Title Pending

Because I don't know yet

[marissablackwing]

Made a lemon cake today, gonna fill it with raspberry jam and coat it with cream cheese frosting

[musashigouda-deactivated2019032]

hey ao3 can you like give the extra $38k you made from this month’s funds drive to charity

[blooming-wilting]

You know it legally is a charity, right?

If x charity aims for £10, but gets £15, would you expect then to give back the extra five or give it then to another charity? No. Any extra costs go into the “rainy day” fund; sometimes servers crash or break, sometimes false reports are made that require the legal team, sometimes you need to hire coders or what not to implement new features or fix bugs or deal with broken code … 

The money they aimed for is the bare minimum, which goes towards things like basic server costs and domain names and legal advice and so forth, but they don’t just “pocket” the rest (as people claim). It’s not a business. It has no advertisements. It needs some “rainy day” cash to function. 

You can’t ask a charity to give money to another charity. 

It needs what it gets to function and improve. 

[fangasmagorical]

kiena-tesedale replied to this post

They don’t “pocket” excess money. They have a publicly accessible budget - waaaay more info than most charities, in fact. In it, you can clearly see where each dollar goes. (Also, you are vastly underestimating either how much traffic AO3 gets or how much servers/hosting costs.)                    

In my experience, people who don’t work in web design and hosting just have no concept of how heavy a load something like AO3 would have. Not only is the traffic absolutely buck wild, but the quantity of data that archive needs to store is fuckoff crazy. I’m talking “more than the library of congress” crazy. The only reason it doesn’t require Netflix levels of data serving is that it’s text based rather than video.

AO3 is in the top 300 websites in the world, and the top 100 in the US. It is the number 2 literature website.

Number 2 in the entire world. JSTOR is 20.

It sees about 6 million people a day. About 250k an hour. Each of those people is loading multiple pages, many are running searches that execute on literally hundreds of potential variables per search. The demands involved are astronomical.

JSTOR, btw, makes 85 million dollars a year.

It’s 18 ranks below AO3′s traffic, and takes in 650 times the amount of money.

But let’s say you think that’s an unfair comparison. Would you say that the Project Gutenberg Literature Archival Group- another text based archive that handles literature operating outside traditional copyright requirements- is more similar?

Because it sees all of 4% of the traffic that AO3 handles.

Care to guess its budget?

Double that of AO3.

AO3 is doing shit on the kind of shoestring budget that I fully, 100% cannot comprehend. And that’s just the archival service.

The 130k also pays for the OTW’s legal team, which they use to defend the right of fandom to fucking exist.

It’s absolutely batshit fucked up that people are fighting to have the OTW defunded and AO3 shut down. They are the only organized group that actually stands directly between fandom- all the art and the fics and the vids and the music and the chats and the memes and everything we love about interactive, transformative work- and an incalculable amount of lawsuits.

[kyraneko]

This is the most functionally-successful and cost-effective website in the history of EVER. By a wide margin.

[marissablackwing]

Hey, Paypal users!

If you use paypal, make sure to go to your account settings, seller settings, business information, and hide everything from recipient! Paypal's new changes are realllll lax with your privacy, and they go into effect really soon!

[sixty-silver-wishes]

also. re: neil gaiman. for all the people wondering, "what if the celebrity I like turns out to be like him?" I just want to say a few more things-

now is a good time to evaluate your relationships with celebrities or internet personalities. this is just like, a healthy thing to do in general; I do it on a regular basis when considering the celebrities whose work I like. take a minute to think about how you feel about those people, and ask yourself how personal your attachment is to them. if you feel attached to them as you would a friend, family member, or partner, you may need to confront that.

if a celebrity you like turns out to have done something reprehensible, that doesn't make you a bad person for liking them in the past. you likely didn't know. if you loved neil gaiman's writing, and even if you still do, you don't have to feel guilty about it. however, you may want to reevaluate continuing to support them financially.

I deliberately said "celebrities whose work I like" earlier, because that's an important distinction to make- a celebrity's work is just their job. you can admire their work, and it can be very important to you, but at the end of the day, they are not their work. people will talk about "separating the art from the artist" when someone does something awful like gaiman, but I think this might even apply to celebrities you admire. for instance, I'm a big fan of tom waits' music. he has a very entertaining stage persona and is an extremely talented artist. as far as I'm aware, tom waits hasn't had any major controversies. but even so, it's important for me to remember that I adore tom waits' artistry, not tom waits himself. I do not want to become personally attached to someone I do not know.

just because neil gaiman did something awful, or because any number of celebrities did something awful, doesn't mean that you should be automatically suspicious of the ones that don't have allegations against them. it does mean that you should be wary of how you should attach to them, but it doesn't do to be paranoid about, for example, david tennant, because you were wounded by neil gaiman's actions. it does mean that you shouldn't form a parasocial attachment to david tennant (or anyone else), but it doesn't mean that he's also secretly an abuser, too.

[typhlonectes]

[just-your-average-cryptid]

"fun" fact:

prior authorization, if you've never heard of it, is your doctor asking your insurance to cover a prescription/procedure/what have you that they want to give their patient. the insurance company can decide that they don't wanna and deny authorization, forcing the patient to cover the cost themselves or cancel the prescription/procedure and continue dealing with whatever brought them to their doctor, without the treatment they need.

in other words, people with no medical degrees or experience can decide that you don't need medical care because profits, even if it would save your life - if you're not dying right this second, you're fine, right?

kiiiiiinda sounds like practicing medicine without a license to me, but what do i know? i'm sure those rich guys are so much smarter than me about how health works. totally not just profiting from people's suffering. noooo.

[vaspider]

Prior authorizations are supposed to be handled by a doctor. Often, you have no one doing that or one doctor "reviewing" an unreasonable amount of cases and just rubberstamping thousands of cases a day. That's why one of the best ways to handle a PA being denied is to ask for the license number and name of the person who reviewed your request. In the US, this is information to which you are entitled.

Usually, rather than admit that they are breaking the law - which everybody fucking knows they're doing - they will then just approve your PA.

I highly recommend Matthew Cortland's Patreon for a lot of info on how to handle health insurance. They're a literal pro at health law in the US and a chronically ill person themself & for a couple of bucks a month, you get access to a huge archive full of how-to & disability/health news.

[sapphling]

"interesting that OP blocked me instead of respond to my point 🤔" curious that the Dave & Busters has requested i leave after shitting my pants on the DDR. could they be feeling a bit owned perchance?

[zarla-s]

I've gotten a few asks warning of a raid of sorts on Christmas where a group of people are going to send gore etc. in asks to random people. Whether or not this will actually happen I don't know, but there are some simple things you can do to protect yourself if you are worried!

Turn off anonymous asks

Turn off media in asks

You can see both of these in your blog settings (not the general settings for your whole account, specifically the blog settings).

You can also turn off asks entirely if you're really worried. I take warnings about things like this with a grain of salt, but there's no harm in taking precautions for a day or so if you're worried! I figured a single short post like this would be more efficient than answering each ask about it, haha. You can change your settings back once you feel like the coast is clear.

[libraford]

I am becoming aware of the effect a lack of trust in the media has had on people, paired with a dearth of research skills.

[libraford]

I'm thinking about the argument I got caught in yesterday- the subject of it doesn't matter.

Often, pseudoscience and misinformation comes packaged with a lot of very important sounding words, and the jargon gets to the point where it seems like a lot of work to fact check it. Which makes the 'I encourage you to do your own research' statements real obnoxious. If it's phrased in a way that's impossible to navigate, good luck.

It sucks, but you gotta.

If you don't want to fact check individual words, that's fine. That's a lot to ask of someone that's just trying to figure out whether something is true.

This is where we get into something called 'lateral research.' Instead of trying to draw a map to a sentence, you check the credibility of their source material.

This is your Snopes, your Fact Check/Media Bias, your Follow The Money.

Knowing more context about what someone is saying will save you a lot of time and energy.

If you're not sure about something, question it.

[zetabrarian]

I feel like I've been throwing this around a LOT lately, but:

Practice SIFT! SIFT is based on lateral research and can be very helpful for these situations.

DON'T just share information without doing your due diligence.

[elizeshiro]

whyyy the fuck does this not have more notes please rb this more often qwq

[libraford]

Well, I mean... probably because I posted it like an hour ago.

[weaselle]

STOP

i have found this post and infographic and i want to share it

INVESTIGATE THE SOURCE

zetabrarian's blog says they are a socially progressive librarian monsterfucker, which a quick scroll through their blog seems to support. This makes them pretty cool but not necessarily the perfect source -- anyone can say they are a librarian, and surely not every librarian is correct about processing information

FIND BETTER COVERAGE

if i go to a search engine (in this case google via firefox) i see that several universities, libraries from large municipalities (like Los Angeles) as well as the BBC all agree that this is a real method experts in information fields recommend. I wouldn't necessarily take any single one of these sources as 100% credible, but they are individually reasonably reliable, and taken together indicate a high probability of factual information

TRACE TO ORIGINAL CONTEXT

A brief search reveals that the SIFT method was created by Mike Caulfield, who is a research scientist at the University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public, where he studies the spread of online rumors and misinformation. This is an extremely good source of information for how to process information on the internet. As the creator of the SIFT method, he has taught thousands of teachers and students how to verify claims and sources through his workshops.

I could not find a post or page about SIFT written by Mike Caulfield himself, so i went to the University of Washington's website for this page about it, since that is the university that employs him.

It corroborates the above information, though there are a few notable differences. For example, under the "trace to original context" section in the Washington U. source (again, as close to the original as i could find) this step contains advice to check the date. This seems very good to include, as in the fast moving world of internet information, things become outdated or get updated very quickly, and yet first takes and outdated articles hang around and get shared for a long time.

EXTRA CREDIT

I personally find that it is important to outright search for the opposite information. For example, I put in a few searches like "Mike Caulfield discredited" "Mike Caulfield wrong" "SIFT method bad" etc. I found nothing showing me any indications this method has any problems. Interestingly, somehow this did turn up an article about news literacy on Medium, which was actually written by Mike Caulfield in April of 2017

[prison-mikes-bandana]

Alfred pennyworth being sassy badass butler part 2

[arguablysomaya]

new rule: if you don't understand this you're not allowed to write superman

[riley1cannon]

#i've never smashed the reblog button faster.#if your batman can't comfort a child then he's not batman.#if your clark isn't driven by an altruistic need to do good and has the will to do harm he's probably not clark kent.

[the-pen-pot]

IOS users and Patreon. Big old heads up.

"Apple is requiring that Patreon use their in-app purchasing system and remove all other billing systems from the Patreon iOS app by November 2024. This means that starting in November, new memberships purchased in the iOS app will be subject to Apple's 30% App Store fee.

First, we want to be clear about one thing: this will not impact your existing memberships at all. Apple's App Store fee only applies to new memberships purchased in the iOS app beginning in November 2024."

Apple users, if you make your pledges through your browser you can dodge this fee.

This is just apple doing its usual nickel and diming to take a slice of every pie.

[figmentforms]

30% is a comically huge cut on top of what patreon already takes. Please, for future support of patreon creators, please avoid the Apple App version of patreon. Open a web browser and support your favorite creators that way to make sure your money goes to the creators and not just disappear into the void of another giant corporate greed hole.

I know lots of fellow artists who need patreon to live and keep making things. Don’t let Apple gobble up what you’re trying to give to them. This is just ridiculous.

*they give creators an option to add the 30% to what they charge the iOS patrons. Yay? 😰 I don’t like anything about this one bit.

[tooies]

if you conceptualize people who do bad things as a special type of person who is purely 100% bad and cannot ever be good or have good qualities then that means that you will not notice or care when someone you like or even you (yes you reading this) are the one hurting people because you will justify it in your head that since you aren't a Bad™ type person then you could never be the one causing harm

[toyourstations]

Statistics that I use to motivate myself

I have a really bad case of the tinkerbells (I need applause to live) so I have these statistics I use to keep myself from getting depressed as a creator*. Here they are. They may help you as well!

In professional marketing, 5% of viewers engaging with a post is positive turnover.

5% of engagers will click the link

5% of link clickers will buy the product

On twitch, the average number of views a live stream has is between 0 and 1

According to social media professionals, 10% of users do all the posting. The other 90% may not even comment.

So if your fanfiction has 100 hits and 5 kudos, you're meeting your goals at fanfiction corp and you're getting your raise this year. If your fanfiction has 100 hits and 10 kudos you're getting a promotion.

If you make a post about your new ttrpg and it gets 20 likes, 10 reblogs, and makes 1 sale, you're doing really well!

If your stream has an average of 1 friend who drops in and chats to you occasionally, you're doing better than average. If you make it to Affiliate you are genuinely doing incredible work.

90% of online creative work is just shunting stuff into the void, and it feels so so so bleak sometimes. But remember. You're doing good at it! Your "flop post" with 3 notes is actually more attention than 90% of internet users get.

Remember not everyone clapping for you is telling you about it. <3

*these statistics are from memory and from anecdotes from various people I have met/seen posts from on the internet. I do not know or care if they are completely accurate thank you

[catmask]

one thing that will never fail to make me stop believing in something is the group of people who believe in it too. not sure what this would be called

[catmask]

its like. someone could say 'i wish there were more lunch options than peas in the school cafeteria i dont really like peas' (imaginary example) and i go yeah me neither. and then someone goes 'yeah peas suck' someone else goes 'they shouldnt even offer peas at all' 'honestly i cant imagine liking peas' 'people who like peas are weird!' 'if you like peas im going to assume you my moral enemy' and its like woah hey guys maybe im going to take a step to the pea likers side because this is getting weird

[catmask]

people are asking if this is about fandoms or about a specific line of discourse and i dont know how to tell you but any time a large group of people starts really angrily creating an imaginary devil in their mind ive made it a habit to step back and go 'now wait a minute' not as someone who has never done this but as someone who tries to learn from their mistakes

[x0401x]

So I just saw a post by a random personal blog that said “don’t follow me if we never even had a conversation before” and?????? Not to be rude but literally what the fuck??????????

I’ve had people (non-pornbots) try to strike conversation out of nowhere in my DMs recently, and now I’m wondering if they were doing that because they wanted to follow me and thought they needed to interact first. I feel compelled to say, just in case, that it’s totally okay to follow this blog (or my side blog, for that matter) even if we’ve never talked before.

Also, I’m legit confused. Is this how follow culture works right now? It was worded like it’s common sense but is that really a thing?

[x0401x]

Saw a sharp increase in my follower count after posting this. The legitimacy of it is driving me nuts so I also feel the need to say that you can follow anyone on here regardless of whether you’ve interacted with them or not. People like the above mentioned blog are exceptions. Perhaps they themselves think they aren’t and therefore will act like they aren’t, but they are, trust me.

Just follow anyone you wanna follow. The worst thing that can happen is maybe getting soft-blocked by the other person, but if they do soft-block you, then they were never that worth following in the first place.

[starfieldcanvas]

wow. really hope this isn't actually a norm taking hold with new users! this isn't facebook, you don't need to know people before following them

[westiec]

this is the '10 year mutuals you've never spoken to once' site

[marissablackwing]

Guess who set up a patreon page? ...No I don't actually have anything special on offer there

Probably don't spend your money unless you have extra laying around (I appreciate it but probably won't show it much)

Get more from Title Pending on Patreon

Patreon is empowering a new generation of creators. Support and engage with artists and creators as they live out their passions!

Don't wanna? That's fine! Wanna argue about it? That's NOT fine, keep it to yourself buddy! (I'm not exactly holding a gun to your head here, jeez.)

...That's it, that's all I had to say. What are you looking down here for?

[shymagnolia]

so I got into grad school today with my shitty 2.8 gpa and the moral of the story is reblog those good luck posts for the love of god

[shymagnolia]

okay so i just got my dream job??? a week after applying to it?? and now i’m thinking….maybe this is the good luck post

[flagellant]

…..not even six hours later i got an offer of a well paying full time long-term job with free room and board in queens in nyc, allowing me independence and a way to escape an abusive situation and an unhealthy environment

likes charge reblogs cast, folks, this is the good luck post

[coffee-or-hot-cocoa]

i need all the help i can get for finals

[finnglas]

Hey so

the last time I reblogged this post right before I got a great job, in a permanent work-from-home position, with benefits, retirement, and a salary literally 3x what I was making before, doing something I really like. 

So you know. 

This might be the real one, y’all.

[azaraspirit]

what the hell? i could use some luck *hits reblog*

[worldheritageposts-official]

World Heritage Post

[monsoonsosoon]

reblogging again… need it bad lol