#cpucs

[nilsford-prattle]

I love me a good evil pizza party

This should happen more!

Also I love making Dark Vince the most fruity goofy guy out there

#cpucs #toy convict #dark vince #prattle art

[stellarartworks]

art assignment: do a crossover between two stories and show how the characters would interact.

me: WWHAT IF THE BLORBOS GO TO WADDLE DEE TOWN AND HAVE FUN??? MAKE FRIENDNS???? 🥺 🥺🥺

… maybe not pg and gorimondo though, they might try to kill each other

#HELLA RUSHED CUZ I HAD OTHER CLASSES’ WORK TO DO #but the guy who did dory from finding nemo dying from lack of water with bibble from barbie being like 😬 above it #i couldnt compete with that even if i tried #cpucs #kirby #kirby and the forgotten land #katfl #clawroline #gorimondo #pg incineroar #meta knight #lucina cpucs #tony cpucs #stellarartworks #fanart #artists on tumblr

[ultimatestellar]

being in a tiny fandom can rlly suck sometimes, but i will say. its fucking hilarious that im pretty sure im the biggest fan of my blorbo In The World. i genuinely think that out of the extremely few people still thinking about this series, i am by far the most dedicated to this one character. no new fans can really take that title considering most of the content focused on her got wiped off the internet. even the creator of the show hasn’t cared in years, and he is very willing to admit that!!!

i can confidently say im the biggest fan of my blorbo so THATS A COOL TITLE

#this is entirely about naomi winters #my sister mentioned that a song playing in the car gave her naomi vibes and i was like Y E S #i can joke that no one knows her like i do and it wouldnt even be an exxageration #startalks #cpucs

[zecroswe]

Apperently Alpharad has stated in a Alphrad Gold video that season 4 of the Cpucs is noncanon now.

I will ignore this information.

#cpucs #cpucs season 4 #Like it's been so long at this point #It's Canon in my heart dammit #Found this on Reddit #Can't share the link #Im on a train with 2% batteri #Check the Cpucs subreddit if you want the link

[cpucl]

In character:

The first episode of the CPU Challanger Leauge (CPUCL) is here! A spiritual successor to Alpharads CPUCS series! (If Alpharad allows It...If he wants me to take It down, I will, promise!). In this episode we will see fighters from all over the 5th dimension compete, veterans and newcomers alike! Will the host survive the low budget, microphone issues, their lack of experience managing tournaments or their mother making Pizza rolls in the same building as the commentary booth? Watch to find out!

#Cpucl #Episode link #smash ultimate #smash bros #cpucs #I only tag that becuase It's #mentioned in the post #I won't tag It in the future so I don't clutter the tag with my own series #It doesn't feel right to do that #Season 1 #Youtube #super smash bros #super smash ultimate #in character #Zecro #Level 9 CPU

[mostlysignssomeportents]

SoCal Gas spent millions on astroturf ops to fight climate rules

Today (19 Aug), I'm appearing at the San Diego Union-Tribune Festival of Books. I'm on a 2:30PM panel called "Return From Retirement," followed by a signing:

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/festivalofbooks

It's a breathtaking fraud: SoCal Gas, the largest gas company in America, spent millions secretly paying people to oppose California environmental regulations, then illegally stuck its customers with the bill. We Californians were forced to pay to lobby against our own survival:

https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article277266828.html

The criminal scheme is spelled out in eye-watering detail in a superb investigative report by Joe Rubin and Ari Plachta for the Sacramento Bee, which names the law firms and individual lawyers involved in the scam.

Here's the situation: SoCal Gas is California's private, regulated gas monopoly. They are allowed to lobby, but are legally required to charge their lobbying activities to their shareholders, and are prohibited from raising customer rates to pay for lobbying.

The company spent years secretly violating this rule, in the sleaziest way possible: working with corporate cartels like the California Restaurant Association and BizFed, the monopoly paid BigLaw white-shoe firms to procure people who posed as concerned citizens in order to oppose climate regulations that are essential to the state's very survival.

The bill topped $36 million – and it was illegally charged to its customers, the Californians whose immediate health and long-term survival these efforts opposed. SoCal Gas refuses to disclose the full extent of the spending, as do its lawyer-procurers, who cite legal confidentiality and a First Amendment right to secretly seek to influence policy in their refusal to disclose their profits from this illegal conduct.

The law firms involved are a who's-who of California's most prominent corporate fixers, including Reichman Jorgensen and Holland & Knight. The partners involved have a long rap sheet for anti-climate dirty tricking, most notably Jennifer Hernandez, notorious in climate justice history for an incident where activists claim she posed as one of them, infiltrating a campaign to force corporate despoilers to clean up their pollution in order to sabotage it, while secretly on a wealthy, prominent landowner's payroll.

Hernandez claims to care about the environment and says that her longstanding, corporate-funded, extensive campaigns and lawsuits against state environmental regulations are motivated by concern over their impact on working people. Her firm, Holland & Knight, denies serving SoCal Gas in opposing gas regulations, but it received $594k in ratepayer dollars, and submitted comments opposing the rules on its own behalf. Those comments were nearly identical to the comments submitted by SoCal Gas.

Hernandez also represents an obscure organization called The Two Hundred for Home Ownership in "a flurry of lawsuits" over California Air Resources Board rules on pollution, seeking to overturn the state's landmark climate change regulations.

Two Hundred for Home Ownership was founded by Robert Apodaca, who told the Bee that Hernandez's work for him is pro bono and not funded by SoCal Gas, but his entry into the fray occurred just as SoCalGas was founding an astroturf group called Californians for Fair and Balanced Energy (C4BES), which pretended to be an independent organization, disguising its relationship with SoCal Gas.

Apodaca is also founder of United Latinos Vote, an organization that had been largely dormant for seven years, not receiving any donations, until 2018, when the California Building Industry Association gave it $99k. The CBIA is a large-dollar recipient of donations from SoCal Gas, and its CEO insists that it was not acting on SoCal Gas's behalf when it made its unpredented donation to Apodaca.

The CBIA donation to United Latinos Vote was forerunner to a flood of corporate donations from the likes of Chevron, Marathon and Phillips 66. Shortly after receiving this cash, United Latinos Vote ran a full page ad in the LA Times, accusing the Sierra Club of pushing for anti-gas appliance rules that would harm working class Latino families.

This ad, in turn, featured prominently in advocacy by the SoCal Gas front group C4BES, funded with $29.1m in ratepayer money, which it then spent seeking to link clean appliance rules with anti-Latino racism. A quarter of California's carbon emissions come from home gas use.

SoCal Gas is regulated by the California Public Utility Commission (CPUC), which tolerated this mounting illegal conduct for many years, even as the company circulated internal memos as early as 2015 discussing its plans to oppose electrification in the state on the basis that it constituted "a significant risk to our business."

But last year, CPUC fined SoCal Gas $10m. Now, CPUC's Public Advocate office has filed a damning, extensive report on SoCal Gas's unlawful conduct, seeking $80m in rate cuts to compensate Californians for the funds misappropriated to protect the company's shareholder interests:

https://docs.cpuc.ca.gov/PublishedDocs/Efile/G000/M517/K407/517407314.PDF

Additionally, the Public Advocate is demanding $233m in fines for the company's refusal to allow investigators to audit its books and discover the full extent of the fraud.

SoCal Gas is the nation's largest utility, but (incredibly), it's not the dirtiest. That prize goes to Ohio's FirstEnergy, which handed $60m in ratepayer dollars to state politicians in illegal bribes in exchange for coal and nuclear subsidies and cancellation of state climate rules. That scandal led to GOP speaker of the Ohio House Larry Householder being sentenced to 20 years in prison:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohio_nuclear_bribery_scandal

There is something extraordinarily sleazy about using ratepayers' own money to lobby against their interests. SoCal Gas and its Big Law enablers have funneled millions in Californian's money into campaigns to poison us and boil us alive, and they did it while using workers and racialized people as human shields.

I'm kickstarting the audiobook for "The Internet Con: How To Seize the Means of Computation," a Big Tech disassembly manual to disenshittify the web and make a new, good internet to succeed the old, good internet. It's a DRM-free book, which means Audible won't carry it, so this crowdfunder is essential. Back now to get the audio, Verso hardcover and ebook:

http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/19/cooking-the-books-with-gas/#reichman-jorgensen

Image: Maryland GovPics (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/mdgovpics/6635539089/

Jackie (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/79874304@N00/197532792

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

#pluralistic #socal gas #california #climate emergency #climate denial #Reichman Jorgensen #california restaurant association #astroturf #Holland and Knight #puc #cpuc #california public utility company #fraud #Alice Walton #bribery #ohio #bizfed #Jennifer Hernandez #American Gas Association #The Two Hundred for Home Ownership #Robert Apodaca #Californians for Fair and Balanced Energy #C4BES #United Latinos Vote #Chevron #Marathon #Phillips 66 #sacramento bee #sacbee #Joe Rubin

[kp777]

By Julia Conley

Common Dreams

Jan 30, 2024

“The commission shrugged off California's climate goals, put rooftop solar's benefits further out of reach of working-class families, and gave another gift to corporate utilities," said one climate advocate.

Climate advocates on Monday asked the California Supreme Court to reverse a new rooftop solar panel policy in the state that the groups say has proven "irony is alive and well," as the policy is impeding the expansion of renewable energy in California just as regulators are calling for a solution to the state's energy crisis.

The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) approved a new solar policy last year at the urging of the state's three investor-owned utilities, led by Pacific Gas & Electric. The new rules slashed a solar power incentive for homeowners by about 75%, sharply reducing the amount utilities pay people with solar panels when they sell surplus power to the grid.

The "disastrous decision," made with the approval of three companies whose "only real competition" is customer-owned solar, said the Environmental Working Group (EWG), has reduced solar industry jobs by 17,000 in less than a year, and the group reported that "75% of California's once-thriving rooftop solar installation companies face a 'high risk' of bankruptcy."

A state appeals court upheld CPUC's new policy last month, leading EWG, the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), and the Protect Our Communities Foundation (POCF) to bring the case to the state Supreme Court.

"California utility regulators shouldn't be untouchable and I'm hopeful the state's highest court will agree," said Roger Lin, a senior attorney at CBD. "The commission shrugged off California's climate goals, put rooftop solar's benefits further out of reach of working-class families, and gave another gift to corporate utilities."

Last month, Lin said, "the appeals court wrongly deferred to these state regulators. This sets a dangerous precedent of endorsing utility talking points and torpedoing an essential tool to fight the climate emergency and environmental injustice."

CBD noted that the California Court of Appeals ignored a state law that "requires the court to review the commission's decisions as it would those of any state agency."

The three-judge panel claimed there was "no basis for faulting the commission's work."

State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-11) said the state is "shooting itself in the foot" by following the guidance of utilities which have a financial interest in reducing solar energy even as the state promotes its ambitious climate goals.

As CalMattersreported last week, California's aim of transitioning to 90% carbon-free electricity by 2035 and 100% by 2045 requires a significant shift to solar power.

"The market is in the gutter," Bernadette Del Chiaro, executive director of the California Solar & Storage Association, told CalMatters. "It should be no surprise to anybody. If you are a business and your market took a 80% nosedive, with great pain, you have to lay off. Some companies shut their doors."

"We are talking about the largest solar market in the country," Del Chiaro added. "This was the most impactful energy decision, easily, for this century so far."

EWG accused California regulators of holding a "confused position" on energy sources, as the group is also challenging a separate decision by the state in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. In that case, EWG is joining Friends of the Earth and Mothers for Peace in arguing against extending operations for "the dangerous, outdated Diablo Canyon nuclear plant," which opponents say runs a safety risk as the plant as its reactors are on several earthquake fault lines.

In the Diablo Canyon case, said EWG, "California is arguing—apparently with zero self-awareness—that the state is in the midst of an energy crisis and needs to generate more electricity... Solar is one of the energy leading solutions, but California can't even seem to agree with itself on the right path forward."

In its state Supreme Court case launched on Monday, EWG said it was asking the court to review the CPUC's "failure to assess the far-reaching benefits of widespread customer-owned rooftop solar."

"Instead, in approving the utility's plan, the commission looked at a narrow set of economic factors only," said EWG. "We'll argue this violates the CPUC's duty under state law to look at a broader range of benefits."

The commission impeded the expansion of rooftop solar power in the state as climate scientists and energy experts have made clear that extreme weather events including wildfires—which have increasingly plagued California in recent years—are intensifying and growing more destructive as a result of continued fossil fuel extraction and planetary heating.

CalMatters reported that the loss of solar power jobs has also devastated communities that would have benefited from employment in the growing industry, which pays solar panel installers an average of $70,000 per year.

"These jobs have been a foot in the door for people who have been in the justice system; their lives have changed," said Adewale OgunBadejo, vice president of workforce development for the non-profit Grid Alternatives, told CalMatters. "This is 100% a job killer."

Caroline Leary, general counsel and chief operating officer at EWG, said it was "absurd" to leave "the destiny of California's clean energy aspirations and the battle against the climate crisis" up to the CPUC's five unelected members. "We can only hope the state's Supreme Court shares this sentiment," said Leary. "The prospects of California attaining Gov. Newsom's ambitious emissions reduction goals are non-existent without a robust and expanding rooftop solar program. The CPUC's disastrous decision at the behest of PG&E and the other monopoly utilities is the most significant setback imaginable in our pursuit of meeting these crucial benchmarks."

#solar power #rooftop solar panel #california #california supreme court #california public utilities commission #cpuc #environmental working group #friends of the earth #scott wiener

[authoramalgam]

I know when people say a character has done every single crime it's for the funnies/ exaggeration/ to just be like yeah they are the bad guy

But like, the actual implications of that are pretty horrifying once you actually think about it

#this post is about tony/toyconvict cpucs #because iirc it was said hed committed every crime #which yeah the cpucs commentary is kinda silly off the cuff things #but still #i refuse to accept that at all #hes still a criminal sure #but not EVERY crime

[notbeingnoticed]

California’s residents have taken a beating from investor-owned utility companies and the CPUC over the past year. Major utility PG&E passed a 13% hike to electricity rates, adding on to what are already among the highest in the nation.

The state passed NEM 3.0, a cut to solar export compensation which sunk the state’s once-thriving rooftop solar market, leading to nearly 20,000 jobs lost and numerous solar installer bankruptcies.

CPUC then moved to shut down the emergent community solar market, which offered a pathway for renters and those with unsuitable rooftops for solar to save on electricity bills. Proponents of community solar legislation say it would enable bill savings of about $300 per year, with total ratepayer savings reaching $9 billion.

[beardedmrbean]

A 30-ton shipment of a chemical that can be used as fertilizer or an explosive is missing from a California-bound railroad car after rail officials confirmed it disappeared during a trip across the West last month.

The railcar, loaded with 61,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate, left Cheyenne, Wyoming on April 12, a Union Pacific spokesperson told USA TODAY Tuesday. Two weeks later it was found empty at a rail stop in the California Mojave Desert, according to a report filed with the federal National Response Center on May 10.

Dyno Nobel, an explosives manufacturer, told local station KQED News the material − "transported in pellet form in a covered hopper car similar to those used to ship coal" − likely fell from a rail car on the way to a rail siding (a short track connecting with the main track) about 30 miles from Mojave in Kern County, just east of Bakersfield.

"The railcar was sealed when it left the Cheyenne facility, and the seals were still intact when it arrived in Saltdale," the company told the outlet. "The initial assessment is that a leak through the bottom gate on the railcar may have developed in transit."

In addition to Dyno, the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) and Union Pacific are investigating the case.

Neither the FRA nor CPUC could immediately be reached by USA TODAY on Tuesday morning.

'Seal still intact'

Officials told KQED the railcar was transported back to Wyoming where it will be inspected.

"At this point in the investigation, we do not believe there is any criminal or malicious activity involved," said Kristen South, a spokesperson for Union Pacific, who works with its customers to investigate any loss of commodity or damaged freight.

"Our investigation is in its early stages because the customer recently reported the possible loss of fertilizer from one compartment of a multi-compartment railcar," South told USA TODAY Tuesday. "The fertilizer is designed for ground application and quick soil absorption. If the loss resulted from a railcar leak over the course of transportation from origin to destination, the release should pose no risk to public health or the environment."

What is ammonium nitrate?

Ammonium nitrate is explosive under certain conditions. Mixed with something flammable and exposed to flame, it can explode.

Timothy McVeigh used 2 tons of ammonium nitrate mixed with fuel oil to destroy the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people in 1995.

But it's not a danger that exists in many places. That's because the chemical, once a popular fertilizer, is rarely used these days, USA TODAY reported in 2013.

Ammonium nitrate was the main suspected chemical in a Texas explosion that killed 14 people in April 2013.

The explosion at West Fertilizer Co. also injured more than 200 and left at least 50 homes uninhabitable.

#nunyas news #good grief

[nilsford-prattle]

HI GUYS THIS IS MY FIRST ANIMATIOJ IN TOO TOO LONG SO EAH

And of course it’s CPUCS

#cpucs #vincent #toy convict #prattle art

[stellarartworks]

cpucs meme redraws: middle school edition

#will this one get any notes cuz its these two?? #maybe?? #im kinda worried tumblr is hiding these posts :( #cpucs #stellarartworks

[ultimatestellar]

wait i don't go here but what's the context behind a season suddenly getting noncanon'd .. i am interested

NO WORRIES BRO ITS A BATSHIT THING TO DO. heres how i understand it!!

(i promise it’s not actually that long, i’m just providing the read more for scrolling purposes)

the cpucs is a series made by a (at the time) gaming youtuber named alpharad and his friends. its made by pitting super smash bros cpus against each other and then commentating over it like its a real smash bros tournament. a good setup for improv comedy since the results you get are essentially random.

3 seasons of this later, they’d somehow created an overarching story for the whole series. in the season 3 finale multiple characters died, long-running character arcs ended, and it was the epitome of emotional payoff. genuinely beautiful. when alpharad and his friends stopped filming they were fucking flabbergasted that they’d created something so meaningful on accident.

after season 3 alpharad was like “well holy shit this is amazing there’s no way we’re gonna stop doing this.” so he and his friends put their whole alphussy into season 4 of the cpucs. like an entire ARG, a shit ton of worldbuilding, heavily expanded character arcs, and its own anime-style opening. they went APESHIT.

unfortunately after doing this for years, that thing known as Burnout started to creep up on them. every episode took a ridiculous amount of work to produce and they were releasing episodes weekly. according to alpharad, season 4 was “okay”. many plot points that they’d planned out didn’t fit well with the random results they got. at this point it wasnt just a silly haha improv comedy series to them anymore. they felt the cpucs had lost it’s magic.

thanks to being so unsatisfied with how season 4 went, and to the extreme burnout, the cpucs was cancelled entirely. there were 1-2 more planned seasons that will never happen. the internet is still unfortunately the internet. the creators of the cpucs were constantly harassed to continue the show for the next year. alpharad committed himself to making the content that he wanted to make, not whatever the audience was pressuring him for.

fast forward a few more years to Now, a friend of his offhandedly brought up the cpucs in a second-channel video. they laughed about it together for a bit, and the conversation turned to the cpucs as a whole. alpharad admitted he wished he never made season 4. it had caused them far more harm than good. a bit of discussion about this lead to, and i quote, “you know what? i’m gonna say it. i’m gonna pull that thing. i’m gonna de-canonize season 4.”

so now everything after season 3 is non-canon, including ALL THE SHIT they did for season 4. the ARG, the worldbuilding, the expanded character arcs, all of it. after everything alpharad and his friends went through for the cpucs it is completely understandable, but this does unfortunately take out like. half the story in the entire series. including my favorite character of all-time, naomi, who was the focus of the ARG.

i refuse to take this personally. that being said though… the other people who have been hyperfixating on this series and its lore for the last 5 years were left with no choice but to jump ship and abandon canon.

#i tried to make this shorter 5 separate times and i give up #ive decided its better to just post this than nothing at all #my apologies ‘:) #startalks #cpucs #alpharad

[titleknown]

I will say,beyond the issue of The Dataset (which is its own can of worms), if folks want to think about image synthesis/AI art as its own artform, rather than a derivative of/potential usurper of traditional/digital art, I think the closest modern artform you should be looking at for analogies is Let's Plays of all things.

Like, the way they use programs with limits coded in by external creators, but then take them and try to push them to their absolute limits, and add context where there was none to the crazy bullshit the game throws back, to create art not solely from a mechanical system or a human but from their interplay.

If you want some examples of what I mean, Monster Factory, Alpharad's CPUCS, Let's Game It Out (and to a lesser extent RTGame) and especially Kruggsmash are all really good examples.

Especially look for how you find and see artistic intent generated/shown in LPs, because I think that that might give one tips on how to find the artistic intentionality a lot of people fear image synthesis lacks.

Hell, I'd assert that the popularity of people doing fan-animations of bits of LPs they like even shows how traditional art mediums could work together with image synthesis.

There's probably a wholeass essay I could do on it, but I'll end for now by mentioning a thing that @tobyfoxmademeascaly said that this does; in fact; mean that Loab and the Final Pam are kindred spirits.

#art #ai art #art critique #image synthesis #let's play #let's plays #art theory #new art theory

[cpucl]

The CPUCL is here!

In Character: Hello, Zecro from the 5th dimension here! I am the creator, manager and commissioner of the CPU Challenger League! A series level 9 CPU tournaments, intended as a spiritual successor to Alpharads CPUCS series (If he allows It, I will take this down if he asks me to, promise!). I will post most of my updates here and I will post all the video links here! I hope you all will enjoy! : D

Out of Character:

Hello! I am just someone from Sweden who was a big fan of Alpharads CPUCS series and wanted to make my own similar series for fun! I hope to capture the fun that series provided, or at the very least fill the void for the people still in the fanbase. Though I am in no way near as skilled of a content creator as Alpharad, but I hope It's a least entertaining. All my posts will either be written in character or out of character, and I'll make sure to differentiate them so It doesn't get confused. All in character posts are intended to be canon.

#Cpucl #Update #smash bros #smash ultimate #cpucs #Not sure if I should tag that last one #But I mention It in the post so I hope It's not inappropriate or anything #super smash ultimate #Zecro #super smash bros #level 9 Cpus #in character #out of character.

[mikedeodatojr]

#Repost @mundogonzo with @repostsaveapp · · · Ficou empolgado com a volta do @mikedeodato para DC Comics e desenhando o Flash? Então saca só, na Terça-feira, 14/3, tem live com o artista, às 20:30🏃🏃🏃🏃🏃 A gente espera você. O link está na bio! ⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡⚡ #MundoGonzo #nerd #geek #comics #hqs #Quadrinhosgram #leitura #leiahq #gibi #dêquadrinhosdepresente #theflash #dccomics #dceu #mikedeodatojr #mikedeodato https://www.instagram.com/p/Cpuc-b2OloN/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

#repost #mundogonzo #nerd #geek #comics #hqs #quadrinhosgram #leitura #leiahq #gibi #dêquadrinhosdepresente #theflash #dccomics #dceu #mikedeodatojr #mikedeodato