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mostlysignssomeportents · 3 months

Text

Google reneged on the monopolistic bargain

I'm on tour with my new novel The Bezzle! Catch me TONIGHT in SALT LAKE CITY (Feb 21, Weller Book Works) and TOMORROW in SAN DIEGO (Feb 22, Mysterious Galaxy). After that, it's LA, Seattle, Portland, Phoenix and more!

A funny thing happened on the way to the enshittocene: Google – which astonished the world when it reinvented search, blowing Altavista and Yahoo out of the water with a search tool that seemed magic – suddenly turned into a pile of shit.

Google's search results are terrible. The top of the page is dominated by spam, scams, and ads. A surprising number of those ads are scams. Sometimes, these are high-stakes scams played out by well-resourced adversaries who stand to make a fortune by tricking Google:

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/phone-numbers-airlines-listed-google-directed-scammers-rcna94766

But often these scams are perpetrated by petty grifters who are making a couple bucks at this. These aren't hyper-resourced, sophisticated attackers. They're the SEO equivalent of script kiddies, and they're running circles around Google:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/24/passive-income/#swiss-cheese-security

Google search is empirically worsening. The SEO industry spends every hour that god sends trying to figure out how to sleaze their way to the top of the search results, and even if Google defeats 99% of these attempts, the 1% that squeak through end up dominating the results page for any consequential query:

https://downloads.webis.de/publications/papers/bevendorff_2024a.pdf

Google insists that this isn't true, and if it is true, it's not their fault because the bad guys out there are so numerous, dedicated and inventive that Google can't help but be overwhelmed by them:

https://searchengineland.com/is-google-search-getting-worse-389658

It wasn't supposed to be this way. Google has long maintained that its scale is the only thing that keeps us safe from the scammers and spammers who would otherwise overwhelm any lesser-resourced defender. That's why it was so imperative that they pursue such aggressive growth, buying up hundreds of companies and integrating their products with search so that every mobile device, every ad, every video, every website, had one of Google's tendrils in it.

This is the argument that Google's defenders have put forward in their messaging on the long-overdue antitrust case against Google, where we learned that Google is spending $26b/year to make sure you never try another search engine:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-27/google-paid-26-3-billion-to-be-default-search-engine-in-2021

Google, we were told, had achieved such intense scale that the normal laws of commercial and technological physics no longer applied. Take security: it's an iron law that "there is no security in obscurity." A system that is only secure when its adversaries don't understand how it works is not a secure system. As Bruce Schneier says, "anyone can design a security system that they themselves can't break. That doesn't mean it works – just that it works for people stupider than them."

And yet, Google operates one of the world's most consequential security system – The Algorithm (TM) – in total secrecy. We're not allowed to know how Google's ranking system works, what its criteria are, or even when it changes: "If we told you that, the spammers would win."

Well, they kept it a secret, and the spammers won anyway.

A viral post by Housefresh – who review air purifiers – describes how Google's algorithmic failures, which send the worst sites to the top of the heap, have made it impossible for high-quality review sites to compete:

https://housefresh.com/david-vs-digital-goliaths/

You've doubtless encountered these bad review sites. Search for "Best ______ 2024" and the results are a series of near-identical lists, strewn with Amazon affiliate links. Google has endlessly tinkered with its guidelines and algorithmic weights for review sites, and none of it has made a difference. For example, when Google instituted a policy that reviewers should "discuss the benefits and drawbacks of something, based on your own original research," sites that had previously regurgitated the same lists of the same top ten Amazon bestsellers "peppered their pages with references to a ‘rigorous testing process,’ their ‘lab team,’ subject matter experts ‘they collaborated with,’ and complicated methodologies that seem impressive at a cursory look."

But these grandiose claims – like the 67 air purifiers supposedly tested in Better Homes and Gardens's Des Moines lab – result in zero in-depth reviews and no published data. Moreover, these claims to rigorous testing materialized within a few days of Google changing its search ranking and said that high rankings would be reserved for sites that did testing.

Most damning of all is how the Better Homes and Gardens top air purifiers perform in comparison to the – extensively documented – tests performed by Housefresh: "plagued by high-priced and underperforming units, Amazon bestsellers with dubious origins (that also underperform), and even subpar devices from companies that market their products with phrases like ‘the Tesla of air purifiers.’"

One of the top ranked items on BH&G comes from Molekule, a company that filed for bankruptcy after being sued for false advertising. The model BH&G chose was ranked "the worst air purifier tested" by Wirecutter and "not living up to the hype" by Consumer Reports. Either BH&G's rigorous testing process is a fiction that they infused their site with in response to a Google policy change, or BH&G absolutely sucks at rigorous testing.

BH&G's competitors commit the same sins – literally, the exact same sins. Real Simple's reviews list the same photographer and the photos seem to have been taken in the same place. They also list the same person as their "expert." Real Simple has the same corporate parent as BH&G: Dotdash Meredith. As Housefresh shows, there's a lot of Dotdash Meredith review photos that seem to have been taken in the same place, by the same person.

But the competitors of these magazines are no better. Buzzfeed lists 22 air purifiers, including that crapgadget from Molekule. Their "methodology" is to include screenshots of Amazon reviews.

A lot of the top ranked sites for air purifiers are once-great magazines that have been bought and enshittified by private equity giants, like Popular Science, which began as a magazine in 1872 and became a shambling zombie in 2023, after its PE owners North Equity LLC decided its googlejuice was worth more than its integrity and turned it into a metastatic chumbox of shitty affiliate-link SEO-bait. As Housefresh points out, the marketing team that runs PopSci makes a lot of hay out of the 150 years of trust that went into the magazine, but the actual reviews are thin anaecdotes, unbacked by even the pretense of empiricism (oh, and they loooove Molekule).

Some of the biggest, most powerful, most trusted publications in the world have a side-hustle in quietly producing SEO-friendly "10 Best ___________ of 2024" lists: Rolling Stone, Forbes, US News and Report, CNN, New York Magazine, CNN, CNET, Tom's Guide, and more.

Google literally has one job: to detect this kind of thing and crush it. The deal we made with Google was, "You monopolize search and use your monopoly rents to ensure that we never, ever try another search engine. In return, you will somehow distinguish between low-effort, useless nonsense and good information. You promised us that if you got to be the unelected, permanent overlord of all information access, you would 'organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.'"

They broke the deal.

Companies like CNET used to do real, rigorous product reviews. As Housefresh points out, CNET once bought an entire smart home and used it to test products. Then Red Ventures bought CNET and bet that they could sell the house, switch to vibes-based reviewing, and that Google wouldn't even notice. They were right.

https://www.cnet.com/home/smart-home/welcome-to-the-cnet-smart-home/

Google downranks sites that spend money and time on reviews like Housefresh and GearLab, and crams botshittened content mills like BH&G into our eyeballs instead.

In 1558, Thomas Gresham coined (ahem) Gresham's Law: "Bad money drives out good." When counterfeit money circulates in the economy, anyone who gets a dodgy coin spends it as quickly as they can, because the longer you hold it, the greater the likelihood that someone will detect the fraud and the coin will become worthless. Run this system long enough and all the money in circulation is funny money.

An internet run by Google has its own Gresham's Law: bad sites drive out good. It's not just that BH&G can "test" products at a fraction of the cost of Housefresh – through the simple expedient of doing inadequate tests or no tests at all – so they can put a lot more content up that Housefresh. But that alone wouldn't let them drive Housefresh off the front page of Google's search results. For that, BH&G has to mobilize some of their savings from the no test/bad test lab to do real rigorous science: science in defeating Google's security-through-obscurity system, which lets them command the front page despite publishing worse-than-useless nonsense.

Google has lost the spam wars. In response to the plague of botshit clogging Google search results, the company has invested in…making more botshit:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/16/tweedledumber/#easily-spooked

Last year, Google did a $70b stock buyback. They also laid off 12,000 staffers (whose salaries could have been funded for 27 years by that stock buyback). They just laid off thousands more employees.

That wasn't the deal. The deal was that Google would get a monopoly, and they would spend their monopoly rents to be so good that you could just click "I'm feeling lucky" and be teleported to the very best response to your query. A company that can't figure out the difference between a scam like Better Homes and Gardens and a rigorous review site like Housefresh should be pouring every spare dime it brings in into fixing this problem. Not buying default search status on every platform so that we never try another search engine: they should be fixing their shit.

When Google admits that it's losing the war to these kack-handed spam-farmers, that's frustrating. When they light $26b/year on fire making sure you don't ever get to try anything else, that's very frustrating. When they vaporize seventy billion dollars on financial engineering and shoot one in ten engineers, that's outrageous.

Google's scale has transcended the laws of business physics: they can sell an ever-degrading product and command an ever-greater share of our economy, even as their incompetence dooms any decent, honest venture to obscurity while providing fertile ground – and endless temptation – for scammers.

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/2024/02/21/im-feeling-unlucky/#not-up-to-the-task

#pluralistic #monopoly #seo #dark seo #google #search #enshittification #platform decay #product reviews #spam #antitrust #trustbusting

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teaandransacking · 1 year

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In response to the Lockwood x reader smut I think that the “we might die tonight” concept is good thank youuuu

Hi! I hope you like this.

fever dream high in the quiet of the night

Pairing: Anthony Lockwood x female reader ~ Words: 1600 ~ content: heavy petting, swearing, sexual tension

a/n: let's agree that Lockwood is 18 or over for the purposes of this fic, ok? ok thanks.

The room is very still around you.

You wish Lucy and George were here, but they’re back at Portland Row, recovering from rapier wounds. Barely a scratch, Lucy insisted, but Lockwood won’t have anyone working unless they’re at full health.

That should count you out, really. You’re never at full health around him. He’s as distracting and frustrating as he is magnetic. You could just as likely kiss him as punch his stupidly handsome face. Most of the time you think you’d choose to do both simultaneously.

Lockwood eventually shrugs off his coat. You’re in the third (?) sitting room of this manor house in Surrey, waiting for the clock to strike seven. That, according to your clients, is when the Visitors arrive. It’s quarter past six - you’re always early, and for once, Lockwood is, too.

“Getting comfy, are we?” you snark.

He folds his long body into the armchair, and you have to resist looking at his lap. You could easily curl yourself up on it.

He lifts one shoulder in a half shrug. “We should rest while we have the chance. We’ll need our strength later, especially with our reduced numbers.”

You swallow. “Yeah. We’ve got this, though.”

He meets your gaze and nods one, decisively. “We’ll do admirably.” He stretches, and you almost miss it - the tiny wince that passes over his face.

He’s still in pain from the gunshot wound.

It was months ago, but-

Your throat goes tight to think of it. How you and Lucy and George closed ranks around him. How his eyes seemed so dim when he finally opened them. How limp he was.

You must make some sound of disquiet, because his eyes narrow and as always, he sees too much. “Are you all right?”

“Fine.”

He smiles, a little. “I’ll allow that I don’t know a huge amount about girls, but I do know when when they say fine like that, they’re far from it.”

You fold your arms over your chest. “You’re a massive hypocrite, you know that? You force Lucy and George to stay at home and rest, and meanwhile, your shoulder isn’t even fully healed.”

Something flashes across his face - vulnerability or pain, you can’t tell. “It’s fine.”

“Oh, and now who’s insisting they’re fine when they’re not?” You hiss, stalking over to him.

He stands from the chair, his face murderous. “You do not get to be in charge here. It’s my name on the door. I am responsible for all of you.”

“Yes! A job that, might I remind you, you cannot complete if you are dead!”

The word comes out in a sob and, startling yourself, you crumple against him.

His arms come around you instantly, and he gently tugs you down into the chair, urging your legs up so you are curled in his lap. You panic for a second but manage to arrange your rapier so it doesn’t stab either of you.

“You have a fucking death wish, don’t you, you prick,” you try to snap, but the seeing as you’re half-crying, the words don’t have the desired effect.

“Believe it or not, I fear death much more these days, now I have the three of you,” Lockwood says softly, pressing a kiss to your hair.

You freeze, and something in the air crackles.

You’ve never been alone together like this before. There’s always someone else in the house, or you’re walking somewhere - Tesco, Arif’s shop - and suddenly the yawning pit of need that constantly lives inside you around Lockwood opens its maw and begs.

“Can’t you just stay home just once?” you murmur into the soft, clean cotton of his dress shirt. “Just stay safe, for fucking once.”

“I’d be a pretty poor agency head if I did, darling.”

It’s the first time he’s used the endearment and it turns everything inside you to liquid.

You lift your face and see that he’s gazing down at you, his dark eyes lust-blown, and he’s so tempting and so close. You slide your hand up his chest, cup his cheek. “Every time we do this, we court death. And I don’t want to die before we’ve had the chance to live.”

He inhales sharply at your words, and then his hands - warm and rapier-callused - cup your face and he captures your mouth a kiss.

It’s soft and sweet at first, then hungrier, deeper. Your tongues tangle. He tastes of bergamot and marmalade and it’s both exotic and comforting, and his mouth is pliable and delicious. You have limited time, so despite the fact you could kiss him for hours, days, you want more.

He makes a sad little sound when you break the kiss, and that alone makes you want to dive back in.

Instead, you shift upwards, move to straddle his lap. When you next look down at him, his gaze is fixed on you, his eyes as black as night. He looks at you as if you personally hung the moon and every single star, and it’s heady, these feelings he always stirs inside you.

His hands slide down to your hips, pulling your body flush against his, and oh. He is definitely as into this as you are.

His throat bobs as he swallows, and then he says, thickly, “Dreamed about this. Being near you. Like this.”

Your heart clenches. “Me, too,” you admit. You glance at the door. You’ll have to go out there soon. Endanger your life. Lockwood will protect you with his. You know it without a doubt.

“Hey,” he begins, and then he whispers your name in that low, buttery smooth voice. “Just be here with me. Don’t think about anything else.”

You almost snark back that he finally has a good idea, but this moment is perfect. You don’t want to ruin it, so you dip your head and kiss him, let your hands start to work on the knot of his tie. It slides through your hands, silky smooth, and then you’re deepening the kiss, plundering his mouth while your slip one, two, three of his shirt buttons through the tiny eyelets, then spread your greedy palms over the smooth, warm skin of his chest.

He groans into your mouth, and it’s a powerful thing, to rob Anthony bloody Lockwood of words, but then you find that any possible clever quip is stolen at your own mouth as his hands burrow under your jumper and cup your breasts through the bra. You arch into his touch, and he mutters something like “perfection” against your lips as he caresses you.

You grind into each other on the wide, soft armchair. He’s hard where you’re soft, and the pressure is exquisite. Impatient, you reach behind yourself, under your sweater, to unclip your bra, and when Lockwood feels the cups release and your bare skin against his, he swears, low and guttural, and making him come this undone makes you feral for him.

He pushes the hem of your sweater up, breaks the kiss, and then sets a hand under your bottom, urging you up so he can put his mouth on your breasts. His face is just a little rough from half a day’s stubble, and the tiny hurt grounds you as he lavishes attention on one breast and then the next, while the push and pull of pleasure makes you dizzy. You fist your hands in his hair, and it’s warm and silky.

You arch your back, pressing into his mouth, and all you can think is yes and don’t stop, and he doesn’t. He is nothing if not thorough, but then it’s not enough, and you’re impatient, every iota of you on fire. You unsnap your jeans and almost rip open the buttons, taking one of his hands from your chest and shoving it right where you want it.

To his credit, Lockwood is a fast learner - he can’t have become the UK’s youngest agency head for nothing, you suppose - and he finds your clit after a only few fumbles, quickly learning which movements make you cry out and press into his hands.

You’ve wanted this for so long that you’re soaked, and it doesn’t take long before that tell-tale sensation begins to coil in your belly.

“Say my name,” he murmurs against the curve of your breast. “Please.”

And he circles his finger over you twice more and you come like that, squirming against him, breathing his name - his first name - and he sighs as he works you through the orgasm, until you’re shuddering from it.

You drop a kiss on his forehead, and you’re about to ask if you can return the favour, find out what he likes, how he tastes, Christ that’d be hot - and the clock strikes seven.

Lockwood withdraws his hand, pulls your jumper down.

“This is not over,” you whisper.

He flashes that megawatt grin. “Not by a long shot.”

And reluctantly, you break apart and get ready to face whatever is behind the door in this old house.

But you’ll do it together.

#anthony lockwood x reader #anthony lockwood x you #lockwood and co fanfiction #tumblr request

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scarfacewastaken · 3 months

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decisions jadis/jen

CONTINUED

Her blood was boiling with every word that Jadis uttered. Jennifer was in complete shock that they had to do this again. "I don't understand." She was good with keeping her cool, up until now. Of course they had to make appearances. They had to follow orders and be the good little soldiers. And now it was even more difficult when the teacher had become the student so to speak.

It felt like the Marines all over again. Only this time instead of shooting Drake in the heart, it felt like she was shooting herself in it. "We're supposed to be trading with these communities. Helping people. Aren't you awl-ways' sayin' people are a resource? These are people, Anne." When the other spoke her rank aloud, she immediately regretted calling her by her first name.

And then that whisper in her ear that gave her chills. And the light kiss on the cheek. This was rare that Jen would break cover like this, so to speak. She always kept her wits about her. Always an excellent liar. Never one to complain, never one to question things. But this was going too far. Especially after finding out about the labs and everything else. How many people they had snuffed out. The last light of the world? Bullshit.

"Omaha. Portland. Campus Cahl-ony?" Her accent grew stronger with each mention of a settlement. "We're takin' their resources so we can thrive." She was livid, you could tell. Mallick narrowed her eyes on the taller woman, still feeling the fear that the other had instilled in her. The power she had over her.

Just calm down, Jenny. Let it go. Relax. Stop questioning. Stop talking. You'll get yourself arrested.

Going over her words in her head like her little mantra.

Sometimes, you gotta' do bad, to do good.

Do bad.

Do good.

Bad.

Good.

The lines were starting to blur within the CRM. She found herself crumbling, the once strong and resilient soldier, now plagued by her remorse. A sympathizer. A traitor. In the history books that would be all they would label her. The reason that the Campus Colony was gone. The reason all of those children, families, teachers, and the entire something thousands of population were gone.

"Punish me." Jen dared her, unable to go through with this. "I"m not helpin' Beale kill anymore people. Nobody else has to die." Standing firm. She kept her voice hushed, as there were eyes and ears everywhere in the facility. All it would take was for one soldier to make their rounds and instantly she would be dragged to the health and wellness center, just like Barca.

But would it end the same way?

@annestokes

#c; jadis stokes;#v; main;

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amtrak-official · 11 months

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there are 67 places named springfield in the united states do you think we should start euthanizing them. also rate portland colorado

Don't kill the Springfields they serve a valuable ecological niche, now onto the main topic

Unfortunately Colorado has to be in 11th place since I can't find a town center and this seems more like a collection of farms than a town

#asks #portland ranking

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bethanydelleman · 6 months

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Hello! How are you?

I am reading about political parties during the Regency era and I have a question. Which of Austen's characters do you think are Whigs and which are Tories?

You really going to force me to relearn what Whigs and Tories were? Cruel, cruel nonnie. I'm going to cheat, this is from my favourite thesis on Jane Austen, Above the Vulgar Economy:

As Josephine Ross in Jane Austen: A Companion maintains,

The clear-cut distinctions of modern parliamentary politics had yet to emerge; and while the Whigs in the House of Commons tended to represent the interests of the aristocracy and upper classes, as well as expressing liberal ideals, the Tories – with their broad adherence to the more traditionally middle-class principles of upholding the Crown and keeping disaffection in check – were more identified with the landed gentry, and educated, but modestly situated, families such as the Austens.

At the time, the two party system was still evolving, and there was a great deal of dissention in the ranks. There were reactionaries, reformers and radical members in both parties. There were conservative, moderate and liberal Tories, and the Whig party was factionalized into Portland Whigs, Rockingham Whigs, Benthamites and Foxites to name a few.

Also, I have gotten the impression from reading other novels (eg. Wives & Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell) from the time that often people knew which party their family voted for, but knew almost nothing else. Something that totally still happens today!

Here is another great passage:

In fact, when Pride & Prejudice was originally written as First Impressions in 1796 and 1797, Austen‟s novel appears to have been taking a stand in favor of two controversial economic proposals being debated in the House of Commons and in the press, a national minimum wage and Poor Law reform, thus Pride & Prejudice was much more than a satire of manners but was also a political critique of Jane Austen's society. Both proposals were championed at the time by Tory Prime Minister William Pitt, the Younger and supported by liberal Tories and moderate Whigs. Both proposals were vehemently opposed by reactionary Tories and radical Whigs. The eligible bachelors in Pride & Prejudice are all associated with the Whig party, as is Lady Catherine de Bourgh, but the characters, like the Whigs in the House of Commons, have very different attitudes towards money and the working class.

Additionally, Austen's contemporaries would have known that Elizabeth Bennet's agricultural county, Hertfordshire, was, at least for the working class, the poorest county in England, just as Fitzwilliam Darcy's Derbyshire, financially stimulated by the Industrial Revolution, was the richest county, and Lady Catherine de Bourgh‟s Kent was a mixed county that varied enormously, from parish to parish, in prevailing wages and in treatment of the poor. The admirable Whig characters, like Fitzwilliam Darcy and Charles Bingley, are kindly and generous, while the radical Whig, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, is selfish and stingy, and George Wickham is simply an opportunist and a scoundrel. By its presentation of the different Whig characters, the text appears to be appealing to Whigs to be generous to the working class and encouraging Tories to look approvingly on those Whigs who are willing to financially support the poor.

Pride and Prejudice also includes a large number of characters who are servants, many identified by name. As most of them have no dialogue and do nothing to forward the plot, their presence in the novel at all may seem curious, but the depiction of the working class in Pride and Prejudice is more subtle to the modern reader than it would have been to Austen‟s original readers. The servants in Pride and Prejudice refute the assumptions of prominent Whig economists and politicians, Edmund Burke, Frederic Eden and Patrick Colquhoun, who depicted the lower class as ignorant, wasteful and immoral. Lady Catherine‟s financial neglect of the poor in Kent conforms to the economists‟ advice based on their assumptions that the working class was already adequately compensated for its labor and that poverty was the result of the irresponsible behavior of the poor. In stark contrast, Fitzwilliam Darcy‟s generosity to the poor in Derbyshire serves as a model response to poverty, and the general prosperity of Darcy‟s home county suggests that the solution to poverty is a combination of higher wages and liberal charity, exactly what the Prime Minister was proposing in 1797.

The general impression that I have gotten is that both Whigs and Tories were relatively ineffective. Anyway, a pretty clear answer for one character:

Pride and Prejudice‟s hero is almost certainly a Whig as well since the choice of the name, Fitzwilliam Darcy, is highly suggestive. Lord Fitzwilliam, later Earl Fitzwilliam, was from the north of England and, as historian William Hague describes him, one of the “Three great Earls of the Whig aristocracy”

Anywho, I'm not going to go through and sort them all since it seems fairly ambiguous who would be affiliated with which party. Also, almost everyone on earth holds some views that are extremely contradictory, so it's impossible to tell.

#question response #whigs vs. tories #someone with a better grasp on politics can answer this if they wish #I encourage everyone to read the extremely long thesis I'm quoting #It's amazing

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aeltri · 8 months

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So basically, transwitch Marina Abramovic (Michael Maxwell) sponsored Conrad Shawcross and Cunter under the pretext that they were both exhibiting work at her NYC gallery. Did she also help them get work Visas? Now, Shawcross may be a nepobaby but at least he's a legit artist. Cunter only got a pass because she was an Epstein honeypot hoe and fellow divine androgyne cultist. These people don't do anything for free though, so Cunter was promptly sent to the Hamptons to work with/for Harvey Weinstein. Uncle Harvey was BFFs with Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, remember? Meaning that Cunter connects to their trafficking ring 4X. Their upline manager Les Wexner is part of the Cleveland Mafia. He in turn has links to the Bronfmans up in Toronto, Cafritz' in DC and the Florida ratlines. Isn't it interesting how Cunter, Heard and Markle were all recruited by the same people? That explains why they use the same playbook, important because HCA owns Portland Hospital. Sara Latham is connected to both their VP and Killary who is a high-ranking witch. Sara Latham works in PR and even repped Markle for a time. It's an incestuous clusterfuck of epic proportions.

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sportsunfolded · 2 years

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youtube

#nba #nba basketball #podcast #basketball #rankings #sportsunfolded #milwaukee bucks #phoenix suns #cleveland cavaliers #portland trail blazers #boston celtics #Youtube

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dangerously-human · 7 months

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Thoughts from the interview chapter:

Contrary to the show timeline, Lucy's been in London for two weeks by the time she interviews at Lockwood & Co. Where has she been staying all this time? (Mom mode engaged! I am Concerned!)

Lockwood tells Lucy he got his full license as an agent a year previously. Given that he started a year after Lucy (9 vs. 8), and Lucy is stated to have progressed rather quickly through the ranks at Jacobs' yet hasn't quite achieved her Fourth Grade presently at approximately a year younger than Lockwood, seemingly Lockwood was quite the star in training.

What would the tests have been like for a different Talent? Lockwood mostly seems to have been planning to test Touch (little hard to test Listening in daylight, and without a captive ghost handy - at least, one that's actually known to talk, unlike the skull at this point). I mean, I guess the skull's jar is sort of a test of Sight, though not much of one.

Lucy is very clever. That kept striking me again and again. She's excellent at what she does, but it's knowing what to do with the clues she gathers - supernatural or from people - that makes her a truly outstanding agent and such a valuable addition to the team. It's clear that Lockwood recognizes that talent for what it is, too, which is another example of his leadership capabilities - he's good at finding what others excel at and equipping them to do it well.

As always, deeply curious about the pre-Lucy days. Lockwood & Co has been accredited as an agency for three months when Lucy interviews, but George has been living at 35 Portland Row for a year - why? I am, of course, willing to bet that they were already taking on cases before being legally authorized to do so, but I so want to know why George moved in with Lockwood in the first place. And what roommate life was like for the boys in general (I'm sure they were disasters, they're teenage boys after all).

On that note - neither of the previous assistants we know of lived at Portland Row. Was it their intention all along that this new assistant would have the option to live with them? Or was that a surprise Lockwood sprung on George after he met Lucy? I kind of suspect the latter.

It's George who first assumes that Lucy is staying! Lockwood hasn't said anything yet when George insists he explain the biscuit rule to Lucy. Lucy thinks he hates her, and there is a lot of tension between them for a while, but he recognizes her as a member of the team immediately, and that's warming my heart this fine Tuesday afternoon.

#personal #rachel liveblogs #lockwood & co

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ltwilliammowett · 1 year

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The Midshipman in years

The term originally denoted the men stationed amidship, i.e. under the Captain’s eye, and were usually skilled sailors. The rating of Midshipman was purely a ship’s rating down to the end of the Napoleonic Wars, and a Midshipman could be disrated by his commanding officer, and made to serve before the mast.

The gunroom, aboard HMS Caesar, Baltic Fleet, 1855 (x)

1643 - The first mention of Midshipman occurs in this year, at which time it does not appear to have been rating leading to any personal honour.

1653 - It was directed that suitable men were to be selected for the rating of Midshipman, receiving extra pay; no one was to be so rated unless able, in case of necessity, to perform an officer’s duties.

1676 - King Charles II made regulations for introduction of Gentlemen Volunteers, or as they were usually called King’s Letter Boy’s, young gentlemen who were training to become officers, their age not to exceed 16 years and their pay were ₤24 a year.

1728/29 - The system of King’s Letters Boy’s was abolished (the last one with that rank was 1732), and the Naval Academy, at Portsmouth was founded 1729.

1740 - Admirals and officers commanding ships were allowed to have a great number of “Followers” also known as Captain’s / Officer’s Servants, ranging from the Admiral with 50 to a Captain with 4 per 100 of complement. They were young gentlemen entering the Royal Navy at about the age of 12, before they became midshipmen. The custom of allowing post-captains to take such ‘servants’ into their ships derived from the older apprenticeship system. Such servants or followers did no menial work since they were aspiring officers.

1794 - The "Followers" was changed in 1796 to volunteer, first class, they were not under the age of 11 and they were intended for the sea service. Unlike King's Letter boys, who were nominated by the Admiralty, a captain's servant was a personal follower of a post-captain, taken on board to oblige relatives or friends. Boys of the second class were between 15 and 16, intended to become sailors. Boys of the third class were between 13 and 15, intended to do actual work as servants.

1816 - The rating of midshipman ordinary was phased out, and all apprentice officers were rated as midshipmen.

1837 - The original Royal Naval College in Portsmouth was closed, after which the only method for training midshipmen in the Royal Navy was aboard ships.

1844 - The rank of naval cadet was created, and to qualify as a midshipman a candidate had to be 14 years old, successfully pass an admiralty examination and have two years of service as a naval cadet or three years of service in the Navy. A decline in qualified officers prompted the Navy to order training in a ship at anchor for all cadets, which began in 1857 aboard HMS Illustrious, which was replaced by HMS Britannia in 1859. Britannia was moved to Portland in 1862, and to the present location of the Britannia Royal Naval College, Dartmouth in 1863.

1869 - HMS Prince of Wales was commissioned, taking the place of Britannia, was so renamed, and, linked up with the Hindustan, remained the officer’s training ships till September 1903, when the new system of training inaugurated by Admiral of the Fleet Sir John Fisher necessitated the opening of separate establishments at Osborne and Darmouth.

#naval history #midhipman in years #midshipman monday #17th - early 20th century #age of sail #age of steam

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metamatar · 2 months

Text

America’s most radical experiment with drug decriminalization has ended, after more than three years of painful results. Oregon Governor Tina Kotek has pledged to sign legislation repealing the principal elements of the ballot initiative known as Measure 110: Possessing hard drugs is again a crime in Oregon, and courts will return to mandating treatment for offenders. Oregonians had supported Measure 110 with 59 percent of the vote in 2020, but three years later, polling showed that 64 percent wanted some or all of it repealed. [...]

Measure 110 did not reduce Oregon’s drug problems. The drug-overdose-death rate increased by 43 percent in 2021, its first year of implementation—and then kept rising. The latest CDC data show that in the 12 months ending in September 2023, deaths by overdose grew by 41.6 percent, versus 2.1 percent nationwide. No other state saw a higher rise in deaths. Only one state, Vermont, ranks higher in its rate of illicit drug use.

[...] Neither did decriminalization produce a flood of help-seeking. The replacement for criminal penalties, a $100 ticket for drug possession with the fine waived if the individual called a toll-free number for a health assessment, with the aim of encouraging treatment, failed completely.

Unpaywalled link: https://archive.is/g4I2R from the Atlantic, so obviously the conclusions are pretty reactionary. Piece includes claiming Oregon never had a war on drugs despite Black Oregon Residents having 2.5 times as many possession convictions.

Surprisingly the economist here https://archive.is/29DIs in an older piece has a slightly better diagnosis.

What seems to be the failure of Measure 110 is a solely criminal justice approach

Portugal decriminalised possession of drugs for personal use in 2001, the first country to do so. There, drug-induced deaths have since fallen and street dealing is uncommon. But Portugal’s policy is different: offenders are taken to a police station and must go before a dissuasion panel at the Ministry of Health. Fully 80% of addicts then choose to start treatment. Repeat offenders face punishment, like being banned from bars, or community service, enforced by police. “The state still has a paternalistic approach,” says João Goulão, one of the architects of Portugal’s effort.

Supporters of Oregon’s policy hope that peer mentors—former addicts—can encourage people to enter treatment voluntarily. They were allocated extra funding in the same ballot measure in 2020. But although possession was decriminalised three months after voting, it took another 20 months for the funding to roll out fully. “If I had to do it all over again, I think I would reverse the way that we’ve done it,” reflects Rob Nosse, a state representative.

Even with the extra funding now being spent, Oregon’s drug treatment remains woefully scarce. Addiction-support workers in Portland estimate that the wait for residential treatment can be up to three months. Recent state analysis found that it needed 60% more inpatient facilities. But the extra money will be going to other services, like the mentors, as well as needle exchanges and supported housing.

#oregon #drug decriminalization

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