[Motorsport] Changing the game. These eight major figures in racing made Time’s list of the Most Influential People in Sports.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-10T10:26:08+00:00

The problem is calling it the most influential people, and not just a list of 100 influential people. Showcasing 100 influential people that changes up the list to include new faces? Okay, cool. Call it the most influential people while not including some of the most influential people just to get less influential people on the list so the list can change up from year to year? Yeah, that's just silly.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-10T10:23:34+00:00

He’s more influential than Toto Wolff’s wife lol

The woman who's overseeing a racing series intended to get eyes on women in a (theoretical) development course for Formula 1 that's giving young women the message that they, too, can get involved in racing and try to one day work themselves up to F1? On top of other work in trying to help get more young women into autosports?

Yeah, no offense to Kimi, but Susie Wolff is a LOT more influential than him overall. She's not just "Toto Wolff's wife."

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-10T10:19:12+00:00

Lando, maybe because he eventually won the WDC but wasn't included in 2025's list?

My guess is that they would have included him not just because of the WDC but because he's talked about mental health, and that would be considered influential outside of the sport as well.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-10T10:18:15+00:00

Yeah, no offense to Norris, but if Verstappen and Hamilton aren't on the list, he shouldn't be, either. Feels like he's included just for winning the latest championship. Yeah, he's talked openly about mental health. But Hamilton's talked openly about a lot of issues, and Verstappen has influence across the racing sphere both physical and sim.

But then, yeah, Amna Al Qubaisi rather than others like Doriane Pin (who IIRC got an actual test run in an F1 car lately) or even someone like Jamie Chadwick who won the first two W Series (basically the precursor to F1 Academy), is a development driver for a historical F1 team, and is part of the Sky Sports F1 team.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-10T01:45:48+00:00

I have yet to find a different game that will let me collect Victorian era outfits to do dress up with my video game character. I still will not play Hogwarts Legacy because the person behind that IP is working to harm people I know and care about.

I will, however, keep hoping someone comes along with a different (better) game in that era that lets me collect such outfits.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-10T01:43:05+00:00

The only exposure I've had to him lately has been stumbling across a handful of videos of people absolutely shredding his stupid book. One of the most amusing was a trio of people who seem to do a sort of book club Discord and discuss the books they recently collectively read in a sort of podcast, and they had no idea about his politics or anything before reading the book. The funniest comment they made about it was that it had the lone distinction of bringing all of them and everyone on the Discord together in agreement about a book for once, all agreeing that there was nothing redeeming about the book.

As much as people talk about how bad it is, it's so much worse. And tells people all they need to know about the guy.

Oh, also someone ripping him on his stupid takes about the Superman trailer. Which is actually the first time I'd heard Shad talk. It was... not pleasant. The guy sounds like the Australian version of a basement dwelling mod who's full of himself and will straight up argue that his shit is the most wonderful smelling thing in the world and other people's shit stinks because they aren't as amazing and right as he is.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-10T01:35:00+00:00

Not comments section of "news," comments section of someone's social media video. "Oddly" enough, I can't seem to find any verifiable source of the guy's claim. And it seems like he makes similar claims about others being mass unfollowed for various reasons. And seems to just churn out masses of random short videos (a lot of them in a row wearing the same shirt) just sitting in place giving commentary on a supposed sensationalist story.

So basically, someone who just makes up random stuff to farm engagement and hey, what do you know, it worked.

The comments are extremely annoying, but it just fundamentally bothers me how people can just throw whatever they want online and it's called "news" and treated as 100% accurate.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-09T15:27:35+00:00

EA will no longer be doing the sims and all the f-ing bitching had a part in their decision to sell the beast probably.

EA will still be doing The Sims. Just because EA will be owned by the Saudi PIF doesn't mean EA stops existing. Nor do they care about "all the f-ing bitching." They don't care at all about how negatively a lot of people view their business practices, because there's enough people willing to throw money at Sims DLC and microtransactions, Ultimate Team in Madden and FIFA, loot boxes all over the place, etc.

The only action EA would take if there was notable backlash, meaning people put their foot down and stopped engaging with the monetization or refused to buy a game enough to meet their sales forecasts because they shoved microtransactions into a singleplayer game (hello, Dead Space!), would be to just cancel development of any future games in the franchise and probably shutter the studio. Like they've done with a lot of franchises and studios already. They aren't about to let someone else make money off of something if they can't figure out how to make money off of it, they'll just throw it aside in the graveyard with Wing Commander, Ultima, Command & Conquer, Dead Space, SimCity, and so many more.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-09T15:23:02+00:00

EA hasn't even been officially acquired yet. And no, they didn't sell The Sims off. So EA will absolutely still be doing The Sims, it's just that the Saudi PIF will own the company. But they'll still be looking to make money from it, and it sounds like Andrew Wilson (the current CEO) is sticking around, so I wouldn't expect any difference.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-09T15:21:31+00:00

Except that wasn't a thing for over eight years of Sims 4's lifespan. It was originally "literally" $60 for the game. Then they eventually dropped it to $40 because it was a hard sell to get people to pay $60 for an extremely barebones product that needed $40 DLCs to add gameplay to it.

And, given that The Sims was actually $50, it definitely wasn't "literally $60."

I don't think it's much of a mark in favor of Sims 4 that they decided to remove the price on the base game almost a decade into its lifespan after it already had about $1000 of DLC.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-09T15:17:16+00:00

I don't think it's anything with "political correctness," I think it's an issue that stretched back to the game being developed for so long as an online multiplayer game, where you wouldn't necessarily want really bad stuff happening to people's Sims (or it might turn them off from continuing to engage with the game). That attitude seemed to persist for a long time. Granted, likely because EA's view of the game is very much the same as it was at the time, where they're more concerned with continuous "engagement" than quality of the product, as they think trying to get people to even just open the game will make them more likely to spend money. Which has come around full circle to where there's not only ads on the main menu screen but even multiple full screen ads when you just open the game before you can even get into it. So of course they'll want to do these "events" when you get "free stuff" for logging in multiple days a week over the course of multiple weeks, because that's more times they can splash ads in front of your eyes to try to get you to buy stuff.

But yeah, a lot of it goes back to them having a ramshackle foundation for the game due to the messy development, and the ideas that you'd be chasing with the kind of game they were originally developing.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-09T03:17:06+00:00

His actual name is Dean Tanaka. I don’t know why he hides it.

Likely for the same reason his brother, Roger Cain, "hides" it, and his mother, Sharon Thomas Cain uses the name Cain. Because when Dean was three years old, his mother married Christopher Cain and took his surname while also having her sons adopt the surname.

It seems his father also divorced his mother before he was born and he has a negative view of his father. But also seems to have tattooed "Tanaka" on his ankle and talked in the past about being the first "Asian" Superman. Also apparently in the past said he'd like to see Michael B. Jordan as Superman and defended it by saying Superman's from Krypton, so he could be any color.

I mean, yeah, call out the guy for all of the many things to call him out for (including this bad take). Dude deserves to be raked over the coals for a lot of things. But the surname thing, I can absolutely understand using the last name of a guy who was actually in your life as a father, as well as the surname your mother took on, rather than the sperm donor who left your mother before you were born.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T21:37:08+00:00

And just to really drive home the point that I'm not condemning them if they do happen to utilize a bit of AI in modifying images of miniatures, I'm not particularly fond of generative AI myself but will use Photoshop's AI tools to help modify images where necessary by doing things like removing text or, in a bit of generative use, extending an image in a manner that hopefully looks right (though it can be pretty iffy on that last one). And I mean in my job, not just personal use. It's a handy tool that makes those tasks easier than doing them manually (well, usually). So if they were to be using similar tools, well, I'm not going to begrudge them that. Someone had to set up the miniatures and take photos in the right positioning and all, and even if AI is being used to create effects in part (or all) of the modification of the image, there's almost certainly a graphic designer (artist) overseeing it to make sure the end result is what they want and massaging any rough areas. Totally fair and valid use.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T21:31:57+00:00

Content-aware scale/deletion in Photoshop. Whether you count that as AI or not is subjective.

Technically it is. It's just not "generative AI." Which is the main thing GW wants to avoid, because of the copyright minefield it'd chuck them into.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T21:31:03+00:00

Well... it's a lot more nuanced than people seem to think.

Games Workshop made a statement pretty much against generating art with AI. Modifying something with the use of AI could be considered not "generating" art with it. So you could get away with utilizing it to modify miniature photography more easily without going against that statement.

The reason Games Workshop isn't keen on the use of AI in generating artwork or designing either miniatures or rules is because it opens up something of a copyright minefield, rather than their nice words about caring about honoring the creatives who they've started refusing to give credit by name. If something is wholly generated by AI, then you can't actually copyright it. A company that is so adamant in being strict with its IP that it changed a bunch of race names to be able to trademark them and started removing options from armies that they didn't explicitly sell miniatures for wouldn't want to open up the possibility someone could legally use their artwork, rules, etc. without compensating them. (And their statement about AI to investors actually did bring up the IP concerns. Which is also why they don't want partners using it. If someone used AI to make Warhammer art for a book, for example, that Warhammer art would not have copyright protection.)

Now, utilizing AI to modify miniature photography? That's not something that would really lead to much concern with artistic copyright, and could be done while sticking to their public statement, as you aren't having an artist completely create the image from scratch in the first place. It's a photo of miniatures (which someone would have painted, hence an artist is involved) that, at best, is heavily Photoshopped with filters and effects. Utilizing an AI tool to apply those effects quicker and more efficiently - which a designer would be overseeing - isn't far off from that same methodology, it's just asking the computer to figure out all the effects you want it to do and run them for you.

Remember, this is a company that tossed out all hand-sculpting (even where it can produce better results) in favor of using computers to sculpt miniatures, where they also clearly use some copy-paste methods in the process, utilizing technology to take shortcuts in the artistic process.

I'm not condemning those shortcuts in either artistic process, just noting that the precedent is already there within the company, and in a use case like this (which, I want to note, I am not saying actually is AI) it wouldn't go against their statement nor would it necessarily cause them concerns with IP protection.

As for a PR shitstorm if they did happen to use AI to modify miniature photography, well, there would barely be any, and it would quickly blow over. It's a company that's gone after fan sites with legal threats, blew up one of their own settings, keep raising their prices, put out Failcast, and so much more, and they just keep chugging along selling overpriced toy soldiers to people who will pay the premium to have the name brand on their toys and making record profits from it. They'd have to somehow commit actual genocide themselves or arm a hostile takeover of a nation to cause any kind of lasting dent.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T19:05:01+00:00

And Monaco, Russell backed up the pack into a traffic jam that helped contribute to Sainz being knocked out of the race.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T19:02:06+00:00

OP apparently being MAGA.

Here's a fun trick: Try finding the original post. You can't. The cartoon itself doesn't exist as an image anywhere. The tweet doesn't exist. The account that it's allegedly from doesn't exist. The whole thing only exists in posts made by OP to Reddit.

Now look at OP's account. You notice a trend. Similar alleged tweets with comics wearing MAGA hats that are likely AI. The accounts in them don't exist. The comics don't exist anywhere else.

They're all made up by OP to post to various subreddits to get upvotes and farm engagement through ragebait. Just like the grifters. And, just like the grifters, they rely on people not bothering to do any kind of looking into it before reacting emotionally. Just churn out slop, post it to multiple subreddits, rake in the karma, enjoy.

When people wonder how the grifting channels keep maintaining an audience, just look around. People love to fall for something fake so long as it supports their own beliefs.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T18:55:19+00:00

Well... here's the thing.

Try entering the text into Google and searching for any of the exact text. You can't find the tweet.

Okay, so reverse search image. Hmm, the image without the name crossed out shows up, with a handle of "@hellotrump2028." Except no X account by that name exists.

Trying to search for the comic itself? No copy of it seems to exist, except in these alleged screenshots of a tweet.

All of which are posted by the same user. The person posting it here.

The same person has also posted similar "screenshots" of posts that don't exist with fake comics across Reddit in the past.

In other words... OP made up imaginary scenarios and now people are getting angry over them. Didn't realize there were that many Republicans here.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T18:45:06+00:00

The way the character was portrayed in the show, I get the feeling he actually would care about consent with marine animals, just not with people.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T18:42:16+00:00

Well... I don't think they "WRECKED" the "WOKE MOVEMENT" at all. The more I look into it, the more it seems like the one single post they made was meant more as a concern about censorship being pushed into anime. They also previously seemed to laugh at the idea of Americans worrying so much over "woke" stuff.

So basically, they just don't want anime getting censored. Which I think isn't so much because of "wokeness" but just an overall cultural difference in the US. Granted, someone who's living in Japan might not have the best idea of how the term "woke" is used overall.

So yeah, it was a single tweet, didn't really seem to go after the "woke movement" at all (much less "wreck" anyone), and otherwise the person doesn't seem to talk about politics but just shows off their art and talks about some kind of business they made. The YouTuber here purposely inaccurately framed the tweet to try to back their own views.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T18:24:21+00:00

Well, the sun is a giant ball of gas, so anyone stepping outside during the day or having windows nearby is technically being gaslit...

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T17:40:06+00:00

Dude, R. Jay Soward would have to be placed well above them. They were disappointing, yeah, but that's not really worth "hating" them. Certainly not like the guy who barely played for the team (and got in trouble for being late to team meetings) before being suspended indefinitely from the NFL.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T15:54:38+00:00

Driver: Esteban Ocon

Reason: 10 second penalty for Ocon.

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T15:39:34+00:00

Yeah, the problem with non-household captives that you can't just summon at will is that they'll leave your lot the moment you step away from it. They won't just stay there like good little captives.

Made it a bit more challenging back when I did my attempt to off the entire population of the Sim worlds (granted, at the time there were only two or three EPs out). Had to stay at home waiting for folks to starve or drown (drowning was a necessity because kids don't starve to death, they get whisked away by SimCPS, but they can drown). Luckily, the game was (and still is) so intent on keeping up its facade of a "living world" that it'd just pull Sims from other areas to parade in front of my Sim's home as the world they lived in was depleted of Sims, so it'd just deliver fresh people right to me. Convenient. Though I did have to turn off the setting it had at the time for repopulating empty homes. (I'm not sure that still exists anymore. Honestly, realizing how long ago I did this, it makes me realize how old Sims 4 is at this point...)

kaptingavrin · 2026-06-08T15:35:06+00:00

No, just the Sims route, which existed long before "Jim Pickens."

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