We need to talk about Manfred von Karma as a villain because quite frankly I am obsessed with how good his writing is. “Haunts the narrative” no this man IS the narrative. His shadow looms over the entire game before we even know about him and his presence lingers long after he’s gone. He makes one decision that sets the entire trilogy in motion. Every main character is directly or indirectly molded by his hands and his decisions, his effect on the legal system is a curse that clings to the characters for the entire series, and he only shows up in one singular case to serve absolute cunt and then die in prison. Who the fuck is doing it like him.
Zak Gramarye would in fact have sold his step-son to the Gavinners
I wish at the part in Death Note where L and Light have their tennis match and the teacher wants them to join the tennis team that he successfully convinced them and the whole story just abruptly pivoted to a sports manga
Previosuly
corporate monster infested with ads which devoured Gamepedia and other companies (feat me on their shit policies, SEO and migration process)
turning entire articles into ads if paid enough
limited functionality preventing admins to even fight vandalism
merging and removing of LGBT+ wikis (and forced domain change for educational [think serious] wikis to "fandom")
official wiki status has no meaning in controlling shit
very much censorship (same good ol' allergy to adult stuff)
gets paid by US Navy to advertise their events (one, two)
Alternative free wiki hostings (aka wiki farms)
Miraheze - started in 2015, non-commercial - no ads and runs on donations, wide array of MediaWiki features, wide array of allowed types of wikis and content, much autonomy for projects, custom domain and private wiki options
wiki.gg - started in 2022 by former Gamepedia staff, limited to video games, accent on involvement of game devs and thus hosting official wikis, has ads for anons (but only of games having wikis here)
Telepedia - started in 2022, limited to entertainment (although might allow other themes upon review), has ads for anons, replicates Miraheze structure
WikiTide - started in 2023, no ads and runs on donations (but also tied w/ premium version called WikiForge), largely replicates Miraheze but has stricter content policies, custom domain option
Other free options I'm aware of are either too limited in allowed content or are very outdated/unstable in technical department to recommend here (or in case of Neoseeker - I'm completely unfamiliar with it, and can't say anything about it), but you still can check them out, alongside paid hostings, on this MediaWiki page.
If you (or your community) are brave and dedicated enough you can go with self-hosted MediaWiki instance (aka independent hosting), like JoJo Wiki (who started on Wikia and succeed at overtaking the SEO) or NIWA wikis. This option, of course, requires funding and technical knowledge, but it's still very much possible.
How to find existing alternative/independent wikis
try to use "-fandom" filter for search query in Google, or use other search engines like Bing or DuckDuckGo
Indie Wiki Buddy browser extension - it modifies search engine results and performs redirects based on its centralized list of independent wikis; a new indie wiki has to be requested/submitted to get added [ Firefox / Chrome ]
Redirect to wiki.gg browser extension - same as IWB but for wikis moved to wiki.gg (as I understand, works automatically without dedicated listing) [ Firefox / Chrome ]
(simple) Redirector browser extension - in case the wiki is neither on IWB or wiki.gg, and it doesn't filter out search results - only performs redirect on whatever you get; a redirect has to be set manually - see this tutorial [ Firefox / Chrome ]
Fuck FANDOM, support real people, support indie wikis
Which Hypmic character do you think is most likely to commit tax fraud? (for some reason i genuinely wanna see your answer to this question NDBWKJDHWKFLWFNBW)
When I mentioned this as an offhand comment elsewhere, I was definitely thinking Rei, but you know what? That's too easy. We can do better. Let's take a deep dive into Hypmic characters and their potential to commit tax fraud.
Ichirou - Ichirou would never knowingly commit tax fraud because he is a good boy at heart, but would he know to pay enterprise tax? Is Ichirou receiving cash under the table from the ol' grannies of Ikebukuro and not reporting it to the government? Does Yamada Odd Jobs even have a business license? This is doubtful, considering that Ichirou is breaking child labor laws by employing Saburou. (Children under the age of 15 cannot be employed for the kind of work the BBs do.) Unless Saburou is not listed as an employee, which means that Ichirou is either paying him off the record (tax fraud!) or not paying him at all (also illegal!). There's also some questionableness about him employing Jirou, as children under the age of 18 cannot be employed for anything that is dangerous or harmful, and any jobs involving rapping with the country's weapon of choice would certainly qualify as dangerous. This whole operation is a lawyer's nightmare. Like father, like son.
Jirou - Do you seriously think Jirou knows how to calculate and file taxes? Hoo baby. This is, of course, assuming that Ichirou (as his employer) doesn't do it for him and also assuming, of course, that Ichirou pays Jirou and pays taxes, both of which I'm not sure we can comfortably decide on our own.
Saburou - Saburou is one of the very few people in this list capable of filing taxes and simultaneously one of the even fewer people in this list capable of creating an offshore account in the Cayman Islands in which to hide his ill-gotten wealth.
Samatoki - Samatoki works for the Katen-gumi yakuza, an organized crime syndicate, but yet he doesn't smuggle weapons, doesn't deal drugs, doesn't extort the locals for money, doesn't act as a pimp for sex workers, doesn't own any casinos, and doesn't loanshark. In fact, he's made clear his disdain for almost all of the things on this list and beats up those who do happen to do the activities on this list. So what exactly does this gang do that's actually criminal? By process of elimination, it's probably tax fraud. They probably own a bunch of restaurants and other small businesses as fronts and just, like, pay half taxes on everything. Scandalous.
Juuto - I cannot look at Juuto and say with a straight face that he doesn't commit some kind of tax fraud.
Riou - He doesn't pay property tax on the land he camps on. I doubt he owns it, so this is less tax fraud and more being a squatter. Either way, illegal.
Ramuda - I don't think Ramuda has a legal government identity - or rather, he probably does, but it's shared with all the clones. This means that while another clone is owning his shop and business (and thus paying property tax, personal income tax, and enterprise tax), he and the other clones are still, presumably, eating food and thus all paying consumption tax. Ramuda's legal identity is therefore paying MORE taxes than anyone else. Does this count as negative fraud?
Gentarou - Assuming that Gentarou is not his legal name, Gentarou is apparently filing taxes under someone else's name which definitely counts.
Dice - Dice is a freeter, and so the matter of his income tax is left up to his various employers. I am positive that the Tobaris did not pay income tax for that smuggling operation he ran in FP/M+ chapters 1 - 4, meaning that Dice has once again unknowingly committed a crime.
Jakurai - Jakurai seems like the one person who would sincerely do all his taxes and, moreover, do them correctly.
Hifumi - Prior to the H Age, Hifumi was a good boy who filed all his taxes properly. Now that the local government office is overrun by women, Hifumi is too terrified to go file for a tax return, which can be necessary if an employee makes over 20,000,000 yen a year. I don't know how much Hifumi makes, but this isn't outside of the realm of possibility. Tax fraud! (Or he just makes Doppo do it. Or there's electronic filing. But shh.)
Doppo - I think his employers would just handle all his income tax by withholding it from his salary, as is standard. There might be some screwy-dewyness from the amount of overtime he works, but this is really on his employer, not him.
Sasara - He would do it only once, and never again, just to say "Tax fraud? More like I'm tax flawed, am I right?"
Roshou - Roshou might run into trouble as an employee of Rei, who is most certainly not filing taxes. This is kind of fraud by proxy.
Rei - Yeah.
Kuukou - As a priest, Kuukou may be exempt from paying income tax for activities that are "related to the purpose of the organization [of the Buddhist temple]" (page 167), but this necessitates that Kuukou has an income. Certainly, we've seen him buy things before, but... where does the money come from? Presumably, he has an allowance from his father or is actually paid by his father for whatever priestly duties he does (cleaning the temple...?), and so the question then becomes whether or not those activities count as religious (I'm going to hazard a guess that cleaning does not count) and whether or not his father handles the bookkeeping correctly, as I don't trust Kuukou to handle his own taxes.
Juushi - I bet he has Hitoya help him with his income taxes. He's a good kid who wouldn't mess it up on purpose.
Hitoya - Hitoya writes off both Kuukou and Juushi as dependents, which probably isn't legal as Juushi almost certainly makes more than 480,000 a year. It also isn't legal in the sense that they're not financially dependent on Hitoya, but his argument is that they're emotionally dependent on him, which should qualify him for an even larger deduction.
Final takeaway:
[Image description: Griffin McElroy holding up a sign that has been edited to read, "I don't understand taxes and at this point I'm too afraid to ask." End description.]