@treepyful / treepyful.tumblr.com
love when ppl defend the aggressive monetization of the internet with "what, do you just expect it to be free and them not make a profit???" like. yeah that would be really nice actually i would love that:)! thanks for asking
Also like. It used to be like that. I think some people forget we had a relatively ad-free internet.
Concept I've been stewing on for a while here. I've got a name for it now and I'm calling it the Shot Dog Factor. It's a numerical value, assignable to any internet post, which represents the average number of engagements it needs to reach before someone comes along acting like this post shot their dog.
And for the sake of High Number = More Danger, which feels like the intuitive and sensible read, let's call it the inverse. As in the chance that any given interaction results in a Shot Dog response.
"Hee hee haa haa" type of silly shitpost? Low Shot Dog Factor. Largely safe. A genuine political opinion? Critically high Shot Dog Factor. Guaranteed to elicit such a response if it breaks containment.
As a result of this phenomenon, you see phrasings and circumventions added specifically to lower the Shot Dog factor. Every "now I know this doesn't apply to EVERYONE'S specific situation, but I just think--" about something where the non-specificity was obvious, but OP needed to add that disclaimer to avoid the Shot Dog from someone who thinks it needs to apply to them.
And another--perhaps the most--critical thing to understand about the Shot Dog factor is that 0 is not a valid value. There's a discontinuation at 0. And as such, the Shot Dog limit, as engagement goes to infinity is, in fact, 100%. Any and every post you have ever made, given enough containment breaching, WILL piss someone off in wild ways. You can lower the Shot Dog factor but it is never 0. Sometimes when a post of yours escapes containment, you must simply sit back and accept this reality.
#op the fact that you called it this. has skyrocketed the shot dog factor for this one astronomically. im so sorry (via @mecharose)
Thank you yeah no that was part of the vision
“what’s posted on the internet stays there forever” is true for everything except that one piece of fanart you saw when you were 10 that changed the trajectory of your life forever. you will never find that again it is gone forever
There's something that I find equal parts hilarious and terrifying.
On one hand it is so funny watching the generation previous to mine (I was born in 84) absolutely say the most unhinged shit online, doxx themselves, and get fired, after spending my entire childhood teaching me online opsec because every stranger was a potential murderer. Social media done rotted their brains.
But on the other I'm seeing kids coming up, seeing them spew all their personals online, and using that to model their unsafe behavior and put themselves at incredible risk because the internet actually got way more dangerous than it was, ironically, when I was coming up being told I had to basically outsmart the fuckin CIA. Now the actual CIA and other bad actors (government, private, and individual) really are out there and these kids are watching fucking meemaw post a photo of the front of her house practically captioned with her fucking SSN and thinking, "yeah, sure, the adults know what's safe."
I gotta be a fuckin millennial about this and beg younger folx to listen to the VCR generation: hide yourself online. Nothing should go there you wouldn't want in the hands of the person who hates you the most.
Be safe, be smart, be a fucking ghost.
I just wanna add that LYING ABOUT YOUR AGE IS NOT ONE OF THE THINGS YOU NEED TO PROTECT.
Minors DON'T LIE ABOUT YOUR AGE. You can't pretend to be an adult. Adults know what adults and kids sound like..
Adults, "Over 18" or "An Adult" IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH.
Your age is NOT sacred texts. There's like 100,000 people in the nearest city who have the same birthday, and probably like half of them share your name.
Allow me to introduce you to Dr. Latanya Sweeney of Harvard University.
She famously demonstrated that nearly 90% of Americans were uniquely identifiable with just three pieces of information about them: gender (binary assumed; think "gender on your state-issued ID"), date of birth, and ZIP code.
"But my age isn't my full date of birth!" Yeah, true, so she also fuzzed birth date to birth year and rechecked her analysis. That still gets over seven in ten people.
Lie about your age, errybody. Don't pretend to be a legal adult when you're not, but otherwise, a year or two off only harms the surveillance enterprise.
It's also okay to just not share that information. Be a ghost! An indeterminately gendered person of mystery! Who are you? Who knows! Where do you live? No comment! Personal details? What are you, a cop?
Honestly, with some notable exceptions, I actually mostly think it's fine to lie about whether or not you're a minor. Because the thing is, "Don't pretend to be a legal adult when you're not" is all well and good until it becomes "Broadcast that you are young and vulnerable". There are people who will use that info against you! You're not obligated to make it easy for them to find.
The caveat is to be careful about things that might get someone else in legal trouble. I'm not gonna tell you to never view any nsfw content because I think teenagers are capable of setting their own limits around that, but for example don't exchange sexually explicit messages with someone who thinks you're over 18. You can set boundaries around this without revealing anything about your age, because adults have just as much right to opt out of sexual interactions as minors do.
Beyond that, though, I honestly think it's fine to lie unconvincingly about your 9-to-5, mortgage, and three kids. I'm not trying to say this is "best practice" but I am saying that no one online is entitled to any information about you, ever, including your majority status. People might know you're lying but it will be harder for them to sort out the truth underneath it. Are you a teenager pretending not to be? Are you a parody account cosplaying investment banking for a lark? This is tumblr, nobody knows!
surviving the current age of internet means saying no to subscriptions and premiums for basic features. you must endure the inconvenience of not being able to use every server emoji in discord. you must build the patience to find alternatives like NewPipe so you can listen to music on youtube while your phone screen sleeps. do Not give these corporations your limited disposable income. tiktok not letting me view videos on my phone without downloading the app? i will outlast tiktok and the execs will be remembered as dull,disgusting capitalists. listen to me, listen to me. if you do not know how to pirate shows from hulu, learn. if you can't pirate it, it is not worth the money to rent it. please i'm on my hands and knees. do not accept this form of internet.
follow up
say YES to artist owned platforms. say yes to nebula for your favorite funny person or informative commentator. say yes or even join cartoonist.coop to support sustainable income for your favorite artist. use the money you saved from cancelling webtoons and commission a new artist for a silly icon pic. i'm telling you it's worth it!
Here's a reddit post with alternatives to start your degoogle journey
blows my mind that i have little online friends who mildly care about me. it’s really nice
anyway hi little online friends i care about you too 🍄
Ma-ia-hii 😮
Ma-ia-huu😩
Ma-ia-hoo😮
Ma-ia-haa 😯
Alo👋, Salut👋, sunt➡️ eu👤, un haiduc🏃♂️,
Si te rog👏😇, iubirea❤️ mea, primeste🔜 fericirea😁.
Alo👋, alo👋, sunt eu👤 Picasso👴🎨,
Ti-am dat beep📲, si sunt voinic💪🙂,
Dar sa stii💡 nu-ti🚫 cer🔙 nimic☝️🚫.
Vrei🔜 sa pleci dar nu 🚫ma, nu 🚫ma iei🏃♂️,
Nu 🚫ma, nu 🚫ma iei🏃♂️, nu 🚫ma, nu 🚫ma, nu 🚫ma iei🏃♂️.
Chipul👩 tau si dragostea❤️ din tei🌳,
Mi-amintesc🧠 de ochii tai👀.
Vrei🔜 sa pleci dar nu ma, nu ma iei🏃♂️,
Nu 🚫ma, nu 🚫ma iei🏃♂️, nu 🚫ma, nu 🚫ma, nu 🚫ma iei🏃♂️.
Chipul👩 tau si dragostea❤️ din tei🌳,
Mi-amintesc🧠 de ochii tai👀.
Te sun📱, sa-ti spun🗣, ce simt😍 acum,
Alo👋, iubirea❤️ mea, sunt eu👤, fericirea😁.
Alo👋, alo👋, sunt iarasi 🔄eu👤, Picasso👴🎨,
Ti-am dat beep📲, si sunt voinic💪🙂,
Dar sa stii💡 nu-ti🚫 cer🔙 nimic☝️🚫.
Vrei🔜 sa pleci dar nu 🚫ma, nu 🚫ma iei🏃♂️,
Nu🚫 ma, nu 🚫ma iei🏃♂️, nu 🚫ma, nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma iei🏃♂️.
Chipul👩 tau si dragostea❤️ din tei🌳,
Mi-amintesc🧠 de ochii tai👀.
Vrei🔜 sa pleci dar nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma iei🏃♂️,
Nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma iei🏃♂️, nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma iei🏃♂️.
Chipul👩 tau si dragostea❤️ din tei🌳,
Mi-amintesc🧠 de ochii tai👀.
Ma-ia-hii 😮
Ma-ia-huu😩
Ma-ia-hoo😮
Ma-ia-haa😯
Vrei🔜 sa pleci dar nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma iei🏃♂️,
Nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma iei🏃♂️, nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma iei🏃♂️.
Chipul👩 tau si dragostea❤️ din tei🌳,
Mi-amintesc 🧠de ochii tai👀.
Vrei sa pleci dar nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma iei🏃♂️,
Nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma iei🏃♂️, nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma, nu🚫 ma iei🏃♂️.
Chipul👩 tau si dragostea❤️ din tei🌳,
Mi-amintesc🧠 de ochii tai👀.
He's so pleased with himself when he sees the sign on Streetview and gets to say the line but to be totally fair here he earned it
I don't know how many of my followers are furries but we just lost one of ours.
He died because the medical industry in the US refused to help. He was murdered in a million little ways, with a million automated systems.
He was on bluesky no more than five hours ago, now he's gone.
Dragoneer ran FurAffinity, which is more or less the furry art site. It looks like its' from the early aughts, has no native pdf support, and has zero discoverability or algorithmic function. It's home to me, it's always been home.
No matter how often I moved or how often my life radically changed, there was FA. I met my husband on the forums. Through the majority of its' life, Dragoneer kept it running. He never sold us out, never tried to keep up with trends. It's a community.
And there is something bitter about losing someone who was key to keeping one of the relics of the internet before corporations took over.
We have our home, but it's lost its' keeper.
Good night, Neer. You kept the lights on.
There's a little ritual FA has. The dead aren't forgotten or deleted, nor is the passing unmarked.
Normal, unbanned accounts are tagged with a tilde before the username, like this
In the event of a death, the symbol is changed to an infinity sign. My friend Anna passed three years ago
I guess it's one more user added to the list
Here for a little time, remembered in the community forever.
everybodys gotta get back into the practice of using pseudonyms online... i remember the time of screen names where u never ever told anyone ur real name and that was just understood as basic internet safety. plus having a screen name is fun because sometimes it sticks so well that it becomes part of ur identity that u can use in whatever facet of ur life you choose. it rocks to pick your own name
idk if this is a contreversial take or not but i think that the ideal internet experience is being able to remove specific things (triggers, nsfw, gore) if you truly dont want to see them but overall being also shown things you aren’t interested in. i think one of my fave things about tumblr is seeing like 50% of my dash be about fandoms im not in, bands i dont like and quotes from books i dont want to read rather than this endless feedback loop of tiktok showing me ‘exactly what i want to see’ in a trap to keep me online as long as possible and blind to communities outside of my own. i want a mix of curating my own experience and a healthy dose of content i don’t already know i want to see, yknow?
I think about this a lot lol
I think about this sometimes, like my immediate friends my family would be able to find and tell
But like do you announce it in the discord servers I'm in? Can they even get into my computer or phone?, or the accounts to say I'm gone? Things like my tumblr they don't even know about, and there's friends in games that they won't know exist. For some people I might just drop off the face of the earth inexplicably.. and that's sad. I want to be able to say goodbye
Some time ago, recent enough for it to still hurt, an online friend of mine was suffering from bronchitis. She was coughing a lot, but could not afford to go to the emergency room and so decided to tough it out. The next day was her birthday, and the last we heard from her was that she was still coughing.
We woke up to wish her happy birthday, and learned that she was dead.
And I cannot tell you enough about how much it still hurts to think about, or how I still get sad every time her birthday comes around, or how it's left a permanent dim on my own birthday, just a few days after hers.
But what I can tell you is that the people she lived with knew how important her online friends were to her, and made sure that we knew she was gone. We made sure to let others know who had even less ties to her online, so that no one was left wondering where she went. We crowdfunded money to send flowers to her mother, who didn't know who we were. We talk about her still. I hang onto images that remind me of her, and look at our old conversations sometimes.
I will continue to find ways to keep Brona in my life after she is gone, because she would have cheered me on the whole way.
I know of other stories that aren't mine to tell, but I mainly want you to know that your online friends will miss you and mourn for you, even if you can't say goodbye. They will keep you on their friendslist and save screenshots of your words. Our digital remains are not ghosts, but cherished memories, and I hope that brings some comfort.
