The flow of spice. Quick blog time.
Let's see if we can keep it short and sweet (Bad news, it didn't work), but here we go!
Special thanks to FloatOverblow for the sick shooping in the title!
About money.
None of anyone's business how this site makes money. But this year has been particularly good for us. Oh, and we're comment-locking this article as anytime you talk money it quickly devolves into a swarm of internet hobos on the information superslopway shaking their coin mugs. Armed with a bunch of unverifiable stories and even some of them aren't even human (not even the fun way). Just automated A.I. Grifters. Also, fuck your crypto as well.
The things we gave money to:
There were a few Mastodon instances we donated to. Some people we helped. Not going to go through those as we feel those are a little on a personal side of things. Deep down, we wish we could do more. We wish we were smart enough to figure out the problems of unemployment, or just putting enough money for food and a roof over my friends. We know a lot of people are suffering. This just isn't a place to list those things. So a lot of what you'll see is products or services that need Kickstarter money for various reasons.
Onwards to the product/business investments.
(Dot)Furry Top Level Domain services.
For those who have no clue what these guys are going for. A Top Level Domain on the clearnet is the prefix that comes at the end of a website. For us, as an example, we have a (dot)COM or commercial at the end. To which at the start of the internet, there were only a handful of publicly available top-level domains. The big three were ".COM", ".NET", and ".ORG". There were, of course, closed-off TLDs like ".EDU" reserved for colleges and schools that would need to prove to the government they are an accredited institution. ".MIL" and ".GOV" obviously were locked only to military and government institutions. During the infamous "Dot COM Boom" of Y2K, where people a few people quickly turned into thousands, and started to squat domains for cash. ICANN was also mitigating this issue by offering country prefix codes like ".US" for the USA, and ".CA" for Canada, just to give two examples.
ICANN also realized that the business owners who wanted to buy the entire Webster's dictionary of TLDs were basically two giants, Google and Amazon. This is one reason why the cost of starting a TLD is blindingly high. (Usually around $250,000 USD for starters) as an attempt to slow these assholes down. ICANN has the monopoly on how prices work within their system, and there's fuck all you can do about it (one of the many reasons why people have invested in alt-nets like Tor and I2P and sadly Web3.0's attempt at cryptoDNS)
When you own a TLD, you can state the Terms of Service (ToS) as to how your TLD is run. For example, you can't just buy a ".XXX" or porno domain, as when you try to send payment, the registrar requires proof of business. The people behind ".XXX" want to make SURE you're selling porn, and if you're not GTFO! Their TLD, their rules.
ICANN recently dropped the prices for smaller businesses that are still serious. But want to run a TLD. And a group of furries really want this. We're surprised it hasn't happened sooner, as it is one of the fandoms that was born on the internet. There was a point where the majority of the fandom was practically running the backbone of the internet.
The TLD Registrar business is a full-time career that would certainly keep them busy for a long assed time! With how shit-tastic the information technology job market has become (fuck you, A.I. startup bros), their requirement for help is valid. They have been up front with the dangers, such as ICANN might tell them to fuck off. Also, even if they luck out and come online in 2030, like they're saying. We're not expecting Registrar fees for their site to be as cheap as our current one.
We threw money at them because it's a legitimate career for a group of furries who seem to really .... really... REALLY.. Like to run registrations for conventions and want to take it to the next level. This is a kink-shame-free and sex-positive blog, boys and girls. Thus, enjoy $69 of my dollars furries. Even though I'm good on the TLD front. If we do get a .furry domain. We'll probably still keep the ".COM" for our blog, but use the other one for other projects.
Things we will NOT throw money at:
The Commodore "Callback 8020" flipphone.
Like every bad tech startup, they have to present you with a problem. In which the problem is:
"big-bad cell phone companies that track your every movement and how your smartphone makes you stupid!"
But if a paraphrase here. But you get the drift. based on a few handpicked research papers. Commodore's conclusion of fixing the problem of smartphones is offering you a product that restricts you from using social networks. Or at least the ones that Commodore can DNS block on their phone OS. We have no clue how they're going to block Mastodon instances.
Once again, a tech company is thinking that a hardware/programmatic solution will magically take care of a societal problem.
Look, for any of my longtime readers. You guys know that sometimes our investments are crazy. We backed the Ouya for fucks sake. Despite how much of a beautiful disaster the Ouya became after it was funded. We enjoyed the product. So much that we think we got our $100 worth out of that console.
This thing STARTS at $400... Holy shit.
We don't see this in the Commodore callback. At all.
For starters. This is not even a new idea. 
The Jitterbug: Original Commercial on YouTube here.
For those outside of the US. There was a phone marketed for elderly people and small children called "Jitterbug" by a phone company called Lively. They're still around to this day! But instead of rocking what appears to be a Samsung SPH-A620 with a modified Java OS to make everything bigger. They've now graduated to Razer-like flip-phones, which allow medical apps to be added to them.
Now, I get it, Commodore. We're up there in age. But you don't have to be insulting about it! Saying you're distraction-free, then putting a rainbow of LEDs on the front case. Well, that isn't very convincing either.
Now, if this is a phone that offers a Niche product for the Commodore cultists, er, enthusiasts, where the phone came with suction cups that you can put on the microphone and receiver, and an interface to hook to your gold-plated Commodore 64, allowing you to "dial-up" to BBS's at a blazing 300baud. I guess that would be something! Taking away the touch screen doesn't help because there are a lot of basic Android apps that rely on a touch screen. So the commodore phone isolates itself even more than the Ouya, as the Ouya at least gave you a touchpad on your joystick(It was terrible, but they tried).
Just as Commodore barely gets on its feet by having its engineers and fans buy back the rights of the company that was handed from company to company for years. Finally, obtain those rights and release an 'official' Commodore 64 after all these years because retro-computing and the pains of nostalgia are a very hip and trendy thing. This feels like the same move Radio Shack did that destroyed them. Jump into the cell phone market that they have no control over or clue about.
So, to answer the song's question:
Don't you want to go back? - lyrics in the video of the new callback 8020 flipphone.
No, we don't. - S
Flip-phones were restrictive tech where the ones buying stuff like this are Scientologists, so they can continue to happily live in some weird state of deillusion.
Sorry. It's a no-go.
Unicomp Keyboards.
Happy 30th annivers--- OH WHAT IN THE SWEET JIMMINY CHRISTMAS FUCK WHAT DID YOU DO?!? - S
*Checks Calendar* Nope, not April Fools' Day.
Man, this hurts us. On a personal level. Not only is Unicomp an American company that is still making the same product after all of this time. But also, we own a 2011 Unicomp keyboard. Heavily modded, of course. But let us explain my personal history with Unicomp.
There was a time in offices where secretaries wouldn't type on a keyboard that didn't have the same haptic feedback as a typewriter. IBM engineered a solution for businesses to make a mechanical keyboard that accommodated such a request. Giving you sounds and the haptics of a typewriter. But for your business computers. With enough of these keyboards in an office, you could hear everyone working, clicking away. The sound of productivity almost turns into a perpetual hum of clicking.
This was also back in the day when offices had high cubicles, heavy carpets, and asbestos flooring/ceilings. In the day and age of open office glass fortresses where everyone can see everyone else in the era of mid-2020's level post-COVID Musk level micro-management, in a slow decline of employees being treated more like machines instead of humans. Even having a Cherry Brown keyboard will probably get you called into the manager's office, asking why you are making so much noise.
Bring a Unicomp into the building and watch people have a fucking meltdown!
The Unicomp keyboard (and IBM Model M, predating Unicomp) was the keyboard we learned (painfully)to type on in high school. So it brings us fond memories to plug this bad boy in and type a blog or two with it. Even though my motherboard has no PS/2 Port, it's okay, that's what PICOs are for. Yeah, we guess this is our knife of nostalgia kicking in.
This keyboard in 2026 is not cheap. In which the great irony is that those who worked in IT long enough during the late 90's, you couldn't give these things away, as everyone wanted a membrane keyboard with no sound. But now, pulling in at $190USD new. But the engineering behind it hardly has changed. With plenty of restoration videos, Unicomp allows enthusiasts of this keyboard to breathe new life into their 30-40-year-old product. But their anniversary version. Coming in at $220USD is a hot mess!
- Distracting letters in the function keys.
- Colorations that IBM figured out years ago are getting scrambled for "Anniversary"?
- Offering an anniversary "partial" keycap set, but not offering a "Restore some sanity" set to undo everything your designers have done.
- Did you guys even fix the sticker at the bottom of your keyboards so it doesn't rub off with simple cleaners? Because THAT'S where you're supposed to put the anniversary celebrations. Just resin-emboss your stickers as car manufacturers do.
Perhaps Unicomp is talking to a particular customer base. The kind of customer who spends an easy $5,000 a week in tech gadgets just to impress on Instagram or something. I have no clue.
But this will be a hard "no" that we'll be buying this particular keyboard. Don't care if this keyboard somehow turns into some weird Xbox collectable that costs thousands in the future. We didn't mind Unicomp making 80/90 percent versions of the Model M because everyone's footprint/needs are different. We even welcomed them making a MAC version because fuck Microslop we would rather have an 'Option' key than a Windows logo (Or an OS/2 logo if you want to feel spicy and get back to your roots, Unicomp!). But this anniversary edition feels like slop an A.I. would put out. Fire your A.I. Prompter.
Final thoughts.
Article made in June, so there are more opportunities. To those who have read all of this. Thank you. We hope that in these turbulent times, you somehow find some financial fortune or at least stability. Yes, even to Unicomp. We're tough because we love what your product stands for.
That's what server said.
+++END OF LINE.