firecat

Dear Exchange creator: Thank you for making something for me!

My number one want: I hope you create something you enjoy, and have fun. I've included my likes and opt-ins, in case you want something to start from, but it's absolutely fine with me if you want to go in a different direction.

This is my generic list of likes, opt-ins, and DNWs for exchanges where I didn't create a letter with specific prompts.

Now with cat!

( Read more... )

Who should get the $$ per month I was donating to Graham Platner?

I just found out the local library (RWC) is sponsoring a talk entitled “The transgender assault on Women and Girls”. The description of the talk says it’s about allowing trans women in women’s sports, but the title and the descriptions of the speakers sure as heck makes it look like it’s about more than that. In other ways this library has been very welcoming to LGBTQ+.

I want to respond but I’m having trouble figuring out how. I don’t mind being out to the city government or library but I don’t want to wade through a lot of vitriol if I post publicly. Do you have any thoughts?

Options:
Write an email to the local newspaper where the announcement was posted
Write an email to someone at the library, but who?
Write an email to the county Pride center
Write an email to the city council
Post on NextDoor
Post on Facebook (the local library has a page) and Bluesky

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minhwa

A team of narrators did an impeccable podfic of one of my stories! It’s a crossover between Star Trek: The Next Generation and 2001: A Space Odyssey.

[Podfic] Dreamer in the Dark by celli_pods, contributor-sky (deepestbluesky), KtInSunshine, peasina, semperfiona_podfic (semperfiona), sisi_rambles, vexbatch pods (vexbatch), with (poemreads), xia_pods

I wrote what I thought was a fun and helpful comment somewhere on R3ddut. The mods decided it was written by AI so they removed it. Do I get a statue with three arms and six fingers per hand as a reward? Should I missspel more words in my next comment?

This is an ~30-minute episode of a Vox podcast called “Today Explained.” There is a transcript.

”How fan fiction went mainstream: The community that underpins Heated Rivalry, explained” by Danielle Hewitt and Noel King

It’s a pretty good intro to fanfic and how it’s become something publishers and creators of TV/movies pay attention to. They interview Francesca Kappa, a co-founder of the Organization for Transformative Works, which created AO3.

Things I learned and some bits I liked:

AO3 was created in part to prevent commodification of fanfiction and the social connections it facilitates.
“one of the projects that I worked on in the early days of the OTW organization for transformative works was that we were being contacted by women in their 70s and 80s who were like having to move in with their kids or going into nursing homes and they had like 3,000 fan fiction zines.”
It was claimed that AO3 is “much bigger than Wikipedia.” I’m not sure what metrics they’re using to come up with that.
[AO3 is] “structurally unenshittifiable” because “we don’t have customers and we’re not a business.”
(Discussing copyright) “it would have been terrible if Shakespeare had to, like, negotiate with Netflix for the right to Hamlet and then didn't get it. Like, that's the world we live in, right? We're like, Netflix owns Hamlet, it has a five-year option, Shakespeare really has a great idea for it, but like, no, I'm really sorry because JJ. Abrams is going to do Hamlet.”
(I need to know which circle of Hell shows JJ Abrams’s Hamlet on repeat, because I really want to avoid it.)

”In 25-Country Survey, Americans Especially Likely To View Fellow Citizens as Morally Bad” by several authors

The details about which countries line up where on the individual issues that Pew chose to use in its survey is interesting, but what really strikes me about this article is the list of issues itself.

Married ppl having an affair
Using marijuana
Viewing pornography
Gambling
Having an abortion
Homosexuality
Drinking alcohol
Getting a divorce
Using contraceptives

How did they come up with this silly list and what does it have with morality? At first I thought it was based in monotheistic religions, but there’s only one overlap with the Ten Commandments and I don’t remember anything about most of those in the New Testament either. (I don’t know much about the others.) All of the things in this list are either completely morally acceptable (contraceptives, being gay) or are unacceptable only insofar as they often lead to harming others (alcohol). Whereas murdering, stealing, and telling lies about other people should be in any list of potentially immoral behaviors. Because “does it cause lasting harm to others” is the most important determinant of what’s moral and immoral. At least that’s how it looks from here.
/soapbox

How does the concept of morality fit into your life?

“But I had an epiphany. You know what all this sycophancy constantly being told you’re right, that you’re brilliant, that every decision is flawless? That sounds an awful lot like being a billionaire.”

[sic - perhaps the grammatical error is to show the writer is not an AI]

"The Secret Tool AI Uses to Seduce You: Explained," by Taya Graham and Stephen Janis

I use AI to get answers to simple questions and I hate when the bot addresses me personally. I hate it possibly to an irrational degree. (Even when someone else shares with me an AI convo they had, I get mad.) Do you use AI for anything and what do you think of this design choice?

I guess Discord is going to start requiring users to prove they are over a certain age if they want to access certain content.

I mainly use Discord to keep connected to fanfic fandom, most of which has certain content. And I definitely am not going to upload my ID.

Does this affect you? If so, what are you going to do when it goes into effect?

This article boils down to “we told you so.” But I like how it explains why the mainstream media dismissed and downplayed what we told you (because their “how to do journalism” rules demand it, e.g.: “Insist on a both-sides structure even when one side is lying“).

“The Media Malpractice That Sent America Tumbling Into Trumpism” by Parker Molloy
https://newrepublic.com/article/205913/media-malpractice-trumpism-project-2025

It’s the 10th anniversary of the first broadcast of Lucifer, which is one of my top 3 favorite TV shows.*
I FEEL SO OLD 😭

*The other two are Star Trek the original series and Babylon 5, just don’t ask me in what order.

What makes you feel old or young?
What are your favorite TV shows?

*sigh* I was just reminded that Peet’s Coffee is owned by a larger corporation now (has been for some time). I‘d rather support a smaller company. If you make coffee from ground beans at home, what is your go-to source? Bonus for fair trade and all those other green, good-citizen buzzwords.

Turns out that listening to an audiobook of The Witcher in the vicinity of an iThing can cause a mildly irritating problem

From the “You don’t say!🙀” files
(Content note: The article uses language that frames ADHD as a problem)

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/adhd-advantage-hypercuriosity

The New Yorker is trying to convince me that Bluesky has become annoying and everyone’s back on Xitter. Not linking because it’s paywalled. True or false?

I never got the hang of Twitter. I have similar problems with Bluesky. I don’t need a social site to deliver me more links. I want conversation. Is conversation dead? Where is it? (I know there’s some here…)

I miss Usenet, lol

Just got out of a week intubated in the icu (not outta the woods but on the mend) and had lost my ability to walk I felt proud of being able to walk around as a fat person so I was embarrassed and described myself as ”weak as a newborn kitten” but when I thought about it I realized kittens come out pretty darn weak but they’re designed to develop into killing machines whch they do in short order yeah I got this. No plans to kill any one just, metaphors have power

OK, who should be the next Bond? I’m impressed by the wide range of suggestions here. I especially liked the suggestion for Rege-Jean Page. No one mentioned Joseph Mawle, Edward Bluemel, Harry Lloyd, or Matthew Goode, though. Or Tobias Menzies!

What do you think?

Guardian readers make nominations for the next Bond

My fave is the semicolon; however, I refuse to cede em-dashes or any other punctuation marks to ChatGPT.

These attacks on the em dash — a ChatGPT hyphen? How very dare you! — have in turn blazed across social media spaces populated by the kind of folks who will tell you, unprompted, that they have a favorite punctuation mark and what it is. (It is very likely the em dash.) — https://www.salon.com/2025/06/11/ai-cant-have-my-em-dash/

"Peter Stormare Gives Update on ‘Constantine 2’; Keanu Reeves Reportedly Unhappy with Script" by Meagan Navarro (very similar articles seen on a number of other entertainment news sites).

"'But to do a sequel, the studios want to have, you know, cars flying in the air. They want to have people doing flip-flops and fighting action scenes,' Stormare said."

I think I agree with Keanu. We already have the John Wick franchise. IT IS AWESOME. But we don't need the Keanu-as-Constantine franchise to turn into another John Wick franchise.

I hope they resolve this soon because I am DROOLING at the chance to see Stormare play Lucifer again.

Profile

firecat (attention machine in need of calibration)

July 2026

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
			1	2	3	4
5	6	7	8	9	10	11
12	13	14	15	16	17	18
19	20	21	22	23	24	25
26	27	28	29	30	31

Page Summary

Active Entries

Style Credit

Base style: Modular by branchandroot
Theme: Purple Haze by timeasmymeasure

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags

Page generated 9 Jul 2026 09:09 am

tiny purple fishes run laughing through your fingers

Recent Entries

Dear Exchange Creator

Contents

Well, ugh.

(Advice request) Upset and unsure how to respond

Guess what movie I just watched

Inspired by

Firsts

Look, the outsiders have discovered fanfic again

You Keep Using That Word, I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means

Got insincere flattery?

Discord age verification

Duck, politics incoming

Happy Anniversary

Where do you get your coffee beans?

Consequences

ADHD research

We need to talk

no subject

The next Bond?

Hey AI — hands off my em-dash

(Keanu-as-) Constantine 2!

Profile

July 2026

Links

Page Summary

Tags

Active Entries

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

Syndicate