the blog killing axolotl is one of my favorite things that has ever happened on this website because talking about it afterwards sounds like an inside joke or perhaps a prank. like always be on the lookout for the blog killing axolotl. he can kill your blog. it happened to me once trust me.

there’s this very specific image of an axolotl plushie with the phrase ‘i am at my limit’ that i’m not posting for obvious reasons (even though i’m inoculated because i tried to post it before) that if you try to post it tumblr will immediately delete your blog. like completely. your blog is just gone if you try to post the image. you can get it reinstated but you have to go to staff and be like ‘hi my blog was killed by a picture of an axolotl can you please give me it back.’ we found this out completely accidentally when brianna brucespringsteendotcom made the image and then posted it and then her blog was just gone, at which point we started to experiment. anyway, a while later we found that if someone submits the image and you don’t know what it is and you try to post it it will also nuke your blog. this obviously all sounds like an incredibly stupid internet hoax so when you try to warn people about the blog killing axolotl you just sound like you’re trolling but i promise you, from the bottom of my heart, that we are not.

people in the tags are like ‘i don’t know if this is true but it sounds wild’ i feel like the old man you meet in the first five minutes of a horror movie that tells the teenagers on spring break not to visit the creepy old house at the end of the road

FAQs:

1. Is this the image of the axolotl plushie with the fire behind it?

NO! that is a different, more well known axolotl image that does not delete your blog.

2. Can I see the image?

for obvious reasons i'm not reblogging it to this post. however, since so many people asked, i put it safely in a google doc for you. go nuts.

3. hey, i remember this! it was over a year ago. does this still delete your blog?

someone in my askbox has informed me, under certain circumstances, yes. and that image is live, so be careful with it.

4. have you figured out what causes it?

same person in my askbox said this

which was my first theory before i went down the source code rabbit hole, although there must be a certain threshold for editing it since in the past people have posted censored versions where it still deletes your blog.

5. can i use it as my icon/can i send it to someone in dms/can i upload it if it's not in a post/can i post an edited version of the picture?

back when this first happened if you did any of the above it deleted your blog, unless it was pretty heavily edited (someone in my discord put him behind bars - you know like he was caged - and i think when we uploaded that it didn't delete the person's blog? i could be wrong though). see the above ask for the most recent information. someone in the notes earlier (don't remember who, sorry) also said that you can upload the original via mobile and it kills your blog, but if you try to post it on desktop it blocks it from being uploaded, so that's also another route you could go if you want to experiment.

6. why have i never heard about this before?

spnblr is more complex and layered than you can possibly imagine it's not my fault you can't see it for the majesty it is.

7. this still sounds fake.

hey man, weird thing to lie about. but the picture and all the information you need to test it out is right here. post it to you blog. go on. prove me wrong. 🙂

8. didn't people try to remotely delete neil gaiman's blog by submitting that image to him?

we did do that yeah.

The things people are describing in the notes sound a lot like what you'd expect if an image was, entirely coincidentally, matching the 'visual hash' of a known exploitation image. there's various algorithms used for visual hashing and there's various lists of known bad material, so it's reasonably likely that it'll trigger similar automated actions on other platforms using a similar method.

visual hashing algorithms are specifically developed to find images that are similar/the same, so they don't have the same mathematical properties that hashes for passwords have - for instance "hash collision" is a desirable property here. this is why some but not all edits do the same thing, sufficient visual distance.

anyway, if that's what this, please be advised that the automated process smashing accounts is also probably sending reports to the feds and putting you on a list you probably would rather not be on. unlikely to have any impact on you but in the instance of federal trouble it will make things a lot more complicated.

there's several suggestions that this might be code in the image; this isn't impossible and every few years someone finds a way to make a common image processing library execute arbitrary code - my personal favourite is CVE-2017-8291 aka "ghostbutt" for various reasons.

however! disabling an account in such a way that staff can re-enable it is not a single simple operation, it would (again probably, I don't work at tumblr and don't know how their backend works but I do know how things work generally) be a reasonably complex thing with multiple steps.

a single image would also not perform the operation against whatever blog uploaded it, and the actual binary code would not survive translation to another image format. that bit is impossible.

there's a similar image that will get your discord account immediately banned. it's a still image of a teen boy eating popcorn, nothing weird about it, he's not nude or anything and the image is completely sfw. however, it was determined (I think someone found proof but it's possible I got bullshit info, this is the top theory anyway) that the image itself is a screenshot from a child exploitation video and it just automatically triggers account deletion due to automatic hash matching.

Tumblr has a ton of automatic account status switches that are flipped without staff oversight. another one is the "shadowban" bug which appears to trigger (we're not sure) if nanny code on the site identifies you (sometimes inaccurately) as a spam or nsfw blog. staff can fix it by flipping the switch back after you contact support, they have a specific category for reporting this bug on the support form now. it would be extremely funny if they added a chaos dunk axolotl support category too

I guess it's theoretically possible that nuclear axolotl could somehow match the hash of a child exploitation image but christ, what are the fuckin odds

edit: I want to echo what normal horse said about getting on fed lists. the majority of Tumblr dirtbag leftists have nothing to fear from fed lists but if you ever in your life get into any federal trouble (including being arrested at a political protest or doing any organizing or at this point even posting "free Palestine") your ping on the "guys who sent child exploitation images online" database could easily be used against you. a 60 year old judge is unlikely to understand "it was a picture of a soft toy that accidentally was identified as child porn your honor", your public defender probably won't either. prosecution is going to point at your name on the Bad Guys List and that's going to be that. so. cover your ass if you absolutely must be funny online, and if you don't know what I mean by "cover your ass" don't risk it at all.

Full article

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

Sorry I think it’s hilarious when Zionists try to come at me with “you should go to Gaza and see how they treat you!” Because that shit actually does not work when you have family who’ve literally been to Gaza and were treated with so much kindness

And before anyone comments I’m just saying this because I’m Palestinian - my mom is actually not Palestinian. She’s not any variety of arab/middle eastern or anything. She’s literally American and didn’t speak a word of Arabic yet. She hadn’t even reverted to Islam yet at the time she was in Gaza and she was traveling by herself. And you know what happened?

Palestinians in Gaza welcomed her into their homes. They made her tea. She played with Palestinian children in the streets. She has pictures she’s shown me of the kids showing her their cats. All she talks about whenever I would ask her about Gaza is how kind and generous the Palestinians there were to her and made her very comfortable. Do you know who actually treated her like shit? Do you know who actually made her feel unsafe and berated her and threatened her?

The fucking IOF

Palestinians are not "animals."

They are not "children of darkness."

Little kids are rescuing cats and trying to comfort them when they themselves are terrified.

A doctor broke down when his father and brother came into the trauma unit.

And several of his colleagues hugged and gathered to comfort him.

Journalists are playing with babies.

Doctors are refusing to evacuate hospitals because their patients can't and refuse to leave them.

There's a little boy who gives tea to the journalists and thanks them for spreading their stories.

He's displaced at the hospital, his home is gone.

A kid was asked what he wants to be when he grows up and he said kids in Gaza don't grow up.

Kids are writing their names on their arms so they can be identified.

Momin Kireka is a Palestinian journalist who was disabled by an Israeli attack in 2008.

And despite the difficulty in moving around, he vows to continue to show the world the truth.

Awni, a young Palestinian boy has a gaming YouTube channel he loved so much.

He was killed in the bombing.

Mohammed Sami was an artist who's dream was to open an art gallery.

He was playing with the kids to raise their spirits. And the next day he was killed.

They are victims.

They are going through unimaginable horrors and still find it in their hearts to be kind.

They have hopes and dreams just like you and I.

They are people.

And they deserve to be remembered as such.

Blind Tumblr users: don’t get the latest iOS app update!

I just updated my tablet to the newest version of the tumblr app for iOS and it completely broke screen reader access for both VoiceOver and Spoken Content. This has happened in the past already, so I will file a support ticket and copy-paste my text from last time, but this really sucks. I sincerely hope this doesn’t affect all screen reader users, but I’m unsure how they could program this bug in a way it only affects me. If you rely on a screen reader to use the tumblr app, I’d advice to not get the latest update to be on the safe side.

When I say “completely broke access”, what I mean is that no posts on my dash or on individual blogs get read or recognized at all. No plain text, alt text, tags, etc. Note count and buttons still work though.

If you also run into this bug, here’s my advice. If anyone has something more useful, please tell me

If you have the latest version but your screen reader didn’t break, also please tell me! I would be fascinated to know if this bug is only affecting some people

TL;DR: The latest tumblr app update for iOS made it so screen readers no longer work in the app

Please boost!

IMPORTANT

Boycott:

Plz you can always watch the shows on pirated sites and find better alternatives for burgers & coffee, nothing is more important than stopping a genocide. It's a global boycott.

longer list of what to boycott here

cmon yall i promise you can survive without burgers and coffee

Longer list here

The BDS movement has their own list of what specific companies they're currently boycotting and have a good explanation of it on their site. Overloading people with many companies to think about is less helpful than have a smaller group of directly harmful companies at a given time.

Current companies they're boycotting are:

I haven't seen anything about Pillsbury being currently under boycott

being alive is great because there are so many different vegetables you can sauté. but then there are also the horrors

with faith and perseverance, one day we will sauté the horrors

i love this website

reblog to sauté the horrors

cop city protesters in georgia are being indicted on RICO charges (which essentially means they’re trying to criminalize community and mutual aid).

they arrested these people for participating in legal protest, which they have a right to, under the precedent that they were “anti-government activists insighting violence against law enforcement” when in fact most if not all agitators were from out of state and not involved with those who organized the protests.

these people are being wrongfully indicted for trying to prevent cop city from being built, which if you don’t know about cop city here is a link to the official stop cop city website.

42 people have been charged with domestic terrorism.

this is not okay.

if you want to support the protestors and others involved with this issue, please go to the Atlanta Solidarity Network’s website where you can donate and check out other ways in which you can help.

fuck cops. stop cop city. support the solidarity network.

Full article

This is exactly the problem with the white centrist approach to dealing with the problems around police. Putting them in new clothes in new cars with "discreet firearms" doesn't do a damn thing to protect people from the violent, oppressive force that is the police.

None of these changes address racial profiling, police brutality, or the fact that marginalized people (rightfully) feel unsafe around cops.

These changes are useless. Abolish the police.

(Commentary from Samira, @politicsofcanada )

Some recent COVID-19 news

Growing Concern for back to school as data shows rising COVID cases in B.C.

A grassroots group of health professionals are calling for British Columbia to reinstate mask mandates in schools and hospitals to prevent a repeat “tripledemic” of COVID-19, RSV and influenza infections that pushed the province’s hospitals to the brink last fall.

And with data showing rising COVID-19 cases in B.C. and two new viral subvariants on the horizon, Protect Our Province B.C. says the province should act sooner rather than later.

The group is composed of more than a dozen doctors, nurses, researchers, teachers and professionals who advocate for evidence-based pandemic policies.

“We know from last year kids and schools were hit hard and if the goal is to keep kids learning in school we need to do what we can to prevent virus spread this fall,” said Dr. Lyne Filiatrault, a retired emergency room physician in Vancouver and a member of the group.

COVID response confounds SARS expert

As COVID-19 surges globally, a leading infectious disease specialist is confounded by the lack of pandemic mitigation measures in Ontario.

Q: What is your advice for people who want to stay safe this fall?

Dr. Dick Zoutman: “One is to be informed. I do recommend Dr. Tara Moriarty’s website — COVID19resources.ca,” Zoutman said. “We owe her a large debt.”

Second, when the latest COVID-19 vaccine is available, “get it,” he recommended.

Third, “buy N95 respirators and make sure you have plenty and have one with you all the time. And when you go into an indoor public space — be it a hospital, a bank, a grocery store, school — put it on. The best ones are the ones that go around your head, because they’re tighter.”

Fourth, antigen rapid tests must be made widely available. “If you have any symptoms, you need to test and isolate yourself.”

Finally, avoid indoor public places this fall, he said. “I haven’t eaten in a restaurant in almost four years, and I don’t intend to.”

@staff LOOK AT THESE IMAGES YOU STUPID BASTARDS!!!

Hey remember when staff deleted the original photoset I posted with this image that had like 60k+ notes? Because I remember.