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hard-core-super-star · 6 months

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During an interview with Hailee, someone asks reader to marry them, and Hailee isn't too happy about it.

it it cool that i said all that? [H.Steinfeld]

pairing: hailee steinfeld x actress!reader

summary: doing interviews with your girlfriend is all fun and games until someone gets too comfortable with their questions.

warnings: none, just fluff; a speck of possessive hailee; two dashes of (not-so) secret relationship vibes; awkward interview moments that gave me second-hand embarrassment while writing

wordcount: 1.1k

a/n: does anyone else remember when comic-con was a big deal? yeah, me neither. so, instead of a convention-type vibe, i went the talk show route. [specifically stephen colbert because he's the only host i can honestly say i like] slowly but surely getting through all of my requests but the urge to write alpha!kate pt. 2 is starting to take over my life so...don't be surprised if i disappear for a few days and then post it out of the blue.

* * * * * * *

There are only a few things more nerve-wracking than having to sit in front of a room full of people and answer questions you’re definitely not prepared for despite all the time you’ve spent overthinking. The only thing that could possibly make that situation more anxiety-inducing is having to do it next to someone you’re dating…in secret.

It’s not a well-kept secret by any means but the lack of confirmation from both parties is more than enough to have fans from both sides analyzing every single comment that gets exchanged. You don’t really mind it, even though sometimes you feel like there’s a target on your face.

A target in the form of looks you can’t hide and smiles you don’t share with anyone but Hailee.

Okay, so maybe you’re incredibly obvious about your feelings for her but it still took her until after you finished filming Hawkeye to realize the truth hiding beneath all your stupid jokes. It would be easy to make fun of her for being so oblivious if you weren’t exactly the same way.

It took more than a few tries but the two of you eventually gathered enough courage to be honest with each other leading to the start of quite possibly the most chaotic but most rewarding relationship you’ve ever had. Just because most people in your life haven’t caught up yet doesn’t make it any less amazing.

The thing no one prepared you for, though, is having to do talk show interviews while avoiding the topic of said relationship. It’s not like either of you is genuinely trying to hide the truth, it’s just easier to explore your developing feelings when there aren’t a ridiculous amount of eyes trained on the pair of you.

Eyes that sometimes don’t quite know how to read the room.

Which brings you back to your current situation. You and Hailee are sitting slightly too close together while doing another interview where you have to dance around spoilers while trying to get people excited for Hawkeye.

It turns out, you don’t actually have to do much since seeing the two of you together seems to be more than enough to get people talking about the show.

“So, y/n, I know this is your first time doing an interview like this and I don’t want to scare you away so how about we get some questions from the audience?”

The crowd erupts into cheers and you can’t help but let out a nervous laugh even though you already knew this was going to happen. Being notified ahead of time still isn’t enough to stop you from worrying about what this segment will bring.

“What’s the worst that could happen right?” You joke, sharing a look with Hailee who merely shakes her head at you.

Of course, the list of “worst things that could happen” is quite long when it comes to people asking you whatever they want.

And right now, the way the brunette hasn’t let go of your hand since you sat down is definitely at the top of everyone’s list of questions. You’re sure no one is surprised by how affectionate she can be sometimes but it’s unusual to see her happily holding onto someone in a room like this one.

You swallow down your nervousness in order to focus on the questions that get thrown your way. Most of them are, in all honesty, softballs. Things like,”What was your favorite part about shooting Hawkeye?” and “Who’s the strongest Avenger?”

You’re thankful for the easy questions until the humor your responses carry inspires some…bolder comments. Stephen lets everyone know the next question will be the last and the lucky fan who’s chosen takes her chance.

“Marry me?”

The easy atmosphere of the room leaves you completely unprepared for the question and the only real response you can offer at first is a laugh. A laugh that earns you a grin from the bold fan and a glare from your unamused girlfriend.

“Yeah, sure,” you reply with a shrug. “My manager will email you my schedule.”

Your response is just as unexpected as the question which just makes the audience laugh harder.

There’s a slightly smug look on your face that disappears the second you turn to look at Hailee.

She’s an actress, and a fantastic one at that, so she hides her emotions well. Unfortunately, you’re an expert at reading her and the lack of a smile on her face tells you all you need to know.

“Too bad you have a very busy schedule,” she says through a chuckle that sounds more forced than anything you’ve ever heard out of her.

“True, true. I’m a very responsible dogsitter and I don’t think Martini would be fine with me leaving her for so long.”

“Does she get jealous easily?” Stephen clearly picks up on you trying to change the topic but Hailee’s not done voicing her displeasure.

“Her owner does.” The words are a mere mumble but the microphone picks her up loud and clear.

Your eyes widen and her comment renders you utterly speechless. It’s not that the words are a complete surprise, you just can’t believe she actually said that in the middle of an interview.

She realizes what she said a few seconds later and her soft eyes meet yours. There’s a layer of nervousness in them that she can’t quite hide and the sight makes your heart clench. You can’t do much to reassure her though so you merely squeeze her hand three times and let the interview continue.

The minutes feel like hours but you eventually wrap up and are allowed to go back into your shared dressing room. Hailee all but drags you inside and you close the door behind you once you're in the safety and privacy of those four walls.

“I shouldn't have said that,” she blurts out, her hands emphasizing her words and the anxiety they carry. “I just, I don't know what came over me. It was stupid and I’m-”

“Lee.” You quickly cross the small space between you and grab onto her slightly shaky hands. “You don't have to apologize, everything’s fine.”

She blinks a few times but the action doesn't get rid of the genuine surprise that's etched onto her features. “You…You're serious?”

“Incredibly. I thought it was cute that you got jealous like that.”

Her usual playful energy comes back the instant she realizes you're not upset. And it very quickly becomes clear she's not actually upset either.

“Excuse me, I wasn't jealous. I just thought it was a lame question.”

“Mhmm, right.” You let go of her hands in order to wrap your arms around her waist and pull her close. “I'll make sure to remind you of that if I ever propose.”

She leans in to kiss you until her brain catches up to your joke. There's a hint of a pout on her lips that makes you chuckle.

“What do you mean if?”

You don't bother with replying and instead kiss her again, knowing your actions will be more than enough to soothe her worries.

#hailee steinfeld x reader #hailee steinfeld x female reader #hailee steinfeld x you #hailee steinfeld x y/n #hailee steinfeld fic #hailee steinfeld imagine #hailee steinfeld fanfiction #hailee steinfeld fluff #hailee steinfeld #hawkeye #mcu #mcu fanfiction #marvel #wlw #wlw fic #writing

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thievesandtraitors · 1 month

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Was recently thinking about Ruby Bridges’s interview on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and how she said she was from New Orleans so when the racist angry white peoples were throwing things and shouting at her as she was walking to school, she thought it was Mardi Gras. And I just love, genuinely love, how sometimes, our little minds and its innocence protects us from some of the worst things we’ll ever experience in life, simply because it doesn’t know any better yet. A true miracle, a true gift, a true defender of our hearts.

#stephen colbert #the way your mind shields you from the godawful world when you’re a child I truly believe keeps kids safe #when it doesn’t know what’s going on so it relates your experience to the closest thing it can remember is a defense mechanism #unlike any other in the world

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lunarsilkscreen · 4 months

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"And Stephen Colbert"

Stephen Colberts Show; "The Colbert Report" laid the foundation for all of the modern day Fox News Rhetoric.

Unlike The Daily Show, the Colbert Report retained its "News Satire" roots by actively satirizing Conservative News hosts and Republican politicians. Arguably, much better than TDS did with Craig.

But the satire kinda laid the groundwork for what see in news analysis shows these days. Where Stewart and Colbert maintained a healthy *public* rivalry between shows; Neither skewed towards any particular side. Despite Colberts *character* maintaining Kayfabe as the *worst kind* of Republican.

I don't know if that's why we see *moderate Democrats* and *conservative Republicans* these days, or if it was always *like* that. (Probably always, as art does in-fact imitate life.)

Colbert's character is assumed unironically by modern conservative pundits to this day.

Despite my unironic dislike for pundits like Tucker Carlson, I must admit; I admire them in that they've studied their competition thoroughly, and took what works, and does not work and made it their own.

Even though, their competition; The Daily Show and The Colbert Report might not have realized they were, in fact, the competition.

Back on Topic; Stephen Colbert covered many varied topics, such as political loopholes and tactics actively used by politicians that were potentially subversive (and possibly dangerous) in nature to the U.S. democratic system.

At two-points even setting up a Super-Pac to run for president just to demonstrate how it's done, and how politicians can hide where the funds in Super-Pacs might end up.

The effects of the Colbert Report demonstrate how it's impossible to fully understand how your character is interpreted by an audience, and that it's impossible to know if your *heavy sarcasm* could be taken seriously.

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wonderfulworldofmichaelford · 1 year

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Is It Really That Bad?

When last we saw Mike Meyers, he had heavily damaged his career by starring in the live action Dr. Seuss adaptation The Cat in the Hat. Yes, I argued that it wasn’t that bad a film, but back in the day critics and audiences didn’t agree, and the one-time comedic juggernaut spent five years without headlining a major film. So, as you can imagine, when it was announced he was going to be coming out with another comedy in the vein of Austin Powers or Wayne’s World called The Love Guru featuring a character he had been working on for years, people got interested. Meyers is a very funny guy, and we all wanted to see him make a big comeback in live action. Shrek is great, but so is Austin Powers, and seeing the man inhabit a ridiculous character (or several) in live action is always amusing. Combine that with the star-studded cast, and what we have is a recipe for success!

Unfortunately, if that worked, we wouldn’t be here. What we got is a film that was so critically reviled that it sank what was left of Mike Meyers’ floundering career, ensured the director Marco Schnabel never directed again, and perhaps most notably sounded the death knell for the comedy formula Meyers had help popularize in the 90s and 2000s. Think of the gags in the Austin Powers films, with their gross-out humor and overly-long jokes and the clever but ridiculous visual gags; these films were already slowly dying off thanks to films like Freddy Got Fingered taking everything to the logical, polarizing extreme, but this movie basically took a genre that was on life support out behind the shed and executed it.

The film managed to make it to #3 on Empire’s 50 Worst Movies Ever (a list I have a lot of issues with, to be fair), but other than that, it really has kind of been forgotten. Sure, it comes up sometimes when people discuss bad comedies, but it’s not really a go-to example like some of the Seltzerberg films. It’s a very niche pick, so maybe there’s some sort of value to it that’s saving it from being more widely mocked. Fifteen years down the road, is The Love Guru really that bad, or was it unfairly judged by critics and audiences?

THE GOOD

With this much talent in the film, there was bound to be something good. Meyers definitely pulled in at least some of the right people, because there are a few truly standout performances here. Chief among them is Stephen Colbert as a deranged, drug-addicted sports announcer who feels like he would be at home in Madworld; they waste no time in showing him either, as he manages to breathe life into an otherwise bland opening infodump. He bounces off Jim Gaffigan pretty well; Gaffigan’s continued exasperation at Colbert’s insane hijinks are pretty amusing.

There is also, amazingly enough, Justin Timberlake. Unlike that other time he co-starred with Mike Meyers in a comedy film, he’s actually kind of funny (by this film’s standards, anyway). He portrays a hockey player named Le Coq, so named because he has a very big dick. Like, it’s fucking enormous, the bulge on this dude is unreal. As lame and one-note of a joke as this character would be in the hands of someone slightly less talented, Timberlake manages to make him amusing by portraying him as a huge fucking idiot, which ends up making him moderately endearing when compared to the “heroes” of the film.

That’s all I got, guys.

THE BAD

I think the big problem is, unfortunately, Meyers himself.

I love the guy and how he can just portray the wackiest people imaginable, but there’s somewhere where you have to draw the line, and boy fucking howdy is Guru Pitka the line. In the first twenty minutes, he establishes himself as a sexist pervert who is also extremely intolerant of dwarfism, and if that’s not enough he is very much the epitome of a guy who cannot stop doing a bit. Meyers shines through this character in the worst way possible here: It always, always feels like he’s mugging for the camera. The cherry on top is that the movie shills him constantly as this super genius guru, but all of his advice and his numerous books that he whips out for gags are the most basic self-help bullshit you could imagine. And there’s the whole weirdness of Meyers playing a white guru with an Indian accent; gives off heavy Apu vibes if I’m being honest, so I’m really not sure why he thought this character would be the next big thing.

And maybe this could be at least a little forgivable if he was ever funny. But he is not. All he does is act rude to others, make the lamest jokes and puns imaginable, and do one of those weird Mike Meyers laughs that sounds extremely similar to ones he did as the Cat. Speaking of the Cat, even if that movie was far from perfect, at least its main character got in a few chuckles with some of his lines, deliveries, and gags. Man got his cock and balls tortured for that pinata scene, you gotta respect that. Pitka doesn’t have anything like that.

Though let’s be real here: Nothing in this movie has anything like that. This is a comedy devoid of humor. Yes, there are a few mildly funny elements here and there, there are a couple of amusing side characters, but it’s not anything you’ll be laughing out loud at. I barely even cracked a smile watching this, at most nodding and thinking, “Yeah, I guess this isn’t as awful as the last few jokes.” Pitka is such an obnoxious and unfunny lead that any time you’re away from him for a moment with a different character, it feels like a comedic breath of fresh air even if the joke is just “This guy has a large penis” or “This guy has dwarfism.” And this film is really ripe with all the worst aspects of comedies of its time: There’s misogyny, there’s toilet humor, there’s lazy genitalia humor, there’s mockery of people with dwarfism (aimed at Verne Troyer, no less!), there’s homophobia… You know, it’s funny. I watched Talladega Nights recently, and while that film has a bit of homophobic humor to it, it kind of fits the sort of characters they are, and the film does end with Will Ferrel giving Sacha Baron Cohen a huge kiss to thunderous applause. Like it’s played for laughs and all, but it doesn’t feel nearly as mean as when this supposed love expert self-help guru is throwing around homophobic insults.

And then there’s the racism. For example, we have Ben Kingsley’s minor role as… sigh… Guru Tugginmypudha. He’s Pitka’s mentor obviously, and he is probably one of the most horrendous stereotypes imaginable. He’s like a minstrel show version of a Hindu guru, and this is even more fucking baffling because not only is he being played by a man who won an Academy Award for portraying Gandhi, Kingsley is literally of Indian descent! What the actual fuck was he thinking when he took this role? I’m guessing it was what he was going to do with the paycheck they offered him, but really, it just comes off as needlessly tasteless in a film nearly completely devoid of flavor.

Oh, and among the many celebrity cameos, we have one from Celine Dion. She’s only ever seen from far away or from behind. Out of all the celebs they got for this film, they decided to keep in a joke for one they couldn’t get, and this is all the more glaring when they managed to manipulate stock footage of Oprah to at least kind of seem legit. Like if it weren’t for everything else I mentioned prior, this wouldn’t really be a big issue, but it kind of just highlights how little of a fuck anyone gave about this movie.

Did I mention the fucking elephants? The plot is resolved with the help of fucking elephants.

IS IT REALLY THAT BAD?

I decided to come up with this series because I wanted to examine some of the most infamous, contested, and despised movies in history and determine if they’re deserving of their reputation. So far, my answer for every film has been a “No,” or at least not a straight up “no.” But The Love Guru? This film is exactly as bad as it sounds.

I think the reason it has been so thoroughly forgotten is because, in the grand scheme of things, it is just another really bad late 2000s comedy filled with all of the sort of jokes people stopped doing in the wake of stuff like The 40-Year-Old Virgin, which pushed comedy in a more natural and realistic direction which involved less outrageous scenarios and more down-to-earth hijinks with a smarter angle to it. This was a film Meyers had been gestating for a while, so it came out right in time to snuff out it brand of comedy by being woefully outdated and out of place, a sad relic of a bygone era of comedy films. It was the sort of thing no one wanted anymore, and so why even bother to remember it?

Frankly, I think this film would have fared a lot better if it had been connected to the Austin Powers films as originally intended. It would have worked on multiple levels: It gives Meyers another new character to bounce Austin off of, it rejuvenates the Austin Powers franchise with a new film, it gives Pitka a role in an established property as a boost, and its humor is far less out of place in a series that relies on that very thing. If they had released it earlier, maybe after Goldmember, they could have given Powers one last hurrah and maybe had Guru Pitka in a film that wasn’t absolute dogshit.

That being said, is this really the worst comedy ever? I’m not sure that it is, but it’s definitely up there. Alongside The Master of Disguise and Disaster Movie, I certainly consider it one of the worst comedies I’ve ever seen in my life. That 3.8 is way to generous; how this film isn’t higher on the Bottom 100 of IMDB is beyond me. This is rated better than Battlefield Earth, better than Cats, and most bafflingly of all it has a higher score than Sharkboy and Lavagirl is just baffling to me! The Room is rated worse than this! HOW?

So hey, congrats to everyone who voted for me to watch this! You’ve given Is It Really That Bad? It’s first resounding “YES, it’s that fucking bad!” I’m sure it won’t be the last time this happens, but what a first entry in films that are hated as much as they deserve… although I honestly think this one deserves to be hated a little more.

#Is it really that bad #review #movie review #The Love Guru #Mike Meyers #comedy

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omegaradiowusb · 1 year

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DECEMBER 24, 2022 (#339)

Flaming Lips, The: "A Change At Christmas (Say It Isn't So)" Chubby & The Gang: "Violent Night (A Christmas Tale)" Linda Lindas, The: "Groovy Xmas" U.S. Girls: "Santa Stay Home" Killers, The: "Don't Shoot Me Santa" Lathums, The: "Krampus" St. Vincent: "At The Holiday Party" Sparks: "Christmas Without a Prayer" Phoebe Bridgers: "7 O'Clock News / Silent Night" Raveonettes, The: "Christmas In Cleveland" Sufjan Stevens: "That Was The Worst Christmas Ever" + "Lonely Man Of Winter" Los Bitchos: "Los Chrismos" Khruangbin: "Christmas Time Is Here (Version Mary)" Low: "Just Like Christmas" Rufus Wainwright & Sharon Van Etten: "Baby, It’s Cold Outside" Tom Waits: "X-Mas Card From A Hooker In Minneapolis" Neko Case: "Christmas Card From A Hooker in Minneapolis" Peter Murphy & Tom Waits: "This Holiday Season & Christmas Sucks" Damned, The: "There Ain’t No Sanity Clause" Siouxsie Sioux & The Banshees: "Il Est Né, Le Divin Enfant" Cure, The: "Merry Christmas Everybody" (live) + "Let's Go To Bed" Cocteau Twins: "Frosty The Snowman" Suicide: "Hey Lord" Alan Vega: "No More Christmas Blues" Run The Jewels: "A Christmas Fucking Miracle" Tyler, The Creator f. Ryan Beatty & Santigold: "Lights On" Ghostface Killah: "Ghostface X-Mas" Surfbort: "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" Stephen Colbert & John Stewart: "Can I Interest You In Hannukah?" Lemmy Kilmister + Billy F. Gibbons + Dave Grohl" "Run Rudolph Run"

Come one, come all. Omega Radio returns to WUSB’s grid on Christmas Eve to deliver all of our good listeners, followers, and supporters some valuable last-minute gifts. As with our always-generous nature, we present two new hours of holiday music from favorite indie, metal, punk, hip-hop, goth, and legendary artists. It’s a bonus broadcast we haven’t done in years and it’s about time we get into the seasonal spirit.

A special one-hour bonus Omega and our second of two Winners Of 2022 broadcasts are on the way to close out the calendar year. Stay tuned.

December 27, 2022 (4PM New York City): bonus Omega

December 31, 2022 (10PM New York City): Winners of 2022 II

#music #playlists #Christmas #indie #hip-hop #rap #punk #goth #metal #omega

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omegaplus · 1 year

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# 4,301

Omega Radio for December 24, 2022; #339.

Flaming Lips, The: “A Change At Christmas (Say It Isn’t So)”

Chubby & The Gang: “Violent Night (A Christmas Tale)”

Linda Lindas, The: “Groovy Xmas”

U.S. Girls: “Santa Stay Home”

Killers, The: “Don’t Shoot Me Santa”

Lathums, The: “Krampus”

St. Vincent: “At The Holiday Party”

Sparks: “Christmas Without a Prayer”

Phoebe Bridgers: “7 O'Clock News / Silent Night”

Raveonettes, The: “Christmas In Cleveland”

Sufjan Stevens: “That Was The Worst Christmas Ever” + “Lonely Man Of Winter”

Los Bitchos: “Los Chrismos”

Khruangbin: “Christmas Time Is Here (Version Mary)”

Low: “Just Like Christmas”

Rufus Wainwright & Sharon Van Etten: “Baby, It’s Cold Outside”

Tom Waits: “X-Mas Card From A Hooker In Minneapolis”

Neko Case: “Christmas Card From A Hooker in Minneapolis”

Peter Murphy & Tom Waits: “This Holiday Season & Christmas Sucks”

Damned, The: “There Ain’t No Sanity Clause”

Siouxsie Sioux & The Banshees: “Il Est Né, Le Divin Enfant”

Cure, The: “Merry Christmas Everybody” (live) + “Let’s Go To Bed”

Cocteau Twins: “Frosty The Snowman”

Suicide: “Hey Lord”

Alan Vega: “No More Christmas Blues”

Run The Jewels: “A Christmas Fucking Miracle”

Tyler, The Creator f. Ryan Beatty & Santigold: “Lights On”

Ghostface Killah: “Ghostface X-Mas”

Surfbort: “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer”

Stephen Colbert & John Stewart: “Can I Interest You In Hannukah?”

Lemmy Kilmister + Billy F. Gibbons + Dave Grohl“ "Run Rudolph Run”

Bonus Omega; Christmas special.

#omega #music #mixtapes #reviews #playlists #Christmas #indie #punk #hip-hop #goth #metal

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phillipcole · 2 years

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Post-AGT Appearance 1213: Amanda Lee Show WEZF 92.9 fm August 9

The Cheerleader Killings would have beaten Lightyear every day last week and finished the weekend at $157 million domestic. It would have completed its international run last week at $172 million. The songs would continue in their respective directions.

Olivia Newton-John would have occasionally entered the top 100 suspects for the last name on Phillip’s sick list, peaking at 93rd in 2019. She would have dropped out of the top 100 early this year. No one would ask. Elana Dykewomon would have joined the top 100 late in 2020 and died at her peak position of 85th. Her fans would start swamping my websites with inquiries. My agent would be on vacation but my publicist would panic and call me this morning. I would give him a quote during the 10-minute call. Our contacts with Colbert would not know who she was but put my quote on the website by the end of this coming hour. The first to quote me would be Amanda Lee at WEZF 92.9, an alternative rock station in Vermont. Her show runs from 9 am to 2 pm and she would use the quote about !:35.

Lee: Welcome back. This is Amanda Lee. As a lot of my fans already know the LGBTQ? community lost a champion over the weekend. Elana Dykewomon fearlessly represented the crusade for equal rights and acceptance and made a lot of enemies doing so. Meanwhile in Hollywood and Dollywood we have a man called Phil Cole. This man is so full of hate I can’t believe he hasn’t been ridden out of town. So he’s got these characters and they get to say outrageous and misogynist things especially. So he dishes his worst opinions off on them and calls it a joke. One of his characters is a man he calls Phillip the Boston intellectual. This guy gets sick all the time when he hears the name of overexposed celebrities. So there’s been a bet going on for years now about the one name on his list that no one knows. Anyways now that Elana Dykewomon is dead people want to know if she might be the last name on the list. So he just posted this on the Stephen Colbert website. They’ve got a contract about this. This is what he says:

PBC: Before hearing the name of a celebrity can make you sick you have to know who the person is.

Lee: Can’t you just feel the hate?

#amanda lee #elana dykewomon #hate

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tilliwriteapine · 2 years

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So about yesterday....

let's see. I woke up to my lab results (went for my physical Thursday), to see my hemoglobin is 7.9. Iron deficiency anemia at its worst!! No wonder I'm exhausted and going up a flight of stairs is like climbing a mountain 😭 My doctor didn't call, so she doesn't know I know, but I'm stopping my Prilosec (of 8+ years), switching to Pepcid, starting iron again (ewwww), and thank goodness she referred me to a gastroenterologist Thursday. Just need to make the appointment.

but good news arrived too! I got tickets for Seth Meyers and Stephen Colbert!!! When I'm in NYC in just over 2 weeks. So excited to see them live 😍 I put in a request for the Daily Show, and am going to try for John Oliver Tuesday. It's gonna be wild!!!!!!

And now I need to grade a ton of my students' work 🤣🤣

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mceproductions · 4 months

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Dancing the Year Away (Countdown Recap)

Before I sum up 2023 We'll look back on the past 30 days Countdown wise.

Best of 2023

Movies

1. Mission Impossible - Dead Reckoning: Part One

2. Oppenheimer

3. The Super Mario Bros Movie

4. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

5. Barbie

6. Suzume

7. John Wick: Chapter 4

8. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3

9. Killers of the Flower Moon

10. The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

11. Elemental and The Flash

12. Fast X

13. Wonka

14. M3GAN

15. The Marvels

Runners Up:

A Man Called Otto

Shazam: Fury of the Gods

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny

TMNT: Mutant Mayhem

80 For Brady

Worst:

1. Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey

2. Expend4bles

3. Ant Man and the Wasp: Quantumania

Honorable Mention:

Puss in Boots: The Last Wish

Best New Show of 2023 Nominee* Winner^

1. Star Trek Picard (Paramount+)

2. The Last of Us (HBO)^

3. Succession (HBO)

4. The Daily Show (Comedy Central)

5. The Late Show with Stephen Colbert (CBS)

6. Yellowstone (Paramount TV)

7. The Mandalorian (Disney+)

8. Abbott Elementary (ABC)

9. Late Night with Seth Meyers (NBC)

10. Loki (Disney+)

11. SNL (NBC)

12. That 90’s Show (NETFLIX)*

13. My Hero Academia (ADULT SWIM)

14. Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) and Real Time with Bill Maher (HBO)

15. Ahsoka (Disney+)*

16. Attack On Titan: The Final Chapters (Crunchyroll/ADULT SWIM)

17. The Good Doctor (ABC)

18. The Owl House (Disney)

19. TONIKAWA: Over the Moon for You (Crunchyroll) and

Outlander (Starz)

20. My Adventures with Superman (ADULT SWIM)*

21. It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia (FXX)

22. 1923 (Paramount+)

23. RWBY (Crunchyroll)

24. One Piece (NETFLIX)*

25. The Simpsons (FOX)

Runners Up:

Tomo-Chan is A Girl (Crunchyroll)

Oshi No Ko (HI-DIVE)

The Walking Dead: Dead City and Daryl Dixon (AMC)

Young Sheldon (CBS)

Jimmy Kimmel Live (ABC)

Worst:

1. Velma (MAX)

2. Secret Invasion (Disney+)

3. Gotham Knights (CW)

Honorable Mention:

Star Trek Lower Decks and Strange New Worlds (Paramount+)

Music

1. Dua Lipa “Dance The Night”

2. MindaRyn “Way to Go”

3. Morgan Wallen “Last Night”

4. Jack Black “Peaches”

5. Miley Cyrus “Flowers”

6. NSYNC “Better Place”

7. Taylor Swift “Karma”

8. Radwimps and Toaka “SUZUME”

9. Ed Sheeran “Eyes Closed”

10. Jason Aldean “Try That in a Small Town”

11. Ludwig Goransson “Can You Hear The Music”

12. Olivia Rodrigo “Vampire”

13. Halle Bailey “Part of Your World”

14. Jimin “Like Crazy”

15. Ryan Gosling “Push”

16. Metro Boomin, Swae Lee, Lil Wayne, and Offset “Annihilate”

17. NBA YoungBoy, Bailey Zimmerman and Dermot Kennedy “Won’t Back Down”

18. Brian Tyler “Level Complete”

19. Neriame “Unmei Kyoudoutai!”

20. Rahul Sipligunj and Kaala Bhairva “Naatu Naatu”

21. YOASOBI “IDOL”

22. Ryan Gosling “I’m Just Ken” and Cher “DJ Play A Christmas Song”

23. Dr. Teeth and The Electric Mayhem “Rock and Roll All Nite”

24. Taylor Swift “Cruel Summer”

25. LAUV “Steal The Show”

26. U2 “Walk On (Ukraine)” and Blink 182 “One More Time”

27. Jung Kook “Standing Next to You”

28. Linkin Park “Lost”

29. The Weeknd and Ariana Grande “Die for You”

30. Rachel Zegler “Nothing You Can Take From Me”

Runners Up:

Radwimps “Kanata Haluka”

Chris Pine “This Is the Thanks I Get”

BTS “Take Two”

Casey Lee Williams “Worthy”

Oliver Anthony “Rich Men North of Richmond”

Worst:

1. Awkwafina and Daveed Diggs “The Scuttlebutt”

2. Nicki Minaj and Ice Spice “Barbie World”

3. J6 Prison Choir and Donald Trump “Justice For All”

Honorable Mention:

Taylor Swift and Her Taylor’s Version Remakes

Game of The Year

Nominee* Winner^

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of The Kingdom^

Starfield*

Sony’s Spider-Man 2*

Super Mario Bros Wonder*

Hogwarts Legacy*

Worst:

The Lord of the Rings: Gollum

THE JAW DROPPERS:

1. Damar Hamlin

2. The Enterprise D Returns to the fold

3. Barbenheimer

4. Breakthrough of Bilingual VA’s in Anime

5. Hamas Gives another Salvo

6. Memory of a Flerken Brood

7. The Toymaker Spices Up Our Lives

8. Looks like ______ is back on the Menu

9. The Twilight of An Icon

10. The Saga of George Santos

HM: A sport goes Swiftie

#best of 2023 #year in review #movies #music #tv shows #game of the year 2023 #countdown recap #jaw droppers #worst of 2023

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podawful · 7 months

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SURVIVING: The Late Nite Writer's Strike - POD AWFUL PODCAST LF16

[2+ HOUR LONG SHOW! JOIN THE PIZZA FUND! $12 level. https://podawful.com/posts/22391]

THE WORST PODCAST THAT HAS EVER EXISTED. It shouldn't be possible. The five top hosts in Late Nite TV, the five men who speak to audiences of millions on legacy media... the five... white guys. Thanks to the WGA Writer's Strike and their own refusal to pay their employees, Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers, and the insufferable John Oliver have come together to create the unfunniest, most unlistenable trainwreck of a Zoom-call-with-your-uncle-style podcast to ever be recorded. And its all a huge grift. Amazingly, despite these huge names all being on board, the STRIKE FORCE FIVE podcast has very little attention on it, and that may have something to do with the news hit-piece done on Jimmy Fallon by Rolling Stone Magazine just a week after it premiered. It's CRINGE, it's FRINGE, it's GROAN-WORTHY... can you SURVIVE IT?

VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpdDfYIBSv8

PIZZA FUND: http://podawful.pizza

RSS FEED: http://podawful.com/rss

YOUTUBE: http://awful.tube

DISCORD CULT: http://podawful.com/discord

TWITTER: http://podawful.com/twitter

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MERCH: http://podawful.shop

http://podawful.com

#podawful #latenight #jimmyfallon

Pod Awful Is an anti-podcast hosted by Jesse P-S

Check out this episode!

#podcast #pod awful

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vidocqsociety · 1 year

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youtube

every time i see someone bitching about how the last strike "made television the worst it ever was" i remember the absolute genius that was stephen colbert, jon stewart, and conan o'brien faking a weeks-long feud that culminated in a brawl just to fill time

#i don't say this to take away from the writers #i believe what they are asking for is fair and they should get it and more #but if you think tv was a desolate hellscape back then #let me tell you #we were gifted with brilliant comedic minds who managed to entertain us #conan was the best at it #the man managed to make him spinning his wedding ring compelling #he climbed into the rafters of his studio #he made guests walk a maze to get to the couch #HE SAVED LINCOLN #man was out here doing the absolute DUMBEST bullshit #and every night he'd be like 'hey if the network thinks this shit is dumb they should probably give the writers what they're asking for'#god i miss that man on my television

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spaciousreasoning · 1 year

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On Strike

Stephen Colbert’s late night program is one of the few shows we watch on live TV. Most of our video consumption comes courtesy of streaming, as has been outlined here numerous times. Now that the Writers Guild is on strike, we’ll be without that entertainment until the two sides come to an agreement.

Fortunately, a good chunk of our video menu is on the channels which feature shows from Britain. We watch a lot of what is carried by AcornTV and BritBox, and very likely those programs may not be disturbed by the current strike.

Of course, even American programs that are already in the can won’t be affected, but the British shows will continue to be produced. Unless the writers over there honor their American brethren by not crossing the virtual picket lines. But I have not seen any indication of that possibility yet.

So we will finish out the current seasons of “Sister Boniface” and “Dalgliesh” and “The Brokenwood Mysteries” and “Grace” and “The Madame Blanc Mysteries” and much, much more.

Not to mention the newest series of “Astrid,” the French mystery show featuring the autistic police archivist, which is airing on PBS. And the final series of “Endeavour,” which is set to debut this summer.

The only entertainment we’ll be missing is the comedy stylings of Colbert and Kimmel and Fallon and... well, Corden just signed off for good. The worst thing about their absence is the missing laughs they provide about current affairs, many of which desperately require some humorous interpretation.

Stay at the bargaining table, will you, folks?

#unions #streaming

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welcometomy20s · 1 year

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April 1, 2023

(Continuing on my impression of AnRel’s work…)

As Churchill famously said ‘Democracy is the worst form of government, except all the other ones’... and perhaps language is the worst form of communication, except all the other forms.

As Shakespeare famously said, ‘is rose by any other name just as smells as sweet?’, but within and beyond the context, what matters is that the word ‘rose’ carries the significance and it is the trouble of the words that whole play and societies are based upon, in a sense.

Note we are not talking about linguistics. To me, linguistics and semantics are two separate things. Linguistics deals with forms while semantics deals with substances, here meaning ‘meaning’. Linguistics are about how the sounds and glyphs are structured to create a word or a lexeme, to be technical, how these words are structured to form sentences, and how the sentences get structured in a form of writing and so on. This is famously the reason why linguists cannot speak every language, because even if you know the structure of the language perfectly, if you don’t know any semantics, as in the meaning of the words, then you cannot make or comprehend anything that a speaker of that language produces.

Ah, I should probably define what a language is. While this is more of analogy than a definition, you can consider a language to be a network of interconnected shortcuts. Broadly, there are two ways of short-cutting. First is to group multiple things into a single thing as a set, or connect one set of things to another set using a map or a function. Ultimately, a language will be constructed out of a bunch of sets and maps.

This includes our ordinary language. We store information in a grid of spacetime (that originally came from Leibniz) and so words carry a line of events of time the word was evoked. Therefore our language is an imprint of our past experience, and by aligning our experiences, we modify our language, hopefully attaining a greater level of understanding. More coverage.

But this will never be a complete process. There will always be misalignment, no matter how small, and over a long enough period, all small differences will eventually show up. That’s the power of law of large numbers. We must not take granted the halls in which we have put our linguistic scaffolding, and we must try to resolve these long-standing issues, without ignoring or silencing the problems as many hierarchies reflexively commit, as these problems will eventually topple giant trees and erode mountains and dry up oceans.

We are moving beyond misunderstanding, the proximate misalignment, into other ‘traps’ or ‘faults’ of linguistic hierarchy, such as delusion of finalization or ossification, where rules and semantics of a given system fails to update due to the reinforce of hierarchy outweighing the need for alignment with current reality. As Stephen Colbert famously put this, ‘reality has a well-known liberal bias’. Reality is constantly shifting and therefore the liberal need for adjustment will never cease under any such system.

There are also systemic traps that one must be careful when constructing semantic hierarchies. Hierarchy, as I defined previously, is a broad term, but the gradient in which hierarchy is felt can be plotted through the scale of assimilation. Assimilation is the gradient (as in the ratio) of people who have the hardest time getting to alignment compared to people who have the easiest time. An effective hierarchical construction will try to minimize alignment for all participants, but most times hierarchies… feel like hierarchies, you feel the pull onto which certain groups are favored over others, which reinforce and spiral out of reality. Alienation is the resulting void of this assimilating force. Marxist will talk about alienation in terms of the class hierarchy, the way capitalism is highly assimilated to the rich capitalist and alienating against the workers and laborers, but this can extend to all forms of hierarchies.

The dueling dichotomies of assimilation and alienation can be seen in many different areas of inquiry, such as… Against assimilation - Auteur theory, identity politics, objective moral theories vs. Against alienation - Death of The Author, affinity politics, subjective moral theories. A society can be measured in its robustness by seeing where the balance lies. If one leans too much to one side or another, it risks increasing blindspots and therefore introduces fragility.

Thinking about what might be assimilated and alienated in a given hierarchy is important because these are, in an economic context, externalities that would inevitably come and destroy the hierarchy in which it has made its bed. Social reproduction theory concerns work that is marginalized by society but is clearly necessary for its continued existence. The so-called ‘essential work’ that people realize was a thing where COVID came around.

There were many talks about the paradox of these ‘essential works’. Even though people considered them essential, we lauded them as heroes, but yet they were never given the due respect. They are underpaid and undervalued. They have little to no voice in shaping the outcomes and directions of society, even though they are the eyes and ears which perceive society at its most granular level. This is the reason unions and democracies are stable.

Social reproduction is commonly associated with women’s work, a union of patriarchy and class structure that is the hallmark of human society, to the point some might use this union of hierarchies as a definition for what a civilization even is. This association has staying power, as in, there is a correlation of work which women newly enter into industries which the hierarchies are trying to suppress, and the opposite happens in industries which hierarchies deemed viable for manipulation. Parks were originally the stewards of the land, in charge of the lands around them, facilitating trade and commerce in those areas. But as they were marginalized by businesses who would forgo governmental intervention in lands altogether, more women entered into the workforce. Computing was originally dismissed as busywork and therefore employed women, but as computing became the backbones for hierarchical structure and computing became about manipulating and creating the scaffoldings of hierarchy, women were pushed out and men entered in - this was similarly done in entertainment and aviation.

As Debord explained in his discussion of The Spectacle, the hierarchy constantly shifts and moves to hide its true nature of assimilation and alienation. But with enough assimilation and alienation, it will become fragile and fall apart under the weight of reality. This is normal and should be encouraged but the fragility of our current hierarchies are so encompassing that we have ended history. We are scrambling together to create alternate, more robust hierarchies, before this current hierarchy collapses, because currently there is no future. All that remains is the end, and increasingly more and more people take this ‘black pill’ because they stopped resisting the engulfing shackling blob of our hegemon.

One of the major ways society can be made fragile is through proliferation of oversimplified concepts. Oversimplified concepts tend to spread farther than less simplified ones because humans tend to seek symmetry, which is not much about spatial symmetry, but in search of the simplest universal structure. One might think this can be protected against, because when a person learns of an oversimplified concept, one would probably find counterexamples and therefore will quickly dismiss the concept. But oversimplified concept art are satisficing concepts, they fit roughly 80% of everyday situations. This can easily induce assimilation and alienation and threaten the viability of a given hierarchy. Note also that oversimplification can breed further oversimplification with assim/alien, by stretching out the satisficing limit.

We increasingly create a cage in which we cannot get out, we pray the reality will set us straight and that our walls are porous and our minds are nimble enough to adjust to new experiences. But these are only achievable at our best circumstances and we fall prey to the self-enforcing lies of confirmation, to which we have little to no awareness or recourse. In that sense, no one is good at communication. Our brains are simply too broken for good communication, or perhaps good communication is impossible within the logical construction we made to describe hierarchy and its mostly ill contents. There is a capacity argument here - one that I made a few weeks ago, that there must be a point where developing more complexity requires more energy than the energy currently available, and at which point the machine resorts to greater and greater satisficing until the system irreparably breaks down. There is a physical limit.

Sidenote - When people complain about jargon… They are not complaining about jargon. Any good jargon should be comprehensible to the people who have knowledge on the subject. If jargon is made to obfuscate, it is on the onus of the people speaking to unpack the jargon. For example, if someone uses florid words to enact the policy that will starve off the poor, or to describe the love of an impressionable girl, the problem does not lie on the florid words but on the hearts of the person who wants to kill and harm innocent beings.

Sidenote 2 - The tension between Auteur theory vs. The Death of The Author and its resolution through discourse oddly tracks with how I view criticism. To me, there are four types of criticism. Interesting ones, which fit my intent and text and which I approve, Enlightening ones, which was not in my intent but which I still approve, Worrisome ones, which I agree is part of the text but something I did not want so I would have to get it fixed, and Refuting ones, which I don’t agree and feel as it through it is not in the text or the accompanying materials.

Tips from the video

When conflict arises, consider the kind of resolution that you were looking for. Do you want to end the conflict or use the conflict as a means of opening oneself? Conflict is a process, to stop conflict is a kind of a death drive mandated by hierarchy. To add - conflict is good, bimodal conflict is bad, multimodal conflict is good, and best conflicts are long lasting without long lasting incentives.

Figure out how much meaning is being lost in translation. Meaning lost to difference in vibration, amplification of that differentiation through relevance, and the overall effect.

It’s typically most relevant to gesture towards perspectives that are misaligned with hierarchical hegemony. Again, it’s a good heuristic.

Go watch (insert video here). Notes on this will be separate.

Good communicators don’t exist right now, so stop pretending to be one. I will argue good communication, in some sense, is impossible through the logical constructions I had made in extrapolation, but the fact that I’m medically certified to be bad at communicating helped me a ton on this tip. To add - structural destruction of relational skills is something I have continued to rally across in the context of web media.

There is no effect without cause and every cause is itself the effect of another. Probably one of the more fundamental ideas that governs physics and philosophy.

If you want or need perfect semantic alignment, then be alone. But be alone generative-ly. Gotta need that but so that people don’t get the wrong idea.

Figure out where the common ground lies between you, what resonates, and use that as a launching pad to reach beyond it.

It is valuable to consider how to provide artists with what they need in order to make their work more like how they want them.

Facilitate conversations through better containers. Again, capacity problem.

Figure out what is missing, how you might be able to acquire it, and chase after what you need.

Discern when [it is impossible to communicate] and walking away with the knowledge that they may not wait for our return.

Yes, we cannot read each other’s mind, but there is a process called science - the process of using sensory details to construct an increasingly complex set of heuristics that tries to progressively map reality, with the knowledge that this cannot be done completely and that the process is limited by our own faculties. Also note that our society has increasingly put blocks in pursuing science, suppressing and warping methods of research.

Burden of understanding, which I would posit is the form of all burdens, is large, and therefore the burden must be shared by the greatest number of people. It takes work to hedge and second-guess, but to pile on that burden to someone else is horrendous.

#long post #semantics #communication

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icarusthelunarguard · 2 years

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This Week’s Horrible-Scopes

It’s time for this week’s Horrible-Scopes! So for those of you that know your Astrological Signs, cool! If not, just pick one, roll a D12, or just make it up as you go along. It really doesn’t matter.

Aries

You’ve been wondering this week if it’s worth showing your true colors to everyone. The answer is an unabashed ‘Yes’. Always show who you are to people, don’t tell. The quiet ones are the ones that change the universe... The loud ones only take the credit. Make sure that people always know where they stand with you on all things.

Taurus

This week a blast from the past will take your mood from zero to hero… from worst to first. Enjoy the things around you, especially wildlife. However, do not trust birds. Canada Goose will crap everywhere and threaten you, but have you seen what the inside of an Emperor Penguin's mouth looks like? If you know, you know. If you go looking it up just remember, you cannot unsee something. Killing yourself will be the only way to forget that image. So don’t do it! (Oh, and… HI, MOM!)

Gemini

There’s another Horrible-Scope later that’ll talk about the Webb Space Telescope, but just for you… have you seen those first pictures released yet? Seriously, go look! It’s called “Webb’s First Deep Field” and it mimics what Hubble did. What Hubble did in a week-and-a-half, Webb did it and leagues better in half a day! This week let your space weirdness flag fly and buy Kerbal Space Program. You will NOT regret it! And Fly Safe!

Cancer Moon-Child

Water polo is not played with horses. Neither are horseshoes. The Galloping gourmet didn’t have hooves, and even though it has 350 horsepower there are no horses in the Ford Mustang. You want to have a summer getaway for a week, consider someplace like the Western Pleasure Guest Ranch, Sandpoint, Idaho. Log Cabins, daily horseback rides, three meals daily, evening entertainment and access to all ranch amenities including… (*SIGH!*) Wifi. And they are Pet Friendly! So you can Bring Your Own Horse… though how you can fit it on the plane is beyond us.

Leo

Ghosts don’t “Real”. And yeah, Google Docs doesn’t like the way that looks, but it’s a wholly accurate statement. And especially in the middle of summer ghosts shouldn’t be a thing in stores yet. There’s still Discovery Day, Labor Day, National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, Back To School, and of course Back To School Head Lice Week before we even get into October! You’ll get to buy Pumpkin Spice Everything soon enough - Slow Down this week.

Virgo

You’ve always wondered, so it’s time you learned something this week. You shouldn’t store vinyl records flat or on an angle - just upright. Yeah, it seems counterintuitive, but that’s how it’s done. Look at how they’re lined up in stores or old radio station setups like WKRP In Cincinnati. Your cassette tape collection, though, is in more danger of growing mold. Stock up on 90% isopropyl alcohol to clean those up. The 8-Tracks are just a loss.

Libra

The greatest things about the Global Information Superhighway are first… that nobody calls it that anymore, and that you can find things you never knew existed. Here’s something for you to do on YouTube; search for song titles you love, but add the term, “Isolated Vocals”. Eventually you’ll find the tracks of Freddie Mercury singing Bohemian Rhapsody, and there are several of them! Go do that tomorrow!

Scorpio

One side effect of Global Warming is the discoveries of animals from 60,000 years ago being released from the snows. Imagine how foolish people are who say they want to clone wooly mammoths now. Can you imagine fur-coated elephants trying to survive in the summers now? And how derisive they’d be in the winter? “Oh, it’s cold, you say? Minus twenty-five celsius is cold!? When my daddy was alive there wasn’t a word for how cold it was! Throw some of that Liquid Nitrogen on my back. Maybe I’ll feel it.”

Sagittarius

In 2017 Billy Joel was on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” and was asked for his Top Five Songs of his OWN songs. Ready for this list? Number five was “Vienna”, four was “And So It Goes”, three was “You May Be Right”, two was “She’s Right On Time”... but Number One from Billy’s own personal choices? Believe it or not, “Scenes From An Italian Restaurant”! As Billy himself put it, “We asked, can we put some Dixieland Clarinet in this song? SURE! Why not? So we put it in!” Just like any good meal, just add a little something of everything to get a great meal.

Capricorn

There’s a lot of little things that will be a growing annoyance, but you can work around them. Imagine what that ONE engineer at NASA was like when they had to report on the micrometeoroid impacts into that new space telescope… more than Five Times So Far! And yet that sucker’s ready to rock! You can do the same, just take it easy and stay cool.

Aquarius

Time to look forward to going home this week. Specifically your first home… the ocean. Plan on taking a trip to the ocean or some other beach for an afternoon. These days sunscreen isn’t good enough: wrap yourself in aluminum foil for UV Protection. People may look at you funny, but just angle your arm the right way to reflect the sunlight in their eyes to get even. And remember: Rip Currents are the beach’s way of swallowing you.

Pisces

You’ve been drinking 2% milk for so long, if you try to switch back to whole milk you’ll end up tying your stomach in knots! If you want creamier coffee creamer just invest in some quality vanilla ice cream. Or coffee ice cream. Or how about mixing these three green ice creams and see how it tastes; some version of Mint, Pistachio, and Matcha. ENJOY!

And THOSE are your Hobble-Scopes for this week! Remember if you liked what you got, we’re obviously not working hard enough at these. BUT! If you want a better or nastier one for your own sign or someone else’s, all you need to do to bribe me is just Let Me Know! These will be posted online at the end of each week via Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook and Discord.

#horoscope #horrorscope #parody #comedy #Yes my mother actually complimented me on these #HI MOM!

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samtheflamingomain · 2 years

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twitter down the shitter

I'm human. A real, meat-being. So of course I'm on social media.

Except Twitter. It has too many buttons and people I don't know. It scares me. I believe my tweet count is in the low double-digits.

So to see the whole Elon Musk debacle, as someone who will never be remotely impacted on a personal level by whatever the fuck he does to Twitter? I feel I'm in a sociologically interesting position.

I was going to make a comparison to a ref, but refs get paid to care about the integrity of the game. The only thing Twitter ever did that impacted me in any way was the ban of Trump, because that meant less things for Stephen Colbert to make fun of him for. I was a whole-ass week late to covfefe.

So, as someone with zero stake in the game (only focusing on Twitter itself, not any economic implications), I'm just... I wouldn't say amused, but almost.

Let's get the obvious out of the way: yes, any large change in ownership of something as massive as Twitter will have effects that ripple out. It could be harmful, especially in the wrong hands.

But here's the thing that I don't think a lot of people want to hear: the hands could be worse. Yes, he was born with a silver spoon up his ass and has some trash-fire takes. He's made some bad decisions, in business and otherwise.

But he's not stupid. As much as it pains me to say it.

I'm the insufferable philosopher that says "intelligence is a social construct, no one is 100% unintelligent". But without any caveats, he's a smart man.

But... he's also extremely selfish and impulsive, and I'd say it gets in the way of his intelligence.

Musk is absolutely a weird, toxic, incel-y dude. He's Michael Scott if he were a billionaire aware of 4chan.

As a die-hard socialist, I hate him on principle. But compared to all the other billionaire assholes, he really isn't the worst of the bunch. If Bezos was doing this, I'd actually be alarmed. He already owns the means by which most people buy EVERYTHING. Musk has a space hobby and one car thing. He's certainly filthy rich, but I'd argue that he doesn't have a whole lot of power.

But I mean that in one very narrow sense: I don't think anything Musk does is ever going to influence law-making or precedent-setting the way many other billionaires have done.

Again, billionaires should not exist, eat the rich, etc. But I think people who use Twitter are... overreacting.

I get the feeling that a lot of people see Twitter as THE social media, or at least the biggest. Maybe it is. But it's not the only one.

At one point, Myspace was the biggest. Then we moved on. We all, eventually, abandoned it completely for Facebook.

It's 20 years later, though. I don't know of anyone who is ONLY on Twitter. We're all on, say, 3 different social media - is one of them going to shit going to cause a Myspace-like exodus from the platform?

Probably not. Here's why: I'm not the only one who has an account for every site but uses only a few. It's different for everyone. Some have Insta just to see others' posts. Some have FB just to talk to that one family member. Some have Reddit just to glance at r/all once a week.

Social media is no longer all-or-nothing. Very few are die-hard "fans" of any one site. If Twitter becomes a cesspool, I don't think it means the end of it, but maybe a shift in attention to a different platform. Maybe it becomes the platform we all check now and then to see what politicians are saying.

At the same time, I think any such change would be very, very slow. People that like their Main social medium will cling to it as it sinks. See: me and tumblr.

Aaaaallll this to say, to go back to my outside-looking-in viewpoint, I don't think Twitter will look much different one year from now.

This goes back to Musk being not the worst possible hands for Twitter to be in. Selfish and impulsive, but also smart. He's not Trump, going bankrupt left and right.

And maybe I'll lose some people here, but let me don my tinfoil hat for just a moment: he's marketing.

All the weird tweets, bad takes, inflammatory threads... he's just trying to make waves. He's a smart man, but he's not a genius.

A smart man makes people write articles about him. A genius plays it quiet.

As an outsider, it seems glaringly obvious that he's simply fanning the flames, getting everyone to write about him. And clearly it's working. Look at me at this exact second.

But this kind of marketing only works when you back it up. When right-wingers are disappointed at his actual level of involvement and leftists are disappointed at all this leading to jack-shit, it's gonna be onto the next one.

We got a little tired of Ukraine and decided Twitter was important enough, and too many people gave Musk a bit too much attention. But totally honest, I think he's more selfish than he is smart, and that will be his downfall, and 6 months from now we'll all be laughing about the time Musk thought he could Change Twitter.

I've been wrong before, though. All we can do is watch the show.

#eat the rich #tax the rich #elon musk #twitter #social media #sam

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