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hikari-ni-naritai · 3 months

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How do you manage to enjoy shows with a lot of like, unavoidable problems? I've seen your posts about the like, cool creativity and such in middling isekai, and I want to appreciate stuff like that too, but I usually can't get myself to ignore the worse parts. How do you do it?

i mean it depends on what you mean by 'problems'. if you mean like, bad writing, that i cant offer any advice on because i have never had a discerning eye. in fact, watching isekai is kinda what taught me to notice when something was bad. before id think things were either really good or just enjoyable and okay. im teaching myself the discernment i lack. but crucially, that is all in my head. in my heart i still very much enjoy things that arent very good because like. i can put good taste in my head but it doesnt mean i feel it in my heart.

but if you mean like 'the problematic elements'. that is an entirely different question. and im not sure im qualified to answer it, really, since i grew up with 'problematic elements' being that something was like. not christian. i dropped that obviously but i didnt exactly like, swap it out for anything. so my aversion to problematic elements is just kinda mostly gone.

but like. a lot of it is that like, i recognize that the media i consume is not a statement on my political beliefs, and i have a very firm foundation for my morality. yes its morally reprehensible for an isekai to portray slavery as like. A Good Thing For These Girls Actually, but Emily doesnt believe slavery is good. so if a girl in an anime is perfectly happy dressing like a maid and being some guys slave, that has no effect on what i believe in real life. if an isekai portrays the monarchist nobility as a good and necessary institution, that doesnt affect Emily's belief that monarchy is dogshit and nobility is double dogshit. if sousou no frieren's depiction of demons as mimicry predators of humans is fascist because it creates an ontologically evil Other that looks like humans yet is incapable of true emotion and needs to be wiped out, that doesnt affect Emily's belief in the intrinsic value of all human life and the fact that genocide is extremely fucking evil.

so like. figure out what you believe and why you believe it, recognize problematic elements in media, and dont let them affect your beliefs. if your problem is that people will think youre a bad person for watching something, understand that those people dont dictate your beliefs either.

but also yknow, a lot of it is the fact that nobody's complaining about these things bc theyre not popular. nobody's discoursing about black summoner, nobody's bitching about smartphone isekai, nobody's discussing karakara. its a lot harder to enjoy things when youre hearing discourse about them constantly. it feels safer to draw your own conclusions, even if those conclusions are 'this is a problematic representation of this thing'. theres no pressure to hate it for its faults bc nobody gives a shit except you. yknow?

anyway theres still lines i dont like to cross, like i hate watching shows with sexual assault or severe bullying, but thats only bc it makes me uncomfortable to watch, not bc i think theres anything wrong with depicting it in art.

if you choose to try and change this about yourself, i wish you the best of luck! it takes time and will probably be uncomfortable, but personally i think its worth it.

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thesinglesjukebox · 4 years

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100 GECS FT. CHARLI XCX, RICO NASTY & KERO KERO BONITO - RINGTONE (REMIX)

[6.00]

At last, something we can all agree on...

Wayne Weizhen Zhang: Chaotic Evil ft. Chaotic Good, Lawful Evil & Lawful Good. [8]

Brad Shoup: Please know that, due to my age and disorder in which everything sounds like pop-punk, I'm treating my delight in 100 gecs with extreme suspicion. The worried bruise of the original "Ringtone"'s bridge finds its double in Rico Nasty's gleefully conflicted verse. Sarah Bonito tries to sneak in a horror short, Charli chirps like a phone that's never going to voicemail. I feel like I'm listening to The Geometrid. I keep waiting for T-Pain, the human ringtone, to show up. [8]

Oliver Maier: I am slightly self-conscious about how much I like this, given that it is such blatant fan service for a) 20-somethings who frequent the main trifecta of [x]heads music subreddits b) Twitter stans who rabidly demand "COLLAB"s from their faves c) Anthony Fantano (only one of these applies to me). If the existence of this remix somehow precedes an uptick in collaborations between Extremely Online™ musicians then I can only hope that they all be so well-executed. The "Ringtone" remix is both wilder than the original and shockingly coherent, I think because all three performers tap into the most elemental versions of themselves. Charli's verse and perfect delivery of an already-great hook would be at home on the cartoonish Number 1 Angel, less so on her moodier self-titled. Sarah from KKB revisits the uncanny children's-show-presenter flow that characterised the group's breakout project and then subsequently vanished. Rico is just as berserk as one would hope. 100 gecs is objectively a very silly project, but the care with which this remix -- a clusterfuck on paper -- is structured into something both logical and extremely listenable only demonstrates how seriously Brady and Les take their tomfoolery. The gecs are among the best to emerge from the post-PC Music boom because they so firmly reject the parameters of good taste and make redundant the tiresome question of whether their intentions are cynical or sincere. You don't make pop music this brilliant and unselfconscious without pouring your heart into it. [9]

Katherine St Asaph: The other day I read a thinkpiece about, among dozens of other things, how Billie Eilish was corporate bullshit and 100 gecs were wholesome DIY outsiders, despite the gecs at that point having already signed to Mad Decent, producing tracks by the likes of Slayyyter and LIZ, and playing ukelele for an America's Got Talent winner. There is so much Discourse like this, and it all makes me so, so exhausted. What about one collection of sound waves (or Bacon-Sheeran number, or accumulated total of bar hangs with hypebeasts) makes it morally bankrupt, while a near-identical collection of sound waves remains morally acceptable? The rapping sounds like Lady Gaga's "Christmas Tree." [2]

Leah Isobel: Making actual pop music demands legibility and the sacrifice of gecs' usual chaos, but this remix manages to keep their interplay of melodic sweetness and noisy menace intact -- see Laura's charmingly polite request for Charli to sing the chorus again before the song nosedives into the "Click" outro. It's like Owl City corrupted with a virus, and it slaps. [9]

Vikram Joseph: I have some questions for the girl asking Charli to sing the chorus again, because we did *not* need that chorus again. "Ringtone" was a pleasant bit of nonsense at 2:20, but padding it out to almost four minutes with guest vocalists (of whom only Rico Nasty sounds vaguely engaged) is a good way to siphon away whatever charm it had to begin with. Sometimes... things that are expensive... are worse. [4]

Jibril Yassin: The rare example of a posse track that succeeds without removing what made the original so great. Let's put 100 gecs in charge of pop posse tracks from now till infinity. [8]

Alfred Soto: Despite the riot of credits, "Ringtone" is closer to a poor 2010 Ke$ha album track. Ringtones? A decade later? The beat sounds like the creators stole it from a Bush-era Nokia. [4]

Alex Clifton: Our featured players here are the highlight of the song, bringing liveliness to a beat that would otherwise be too glitchy for me. And yet after a while it has the same effect that a phone ringing for two minutes does: slightly annoying, loud enough that you can't ignore it, but too muffled in your bag to find where it could be. Please note my score is expressed in gecs instead of points. [5]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: It's too long and labored over, lacking the giddy charm of the original because the voices are too straightforward. It's fun seeing all these artists on the same track, but all this does is prove that 100 gecs is even more singular than we may have initially thought. [3]

Tim de Reuse: 100 gecs don't work nearly as well for me on such low energy, and their usual reckless abandon appears to have been reined in here so as to elevate the presence of their high-profile features. That, along with the nearly four-minute runtime (about twice as long as a 100 gecs track ought to be, by my measure) gives this the character of a listen-once joke. To be clear, it's a delightful joke. [6]

Ian Mathers: Absolutely better than the original (and "Money Machine" for that matter), mostly because it no longer sounds like Big Dumb Face trying to adapt to modern trends. But it does make me wonder if this is what the people who didn't like Charli's work with PC Music felt like they were hearing. [5]

Jonathan Bradley: 100 gecs let the lil homies ride on us; it's like showing up to gecsCon -- surely a real thing that could exist -- with a grocery bag full of Monster, weed and money, and discovering in astonishment that other people like this band too. (One infamous afternoon, I played 1000 gecs for my office; they were distraught, but I since found out I converted at least one co-worker.) So everyone in this PC Music Khaled lineup tries hard to do their best gecs, with Charli leaning into the lovestruck cutesiness, Sarah Bonito trying to channel the uneasy relationship with technology, and Rico summoning the unearned confidence. But although the elements that original gecs Dylan and Laura stick together sound familiar, their sound is a singular one: A.G. Cook and co. are too deliberate; Black Dresses too consumed by the horror and anxiety around them; Ayesha Erotica too singleminded; Brokencyde too scene. The best part in the remix is when Laura Les asks Charli to sing the chorus again, doing more gecs in one line than anyone else could in three verses. It turns out there's something particular to this mish-mash of pop enthusiasm, hypermodern tension, and shitposting that is not easily replicable. "You just copy everything we do," Laura once chirped, prophetically. "If I wasn't me, I'd copy me too." There's only one gec, even when there's 100 of them. [7]

Kylo Nocom: You know, all that matters is that they had fun. [6]

#100 gecs #Charli XCX #Rico Nasty #Kero Kero Bonito #remix #pop #music #music review

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klimpaloon-loves-superwholock · 6 years

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I know this is a bit late, and I don’t usually make original posts, but I want to gather my thoughts on VLD s7, even though I literally never participate in fandom discourse lol. So I guess we’ll see how this goes.

There were great parts of this season. Let’s start with that.

First of all, Hunk was incredible and I’m so glad he finally got an arc where he could shine, even if I feel like it was long overdue. Seriously, I feel like Hunk was the best part of this season and I cannot state enough how much effect he had on my overall impression of the season. He basically carried the season singlehandedly and I don’t understand why searching through the tag rn I can hardly find any appreciation for him this season. (yeah jk I know why ha)

Everything they did with the Paladins’ families (from Hunk’s arc about rescuing his parents to Lance reuniting with his family and his relationship with Veronica to freaking Colleen!!!! just straight up stealing the show for two episodes!!! What an icon I love her so much!) was absolutely perfect. (I will say I’ve seen speculation that Hunk’s sister and her kids died since they weren’t there in his hospital room, which I desperately hope is not the case since that really should have been mentioned.)

I also loved seeing Shiro take charge and become Captain of the Atlas without even seeming to realize that he was the man for the job.

Sendak was a formidable and interesting villain who raised the stakes, which made it more satisfying when they defeated him.

I enjoyed getting to know Romelle more and see her in action.

Coran and the mice’s team up to break out the rest of the gang was very good and funny.

KOSMO!!!!!!! A GOOD PUPPY!!!!!! HE HAS A NAME!! I LOVE HIM SO!!!

I enjoyed seeing Lotor’s ex-generals again (because I love them), although I do have some issues which I’ll get to later.

The new characters they introduced, mainly Rizavi, Leifsdottir, Kinkade, Veronica, and Griffin were all great and I loved them! They did a great job of making me care about these new people. (And Kinkade is drawn so pretty what the heck y’all sleepin on this beautiful dude)

Seriously Colleen was so great I cannot stress this enough. I’ve been feeling for this poor woman who thought that she’d lost her whole family since season 1 so I’m so glad to finally see her in action, fighting for her family and her planet.

They did a good job of setting up Admiral Sanda’s inevitable betrayal, even if it was a really stupid thing for her to do.

Ep 5 was great; I was super excited to see what the Druids looked like under their masks, Macidus and Keith’s teleporting fight was awesome, and it’s always great to see Allura’s magic develop more, even when I wish it wasn’t so unclear how/what she’s doing.

Lots of the fights were so cool, from the Voltron team taking down the Galra drones in the cave system in Ep 2 to all the MFE fights to Shiro’s rematch against Sendak to even Voltron’s fight against the Robeast. These fights, I’ve noticed, are always especially cool when they unlock a new ability like Hunk’s turrets and Voltron’s double swords. Also I forgot how strong Alteans are until Romelle just straight up ripped apart a drone.

As much as I overall didn’t like The Feud as an episode, it did have some great moments with Pidge taking down Bob, Allura and Hunk being cute in the background, and the team being overall really supportive and loving of each other.

Shay came to visit Hunk!!!!!!!

Unfortunately, as you may have guessed, I also have a lot of problems with this season. Ones that, for me, are too serious to ignore. But let’s start with my more minor grievances, then work our way up to the big ones, shall we?

I don’t like Shiro’s new arm. It reminds me too much of Sendak’s and is too bulky/strange looking for for my taste. And for some reason my eyes have a hard time finding it? Like they’re drawn to the light emanating from his shoulder and not the forearm/hand. Idk, but I’m not a fan.

I wish Griffin had apologized to Keith for being such a jerk about his parents. I kept waiting for it since they had all these long glances with each other. I came to like him despite the bad initial impression only because he proved to be a good leader who valued every member of his team and knew when to step aside because someone else was better at a job. But I still kinda needed resolution for his rudeness, especially since he’s obviously grown since then and should want to make amends.

Admiral Sanda’s just so freaking stupid????? Like, how did she get that high in ranking when she consistently makes such bad decisions???? Clearly the dictator who’s controlling earth who comes from a war-mongering culture that enslaves and destroys planets isn’t just gonna let y’all go once he gets Voltron. He’s either gonna continue using you as slaves because nothing’s stopping him or destroy you because you’re no longer useful. Listen to people who know the Galra better than you!!

I saw somewhere that Matt has a girlfriend now???? When did this happen????

They somehow got the ENTIRE BALMERA to Earth?!!!????!!?!?!?!? How did they build a teleduv big enough to do that!?!

Also, where did they get a teleduv? Did the Atlas have one? Or was that something that they built during the epilogue montage??

How did Keith summon his bayard telepathically?? Was that a Galra thing or a new Paladin ability?

How did Shiro manage to survive falling from space to earth on the outside of a ship while fighting Sendak?? I mean I’m really glad he lived, but??? How??

I don’t think we needed so much time dedicated to Sam Holt updating the Garrison and then the rest of earth on what happened in space. I kinda appreciated it since it’s been a long time since I watched the early seasons, but at the same time he didn’t tell them anything that was new information to us as viewers. The only things we gained from those scenes were how others reacted to this info. (And we still didn’t get to see the reaction of the person I was most interested in, Adam, but I’ll get to that later.)

This is a problem I’ve been having with the show since like season 3 or so, but how much time has passed? They actually explicitly said it at a couple of points this season, what with 3 years having gone by for most people but only a few weeks for the Voltron team, but why did that time difference happen? Also, how much time passed between the team leaving Earth and them fighting Lotor in last season’s finale? Because I could believe any time frame between 6 months to a few years for that, which makes a big difference in how old the paladins are. According to the show, Sam landed on earth 4 years before the team gets back to the Milky Way, so I guess Sam left the team a year before they faught Lotor??

I didn’t get the thing with Allura’s crown gem? Since when is that a power source? And I was really struck by the imagery of her literally throwing her crown away to help her friend, but I feel like it would’ve been more powerful if we had been given some information about what exactly that gem is and what it means for her. Just make this more clear for me. Also, Shiro has already lashed out and hurt people against his will, so I really didn’t need that angsty moment for him.

The B-plot in Ep 1 was tonally dissonant from the A-plot of Shiro’s flashbacks, and it ended up being totally useless anyway. As much as I enjoyed Romelle and Hunk’s banter in those parts, they would’ve been better placed somewhere else. They should’ve just dedicated the whole episode to Shiro’s flashbacks and given us more information about him.

If they were going to mention that Shiro had a progressive disease in his flashbacks, then they need to explicitly mention in the show that he doesn’t have it anymore. As it is, people who don’t know about the SDCC announcements are just gonna assume he still has it. If it doesn’t happen in the show, it’s not canon. Also, if he’s had this disease the whole time, then why is s7 the first time it’s mentioned? The way he held his arm in the flashback reminded me of the way he held it when his Galra arm activated for the first time. Did the arm help fight the progression of the disease like that lil wristband did? If so, that should’ve been explained and made clear a long time ago. It just bothers me that this is the first time we’re hearing about this major part of Shiro’s life that he’s been fighting with, and that in show we’re given absolutely no resolution for it.

I guess the gem powering Shiro’s arm and the Castleship diamond powering the Atlas connected somehow?? Which is how Shiro turned it into a giant robot? ??????????????? I’m genuinely very confused on what was going on there. It needed to be made more clear. I was on board for whatever they were doing at first just because Shiro looked so pretty in that lighting, but they took it in the weirdest direction possible. Why would anyone care about Voltron anymore when you’ve got a bigger, stronger robot now? Voltron’s no longer the most powerful weapon in the universe - the Atlas is. And it only became such by coincidence. Which is just. Irritating.

The Feud episode. Oh boy. First of all, I got some serious emotional whiplash from the change to this episode. It just didn’t seem to fit in with the rest of the season at all. Second, they just really did not have to spend that much time making fun of Lance for being stupid. Especially when he’s not. Also, the first two of the people he had to identify had masks on, and Lance had only met them briefly. ALSO you’re telling me that Lance, the most social and outgoing of the Voltron team, is the one who’s bad with names/faces????? ALSO spending less time teasing Lance would’ve opened up more time for giving Hunk and Allura their own activities. ALSO everyone else on the team gets a little speech about how they’re valuable, but Lance just gets “I don’t want to be stuck with him forever”?????? That’s so freaking messed up. Third, the whole premise of the episode was strange to me. Like why would an all powerful being who tests heroes do it in this way? It seems to me that that premise fits Ep 6, where they were stranded in space, much better. They were genuinely tested then, and the forces that attacked them and propelled them through lightyears of space were never explained, so saying that Bob did it and propelled them towards their goal as a reward for passing the test could’ve been a satisfying answer to those questions. And fourth, can I also ask why Morvok was the fourth player?? Like he’s a nonentity in terms of villains. And they still didn’t have the same number of players as team Voltron. Haggar’s still alive, so they could’ve put Sendak on there too. And for the fifth player they could’ve put on a fan favorite villain character. One who showed up in more episodes than Morvok did. One who died a while back and who the fans have wanted to see again ever since. Like, I don’t know, NARTI!! Ugh.

The Robeast. I just. This season could’ve ended on a pretty high note if they had just cut that out and just went straight to the lil epilogue after defeating Sendak. As cool as that fight was at parts, it caused a pretty low finale, which is pretty disappointing after last season’s incredible finale. I get that they needed to foreshadow Haggar’s return to this fight or whatever they’re doing for next season and that she’s been working on the lost Alteans, apparently, but it was just a strange note to end on. Especially with the weird addition of Atlas to the Giant Robot Squad. And Allura’s line “Seriously? We just defeated Sendak and now we gotta deal with this?!?!” (I’m paraphrasing) was a MOOD.

Okay, so this post has gotten kinda out of control, so I’m gonna have to save the biggest issue I had (betcha can guess what it is) for another post. So. Look out for Part 2 of this nonsense. Feel free to reblog with your own ideas/input!

#voltron #vld spoilers #vld s7 #vld discourse #criticism

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coin-river-blog · 5 years

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Anti-government activists in Thailand are using crypto tech to help prevent authorities from censoring “Rap Against Dictatorship,” a controversial music video that has gone viral in the country. The video, which excoriates Thai government and military authorities on a number of social issues, has achieved runaway success in Thailand, amassing more than 28 million views on YouTube since it was released on October 22.

‘Rap Against Dictatorship’ Finds a Home on the Blockchain

“Rap Against Dictatorship” goes after authorities in the kingdom, lambasting them for their role in Thai problems such as government-level corruption, military high-handedness, censorship, and legal double standards, among other matters. Though comments were turned off on the video, it has gathered more than 925,000 “likes” on YouTube and just 25,000 “dislikes,” indicating that its message resonates with the majority of viewers.

youtube

Spooked by the video’s potential to encourage anti-government public discourse in the country which has famously repressive anti-dissent laws, Thai authorities have already responded with a series of actions aimed at creating a chilling effect on any movements sparked by the video. The country’s deputy national police chief, Srivara Ransibrahmanakul, has warned that the video may be breaking the law, and a number of artists who created the video have been summoned to testify before the country’s National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO).

In an attempt to prevent the video from being lost to censorship, an unknown individual has placed “Rap Against Dictatorship” on the Zcoin blockchain using an IPFS link embedded in a transaction on the blockchain. Zcoin is a privacy coin which is the first full implementation of the Zerocoin Protocol, not to be confused with the Zerocash Protocol. The video now has a permanent and indelible copy in the IPFS link on the Zcoin blockchain at block number 111089.

Speaking about the pioneering development, Poramin Insom, who is the founder and lead developer of Zcoin, as well as a Thai national, said:

“We don’t know who added the IPFS link to their transaction, but this link has been secured by the blockchain and cannot be removed or hidden. Furthermore, by using Zerocoin protocol, the Zcoin blockchain keeps the link is private and therefore the identities of the uploading parties cannot be known.”

Exclusive Interview With Zcoin Founder

CCN recently had a chat with Poramin to get his take on what the development means for activism in Thailand and for the expanding usage of blockchain technology globally.

CCN: Let’s say the Thai government succeeds in getting this video taken off YouTube, how will people in the country be able to access it from the Zcoin blockchain? Poramin: The primary technology behind this is Inter Planetary File Systems (IPFS) where the actual file is being stored in a distributed way and replicated throughout the IPFS network. It is the IPFS link that is uploaded on the blockchain as a kind of uncensorable and permanent bookmark.The easiest way to access the file is to go to https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipfs/ and then enter the IPFS link that is embedded into the Zcoin blockchain on block 111089. This will play the video. This allows an easy to share link even if it is blocked from YouTube. Even if the government blocks gateway.ipfs.io, it still can be accessed by downloading the IPFS program and then accessing the file using that same link. The role of Zcoin’s blockchain is merely embedding the link permanently in a place where it cannot easily be taken down, while doing it in such a way (via the Zerocoin protocol) where there is no trace to who put up the link.

CCN: Are Thai authorities aware of the reality of non-censorship that the blockchain can create? What do you think their next move will be?

Poramin: I believe Thai authorities are still coming to grips on blockchain technology, and although there have been many positive developments — for example with regulation and licensing of digital exchanges — I think they are yet to realize the full implications of the technology. It’s just a matter of continuous engagement and education.

In this case, it is actually IPFS that does the storage, with the blockchain serving as a timestamp and “uncensorable bookmark” of sorts. The posting on the blockchain seems to be more of a statement of the futility of censorship rather than anything else.

For those evading censorship, the allure of blockchain is that it offers permanence. Websites, social media and other places can be blocked or brought down, but it’s nearly impossible to alter a public blockchain like Zcoin. Although other blockchains like Bitcoin and Ethereum can be used as well, they don’t hide transaction history, so a determined blockchain analyst may still be able to identify the poster.

While I’m uncertain how Thai authorities will react, I do hope they realize that blockchains change the way information is disseminated, much akin to how social media in the past decade or so has played a pivotal role in politics. Attempts to censor social media have generally been unsuccessful, perhaps with the exception of China, with its nation-wide implementation of its Great Firewall.

CCN: If this video’s permanent record on the blockchain becomes a rallying point against censorship and government malfeasance in Thailand, do you see similar actions being taken in other parts of the world?

Poramin: The use of blockchain for anti-censored content is rather low, as social media is still a much more convenient and widespread [medium] used to incite public outrage in most parts of the world. However, in China, where they do succeed in blocking and monitoring social media, blockchain was used to embed the text of a controversial open letter which spoke against Peking University. There is also an interesting use case when Catalonia, who sought independence from Spain, used IPFS (not blockchain) to let people know where to vote.

I am excited to see the use of technology like Zerocoin, which allows anonymous but verifiable voting or polling where you can prove that someone has participated in the vote, but not which way they voted. This means people can vote without fear. This would be an amazingly powerful tool for governments and citizens alike, and combined with a permanent recording of votes on the blockchain, allows for an unforgeable and anonymous voting system.

CCN: On the flip-side, what if someone were to use this functionality to upload something objectively wrong like child pornography? Is there any protocol for dealing with such an eventuality? Would that perhaps help the Thai government and other repressive governments around the world to make a case against blockchain technology?

Poramin: Zcoin’s blockchain is not hosting the content itself, it’s only hosting the link to the content on IPFS. Also we are technologically neutral and a public utility. As with the internet, blockchain can be used for both good things and bad things. In this case, I think its potential and various use cases are much greater. IPFS has some inbuilt mechanisms where those running IPFS nodes can optionally choose to implement blacklists should they wish to do their best to comply with their local laws.

Also, for most people, you would need a block explorer and to know exactly which block to find the link. Unlike messages or political statements which can be made public and permanent, child pornography links would not really make sense to be stored on a public blockchain as there are many other more discreet ways to share it, such as on the deep web (not that we are condoning it).

CCN: There are thousands of competing blockchains in existence. In your opinion, why was Zcoin chosen specifically to store this very important video? Poramin: Zcoin is dedicated to enhancing privacy, whether digital, financial, or social. Our blockchain is designed to prevent the exposure of identities or any shared data, so its privacy mechanisms will naturally appeal to those wanting to resist censorship. While it was never Zcoin’s intention to be a platform for this specifically, it’s interesting to see how the technology can serve people in many different ways. Zcoin has also had some significant exposure in Thailand, which may have also resonated with the person who posted the video on the Zcoin blockchain.

Featured Image from Shutterstock

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cryptnus-blog · 5 years

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Activists Use Crypto to Protect 'Rap Against Dictatorship' from Censorship

New Post has been published on https://cryptnus.com/2018/11/activists-use-crypto-to-protect-rap-against-dictatorship-from-censorship/

Activists Use Crypto to Protect 'Rap Against Dictatorship' from Censorship

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‘Rap Against Dictatorship’ Finds a Home on the Blockchain

youtube

Speaking about the pioneering development, Poramin Insom, who is the founder and lead developer of Zcoin, as well as a Thai national, said:

Exclusive Interview With Zcoin Founder

CCN recently had a chat with Poramin to get his take on what the development means for activism in Thailand and for the expanding usage of blockchain technology globally.

CCN: Are Thai authorities aware of the reality of non-censorship that the blockchain can create? What do you think their next move will be?

Featured Image from Shutterstock

Follow us on Telegram or subscribe to our newsletter here. Who is Buying Bitcoin? Take the survey here and help us with our study.

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newstfionline · 7 years

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Prozac Nation Is Now the United States of Xanax

By Alex Williams, NY Times, June 10, 2017

This past winter, Sarah Fader, a 37-year-old social media consultant in Brooklyn who has generalized anxiety disorder, texted a friend in Oregon about an impending visit, and when a quick response failed to materialize, she posted on Twitter to her 16,000-plus followers. “I don’t hear from my friend for a day--my thought, they don’t want to be my friend anymore,” she wrote, appending the hashtag #ThisIsWhatAnxietyFeelsLike.

Thousands of people were soon offering up their own examples under the hashtag; some were retweeted more than 1,000 times. You might say Ms. Fader struck a nerve. “If you’re a human being living in 2017 and you’re not anxious,” she said on the telephone, “there’s something wrong with you.”

It was 70 years ago that the poet W.H. Auden published “The Age of Anxiety,” a six-part verse framing modern humankind’s condition over the course of more than 100 pages, and now it seems we are too rattled to even sit down and read something that long.

Anxiety has become our everyday argot, our thrumming lifeblood: not just on Twitter (the ur-anxious medium, with its constant updates), but also in blogger diaries, celebrity confessionals, a hit Broadway show (“Dear Evan Hansen”), a magazine start-up (Anxy, a mental-health publication based in Berkeley, Calif.), buzzed-about television series (like “Maniac,” a coming Netflix series by Cary Fukunaga, the lauded “True Detective” director) and, defying our abbreviated attention spans, on bookshelves.

While to epidemiologists both disorders are medical conditions, anxiety is starting to seem like a sociological condition, too: a shared cultural experience that feeds on alarmist CNN graphics and metastasizes through social media. As depression was to the 1990s--summoned forth by Kurt Cobain, “Listening to Prozac,” Seattle fog and Temple of the Dog dirges on MTV, viewed from under a flannel blanket--so it seems we have entered a new Age of Anxiety. Monitoring our heart rates. Swiping ceaselessly at our iPhones. Filling meditation studios in an effort to calm our racing thoughts.

Consider the fidget spinner: endlessly whirring between the fingertips of “Generation Alpha,” annoying teachers, baffling parents. Originally marketed as a therapeutic device to chill out children with anxiety, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder or autism, these colorful daisy-shaped gizmos have suddenly found an unlikely off-label use as perhaps the an explosively popular toy, this generation’s Rubik’s Cube.

But the Cube was fundamentally a cerebral, calm pursuit, perfect for the latchkey children of the 1980s to while away their lonely, Xbox-free hours. The fidget spinner is nothing but nervous energy rendered in plastic and steel, a perfect metaphor for the overscheduled, overstimulated children of today as they search for a way to unplug between jujitsu lessons, clarinet practice and Advanced Placement tutoring.

According to data from the National Institute of Mental Health, some 38 percent of girls ages 13 through 17, and 26 percent of boys, have an anxiety disorder. On college campuses, anxiety is running well ahead of depression as the most common mental health concern, according to a 2016 national study of more than 150,000 students by the Center for Collegiate Mental Health at Pennsylvania State University. Meanwhile, the number of web searches involving the term has nearly doubled over the last five years, according to Google Trends. (The trendline for “depression” was relatively flat.)

To Kai Wright, the host of the politically themed podcast “The United States of Anxiety” from WNYC, which debuted this past fall, such numbers are all too explicable. “We’ve been at war since 2003, we’ve seen two recessions,” Mr. Wright said. “Just digital life alone has been a massive change. Work life has changed. Everything we consider to be normal has changed. And nobody seems to trust the people in charge to tell them where they fit into the future.”

For “On Edge,” Ms. Petersen, a longtime reporter for The Wall Street Journal, traveled back to her alma mater, the University of Michigan, to talk to students about stress. One student, who has A.D.H.D., anxiety and depression, said the pressure began building in middle school when she realized she had to be at the top of her class to get into high school honors classes, which she needed to get into Advanced Placement classes, which she needed to get into college.

“In sixth grade,” she said, “kids were freaking out.”

This was not the stereotypical experience of Generation X.

Urban Dictionary defines a slacker as “someone who while being intelligent, doesn’t really feel like doing anything,” and that certainly captures the ripped-jean torpor of 1990s Xers.

For these youths of the 1990s, Nirvana’s “Lithium” was an anthem; coffee was a constant and Ms. Wurtzel’s “Prozac Nation: Young and Depressed in America,” about an anhedonic Harvard graduate from a broken home, dressed as if she could have played bass in Hole, was a bible.

The millennial equivalent of Ms. Wurtzel is, of course, Lena Dunham, who recently told an audience at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan, “I don’t remember a time not being anxious.” Having suffered debilitating anxiety since age 4, the creator, writer and star of the anxiety-ridden “Girls” recalled how she “missed 74 days of 10th grade” because she was afraid to leave her house. This was around the time that the largest act of terrorism in United States history unfolded near the TriBeCa loft where she grew up.

But monitored by helicopter parents, showered with participation awards and then smacked with the Great Recession, Generation Y has also suffered from the low-level anxiety that comes from failing to meet expectations. Thus the invention of terms like “quarter-life crisis” and “FOMO” (“fear of missing out,” as it is fueled by social media apps like Instagram). Thus cannabis, the quintessential chill-out drug, is turned into a $6.7 billion industry.

Sexual hedonism no longer offers escape; it’s now filtered through the stress of Tinder. “If someone rejects you, there’s no, ‘Well, maybe there just wasn’t chemistry …,’” Jacob Geers, a 22-year-old in New York who works in digital sales, said. “It’s like you’re afraid that through the app you’ll finally look into the mirror and realize that you’re butt ugly,” he added.

If anxiety is the melody of the moment, President Trump is a fitting maestro. Unlike his predecessor, Barack Obama, a low-key ironist from the mellow shores of Oahu, the incumbent is a fast-talking agitator from New York, a city of 8.5 million people and, seemingly, three million shrinks.

In its more benign form, only a few beats from ambition, anxiety is, in part, what made Mr. Trump as a businessman. In his real estate career, enough was never enough. “Controlled neurosis” is the common characteristic of most “highly successful entrepreneurs,” according to Mr. Trump (or Tony Schwartz, his ghostwriter) in the 1987 book, “The Art of the Deal.” “I don’t say that this trait leads to a happier life, or a better life,” he adds, “but it’s great when it comes to getting what you want.”

Everything had to be bigger, bolder, gold-er. And it made him as a politician, spinning nightmare tales on the stump about an America under siege from Mexican immigrants and Muslim terrorists.

But if Mr. Trump became president because voters were anxious, as a recent Atlantic article would have readers believe, other voters have become more anxious because he became president. Even those not distressed by the content of his messages might find the manner in which they are dispensed jarring.

“In addition to the normal chaos of being a human being, there is what almost feels like weaponized uncertainty thrown at us on a daily basis,” said Kat Kinsman, the “Hi, Anxiety” author. “It’s coming so quickly and messily, some of it straight from the president’s own fingers.”

Indeed, Mr. Trump is the first politician in world history whose preferred mode of communication is the 3 a.m. tweet--evidence of a sleepless body, a restless mind, a worrier.

“We live in a country where we can’t even agree on a basic set of facts,” said Dan Harris, an ABC news correspondent and “Nightline” anchor who found a side career as an anti-anxiety guru with the publication of his 2014 best-seller, “10% Happier.” Mr. Harris now also offers a meditation app, a weekly email newsletter and a podcast that has been downloaded some 3.5 million times in the past year.

The political mess has been “a topic of conversation and a source of anxiety in nearly every clinical case that I have worked with since the presidential election,” said Robert Duff, a psychologist in California. He wrote a 2014 book, “Hardcore Self-Help,” whose subtitle proposes to conquer anxiety in the coarse language that has also defined a generation.

The Cold War, starring China, North Korea and Russia, is back, inspiring headline-induced visions of mushroom clouds not seen in our collective nightmares since that Sunday evening in 1983 when everyone watched “The Day After” on ABC.

And television was, as Marshall McLuhan famously wrote, a cool medium. Our devices are literally hot, warming our laps and our palms.

“In our always-on culture, checking your phone is the last thing you do before you go to sleep, and the first thing you do if you wake up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom,” Mr. Harris said. “Just today, I got an alert on my phone about the collapsing Arctic ice shelf. That’s scary as hell.”

Push notifications. Apocalyptic headlines. Rancorous tweets. Countless studies have found links between online culture and anxiety. But if social media can lead to anxiety, it also might help relieve it.

The “we have no secrets here” ethos of online discourse has helped bring anxiety into the open, and allowed its clinical sufferers to band together in a virtual group-therapy setting. Hence the success of campaigns like #ThisIsWhatAnxietyFeelsLike, which helped turn anxiety--a disorder that afflicts some 40 million American adults--into a kind of rights movement. “People with anxiety were previously labeled dramatic,” said Sarah Fader, the Brooklyn social media consultant who also runs a mental-health advocacy organization called Stigma Fighters. “Now we are seen as human beings with a legitimate mental health challenge.”

And let’s remember that we survived previous heydays of anxiety without a 24-hour digital support system. Weren’t the Woody Allen ‘70s the height of neurosis, with their five-days-a-week analysis sessions and encounter groups? What about the 1950s, with their duck-and-cover songs and backyard bomb shelters?

That era “was the high-water mark of Freudian psychoanalysis, and any symptom or personality trait was attributed to an anxiety neurosis,” said Peter D. Kramer, the Brown University psychiatrist who wrote the landmark 1990s best-seller, “Listening to Prozac.” “And then there were substantial social spurs to anxiety: the World Wars, the atom bomb. If you weren’t anxious, you were scarcely normal.”

Scott Stossel, editor of The Atlantic, whose “My Age of Anxiety” helped kick off the anxiety memoir boom three years ago, urged people to pause, not for deep cleansing breaths, but for historical perspective.

“Every generation, going back to Periclean Greece, to second century Rome, to the Enlightenment, to the Georgians and to the Victorians, believes itself to be the most anxious age ever,” Mr. Stossel said.

That said, the Americans of 2017 can make a pretty strong case that they are gold medalists in the Anxiety Olympics.

“There is widespread inequality of wealth and status, general confusion over gender roles and identities, and of course the fear, dormant for several decades, that ICBMs will rain nuclear fire on American cities,” Mr. Stossel said. “The silver lining for those with nervous disorders is that we can welcome our previously non-neurotic fellow citizens into the anxious fold.”

#anxiety #worry #age of anxiety

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