Everybody talks about Anastasia, which is a shame, because it’s a far less interesting example of Russian fake heir drama than that whole business with the False Dmitries.
Okay, so Ivan the Terrible’s youngest son,
Dmitry, was assassinated in 1591 at the age of 8. Fast-forward nine years, and there’s a guy going about Eastern Europe claiming that he is Dmitry, having secretly escaped the assassination attempt and lived in hiding under a false identity ever since. This sort of business isn’t too unusual, but this guy actually pulls it off, managing to gain the Russian throne and rule for nearly eleven months before being dragged from the palace and publicly executed in early 1606. He’d subsequently go down in history as False Dmitry I.
Here’s where it gets interesting. In mid 1607, a second impostor declares himself. Bizarrely, this one doesn’t dispute the first impostor’s legitimacy; instead, he claims to be the same guy, having miraculously survived his apparent execution the year before. He somehow wins the political support of False Dmitry I’s widow, and with her vouching for his identity, he gains the allegiance of the Cossacks, rallies an army over 100 000 strong, and tries to “take back” the throne. Though his march on Moscow ultimately failed, he successfully conquered most of Southeastern Russia, which he would rule until his untimely death in December of 1610, when he was beheaded in a drunken altercation with a Tartar prince. The history books know him as False Dmitry II.
Now jump ahead three months to March of 1611, when a third fucking impostor pops up. Dude apparently just magically appeared from behind a waterfall in goddamn Ivangorod and declared himself Tsar. Following the lead of False Dmitry II, he doesn’t dispute either of the two previous impostors, instead claiming some sort of spiritual reincarnation and/or magical resurrection – it’s not entirely clear which – to establish himself as the same guy. He must have talked a good game, because he managed to win the support of the same fucking Cossacks who supported False Dmitry II’s claim. Unfortunately, he was a far less able commander, being forced to flee his stronghold only a year later, whereupon he was spirited away to Moscow and secretly executed. Though he never managed to actually rule anything, historians decided to stick to the theme and dubbed him False Dmitry III.
At this point the historical record becomes confused, with some sources asserting there was a fourth False Dmitry, though others insist that the third False Dmitry was simply counted twice due to poor record-keeping. Still, whether we’re talking about three False Dmitries or four, imagine the whole mess from the Tsar’s perspective. Dude just wouldn’t stay dead!
ohh you missed one of my favorite bits.
False Dmitry I not only was executed, it was KNOWN he was fake. Powers that be used him until he was trouble, and THEN executed him.
Then quartered him.
Then cremated what was left.
Stuffed the ashes in a can.
And shot him out of a cannon back towards Poland, where he actually came from.
He pissed off a few people, yeah.
It was a very miraculous survival.
My favorite memory from Russian Studies class was when the professor got through introducing the idea of the first False Dmitri. He paused and said, “Now, the problem here is that he was the FIRST False Dmitri. Yeah. It’s all downhill from here.”
Why are people still up in arms about AO3 needing donations to run? Their budget is publicly available. You can go onto the website, right now, and read it. If you donate more than a certain amount (pretty sure it’s more than $10), you can vote in their elections, because you’re considered a member, and that’s how memberships work.
It’s a free site to use, but not to run or to maintain, especially not with all these net neutrality battles.
Y’all gotta understand that it’s not just fanworks, there’s a lot more that goes into archiving.
Signal boosting this because it’s important af. OTW is a nonprofit organization, specifically a public charity as classified by the US tax code. That means they file a 990 tax report each year that lets you see all of their finances – what they’re spending money on, where their money comes from, etc. You can see their 2016 990 here if you’re so inclined.
And if you’re not sure about how OTW is using their donations? Ask questions. Get involved. Even if you’re not comfortable with or not in a position to donate, there are lots of opportunities to give your time; it’s an all-volunteer organization that recruits regularly. I know for a fact that I get more value out of what OTW provides than most, if not all, my other paid services combined, so $10 to be a member is more than worth it.
ao3 is routinely used as an example of an excellent digital archive in library and information schools – they’re not just a fansite; they’re held in high regard by people across the industry. they run initiatives to preserve old fansites and groups, in addition to the day to day work of hosting all of our work ad-free to ensure maximum creative freedom. ao3 is not just a place to post your fic; it catalogues and preserves our history and culture.
$130,000 a year though?
Dude, I don’t know if anyone’s gotten to you yet, but as someone who used to work for a server hosting company, that is NOT a lot of money. It feels like it, especially if you’re a part-time, paid-by-the-hour employee, but when it comes to tech services, that’s incredibly cheap. With the amount of content that AO3 has to host, they’re not dealing with one or two $1000 rackmount servers from Newegg.
Their facilities are going to look closer to this:
Or if they have nice ones, they may have a shelf of these:
They spend about $102,000 a year for server space, I’m rounding down to make the math a little nicer. That’s about $8,500 per month. That’s really, really not a lot.
Now, to be fair, I was on the documentation side of things and mostly wrote instructions on how to perform operations on servers, so I don’t actually know how many servers AO3 needs to house all their data. I also don’t know the exact volume of data AO3 has to handle, but $8,500 a month sounds like an entirely reasonable amount based on what I do know.
I already reblogged a different version of this post, but reblogging this one for some reference to how many server resources go into a project like this. Lots.
Given the sheer tonnage of material they host, I’m surprised their server budget is *only* $8,500 a month.
A strict all girls boarding school is across a river from a strict all boys boarding school.
Boys and girls are forbidden from fraternizing, but they find sneaky ways to form friendships and even date. I assume there is heavily monitored internet and phones are for emergencies only so they have to resort to more unconventional methods of communication. (Messages in bottles, a system of mirrors, writing on chalkboards and putting them in the windows ect.ect.)
Until one day a shy boy at the boys boarding school tells his best friend (and the leader of a resident well meaning boys gang) that he actually feels more like a girl.
The gang leader contacts the leader of a girl gang across the river and they begin to plan an overly elobrate heist to smuggle the shy trans girl across the river in exchange for a chill tomboy and the two will assume each other’s lives until they graduate.
Hijinks ensue as they pull a ‘Great-Esacpe’ style mission to avoid detection from the overly strict headmasters and an overly passionate team of campus security guards.
Friendships are tested, there is lots of home-alone style logic to outsmart the adults, and there is romantic tension between the leaders of the gangs as they put aside their differences to help their two friends find a place to be themselves. It is light-hearted in tone but is also over the top and everyone plays it way too serious to the point of comedy. The two kids swapping places have classic “parent trap” style hijinks pretending to be the other person and avoid detection.
Think “kids next door” + “recess” but shot like a heist movie.
Add a funny character actor as a dopey but well meaning janitor and you got a stew going.
As a parent of two young impressionable children I 100% would take them to see this movie.
Man I know emulators are technically considered piracy I guess, and I can see why it would be an issue with newer games (not that most emulators are advanced enough for that anyway), but I just… hhhhhh the way the video game industry operates in regards to old games is so fucking stupid. It’s like
Gamers: Hey, I’m really interested in this game you made a long time ago! Can I play it? Game companies: No. Gamers: But I’ll give you money! Game companies: We no longer manufacture, support, or distribute that game or the console it’s available on. There’s no way for you to buy it. Gamers: Well, what about this slightly-newer-but-still-outdated game that was never released in my region? Can I play that? I’ll give you money. Game companies: No. You’re only allowed to play games from your region. You can’t buy it from us. Gamers: So, you don’t provide any way for me to purchase these games from you, or to play them in any form? Game companies: Correct. We don’t care about these games anymore. They might as well not exist. Some guy on the internet: Hey, I found some old and foreign games that aren’t sold or available to play anywhere, so I fixed them up so everyone can play them now for free! Here you go! 🙂 Game companies: ABSOLUTELY FUCKING NOT. HOW DARE YOU STEAL OUR PROFITS. PLAY THE GAMES LEGALLY OR DIE. Gamers: But you just said there’s no way to play them- Game companies:FUCK YOU
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