Random Musings from a Random Mind

Lookit that smug bastard.

“there’s a restaurant two miles from my house called—” nope

“today I learned [celeb] went to my high school—” nope nope nope nope nope

these are all real posts I’ve seen on the internet that allowed me to identify a user’s hometown instantly. if it’s a small town, that’s doubly dangerous, because a bad actor could trace you just by a unique first name or selfie you once posted. in an age where doxxing and stalking are some of the worst I’ve ever seen it, you HAVE to think twice about what you’re posting online.

i once saw a 13-year old post an image they noted as being “a few miles from their house.” it had a theater in the shot with a unique enough name to be local. one google maps search, now everyone knew not only what city they lived in, but the possible neighborhoods in that radius too. and they had a HUGE following…who all knew this was a 13-year-old child.

so yeah. not to sound like a 90s internet safety PSA…but I’m gonna be that PSA for a minute.

if you’re posting an image, there is NO need to say that you live there. you could just be traveling. “saw this in Montana” is better than “saw this by my house!”

before you post about a venue, especially a restaurant or small store, check and see if it’s local—CRUCIALLY if it has only one or two locations. people might travel to arenas or convention centers, but they’re far less likely to be traveling to Bartleby’s Fish and Chips. if it’s an anecdote and you still live nearby, you can honestly just leave the name out entirely.

if you’re sharing a news story, it can just be a story you found and wanted to share. you don’t have to clarify “it happened in my town,” because even if you don’t mention your town name, an easily-googled news article will.

if you’re seeing a concert or meeting a celebrity on a tour that’s stopped locally, wait until they’ve hit a few more venues before you post about it, or at the very least wait until you get home. this is honestly a smart move for any event you attend: unless you’re marketing yourself, there’s no need to advertise your location in real time.

check your selfie backgrounds for anything identifying. this includes city names on venues, school names, street signs, and house numbers.

this stuff is flexible if you no longer live in your hometown, or if your city is particularly big, but there’s STILL no reason to tie yourself to your school, your workplace, or your street. you can call it paranoid, but as someone who’s seen my friends get literal death threats over fictional characters before, the last thing I want is someone willing to act on those threats finding out where they live.

I once had a friend post a photo while visiting me with both a unique local business and a set of street signs in the background, while they knew I was being stalked by someone who knew and potentially followed their account. I wasn't in that photo, but other posts from that weekend made it obvious they were staying with me. They hadn't yet been in a position where they regretted having that information publicly available, so it didn't occur to them to avoid sharing it.

Oh the woes of having one of your favourite characters be the hardest for you to draw. I'm not as consistent with Knux as I am with other characters, but I'm hoping this character sheet helps our storyboard team nonetheless 🤸

Sonic HERE | Shadow+Tails HERE

Not just in your body, but in your mind, your relationships, your work, your environment, your pockets.

You’re not weak. You’re holding a lot all at once.

Tumblr isn't TikTok. It's not Youtube. It's not Instagram or Twitter or BlueSky or whatever other social media sites are out there, competing for your eyeballs.

There's no algorithm here. There's nothing putting things in front of you, wanting you to just sit and mindlessly scroll as it decides what you should see. (Generally speaking. There are still the "based on your likes" or "because you follow suchandsuch tag" and sponsored stuff, naturally. But those usually aren't outside your realm of interest. Usually.)

Here on Tumblr, you curate your own content. You look for tags that interest you, you follow those who create art/posts/writing that feed that lizard brain the dopamine it so craves. In so doing, you find more and more, because the backbone of this site is reblogging. Take note of this, write it down if you need, this is important.

It's not enough just to follow people and tags. It's not enough just to like something. You need to reblog it. (That's that little back and forth arrow thing below.) Reblogging shares that post to your own blog, so people following you will see it. If it interests them, they (ideally) reblog it, spreading it to their followers, and so on.

If you tell two people, and they tell two people, and they tell two people, then that means a whole helluva lot of people have seen that post who might not have otherwise.

But this won't happen unless you reblog the post.