Daily Archives: May 6, 2020

HEGINS, SCHUYLKILL COUNTY (WBRE/WYOU) A local farmer has created a Facebook page connecting local food producers with consumers across the commonwealth.

Heidi Flory, a contract grower for commercial broilers and owner of a small calf operation on her farm in Hegins turned to social media to help create a community bond. The Facebook page, PA Farm to Family Table +, has already grown to nearly 3400 members in just a few weeks.

I started the Facebook page kind of when the pandemic started, Flory told Eyewitness News. I was noticing the disconnect between consumers and their food. I always knew there was one, but it came very apparent.

With the coronavirus pandemic making it difficult to find certain products at the store, Flory wanted to make a non-political page to explain why this may be the case and to show where your food comes from, along with how to get it.

My primary goals were to educate people on what actually goes through to get to the grocery store and then also connect local farmers with consumers directly, so when they cant find things in the store, they know they can get it locally, theres not a shortage. Flory said.

Meats and dairy arent the only things found on to the groups page. Members can advertise or find products such as soaps, nursery plants, produce and even information on local events. It also reaches far outside of Schuylkill County.

Its mostly within Pennsylvania, a lot of it at this point is central and northeast. We are starting to get people in from some of the further counties are sharing the group and getting connected that way. Flory said.

Flory says the group started with nearly seventy producers on the list. Now, they are continuing to make the page easy to connect with producers within specific counties.

We are working on a list by county now of producers that hopefully will be able to post and everybody can just go in and find the county they are looking for and then find the products that they want. Flory said.

A poll with the producers on the Facebook page revealed that a majority of the members saw an increase in business traffic since joining. While it started in part because of the pandemic, Flory told Eyewitness News she intends to keep the group going after the coronavirus.

Flory says shes using her platform as Dauphin County Elite Miss United Atates Agriculture to continue her facebook group and promote food for thought.

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Local farmer creates Facebook page connecting the public to food producers - PAHomePage.com

Facebook is rolling out a new tool today allowing users in the US and Canada to transfer their photos and videos to Google Photos.

The tool can be accessed by heading to your Facebook settings, then heading to the tab that reads Your Facebook Information. There youll find the option to transfer your photos and videos. Youll need to connect your Google account before you can transfer your files.

The photo transfer tool initially launched in early December last year as part of the Data Transfer Project, with Facebook vowing to expand the tool to more countries in early 2020. As of March, the tool started becoming available around the globe, including countries in Africa, Asia Pacific, and Latin America. Facebook said that in the next couple of months remaining countries will have access to this tool. Once the tool rolls out globally later this year, Facebook told The Verge that people will also be able to transfer photos to other companies that join the Data Transfer Program.

The Data Transfer Project is a data-sharing initiative that launched in 2018 to help people easily move their data between various online services. The project includes several companies collaborating to shape the future of portability, including tech giants Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Twitter. The initiative is still in its early stages, with most of the progress focusing on the back end, though last June, Google teased user-facing projects could roll out soon.

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Facebooks new tool makes it easy to transfer photos and videos to Google Photos - The Verge

Facebook Messenger Rooms is set to compete with Zoom and other group video chat apps.

Facebook's new group video chat featureMessenger Roomsis getting ready to compete with services likeZoom, SkypeandMicrosoft Teams, as more people turn to video chat amid coronaviruslockdowns and quarantines.

Facebook users will soon be able to create a video chat room via Facebook or the Messenger app and invite up to 50 people to join a video call -- even if they don't have a Facebook account. There will be no time limits on calls.

Now playing: Watch this: Facebook unveils Messenger Rooms

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Messenger Rooms arrives as some people are looking for an alternative to Zoom, which has faced a number of security and privacy issues in the past two months. (If you are still using Zoom, you can take steps to lock down your meetings and prevent Zoombombing, and learn other hidden tips and tricks).

Facebook Messenger Rooms will be rolling out in certain countries this week before expanding globally, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a livestream on Friday. Keep reading for Facebook Messenger Rooms' stance on privacy, and how to get started using the new video chat platform.

Read more: 10 free Zoom alternative apps for video chats

While Facebook has also grappled with many security and privacy problems, Zuckerberg said in the livestream that the company has been "very careful" and tried to "learn the lessons" from issues with other video conference tools in recent months.

More than 700 million accounts participate in voice and video calls every day on Facebook Messenger and the Facebook-owned WhatsApp, and the number of calls has more than doubled in many areas since the coronavirus outbreak began, the company said in a press release.

Messenger Rooms privacy protections include the ability to control who sees your room, and can lock or unlock it. If it's unlocked, anyone with the link can join and share the room with others. But the room creator has to be present to start the call. They can control who can join, and can remove participants at any time, too. People can report a room for violating Facebook rules -- though those reports will not include any video or audio from the call. Facebook doesn't listen to your calls at all, the company said.

Once it's available in your area, here's how to create a Room from your phone:

1. Open the Messenger app.

2. Tap the People tab at the bottom right of the screen.

3. Tap Create a Room, and select the people who you want to join.

4. To share a room with people who don't have a Facebook account, you can share the link with them. You can also share the room in your News Feed, Groups and Events.

You can join a room from your phone or computer -- no need to download anything, according to Facebook.

Facebook plans to add ways to create Rooms from Instagram Direct, WhatsApp and Portal as well. Features will include 14 camera filters and changeable backgrounds.

For more, check out 11 video chat app tricks for Zoom, Skype and FaceTimeand how to stay healthy and entertained at home during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Discover the latest apps: Be the first to know about the hottest new apps with the CNET Apps Today newsletter.

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Facebook's Messenger Rooms video chat app: How to use this Zoom alternative - CNET

But Facebook and its fellow internet titans have a huge advantage over most other companies: piles of cash.

Googles parent Alphabet had $117 billion on hand at the end of March, while Facebook had more than $60 billion greater than the gross domestic products of Lebanon, Slovenia or Tanzania. Amazon reported $24.3 billion in free cash flow. That money will help the companies to stave off the layoffs and closures that have sent unemployment soaring to Great Depression levels.

Google and Facebook could have revenue decline 20 or 25 percent year-over-year, and not have to worry about going out of business, said Mark Mahaney, managing director at RBC Capital Markets. More than any other ad-driven business model, Google and Facebook can afford whatever comes out of Covid.

Yelp a longtime critic of Google with antitrust regulators laid off one-third of its workforce and furloughed another 1,100 employees this month as its revenue from small-business ads shriveled. TripAdvisor, another Google detractor, said it will lay off 900 employees and furlough many of its remaining U.S. workers. Uber, which competes with Google sibling Waymo in developing self-driving cars, is also considering steep layoffs, The Information reported this week.

The plight is even worse for media companies whose ad dollars were already dwindling amid competition from Google and Facebook. Some estimates place the number of U.S. journalists laid off because of the pandemic at more than 33,000. News Corp. one of the most vocal anti-Google publishers suspended print editions of 60 of its newspapers in Australia, though U.S. operations and the flagship Wall Street Journal have yet to see cuts.

Startups are also aching, with roughly 30,000 of their workers laid off across the country since the beginning of March. In a note Monday, the National Venture Capital Association said investments in fledgling companies is likely to drop significantly, adding that companies will shut down at a higher rate than what is inherent to this risky industry.

And Amazon is poised to have many fewer competitors when the outbreak ends: As many as 100,000 retail outlets are likely to close in the next five years, UBS research analysts suggested in a note last week, as the coast-to-coast shutdowns hasten the trend of shoppers moving online. Some long-established retail names may never recover from the pandemic: The Gap, the San Francisco clothing chain that owns Old Navy and Banana Republic, said last week that it expects to shutter some locations permanently, while J.C. Penney skipped paying interest on bonds this month the first step toward a bankruptcy filing.

Even when the economy recovers, the big guys will be the first to reap the benefits.

Facebook and Google are poised to bounce back faster than other ad-supported businesses, said Jasmine Enberg, senior analyst at eMarketer. Their platforms allow marketers to essentially flip a switch on online ads, so as easily as they could halt them, they can get them running again. The two companies already control 60 percent of the online advertising market, eMarketer estimates.

Whenever there's economic uncertainty, advertisers tend to turn to these tried-and-true platforms and they're less likely to be experimental, she said. Facebook and Google, at this point, are considered to be essential platforms for advertisers.

Amid the last recession, tech companies used their reserves to buy up businesses at a higher clip than normal, with Google scooping up a record 36 companies, according to an analysis by CIO Dive.

Now, the big tech companies will once again have a chance to go bargain hunting scarfing up talent, intellectual property and rival businesses at much reduced prices. Both Zuckerberg and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said during an earnings calls this week that they would look to invest throughout the downturn, even while slowing hiring in areas other than engineering and product management.

One of the harder issues for antitrust will be how to manage mergers and acquisitions coming out of this crisis, said Gene Kimmelman, a senior adviser for the advocacy group Public Knowledge. Certainly, the big tech firms are sitting on boatloads of cash and they could buy if they thought it made sense. There may be a lot of floundering smaller players.

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How the virus could boomerang on Facebook, Google and Amazon - POLITICO

Blenders ability comes from the immense scale of its training data. It was first trained on 1.5 billion publicly available Reddit conversations, to give it a foundation for generating responses in a dialogue. It was then fine-tuned with additional data sets for each of three skills: conversations that contained some kind of emotion, to teach it empathy (if a user says I got a promotion, for example, it can say, Congratulations!); information-dense conversations with an expert, to teach it knowledge; and conversations between people with distinct personas, to teach it personality. The resultant model is 3.6 times larger than Googles chatbot Meena, which was announced in Januaryso big that it cant fit on a single device and must run across two computing chips instead.

FACEBOOK

At the time, Google proclaimed that Meena was the best chatbot in the world. In Facebooks own tests, however, 75% of human evaluators found Blender more engaging than Meena, and 67% found it to sound more like a human. The chatbot also fooled human evaluators 49% of the time into thinking that its conversation logs were more human than the conversation logs between real peoplemeaning there wasnt much of a qualitative difference between the two. Google hadnt responded to a request for comment by the time this story was due to be published.

Despite these impressive results, however, Blenders skills are still nowhere near those of a human. Thus far, the team has evaluated the chatbot only on short conversations with 14 turns. If it kept chatting longer, the researchers suspect, it would soon stop making sense. These models arent able to go super in-depth, says Emily Dinan, the other project leader. Theyre not able to remember conversational history beyond a few turns.

Blender also has a tendency to hallucinate knowledge, or make up factsa direct limitation of the deep-learning techniques used to build it. Its ultimately generating its sentences from statistical correlations rather than a database of knowledge. As a result, it can string together a detailed and coherent description of a famous celebrity, for example, but with completely false information. The team plans to experiment with integrating a knowledge database into the chatbots response generation.

FACEBOOK

Another major challenge with any open-ended chatbot system is to prevent it from saying toxic or biased things. Because such systems are ultimately trained on social media, they can end up regurgitating the vitriol of the internet. (This infamously happened to Microsofts chatbot Tay in 2016.) The team tried to address this issue by asking crowdworkers to filter out harmful language from the three data sets that it used for fine-tuning, but it did not do the same for the Reddit data set because of its size. (Anyone who has spent much time on Reddit will know why that could be problematic.)

The team hopes to experiment with better safety mechanisms, including a toxic-language classifier that could double-check the chatbots response. The researchers admit, however, that this approach wont be comprehensive. Sometimes a sentence like Yes, thats great can seem fine, but within a sensitive context, such as in response to a racist comment, it can take on harmful meanings.

In the long term the Facebook AI team is also interested in developing more sophisticated conversational agents that can respond to visual cues as well as just words. One project is developing a system called Image Chat, for example, that can converse sensibly and with personality about the photos a user might send.

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Facebook claims its new chatbot beats Googles as the best in the world - MIT Technology Review

They will not get to share in the memories synonymous with college graduation the collective tossing of caps, the hugs from friends and the walk across the stage to get their diplomas.

They will get Oprah Winfrey, who Facebook said this week will address graduates in a virtual commencement ceremony on May 15.

This is a bittersweet time for the Class of 2020, Marne Levine, a Facebook vice president, wrote on the social media platform on Tuesday. They are commencing at a time of great uncertainty. But graduating is a tremendous achievement, and worth pausing to celebrate even in these circumstances.

Graduates will also get LeBron James, whose foundation is organizing a prime-time special that will feature musicians, cultural icons, and athletes including Megan Rapinoe, Pharrell Williams, Malala Yousafzai, the Jonas Brothers and Bad Bunny.

This will be a moment to come together as one nation to applaud this rite of passage, the organizers of Graduate Together: America Honors the Class of 2020, said in a statement. The organizers also include Entertainment Industry Foundation and the XQ Institute.

In a statement, Mr. James said he wanted to help create a show that would help ease the pain the coronavirus has had on the more than 3 million seniors who will be missing out on a traditional graduation ceremony and their families.

These students have worked incredibly hard for this and theres no way we can let that go unrecognized, he said. While this wont be the graduation experience they were supposed to get, we hope we can still give them something special because they deserve it.

The special will air on May 16 on ABC, CBS, FOX and NBC and on social media.

Ms. Winfreys commencement speech will be broadcast at 2 p.m. Eastern time, or 11 a.m. Pacific time, a day earlier on Facebook and Instagram, which are part of the same social media company.

Oprah will also be joining hundreds of other celebrities starting Friday evening including Julia Roberts, Quincy Jones, Yo-Yo Ma, Naomi Campbell, Alanis Morissette and former President George W. Bush who will gather online for The Call to Unite, a 24-hour charity event to raise money for Covid-19 relief.

Ms. Winfrey is not the only celebrity who has been enlisted to give students a proper send-off.

Simone Biles, the reigning Olympic gold medalist in the all-around gymnastics competition, will also take part in the Facebook virtual graduation, as will the actresses Awkwafina and Jennifer Garner and the musicians Lil Nas X and Miley Cyrus.

The radio giant iHeartMedia is also choreographing a series of star-studded graduation speech podcasts that will feature Hillary Clinton, Jimmy Fallon, Chelsea Handler and others.

Even the Anheuser-Busch-owned beer brand Natural Light is getting involved in the virtual festivities. The brand announced that it would hold a virtual commencement ceremony on May 14, headlined by the billionaire Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, the actress Jane Lynch and the sports commentator Stephen A. Smith.

Oprah is not the only Chicagoan who has been highly sought as a graduation speaker. So has former President Barack Obama, whom one graduating senior, in a widely shared tweet, tried to recruit to give a national commencement address.

It drew nearly 50,000 retweets, but no public response from the former president.

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Oprah Winfrey to Give Commencement Address on Facebook - The New York Times

(Bloomberg) -- Facebook Inc. reported an 18% increase in first-quarter revenue, showing advertising demand was strong before the Covid-19 pandemic hit marketing budgets. The company also said business was steady in the first few weeks of April, sparking a surge in its shares.

The social-networking company said sales came in at $17.7 billion in the first quarter, ahead of Wall Street estimates of $17.3 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The results include just a few weeks in March when coronavirus lockdowns began to hammer the economy.

On March 24, Facebook warned that its advertising business was weakening. The company does not issue revenue guidance, but said on Wednesday that revenue in the first three weeks of April was roughly in line with the same period a year earlier.

After the initial steep decrease in advertising revenue in March, we have seen signs of stability, the company said in a statement.

Facebook shares jumped more than 10% in extended trading. They closed at $194.19 in New York earlier.

The companys services are being used a lot more as millions of people shelter in place and look for entertainment and ways to keep in touch online. Daily users of all Facebooks apps, including Instagram and WhatsApp, averaged 2.36 billion in March, up from 2.26 billion in December, the company said. Facebooks core social network now has 1.73 billion daily users, compared with 1.66 billion during the final month of 2019.

That spike will likely have less impact on Facebooks business than in prior quarters. Many of the companys most popular features during the pandemic including voice calling and direct messaging are not areas where the company makes significant revenue. Facebook also gets more than half of its sales from small businesses that are suffering from the Covid-19 lockdown and recession.

Some are optimistic, however, that the proliferation of the companys messaging products will pay off in the near future, offering an alternative business to complement advertising. Facebook invested $5.7 billion in Indian telecom giant Jio Platforms earlier this month. The deal, which includes a strategic partnership, could bring WhatsApp business services and payments products to millions of Indian retailers.

There is a silver lining for Facebooks ad woes: a potential to diversify into payments and e-commerce sooner, leveraging engagement and new habits, said Bloomberg Intelligence senior analyst Jitendra Waral.

Facebook forecast total expenses to be between $52 billion and $56 billion for the year, down from a previous range of $54 billion to $59 billion. The company said expenses will still grow in the face of expected revenue weakness, which will cut into operating profit margins in 2020.

Shelter-in-place orders are delaying construction projects, including data centers, temporarily lowering Facebooks capital expenditure. Given the strong engagement growth and related demands on our infrastructure, this years capex reduction should be viewed as a deferral into 2021 rather than savings, Facebook added.

(Updates with capex comments in final paragraph.)

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Facebook Surges After Revenue Holds Up in Midst of Pandemic - Yahoo Finance

In 2011 Pytellek was arrested when he refused to respond to his name being called as a defendant, claiming that he was in fact the administrator of the estate of Mark Pytellek.

Solutions Empowerment also has links to recent anti-lockdown efforts by an Australian mixed martial arts studio that led to a confrontation with police.

At the conclusion of the May 2 video, Anthony Golle thanked Solutions Empowerment and other anti-vaccine and sovereign citizen groups and campaigners for their help in the first stage of a three-stage campaign to roll back vaccination rules.

"We're not all siloed doing separate things, we're trying to create a life where we don't have these overbearing rules in places, so that we can make free choices and live the lives that we want to," he said.

Its not known how many people have used the document creator, nor how much money it has raised. The Golles, Pytellek and Armstrong did not respond to questions from BuzzFeed News about how many people have used the service.

A video posted on Solutions Empowerment's Vimeo account showing people how to complete and send the forms has been viewed more than 1,200 times.

If the comments section is anything to go by, people are contributing. Dozens of comments thank the Golles and say theyve used the document creator and donated.

"Must do this tomorrow," one Facebook user wrote, "will be $5 well spent.

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A Big Anti-Vaxxer Facebook Group Is Urging Members To Donate To A "Sovereign Citizen" Workshop Business - BuzzFeed

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Danny is online weekly to chat live with readers. Heres an edited transcript of this weeks chat.

Q. Nudes and prudes:While locked down, my husband and I have begun to seriously explore our interest in sex with others. Since no one can meet in person, its a great time to meet online, Zoom chat, and get to know people pretty well, something that gives me great comfort as we move forward with new adventures. Weve been chatting with lots of interesting folks and look forward to maybe meeting up in person whenever that is deemed safe. Weve met one couple whom we like a lot and who are huge fans of and advocates for a vacation resort in Jamaica that caters to people in the lifestyle, as they call it. The husband made a really intriguing and compelling case for giving it a try, emphasizing the complete safety and freedom to do or not do anything we would like. The resort itself is even divided between a prude side and a nude side to allow everyone to adjust to their level of comfort. Hes urging us to join them in October if its deemed safe.

Honestly we have always been rather repulsed by the idea of a place like this and thought wed never be interested, but after his cheerleading, we took a look at the resorts website and were considering ituntil I got to the part about the theme nights where people dress in costume and act according to the theme. One theme night in particular: Jamaican night. I can only imagine lots of drunk white people with fake dreadlocks speaking in a Jamaican accent. The cultural tone-deafness and nakedliterally in some casesexploitation of people of color appalled me.

Our new friends explanation seemed the height of white privilege. He claimed the staff, all of whom are people of color, really enjoy the night too! My husband agrees with me that the themed evening is in exceptionally poor taste but does not think its a deal-breaker. I really dont think I could stomach it, and I see it as a reason not to go. My husbands position is that we should go and skip that night. Am I being too sensitive and overreacting?

A: It is of course entirely reasonable to decide against going to this resort based on what you have learned about this theme night,especially given that this isnt the sort of hotel you ever wanted to visit in the first place. If your question is whether it would be an overreaction to decide against pursuing any kind of relationship with this couple, based on their enthusiastic defense of the resorts theme nightsno, I do not think you are being unreasonable.Its never an overreaction to say,Im no longer interested in having sex with someone because of the way theyre behaving. Thats just consent! Youre not saying these people should be fired from their jobs or that theyre eviljust that their attitudes are a turnoff for you. (And for what its worth, I think anyone who suggests a joint vacation as a first in-person date is sending out some very erratic signals! Theres a reason dates tend to start with relatively safe, low-level interactions like getting a drink together in public before proceeding to sex.)

There are many,manycouples in the world who like to have sex with other couples; you are not going to be starved for company when you emerge from isolation. Any kind of group sex needs to come with the important caveat that anyone can, for any reason, no matter how small or whimsical, decide to opt out without guilt, pressure, or recrimination. If its a deal-breaker for you, its a deal-breaker. (Also, for whatever its worth, they sound boorish, insensitive, and prone to employing pressure tactics. I wouldnt want to sleep with them either, in your position.)

Send questions for publication to prudence@slate.com. (Questions may be edited.)

Join the live chat Mondays at noon. Submit your questions and comments here before or during the discussion.

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Q. Co-worker crush:Im sure you get letters like this constantly, but here goes. Im in love with a co-worker. Hes single. Im unhappily married. We also happen to be very good friends. In many ways, I feel like hes my soulmate. There are several obvious problems with this, but two rise to the top: 1) While I know he values our friendship, there has been no clear indication that he has other feelings for me. (There have been deep, meaningful conversations, time spent together, and several things that could be subtle hints, but nothing definitive that I havent just chalked up to me reading too far into things.) 2) Did I mention Im unhappily married? Ive been trying to push these feelings away for a couple of years and it has not worked. Its not just a crush because, in my experience, those go away. I see him as a complete person and am aware that hes not perfect. I need to know how to stop fantasizing about being with him. I need to know how to stop setting myself up for constant heartbreak. Thus far, I havent opted to cut contact with him because I value his friendship tremendously. At this point, I suspect Ill choose to endlessly suffer than lose his friendship entirely.

A: You are of course free to endlessly suffer, if thats really what you want. But I hope you choose to do something else! For example, you might choose to leave your unhappy marriage. Even if your co-worker doesnt return your romantic feelings, it might feel a lot more pleasant and a lot less miserable to have a crush on a friend if you werent also in a loveless relationship. The setting [your]self up for constant heartbreak doesnt come from the fact that youre mooning over a guy you work withit comes from the constant heartbreak of being in a joyless marriage. I wont pretend that leaving such a marriage is as easy as snapping your fingers, but it can be done; people leave loveless marriages every day. Make today the day you do it.

Q. Furious at parents real estate agent:My parents are in their mid-70s and have been trying to sell their home for several months. They initially planned for an open house in mid-March, but thankfully that didnt happen. However, up until that point, their agent insisted it still take place until they canceled (a day before the open house was to take place). Now their agent is telling them to try again in May. I am furious that their agent is potentially putting my elderly parents (and potential buyers) at risk. My parents next move is to a retirement facility right by our house. Naturally I am paranoid about these events because of the pandemic and because living with other senior citizens with common spaces sounds frightening. Under normal circumstances, Id be very supportive. Right now, I am having a hard time not picking up the phone, calling this agents business, and insisting that this be put on hold for the unforeseeable future for the safety of all people. My husband says its better to call the agent and not get her office involved, but she sounds as though she wont listen to actual CDC recommendations. How do I handle this? Or should I accept that my parents will make the decision and not us?

A: Assuming your parents are not movinginto a retirement facility because of increasing memory problems or difficulty making decisions (I think you would have mentioned those things if they were the case), I think you can accept that this is your parents call to make and its up to them if they want to speak to their real estate agent about their concerns. You can absolutely share with them that youre angry at the risks she was willing to expose them to and encourage them to escalate the issue with the agency if necessary, but as much as I understand your indignation on your parents behalf, I dont think its time for you to fight this battle for them.

Now, if your parents feel anxious at the prospect of seeming difficult toward their agent and you wanted to offer to speak to her on their behalf, I dont think its an unreasonable prospect as long as youre able to plan out what you want to say beforehand and dont go into the conversation already maxed out: Listen up, you would-be murderer, etc. But I think the best course of action is to encourage them to speak to her themselves, and the next best bet is to offer to speak to her or the agency on their behalf with permission.

Q.Is my ex well-meaning?Im a woman in my early 30s. A few months ago, my ex Heinrich dumped me after a more-than-four-year relationship. We hadnt been communicating well, but he hadnt expressed dissatisfaction to me before this. I had a megabreakdown. I ended up running outside our apartment, hyperventilating and nonverbal and bleeding from some accidental cuts on my leg, until a kind stranger called an ambulance. During that time my ex didnt so much as look out the window. Apparentlyand hes incapable of lying and also a putz, so I believe himhe simply panicked and somehow thought I had called someone to help me. This despite the fact that a) I have a mental illness that hes well aware of and b) I hadnt been wearing pants when I rushed outside.

About a month later, I had a road accident and called him to help me get to the hospital. (I probably should have called a ride-share, but I was really upset and didnt think of it.) We started talking again, and since then hes tried to be helpful. Hes planning to pay for my ambulance ride from after the breakup, and he brought me food when I was having trouble getting around. He clearly feels awful. We had a few decent text and phone conversations. I even told him Id like to be friends again.

But recently, I suddenly cant stand the thought of seeing him or even texting with him. Before all this happened I always thought of Heinrich as the kindest and most compassionate person I knew. Even post-breakup, the thought of becoming friends again someday really comforted me, despite the cowardly way he acted. I will eventually have to get my stuff from his apartment. The other factor is that I got used to seeing his wonderful family once a week (pre-pandemic, of course) and they would like to maintain a friendship with me. Nonetheless, I really want him to know how badly hes hurt and destabilized me. Breaking up without any prior conversation was his right, but he totally failed to help me when I desperately needed it. He acknowledges as much. And I hate the idea that hell get to move on from this while my equilibrium is shot to hell. Frankly, I want him to suffer, even if its just by stewing in guilt.

Am I being unfair or overly harsh? What do I tell him? Do I make sure he knows exactly what this has done to my brain? Do I attempt to recognize that hes trying to make it up to me and offer to be friends at some later date? Say I thought I could forgive him but cant, but by the way, I still would like him to pay for my ambulance ride? Communicate with him only via third party? I feel like I cant think rationally about this.

A: I think there are a few good signs in your letter: Youre aware that right now your primary desire is to punish Heinrich, that you dont actually want to be friends with him, and that youre not presently capable of treating him with respect or consideration. Youre also able to affirm that he had the right to end your relationship, which is true, and that he did not realize you were in need of an ambulance when you ran out of the house after your breakup. For now at least, I do not think you should communicate with Heinrich either yourself or through a third party. You two are broken up, and friendship is not currently possiblethe best thing you can give each other is space, distance, neutrality, and the absence of harm.

You say that he hadnt expressed dissatisfaction to you once in your four-year relationship but admit that you two werent communicating before your breakup; I think youre fixated on the belief that if Heinrich had expressed dissatisfaction in a way that you could have heard, you two would never have broken up, or your breakup would have come in some way you could have anticipated or understood as fair. The idea that he gets to move on while you have to suffer is, I think, a component of that belief. You of course cant know what his equilibrium is really like post-breakup. I imagine that learning your ex injured themselves and went to the hospital directly after your breakup would be fairly distressing, and the fact that Heinrich offered to pay for your medical costs suggests that he is not simply skipping away to his happy place. But more importantly, its part of the fundamental reality of a breakup that the people who break up do, in fact, get to move on afterward. You cannot say you recognize his right to break up with you while also demanding the right to punish him for moving on, since that is exactly what a breakup is.

Heinrich has not damaged your brain; he has ended your relationship, and you are sad, hurt, and angry. Youre entitled to those feelings, but they do not entitle you to seek to make him suffer, nor do they mean hes single-handedly responsible for either your happiness or unhappiness. Please speak to a therapist, if youre not already seeing one, with the express goal of making sure you do not contact your ex and finding ways to take responsibility for your own healing and well-being. I wish you all the best in that project and urge you to leave your ex-boyfriend alone.

Q. Quarantine partiers:My boyfriend has a large group of friends in their 30s who still like to party. Despite our states shelter-in-place order, they are getting together on a regular basis to hang out, drink, and do drugs. It makes me so angry. I see posts by essential workers putting their lives at risk while begging people to stay home. I have high-risk family members who are terrified.

My boyfriend agrees they are being stupid but also sometimes seems tempted to joinif it werent for me, I think hed be out with them. He also makes excuses for why he cant attend each invitation instead of standing up and telling them he wont be socializing because he thinks its irresponsible. I know we cant control everyones actions, but am I overreacting by being upset that he isnt taking this more seriously? When things eventually calm down, do I need to just let it go and keep my mouth shut? I see this as abusing their privilege in a way that would be important to call out in similar but more familiar circumstances.

A: Its rarely my advice that someone shouldlet it go and keep [their] mouth shut when it comes to talking to a partner about serious disagreements regarding matters of public health, safety, and shared values. That doesnt mean I think your only options are to either convince your boyfriend to agree with you on every point or break up with him! But given that you two are, at least at present, in agreement about what you ought to do (not go to parties), I think theres room to discuss honestly and nonjudgmentally his desire to be around other people, and the ways in which it can sometimes feel daunting to contemplate disagreeing with ones friends. That doesnt mean you have to plan on individually yelling at all of your boyfriends friends after shelter-in-place orders have been lifted, but you can certainly talk to him now about your concerns and frustrations and be honest about how you think he should consider telling themwhyhes not coming to parties instead of making up in-the-moment excuses.

Q. Live-in love:I am a dedicated mom to my two kids and a hard-working professional with a wonderful family and great friends. I have been dating a lovely man for three years. I took things very slowly with him but now he is an integral part of my life and my kids adore him. Hes a great guyhe is upbeat and active, he cooks and cleans, and he is fun and loving with my kids. He has wanted to move in with us for a long time. The thing is, I do not want him to move in. Part of it is that we have different financial philosophies (he spends every dollar he has and I budget for the rainy days). Part of it is I sometimes feel like my kids and I fill the role of family for him, but really he could have latched onto anyone. But mostly, I just love the autonomy of being the king of my own castle and having my own space. After a bad marriage and awful divorce, I feel like living alone (with my kids!) is an opportunity. I dont want all of his stuff here. Alone time feels more like a need than a want at this time in my life.

We have broken up over this issue in the past but reconciled because we missed each other. We agreed that he would stay with us during the pandemic, and, although he has not done anything wrong, I find myself irritated by his constant presence, and my interest in sex and affection has diminished. He has made it clear that he wants a live-in relationship. I do not want him to move in, but I also dont want to lose him. We are at an impasse. Do I suck it up and have him move in to spare my kids and me the heartbreak of losing him? Am I a terrible mother for letting my kids love this good man only to break up with him because I dont want to live together? How would I explain that to them? Its been three years and if I still dont want him to live here, I dont see myself changing my mind anytime soon.

A: At the risk of sounding flippant, you kind ofdidchange your mind: Your boyfriend currently lives with you. I dont mean to dismiss the extreme circumstances that led to him doing so; I understand that, if your options were to either shelter in place together or apart, you didnt want to commit to a situation where you might not be able to see each other up close and in person for weeks or months or longer. But if you really dont want to live with him, and hes currently living with you, then its incumbent upon you to figure out how much longer youre willing to live together out of expedience and be very clear about a move-out date. Youll also then have to be prepared for his reaction and for the possibility that you two may someday break up over this issue again, because its a pretty serious matter of compatibility.

This feels harsher than I intended when I began writing this out! I really understand why you value your space, and I can hear the ways in which you feel terrible guilt for wanting privacy and space in a way that you fear conflicts with your childrens well-being. But hes only been staying with you for a few weeks, and I dont think your children are going to fall apart if he doesnt move in forever. More importantly, I dont think it will be good for your children or for you if you keep on as you are out of a misplaced sense of guilt, since you already feel stifled, crowded, itchy toward affection, and sex-averse living with this man. The best thing you can do is be clear with him about how this is not going to work for you long-term and that you need a very clear exit date for this living arrangement, and then let him have his say too. Maybe hell be able to swallow his disappointment; maybe you two will break up. Both of those alternatives are better than slowly being driven to distraction because you two live together.

Q. Reaching out to estranged family:Growing up, my aunt Suzanne and I were pretty close. She was the younger, cooler, single sister living in the big city, while my parent and all our family lived in the conservative suburbs. But over the years, the relationship between my parent and my aunt soured, to the point where they havent talked in years. We managed to stay close and in contact from the time I was 10 up through my post-college years. But we ended up losing contact and I didnt invite her to my wedding, at my parents request, despite my misgivings and desire to have my aunt there. We havent talked in nearly six years.

Suzanne is a nurse living in one the cities hit hardest by the coronavirus, and shes been on my mind lately. I want to make sure shes all right and staying as safe as possible while being on the front lines against this pandemic. I really do miss her. Is this a good idea? Do you think I should just not add this pressure to her given her current focus on saving lives? If I do reach out, is a text the best wayis it too hard to ignore if she doesnt want to respond? Or should I snail mail her? What do I say to her? I think me not inviting her to my wedding was seen as me sending her a sign, so our distance is clearly my fault. But honestly, I was just so tired from being in the middle of the debate between her and my parent. I have no ill will toward her and would love to have my aunt back in my life again if possible.

A: I think its possible! Youre aware of the various possible reasons Suzanne might decline to reconnect, but as long as youre prepared to shoulder the disappointment of an angry or a nonresponse with good grace, I think you can try to get in touch with her. You can keep the initial message relatively brief: Just let her know that youre thinking of her, that you miss her, are sorry for having let the relationship lapse (save any explanations about your difficult relationship with your parents for a later conversation, if and only if Suzanne seems interested in having one), and that you understand if she doesnt want to respond.

For what its worth, while I dont want you to be too hard on yourself, I think you not inviting your aunt to your wedding was very much sending her a sign. Thats not a strange or unique spin she might have put on the situation, but kind of the only way she could have read it. The fact that you were so tired from your parents haranguing that you excluded her from your wedding is useful contextual information (I hope its clear I dont think youre a monster for having done so), but it doesnt really change anything. You chose to prioritize your parents wishes in that case and lost that relationship as a natural result of that choice. That doesnt mean you have to spend the rest of your life begging forgiveness for having excluded her from your wedding, but there were only so many ways shecouldhave read such a rejection. I think any possible reconciliation would only be stymied if you attempted to relitigate that choice, so its better not to try to justify or downplay it. The point here is that you miss her and are sorry that you didnt prioritize your relationship with her, not to get her to agree that you made the right choice about your guest list for your wedding years ago.

Q. Follow-upre: Furious at parents real estate agent:Hi Prudie, thanks for taking my question. One of my parents reasons to move is because of my fathers increasing memory loss. The facility has a memory care unit that my father needs, and my mother would need him to use that because its a lot for her to deal with on her own. I dont know whether this changes any of the scenario, though. And their state is one that has been very hard hit by COVID-19. But so is ours (and its where the retirement facility is).

A: Thats helpful backgroundthank you so much. In that case, I think you should speak with the agent yourself and try to (as best as you can, given your understandable anger) keep a civil tone and stick to discussing CDC guidelines and any local ordinances you think she needs to comply with, rather than speculate about her motivations or her character. If that goes well, you have gained your brother, as the expression goes. If not, and you want to go over her head to speak to the agency to make sure its ensuring that its agents comply with public health and safety regulations, I think thats the next best step. Im so sorry you have to deal with all of this right now, and I hope youre able to get your parents somewhere safe as soon as possible.

Q. Re: Furious at my parents real estate agent:You could buttress your argumentsand give your parents ammunitionby checking your local Realtors association guidelines and best practices. You can find your local association on the National Association of Realtors website. The associations administer the exams and give accreditation to Realtors. You could give them a buzz and see what they have to say.

A: Thats so helpful. Thank you! Anytime there are centralized guidelines that govern a particular situation, it can only help to familiarize yourself with them. Hopefully they have clear-cut recommendations for how their agents can safely do their work, and youll be able to convince the agency to comply.

Danny M. Lavery: Thanks so much for chatting today, everyone! Take care of yourselves as best as you can, and see you next week.

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Q.Does climate change mean I shouldnt have kids? Im terrified that Im going to have a kid in the next five or six years, and then things will start to get really bad when the kid is still young. This is obviously terrifying; no young kid could have the psychological or tangible skills to cope with that, and Im not sure I would either. Its all Ive been thinking about for weeks. Im sure you get emails like this all the time (though probably from actual parents), and I know theres no real answer, but how does one make this choice? Is it ever the right one? Read more and see what Carvell Wallace had to say.

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