SociallyIneptWeeb

I know what the meme is supposed to represent, but the Tolkien nerd in me feels the need to correct the universal misunderstanding of the picture used.

Frodo isn’t saying he can’t read the inscription on the One Ring because it’s in Elvish. He actually is pretty fluent in Elvish in the novel, but the inscription on the Ring was in the Black Speech, which he couldn’t recognise.

Houthi is a name of a tribe, a surname of the tribe’s leader, as well as the name of a movement associated with that tribe.

The Houthi movement is a Shi’a Islamist movement from Yemen (where about 1/3 of the population are Shi’a, and 2/3 Sunni). The movement has been on the opposing side to the Yemeni government in the long Yemeni Civil War.

Allegedly it’s supported by Iran (which Iran officially declined) and it’s mottos include “Death to America” and “Death to Israel”. That should explain roughly why they are causing a stir in the Red Sea region.

Honestly I don’t even know where to start with this, so I’ll keep it simple. Enshittification of Twitter, Reddit et al. is not necessarily a result of capitalism, and likewise Fediverse doesn’t exist because “workers took the means of production”.

For example the disastrous YouTube monetisation policy comes in part from a desire to keep the site “child friendly” (that’s why swear words and gore are banned), and in part due to a need to follow existing copyright law.

Even if YouTube was run by a worker co-op, or was a state enterprise those two factors would likely still lead to stringent monetisation rules.