Category: Uncategorized

Indiegogo deplatforms Bitchute

It looks like Indiegogo’s legal team still hasn’t read their own Terms of Use or Refund Policy:

Many of you will know about the Indiegogo campaign that we ran last year to build an open-source commenting platform named Comment Freely. Well, it was time for Indiegogo to pay us and rather than giving us the money they decided to refund it without even telling us why. We’ll be putting up a public blog post about this soon with more details. This is breaking news so we’re still considering our options.

Sounds like JAMS is going to have a very good 2019.

When are contributions not eligible for a refund?

Contributions cannot be refunded by Indiegogo, if any of the following are true:

  • The contribution funds have already been transferred to the campaign owner
  • The campaign has ended
  • The perk associated with the contribution has been fulfilled (contribution is marked as fulfilled on Indiegogo by the campaigner)
  • Indiegogo determines that there has been an abuse of our Terms of Use, or the refund policy.

Please note, we are unable to cancel your campaign or issue mass refunds for any campaign that has raised funds.

Resign, racist

Kamala Harris makes it clear that the Democratic Party has NO PLACE for white men:

Kamala Harris@KamalaHarris
Leaders are called to a higher standard, and the stain of racism should have no place in the halls of government. The Governor of Virginia should step aside so the public can heal and move forward together.

Clearly Ralphie Northram should resign from the Virginia governorship. Because blackface raciss superbad. As should all the Republican consultants upon whom Ed Gillespie spent $29 million and still couldn’t find his opponent’s medical school yearbook.

Chuck Dixon’s Avalon #3

As you can see, the unexpected drama with Amazon did not even cause us to break our stride. Chuck Dixon’s Avalon #3 is now available in high-resolution digital format from Arkhaven.

UPDATE: It is now available in Kindle format on Amazon as well. However, it is not available via Kindle Select.

Chuck Dixon’s Avalon #3: The Conscience of the King

While King Ace is in training with Big Simba and the Specials of the UN-SPC, his former partner-in-fighting-crime Fazer languishes in a prison designed especially for people with superhuman powers. Fazer is desperate to escape, but how can he get out when his jailors possess the technology required to block his unique abilities?

But Fazer isn’t the only one feeling trapped, as King Ace quickly comes to learn that his new team isn’t tasked with fighting crime in the city of Avalon, but rather, tracking down other people like him and Fazer. And he also discovers that signing on with the official forces of law and order means accepting restrictions on your ability to do what you think is right.

Chuck Dixon is the most prolific comic book writer in history. Set in the world of Alt★Hero, CHUCK DIXON’S AVALON is the legend’s newest creation. The CBZ file contains high-quality 2048 x 1316 images. 24 pages. DRM-free. $2.99.

The print and Kindle editions will be available soon. We are still working with Ingram on sending out the replacement Issue #2 to those who received the silent editions. As the first two issues of CHUCK DIXON’S AVALON are no longer exclusive to Kindle Select, we will make high-resolution CBZ-format editions available on the Arkhaven store this weekend.

Please note that as of issue #3, we have changed over to standard comics format for the single issues. The omnibus editions will still be 10×7.

UPDATE: If you are an Arkhaven backer, please check your email.

Just say no, Johnny

John Scalzi@scalzi
TFW something designed to antagonize me turns out to be a consistent and profound source of trouble for the person who made it. Karma is apparently real, y’all.

I wonder what this Karma is in response to?

OVERDOSE

Complainant: Scalzi, [REDACTED], [ADDRESS], Bradford, OH 45308
Incident Address: [ADDRESS], Bradford, OH 45308

DETAILS: Report of male subject unresponsive

Perhaps Mr. Scalzi should spend less time snarking and snorting things and more time working on his next literary failure. Anyhow, if you’d like to read the book that all the fuss was about yesterday, it’s called CORROSION and you can pick up the DRM-free ebook at the Arkhaven store.

A new president for France

Russia Today reports that Marine Le Pen is now the President of France:

Exciting news from France: Marine le Pen is the country’s new president. After the Macron regime plunged the country into political crisis, Mrs Le Pen took the oath of office on Place de la Concorde on Friday before a small crowd of gilets jaunes (yellow vests) specially assembled – with the TV cameras – for the occasion.

Proclaiming that she was acting according to Article 7 of the Constitution of the 5th Republic, Mrs Le Pen announced that Emmanuel Macron is no longer in office. To be sure, the government and civil service, the police and the armed forces all continue to operate normally, and Mr Macron continues to work in the Elysée Palace as usual, while Mrs Le Pen is under investigation for financial irregularities. But as she has received official recognition from both Russia and China, she has now become the legitimate president of France.

Of course, this fictitious scenario is ridiculous. But it is no more ridiculous than the recognition of Juan Guaido as president of Venezuela, voted by the European Parliament on January 31, one week after the recognition of him by US President Donald Trump.

I have to admit, I have absolutely no idea what the God-Emperor is doing when it comes to Venezuala. The whole situation looks entirely inexplicable, and as the Russia Today parody makes clear, it’s not even remotely convincing to anyone, least of all the Venezuelans. All I know is that if the European Parliament is for it, it’s almost certainly a terrible idea.

Is prescribing puppet leaders to banana republics really optimal foreign policy in 2019? Do any of these people realize that the South American countries are now considerably larger and more powerful than any of the European nations?

Someone was talking to you

But it wasn’t God. I’m not even remotely surprised by Jordan Peterson’s account of one of his spiritual experiences. The Fencing Bear shares an interview with the Manufactured Man:

Peterson: I can tell you one of the experiences that I had… When I was…. This would be in 1985 or thereabouts, when I was busily working on the first draft of my book Maps of Meaning, where I was outlining this idea that the path of the Hero who voluntarily confronts uncertainty and stands on the border between Chaos and Order is the appropriate target for human development. It’s an alternative to the chaos of nihilism and the totalitarianism of rigid belief. So, and that’s the bearing of responsibility for Being. I was working all of that out. It’s actually an answer to the postmodern conundrum as far as I can tell as well. But anyways, at the same time I was making this sculpture, which is about a foot thick. It’s made out of layers of what’s called  foam core, which is styrofoam pressed between two pieces of paper that’s about a quarter of an inch thick and so often used for backing on prints and so on if you get them framed. I made this piece that I called “The Meaning of Music,” and it’s a mandala, so it’s a circle inscribed inside of a square, although I tried to make it multidimensional in a complex way that I can’t really describe at the moment. But what I was trying to do—and I broke it into pieces—what I was trying to do was to produce a visual object that flickered and changed when you looked at it because it was too complex to process visually. You know, like a Necker cube? That’s one of those cubes that reverses when you look at it.

Trussell: Yes.

Peterson: Well, this is like a Necker cube on steroids. Because music, of course, it stays the same across time, but also transforms across time. And it’s full of layered patterns, you know. And the patterns interact harmoniously with one another… And I was fascinated by music because it gives people the direct intimation of meaning. Even if they’re nihilistic punk rockers, they still can’t criticize the experience of meaning that they engage in when they’re listening to their favorite band. It helps them transcend the nihilism of their irrationality…. And you can’t argue with it. It’s like arguing with dance…. It’s beyond argument. And so I was making this sculpture, and I spent like four months on it. I was thinking about it a lot. And I got it mostly assembled, and then I was in my living room in Montreal, and I was listening to Mozart’s Fourth Symphony, the Jupiter Symphony, and I was really listening to it, and it’s one of these complexly, multi-leveled, patterned pieces of auditory sculpture that I believe represents Being. Because what Being is is multiple levels of patterned transformation interacting simultaneously, and music is a representation of that, which is why I think we find it meaningful. Anyways, I was listening intently to this symphony and at the same time I was concentrating on the sculpture that I had made, and all of a sudden—and everything I am about to say is a metaphor because there’s no way of encapsulating it properly in words—it was as if the heavens opened up above me. I mean, I was still in my living room, but the experience is best represented by one of those early Renaissance paintings where you see God or Christ up in the sky with an opening in the sky against the clouds and against the sun so…it was like that, even though I didn’t really see that, it felt like that, and there were some visuals that were associated with it. And then I felt something descend upon me that had a personal nature. You know, something like you were describing as a… higher consciousness that was actually a being of a sort, and it filled me from the inside out. And…it was enrapturing, let’s say. And it was an incredible feeling…. It was a divine feeling, I suppose is the right way of thinking about it. It was certainly a religious experience…. And it transformed me. And it turned me into something far more than I normally was. And maybe you can think about that as an intimation of what you could become if you worked on it for the rest of your life, which is sometimes what I think hallucinogens provide people with—an image of who they could be if they shed all of their dead wood.

Trussell: Right.

Peterson: Anyways, it was as if an offer was being made to me that I could be like that from now on permanently. And I thought, well, I don’t know how to do that. I couldn’t walk down the street in this condition, in this elevated condition. I wouldn’t belong in the world anymore. I wouldn’t know how to function. I don’t know how I could do it… So, this experience, this thing, say, that was communicating with me…accepted that as an answer, although I would say, with some sorrow, and then it receded. And then I went and talked to my wife, and I told her what had happened, and I was shaking, like, a lot…. Like, a tremendous amount. And my pupils were completely dilated.

An offer was almost certainly being made. And Peterson isn’t telling the whole truth about it. Whether or not he accepted the offer that was made to him then, he certainly accepted it, or one very much like it, later.

Reinstated

From Amazon:

Thank you for your email concerning the status of your account.

The most recent message we sent to you regarding ASIN B06XFQ24QC was incorrect.

Based on your appeal, we are reinstating your account and you will receive any applicable royalties.

Thank you all for your support. This is not a fight we wanted or sought, and we’re pleased to be able to put it behind us. I’ll be discussing the matter on the Darkstream. And if you want to know what all the fuss was all about, you can now buy CORROSION: The Corroding Empire, Book One, at Arkhaven. It’s actually a good SF novel, a lot better than the book it was originally published to parody.

Galactic society is ruled by algorithms. From interstellar travel and planetary terraforming to artificial intelligence and agriculture, every human endeavor has become completely dependent upon the hypercomplex equations that optimize the activities making life possible across hundreds of inhabited worlds. Throughout the galaxy, Man has become dependent upon the reliable operation of 10 million different automated systems.

And when things begin to go wrong and mysterious accidents begin to occur, no one has any idea what is happening, except for a sentient medical drone and the First Technocrat of Continox. But their ability to even begin to try fixing the unthinkably complicated problem of galaxy-wide algorithmic decay is made considerably more difficult by the fact the former is an outlaw and the latter is facing a death sentence.

Johan Kalsi is Finland’s hottest science fiction author. An accomplished geneticist as well as a 6’3″ ex-Finnish Marine, in Corrosion, Kalsi rips off Asimov even better than Scalzi rips off Heinlein!

Lies, lies, lies

Amazon is telling a LOT of lies today. I received this transcript of a conversation today from a reader.

CUSTOMER: I wanted to buy the kindle version of the book Jordanetics by Vox Day. Yesterday I saw it in your site, today I cannot find it anymore. Can you find out what happened and maybe send me the correct link to buy it.

AMAZON CUSTOMER SERVICE:  I have gone through your query. Let me check on it.

AMAZON CUSTOMER SERVICE: I have checked with my leadership team and the Kindle version is removed due to some missing content. No worries, it will be back with in 4-6 hours. And then you can order it.

CUSTOMER: what missing content, was there a technical fault? I know somebody who has it, and he said he got it a few weeks ago from you. He did not say anything about a problem..

AMAZON CUSTOMER SERVICE: The publisher has removed to update the content.

CUSTOMER: And the publisher told you the update would be finished a few hours from now?

AMAZON CUSTOMER SERVICE: Nope, but the updates are always done with in 4-6 hours. So it will be available soon.

I’ve been receiving a number of these exchanges today. Be sure to use the customer service chat so you can catch them lying on the record. Go ahead and email them to us, these exchanges could prove useful if Amazon is inclined to get defensive and stonewall instead of simply rectifying the situation.

Just for the record, the publisher did not remove Jordanetics to update the content.

UPDATE: I’m noticing a certain theme here:

CUSTOMER: I wanted to buy the Kindle version of “The Last Closet” by Moira Greyland, but found that it is no longer available on Amazon. Why was it removed and how can I purchase the e-book?

AMAZON CUSTOMER SERVICE: : Hello, my name is Mary. I’m here to help you today.

AMAZON CUSTOMER SERVICE: I’m sorry to read that “The Last Closet” is not longer available on its Kindle Edition.

AMAZON CUSTOMER SERVICE: This is something that we cannot control to be honest with you, it depends on the publisher. We do have an option for you to request the publisher to have this book available for kindle ?

To be honest? Really, Amazon?

Amazon takes down Castalia House

You may have noticed that you can’t find any Castalia House ebooks on Amazon right now. That’s because Amazon shut down our KDP account on the basis of a wildly spurious claim of publishing material to which we do not have the necessary rights. We happen to have some VERY bad news for them on that subject….

The book in question? You guessed it. Corrosion: The Collapsing Empire again. This is the second attack on that book this month, as ten days ago, they pulled the book itself down for the sixth or seventh time due to claims that it was “misleading”.

From: Amazon.com [kdp-quality-assurance@amazon.com]
Sent: 21 January 2019 21:59
Subject: Notification from Amazon KDP

While reviewing the following books we found the title, cover image, descriptions and/or authors of the following book(s) are misleading to our customers:

Title: Corrosion (The Corroding Empire Book 1)
ASIN: B06XFQ24QC

As a result, the book(s) have been removed from sale from Amazon.

Not only have they shut down the account, but they sent us an email today declaring that they will not pay us any of the unpaid royalties, thereby screwing over each and every author we publish.

As last communicated in the message on January 21, 2019, we have identified the submission of content for which you did not have the necessary rights. Due to this and previous violations, we are terminating your account and your Agreement effective immediately.

As part of the termination process, we will close your KDP account and remove the books you have uploaded through our channels from sale on Amazon. Note that you are no longer eligible to receive unpaid royalties for sales that occurred prior to this termination.

Additionally, as per our Terms and Conditions, you are not permitted to open any new KDP accounts.

Of course, there were no previous violations that internal SJWs did not invent as we’ve been repeatedly cleared of the “misleading” charge for that book. Needless to say, we will not be taking this latest SJW attack lying down. I won’t be surprised if the account is rapidly restored once we contact the manager who has been repeatedly dealing with this issue, especially since we were promised that it would never happen again after the last time.

 Of course, this is precisely why we established the Arkhaven and Catalia Direct stores, because we knew better than to trust Amazon’s assurances that it would keep its SJWs under control. If you want to show support for Castalia and its authors, you can either write to Amazon and complain about this unwarranted action or pick up a print, ebook, or audiobook from one of our direct stores.

This is precisely why it is so important to a) build your own platforms and b) support the alternative platforms. This isn’t just about Castalia House because the same thing can be done overnight to any author or independent publisher who utilizes KDP. And if you’re a Castalia House author, please don’t panic, rest assured we are already in the process of taking care of things. But if you want to send an email to Amazon protesting their unwarranted removal of your books, please feel free to do so.

UPDATE: Amazon can’t even find the account information. It looks like whoever was responsible actually wiped all the data.

How you get Hitler

Or at least people who are totally unmerciful and absolutely unwilling to tolerate even the presence of SJWs:

“The rising Left is bound and determined to crush or at least permanently sideline people it deems heretics — in particular, whites, males, orthodox Christians, and skeptics of the LGBT project. It does not want a pluralistic modus vivendi; it wants total domination. The establishment Left lacks the will to stop them. Its members are terrified of appearing un-woke. . . . The establishment Right lacks the will to stop them either, for fear of being called bigots. And it lacks the will or the imagination to stand in any way against corporate interests. . . . Bottom line: Identity politics will dissolve the traditional bonds that have held Americans together, and re-bind forces of the Left and forces on the Right to each other.”

The thing is, you don’t get Hitler because of Hitler — there are always potential Hitlers out there. You get Hitler because of Weimar, and you get Weimar because the liberals are too corrupt and incompetent to maintain a liberal polity.

I just roll my eyes when people tell me that I’m too extreme or that I’m too judgmental. Especially by people who wind up in the crocodile’s mouth less than 24 hours later because they don’t understand that you can’t negotiate with or provide any accommodation to SJWs.

SFWA. Twitter. Bleeding Cool. Indiegogo. Amazon. It’s always the same attack, the same tactics, over and over and over again.

The funny thing is that conservatives like Rod Dreher are more concerned about young authors who give into the scare tactics and voluntarily unpublish themselves than they are about Amazon taking down dozens of authors in one fell swoop.

I keep talking about how in the West, we are swiftly moving into a culture that resembles communist totalitarianism — this, based on what people who grew up under communism tell me. It’s not about gulags or secret police; it’s about building a post-liberal culture defined by militant progressive ideology, and enforcing it by destroying, personally and professionally, those who dissent. Part of this is inculcating fear and self-loathing within the minds of people living in those cultures. You don’t need the secret police when you have taught people to police themselves according to your totalitarian principles.

Today the New Totalitarianism took a new scalp, in a way that ought to scare the hell out of all of us, on both the left and the right, who value free speech and inquiry. And it happened to someone born in a communist country.