AwesomeJuNa

Anime simp culture

So I recently found my forgotten love for anime again and I blame YouTube for it. I was looking for a new study playlist and I still don't know how I ended up on a playlist with a title saying "A playlist for simps" and a picture of an anime character, who was at this point of the story still unknown to me. So to shorten things up a bit my reaction basically was: What the hell? Since when do we use the word simp for 2D characters? 

For all of you who do not know what a simp is, where have you been on the internet to not come across this? However, the basic definition was: 

A man that puts too much value on a female for no reason. (Urban Dictionary, 2012). 

Back then, it was used as an insult for men regardless of them being only respectful to women or actually expecting something in return from them. Nowadays, I feel the definition of a simp has changed to a more varied usage of it. So especially in this whole anime bubble simping seems to be quite common meaning that when you simp for someone, you basically have a crush. 

Crushing on someone is not that uncommon and even before we all started to use the word simp for it, crushing for a nonexistent character was already known as well. We now just have a new word for it, I guess?

Nevertheless, this whole thing about simping for your favourite character gave me a thought about a new form of celebrated escapism. Who is guilty of imagining situations with you and your comfort character as the protagonists? Definitely not me! (ahem) But to bring it back on a more serious note, there seems to be a growing acceptance of imagining relationships with people who do not exist, although this is only my perception and it is not based on any research. When I say this, I have to think of all the recommended videos with titles like "sing along if you simp", "POV: You are alone with your comfort character" or "You had a dream about xyz" etc. 

I mean true, our world currently sucks and sometimes imagining things for the benefit of your own mental health is probably okay. But the big question of this whole topic now is how much is too much?

Will we all be incapable of functioning relationships because our favourite anime character is just ten times hotter, nicer or more understanding and our imagined situations are just way more exciting than anything else that happens in real life? I am exaggerating now, but I would be interested if this should be seen more critically. On the other side, you could argue that it is only for fun and because of Covid we don't have better things to do anyway. 

I guess I'll end this by saying make up your own mind about it. 

PS: I am sorry for not having posted anything last week. Procrastination (watching too much anime, while having an assignment) is hard... 

See ya, 

Caffeé sospeso

This week's short article is about a (to my mind) very lovely custom - the "caffé sospeso" or suspended coffeé. This tradition has its origin in the working-class cafés in Naples, Italy. Asking for a "sospeso" people order and pay for two coffeés but receive and consume only one of them. The other one then gets "suspended", so that it can later be given to people in need for free. This anonymous act of kindness and charity presumably has its roots at the beginning of the 20th century. It spread over Spain, where it is called "café pendiente" (which means as much as "hanging coffeé") and from there to several other European countries. Even in some American countries and in Australia lots of bars offer the suspended coffeé. The custom surely also had its highs and lows. Before it spread that far it was at some point barely practiced at all or only around Christmas time... But around 2010 (or more exactly in 2008) it experienced some kind of revival, mostly ensuing the eurozone crisis, and then got distributed nearly all across Europe. By now, you can order a suspended coffeé in assumably 15 Mio. cafés in 34 different countries, and some of them even make it possible to suspend whole meals. Meanwhile, a lot of websites emerged, that register and list the cafés that take part in that initiative. So look it up :) In my opinion, the "Caffeé sospeso" is a very adorable and kind tradition, that far too few people know about, and that should really be kept alive. It's a very small and simple act of love and warmth and made me smile when I first read about it. <3 Alright, that's almost everything for now. I'd like to dismiss you with a little fun fact: In 2013, in a coffeé in Edmonton, Canada, an anonymous customer paid for 500 large coffeés and started kind of a trend, that resulted in over 10,000 cups in more than 30 different locations paid for by donors!

Discussion about our digital selves

So today's topic is about FaceTune and all these other apps helping you to achieve your perfect digital self! Weirdly enough that everybody is used to see these perfect Instagram shots with an hourglass figure, smooth skin, big eyes and plump lips, people are still called out for when they get caught for their edited photos. Isn't this a paradox itself? We expect that celebrities and influencers give us a glimpse of their unachievable lives where everything is supposed to be glamorous and then letting them deal with a backlash as soon as someone exposes their lies. I guess we can agree on the fact that most influencers make their money by presenting us with a world we all know cannot be completely natural. Still, this image is in our head, in our thoughts and we aspire nonetheless to be like them. The consequences of this? A world where everybody can alter their digital appearance and it is easier than it has ever been. Before we knew about these shiny magazine covers where celebrities were photoshopped. No wrinkles, perfect makeup and hair, a slim body. Basically, the whole programme making teenagers feel unsatisfied and insecure about themselves. Good job beauty industry, you always know how to make your products as desirable as possible giving young people the hope of achieving something that any famous person would not even achieve without the help of Photoshop. But nowadays, access to perfect self-portraits is not only available for the rich and famous ones. FaceTune revolutionised the depiction of beauty and even its standards. (I guess I can't write an essay about such a topic without even dropping the name of the Kardashian-Jenner clan at least once. I am sorry!) The fortune of every Kardashian and Jenner bases on the fact that they have become Instagram famous with a young fanbase being willed enough to do and buy anything to achieve the standards this family is setting. That most of their posts are heavily edited and their bodies and faces only look like they do now with the help of plastic surgery and fillers, does not seem to matter. This kind of success naturally comes with imitators trying to set up their Instagram careers and these on the other hand can influence even more people believing that this is the only way to be perceived as pretty. I know that this is heavily simplified but I hope you get my point. We know about these edited photos, we may call them out, but there will never be an end to this as we feel the need to excel in our digital presentations of ourselves.

Cheers, 

Why first aid is important #2

European 112 Day

So, this week is going to be about first aid again. Even though it’s already a few days gone, there has been a quite special date this week: European 112 day was held this Thursday, on february 11th. Plus 112 has its 30th anniversary this year :)

112 is the common emergency telephone number of the member states of the Europan Union (as well as some others). It is supposed to be dailed free of charge from all mobile and fixed telephones whithin these countries in order to reach emergency services such as ambulance, fire rescue and police. The emergency number is part of the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) standard. Even in countries far away from Europe (like the USA or Australia, Great-Britain etc.) you can be helped by dialling 112, you will be directly forwarded to local emergency number by the GSM. Due to this standard, 112 can even be dailed in a locked phone with no SIM-card in it.

In 1991 (30years ago) the Europen Union decided to create a unitary emergency number for all its member-states in order to grant better access to help in case of emergencies, especially for travellers. Previously, every country used to have their own number, in some they still do coexist alongside with the 112. Since 2003 mobile companies are furthermore allowed to transmit the caller’s location data to the rescue control centers, so that they may send help directly to them in less time.

The european 112 day is held annually since 2009 with the purpose to raise awareness for the common emergency number and to promote its advantages. Actually, in 2008 the surprisingly low figure of barely more than 20 percent knew about the existence of the common emergency number. Five years later, statistics show, that this figure has already increased up to nearly 30 percent and grew further ever since. Today 112 has become some kind of symbol for help and support.

OK now, once again, why is an emergency number, and therefore an emergency call so important? As I already wrote a few weeks ago (in „Why frist aid is important Pt.1): In case of an emergency (be it a medical emergency, a fire, an accident or whatsoever), setting an emergency call is your quickest and most important acces to further, professional help. All you need is a phone and you are possibly going to save lives.

There is barely anything you can do wrong, but ideally, you should provide the necessary information effectively, in a quick but precice way. The most important information the rescue control center needs to know from you are those about the location and the scenario of the emergency.

As a small aide-memoire, try to remember these „4 Ws“ while setting an emergency call. These will help you to provide all the crucial information:

Who is calling?

Where did the incident happen?

What happened? (Describe the Situation as exactly as possible. It is also very helpfull if you can say how many people are affected!)

Wait for further questions!

Having remebered these, you already did a great job. If you already know or found out some information about the patient(s) like name, sex, age, the exact problem or what happened in detail, you can pass these information on as well, that too, helps a lot! To give the rescue workers a better idea what exactly the patient is dealing with, try to describe their condition as good as you can. Terms like these might help you here: Injury, breathing difficulty, bleeding, unconciousness, road accident, chest pain, fitting, drowning, pregnancy/in labour, burns or allergy. This way you can give an even better idea, what kind of help is exactly required.

Alright, so in conclusion: Setting an emergency call can save lives and there is barely anything that should prevent you from doing so. Dialing 112 (or 911, 000, etc.) is the most basic and a very fundamental part of first aid! It’s not even hard, and even easier when you make sure to remember your „4 Ws“!

I think that’s it for this week. Here in Germany we had al lot of snow and pretty low temperatures, last week, which I certainly enjoyed :) But unfortunately that also comes along with an increasing number of traffic accidents and other snow and ice related injuries… So let me remind you to stay careful and safe! Until next time!

Being aware of consumerism

Hi again!

This topic is more something I came across from time to time. Actually, every time the makeup brand ColourPop Cosmetics announced its latest collection on Instagram. And this happened a lot! Please do not get me wrong. I really like the products as they are working well for me and are affordable (If you do not include the fees for international shipping, though). But it annoys me so much when it feels as they would announce a new collection every two weeks! Just by taking a look at all of the eyeshadow palettes being part of a collection, you will realize how similar they actually are. Sure, some of the shadows do vary but the essence of them is basically being another nude palette. Still, as a potential customer, my first thought always is: "What a pretty palette! I want to buy it!" 

Still, thinking of how many people do buy all these new product and probably not using them as they already have so much makeup, I just feel that it is wasteful and not really responsible for a company coming out with so many products. Yet, as ColourPop is a business aiming to generate profit and obviously seeming to make a profit with this kind of selling strategy as this is not a recent development, it is not surprising anymore. 

In addition, companies have mastered the technique of marketing products allegedly fulfilling a need that you are supposed to have (This is a topic for itself, I may write about in the future ;)). So it is understandable why we all often feel as if we have to constantly buy something new to keep up with the trend.   

So how can we as individuals, desperately trying to keep our money together, prevent ourselves from going on the next shopping spree?. Many purchasing choices base on our mindsets. Certain thoughts can encourage you to buy something new. Just some examples:

I want to treat myself. 

I am unsatisfied with my routine. 

I want to improve my looks. 

I had a bad day and I want to buy something new.

...

All these thoughts can be indirect incentives for you to purchase a new product. The question now is: How can I deal with it?

So speaking of myself, it helped me a lot to remind myself, every time when I wanted something new, what I already have. It surely does help to visualize the number of things you have. If I still wanted the product, I would write a list of reasons why I want to buy it. In case you still tend to buy new products regularly, I would like to encourage you to set up a monthly budget divided into different spending categories. This is also a great student tip in general! 

Nevertheless, I want to remind you that you do not have to feel guilty for feeling the need to buy something new. It sure is fun and companies design their websites and apps in a way that you as a customer stay as long as possible on it and eventually buy something. (Again, another topic, I would like to talk about one day!)

Stay smart while shopping,

... Cosmic Latte!

Well, hello there, it’s Ju again :) This week, I’ve got a rather short one for you. Have you ever wondered, what the average color of the universe might be? No? Well honestly – me neither…  But please allow me to enrich your lives with some random knowledge, you’ll most certainly never ever need, but just as well cannot forget ever again ;)

So apparently, some people have figured out the answer to that particular question. A group of astronomers from John Hopkins university tried to determine it several times, actually. Using the so-called 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey, the light of more than 200,000 galaxies was measured, and after lots of calculations at some point including the galaxies' wavelengths and spectra, the universes average color was found out. In case you still wonder what an „average color" is supposed to be: Imagine you put the whole universe in a small box and all its light shone out of it at the same time. The color you’d perceive would be the average color. However, in 2001 said group of astronomers figured that color to be more of a greenish-white, at first. About a year later, they had to correct their initial result and claimed it to be a rather beigeish white, which is the latest statement up to today.

Now in order to get a better image of that beigeish white color, here’s some data for you:

The colour’s hex triplet code is #FFF8E7

RGB color code: 255, 248, 231

CMYK code: 0, 2.7, 9.6, 0

ISCC-NBS-description: pale yellow-green

Alright, that’s the color, now it needs a name. When the average color of the universe was found, it was published and announced on several channels and news-outlets, which included the call to send in suggestions for a name. Several people followed that call. Some of the most successful suggestions were „Cappucino Cosmico“, „Big Bang Beige“, „Astronomer Almond“, „Univeige“ or „Skyvory“. Still, the winner was a different name (as you might have guessed). The researcher's favorite was „Cosmic Latte“. They loved its resemblance with the Milky Way’s name – the „Via Lattea“ if put in its discoverer Galileo Galilei’s native language.

I didn’t know about that whole topic either, at least until recently. But once I learned about it, as an astronomy class veteran, semi-professional stargazer and lover of certain space-associated movies, I found myself quite fascinated and decided, that I want to share that with you :)

Upselling

Even though you will probably not have an idea what this term means you may have come across this sales technique while shopping for a new smartphone. 

So per definition upselling is a sales technique used to get a customer to spend more by buying an upgraded or premium version of what’s being purchased. So what does this mean putting it into practice? There are many examples for upselling, like a larger meal size in restaurants, luxurious upgrades for a new bought kitchen, or a smartphone with a higher capacity.

Speaking of smartphones, I visited Apple's website, and they seem to have mastered this technique. Just take a look at how the company sells its iPhones. You choose a model with a given price then you can select display size, colour finish, capacity and at the end you can even choose if you want to have AppleCare+ coverage for your phone or not, everything with extra charge. In the end, all these little decisions result that the price for this phone is way higher than the one you started with. Just try it out yourself. 

But why does this happen to us?

Every decision itself seems to be logical, and the given comparisons of every option also do not seem that far apart while looking at the pricing of them. However, all these small extra charges add up, resulting in a price you definitely did not start with when choosing the model. 

Apple is just one of many companies using upselling to increase their sales significantly. But its website is a prime example for this technique with all these small decision steps in the buying process. The customer shall think that every small upgrade is beneficial and reasonable.

Finally, Apple is not the only company pursuing this strategy. Other examples would be Amazon where you buy a product and get the option to buy it with other products together as a bundle or fast food restaurant with their order terminals. The list is endless.

So I hope it was a little bit helpful to see what kind of tricks companies use to make you spend more money than planned. There are many more ways how to manipulate customers buying decisions and upselling is only one of them. 

Stay smart while shopping,

Why first aid is important:

In this post, I want to talk (or rather write) about the quite serious topic of first aid. It might be especially important to me, for being basically a part of my every-day-business (as a trainee paramedic), but providing first aid in an emergency can not only turn out crucial for surviving, it can actually save a life! Nevertheless, I keep arriving in situations where nobody has helped :( The reasons that I appear to see are mostly, that a lot of people do not know what to do, how to help, or that they are afraid of doing something wrong. Good thing, that I’m here to explain ;)

However, we are dealing with a quite complex topic here, so today’s going to be about the more basic, general stuff and I’ll come to the more specific aspects in due course in some of my following postings. (By the way, in Germany we usually don’t learn anything about first-aid in school! But we have to take part in courses to get our driver's licenses…)

So! First off, the most important thing to know about first-aid: You cannot do anything wrong! (Except not helping…) Keep that in mind.

But now, to somehow provide you a definition of what this all is about: First aid is the immediate assistance given to a person suffering from either minor or severe illness or injury. Its basic target is to preserve life and prevent the condition from worsening, maybe even to promote recovery. Mainly, it is the initial intervention in serious conditions prior to the availability of professional medical help. Overall, there are lots of different kinds of situations that might require first-aid (like accidents, bleedings or injuries, poisoning, serious diseases such as strokes, heart-attacks, allergic reactions, and so on). What you need to understand, is that at some point all of these conditions at some point cause a disturbance of either the consciousness, breathing, or circulation of your „patient“. These disturbances can sooner or later lead to a deficit of oxygen in their body, which is not exactly very good… Once you’ve recognized a person in an emergency, stay calm, and take your time to decide. Evaluate possible dangers (which a mostly caused by the surroundings, e.g. other vehicles, chemicals, fire, buildings, ice, etc.) for the person that you are about to help, just as much as for yourself. Protecting yourself always comes first! (you can’t help anyone getting yourself hurt…) Once you are sure the situation is safe, you can begin to act. For better understanding, imagine yourself as a link in a chain. Your measures as well as your emergency call represent the very first ones. These are followed by professional medical aid provided mostly by the rescue services and later the hospital. That might already sound like a lot to consider and think about, right? But once again, be aware, that you cannot actually do anything wrong, as long as you at least try to help. The probably most important and most basic measure that everyone can and should do is setting the emergency call! This is your access to professional medical help. Here a quick overview over a few international emergency numbers:

112: With this number, you can call an ambulance in most European countries.

911: This is the emergency number on most of the American continent.

000: the Australian number for an emergency call.

In some cases, you might also end up at the police, but don't worry they can forward your call, and you’ll get help eventually.

Additionally, lots of countries have their own, different number. Therefore, when you are traveling, make sure to be informed.

Once you've set the call, you have actually already helped a lot!

What you can do next, are immediate and further measures. Immediate measures are those measures that need to be done as soon as possible, to some extent already before your call. These include things like the rescue out of the danger-zone (without endangering yourself!), stopping bleeding, bringing your „patients“ in the right position, or perform CPR if necessary. After that, continue and perform further measures until help arrives. What is important here is calming your „patient“, positioning them comfortably, applying bandages, stay with them, talk to them so that they know you are there and help is coming. Do not forget to constantly reevaluate their condition. So in conclusion, first aid can save lives! Be it in traffic, at your job, your free time, or wherever. And I can’t emphasize it enough: The most important thing is not to do nothing. Stay calm and try to help the best you can! Make sure to have an overview and not to endanger yourself. The easiest thing to do is setting up an emergency call. However, often valuable minutes pass before a rescue team arrives. In that case, it depends on each individual to prevent worse!

Okay. That’s it for now. As you might have assumed, this topic is quite important to me, and I’m sure, more posts will follow, to go a still a little deeper into the matter ;)

I hope you had a good start in 2021 and still enjoy our blog!

Stay Safe!

...Fear of the future

Ok, so how do you guys keep track on your dreams during a pandemic?

By starting with this sentence, I wanted to prevent my text from becoming one of these generic posts where you get a list of things like yoga, bullet journaling, meditation or overall reflection which you can do to stay on track of your dreams. So please enjoy my third attempt in now trying so. Why do I not like these kinds of posts? Well, to make it simple: I am lazy. So I do not feel the need to check my progress every week, because all I can think of is that I am doing alright, I guess? Yes, I do like to reflect sometimes. For example, I reflected my whole year of 2020, and surprisingly, not everything was as bad as I thought it was. I changed my study course, I moved to another town, I got to know new people and many other positive things happened in this year. But at the same time, I feel insecure about my decisions. Was it the right choice to change my course? Should I have tried to stick to it, as a bachelor in economics gives a higher chance of getting a job in comparison to a degree in media studies? Otherwise, I wanted to start my own business so that no HR manager would even get the chance of evaluating my CV. However, the thought of self-employment makes me anxious, too and I am still stuck in my first semester not knowing anything! How will the Corona pandemic evolve? When will this madness finally be over? I feel stuck, and I cannot even imagine a way out of it. I assume that I am not alone out there and that many young students are fighting with the same thoughts as I do. So coming back to my headline, I genuinely want to ask you if you have any methods or habits which help you to stay positive. 

Send some help, please!

... New Year’s resolutions!

Since Christmas is over now, we are heading straight towards the year 2021 and New Year’s Eve, or as we call it here in Germany: „Silvester“. This very last day of the year is closely connected with lots of traditions such as fireworks, Good-Luck-Charms, several other superstitions, and in many cultures also the so-called New Year’s resolutions.

I originally considered them a rather modern „invention“ but during my research, I learned that the actual origin of this custom is not completely clear but that its roots might reach back to ancient times. More exactly to the Babylonians. Some 4000 years ago the Babylonians celebrated their new year with an eleven-day festival in what today would be March. In this context, they also reportedly made promises to their gods to earn good favor in the following year. This tradition has somehow continued until this day, even though it might have experienced some changes and certainly got quite hyped in modern times. Later, the Romans moved the first day of the new year to Jan 1st. This way, they wanted to honor Janus, the two-faced Roman god of new beginnings. In countries shaped by christianity, the date of the new year has stayed the same ever since, even with the transition to the gregorian calendar.

Alright, that’s the historical point of view. Now let me explain what exactly New Year’s resolutions are, and what makes them so popular. A resolution can be defined as a firm decision or an opinion/decision that is formally expressed. That already explains quite a lot. A New Year’s resolution is therefore a decision to do (or not to do) something to accomplish a personal goal, to let go of a personal habit, etc. And on a yearly basis there comes a time, when people start to reminisce the past year and consequently set goals to improve themselves and their lives as the new year begins.

There are several kinds of resolutions: rather practical ones, those of mental/emotional kind, etc. They all do have one point in common: they all are some kind of a personal road map for the next 12 months. In most cases, these resolutions contain something like losing weight, quitting something, drinking less alcohol, saving more money, eating more healthily, and so on…

An estimated half of the people that make resolutions actually seem to be convinced that they will stick along and surely even less really do. Once they are set, following New Years Resolutions appears to be quite difficult. When I did my research for this post, I felt like they were more of a falling trend, for I found tons of articles that explained reasons for the failure of resolutions instead of reasons that speak for them or give tips on how to follow through. That’s darn negative :(

That’s why I composed some tips, that might help you sticking along with your resolutions, on my own:

Get specific and concentrate on your most important goals. That helps you to keep an overview and can prevent you from getting overwhelmed so that you can focus on what matters most to you.

Tell others or get a partner. They can help you to stay motivated. Plus it gets harder for you to simply give up.

Take time to evaluate yourself and don’t be overly ambitious. This is how you can avoid being disappointed in case you cannot reach a target, that was simply set too high.

But what is it that made this custom survive several thousand years? New Year’s resolutions are a triumph of hope over experience, a way to quantify for ourselves what we wish and what we want to change. Thus, we use a certain date as an impetus to catalog our personal dissatisfactions or try to erase our errors in the past. We use the new year as some kind of a reset button. To start anew. You know: „New year, new me“ and so on.

The beginning of the new year makes us want to change our mind-set. It is a great possibility to take some time in order to look at changes that we want to accomplish to make the following year better for ourselves and for others. For some, it might even feel vitalizing and invigorating.

Making resolutions sets a personal challenge. Being comfortable with maintaining the status quo is a part of human nature. Therefore the resolutions are a great opportunity to be productive, continue to grow, and to explore ourselves, but also give us a chance to gain a bit of control over what is happening in our lives.

Also, setting a resolution (and beginning to follow through) we trigger a quite powerful „neuro-hormone“ called dopamine. Dopamine helps control the brain’s reward and pleasure centers and also regulates emotional responses.

However, as far as I’m concerned, I’m quite a fan of New Year’s resolutions. They are all about hopefulness, they are a promise we make ourselves. Making a resolution is an expression of the desire to take a step towards positive change.

So obviously, I already planned my resolution for next year :) And I’d like to share it with you (as a motivation for myself and maybe also for you guys) :

You may not know that about me yet, but I tend to be late…constantly… I really struggle to be on time, which is why I am actually in a constant hurry. I really can’t stand that trait of mine, it’s very stressful… That’s why my resolution for 2021 is to be just five minutes earlier than I’d usually be. It’s really not much, but it has the potential of destressing my life a lot :)

I hope my resolution works out the way I want it to, and I hope yours will do so, too! I wish you guys a happy new year! May it be better than the last… See you next year!

Stay healthy, Ju

Let’s talk about how Tumblr makes money.

So when you look up how many users Tumblr has in 2020, you will find an estimated number of nearly 292.5 million individual users worldwide and an overall number of 496 million unique blogs. Even though I am not an IT expert, I would still assume that you need quite some server power to run this website, like a lot of server power and this cannot be cheap at all.

Thinking of other social media platforms, like Facebook, Instagram or Twitter, all of them have one thing in common: They have ads and sponsored content. So does Tumblr and you probably already came across them.

Targeted Advertisement

The basic stuff. With the help of parameters, like age group, gender or interests, Tumblr can create a specific target audience being suitable for the company's product or service while assuring a high level of exposure as the placement is part of the dashboard and seen as a sponsored post. So if you, for example, follow various blogs about cats, you will sooner or later find a sponsored post about cat food or toys in your dashboard (Of course there has to be a company selling cat food or toys AND paying Tumblr for advertisements).

Sponsored Apps

This was surprising for me, as I have never seen this kind of advertisement on any other social media platform, that I use. But it is basically an advertisement post for another app or mobile game. When you click on this post, you will be lead to an App store, where you can download this promoted app. In terms of a target audience, it is the same as other sponsored posts with the use of parameters.

Sponsored Day

"Do you want maximum exposure for your company? If this is the case, then the sponsored day will be perfect for you!" No seriously, a company doing this will reach a high viewership as it is an exclusive cross-platform promotion. For 24 hours, the company's ad is placed on Tumblr's homepage, your dashboard and explore tab. When we now think back of the 292.5 users worldwide, I would guess that this is probably one of the most expensive forms of advertising on Tumblr.

Themes

It was the first thing, Ju and I randomly came across, while we got started with our blog. A marketplace for blog themes which can be bought or sold by users.  The prices I found had a wide range starting with 9$ up to 49$, while the templates were in varied forms from being more basic up to artistic.

So did you know about all of these forms of how Tumblr generates revenue? I was surprised by the possibility to promote another app on Tumblr because I always thought that it has the highest priority to keep the user as long as possible scrolling through the dashboard or the explore tab. Giving other apps a chance of advertising may result that the user will eventually download this app and therefore, spending less time on Tumblr. But maybe this is not the case, and we will spend even more time with our smartphones. Who knows?

Suggestions or questions are highly appreciated!

See you,

Hi there! I am Na ^-^

So starting with the basic facts, I am 21 years old, live in Germany, and I currently study Media studies, which is actually my second try on pursuing a Bachelor's degree. Before I studied International Management, but I was disappointed by the programme, the lectures and the whole university itself. Nevertheless, I am still interested in economics, business and entrepreneurship. So I will probably talk a lot about these topics hoping I will not bore you too much with it. Still, I think it is so important to have some basic financial knowledge because especially as a woman, we have to deal with many problems like old-age poverty or the gender pay gap. 

Back to myself, self struggles are a big thing for me, like have I wasted my time by changing my studies or have I still enough time left to start my own business? Like, I get it, I am just 21 years old. But it does not really help to see all these young, wealthy influencers on Instagram travelling around the world while I sit in my room writing my next essay for film analysis and with COVID-19 it does not get better at all. Having to cancel mostly all of your plans with family and friends for this year was hard. Not being sure when this will finally be over is even worse. 

But I do not want to finish this post in such a negative way. So here are some brief facts about myself!

 I am a dancer. Starting with ballet, I tried many different styles. Step, Modern, K-Pop, Jazz the list is quite long. But at heart, ballet will always be my favourite :)

While Ju loves Star Wars, I prefer Star Trek, and I love the new season of Star Trek Discovery on Netflix. 

As you read before, I want to become an entrepreneur. 

I'm an INFJ.

I probably heard more Lo-fi than actually listened to my professor's lectures ...

I love baking and cute stuff UwU

I am interested in video games and I would like to play them as well, but my laptop is too old for all these new high-end games so I have to stick to watching them in streams...

One day, I want to buy the Nintendo Switch so that I can play The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

I think this is it for the start. So I hope you will follow our journey and I hope we can brighten up your day, at least a little bit. 

See you soon!

Hello there! Ju here :)

As we promised you before: we are going to tell you a little something about ourselves. And now, I’m going to make a start, so…

Who am I and what do I do?

Basically, I’m just a simple 20-year-old german girl trying to make my way in the universe. I believe in kindness, music, and education. Oh – and in medicine… And currently, that very last one is how I earn my living. In about half a year from now, I am (hopefully) going to be a paramedic. That’s what I’ve been training for since I left school more than 2 years ago. So far, that has been the most excellent time. I have already learned so much! Not only about medicine but about people, about communication, and even about myself. And I definitely don’t want to stop growing. This is why my medical career will most likely continue even further: When I grow up, I want to be a doctor :)

Alright. That’s a lot. Still – what else is there, you should know about me? I’ve taken the liberty of summarizing that in a shortlist:

I love music! Probably more than anything! I love listening to it, I love singing, I know how to play several Instruments etc. (but I don’t dance (in public)).

Na and I have known each other forever (or something… 10 years at least!).

I’m an INFP.

I teach children how to do Judo.

I know how to do Judo.

I’m a nerd (as you may or may not have already noticed); I love books and movies and series and cartoons and so on.

Also, I really enjoy musical theatre.

My taste in music is quite versatile, still my playlists mainly consist of ’80s, rock and showtunes.

I like birds.

I’m into random facts.

So in conclusion: What can you expect from me?

I will try not to bore you with overly complicated medical content or ultra nerdy stuff. But surely a big deal of my postings are in some way going to be medicine-related… Apart from that, my self-chosen purpose is to lift your mood, make your minds work a little, or maybe even teach you something you never knew. Well at least that’s what I hope to do, this is still all new to me :)

I hope you guys enjoy our blog! May the force be with you.

Hello world!

We are Ju and Na. We recently joined Tumblr and have no clue of nothing. But we wanted to share our thoughts with you all! 

So what can you expect from us? Basically, everything is possible! This blog is for our thoughts and what keeps us awake at night, either serious or random. 

First things first, we will introduce ourselves so that you can get the idea of who we are and what’s on our minds.