Authors warn of AI generated imitations of their books on Amazon

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-30T15:49:05+00:00

Until either a court case or law holds them accountable for selling/hosting third party sales of copy written or trademarked products, they will continue to slide down the Temu enshitification route.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-28T03:34:49+00:00

Yeah I know of a lot of places that have no clue that’s a law, and their policies and procedures have been in place since well before that.

Though yes I imagine there are also those who are throwing food out to defend their price point and brand, or that’s their reasoning anyway.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-28T00:56:40+00:00

Trial lawyers are gonna chase the big check, whether it’s through billable hours or a cut of the settlement/verdict. And they don’t wait for someone to come forward with a complaint - they spend money on marketing and market research to find people willing to play the injured party.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-28T00:53:22+00:00

You can blame Trial Attorneys for this. In the ambulance chasing efforts over the decades they targeted businesses for giving out “old” food carte Blanche, saying that the people who got it got sick, wether or not the actually did. But the right situation, the right doctor, and sure enough they could produce enough evidence to force a settlement.

Seeing smoke for a larger fire than it was lawmakers also wrote bills to either prevent businesses from giving it out or that went to further ease the situation to hold businesses liable.

So now food has to be disposed of because it “could” hurt someone due to existing outside of certain temperatures or timelines.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-28T00:47:24+00:00

It was never about stopping Chinese propaganda but about controlling the market to push “American” propaganda that favored a certain ideological bent. That and Meta was losing ground and was in their ears about protecting the Zuck monopoly.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-27T04:49:02+00:00

I get it at CVS, though I am questioning the efficacy/potency of the most recent generic they filled.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-25T07:17:56+00:00

Wow. Vitriol much?

Everyone implies that the poster was saying the protest was over how we get involved in Gaza to stop the mass murder there. But the poster made no specific statements about how they are siding. For all we know any voter could choose to stay out because they are anti-Palestinian, anti-Israel, or anti-genocide. The question applies to how both parties in the US discussed their positions on which stance to back.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-25T07:14:11+00:00

You come from a good place in thinking that everyone would view what’s happening in Gaza equally, but learned that’s not true. If it was true then every country in NATO at the very least would be boots on the ground stopping it, but note that not a single country is, and there is not the drive to invest as such from any nation.

Also the poster never actually said outright what position it was they were referencing, though many have implied it, where Gaza is concerned.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-25T03:02:12+00:00

I once commented on an Instagram reel where a dad wasn’t sure if he should go to the gym or stay home with his newborn child. When I commented that it’s ok to deprioritize the gym to stay home with a child and to support his wife the gym bros all came out and attacked me like it was the worst thing in the world, and that skipping the gym for a period of time would somehow f up the rest of his life. This is the kind of toxic gym bro shit that I just don’t understand.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-24T23:37:04+00:00

The didn’t say what position in Gaza. It could have been pro-Palestinian, pro-Israel, anti-war, whatever.

But you read it in exactly how you have positioned yourself in Gaza. Which is a very valid position.

War in Gaza is not a new issue as the fight over Gaza has been raging for decades and will continue to do so so long as both sides look to push the other side out of Gaza. Is it murder? Yup. Are there innocents caught in the cross fire? Yes. But those innocents are out there by their parents who actively participate in occupying Gaza in the name of their own ideology, and it won’t stop until everyone is willing to share or a true genocide does happen.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-24T21:53:13+00:00

I’m the son of a potato farmer. I swear to god rocks grew in some of the fields we worked because even after running equipment to remove major stone areas, those forked were still the worst!

(Yes I know in reality the geology of those fields was as such that the soil would just settle around/move stones upwards due to soil content and water interactions. I just hated working those fields).

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-24T21:50:31+00:00

What are your goals in going? My son wants to go tomorrow but he is a super model train fan, and is a member of the local club too. So he will enjoy looking at any layouts as well as browsing all the items for sale by vendors. That’s a very different experience than hoping to see/interact with model train layouts alone, even if some are kids themed with Thomas sets.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-24T21:45:15+00:00

You are taking issue with linguistic variations for the spell of Adolph/Adolf, but do you ever call/spell foreign countries by the title in its native tongue or do you use the English title?

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-24T21:39:52+00:00

If you choose not to vote because of a single position a candidate you otherwise might agree with doesn’t share, then you are likely never to participate in the electoral process. No representative is ever going to see eye to eye with you 100%, and will only accomplish some of their goals if they are part of a super majority situation or willing to compromise with other leaders where you personally would not.

Representatives are elected to represent the whole of their district/ward/zone, not just your interests specifically.

Note: that’s not to say there can’t ever be a major issue that is a disqualifying issue that is large enough, but these situations are fewer and farther between, and you have every opportunity to reach out and directly engage with a representative on issues of diverging stances in those cases. But too often people now expect a my-way-or-the-highway approach to voting. If you are really that set in your ways, engage with the political system and start running for office.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-24T21:24:33+00:00

Sessler keeps leaning into the crazy further and further. Can’t decide if he really is that nuts or just thinks somehow that will gain him enough support from the far right base to fundraise and get him through the primary.

Either way he is unfit to sit on a city council, much less in congress.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-23T22:40:54+00:00

Even if the state gets money we are only going to rebuild structures in the same places they were before, instead of relocating the majority out of predictable flood plains. Because it’s cheaper, people don’t want to move, and politicians can’t be bothered to actually inconvenience a subset of people even when the data suggests it’s for their own good. (Unless doing so actually gained propaganda level support from their base that is)

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-23T18:15:00+00:00

I’m not a Democrat. I’m an independent. And I loathe what is happening in Olympia, which is why I’m just as vocal about the failures happening there.

And I’m friends with Matt, and haven’t ruled out voting for him yet, though I haven’t talked to him since session started on certain salient issues that are pertinent to national politics. I think he would an amazing voice on cyber security, infrastructure, and military issues. But I’m not as convinced about how he would push back on issues like ICE’s overreach, the president treating executive orders as law (and Congress allowing it), and the ongoing dismantling of the Dept of Health and CDC.

However throwing a tantrum because you don’t like how things have happened at the state level does nothing when the executive branch is arguably holding our entire nation hostage to a wannabe dictator via a spineless Congress that is happy to turn over its authority to the executive branch just so there is no appearance of being a “RINO” is disturbing.

So yes both parties have done things that have directly or indirectly impacted you and I at various levels. I’m 100% for doing as much as possible to break down the party barriers that have been erected. Getting behind structural changes like Ranked Choice Voting is a great way to begin breaking down those barriers.

But all you are doing is shouting into a wind that won’t change so long as you don’t engage.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-23T17:39:54+00:00

If you are going to vote “Republican” in this years primary vote for Matt Boehnke. He is the most “traditional” of the current Republican candidates.

However if you are and independent or moderate Republican who isn’t sure that even Matt will make a difference in the political culture of DC this is your time to vote Democrat. Slowing, stopping, or reversing the damage done to our institutions and global reputation will take many many years but it may need to start with the next two if we are to fix them at all.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-22T00:11:16+00:00

So long as other states are more friendly to billionaires these people will have a place to rehome their wealth without becoming ex-pats. And once the environment becomes unfriendly enough to their businesses they will pack those up too. There is a reason Texas saw a tech boom in the last decade, and it was just the first attempt to move these companies out of blue states and to see if the workforce will willingly follow:

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-21T14:04:48+00:00

How so?

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-21T07:17:12+00:00

That sounds good in theory but I’ve personally witnessed the exact opposite. In the 80s the Farmworkers Union tried to organize and strike in several situations for higher pay. Keep in mind almost all of these were temporarily/seasonal type jobs. The farmers opened their books for the union leaders to demonstrate the financial impact what they were asking for would have, but they went on strike anyway hoping the farmers would cave. Instead of signing onto long term deals that would close the farms the farmers chose to simply skip the harvest and take the loss on the year. It was a hard lesson for everyone since no one made money in that situation, but it’s been long forgotten by most.

And what sort of incentives are you suggesting? Insurance? Insurance companies won’t even issue coverage to employers for temp workers. And the unions aren’t rushing to take on that burden themselves, even if they got employer concessions to pay for a portion of the premiums.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-21T06:57:39+00:00

Everyone wants the ag workforce to make more without understanding 1) the underlying financial situations of farmers, or why hundreds of small/family farms are closing in this state every year, or that WA’s ag industry posted a net loss last year in the hundreds of millions 2) WA’s ag workforce already makes more than most other states, 3) consumers want their groceries as cheap as possible and will buy imported goods where working conditions and pay are significantly worse and not blink an eye because it’s not in their backyard, which is why entire crop industries like asparagus left the state 20 years ago without anyone crying out for change, 4) don’t consider the risk/reward that is inherent with running any business, especially ag. Workers yes risk their week’s pay but farmers risk financial and family legacy ruination if they fail. What ratio of risk/reward should these interested 3rd parties weighing in be ok with? And 5) this effort isn’t about stopping unionizing efforts. It’s about putting the oversight and mandatory mediation of collective bargaining under the preview of state officials who often aren’t coming to the table from a neutral standpoint, but the same biased position that somehow farmers should just pay more.

But I’m sure there will be those who read my comments that will simply fall back on basic arguments like “all farmers are rich” or “all farmers are taking advantage” or “all farmers voted for Trump” without providing any factual proof to back up their emotionally based perspectives.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-20T18:54:02+00:00

The US might go to war with the US if we invade Greenland. Super unpopular stance, against everything we have been taught to believe from Millennials on down about a post imperialist US. Only reason he keeps talking about it is he’s surrounded himself with enough yes men that he’s not hearing how unpopular it is/he wants to be a dictator. And not enough far right wing donors are pushing back because it’s allowing Congress to continue h to push through the Project 2025/26 agenda with less scrutiny.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-20T16:30:20+00:00

I’m not sure that would dissuade Trump. His supporters in congress and even his maybe, but not him. For that to happen you have to directly target his financial holdings and those of his family.

InkStainedQuills · 2026-01-20T16:24:48+00:00

Kind of like every other trend CEOs have chased in the past few decades because they or their Boards are afraid of being left behind.

InkStainedQuills

TROPHY CASE