Because we too are hopping onto the bandwagon of everything Star Wars related, we added a special SW-themed feature!
Try it!
Also, we’ve started going over the snippets to assure they assign the correct gender. Because Fanfics are suppose to be canonically correct, dammit!
And we’ve added a cool, useful FAQ page filled with questions you weren’t actually going to ask but once you know about them, you go all like “Oh, that’s actually pretty cool/useful!”.
We’ve finally added the gender-unspecific gender to your main character. Yaaaay! It replaces any he/she with ‘they’ and hopefully/probably the right verbal inflection. Finally some terrible fanfic representation for all ya’ll genderqueer captains out there.
Sadly, our sidekicks and villains are not that progressive yet, then again, neither is the source material :x (srlslybigenderednormativescum)
So I had a LG Flatron W2261vp of about 4 years old and one day it just stopped working. Light briefly came on, then cut out again.
Fortunately due to the wonders of the internet, I found some guides relating similar models and how to open them up & fix them. (Such as this one: https://imgur.com/a/sy05j)
After some fiddling around, I found the culprits:
That’s not how capacitors are suppose to look like. Incidentally, if your monitor goes wrong, chances are it’s the capacitors.
So I went off and got some replacements. In my enthusiasm I got the wrong ones first >_o I also removed the broken capacitors with just a soldering iron. Turns out there is actually little you can really fuck up with a soldering iron.
Soldered in, still need to cut off the tips, but that’s it.
And tadaaaa:
Now I have a monitor I don’t know quite what I’ll use it for (as I got a
replacement just the day before). Still, fixing things is waaaaayyy
easier. Do make sure you take pictures while fixing things, it makes it
easier to reassemble the thing later.
Today I was opened for the possibility that most rebellion in pop-culture establishes the cultural values of the reader. That there is no true expression of rebellion because the rebellion in the story justifies the status quo of the reader.
For example: Luke and Harry Potter fight fascism. Katniss wants a liberal democratic
society. So many fight for a ‘freedom’ (insert own preference of said freedom). No one ever questions the need for ‘freedom’ (unless they’re the baddie).
But the funny thing is that when we’re confronted by someone else’s pop-cult version for reasons to rebel, it’s 'propaganda’ (see 'Hero’).
Non of this is deliberate. We simply seem to have a society in which we feel it’s necessary to keep reminding everyone about the joy of the status quo. Of course, our status quo might not be in line with our values (equality for all is still fickle in reality), but the pop-culture rebellion-narrative never points out these issues with our own society. Arguably that’s not its function.
And of course, stories of rebellion are super fun and exciting. But perhaps taking this into account can lead to deeper and more fulfilling stories.
I’m lately getting a little concerned over the amount of attention we’ve been giving to a certain subsection of the internet that loves becoming upset at us taking marginalized voices seriously.
The thing I’ve come to realize is that we’re not really the audience of GG-eske outrage. It’s a community meta-game that these people are playing as to gain admiration and respect in their own subculture. A Let’s Play (We’re Angry), if you will. The content of our products is irrelevant - they’ll latch onto anything that is a deviation from their established normality (judging the call-to-action threads dominating their fora). Beamdog’s ‘crime’ was a one-line dialogue from a minor NPC FFS.
Knowing this, I feel we’re engaging this negativity too much. Spending more time assuring each other how stupid these people are, rather than talking about our productions or our insights or what makes games fun for us. There is a whole slew of games with interesting mechanics and fascinating approaches that we don’t hear about, in favour of spending energy typing up thinkpieces about things we essentially already agree with each other on. Worse, the victims are making cool stuff - but we’re more talking about their woes than their work.
I also feel we’re less talking about how to achieve progressive goals and more talking about people attacking us for trying so. Our discussions keep circling around and around, never really breaching the surface because we keep letting ourselves be interrupted.
That said, we should support the people falling victim to this insanity. Absolutely. We should criticize the culture feeding this shit to its adherents. We should criticize the companies tolerating this insanity.But we shouldn’t *all* fall victim to this insanity. We shouldn’t let GG-eskes dictate the discourse in our hobby/job.
I’m absolutely open for being wrong*. And I understand & share the need to see others validate your bad feelings about something. But much like how representation is more than just “oh, but my setting has gay people”, the degree we express concepts and ideas publicly, indicates the importance we give to ideas and their place in our discourse.
TL;DR - support the harassed, call out the harasser, but don’t let harassers dominate our discourse. Chances are the harassed makes interesting stuff - talk about that more.
(I also acknowledge the irony of my long post ;-) )
*Whenever you read something I said and go “How DARE she imply that” - I’m probably not implying that. But y'know, Death of the Author and all that :P
We added a new useless feature! Text-To-Speech! Select some text, and you now get the option to listen to it read out.
(provided there hasn’t been too many users already that day - it’s a
computationally expensive process,which means the service we use charges
if you use more than a few hundred per day)
We added more presets: -Guardians of the Galaxy -The Simpsons -Ace Attorney -Justice League -Mighty Morphin Power Rangers -The Chronicles of Narnia -The Beverly Hillbillies -Star Wars Episode 1
Starting from now, we’ve also revamped the relationship system somewhat, allowing for more Slash fic stories!
Besides that:
More Font Style options!
Better Font Style selection (try the dropdown now)
A few more regular snippets.
Some layout improvements on smaller screens.
oh, and we also optimistically added a Flatr button to some pages.
Site should be a bit quicker.
Some bugfixes
As this was a fairly big update, be sure to let us know if there is any problems :-)
Kinorah is a small planet in the Nuazbayeh system. A few years ago, the exploration vessel Mokobortai made contact with the Kinoran population. Nowadays the Kinorans are a candidate member of the economic alliance League of Independent Planets and have warm diplomatic ties with the surrounding cultures – including the Nardijash Empire and the Taekon Republics. Kinorah is known for its refreshing unsullied art culture, diverse landscape and friendliness to Alien travellers.
(map projection attempt to justify equatorial nations’ size relative to polar size. Ocean proportions unrealistic)
Official Name
Nuazbayeh Kinorayeh
Seat of Government
Telleh
Type of Government
Democratic Federation
Population
1.2 billion inhabitants
Species
Kikiru (41%), Vwick (31%), Inwid (26%), Misc (2%)
Language (fluency%)
Nayaltè (91%), Soboro (71%) - Most Kinorans are fluent in both.
Currency
Raví (‘gifts’)
Religion
Kinorah has a large variety of religion, ranging from massive multimillion faiths to small cults surrounding the goddess.
From the earliest records on, violence dominated Kinorah’s politics and sciences. Then rouchly a century ago, the New Age broke through. With the New Age, Kinorah’s politics changed from feudalistic and Machiavellian ruleships to a federal democracy. There was a price to be paid though and a great number of lives were lost due to conflicts during the transition.
From there, a unity was formed. But the system wasn’t without its faults. Among the Kinoran Parliament, the Kinorezqölque, corruption ran rampant and the system became more and more bureaucratic. Voices from nations and states cried out for renewal of the system or they would leave the Union and start their own collaborations. When nothing changed, the Union collapsed.
From the ashes of the Union, a new political movement rose. Founded by six Kinorans from all directions of society, Har-Ikei fought for reunification of the world. The movement appealed to both young as old people, with its promises of a unity without all the senseless bureaucracy and with possibilities for each to be a part of the social discussions. The movement also founded schools and academies to promote education and unity. While it never explicitly stated so, Har-Ikei pressed for a secular society and a common unifying culture. But while Har-Ikei brought prosperity, efficiency and development onto the Kinoran people, the democratic structure was reduced to theory. Times were especially harsh for any population that did not abide to Har-Ikei’s Union Laws, a set of laws designed to bring conformity and nationality to the people. While this greatly reduced discrimination of any sort, it also frowned upon people’s native identities. Har-Ikei lasted 30 years until the combined effort of rebel groups managed overthrow the despots. New conflicts looked about to burst until the Alien worlds made contact with the Kinorans and unified them under a single federal structure.
Cultures
With three species on a single planet, Kinorah has enough cultures to keep your average anthropologist satisfied for years to come. The mixed species society also inevitable leads to mixed species relationships. One of the first things to notice about the Kinoran societies, is that there is hardly any sort of species-based segregation. While Kinorah sure had its wars, hatred based around species is practically unheard of. Of course you’ll hear the occasional joke about stoic Inwid or possessive Kikiru, but unlike the way Nardijash sub-species interact, it is hardly ever meanly meant. Kinorans love making jokes about Aliens too, so keep in mind not to value your honour too highly when visiting.
This mixture also has its quirks in other interaction. Inwid pubers traditionally go through a series of utmost embarrassing social moments as the other species lack the pheromones that normally keep Inwid from pursuing sexual relationships within their own gender. Kikiru in turn, have the tendency to consider close friends as a part of their family hierarchy, making Kikiru friendship rewarding, but full with exhausting etiquettes. The Vwick occasionally forget that they do share their society with two other, differently build, species, can be subconsciously being the most ethnocentric of the three. Still, as experienced travellers know, to really understand a people through clichés and stereotypes is impossible and most important: no fun at all.
Don’t be ashamed to ask what is expected from you. Kinorans are used to having to explain their own cultural customs to other Kinorans. Your Alien identity grants you a lot of slack. One should however take into account that especially around the main city of Telleh, hospitality is an important value. During the Har-Ikei times, mistrust and paranoia ran rampant through society, and still invitations are not given to just about anyone. Asking about those times will get you an evening full with wonderful but slightly unrealistic stories, since everyone claims to have been a part of the dissidents’ movement Veskiyl.
Other things to keep mind of are bathing and sauna customs (bare naked and sexes mixed), general hygiene (no tossing paper on the streets!), and consumption of drugs (public intoxication in Telleh will get you a night or two in prison and a hefty fine). Private property is to be respected, baring arms of any sort is illegal without a special permit and disrespect towards military or spiritual persons can get you into more trouble than you’re used to. Don’t give tips, it is regarded as insulting and degrading.
Last but not least, should you experience any supernatural incidents, you’re advised to–
If you would like to know more, for just under 17 Iaryénya you can download ‘A Casual Travellers’ Guide to Kinorah’ to your PDA. Updates included for free!
My new project :-]
Been working on this stuff for years. Now finally the time to release it upon the world.
It’s the universe my current in development game is going to take place. It’s going to be great fun.
filipfatalattractionrblog said: "I think you’re trying to build an inescapable doom-trap to get the outcome that you want. The problem with this is that escaping from inescapable doom-traps is what super heroes do." - I think that's the core of the whole "killing" debate. Some people think it's more inspiring to have superheroes find a third way in a scenario with no right solution while others think it's more inspiring to show them making hard, not fully morally clean choices, and still be heroes.
I think this has as much if not more to so sub-textually with the audience wanting to feel good about itself.
