Xavid
@xavid.itch.io
Genderqueer game designer, union activist, and treehugger. I also do stuff with computers?
Reposted by Xavid
medium.com/@isabellerue... looking at a bunch of different PbtA and Belonging Outside Belonging games and discussing how they handle setting up PC bonds. I think this one is pretty good #pbta
PC Bonds: Looking at PbtA & Descendants
Player Character (PC) Bonds are a common staple in Powered by the Apocalypse (PbtA) games, and Belonging Outside Belonging (BOB) by…
medium.com
February 19, 2026 at 2:41 PM
medium.com/@isabellerue... looking at a bunch of different PbtA and Belonging Outside Belonging games and discussing how they handle setting up PC bonds. I think this one is pretty good #pbta
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i frequently feel shut out from a lot of in-person culture because of how thoroughly the public has been propagandized into pretending that they are anything other than temporarily able-bodied. but mask-required events are incredibly popular! nobody likes getting sick!!!
February 19, 2026 at 10:50 AM
i frequently feel shut out from a lot of in-person culture because of how thoroughly the public has been propagandized into pretending that they are anything other than temporarily able-bodied. but mask-required events are incredibly popular! nobody likes getting sick!!!
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one of the great and terrible coups of the sociological production of the end of the pandemic was the line "you can't force people to mask." actually, people mostly do what they're told. that we've totally given up on shaping public behavior is nonsense. ask people to mask at a show, and most will!
February 19, 2026 at 10:48 AM
one of the great and terrible coups of the sociological production of the end of the pandemic was the line "you can't force people to mask." actually, people mostly do what they're told. that we've totally given up on shaping public behavior is nonsense. ask people to mask at a show, and most will!
Reposted by Xavid
This is a really cool story focusing not just on the potential role of triple deckers as part of the overall solution to the housing crisis, but also how they contribute to the social fabric of a community.
Three Stories: The Triple-Decker and Massachusetts’ Housing Crisis | Magazine | The Harvard Crimson
As Massachusetts faces a housing shortage, local cities are turning back to triple-deckers — an iconic New England housing structure. Still, some question whether the triple-decker is part of the solu...
www.thecrimson.com
February 18, 2026 at 3:51 PM
This is a really cool story focusing not just on the potential role of triple deckers as part of the overall solution to the housing crisis, but also how they contribute to the social fabric of a community.
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an under-discussed trope in the cyberpunk genre was the idea that once one achieves ludicrous levels of wealth, they cease to be “human” in any meaningful sense.
the more removed from all of humanity you are, the more focused on one insane goal you become (hoarding of capital), the less you are actually part of this entire species anymore, I guess. Pretty weird (and infinitely stupid!) that this is the future we live in
February 18, 2026 at 3:36 PM
an under-discussed trope in the cyberpunk genre was the idea that once one achieves ludicrous levels of wealth, they cease to be “human” in any meaningful sense.
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Despite being back at work, Kickstarter is retaliating against our teammates for our legally-protected strike action from last year. Tell Kickstarter’s CEO this is both ILLEGAL and UNACCEPTABLE
February 18, 2026 at 4:42 PM
Despite being back at work, Kickstarter is retaliating against our teammates for our legally-protected strike action from last year. Tell Kickstarter’s CEO this is both ILLEGAL and UNACCEPTABLE
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Muppets are totally a technology! So is weaving, and knitting, and sewing, and embroidery. I love helping people learn to make things with those technologies and find joy in it. People innovate there too: new threads! Superwash wool yarn! Making 80s knitting machines talk to new computers! #DHmakes
“Is there a technology the left is excited about?”
High-speed rail! MRNA vaccines! New cancer treatments! Solar and wind energy collection! Better and longer-range EVs! That wood that's harder than steel! New apples! Fibermaxxing! Buldak Swicy ramen! Muppets! Muppets are too a technology, shut up!
High-speed rail! MRNA vaccines! New cancer treatments! Solar and wind energy collection! Better and longer-range EVs! That wood that's harder than steel! New apples! Fibermaxxing! Buldak Swicy ramen! Muppets! Muppets are too a technology, shut up!
February 18, 2026 at 2:50 PM
Muppets are totally a technology! So is weaving, and knitting, and sewing, and embroidery. I love helping people learn to make things with those technologies and find joy in it. People innovate there too: new threads! Superwash wool yarn! Making 80s knitting machines talk to new computers! #DHmakes
Reposted by Xavid
“All children held in immigration detention should be immediately released, and these facilities should be permanently shuttered.”
A group of pediatricians wrote an op-ed detailing the traumatic, lasting effects kids in detention centers will endure:
www.usatoday.com/story/opinio...
www.usatoday.com/story/opinio...
We're pediatricians. We see how ICE is harming children. | Opinion
Liam Ramos is one of more than 1,700 children to have been put in family detention centers since 2025. We call for these centers to close.
www.usatoday.com
February 17, 2026 at 6:51 PM
“All children held in immigration detention should be immediately released, and these facilities should be permanently shuttered.”
Reposted by Xavid
AI is the “asbestos of the internet”
February 17, 2026 at 5:23 PM
AI is the “asbestos of the internet”
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A system built to eat people never stops eating people.
The concentration camps will not only be for immigrants, documented or otherwise. They already aren't.
They won't only be for brown and Black people.
The targets will keep expanding. It will not end.
The only way it will is if we stop it. Both in and out of the system. There is no other way.
They won't only be for brown and Black people.
The targets will keep expanding. It will not end.
The only way it will is if we stop it. Both in and out of the system. There is no other way.
February 18, 2026 at 12:10 AM
A system built to eat people never stops eating people.
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I regularly see people wondering how it's possible that there are so many musicians and writers and film makers and artists from a tiny nation like Iceland.
And the answer is really simple: State funding for art education and artists. I literally get a salary from the government to write books.
And the answer is really simple: State funding for art education and artists. I literally get a salary from the government to write books.
I’m constantly astounded at the sheer level of artistic production coming out of Iceland. Novels, movies, music. Amazing.
February 18, 2026 at 2:23 PM
I regularly see people wondering how it's possible that there are so many musicians and writers and film makers and artists from a tiny nation like Iceland.
And the answer is really simple: State funding for art education and artists. I literally get a salary from the government to write books.
And the answer is really simple: State funding for art education and artists. I literally get a salary from the government to write books.
Reposted by Xavid
Daylight your buried streams or they will periodically do it for you.
You can see the buried waterways of Los Angeles-Orange County in www.arcgis.com/apps/mapview...
@awalkerinla.bsky.social
@awalkerinla.bsky.social
February 17, 2026 at 6:38 PM
Daylight your buried streams or they will periodically do it for you.
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automated voice transcription is a technology that, word by word, had a pretty clear failure mode.
It might transcribe a word incorrectly but you could notice it didn't make sense with the words around it; the failure was VISIBLE.
a good failure mode SHOWS IT HAS FAILED
It might transcribe a word incorrectly but you could notice it didn't make sense with the words around it; the failure was VISIBLE.
a good failure mode SHOWS IT HAS FAILED
February 17, 2026 at 8:08 PM
automated voice transcription is a technology that, word by word, had a pretty clear failure mode.
It might transcribe a word incorrectly but you could notice it didn't make sense with the words around it; the failure was VISIBLE.
a good failure mode SHOWS IT HAS FAILED
It might transcribe a word incorrectly but you could notice it didn't make sense with the words around it; the failure was VISIBLE.
a good failure mode SHOWS IT HAS FAILED
Reposted by Xavid
I don’t know who needs to hear Jesse Jackson leading the kids on Sesame Street in this beautiful call-and-response reminding them that every child is somebody, but here it is
February 17, 2026 at 11:41 AM
I don’t know who needs to hear Jesse Jackson leading the kids on Sesame Street in this beautiful call-and-response reminding them that every child is somebody, but here it is
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well what do you know mikelovesrobots.substack.com/p/wheres-the...
February 17, 2026 at 10:54 AM
well what do you know mikelovesrobots.substack.com/p/wheres-the...
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Rev. Jesse Jackson's "I *am* somebody..." remains one of the all-time great pieces of 20th century rhetoric / agitprop
And he could deliver it at a Black separatist meeting, the Democratic National Convention, or on god-blessed Sesame Street (see below 🥹)
RIP to the Voice of the Voiceless
And he could deliver it at a Black separatist meeting, the Democratic National Convention, or on god-blessed Sesame Street (see below 🥹)
RIP to the Voice of the Voiceless
February 17, 2026 at 11:29 AM
Rev. Jesse Jackson's "I *am* somebody..." remains one of the all-time great pieces of 20th century rhetoric / agitprop
And he could deliver it at a Black separatist meeting, the Democratic National Convention, or on god-blessed Sesame Street (see below 🥹)
RIP to the Voice of the Voiceless
And he could deliver it at a Black separatist meeting, the Democratic National Convention, or on god-blessed Sesame Street (see below 🥹)
RIP to the Voice of the Voiceless
Reposted by Xavid
February 17, 2026 at 4:24 PM
Reposted by Xavid
Sure, Blades '68 brings an artificial sky, corporate espionage, and swingin' pop culture to Doskvol. But designer @olddog.games says he's most excited to give players more time for bants with the crew.
The groovy retrofuture of Blades '68 owes plenty to the past
Designer Tim Denee says modernizing the beloved tabletop RPG was a "reclamation" of his creative roots.
www.rascal.news
February 17, 2026 at 3:08 PM
Sure, Blades '68 brings an artificial sky, corporate espionage, and swingin' pop culture to Doskvol. But designer @olddog.games says he's most excited to give players more time for bants with the crew.
Reposted by Xavid
Also, a GM doesn't need to be anywhere *close* to as good a designer as someone putting out a game to improve that game for their table, because they have the titanic, overwhelming advantage of actually being at their table.
February 16, 2026 at 5:06 PM
Also, a GM doesn't need to be anywhere *close* to as good a designer as someone putting out a game to improve that game for their table, because they have the titanic, overwhelming advantage of actually being at their table.
Reposted by Xavid
Pneumatic tubes? In this economy?!
If you're in healthcare, yes! Every hospital has tubes. They’re labyrinthian & networked & cool.
At Tube Talk, I talked with those who make them and those who run them. Give it a read below! #tubetalkmedia #pneumatictubes
www.tubetalk.media/p/pneumatic-...
If you're in healthcare, yes! Every hospital has tubes. They’re labyrinthian & networked & cool.
At Tube Talk, I talked with those who make them and those who run them. Give it a read below! #tubetalkmedia #pneumatictubes
www.tubetalk.media/p/pneumatic-...
The Last Bastion of Pneumatic Tubes
Pneumatic tube systems are thriving in the healthcare industry. And while the technology is an old one, the hospital systems have recent innovations that make it state of the art.
www.tubetalk.media
February 15, 2026 at 3:53 PM
Pneumatic tubes? In this economy?!
If you're in healthcare, yes! Every hospital has tubes. They’re labyrinthian & networked & cool.
At Tube Talk, I talked with those who make them and those who run them. Give it a read below! #tubetalkmedia #pneumatictubes
www.tubetalk.media/p/pneumatic-...
If you're in healthcare, yes! Every hospital has tubes. They’re labyrinthian & networked & cool.
At Tube Talk, I talked with those who make them and those who run them. Give it a read below! #tubetalkmedia #pneumatictubes
www.tubetalk.media/p/pneumatic-...
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Welcome to the Cambridge Somerville Independent, on Bluesky at @csindie.bsky.social. You can find it online right here: #journalism csindie.com
Cambridge | Somerville Independent
csindie.com
February 16, 2026 at 7:52 PM
Welcome to the Cambridge Somerville Independent, on Bluesky at @csindie.bsky.social. You can find it online right here: #journalism csindie.com
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Just did this.
"Rude" is essentially a shadowban and is capriciously applied.
"Rude or impolite, including crude language and disrespectful comments, without constructive purpose."
Dudes, your CEO was shrieking "Waffles!" at people.
"Rude" is essentially a shadowban and is capriciously applied.
"Rude or impolite, including crude language and disrespectful comments, without constructive purpose."
Dudes, your CEO was shrieking "Waffles!" at people.
If you want to see posts from cool people on here, go to @moderation.bsky.app and turn off this label
February 16, 2026 at 6:30 PM
Just did this.
"Rude" is essentially a shadowban and is capriciously applied.
"Rude or impolite, including crude language and disrespectful comments, without constructive purpose."
Dudes, your CEO was shrieking "Waffles!" at people.
"Rude" is essentially a shadowban and is capriciously applied.
"Rude or impolite, including crude language and disrespectful comments, without constructive purpose."
Dudes, your CEO was shrieking "Waffles!" at people.
Reposted by Xavid
Voting for the lesser evil is what you do AFTER you have exhausted all other options. Refusing to exhaust those options, uh, what Rob says.
The further in advance you announce your willingness to vote for a horrible person as the lesser evil, the more enthusiastically supportive of that evil you seem.
Which is to say, Newsom is horror show, and preemptively declaring support in a theoretical future vote says you like his kind of horror
Which is to say, Newsom is horror show, and preemptively declaring support in a theoretical future vote says you like his kind of horror
February 17, 2026 at 1:09 AM
Voting for the lesser evil is what you do AFTER you have exhausted all other options. Refusing to exhaust those options, uh, what Rob says.
Reposted by Xavid
the thing that's so satisfying about the "i'm gonna punch you" / "you'll get in trouble" / "okay" exchange is that the kid throwing the punch has more moral clarity than 95% of congressional democrats
February 16, 2026 at 5:49 AM
the thing that's so satisfying about the "i'm gonna punch you" / "you'll get in trouble" / "okay" exchange is that the kid throwing the punch has more moral clarity than 95% of congressional democrats
Reposted by Xavid
If you are a dude in your 30's-50's it's so important that you watch Porco Rosso
February 16, 2026 at 1:36 AM
If you are a dude in your 30's-50's it's so important that you watch Porco Rosso