If I die, remember that I begged you and asked you for a small donation or to share my post. I will not forgive anyone who sees this post and does not support me with a single word or a small donation and ignores me.
I'm writing this post with tears in my eyes from the intense pain I'm experiencing. I've suffered from severe pain and multiple fainting spells this past two week due to my severe anemia and my inability to afford all the medications I need because of their high cost. All I wish for is to never faint again, so I hope you will stand by me and help me buy my medications quickly. Please donate.
Worse still, I was injured when our house was bombed while we were inside. I was hit by shrapnel that is still embedded in my body, and I need urgent surgery to remove it. Throughout this time, I have been suffering from constant pain. My surgery is very expensive, and I don't have enough money for it. Now I can't sleep because of the intense pain, and I can't afford my medications and painkillers to stop the pain because of their high price.
I need your help to stop my pain and save myself as quickly as possible. Please, I don't want to die. Please help me raise the money for my medication and surgery as soon as possible. Please stand by me. Please donate.
Do you know what itâs like to watch your family starve? I do.
My⌠Hani Almadhoun needs your support for Hot meals 4 Starved Palestinian
Do you know what itâs like to watch your family starve? I do.
My⌠Hani Almadhoun needs your support for Hot meals 4 Starved Palestinian
The US-backed terrorist state of Israel killed Palestinian chef and co-founder of the Gaza Soup Kitchen, Mahmoud al-Madhoun.
Mahmoud was able to feed over 3,000 Palestinian civilians a day through the genocide.
Let's keep giving it all we've got for the Gaza Soup Kitchen. Israel has repeatedly targeted and killed those who have given service to the Gaza community.
Donate as much as you can or if you're unable to, share this post so it reaches more people! Any amount, even a dollar, can help the heroes of the Gaza Soup Kitchen to feed the people of Gaza.
19-year-old Khalil Al Habil's liver and kidneys are failing. Shrapnel damage from the bombardment that killed his baby brother Omar has gone mostly untreated due to a lack of funds and resources. The ill effects of this damage have progressed to the point that the organs are losing their ability to function. Khalil urgently needs 3 rounds of treatment to combat the effects of his deteriorating liver and kidneys.
These organs perform vital functions in the body. The body cannot function without them. If Khalil does not receive emergency intervention soon, he will die!
The first round is $1000 usd-let's get this round paid for so we can get Khalil the help he needs!!!
Current: $8,756 out of $9,012 usd (18 March)
Need to raise: $256 usd
Hello, my name is Khalil, I'm 19 years old, from Gaza.
As Google has worked to overtake the internet, its search algorithm has not just gotten worse. It has been designed to prioritize advertisers and popular pages often times excluding pages and content that better matches your search termsÂ
As a writer in need of information for my stories, I find this unacceptable. As a proponent of availability of information so the populace can actually educate itself, it is unforgivable.
Below is a concise list of useful research sites compiled by Edward Clark over on Facebook. I was familiar with some, but not all of these.
â
Google is so powerful that it âhidesâ other search systems from us. We just donât know the existence of most of them. Meanwhile, there are still a huge number of excellent searchers in the world who specialize in books, science, other smart information. Keep a list of sites you never heard of.
www.refseek.com - Academic Resource Search. More than a billion sources: encyclopedia, monographies, magazines.
www.worldcat.org - a search for the contents of 20 thousand worldwide libraries. Find out where lies the nearest rare book you need.
https://link.springer.com - access to more than 10 million scientific documents: books, articles, research protocols.
www.bioline.org.br is a library of scientific bioscience journals published in developing countries.
http://repec.org - volunteers from 102 countries have collected almost 4 million publications on economics and related science.
www.science.gov is an American state search engine on 2200+ scientific sites. More than 200 million articles are indexed.
www.pdfdrive.com is the largest website for free download of books in PDF format. Claiming over 225 million names.
www.base-search.net is one of the most powerful researches on academic studies texts. More than 100 million scientific documents, 70% of them are free
And ISTG if I see one argument that you "don't like movies by problematic white men". Oscar Micheaux has films available as far back as 1920's
Alice Guy has such an extensive filmography starting in 1896 that it is genuinely overwhelming. Including the first film with an all african amercian cast in registered history.
Start caring about history and stop hiding behind fake progressive morals to excuse your ignorance.
This person has done THE most impressive job I have ever seen compiling links to many films and books for free
This is an impressive list of film noirs you can watch for free
TubiTV is my favorite streaming site, it has a spectacular list of older films, and you don't need to even create an account to watch them
Also the amount of great older movies available on youtube always impresses me. Every time I can't find an obscure movie on torrent, it is usually just there on youtube. Mosfilm has been remastering their most classic releases and uploading them there.
Anyway, be curious! Search "films about <thing you like>" on your searching engine of choice. Chances are someone made a movie about it no matter how weird and crazy it might seem!
I know I jest sometimes, but films are legitimately great! There is so much to discover out there, it keeps me always excited for the next great thing I can discover that I had never heard about! Please, shed you chains of hollywood fast food, there is so much beauty just at your reach
As another parent of a small child, I would be interested to any recommendations or anti recommendations in the picture book category too
Fair enough.
My best weird offbeat nerd-hipster kids'-book recommendations are You Can Count on Monsters and Life on the Infinite Farm by Richard Evan Schwartz, published by the American Mathematical Society. The author is an insane mathematician trying to impart serious math intuitions to very small children with the power of eye-searing surrealist pictures done in xfig. You Can Count on Monsters teaches about prime factorization by creating a unique monster for each integer between 1 and 100 - prime numbers get new monster models, composite numbers get weird combinations of monsters based on their prime factors. (So the 8-monster is made of three 2-monsters, etc.) Life on the Infinite Farm shows you how to do simple operations on infinite numbers by depicting the problems encountered by an infinitely-long cow, a crocodile with infinitely-many teeth, etc.
Everything else I have to offer is a lot more mainstream than that.
My son desperately loves music, and we've gotten tremendous mileage out of the Story Orchestra series, which gives you simple stories combined with simple pretty pictures and push-button classical music recordings. It's just a really charming and fun way to get exposure to a lot of standards like Swan Lake, The Nutcracker, Peer Gynt, The Planets, etc.
...my son desperately loves music, which is probably the only thing that can account for his affection for The Story of the Saxophone, which sure is a short children's biography of Adolphe Sax. You probably know whether you're in the market for that thing.
The Elephant & Piggy books by Mo Willems are funny and punchy with memorable characters, and teach lots of simple basic life lessons in the ways that you'd expect from mainstream kidlit. Same goes for the Kitty and Dragon books by Meika Hashimoto, which are somewhat less funny and more traditionally sweet. Unfortunately, except for the first collection, Kitty and Dragon is available only through the Epic portal online (and not in print form).
Of all the kids' authors I've first encountered as a parent, Julia Donaldson is probably the best overall. Her stuff feels like it's destined to become Beloved Classics of Childhood, without very much of the preachiness or hyper-sentimentality that you find in so much of the kidlit market. The Gruffalo is a good trickster tale.
For very little kids, Christopher Franceschelli's Block series (Bug Block, Shark Block, etc.) are good for presenting Cool Things About the World in a very simple straightforward way. They're kind of hit or miss, though, and I was very disappointed by Dino Block.
Special shout-out to the Mini Myths series - especially Please Share, Aphrodite! - which are fun for kids but really a lot more fun for Greek-mythology-aware parents, since each one is basically an extended joke in which a classic myth is translated into a very low-stakes kidlit situation.
EDIT: THIS IS A CARRD NOW! it's updated and organized!!
use overdrive, libby, hoopla, cloudlibrary, and kanopy instead of amazon and audible.
use firefox or librewolf (open-source fork of firefox) instead of chrome or opera (both are made with chromium, which blocks functionality for ad-blockers. firefox isn't based on chromium).
use mega instead of google drive
get rid of bloatware
use libreoffice instead of microsoft office suite
get free stuff with the help of r/FREEMEDIAHECKYEAH, r/piracy and r/roms
use trakt (for shows and movies), letterboxd (just movies), or TMB instead of IMDB (owned by amazon).
use storygraph instead of goodreads (owned by amazon).
use darkpatterns to find mobile game with no ads or microtransactions
use mediahuman or cobalt to download music, or support your favorite artists directly through bandcamp
make youtube bearable by using mtube, newpipe, or the unhook extension on chrome, firefox, or microsoft edge
use search for a cause, ecosia, or ocean hero to support the environment instead of google
use thriftbooks to buy new or used books (they also have manga, textbooks, home goods, CDs, DVDs, and blurays)
use flashpoint to play archived online flash games
find books, movies, games, etc. on the internet archive! for starters, here's a bunch of David Attenborough documentaries and all of the Animorphs books
burn your music onto cds
use pdf24 (available online or as a desktop app) instead of adobe
use thunderbird, mailfence, countermail, edison mail, or tuta instead of gmail
remove bloatware on windows PC, macOS, and iOS X
remove bloatware on samsung X
use pixelfed instead of instagram or meta
use project gutenberg for free public domain books, and librivox for public domain books and audiobooks
use the seal app (android only) to download video and audio
use ellipsus instead of microsoft word or google docs
use mastodon instead of twitter
use peertube to create a network of small video hosting providers (disclaimer: not a 1:1 alternative to youtube)
use threema and signal for encrypted communication, on mobile and desktop
use qwant and startpage for secure internet browsers
use syncthing to securely transfer files between devices
learn how to jailbreak your kindle/ereader if you have one (wiki and video walkthrough)
use riseupâs email and VPN for secure communication (aimed towards activists)
use cryptpad and collabora instead of the microsoft office suite
use google takeout to export the data on your google account
use library extension to look for books on online stores and find them at your library
remove paywalls with removepaywalls
install the open-source adblocker ublock origin
install sponsorblock to skip sponsored segments on youtube videos
use bookfinder to look for the cheapest available listings of books, including textbooks
learn a language through mango (duolingo laid off some of its employees and now relies on AI translations) for free with a library card or through your school
edit photos with photopea
edit pdfs with foxit and sumatrapdf
download music with doubledouble
take notes offline and collaborate securely with obsidian
for android tv, use smarttube and cloudstream (ad-free, open-source)
change your OS to linux
changelog:
removed ground news (uses AI to summarize articles)
removed unroll.me (sells your data)
removed proton mail and drive (AI assistant feature, claims of CEO Andy Yen supporting Trump, please DM if you have proof I can add here)
removed NCH suite (only has very basic free features, puts watermark on anything saved)
notes:
this post blew up while I wasnât looking (the end of my semester was hellish, and i recently came back from a 3-week family vacation). thanks so much for all the suggestions! <3
i included Ecosia because of their financial transparency. Itâs physically impossible that they plant a tree for every search, but their profits still go towards projects including reforestation and solar energy. i view their actions as a net-positive
feel free to add more alternatives, resources or advice in the reblogs or replies, and i'll add them to the main post <3
reading more about this today and blown away/furious that the second quilt was bought by a white artist for only $5 (around $140 at the time) when powers was talked down from her initial asking price of $10 because her family were so desperate for money at the time. the quilt is now owned by the smithsonian
ive said it before and ill say it again: the most valuable skill ive ever learned and im still learning to this day is how to vet information and think critically about it.
ask yourself:
⢠what is the main point/points of this information i have read or heard?
⢠is this information neutral? is there leaning of support towards a specific side or cause? is emotional language used and if so, in what way is it used? what parts of this information is it used to emphasis?
⢠who is telling me this information? what is the benefit to this person if I choose to believe this information? (note: this is often seen as negative but can is also neutral - is it awareness? clout? are they selling a product or service? are they a believer or involved in a cause? is this their field of expertise?)
⢠how was this information produced/discovered? who funded it? who discovered it? what are their affiliations? again, what do they gain if i believe this information?
⢠does this information come from other sources? do they agree with it or disagree with it? what kinds of evidence do they have that support or deny it?
being able to stop and ask yourself questions like this is key in order to fight misinformation and propaganda, which is so easily spread with social media.
read/listen to/interact with sources that come from all different view points on a topic, even if you donât agree with them or youâre skeptical. analysing from all angles will let you effectively combat misinformation, be able to defend and explain your position and give insight into other stances (where people are coming from + why)
critically analysing sources from your own stance or point of view is also really important to help you keep developing your own beliefs and arguments
Thereâs lots of ways to do this, and I recommend research the topic more in depth. Even if you go to a place like StuDocu where you can get worksheets from university-level classes on analysis of information like this.
Think of the:
⢠Title (the wording, whatâs used to catch your eyes, whatâs emphasised, what framing is already being set?)
⢠Author (Who are they? Whatâs their affiliations? Do they have a degree, and if so, what in and where from? Who do they work for? Who have they worked for? Are they part of any groups, organisations or movements?)
⢠Media outlet (Where do they fall ideologically? What kind of media do they usually produce? Whoâs their advertisers? Which market do they target? Who funds them? Do they fund or donate to anyone? Whatâs their affiliations?)
⢠Journal (In the case of scientific papers) (Whatâs their impact, their rating? What is the submission process like? What kind of papers do they usually publish? Who are they funded by? Do they fund anyone, and if so, who? Are there are professionals who have talked about their experiences with this particular journal?)
⢠Date (How old is this information? Is there a chance it is outdated? Is it an earlier work on a topic, or a more recent one? Based on when itâs produced, what sources and events does it have to pull information from?)
⢠Type of media (What is this media? A report? Paper? Meta-analysis? News article? Opinion piece? Blog? Are you familiar with this form of media, or do you need to research about it further and understand itâs purpose and benefits/flaws?)
Itâs also really, really important to be able to take in information from a piece of media and be able to divide it into three separate things in your mind: facts, inferences and judgements. (It can also be useful to add a fourth aspect - your own judgement/opinion, that has arisen as a result of you taking in the information.)
As Google has worked to overtake the internet, its search algorithm has not just gotten worse. It has been designed to prioritize advertisers and popular pages often times excluding pages and content that better matches your search termsÂ
As a writer in need of information for my stories, I find this unacceptable. As a proponent of availability of information so the populace can actually educate itself, it is unforgivable.
Below is a concise list of useful research sites compiled by Edward Clark over on Facebook. I was familiar with some, but not all of these.
â
Google is so powerful that it âhidesâ other search systems from us. We just donât know the existence of most of them. Meanwhile, there are still a huge number of excellent searchers in the world who specialize in books, science, other smart information. Keep a list of sites you never heard of.
www.refseek.com - Academic Resource Search. More than a billion sources: encyclopedia, monographies, magazines.
www.worldcat.org - a search for the contents of 20 thousand worldwide libraries. Find out where lies the nearest rare book you need.
https://link.springer.com - access to more than 10 million scientific documents: books, articles, research protocols.
www.bioline.org.br is a library of scientific bioscience journals published in developing countries.
http://repec.org - volunteers from 102 countries have collected almost 4 million publications on economics and related science.
www.science.gov is an American state search engine on 2200+ scientific sites. More than 200 million articles are indexed.
www.pdfdrive.com is the largest website for free download of books in PDF format. Claiming over 225 million names.
www.base-search.net is one of the most powerful researches on academic studies texts. More than 100 million scientific documents, 70% of them are free
may you live in interesting times @joanlocks - Tumblr Blog | Tumgag
