Fic Roundup
Fic Roundup
bare: a pop opera
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Jason, the Giant Killer. PG. AU. Zombies. Also submitted for Yuletide NYR 2009. I like this best. (1984 words)
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awake
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bare: a pop opera
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Jason, the Giant Killer. PG. AU. Zombies. Also submitted for Yuletide NYR 2009. I like this best. (1984 words)
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Livejournal, come on.
Originally posted by 
poisonivory at Livejournal, come on.
poisonivory at Livejournal, come on.I never use Scrapbook, but I think people who pay for a service should, you know, know when that service gets severely diminished. Via caiusmajor:
caiusmajor:Originally posted by zeitgeistic at Livejournal, come on.
zeitgeistic at Livejournal, come on.Alright, I am not drunk enough to deal with this, so I'm just going to put out this PSA:
Livejournal Scrapbook is going away. Your 10GB of Paid Member space is now 2GB. If you care, there is an explanation in Russian on the Russian news page. There's also a user-submitted translation.
+ You will no longer have access to your Scrapbook once this goes live.
+ Your images will redirect, but the URL will be different.
+ Unable to tell what will happen to any photos you have that put you over the 2GB limit.
+ Back up your Scrapbook just in case.
+ If you want your photos transferred over now instead of waiting, let them know here.
Livejournal Scrapbook is going away. Your 10GB of Paid Member space is now 2GB. If you care, there is an explanation in Russian on the Russian news page. There's also a user-submitted translation.
+ You will no longer have access to your Scrapbook once this goes live.
+ Your images will redirect, but the URL will be different.
+ Unable to tell what will happen to any photos you have that put you over the 2GB limit.
+ Back up your Scrapbook just in case.
+ If you want your photos transferred over now instead of waiting, let them know here.
The fiasco continues
Originally posted by electricdruid at The fiasco continues
electricdruid at The fiasco continuesACTA in a Nutshell –
What is ACTA? ACTA is the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. A new intellectual property enforcement treaty being negotiated by the United States, the European Community, Switzerland, and Japan, with Australia, the Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Mexico, Jordan, Morocco, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, and Canada recently announcing that they will join in as well.
Why should you care about ACTA? Initial reports indicate that the treaty will have a very broad scope and will involve new tools targeting “Internet distribution and information technology.”
What is the goal of ACTA? Reportedly the goal is to create new legal standards of intellectual property enforcement, as well as increased international cooperation, an example of which would be an increase in information sharing between signatory countries’ law enforcement agencies.
Essential ACTA Resources -
- Read more about ACTA here: ACTA Fact Sheet
- Read the authentic version of the ACTA text as of 15 April 2011, as finalized by participating countries here: ACTA Finalized Text
- Follow the history of the treaty’s formation here: ACTA history
- Read letters from U.S. Senator Ron Wyden wherein he challenges the constitutionality of ACTA: Letter 1 | Letter 2 | Read the Administration’s Response to Wyden’s First Letter here: Response
- Watch a short informative video on ACTA: ACTA Video
- Watch a lulzy video on ACTA: Lulzy Video
Say NO to ACTA. It is essential to spread awareness and get the word out on ACTA.
Via TumblrSendong
I've already given what I can to the fund drive and ransacked the house for toiletries and clothes to send to the victims of Typhoon Sendong and still, my efforts are so paltry given the terrible devastation caused by the floods. I don't know what else to do.
In the Market for New Workfriends
Just went through a major fark up of a job with a friend turned workmate. I had never worked with her before in a professional context and I had no idea of how she works until OMG we were neck deep in the project and too late to pull out.
It was a rush job and we just had enough time to fulfill the order and it would have been totally doable. Except that we had given the client three options and client goes back to us saying that they choose Option 2. What is Option 2, I ask my friend who was the one coordinating with the client. She emails back, This one, and I proceed from that information and build up the order based on Option 2 specifications.
After three sleepless days, we submit and client fires back, "What the hell is this?" Apparently, there had been a misunderstanding as to what client understood to be Option 2 and my friend had actually assumed what the client meant, instead of confirming with the client what they actually wanted. So our submission was actually not to spec.
We come in and revise the submission according to specs, but of course we've lost three days by now and it was obvious that we wouldn't be able to fulfill the order. Client gives us the option to submit everything to spec on time (and in the process, kill ourselves) or agree to amend the contract and say that we are only making partial delivery for partial pay. We chose the second option and we prepare an amendment for the client to sign and entrust the task of making sure that the amendment was signed by the client before the given deadline.
Everything was quiet, as we regrouped (and avoided one another for fear of murder/getting murdered because of this fuck up). Then a full day-and-a-half after client's deadline, my flaky friend gets back to me and tells me that she wasn't able to send the amendment to the client by deadline.
OMG WE'RE GOING TO GET SUED OMG! I WANT TO SLAP MY FRIEND FOR SERIOUS!
It was a rush job and we just had enough time to fulfill the order and it would have been totally doable. Except that we had given the client three options and client goes back to us saying that they choose Option 2. What is Option 2, I ask my friend who was the one coordinating with the client. She emails back, This one, and I proceed from that information and build up the order based on Option 2 specifications.
After three sleepless days, we submit and client fires back, "What the hell is this?" Apparently, there had been a misunderstanding as to what client understood to be Option 2 and my friend had actually assumed what the client meant, instead of confirming with the client what they actually wanted. So our submission was actually not to spec.
We come in and revise the submission according to specs, but of course we've lost three days by now and it was obvious that we wouldn't be able to fulfill the order. Client gives us the option to submit everything to spec on time (and in the process, kill ourselves) or agree to amend the contract and say that we are only making partial delivery for partial pay. We chose the second option and we prepare an amendment for the client to sign and entrust the task of making sure that the amendment was signed by the client before the given deadline.
Everything was quiet, as we regrouped (and avoided one another for fear of murder/getting murdered because of this fuck up). Then a full day-and-a-half after client's deadline, my flaky friend gets back to me and tells me that she wasn't able to send the amendment to the client by deadline.
OMG WE'RE GOING TO GET SUED OMG! I WANT TO SLAP MY FRIEND FOR SERIOUS!
Oneupmanship
Can I just say that I spent the day dodging a client who kept trying to get me to commit to doing Tasks B, C, and D even though he only contracted me -- and I only agreed to do -- Task A? And even if this client promises to pay me more (which he isn't), I am not inclined to take on additional work for him because he also keeps trying to get me to agree to meet him for dinner even though I keep telling him that it would be enough if I just email him whatever. We don't need to meet! Not only do I have no time to spare, he's also freakishly boring. Not to mention, his insistence that I spend my Friday nights with him to discuss this project even though I've repeatedly told him that my Fridays are already spoken for is starting to border on the creepy.
God, I just want to go to bed, turn off my phone, burrow under the covers and read fic. Now, where is my fic? I really need something to calm me down right now.
God, I just want to go to bed, turn off my phone, burrow under the covers and read fic. Now, where is my fic? I really need something to calm me down right now.
Hug Each Other and Carry On
Via Barking Up the Wrong Tree
What effect does S+M have on relationships?
In two studies, 58 sadomasochistic (SM) practitioners provided physiological measures of salivary cortisol and testosterone (hormones associated with stress and dominance, respectively) and psychological measures of relationship closeness before and after participating in SM activities. Observed activities included bondage, sensory deprivation, a variety of painful and pleasurable stimulation, verbal and non-verbal communication, and expressions of caring and affection. During the scenes, cortisol rose significantly for participants who were bound, receiving stimulation, and following orders, but not for participants who were providing stimulation, orders, or structure. Female participants who were bound, receiving stimulation, and following orders also showed increases in testosterone during the scenes. Thereafter, participants who reported that their SM activities went well showed reductions in physiological stress (cortisol) and increases in relationship closeness. Among participants who reported that their SM activities went poorly, some showed decreases in relationship closeness whereas others showed increases. The increases in relationship closeness combined with the displays of caring and affection observed as part of the SM activities offer support for the modern view that SM, when performed consensually, has the potential to increase intimacy between participants.
Source: "Hormonal Changes and Couple Bonding in Consensual Sadomasochistic Activity" from Archives of Sexual Behavior, Volume 38, Number 2 / April, 2009
Auction Hunters | Storage Wars
So I want to read fic about Brendon watching Storage Wars and realizing that the locker that is being emptied out and judged as worthless is actually Ryan's.
The Stanford Prison Experiment
The Stanford Prison Experiment: History’s Most Controversial Psychology Study Turns 40
"Forty years ago today, the Stanford Prison Experiment began — arguably history’s most notorious and controversial psychology experiment, which gleaned powerful and unsettling insights into human nature. Orchestrated by Stanford researcher Philip Zimbardo, the study randomly assigned 24 middle-class college-aged males, recruited via newspaper classifieds and pre-screened to have no mental health issues or criminal history, to the roles of prisoners and prison guards in a hyper-realistic simulated prison environment. Though the guards were instructed to under no circumstances harm the prisoners physically, they were encouraged to think of themselves as actual prison guards and instill in the inmates a sense of powerlessness, frustration and “arbitrariness,” to make them fully believe that their lives were controlled entirely by “the system” and that they had no freedom of action whatsoever.What followed was a devastating manifestation of the human capacity for cruelty and evil, so powerful and dehumanizing that the researchers had to end the two-week experiment after the sixth day. What’s most striking about the study is that all the participants were “normal” young men, yet they came to identify with their assigned roles so deeply that their behavior and entire personalities morphed to unrecognizable extremes, molded after the expectations of the respective role."
LJ, there is no indent function anymore. How can I make it clear that what I'm posting is a quote? #bothered
Will Things Ever Get Better?
"When you read about the hardships I found people enduring while I was researching my book—the skipped meals, the lack of medical care, the occasional need to sleep in cars or vans—you should bear in mind that those occurred in the best of times. The economy was growing, and jobs, if poorly paid, were at least plentiful.
"In 2000, I had been able to walk into a number of jobs pretty much off the street. Less than a decade later, many of these jobs had disappeared and there was stiff competition for those that remained. It would have been impossible to repeat my Nickel and Dimed "experiment," had I had been so inclined, because I would probably never have found a job.
x x x x x
"The viciousness of the official animus toward the indigent can be breathtaking. A few years ago, a group called Food Not Bombs started handing out free vegan food to hungry people in public parks around the nation. A number of cities, led by Las Vegas, passed ordinances forbidding the sharing of food with the indigent in public places, leading to the arrests of several middle-aged white vegans.
"One anti-sharing law was just overturned in Orlando, but the war on illicit generosity continues. Orlando is appealing the decision, and Middletown, Connecticut, is in the midst of a crackdown. More recently, Gainesville, Florida, began enforcing a rule limiting the number of meals that soup kitchens may serve to 130 people in one day, and Phoenix, Arizona, has been using zoning laws to stop a local church from serving breakfast to homeless people.
x x x x x
"In what has become a familiar pattern, the government defunds services that might help the poor while ramping up law enforcement. Shut down public housing, then make it a crime to be homeless. Generate no public-sector jobs, then penalize people for falling into debt. The experience of the poor, and especially poor people of color, comes to resemble that of a rat in a cage scrambling to avoid erratically administered electric shocks. And if you should try to escape this nightmare reality into a brief, drug-induced high, it's "gotcha" all over again, because that of course is illegal too."