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Spags. Broke your set.
) received any compensation for this.
QuoteHalloween treat: edible petri dishes! Apple cider and coconut smears and pomegranate cranberry coconut smears. I think they look a lot like Klebsiella pneumoniae. Yum! (Vegan!) Whee!
QuoteWho We Are
Anonymous is a decentralized network of individuals focused on promoting access to information, free speech, and transparency. The group has made international headlines by exposing The Church of Scientology, supporting anti-corruption movements in Zimbabwe and India, and providing secure platforms for Iranian citizens to criticize their government.
Anonymous Analytics, a faction of Anonymous has moved the issue of transparency from the political level to the corporate level. To this end, we use our unique skill sets to expose companies that practice poor corporate governance and are involved in large-scale fraudulent activities.
What We Do
We provide the public with investigative reports exposing corrupt companies. Our team includes analysts, forensic accountants, statisticians, computer experts, and lawyers from various jurisdictions and backgrounds. All information presented in our reports is acquired through legal channels, fact-checked, and vetted thoroughly before release. This is both for the protection of our associates as well as groups/individuals who rely on our work.
Quotepurkinje writes "Tiny bits of genetic material, called microRNAs, can make their way from the food you eat into your blood stream, and change how your genes are expressed, according to a new study. A team of Chinese scientists found tiny bits of white rice microRNA floating around in people's blood after a meal. When they looked at what was happening on a cellular level, they found that the microRNAs were changing gene expression, decreasing levels of a receptor that filters out LDL (bad) cholesterol. When the scientists gave mice both rice and a chemical to block the microRNAs, their levels of that receptor returned to normal---showing that the microRNAs weren't just swimming through the blood stream, but acting on genes in the animals' cells."
QuoteGuppy writes I'm going to have a hard time believing this, until we get a couple more labs to replicate the findings.
Just about every animal on earth, including us, produces copious amounts of RNAse, an enzyme that shreds RNA molecules. And while most enzymes are rather fragile, RNAse is unusally robust -- you can boil some RNAses for hours, and they will retain their activity. They're everywhere, on your skin, in your body -- and it's a pain in the butt when you're working with RNA (you put RNAse inhibitors in everything to keep them from chewing up your material).
It's almost as if it were being produced as some kind of defense mechanism against... hmm....
QuoteThe entire 45-year (1896-1940) archive of the Art Nouveau-era German magazine Jugend ("Youth"), "Munich illustrated weekly magazine for art and life," is now online at a Heidelberg University site. Potentially a tremendous source of public-domain illustrations for indie publishers.May, 23rd, 1896 Cover
Quote "From the intel, it appears that a company was set up in Mexico to purchase weapons through the U.S. Direct Commercial Sales Program, and that the company may have had a direct link to the Zetas."
The U.S. Direct Commercial Sales program is run from the U.S. State Department's Directorate of Defense Trade Controls. It regulates and licenses private U.S. companies' overseas sales of weapons and other defense materials, defense services, and military training.
...
If these allegations can be verified: what on Earth was the State Department thinking supplying the direct sale of military weapons to a cartel front company? Weapons that were then smuggled out of the very airport used by the Drug Enforcement Agency charged with bringing down the cartels?
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The program is set up so that the sale of U.S. guns to foreign entities involve direct negotiations with the governments of those countries purchasing the weapons. The description of the program specifically states that it regulates the sale of U.S. firearms to other countries or international organizations.
How, then, did a drug cartel purchase weapons through this program when it is neither an international organization nor a government?
At The Truth About Guns, Brad Kozak opines:
The ATF was not the only ones running guns to Mexico. Apparently the State Department was playing, too. And then consider this angle — was the State Department competing with the ATF for the hearts and minds of the Mexican drug trade?
...
If the ATF is supplying the Sinaloas (with Calderón's tacit approval and/or help) and State is playing for the Zetas, where does that leave the rest of America?
Pony up the cash or this historic Discordian literature goes the way of American Idol (flash and forgotten), and you'll never get to read it. 
)Quote...
Human beings don't always like good nourishment. We seem to love white sugar, and unless we understand why we feel nauseated and disoriented after binging on sweets, we'll just keep going. People like low-nutrition TV, too. And that shapes the internal, self-regulated editorial culture of news.
Take newsroom aesthetics as an example. I admit felt a profound discomfort working in an industry that so casually sexualizes its workforce. Every hiring decision is scrutinized using a skewed, unspoken ratio of talent to attractiveness, where attractiveness often compensates for a glaring lack of other qualifications. The insecurity, self doubt, and body-image issues endured by otherwise confident, intelligent journalists would break your heart. And clearly there's a double standard, a split along gender lines. But in an environment where a lot of top executives are women, what I'm talking about applies to men as well. The idea has taken root that if the people reporting the news look like your family and neighbours, instead of Barbie and Ken, the station will lose viewers.
The problem with the CBC:
Aside from feeling sexually attracted to the people on screen, the target viewer, according to consultants, is also supposed to like easy stories that reinforce beliefs they already hold. This is where the public broadcaster is caught in a tough spot. CBC Television, post-Stursberg, is failing in two ways. Despite modest gains in certain markets, (and bigger gains for reality shows like Dragon's Den and Battle of the Blades) it's still largely failing to broadcast to the public. More damnably, the resulting strategy is now to compete with for-profit networks for the lowest hanging fruit. In this race to the bottom, the less time and money the CBC devotes to enterprise journalism, the less motivation there is for the private networks to maintain credibility by funding their own investigative teams. Even then, "consumer protection" content has largely replaced political accountability.
It's a vicious cycle, and it creates things like the Kate and Will show. Wall-to-wall, breaking-news coverage of a stage-managed, spoon-fed celebrity visit, justified by the couple's symbolic relationship to a former colony, codified in a document most Canadians have never read (and one province has never signed). On a weekend where there was real news happening in Bangkok, Misrata, Athens, Washington, and around the world, what we saw instead was a breathless gaggle of normally credible journalists, gushing in live hit after live hit about how the prince is young and his wife is pretty. And the public broadcaster led the charge.
Aside from being overrun by "Action News" prophets from Iowa, the CBC has another problem: the perception that it's somehow a haven for left-wing subversives. True or not, the CBC was worried enough about its pinko problem to commission an independent audit of its coverage, in which more consultants tried to quantify "left-wing bias" and, presumably using stopwatches, demonstrate that the CBC gives the Conservative government airtime commensurate with the proportion of seats it holds in the House of Commons. Or something like that.
Jon Stewart talks about a "right-wing narrative of victimization," and what it has accomplished in Canada is the near-paralysis of progressive voices in broadcasting. In the States, even Fox News anchor Chris Wallace admitted there is an adversarial struggle afoot -- that, in his view, networks like NBC have a "liberal" bias and Fox is there to tell "the other side of the story." Well, Canada now has its Fox News. Krista Erickson, Brian Lilley, and Ezra Levant each do a wonderful send-up of the TV anchor character. The stodgy, neutral, unbiased broadcaster trope is played for jokes before the Sun News team gleefully rips into its targets. But Canada has no Jon Stewart to unravel their ideology and act as a counterweight. Our satirists are toothless and boring, with the notable exception of Jean-René Dufort. And on the more serious side, we have no Keith Olbermann or Rachel Maddow. So I don't see any true debate within the media world itself, in the sense of a national, public clash of ideas. The Canadian right wing, if you want to call it that, has had five years to get the gloves off. With a majority Conservative government in power, they're putting on brass knuckles. Meanwhile the left is grasping about in a pair of potholders. The only explanation I can think of is they're too polite, or too scared. If it's the latter, I think it's clear enough why.
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Quote"Thousands of circular plates are connected by thin springs, creating a wholly new material that holds its form as well as being flexible. The layout of the circle pattern was achieved through custom written code that lays out the circles according to the curvature of the surface. In this way, the aesthetic design is completely derived from the structural design."
Quote
This kind of reaction is a problem because cortisol kills cells in areas of the brain that control memory and emotion regulation. Over time cortisol levels can build up and increase a person's risk for more severe endocrine impairment and more severe depression.
QuoteWhat is it?
This a method I've used to help myself improvise and scene frame, initially an outgrowth of techniques from my Feng Shui days to now. It works with most traditional games and replaces the need to pre-plan events and scenes (whether linear or branching) and cuts down prep time by a LOT.
The Basic Idea
Traditionally improvisation has been considered an advanced technique. Mostly because all the advice we've seen is about preparing adventures either like a videogame level (map, NPCs, monsters go here), or else preparing a set of events, either linear or branching and then trying to engineer the player characters into the events.
The players show up every week with just a character sheet and seem to improvise just fine. "But wait! Players only have to deal with just one character! They don't have to figure out what will happen!"
But that's not the key difference in play. The difference is that the players have prepared a tool for improvisation -the character. With the character, the players don't need to prep a list of possible events and responses, they simply use the character as a focus to improvise with. They can make up on the spot how a "hot-headed young knight out for glory" ought to act without thinking too hard.
What the GM needs is to prep tools that do the same thing. Instead of trying to guess what might happen, what the players might do, what they might find interesting, you can instead prep tools that react to what IS happening, what the players SHOW you they want to do.
The GM's role really boils down to helping make interesting stuff happen. This breaks out into framing engaging scenes (and conflicts) and presenting neat NPCs. So let's talk about how to make that happen...
Focus
The Focus is the basic idea or situation of what the game is going to be about. Everyone in the group ought to know what this is- "A fight for the throne!", "Destroy the One Ring", "The Battle of Troy", whatever. The Focus can be created as a group, though one person can take the lead if the group doesn't really have direction.
The players need to know the Focus to make appropriate characters and know what kind of conflicts to expect in the game. You, the GM, need them to know this because you're going to play off of what they do with it.
Character Creation
The players build their characters together, building with the Focus in mind, and also looking to build characters that play off of each other. If the players build their characters seperately, you might end up with the usual rpg motley crew- "A rabbi, a monkey, and a half-elf necromancer walk into a bar..." (aside from octaNe, I can't think of any games that this would be a good sign for the campaign...)
Flags
Flags are mechanics that the players can use to indicate what they find interesting in the game and what they want the game to be about. Some games make this overt- such as Riddle of Steel, Burning Wheel, Sorcerer, Shadow of Yesterday etc. They put up beliefs, ideals, or conflicts in a big way, saying to the GM, "Hey, do this! Make the game about THIS!" Flags are a way for the player to tell the GM what they think is interesting and important.
PAY ATTENTION TO THE FLAGS. WRITE THEM DOWN.
"What about games that don't have obvious flagging mechanics?"- Most traditional games lack overt flagging mechanics, at which point you have to play detective. Look at the things the player does to create the character in terms of taking goals, vows, background traits, advantages, disadvantages, relationships, contacts, abilities, back story, etc. If the player is playing a priest, but takes "Hated Enemy- The Bishop", there's probably something interesting going on there. But don't just stop there, mention it- "Hey, it seems like this guy's thing is about THIS, what's your take on it?" And let the player spill their guts. Note it down and figure out what the big conflict, issue or ideals are behind that.
Making NPCs
Now, that the players are set up, you set up your characters. You know what the players want the game to be about, so the NPCs are just tools to make that happen. The NPCs exist SOLELY to produce scenes and conflicts that hit what the players have asked for via Flags.
Look at the Focus, build characters who fit in with that, and either oppose, support, or make things complicated for as many Flags as possible. For example, if two Flags involve "Loyalty to Family" and "Always do what is right", it's easy to produce a family member who is corrupt. Notice that two different PC's can have these flags, and it still will be interesting.
Any NPCs of importance want one of three things:
1) Help from the PCs
2) Oppose the PCs
3) Use the PCs
WRITE DOWN WHAT THE NPCs WANT/NEED. WRITE DOWN GENERAL PERSONALITY TRAITS THAT WILL HELP YOU ROLEPLAY THEM.
Good conflict happens when someone is:
1) Desperate
2) Overreacting
3) Violent
4) Irreponsible
5) Immoral
6) Irrational/Fanatical
7) Hiding SomethingJealous
9) Any/all of the above.
Basically, someone's willing to do something crazy and fuck someone over. You don't even need a lot of characters like this- even one will do, provided he or she sets the rest of the characters off in a chain reaction.
The NPCs should be set up in a web of problems- some allied, some against each other, for a variety of reasons. For short term play, you want between 1-3 problems depending on how likely the players are to buy into the conflict. For most games, I'd recommend around 3-4 seperate problems tangled together. In all likelihood, the players are going to latch onto one or more of them as interesting, and in the event you toss out a dud or two, you still have something to work with.
No NPCs should be isolated, you want to be able to follow a chain of connections between them (which can be blood, sex, friendship, opposition, duty, etc.)
YOU WILL WANT BETWEEN 3-12 NPCS DEPENDING ON HOW LARGE OF A SITUATION YOU ARE BUILDING.
Nameless minions
A lot of characters will have secondary allies, servants, minions, friends, gangs, etc. These folks basically exist to serve main NPCs, you might have to stat them up for the system, but you don't need to give them motivations or consider them independently. Only do the above process for characters likely to make their own decisions.
Your Conflict Sheet
Take a sheet of paper, down the left side, write down the names of the PC's and their Flags, relationships, etc. Down the right side, write down the NPCs and their needs/wants, flags, relationships, etc. Also include a little bit of personality bits to have in mind. The players use their characters to help them improvise during play, you will use your Conflict Sheet.
Those of you experienced in this kind of play will recognize that this serves exactly the same purpose as Sorcerer's Relationship Maps or Dogs in the Vineyard's Towns.
Scene Framing
Throw a problem in the players' faces
Frame a scene with one or more NPCs that sets up a conflict or problem. This shouldn't be hard- ALL of the NPCS on your list either want help, oppose, or want to use the PCs, so you ought to have plenty of ammo at your disposal. The players will react, and whatever happens, you react in return. How should you react? Roleplay your characters! It's just like what the players are doing!
When the scene slows down, cut away
Don't let the scene die out. Cut it. You want the excitement to carry over into the next scene, instead of having to build it back up again. "Excitement" here doesn't have to be crazy action, good roleplaying produces excitement, tender moments produce excitement, etc.
Next!
Now, introduce a new situation and a new NPC. You're going to introduce the whole cast, sooner or later. They don't all need to be conflict based scenes, but you want to keep dropping tidbits of the NPCs Flags and keep hitting the PCs Flags at the same time. Remember, every NPC wants something from the PCs. And at least some of them are going to take drastic measures! And some of the other NPCS are going to react to that as well! When the players react, you react with your characters. Other characters are likely to take actions, and then you can frame new scenes.
Using the List
Between Scenes, look down both sets of Flags and figure out which characters are going to fit together in exciting ways. "Exciting" meaning trouble. Put characters together who are likely to oppose each other. Put characters together who ought to be on the same side, but will hate each other's guts. Put characters together who will misunderstand and overreact.
It's not hard to think of worse-case-scenarios, and make them happen. As both the players react and you react in return, it's easy to figure what kind of conflicts happen next, based on playing your NPCs and hitting the players' Flags.
The Classics
If things slow down, remember, you can always have an NPC:
- Get Violent
- Reveal a Secret
- Betrayal!
- Be an Asshole
These 4 things alone or in combination, always make for interesting times.
Reacting to the Players
Watch the players! Traditionally the players have looked to the GM to pick up cues as to what they should do next. NO! You watch the players to see what you ought to do next. When the players are excited, you're doing good. When the players are bored, you're doing bad! There's no prepped events to distract you, there's no preplanned story for you to remember- just look around the table and pay attention in the game.
What you're doing is using the Conflict Sheet to crib note what the players want to see and things you think would be interesting. If you throw out a scene, situation, and conflict that the players ignore, don't sweat it. In fact, maybe you should note or cross it out on the Conflict Sheet, and circle the ones they do find interesting. The players might actually be interested in something that ISN'T on their Flags, so note it for yourself. Change the NPCs Flags in response to the actions of the PCs, perhaps enemies have become friends and friends enemies?
The Conflict Sheet is a draft in progress- not set in stone. Between sessions, you will make changes, but pretty much it'll just be cleaning up or rewriting what is there based on what has happened in play.
Between Sessions
Remove NPCs who no longer are part of the situation, change NPC Flags and attitudes according to the events in play, add another 1-3 NPCs if things are looking sparse but you want to keep going with the situation. Or, you can let the situation keep going until it feels "done". Then make a new one. Making a new one is easier than making an initial set of NPCs, because you'll have a good feel for the PCs Flags.
How much work is this?
So, players generate characters- that's not much different than most games. Initial set up requires thinking up good sets of NPCs that hit the PCs Flags. At the least, you can make a bunch of NPCs opposed to the PCs Flags. Me personally? It's usually taken between an hour to a few hours, depending on the number of NPCs being made and how crunchy the system for character generation is.
But- between sessions? Usually 10 minutes or less. The initial setup is heavy (about as heavy as making characters) but after that, it's a breeze. You don't have to generate new events for each session- you've got a tool to improvise.
What does this work for?
This technique works good for Narrativist style play, though I think it'd work just as well for Sim play as well. The only thing it doesn't do good is Gamist play, mostly because Gamism isn't really concerned with these sorts of things.
The Short Version
1) Pick a Focus
2) Players make Characters
3) What are the Flags?
4) Make NPCs to hit the Flags.
5) Write down the PCs & their Flags, write down the NPCs and their Flags.
6) Look at the list- put characters together who will make drama.
7) Cut Scenes, Get Violent, Reveal a Secret, Betrayal, Be an Asshole
Conclusion
I use this for a LOT of games, mostly stuff like Riddle of Steel and Burning Wheel, though pretty much it's what I'll also use for traditional games if I run those as well. It began when I realized that I was running Feng Shui by just running the NPCs as I would PCs, and things worked just fine. Add in a few years of exposure to stuff like Sorcerer, Riddle of Steel, etc., and here we are.
I hope you find it useful for your games, and let me know how it works for you.
QuoteThe Conflict Web
Yesterday I told you how to make Scene Frame on the fly, with an easy tool. Here's another prep tool to make scenarios full of conflict for your games. This is part brainstorming and part R-map.
How Big?
The first question is how big the conflict is going to be. "Big", not measured by the number of characters, but by the number of potential "sides" and subconflicts that might emerge. If you have armies of millions at war, but there's only 2 sides and no betrayals or secondary motivations- it's a very simple conflict (GI Joe). If you have 3 people with multiple motivations, betrayals and layers, it can be terribly messy (House of Flying Daggers).
You don't need to nail down an exact number of potential sides, but you want a good idea before you get to work, so that you don't end up making an intense multilayered George R.R. Martin level of conflict for a one-shot.
A magic number to go with is 3 sides. 3 sides is enough to make things interesting, but not so many people get confused.
Building the Web
Start with any 2 characters in conflict over something. They haven't taken action- yet, but at least one of them will, and the other will have to respond. Write down their names on a sheet of paper, draw a line connecting the two. Put a triangle through the center of the line. The problem cannot end between the two- it has to drag in other people and affect others.
Now, add a character who has a tie to either one or both of the characters on the sheet. Attach a line connecting the characters, and add a symbol based on the following:
Triangle=Antagonistic
Circle=Friendly
Square=Duty/Power/Obligation
Complications
Now, keep adding characters connected to other characters, and sub-situations to explain their relationships, particularly looking to stress other relationships. For example, if Amy and Beth hate each other, and Clarissa is friends with them both, that stresses Clarissa's relationships (and makes good drama).
Feel free to add lines between any characters on the sheet if it would make sense for them to be connected. This is a great place to set up sub-conflicts and crazy love triangles.
If you are prepping for a one-shot or so, you probably want to stop anywhere from 3-6 characters. If you are planning on doing a short run, 5-8 characters is usually good. If you are planning on doing something long, 8-20 characters is usually sufficient (you can always add more later...).
Rule of Two Supporters
For any character who is a figurehead to a particular "side", give him or her two supporters who provide different aspects of that particular side. This is an excellent place to put in extreme views of a particular issue, or contrasting takes on it.
For example, if a new religious leader is trying to gain legitimacy for his movement, one of the followers might be an altruistic progressive sort, who just wants to help society, while another might be an extremist with a chip on his shoulder...
This lets you address the same issue from a few different angles, as well as build sub-conflicts within any side, or even alliances from different sides from the supporters...
How do you use this?
This gives a simple visual cue for motivations and relationships between various characters. It also is a great brainstorming device. All the characters end up connected, not a random assortment of disconnected characters who have nothing in common, plus it makes building sub-conflicts a snap. Take the ideas you get from it, and apply it towards building a Conflict Sheet for Flag Framing, or whatever method suits your fancy.
In play, this doesn't see as much use from me, mostly because it charts highly changable relationships, and becomes a logistical hassle to try to upkeep during play itself. It might inspire potential reactions or motivations, but I tend to use it more to prep play and occasionally muse on things between sessions. Sorcerer's R-maps, which track non-changing relationships are a better tool for in play usage.
Advanced Web building
What happens if two characters have different feelings for one another? If you want to get more complicated, you can put two symbols on each line, the one closest to the character's name representing how they feel about the other character.
For example, if Alvin looks up to his father Bill, but Bill only takes care of Alvin out of social pressure, you'd have a Circle next to Alvin, and a Square next to Bill on that line. Ouch! There's bound to be problems somewhere in that relationship, and it's easy to create conflicts based on that kind of stuff.
Example
This may not be the BEST example, but I used this technique to write up the characters in the HeroQuest scenario, Well of Souls, which I wrote with Peter Nordstrand a couple of years ago.
A Standard Shape
Have 3 sides, give each side 2 followers. Some of the followers will be allied, some will be against each other- regardless of the sides they actually hold. This gives you 9 characters, and a couple of sub-conflicts.
Strong Points
This technique is specifically designed to create the crazy multilayered relationships you see in epics like Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Heroes of the Watershed/All Men are Brothers, The Ramayana, The Mahabharata, Njal's Saga, and more modern fiction like Artesia or A Game of Thrones. I've found that it works really well for HeroQuest games, Riddle of Steel, and similar games where politics might play a large role.
Hopefully you will find this useful to generate scenarios, conflicts, and NPCs for your games. I've been using it for a couple of years, and it's worked really well for me. Give it a shot and let me know what you think!
to that.
