April 28, 2020
The Mob Comes For SakimiChan
Whatever one thinks of Mr Hambly or B.I.T.C., the situation they're reporting on seems to be very real, disturbing and I think we can agree, unacceptable.
Beautyphobes strike again.
It appears that SakimiChan, who (in addition to being a talented and popular artist) gives monthly tutorials on how to draw, has run afoul of the Guild Of Professionally Offended Karens.
Specifically, GOPOK is appalled that an old tutorial in artistry is focussed on rendering the wrong sort of body type.
Sakimi-chan was soon bombarded with criticism and harassment by like-minded art authoritarians, or ‘arthoritarians,’ with the harassment ranging from claims that she was a terrible artist because she did not ‘understand anatomy,’ to accusations of fatphobia based on a tutorial on drawing plus-sized bodies that did not conform to the critics’ very specific standards of representation, to outright calls for the continued bullying and harassment of Sakimi-chan:
Well that' sucks.
If you agree that these puritanical scolds ought to get bent, then follow Sakimichan on Pixiv and on Twitter: Support her quest to add beauty to the world on Patreon and buy her stuff on Gumroad and/or Art Station.
Here's what for her is a low res-piece of 'GravityGal' from her Pixiv...
Yes ladies, she draws dudes too...
...and if you're into it, yaoi, yuri...and interpretational furry.
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April 27, 2020
Entertainment News That is Either Very Good or Very Terrible
Quick! To Google Translate...for justice!
What could this mean? It appears to be about One Punch Man, but the katakana looks almost like it says "Hollywood" right before the word jisha movie. What's a jisha movie? and why are there so many loanwords mucking up a tweet about One Punch Man?
"Original: ONE Animation: Yupan Murata's manga" One Punch Man "will be made into a live-action movie in Hollywood. Distributor Sony Pictures has high expectations for this film adaptation, assigning Scott Rosenberg and Jeff Pinkner, the popular screenwriters of "Venom" and "Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle" to the script development.
I'm cautiously hopeful.
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Adaptational Decay
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I Think I've Found The Problem
Perusing Pixy's site, it dawned on me that one of the main issues with 2020 is that so much of what's happening could be a blurb for a Sy-Fy Channel movie.
Art by Orca-Bueto (Mtseven)
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April 26, 2020
The Most Interesting of Times
Can inspire the hottest of takes.
Assuming the current flurry of rumors regarding the ill health or demise of Kim Jung Il is based on truth, then times may get interesting indeed.
In the unlikely (but not impossible) event that the left's DPRK waifu gets to be leader of a fiercely patriarchal communist party, it will be good to remember that this woman is apparently in charge of the DPRK State Security Department, the secret police, and is reportedly the main architect of Kim Jong Il's cult of personality.
She's bad news people.
As opposed to bad newspeople.
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April 22, 2020
Well This Sucks
Valve and Steam have been hacked.
Don't play multi-player games on Steam, especially Counterstrike, Global Offensive or Team Fortress 2.
Maybe stay off of Steam all together.
Valve has responded and is warning people to stay off their games ENTIRELY. It appears that a disgruntled former employee has released the code for a huge number of Valve games.
Watch on Bitchute.
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In Which I Post Against Type
I am deeply sympathetic to the concerns of the protestors who are demanding an end to the lock-downs. They are stuck in houses with stir crazy kids , are justifiably worried about not having work and have a healthy, admirable and frankly, well founded, skepticism of the officious overlords who do nothing to hide the great glee that said officials take in tormenting them via these mitigation efforts.
However, I think the protestors are wrong on the merits in most cases, and they don't help their cause, the country or themselves by having mass gatherings without masks.
The virus is real. It's not "Just a flu bro."
"These numbers contradict the notion that many people who have died from the virus might soon have died anyway. In Paris, more than twice the usual number of people have died each day, far more than at the peak of a bad flu season. In New York City, the number is four times the normal amount. . . . But the total death numbers offer a more complete portrait of the pandemic, experts say, especially because most countries report only those Covid-19 deaths that occur in hospitals.â€
That is from this report which is behind a paywall.
Of course that report is at the New York Times, Duranty's rag, which is reason enough for many to dismiss it out of hand. That doesn't make them stupid. It makes them observant, but one of the sinister things about outlets like the Old Grey Lady, is that amongst all the lies, husks of their competence still remain, so simply dismissing everything they say, while well founded, is not always right. If the NYT reports that the Earth goes around the Sun. That doesn't make geocentricism right.
I've been following this story for a while, and while I think it is not meeting the direst predictions, it IS , in fact, a real thing that is markedly worse than the regular flu. It is not clear to me how much of the lower than predicted deaths are from the current lockdown measures but I'm fairly confident that the percentage is non-zero.
I think that we probably ought to continue this for a few more weeks at l least in Urban areas, especially since there are a number of promising treatments in the pipeline that, if effective and approved in the next few weeks, will lower actual risks substantially, making the deaths from a premature abandonment of the effort rather senseless.
That being said, the draconian and stupid measures being taken in some areas are simply not helping. The idiotic harassment of people walking alone, gardening or trying to give their kids a bit of fresh air are nothing but the sadistic cruelty of people who hold those they nominally serve in contempt. The naked power grabs of people like Virginia's odious Governor Northam, who has set a hard limit of ending the lock down REGARDLESS OF DATA for after primaries and local municipal elections (for which ballots will have to be handled by the postal service union) shows that much of the lock-down is not in good faith.
I noted that I think that most of the protests are understandable but wrong headed. Most is not all. For example, the in-car, rolling protest, in Michigan to stand against that loathsome governors disgusting overreach and senseless power-trips was absolutely brilliant in execution and completely justified.
On the other hand, other mass rallies without masks of any sort are, in my opinion, counter-productive in every way.
They WILL result in a spike in cases, which will kill people, and they will therefore give aid and comfort to out tormentors not only in the arena of public opinion, but also in the demographics of the voters that are taken off the electoral chessboard.
I don't think that asking people to wear some form of mask in public, at least on public transport or in stores during a public health emergency is a civil rights violation, especially when a workable solution is well within most people's means.
My opinion on this matter is not a popular one amongst many people I look up to and will no doubt piss off many of my readers, but I really think, given my area of expertise, that the lockdowns are the way to go in the near term.
What is my expertise? Well, I was a hazmat responder for 12 years and I'm sporting a bachelor of arts in history. We history majors are absolute mad-lads in the area of 20-20 hindsight. Predicting future trends, not so much, but observing past events like the 1918 flu, which this most resembles and comparing the responses in that catastrophe of St. Louis and Philadelphia convinces me that a premature release of the lockdowns in urban areas is unwise. We've been following the St. Louis model in most places which I think is likely why the death and woe in this country have not matched those in less fortunate areas or come close to the most dire predictions. Our worst hot-zones are special cases, in NYC, he phenomenal density and high use of public transit has likely goosed the numbers and in NoLa poverty is added to those factors.
There are other factors to be taken into account to be sure:
A full on depression will be worse in many ways than the plague itself, and poverty in the long term will kill far more than this disease, as well as exacerbate the effects of this pestillence and others, one only need to look the hell befalling Ecuador to see this. So this obviously cannot go on forever. However, we are reportedly but a few weeks away from the ability to test most everybody and the aforementioned treatments being looked at have enough potential to justify hanging on for a little bit.
One final note about the economy, the 1918-19 flu coincided with a largely unrelated depression, sharper even than the 1929 crash and saw tremendous levels of post WW1 debt. However, it bounced back into the Roaring 20s, largely because the government got mostly out of the way.
Ensuring that the government stays out of the way requires winning the election in November, which requires showing up at the polls and not being in body bags. Remember what these officious bullies and sneering jackasses said about us and their "mitigation" efforts that show a total lack of good faith, common sense or both. But in the meantime don't play into their hands, or the protein spikes of Corona-Chan.
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It's Just Like Christmas
No really. We are fully into Christmas levels of volume at my work. I personally lifted between 8,000 and 10,000 parcels today. Also, I have developed an intense hatred for Nordic Tracks and "Gaming Chairs".
Of course, I'm not dealing with anything like the hell that the ICU staff in hospitals are confronting on a daily basis, and I am not working in customer service and all the abuse that entails right now. More importantly, unlike many right now, I'm still employed. And, realistically, if work were a pleasant place to go to, they would charge admission. However, I do have two kidney stones, a sprained ankle, every muscle hurts and I'm exhausted.
I've got to get Spliff-Girl of the front page, so, here is a video that, while only tangentially related to the subject at hand, does have the benefit of being refreshingly devoid of any pretensions of respectability.
Music: Shake It by SISTAR. Animation by Natsumi Chan. Support her on Patreon.
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April 20, 2020
Happy National Splif Day
I'm sure that no harm can come from encouraging people to damage their amygdalas and lower their IQ by 8 points.
But hey, whatever gets you through the Quarantine.
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April 16, 2020
A Wise Person Learns From the Mistakes of Others (UPDATED)
I'm not particularly wise, but even I can take steps to avoid the tragic fate of our ancestors, the Golgafrinchans.
UPDATE: OK, So I've got this thing, and I must say, I'm suspicious. I have no way of knowing if this is working. There are allegedly two UV bulbs inside, but of course all frequencies of UV light are invisible to about 99.9+% of humans, and then there is the refrigerator door light problem.
Its controls consist of a flashing light that is green, red, or blue depending on how long a sterilization cycle one chooses. (5,10, or15 minutes).
It does not even have a manufacturer noted on its packaging, only the words UV Sterilizer and Made in China.
Upon opening it, I sneezed.
It does not have a plug, per se, but rather a USB cord that plugs into a micro-usb jack on the product itself. (Though in fairness, that obviates the necessity for voltage adapters, since USB is an international standard).
Shamefully lacking any electron microscopes with which to inspect the health of the microbiome on my phone and facemask, I have no way to see if this is working or not and I obviously don't want to stare at what might or might not be a UV bulb.
There is no instruction for or indications of any ability for changing the allegedly extant UV bulbs.
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April 15, 2020
Meanwhile: In China (Far Beneath the surface of the Earth)
It appear that everybody's favorite contributor of exotic cuisines and discoverer of new and consequential organisms has made yet another contribution to the overall sense of well being that we all enjoy right now.
It seems that China has been conducting very, very small nuclear tests.
China might be secretly conducting nuclear tests with very low explosive power despite Beijing’s assertions that it is strictly adhering to an international accord banning all nuclear tests, according to a new arms-control report to be made public by the State Department.
There is little indication of direct evidence, but there has been a tremendous activity at the main Chinese nuclear test site, (a place called Lop-Nur) there have also been reports of subterranean explosions and these apparently coincide with the shutdown of monitoring stations that the U.S. and China maintain in each other's countries as per treaty to confirm neither is conducting nuclear tests.
This assertion is made in a soon-to be released report by the U.S. State Department on Adherence and compliance with non-proliferation matters.
A quick perusal of publicly available documents reveals that in last years report on the same subject, similar concerns were raised.
From page 39 of last years State Department report on Adherence to and Compliance with Arms Control, NonProliferation, and Disarmament Agreements and Commitments (PDF)
PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA (CHINA)
FINDING
The information raised by DIA Director LTG Robert Ashley in his remarks at the Hudson
Institute on May 29, 2019, including China’s possible preparation to operate its test site year
round and its use of explosive containment chambers, coupled with China’s lack of transparency
on their nuclear testing activities, raise questions regarding its adherence to the "zero-yieldâ€
nuclear weapons testing moratorium adhered to by the United States, United Kingdom, and
France.
CONDUCT GIVING RISE TO COMPLIANCE CONCERNS
China probably carried out multiple nuclear weapon-related tests or experiments in 2018.
Additional information is provided in the higher classification version of this report.
ANALYSIS OF COMPLIANCE CONCERNS
The nature of these tests raises concerns regarding China’s adherence to its moratorium, which
China declared in 1996, judged against the U.S. "zero-yield†standard. That is the extent of what's in it. Again, this is from last years report, which, being a public document was found with about 2 minutes of web searching after reading the linked articles. It will be interesting to see if the forthcoming report has further details or evidence, in particular the timing of the sensor stations going off line.
A representation of a Chinese nuclear attack from the Art of Fallout 4
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April 14, 2020
And Now a Word From Our Sponsors
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April 13, 2020
As if Things Weren't Bad Enough Already
It appears that today's journalists can't even spell journal.
In other news, Krakatoa is erupting.
But it's pretty much always doing that.
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April 10, 2020
Well THIS is Well Done
Originally by Moouyo, whose BilliBilli page is here.
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It Ends
Just a quick update on last night's post. In lieu of actual content here is something pleasantly disturbing by Tokyo Gensou. Buy his art book here.
more...
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April 09, 2020
Uncertainties
more...
Unpleasant banality resides below the fold, here's something much more pleasant by Noba (support him on Fanbox)
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April 08, 2020
Is This Real? It CAN'T be Real.
TweetShot via
more...
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Cooking Mama CookStar Does not Exist. (UPDATE: Unless it Does.)
There's an odd story over at One Angry Gamer* that is at least partially corroborated by other outlets.
It seems that the lates installment in the Cooking Mama franchise is now out.
Or not.
Here's a quick overview of what may or may not have happened.
Cooking Mama CookStar was announced for the Nintendo Switch and in its promo materials an offhand mention was made that it would employ blockchain technology. (For some reason).
This led to crazy conspiratorial speculation that the game was an elaborate and cunning crypto-currency mining scheme.
The game release date has come and gone.
The game is listed as for sale but is not available. **
It was available at some point, because there are people who have physical copies that are playable...if not connected to the internet.
There are unconfirmed reports that the game is a terrible power hog and reports that an early version could damage the Switch. (How?)
There were reports (read anonymous posts) on Discord that the crypto-mining software was also forwarding user info to nefarious people for nefarious purposes. (A source quoted in the IGN article invokes the Kochs).
Nintendo assures everybody that there never was no-way no-how any crypto mining software on their game.
Analysts who have examined one of the few extant examples of the game claim there is evidence that crypto-mining software was removed...clumsily, which accounts for the games reported poor optimization.
Other sources say that there's nothing in the code that is indicative of crypto-mining now.
It's unclear, however, who actually developed this particular game. There are three companies denying any responsibility for it and another sketchy address in Connecticut. It's also unclear at what level of development blockchain technology was considered. Nintendo says it wasn't but it clearly was considered seriously somewhere at some point was it was mentioned in the promotional materials. (along with the vegetarian option...which may or may not be significant)
So what really is going on here?
No one who's asking knows and no one who knows is talking.
However the game existed at some point as there are "let's plays" on You Tube:
Nintendo says all is well. Buy their game. Which you can't get.
UPDATE 19:39 April 8: It now appears to be available via the game's website. They are only selling physical copies though (which is not in and of itself a bad thing)
* Don't read the comments!
** Screencap taken at time of this post is here.
more...
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An Explanation for One of the Most Counterintuitive Examples of Planetary Topography
Two of The Brickmuppet's Crack Team of Science Babes brings us a follow-up to a post from about 8 months ago where we noted the then recent confirmation of very broad and deep glaciers on...planet Mercury.
"Science Babes" are actually V-Tubers Lita and Liz (of KMNZ) as drawn for their album cover by Shyugao
While the moon has for quite a while been confirmed to have water in the permanently shadowed regions at its poles, this is assumed to mostly consist of permafrost and a few lakes as there has, thus far, been no indication of the sorts of huge exposed glaciers that have been found on Mercury. Given Mercury's proximity to the sun, one would think that Mercury would have rather less than the moon.
However, according to Phys.Org scientists now think they have figured out the discrepancy.
Read the article in full, but the short version of the hypothesis is that the intense solar bombardment across most of the temperate and tropical regions releases hydroxyl ions from the surface. These. being large in number and energetic on account of their heat collide and form water molecules which bare then scooped up by magnetic tornadoes and deposited on the poles. If deposited in a permanently shadowed area they freeze and build up over millennia.
All pretty straightforward...except for the part about magnetic tornadoes.
Protons from solar winds are more plentiful on Mercury than on Earth, where a mighty magnetic field whips solar wind particles, including protons, back out into space. Mercury's field is only about 1 percent as strong, and it swirls protons down onto the surface."These are like big magnetic tornados, and they cause huge proton migrations across most of the surface of Mercury over time," Orlando said.
Oh. Well that explains it then .
There's more on Mercurian Glaciers here and here, and another Reader's Digest Condensed version below..
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Someone is Not Understanding the Issue Here
I just deleted a spam comment which boasted that it was not providing a single link to another site but several links to sites with a wide variety of services.
This may come as a surprise to the spammers, but that is not actually an improvement.
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