I really wish they’d rerelease this in 4K, the visuals are spectacular.

M O I S T U R I Z E M E

IMHO 2012 was the one that really broke their brains. The tea party types tried to get various firebrands on the ticket, but end up having to support Romney. Hey, at least he’s a squeaky-clean telegenic millionaire pushing the most severe conservative fiscal policies! Proceeds to get stomped by the Obama campaign so bad that Karl Rove couldn’t believe it as it was happening. THEN the establishment GOP flirts with moving to the center on immigration. The backlash against that on the right, supercharged by the mainstreaming of mobile social media (plus social justice protests and the looming Clinton campaign) was what fueled the rise of Trump.

Heckjumpers

https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2006/07/12/a-wider-perspective-on-flavor

My nightly routine before bed:

• Smartle (simple word game)
• Chronophoto (guess the year five photos were taken)
• TimeGuessr (guess the year and location five photos were taken)
• Connections (NYTimes categorization game)
• Spelling Bee (NYTimes letter game)
• Hurdle (basically five linked Wordles)
• Wordle
• Strands (new NYTimes letter game)

Also try to play AntGame.io at least once a day to get a decent score.

I thoroughly enjoy MetaFilter (one of the last surviving community blogs from the 90s) and Tildes (a more recent attempt at capturing the same feel). Text-heavy discourse, minimalist design, human-scale moderation, and moderately gatekept (MeFi has a $5 fee, Tildes is invite-only). PM me if you’re interested.

As shitty as American politics can be, we should be very thankful that overt violence against political candidates, journalists, volunteers, etc. has not (yet) been normalized. I can’t imagine being involved with Mexican politics, especially anti-drug/anti-corruption reform, with the threat of cartel retaliation hanging over you and your family. Strong respect to those who tough it out.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headline#Headlinese

Defederating Beehaw would not only weaken it as an instance, but remove its positive influence from the wider fediverse. The big platforms wield so much power and influence and money, the smaller upstarts need to connect as much as possible to stand a chance at relevance as a credible alternative. We’re all better together. I really hope you reconsider.

It’s an organic community, small enough and long-lasting enough that it’s easier to get to know people as people instead of as names on a screen you’ll see once and likely never again. The admin team is similarly small and easy to talk to, not an algorithm or a faceless corporate enforcer. The mods are paid professionals funded largely by community donations. The site is also in the process of transitioning to a non-profit management, so less risk of selling out or enshittifying itself. I like the posting and commenting culture – text-heavy, minimalist style, and a wide variety of topics often deeply researched and explored in lengthy posts by people passionate about the topic, rather than 24/7 outrage-bait headlines and viral videos. And the subsites are really fun – I mentioned AskMeFi, but there’s also a place to share one’s music, personal projects, discuss media, organize meetups, etc. I also appreciate how the mods and guidelines take a strong stance against bigotry and microaggressions – hate speech and spam are virtually unheard of. Very refreshing when the bigger platforms seem intent on pursuing growth at all costs and minimizing administrative overhead. Overall, a cozy, human-scale community that seems more and more like a throwback that we should be moving back to.

Not sure if this is what you’re looking for, but my favorite eerie/creepy horror movie that doesn’t rely on jump scares or gore is The Mothman Prophecies. It’s about a journalist who stumbles across a small town haunted by this horrifying presence that seems to predict terrible disasters. The style is on point, and it’s especially creepy because it’s supposedly based on a true story.

MetaFilter! It’s an old-school text-only community blog that’s been around since 1999. I love the variety and depth of posts on the front page, and the AskMetaFilter Q+A section is super useful.

Like all fascist conspiracy theorists, it inevitably connects back to anti-Semitism.

Sinfest. Used to be a charming and funny daily webcomic about an eclectic cast of colorful characters getting into surreal and philosophical situations. Then one day in 2011 it suddenly swerved hard into radical feminism. I’m not anti-feminist myself, but the comic became obsessed with it – literally every strip was related to The Patriarchy in some way and it became extremely preachy and boring.

I checked out for the better part of a decade, and when I randomly revisited a couple years ago it turned out that the author had transited the TERF-to-fascist pipeline and turned into an extreme-right antivax conspiratorial fascist loon, of the “teachers are secret pedos” and “the war in Ukraine is a hoax” variety. Super sad to see.

Does doing this fuck with your recommendations? Or open your account to being banned if you don’t continue accessing it from the subscribed country?

There’s always going to be an activity difference given the userbase gap, but it’s a mistake imho to see a slow-paced community as “dead”. As long as it has active subscribers, any post will get votes and comments from people who see it, even if it’s been weeks or months since the last post in that community. Slower-paced, but still there for whatever content gets posted.

The irony is that the situation is pretty much the opposite of this – the US vetoed a symbolic, non-binding resolution for essentially messaging reasons (it didn’t explicitly acknowledge Israel’s right to self-defence), but when it comes to concrete action it’s providing millions in humanitarian relief, and Biden is pressuring Netanyahu privately and publicly to pull back from a full invasion and allow a relief corridor.

I get people not taking the IDF at face value, but Hamas ain’t exactly trustworthy, either.