I'm writing this question with genuine curiosity, because I could use some advice since it's something that has impacted by dating life. I'm a larger guy in the 🍆 department, measuring in at around 9.5" long and 7" girth. I am focusing in on dating with long term potential goals, but from an intimacy level, being larger endowed has become a hurdle in physical chemistry with partners. I've learned to ease into things at the comfort of my partners, but I've had at least three women tell me (in the most kindest way) that they just can't enjoy sex with me due to my size. It's disappointing because I usually invest some time into connecting on a personal level before things move into an intimate level, and so now, I am wonder if there is any possible way that a guy who is larger down there can somehow filter matches better or provide an early indication of this being as a possible dealbreaker for them without it sounding horribly braggadocious or weird.
Any advice from women here would be immensely helpful!

Well hello fellow Minecraft lovers! It is time for the first snapshot for 1.20. We know we promised no more major features, so how did we end up with such a big snapshot? You thought the trails were over? NO! In snapshot 23w12a we have even more tales to tell! Our devs apparently could not resist throwing in a few extra additions. Enjoy!
This update can also be found on minecraft.net.
If you find any bugs, please report them on the official Minecraft Issue Tracker. For any feedback and suggestions on our upcoming 1.20 features, head over to the dedicated Feedback site category.

New Features

• All features and changes from the "Update 1.20" experimental pack are now part of the game
• Vibration resonance functionality has been added to Blocks of Amethyst
• Added the Calibrated Sculk Sensor block
• Added Suspicious Gravel, more Archaeology sites, and new Pottery Shards
• Added 5 new armor trims
• Signs have improved customization options
• Added Sniffer Egg
• Added Pitcher Plant

Vibration Resonance

• Blocks of Amethyst have a new behavior when placed adjacent to Sculk Sensors
  • If that Sculk Sensor receives a vibration, the Block of Amethyst will re-emit its frequency as a separate vibration at its location
• This behaviour is called Vibration Resonance, and allows players to move vibration frequencies across long distances without having to recreate the vibration naturally

Calibrated Sculk Sensors

• A new variant of Sculk Sensors which allows you to filter vibrations based on their frequency level
• They are not found naturally and can only be crafted with 1 Sculk Sensor and 3 Amethyst Shards in the Crafting Table
• One side of the Calibrated Sculk Sensor can receive a redstone signal as input
  • The strength of that redstone signal is the only vibration frequency the Sculk Sensor will listen to

Archaeology

• Added Suspicious Gravel block
  • It has the same characteristics as Suspicious Sand
• Added Suspicious Gravel to Cold Ocean Ruins
• Added Suspicious Sand to Warm Ocean Ruins
  • Sniffer Eggs can be found here
• Added the Trail Ruins, a buried structure from a lost culture
  • Four Armor trims can be found here
• Added 16 Pottery Shards (so there are now 20 Pottery Shards in total)
  • These have been distributed between the 5 Archaeology sites: Desert Wells, Desert Temples, Cold Ocean Ruins, Warm Ocean Ruins, and Trail Ruins

Armor Trims

New armor trim Smithing Templates have been added to the following structures:

• Trail Ruins
  • Wayfinder Armor Trim
  • Raiser Armor Trim
  • Shaper Armor Trim
  • Host Armor Trim
• Ancient City
  • Silence Armor Trim

Signs

• Sign text can now be edited after being placed in the world
  • This can be done by interacting with the Sign
• Both sides of the Sign can now have separate text and colors, allowing for further customization options
  • By default, a Sign will prompt you to input the front side's text when placed
  • To apply text to the back-side, you must walk to the other side and interact with that face to edit it
• Signs can now also be waxed with Honeycomb, preventing any further edits to its text
  • Click commands on Signs can only be invoked when the Sign is waxed
  • If a Sign with a click command is not waxed, interacting with it will not invoke the command and instead open up the edit screen as usual

Sniffer Egg

• Can be found in the Suspicious Sand of Warm Ocean Ruins
• When two Sniffers breed they do not immediately spawn a Snifflet; instead, a Sniffer Egg is dropped
• Hatching
  • When placed on Moss, the Egg will hatch after approximately 10 minutes
  • On all other blocks, it will hatch in approximately 20 minutes

Pitcher Plant

• The Sniffer can now occasionally Sniff up a Pitcher Pod item
  • This Pod, when planted in Farmland, grows into a Pitcher Crop, which has five growth stages
  • Once fully grown, the Pitcher Crop can be harvested, yielding a two-block-tall Pitcher Plant

Changes

• Vibration frequencies of many actions in the game have been tweaked
• Wither effect particle color has been adjusted to make it more distinguishable
• Potion of Slow Falling color has been adjusted to make it more distinguishable
• Step sounds can now combine for blocks walked through and stepped on

Vibration Frequencies

In preparation for the Calibrated Sculk Sensor, vibration frequencies have been greatly simplified to prevent unwanted interference. The following are category descriptions for each frequency and the expected events that they correspond to:

1. Movement in any medium (land, water and air)
2. Landing on any surface (land or water)
3. Item interactions
4. Gliding with an elytra or unique mob actions (Ravager roar, Wolf shaking, etc)
5. Dismounting a mob or equipping gear
6. Mounting a mob or interacting with a mob
7. Mobs and players getting damaged
8. Consuming items (drinking and eating)
9. Blocks 'deactivating' (door close, chest close, button unpress, etc)
10. Blocks 'activating' (door open, chest open, button press, etc)
11. Blocks changing (cauldron water level rising, adding food to campfire, etc)
12. Blocks being destroyed
13. Blocks being placed
14. Mobs and players teleporting or spawning
15. Mobs and players dying or an explosion

Combination Step Sounds

• Combines two different step sounds
• Occurs for carpets, snow, nether sprouts, as well as warped and crimson roots
  • The top-most block you are walking on is played as normal
  • The block underneath is played at a lower volume and pitch

Armor Trims

• The Dune Armor Trim now has a brand-new pattern and Smithing Template icon
• The Dune Armor Trim's old pattern is now used by the Sentry Armor Trim
  • A new icon has been made for the Sentry Armor Trim Smithing Template to fit this pattern
• The Sentry Armor Trim's old pattern is now used by the new Shaper Armor Trim

Technical Changes

• The data pack version is now 13, accounting for sign data format changes
• Added a capped rule structure processor that limits the number of replaced blocks for a structure piece to a configured maximum
• Configuring block entity fields in a rule processor rule is now delegated to a referenced block_entity_modifier instead of the previously fixed output_nbt configuration
• Game events have changed vibration frequency and some have been removed
• Tweaked display entity interpolation
• Removed update_1_20 feature flag and built-in datapack - features are no longer experimental

Structure post-processors

Capped post-processor

• A capped post-processor has been added which can limit how many blocks a delegated post-processor randomly transform in a structure
• This can be used to configure a structure piece to have an exact amount of specific blocks, instead of using random distribution
• The capped post-processor has following required parameters:
  • delegate A post-processor which performs the actual block transformation
  • limit Maximum amount of blocks that the delegated post-processor can transform
    • The blocks inside a structure are all randomly passed to the delegated post-processor until it has transformed the limited amount
    • Either constant or random number generator sampled during post-processing

Rule post-processor block entity configuration

• Previously a rule could specify an optional fixed output_nbt which would be added to the processed output block entity
• This field has now been changed to reference a block_entity_modifier
• Existing block_entity_modifier's are:
  • passthrough Retains existing fields on the block entity
    • This is the default if no block_entity_modifier is specified
  • append_static Similar to previous output_nbt this provides fixed fields to add to the block entity
    • A minor change is that this modifier appends configured fields to the processed block instead of replacing existing fields
  • clear Removes any existing fields on the block entity
  • append_loot Appends a loot table and seed to the block entity through required parameter:
    • loot_table Referenced loot table to add to block entity as LootTable field
    • Field LootTableSeed is also added to the block entity using random seeded by block position

Game Events

• piston_contract game event has been removed in favor of block_deactivate
• piston_extend and dispense_fail game events have been removed in favor of block_activate
• Many game events have new vibration frequencies:
  • 1: step, swim, flap
  • 2: projectile_land, hit_ground, splash
  • 3: item_interact_finish, projectile_shoot, instrument_play
  • 4: entity_roar, entity_shake, elytra_glide
  • 5: entity_dismount, equip
  • 6: entity_mount, entity_interact, shear
  • 7: entity_damage
  • 8: drink, eat
  • 9: container_close, block_close, block_deactivate, block_detach
  • 10: container_open, block_open, block_activate, block_attach, prime_fuse, note_block_play
  • 11: block_change
  • 12: block_destroy, fluid_pickup
  • 13: block_place, fluid_place
  • 14: entity_place, lightning_strike, teleport
  • 15: entity_die, explode

Tags

Step Sounds

• The blocks that can produce a combination of step sounds is controlled by combination_step_sound_blocks

Display entity

Interpolation changes

• Previous values are always discarded if interpolation_duration is 0
• Made sure that render properties are applied at the same time (so block_state is applied at the same time as transformation, i.e. at next tick after receiving update)
• Entities are not rendered unless initial data is received. That means display entities might not show on the first tick.
• Note: due to how game handles updates, changes to entities made after summoning might be delivered to clients with later tick

Fixed bugs in Snapshot 23w12a

• MC-157727 - The small cube in honey/slime blocks isn't displayed in inventory
• MC-165221 - 3D Modeled Potions are not rendered correctly in the "GUI Display"
• MC-197241 - Players can change the color of a wolf's collar even if they're not its owner
• MC-201647 - Entity riding an entity can cause location/coordinate desync
• MC-256488 - Bamboo Raft and Raft with Chest models float above ground
• MC-256551 - Baby camels have a visible inventory
• MC-256585 - Z-fighting occurs on the text of hanging signs
• MC-259201 - The tops and bottoms of donkeys' ears are miscolored
• MC-259879 - Display entities with a rather large shadow_radius value can cause performance issues
• MC-260020 - Reloading the world resets the Brown Mooshroom's given flower
• MC-260043 - Decorated Pots don't play breaking sound in creative mode
• MC-260047 - Decorated pots from the creative inventory and new blank decorated pots with no NBT will match their texture to the last decorated pot you crafted
• MC-260053 - When rotating a decorated pot with the debug stick, it will spawn a decorated pot item
• MC-260061 - Sniffer's ears and head z-fight
• MC-260069 - Growing cherry trees inside each other causes their leaves to decay
• MC-260240 - Sniffers that are in love sometimes don't attempt to approach one another to breed
• MC-260251 - The walking animations of sniffers don't change in relation to their movement speed
• MC-260282 - Sniffers can sniff out and follow players in spectator mode
• MC-260296 - Pink petal block models are not optimized
• MC-260317 - Sniffers try to sniff out obstructed blocks they can't reach
• MC-260320 - Parity Issue: Snifflets (Baby Sniffers) have an inconsistent model with Bedrock
• MC-260326 - Dying sniffers continue to dig
• MC-260409 - Cherry Grove biome is not in the #is_overworld biome tag
• MC-260503 - Sniffers refuse to dig into soil with a non-solid block on top
• MC-260632 - Riding an entity that is far away causes client/server desync
• MC-260678 - Potion of Invisibility looks too similar to the Potion of Slow Falling
• MC-260750 - Magma blocks use unnecessary random ticking for an outdated feature, causing performance issues
• MC-260757 - Updating a large amount of Iron Bars causes the game to hang in-game or during the Saving world screen
• MC-260777 - Sniffers ignore some dangerous blocks while sniffing and pathfinding resulting in them being damaged
• MC-260778 - Sniffer tries to sniff out blocks outside the world border
• MC-260779 - Sniffers can dig into blocks outside the world border
• MC-260839 - Mobs can replace weapons held in their main hand with armor
• MC-260885 - Display entities summoned with initial transformation interpolate incorrectly from default transformation during next transformation
• MC-260897 - Display entity's previous state of interpolation doesn't work as expected

Get the Snapshot

Snapshots are available for Minecraft Java Edition. To install the Snapshot, open up the Minecraft Launcher and enable snapshots in the "Installations" tab.
Testing versions can corrupt your world, please backup and/or run them in a different folder from your main worlds.
Cross-platform server jar:

• Minecraft server jar

What else is new?

For previous changes for Minecraft 1.19.4 and new features for Minecraft 1.20, see the previous release post. Read more about the changes in the Wild update in the release post

Well hello fellow Minecraft lovers! It is time for the first snapshot for 1.20. We know we promised no more major features, so how did we end up with such a big snapshot? You thought the trails were over? NO! In snapshot 23w12a we have even more tales to tell! Our devs apparently could not resist throwing in a few extra additions. Enjoy!
This update can also be found on minecraft.net.
If you find any bugs, please report them on the official Minecraft Issue Tracker. For any feedback and suggestions on our upcoming 1.20 features, head over to the dedicated Feedback site category.

New Features

• All features and changes from the "Update 1.20" experimental pack are now part of the game
• Vibration resonance functionality has been added to Blocks of Amethyst
• Added the Calibrated Sculk Sensor block
• Added Suspicious Gravel, more Archaeology sites, and new Pottery Shards
• Added 5 new armor trims
• Signs have improved customization options
• Added Sniffer Egg
• Added Pitcher Plant

Vibration Resonance

• Blocks of Amethyst have a new behavior when placed adjacent to Sculk Sensors
  • If that Sculk Sensor receives a vibration, the Block of Amethyst will re-emit its frequency as a separate vibration at its location
• This behaviour is called Vibration Resonance, and allows players to move vibration frequencies across long distances without having to recreate the vibration naturally

Calibrated Sculk Sensors

• A new variant of Sculk Sensors which allows you to filter vibrations based on their frequency level
• They are not found naturally and can only be crafted with 1 Sculk Sensor and 3 Amethyst Shards in the Crafting Table
• One side of the Calibrated Sculk Sensor can receive a redstone signal as input
  • The strength of that redstone signal is the only vibration frequency the Sculk Sensor will listen to

Archaeology

• Added Suspicious Gravel block
  • It has the same characteristics as Suspicious Sand
• Added Suspicious Gravel to Cold Ocean Ruins
• Added Suspicious Sand to Warm Ocean Ruins
  • Sniffer Eggs can be found here
• Added the Trail Ruins, a buried structure from a lost culture
  • Four Armor trims can be found here
• Added 16 Pottery Shards (so there are now 20 Pottery Shards in total)
  • These have been distributed between the 5 Archaeology sites: Desert Wells, Desert Temples, Cold Ocean Ruins, Warm Ocean Ruins, and Trail Ruins

Armor Trims

New armor trim Smithing Templates have been added to the following structures:

• Trail Ruins
  • Wayfinder Armor Trim
  • Raiser Armor Trim
  • Shaper Armor Trim
  • Host Armor Trim
• Ancient City
  • Silence Armor Trim

Signs

• Sign text can now be edited after being placed in the world
  • This can be done by interacting with the Sign
• Both sides of the Sign can now have separate text and colors, allowing for further customization options
  • By default, a Sign will prompt you to input the front side's text when placed
  • To apply text to the back-side, you must walk to the other side and interact with that face to edit it
• Signs can now also be waxed with Honeycomb, preventing any further edits to its text
  • Click commands on Signs can only be invoked when the Sign is waxed
  • If a Sign with a click command is not waxed, interacting with it will not invoke the command and instead open up the edit screen as usual

Sniffer Egg

• Can be found in the Suspicious Sand of Warm Ocean Ruins
• When two Sniffers breed they do not immediately spawn a Snifflet; instead, a Sniffer Egg is dropped
• Hatching
  • When placed on Moss, the Egg will hatch after approximately 10 minutes
  • On all other blocks, it will hatch in approximately 20 minutes

Pitcher Plant

• The Sniffer can now occasionally Sniff up a Pitcher Pod item
  • This Pod, when planted in Farmland, grows into a Pitcher Crop, which has five growth stages
  • Once fully grown, the Pitcher Crop can be harvested, yielding a two-block-tall Pitcher Plant

Changes

• Vibration frequencies of many actions in the game have been tweaked
• Wither effect particle color has been adjusted to make it more distinguishable
• Potion of Slow Falling color has been adjusted to make it more distinguishable
• Step sounds can now combine for blocks walked through and stepped on

Vibration Frequencies

In preparation for the Calibrated Sculk Sensor, vibration frequencies have been greatly simplified to prevent unwanted interference. The following are category descriptions for each frequency and the expected events that they correspond to:

1. Movement in any medium (land, water and air)
2. Landing on any surface (land or water)
3. Item interactions
4. Gliding with an elytra or unique mob actions (Ravager roar, Wolf shaking, etc)
5. Dismounting a mob or equipping gear
6. Mounting a mob or interacting with a mob
7. Mobs and players getting damaged
8. Consuming items (drinking and eating)
9. Blocks 'deactivating' (door close, chest close, button unpress, etc)
10. Blocks 'activating' (door open, chest open, button press, etc)
11. Blocks changing (cauldron water level rising, adding food to campfire, etc)
12. Blocks being destroyed
13. Blocks being placed
14. Mobs and players teleporting or spawning
15. Mobs and players dying or an explosion

Combination Step Sounds

• Combines two different step sounds
• Occurs for carpets, snow, nether sprouts, as well as warped and crimson roots
  • The top-most block you are walking on is played as normal
  • The block underneath is played at a lower volume and pitch

Armor Trims

• The Dune Armor Trim now has a brand-new pattern and Smithing Template icon
• The Dune Armor Trim's old pattern is now used by the Sentry Armor Trim
  • A new icon has been made for the Sentry Armor Trim Smithing Template to fit this pattern
• The Sentry Armor Trim's old pattern is now used by the new Shaper Armor Trim

Technical Changes

• The data pack version is now 13, accounting for sign data format changes
• Added a capped rule structure processor that limits the number of replaced blocks for a structure piece to a configured maximum
• Configuring block entity fields in a rule processor rule is now delegated to a referenced block_entity_modifier instead of the previously fixed output_nbt configuration
• Game events have changed vibration frequency and some have been removed
• Tweaked display entity interpolation
• Removed update_1_20 feature flag and built-in datapack - features are no longer experimental

Structure post-processors

Capped post-processor

• A capped post-processor has been added which can limit how many blocks a delegated post-processor randomly transform in a structure
• This can be used to configure a structure piece to have an exact amount of specific blocks, instead of using random distribution
• The capped post-processor has following required parameters:
  • delegate A post-processor which performs the actual block transformation
  • limit Maximum amount of blocks that the delegated post-processor can transform
    • The blocks inside a structure are all randomly passed to the delegated post-processor until it has transformed the limited amount
    • Either constant or random number generator sampled during post-processing

Rule post-processor block entity configuration

• Previously a rule could specify an optional fixed output_nbt which would be added to the processed output block entity
• This field has now been changed to reference a block_entity_modifier
• Existing block_entity_modifier's are:
  • passthrough Retains existing fields on the block entity
    • This is the default if no block_entity_modifier is specified
  • append_static Similar to previous output_nbt this provides fixed fields to add to the block entity
    • A minor change is that this modifier appends configured fields to the processed block instead of replacing existing fields
  • clear Removes any existing fields on the block entity
  • append_loot Appends a loot table and seed to the block entity through required parameter:
    • loot_table Referenced loot table to add to block entity as LootTable field
    • Field LootTableSeed is also added to the block entity using random seeded by block position

Game Events

• piston_contract game event has been removed in favor of block_deactivate
• piston_extend and dispense_fail game events have been removed in favor of block_activate
• Many game events have new vibration frequencies:
  • 1: step, swim, flap
  • 2: projectile_land, hit_ground, splash
  • 3: item_interact_finish, projectile_shoot, instrument_play
  • 4: entity_roar, entity_shake, elytra_glide
  • 5: entity_dismount, equip
  • 6: entity_mount, entity_interact, shear
  • 7: entity_damage
  • 8: drink, eat
  • 9: container_close, block_close, block_deactivate, block_detach
  • 10: container_open, block_open, block_activate, block_attach, prime_fuse, note_block_play
  • 11: block_change
  • 12: block_destroy, fluid_pickup
  • 13: block_place, fluid_place
  • 14: entity_place, lightning_strike, teleport
  • 15: entity_die, explode

Tags

Step Sounds

• The blocks that can produce a combination of step sounds is controlled by combination_step_sound_blocks

Display entity

Interpolation changes

• Previous values are always discarded if interpolation_duration is 0
• Made sure that render properties are applied at the same time (so block_state is applied at the same time as transformation, i.e. at next tick after receiving update)
• Entities are not rendered unless initial data is received. That means display entities might not show on the first tick.
• Note: due to how game handles updates, changes to entities made after summoning might be delivered to clients with later tick

Fixed bugs in Snapshot 23w12a

• MC-157727 - The small cube in honey/slime blocks isn't displayed in inventory
• MC-165221 - 3D Modeled Potions are not rendered correctly in the "GUI Display"
• MC-197241 - Players can change the color of a wolf's collar even if they're not its owner
• MC-201647 - Entity riding an entity can cause location/coordinate desync
• MC-256488 - Bamboo Raft and Raft with Chest models float above ground
• MC-256551 - Baby camels have a visible inventory
• MC-256585 - Z-fighting occurs on the text of hanging signs
• MC-259201 - The tops and bottoms of donkeys' ears are miscolored
• MC-259879 - Display entities with a rather large shadow_radius value can cause performance issues
• MC-260020 - Reloading the world resets the Brown Mooshroom's given flower
• MC-260043 - Decorated Pots don't play breaking sound in creative mode
• MC-260047 - Decorated pots from the creative inventory and new blank decorated pots with no NBT will match their texture to the last decorated pot you crafted
• MC-260053 - When rotating a decorated pot with the debug stick, it will spawn a decorated pot item
• MC-260061 - Sniffer's ears and head z-fight
• MC-260069 - Growing cherry trees inside each other causes their leaves to decay
• MC-260240 - Sniffers that are in love sometimes don't attempt to approach one another to breed
• MC-260251 - The walking animations of sniffers don't change in relation to their movement speed
• MC-260282 - Sniffers can sniff out and follow players in spectator mode
• MC-260296 - Pink petal block models are not optimized
• MC-260317 - Sniffers try to sniff out obstructed blocks they can't reach
• MC-260320 - Parity Issue: Snifflets (Baby Sniffers) have an inconsistent model with Bedrock
• MC-260326 - Dying sniffers continue to dig
• MC-260409 - Cherry Grove biome is not in the #is_overworld biome tag
• MC-260503 - Sniffers refuse to dig into soil with a non-solid block on top
• MC-260632 - Riding an entity that is far away causes client/server desync
• MC-260678 - Potion of Invisibility looks too similar to the Potion of Slow Falling
• MC-260750 - Magma blocks use unnecessary random ticking for an outdated feature, causing performance issues
• MC-260757 - Updating a large amount of Iron Bars causes the game to hang in-game or during the Saving world screen
• MC-260777 - Sniffers ignore some dangerous blocks while sniffing and pathfinding resulting in them being damaged
• MC-260778 - Sniffer tries to sniff out blocks outside the world border
• MC-260779 - Sniffers can dig into blocks outside the world border
• MC-260839 - Mobs can replace weapons held in their main hand with armor
• MC-260885 - Display entities summoned with initial transformation interpolate incorrectly from default transformation during next transformation
• MC-260897 - Display entity's previous state of interpolation doesn't work as expected

Get the Snapshot

Snapshots are available for Minecraft Java Edition. To install the Snapshot, open up the Minecraft Launcher and enable snapshots in the "Installations" tab.
Testing versions can corrupt your world, please backup and/or run them in a different folder from your main worlds.
Cross-platform server jar:

• Minecraft server jar

What else is new?

For previous changes for Minecraft 1.19.4 and new features for Minecraft 1.20, see the previous release post. Read more about the changes in the Wild update in the release post

Basically what the title says. So I play every hero pretty well, but for a while I would mostly play ana & rammatra (made my way to diamond in open queue and support w them). lately I’ve been playing a lot of kiriko and rein. Issue is, now when I go back to playing ana or ram, I find it really really difficult to switch back to their play-style.
Whenever I play ana now it’s a huge skill diff if there’s another ana on the enemy team (I used to hit crazy sleeps and now I miss like 70% of the time). I subconsciously position as though I have more mobility. Sometimes I use nade more like suzu rather than going for big antis. Same with ram, I have a hard time not playing him like rein.
I feel like I completely lose the muscle memory if I start to “main” another hero. It’s also hard to get back into practicing with ana or ram because I get frustrated when I miss shots or mess up CDs that I know I wouldn’t have before, and usually if I don’t play my current “main” I lose.
These are just specific examples, but it goes for the whole roster. How the heck do you keep a flexible hero pool without losing skill?

Hello, graduate workers of UIUC!
Exciting news: this will hopefully be the LAST post we ever have to make about how you should come to this week’s contract bargaining session, because this Friday will hopefully be our LAST contract bargaining session! This is the culmination of everything we've been fighting for this past year.
I know—it feels like every other week we’re telling you about THE MOST IMPORTANT BARGAINING SESSION YET! As we get closer to the end of the bargaining process, the more important the topics under discussion become, and the more we need GEO membership to attend bargaining sessions to show the UIUC Administration that we’re paying attention and we care about our wages.
We have good reason to believe that during this Friday's session, Administration will move towards our demands, including a wage increase above inflation and fee waivers. With luck (and pressure from you!), we'll have a contract by the end of the session.
During the last few bargaining sessions, the GEO bargaining team and Administration have been discussing the topics our membership has voted as most important: wages and healthcare. Admin’s latest offer was a $20,450 minimum for this year. Can you live on that? A living wage for one childless adult in Urbana-Champaign is $36,650, so for many of you, the answer to that question is “no.”
To further put Administration’s offer into context, here’s how it compares to minimums at what the university considers their “peer institutions” and to the GEO’s latest proposal of a $23,400 minimum, which we believe is comparable to other graduate programs, all in "Urbana-Champaign dollars":
​
Image ID: A graph showing graduate worker compensation adjusted to cost of living at eighteen different U.S. American universities, the current minimum at UIUC, the GEO’s proposed minimum for UIUC, and Administration’s proposed minimum for UIUC. The x axis goes from 0 to $38,000 and the y axis is universities sorted in descending order of adjusted compensation. “UIUC (now)” is the second-smallest compensation. “UIUC (Admin)” is the fifth-smallest compensation. “UIUC (GEO)” is exactly in the middle of the pack at 11th smallest/11th largest.
We calculated Cost-of-Living-Adjusted Compensation (before tax) as (Minimum academic year wage + health insurance paid by the university - student fees - health insurance paid by the grad worker)*(C-U cost of living/Location's cost of living).
It’s not like the university can’t afford to pay us more–their unrestricted reserves (money available to them without restrictions on its use) grew from $0.525 Billion in fiscal year 2019 to $1.307 Billion in fiscal year 2022.
Administration knows what they’re paying us; they know what the cost of living is in Urbana-Champaign; they know that their offer is below inflation. They don’t care. It’s their job to pay us as little as they can get away with.
Our best counter to this, as employees, isn’t graphs and testimonials and surveys about graduate worker quality of life. It’s showing up in numbers. The more of us care enough to show up, the more potential disruption we could cause. That’s it. That’s what the university administration cares about.
As academics, we want our well-cited arguments and the base, obvious fact that we can’t live on $20,000 a year to be enough to persuade the administration to pay us a living wage. It should be enough. It’s frustrating that it isn’t.
So we end up here again: asking you to come to the bargaining session this week. It’s hard to talk about how important showing up is without sounding like a cheesy pro-labor slogan about the power of the people, united! but, well, graduate workers showing up en masse is the most powerful tool we have.
Every additional graduate worker who attends the session is more pressure on the Administration, and therefore more potential money in your pocket over the course of our next contract.
Be at the Illini Union, Room C, this Friday, March 24th. The bargaining session is scheduled from 10:00 am - 5:00 pm; show up for whatever time you’re available. Bring a friend, bring three friends, bring your whole department.

It’s your last chance to make a difference. All you have to do is show up.

Friday 3/24, Illini Union Room C, 10:00 am - 5:00 pm. See you there!

In February, Rockstar confirmed that development of Grand Theft Auto VI is well underway. In July, the TakeTwo subsidiary publicized that it would no longer work on Red Dead Redemption 2 or its online offering to focus on the development of the next title in the mega-popular GTA series. Despite this, talking about the next installment in the 25-year-old franchise is discouraged, at least on the official Twitch channel of Rockstar Games. This follows behavior the company started exhibiting on YouTube as well.
When users attempt to type GTA VI or GTA 6, they are greeted with the message that appears when a banned word or filter is applied on Twitch channels – "Your message wasn't posted due to conflicts with the channel's moderation settings." Publishers hushing people on their own platforms about titles is nothing new. Wild speculation can often draw attention to things the developers may not wish to reveal or may not have information about yet.
twitch chat no gta vi Screen Capture of Rockstar Twitch Chat Censoring GTA VI
Grand Theft Auto VI is not expected to be available until sometime in 2024. The belief right now is that Rockstar wants to focus marketing on the Grand Theft Auto Online portion of their business. GTA Online has shown a regular player base and persistent earnings for the company. There's potential for a loss of funds if people's focus is shifted away from what is currently earning them money.
There is very little known about the new title. Some people have ventured guesses that we may see a return to Vice City, the fictional city based on southern Florida cities in the United States. As of right now, the only information anyone has from Rockstar for sure is that it is being worked on. Anything else is most likely speculation.
gta cuban plane Screenshot of Cuban Airplane from Grand Theft Auto V
There are also concerns that Rockstar employees are not necessarily staying on very long right now. This follows some trends that have been occurring recently in the game development world. Poor worker treatment at Activision-Blizzard led to employees at one of its subsidiaries forming a union. Hopefully things remain stable enough at Rockstar and TakeTwo for GTA VI to arrive on time, though.

Pw is diff
I’m standing near summon pool thanks!

Hello, I have a black texture on a white background, how do I filter out the white so that only the black stays?
Thanks for any help.

When a brand or company keeps the price in the product the same but lowers the quantity of the product? For example I know for a fact (or at least a good feeling) that snickers and mars bars where bigger when I was a child. Yet it seems that the price is way higher (of course inflation) but still.

Forest Ruins spawn in any forest biome like oak forests, taiga forests, Cherry groves and jungles and include blocks based on the biome it’s in like, for example, one in a cherry grove would be made out of cherry logs and dirt whilst a jungle one would include jungle wood and mossy cobblestone. These would have a new block (suspicious dirt) included in them and would be pretty cool to come across whilst exploring and would also include their own loot pool completely separate from desert temples, desert wells and ocean ruins. This includes:

• [new] dragon pottery shard
  
• [new] diamond pottery shard
  
• [new] Steve head pottery shard
  
• [new] checkered pattern pottery shard
  
• gunpowder
  
• string
  
• iron ingot
  
• copper ingot
  
• mossy skeleton skull
  
• [super rare] diamond
  
• [rare] emerald
  

Hey Im Clay, Im 20, Im from Michigan and Im looking to find a player 2, someone who I can just share anything with, eventually having a family and being a Dad and a house husband, not a perfect family but one thats happy and healthy. My hobbies include gaming, writing stories, making music, and occasionally streaming games. I love voice acting and cinematography but I have no experience in the latter. If youre someone who loves gaming, a nerd who loves mtg, d&d, or if youre someone who is 420 friendly, or you enjoy dark humor and have zero filter, then I would like to make it known my DMs will be waiting for that special person

Is pool together real?

To sum up, I have invested over 400 hours into playing Overwatch and have recently been on losing streaks, where the first game always had a leaver on our team, followed by multiple losses. This has occurred over several days while playing solo queue, and I believe it indicates a rigged matchmaking system that remains unresolved.
As a tank player, I improved from Silver 4 to Gold 3 with a 60% winning rate but lost six games in a row afterward. As a DPS player, I climbed from Gold 3 to Plat 3 with a 70% winning rate but lost nine games in a row after that. Finally, as a support player, I went from Plat 3 to Plat 1 with a 10-win, 4-loss record but then lost four games in a row.
After reading multiple threads about the rigged matchmaking system, I suspect that Blizzard is employing a gambling strategy to punish winning players and manipulate the outcome of their games. They may use an algorithm similar to those on TikTok and Instagram that labels players with specific preferences, such as frequent leavers or throwers, and assigns them to a team with a winning player to hinder their success.
This unethical approach undermines the integrity of a great game and forces players like me to invest more time and effort in climbing the ranks. However, this is not feasible for regular players like myself who have full-time jobs and consider the game a hobby. While I have learned many tips from professional players, including Awkward, who climbed from unranked to GM, I acknowledge that I am not a pro player. Fortunately, this issue can be resolved by fixing the matchmaking system.
Experiencing a rigged matchmaking system in Overwatch is frustrating, and I spend too much time playing the game and being lured in by the system. Therefore, it may be time to consider quitting competitive play entirely.
I would appreciate your opinion on the current state of matchmaking, even though it may be a well-known topic. Please don't suggest that I am tilted (I am rethinking it and have already chilled for a day), have not watched my replays, or learned from others, as I have already done so. My question is simple: if I am not suited for a particular rank, why does the matchmaking system used rank deflation/inflation to assess my performance and pair me with incomplete teammates, expecting me to carry the team? It is a waste of time to continue grinding for hours with an unknown skill level and random teammates, and as a result, I have decided to take a break from playing for a while.