the machine?” and i said, “yes” and she brought the machine over and i paid, because my dinner companion, despite apparently being visible to my waitress, was imaginary bill hader. 

[queenofthefaces]

I had a tattoo client ask if I ever used AI to design tattoos for me. Man I spent the better part of a decade doing shitty bit work as a graphic designer and now that I have the space to do whatever I want, I'm gonna let the computer generate random garbage for me? What next should I have a computer that eats my dinner and fucks my wife?

[queenofthefaces]

extremely weird to think about the fact that the internet is a collection of physical objects, like, if i send a message to a person on another continent, there's a continuous physical path that each packet followed between each of our routers and it probably passes through an undersea cable which doesn't feel like something that should be real how did people manage that