In response to the US Treasury sanctioning crypto mixer Tornado Cash, advocacy groups such as Coin Center have come to its defense arguing that smart contract code is not a sanctionable entity.

With this new precedent, it is unclear if privacy coins such as Monero will face similar censorship. A hard fork update on Aug. 13 reportedly made Monero transactions harder to trace potentially closing any back doors law agencies used to track transactions.

The view that any cryptocurrency transaction is private by default is a common misconception. In fact, the opposite is true. Blockchain data is public and transactions are traceable. Crypto mixers and privacy coins were created to provide privacy for this open financial system. But both face different uphill battles. Before analyzing the likelihood of eithers success, we need to explain how they work, where they differ and the regulatory strategy game of financial censorship.

A crypto mixer, also known as a tumbler or blender, is a transaction mixing tool or service that anyone can use to obscure a crypto wallets source of funds. These tools were first created for bitcoin in 2013 but became a popular alternative to privacy coins once solutions like Tornado Cash made it available for a variety of cryptoassets.

There are two types of crypto mixers: custodial and non-custodial. Custodial blenders such as blender.io are central entities that take full custody of funds to mix transactions. Users pay a fee for the service and trust the entity to return their funds once the transactions are blended.

Blender.io was the first mixer to be sanctioned by US Department of the Treasurys Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). It did not receive the same attention as Tornado Cash because it fell under the pattern of previous sanctions made against persons and entities. A North Korean state-sponsored hacker collective known as the Lazarus Group reportedly used the service after a hack against Axie Infinity that resulted in a $620 million loss.

With Tornado Cash, users send funds to smart contract addresses that automatically mix deposits of the same amount. They then use a zero-knowledge proof contract to prove they have the right to withdraw that amount.

For example, say you want to mix 11 ETH. Tornado Cashs smart contracts group deposits by amounts. So you could deposit 10 ETH to the 10 ETH mixer and 1 ETH to the 1 ETH mixer. Once funds are sent to each blender, the contracts then use zero-knowledge proofs to verify you sent a deposit to each one without knowing which one was originally yours. This essentially gives you the equivalent of a withdrawal permission slip for each mixer.

So if you were to use the permission slips to withdraw both deposits, it would be close to impossible for any outside observer to identify the correct source of funds. They would see a myriad of potential options.

The tool provides pretty good financial privacy by breaking the link between the sender and receiver. But its not perfect; theoretically, third party blockchain intelligence could use outside data and behavior models in an attempt to deduce which transaction history belongs to the tokens on your new wallet address.

On Aug. 8, 2022, OFAC added a list of addresses associated with Tornado Cash to the same list of sanctioned addresses where Blender.io ended up. This was in response to news that the Lazarus Group used the tool to launder $455 million in stolen funds.

OFAC used the same messaging and reasoning as it did Blender.io, but it did not acknowledge the key custodial difference between the two. In Coin Centers full analysis, they argue that Tornado Cash has two separate elements: The decentralized group of governing members they call Tornado Cash Entity and the immutable smart contract coin mixers they call Tornado Cash Application.

The Tornado Cash Entity cannot update or change the Tornado Cash Application because the original creators destroyed their admin keys. The smart contracts will exist as long as the Ethereum blockchain continues to operate. So even though the Tornado Cash website is down, anyone can spin up a new front end or interface with the smart contracts directly that lets users access the same mixers.

The problem is that OFAC included these immutable smart contract addresses in the list of sanctions. So there are now innocent Americans with funds still in these mixers. If they attempt to move the funds, they will be breaking the law and subject to penalty. And because the application is not an entity, it has no means to petition OFAC for sanction removal.

Coin Center further argues that because the Tornado Cash Application is not an entity, OFAC did not cite the proper authority to add the smart contract addresses to the sanctions list. This marks an unprecedented move with potential constitutional issues.

In response to OFACs announcement, companies agreed to censor anyone connected to these addresses. The decentralized finance app Aave blocked any users that had Tornado Cash funds sent to them in a dust attack. And Circle followed by freezing 75,000 usd coin stablecoins belonging to Tornado Cash users. The Blockworks Empire podcast explains how that is possible in a Twitter thread.

Privacy coins are cryptocurrencies that use a variety of approaches to obscure IP addresses, wallet balances and the flow of funds from public view. They differ from crypto mixers in that they make financial privacy less of a feature and more of a product. As a result, they only provide privacy to transactions made in a specific currency.

The two most popular privacy coins are Z-cash and Monero. Z-cash is a cryptocurrency that relies primarily on zero-knowledge proofs to shield transaction info. In October 2018, Z-cash announced that they fixed an 8-month-old bug in proofs that could have permitted an infinite inflation of supply. Due to transaction privacy, it was unclear how much was actually inflated.

Since this early stumble, z-cash has never returned to the highs of the 2017 bull cycle and currently ranks second to Monero in total privacy coin market cap. While monero was able to once again reach similar prices of the 2017 market, it failed to break its all-time high in 2021.

Monero is a privacy coin that offers financial anonymity through layers of privacy-enhanced blockchain encryption. Every transaction utilizes single-use stealth addresses to prevent the visibility of public address balances. So only users with a wallets private key can map its balance back to a public address. It also uses ring signatures to obscure the source of funds in a transaction by including random addresses in the verification signature.

The Monero protocol was upgraded on Aug. 13. While the previous version of Monero offered a layer of privacy, its complete untraceability was debatable. In 2018, critics claimed that inputs in a signature ring could be deduced through a process of elimination. And in 2021, CipherTracer reportedly patented a method that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) uses to trace transactions.

Even if CipherTracer discovered real vulnerabilities, the extent of their impact is unclear. They didnt disclose their methods or success rate. This previous version still provided a degree of financial privacy in the sense that it blocked anyone not willing to pay CipherTracer.

But this disincentive is less resistant to state sanctions and censorship. Theoretically, the state is more willing to spend resources in an attempt to trace addresses especially if they suspect a connection to crime, or in some countries, political opposition.

In Canada, an effort was made to trace financial contributions to the trucker freedom convoy. The government ended up sanctioning 34 crypto wallets in connection to the movement, and Monero addresses were included in that list.

The Monero developers hope this update will close any potential vulnerability by increasing the number of transactions in a ring signature. But in response to the update, CipherTracer stated, While Moneros upcoming chain improvements are significant, the fundamentals of our approach to tracing probable source of funds will still apply after the fork.

If the upgrade does succeed in closing these back doors, there is concern that OFAC may take similar actions against Monero. In an interview with CoinDesk, a Monero contributor said that, at the moment, Im not concerned about immediate legal action.

There is no direct financial incentivefor developers, unlike [the situation with] the Tornado Cash developer, he said.

These comments seem to infer that the potential ability for the developer to profit from the use of these smart contracts makes him liable. Dutch financial crimes agency FIOD arrested a Tornado Cash developer on suspicion of laundering money through the tool. But it is unclear if that arrest was for his specific attempts to launder money or for his connection to others using it for that purpose.

Even though top privacy coins such as monero and z-cash are actively working to increase the privacy of transactions, they have not seen the same degree of adoption as leading layer-1 blockchains such as Ethereum. Many competitors, including Secret Network and Oasis Network, argue that the reason for this lag is that privacy coins do not offer a base layer of privacy that can be used to build Web3.

In 2020 Secret Network was the first privacy based blockchain to enable smart contract programmability. It lives in the Cosmos ecosystem and is working toward a vision of Web3 privacy. It has launched multiple apps such as the decentralized messaging service Altermail, and decentralized exchange SiennaSwap.

But Secret Network and its competitors face the classic challenge of an overcrowded sector. They still have a long way in overcoming the market dominance of Monero and Z-Cash. The threat of sanctions have motivated many in the Z-Cash community to explore creating their own smart contract programmability.

The battle against financial privacy feels like a game of whack-a-mole. So far, the state has tried two different tools. With crypto mixers, they used the regulatory sanctions hammer. And for privacy coins, they tried blockchain intelligence sleuths.

Their approach may be, if one financial privacy method is too popular with criminals or too hard to trace, they will just shut it down with the hammer.

Advocacy groups such as Coin Center may respond by challenging such actions in court, but that process will take years. The sanctions are very likely hurting innocent Americans in the meantime.

For other privacy solutions, they may use investigations to continue in their cat and mouse chase with developer upgrades.

User adoption, though, is a key element to this game. As more people are drawn to either mixers or privacy coins, the chance of tracing transactions becomes exponentially difficult. Switching analogies, its like the classic police chase down a narrow alley. If the suspect reaches a bustling parade, they can dust off and subtly slip away into the crowd.

If a privacy coin, mixer or base-layer privacy solution gains mainstream adoption, it could have greater resistance to censorship. State officials would struggle to find the political backing for sweeping sanctions or technology needed to crack privacy measures. And the potential Tornado Cash sanctions fallout for Ethereum validators may pull millions more into this conversation.

Get the days top crypto news and insights delivered to your inbox every evening.Subscribe to Blockworks free newsletternow.

Blockworks

Editor, Evergreen Content

John is the Editor of Evergreen Content at Blockworks. He manages the production of explainers, guides and all educational content for anything crypto related. Before Blockworks, he was the producer and founder of an explainer studio called Best Explained.

Read the original:

Crypto Mixers and Privacy Coins: Can They Resist Censorship? - Blockworks

Fiction writer Anthony Marra joins Fiction/Non/Fiction hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss how his new historical novel, Mercury Pictures Presents, echoes the rights current embrace of authoritarianism in the U.S. and globally. By looking at censorship in 1940s Hollywood and the fascist regime of Italy during that same period, Marra teases out truths about conservatives current interest in controlling popular opinion.

Subscribe and download the episode, wherever you get your podcasts!

Check out video excerpts from our interviews at LitHubs Virtual Book Channel, Fiction/Non/Fictions YouTube Channel, and our website. This podcast is produced by Anne Kniggendorf.

*From the episode:

Anthony Marra: Mercury Pictures Presents is, shall we say, a long-awaited novel. It was during the run-up to the 2016 election when I first began to really see the parallels between so much of what these characters are struggling with and what many people in the U.S. in 2016 were in terms of trying to understand this rising threat.

Whitney Terrell: One of the ways that your book works, and I was very impressed by, is by resurrecting stories about life under actual fascism, particularly in Italy. It helped me imagine how such a regime might happen here in the United States. I was particularly interested in the character of Giuseppe Lagana, whos a lawyer, and who gets caught up, sort of at odds with, Mussolinis regime. Could you talk a little bit about him and how he gets into trouble?

AM: Yeah, absolutely. So, Giuseppe is the father of the novels central character, Maria Lagana, and he works as a defense attorney in Rome, primarily defending socialists and anarchists prosecuted by the state. And to me, he is this heartbreaking figure in that he continues to believe in the rule of law and the impartiality of the court and the nobility of defending the accused, even as Mussolinis regime chips and chips and chips away at the underpinnings of the justice system, eventually instituting these tribunals that pass sentences without trials altogether.

And Giuseppes way of trying to quietly resist that is simply to document the lawlessness of these tribunals, which eventually leads to his own arrest. And he is sentenced to

Its one of those things where you can see sort of through Giuseppe, through his gradual realization that the world that he believed he was living in had slipped away much earlier than he had thought, and I always felt as I was working on that during the Trump years, just just seeing how much of things that I believed in about America turned out to be empty, and how many aspects of my own relationship to my country were built on this sort of false mythologythat was certainly something that Giuseppes character helped illuminate for me in my own personal life.

V.V Ganeshananthan: Giuseppe is also one of my favorite characters. I was reminded actually of conversations Id had with lawyers who would tell me that they were documenting for precisely the reason that Giuseppe documents, which made it feel very alive to me. Theres a remarkable early scene where Giuseppe and Maria, who you spoke of, are attending a showing of the movie

In LA after Maria has fled Italy, she and her boss Artie Feldman, battle U.S. censors who consider Arties films decadent and too critical of fascism. And I wonder if you can talk a little bit about the role of censorship coming from different actors in the novel.

AM: The forces of reactionary conservatism have obviously long embraced censorship as a way to mold society to their liking. And the great irony in all of it, of course, is that its the very people waving around pocket-sized Constitutions who are the first to ban books. In the period covered by this novel, all movies were censored by an organization called the Production Code Administration.

And a lot of this resulted in truly ridiculous forms of censorship as the production code strove to make movies gratuitously inoffensive. For decades, you couldnt show a pregnant woman on screen because it might raise uncomfortable questions about where babies really come from. You couldnt show a couple on the same bed unless both of their feet were planted on the ground. If you remember the movie Psycho, it was chiefly scandalous for the fact that it was the first movie in about 30 years to show a toilet bowl. In the bathroom scene, theres a toilet bowl, and a toilet bowl had not been seen on screen since the early 30s.

Of course, much more insidious than this priggish sense of morality was the production codes prohibition on politics. If you only received your news in the 1930s from your local picture house, you would have thought that the American South was untouched by Jim Crow, and that Europe was untouched by fascism. By the late 30s, filmmakers were beginning to push back against this censorship often by very convoluted means. For instance, there was a movie made in the late 30s, about the Spanish Civil War.

But the only way that the filmmakers could get past the censors was to make it an absurdly unfaithful depiction of the conflict. So they actually brought experts in who had participated in the Spanish Civil War in order to make sure that the movie was meticulously inaccurate. They made sure that the uniforms were all wrong, that the settings were incorrect. And so the only way to make a movie about a true and contentious subject was to turn it into pure fantasy.

In September 1941, there were enough of these anti-fascist movies that isolationists in the U.S. Senate began to hold hearings to investigate so-called Hollywood war propaganda. The heads of the major studios all testified there, and they really acquitted themselves brilliantly. They more or less used the opportunity to reveal the hypocrisy behind the investigations themselves. And three months later, following Pearl Harbor, those filmmakers and executives were fully vindicated.

VVG: One of the ways the different kinds of censorship intersect across borders here is in the figure of Maria, who corresponds with her father, who is confined in the manner that you described earlier. Theyre corresponding and his letters are censored, and then she uses her knowledge of how things are censored or how to get things past censors in the film industry, which I thought was so interesting. There are characters who are in really quiet ways censoring themselves or by strategizing about censorship or who, behaving in response to censorship, are altering what they might say in ways that they almost dont recognize.

AM: I feel like we have a certain number of themes that we keep returning to, a certain number of ideas that kind of animate our work. And for whatever reason, censorship is one that Ive returned to in several of my books. Do you all find that in your own work that youre kind of almost like reshuffling the same deck of cards in each new project?

WT: Yeah, I have themes that I go back to you all the time. Sure, absolutely. I think thats true for everyone. I wanted to point out, back to the lawyer thing, when Trump was appointing so many judges, thats when the way that the legal system in Italy changed in the 30s, to cease to be really a legal system and be like an authoritarian legal system that doesnt apply rule of law any more I started realizing, Oh, that was kind of the idea. Thats why it was so important to him to get judges. If you can end the way the court system works, you get around that, then you start moving toward authoritarianism.

Similarly, when you start controlling information and you start leaning on calling things decadent, you can use decadence, like the kiss in the recent Buzz Lightyear movie, or whatever it is you want to call decadent, to suppress political content that you dont like. And thats what youre also talking about here is that the real reason that censorship was going on in the 30s and 40s, and in your novel, the head censor is a Catholic, surely not an accident, and he is really concerned about not hearing a lot of criticism for fascism. So he uses sex as an excuse to basically censor that political side. And I feel like thats exactly whats happening today.

AM: Yeah, absolutely. Criticisms toward changes in culture are camouflage for these very specific and intense political ideologies and agendas. Im curious what you all think about the changes in censorship over time, because one of the things that I was thinking about over the last several months, just reading the news and seeing, talking about, book bannings and all of that is just how much less effective censorship is today.

Im not sure if its a result of technology, just giving us so much access to information that if your local library bans a particular book, there are just so many more venues for you to find it in. Maybe its also that in the present day, weve just become hopefully somewhat more educated about the intentions and motivations behind the censorship But I could be talking complete bullshit. So Id love to hear your thoughts, Sugi.

VVG: I dont think youre talking complete bullshit, but I guess I wonder who are the we who know how censorship operates? Because theres obviously a whole set of people who are buying whats being sold. Theres this list of books that have been banned in, I think, Utah, thats going around, and it has a huge number of LGBTQIA-associated books, and then some of them are bestsellers.

And so theres this increased surveillance, but then theres also these increased ways to get around it and a population that maybe is better at getting around some of the things that we might expect to be censorship. But then it does seem like theres this other set of people who are whos the audience for the propaganda? Someones putting out the propaganda movies and someone sits in the audience and cheers and feels good about watching it. There are parts of me that like a good montage and a movie with a rousing Hans Zimmer score; I cant pretend that that part of me is not there. How has censorship changed over time? I think that my wariness of the American government has certainly increased. Im curious what you would say about this, Whitney.

WT: We did a couple episodes on book banning earlier on. And one of the things that came out is that when youre in a conservative state or a state thats run by conservatives like Florida, the teachers start getting really worried about what they can and cannot teach. So when youre dealing with public school teachers, or even public university professors, professors are a little bit more protected than school teachers. But I do think that censorship and state rules on what you can and cannot teach really will start to affect what high school and middle school and elementary school teachers feel comfortable teaching. And that actually can change how the kids are educated. I think thats why conservatives are concerned with that.

*

Selected Readings:

Anthony Marra Mercury Pictures Presents The Tsar of Love and Techno A Constellation of Vital Phenomena

Others:

Frankenstein Psycho Lightyear S5 Episode 13: Farah Jasmine Griffin: Censoring the American Canon S5 Episode 12: Intimate Contact: Garth Greenwell on Book Bans and Writing About Sex Doctor Faustus by Thomas Mann Billy Wilder Three Days of the Condor Jason Bourne franchise Ban on 52 Books in Largest Utah School District is a Worrisome Escalation of Censorship PEN America

__________________________________

Transcribed by https://otter.ai. Condensed and edited by Anne Kniggendorf.

Read the original:

Fascism Past and Present: Anthony Marra on What the Censorship of 1940s Hollywood and Italy Can Teach Us - Literary Hub

This week, the local-to-me Moms For Liberty contingent lost their bid to get Gender Queer removed from Barrington School District 220. Parents and community members who supported the right to read and queer students and educators in the district showed up to the meeting, and the committee reviewing the book found it to be appropriate for their high school library.

As this was happening, a new billboard showed up in Crystal Lake, Illinois, which is just a few miles west of Barrington. The billboard said that districts in the town needed to stop sexualizing children, and at their school board meeting the same night, a regular right-wing staple showed up and spoke about government conspiracies related to the 1918 pandemic (shes been mad about a book in their school library since at least January). That individual filed three FOIA requests in a span of minutes to the school district. The first, which was denied, demanded to know the sexuality of educators and students in the district. The second and third were requests that could be Googled.

Snuggled in between Crystal Lake and Barrington is Cary, which has its own breed of right-wing parents itching to get their say in education.

Today In Books Newsletter

Sign up to Today In Books to receive daily news and miscellany from the world of books.

Thank you for signing up! Keep an eye on your inbox.

Barrington, Cary, and Crystal Lake are close to Lake In The Hills, where UpRising Bakery was vandalized in July because they were hosting an all-ages drag show brunch in their private business. The event was canceled as they cleaned up the damage from the individual who drove over an hour to destroy the space the night before the show, and what followed was a lawsuit from the ACLU against the town because of how it decided to proceed. The queer-owned bakery was able to host the show to a sold-out crowd just days later.

UpRising also sent educators in Barrington a welcome back feast to kick off the school year and support them as they endure continued attacks by groups who have agendas and no background in education.

Never fear, though. The local Moms For Liberty group tweeted their support of educators as parnets (yes, misspelled that way), then showed up to the board meeting to talk about indoctrination.

Im sure Im not saying anything that will shock readers here, but if its not clear already, perhaps this makes it clear: while this is about the books, it is in no way about the books. Its about the systemic erasure of queer people. If the books arent available and the teachers are called any number of names, then queer people disappear, right? And if a private business is vandalized by someone who was at the January 6 insurrection its not about education or indoctrination, is it?

I was unable to make the board meeting in Barrington to support queer members of the district. Despite that, and despite not being a citizen of the community but one of a town nearby, I wrote a letter. Im sharing it here in hopes that this can help others looking for ways to act and how to approach letter writing. You are welcome to copy and modify as appropriate.

Ive shared a template before. This is that template expanded. In addition to offering support for the book and for queer community members, I took the time to lay out who the people behind these pushes to curtail intellectual freedom are and the where and how of these coordinated movements.

In addition to sending the letter to the board, I also emailed every teacher librarian in the district and thanked them for their hard work. One board member thanked me for that, as they knew how much ugly rhetoric and discussion around these hard-working members of the school community were fielding.

So much for the Joyful Warrior parnets supporting educators.

I wanted to share the above story because much of this is news to me this week. I live here, I spend a lot of time researching book bans and access to information, and yet, I did not know what was happening in Crystal Lake. It was a reminder how wide-spread this right-wing nationalism is and, more, how local media fails to keep their eye on these things its being put on citizens to share this information and to band together, show up, and make sure that student rights are at the forefront of education.

This is not the beginning nor the end of challenges in Barrington. The district retained Lawn Boy earlier this year, and several other books are on the docket for review. Those include Flamer, This Book is Gay, Fighting Words, and All Boys Arent Blue.

It is equally disturbing that, aside from Chicago Media Collective, not a single Chicagoland media outlet had reported on this story until Thursday (the meeting was on Tuesday). They gave space to those who created the queer panic earlier this summer, but it has been radio silence still. This means parents who want to show up in support of education as a means to expanding world views remain completely in the dark about whats happening.

The lack of local media, as well as the focus of legacy media on only the clickiest stories, is in no small part why we are where we are and why well continue to be plowed by these well-organized, well-funded hate groups.

The Get Ready Stay Ready toolkit, built by parents and librarians, is one way to be prepared as an average citizen. This on-going effort is an incredible resource for staying up to date on issues relating to censorship and how you can prepare and fight back against these agendas. There are letters and templates you can use to contact school and library boards, training and educational resources to up your knowledge, and and resources aplenty for civic engagement, for supporting queer people, and for seeing and boosting voices of marginalized people. Save this and refer to it often as you continue your work ensuring access to information and ongoing support for queer and BIPOC students, educators, and library workers across the country.

Original post:

Defending the Right to Read: Book Censorship News, August 19, 2022 - Book Riot

In a report from TheBlock, the team behind the Ethereum (ETH) protocol Aave addressed the concerns about their address screening process. The decision to partner with compliance firm TRM Labs has been gaining a lot of attention after several high-profile personalities were blocked from accessing the platform.

These individuals and smaller users include TRON founder Justin Sun, Ethereum educator Anthony Sassano, CEO of Coinbase Brian Armstrong, and others. Over the weekend, these names were blocked from using Aave until an update to the platforms frontend re-instated some with access to the protocol.

As Bitcoinist reported, the U.S. Department of the Treasury imposed sanctions on decentralized exchange Tornado Cash. This unleashed controversy in the crypto community and prompted some users to dust, and send small amounts of ETH to high-profile individuals as a form of protest, leading to some users being lockout by the protocols front end.

The team behind Aave confirmed that the address screening process is being implemented on the protocols website (frontend), but a deeper implementation would require community approval, according to the report:

The wallet monitoring here is only at the front-end layer, as for on-chain, contract-level [wallet monitoring] as it applies to the Aave Protocol, the Aave smart contracts are decentralized no one person or entity can change, control, update or shut down the protocol. For any change to occur to the protocol, an AIP (Aave Improvement Proposal) would have to be proposed, voted on, and approved by the Aave DAO.

Via their official Twitter, the team behind the Ethereum protocol claimed that the address screening system has been implemented to provide users with more security. This system identifies all users that have interacted with Tornado Cash, including dusted addresses.

The team behind the project confirmed that they implemented their address screening system following the U.S. Treasury sanctions on Tornado Cash. Aave claims that it will continue to mitigate any issues with this system and will continue testing the integration with TRMS API.

In that sense, and in light of recent events, Aave said:

The Aave Protocol is and remains decentralized and governed by the DAO. We encourage the community to remain engaged and actively fight for equitable finance. The Aave team will continue to innovate. We encourage the community to remain engaged and actively fight for open and fair finance.

Several digital rights organizations and crypto think tanks have expressed their concerns about the sanctions imposed on Tornado Cash, and the consequences: developers arrested, users blocked from certain platforms.

Coin Center is one of the organizations questioning the Treasurys decision as they believe it crossed a line and an important distinction between entities with the capacity to jeopardize the financial system and neutral technologies.

In a recent report, the organization claims that the sanctions are an overstepped of the institutions legal authority. Coin Center revealed that it will cooperate with other organizations to pursue administrative relief, and potentially challenge the sanctions in court.

Excerpt from:

Why Aave Will Submit Address Censorship To A Community Vote - Bitcoinist

After being smeared by Big Tech censorship partner The Dispatch as a frequent purveyor of bad information for calling out the Pfizer CEO for not being fully vaccinated last year, Newsmax White House correspondent Emerald Robinson was exonerated by an admission in the CEOs own book but not before being deplatformed by Twitter.

Robinson published an article on her Substack on Monday morning triumphantly declaring, I Was Right About The Pfizer CEO! after journalist Jordan Schachtel noted that Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla admitted to canceling his March 2021 trip to Israel because he had not yet received his second Covid-19 jab.

In his book Moonshot: Inside Pfizers Nine-Month Race to Make the Impossible Possible, published in March of 2022, Bourla confirmed that he declined to advise researchers in Israel in early March of 2021 because he was not in compliance with the countrys two-jab requirement.

Getting vaccinated had created a crisis of confidence for me, Bourla wrote. I chose to wait until my vaccination might be used to encourage those with vaccine hesitancy later on.

Shortly after that cancellation, Bourla received his second jab.

In August of 2021, Robinson tweeted a link to a report explaining why Bourlas plans changed. Robinson emphasized that, out of all people, it was the Pfizer head who was not fully vaccinated.

But at the time of Robinsons tweet, Big Tech censors and their partners jumped at the opportunity to take down someone who regularly questioned the Covid-19 shot. Twitter added a context warning to Robinsons tweet, and The Dispatch published a false article attempting to refute the reporter.

In the fake fact check, Dispatch fact-check editor Alec Dent shamed Robinson for sharing that Bourla has not been vaccinated against coronavirus months after the trip was canceled. He lamented that the misleading tweet went viral.

A Newsmax correspondent tweeted a story about Albert Bourla without noting it was from March, the subheadline of the article states.

Dent cited a statement from Steven Danehy, director of media relations at Pfizer, who denied that Bourla was not fully vaccinated as proof that Robinson was lying to thousands of people on Twitter.

That is categorically false. Dr. Bourla has been fully vaccinated with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, Danehy said in a statement.

Dispatch editor and CEO Stephen Hayes amplified Dents article and noted that Robinson is a frequent purveyor of bad information.

[She] tweeted yesterday that the CEO of Pfizer had to cancel a planned trip to Israel because he was not fully vaccinated, Hayes wrote. The Pfizer CEO was fully vaccinated in March.

But even though Robinsons tweet didnt occur until months after the canceled trip, Bourlas book confirms she was right: The CEO had to cancel a planned trip to Israel because he was not fully vaccinated. Theres nothing misleading about it. Robinson clearly did not forget how The Dispatch targeted her for reporting the truth and hinted in her recent Substack that she plans to take legal action.

Did The Dispatch receive any funding from Big Pharma or its affiliates? Or from the federal governments HHS to push the COVID vaccines? My attorneys will be asking them such questions very soon, Robinson warned.

The Dispatch has a longstanding partnership with Big Tech to suppress and censor conservative voices. During the 2020 election cycle, The Dispatch colluded with Facebook to block two advertisements from the pro-life group Susan B. Anthony List, which detailed then-Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden and vice presidential nominee Kamala Harriss support of abortion on demand up until the moment of birth. The Dispatch rated the ads partly false because they said Biden has not explicitly stated that he supports late-term abortions, even though he has repeatedly said he wants no restrictions on a womans right to choose.

After The Federalist published an article detailing the censorship, the Dispatch claimed that even though its main Twitter account retweeted the article, it was accidentally published in draft form by the editorial staff.

The fact-check was published in error and in draft form, before it had been through final edits and our own internal fact-checking process, Hayes wrote. As a result, the viral post was assigned a partly false rating that we have determined is not justified after completing The Dispatch fact-checking process.

Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire and Fox News. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.

Read the rest here:

The Dispatch Smeared Reporter Who Called Out Not-Fully-Vaxed Pfizer CEO - The Federalist

The Rev. John Bouquet| Special to Ashland Times-Gazette

The Motion Picture Association can produce a movie and then evaluate that movie based on its content as to whether it should receive a G, PG, PG-13, R or NC-17 rating, grading whether the content of the movie or the subject matter is safe for children or too extreme.

No one claims any offense to this rating system. No one cries censorship.

This debate about certain books in the Ashland Public Library is not about censorship.

Wikipedia's definition of censorship is, the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This is about proper examination and the content of the books to age appropriateness.

Every book in the library and those not in the library have been censored by the library. It is the subject criteria that is the issue. The library and the American Library Association have a criterion and an array of subjects they want to introduce to the public.

We have not said ban the books. We have not asked for them to be removed from the library. The request from the beginning is for these books to be moved to the adult section because the subject matter is too extreme for childrens eyes.

The books are graphic in sexual content. They are targeted for children ages 5-12, according to their publishers. The content is too mature for a young child to comprehend.

Just because there is a paragraph of explanation, the eyes and mind of a child are drawn to pictures first, not words. Unless there is custodial parental instruction, the child is left to decide. This is a dangerous possibility.

We have a simple solution to this dilemma. The books can stay in the library, but they should and must be moved to the adult section. Any parent, grandparent or trustworthy adult can pull the book, check it out and introduce their children to these subjects under proper instruction and explanation.

This is about protecting the innocence and purity of our young hearts and minds. The next generation is our responsibility to guard their hearts. This is about the parent rights to introduce their children to these stages of mature subjects at a time deemed acceptable to the parents.

The library Board of Trustees has been clear in their communication. It is not our job to protect the children.

The Trustees have also said, We trust the publishers of these books.

We do not agree with either of those statements.

The pastor shepherds of several churches in this county could not disagree more. The community health and well being of children is when they know their parents, their pastors and teachers all want to protect their minds from subjects of adult nature for as long as we can.

I believe the library is responsible to join us in protecting the minds and hearts of children. The library trustees should step up to the plate and move these books to the adult section.

We do not trust the publishers at all. They are writing books to make money, promote an agenda and to introduce children to subjects they are not prepared to deal with at ages 5-12.

The Rev. John Bouquet is the senior pastor of Bethel Baptist Church in Savannah. He is an active participant in the Ashland County Ministerial Association and has pastored in the community for 40 years.

Visit link:

Rev. John Bouquet shares a view about the Ashland library book debate - Wooster Daily Record

The Ethereum community is more giddy than usual. On weekly Zoom calls dedicated to technical matters, Ethereum developers have been celebratingeven singingas they advance toward the mergean event hailed as the most important technological upgrade in the history of crypto.

But what exactly is the merge? Those who follow crypto news have likely heard about it, and are aware it represents a shift to something called proof of stake. But there are few detailed accounts of the technical process, and the merges implications for the larger crypto ecosystem.

To that end, Fortune spoke to Ethereum core developers to craft a detailed overview of the mergecurrently slated for mid-Septemberand the controversies that have surrounded it. Heres all you need to know.

Eth2, Ethereum 2.0, ETH 2.0The project has been called many things in the past, but earlier this year the Ethereum community settled on the merge.

Most simply, the merge is a long-planned Ethereum upgrade aimed at improving the network. Such upgrades are commonplace, but this is the most important one to date, and its success will pave the way for developers to introduce a host of new features to the network.

The merge will, well, merge the current Ethereum mainnetor the main public Ethereum blockchain used by everyonewith something called the Beacon Chain. Currently, both chains exist in parallel. But only the Ethereum mainnet, which currently uses a mechanism called proof of work, is processing transactions.

Once the merge is complete, the Ethereum mainnet will shift away from proof of work and instead adopt the Beacon Chains proof-of-stake mechanism.

Proof of stake (PoS) is a type of consensus mechanism that differs from the traditional proof-of-work (PoW) one.

A consensus mechanism describes the way Ethereumor other blockchainsdetermine the legitimacy of transactions posted to its network. It is how a blockchain governs itself.

Ethereum can be seen as a distributed database of nodesor computers that run software to verify blocks and the transaction data within them. To reach consensus on the network and make a decision, the majority of nodes must be in agreement, and the choice of consensus mechanism determines how they do that.

Once Ethereum shifts to a proof-of-stake consensus mechanism post-merge, the network will rely on trusted entities known as validators to verify transactions and add new blocks to the blockchain. A validator will be chosen at random each time a new block is to be added, which will occur every 12 seconds or so post-merge.

Anyone can apply to be a validator by depositing 32 Ethereum (about $61,000 at mid-August prices)a sum intended to ensure that participants have a stake in the success of the networkand run up-to-date software.

As the Ethereum Foundation explains, prospective validators will then be added to an activation queue that limits the rate of new validators joining the network. Once a validator is activated, it will be eligible to review and approve new blocks the Ethereum network proposes to add to its blockchain.

In return for securing the network, validators will earn Ether as reward.

While the 32 Ether staked as collateral serves as a major incentive to behave appropriately, there are also punishments for validators that are incompetent or malicious. Namely, they can be penalized with the loss of some or all of their deposit.

The merge hasnt happened yet, but the Beacon Chain already has over 415,000 validators.

Proof of work is another consensus mechanism that has been used by the Ethereum mainnet since its genesis. Other older blockchains, most notably Bitcoin, continue to employ it.

The work in proof of work comes in the form of mining, where miners expend energy in the form of computing power. Though its supporters (mostly Bitcoiners) love proof of work, saying its the most secure mechanism, the process is notably bad for the environmentwhich has been a key factor in prompting Ethereums shift to proof of stake.

For one, Ethereum is the most-used blockchain and powers Ether, the second-largest cryptocurrency, with a $202 billion market cap. Ethereum also hosts numerous decentralized applications (dApps) and decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols and establishes the authenticity of millions of non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

This means the outcome of the merge will affect not just the Ethereum blockchain, but a wide constellation of products and services that rely upon it. And given Ethereums size and influence, the fate of the merge is likely to have a ripple effect on the broader crypto industry.

Meanwhile, the switch to proof of stake will affect thousands of people who mine Ether, many of whom have expended significant capital in the endeavor. Most will probably turn to mining other proof-of-work coins, but the merge is still likely to hurt their bottom line.

But while the merge is bad news for miners, the vast majority of the Ethereum community and beyond see the end of mining as a good thinghelping both the planet and Ethereums reputation. The switch from proof of work to proof of stake [will] reduce overall energy consumption of Ethereum by 99.9% or more, Ethereum core developer Preston Van Loon told Fortune. Thats no joke.

Another important consequence of a successful merge will be a reduction in the issuance of new Ether. After the merge, Ether is likely to become the largest deflationary currency, according to Lucas Outumuro, head of research at blockchain intelligence firm IntoTheBlock.

In his latest newsletter, Outumuro predicts that because the cryptocurrency will no longer be awarded to miners, the amount of new Ether issued will drop by approximately 87%. ETHs net issuance is now projected to range between 1.5% to 0.5% based on the last three months of data, compared to 4.5% to 0.5% using Q1 to Q2 numbers, he wrote on Aug. 19.

This decline in issuance, in turn, means Ethereum could eclipse Bitcoin in market cap over the next 12 months, according to an Aug. 12 report by research firm FSInsight.

Finally, the merge is viewed as a critical step for Ethereums overall development. According to Ethereum creator Vitalik Buterin, the network is now about 40% complete, and after the merge, Ethereum can go up to being 55% complete, he said.

Also on Ethereums road map are four other phases happening in parallel that developers are calling the surge, verge, purge, and splurgeall of which aim to make Ethereum much faster, safer, and more decentralized. At the end of this road map, Ethereum will be a much more scalable systemBy the end, Ethereum will be able to process 100,000 transactions per second, Buterin said.

While most of the Ethereum community strongly supports the merge, a vocal minority is denouncing it as a colossal mistake. While some of this criticism is rooted in self-interestnamely, miners concerned about lost incomethere are also ideological concerns.

Namely, critics say proof of stake will make Ethereum more centralized and less secure, and point to the dominance of a few entities holding staked Ether (Ether deposited on the Beacon Chain).As data firm Messari has pointed out, Lido Finance controls a whopping 31.2% of all staked Ether on the Beacon Chain, while Coinbase controls 14.7% and Kraken 8.5%.

The large positions of Lido and others reflect the fact they are custodians for thousands of smaller Ether holdersand dont actually own most of what they holdbut the centralization fears persist nonetheless.

These concerns include fear that law enforcement may treat validators as a target for censorship or surveillance. Buterin himself addressed this on Twitter. He signaled his support in burning the stake of any validators that censor the Ethereum protocol if asked by U.S. regulators.

I believe the Ethereum community is strong enough to fight off base-layer censorship, EthHub cofounder Anthony Sassano tweeted on Aug. 16. Bitcoin is prone to the same censorship risks as Ethereum isit doesnt matter if its PoS or PoW.

Even Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong suggested on Aug. 17 hed rather stop the cryptocurrency exchanges staking business than comply with any potential censorship sanctions.

Another concern surrounds MEVMaximal Extractable Value (formerly Miner Extractable Value)and potential MEV-Boost issues post-merge.

MEV is the profit a miner or validator can make by picking, excluding, or reordering transactions within blocks. MEV-Boost is an optional software built for proof-of-stake Ethereum. It allows validators to sell blockspace to so-called block builders and outsource block production to maximize their rewardeffectively subcontracting some of their validating duties.

Though there are upsides to MEV and MEV-Boost, both can also be used by bad actors in a malicious way. Specifically, some within the Ethereum community are worried about censorship of MEV-Boost relay operators, or entities that connect validators to block builders, among other things.

Questions surrounding MEV and MEV-Boost post-merge have increasingly consumed the attention of countless users on crypto Twitter, to the point where it was even addressed during the most recent Ethereum Core Developers meeting. Though developers understand the concern, theyre hopeful that MEV-related issues, especially involving censorship, will not be prevalent threats, and remain focused on building Ethereum as a censorship-free protocol.

Finally, there are other fears over proof of stake, notably the risk of a 51% attackwhere bad actors conspire to take over more than half the computing power of the network, and tamper with the blockchain record to steal tokens. But with proof of stake, an attacker would need majority ownership of staked Ether to pull this offand that would be incredibly expensive to obtain.

Buterin himself doesnt see a 51% attack as fatal, and the Ethereum community has likewise downplayed the concern, reminding others of the ability to slash a validators stake, among other things.

No.

Gas fees refer to the cost of carrying out a transaction on the Ethereum blockchain. Gas fees are paid in Ether (denominated in the smallest unit of Ether called gwei), and have frequently spiked during busy periods because of higher demand for transactions to be processed.

Gas fees are considered a big pain point for Ethereum users. This is unsurprising since, during the busiest periods on Ethereum, gas fees can reach hundreds of dollars, making the network unviable for many.

The merge will shift Ethereum to proof of stake, but it will not expand network capacity. Therefore, it will not impact the price of gas fees.

Buterin predicts gas fees will drop in the future, though. He estimates that in time, after the merge, gas fees could be as low as $0.002 to $0.05 owing to roll-upsa so-called Layer 2 technology that rolls-up a multitude of transactions off-chain, processes it, and then records a compressed version on the main Ethereum blockchain. And as the Ethereum Foundation says, The transition to proof of stake is a critical precursor to realizing this.

Yes, there are many.

For one, the merge wont speed up the time it takes for Ethereum to process transactions. Though timing for new block creation and settlement (or finality) will change slightly post-merge, it wont be substantial enough for Ethereum users to notice, the Ethereum Foundation says.

Another misunderstanding about the merge involves the time frame during which investors can cash out their staked Ether after the upgrade.

Investors wont be able to withdraw their staked Ether immediately after the merge occurs, and will have to wait until the Shanghai upgrade, which is the next major upgrade following the merge, the Ethereum Foundation says. This means that newly issued ETH, though accumulating on the Beacon Chain, will remain locked and illiquid for at least six to 12 months following the merge.

To Ethereum core developer Tim Beiko, the biggest misconception about the merge is that you need 32 Ether to run a node, he told Fortune. You dont. Running a node is free, he said. Thirty-two Ether is only needed to run a validator, as mentioned earlier.

Validators also cant change protocol rules, Beiko said. All the nodes validate protocol rules, hence validators cant single-handedly change them.

A lot.

To prepare for the mergeand any other Ethereum upgrade for that matterdevelopers rely on Ethereum test networks (testnets) to practice running code before they deploy it on a mainnet. Testnets are similar enough to the Ethereum mainnet that developers can run tests and check for bugs or security holes to prevent such shortcomings from impacting the main blockchain.

Prior to the upcoming merge, testnets Kiln, Ropsten, Sepolia, and, most recently, Goerli all underwent the transition to proof of stake as dress rehearsals for the real event.

Additionally, Ethereum developers introduced a handful of changes to the blockchain known as hard forks to pave the way for the merge, including the so-called London hard fork in 2021. London had a few purposes: It aimed to stabilize transaction fees by permanently destroying (burning) a portion of such fees, removing that Ether from circulation. The London hard fork also delayed the so-called difficulty bomb, a mechanism intended to incentivize the network to move away from proof of work by exponentially increasing the difficulty level of puzzles required for miningmaking continued mining unviable.

Following London, other forks like Arrow Glacier and Gray Glacier pushed the difficulty bomb off further and changed its parameters. There was also Altair, which upgraded the Beacon Chain.

Developers have conducted as well 10 mainnet shadow forks where they ran through the merge using a small number of nodes. This proved helpful since the shadow fork process is minimal enough to not disrupt the mainnet, but useful enough to assess any potential issues prior to the big mainnet merge. As developers continue to prepare for the merge, theyre planning still more shadow forks.

The process of the mainnet merge activation itself is intricate and involves three big steps, as Christine Kim, research associate at Galaxy Digital, explains.

To start it all, an upgrade called Bellatrixnamed after a star and not the villain from Harry Potterwill happen first and set things into motion. It will prepare the Beacon Chain for the merge. Next, the network will need to reach a final Terminal Total Difficulty (TTD) value, which represents the potential difficulty level for mining, once the Bellatrix upgrade is complete. Nodes will watch for it, and once reached, it will prompt the final step, called the Paris upgrade. Paris will remove dependence on proof of work mining and mining difficulty, among other things, readying the network for the Beacon Chain and proof of stake.

Given the complexity of all this, the process will definitely not happen overnight. Ethereum developers predict that there will be a 14-day period between Bellatrix and the mainnet merge.

Many things can go wrong, and its difficult to predictdespite years of tests and preparation.

Ultimately, the merge is far from a slam dunk, and various issues may ariselike hiccups with clients or software verifying transactions, and application breakdown, among othersthat are so complex they can be difficult to plan for. Bad actors might also try to sabotage the process as well.

But Ethereum developers and engineers are working to be ready for any potential problems, and contend that theyre prepared.

No. Be very wary of anyone telling you otherwise.

As the Ethereum Foundation says:

As a user or holder of ETH or any other digital asset on Ethereum, as well as nonnode-operating stakers, you do not need to do anything with your funds or wallet before the merge.

Any funds held in your wallet before the merge will still be accessible after the merge. No action is required to upgrade on your part.

As we approach the merge of Ethereum mainnet, you should be on high alert for scams trying to take advantage of users during this transition.

Some people unhappy with the merge may try to branch off and create their own projects and variations of Ethereumbut anything of the sort will never be Ethereum.

For example, a cohort of miners are planning an Ethereum hard fork post-merge to create what they call ETHPoW, in an attempt to continue a proof-of-work chain and retain their income. But even though this project sounds like ETH, and somewhat includes Ethereum in its name, it is not correlated with Ethereum, and will have its own token and applications if it succeeds.

Ethereum developers are targeting the week of Sept. 15 for the merge, with TTD set to 58750000000000000000000.

Nonetheless, many factors may change that time frame. The Ethereum developers made clear that the timing is an estimate and nothing is finalized yet.

But, its safe to say that Ethereum is closer than ever before to proof of stake. As artist Jonathan Mann sings after every successful merge test on each developer call, Ethereum wont be resisting the urge, the urge to merge.

Originally posted here:

Ethereum merge will change crypto forever: Everything you need to know - Fortune

Live A Lives English localization has come under fire, as yet another Square Enix title is being accused of censorship and poor translation.

Source: Live A Live (2022), Nintendo

RELATED: Eidos Montral Founder Describes Management Of Square Enixs Western Studios As A Train Wreck In Slow Motion

Originally released in 1994, the SNES JRPG takes place across multiple eras, each with their own twists on gameplay. From the ancient past to the far-flung future, from feudal Japan to the wild west, a mysterious threat seems to transcend time and space. The game didnt have an official western launch until its 2022 remake, with English gameplay of the SNES original coming from fan-translated emulators.

Twitter profile@iuntue, an account dedicated to cataloging inaccurate translations and censorship in localization of Japanese games, shared their thoughts on Live A Live Remake. As with several prior Square Enix titles, liberties appear to have been taken, typically avoiding content that could be deemed sexist or offensive. This is despite a study this year proving sexualized content doesnt cause misogyny or body image issues.

It should be noted that while Square Enix both develops and publishes Live A Live in Japan, the games worldwide release was published by Nintendo. Even so, thanks to Square Enix own ethics department and aforementioned recent history, one must wonder which of the pair dictated these changes.

Source: Live A Live (2022), Nintendo

Starting with the Imperial China chapter, Earthen Heart Shifu (Xin Shan Quan Master in fan translations) playfully teases bandit Lei Kugo over her temper. It could be argued he is either evoking the trope of a much older man either making flirtatious comments or testing her resolve to keep her temper; a flaw Lei eventually overcomes in the story as she becomes Shifus student.

In the English version however, Shifu doesnt outright tell her to keep her calm. Instead he reassures her that he wont forget her name, praises it, and cautions her to avoid the arrogance that led to him so easily halting her attempted mugging.

Japanese

Earthen Heart Shifu: All right, all right, no need to get so angry. Youre letting your pretty face go to waste.

English

Earthen Heart Shifu: You may rest assured that I will not [forget your name]. It is a good, strong name, worthy of pride. But pride will lead you astray if you let it. As it did not so long ago.

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

Moving to the Wild West, the Mariachi band appears to have lost their Mexican accents at first. @iuntue highlights how one band member greets you with A-amigo! in Japanese, but G-greetings, my friend! in English.

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

However, the English version does feature the band members speaking and singing in Mexican, with their words translated into English in brackets. They also use Spanish words when addressing the player in English, such as vaquero and pistolero, and dubbed lines spoken with a Mexican accent.

One also inquires, Tequila! Yes, tequila! Thats what you need, yes? which could be assumed to be a stereotypical Mexican drink. As such, if there was an attempt to downplay Mexican stereotypes, the only change made would be ditching the Spanish/Mexican word for friend.

Source: Live A Live (2022), Nintendo

A later scene also sees an outlaw harassing Sundown for sitting in his spot, has his advances rejected by Annie, and then hurls a child into Sundown who remained still up until that point. Pretending to make amends, the outlaw mockingly offers to buy Sundown a glass of milk, alluding to his perceived delicate nature.

As Sundown rejects the milk, the outlaw mocks Sundown in the same manner in English and Japanese. Sundown can then either remain silent or respond. In Japanese his response is curt, arguably fitting someone slow to anger, or wanting to avoid trouble and about to be pushed too far. In English its more of a quip, and almost looking for trouble.

Japanese

Outlaw: Or do you like it when the milk doesnt come from mamas titty? (Machine Translation: DeepL)

Sundown: Get lost.

English

Outlaw: Lemme guess: its not that you hate milk, but that you cant stomach it less its fresh from your mothers tits!

Sundown: Your mothers, maybe.

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

Players also have the option to swipe clothes from Annies wardrobe. In the original 1994 version at least, based on the English fan translation players can find Annies Nighty. In the 2022 English version, this is Annies Diary.

She still acts with disgust over the player obtaining it, and showing it to her has Annie responding Hey! This aint no library! Youre on thin ice, you two! However, as it was a nighty, players are able to equip the diary to the torso armor slot.

It could be argued that the censored version still works, as tucking a book under your shirt or jacket so its just in front of your heart is a trope that would fit in the wild west setting. Even so, it cant hide the fact it offers very little defense, much like a sheer nightgown. This is also not the only time a piece of inappropriate gear was renamed.

Source: Live A Live (2022), Nintendo

RELATED: Square Enix Heavily Censors Sexualized Artwork From Various Series For English Release Of Manga UP! App

In the original 1994 release, during the Near Future chapter, Watanabe can help the player obtain Taekos Panties, but not before several failed attempts including his own boxers. In the localized version of the 2022 remake his initial offer is Watanabes pocket lint (originally Watanabes Boxers). In other instances outside the home, Watanabes Boxers is changed to Watanabes Badge.

The reason for this change is because Akira is attempting to steal Taekos pocket money. Players are given Taekos Pouch (Taekos Jeans), Taekos Picture (Takekos Stockings), Taekos furious fist (Taekos Punch, with a notably softer sounding tap when Akira uses it on Watanabe), and finally Taekos Secret Stash (Taekos Panties).

@Iuntuenotes that this change is also reflected in the Japanese version, at least with the underwear being changed to money; specifically, Taekos Secret Savings via machine translation on DeepL. Again, these items may be equipped to certain armor slots despite their new titles.

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

Another point of contention among fans was the fact that, as detailed by Twitter user @KingOfPrinnies, this change makes the scene slightly out of character for Akira.

Now that Ive hit the Near Future chapter in Live A Live, I think Ive found my 2nd issue with the official translation, the userbegan (his first issue mentioned later in this article). The original lets Akira have Watanabe try to steal Taekos underwear, but thats been changed to have him steal money. Which, morally somehow seems worse.

Source: @KingofPrinnies, Twitter

Like, stealing the underwear of the woman who raised you since you became an orphan has some implications if you think about it, but like, now youre stealing the money shes been saving up. Like, dude, maybe that money was for THE ORPHANAGE YOU LIVE IN, @KingofPrinnies reasons. Dk move.

Source: @KingofPrinnies, Twitter

NPC Kazu also states Yukis so mean! She keeps calling me Sir Farts-a-Lot! But it wasnt me! In the original Japanese, Kazu states Yuki called me a pervert!

One more scene in the near future has Lawless, a cool and collected biker who Akira looks up to, offering slightly different dialogue. As he pilots a mecha with his dying breath, he reveals the truth about his past, and how he was responsible for something terrible in Akiras life.

His girlfriend Taeko interrupts, saying hes in no condition to keep piloting the mecha and needs to rest @iuntue shows how in both languages Lawless answers about doing the right thing to make amends, but in Japanese was censored, likely to prevent accusations of misogyny.

Source: Live A Live (2022), Nintendo

Japanese:

Lawless: Its not a womans place to but in When a man is setting things Straight

English:

Lawless: Sometimes youve gotta own up to your mistakes Consequences be damned. Am I Am I right?

@iuntue also notes that even the fan-translation wasnt accurate, as they went with Women always get in the way Right?

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

One final line comes from the Pre-History chapter, which is almost entirely devoid of text. While its amusing to think English localizers may have bungled a chapter with only one word of dialogue, there are menus, equipment, and skills found in this chapter.

At the end of Prehistory, @GeneKanichen explains, Pogo fks the girl and creates spoken language by saying LOOOOOOOVE!!! (Ai in Japanese). The scene is fairly suggestive, as Pogo is seen walking into a cave with a girl, and despite being comic relief ties into Live A Lives themes of humanity, love, hatred, and keeping hope for better things. The new game leaves it as AIIIIIIIIEEEE.

@LunarArchivist shares the fan-translation and official 2022 English versions side by side, much to their disgust. Jesus Christ.

Source: @LunarArchivist Twitter, @GeneKaninchen Twitter

Note: Spoilers for Live A Live from here.

In the games final chapter, @iuntue justifies that The localization kinda explains Aieee! if you pick Pogo at the end. While Pogo screams Aieee! again, Oersted understands this as him attempting to say love in Japanese. In English, he merely takes the cave-mans wild caterwauling as being passionate, and reminding him of love.

Japanese:

Pogo: Ai~~~!

Oersted: A Aika (Love)

English:

Pogo: Aieee!

Oersted: Such passion. Nay. Tis love.

Source: @iuntue, Twitter

What do you think of Live A Lives localization? Let us know on social media and in the comments below.

NEXT: Interview: Fan And Professional Translators Speak Out On Western Localization Issues And The Current State Of The English Manga Industry

Visit link:

English Localization Of Square Enix's 'Live A Live' Found To Be Riddled With Poor Translation And Censorship - Bounding Into Comics