You're afraid to be corny, but I was born on the cob

I would make this video required watching for everyone in the entire world, if I could. It discusses over why they literally don't make things like they used to, and why so many products are so shit nowadays, with multiple real-world examples throughout. Not only that, it explains what you can do about it.

Support Right to Repair!

I've been pondering making a community for one of my interests. None of my current 'big 3' hyperfixations (Alien Stage, Dungeon Meshi and STUDIO INVESTIGRAVE games) have a community of their own. I know for a fact that INVESTIGRAVE's games do not have an audience here on Dreamwidth, because I'm the only bitch who comes up when you search "Dead Plate" (their most popular game). If we, again, use searching via interests as a reference point, there is more of an audience for Alien Stage, but nearly half of the results for it have journals which have never updated even once. Which leaves Dungeon Meshi -- 3 whole pages of people who name it as an interest!

I went ahead and made the community, gave it an icon and made it an associated graphic. I thought I might-as-well claim the username now, as I could always just delete it later. It's still being set up, though, so I'm not gonna link it until it's actually ready for members.

So far, this "Creating a Dreamwidth community" masterpost that was shared with me has helped a lot with the fine-tuning. I'm currently having to duke it out with the current "can't apply styles to communities" glitch, and with figuring out the final details.

Currently, the rules I've decided on are as follows:

• The "treat others with respect" rule. This includes bigotry and harassment.
• A rule regarding which content requires a cut. Right now, I'm requiring a cut for triggering content, image-heavy content, large images, explicit sexual topics, and long text (3+ paragraphs). I'm also more or less yoinking the approach of bnha_fans regarding spoilers for the anime: spoilers for the anime require a warning and cut, but, unless a post is tagged as anime-only, the comments are fair game for all discussion.
• Provide a source for fanworks you didn't create, and only do so for artists who are okay with credited reposts.

I'm running into an issue with regards to "taboo" content. I'm a survivor who is triggered by subjects that a lot of fandomfolk on here tend to enjoy, which means I would not be able to moderate said content. (I also just plain don't really like to interact with folks who post that stuff a lot, if I can help it. I probably wouldn't be able to help it, though, if I ran a community, which is fine, I guess. Community-runners have to talk to all sorts of people they may not like.) However, if I put, "No fanworks depicting these things," in the rules, I know from experience that I'm going to get a bunch of disgruntled people (either to my face, or in "fandom wank"-type communities) yelling at / about me for being a prude, anti, fascist, probably not even a real victim (yes, real example), etc. Which, you know, I would prefer to not happen. But that still doesn't change the fact that I can't moderate that without triggering flashbacks, which I would also prefer to not happen.

Ugh, I hate dumbfuck fandom discourse. Why is "I don't want to see triggering content" seen as a declaration of war on among fandom olds?? Christ.

I felt like this was truly the only choice for this week's highlight, given how popular Honey is. Fair warning: this is a "part 1", which isn't clearly advertised in the video title, but it still contains a lot of damning evidence about how Honey steals from creators, and purposefully gives their customers worse coupon codes while telling them it's the best one available, to stop them for searching for better ones. Among other things.

Frankly, it all stops being surprising once you remember Honey is owned by PayPal.

There's something deeply fascinating about watching a company fumble the bag over and over again, wouldn't you agree? That's what this video's all about, with the distinctive flavor of gaming history! Melody does a great job, as she usually does, covering everything in an engaging and humorous way.

I see a lot of folks saying that they "block/mute and move on". Which is a good practice, and this post is not about knocking it. Instead it's asking, how exactly does one do that on Dreamwidth?

Per my understanding, there is no "blocking" on Dreamwidth. There's only banning someone from your account. Banning someone from your account doesn't, however, prevent the user from commenting on your community posts, prevent you from seeing their comments, nor does it even prevent you from seeing their posts from the communities you subscribe to. You can block anonymous comments, and enable selective comment screening, but, per my understanding, that's about it.

Is everyone and their mother just using the Dreamwidth Blocker Userscript, like myself? Or are there some other trick(s) that I don't know of?

(At the risk of going on a tangent: I know that it's a leftover from Livejournal, but the complete inability to preen your feed experience via blocking or muting someone is a serious turn-off for me. I really like Dreamwidth otherwise, but when "block and move on" and "curate your experience" has become, like, some of the core tenants of fandom, it's really annoying. I shouldn't need to download an extension that only sometimes works, just to not see upsetting darkfic on my feed. Because it's my feed! Let me remove the things I don't want to be there! Aarrrgh!!)

A longer post about The Current Events is in the works, and is gonna be published hopefully later today, but I just wanted to ask this question (and complain a little bit, because what are journals for if not that?).

(Cross-posting from the holiday_wishes community.)

Hello, everyone! My name is Azure, and this is my first year participating in Holiday Wishes! I'm a relatively young (in my 20s) queer individual big into fandom! I look forward to fulfilling some wishes. In the meantime, here are mine!

˚˖𓍢ִ໋ ୧ ✉️ ‧₊˚ .⛸️ ❄︎ ⋅

1. Help me move!

I'm currently saving up to move out of my parents' home! They forbid me from going on HRT, so I'm trying to get away from them as fast as possible. Plus, being trans in a red state has never been the safest in the world...

My Paypal.me is here (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/azuremist), and my Ko-fi is here (https://ko-fi.com/azuremist)!

ˊ🧣☆ˋ☕️

2. Comments on my partner and I's fics!

I am AzureMist on AO3, and some fandoms I've written for include Dungeon Meshi, MILGRAM, and Pokémon, among other things! If you're familiar with any of the fandoms I've written for, from 2021 onward, I'd really, really appreciate it if you could spare some kind words!

My partner is verdantscribe on AO3, and lately, he's been really bummed about the lack of comments on his fics. So, if you'd comment on any of his 3 most recent ("Le Judas", "Dissos: NMDA Receptor Antagonist", and "Hallucination Panic"), that would be amazing! Especially if you're familiar with their source materials (Dead Plate, Dungeon Meshi, and Cold Front, in order).

ˊ🧣☆ˋ☕️

3. Art of my OCs!

I'm basically always looking for art of my fursona (https://toyhou.se/4817527.azure) and persona (https://toyhou.se/7930464.azure-persona)! I'd also really love art of my Dungeon Meshi OC (https://toyhou.se/28234949.tamir). Linked is a page with each character's information and gallery!

ˊ🧣☆ˋ☕️

4. Some support for my art tumblr!

A reblog, a kind comment, or maybe even a follow for my art tumblr, artsy-azure, would warm my heart!! It's brutal out here for us artists online in this day and age...

ˊ🧣☆ˋ☕️

5. A custom Winamp skin

No, you have not been transported back to 2001. I recently downloaded Wacup (a Winamp remake for the modern age)! However, I can't find a Winamp skin of my childhood fave, to complete the 2000s fun: Amulet Spade from Shugo Chara! If anybody has the ability, I'd love to see a Winamp skin featuring her! (If you need help finding official art of her, hit me up in DMs or shoot me an email. I have oodles!)

ˊ🧣☆ˋ☕️

6. Paid time on platforms

Namely, this includes paid Dreamwidth, Discord Nitro (I'm @bede908), and Tumblr Premium (I'm @azuremist)! It's super appreciated!

ˊ🧣☆ˋ☕️

7. Enamel pins

Especially cute / "kawaii" ones, ones in pink, and ones depicting rabbits~! I'd also be thrilled to receive any pins for my fandoms (I'm really into Pokémon, Dead Plate, Dungeon Meshi and Alien Stage right now).

ˊ🧣☆ˋ☕️

8. A multi-tiered display case

I've recently gotten into collecting figurines! Which means I've also recently gotten into cleaning dust off of my figurines. A display case, at such a size that it can be sat on top of a desk without taking up the whole space, would help me a ton!

ˊ🧣☆ˋ☕️

9. Icons matching my layouts' color scheme

My icons (click here to see them) all follow a distinct color scheme that match my journal's layout! I'd be grateful if someone could make me a Vincent (Dead Plate) or Ivan (Alien Stage) icon fitting that color scheme.

ˊ🧣☆ˋ☕️

10. PIPE DREAM - life-sized Furret plushie

Hey, you never know if you don't try!

For basically as long as I've known about it, I've been desperately trying to get the life-sized Furret plush. Furret is my favorite Pokémon of all time, and its comically large size is easy one of my favorite things about it. But it's also been out of stock for as long as I've known about it, too. So, if anyone happens to have this big guy, to finally get my hands on it would be a Christmas miracle!

˚˖𓍢ִ໋ ୧ ✉️ ‧₊˚ .⛸️ ❄︎ ⋅

Thank you and happy holidays to you all! If you need my physical address, DM me here, or email me at azures.mist@protonmail.com! (Sorry for the hassle. My momma always taught me to never put my address online publicly, ha! As apologies for the extra steps, I'll e-mail you a photo of my doggy next to whatever you sent once it arrives!)

Path: Moonlight Trail
My goal: 20,000
Current word count: 16,543

I wrote my review for Cold Front, and I started outlining my article about suicidism. I'm hoping to start writing that article today, or tomorrow. Fingers crossed! Especially because I have this week off from college.

As you can see, I bumped my wordcount goal down. I initially bumped it down to 15k, and then ended up passing it while outlining my article. I tried really hard to let myself be proud, but it was hard, because I was basically almost at 15k when I chose to bump it down. So, I chose to bump it back up again to 20k. I think that's doable for me even at this point, so here's hoping!

Of course, my mental health is still, as the kids say, Bad. But I feel a lot better about this challenge after changing the word count goal, and stopping that "daily minimum word count" nonsense.

I'd never heard of Bad Cinderella before this video (fake theater kid, smh), but that didn't stop me from being sucked into this video and possessed by the forces of Messy Theater Drama. A super interesting case study regarding everything from the unrelenting greed of billionaires to the way that pop culture props up feminist ideas while still simultaneously being misogynistic.

Rating: G

Fandom: Delicious in Dungeon

Characters: Kabru, Laios Touden, Marcille Donato

Relationship: Kabru/Laios Touden

Words: 1,762

Content Warnings: Time period-appropriate sexism and homophobia, implied racism

Tropes: Unconventional Format

Summary: Some words from King Laios Touden's biography, regarding the debated existence of Kabru of Utaya.

( Notes )

---

( Read more... )

Path: Moonlight Trail
My goal: 25,000
Minimum words to hit each day: 834
Current word count: 7,659
Current average words per day: 851

It's no secret that my mental health's been in the gutter, so I've been struggling to write. Still, I've managed to keep my average word count per day above my goal. Thankfully, just before The Big Incident, I started a sillier, more low-pressure project to write an article rating all of my pride flags. I just finished and uploaded that to my personal site today. It made for a good buffer while I tried to get my act together. I even had the 2nd highest wordcount out of everyone on the Moonlight Trail at one point, so that was cool!

I'm going to be starting on a project that I'm very excited about next: the one I've temporarily named "History Hates Lovers", until I come up with something better. I hope that doing a project I've looked forward to will motivate me, and not just end up making it come out like garbage. A lot of today was pooling together the research and resources regarding the relevant topics. Research is one of my favorite parts of writing, especially for something like "History Hates Lovers" which largely relies on historical elements, so I'm having fun with it.