is it legal to own a slot machine in florida - win
Living The Screen Life #productsmakemehappy
Original Author Important official legal disclaimer: This is a short work of fiction. Any resemblances to real people (including myself); people you may know; people you think you may know; etc.; is entirely deliberate. When I’m at work I’m staring at a screen. When I’m not at work I’m staring at screens. Checking social media. Scrolling through updates. Scrolling through friends. Scrolling through #instagram. Scrolling through #amazon. The customer is always right. Make sure the product you’re selling is something that people want to buy. On the subway we’re surrounded by people that we don’t know and never will. Our heads are tilted down, eyes connected to smartphones and pod devices. Playing free games. Bright lights and colorful shapes. Swipe swipe swipe. Group texts. #netflix. Fantasy football updates. #snapchats. The anxiety of being human. New Yorkers avoid looking at or talking to one another. Once in a while there will be a crazy person on the train and all of us normal passengers can smile at each other and sigh. At least we’re not crazy. The subway tunnels are the arteries and veins of the city, the passageways of the busy hive. If you close your eyes the movement through the tunnels feels organic, alive. A buzz of worker bees on our way. Where are we going? I don’t want be a part of the hive. But I’m a human being. I need other human beings. Something is broken in me. I hate myself. I don’t feel connection in any aspect of my life. friendships, family, romance, work. Ennui and alienation are my reality. A city of 8 million people. A hive of loneliness. My life is no tragedy. I don’t have any real reasons to be sad but I’m sad. I wasn’t abused. My parents love me. I went to college. I had all the benefits of a middle class upbringing. I’m a white male in a society that has persecuted anyone and everyone who isn’t. I eat mostly fast food. Chinese delivery. #mcdonalds. #kraft macaroni & cheese. #dominos. Microwave dinners. High sodium. High Fructose Corn Syrup. MSG. Intense flavors. Addictive flavors. There was a terrorist attack and the nation was in shock. A maniac with a gun shot up a shopping mall. The president offered his condolences. We had an all-staff call at work to discuss how we felt. It’s important for us to remember that terrorists are evil. When terrible things happen on our TV screens it’s important to show solidarity. We’ve never had an all-staff call at work to discuss our solidarity with the homeless people that we walk by each day between the subway station and our office. The woman who stands by the subway entrance shaking her cup of change every day. The couple that sleep in sleeping bags each night under the awning of the bodega. We didn’t have an all-staff call to discuss our solidarity with our co-workers who were laid off last week. Binge. Binge-watch. Binge-watch television. The revolution will be televised. The revolution will be tweeted.
Browsing the internet, searching for a date. Swiping through thousands of profiles. The deep human need for connection. "Love to travel". "Looking for a partner in crime". “Enjoys witty banter”. Attempting to send thoughtful messages that will stand out. Being ignored. Rejected. Every once in a while a rare response. Variable rewards. You’ll never win if you don’t play the game. Dopamine. Slot machines. Addiction. Sometimes I wonder if people have genuine friendships anymore. Sometimes I think back to the times when I had friends. My friends from college. I think I was always a little bit sad underneath it all. But friends are a good medicine. We had a lot of fun back in college. This was back before our jobs dragged us to all different corners of the country. Nowadays we talk about the #nfl or #GoT through group texts. Sometimes we wish each other happy birthday. Usually we forget. Breaking news. Check your smart phone. Turn on your television. President Trump did this. President Trump did that. Terrorist attack. Hurricane. Polar Ice Caps melting. Destruction. Human beings are terrible to each other. Stay informed. Stay alert. Informed citizens watch the news. Check #bbc, #cnn, #msnbc. Get updates and notifications. Twitter and social media keep us informed. Smart phones are smart. Drugs make me feel better. Temporarily. Porn works too. Weed. A little coke. A little molly. Drugs and porn don't really make me happy, but they at least make me not sad for a while. A quick bump to take the pain away. Everyone is an addict. Addiction is good for the economy. Some addictions are respectable. Some not so much. work, shopping, smart phones, #facebook, television, fossil fuels, #marvel super-hero movies, #mcdonalds, #instagram, pornography, #dominos, coffee, alcohol, #snapchat, cocaine, #oxycontin, heroin. The economy is doing well. I talked to my sister a few weeks ago, she lives in Colorado. She used to live in Arizona, and before that North Carolina. I miss my sister. Like most young people she goes wherever her or her boyfriend can find work. She complained about her job, about how all her coworkers seem so fake. No one really seems to care about what they’re doing. It’s more important to make it seem like you care than it is to actually care. The other day I saw a picture she posted with her co-workers - “So happy to work with these great people and this awesome company #workfriends”. The global economy is great. Even as it rips apart the connections that we need for our emotional health, it comes up with ever more products and services and gadgets for us to substitute for those connections and soothe our loneliness. One day we will all be starting at screens all the time and we’ll never have to interact with humans in the real world ever again. Life will be good. I know some people who find meaning in their work. They work long hours. They go out drinking with co-workers. Mostly they work in advertising or tech or finance. These industries are important because they help our economy grow. Growing the economy is important. We may live on a finite planet, but we’re committed to an economy that can grow forever. An economy is not the only type of organic system that can commit to a cycle of endless growth. Sometimes it happens with cells in the human body for instance. This is called cancer. Most of my time at work I sit at my desk pretending to work hard. Wondering what the other cubicle bees are doing with their time as they pretend to be working hard. Sometimes I do spread sheets that people tell me are useful. Measuring. Counting. Once in a while I’ll grab lunch at the bodega or at #mcdonalds and I’ll notice how the employees there work so much harder than I do. Most of them are bi-lingual. They probably work harder in an hour than I do in a day. I sit at a desk in front of a computer, so my job is really important. Smart phone. Smart TV. Smart car. Smart house. We are smart. When I get out of work I walk to the subway with all the other worker bees leaving their jobs. The sidewalks are buzzing with people heading this way and that. It’s important to walk fast to wherever it is you’re going. It’s important to go where you’re going and for everyone else to go where they’re going. Thinking about where you’re going is time wasted when you could be getting to where you’re going. Be careful if you smile at other people, they may see it as a threat. At rush hour there is always a man on the corner near the subway with a sign that says “Jesus Loves You.” His eyes are intense. He doesn’t seem to be in a rush to get anywhere. I love to learn. I love to read. I mostly hated school. Some of the most intelligent, interesting, and creative people I knew were dropouts. School was useful for teaching us that life is about measurement and performance and specialization and commodification. Your peers are your competition. Things like empathy and imagination and cooperation are hard to measure. They’re non-linear. School doesn’t like them. Prison population is something we can measure. There are more black men in prison today than there were enslaved at the time the Civil War began. There are 2.3 million Americans in Prison. America is the home of the Free and the Brave. There was a pretty young woman at the register at the bookstore. She told me that she was a huge fan of the Nabokov stories I was buying. Said she loved the way he plays with language and meaning. She reached to give me a bag for the book and I told her I didn't really need one. She apologized and smiled and said that she must have asked me about a bag already. I told her that she hadn't. She blushed. I asked her her name. I asked her for her number. Later I sent her a message. Maybe I could take her out for a drink sometime. Smiley face emoji. I never got a response. Connecting with people is hard. Social media. Social. Media. We are social. We connect with our screens. Social media connects us to what is important. Likes, upvotes, retweets, friend requests, updates, notifications. That friendly buzzzzzz from your smart phone. It feels good to be social. Dopamine. Remember - Your brand matters. Everyone is watching. Technology makes the world better. Technology solves problems, especially problems created by other technology. If new technologies create problems, the solution is to develop newer technologies to solve those problems. Technology and progress are the same thing. Technology helps the economy grow. When technology makes human beings obsolete, that is progress. Sometimes it seems that we relate to our machines better than we relate to each other. One in sixty-eight children in America is diagnosed with autism. Autism is characterized by impaired social interaction, impaired verbal and non-verbal communication, and restricted and repetitive behavior. I feel like my job isn’t actually about doing anything. Success is really about making it look like what you do is important. Lying to yourself to tell yourself that what you do is important. Teamwork and cooperation are actively discouraged at work. No one knows what anyone else does, but supposedly what everyone does is important. Stare into your computer screen. Do we live in a world where success is about manipulating our fellow human beings? #winning One day after work I saw an old woman on the subway with a young girl sleeping at her side. The woman was sewing a scarf. Sometimes people are good to each other. Sometimes the small things in life can be incredibly beautiful. Once in a while happiness will come when I’m not searching for it. I wish I had a girlfriend. Someone I could talk to without feeling like I’m lying to myself. People around me are growing up. Getting married. Having kids. Settling into life. My conscience is at war with my culture. One day I took a train out of the city. I took some molly. I was hoping to escape the traps of language. I needed nature. I needed art. I was looking for something that wasn’t for sale. Our culture destroys connection. Alienation is endemic to the system. Nobody knows anybody, nobody knows themselves. We blame and ridicule anyone who reflects the fear that is hidden within ourselves. Those who are suffering the most – the poor, the homeless, the drug addicts, the crazy, the uneducated. Anyone with a political ideology different from our own. Organic human interaction doesn’t exist, all that matters is your ability to sell and your ability to consume. Smile for #instagram, smile for #facebook. Image is everything. Human beings are commodities. We stare into screens, selling ourselves to each other. We desperately hang on for a sense of meaning and purpose to a culture which is destroying the ecosystems that we depend on for life. A culture which transforms our deep emotional need for meaning and connection into a deep emotional need for products. In 2015 there were 33,000 deaths in America from heroin and prescription opioids. These drugs are pain killers. Pain. Killers. What pain are we trying to kill? Some of the best people I know are chronic drug users, some of them functional, some of them not so much. What does it mean to be a human being? Once I got so lonely that I was no longer myself. I was the hive. The people moving to and fro, the traffic, the ambulances, the delivery boys on their bicycles, the junkies, the couples hand in hand on the sidewalks, the children and dogs playing in the park, the street festivals, the subway cars rumbling through their tunnels. It was all me. The sounds of the city are music. Everything is frequency. It’s buzzing. Rather than acknowledging and sharing our pain and fear, using vulnerability to connect, we project onto each other. We revert to tribalism. Tribalism and hatred increase when our communities are our screens. Morality and empathy function differently in this environment. There is only the tribe and the Other. The safe space and the enemy. Stronger Together. I’m With Her. Make America Great Again. #BackLivesMatter #BlueLivesMatter Advertising is our culture. #hastag your tribe. I miss my sister. I miss my whole family. Including my extended family that I don’t really know. Sometimes I think that humans aren’t really supposed to behave like bees in a hive and that we are actually designed to live close to our families and our friends and work close to where we live. Maybe work and life and culture and happiness aren’t supposed to be separate things. “Commute” is a silly word. There’s a hope somewhere deep down that we actually need each other…that people are worth it. As a straight, college educated, white male, I sometimes feel that I’m not allowed to be upset about the world we live in, I’m not allowed to be hurt by it. I need to #checkmyprivilege. Maybe I just need more drugs. It’s important for us to be living in a state of constant consumption. After all, what are we if we’re not consumers? What does it mean to be a human being? Sex sells. Sex is a good product. Orgasms can be counted. How many people have you fucked? I don’t know how to have a genuinely vulnerable emotional connection with another human being. What happens after the orgasm? Connecting with someone who you hope to have an intimate and beautiful relationship with is about selling yourself. Always remember: You Are A PRODUCT. Make sure you have a great profile pic. It’s important to start out with a clever user name. Never start with your real name. This is advertising, people don’t want to know the real you. Make sure you look sexy at all times. Ugliness doesn’t sell. Swipe your way to happiness. True love is a click away. Everyone’s there. An entire city. A busy hive. Drugs are Good drugs when society says they’re Good drugs. Good drugs are legal, Bad drugs are illegal. Good people Hate president Trump. It’s important to have socially acceptable outlets for channeling negative emotions when living in an oppressive culture. Ridiculing and making fun of Trump and his supporters is something we can all do together and share in the fun. Is it possible that Trump supporters might be human beings too? Is it possible that hatred is just fear and pain turned outward? How’s your social media presence? What does it mean to have “presence”? where am I when I have #presence? Presence; noun; The state or fact of being present; current existence or occurrence. Science and technology allow us to track and influence the behavior of massive numbers of human beings. The entire hive. How does the swarm function? Humans can be tracked by consumption habits and behavior predicted and influenced using algorithms. The more data there is the more accurate the predictions. Eventually feedback loops from past behavior can be used to influence future behavior. What we consume tells us who we are and who we will be. #hashtag it. Humans are just numbers after all. Numbers that can be measured, counted, commodified. Tech and big data are amazing. It’s really great they way the tech industry helps our economy. Why judge people by the content of their character when there are statistics and algorithms? More products to help the economy grow. What does it mean to be a human being? After the Civil War, the former slaves were free to make their way in this home of the Free and the Brave. In Florida and other parts of the south, during the reconstruction period, it was common for freed slaves to be thrown in jail for no other reason than the fact that they didn’t have work. Once there, they were forced into chain gangs to build railroads and other infrastructure projects. Many of them died due to terrible conditions and over-work. Railroads were important because they brought industry and technology and economic growth. Economic progress makes the world better. Every once in a while the screens get turned off. I get the rare chance to talk with friends or co-workers away from the screens and outside of the office environment and I have the impression that they are genuinely interested in having a positive impact in the world and in their community. Why do I feel so alienated at work, and in life? Why are we so disconnected in a world of constant connection? It has something to do with the system, the wider culture. Culture is powerful. Worker bees working, the rhythms of the hive. A beautiful fall day in Central Park. An oasis amidst the concrete. The wind blows through the trees, leaves shimmering in the sun. Fractals. The individual elements reflect structural patterns of the whole. A beehive is an amazing thing. We can’t understand the hive by looking at the behavior of an individual bee, yet the combined behavior of the bees create a new phenomenon that is more than the sum of its parts – the hive. Swarming is like a cultural phenomenon of the hive. It is a pattern of the hive reflected in the bees. The heroin addict reflects our culture of addiction. The cancer patient reflects our pathological attachment to endless growth. The autistic child reflects a society in which we have lost the ability to empathize, lost the ability to feel. We relate more to machines than to each other and to the earth. A black man murdered in the street reflects a culture in which human life is a just a number. Humans are products. A salesman for president is a reflection of us. It shows us who we are. The art of the deal. President. Salesman. Don’t forget that you’re for sale. Everyone’s watching. I don’t have a single person that I feel I can talk to about things that matter to me. I don’t have a single relationship where I feel I can be comfortable being myself, where I feel understood. Attempts that I make to connect are met with rejection. I fail over and over and over again. The relationships I do have are superficial. Why am I so broken? Sometimes I think that I might have something positive to offer. The personalities that thrive in the modern world are those that embody the traits of psychopathy. Rapid turnover in interpersonal relationships. Lack of any real need for a sense of community or place. Focus on the superficial and image based forms of communication as opposed to depth and nuance. Lack of empathy. Commoditized, fragmented, specialized and depersonalized interactions with others and with the planet. We are all engulfed in this culture. There aren’t any good guys or bad guys. Causality is non-linear. We’re all guilty. We are a society in which the ability to consume is our highest virtue and being poor is a moral failure. Poor people hate themselves and each other for being poor and worship rich people for being rich. Rich people hate themselves just as much as poor people, if not more so. Can you ever consume enough to create an identity? What does it mean to be a human being? Technology, screens and financial capital. Fossil fuels. Endless War. Drone Strikes. 150 to 200 of the species that make up the biosphere of planet earth go extinct every single day. 2,220,300 people incarcerated in the United States of America. Home of the Free and the Brave. Does the bee comprehend the nature of the hive? There are 7.442 billion human beings on planet earth. The individual human brain does not work with those kinds of numbers. We can’t relate to 7,442,000,000. 7,442,000,000 are not faces that we know. 7,442,000,000 is not connected to place. The way we make sense of 7,442,000,000…is as a product. A product to be exploited and used for all that it’s worth and then discarded a long with the rest of the natural world. Success in our culture, in the industrial juggernaut that we call our economy, comes from the ability to manipulate the largest number of human beings, from figuring out and implementing the most efficient ways of turning human beings and the planet into a #commodity.
Going through old issues of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter and posting highlights in my own words, continuing in the footsteps of daprice82. For anyone interested, I highly recommend signing up for the actual site at f4wonline and checking out the full archives. FUTURE YEARS ARCHIVE: The Complete Observer Rewind Archive by daprice82
”Unlike his two older brothers who died tragic deaths, in Mike’s case it’s closer to the truth to say he lived a tragic life.” Mike Von Erich, age 23, died of an overdose of tranquilizers on either April 11 or 12 in an apparent suicide. He never was physically or mentally equipped for pro wrestling, yet he was pressured into it anyway and pushed so hard that even he seemed embarrassed by it. In his first promo ahead of his first match, Fritz and Mark Lawrence were pushing the idea that Mike was more talented than his three brothers, who were at the peak of their popularity. Mike never seemed comfortable with that comparison. And despite only ever losing a handful of matches in his career, Mike never was taken seriously as a big star, and even before the toxic shock syndrome incident nearly two years ago at least two promoters had told Dave that pushing Mike would kill World Class.
Mike’s issues with addiction began during recovery from toxic shock. He had car accidents, DUIs, and regular appearances in the newspapers for small misbehaviors. On July 4, 1986 he returned to action and was billed as “The Living Miracle,” but it was clear he wasn’t fully recovered. On the morning of April 11 he was driving in Argyle, Texas (the same city Kerry had his motorcycle accident) and was pulled over. He was arrested for a DUI, possession of marijuana, and possession of a controlled substance before he was bailed out. That was the last he was seen alive. His family assumed the worst on the 13th and told friends that they thought he was dead. Police were called and his truck was found near Lake Lewisville with an unsigned suicide note in his writing. They tried to find his body in the lake for a few days, but no luck came. The news went public on April 15 when someone connected the Adkisson last name to the Von Erichs, a court reporter or a police department worker, most likely. His body was found by a police dog, zipped in his sleeping bag near the lake. His funeral was held on April 18 and about 500 fans attended.
Dave’s not even going to speculate about what this means for World Class or the future of the Von Erich family. He just hopes Fritz doesn’t try to capitalize on it and make the May 3 show a David and Mike memorial show and try to profit off pictures and t-shirts with Mike’s face on them, but he already knows he’s wrong about that. Dave lived in north Texas in 1984 and remembers very well firsthand how World Class treated the death of David Von Erich, and he’ll never forget the “crass commercialization of the death--seeing the t-shirts raised to $20 and photos to $10--rushing out a record and a book that seemingly went public within days, etc.”
The zombified corpse of UWF is shambling about in the news still. The April 18 tapings of Power Pro Wrestling have happened, and several Crockett ideas have been implemented. UWF will now have longer ring introductions (fans aren’t happy but will probably get used to it), Jim Ross has been put at ringside for ring announcing duties rather than having a podium in the back, and Big Bubba Rogers is the only JCP/NWA guy to come over so far. Magnum T.A. will be the new color commentator starting at the next tapings, and John Ayres of the San Francisco 49ers will be the new commissioner (his teammate, Russ Francis, has been doing color for AWA tapings in Vegas and refereed a few matches as well, and later on we’ll note he’s making his wrestling debut on the May 2 card there). Ayres was a teammate of Tully Blanchard, Manny Fernandez, Ted DiBiase, Tito Santana, and Kelly Kiniski in his college days at West Texas State. Ayres has talked about jumping to pro wrestling when his football career is done (which Dave figures is probably a year or so from now). Popping ahead to the future: Ayres won’t go on to a pro wrestling career after his football career, and will retire following his jump to the Broncos and loss in the SuperBowl in 1988.
Anyway, there will be a brief UWF hiatus at the end of the month and UWF crew status is uncertain. The last house show currently scheduled is April 28 in Albuquerque, and there will only be tv tapings for UWF until Dusty’s happy with where the storylines are, which may take until June. The Houston office has switched allegiance to WWF, and the Fort Worth area is genuinely in danger of dying as far as interest goes. Buzz Sawyer, Sam Houston (to join his brother and father in WWF), Nickla, Missy Hyatt (to WWF) are all definitely gone. Probably leaving are One Man Gang (Dave says he’s likely to be Hogan’s next monster by late summer), Savannah Jack, and Bill Irwin.Eddie Gilbert is staying as Dusty’s booking assistant, as are Rick Steiner, Sting, Scandor Akbar, Angel Muhammad, Terry Taylor, Chavo Guerrero, Gary Young, and Chris Adams. No word yet on how where the Freebirds and Sunshine will land.
Ted DiBiase and Steve Williams are the big question marks. DiBiase is currently in Japan, so no idea what he’s thinking, but both JCP/NWA and WWF want him, no doubt about it. Williams could stand to be the biggest winner here, for similar reasons, as he’s also highly coveted and hasn’t made a commitment either way.
Jim Neidhart’s trial began on April 13. He’s accused of punching a flight attendant on a flight. The key witness for the prosecution, the head flight attendant, testified that she saw Neidhart punch the accuser on the left arm four times near the beginning of the flight, then again later and also slapped her with the back of her hand. Jerry McDevitt, our favorite WWF legal counsel, claims Neidhart merely tapped her on the arm and says he has many passengers willing to testify to this claim. Due to the accuser’s job as a flight attendant, the charge is interference with a flight attendant on duty and carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a $275,000 fine.
Riki Choshu has announced a new Ishingun stable. The new group includes Masa Saito, Kuniyaki Kobayashi, Hiroshi Hase, Nobuo Honaga, Shunji Takano, Super Strong Machine, and Hiro Saito. Yoshiaki Yatsu, Shinichi Nakano, Isamu Teranishi, Masanobu Kurusu, and Haruka Eigen have remained with All Japan. Animal Hamaguchi has announced his retirement rather than picking a side.
Rather than settle the contract issues in court, Baba demanded Inoki settle out of court for $600,000. New Japan refused the demand, but if they don’t ocme to some kind of agreement then Choshu and his crew can’t legally work for Inoki so something’s got to give. Especially since New Japan is already selling tickets and advertising Choshu for shows. And while Choshu and crew jumping makes New Japan the place to look for the best wrestlers, they’ve got some obstacles. Choshu’s popularity has taken a big hit with all this controversy, and New Japan’s tv is a complete disaster. Their new show is kind of like Tuesday Night Titans and was mainly comedy, which is no good for New Japan. This show has replaced their old tv with arena main events, and it’s been plummeting in the ratings since it debuted, coming in at half of what the old show had been getting. It’s so bad that this might be the lowest rated show on prime time network tv in Japan currently, which would be disastrous for wrestling’s popularity in Japan. If all the young stars are seen on this show not wrestling and instead doing poor comedy, it’s hard to think it’ll work out well for viewership (did you hear that, WWE?).
Ken Patera’s getting a big babyface push on WWF tv, and they brought up his time in jail. In 1985, Patera and Masa Saito were arrested after Patera angrily threw a rock through a McDonald’s window. They proceeded to assault the officers called in to deal with them, and Patera was eventually sentenced to two years in prison (he signed with WWF between the incident and his jail sentence). Okerlund brought this up, and Patera admitted remorse on tv, but literally every account Dave’s ever heard, even recently, has Patera maintaining innocence (his complete lack of remorse is why he was denied parole, supposedly).
Just some notes on Puerto Rico. The style here is high on blood and violence, light on actual moves. Bruiser Brody is a face here after helping Invader #1 against Abdullah the Butcher and Jason the Terrible. The chase between Brody and Abby was comical as Brody had to zigzag to avoid catching up, prompting Dave to speculate that Brody could give Abby a 35 yard head start in a 40 yard race and still win.
Dingo Warrior was fired in WCCW for refusing to job to Nord the Barbarian. Something a little ironic about Brody firing someone for refusing to job.
Also that rich Texas guy Bum Bright? He seems to be cooling off on relations with Fritz Von Erich. Apparently he has a bit on his plate, as Dallas Cowboy Rafael Septien has pled guilty (he’s been on trial for some kind of indecent acts involving a minor).
[JCP/NWA] Ricky Morton’s eye injury is just a scratched retina. He should be back in the ring in a few weeks.
JCP ran their April 12 show in Marietta, Georgia against the UWF show at the Omni. Yes, they already owned UWF by this point. They drew 850 fans. The UWF show drew 8500 fans.
Central States is doing an angle where Warlord is actually a Russian posing as an American. Dave finds this funny because Warlord is actually a statue posing as a wrestler.
Also Debbie Combs beat Penny Mitchell in Central States to win the women’s championship. This is just a match result here in the newsletter, but it’s actually kind of an important result. After Moolah sold the title to Vince, there was no more NWA World Women’s Title, and Debbie wound up being crowned the next champion in 1986 in a quite possibly kayfabe battle royal in Hawai'i. After Central States withdrew from the NWA when JCP abandoned the territory and sold it back to Bob Geigel in February of 1987, the NWA World Women’s Title was suspended - Crockett had no use for it. So here we have a match for a vacant NWA World Women’s title in a non-NWA territory, but this win is going to be the basis for the continued lineage of the title up through 1996 and will be recognized by the NWA to this day.
Shinobu Kandori, who recently retired, may be coming back to work with AJW. Magazine interviews have her challenging Chigusa Nagayo. Guess she liked wrestling enough after all (she’s still wrestling 32 years later, even while she’s been a member of the Japanese Diet for over a decade).
AJW and WWF are negotiating a U.S. tour for the Jumping Bomb Angels. Dave thinks there are two things preventing this from getting over in the U.S. First is that WWF is full of Moolah’s girls, so there goes any point in having joshis wrestle here if you’re just going to hamstring them by putting them in the ring against wrestlers who are comparatively randoms pulled from the street. Secondly, they’re super small and that’s going to be a hard sell to WWF audiences. But hey, you never know. Maybe Vince will do good with women’s wrestling this time around. You never know, these things are possible.
Bunch of All Japan results. Ted DiBiase’s on this tour, as are Tommy Rich and Carlos Colon. Colon left the tour after April 10 because he’s not cut out for this style. Fans didn’t care for Tommy Rich and thought he wasn’t good enough as a wrestler to hang, which made it hard to take him seriously.
The IWGP tournament is looking to be really hot this year. It’s got a big line up Inoki, Kimura, Mutoh, Mada, Fujiwara, Choshu, Saito, Kevin Von Erich, Kobayashi, Steve Williams, and more). Andre the Giant and Kerry Von Erich are officially announced as not part of the tournament. Meanwhile, Dick Murdoch was at an All Japan show in the dressing room, but Baba claims he’s not trying to poach him.
Someone writes in wanting to know who the most effective heels are in Japan. Dave comments that Japan doesn’t really do heels the way we do over here - the context is primarily about athletic rivalry, so fans cheer both guys as they please. When they do boo someone (Lance Von Erich, for example), it’s because they don’t want to see him, not because he’s getting heat. So let it be known that the originator of X-Pac heat was Lance Von Erich.
Another letter asks why Bruiser Brody isn’t signed with anyone worthwhile. Dave says that what Brody probably likes is he has something no wrestler working for a major promotion actually has: independence. He works when he wants, isn’t beholden to anybody, and still makes good money (and when he was working Japan regularly, he was probably one of the highest paid wrestlers around). Dave figures his independence means a lot to him, although he suspects if the business continues to narrow we may see Brody sign somewhere (Unfortunately, Brody has about 14 months left before he’s murdered and we never find out if he would have signed somewhere).
A few letters react to the buyout of UWF. Everybody agrees it was shocking. One writer doesn’t want to think about what it’ll be like without Watts running the show, but loves the idea of getting to see Ric Flair and the Road Warriors. Another says the only thing that could be as shocking this year is if Hogan dropped the title, and “that’s certainly not going to happen.” (Only missed it by two months). Another worries that Crockett might tone down UWF’s tv and hopes that things can stay the same but with more talent available.
We’re also still getting a lot of comments on Misty Blue and Dave’s remarks about Misty. The last letter writer mentioned above also commented saying he doesn’t agree with the comments saying Dave is sexist, but does think Flair and Okerlund should tone down the sexist remarks they make because kids are watching and what if a censor actually started paying attention/ Another says he was furious when they cut away from the match since women’s matches are so rare for Crockett. Why bother showing it if you’re going to just cut away and make yourself look inferior to McMahon in yet another way. He says the only reason he brings it up is he thought Dave’s comments about her looks were ridiculous and doesn’t understand why, whether Dave thinks she is or not, Dave would call her ugly in a newsletter. Lastly, another reader says Dave spends too much time apologizing here and he’s indignant about Dave being called a sexist. He wants us to know that he’s sure he speaks for the majority in saying that Dave’s remarks were inoffensive. He brings up Dave critiquing the powerlifter types and how male wrestlers who sell themselves as sex symbols (Magnum T.A. for example) might be hurting that by blading too much, also fans call women worse things so what about that?
Memphis: Paul E. Dangerously has been renamed. He’s now Paul Dangerly, and he’s managing Austin Idol.
[Florida] Pex Whatley was moving from Charlotte to Tampa and his moving truck was stolen. Everything he and his family owned is gone.
AWA fired Col. DeBeers and Buddy Rose after that independent show. Rose is hoping to jump to WWF, but if he does it’ll be as a job guy.
Here’s a look at what the tv offerings in the Bay area look like on Saturdays. From 11 to noon you have AWA (channel 20), NWA Pro (channel 26), Pro wrestling this week (channel 44), NWA Florida (channel 48), UWF Power Pro (channel 40). Dave says any of those groups thinking they’re going to get any kind of audience is a mistake. Then from 11 pm you have WWF (channel 31, plus NBC for Saturday Night’s Main Events every other month or so), UWF (channel 11), NWA Worldwide (channel 26). Also WWF(who dominate this market) has a 10 am Saturday slot, and they’re finally facing competition in the form of GLOW (channel 44), which shows that if you think wrestling is run by people who don’t make sense, that’s nothing compared to those who run tv stations in San Francisco.
Jim Neidhart was acquitted of all charges. Dave finds it curious how the charges made all the papers, but the verdict not so much. More on this next week.
Big Bubba Rogers beat One Man Gang for the UWF Title. This is just a quick note scrawled on the bottom. This is, in hindsight, where a lot of people peg Crockett’s takeover of UWF as failing.
Cameron Parish, Acadiana FOR NINE STRAIGHT HOURS, Maxim Galloway's white Jeep rumbled down Louisiana Territorial Highway 292 West, save for a short detour onto Highway 104 due to a bridge collapse near Creole. There wasn't much on the airwaves in this desolate region except a mish-mash of unintelligible interference from pirate broadcasters shouting down their competition using home-brewed radio transmitters. Not that it really mattered. The Jeep's knobby tires, open top, and missing doors made it impossible for Galloway to hear anything over the deafening road noise and rushing wind. The rural highway was deserted. He'd seen no vehicles in either direction since Holly Beach. Only the brave, stupid, or desperate drove west to Texas and it was unthinkable for a Texan to drive east to Acadiana. Here was a sort of no-man's land where nutria rats outnumbered humans a thousand to one. Amid the bald cypress and longleaf pines stood the occasional dilapidated homestead, but these rugged natives kept mostly to themselves and communicated only by means of barbed wire fences and angry signs with pictures of dogs and guns and skulls. Strangers were absolutely not welcome. The utter desolation discouraged highwaymen, though, which was a welcome benefit. Galloway hated this drive but it was the most direct route from New Orleans to Texas that avoided National Route 1A—the old U.S. Interstate 10—whose border crossing at Orange took hours to clear and was far too stringent. That made the secondary crossing at Port Arthur the preferred entry-point if he was to avoid undue scrutiny. He wanted to stomp his foot down on the gas pedal and tear down the highway but it was suicidal to drive faster than forty miles per hour, and only that fast when the weather was good. The broken concrete road was a minefield of washed out slabs, gaping potholes, and crumbling shoulders. Every once in a great while, a local might haul a pickup truck full of dirt and gravel to fill in the smaller craters, but these fixes were intermittent and temporary. When holes got too big to fill, a large stake was planted in the middle; a simple warning for travelers to drive around. Notoriously large, car-swallowing canyons sometimes found their way onto public GPS services, often with colorful monikers like “The Gaper” or “Odelia's Gash” or, Galloway's favorite, "Didee Rectum" which had damn near killed him. Adding texture to the deplorable road conditions was the trash. Colorful litter lined the roadside like wildflowers, while real wildflowers struggled to find sunlight. Strewn among the rubbish were the usual castoffs one expected to see on the side of the road—broken furniture, rusted appliances, rotting tires, depleted car batteries, construction debris, and household garbage. In more heavily-populated areas, these dump sites swarmed with salvagers hunting for metals to scrap or objects that could be repaired and resold. But out here, on the edge of nothing, few bothered to make the journey. Several groups had stepped forward over the years, offering to take over maintenance of the highway in exchange for toll rights, but there were always problems. Gaining titles of ownership that would hold up in court was practically impossible. Public declarations needed to be made, which often led to vociferous protests from local denizens incensed at the idea of paying for something that had been free for so long. Competing claims, cross claims, and counter claims got filed in a dozen courts. Lawsuits were threatened. Ultimately, ownership of the highway fell into a sort of legal limbo—a Purgatory of restraining orders, injunctions, and outright death threats. In such an uncertain environment, no one was willing to accept the risk and expense of making the necessary repairs for fear their ownership claims would simply be ignored. So the highway slowly decayed and travelers did their best to make do with what remained. A more practical issue was that hardly anyone used this stretch of highway anymore. Partly due to the hazards of driving on such a poorly maintained road—a danger to both cars and passengers alike—but mostly because this was a border region and an Acadian couldn't cross the Texas border without a passport. If you somehow managed to obtain a passport, you were also required to be properly licensed and insured and your car needed to be titled and registered with a legitimate motor vehicle department. Simply put, without a destination and the bureaucratic means to get there, this stretch of highway was practically useless. The nav display on the Wrangler's dash informed Galloway that he was nearing the Texas border. Up ahead, the Sabine River snaked through cypress swamps, marking the eastern edge of the Texas republic. As Galloway's Jeep reached mid-span of the causeway bridge traversing the river, the broken highway instantly transformed into a silky smooth ribbon of fresh white concrete. Galloway smiled as he mashed his foot down on the gas pedal, accelerating the jeep to its eighty mile per hour top speed. After a brief yet oddly satisfying ninety seconds of high-speed travel, he lifted his foot off the gas and coasted to a stop. The Port Arthur border crossing was a small white, prefabricated building squatting low on the side of the highway. Two SUVs and a highway patrol cruiser sat parked next to it, pointed westward, ready for pursuit. As Galloway crept up to the shack, a uniformed woman stepped out onto the highway, beckoning him forward onto a large steel plate. He pulled onto it and stopped. A moment later, he heard a faint hum and almost felt his DNA twist as hundreds of millisieverts of scanning radiation dosed his testicles from beneath. Two male agents, each with a “sniffer”, exited the prefab hut and began a wordless tour around the Jeep. The first agent held an explosives trace-detection device, a puffer machine, slung across his shoulder like a portable vacuum cleaner. The agent blasted both the Jeep and Galloway with short bursts of air, which the machine sucked up and analyzed for the tell-tale signatures of contraband weapons, bombs, and other explosives. The second agent led a leashed German shepherd into every nook and cranny of the Jeep, imploring the animal to alert to something, anything, be it narcotics or a bag of soggy french fries. “Good afternoon, sir. May I please see your passport, driver's license, vehicle registration, and proof of insurance?” the female agent asked while her two male counterparts continued their probe. Galloway reached into a pouch hanging from the jeep's roll bar and handed his papers to the agent with a smile. She flipped open his blue passport. A gold-leaf imprint of a proud bald eagle and the words "The United States of America" gleamed in the mid-afternoon sun. “Where are you coming from, Mr. Pettigrew?” she asked without looking up. “Orlando,” he lied. He noticed a camera mounted on a stanchion pointed in his direction. No doubt his Florida license plate had been scanned and cross-checked in a database somewhere. “And what's the purpose of your visit today?” she asked, now examining his Florida driver's license. She lifted a device hanging from her belt and swiped the card through a slot on the top, then studied the readout. She dropped the scanner back down, apparently satisfied. The name might be fake, but the card was real. “Friend's getting married on Saturday. Driving out for the wedding.” “Where does your friend live?” “El Paso.” "Oh yeah? Where in El Paso?" "He's got a place out in Mountain View. You know the area well?" "Mm-hmm, and where will you be staying?" "Towne Place Suites, just off 375. Same place I always stay." "You have a reservation there?" "Yes, ma'am. I can pull it up if you want." "No, that's fine. Which church will the ceremony be at?" Galloway lifted an eyebrow. "Mike's not really the churchgoing type. Whole thing's being held up at the Coronado Country Club." He jerked his thumb backwards to indicate the golf club bag laying across the back seat. "Let's us get in a round the morning of. Should be a good time, if it ain't too hot." “Drove all the way from Orlando, did you? That's quite a haul. What made you decide to take 292 instead of the A1?" Galloway patted the steering wheel. "That's why I brought this old bucket. A little road trip adventure through Acadiana. I'll definitely be taking the A1 back home, though." "You could have flown." “I don't like planes.” That was actually true. “Afraid of flying?” “Crashing.” "I see. And how long is your trip?" "Heading back Sunday." The agent finished examining his papers and, for the first time, looked at him. She was middle-aged—forty-five or fifty he guessed, a little older than himself—but she had a formidable demeanor. She was solidly built and bulkier than her uniform and bulletproof vest suggested. She intimidated. He imagined she used phrases like “blow me” with the boys back at HQ and they all wondered if hers was bigger than theirs. She peered into the back of his open Jeep—the vehicular equivalent of shorts and sandals—and asked, “Do you have anything to declare, Mr. Pettigrew?" "No, ma'am." "Are you transporting any firearms or narcotics today, sir?” “No, ma'am.” Another lie. The morphine nebulizer in his boot was double vacuum sealed in three mil plastic. He hoped it was enough. She considered his response and then looked to her partners, who shook their heads. She turned back to Galloway and he could tell she was going to ask him one last lie-detector question. “I don't see a gift,” she said. “That's right,” Galloway replied confidently. The border agent studied him closely. “You didn't get your friend a wedding gift?” Galloway's eyes crinkled and his mouth quirked up. “No, ma'am. Driving three days to see him marry his third wife in seven years is the only gift he's gettin' from me.” The agent paused and smiled back. She peeled a sticker from a booklet in her pocket and affixed it to a blank page in his passport, then handed the documents back. “Welcome to The Sovereign Republic of Texas, sir. You have a safe trip.” Galloway nodded, returned the papers to the pouch, and threw the Jeep into gear. As he started to roll forward, the agent stepped closer. “Hold up, sir.” Galloway stopped the Jeep, his pulse quickening. “Yes?” “Don't forget to buckle up. It’s the law.” It had been two years since Galloway's last trip to Texas, and the differences always caught him off guard. It wasn't just the roads—smooth, wide, and luxurious with nary a cigarette butt marring her pristine shoulders—but the signs. Signs were everywhere. Roads were picketed with signs on posts warning drivers of every conceivable road condition and admonishing them to obey every rule. Stop, yield, no passing, school zone, enter here, exit there, no turn on red, turn on red only from right lane, no left turn, no u-turn, one way, bike lane, pedestrian crossing, slow children at play, mile markers, one-tenth mile markers. Some signs were even self-aware enough to acknowledge the maddening number of signs and warned to beware of angry drivers. Then there were the signs that made absolutely no sense. The dead end signs posted at dead ends, or the signs with pictures of little stop signs on them indicating that a stop sign was imminent. These weren't signs at all. They were labels. There were signs everywhere and there didn't seem to be a reason for most of them except that some powerful lobby of sign-makers had been very busy demanding the placement of ever more signs. Even more astonishing than the signs was how the Texans obeyed every single one of them, even when no police were in sight. It seemed bizarre obedience until he noticed the cameras. Above, near to, and even inside the signs were cameras. Red light cameras, speeding cameras, cameras on buildings, cameras on light posts, camera's suspended on wires overhanging the roads. Everywhere Galloway looked he found a camera staring back. Printed words, enforced by a panopticon, ensuring safety for all. Galloway stopped for the night in San Antonio, renting a room at a roadside motel where he was required to surrender his passport for photocopying. The next morning, he made for El Paso. The journey across the expansive waistline of Texas was as time-consuming as it was monotonous. No matter how fast he drove, fifty-five or eighty, the landscape stayed the same. When the road ahead narrowed to a vanishing point on the horizon, distance lost all meaning. He consoled himself with the certainty that, at least out here, there was little chance of being ambushed by highwaymen patrolling the roads, hidden in a median or beneath an overpass. The only danger to be found on these roads were the occasional highway patrolman hiding in a median or beneath an overpass, a warning to all travelers to be mindful of the local authority. Despite the illusion of immobility, Galloway arrived in El Paso nine hours later, on the western frontier of the Texas Republic. He exited the highway onto Expressway 54 headed northwest, toward the New Mexico border. Nearby, on an embankment, carefully-placed white gravel announced ominously that Galloway had arrived at “THE EDGE OF TEXAS”. The border fence wasn't very tall. It didn't need to be. In fact, the fence seemed an extravagance considering the pair of main battle tanks positioned on either side of the road. In Galloway's opinion, these rolling death machines provided all the deterrence necessary to keep undesirables away. He approached the southern guard post of Wizmer Bliss and, with no small sense of irony, noticed the hand-painted sign labeling the street on which he was traveling. Martin Luther King Jr Blvd. The approach to the guard post was a zig-zagging path, winding through carefully placed concrete K-rails. As Galloway navigated his Jeep through the barrier, a soldier in a tank manning a machine gun tracked his progress. Halfway through the barrier path, he encountered a small stop sign. Galloway put the Jeep into park and waited as a trio of soldiers, rifles at the low-ready, approached from the border gate. The Jeep had no doors so there was no need to roll down the window, which was perfect because Galloway had no intention of removing his hands from the steering wheel. One soldiers approached Galloway while another took a cover position to his left and the third probed beneath the Jeep with a telescoping mirror. “Sir, this is a restricted area.” The soldier's words were clipped and precise and redundant because a giant sign on the gate read “THIS IS A RESTRICTED AREA”. Although the soldier faced Galloway, he seemed to look through him, as if Galloway wasn't a person but a potential hostile. “My name is Maxim Galloway. I'm here to see Colonel Tamar Davidov." "May I see some identification, sir?" Galloway retrieved them from the pouch and handed them over. The soldier, whose last name was Pruett according to the stencil on his chest, studied them briefly and handed them back. He removed a folded sheet of paper from his breast pocket and opened it. Galloway spied his shoulder patch and tried to divine the soldier's rank, but anything after three stripes and he was clueless. Pruett had five. All Galloway knew was that he was some species of sergeant. “Sir, you were given a code key. Please show it to me.” Galloway opened his wallet and produced a small plastic card with a tri-color triangle printed on one side. The emblem of the First Armored Division, Old Ironsides. A series of alpha-numeric characters was printed on the opposite side. He held it out for the soldier to examine. “Thank you, sir. Please read the appropriate key string.” The key string Colonel Davidov used was on the third line. Galloway slowly read each character aloud as the soldier checked them against his list. When he finished, the soldier turned and nodded to his partners, who lowered their rifles to a less threatening position. “Sir, please proceed through the gate and continue approximately fifteen miles to the next checkpoint. You will be given further instruction when you arrive. Sir, please do not deviate from the road for any reason. Do you understand, sir?” “Yes. Thank you, Sergeant.” The soldier backed away from Galloway's Jeep and motioned for him to proceed. Galloway picked his way through the rest of the K-rail maze and approached the cantilevered gate, which now stood open. He drove through with a wave to the machine gunner but he did not wave back. The border gate quickly disappeared in the rear view mirror. Ahead lay the desolate vastness of the Tularosa Basin. Stretching one hundred and fifty miles to the north and fifty miles east to west, the desert basin sat like a giant sugar bowl nestled between the deflated bosoms of the San Andres and Sacramento Mountains. Before The Collapse, Wizmer Bliss had been the largest military complex in the United States; a proving ground where the Army and Air Force tested things like missiles and rockets and nuclear bombs. The military chose the region for its remoteness, arid climate, and scarcity of life. The basin so exemplified these characteristics that throughout the long geographic history of the continent, no civilization had ever bothered to settle there. It had taken a second world war to finally bring life to this valley. Back then, the military complex comprised more than seventy-one hundred square miles of Department of Defense-controlled ground and airspace known as White Sands Missile Range, Fort Bliss, and Holloman Air Force Base. An area slightly smaller than the State of New Jersey. Today, everyone referred to it simply as White Sands. Galloway cruised along a two-lane ribbon of asphalt that stretched to a point at the horizon, aimed like a spear at the heart of the rugged Organ Mountains to the north. Dry hot air boiled off the desert floor and pushed against the small open Jeep, scouring Galloway’s face. Tremendous columnar thunderheads as tall as mountain peaks hung ominously to the west, but were too distant to offer protection from the relentless midday sun. Galloway briefly cast his eyes skyward. He perceived nothing but an unbounded and featureless blue canvas but this was merely an illusion. He knew that somewhere up there, miles overhead, a massive thirteen-inch lens was silently monitoring his passage, held aloft by an unmanned areal vehicle drifting noiselessly beyond his detection. There was little doubt that its observers would know the instant he deviated from the approved course. The next checkpoint was slightly less stringent, and the soldiers marginally more sociable. From there, he was directed to yet a third checkpoint, which in turn led into what appeared to be a small town of low beige buildings. A sign at the final checkpoint identified the town as WSMR Bliss, Command Administrative Department. The checkpoint guard, a petite young Mexican woman whose family name was Vargas, provided Galloway with a visitor's badge and map and showed him where to go. “You want B-345, sir. Right...here,” she said, leaning in to point at a small square on the map. Galloway inhaled an exotic mix of lavender hand lotion and the perflourinated compounds out-gassing from her perfectly dry-cleaned uniform. He checked her form. Vargas was about half his age he guessed, small but fit, with a confident and mature bearing that he found appealing. He looked at her, catching her eye for a brief instant, and smiled. Her eyes widened and she stepped back. “Is there anything else I can help you with, sir?” Her tone was formal and abrupt. “No, this is great. Thank you...Miss Vargas?” “Staff Sergeant,” she corrected. Galloway smiled again but she lifted her chin and waved him on. “Please clear the checkpoint, sir.” Galloway snapped a friendly salute and pulled away from the gatehouse and out onto the main drag. Everything in White Sands was painted in a limited palette of beige, tan and brown. Hostile plant beds, xeriscaped to within an inch of their lives with pumice and gravel, corralled jagged dwarf yucca, apache plume, and spiny cane chollas——the high-desert equivalent of an English country garden. Galloway found Building 345 tucked between a single-screen movie theater and the Public Affairs Office and he pulled in to a mostly empty parking lot. As Galloway approached the single-story building, he read the large block letters bolted over the door. DEFENSE SECURITY COMMAND - PARTNER CAPACITY CENTER. He entered through large glass doors and was greeted by a blast of cool air that washed over him and soothed his sun-baked skin. Lights over a metal detector just inside the door blinked silently as he made his way across a well-appointed and carpeted lobby toward a long reception counter. On the paneled wall behind the counter was the official seal of The Legion of White Sands, an uppercase Lambda inscribed within a circle. "How can I help you, sir?" the young man behind the counter asked. "Maxim Galloway, here to see Colonel Davidov." "Please sign in," he said, gesturing to a tablet secured in a display stand on the countertop. Galloway entered his information, noting that the form's name field would only accept his initials. As he typed, the receptionist placed a clear plastic container on the counter. "Please turn off all of your personal electronic devices and place them into the bin. Do you have any implants, sir?" "Cellular. And cochlear stims," he added as he fished through his pockets. The receptionist leaned over the counter and pinned a lozenge-shaped plastic device to Galloway's shirt collar. "Please keep this on you at all times. Colonel Davidov will be out shortly. You can take a seat over there." As Galloway lowered himself into the lobby's sole chair, it occurred to him that he was very likely to be the afternoon's only visitor. Given the nature of Defense Security Command's services, it would not do well to have their clients crossing paths. It didn't take long for Col. Davidov to appear, an ebullient, middle-aged woman of distinctly Middle Eastern descent. Her dark blue dress uniform bore a fruit salad of colorful ribbons that covered most of her coat's left breast. "Mr. Galloway, welcome!" she said, beaming. "Thank you for making the journey. We appreciate the pains it must have taken for you to get here." He shook the colonel's eager hand. "Please, follow me." They passed through wooden double doors into a long corridor lined with dozens of windowless rooms. She led him to a door with a small plaque that read "Conf. Rm. 14B" and they both entered. Inside was a small round table and two office chairs. A plastic pitcher of water and two plastic cups rested on the table, but there was nothing else. No other furniture, no phone, no clock, no projector, no data ports, not a single sticky note or paper clip, and nothing on the bare white walls save a large stenciled inscription: Deterrence - Thou shalt not do it Defense - Thou shalt pay for it Reprisal - Thou shalt not get away with it Col. Davidov sat in one of the chairs and Galloway took the other. He noticed for the first time that her hands were as empty as his own. "I understand you're here representing interests in the Acadian Territories." Davidov began. "That's right. I was contracted by parties who've chosen to remain anonymous. Even I don't know their identities." "That's understandable and not at all unusual. Water?" "Yes, please." "Help yourself. Our business is very simple, Mr. Galloway. Allow me to walk you through it." She motioned to the inscription on the wall. "We offer only the three services you see here. "Deterrence is our standing-army offering. Troop and ordnance levels are determined by us, based on risk assessments provided by our intelligence analysts. You provide the land for bases and hardened military installations per our request. Rates are variable depending on troop strength, border length, population size and population density, with a ten year minimum contract term. Hostile engagements are charged extra. "Defense is our on-demand offering. We monitor foreign military troop movements and other intelligence reporting. If you are attacked or invaded, or we believe it likely to happen, we will stage and forward deploy from command and support positions to repel as necessary. You pay an annual fee plus expenses. This is our most popular and cost-effective choice. "Reprisal is our simplest, but most costly offering. If you are attacked or invaded, we will immediately retaliate with Trident II ballistic missile strikes from our submarine fleet against the target of your choosing until it is destroyed. The annual fee is the same for every client and it is quite substantial. In the event the service is ever activated, we make no guarantees that your territory will not be destroyed in kind. As you can imagine, the geopolitical consequences of deploying this service would be dire for everyone involved." "So, does your client have an offering in mind?" Galloway's heart thumped in his chest and blood whooshed in his ears. Was that really all there was to it? He'd prepared himself for something more drawn out and complicated. He was authorized to disperse the billion plus necessary to secure the contract. All he needed to do was speak the words. His mouth was suddenly bone dry. He poured a cup of water and stared at the inscription on the wall while Colonel Davidov waited patiently for his response. When he finished drinking, Galloway set down the empty cup with a trembling hand, cleared his throat, and said in a hoarse voice, "Reprisal."
My Mini Reviews On Each Major Entry Into the Need For Speed Series.
I've been feeling the need... the need to make a brief-but-detailed review and personal score out of 10 on each game in the series for a little while now. I am heavily invested into the series as it is the only long-running game series I've been this invested in. It all started thanks to my dad because he is as well, he started me on NFS III when I was around 4 or 5 years old. My dad and I have every platinum trophy for each game starting with the first to introduce trophy support on the PS3 with Undercover, and have 100% on most of the games at some point in my life. If I had the skills and desire to I would make a YouTube video but this will do, it's just cathartic to get it out of my system!
So to start off I have not played The Need For Speed or Need For Speed II so I have nothing to say about them. I watch the videos from Lazy Game Reviews on them and I recommend them, his reviews on them show you pretty much all you need to know about those titles.
Need For Speed III: Hot Pursuit, High Stakes, and Porsche Unleashed are the ones I have not played much at all since they were relatively new so I can't really give a definitive review of these titles other than I think they were great for their time and are relics to be treasured. Of the three I would say that the one that holds up best and was the most fun is High Stakes.
Hot Pursuit 2 (8/10): And now we get right into the good stuff! This game on the PS2 is legendary, a smooth transition from the PS1 era NFS titles and into the PS2 era of Black Box's golden era of NFS. Right off the bat this game has a killer intro and theme with Goin' Down On It that I think is the most iconic in the series along with Get Low in Underground and the intro to Carbon (more on those later). The progression is fun and in old 2000's video game fashion very challenging and time-consuming, and the soundtrack while small is very memorable and one of my favorites. This was truly the start of something amazing for the racing game community and I can confirm that this game holds up very well to today's standards.
Underground (7/10): Talk about one of the greatest intros to a video game of all time! As stated before UG, HP2, and Carbon have my favorite intros in the entire series and give me goosebumps when I boot the games up. It gets you hyped into what you're about to experience and Get Low while corny actually makes for a kick ass menu theme. The rest of the soundtrack is killer too, another favorite of mine. I recently replayed this game and beat it on the PC and can say that is the definitive version of the game with the best graphics, minus some compatibility issues with newer Windows versions. Feels much more repetitive than its predecessor due to the lack of a progression tree but upgrading cars feels satisfying enough to keep you invested into the game. The Drag events are some of my favorite event types in the whole series because of the stakes involved, and I love them in the Underground games. I will also say now that I abhor drifting events in all game, however I think they're best in the Underground games because it feels more natural and you get to drift with other drifters on the track and tracks are specifically designed around drifting. Alright, now here comes the part where I brace myself for impact on the next one...
Underground 2 (7/10): Okay I know this is a very unpopular opinion, but I just don't enjoy this game like everyone else. I do enjoy this game, but I think it lacks a lot in some areas. Firstly, I think the menu is awful especially compared to the last installment having one of the sweetest in the whole series. I do enjoy the Riders On the Storm remix as much as the next guy but it does not hype me up at all. Aside from that another stellar soundtrack with a fantastic mix of Rap, Electronic, Rock, and Metal. I also do not find the 350Z as iconic as Eddie's Skyline and the story, while not an important aspect to the series as a whole, is very forgettable. I love the city and driving around it is nice but it feels lifeless with no police or any real reason to freeroam other than for fun. The events are terribly repetitive and when I replayed this game on PC a few years ago I felt like it was a boring grind to 100%. I know people praise this game for the customization, but to me it feels more like quantity over quality. Most of the visual upgrades are terribly dated and are really tacky now, but I know it's subjective and if you like spinners and underglow don't let what I think change that! One little touch I loved in this game that never made a return was the Dyno. I don't think it had a real purpose but damn was it sweet. Seriously if they could remaster this game and MW and combine them into one ultimate experience I think it would make the perfect game.
Most Wanted (2005) (9/10): Yes I lean heavily towards the MW over UG2 crowd. This is my favorite entry in the series and think it is near flawless with the Black Edition on PC. I know the biggest argument against it is that the customization isn't as good as UG2 and I just don't mind it at all, it's more than good enough for my standards. Ironically enough I think the intro to this one is a little weaker than HP2 and UG which is why I didn't mention it before. However the prologue is flat out my favorite prologue to any game. It instantly hooks you into the game and gives you something to desire, to beat the game for: the legendary BMW M3 GTR. Even though the graffiti art-style is dated I still enjoy it and think it hold up alright, better than some more recent entries in the series, pitifully. I like the choice to make the game at permanent dusk, a unique time of day for the series. The handling is top notch as is the other Black Box golden age games. The live action cutscenes are fun and memorable and not super ham-fisted like some later entries in the series. The soundtrack is also quite possibly the best in the series, literally every song is amazing (except I don't care for I Am Rock and I can't stand Avenged Sevenfold). The Blacklist is the solution to the problem I had with UG2, having a reason to play all the events even if they can be repetitive at times. The challenge series is fun and has some cute races where you drive wacky vehicles. Ultimately this game has my favorite "endgame," where I constantly come back to the game time after time to experience the actual hand-down best pursuit system in any game I've ever played. It is incredibly satisfying and is very well balanced, shifting between moments where you are running for your life anxiously looking around every corner and you map for Rhinos or Roadblocks and moments where you have a brief window to lose the remaining cops and escape. The flaws with this game are minor at worst and it is a fantastic racing game. I could go on detailing more of what this game does right and ares where it could be improved but then I'd be here all day.
Carbon (8/10): This game is underappreciated, I believe primarily because of this game's biggest flaw. Apparently this game was supposed to have more content but was unfinished because of the strict deadline sadly. This game may have been the best in the series but we'll never know. What I want to say though is this game has the best personality of any game in the series, it holds up amazingly. I get chills when I boot this up on my PS3 and hear the IMAX/THX-eque EA|HD splash screen. The neon style and score are stunning and scream to be remastered in 4K HDR. I love the touch to have unique themes for the three vehicle classes on the menu. The licensed song soundtrack is not quite as good as previous entries but still is pretty solid, and is made up for by the amazing score. Aside from those aspects it feels great to play as a sequel to MW and carries over nicely gameplay and story wise. Thankfully the Pursuit system is largely unchanged from MW but has less of a presence which means they can easily be overlooked. Again the main problem is the territory progression system, while fun, is too short and not as satisfying as it should be. I like the crew aspect but it's a little unbalanced where some are meta and others are rather useless. The best thing that keeps me coming back for more is the Canyon races. The dramatic score and stakes of the game mode are amazing and I wish this mode could see a proper comeback.
ProStreet (5/10): I used to love this game but as time goes on I think it doesn't hod up very well. I love the legal racing atmosphere and the style of this one is great, but the gameplay and such weren't very well made. It's been a long time since I've played it so I don't have much else to say. My favorite thing about this game though was the adrenaline of speeding down the american highway tracks in a fully upgraded car trying not to die, it was a thrill I haven't felt much in later entries in the series.
Undercover (4/10): This was the worst NFS game until another came along to usurp that title, which we'll get to later don't you worry! First of all, perhaps this game is a better experience on PC, but dear lord was it truly awful on the PS3. This was where you start to really see how EA didn't care about the PS3 versions of the games because of the PS3's difficulty to work with development-wise. It crashed frequently and the story was boring and forgettable. This game felt like the opposite of how I feel about Carbon, it feels like it has no personality and is bland and lifeless. Nothing felt satisfying to me in the game and getting the platinum for this one felt like an obligation more than anything else, but hey I was still in middle school and had no life so I played this with my dad and enjoyed that at the very least, but even he thought this one was lackluster. The only redeeming thing in this game is the soundtrack is pretty great but that's about it.
Shift (6/10): I love sim racing and this is what started it all for me. It's not perfect and it isn't super realistic compared to its competitors but it was an honest first attempt from Slightly Mad Studios who would later go on to make the acclaimed Project CARS series. My favorite thing with the Shift games that really isn't present in other racing games is the depiction of racing being brutal and almost terrifying. I think it was done a little better in the one aesthetically speaking and I love how adrenaline pumping it is, the intro cutscene is really cool! The gameplay isn't very memorable though especially being outdated by other sims and even another entry into the Shift series.
Hot Pursuit (7/10): Any fan of the Burnout series will surely enjoy this one. Criterion is a fantastic developer and it's ashame EA did what they do best and throw developers around willy nilly and devour them up when they're not mega successful, rather than letting them do their own thing. Regardless while not as satisfying as a genuine Burnout game, it's still really fun and if this was still on current consoles it would be my go to recommendation for anyone unfamiliar with racing games and wanting to know what NFS to try first. It's a little too arcade-y for my tastes where the pursuit are more of games than actual stress-inducing pursuits like MW or Carbon. I seriously keep this installed on my PS3 for the sole purpose of listening to the narrator give detailed descriptions of each car, it's so satisfying to listen to with the car porn on screen and is a great way to learn about each car without having to read a boring text description.
Shift 2: Unleashed (6/10): I pretty much have the same opinion on this as the last Shift game. Mostly the same although I like the intense intro cutscene at Spa, and the Stephen Baysted score and remixes of songs are phenomenal. I like soundtracks like this and DRIVECLUB where a handful of song are remixed to make multiple different versions of the same song.
The Run (6/10): I like the presentation of this game and the story was alright and not too in your face like Undercover, at least from what I remember. This is another example where I'm sure the PC version is pretty solid but the PS3 version was unacceptable. The framerate would severely drop WHILE DRIFTING. Seriously I'm not even kidding the fastest way around the tracks was to grind up against the guardrails to keep the framerate as stable as possible. I'm not sure if this was ever fixed but wow it was pitiful. Aside from that I love the concept of racing cross country like the 2014 film (which I am actually a fan of).
Most Wanted (2012) (7/10): Another solid Criterion Burnout ripoff NFS game. This game is almost literally Burnout Paradise but with heavier physics that I think are slightly weaker. Due to this I didn't find the game to be very memorable honestly. It's a great game but Burnout Paradise is much more satisfying, especially considering it is remastered for current consoles.
Rivals (6/10): I like this one quite a bit when it came out, it was the last to have any official Criterion involvement and the first to be developed by Ghost, so this was another "transitional" entry between eras like Underground and Carbon. I tried it the other day and it doesn't hold up as well as I thought it would but I still think it's pretty decent. Sadly it's the most recent entry to let you play as the cops, which is a really underutilized feature in this series ironically enough. The game feels nostalgic, like a blend between the Criterion Hot Pursuit and the Black Box Hot Pursuit 2. I like the little story, bare-bones which is totally acceptable for an NFS game.
Need For Speed (3/10): Boy this one was a doozy. The series was probably due for a soft reboot but they kind of messed this one up. I managed to platinum it in literally 7 days from the day I started playing it, that's how sad this game is. It's not a total trainwreck but it has way more cons than pros. The handling model is the worst in the entire series, but at least it's only gotten better with each Ghost game. The always online model was the product of a terrible game industry and was I'm sure EA's idea over Ghost's. It is always fun when you're in the middle of a race and slam into another player or their AI and ruin your race. As for the pros I like the night time aesthetic of the game. Of course with that came the modern trend of cringe-worthy stance culture that car about style over performance that persists in the next two games but to a lesser extent. But hey at least it's optional, so I have to drive slammed shitbox 90's Honda Civics because that's not what I have in mind when I play a NFS game where you can drive exotic cars that most people could only dream of driving. But I was surprised to say that this game has a pretty stellar soundtrack (it introduced me to one of my all time favorite bands, HEALTH), I even loved the additions of classic NFS themes to the soundtrack for nostalgia.
Payback (2/10): I didn't think it could get any worse than Undercover, but then the state of the gaming industry had to come in and desecrate everything in sight. I could just say this game has despicable, shoehorned in microtransactions that make me feel bad know there are people that actually throw money away at in game currencies and leave it at that. But I just got the platinum last week out of obligation since I paid for the dang thing two years ago and never wanted to play it so I had to get my money's worth out of it. The handling is better than its predecessor but that's not saying much. The story is horrid and features some of the worst and most uninspired voice acting I've ever heard. I like the Las Vegas atmosphere and the soundtrack has a few good tracks and I like the menu theme. Upgrading cars with a slot machine is laughable and totally represents EA until they just recently backpedaled with Jedi Fallen Order and NFS Heat not having microtransactions, but we all know they didn't do it out of the goodness of their wretched soulless corporate money hungry hearts. Getting 100% in this was completely unsatisfying no matter how badly I tried to give this game an honest shot. Hopefully the series will never stoop to this low again.
Heat (6/10): I really enjoyed this one much to my surprise. The handling still is miles away from the Black Box games but is vastly improved over the other Ghost games. As a sim racer, I play NFS games for eye candy and simple racing fun, and this one delivers! Finally a NFS game in 4K HDR, it's gorgeous and it's aesthetic is reminiscent of Carbon with the bright neon lights and 80's Miami theme. I was surprised by the number of cars available at launch and they look superb. While the pursuit system is a tad broken and also miles away from MW and Carbon's, I like the Night mode design. Shoot, this game has more gambling in it than Payback, but the good kind where you risk losing Respect for getting busted as opposed to literal gambling. The Day/Night mechanic is pretty neat and almost makes it feel like two games in one. Once gain I wish they would just drop the story because it's pretty annoying even if it isn't as bad as the previous two. I find the characters annoying and as someone who moved to Florida the Miami car culture hits pretty close to home, I don't really care for it like I mentioned with NFS 2015. I also do not care for the overly latino soundtrack but I can say it is pretty accurate, I do however enjoy the garage songs and I enjoy listening to them while customizing wraps. I just wish there was more diversity in the soundtrack like older NFS games.
Well I think that's about all I have to say without making this any longer than it already is. If anyone reads even a little of this then thank you! I mostly did this for myself so if anyone else gets anything out of this then that's great. If you're interested in exploring more of the series and wonder how some of the games hold up I hope I could provide some insight. Even though I'm a little harsh on UG2 I don't dislike it by any means, the only two I don't recommend are Payback and Undercover. The ones I recommend most for anyone unfamiliar with the series are Most Wanted (2005), Carbon, Hot Pursuit 2, Heat, and Hot Pursuit (2011). That's all I have for now! Edit: changed my score of UG2 to a 7, I was a bit harsh with an average rating, and emphasize I DO LIKE THE GAME, do not misquote me saying I dislike it just because I don't enjoy it as much as everyone else
Going through old issues of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter and posting highlights in my own words. For anyone interested, I highly recommend signing up for the actual site at f4wonline and checking out the full archives. PREVIOUS YEARS ARCHIVE:1991 • 1992 • 1993
So as a lot of you are aware, Dave called these posts "kind of sleazy" on Twitter last night. I have a few thoughts on it. For starters, I get the impression that Dave probably isn't familiar with these posts. The initial tweet made it sound like some guy on Reddit is just copying and pasting all his stuff and claiming it as their own, which is obviously not the case.
On every post, there's a link at the very beginning to his site, encouraging people to subscribe to f4wonline because it's worth it. I'm not now and never will try to monetize it or do any of this for my benefit. I don't care. I'm only doing it because I genuinely love reading them and writing the recaps. It's enjoyable to me and I like learning new things. Hell, for the first several months I was doing this, I didn't even get useless Reddit karma-points for it because text posts didn't give karma. But allow me to reiterate: these posts only scratch the surface of his archives. For every paragraph I write, there's usually several more paragraphs of details and context that I'm leaving out that are incredibly interesting. His site is 1000% worth the money and the old newsletter archives are only a fraction of the reason why.
I'm posting highlights. Usually 10 to 15 total paragraphs (in my own words) out of newsletters that are often dozens of pages long. It's highlights of stuff that happened 25-30 years ago. I understand the archives are a selling point for Dave, but I feel like there's not a whole lot of people aside from me thinking, "I'm gonna go read the Sept. 23, 1991 issue from front to back!" I haven't seen a single person say they unsubscribed because of these posts. Which brings me to...
Literally dozens of people have commented saying these posts made them subscribe. In fact, almost all of the replies to Dave's tweet are people telling him they subscribed to his site because of these posts when they otherwise wouldn't have. If anything, I truly believe these posts are driving traffic to him rather than away, which I think is awesome.
I try to do more than just rewrite stuff. After recapping all of it in my own words, I try to add historical context to it. Updates on what ended up happening, opinions on things looking back with hindsight and perspective, adding links to YouTube videos or pictures of things that are talked about, etc. I make a conscious effort to try and distinguish it from simply copying Dave's hard work.
I really don't want to stop posting these, I enjoy writing them, people enjoy reading them, and I truly believe (and many of you have proven) that these posts are actually driving subscriptions to his site. I respect the hell out of Dave Meltzer. If he reads this and still has a problem with me doing it, let me know, let's talk about it. I don't want to step on anyone's toes. But given how much of his new content is directly copied and pasted here every day, I honestly don't think what I'm doing is remotely comparable. One last thing:the overwhelming majority of you have been super supportive of this and have been defending me and I appreciate it. To those who have tweeted to Dave and told him that these posts are the reason you subscribed, thank you sincerely, I hope it changes his opinion. I'd love to have his blessing on this. To those of you who have shit-talked Dave over it, please don't. I don't think he knows the full situation here and he's got a right to feel however he wants about it regardless. I can respect that and only hope he can see that this isn't what the initial tweet made it sound like. So with all that being said...
FOX Network's new deal with the NFL is looking to be a big threat to pro wrestling and the WWF in particular. Both WWF and WCW have had syndicated TV time slots moved in markets all over the country, or in some cases, dropped completely. The WWF Superstars show in particular took a huge hit in major cities around the country. Weakened or lost time slots in certain cities just makes it that much harder for them to draw crowds to live shows in those cities, which couldn't come at a worse time considering both WWF and WCW are in the midst of drawing record low house show crowds. The NFL deal isn't the only reason though. Falling ratings and advertisers not wanting to be associated with the product due to negative publicity have also led to many TV stations distancing themselves from wrestling. As a result, expect WWF to stop running shows in cities where they took the biggest hits. Luckily for WWF, they still have the successful Monday Night Raw show and the PPVs still generate big bucks.
The only good news right now for WWF is that Summerslam's buyrate came in only slightly lower than last year's Summerslam, which in this day and age, is considered a success.
UFC 3's PPV buyrate is in and it did a 0.65, which is better than every WCW's PPV in the last two years, aside from the recent Hogan/Flair show and is almost in the low-end of WWF buyrates. And considering they did this without any television promotion (whereas WWF and WCW have hours of TV each week to promote) and without any household name stars, this can only be considered a monster success and everyone expects UFC 4, in December, to do even bigger numbers. The big question of UFC that everyone wants to know is, "Is it really a shoot?" Dave thinks it is and he thinks someone is going to eventually get seriously hurt. Which will then lead to PPV distributors getting squeamish about carrying it and UFC can't survive without PPV.
Side note here: Dave goes on and on about UFC and while it's definitely interesting, I'm not enough of an MMA fan to really recognize when something from 20+ years ago is noteworthy enough to include. Plus, this is the wrestling subreddit. I'll continue to drop MMA tidbits in there as I see them if I think they're interesting or it affects wrestling, but I probably won't spend too much time recapping MMA stuff, even if Dave does.
WCW's Fall Brawl is in the books and Dave was underwhelmed. He heard a lot of complaints from people upset over the lack of blood in the War Games match. Cactus Jack lost a loser leaves WCW match and he's done with the promotion. Jim Duggan filled in for Ricky Steamboat and won the U.S. title in 35 seconds by squashing Steve Austin. VadeSting was the best match on the show, even though the booking didn't make a lot of sense.
The biggest news coming out of Fall Brawl is that Ricky Steamboat had to pull out of his match with Steve Austin and forfeited the U.S. Title due to a legit back injury. Steamboat injured his back in one of his recent matches with Steve Austin last month and WCW has known about the injury since then but continued to advertise an Austin/Steamboat match despite knowing that he wouldn't be wrestling (Dave has a real pet peeve about false advertising). Steamboat isn't expected back until at least January, but there's real concern that the injury might be career-ending (indeed it was. Steamboat didn't wrestle another match until 15 years later, when he finally returned to the ring at Wrestlemania 25 and had that brief feud with Chris Jericho).
WCW held a press conference in Detroit to officially announce the Halloween Havoc PPV, featuring appearances by Muhammad Ali and Mr. T as the special referee. Earlier in the week, negotiations with Mr. T over money caused him to pull out of the show and they were going to drop the special ref gimmick, but they worked it out so he came back on board at the last minute. Because of Muhammad Ali, the story got a lot of mainstream coverage and WCW sold $40,000 worth of tickets the first day they went on sale, which is their biggest first-day sales in years.
FMW had to cancel 2 recent shows because they were outdoor events and the cities had just been hit by a typhoon. I suppose that's a decent reason.
In Michinoku Pro, they did an angle where Shiryu, Sato, and Terry Boy formed a stable called Kaientai (Sho Funaki and Taka Michinoku would later join the group and they would eventually reform it as a tag team in WWF during the Attitude Era. But this is the beginning of Kaientai.....indeed).
The story of Jim Cornette's arrest made several local and national newspapers. Jim Cornette changed his answering machine message to say, "Hi, this is Richard Kimball (the character from the movie "The Fugitive") and I swear it was a one-armed man with that baseball bat. If you've got a message about Smoky Mountain Wrestling, leave it. If you've got a message about my new paint, body and auto glass shop, leave that too." (Cornette's pretty funny, I gotta give him that). Cornette has agreed to pay for the damage to the car if O'Connor returns his video camera.
Ole Anderson got fired from WCW. Anderson's son Bryant is expected to debut for SMW soon, so Ole Anderson filmed several promos for SMW, promoting his son. Eric Bischoff apparently told Ole that it wasn't in his best interest to be associating with Cornette and SMW and then fired Ole the next day.
Chris Jericho's broken arm has apparently spelled the end of he and Lance Storm's tag team in SMW. Cornette was paying them each a $900 a week guarantee, which is more than anyone else in the company is making, because he expected the team to turn the promotion around. But the Thrillseekers didn't get over as well as Cornette hoped and with the promotion struggling, they can't justify the price tag, especially with Jericho on the shelf, so they're gone.
Missy Hyatt appeared on the Sally Jessy Raphael talk show in what appeared to be a fictional role, playing a woman who was mistreated by her boyfriend. Dave had a friend of his appear on the show several years ago and the friend told him the whole thing was scripted and fictional. (Can't find any video of Missy on this show).
Jim Crockett held his second TV taping for his new NWA promotion and it was a total bust. All no-name wrestlers, no continuity from the previous TV taping, very few wrestlers who worked the first show returned because they were unhappy with their pay, and the show only drew about 300 fans to a building that holds 2,500. And finally, the matches all sucked.
Sabu and Tazmaniac had a hardcore match at an indie show in Michigan that included the following foreign objects: A car radiator, a television, a radio, a VCR, a freezer door, a baseball bat, a fan, a toaster, a vacuum cleaner, a pool cue and more.
Speaking of Sabu, he's apparently talking about going to WWF in a few months, but no confirmation on that.
Road Warrior Animal is telling people he plans to return to the ring in early 1995 and reform the tag team with Hawk in New Japan and probably WCW. Animal reportedly looks enormous lately.
Sandy Barr is talking about re-opening his Championship Wrestling USA promotion soon. The company has been shut down ever since they lost tons of money promoting the big show that Tonya Harding appeared on.
The AAA show being produced by WCW is called "When Worlds Collide." However, ECW (Paul Heyman in particular) is throwing a fit because ECW recently released a video with the same name. Heyman has gotten lawyers involved and the two sides are discussing a settlement. Heyman is willing to drop the issue if Ric Flair would come work a 60-minute draw at the ECW Arena against Shane Douglas. Flair was approached about the idea and flat out refused. There's been talk about WCW allowing Ron Simmons to work ECW's upcoming Florida show, but that's up in the air also. For now, latest word is WCW is planning to go ahead and use the "When Worlds Collide" name anyway and just take their chances against ECW.
WCW has found themselves in the midst of a bit of a bidding war. UWFI in Japan was wanting to sign a deal with WCW to exchange talent, but when New Japan heard about it, they offered WCW more money for a similar deal. Honestly, most of WCW's stars don't really mean much to the average NJPW fan, but they mostly just want to sign the WCW deal in order to keep UWFI from getting it because if they could get Hogan or Flair to come work UWFI shows, that would still be a pretty big deal for them. So NJPW is mostly just doing this to fuck over UWFI, not because they actually care about working with WCW.
Vader is now scheduled to work against Hulk Hogan at Starrcade. Hogan had initially refused to work with Vader because of his reputation for working stiff, but Vader has promised WCW that he'll take it easy on him, so that is now the plan. The original plans called for Hogan to drop the belt to Sting at the show but that's obviously been changed.
Bad weekend for Steve Austin, who not only had to put over Jim Duggan in 35 seconds at the PPV, but his house flooded the day before.
WWF's All-American show is being renamed The Zone and will feature more wrestling and less talk in an attempt to counteract the ratings beating the show has been taken on Sunday since the NFL and FOX deal started.
Dave offhandedly mentions that WWF is trying to bring back Ultimate Warrior.
Superstar Billy Graham's long-standing lawsuit against WWF was partially settled and then dropped this week due to a statute of limitations issue. Graham had sued WWF, Dr. Zahorian, and the makers of several different brands of steroids. The steroid companies settled and Graham will receive around $30,000 total, but it is believed the entire amount will go to his lawyers because his legal costs exceed that amount. Meanwhile, WWF and Zahorian both refused to settle and then the suit was dropped because there's a 2-year statute of limitations and since Graham waited many years before filing the suit, a judge would have tossed the case out anyway if it had gone to trial.
A recent TV Guide article listed WWF as one of the magazine's favorite guilty pleasure shows, but also mentioned the steroid scandal. Linda McMahon wrote a letter to the magazine that they printed, saying she was glad they liked the show, but argued that they have been testing for steroids since 1991 and that they were cleared of any wrongdoing in the trial.
On the WWF Superstars show that airs in Belgium and the Netherlands, the guy who does commentary for the shows completely buried the product, saying repeatedly that the matches are fake, the wrestlers are all friends, and no one ever really gets hurt. Needless to say, he's probably going to get fired.
Razor Ramon has told friends he plans to take some time off at the beginning of the year to spend some time with his family.
Sparky Plugg's name has been changed to Bob "Spark Plugg" Holly.
Among the more frequently mentioned G+ alternatives at the Google+ Mass Migration community, and others, is MeWe with over 250 mentions. The site bills itself as "The Next-Gen Social Network" and the "anti-Facebook": "No Ads, No Political Bias, No Spyware. NO BS. It is headed by professed Libertarian CEO Mark Weinstein. As the site reveals no public user-generated content to non-members, it's necessary to create an account in order to get a full impression. I thought I'd provide an overview based on recent explorations. This report leads of with background on the company, though readers may find the report and analysis of specific groups on the site of interest.
Leadership
Founder & CEO Mark Weinstein. Co-Founder & Chief Scientist, Jonathan Wolfe (no longer with company). Weinstein previously founded SuperFamily and SuperFriends, "at the turn of the millennium". Weinstein's MeWe biography lists articles published by The Mirror (UK), Huffington Post, USA Today, InfoSecurity Magazine, Dark Reading, and the Nation. His media appearances include MarketWatch, PBS, Fox News, and CNN. He's also the author of several personal-success books. His Crunchbase bio is a repeat of the MeWe content.
Advisory Board
Sir Tim Berners-Lee: Inventor of the World Wide Web.
Jack Canfield: Legendary Founder, Chicken Soup For The Soul.
John Friedman: Founding Partner, Easton Capital.
Cullen Hoback: Director, Terms and Conditions May Apply.
Dianne Morrison: Partner, MorrisonMcNabb, LLC.
Colin Sebastian: Director, Equity Research/Internet, RW Baird.
Brett Shevack: CEO, Brand Initiatives; Former Vice Chair, BBDO.
Marci Shimoff: author, Happy for No Reason.
Sherry Turkle: Professor, MIT; author Alone Together.
Ownership & Investment
MeWe is the dba of Sgrouples, a private for-profit early-stage venture company based in Los Angeles, though with a Mountain View HQ and mailing address, 11-50 employees, with $10m in funding over five rounds, and a $20m valuation as of 2016. Sgrouples, Inc., dba MeWe Trust & Safety - Legal Policy c/o Fenwick West 801 California Street Mountain View, CA 94041 Crunchbase Profile. Founded: 2012 (source) Secured $1.2M in seed funding in 2014. 2016 valuation: $20m (source] Backers:
John Friedman, venture capitalist, founder & MD, Easton Capital, New York, NY.
Despite the business address, the company claims to be based in Los Angeles County, California and is described by the Los Angeles Business Journal as a Culver City, CA, company.
Do you have friends still on Facebook? Share this link with them about Facebook wanting their banking information - tell them to move to MeWe now! No Ads. No Spyware. No Political Agenda. No Bias Algorithms. No Shadow Banning. No Facial Recognition.
MeWe provide several policy-related links on the site:
California Disclosures -- Do Not Track, 3rd-party cookies, and California Privacy Rights.
Your Identity: We protect it to the extent the law allows
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The ToS addresses:
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Effective: November 6, 2018.
FAQ
The FAQ addresses:
What is MeWe (emphasises privacy)
The Politics of MeWe ("absolutely no political agenda")
How can MeWe be free and make money? (additional services/freemium)
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What are some unique features of MeWe?
Who can see the posts I share?
Can I delete my MeWe account and is it easy to do this?
Values
This emphasises that people are social cratures and private people by right. The service offers the power of self expression under an umbrella of safety. It notes that our innermost thoughts require privacy. Under "We aspire...":
MeWe is here to empower and enrich your world. We challenge the status quo by making privacy, respect, and safety the foundations of an innovatively designed, easy-to-use social experience.
Totalling 182 words.
Privacy Bill of Rights
A ten-item statement of principles (possibly inspired by another document, it might appear):
You own your personal information & content. It is explicitly not ours.
You will never receive a targeted advertisement or 3rd party content based on what you do or say online. We think that's creepy.
You see every post in timeline order from your friends, family & groups. We do not manipulate, filter, or change the order of your content or what you see.
Permissions & privacy are your rights. You control them.
You control who can access your content.
You control what, if anything, others can see in member searches.
Your privacy means we do not share your personal information with anyone.
Your emojis are for you and your friends. We do not monitor or mine your data.
Your face is your business. We do not use facial recognition technology.
You have the right to delete your account and take your content with you at any time.
Press
There are a few mentions of MeWe in the press, some listed on the company's website, others via web search.
Self-reported articles
The following articles are linked directly from MeWe's Press page:
The page also lists a "Privacy Revolution Required Reading" list of 20 articles all addressing Facebook privacy gaffes in the mainstream press (Wired, TechCrunch, Fortune, Gizmodo, The Guardian, etc.). There are further self-reported mentions in several of the company's PR releases over the years.
Other mentions
A DuckDuckGo search produces several other press mentions, including:
Facebook Alternative MeWe Raises $5.2M, Los Angeles Business Journal (July 7, 2018) "The latest round, as well as MeWe’s total $10 million in fundraising, was predominantly backed by celebrity investors, such as author Marci Shimoff, Rachel Roy, and Lynda Weinman, founder of Lynda.com, which sold to Linkedin in 2015 for $1.5 billion. Jack Canfield, creator of the “Chicken Soup for the Soul” book series, also invested in MeWe."
Full Page "Dear Facebook" Letter In The New York Times from MeWe, the Competitor Mark Zuckerberg Refuses to Name Yahoo Finance/PR Newsire (May 28, 2018) "Facebook competitor MeWe, in its first-ever advertisement on any medium, took a full-page in the New York Times on Sunday, May 27th. MeWe's "Dear Facebook" letter is a direct response to Mark Zuckerberg's letter ad on March 25th, and a response to Zuckerberg's refusal to name a Facebook competitor in front of Congress."
Is building a Facebook alternative worth the effort? MeWe thinks soVentureBeat (July 5, 2018) "[T]here are still companies hoping to make their mark in the social networking realm with “Facebook alternatives.” One of those is MeWe, a “next-generation” social network that positions itself as the anti-Facebook: “Your private life is not for sale. No ads. No Spyware. No BS,” its website proclaims." Continues to mention "modest $5.2 million" funding round. Also a "sister product", MeWePRO, a Slack competitor.
Startup MeWe Launches Free, 'No Ads' Social NetworkeWeek (March 16, 2016) "MeWe, a new network engineered with its users' data privacy built in, is betting that a lot of people will say yes to both of those questions. The Mountain View, Calif.-based startup, whose parent company is Sgrouples.com, launched its freely available social network out of beta March 9 with more than 200,000 members already using it.... Sir Tim Berners-Lee, co-architect of the World Wide Web, found out about MeWe on his own and approached the company about getting involved."
Facebook Alternative MeWe closes $5.2M Series A Yahoo/PR Newswire (July 5, 2018). "The investment brings MeWe's total funding to $10 million, to support the engineering of MeWe and the enterprise version MeWePRO.... The company has relied on high net worth individuals for all of its funding including Lynda Weinman, founder of Lynda.com ...; Marci Shimoff, a #1 New York Times bestselling author ...; Rachel Roy...; and Jack Canfield."
Exactis Data Leak 2018: 340 Million Records ExposedInvestorPlace (June 29, 2018) "'Today's cookies can link your mobile phone to your laptop, to your home monitoring devices, and much, much more. Creepy? Scary? Orwellian? Yes, yes, yes,' Mark Weinstein, the privacy expert and founder of social media company MeWe, told MarketWatch. 'So imagine that Exactis, like Facebook, knows everything about you — really.'"
MeWe Raises $3M in FundingFinSMEs (March 9, 2016) "Sgrouples, Inc., the Mountain View, CA-based developer of MeWe, a social network with neither ads nor tracking, raised $3m in funding."
MeWe Raises $4.8 Million, Launches Next-Gen Social NetworkCision/PRWeb (March 9, 2016) "The company also announced the completion of its $3 million Seed III round of funding at a $20 million valuation, bringing MeWe’s total funding to date to $4.8 million."
This section is a basic rundown of the user-visible site technology.
Mobile Web
The site is not natively accessible from a mobile Web browser as it is overlayed with a promotion for the mobile application instead. Selecting "Desktop View" in most mobile browsers should allow browser-based access.
Mobile App
There are both Android and iOS apps for MeWe. I've used neither of these, though the App store entries note:
MeWe Android 4.4 rating (13.1k ratings). Permissions: Contacts (read), Location (approximate/precise), SMS (receive), Phone (read status & identity), Photos/Media/Files (read, modify, & delete contents), Storage (read, modify, or delete), Camera (take pictures/videos), Microphone (record audio), Device ID & Call Info (read status & identity), and numerous elements under Other.
Crunchbase cites 209,220 mobile downloads over the past 30 days (via Apptopia), an 80.78% monthly growth rate, from Google Play.
Desktop Web
Either selecting "View Desktop" or navigating with a Desktop browser to https://www.mewe.com your are presented with a registration screen, with the "About", "Privacy Bill of Rights", "MeWe Challenge", and a language selector across the top of the page. Information requested are first and last name, phone or email, and a password. Pseudonymous identities are permitted, though this isn't noted on the login screen. Returning members can use the "Member Log In" button. The uMatrix Firefox extension reveals no third-party content: all page elements are served from mewe.com, img.mewe.com, cdn.mewe.com, or ws.mewe.com. (In subsequent browsing, you may find third-party plugins from, for example, YouTube, for videos, or Giphy, for animated GIFs.) The web front-end is nginx. The site uses SSL v3, issued by DigiCert Inc. to Sgrouples, Inc.
Onboarding
The onboarding experience is stark. There is no default content presented. A set of unidentified icons spans the top of the screen, these turn out to be Home, Chats, Groups, Pages, and Events. New users have to, somehow, find groups or people to connect with, and there's little guidance as to how to do this.
Interface
Generally there is a three panel view, with left- and right-hand sidebars of largely navigational or status information, and a central panel with main content. There are also pop-up elements for chats, an omnipresent feature of the site. Controls display labels on some devices and/or resolutions. Controls do not provide tooltips for navigational aid.
My Cloud - Seamlessly organize all your content in My Cloud; it's your personal cloud. My Cloud offers an interactive dashboard for you to control everything you’ve posted or shared - making it simple to delete or reshare.
Unique profiles - Be yourself, free from any tracking and spying. Customize your profile for every group you create or join.
Voice integration (on any or all content) - Post pictures, videos, or documents and include a voice message. Respond to a shared post or just chat. MeWe’s voice integration works for you and your contacts throughout the entire platform.
Universal tagging - This is a new, convenient way to sort and organize all the content you receive and share, making it easy to find everything, anytime.
Enhanced permission control (patent issued) - Manage permissions on a granular level and decide exactly who sees what. You can also remove yourself from the search directory, make yourself invisible to other members online, and much more.
Much More – join MeWe today and take a look inside! MeWe is the next-gen social networking experience designed for you to have fun, stay in touch, collaborate, organize, and simplify.
Community
A key aspect of any social network is its community. Some of the available or ascertained information on this follows.
Size
Weinstein claims a "million+ following inside MeWe.com" on Twitter. The largest visible groups appear to have a maximum of around 15,000 members , for "Awesome gifs". "Clean Comedy" rates 13,350, and the largest open political groups, 11,000+ members. This compares to Google+ which has a staggering, though Android-registrations-inflated 3.3 billion profiles, and 7.9 million communities, though the largest of these come in at under 10 million members. It's likely that MeWe's membership is on the whole more more active than Google+'s, where generally-visible posting activity was limited to just over 9% of all profiles, and the active user base was well under 1% of the total nominal population.
Active Users
MeWe do not publish active users (e.g., MUA / monthly active users) statistics.
Groups
MeWe is principally a group-oriented discussion site -- interactions take place either between individuals or within group contexts. Virtually all discovery is group-oriented. The selection and dynamics of groups on the site will likely strongly affect user experience, so exploring the available groups and their characteristics is of interest. "MeWe has over 60,000 open groups" according to its FAQ. The Open groups -- visible to any registered MeWe user, though not to the general public Web -- are browsable, though sections and topics must be expanded to view the contents: an overview isn't immediately accessible. We provide a taste here. A selection of ten featured topics spans the top of the browser. As I view these, they are:
MeWe Favorites
Music
Entertainment
Lifestyle
Travel
Health & Fitness
Foodies
Cars & Motorcycles
Technology
Fashion and Beauty
Specific groups may appear in multiple categories. The top Groups within these topics have, variously, 15,482, 7,738, 15,482 (dupe), 7,745, 8,223, 8,220, 1,713, 9,527, 2,716, and 1,516 members. Listings scroll at length -- the Music topic has 234 Groups, ranging in size from 5 to 5,738 members, with a median of 59, mean of 311.4, and a 90%ile of 743.5. Below this is a grid of topics, 122 in all, ranging from Activism to Wellness, and including among them. A selected sample of these topics, with top groups listed members in (parens), follows:
Activism: QAnon+++ (2,572), PATRIOT PREPPERS USA (2,430), Deplorables Republic (2,48), The War Drummer (1,898), Patriots for a United America. (1894), Anonymous (1,700).
Alternative Energy: Reiki, Crystals, and alternative healing (2,114), 💜Starseeds & Empaths💜 (345), Living in Colour (365).
Alternative Lifestyle: Natural Healing and Home Remedies (3,045), Backyard Farming of All Things (2,696), WeTheSheeple (2,251).
Alumni Connections: Google Plus Refugees (271), Google+ Refugees (186), Frog Pond (156), Carlsbad NM High School alumni (57).
Animals: I Love My Dog (4,421), Pussy Shots (4,619).
Astronomy: Spherical Earth Truth, Flat Earth is Wrong (278), Nibiru, Nemesis, Hercolobus, The Destroyer (187).
Biology: Trees (344), Field of Birds (104), Patriots of Australia (51).
Culture: Destroying the Illusion Fans (1147), my friends (551), Coffee Addicts (542).
Cyclists: Car Free Cities / Cycle communting (26).
DIY: Homesteading DIY (5843), Prepper Living (3110), Knucklehead Homesteading (2102), 1911 owners forum (1,474).
Dating: 🌸something Beautiful just for you too🌸 (237), Relationship Junction (171), LDS Dating (114).
Education: Q-Anon Patriots (1,616), InfoWars.com (1,217), Constitutional Liberty for All (907), Prepping, Homesteads skills and Community (887), Shamanic Community (756), Truther Talk (665).
Environmental: Geoengineering, Chemtrails, HAARP (455), ShareYourLove (253), The Seasons (193), Near Term Human Extinction Love (174).
Personal Improvement: For Introverts. (1,214), Anarchy, Philosophy, Psychology, and Spirituality (679), Positive Affirmations (447).
Philosophy: In5d Esoteric Metaphysical and Spiritual Database (1,764), Thought Bouncing (1,137), Obtectivists - Galts Gulch - Ayn Rand fans (561).
Poetry: Dead Poest (1,407), Palacio de Poetry (451), Poets Corner (412).
Politics: Donald J. Trump 2016 - Present (11,486), The Conservative's Hangout (8,345), Qanon Follow The White Rabbit (5,600), Drain The Swamp (4,978), Libertarians (4,528), United We Stand Trump2020 (4,216).
Pop Culture: The Loftus Party (116), The Walking Dead: The Stalking Dead (100), Tyler, Texas (71).
Privacy: Join the Open/Privacy Movement (3974), Kingsport tn gun trader (1,157), Safer Computing (555).
Self Help: * SURVIVE and THRIVE* (858), Preparedness and Off Grid Living (763), Free (631).
Self-Directed Learning: Exposing the Matrix of Lies (997), WAKE THE FUCK UP (474), Wake the Fuck Up. The Next Dimension (287). WTFU when SHTF (126).
Social Change: Armed with Truth and Knowledge (1,986), VEGANS UNITE (766), ACTIVISM universal headlines ~❉~ (729), Meet Earth's Cosmic Neighbors (MECN) (663).
Space: Space (579), ** THE AMAZING UNIVERSE and OUR WORLD** (546), WE ARE NOT ALONE... (488).
Sports: Australian IPSC Buy And Sell (591), Formula 1 (295), Border War Rifle Series, Iowa PRS Matches (280).
Sports Teams: Liverpool FC (228), GEORGIA BULLDOGS (129), The Black and Gold (89), Dallas Cowboys Fans (80).
Subculture: Neon Revolt (3,696), Redneck Funnies (2,042), Serial Killers And True Crime (724).
Surfers: NZBM BEACH VIBES (416).
Sustainability: Common Sense Home (1,746), The Survivalist (1,603), Barter For Prepping/Survivalism/Homesteading Goods (1,274).
Techies: MeWe Help And Support (948), Geek Time (220), GZOSP (124).
Technology: Apple Discussions (2,722), Linux and Open Source Users Group (3,423), Cutting Edge Military Technology (3,201).
Transportation: Truckers Life (431), Aviation (316), Duramax Diesel (312).
Videos: ♥ MY FAVORITE YOUTUBE VIDEOS ♥ (926), Video Meditations (196), The 80's Again - My Retro 80's Music And Video (180), Deep Space Seven (127), Naked Male Celebrities (74).
To be clear: whilst I've not included every topic, I've sampled a majority of them above, and listed not an arbitrary selection, but the top few Groups under each topic.
Google+ Groups
Google Plus expats (1,862)
Google+ Refugees (186)
G+ Refugees (101)
my Google+ expatriates
The Google Plus expats group seems the most active of these by far.
Political Groups
It's curious that MeWe make a specific point in their FAQ that:
At MeWe we have absolutely no political agenda and we have a very straightforward Terms of Service. MeWe is for all law-abiding people everywhere in the world, regardless of political, ethnic, religious, sexual, and other preferences.
There are 403 political groups on MeWe. I won't list them all here, but the first 100 or so give a pretty clear idea of flavour. Again, membership is in (parentheses). Note that half the total political Groups memberships are in the first 21 groups listed here, the first 6 are 25% of the total.
Donald J. Trump 2016 - Present (11486)
The Conservative's Hangout (8345)
Qanon Follow The White Rabbit (5600)
Drain The Swamp (4978)
Libertarians (4528)
United We Stand Trump2020 (4216)
The Right To Self Defense (3757)
Alternative Media (3711)
Hardcore Conservative Patriots for Trump (3192)
Bastket Of Deplorables4Trump! (3032)
Return of the Republic (2509)
Infowars Chat Room Unofficial (2159)
Donald Trump Our President 2017-2025 (2033)
Berners for Progress (1963)
Sean Hannity Fans (1901)
The American Conservative (1839)
I Am The NRA (1704)
Tucker Carlson Fox News (1645)
We Love Donald Trump (1611)
MAGA - Make America Great Again (1512)
Q (1396)
ClashDaily.com (1384)
news from the front (1337)
Basket of Deplorables (1317)
Payton's Park Bench (1283)
Convention of States (1282)
Britons For Brexit (1186)
MoJo 5.0 Radio (1180)
MeWe Free Press (1119)
The Constitutionally Elite (1110)
Libertarian (1097)
WOMEN FOR PRESIDENT TRUMP (1032)
AMERICANS AGAINST ISIS and OTHER ENEMIES (943)
#WalkAway Campaign (894)
ALEX JONES (877)
The Lion Is Awake ! (854)
We Support Donald Trump! (810)
The Stratosphere Lounge (789)
TRUMP-USA-HANDS OFF OUR PRESIDENT (767)
Official Tea Party USA (749)
Mojo50 Jackholes (739)
Yes Scotland (697)
"WE THE DEPLORABLE" - MOVE ON SNOWFLAKE! (688)
Judge Jeanine Pirro Fans (671)
Anarcho-Capitalism (658)
Ted Cruz for President (650)
No Lapdog Media (647)
Q Chatter (647)
Daily Brexit (636)
Tucker Carlson Fox News (601)
The Trumps Storm Group (600)
QAnon-Patriots WWG1WGA (598)
100% American (569)
Ladies For Donald Trump (566)
Deep State (560)
In the Name of Liberty (557)
Material Planet (555)
WikiUnderground (555)
Trump NRA Free Speech Patriots on MeWe Gab.ai etc (546)
Magna Carta Group (520)
Constitutional Conservatives (506)
Question Everything (503)
Conspiracy Research (500)
Bill O'Reilly Fans (481)
Conservative Misfit's (479)
Canadian politics (478)
Anarchism (464)
HARDCORE DEPLORABLES (454)
Deplorable (450)
Tampa Bay Trump Club (445)
UK Politics (430)
Bongino Fan Page (429)
Radical Conservatives (429)
RESIST THE RESISTANCE (419)
The Deplorables (409)
America's Freedom Fighters (401)
Politically Incorrect & Proud (399)
CONSERVATIVES FOR AMERICA ! (385)
Political satire (383)
RISE OF THE RIGHT (371)
UK Sovereignty,Independence,Democracy -Everlasting (366)
The Patriots Voting Coalition (359)
End The Insanity (349)
Coming American Civil War! (345)
Constitutional Conservatives (343)
United Nations Watch (342)
A Revival Of The Critical Thinking Union (337)
The New Libertarian (335)
Libertarian Party (official ) (333)
DDS United (Duterte Die-hard Supporters) (332)
American Conservative Veterans (331)
Anarchism/Agorism/Voluntaryism (328)
America Needs Donald Trump (326)
The UKIP Debating Society (321)
Coalition For Trump (310)
Egalitarianism (306)
FRIENDS THAT LIKE JILL STEIN AND THE GREEN PARTY (292)
2nd Amendment (287)
Never Forget #SethRich (286)
Green Party Supporters 2020 (283)
It seems there is relatively little representation from the left wing, or even the centre, of the political spectrum. A case-insensitive match for "liberal" turns up:
104: Conservatives Against Liberal Beliefs C.A.L.I.B (273)
184: Progressive and Liberal Politics (119)
301: Liberalism is a Mental Disorder (33)
302: Resistance Against Liberal Socialism (33)
358: NOT For Liberals (17)
367: Drinking Liberally Houston (14)
400: Stephanie Miller's Sexy Liberal Army (6)
Mainstream political parties are little represented, though again, the balance seems skewed searching on "(democrat|republic|gop)":
391: Saving The Republic: Video News & Opinion (8)
The terms "left" and "right" provide a few matches, not all strictly political-axis aligned:
7: The Right To Self Defense (3757)
80: RISE OF THE RIGHT (371)
150: POLITICS ON THE LEFT (156)
157: 1st Amendment Rights Protected By The 2nd Amendmen (141)
209: On The Left With Jeremy Corbyn (84)
262: Eyes-Left Labour & PP - Social Media (49)
300: Gather Left (33)
385: Defend Washington State Gun Rights (9)
390: Left Coast Conservatives (8)
Socialism and Communism also warrant a few mentions:
121: Revolutionary Socialists United (204)
216: Socialist Thought (79)
220: Stories Of Communism (76)
262: Eyes-Left Labour & PP - Social Media (49)
288: Snuggly Wuggly Socialists (38)
302: Resistance Against Liberal Socialism (33)
And there are some references to green, laboulabor parties:
97: FRIENDS THAT LIKE JILL STEIN AND THE GREEN PARTY (292)
100: Green Party Supporters 2020 (283)
262: Eyes-Left Labour & PP - Social Media (49)
320: Green Party of Ohio Issues & Discussion Group (29)
Conclusion
Whilst there may not be a political agenda, there does appear to be at least a slight political bias to the site. And a distinctive skew on many other topical subjects. Those seeking new homes online may wish to take this into account.
Updates
Various typos and tagging corrections. 2018-11-29 - 30
Added G+MM references count for MeWe to lede paragraph. 2018-12-2
Guy who promised to sell our product (hairstyling scissors) refuses to return them after deciding not to sell them
Long one with three parts. My dad sells high end hairstyling scissors that he designs himself. Our business has patents and trademarks for all sorts of scissors in the U.S. He also does sharpening for the shears (hairstyling scissors) and other knives as a side thing at the office to earn some cash. He's been sharpening shears for over 20 years but recently officially started providing the service to everyone willing to pay. Recently my dad has been training people to become our dealers in other states or cities. We are based in Florida, and the person in question was to go back go Virginia. To sell our merchandise and know their info in the market, we teach them sharpening techniques. It's easier to learn about the metals they are made from and what is high quality or not if you learn sharpening. He taught a new person, let's call him Kevin, how to sharpen scissors and sold some sharpening machines to him so that he would be able to do it on his own. We also gave him ~75 shears worth up to $12,000 or more for him to sell in his state when he finished training. How we do our contract is that we allow our dealers take large amounts of shears from us and they pay us half the amount of what they sell each month. This way they are not indebted the moment they start working with us. This was around 3 or 4 months ago in Late March or early April. Part 1: About a month later, the guy said one of the machines he bought was not useful for him and he wanted to return it. It was a $1800 machine that we gave him a discount for and sold at $1500. However, the machine was meant for righthanded people and did not have a slot on the side for left handed people like Kevin. He requested that we cut a slot on the side. We did as he asked but my dad told him that it would lower the price of the machine permanently. When he requested a return, he demanded full price of the machine. He tried to force this transaction by shipping the machine back to our office asking for a full price return. Mind, this was originally a new $1800 machine that we sold at $1500, but was returning used and damaged and definitely not even worth $1500 anymore. We obviously told him we could not give him a full return and offered $1000 instead. Kevin responded by implying that he would withhold our scissors until he got a full return. He also implied that my dad tricked him into buying a machine that was unneccessary for him. We tried to communicate with him multiple times but he refused to respond after a few exchanges. He later finally sent a mail directly telling us he would not give our scissors back until he got his full return. This was the last exchange for about a month. Part 2: Kevin realized that since he paid with a credit card, he was capable of chargebacking us around late May. We had never even heard of such a thing before when we got an email that said $1500 was about to be taken out through a chargeback. We had to learn how to dispute the claim on businesstrack or the transaction would end with him giving back a damaged machine and taking $1500 from us by force. We wrote up our side of the story and disputed the claim around late May or early June. Sometime in June we got an email saying that $1500 was returned to us after our case was reviewed. Kevin decided to respond this time by saying through text message that since we took the chargeback back, he would not be returning our scissors. He refused to communicate further and our attempts to look him up were futile as the address he sent mails from was a bank. Part 3: Lastly around 2 weeks ago July 12, he chargebacked us again for the same case. The credit card company's reasoning for allowing this was that he provided proof of return. Granted, we do have the machine back but we cannot allow a full return of $1500 for it. We tried numerous times to pay him back partially for the returned machine but he defiantly refused negotiation. We specifically asked in the second dispute that we get $500 back to finally end this one dispute. The other main dispute was the problem with the shears worth $12,000. We have a receipt as proof that he took shears from us that we did not charge at the time. The transaction took place in Florida and we have all proof he did not return them. In fact we have texts from him saying he has then and wont be returning them. He has taken them somewhere in Virginia and has refused to give them back; we do not even know if they are damaged or was sold. We are currently looking to sue him for them back but I wanted to ask reddit first. How should we try to get them back? What happens if we fully prepare a legal team but he responds by just returning them with no apology as if to mock us? What can we do to him then?
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