Ivanova Is In My head

Alyssum here, they/them and a little too obsessed with b5. Thank you Silver. Jewish. Israeli. If you have an issue with that - leave.

[alyssumlovesthecosmere]

Lost and Found Phone

So this weekend was insane. And I mean insane insane.

highlight reel:

lost my phone

went to the czech police to report it stolen

(met a prof who shares my name)

talked with a crayyyyzy lady

got flirted with by my server at the restaurant?

kind of asked her out

joined the pride parade for five minutes after lunch

had my phone COME BACK TO ME

Whole story under the readmore because. long

I am currently in Prague for a Linguistics thing called ESSLLI. It’s a lot of fun but I am, importantly, not at home, ie, not in my home country or somewhere where I speak the language.

On Friday, it being Friday and almost shabbat, I skipped some lectures so that I can buy some stuff for shabbat. As I’m showing friends my new purchases (the book Yesteryear being one of them – holy heck what a book), my tram arrives, so I put my phone in my pocket and get on the tram.

Tram door starts closing, I look in my pocket to stare at my phone and- wait. Where’s my phone. Oh fuck oh shit it fell out. Okay i’ll get off in the next stop, take a tram back, and pick it up from the ground. I get back to the stop and- oh fuck oh shit my phone isn’t here. Okay breathe. Whatthefuck how do I handle a foreign city without a phone. Or my credit card. Or id card. Or transportation card. Or my card that says i’m at x accommodation at y room please give me a key.

I ask some ladies if they saw my phone- no english, and no phone. Okay shit. “oh there’s a young lady she’ll probably have whatsapp for me to call my phone’s regular number (which I remember but can’t call regularly without racking up Charges™️, and I don’t know the foreign number).”

I ask her, and she, thankfully speaks english, and incredibly is willing to be there as I go through all the stages of panic.

Phone doesn’t answer. I call my parents – whatthefuckdoido they go uhhh fuck and then we remember that I had location services and an app called Tile on so that if chas v’chalila anything happens, they’ll be able to know where I am. Basic safety as a Jew, yknow?

Phone shows it was last seen ten minutes ago, where I was. It’s not there. Ohfuck it’s been stolen and they turned off the phone. Now what.

Now I go to the people at ESSLLI and tell them what happened (kind young lady paid for my tickets). They go. Shit. Let’s look at google’s location services – it seems my phone was turned off at 13:15 exactly where I dropped it. Fuuuuuck. Kind lady at ESSLLI, we’ll call her Heather (not her real name), calls the police and asks what to do. They say to come to the station and make a report.

Meanwhile, we’re planning on buying me a new phone because *waves hands at world* kinda hard to function without one. We hurry to the police station and. Wait. And look at phones. And wait some more. Finally I get in, file the report (with the help of V who speaks Czech and translated for me), and get out. It’s five pm. I still need to stop by ESSLLI to pick up some food I’d bought and put in their fridge. And then it takes an hour from ESSLLI to get to the dorms and I need to shower and get to shul/synagogue by 19:30. Because it was, at that point, so late (for me), I chose to not buy a phone and get it a day later, and rather wait till after shabbat. Thank you hashem for that.

I finally get to shul, a little bit late (for those who know – I got there in middle of Lecha Dodi, oops). And who do I see but. A lecturer from ESSLLI. Who’s name I share. Who, when I introduce myself goes “YOU’RE THE OTHER [REAL NAME] AT ESSLLI???? I thought they just got my name confused!” which was, frankly, hilarious, and a bit of laughter was necessary.

I get to dinner (restaurant shalom, they do shabbat meals as well), and the nice server – who I figured was nice to me because last week I came in all disheveled and stressed (note to any religious folks travelling abroad, don’t land on friday in a new place) – we’ll call her Gila (not her real name0, says to me “I didn’t want you to sit alone (which I also didn’t want, and asked for the minyan table – but it wasn’t available), so I put you with someone (spoiler: he never showed).” Okay, fine, I sit down and wait. Meanwhile, in comes a young lady who is also clearly disheveled, and sits down at a long, unocupied table. Alright that’s chill.

….Then she comes to my table. Ooookay? She sits down okaythisisfine and goes “do you think they’d accept my payment now, even though it’s already shabbat? I just got out of hospital”. I tell her that idk, but she should ask. She stays seated. I uh, sit and wait, she keeps sitting, I’m confused, I eventually ask her why she was in hospital, and she begins. A Spiel™️. “I was very smart, you know, IQ 152, we jews are smart as you know” oh I see where this is going oh b o y “but then I got Lyme Disease from the covid vaccine, and…” and I go. oh. Oh this is going to be long and crazy oh b o y. tl;dr – no one listens to her, everyone is against her, the czech people are “stupid sheep” the jews here are “in the mafia and refuse to help her”, and the only good place for her is israel because, and I quote “the arabs may be horrible and violent but at least they’re kinder than the czech people sniff”. Now I have neither the will nor the patience to unpack *gestures largly* all of that so I tell her that I’m going to start my dinner, and she leaves to go ask the restaurant for food.

As I’m eating, Gila comes over to ask me if I want a soft drink, and I say yes – Cola. She comes back a minute later with a cola bottle that says on it “hottie”. has she been flirting with my ohmygd I think she was wait- alyssum.exe has stopped working. Now, earlier on, as she was seating me, I asked for her name (Gila, as we said above), and she complimented mine. Additionally, she had been extra nice with me. Which, again, I’d figured was just “very clearly tired and disheveled tourist”. Anyway I go. Alright I’ll ask some allo friends for their opinion because clearly mine can’t be trusted, finish my food, and go back to the dorms.

In the morning, I go to shul, and then go back to the restaurant, meanwhile I haven’t actually had a chance to ask friends and I decide. Fuckit. I’m gonna ask her if she was flirting. So I do so. She says “oh I’m a Scorpio so I was being friendly, but also I was flirting a bit.” I tell her that I’m interested but also I won’t be here long, and we agree that I’ll come for lunch during the week and give her my number.

On my way back from the restaurant, the Prague pride parade is marching. Right where I need to walk. Uhhhh. Wait I can just join them?? there’s no security blockade? Cool. So I do. A little awkwardly because it kiiinda feels like uvdin d’chol (weekday stuff vs shabbat stuff) but I join them for a bit and then get back to my dorms.

Once back, I read a bit of Yesteryear, study friday and shabbat’s daf yomi, and begin debating the merits of a post-lunch shabbat nap. And then there’s an intense knock on the door. is that my roommate? Nope! It’s a lil old lady with her husband/son showing me the dorm key document and asking if I lost a phone on Friday. I am. flabbergasted, my gasters are fully flabbered and I am. Trying to come up with a sentence that isn’t a sobbing yes, while also trying to figure out if I can even take my phone from her because it is still shabbat (I do not currently care for the actual halachic answer) and decide “you know what it’d be weirder if I didn’t take it so I will just. Take it”.

As she’s giving me my phone back, she explains (in broken English) what happened. She found my phone at the tram stop, and wanted to give it back. However, she worried that the battery would die, so she turned the phone off (gd bless little old ladies). Then, her diabetes flared up, so she couldn’t come to the dorms to give me my phone, which, as above – caused me no small amount of stress. And then she came on shabbat, middle of the afternoon, right before my nap. Which I ended up not taking.

She finishes her explanation and leaves. I go, sink to the floor (I put the phone down as quickly as possible because I’m not dealing with it till after shabbat), and say הטוב והמטיב because I have no idea what else to say and yeah I’d call this some good fucking news.

Now, once motzei shabbos comes (ie – shabbat ends), I call my family back in israel and tell them the story. They are as gabber flasted and flabbergasted as I was. I then say “look. The document said I’m from Israel. I know we’ve checked and we know the phone had not been turned back on (important – because had it been, we’d have worried about viruses being placed on it), but since the document said I’m from Israel I’m a smidge worried that, idk. She may have attached something.*” Now, this is. Doubtful because a. little old lady and b. my phone doesn’t feel different, but there’s still that little whisper of doubt and worry because. People really do hate israel.

I turn my phone on and nothing happens.

So now I have my phone back, a possible date, and am dealing with the fallout of having canceled my credit card.

*this line specifically is fully made up because I actually referenced an in family joke but that’s a whoooole different story.

[foldingfittedsheets]

At work at a mattress store a man asked if I’d heard of these water systems for heating and cooling beds.

“I’m a bit wary, I’ll admit,” I told him. “Putting a large amount of water on something that should absolutely not get wet seems risky.”

“I have one,” he replied. “It’s got like a hundred water chambers so it’s supposed to be completely leak proof.”

“That’s what they said about the Titanic,” I said instantly.

It had seemed so funny in my brain but as it hung in the air between us I profoundly regretted saying it. I’d been so caught in the euphoria of a perfect parry to his statement that I didn’t think it through. Even as I sweated in salesperson I was still a little impressed with the speed of my wit.

I watched his eyes dim and his expression slacken in dismay and I wanted to gobble my very funny but inappropriate joke back into my mouth when he admitted, “Mine leaked.”

I burst out in relieved laughter and he was a good sport. He told me the company had replaced it and it really did help him sleep cooler. I suggested a waterproof protector for underneath it and he readily agreed.

[postergirlfornothing]

[dopeeeeeeshxt]

Ayeeee

[lightspeedsound]

Adorable, beautiful magic

[green-loaf]

Guys, I think I might be gay

[livsalot]

[pixiemage]

Hey there! Just a friendly reminder/PSA from your friendly neighborhood Pixiemage!

“Dead Dove: Do Not Eat” is too often (incorrectly) used as a cover-all tag, on fics ranging from Vaguely Uncomfortable to Serious Shit, as a replacement for any intense tags relating to the story. People will use it to say “Holy shit guys some INTENSE SHIT happens in this story” without actually saying what that Intense Shit™ is.

In actuality, the “Dead Dove” tag is meant to be used in addition to other warning tags. Pulled from a scene from the show Arrested Development (look it up on YouTube!), it means “Hi! Hey! I labeled this fic to warn you of what’s in it, so you might REALLY want to read those labels! This fic is exactly what it says on the tin! The tags are accurate! Don’t say I didn’t warn you, because this is me warning you! Read the tags!”

So before you accidentally use the “Dead Dove: Do Not Eat” tag without context, here’s your preemptive lesson for next time. Please tag your fics accordingly! Ta!

~ Pixie

[userfish]

baseball fights are better than hockey fights because everyone expects a fight in hockey. baseball fights are some real hater shit

[userfish]

ABSOLUTELY COMICAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[cosmicanger]

[mammalianmammals]

[2percentsugar]

does anyone else remember being a hapless american child looking at the prices of books on the inside flap and wondering. do we just hate canadians? this book is $8 here and $13 there, that feels..... mean somehow

[2percentsugar]

in honor of this post getting way too many notes i would like to add that my mom DID try to explain it when i was five and i completely misunderstood. for several years after i believed it was because canadian money was more important so the publishers wanted more of it than american money. this is because i was rather hapless

[shadow-manor]

The rest of the thread is here.

tl;dr: Don’t monetize AO3, kids.  You won’t like what happens next.

[ratherembarrassing]

read this thread. this is by far the most concise explanation of a lot of different issues that i’ve seen in fandom spaces in a while. cosigning both the linked thread and the thread about aus/uk/can law that’s linked in-thread.

[billybluboy]

AHDHXHEBSG TWITTER WRITERS DID WHAT NOW???? AND PEOPLE PAID THEM????

[prof-grace-aspen]

If someone has never taken a class that includes copyright law, they may not know this stuff, so I don’t necessarily blame random people for not knowing what copyright is, but like… maybe just maybe it’s something that should be taught????

[antifa-stray]

[mercurywells]

Just another reminder, because this always drives me crazy, but even if monetizing your fic was 100% unambiguously legal and protected, AO3 would still not let you do it because AO3 was founded and is supported by people like me who want a fandom community that is completely divested from making money off of fic.

[naryrising]

Yes, this. Lots of fanworks on AO3 are unambiguously legal. Fics based on Shakespeare plays and fairy tales and Greek mythology and The Great Gatsby and your original character from your D&D game are not violations of copyright, because no copyright applies to those things.

AO3 still doesn’t let you monetize those things on the site, because we don’t want the site to be commercial! Because that’s not what it’s for!

It’s not there for you (generic you) to make money off the efforts of the people who build and maintain the site for free! We aren’t getting paid for the work we do to give you a nice site to use, just like you aren’t getting paid for the work you do to create whatever art you share there. Because fandom is supposed to be a community where we share with each other, and therefore we all benefit.

The deal is, we give you a free, stable, safe platform to host your works. In exchange, you get a site that isn’t covered in ads and tip jars and links to gofundme and “read the next chapter at my patreon”. You get one goddamn place on the internet that isn’t trying to make money off you. And we will defend that space and keep it non-commercial.

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

If you want to make money off your fics, you can instead post them somewhere like royal Road. “Oh, but Royal Road’s culture is so much more negative and stressful and lacks the supportive norms of AO3!” Yeah, because people are trying to make money there. Half the userbase is treating it as a storefront and hustling is the natural social consequence of that. AO3’s culture can only exist because it’s not commercial.

[biggest-gaudiest-poltergeist]

it's healthy for academics to have professional feuds. enrichment activity

[biggest-gaudiest-poltergeist]

Holy shit. "The demese ef the Ne'enderthels: Wes lengege a fecter?" published in the Science magazine

[biggest-gaudiest-poltergeist]

short but sweet

[gigglepuffpixie]

[meatballlady]

There seems to be a misconception about Grace's translation software that is bothering me more and more and we need to address:

It is *not* AI. It is not """interpreting""" Rocky's words/meaning. It only picks up literal words.

This is how it works:

Eridian words are musical notes/chords

Soundwaves are physical, and at different frequencies they make different patterns! These physical patterns, and therefore Eridian language, is formulaic and repeatable. This is easily processed by computers in a reliable way. This is also lucky for Grace!!

Grace and Rocky create a database that maps notes/chords to words

When Rocky speaks, the computer looks up the exact notes in their pre-made database and returns the associated word

It is a FORMULAIC LOOKUP, NOT AI

Rocky isn't saying "My loneliness knows no bounds, and I have forgotten my soul in the endless abyss" which the translator outputs as "Rocky in space too long"

Rocky is literally saying "... Rocky in space too long" knowing that that's the only words the translator has to draw from.

It's a bit terrifying to me how quickly people are just accepting "yeah computers must be intuiting basic meaning" because that's the opposite of how it works. They don't "understand" anything. They take gads of data and turn it into something that looks like it has meaning, not the other way around. I know I'm fighting a losing battle here, and maybe I'm just being a pedantic asshole, but god do I hate how pervasive this misconception is.

[stevishabitat]

So much this. Rocky's weird language quirks are because he's simplifying and restructuring his language to make it easy for Grace and/or the computer to pick up.

Rocky is doing the hard translation work in his head before he speaks because Grace is learning and the computer can only regurgitate words that have already been saved — in the order that Rocky says them.

Like when you have a friend who is learning your language, and you slow down and use simple words/sentence structure and fewer slang/jargon words to make it easier for them.

Because hearing is Eridians' primary sense, they have a better memory for sounds, which means Rocky picks up English quicker than Grace can pick up Eridian.

In the book, there is no text-to-speech involved, Grace records Rocky's vocab into a spreadsheet, which he uses for reference on the fly and also as a DIY duolingo for Eridian practice. The movie just adds a speech generator (which is a pre-recorded soundbank provided by a NASA journalist, played by James Ortiz, lol).

But it's doing the same thing — just out loud for the audience's benefit (and so Grace doesn't have to be running back and forth to his spreadsheet in the early days). It matches soundwaves that Rocky generates to the vocabulary spreadsheet and then pulls the corresponding English word from the soundbank.

Obviously it *should* sound very early GPS voice 🤣 because it's word-by-word without infection, but although Ortiz did try that a bit, it wasn't working well on-camera. So they turned him loose to give Rocky's voice personality. And we can suspend our disbelief for it because he's *fantastic*.

But especially when writing for Rocky in fics, we need to remember exactly what's happening, otherwise it won't sound authentic.

Mary's voice is likewise not really ai. It's a voice assistant with a prerecorded soundbank as well. It can really only respond as programmed.

[dizzyghoast]

every so often i remember how awesome the modern interconnected multicultural world is. i grew up getting to hear fairy tales from all over the world. africa, asia, europe, america. everywhere in between. i can have bagels for breakfast, curry for lunch, and ramen for dinner without even leaving the city limits. music and art and philosophy and technology that originated thousands of miles and years apart from eachother have come together and interwoven into something greater than the sum of its parts. its hard not fall into despair when thinking about the horrors but god. god the wonders.

[dizzyghoast]

you can have friends on the other side of the planet! neither of you even has to travel!!!!! you can just talk to them whenever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[joycomplexx]

by the way it's fine to like sexual content just for the sake of it. "we can't ban porn because other stuff will get banned" "sometimes nude art has value" "the government will classify queer people as sexual" this is all true but it's okay to just like porn. its okay to not want porn to be banned because you like it.

[the-quasar-hero]

Man who hates the very concept of life and all living beings: I should design portal websites for colleges and job applications

[jewishpangolin]

[alandrosul]

women in stem. women in root. women in leaf.

[shamebats]