iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

I don’t know how the fuck long I’ve been on here. Who cares? Why assume I take that sort of stuff seriously? Why are you assuming this is an argument? Why are you so reactive? Have you had a hug lately? Are you having even a little fun on this platform?

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

What if we all lost by pretending BlueSky wouldn’t be a bunch of arguing within a month?

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 14/02/2025

Goths are like sea urchins: spiky exteriors, with a gooey, defenseless interior which predators find delicious. This analogy became more disturbing the more I wrote of it.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 10/02/2025

The people who want you to believe that everything is going to be okay are as equally wrong as the people who want you to believe that nothing is okay.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 04/02/2025

“I’m not being sarcastic! Noooooo, this is just a widdle speech impediment!”

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 04/02/2025

Day one on BlueSky: Hi everyone! I hope this platform is less toxic than the rest! Also day one on BlueSky: *posts something toxic*

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 04/02/2025

It’s a lot more stirring than sullenly stating that America doesn’t deserve to exist

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 03/02/2025

Now that I’ve used LinkedIn Easy Apply, I finally understand why I see people talking about applying for thousands of jobs. I didn’t realize it was now easier to apply for a job than to order stuff on Amazon

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 03/02/2025

Jack wandered down the produce aisle, staring passively at the fruit and vegetables. His eyes fell on a cucumber, perfectly shaped, nine inches end to end. He stuck his hand into his pocket and adjusted himself unconsciously; when his gaze found a package of cocktail cucumbers, he felt whole again.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 31/01/2025

I can dig it, and it’s a needed change. As a recovered goth, I can attest to how easy it is to fall into the trap of thinking that cynicism is a superior way of seeing the world. It’s not; it’s entirely defined by its own biased thinking and intellectually indefensible. There is no future to it.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 29/01/2025

How about a nice beach, eh? Ireland’s western coast is quite rightly known as the Wild Atlantic Way, but is dotted with coves and beaches just like this one, where you’d never know the Atlantic is thundering away just beyond. Brackaharagh Beach, County Kerry #ireland #photography

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 29/01/2025

Why, why does this raise questions? The DEI push failed because it was put in the hands of newly-minted C-suite flunkies and HR managers. Corprations are required by law to put shareholders first. They do not love you. They love money. Either become money or stop trusting them. #target

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

ChatGPT broadly turned the American AI race into a raise-it-spend-it prestige game and stomped out innovation as a result. Imagine all the thousands of amazing half-finished AI projects now on hold because the home company dumped it all to monetize ChatGPT widgets.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

Another photo of lovely Ireland for you today. This nice little ruin sits right next to Castle Clontarf in Dublin and is often mistaken for the one Bram Stoker was baptized in. It was full of fireweed and someone’s litter, but no vampires. #photography #ireland #dublin #ruins

Ruins of an old chapel in Dublin Ireland

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

So go join a book club so it’s not just you being brainwashed by fantasy romance novels, or whatever everybody’s into these days

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

Maybe that’s just me being paranoid! Either way, there’s still obviously a lot of power behind the spoken word and the direct transmission of information from one person to another. You learn more completely, so to speak, when you are fully in the world.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

There are plenty of theories as to why, though: obviously, to maintain a strict power structure and a secret knowledge is a popular theory, but perhaps is a bit paranoid. Another idea may be that the Druids recognized the awful power the written word has to incite dogma and crush free thought.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

Why would they be so annoying? Nobody knows, since they didn’t write it down! All Druidic rites and training are lost to us as it was entirely taught through direct teacher-pupil instruction, utilizing verse to aid in memorization and recall. Poetry was more than art; it had real magical power.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

One of the most uniquely annoying things about the Druids is that they refused to write down anything they were doing. Celts were literate, despite rumors otherwise: on the continent, they used Greek or Latin scripts for transactions and inscriptions, while Ogham eventually developed in Ireland.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

Ah, “make an effort so we can mock it” feels so refreshingly ‘10s internet

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

Can I get a Goodreads concerns shorthand? That isn’t one I suspected of becoming an issue.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

I mean, how likely is it that the running narrative in their heads would be in English in the first place, right? Unless you want to be lazy and use “Common” or something for your language name, because jeez

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

I’d say death, but I’ve become convinced that dying is going to be more complicated than I’ve been led to believe.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

Debunking also enforces the idea that science is purely subtractive. People seem to be blissfully unaware that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, yet use science to be brutally reductive about the world around them towards anything they don’t immediately agree with. That’s bad science!

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

I see from your question mark that even you are unconvinced by this answer

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

I got stuck to one as a child and as an adult I returned and stuck it to me out of spite

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

We’re featuring one of my favorite fragrance blends this month! With notes of heather, rose, narcissus, and vetiver, Cross of Brigid is inspired by the first flowers of Spring and the thawing of the earth. I loved seeing heather in full bloom all over Ireland wherever I went!

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

To play the advocate a bit, this is pretty obviously PTSD

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

Unbelievably skilled characters are pretty difficult for me, ESPECIALLY in a fantasy setting, simply because it’s so common. Going grimdark and making everyone a nihilistic warlord with trauma isn’t necessary, but some imperfections make it feel more like you can imagine yourself there with them.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

And yet, the display of anguish atop my lawn

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

It’s a little absurd to drop concepts this abstract in one sentence and walk away like you’ve proven something.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

Hell yeah, he is! His philosophy is prescient in that it jives strongly with non-Western concepts of the experience of reality being mostly a sensory illusion, as well as the holographic universe theory of modern times. The rare heretical thinker has smelled the truth here and there.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

That is true, and the fact that one is in use here at all still keeps me on edge. It’s probably better if I kept it that way.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

Mine is laying forlornly in the backyard because I don’t have the heart to cut it apart

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

UX is industry jargon for lipstick on a pig, pass it on

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

If you’re equivocating on quitting FB, Twitter, IG, etc., if it helps, recognizing that every time I interacted with someone on any of those platforms I was encouraging their ongoing social media addiction did add a bit of clarity. Even pictures of cute animals carry a heavy moral burden.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

It’s worth nothing that the community spaces are literally owned by the Bad Tech Bros

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

Some rockhound out there is definitely rolling around with the social handle “agatedaddy”

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

What on God’s green earth happened to the art?

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

Also, screen addicts hanging out in comments sections trying to convince Mark Cuban that democracy is dead, which is very effective messaging

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

I think it’s the people who came around to vent about the election and don’t want the platform to be about anything else

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

It feels a little weird having to block comedians, actors, and US representatives in order for my feed to not be 100% suicidal ideation, but the mushroom posts are becoming more frequent as the algorithm starts to get it

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

Someone needs a picture of Ireland, and I guess that someone is you. The beautiful Torc waterfall in County Kerry cascades from the Torc Mountains before spilling into Muckross Lake. On an island that often looks like a Tolkienesque fever dream, Kerry stands out as particularly magical.

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

Honest question, does this feel compelling?

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

I honestly felt very creeped out by people trying to friend me on an app I mostly used to learn how to ask where the bathroom is

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

back in my day we called them birds and they LIKED IT

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

Things get a little over the top when the cult surrounding her roommate tries to sacrifice her to ensure a good harvest

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Matthew O'Carroll @matthewocarroll.bsky.social · 27/01/2025

It’s a speech impediment PRECIOUS

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