sherbetdibdab

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If you're like me--cynic, snob, or otherwise a discerning person--you will already know that James Cameron's Avatar was going to be shit just based on its summary alone.

I'm here to vindicate you. I came out of the theater doubled over laughing, because really, it's either laugh or rage.

By rage, I mean "I'll hunt James Cameron down and burn his house and choke his pet dogs/cats/goldfish to death and then burn them too." That kind of rage. And you can bitch about me having ~*liberal hang-upgs*~ and agendas or "reading too much into this, it's just FANTASY and ESCAPIST ENTERTAINMENT" if you like, but keep in mind that I'll call you names and you will deserve every single one.

( OH JAMES CAMERON NO. NO NO NO. )

Brb, pouring gasoline on Cameron's house. Anyone got a couple of matches? A lighter maybe? Speaking of which, the precious mineral sought after by the human imperialists? It's really, truly called unobtainium. What is it used for? Why do they want it so much? We're never told. They just do and want an excuse to burn down a big tree, duh.

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renaissance2010
Turning to photography as a creative outlet during a valiant fight with breast cancer at age 34, renaissance10 survived and set up a photo contest to help raise funds for the Lavender Trust, a nonprofit that provides information and support to younger women with breast cancer. In the first two years, the competition brought in over £65,000 (that's $107,260.73 U.S.!), with entries from 130 countries last year. Renaissance10 recently joined LiveJournal to meet other passionate photographers and find supportive friends.

curiouscupcakes
Holy buttercream frosting! If you have a sweet tooth for sugary goodness or a wandering eye for whimsical confection, this is pure ecstasy iced in deliciousness. Hailing the beloved cupcake as the artisinal canvas of choice, you'll enjoy recipes, photos, and bountiful tips to bake up a batch, whether your taste leans toward French classics or funky and flavorful.

mission101
With New Years in the offing, it's an ideal time to reflect on past accomplishments, make peace with disappointments, and refocus the lens on future goals. This community welcomes you to create a bucket list of 101 things you plan to accomplish in the next 1,001 days. Offering support, guidance, and inspiration, this is a great way to jumpstart those pesky resolutions.

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On Eye Weekly, Stuart Bergman began a column on the challenges of music fandom Music fans tend to express their devotion in peculiar ways — see: flower-tossing Morrissey fans; the uncommon amount of online Panic! At the Disco fan fiction; Juggalos.

In the Huron (Michigan) Daily Tribune, Bill Diller profiled local writer Karen Schweitzer, who said she was inspired by J. K. Rowling, who “was this single mother who got this idea one day, and turned it into an entire empire.” […] “That was just fascinating to me. I love the way she writes, and it inspired me to start writing some fiction. I joined an Internet website that did collaborative fan fiction, where everyone got together, and worked together, to write a story.”

And, last week L. A. Weekly had an article on M/M romance; this week, the editors compiled reactions, including one from Nigel Puerasch, who wrote “I am a writer of original ‘slash,’ with several published short stories. I am a mostly gay man. I often prefer the writing by women because it has emotional depth and power."

(Crossposted to http://as-others-see-us.dreamwidth.org/9309.html.)

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Kij Johnson's Fudoki: think Lian Hearn's Tale of the Otori except it doesn't FUCKING SUCK ROTTEN, BLOOD-ENCRUSTED, WORM-RIDDEN APPENDAGES.

( Actually, it's really quite good. Good? Excellent, even. )

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Holiday debuggery

We know there were a few kinks with the holiday promotion. We've been working very hard to get them ironed out. If you have a paid/permanent account, keep on sending those coupons. Here's an update:

• If you were unable to send out multiple coupons at a time, please perform a hard refresh, and you should be good to go.
• If you redeemed a coupon to upgrade your account and the balance at checkout was $0 instead of $9.95 or $15, this means your upgrade did not go through (nor were you charged). We've straightened this out, so you can now apply your holiday coupon toward the purchase of an annual paid account.
• If you tried to redeem a holiday coupon and had trouble using a gift certificate to cover the balance of an annual paid account, we identified the root problem. If this happened to you, you can now use your holiday coupon together with your gift certificate.
• If the number of holiday coupons you have available suddenly goes up (instead of down), this might be due to recipients declining the coupons, at which point your pool of available coupons will be replenished and, therefore, increase.
• If you need assistance with holiday coupons or pretty much anything else (well, LiveJournal related), please open a support request and we'll be more than happy to help!

Tweaks

• There were some initial glitches displaying results on My Guests, but we've worked them out. We hope you'll check out who's been checking you out!
• Some of you reported formatting issues using the Rich Text Editor (i.e., line breaks were being removed incorrectly). We've implemented a fix! Thanks so much for your patience.

Give a little extra!

We're pleased to report that we've already sold over 100 virtual red ribbons in honor of National AIDS Awareness month. Remember, for each charitable vgift you purchase for $2.99, we'll donate 100 percent of gross proceeds to IAVI.org (the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative) to fund the development of an HIV vaccine. Once again, we thank you for your generosity.

Celebrate with holiday vGifts!

Stop by the Virtual Gift Shop and share some holiday magic with your LiveJournal friends.

Photos of the week

We're back with more dazzling pictures from around the world. Congrats to marlenemcc, who has been awarded a virtual blue ribbon as the winner of our fourth photo contest. We hope you'll click over to LJ_Photophile poll and tell us your picks in pics!

For more fantastic user content, we'll meet you under the cut. ( Read more... )

Curtains

Thanks, again, for reading. Here's wishing you the very merriest of holidays. We'll see you next year!