Nocturna IV @nocturnatuc - Tumblr Blog

Please consider helping an autistic queer person who just survived the worst day of their life

The situation in my country is deteriorating rapidly. Today, my brother, who lives in another city, called to say he had been kidnapped. The captors were demanding money transfers to their bank accounts.

I immediately contacted 911 while stalling the kidnappers and gathering as much information as I could. They forced me to transfer $320 to one account, and then $250 to another.

Thankfully, the emergency dispatcher was able to trace their location. When the kidnappers attempted to move my brother to a second location, a patrol car intercepted them. The kidnappers fled, and my brother is now safe.

I've already filed an extortion report, but the bank cannot reverse the transfers. The $570 is gone.

Right now, the most important thing is that my brother is alive, but I'm left with an empty bank account. I don’t know how I’ll cover even the basics in the coming days.

Any support means the world right now. Whether it’s a donation, a share, or simply a reblog. Anything helps me survive this month.

PayPal & Ko-Fi

nocturna-iv

Please consider helping an autistic queer person who just survived the worst day of their life

The situation in my country is deteriorating rapidly. Today, my brother, who lives in another city, called to say he had been kidnapped. The captors were demanding money transfers to their bank accounts.

I immediately contacted 911 while stalling the kidnappers and gathering as much information as I could. They forced me to transfer $320 to one account, and then $250 to another.

Thankfully, the emergency dispatcher was able to trace their location. When the kidnappers attempted to move my brother to a second location, a patrol car intercepted them. The kidnappers fled, and my brother is now safe.

I've already filed an extortion report, but the bank cannot reverse the transfers. The $570 is gone.

Right now, the most important thing is that my brother is alive, but I'm left with an empty bank account. I don’t know how I’ll cover even the basics in the coming days.

Any support means the world right now. Whether it’s a donation, a share, or simply a reblog. Anything helps me survive this month.

Paypal

nocturna-iv

Cocteau's La Belle Et La Bete

In a tale of transformations. There is overwhelming sense of disappointment in the ending scene, the note of dissatisfaction in Belle. She accepts the transformed Beast as a compromise.

Greta Garbo’s now immortalised riposte to the film, "Give me back my beast", summed up the desire for altogether different ending.

Belle's final words, by contrast, seems to have been forgotten. "I like being afraid", she admits to the Beast, a late realisation that the thrill of the monster cannot match the man. Better to be a little afraid than bored, Belle suggests. ×

avaantares

Fanfiction Authors: HEADS UP

(Non-authors, please RB to signal boost to your author friends!)

An astute reader informed me this morning that one of my fics (Children of the Future Age) had been pirated and was being sold as a novel on Amazon:

(And they weren't even creative with their cover design. If you're going to pirate something that I spent a full year of my life writing, at least give me a pretty screenshot to brag about later. Seriously.)

I promptly filed a DMCA complaint to have it removed, but I checked out the company that put it up -- Plush Books -- and it looks like A LOT of their books are pirated fic. They are by no means the only ones doing this, either -- the fact that """publishers""" can download stories from AO3 in ebook format and then reupload them to Amazon in just a few clicks makes fic piracy a common problem. There are a whole host of reasons why letting this continue is bad -- including actual legal risk to fanfiction archives -- but basically:

IF YOU ARE A FANFIC AUTHOR WITH LONG AND/OR POPULAR WORKS, PLEASE CHECK AMAZON TO SEE IF YOUR STORIES HAVE BEEN PIRATED.

You can search for your fics by title, or by text from the description (which is often just copied wholesale from AO3 as well). If you find that someone has stolen your work and is selling it as their own, you can lodge a DMCA complaint (Amazon.com/USA site; other countries have different systems). If you haven't done this before, it's easy! Here's a tutorial:

HOW TO FILE A COPYRIGHT COMPLAINT FOR STOLEN WORK ON AMAZON.COM:

First, go to this form. You'll need to be signed into your Amazon account.

Select the radio buttons/dropdown options (shown below) to indicate that you are the legal Rights Owner, you have a copyright concern, and it is about a pirated product.

Enter the name of your story in the Name of Brand field.

In the Link to the Copyrighted Work box, enter a link to the story on AO3 or whatever site your work is posted on.

In the Additional Information box, explain that you are the author of the work and it is being sold without your permission. That's all you really need. If you want, you can include additional information that might be helpful in establishing the validity of your claim, but you don't have to go into great detail. You can simply write something like this:

I am the author of this work, which is being sold by [publisher] without my permission. I originally published this story in [date/year] on [name of site], and have provided a link to the original above. On request, I can provide documentation proving that I am the owner of the account that originally posted this story.

In the ASIN/ISBN-10 field, copy and paste the ID number from the pirated copy's URL. You'll find this ten-digit number in the Amazon URL after the word "product," as in the screenshot below. (If the URL extends beyond this number, you can ignore everything from the question mark on.) Once this number has been added, Amazon will pull the product information automatically and add it to the complaint form, so you can check the listing title and make sure it's correct.

Finally, add your contact information to the relevant fields, check the "I have read and accept the statements" box, and then click Submit. You should receive an email confirmation that Amazon has received the form.

Please share this information with your writer friends, keep an eye out for/report pirated works, and help us keep fanfiction free and legally protected!

NOTE: All of the above also applies to Amazon products featuring stolen artwork, etc., so fan artists should check too!

heywriters

UPDATE: Plush Books still exists on Amazon and on Goodreads under the pseudonym "J.D. Geraghty" where the fanfics are also listed. They also have a list of cookbooks that are without a doubt AI written (the descriptions for the books are repetitive nonsense so god forbid what exists inside).

From what I can see on Amazon, most of the stolen fanfics have become "Unavailable." This entity likely operates under more than one name, so it isn't safe to assume crisis averted. Numerous bad actors are posting AI written works to Amazon, which just means plagiarism slurry with a side of potential danger (like the autogenerated mushroom identification books).

oh ffs. shared.

This is important.

Vox's Two Favorite Demon Eaters! Here Give the artist some love, this fanart is beautiful!

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

It is a scene from my fic that was a KF requested.

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Hazbin Hotel (Web Series) Relationships: Alastor/Vox (Hazbin Hotel) Summary:

The room was dimly lit, the curtains undrawn, allowing a kaleidoscope of colors to bathe Alastor’s face. He had seemingly settled on the couch hours ago, one hand supporting his chin while his ankle rested gracefully on his opposite knee. Waiting, perhaps. And there was Vark, sprawled across most of the sofa, reclining placidly with his head nestled in Alastor’s lap.

What caught Vox off guard was the sight of Alastor fast asleep in his apartment.